Forever Until Tomorrow (War Eternal Book 5) (41 page)

"I can see. You'll have to tell me all about it."

"I will."

The ground shook slightly, a reminder of their need to move.

"Should we expect resistance getting out?" Mitchell asked.

"Unlikely," Kathy replied. "Whatever you did to Watson, it appears he's incredibly distracted."

"I didn't do anything but tell him the truth."

"The truth?"

"Before I left Origin, she told me she had one more plan to stop Watson."

"What was it?" Katherine asked.

He laughed. "I don't think it was anything."

"Stop an AI by giving it a problem it can't solve," she said. "I like it."

"We haven't stopped anything yet," Mitchell said.
 

"You have to win a battle before you can win a war."

"True enough."

"Mother. Father. Enough flirting. We have to go."

"We're right behind you," Mitchell said, looking at Katherine. She could tell by his expression that there was something there for him. A history, a chemistry that she could see he wanted her to share. A big part of her wished she felt the same, and that she could know him in the way he seemed to know her.
 

They had fought.

They had won.

It would have to be enough.

"There she goes," Captain Verma said, pointing to the ice below.
 

Mitchell glanced over at Katherine out of the corner of his eye before turning his attention to the scene below the VTOL. The ice around the Goliath was covered in large fissures as it slowly separated beneath the weight of the starship. The wreckage itself had finished its crumpling, the superstructure creating a gradual v-shape that would have left them trapped inside if they hadn't escaped when they did.

Katherine. He had waited so long to meet her. He had dreamed about her so many times. Pictured holding her, kissing her, telling her that he loved her.
 

She didn't know him. He could tell by the look in her eyes. The emotions he was feeling weren't emotions that she shared. He surprised himself with his ability to accept that truth. It didn't matter that she didn't love him back. It didn't really matter if she ever loved him.
 

He had found her.

He had saved her.

He had saved them both, and in doing so had kept the war from ending and prevented Watson from winning in this time, in this future.
 

It was a small victory, but for once it was a victory.
 

For once, the people he cared most for had survived.
 

"It's kind of sad," Michael said, leaning over his shoulder, positioning himself between Katherine and Mitchell.
 

"Losing the XENO-1?" Katherine asked.
 

Mitchell was grateful that nothing had happened to the stocky programmer. Katherine had been overjoyed to find her friend alive and safely in the company of Max, Lyle, and Damon, already aboard the VTOL and anxiously awaiting their return.
 

It would have been the perfect reunion if Cooper hadn't died during the middle of it.
 

He felt guilty for the loss, more so than he usually did. It was as if winning a battle had given him the strength to care about losing people again. He would mourn them later. He would honor them later, in the tradition that had been passed down to him by Millie and the Riggers. He realized at that moment how much he missed them, and at the same time, how hopeful he was that he would never see them again. He wanted to win this war before he ever needed to call on this recursion's version of the Riggers.
 

"All of it, when you think about it," Michael said. "Humankind's greatest leap forward turns out to be our downfall, and all because of something we created. Apparently based on a machine language I created if the data card you gave me is any indication."

"If it weren't your language, it would have been someone else's," Kathy said from behind them. "Humankind's creation of artificial intelligence is inevitable."

"Maybe. But isn't that sad? Why aren't we satisfied with thinking for ourselves? Doing for ourselves?"

"That's an interesting thing for you to say," Katherine said. "Considering your field."

"I know. Before all of this happened I never would have said it. Now I know we're heading in the wrong direction. AI is a crutch at best, a megalomaniacal need to play God at worst. We make things too easy on ourselves, and then what?"

"And then when the shit hits the thrusters, we get splattered in it," Max said.
 

"You sound like Li'un Tio," Kathy said to Michael.

"Who?"

"He was called The Knife. He was a very intelligent, very dangerous man. He believed that nothing good would ever come from artificial intelligence. That no matter our best intentions, no matter the safeguards we put in place, that intelligence would always do us harm, even if it believed it was protecting us."

"Watson isn't trying to protect us," Mitchell said. "He's trying to kill us. Every last one of us, for all of eternity. There's nothing benevolent about his goals. There's nothing motivating him but hate and anger and his own desire to play God." He raised his hand, pointing at each of the people assembled in the back of the VTOL. Trevor, Max, Lyle, Damon, Michael, Kathy, Katherine. "We're the only ones standing in his way. We're the only ones that can fight back."

Mitchell paused in his speech as a sharp crack echoed from the ground below, loud enough to be heard inside the craft. He turned his attention back to the small viewport, watching as the ice split apart and the Goliath began to sink in earnest. Ripples of water spread out around it as it displaced the water, in waves that were large enough to destroy the bases arranged around the wreckage. Verma had sent warning. He could only hope it had been heeded.

The VTOL hovered above the site in a silent vigil as the massive starship disappeared from view beneath the broken ice and water. It took nearly an hour for the sheared off head to reach the waterline, and another ten minutes for it to drown below it.
 

No one moved, no one spoke.

Finally, Mitchell looked away. His eyes passed over each of them, and they returned his gaze in turn. The secret to winning war eternal couldn't be found in numbers or logic. It couldn't be quantified or counted, plotted or preordained. It was hidden in the hearts and souls of the people who gave everything they had to make it happen no matter the cost. In each of the men and women standing in front of him, willing to follow, willing to die to save a future they would likely never see.

"I gave up twenty years to see tomorrow," he said. "This is our chance. Our time. Yesterday is over. The past is behind us. We won today, and we're going to win again. Tomorrow will come. I promise you that. Whatever it takes, tomorrow will come."

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Forward Into Tomorrow
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