Lone Ranger Legacy

By Sharon L Reddy

The fourteen worlds of the theocracy of The Way of Light church had forced the other nine in the sector to accept laws with which they did not agree. Then tragedy struck Sereband. Major Addison Addison was sent to get the army's share of the solution, two clones "that" would give them the healthy genetic material the laws wouldn't allow the world to import. One of the two said the disaster was too odd. It had been an attack and the result hadn't been what was intended. If Frabee's sweet blush was dangerous to Sereband, her culture had already been changed.

About books by Sharon L Reddy, reviewers said:

recluse:
"The author is a fine wordsmith who possesses a marvelous imagination."

Raven's Reviews:
"...unique, fast-paced style ...allows one to read almost as fast as one can think."
"...romantic brain-candy... If you like almost any kind of men at all, you'll like hers..."

Mistress of the Dark Path:
"...you will also notice your mind is stimulated."
"...designed for a more educated and worldly crowd."

R. Cagle:
"I got hooked immediately."

Marji Holt:
"The characters came out of the books and into my dreams."

Twenty-four titles. Start your collection today.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sharon L Reddy
• Release date: Jun 6, 2011
• ISBN: 9781583385630

Sharon L Reddy

I write science fiction romance, but it's the literary definition of romance. Swashbuckle, Baby, in "white tie and tails." High romantic fantasies, million word mysteries, family sagas, statesmen, gurus and wise immortals. Loving dads, sons and brothers, and of course, the women who understand and appreciate them. High fashion and landscape design. Materials and art, the books are built to be read very fast, specifically for the way women visualize. Research on the soap operas of the fifties, trends in international populist (fan) fiction, technological development, and above all, long-term entertainment value. It has to be good in reruns. The intent is create a body of work that's just fun to read, in spurts or bursts over decades. Ethics, responsibility, nobless oblige, the power of money, the use of prestige. I write good guys win. Period. They're fantasies for women. Men with lots of muscle say, "I love you," a lot.Most of what is currently published was written in the first decade, 1991-1999, before Mother Nature changed my personal definition of "mature audience." I hope you'll remain with me as I and my work mature and enjoy the second decade of my work now being published, as well.I've lived many places and visited far more. My current residence is on a high mesa in New Mexico, in the United States, where I am engaged in a habitat restoration project.Explanation of the Pilots Group:Some of these works have been sitting on my hard drive close to twenty years and they're no fun for anyone just sitting there. They're exactly what they've been titled, pilots, like for a TV series. It is my intent and hope that other writers will choose to continue the adventures of the characters. There are only three restrictions. Don't kill off my heroes, don't make good guys bad guys and give my story credit if you publish. Yes, you may publish and make money on your stories. I loved reading and writing fan fiction, but the limitations on it could be frustrating, so... Have fun with these works that specifically don't have them.

Book preview

Sharon L Reddy

Lone Ranger Legacy

©1995, 2011

Target Yonder

Millennium Works Collection

Smashwords Edition

ISBN 978-1-58338-563-0

Chapter One

The congress debated the issue five 'months,' then put it on the ballot as a referendum. It was the only solution they could see. The individual members of the congress couldn't agree with themselves on the issue. The decision would be made by those who could make a choice, yes or no. They had just enough time to get it on the ballot.

No advertising was done. No support groups sprang up. The people knew the need and the choice. They knew the options. The choice would be made by each one who decided to make the choice one way or the other. It was made by twelve percent of the population who voted. That wasn't unexpected. The turnout for the election was moderate. That hadn't been unexpected either. The count was done and checked and the people accepted the choice. There were twenty-three more votes to accept the offer of Kethis Laboratory. They would buy young men.

It wasn't an extremely populous planet. That was part of the problem. It was suddenly getting less populous fast. They needed healthy genetic material. The fourteen worlds The Way of Light Church dominated in the Sector League had made it illegal to do in-vitro fertilization eighty years before. They'd also made it illegal to import human gametes. Then the Chirardy sea mines had been opened and an algae had changed. It was eaten by the most common type of food fish. Fish was a major source of protein. By the time they'd identified it, they needed healthy genetic material. Kethis Laboratory had made an offer.

Major Addison took a deep breath instead of arguing. General Moshyan smiled ironically and she returned it. The reaction was why she was right for the job.

General, they're going to be pretty dependent.

I hope they are, Addy. By law, they're not people. They are defined as property. They're being 'built' for a purpose.

I feel odd doing business with Kethis Labs.

This is why they still exist. If there's a profit to be made in helping a world avert a disaster, they'll find a way.

Sometimes I want to just pick up Sereband and move it to another sector.

If you find a way, every person on the planet would cheer. Well, maybe not every person. Some might be unconscious. Meanwhile, we carefully keep the treaty that makes it a much less dangerous place to live.

Tell me what I'm actually going to have and help me figure out what I'm going to do.

I don't know. Male clones. All tissue donors deceased. All 'rated superior.' We know they were capsule-grown and link-educated. We know they're the equivalent of eighteen standard years, but not how old they are. That's part of the process and secret. We know there are one hundred ready and there will be one hundred more in a half-year. We know there will be one hundred every half-year for five years. You were chosen to get our two from the first hundred.

And take them from base to base to be milked.

Addy, there are nearly thirty thousand women in the military of prime childbearing age. We have the organization to make it simple for them, even if they don't want to be more than an occasional visitor in a child's life. Personally, I hope some of them decide they're going to get baby the old-fashioned way.

What?

Think about it.

Many of them have loves.

They will decide whether to try again and again with their loves, in hopes they get lucky and a healthy ova and sperm make a healthy child. Or if they'll go with those loves to a clinic to start with better odds. Those thirty thousand don't all have a high percentage of healthy ova either. The ones I'm talking about are the young women who do and know we need their children, but don't have a special someone. Think about it, Major.

Addison did think about it. She had a great deal of respect for the general, as general, psychiatrist and best friend. Verid Moshyan expected her to figure out how to do something. She was currently working on what that something was.

Suddenly she stopped walking. The truth was the idea of women actually having sex with the clones was unpleasant. She wanted them to be domestic animals to be milked. They had no rights and couldn't be freed because they weren't enslaved. One could only make slaves of people. They were things, and the attitude of the sector had begun to take root on her world.

She walked into the lovely park that fronted Army Headquarters in the capital and found a pleasant bench. The general had handed her more than an unpleasant assignment. She'd handed her a difficult and possibly dangerous one, if she did it right. They were young men, even if they were things. Somehow their people had to accept them as both, without damaging the society, and it started with her and the young men she was going to get.

Sereband's military was a compromise. They did need to be prepared, but the threat they were prepared to meet was actually unlikely to be an armed force, if they were careful in how they dealt with the fourteen worlds where The Way of Light was the universal religion. They served as space police and disaster assistance, but their function in the society was to provide training and education. A great many young people joined for three to four years because of the educational opportunity.

University level classes were taught on every base and every class hour counted as four duty hours. It was considered the appropriate way to get tech training, as well. She'd joined for that reason and gone from advanced tech training, to university classes, to officers' training. She had two doctorates. Most over the rank of captain did. Most first sergeants had at least masters degrees. It wasn't a requirement for any rank, but there was always something interesting being taught and degrees just accumulated once one had the basics. They were highly-educated, well-trained and under threat.

The threat wasn't the disaster which had struck. It was the situation it had put them in. In any other sector, they could have done in-vitro to assure healthy children, aborted damaged fetuses, or yelled for help and every planet in the sector would have sent healthy gametes.

They were one of nine actual democracies in the sector. The other worlds called themselves democracies, but they were functionally theocracies. If the church didn't like it, there would be a law passed against it. If you didn't agree to the law they wanted, you could find yourself fighting a holy war. And so, there was a sector league and every inhabited world sent representatives to 'rubber stamp' the laws they were forced to accept.

There was no abortion, no genetic engineering, no divorce. Human life was precious and perfect and marriage was holy. If you weren't sure you wanted to spend a hundred years or more with someone, you didn't do it. Couples didn't just separate either. Sex with someone besides the spouse was illegal too. It was a minimum two-year prison term if you were caught. Proven prostitution was a minimum ten-year sentence. The only law the church hadn't gotten passed, that she could think of, was the one making any sex outside marriage illegal. They'd tried that one when people had stopped getting married. They'd backed down when the nine planets had proposed a tax on them to help support a prison population of several billion.

On Sereband, almost no one got married. Those few couples who did, had usually spent fifteen or twenty years together already. It was the same on the other eight, who wished their worlds were in another sector.

The church itself puzzled her. The belief was simple and reasonable. Basically, it all works and there's some reason for it. The problem was the church hierarchy had determined exactly how humans were supposed to 'work,' and it was becoming less tolerant of people who didn't agree. And still growing, even on Sereband. No religious group could minister or hold services on military bases, but there was a The Way of Light church near every gate of every base.

She'd never been in one. She'd started to go 'just to see' when she'd been a private, but the hair on the back of her neck stood up when she put her foot across the threshold and she'd turned around. She hadn't thought about that in a long time. She suddenly shivered. She had the distinct feeling she'd barely escaped the 'jaws' of something.

Bennett Tulaga was thinking about the church of The Way of Light at that moment too. They'd moved fast enough the church hadn't had time to react. It had been very close on Sereband, but they had voted to accept the contract. He and a large number of others had worked very hard to make it unbreakable and seemingly reasonable. No one who actually knew how much each clone 'cost' would tell anyone otherwise. He smiled at the pang of guilt he felt for being 'pleased' Sereband had suffered a horrible disaster. The opportunity had been grasped with joy, but all of them at Kethis would have worked desperately to prevent it if they'd known...

The danger, of course, lay in the unpredictable reaction of the church. They'd done everything they could to prepare for it, but that was basically be wary and ready to move fast. They could suddenly be defending themselves against fleets of 'believers' who, of course, did not have church sanction, but showed the nobility of their spirits and the Light of Faith within them. They could be running for the other side of human space with the militaries of fourteen worlds chasing them too, but it was much less likely. He stopped enumerating the possibilities and took a deep breath.

He had faith too. He believed something helped when you were doing the best you could to help. He was smiling when Andris Kobe walked through the open door of his quarters. Hers were across the corridor on the huge Kethis Laboratory Station, in orbit around the gas giant they called 'Stripes.'

You're not as nervous as I am.

I'm not sending my children into the bear's den. Are they ready, Andris?

Yes. They understand they exist to save a world. All of them said they wanted to do it. I've talked with each individually and so have the others. They believed us when we said anyone who didn't think he could handle it should not go. I have one hundred sporting a lovely script C on their left cheeks. Frabee wants one.

He's not a clone, Andris.

Well, that's a matter of interpretation of the term. It's the reason he exists too, Bennett. He's the proof the technique worked.

He knows too much.

He knows the statistics of the disaster. He knows we were working desperately to find a way to help.

He knows we feel something is a danger to all of us and that's the real 'desperately.' He's caught the feeling?

Some of that and some is his situation here.

He's useful and we like him.

Running errands seems a bit mundane for a person 'built' to save a world, don't you think?

You want to let him do this. Why?

Actually who, Major Addison Addison.

Addison Addison?

Her parents had the same surname. It's common for unmarried couples to give the child the father's surname, or at least some form of it, as first name. Hers evidently just couldn't resist. She's in what they call the 'bio corps.' She's not medical personnel or a biologist. She's a very hot pilot with doctorates in trans-light physics and colonial history. I read her doctoral theses. I was impressed with the one for history. Brailer recognized the one for physics.

One hundred is one hundred, Andris. It makes an exception to the letter of the contract.

Frabee said there should be one who has watched what happens on Sereband to talk to the next group. He carefully explained why he wasn't the right one for the job. I think he's right, Bennett. Only one of them can tell them how it feels to bear that kind of... burden. I've also got a gut feeling keeping Frabee from doing what he thinks he should is a mistake.

Since your 'gut feeling' has led research on this station the right direction time after time, further argument would seem silly.

Frabee chose a partner. He surprised him into a sudden smile with a grin and wink and watched pleasure suffuse him. He remembered his first real smile very clearly. He decided to name him Terrance.

Hi. I'm Frabee. You're Terrance.

I'm what?

You don't get to pick a name. Somebody sticks you with one. In my case, it was stuck on before I was two cells. I was first of the batch. I've got six months of deciding who I am. I figured I'd give you a head start with a classy name. I remember my first smile. Oh, and my first real case of giggles. I was helpless. I laid on the floor and people just stepped over me. That did not lessen the giggles, and everyone who did was smiling. It won't be like that on Sereband, but the society is too healthy not to be worth it.

I understand within limitations of which you obviously are aware.

We're spermatozoa-producing biological machines. That is our legal status.

We have none. That's a definition.

Oh, I'm glad I chose you.

You're speaking of more than giving me a name?

Yes, I am. Communications. Message to Andris from Frabee. I picked my partner. He's a cute little thing. I named him Terrance.

I'm two meters three.

Yes, and almost as gorgeous as I am.

Since our appearance is not something we did, your seemingly smug attitude about it is confusing.

Remember, I've been keeping myself in this shape. I also chose my hair style and my clothes.

You're wearing the same thing I am.

Blue covalls make my eyes look greener. Watch.

What are you doing?

Individualizing.

Frabee rolled the sleeves, then pushed them above his elbows. He opened the top two fas strips, stood the narrow collar up in back and 'pressed' the open top into lapels with his fingers. Terrance was watching very closely. He was waiting for the slight look of confusion. He remembered that feeling too.

The desire to touch is healthy, Terrance. We don't have a morass of societal attitudes to slog through, but we also don't have the experience of adolescence and sexual awakening. I haven't had sex yet, but I've gotten and given hugs.

Uh...

A hug wasn't quite what you suddenly had in mind?

No, it wasn't.

Want to do something about it?

What?

As I said, I haven't yet. Of course, I wasn't in the same situation to start. Terrance, a pair of us are being sent to each of fifty organizations on Sereband. 'Places' doesn't really say it. The government bought medical aid and gave the responsibility to various groups to see to it the purchased vaccine is widely distributed.

Vaccine, it's how the people here see us, isn't it?

No, they see us as youths with all they can give us to prepare us for the task of saving a world.

Youths?

They don't see us as children, but the rest of you don't have enough actual life experience for the emotional tenor of the term 'young men.' Youths was a compromise. Listening to people talk is wonderful. The discourses chosen for the link were very carefully selected to give us an appreciation of it. We're stuffed with facts and figures and the way to manipulate them as well, but those were just listed, not debated point by point. We got history in as unbiased a form as ever existed. We got the words of the great speakers to explain how people on each side of every conflict felt about it, not just who fought who where and on what date, or who won what election campaigning on what issue. So, have you run into anything you have a real opinion about yet?

Yes. I like what you did with your covalls and I don't have any personal objections to having sex with a male.

Thanks, but I'll give you a bit of time to be sure of the second one.

Oh, I'm quite sure. I'm also quite sure I'm... scared.

So am I. Doing what you're sure needs to be done, even though it scares you, is the real meaning of courage. If there isn't fear to overcome, it can't be a courageous act. In my six months, I've learned the people here are courageous.

Here?

Yes. The hierarchy of the Church of The Way of Light didn't expect the people of Sereband to vote to accept the contract. You were readied because the people here hoped, not expected, they would. The church isn't popular on Sereband, but it's growing. It isn't popular on any of the nine democracies, but it's growing.

I now understand the meaning of 'ominous.'

You now understand profit is not the motive for the research done here. They won't tell any of us that. It's a feeling that has to be absorbed. That's why I'm going and one of you is staying here to talk to the next batch about what happens to us. Terrance, I do know the six-month interval was something they chose and not how long it requires.

How long?

I don't know. If I did, I probably wouldn't be going with you. I don't know if it's shorter, or much longer. They learned what had happened on Sereband eleven years ago. Artificial light was the stimulus for an algae to change, but it didn't do it by adapting to the light. It adapted to change. It produced a mutagenic agent. The algae in the oceans of Sereband is now slightly different in every habitat of the sea. It was always everywhere. They no longer eat fish for protein on Sereband, but the population is falling, so they aren't in danger of starving.

So many thousands of damaged children to care for, how can they give all of them the love... a child needs?

I've given a lot of thought to the understanding each of us has of love, Terrance. We're grown in a capsule, as it's called, and our life experience is computer instilled, but we know what love is. We recognize it instantly.

We also don't have the same initial personality. It's one of the first things we realized. I now have an opinion that they kept us together as a group, so we would learn we did not.

You're right and they're amazed at how distinct your personalities are. All of us got the same basics, but the educational focus changed a bit after them. This one got a bit more social science, that a bit more physical. This one got a bit more music and that a bit more visual art. This one a few more great novels and that a few more poems. They gave us all they could to assure we survived the experience. People are going to try to kill us, castrate us, damage us physically, and those are the simple threats to deal with. It's the reason behind those threats that's the most dangerous to us. We will be emotionally injured. They did everything they could to keep that injury from being crippling.

Frabee looked around at the rest of the group who had gathered to hear the conversation. He counted the number who met his eyes and nodded. He was pleased. One lifted his hand to catch his attention and spoke.

I shall wait for the next group. I understood all you told us, perhaps even that which you did not say. I understand it will be a great deal more difficult to go, when one has seen the injury done to you and experienced its echo in oneself. I will be able to do so. You have taught we need a leader and how he is to lead. I can do that as well. I know I am the right one to do it, because I don't like it.

Communications. Message to Andris. You can stop trying to figure out who not to send. The right one picked himself. I'm naming him George. He'll appreciate the humor of it about the third time someone sends him on an errand.

Andris burst into laughter. Let George do it, was an oft-heard phrase on the station. Giretta Padlum, a biochemistry lab aide, said it when she was busy with something and someone asked her to do something else. It had spread. It was the way they said, Find someone else if you can, but I'll get to it as soon as I'm done with this if you can't. Frabee had been the someone a great deal of the time. Bennett grinned at her.

He just told you it worked.

Yes. They're different individuals to start with. It's what Sereband and, more importantly, the church don't expect.

Terrance and George. I don't think he likes Frabee.

Well, he likes it because of how he got it. He understands it was a term of affection for the bit of life we pinned our hopes on.

I'm even more nervous about sending him now.

Hiding our hope from them would be a terrible thing to do to them, Bennett. They have to see it in us to know we don't see them as things. That's what he's making sure they recognized. It's a defense he's sure they need.

How are we doing on tissue collection?

Haskerty wants to collect from some still living.

What?

He has a mental list of very elderly who will probably be deceased within five years and have already designated their bodies for research.

There's something special about them.

They meet the criteria; brilliant, beautiful, long-lived and exceptionally healthy physically and emotionally the entire length of them.

Engineered?

Some of them may be. I don't ask. I once asked if we were getting a good range of skills and talents. He told me Askya had said, 'a butcher, a baker, a candlestick maker' and butcher had been the only difficult one to find, but he'd decided a farmer from a self-sustaining homestead qualified.

I trust his judgment.

We all do, or we'd be asking a great many more questions. Which, of course, is why the decision on who is his alone.

So is the way he gets tissue. Remind him of it.

Thank you. I think he needs the reassurance. If he didn't, he wouldn't have asked. He'd have just done it and given us the tissue after they were deceased. He's sturdy, but it's a hell of a responsibility.

Yes, and he ended up with it because he stated we wanted successful people, not successful professionals, while we were all naming off great successes in our own fields. I had several I was sure we should try for. So did everyone else. He told me opportunity and environment were the reason one with math talent became a physicist of great renown and another a meteorologist whose neighbors liked him.

He said about the same thing to me. That's when I pitched my mental list and Todra said, 'Thank you. You're drafted. I retire,' and we put her back to work here. He may have a personal criteria of men who became successful people against the odds of bad environments and lack of opportunity.

No more speculation. Every time I do it, I come back to the Ursan experiments in genetic engineering of two centuries ago. If I have to swear to tell the truth in a court of law, I don't want to have to admit I even suspect some tissue came from men who were the results of the experiments. Which is why it bothers me Frabee is going.

We just chose the healthiest sample each time. He's not engineered. He was selected, just not in quite the same fashion as the rest and he doesn't know it.

Are you sure?

Yes. No one told him and there aren't any records of it. I'm sure he's figured it out, but he doesn't know it. He's quite capable of making the distinction.

The unmentioned criteria for working here, being able to not help people you care about bear the heavy load you can see they're carrying.

Just tell them you're there if it becomes too much to carry and you trust them to know if it does. Haskerty knew when he needed help with his.

I've got mine settled in my backpack and my knees aren't buckling under it.

I'm right across the corridor if you get a chunk you can't get packed alone.

I love you too. Marry me.

One of these days, I'm going to shock you and say yes.

I expect it. I figure you'll stop getting a gleam in your eye, when you have off-station leave coming soon, when you hit about a hundred sixty.

Um, speaking of which, I'd like ten days.

Noggery?

There's a gorgeous new resort opening on Caliph Bay. They're making sure their new neighbors like them, with a huge festival that's filling all the hotels in the area. I already made a reservation and a couple costumes for the festival, moved money to my play-with account, lost two kilos so my skimpy black swimsuit looks good...

Yes. I'm sure you planned it for after this group has all been picked up.

Four days.

You're sure you'll need the distraction the first few days they're on Sereband.

It will help keep me from just going after them all and bringing them home where they're safe.

We gave them every defense we could, Andris, including physical skills.

Cadry chose sailing. She said she was telling everyone because it was rather innocuous and someone had to come up with an example. I don't know what anyone else chose to include, but I know there were several duplicates and several that were, more or less, variations of the same thing. Prinsky expected it. He handed me a selection program before the computer asked for one. He thinks we should tell the reps who come to get them, physical skills were computer selected and we won't know what they are until they're exhibited either. Except sailing, which was given as an example.

It's good. Selection criteria?

The best all-around physical benefit, then the most popularity to distinguish between variations. Prinsky said putting the physical first assured we didn't get catch instead of baseball.

I'll tell them that's the somewhat crude example the programmer gave.

I thought it was good too. I giggled the whole time I loaded the eighty-three gigs. Now, about Addison Addison.

I won't tell her anything, but I'll talk to her.

She'll hear what you don't say.

Chapter Two

Addison left the bridge. The two clones she'd picked up were waiting in the lounge. They weren't what she'd expected. She'd known it from the moment she saw them. The small fair one, with light golden-brown hair and green/blue eyes, had grinned and said his name was Frabee. The great big kid had smiled and said he'd named him Terrance and he wasn't sure being stuck with an acronym would have been worse. A sense of humor was very unexpected.

Terrance turned around when she walked in and she smiled. The general was going to get her wish. Women wouldn't notice the tattoo on his cheek until after they'd noticed gorgeous red-gold curls, wide shoulders, narrow hips, pale bronze skin, beautiful muscle, big blue eyes, long lashes, wide brow, strong jaw, a wonderful smile... After that, the first response by any healthy woman was Ooh, he's not companioned. She realized Frabee knew it when he winked.

You know you're not what I expected.

I do. He's realizing it. Major Addison, I was the first of the batch. I have more days of life experience to put knowledge in context than the others. No two of us are from the same donor and no two of us are identically educated. I hear music I want to play, but I learned playing an instrument was not a skill I have. Terrance won't know if he does until he tries to play several of the most common ones.

I was told the station personnel didn't know what physical skills you had, except sailing.

Sailing?

It's the one skill they're sure you have because it was the example given, Frabee.

Thank you. That explains why I looked out a viewport and wished the world I was seeing had seas.

How many is several days, Frabee?

Major, I will tell you the exact length of time if you truly wish to know it.

How long?

A half-year, of course. I also know that's not 'how long it takes.' It was long enough to observe the station personnel didn't ask each other for details and come to understand some of the reason why I wasn't told.

We know why we exist, Major. We were given the choice of whether or not to go to Sereband. We all chose to fulfill the reason for our existence. None of us was going to throw away that advantage.

Advantage?

History and literature are full of the struggle to find reason for individual existence. We are the first who didn't have to accept there was one on faith alone.

He makes me want to look at his educational program too, Major. I know of four people who avoided them because they didn't want the temptation.

You should know how people view Kethis Laboratory, Frabee.

Oh, I do. They work hard at maintaining the reputation of being strictly profit-motivated. One of the first opinions I formed was the only enjoyable part of it is spending lots of money on luxurious vacations.

Addison laughed. The pretty, beautiful, little fellow, a good five cens shorter than her average one seventy-four, was going to be an interesting companion. That thought worried her.

Frabee, I said I thought you'd be very dependent and the general said she hoped so. You're army property.

We are, Major. We can't keep ourselves alive and unmaimed.

Maimed?

What's the punishment for removing a part from a piece of army equipment? Is it greater if the removal makes the equipment useless? Killing us would be destruction of government property. Is it sabotage, or just defacement, if someone castrates us? Would there be any reason to work to keep us from bleeding to death if someone succeeded? We know the fact is there wouldn't be. I have faith someone will choose the truth of what I am over the fact of what I am if it happens to me. I was tempted to see if there was still a record of my educational program when I realized I did.

They don't keep records?

No, Terrance. The donors met the criteria of intelligence and health and educational parameters were given to the comp. I'm sure the major knows it.

I do. I also know I was told more than others.

You're a guardian of your society. You were told they did their best to limit the danger we are to it. I learned no records would be kept when a person complained he had the perfect opportunity to see exactly what part of personality was physically based. Another told him that would only have been possible if we all had the same education and our personalities were assessed before anyone spoke to us. He smiled widely and said he'd work on being grateful he'd been kept from making assumptions. Your army has a cavalry, doesn't it?

No, it has an equestrian team called First Cavalry. They have the only horses on Sereband and they were a gift from another world, so we'd have an equestrian team to compete with theirs. We never did.

That makes it even more suitable as an analogy. We're prize studs. We were purchased with the guarantee we come from superb bloodlines and have good general training. I'd prefer to say like pedigreed cats, but we can't be pets, even if I do want to curl up in your lap and purr.

I liked the horse analogy, Frabee. I wouldn't fit in her lap. I wish she'd decide to ride me.

See why I was sure I'd be tempted to look at his educational program, Major?

Yes, Frabee, I most definitely do. The general hopes a great many women decide to 'ride' you.

Uh... I thought I understood how dangerous this was going to be. I thought I understood the enormity of the job you'd been given. Protect us, Major. We can't say no to anyone, even if we're sure they mean us harm.

You will tell me if you feel that way, Frabee.

No, Major, we will not. We can't refuse even to that extent. All we can do is hope you see some sign of wariness in us and protect us. A good handler would see a stallion didn't want a specific person touching him, even though very well-trained to allow strangers to do so.

Major, I want to have sex with Frabee first.

What?!

I want him to have one experience of sharing and I'm the only one with whom he can. You attract me much more, but we can only be something you, and everyone else, use. It will aid you in your task, knowing we had that caring touch to strengthen us.

Frabee, it would only take about two days to slow down, compute a course and go back to the station.

I've been telling myself, 'The record of each section of his educational program was probably erased as soon as it was completed,' since forty seconds after he smiled and I decided to name him Terrance, Major.

Forty seconds sounds right. That's about how long it was before you told me you hadn't had sex yet, and asked if I wanted to do something about it.

That wasn't quite what I said.

Yes, it was, Frabee.

Yes, but it's out of context.

Are you going to stall every time I say yes? Last time I did, you said you'd give me a bit more time to be sure. I said I already was.

You changed the subject.

Of course. The conversation was for the benefit of us all and we all needed assurance being scared was healthy too. Major, he can warm a room rolling up his sleeves. I wondered if his physical skills list included striptease. I'm sure it included some type of dance. Nothing else would give him an ass like that.

Frabee's deep blush delighted her, until she saw it frightened him. Terrance suddenly pulled him into his arms and looked at her over his head. She nodded, said dinner was at twenty ship time in the galley and left the lounge.

Computer, suspend security recording in the lounge and cabins and erase from the point you confirmed we're on course. Authorization code; add it Addy blue blue maroon.

Personal and mission authorization code accepted. Security recording edited. Log open.

Record to log. Major Addison Addison reporting a command to edit security recording per regulations. I briefed them a bit, then left them to talk it over if they wished. Since part of the contract is no social studies be made of them, I ordered security log editing and no recording of their subsequent conversation. Personal observations in support of decision to edit. They're more individual than I expected. I was informed no two are identically educated after a certain point. I learned the personnel of Kethis Laboratory do not exclude themselves from the stricture against social studies. They don't keep records of the donors, education programs or anything else, as far as I could tell, and they stated that was the reason. I thought it very odd until I caught myself wanting to have a look at their education programs. I'm no sociologist, but I'd be grateful not to have the temptation. It's going to be a temptation to our people too. I recommend no security recording of any of the... purchased males' conversations when no others are present. I'm completely satisfied they don't know more, and perhaps less, about them than we do. If we do record them, some sociologist or psychologist won't be able to resist the temptation to study their adaptation to their odd situation. Close log. Personal addendum to General Moshyan. My reaction is tell people the First Cav doesn't keep records of what the stallions do in their stalls. These stallions have furniture in theirs, but it can't be seen as different. Send log and addendum.

Addison was moving dinner from the prep unit to the table when the answer to her report came back. She burst into laughter. It included the security program for the First Cav stud barn and a note from the commander, Colonel Hoskinary.

He said his programming chief had been rather confused by the request to remove the computer alert if the stallions got too restless. He noted he hadn't seemed less confused when he told him they didn't have to worry they'd bite or kick one another if there was a mare in season close by. However, his assistant had giggled the whole time she'd been writing the code. He was promoting her to Sergeant First since she refused to let him make her a lieutenant. There was a notation the program was one of fifty copies sent at the request of the president. She left the note on the screen when the boys walked in.

That came with the First Cav stud barn security program. The president ordered the program be sent. None of you will be recorded when you're alone in your quarters. You weren't for the last three hours.

Thank you. I needed to hear that badly.

The mental niche will help a lot of people too, Major.

I thought so, Terrance, and evidently the president agreed. She ordered fifty copies sent. I really didn't expect that. My personal experience with the government is frustration at how slow they move on something I'm sure should be done now, if not yesterday.

A bit of built in inefficiency gives people time to think things over before opinion becomes law.

I realize that, Frabee, and think about it right after I stomp through my quarters yelling. Sorry, I can't resist. How do you like the ride so far?

Damn!

Addison was upset too, but Terrance seemed to understand and she didn't. She decided she needed to and just plain asked.

Frabee, why does it frighten you when you blush?

Let me try to answer her, Frabee. Only a person can be embarrassed, Major. We want people to put us in a mental niche as property. One glimpse of a blush like that would move us out of that niche and into the center of their attention. It could make the job of protecting us a great deal more difficult.

And get me at least a hundred people helping me watch over you for every one that might consider making it more difficult, Terrance.

Major, it's because a hundred would help that each one of us chose to try to aid Sereband. We're sure your society is worth saving. A blush frightens me because it could damage it more than the seed of my body will aid it. I'd never done it before and have no control over it.

Frabee, you're adorable. Terrance is magnificent. Some people want to ride the most magnificent stallion, but some always choose the one that nuzzles in hopes of a treat. I was having a great deal of difficulty figuring out how to treat you as equipment until you reminded me the army did have other living equipment.

Does that mean you won't slap me if I nuzzle your pockets looking for a treat?

The major laughed and Frabee realized he was falling in love. It was the one pain he hadn't expected. He knew a great deal more about the situation on Sereband, and a great deal more about her, than anyone else realized.

He'd discovered he remembered everything he'd seen on a screen or a page of hard copy after all the tests had been done. He'd told no one he 'read the pictures' in his memory, and something in him yelled the algae had help changing, even if the undersea lights around the mines had been the agent.

Major, can you turn off the security monitor while we eat?

While we eat?

I don't know what it is and have one experience of spitting something out before I realized I was doing it.

Computer, monitor only. Note reason is given in previous ten seconds of security log.

Security monitoring in non-recording mode.

Will that do?

Yes. The change in the algae was too odd. I could probably build an algae that would produce a mutagenic agent when exposed to a certain band of light, but it would be damn difficult to do.

You think we were attacked.

Yes, I do. I also think it was a disaster for the attacker as well as Sereband. The mutagenic algae would be even more difficult to control than to build.

Makes sense to me, Major. A mutagen was introduced at the bottom of your food chain. By the time it reached the top, it didn't do what it was intended to do. Reducing the number of healthy children born would only make sense if someone planned to physically attack you about fifty years from now.

I think the plan was for some other kind of change. The lights of the sea mine were chosen as agent because you wouldn't suspect you'd been attacked. They probably knew something had gone wrong with the plan before you knew you were in trouble.

About fifteen years ago and they're trying something else.

What have you seen, Major?

A The Way of Light church built in every community of over ten thousand and one outside every gate of every military base, Frabee. I almost walked into one once. It was the first time the hair on the back of my neck stood up. I've learned that hair recognizes dangers my conscious mind doesn't since then, and get very wary when it does it. It was enough to stop me on the threshold then and this isn't the first time it's occurred to me that was the most dangerous situation it ever warned me about. Frabee, most people use one hand or the other to eat with.

Sorry. I use both hands for everything and forget there are times it's not appropriate.

You're ambidextrous?

Major, he's ambi-everything. Damn! I'm sorry, Frabee.

Frabee, if my society changes so much you have to fear a gentle tease, because it might make you blush, it would no longer be worth defending. You're not legally persons, but you're human males. We all know it. No one objected to the contract on the grounds we were considering cross-breeding, but a great many did on the grounds we were considering buying people. If I have to tease you into blushes, until you're so used to being pink it isn't frightening, I will. I don't like having the mushy smile I start to get interrupted with a pang of guilt, but I'll put up with it long enough to get you over it. You're adorable. Terrance is magnificent.

Major, that's the second time you've said that and I don't understand what you're telling us.

It's the rest of the mental niche, Frabee. You want to pet something adorable and stroke something magnificent, kittens and horses coming to mind as examples, though I've personally stroked more magnificent pieces of technology than animals. I've never actually 'met' a horse. I've been teased I'm in love with my flyer more than once. I always answered I probably would be if I could figure out a way to get it in bed. I won't change that, but I might add Terrance is almost as magnificent and it's a bit frustrating he doesn't fit either.

I wouldn't even notice my feet hang over, Major.

Mine wouldn't. What am I eating?

Protein. The goal is palatable and not disgusting-looking. Disguise isn't considered necessary. We all know most of our protein is synthetic and why.

The original colonists of Sereband decided against large herds of domestic food animals. The narrow temperate zones were cultivated with plants native to the world. We know why the original colonists made those decisions. All of us read the charter debates. Tell us how you feel about it now, Major.

Seeing Sereband from space makes you really think about the decision the founders made, Terrance. It looks very different from most human settled worlds. You suddenly see how amazing it is the planet survived the stellar incident that turned a wide band around the equator into black glass. We know that incident was of short duration. The math says no longer than two revolutions or Sereband would be a cinder. We don't know what that stellar incident was, but there should be a couple smaller planets in inner orbit in a system like that and there aren't. Indigenous life on Sereband is a miracle. It survived both the stellar incident and the estimated fifty years that smoke and dust hung in the air, so thick the sun couldn't warm it. It was a very short ice age, but it covered the world. I personally agree with the theory something struck the sun and it splashed. I did the math and it fits the observed phenomena. I know a solar flare of that magnitude is possible, and solar flares are much more common than something hitting a sun hard enough and fast enough to splash, but it gives me more of a feeling of security than just the statement it's a very stable sun now.

You're right. Something came into the system and it was big enough to pull the inner planets out of their orbits and into the sun behind it, but they weren't nearly as massive and just added a bit of fuel. It would be interesting to do a thorough survey of ten or fifteen cubic light years of space around Sereband to see if there's more evidence of the passage of a huge chunk of collapsed matter moving very fast.

Yes, Terrance, but it would be terribly expensive and take a long time. Even scientists understand doing it just to satisfy their curiosity about it is impractical. So, unless we come up with a better reason for spending the money and several decades to do it, there won't be a survey.

I want to look at the math.

I want to go sailing with you in moonlight, Major.

On a silken bay, on a warm summer night with a gentle breeze and only a bottle of wine between us.

Math and poetry? I'm not sure that's fair.

Frabee, they erase sections as soon as they're complete.

If they didn't before, they did after I stepped from the capsule. I'm perfect, Major. They were awed with themselves. I am very much an eighteen-year-old human male of this civilization. I am far healthier than average in all ways. I'm very mature for my age.

We don't have to search for a purpose in life. We exist to fulfill a noble one. We don't have to provide for ourselves or find someone to continue to do so while we gain more skills. The skills exist because there are very few in the civilization of our age who have not participated in some type of physical activity. Thank you, Frabee. I needed the term 'stepped from the capsule.' That's exactly what I did, Major. Our minds aren't data banks we must access. We know what we are when someone reaches out a hand to aid us down one small step. Thirty seconds later, the subject of Sereband has come up in the conversation. We discover who we are very rapidly. The discovery is amazing. The sense of self is already there. Frabee grinned and winked at me and I smiled.

I was sure I could surprise you into one and I wanted to watch and remember.

Major, he's in love with you.

I didn't say that!

No, Frabee, you didn't and never would have. Sorry, she has to know. Major, if it's you or him, he's going to try to make sure you stay alive. Telling him not to won't work. At some point, he's going to choose to defend you because of your value to your world. I'll be helping him. The stallion analogy works again. A stallion wouldn't let someone kill his person if he understood that's what was happening. We're a lot smarter. Train us to help defend ourselves and you and tell everybody we are.

What?!

Frabee, if there's an enemy out there to watch, I'd rather not have to watch drunks and bullies too. They make great distractions and very effective cover.

Terrance, the general is going to like you. You're going to scare the hell out of her, but she will like you.

Frabee had a sudden thought and began to giggle. The look on Terrance's face did not make him giggle less. He wanted to share them too much not to try to tell him. In giggly bursts, he told him: it was probably very frustrating, to the church to have proof, someone would clone soldiers, to fight a war, just as they'd said, when they'd passed a law, against cloning in the sector, and not be able, to point it out, because they didn't want, anyone to know, they were soldiers, because they had attacked, and the most important reason, for keeping the attack secret, was because, it was an embarrassing fiasco.

Terrance was lying on the floor giggling long before Frabee finished the explanation, but he kept going. His experience was good explanations, of why someone was giggling, brought on relapses one didn't get if one just caught them. He stayed on his chair until Terrance 'burst' back, We're not soldiers. We're army mounts.

Addy, with a great deal more experience with giggles, hung onto the table and only got a bit of food on the arm she held on with. When she got her head up off of it, she ordered the computer back to normal status, told it the galley was to be considered part of their stall and them she'd see them in the morning. She didn't bounce off the corridor walls very many times on her way to the bridge. Her quarters, of course, were part of it.

She dropped into the big chair in the 'parlor' between her bedroom and the bridge. It was a personnel courier ship. The boys were in generals' quarters. She was a major. They'd always be in very nice quarters, if they were with her. It made her feel a bit odd to realize she was the only one she trusted with the job.

Computer, authorization code; edit Addy bluefruit ice. Scramble format four. Message to General Verid Moshyan.

Encrypting program ready.

Mose, the answer is it takes eighteen very full years, even if the time period is shorter. The food on my sleeve is because I was laying in my plate. I haven't giggled that hard since we went to Hammer Beach. The price we paid was calculated carefully to seem reasonable. We're under attack and our allies started building defensive weapons for us as soon as we knew something was wrong, maybe before. Since it was a sneak attack, it's sneaky aid. I have no doubts whatsoever the boys are all fully committed to aid Sereband. I've been told in no uncertain terms that our two are sure it needs me more than it needs them and at some point they'll be protecting me. Terrance suggests training, and not secret, will reduce the number of bullies and drunks because they... I keep wanting to tell you everything they said. I will say I didn't land in my plate until Terrance pointed out they're army mounts. They're charming and witty, Boss. They're also brilliant, beautiful, talented and skilled. One of our two 'stepped from the capsule' a half-year ago, our year. They were surprised. I was told a good trainer would know if a horse didn't want to be touched by someone in particular, no matter how well-trained it was to accept the touch of a stranger. I want a groom for them. They need tack for the groom to take care of. The only unit in the army with grooms is First Cav. Tell Hoskinary about the food on my sleeve and you'll be transferring a groom to medical. He'll find the right one if he has to transfer someone out of medical to First Cav for you to transfer. If something like that happens, the ranks should be giggling for days. The right person will be real particular about who 'rides' them. The flat truth is Frabee is going to prove we were attacked and stop them or get killed trying. The correct response is giggles. We bought a bunch of volunteers. One thousand of the finest physical specimens the human race has ever produced, with what may be the best educations ever gotten, are on their way to Sereband and the first hundred all think we're worth it. We go by the contract with our tongues in our cheeks and daring someone to move. We are at war. The mutagen was supposed to do something else. Would we have lost fewer in a physical war? Is the cost of caring for the damaged children who are born less than rebuilding after a missile attack? The answer is probably no. We'd have had allies in other sectors sending fleets to help defend us when the first missile struck. The enemy doesn't want our world. It wants us. If Frabee must be terrified because he has no control over his sweet blushes, the enemy has already won. You were right. I'm the best one for the job. Close message and send.

Chapter Three

Colonel Alud Hoskinary pointed out First Cav had a medical section. Colonel Abrams Rochinski of Bio pointed out they had a vet. Colonel Mishtali Gobrinsi pointed out Transport had a real one and mounts were transports. Colonel Rochinski said they were staying in Bio and so was Major Addison. The ranks began to giggle. The civvies began to notice. The ranks explained it was Major Addison they all really wanted and this was the first time anyone but Bio had come up with a good 'reason' for a transfer. Then Hoskinary started looking for who should suddenly be in First Cav.

Lieutenant Carmody Gelsen explained General Moshyan had asked he hold all calls until she stopped giggling too hard to talk, then he recommended people call back in two or three days for an estimate on when to try again. General Nastreva Mursher was about to transfer three people into First Cav to keep 'his' master sergeant out of it. Since he was General of the Army, he would probably hang onto his batman/driver/cook. He said it would take three people to replace him and a new wing on his quarters to house them would be expensive.

Other generals and colonels had started coming up with 'reasons' why none of the three he transferred should be from their units. Some of them were really good. He recorded a great many more really good 'reasons' that would keep the general giggling, and the civvies began to notice.

The president called a meeting of the fifty people who were 'responsible' for them the day before the first ships bringing the clones were due to land. General Mursher was the only one smiling and he looked like keeping it just a smile was difficult. The meeting was because the rest of them wanted to know why.

We're laughing at ourselves. The clones are human. It's what made the decision so difficult, but we somehow lost track of that essential fact. They intend to help. They think the way Kethis found around the church-sponsored laws is wonderful. They're waiting for us to see the humor of it. They know they're the highly educated cream of the species. The major we sent for the two assigned to us said she landed in her plate when one noted they're army mounts, after being told we expected some women would want to get baby the usual way.

What?!

Why wouldn't they, Doctor Hanover? Ugh, clones? You're a physician. How did you forget the truth of a medical procedure? Fem President, I recommend anyone who has entered a The Way of Light church in the last fifteen years be considered a security risk.

General, that's outrageous!

No, Fem President, it's a desperate measure to slow the conquest of our world by an enemy that has already conquered fourteen.

The Way is the Light! The Light is the Power! You are a traitor to your species!

The General of the Army slugged the Director of the Sonderson Continental Medical School. The president called the Secretary of Defense into the office and asked her if she'd ever been in a The Way of Light church. When she said no, she told her anyone who had been in the last fifteen years was to be considered a security risk.

Aderssy Reames looked at the two doctors examining the doctor on the floor, the three examining the gash on the general's head, the bent statuette on the floor, then nodded. General Mursher said his throbbing head argued his feeling he should thank Dr. Toshinetti. He'd expected hours, if not days or months, of argument about it.

The University of Blandis veterinary school dean told the medical school administrator they had room to board the medical school's mounts and she was sure enough people would volunteer to exercise them that she wouldn't need to hire anyone additional. Since the administrator roared with laughter in the middle of the chancellor's Commencement speech, a large number of people wanted to know what she'd said to him.

A spokesperson for the church of The Way of Light read a statement that the legality of the contract was in question because prostitution laws might apply. A very large number of people on Sereband heard the clone, someone had named Alfred, had said there were no laws against buying sex toys and he was glad the journey was over so he could begin demonstrating he was one.

Bennett Tulaga read the message on his screen again and decided laughter and being scared silly were probably both appropriate responses. It was from Major Addison Addison.

Frabee blushed and it scared him. Since it was a reasonable reaction, something needed to be fixed. My society knows a mushy smile should not be interrupted by a pang of guilt! He's adorable and Terrance is magnificent. You're probably going to end up in the spotlight. We think clips of our president giggling are a great investment in potential allies outside the sector.

The people of Sereband saw Frabee's adorable blush the first time less than ten minutes after they landed. The very alert newscam op who caught the blush caught the reason too. Someone yelled the import of human gametes