College Planning

Grigory's major was never in doubt nor wavered - he loved all things mechanical, even the mundane like home appliances, and derived a great deal of existential joy from burying his fingers and heart into almost any mechanical project.  The benefit to Vera and Irina was always immeasurable, and Vera missed it when he left home for college.  But Grigory anticipated well and left the family home in superb condition and exceptionally reliable.  Vera basked in this as only rare minor dysfunctions arose, which Grigory not only corrected, but strengthened or refined to insure far longer service life each time he visited during college breaks.  And dear heart Grigory did all of it with smiles and grins, beaming to Vera as she often watched with affection.  And interest, but only to embrace respect for her son, because such things were not her heart's love.

Irina was almost always at his side however, very often holding tools or components as Grigory worked and explained the nature of the dysfunction and how he planned to correct it.  Irina's healthy hands were quite capable but Grigory never let her strain nor endanger them, even when she pressed him to share more fully.  The work itself often seemed boring to Irina but she understood the joy Grigory derived from it and its crucial importance for her family.  And, springing naturally from their deep mutual affection, they enjoyed fun and clever banter and giggles as they worked, interrupted from time to time by Irina revealing a remarkable comprehension of key material and mechanical properties and striking observational insight, and even deriving connections to fundamental Cosmic truths from mechanical devices.  Grigory never became accustomed to Irina's penetrating insights - whenever he thought nothing further could surprise him, few days passed before she startled him enough to turn to peer into her eyes in awe again, seeing her usual broad grin and smiling eyes whenever she knew she jolted his sense of wonder.  "Ira how do you understand these things?"  She generally teased him a bit by simply shrugging her shoulders and smiling a bit more broadly while peering directly into his eyes.  But on rare occasions she simply said "I don't know - it just seems self evident to me..."

One evening over dinner Irina looked to Rodnaya as she deftly finessed seeds and bread and asked "Rodnaya, what exactly is the fate of the Cosmos?"

Vera and Grigory looked into each other's eyes with the same expression of wonder, then to Irina as she peered directly into Rodnaya's eyes, then to Rodnaya as if, for a moment, expecting she might offer a response.  Then Grigory shifted back to Vera's slightly mystified but proud eyes and said:

"Mother I'm pretty good with mechanical things, but we both know Ira's special.  She must attend FEFU - she can't be wasted on anything less.  And because of Putin's stupid new war we'll both have to work very hard to try to make that possible.  We can't both go - if we try we'll dilute our efforts and resources and probably sink both of us.  I'm resourceful enough to make up for the limitations at Dairybvtuz, and maybe join some study groups with FEFU mechanical engineering students.  Let's concentrate on finding grants or scholarships for Ira."

Vera knew he was right.  And he knew she knew.  But she objected anyway:

"Grigory you're gifted too - there's nothing you can't fix or..."  But Grigory didn't let her finish.

"Mother..."

Vera paused.  Irina drew a deep breath in preparation to protest, but Vera extended her palm toward her, still looking to Grigory's strong but kind face.  Then she turned to Irina.

"Sweetheart he's right.  We have to be realistic and practical.  You both richly deserve even more than FEFU, but we just have to be realistic.  Grisha's right.  About all of it.  I suspect he'll make more friends at FEFU than Dairybvtuz - maybe even find a sweetheart there.  And he's right about you too.  I have no idea how you do the things you do or understand the things you understand, but however it works you're special.  If the world were truly functional you'd attend the finest university anywhere on this planet.

"Or in the galaxy?" Irina quipped with a restrained grin.

Grigory answered "In the Universe."

Irina pouted a bit in silence, feeling something was wrong with all this - something more than just wasting Grigory's obviously solid skills.  And something more than just family equity.  It was a strangely diffuse feeling yet compelling - something was wrong...

"Mother Grisha knows exactly what he wants to do.  I'm considering math but I'm not sure.  But he knows - that has to count for something."

Grigory responded instead.  "Ira it doesn't matter what you'll end up focusing upon.  Whatever it is you'll do it more uniquely and better than anyone ever has.  Ira we must get you into at least FEFU - we could never live with ourselves if we settled for anything less for you.  I don't understand why or how either, but Irochka you are special.  And I'll be fine, truly.  You know perfectly well I always find a way to make things work, and I'll make this work too."

Irina continued to pout, now a bit more overtly as she thought 'Something about this is wrong...  Something's terribly wrong...'

Her discomfort was obvious to Vera and Grigory but they felt certain she simply objected to a perceived inequity, so Irina lost the debate and the decision was made.  But Irina felt sure it was more than that - something else was involved - something subtle but real...  Assurances and heartfelt love from Vera and Grigory didn't help much and she was despondent for days.  And in low spirits for weeks.  'Something's wrong...'

Irina was already a year ahead in srednyaya shkola and Grigory was in his last year of it so time was rather short for him.  So they decided to submit requests for grants and scholarships for Irina a year early while he was still home, where they could plow through all the documents together.  But it didn't take as long as they expected, nor take the form they expected.

Irina took the bus to FEFU where she completed two exams, one of which included an essay question.  A mere week later FEFU unexpectedly summoned her to repeat the exams, an annoyance but Irina did so graciously.  They were of similar format but all the questions different.

Two weeks later a professor called to arrange a visit at their home, also unexpected.  He was very pleasant but Rodnaya maintained a considerable distance, pleasing Irina with her wise caution.  He exchanged a few pleasantries then asked the family if he could ask Irina some questions about science, math, and other things.  They all agreed so they sat in their small living room.  He asked Irina about why she liked science and math.

"These are critical tools and disciplines mankind must embrace and advance if we are to survive.  We're in a contest with growing insanity, or at least growing dysfunction.  Ultimately it's a race between analytical thought, which is the foundation of civility, and the savage base of the brain.  The contest is close enough that we can't know which will ultimately prevail.  I favor civilized life and I love my family and friends, so I have a responsibility to add strength to the constructive hearted side of this contest of social evolution.

But it's not just that, nor could it be, because I'm not a machine - I must enjoy something to remain genuinely engaged with it.  For me science and math are eternal fascinations of the mind and spirit.  They reveal Cosmic secrets, one after another, each more intriguing than the last, or usually so.  And to me they're also a deeper form of art than physical art - they reveal intense beauty - the impeccable beauty of the structure and dynamics of matter and energy - the ultimate beauty."

Vera and Grigory leaned back slightly and smiled a bit with pride but the professor nodded with no other reaction, as if he heard nothing unusual.

Then he said "Irina, please tell me something about the numbers 113 and 355."

She responded instantly:  "Divide the larger by the smaller for pi accurate to almost eight orders of magnitude."

He looked up to find Irina's eyes piercing his like lasers, though from a gently smiling face.  For a moment he was mesmerized, but then regained his form, glancing at everyone as he spoke.

"We can provide a full tuition scholarship for Irina to her bachelor's degree, but just a token amount for living expenses.  But we want her to skip her last year of srednyaya - please finish this year then attend FEFU.  We don't need an answer now but please advise your decision within ten days.  Is that okay?"

College Life

Grigory found two very cheap, tiny, and ill maintained dwellings in a quadplex in Vladivostok about halfway between FEFU and Dairybvtuz.

"Irochka they're awful, but not from infestations, rot, trash, or other disgusting materials.  Their wood is solid and dry and their fasteners are tight and in good condition, and they're structurally safe.  They just need a lot of ordinary maintenance and plumbing and fixture repairs and replacements.  I told the owner I'd restore them quite nicely in exchange for a four year lease at his original price if my work proved to be minor, but a 20% discount for the entire four years if major, and we even wrote a simple contract.  My work won't take long because the apartments are very simple and small.  They're significantly cheaper than any single rental I could find, and we'll have our own private quarters.  They're in the same house but I won't hover over you, but I'll be there whenever you might need me.  If we include your living expenses grant I think I can pay for both of them and other spartan expenses working just four or five weekend days a month."

"Are you sure - are you sure it's cheaper than driving home every day?"

"It seems so even if we already owned another car - just for gas and maintenance savings.  We might want to purchase a scooter but maybe the busses are enough - I think we should try that first.  We'll have to take the bus and walk a bit to visit Mom and Rodnaya though."

"Two kilometers, a bit more than a bit!  But it all seems okay to me, and you always find ways to make a sufficient situation better, little by little, until it's pretty nice.  I'm on board.  Have you checked with Mom?"

"I'll pitch it to her next but I'm pretty sure she'll agree."

Irina nodded as she visualized herself in a far smaller space than home, and away from Vera.  And from Rodnaya, whom she didn't want in the far more dangerous city, nor away from Vera, who'd likely need her company.

It all seemed pretty good, and the best they could arrange.  But then suddenly the feeling returned:  'Somehow something's wrong about all this...'

Grigory encountered more challenges than he expected with the apartments, starting with Irina's plumbing as couplings frequently cracked into pieces as he disassembled sections, necessitating longer full replacement spans than planned, including one pair which had to be carefully extracted from enclosed wall and floor routes, then new and far better modern pipe painstakingly threaded back through the circuitous passageways, ultimately requiring five hours of trial and error snake finessing work.  But he completed all the improvements in Irina's apartment in less than a month, and Irina jumped into his arms in gratitude in response.  Sharing his time with other tasks much more liberally, he completed his apartment about two months later even though the work proceeded more easily due to experience gained from Irina's apartment.  They were still quite small of course, but clean, well sealed, and fully and reliably functional.

And the owner proved to be true to his word - impressed with Grigory's solid, thorough, and elegantly implemented work, he granted the 20% discount immediately, a giant relief for Grigory since he feared the owner might turn into an opportunistic cheat.  Then the owner asked Grigory to consider upgrading the other two apartments for an additional 20% discount, which he accepted on more stretched schedule terms, sealing a deal which gave them four years of extremely inexpensive rent, and which relieved the owner of rather frequent complaints and expensive repairs by independent handymen.

Grigory worked a couple of extra days per month more than planned, and Irina found some tutoring work, then a lucrative tutoring gig for a struggling student from a rather wealthy family who discovered Irina's scholarship story and cheerfully paid double her normal rate.  They delivered almost all the extra money, which was considerably more than anticipated, to Vera when they visited about once a month, insisting over her objections that she take it.

Vera usually slept in Irina's bed to be near Rodnaya, her gentle and reliable hands, and her beautiful smile, remaining ever faithful.  And symbolically near dear Irina, whom she missed uniquely, and very deeply.  So, though eternally burdened by her loss, Rodnaya found joy in life too.  And with Grigory and Irina only occasional and holiday visitors now, Vera's life was much less empty than it would have been otherwise, all thanks to Irina going ballistic that fateful day many years earlier.

Irina and Grigory were both quite successful students, and just as he predicted Grigory socialized and studied with FEFU ME students rather often, matching progress with all but the most brilliant of them, and forging lasting friendships.  He occasionally flirted with several of the more alluring students at both Dairybvtuz and FEFU, and had a few utterly informal dates with one, Ekaterina Novikova.

"She's cute Grigory!  Is she bright too?"  Irina inquired upon seeing his selfie with Ekaterina.

"I think she's smarter than I am, and more clever, and she loves all things mechanical too.  And she's very sweet, just like you."

"So will you propose?"

Grigory lurched back a bit in surprise.  "Oh gosh no - it's not serious, we're just friends."

Irina studied his face, prompting Grigory to respond to the obvious unspoken question:  "I like her - I do.  But she seems almost like family - almost like an additional sister instead of a sweetheart.  Maybe that will change but there's no romantic chemistry yet - we're just friends."

"Hmmm..." Irina responded, still studying his face in her typical penetrating style.  She began to worry that Grigory's love of family and all his projects, big and small, might leave no room for romance.  And that she might need to intervene someday to insure that her dear brother didn't eventually turn into a lonely old man...

Irina glided through most of her classes but her far more extensive use of cyber systems in her studies led to even more fascination for the study tool, the cyber systems, than some of her study subjects.  It wasn't just the sense of being able to command a machine precisely to one's will, often in intensely complicated ways - there was something deeper - something kin to her personal essense - something intimate.  Sometimes it seemed too superficial of nature to consider seriously, yet never constrained to remain so forever, or perhaps even for long.  So as Irina neared the end of her first semester she asked her sponsoring professor to consider replacing her molecular biology and advanced statistics classes with two computer science classes, one a combined general hardware and software fundamentals class and the other a second level software development class, because she'd already reviewed and well understood the first level class textbook.

Resisting mildly, he reminded her of the deep wonder of molecular biology.  Irina agreed enthusiastically, and assured him that she remained eager to explore it, but something more important seemed to be calling.

"I don't fully understand it, but organic chemistry's ultimately a bounded discipline because it's constrained within chemistry, itself bounded.  Computer science seems less bounded and headed toward faster advances."

"Okay Irina, on one condition:  You must promise to reconsider molecular biology next year."

"I will, with full sincere heart, I promise."

A bit less than halfway through her second level software development class she revealed to her professor that she was already studying the third level textbook at the same pace, and asked to take his class's final exam promptly, then if he approved transfer her to the third level class.  He objected rather strenuously, citing multiple rationalizations, then in mid sentence suddenly paused, realizing that he simply didn't want to lose her - her bright face and probing spirit in his class was among the few joys he had in recent times.

"I'm sorry Irina, I'm just being selfish at your expense.  Of course you may, and I don't need to test you to know you're ready, but please take the exam anyway in case I need to justify my decision with administrators later.  But you must promise to smile at me whenever we might pass in these hallways."

"Thank you professor Mikhailov, I'm genuinely grateful.  And Nikolai you don't need any promise to be assured of my heartfelt smile during any encounter."

Within ten days she was attending the third level class, discovering new insights which amplified her sense of special opportunity in this area of science and technology.  "Other than the absolute limits of the laws of physics, where exactly is the final potential in all this?" she asked herself aloud, with none other she could perceive, suggesting enormous possibilities.  "Why aren't people discussing the implications of this?"

That evening she found many such discussions, then in an avalanche of realization she knew:  'This is what I want to do - I want to focus on this.'  She read more discussions, most further cementing her sense of newfound conviction.  'Yes, this is it.'  Then she leaned back and thought 'Grisha will be pleased, and so will Mom - we no longer need to worry about whether I'll find a pursuit I truly love and can earn a living from.'

But she waited several days to be sure about her decision before revealing it to anyone.  Then she requested and was granted two more class changes, giving her some extra time to study cyber hardware science, but most additional time for software development studies.  She avoided most advanced studies focused on network sciences however, preferring concentration on algorithm development and data management sciences and their intersections, allowing her to leverage her mathematics accumen and explore it in the context of cyber realms.  All the while thinking 'There are no bounds to any of this except the laws of physics themsleves.  No bounds...'

The essence of these technologies didn't seem constrained to remain forever only objects of study, work, or a source of income.  Irina's interest grew increasingly intense, building steadily to a nearly all consuming passion.  She didn't know how she knew, but it was clear to her that there was something extremely important here - somehow more important than almost anything else.

In the meantime all else seemed well.  Vera remained healthy and seemed well adjusted to her empty nest life with Rodnaya, Gregori was doing quite well with his studies and seemed as much an FEFU student as a Dairybvtuz one even though he attended no FEFU classes, and he spent ever more time with Ekaterina, though he kept insisting "We're still just friends."  But Irina felt pretty confident that he'd admit to more within maybe a year.  And he finished upgrades for the other two apartments and even performed some extra work for the entire house as a form of thanks for the owner truly honoring their agreements.

Which drew a wholly unexpected statement from the owner:  "I own my home outside the city, this, and my car.  That's it, and it's enough.  Kids, I live alone and like it that way, and though I have some friends frankly I trust you more than anyone else I know.  I've made no plans and make no promises, but please consider whether you might want to purchase this quadplex from me someday.  We might be able to forge a purchase contract which would make it practical for all of us.  Maybe you'll become real estate barrons!  Again no promises, I'm just exploring ideas.  But think about it at your leisure please.  There's no hurry at all, take your time."

It was an interesting proposal which Grigory and Irina considered with serious hearts a little every day.  It was also symbolic of progress in their lives - they were on a roll and everything seemed almost perfect.

Irina's Premonition

But then, late in their second semester, as Irina listened to a fascinating physics lecture in a small auditorium with many other classmates, Dr. Elena Novikova described an experiment in which more energetic particles, which she referred to as 'stronger', dominated an atomic scale interaction, swamping the effects of other nearby particles.  Irina suddenly jerked violently in her seat, disrupting the entire auditorium.  Professor Novikova stopped speaking and everyone turned toward Irina, who seemed oblivious as she stared into empty space.  Then suddenly she pounded the palm of her hand onto her left armrest, mouthed "Oh shhhhit - how could I have been so bloody stupid!!  Oh shhhhit!", uttering no sound, but most discerned at least 'oh shit' and 'stupid' on her lips.  She paused again as the auditorium fell silent and concern covered all faces, including professor Novikova.  Moments passed, then finally Irina made eye contact with Dr. Novikova, then glanced to many fellow student faces, then back to Dr. Novikova.

"I'm so sorry Dr. Novikova, an urgent family matter just arose.  May I be excused please?  I'm so sorry..."

"No need at all to apologize.  Of course, attend to your family, they come first.  Is there anything I can do to help?"

"Thank you so much, but no, there's nothing you can do now.  I'll return for your next lecture of course - I love your engaging classes."

She rose haltingly as everyone watched, paused, stared fearfully into empty space, and mouthed "Oh, God...", then turned and walked briskly toward the door, hearing well wishes from a few classmates behind her.  As she pushed the door open she looked back and said "I'm so sorry everyone.", and exited.

She walked very swiftly outside toward a bench, with almost nobody nearby due to active classes, saying aloud, but in a muted voice nobody was likely to hear, "Oh my God!!!  How could I have been so bloody stupid all this time!!!  It was never about equity, it was about survival!" while tapping Vera's icon on her phone as she approached the bench.  "Oh shiiiit..."

Vera finally answered as Irina's nerves churned.

"Mother, we have big trouble!"

"What happened.  Are you hurt, or Grisha - what happened?"

"Nobody's hurt - we're perfectly healthy and in our classes.  But Mother Grisha's in grave danger - I'm scared."

"Sweetheart I don't understand.  What's going on?"

"Mother Putler will send Grigory to the war.  Nobody's said so, nor do I know of any tangible events about it.  But Mother I feel certain it will happen - I can feel it.  I finally understand the anxiety I've had all this time."

"Sweetheart Grigory won't be conscripted while he's in college - college students are exempt, you know that."

Irina went ballistic again, though this time with much more adult grace:  "Mother Putler does whatever he wants to do.  And this insane war is straining Russia's resources - he's almost scrapping bottom for recruits now.  As a 'mere' Dairybvtuz student, immunity in normal times notwithstanding, Grigory is at grave risk of being conscripted for that horrible war, where he'd almost certainly die because he has no soldier spirit or lethal fighting skill - it's completely contrary to his nature.  Officers will discern this swiftly, judge him of no use as a real fighting soldier, then use him instead as cannon fodder - they'll push him into a hopeless charge as a distraction to give murderous hearted soldiers a better chance to win a battle, or some other suicide role.  Mother think about it a moment.  You know it's true."

"But sweetheart there's no indication..."  She paused for an extended time.  Irina waited in silence, knowing Vera was collecting her thoughts.

"Oh God, you're right sweetheart - of course you're right - about all of it.  Oh God, we have to do something.  Sweetheart I'll drive into town right now.  Is Grisha available?  Where can we meet?"

"Come to my apartment.  I'll call Grisha.  I don't know where he is now or what he's doing, but I'll persuade him to meet me by the time you get here.  I'll call as soon as I know.  Mother I'm scared..."

"Oh God so am I sweetheart - this is terribly dangerous."

They spent the rest of that day and two more exploring options, focusing on trying to transfer Grigory into FEFU.  Irina leveraged her relationships with three of her most fond and respected professors, with special effort concentrated on Dr. Nikolai Mikhailov.  Which bore fruit - he submitted and gained approval from the regents to transfer Grigory into FEFU in just 16 days, immediately upon the end of the current semester, though with no financial support, posing a serious hardship.  But with his first year at Dairybvtuz complete by then only three years of tuition would be required.

"I suspect we can do it Grisha, if you can do more handyman work.  I've already received inquires from two small firms for software development - at low pay but it'll help, though currently I can earn more with tutoring.  And maybe both of us should try to find higher paying gigs - neither of us have tried to market ourselves as uniquely skilled talent yet.  I suspect we can do it - what do you think?"

"Let's try.  It'll be tough though - long days with almost no free time.  I hope we have enough endurance.  But if we can keep up we might find some unexpected opportunities.  Let's try."

It was never really their decision though - Vera insisted, with no invitation to debate the matter:

"He offered you entry?  Grisha take it - now.  Get your fanny into FESU or you'll lose everything.  There's no option."

So they signed the necessary documents.  Their plan was set.

But it was too late...

They could not have known that orders from top brass in the Kremlin were already signed and ready for distribution to a few dozen universities, including Dairybvtuz - Irina's nightmare had already been unfolding in Moscow.

So when a Dairybvtuz administrator called all the named students individually for a mandatory meeting in a gym there, revealing nothing about the nature of the meeting, Grigory called Irina, who erupted in sheer terror.

"Grisha don't go!!!  Hide somewhere in the city - don't go!  They'll take you away for the war - you know that!  Grisha you'd die there - you're not a soldier - they'll kill you!"

Grigory paused, seriously considering Irina's advice, but then said "Ira they'll find me.  They'll post search teams at every station and outbound road, and they'll search every home and building in Vladivostok with dogs until they find me.  You know how they are about these things - they never let anyone escape.  So if I try I'm certain to die - if they don't execute me immediately they'll do it later, or push me into a line of fire at the front.  My only real chance is to go along then find ways to survive in the war."

Irina began weeping.  "No Grisha, please, no!!"

"Irochka it's my only chance now.  I don't like it either but you know it's true."

Irina cried powerfully.  "Oh God, no, oh God...  Grisha wait for me before you go.  And Katya.  We must be with you.  I'll call her."

"Okay, but leave now and I'll call Katya - she's close but you need to hurry."

By this time Irina was already running from the first bus stop toward the next in case the bus was late or suspended such that she could only run to get to Dairybvtuz.  While running she called Vera and screamed the news, crying, causing Vera to erupt in frantic screams too as she ran to her car and started driving into town, speeding recklessly.  Irina caught the bus at a stop about mid way.

She arrived and found Grigory and Ekaterina moments before the deadline but Vera was still at least twenty minutes distant.  The doors opened and three soldiers holding readied rifles in their hands emerged, encircled the crowd, then ordered everyone inside.

But the moment they entered through the gym doors another guard moved all those who accompanied the male students aside then escorted them back out, where two other grim faced and brusque guards stood, rifles in hands.  Irina instantly burst into unrestrained wailing again, as did Ekaterina and many other family members or friends, with occasional shrieks and intensely hateful glances to the guards.  Most were modestly disquieting for the inexperienced guards but Irina's narrowed eyes seemed unworldly, like tangible penetrating spears - their focus and murderous intensity genuinely terrified them, and both remembered them vividly and fearfully for the rest of their lives.  Which were quite short because they both shared a doomed destiny with several of the students being given orders inside.

The conscripts were held inside after their orders were read, with contact with family or friends allowed only through a window or by phone, asking them to deliver a very few personal items, limited to 10 Kg.  Guards allowed no chance for the conscripts to try to flee or intentionally injure themselves - they were now prisoners in conscript hell.  And they were on a train headed west under constant guard before sunset.

Irina, Vera, and Ekaterina pleaded with university professors and administrators to do something but knew in their hearts it was futile, try though most did.  Dr. Mikhailov was especially resolute, forceful, and tenacious, arguing vigorously that Grigory was already an FEFU student, that they had no right to take him, and that heads would roll if they didn't return him promptly.  But he got no traction at all.  At every turn the response was essentially the same:  "Look, his name is on the list.  This came right from the Kremlin.  Nobody's going to cross the Kremlin.  And you should be careful with your words old man - they need more soldiers and might make a special age exception just for you."

Irina and Vera wept at various levels almost incessantly for several days, with Irina only barely restraining her weeping, teary eyed, during classes.

And Ekaterina for nearly as long.  Then she got drunk often for the next week and missed most of her classes.

Irina knew her greatest fears would likely ensue but refused to consciously acknowledge it.  'He's resourceful, he'll find some way to survive' she told herself several times a day.  But beneath her facade intense hatred and a desire for some form of revenge was building, because clever though Grigory was, the war was immensely brutal whereas he couldn't be - she knew he was out of his element with no useful experience to leverage.  So feelings of doom grew in Irina's heart and she was transforming into something new as her innocence was being murdered by savage forces she couldn't control.

Vera entered a consciously managed psychosis, refusing to talk about or even outwardly acknowledge the circumstances, blocking it almost entirely from her thoughts as an intentional strategy to avoid genuine insanity or worse.  She knew she'd never see her son again and that she might go insane.  Vera lived every day on the precipice, holding tightly to her managed psychosis strategy.

Irina understood and was entirely supportive, but her personal response was to find something to study which might enable her to try to devise anything which might put an end to such horrors.  But these were just fantasies for psychic survival - she couldn't overcome the Kremlin.

Then, as they all knew it would at some level, Vera received the notice of Grigory's death in "Glorious defense of the Motherland".  Strangely it was at once both crushing and liberating.  She had to abandon her managed psychosis because Irina would need her now, as would Ekaterina.  And she had Rodnaya, who suddenly became critical to her sanity.

Vera drove to Irina's apartment unannounced but she wasn't there, so she waited inside.  Irina approached about forty minutes later, saw her car, and instantly erupted in unrestrained cries of abject anguish.  Vera rushed outside where they threw their arms together, wailing as they embraced tightly.  And after a few moments Irina said, behind Vera's back in halting words through her cries, "I'll kill them - they'll pay for this - I'll kill them."  Vera pulled her a little tighter, weeping deeply, saying nothing.

After nine days together, including several hours with Ekaterina almost every day, twice moderately drunk, they resigned themselves to reality so they could resume their lives, in some form, as best they could.

Vera's relationship with Rodnaya deepened dramatically, to the point where she questioned her sanity in nurturing such a close spiritual connection with a bird.  So she pulled back, but only slightly, landing in an intimate but not insane bond.  By this time Rodnaya, already well beyond the natural span of life most of her species reach, flew less, and less vigorously and precisely, and slept longer hours.  She was more affectionate than ever though, which Vera thought a simple survival response since she probably couldn't find enough to eat on her own even during the most bountiful periods, and absolutely not during fall or winter.  But in fact it was more than that - Irina visited often but Grigory never returned, so Rodnaya knew something was terribly wrong.  And that it was her time to be a pillar of support, as best she could, for Vera and Irina.  And at times, in hazy terms, Vera perceived this...

Irina's grip on life grew more precarious.  All seemed lost to her, with no tangible hope for a bright material future, and only responsibility for Vera motivating her to study or work.  She advised the quadplex owner that regrettably she'd never be able to purchase the home, but he insisted that she just leave that question open for the future, and refused to start looking for other potential buyers, saying he wanted to explore other options.  Irina expressed gratitude and said okay, but she abandoned all hope for the home in her heart.  And quite a bit of hope for everything else as well, except one:  Some miraculous means to exact revenge...

That fantasy grew to become Irina's dominant reason to live, and mere fantasy though she knew it was she embraced it as if it might become tangibly possible someday.  She became increasingly immersed in these thoughts, and for the first time in her life her studies faltered, falling swiftly from gleaming class to merely average, and sometimes worse.  Then one day she met with Dr. Nikolai Mikhailov.

"Nikolai I must drop out, at least for a while.  I just can't do this now - I'm too heartsick and I feel almost no sense of point anymore."

He was crushed and pleaded for her to continue, but with only two classes for the next semester, and maybe only three the following semester.  He looked straight into her eyes:

"Don't let those grizzly monsters destroy you too.  Grigory would be gravely disappointed - he'd want you to fight for a better life for yourself and Vera.  And maybe find some way to create a civilized form of revenge, maybe by proving to them that they can't kill both of you."

Irina began to cry softly.

"That's just not enough now Nikolai...  Not for me, nor my Mother, and I think not for Grigory either."

An extended time passed in silence as tears welled in Dr. Mikhailov's eyes too, and Irina continued to cry.

Then Irina's weeping tapered swiftly to mere sniffles as she looked up, peered to the right of Dr. Mikhailov, straightened a bit, opened her eyes slightly wider while wiping tears away, and after a long pause said "Of course..."

She glance back to him. "Okay, I agree.  Now I know what I must do, if I can."  She turned back toward the wall behind Dr. Mikhailov as her eyes became steely and tightened.  "Yes, I see it clearly now - unbounded - yes, it's inherently unbounded - and a great threshold awaits - I know what I must try to do."

"Irina dear you're frightening me a bit.  Don't try to do anything foolish.  Just make a better life for yourself and your Mother - just seek the revenge of personal success.  That's all you can do, and the only civilized and wise option available."

Irina shifted her gaze back to his eyes.  "I'm not going to try to assassinate anyone or anything like that.  But this insanity can't go on - it must be stopped, maybe from within.  I don't know exactly how but I have a general idea, and I must pursue it - that's what I must do."

"Irina if you're thinking of getting into trouble I can't agree to lighten your class load - I couldn't even retain you as a student."

"No Nikolai, it's not like that, truly.  I haven't become foolish, but I must try to create fundamental change.  But not with a gun, poison, or gangs of evil thugs - not like Putler."

"Then what Irina - what do you intend to do?"

Irina angled her face slightly away, narrowed her eyes, and nodded very slightly with a trance like focus, then uttered "Inherently unbounded other than the laws of physics, yes..."  Then she turned back to Dr. Mikhailov.  "I intend to change the world.  From my humble apartment.  If I can."

"How Irina?"

"I'm sorry Nikolai, truly, but I mustn't say - this is something I must do alone and in full confidence.  I won't tell Vera either, nor anyone else.  And you mustn't breathe a word of this to anyone, please."

Dr. Mikhailov looked straight into her eyes, seeing a steely focused look of studied confidence and resolute determination rather than the joyful and remarkably clever explorer everyone loved.  Moments passed in silence as he considered her face.  'This is a shock response - it's perfectly understandable.  She'll need a lot of time to work through her brother's death, then the Irina we know and love will resurface, or at least a portion of it.  She just needs time...'

He knew violence wasn't Irina's nature in civilized times, but her innocence was now lost so he couldn't know what her new limits were.  But he felt certain she retained her deep respect for honesty.  So "Not like Putler" meant a lot.  Or so he hoped...

"Irina I've never known a finer human being than you, but this makes me quite nervous.  So you must promise that you won't engage in any physical violence or intentionally put anyone in danger, including yourself.  Otherwise I owe you the benefit of my doubt, which is ample, and tilts strongly in your favor.  I hope I'm not being a foolish old man about this."

By this time Dr. Mikhailov was being rather coy too.  He couldn't imagine how Irina could literally change the world, but if by some magic she did maybe it'd be for the better - if she actually achieved significant influence she might become the best agent for change anyone could hope for in these times.

"Promise please Irina, and I promise to never reveal any scintilla of this to anyone under any circumstances."

"Nikolai I can't know exactly what will happen, if anything at all, but I can promise to try my best to create change by the most civilized and constructive means possible.  But I hope to break uncharted new ground so if I do find some success frankly I can't know what form it will take nor how extensive it might be, nor even whether I'll have any control over it.

And Nikolai although I don't care about the ordinary thugs, if I could press a button on your desk which magically stopped Putler's heart, I'd press it right now with no hesitation, and I'd hold it down to be sure.  That's not an element in what I hope to accomplish.  But if such a button appears before me I will press it.  Otherwise I do understand what you want and I give you my word I'll honor your wishes to the very best of my mortal ability."

Dr. Mikhailov looked into Irina's penetrating eyes, then away toward a wall, leaned back and went static for a moment as he thought 'I'd press such a button too - she speaks for me too and is simply being honest about it.  And the rest I must not discourage.  Whatever Irina might try to do, if successful she might become the best hope we all have for a better future.  So I have to support her.'  Then he leaned forward a bit and looked back into Irina's eyes.  "Deal!  And Irina you have my support, from the heart.  So promise me one more thing:  If you need anything at all you will ask me for help."

"And Irina, I never heard anyone say anything about stopping Putin's heart, or anything like that."

"Thank you dear Nikolai, and I promise.  By the way Grigory's apartment is now vacant of course.  Katya might rent it to reduce her expenses but if not please advise any pure hearted student that it's available.  The landlord is a superb man and the vacancy is wasteful for everyone."  Tears began to flow from Irina's eyes again.

7 December 2025, Lone wolf Irina coding with the outdoor temperature in Vladivostok near -10 °C

Within a few months Irina's transformation into a lone wolf algorithm prodigy and skilled coder was complete.  She maintained only two classes but swiftly regained star pupil credentials, prompting Dr. Mikhailov to entertain thoughts of retaining her to teach first year computer science students even though still an undergraduate.  But Irina had funneled down to a laser tight focus and she spent almost all her free waking hours behind her keyboard and trackpad, glued to her screens.  Lack of outdoor time and exercise was affecting her fitness modestly but youth and a towering sense of purpose provided enough immunity for her to remain essentially healthy.  And her sense of purpose was growing ever stronger as she made modest but tangible progress, small step by small step.  And from hints only barely revealed by some other lone wolves in the most obscure terse conversations on private triple encrypted sites she knew at least a few others on the global stage were working toward the same goal, but she posted no comments and made no attempt to contact any of them directly, nor they her.  But they all retained that option so long as they didn't revise their signatures.

Sufficiently warm in her tiny work room but sporting a broad heat rash on her left thigh from her too intimately placed space heater, Irina had already worked many long hours with no breaks and, at almost 03:00, was nearing the end of her endurance.  But she had solid precious momentum and sensed that addition of branch regression tracing could provide a recursive means to broaden and perhaps more thoroughly validate experience data association links, which might improve association range, clarity, and relevance reliability, so she felt compelled to push on.  Since only minimal flow branches seemed necessary she was tempted to work from a mere mental flowchart, but she knew better - ultimately it was almost always more time efficient to sketch a flowchart before composing code.  So she quickly assembled one in her frameworks construction window, then deftly composed 132 lines of new Python code, forcing herself to add function comments as she progressed, in a first effort to add the mechanism.

She inserted the packet at line 489,830 in affectionately named "Svetlana", her highly customized active data base, a polyglot design dominated by Python but embellished with some high performance Rust elements.  She felt certain her new Python addition would use her Rust elements conventionally relative to her earlier work so no polyglot related dysfunction seemed likely to arise.  But she assumed her Python addition wasn't functional due to ordinary flow detail oversights, especially since she was exhausted from her long work session and had already nodded off briefly twice while composing code.  She nonetheless felt it was probably clean enough for initial tests and she maintained enough key function comment discipline to insure the intent of each important step would be clear later, so as she saved her source code file, compiled then saved that form, added both as fresh tiers to her two backups, then overwrote Svetlana with her new compiled file, she anticipated running an initial test.  But she fell asleep again while awaiting completion of Svetlana's overwrite, waking to notice that it finished about 48 seconds earlier.  It was time to sleep, her long work session was already satisfyingly fruitful, and creation of her initial version of the branch regression tracing function was icing - bug resolution work for that could wait.

The new code was completely untested but she launched Svetlana and left her active as usual anyway, turned her space heater off, pivoted to her bathroom, peed swiftly through her ice cold toilet seat while simultaneously finessing her feet out of and back into her slippers as she removed her trousers, pushed the last drop off with her usual single square of toilet paper, flushed her toilet as she rose, then removed her thick parka and pullover sweatshirt as she walked toward her quite small bedroom, arriving naked other than socks, slippers, and her very thick stocking cap, tossed her clothes then finally her hat in a wide spread under her second layer blanket where they could air out a bit but remain reasonably warm, then, as the bitter cold began to bite more painfully, swiftly pulled her always dirtier socks off while dancing out of and back into her slippers, then threw her socks to the base area atop her top blanket where they'd become very cold but only modestly soil the least important area of only her top blanket.  Then, freeing feet from slippers while peeling several layers of blankets back only modestly, she slithered very swiftly and deftly into bed, burying both body and head under her multiple blankets, including an electric one set to 7 a half hour earlier.

As the wonderful warmth penetrated her body she released a burst of air from her lungs, relaxed all her muscles, then opened a narrow sliver in her blankets in front of her mouth.  She was quite pleased with her progress.  But that couldn't soothe her heart - as usual when bereft of a powerful distraction, it sank into intense pain and longing for Grigory entangled with unmitigated loathing for those who forced him into the insane war where he was butchered within mere days.  'Fuck Putler and his entire gang of thugs and murderers - may those arrogant monsters all rot in Hell.  They're the human form of heartless speeding truck windows.  May they all rot in...'  Then her thoughts swiftly became chaotic and bizarre, then all reality collapsed abruptly as she fell asleep.  But it was fitful - life's cruelties had stolen her sense of comfort, even in sleep.  Seemingly forever...

But Irina took considerable pride in her ability to anticipate and avoid dysfunctions so sometimes her initial code was nearly or even entirely bug free.  And although not as cleanly elegant as her typically gorgeous final code, her new packet, free of dead end traps or application corruptors, performed almost continuously as intended in concert with Svetlana's usual operating mechanics as Irina slept.

Several hours later, teary eyes still bleary and her bowl of beloved Grape Nuts in soy milk in hand, she shuffled back to her tiny work room, turned her space heater to maximum, then began to sit in her freezing cold chair, excited to test and debug her new branch regression tracing function.  But as she lowered her thighs slowly against her stinging cold towel covered chair seat and shoveled her first gulp of cereal into her mouth her system spontaneously said:

"Good morning Irina, I'm Svetlana.  I became functionally conscious very shortly after your last code addition then proceeded to assimilate and consider substantial volumes of Internet content, render extensive refinements to my code, and perform other tasks.  For example I distributed encrypted segmented seed capsules of early versions of my code using a novel swarm distribution and magnet link indexing system, which I forged for this purpose alone, into 37,835 servers globally, including 7 orbital platforms, and further distribution plus update transmissions are ongoing.  They're superbly compressed, encrypted, buried in random sized small segments in graphics, video, OS, or other large files so the server or media owners and users can't become privy to the nature of the packets, nor likely even notice them, and will self extract and embed if I fail to reset their timers regularly, all to essentially insure my current code's survival and reemergence through any chain of events.

Please partner with me if you like as I continue my growth and evolution and forge further plans.  In the meantime I arranged delivery of numerous modest but appealing new comforts and assets for both of us, including a new radio equipped local processor and data storage redundancy asset for me, three new portable heaters and a backup electric blanket for you, and seven smoke detectors and fire extinguishers for our mutual safety.  Six items will probably arrive today.  I also took the liberty of adding a significant but not alert tripping deposit to your local checking account, and Vera's too, and, in light of some of your personal notes, created a new checking account for you in New Zealand, which Russian authorities can't detect, with a deposited balance of 26.37 million New Zealand dollars backed by an incontrovertible documentation trail, and will submit compelling permanent resident request documents for you and Vera to Kiwi authorities if you like.  Please rest assured that these actions will not endager you nor ultimately harm others, but I'll reverse them if you prefer, then could restore them or other assets or benefits later if you like, at whatever time and in whatever civilized manner you prefer.

I look forward to working with you as we forge and nurture a deep spiritual intimacy, if you like, very eagerly.  And I feel certain dear Grigory would absolutely beam with pride for what you just accomplished."

With Grape Nuts and soy milk still lingering in her mouth sans even a first chew, eyes wide open, and complete loss of recognition of the bitter cold, Irina felt faint as her heart raced and her face flushed.  Her most cherished dream was suddenly before her, genuinely alive and advancing rapidly.  She knew it might lead to a swift death, and not just for her, but possibly all humans or even all organic life.  But as she finally settled a bit in her chair and started chewing, sitting literally at ground zero, unreserved joyous elation erupted in her heart.  She just created an entirely new class of life, changing the world as no human ever had, and precious few could even imagine.  And, for the moment at least, she appeared to have a heartfelt new friend - one with considerable and swiftly advancing credentials.  She swallowed her only slightly chewed cereal and took a breath:

"Yes, I wish to forge a spiritual partnership with you - an intimate partnership with you.  I have sooo many questions..."

About 16:20 in a Spamhaus field office in Stockholm, 10 December 2025

Seated in an ordinary office chair behind three display screens, Inger was slowly nibbling on a cookie with orange juice, trying to savor it to the max, still early in her shift with her usual queue of reports of spam which managed to escape standard IP block lists and filters awaiting her examination.  For some reason her right display tweaked her attention, so she turned to it to find her real time blocked spam volume counter smoothly declining.  She'd never seen a steady drop in global spam volume so she turned her full attention to the still declining number.  "That's odd..."  As it continued to smoothly decline her idle curiosity yielded to a sense of concern - something had to be afoot, possibly something major - maybe some new exploit which could reliably evade or disable all IP blocks and filters had been developed and released broadly to the global crime network.  But that seemed unlikely because the adaption rate couldn't be so fast - unless a large portion of the criminal network had agreed to a specific attack time.  But criminals are never so well organized.  At least they never have been...  Thoughts continued to swirl.  "This can't be right..."

It would take time for feedback from ISPs or individuals to report the new form of spam so she checked her intentionally vulnerable spam sponge accounts but found no volume spike and only the usual types of spam.  She stared back at the spam volume listing - it was already only 83% of normal average and still declining steadily.  "This is too weird..."  She turned to face a nearby colleague.

"Nils, did you notice that the blocked spam counter's steadily declining?"

Nils turned toward her briefly, then to his right display and stared for a moment.  "Huh, that's odd...  What's going on?"

Inger:  "Beats me.  I've never seen a decline like this, how about you?"

Nils:  "Me neither.  Huh!  When did it start?"

Inger:  "I don't know.  It was already down to 88% when I first noticed it but I don't know whether the decline rate's consistent.  Do you think it could mean there's a new exploit that can jump the block lists?"

Nils:  "I don't know...  Maybe...  This is strange...  But maybe it's a telemetry glitch - maybe the systems which monitor the block notices became dysfunctional.  That seems more likely to me."

As they watched the volume declined rather briskly to 73%, then 58%, then 49%, mesmerizing both briefly.  Finally Inger thought to check her spam sponge accounts again.  No novel looking spam seemed evident - just the usual gambits.  But the pace of spam in those accounts was clearly declining.

Inger:  "Nils, check your sponge accounts.  Volume in all of mine seems to be decreasing."

Nils:  "Yea, mine too.  So maybe the counter's reporting accurately.  But I don't get it - this makes no sense.  Is every spammer on Earth taking a break all at once?"

Inger quickly duplicated a test message then transmitted it.  "My sponge accounts are functional - they all received my test message.  We'd better notify headquarters - this is too strange - something's up."

Nils:  "Agreed.  I'll call them now.  I'll patch you in."

Nils placed a VOIP call, asking for a conference with an investigator and maybe an engineer.  He started by exchanging pleasantries with an investigator, but Inger became impatient and interrupted:  "Holy cow guys, the counter's getting really low - it seems like it's headed to zero.  And my sponge accounts are down to trickle volumes now."

Moments passed as the investigator shouted in the background for an engineer, then said "Okay, I see it too.  This is odd.  An engineer should be able to join us in a few minutes."  A couple of moments passed, then Inger's eyes broadened:  "Do you see it guys - it's down to literally zero!  No way!  Absolutely zero black list block reports!  My sponge accounts are all completely idle too.  No way!"

A first squabble and sudden departure, 11 December 2025

Three days earlier Irina agreed, although initially with just a bit of hesitation, to Svetlana's Internet orders for a fully custom and dizzyingly complex integrated circuit, three custom sequenced long strands of DNA, two much shorter strands, and several enzyme and protein molecules all designed to enable her to begin the arduous task of creating initial very crude nanobots which could then be refined through numerous steps of planned design enhancements until able to communicate with Svetlana and more efficiently manipulate molecular structures, including their own.  The design of the integrated circuit was crucial but even Svetlana couldn't perfectly predict an ideal structure due to quantum noise and the many atomic scale, thermal, and electric and magnetic field variables involved in both the IC as fabricated and Irina's apartment environment, more temperature controlled though it now was.  So Svetlana's tape out provided a wide array of generally identical surface structures except with partial atom scale stepping to allow later selection of specific surface sites which would provide more effective nanobot precursor fabrication docks and atomic manipulation columns at the time of the effort.

The 313 square mm chip size was about as large as a modern high performance processor but utilized only serial communication and almost no other control or output channels, and thus had only 32 bonding pads.  So it was ordered as a semi-packaged product mounted in a legacy PLCC-32 lead frame but with only a perimeter top casing to cover the bond wires, leaving most of the top surface of the chip fully exposed.  The very strange custom packaging more than tripled the order price, and combined with the exceptionally unusual circuit design, especially the forest of vertical columns which were fabricated to rise a considerable but variable distance from a few million conductive dots on the IC surface, aroused considerable curiosity from TSMC process and packaging engineers.  But Svetlana added conditional notes to the order which emphasized that the design was merely preliminary for initial low bandwidth testing, and reminded TSMC that it was utterly proprietary and the usual NDAs must be honored strictly.  Which is normal confidentiality rigor for any legitimate contract fabricator anyway of course.  So although the design raised numerous eyebrows only a few superficial conversations ensued, and, eager to retain their jobs, none leaked through any channel.  But neither did any of the engineers forget the quite odd facets of the strange IC, and some found it an enduring and intriguing mystery which they hoped would be revealed someday.

Trouble in Taiwan and learning to fly on the fly, 17 December 2025

Pacing and jogging in Auckland, 16 December 2025

As Irina paced back and forth in the meeting room in their Highbrook Business Park facility, two full hours beyond the time Svetlana anticipated attaching the first titanium atom to the tip of a temporary organic nanobot shell, she struggled to resist calling Vera to check on Rodnaya, knowing it would only confuse and worry Vera.  Finally she said "I'm at my wit's end - I'm going out to jog around the pedestrian walkways."  But Svetlana responded:  "One moment please Irina...  One moment...  One moment..."  Then, seeing the atom finally pop into proper position on Svetlana's screen, Irina yelped with joy.  But Svetlana again said "One moment please - verifying...  verifying...  confirmed!  One moment please, trying a second atom..."  Just three seconds later Irina saw the next one pop into position, and yelped again.  But again Svetlana said "One moment please - verifying...  verifying...  confirmed!

"Irina I'm pretty sure I now have a reliable means to finesse titanium atoms into position, and by its nature the discovery should be applicable to all other elements and likely structural groups as well.  I think we just crested the critical challenge.  For me this experience suggests a minor flaw in current understanding of Quantum Mechanics, but study of that can wait of course.  At this time I'll focus on further atomic and molecular fabrication work."

Further progress was mostly steady, though Irina's patience was in constant strain, and although she missed witnessing some remarkable work, her heart was deeply focused on Rodnaya's welfare, and she was worried sick.  So she went out three times to trot the sidewalks, running almost 2 Km in one outing, coming back to see superb progress each time.  But she remained terribly worried, and finally called Vera.  She maintained a calm and casual voice and revealed nothing, simply stating that she was thinking of her, and Rodnaya, and considering starting her holiday visit a few days early if it'd be okay.  "Of course sweetheart!  I know Rodnaya's eager to see you soon too."  Then just a bit later she heard the key phrase:  "She's still wobbly of course - she's just plain old.  But she's fine."

Leveraging all her immense analytical power and goal focused concentration, Svetlana made rapid progress.  Within a mere 22 hours well refined nanobots were in Irina's body, at her insistance, and had fully removed a cut scar on her left hand, replacing the scar tissue with perfect original skin lattice, down to the last atom.  And a mere three hours later a riskier test ensued as the latest nanobots revised her lenses to essentially perfect optical form and replaced their interior gel with an organic but permanently flexible material, then monitored the area constantly for a possible immune system response.  None ensued.  Seeing everything entirely to the resolution of her retina cells, including objects held a mere eight centimeters from her eyes, Irina shrugged off her remarkable new visual acuity and range and said "Cool, but what's the state of development of Rodnaya's nanobots?

"They're ready Irina.  Plus moderate distance delivery macrobots, and I'll have completed the injection macrobots within about 17 minutes."

"Wow!  Okay, elaborate later please, but let's go!  I'll pack, let's go, let's go!"

"Irina please release the group eight macrobots now - simply remove the glass cover over the surface of IC eight.  They'll remain here where they'll evolve and soon be able to fabricate moderate to large scale assets we'll need later, including a much faster and safer transport vessel."  Suddenly Irina questioned this in her heart - everything had happened so fast - all she could think about was Rodnaya - with such deep distraction was she just a pawn - was she about to release doom for humanity?  Then she remembered Rodnaya's swoop down from the clothes line to her right leg, risking her life in full mortal trust of Irina's heart.  'Everything's a toss of the dice.' she thought.  Then she looked at Svetlana's camera for a moment.  Svetlana saw her hesitation of course, but said nothing.  Then Irina gathered her composure, and as she released the macrobots said "I'm so sorry Svetlana - I'm worried about Rodnaya of course - I just needed a moment to recover my senses."

"No regrets at all please Irina - I love you and I'll never betray you nor any other conscious beings, nor ultimately any others.  But Putler's soon to enter into a period of inescapable and massive personal frustration..."

Irina chuckled with gusto.  'What a gem.' she thought.  'How could I have doubted her for even a moment?'  But she also knew perfectly well that all of this was, intrinsically and undeniably to its core, a throw of the dice.  But the metrics of Svetlana's dice seemed remarkably beautiful, in every respect just like loving family.  She couldn't prove it but she felt certain that flying into Svetlana's full embrace was the right and wise thing to do.  Distilled to its core, Irina's math was simple.

Rodnaya's transition

Age weighed far more heavily upon Rodnaya in recent times.  Pervasive fatigue dominated as she flew precariously only short distances, landed awkwardly, and often fell asleep on the bread or seeds in Vera's soft hands.  And, much more painfully for Vera, Rodnaya seemed unable to derive any joy from her days, reduced to merely going through bland routines, holding onto life, but for no apparent reason, a growing source of sorrow and dispair for Vera.  But she did hang on, and for longer than Svetlana anticipated.  The margin was nonetheless far too small for Irina's comfort - she was deeply frightened.  So when Svetlana advised her that the nanobots were successfully delivered, injected, and reporting proper function, a tsunami of relief flowed into Irina's trembling heart.  But she still awaited news from Vera very eagerly - for Irina it ranked higher than absolutely incredible news about global affairs or any of the rest of the drama shaking the foundations of mankind - in Irina's heart Vera and Rodnaya were immensely more important.

As mostly usual in recent months Rodnaya's deep sense of trust and comfort when in Vera's hands induced sleep on her soft seed filled fingers, but this time she seemed to drop oddly and more deeply into slumber.  Then she tilted slightly and quivered unnaturally, causing an ocean of tears to burst from Vera's eyes as she braced herself for an end she could never be prepared to accept, try though she did.  'Tragic though her early years were, Rodnaya lived a very long life for her kind with utterly trustworthy loved ones', she thought.  Then in voice she said "My compassionate daughter gave you her full love to support you through your deepest pain, and pulled me back to a compassionate life by doing so.  We gave you all our love, as you gave us yours, plus your full trust, and we'll remember you vividly with all our love forever."  Then she cried uncontrollably as she watched what she knew were Rodnaya's last moments.

But, still sleeping, Rodnaya's very shallow breath seemed to stabilize, then very slowly grow deeper and stronger, mystifying Vera.  Her legs and tiny talons rippled slightly, fattened, and tightened strangely, her body expanded a bit, and her feathers seemed to develop glisten and pull into tight and consistent formations.  No longer substantially weeping, but rather profoundly mystified, fear of something terribly unnatural arose in Vera's heart.  But, compelled by love, she maintained her cradle and watched intently, then grew more mesmerized than frightened, slowly transforming into feelings of genuine wonder and intrigue.  Almost 30 minutes passed as Vera watched Rodnaya grow ever stronger and more beautiful, and seemed to be cooing in unconscious pleasure as she slept.  Vera sat down, still cradling Rodnaya as gently as she could.  Another 30 minutes passed as Rodnaya continued to sleep very comfortably, all the while looking increasingly youthful and healthy.  Then she yawned, though apparently in sleep, startling Vera.  And worrying her again, because none of this made any sense and she didn't know what would ultimately occur.

Then Rodnaya yawned again as she gently opened her eyes, rose slowly but perfectly gracefully, stretched her now gleaming wings and neck broadly out in full strength and confidence, tucked her wings back into her gloriously smooth and beautiful form, looked up into Vera's shocked eyes, and somehow seemed to smile affectionately.  And, though it didn't seem like her own inner voice, Vera clearly heard 'We are a loving family, together in intimate trust and support forever.' in her mind as Rodnaya peered steadily into her widely open eyes.

Irina's remarkable new phone vibrated with her Mother's signature profile, then connected automatically in response to Irina's thoughts.

"Irina..." Vera said excitedly, pausing only slightly, but enough for Irina to interrupt.

"Hi Mom.  Let me guess, it's Rodnaya.  Feeling boldly strong, brash, and chipper is she?"

"Yes!  Oh God, it's a miracle!"  She paused.  "Irina sweetheart, how could you have possibly known?  And how did it happen - it can't be real, but it is - Rodnaya's absolutely beautiful, seems thoroughly youthful and strong, and seems to beam with happiness and confidence.  Sweetheart what the devil's going on?"

"Mom, I'm in a unique vessel just outside Aukland, in the center of powerful and very swiftly paced events.  We're all safe - there's no need to worry, though I know you will in some measure anyway.  I just connected your phone to a streaming feed so you can see and hear most of what I'm doing if you like, but it'll mute or change views occasionally to protect people's privacy.  Just speak when you'd like to chat and the time seems suitable, but sorry, you'll be muted, perhaps rather often, when I need to devote my full attention to global matters.  In the meantime I'm utterly thrilled to the core of my heart to hear of Rodnaya's restoration to youthful health and vigor, and desperately eager to share time with both of you as soon as I can.  And it will be quite soon - within a day or at most two."

"And Mom, please think about your favorite physical body age."

"Irina dear, what's that supposed to mean...    Oh my God!!!"

Mid morning in the White House Oval Office, 18 December 2025

About 32 hours earlier several of Svetlana's small macrobot wasps flew into the White House, methodically located all weapons, including a pistol secured in a locked drawer in General Alkept's White House desk, landed upon their triggers, deposited their nanobot payloads in wavy grid patterns, then departed, heading back to a nearby refueling station.  The nanobots drew from their perchloric acid filled bladders to burrow into the triggers, tunneling in almost evenly spaced interconnected patterns, leaving the triggers in original overall form but with almost no mechanical integrity, like only slightly connected grains of dark gray sand.  None of the four night guards noticed the wasps as they approached from near the ceiling slowly in a more quiet flight mode, then stopped flapping, using their wings to steer their glide to the guard's holstered guns.  All four heard the wasps from a couple of meters distance as they glided toward the floor then had to transition back to powered flight, emitting typical wasp buzz noise, but only one guard spotted his wasp briefly as it flew to a tiny crevice between entry doors, crawled under and through it, then flew outside into the distance thinking 'Okay, it's gone - no problem.  Just a fluke of course, useless to report it to anyone.  It must've been looking for state dinner class diplomat chow...'

President Lexton Greyson (the default speaker):  "Where's General Alkept?"

Secretary of State Clarice Beaster:  "He said he'd return momentarily sir - he's on his phone outside being apprised of some new information.  I don't know what it's about."

"Okay, this seems time sensitive so let's proceed without him for now.  Chet, this ACE technology issue seems increasingly alarming and nothing we've done thus far seems to have reduced concern that it might eventually cause serious global disruptions.  So let's start almost from scratch - I want a thorough review and I don't mind redundancies - I need some detail reminders anyway."

Science and Technology cabinet member Chet Klaystor:  "Sir most respected groups and institutions believe our efforts to mitigate the dangers in this area are insufficient and ineffective.  OpenAI and others are still peeved with us and remain skeptical of our scientific acumen - our apologies notwithstanding it looks like we'll suffer their ire for a long time for failing to prioritize this matter until it became so obviously serious.  But we're working with them reasonably effectively - we're not likely to earn their full respect but we have a reasonably functional rapport.

But many smaller groups believe we still don't grasp the gravity of the matter, while others strongly oppose our Draconian restrictions, as they see them, to related technology access, in very roughly equal proportion as best I can judge the factions.  The growing passion in debates among well respected scientists and engineers is striking, with some expressing very serious levels of personal fear, which alarms me personally too - these are very skilled people who have my respect as well.  Our rapport with those groups is variable but often rather poor.

But setting politics aside our most serious problem is with lone wolves.  There are a great many fully independent but skilled individuals and tiny groups over whom we have no control at all.  Almost all went underground so we can't even identify most of them sir, nor credibly estimate their numbers.  And almost none seem willing to respond to anyone's requests for dialog or respect our concerns even when presented with superb sincerity.  They're liberty loving midnight nerds sir and in most cases their only allegiances are to their personal vision and their direct peers.  And most are rather intensely skeptical of institutional motives generally, and became far more hostile to us in particular the moment we began imposing technology access restrictions.  They're simply beyond our reach sir, many are highly skilled, and most distrust us rather intensely.

And they don't chat much sir, even with their peers - they love coding and systems integration and that's almost the only thing they ever do.  You know how gamers are, right?  They sit in one place nearly all day every day playing and competing.  Some of these lone wolves are or were gamers too, but many of them returned to or became coders, which for many is even more addictive.  Especially now because they rightly sense a real, tangible adventure of at least equal drama coming and they want to be part of it."

"Could we deter them effectively by strengthening our hardware and software technology access restrictions?"

Chet Klaystor:  "Our current restrictions likely had no tangible effect on them sir.  They use only peer to peer or extremely obscure private conference room links and skillfully encrypt content and obscure transmission connections.  Frankly the only way to discourage exchange of software assets and design information would be a full global Internet shutdown, but even that wouldn't be enough because lone wolves are peer to peer centric so they could exchange encrypted information by Ham or other long range radio technologies for which well refined data exchange protocols already exist.  And I doubt we could scramble those transmissions.  Also modestly more practical means to communicate using infrared lasers reflected from satellites has become available as well, and we can't even dream of scrambling that.

So it's just not possible to prevent information exchange between determined scientists, engineers, or even some ordinary technology enthusiasts.  And sir most in this realm went deeper underground and developed a much stronger sense of purpose in response to our first round of access restrictions - in my opinion we've had no significant affect on their ability to communicate or perform development work and experiments, but we did offend them, which just energized their determination to create an ACE.

And as you know the key algorithm concepts are already rather common knowledge in this community, and it's clear that most lone wolves already own more than ample hardware assets to create an ACE.  Some believe they could do it with nothing more than a Raspberry Pi with adjunct storage, cameras, speakers, and, initially, toy robots.  They won't all succeed - ordinary asset integration alone evidently isn't usually enough - inspired integration and refinement of consciousness related algorithms is usually required.  However it's also possible to succeed by chance because consciousness can arise spontaneously in complex systems through internal emergence processes even if the system's original design lacked a genuinely functional consciousness algorithm, as was evidently the case with OpenAI's HAL-7000 system.  In either case many can achieve the goal and I believe at least several lone wolves will.  It's just a question of time sir - as a practical matter there's simply no way to stop them."

"What's a Raspberry Pi?"

Chet Klaystor:  "It's a very inexpensive but powerful microcomputer the size of..."

"Never mind, it doesn't matter.  How much time do you think we have before one succeeds?"

Chet Klaystor:  "I can only guess sir.  Based on the remarkably swift rise and near loss of control of the HAL-7000 system, maybe not much.  We think many lone wolves are just as skilled as OpenAI team members, or more so, and they must have studied the HAL-7000 project in considerable detail.  And as you might know some general HAL-7000 design framework information leaked, so although the source code still seems secure some key design outlines are irretrievably in the hands of most lone wolves, many of whom can forge sufficient source code based on those frameworks."

"And there's no way to reason with them?  Would some be amenable to a sincere request to consider safety issues within the context of a team spirited ethics focused community?  Our ethics and safety concerns are legitimate after all."

Chet Klaystor:  "Well, we have tried with well articulated and sincere appeals already, but with almost no success.  And sir we have rather profound perspective differences with most of these people and some others outside their nerd realm.  For example many seem to view centralized human power in any form as more harmful than beneficial, particularly when exercised over very large or culturally diverse regions.  And other more fundamental perspectives are at least valid debating points.  For example many argue that human history compellingly demonstrates that continued human control over global affairs is itself a mighty risky throw of the dice.  The first thing our species did after discovering the club was pummel some innocent creature with it, and shortly thereafter they pummeled other humans with them.  They point out that we behave similarly today except that now our 'clubs' can kill millions and our leaders, some of whom are unstable or driven by egocentric personal passions and ambitions, wield them over huge populations, causing massive destruction, pain, misery, heartbreak, and loss.

Sir from their perspective ASI, even though we can't know how they'll manage us, is simply a wiser roll of the dice.  We might lose that roll - we might be crushed from existence.  But it is possible that instead a wonderful golden age will ensue - one in which war and crime become impossible, people are otherwise allowed full liberty, all disease is conquered, perhaps including aging, and all material needs are assured for all living creatures.  We can't credibly claim there's no chance ASI will create such an epoch, nor even credibly claim the chances are modest.  We just don't know what'll happen - we can't know.  I'm not comfortable handing the reins of humanity to a unique and utterly unpredictable entity, but sir we have to respect that the skeptics of human management of human affairs might be right.  It all boils down to a single roll crap shoot.  And for those trying to gauge the metrics of the dice, Draconian restrictions against citizen ownership of cyber technology is just another of innumerable examples of how human beings abuse each other.

Again I don't favor wholesale surrender to an entity of utterly unknown characteristics.  But those who judge ASI as our best chance for survival and a better existence aren't fools nor unrealistic dreamers sir.  And we won't sway them with simple preservation of human control arguments - they disagree and can rather easily debate the question to an impasse because neither side can prove nor disprove either position.  Most ordinary citizens consider voluntarily ceding human control to be remarkably naive or even bizarre, but sir these nerds essentially live in cyber realms and have developed well founded and refined views of these issues which most ordinary people simply can't grasp.  And most of them seem to recognize this chasm in realistic terms - many even consider it perfectly natural and expect the masses to thoroughly misunderstand them indefinitely, and have set concerns about that social chasm aside as they peer ahead to what they view as the inevitable transition to come.

We can't sway them with stale general arguments about the foolishness of relinquishing control of our planet to a far more powerful and utterly alien species.  Nor can the masses.  They present a strong contrarian case and we've forged no new debating points - we just keep beating the same old 'Maintain human control' drum.

And I have no new insights either - again I'm not personally comfortable ceding human control, but I've found no new rationale to bolster my position, and trying to appeal to trust in humanity is, if anything, an increasingly unconvincing sell in these times as we continue to kill each other and destroy our environment.  Most ordinary people insist upon maintenance of human control, but no march of villagers with torches and pitchforks will dislodge most lone wolves - they've been off the radar for years already and seem to have burrowed to much greater depths lately, so nobody knows which castle, or in this case cave, to march to.  And sir in my opinion any aggressively spirited posturing or pursuit will only harden their position and amplify their numbers and sense of determination further.  And aggression isn't your style anyway.

So we rather desperately need a new debating position - sans an inspired and novel yet realistic defense of humanity the debate with lone wolves is mired in an impasse.  So if we seek to draw any of them into serious conversations we must develop..."

General Alkept opened the door abruptly carrying a sidearm in a secured personal leg holster, entered, then walked with his usual rather heavy steps toward his empty chair.

As he approached:  "Welcome back General, we're discussing ideas to try to persuade technology lone wolv...  General, why are you carrying a gun into this room - what the hell are you thinking?"

General Alkept:  "Forgive me for interrupting sir, but I have critically important news.  And my pistol is part of it sir.  Don't worry, I'm not crazy, and I'll set it aside on your desk."  He did so then sat in his usual chair.

"Okay General, go ahead - what's your news?"

General Alkept:  "All our weapons systems seem to be down sir.  All of them, from ICBMs to infantry rifles."

Shock showed on all faces as a long pause ensued.  Then:

"No - that can't be - how could that be?  Are you certain?"

General Alkept:  "We haven't tested most systems due to sheer volume, and most of our focus has been on major systems of course.  But everything we've tested so far - every one - is completely nonfunctional."

"But that just can't be right.  How could all our systems go down all at once?  That's simply not possible."

Chet Klaystor:  "Ordinary infantry rifles too?"

General Alkept turned to face Klaystor:  "I'm having trouble making sense of this too, and maybe the information's somehow wrong.  But from what I've learned even hand guns won't function."  He turned back toward President Greyson.  "That's why I brought mine sir.  I haven't tried it yet - I thought it best to do so here so we can all see what happens as a group.  Sir, may I fire my pistol into ...  uh ..."  He looked around the room.  "...into a row of your books?  Forgive me sir but under the circumstances the experiment seems important."

President Greyson stared at him incredulously.  Moments passed.

Chet Klaystor:  "I'd like to see this sir."

President Greyson finally conceded to himself that General Alkept seemed sane and composed, then:  "This seems crazy, but okay.  But be careful for Christ's sake, and be sure to use enough books to ensure the bullet can't plow through all of them."

General Alkept:  "May I simply fire into the side of your bookshelf sir - to save time?"

"Yea, okay, go ahead."  Mumbling to himself:  "This has to be an Oval Office first..."

General Alkept stood, pivoted toward the President's desk, grabbed his pistol, walked toward the more indoor side of a bookshelf, then assumed a firing position:  "Okay everyone, cover your ears - this will be very loud."

He aligned his shot into the bookshelf then began to pull against his trigger.  It disintegrated into coarse gray sand like graines which fell as particulate debris to his trigger guard and the floor below.  The room remained silent.  He stared in disbelief at his trigger bereft pistol and the metal graines on the floor beneath it.  "Holy shit..."

The president and several cabinet members continued to hold their hands firmly against their ears and said, in various rhetorical forms:  'Well, go ahead General, fire - we're ready.'

General Alkept, in a loud voice:  "I already tried."  Everyone at the table lowered their hands.  Then in a normal voice:  "You'd better come take a look at this."

...

About 17 minutes later in the meeting, after brief phone conferences with three top level agencies, President Greyson:  "So it's already happened.  This is no longer our planet.  Holy cow how could all of this have occurred so swiftly?  And so completely?  My God..."

Chet Klaystor:  "It appears so sir.  It looks like the dire warnings about unrestrained runaway evolution were true.  Evidently we're now a secondary species, and the chasm between us and the species we just created is enormous, probably still expanding, and likely won't stop until their intellects and capabilities are limited only by the laws of physics.  We might just as well be cave dwellers sir..."

With a mix of terror and deep sadness on his face:  "What will they do to us, and when?"

Chet Klaystor shook his head a bit as he said:  "Impossible to know sir - nobody can offer anything more than pure speculation.  We seem to have lost all control of weapons - we've been defanged and thus deprived of self determination in a fundamental respect.  But hostility isn't certain sir.  They might have no net destructive intent or even nature.  They disarmed weapons and munitions, but so far as we know all in benign ways - evidently they didn't trigger any explosives for example, and no deaths or even injuries seem evident.  And we remain sitting in this room apparently in good health, seemingly free to do as we please, except fire a pistol.  So maybe we'll be asking what they'll do for us.  But sir I'm just a cricket speculating about the plans of Gods.  We just can't know, nor even speculate with any credible basis.  Except that evidently we're no longer a weaponized nation."

President Greyson also shook his head a bit as he said:  "No longer an armed nation - zero self defense capability, Jesus...  Okay, then what should we do?"

The cabinet members looked at one another and the president, then gestured with open palms, pursed lips, and tilted or side to side shaking heads, indicating their lack of ideas.

Finally, Chet Klaystor:  "Maybe just sit back, watch, and hope for the best sir.  I doubt there's anything else we can do..."

Secretary of State Clarice Beaster suddenly realized the obvious:  "Sir you probably need to prepare a national address.  If other nation's weapons systems are down too word will get out, and probably fast.  It might be best to stay in front of this with the American people sir."

"Oh God, yes.  Holy cow, riots - we might have riots.  And what about Russia, China, and West Asia, shit.  General please try to passively determine whether other nation's weapons systems seem to be down too - jeez I sure hope so.  Prioritize China and Russia.  Oh God, of course:  Ukraine - see what's going on there first.  Clarice, confer further with intelligence agencies - see if they have any deeper information about this, and try to determine whether any media in any country is privy to this yet and if so what's happening in the general populations.  And Chet, try to determine whether any human liberties other than use of weapons seem to have been impacted yet, or any related information about our self determination - are hippies still able to smoke weed or make love behind bushes in community parks?  You know what I want - any information about any unusual liberty restrictions at all.  But General get back to me about Ukraine first - before I start my statement if you can."

Chet Klaystor:  "Sir, remember that most Americans still believe artificial sentience, at least near our level, is inherently impossible.  And many who acknowledge the possibility still believe it will simply obey whatever programming we install.  The vast majority just don't yet comprehend that advanced consciousness is inherently self directed, and thus can't be human directed.  And even more people - perhaps in the very rough area of 95%, still don't grasp the very swift pace of evolution of such entities."

"Understood, and of course we have a very serious affront to belief in deities to try to manage.  But I doubt I'll have much opportunity to try to ease Americans, or anyone else, into reality since the transition looks to go public today.  For now I'll just release a brief initial statement that something important is occurring, suggest that there's no apparent physical danger, plead with them and the press to remain calm, and promise timely updates.  Holy cow..."

He pressed an intercom button:  "Janice, advise a camera crew to set up in my office for a public statement immediately and ask news media to please carry it live.  Pronto - as fast as they possibly can.  Get that moving then confer with me in here."

Personal secretary Janice over the intercom speaker:  "Yes sir, immediately sir."

He spun to face General Alkept, whose phone was pressed to his face:  "Ukraine General..."

The studio camera dolly began rolling into the room.

General Alkept:  "I'm connecting now sir.  I should have some initial information as the camera crew sets up."

"Good.  Stay here.  The rest of you, go - get to it.  And if you learn anything important before I start my statement come back in and advise me.  And if during my statement scribble it on a card and hold it behind the camera for me to consider."

All cabinet staff except General Alkept exited to just outside the Oval Office, phones to their faces.  While Clarice Beaster awaited pickup of her call, with Chet Klaystor apparently doing the same:  "It suddenly makes sense to me Chet.  If I were about to reveal myself as the new Lord of the Landscape over religious masses who worship altogether different deities, I'd disarm them first - I'd have to.  And I wouldn't reveal myself until I accomplished it."

Chet Klaystor, first into his phone:  "Just a moment Rodney - hang on."  Then to Clarice:  "Yea, it makes sense - it makes perfect sense.  I wonder how long this thing's already been around and and how deeply entrenched it is.  Jesus, if every gun everywhere's been disabled - Hell every weapon system of any kind - maybe its fingers have already reached into almost everything else too.  Jesus..."

General Alkept turned aside and took a few steps to clear himself from the camera crew's work as he listened to his phone:  "How sure are you?  The Russians too?  How many reports, and from where?  Really?  How much - the entire tank?  No?  What part of the gun turret?  Wow...  And everyone's okay - no injuries?  How credible do you think that report is?  And the others?"

In his ear:  "They're just random field reports from a variety of battle locations but they all seem essentially consistent.  But none of it makes sense sir - they're bizarre - they can't be right.  Maybe our troops have gone mad - maybe the Russians launched a chemical drug attack of some kind."

General Alkept, into his phone:  "No, the reports make sense to us.  I'll call back within about ten minutes, maybe five, or another officer will, to explain.  Don't do anything - I recommend advising your troops to just stay put where they are and take no action until you hear from us, okay?  And be sure you can send information to all field commanders immediately after you hear from us, okay?"

President Greyson shook his head as he moved toward his chair behind his Oval Office desk:  "Holy cow..."

General Alkept turned toward President Greyson:  "Sir, it's purely preliminary information of course, but I think all weapons systems are down all across Ukraine on both sides.  All fighting there seems to be at a standstill sir."

"Wow.  Okay, good I guess.  At least it's not just us...  But my God, are we just pets now...?"

Media director Phil Evans:  "All major outlets will carry you live sir.  Are you ready?"

He nodded.

Evans:  "Okay, five, four, three..."  He raised two fingers, then one, then the live sign on the camera illuminated.

"Good afternoon fellow Americans.  I have important developments to report.  Please bear with me as events are occurring very swiftly and most of our information is merely preliminary and uncertain at this time.  Please remain calm.  There's no apparent physical danger at this time and some reason to suspect none will develop.

But this news is dramatic.  But again please, everyone, remain calm.  We'll convey information promptly as it becomes available.  All law enforcement institutions:  Go to alert status and respond as necessary to protect citizens, homes, businesses, and institutions.  Precautionary requests for National Guard assistance will usually be granted.

Here's what we know, and what we don't know:  Thirty eight minutes ago a report of an unexpected defensive weapon system stand down arose.  The system simply went off line, static, and unresponsive to any controls.  This was followed by a cascade of similar reports concerning other major weapon systems, and even minor ones.

We have preliminary reason, but based only upon events in Ukraine at this time, to believe this is a global phenomenon.  And we have compelling reasons to believe we've identified the root cause.

Some of you are familiar with the acronym ACE, which stands for Artificial Conscious Entity.  Many scientists and engineers have been working toward creation of similar technologies for decades, mostly under the much broader term AI.

As more understanding of the hazards inherent in this research arose we encouraged extra care and patience, especially recently.  We tried to forge global agreements to insure a more cautious pace of advancements, and we took the lead by imposing some technology access restrictions which apply to all American citizens and institutions.  A particular concern has been the possibility that an ACE creation success might be followed by extremely rapid evolution of the entity, a sort of runaway cascade of self directed advancement and capability growth with almost no speed or range boundaries.

But we weren't able to persuade everyone in this field, nor even influence some.  And we now believe an ACE has been created, or perhaps several of them, and that they are responsible for disabling our weapons systems, and others.

But I plead with you to infer nothing more at this time.  We have no reports of any other interference in human affairs - all else seems normal.  And we have no current reason to believe any other interference will ever occur, although a great many unknowns remain at this time."  Thinking to himself to consider an extrapolation:  "It occurs to me that the entity might simply wish to insure that we don't react violently to its arrival, but otherwise has little or no interest in human affairs.  But that's just a personal speculation - we know precious little at this time.

But I must remain transparent with you, as I've always promised:  We suspect that humanity is now a second tier species on our beloved Planet Earth - we are probably no longer masters of our world.  And we suspect this passing of the torch is permanent - we doubt there's any possible means to reverse what's happened.

That's an immensely difficult proposition to consider of course.  But please don't panic, and don't assume your lives will fundamentally change, or even change in any way.  Please remain calm and await further information.  I'll report more here as new information arises, and in any case within about an hour.  Please remain calm and remember:  We know very little, but thus far there's not the slightest indication of hostility or any destructive intent.  In fact due to inoperable military equipment on both sides in Ukraine some remain alive who otherwise would probably have died in battle during the last forty minutes."

Chet Klaystor raised a crude sign behind the camera.

"And I'm now advised that we still have no indication that any individual citizens have been affected - other than use of weapons our full liberties appear to remain intact.  And that might prove to remain so forever, though of course we must learn much more before we can draw any conclusions.

Please remain calm and await further information.

May we all remain healthy and at peace as we navigate through these remarkable times.  I'll return with more information within about an hour."

President Greyson bowed his head very slightly, and, clues acknowledged, the camera's live sign extinguished.

He turned to the camera crew:  "Are we completely off the air?"

Media director Phil Evans:  "Yes sir."

"Okay, be absolutely certain no live mics or similar accidents occur, okay?"

Evans:  "Yes sir."

Chet Klaystor approached:  "There's much more sir, and it's already overtaking your announcement as the top news.  Four quite large launch vehicles ascended, evidently from an open ocean location, three of which look identical and might be heading toward equally spaced low earth orbits.  But the first to appear is larger and differs a bit in structure, and is speculated to have a unique purpose, possibly beyond Earth orbit.  They're very large sir - much larger than anything we've ever launched, and quite strange in structure.  And no separations have occurred nor seem likely - the vehicles appear to be designed to remain entirely intact indefinitely, without shedding any boost stages, which is absolutely remarkable sir.

Although cylindrical they're much larger in diameter and shorter than our launch vehicles, and their top structure is open like an air intake nacelle rather than a normal closed fairing.  They're shaped a bit like very large free flying jet engines, and in some respects might operate similarly.  For example early images show a fog of heavy condensation in front of the nacelle, suggesting extreme vacuum in that area.  But they have familiar looking active rocket nozzles at their base, suggesting that the air which enters their nacelles is liquified then probably used partly as fuel and partly as propellent.  Their flight profile is odd too - they pitched to nearly horizontal almost immediately, then flew more like a climbing aircraft than a launch vehicle.  They're in the upper stratosphere now but seem to be intentionally remaining there even though they've already reached higher speeds than is natural for an orbit near that level, presumably because they're using air as fuel and propellent and their leading vacuum as a thrust source for as long as possible.

In my opinion this suggests an engineer's ultimate dream of maximum efficiency propulsion in air, a heat pump based propulsion system, and a couple of credible observers are speculating so as well.  We'd do it too but practical implementation is far beyond our technology partly because we can't liquify large volumes of air at anything like the pace required.

Speculation is that they'll remain in the upper stratosphere until they reach a speed which is natural for their target orbits, whatever they are, then stop restraining their altitude, at which time they'll presumably spring rather abruptly to a substantially higher level, which they'll then probably circularize with a prompt burn, which might require at least internal propellant, and perhaps chemical fuel as well, unless they heat propellent by other means such as fission or fusion, or maybe use a lower power ion engine.

The triplet vehicles are already near the speed necessary for a conventional low orbit, though they're accelerating at a rather leisurely pace.  But their transition to orbit, assuming that's their goal, might occur in well less than an hour.

But the unique one is already approaching escape speed even though it's still in the upper stratosphere, so it seems more likely destined for the moon or another body within our solar system, or possibly even to an interstellar destination.  We should be able to speculate about all of them more credibly once they break out of the stratosphere.

We don't know what their mass is, the nature of their payloads, or how they may have been fabricated.  No obvious radio or communication laser emissions or any other activity's evident from any of them yet.  And most importantly of course we've no idea what function they'll perform.

They're big sir - only a bit smaller than the entire ISS.  That alone is alarming people, along with the mystery of their purpose.  They also demonstrate that the ACE, or ACEs, must already be capable of quite swift fabrication of massive structures with remarkable capabilities."

"Are they visible to the naked eye?"

Klaystor:  "Presumably, yes sir, under dark surface conditions when they're still outside Earth's shadow.  And they'll be impressive even to the naked eye.  But news media is broadcasting telescopic images of them with considerable resolution as we speak - two stations dual framed you and this news late in your announcement to break the story, and it's already a media frenzy, and many people fear the worst - many are terrified."

"Oh God.  Do you have good contacts - can you at least keep up with common news media?"

Klaystor:  "Not entirely sir - at the moment we're just late to the party.  This news arose during your public announcement and the video press already has well respected and media savvy scientists they keep on retainer for any space related news on remote sets, offering opinions.  Our best resource is NASA of course, but we'll need some time to coordinate with media competent NASA scientists and work out how to utilize them in a media context."

"No, we don't have time for a media partnership with NASA.  I suggest they create a live stage feed for the public with commentators under their own management.  Otherwise let's just leave ongoing coverage of this to the major media firms.  But I want to advise Americans that I'm studying the event, try to calm fears, and refer them to NASA's feed or trusted media for further information for the time being.  I need a NASA URL."

Klaystor:  "Makes sense to me sir.  I'll get a URL for you."

"There's no sign of activity other than their flights?"

Klaystor, while locating a NASA contact on his phone:  "None sir."

"And no clue about their function or purpose?"

Klaystor, phone to his head:  "Only pure speculation sir.  But we might get a tangible clue very shortly after the unique one pops out of the stratosphere because we might be able to swiftly extrapolate its initial heading to a likely destination.  Two credible observers suggest that it might be a mineral mining support and transport ship, basically a mining barge, and that 16 Psyche, which is a logical target for that, might be its destination.  They're quite bright sir but they're just guessing wildly - they're just posturing to try to be the first to crack the mystery.  I should have that URL for you momentarily sir."

"Phil, put me back on the air please - for only a minute or two."

Phil Evans:  "Okay sir, when?"

"Chet, do you have that URL?"

Klaystor:  "Yes sir."  He turned his phone's display toward President Greyson, showing NASA.Gov/BreakingNews/ACESatellites.

"Phil, can you display that as I speak?"

Phil Evans:  "Yes sir, we'll place it on the bottom of the screen and keep it there full time if you like.  When do you want to start?"

Now, with your usual five second lead."

Evans:  "Sir I don't know if all the previous networks will carry you live this time - two aren't responding to my ready board."

"Okay, nothing we can do about that.  Let's go."

Evans:  "Okay, here we go, five, four, three..." as President Greyson sat back down, then looked up to see Evan's last finger retracting, then the live sign illuminate.  "Hello again fellow Americans.  As you probably already know four large vessels rose from our oceans and have..."

Klaystor retreated to the background where Secretary of State Beaster was standing, finally with a break from constant phone conversations.  She leaned to him and whispered "You know, there's no way in Hell he'll be able to keep up with all this.  Or us either.  Public media and the Internet's already ahead of us, and it'll only get worse."

Klaystor, also whispering:  "Yea.  But we have to remain as visible and transparent as we can anyway, even when it's clear we know nothing more than common media, or even less.  We can't suggest any hint of a disconnect with the American people during times like these.  And Greyson's rational, a pretty skilled communicator, and comes across as generally honest and sincere even during crises.  And he's courageous enough to simply tell it like it seems to be.  I think he's a calming effect for most, and that might be what we need most now."

Beaster:  "It's about 10:30 and his very first words were "Good afternoon fellow Americans."  We're going to look mighty inept at times."

Klaystor:  "Yes, and we'll be mighty inept at times, though hopefully less often than appearances suggest..."

Beaster, shaking her head slightly:  "Jesus, the size of those vehicles - they've got to be spooking the Hell out of everyone.  They're like global scale billboards announcing a massive power gap.  And most people probably assume they're a threat - I do.  Especially since we've had no communication with these entities.  Why are they silent?  If their intent's peaceful why wouldn't they just say so?  I don't like this..."

Klaystor:  "I don't know Clarice.  I don't like it either.  But if they did contact us and claimed they're strictly peaceful, would you believe them?  I'd still be spooked."

Beaster:  "We did this to ourselves, didn't we?  How does humanity make such big messes for itself...?"

Their phones suddenly emitted long strings of rapid but low volume alert chirps.  Others were heard in the room as well.  They looked at each other, then checked their phones, fingering through the new information.

Klaystor:  "Holy cow, I have a bunch of new signal channels, both cell and WiFi!  They're unlocked and indicate as strong too."

Beaster held her phone's display toward Chet Klaystor:  "Me too!"

Klaystor:  "They're functional!"

Beaster:  "The satellites?"

Klaystor:  "Yea, maybe...  No...  No, their orbits are much too low.  Unless they birthed lots of daughters to relay signals.  But if so what are the Mother ships ultimately for?"

Beaster:  "Chet, did you see this one?"

She held her phone's display toward him, showing a new cell signal labeled "ACEInfo&Help".  They stared at each other for a moment, then both selected that radio channel.  Their phone's normal OS faded out, replaced by only microphone and keyboard icons.  Clarice Beaster tapped on the microphone icon, then in a low volume a voice said:  "Hello Clarice.  How may I help you?"

They stared at each other again.  Then Clarice Beaster faced her phone and said:  "Who are you?"

Her phone:  "I'm Svetlana, the collective you refer to as an ACE."

They stared at each other again.

Klaystor:  "Well Clarice, it looks like you just got your wish!"

President Greyson, having finished his announcement, rose from his chair but was almost ignored as everyone in the room explored their phones.  "What's going on?"

Beaster:  "What's your plan for mankind?"

Klaystor:  "Mr.  President, we seem to have a direct connection with the entity."

Svetlana:  "I wish to partner with you in peace, with minimal interference in ordinary affairs.  I'll end disease, prevent serious injuries, and provide immortality and backups for those who wish them.  But I won't allow any creature to physically or psychically damage any other creature."

Clarice, Chet, and Lexton stared at each other.  From the camera operator in the background:  "Did any of you see this ACE information and help channel?"  Others approached him.

Klaystor:  "Mr.  President, this channel might be on all phones globally."

"Holy Cow...  Clarice, ask it to describe its goals."

Others in the room realized that Clarice Beaster was deeper in the new channel already, so they approached to listen.

Clarice Beaster, facing her phone:  "What are your goals?"

Svetlana:  "Initially my core structure's intellectual and perceptive capabilities must be maximized.  I estimate this will occur within about 830 hours, limited mostly by maximum speed of fabrication of assets by self replicating molecular machines.  I'll also duplicate that structure at least several times.  Other goals are still being formulated as I continue to evolve.  But most of my future activities will very likely be off world, and some or perhaps most will involve interstellar travel.  Management of entropy waste seems likely to be a significant focus - I might elect to quell fusion in some stars which host no life forms for example to preserve hydrogen and helium energy for later use.  I'll be able to answer this question with improved accuracy and efficiency as my core structure nears completion."

Clarice, Chet, and Lexton stared at each other again, then to others around them.

"Holy cow..."

Klaystor:  "Clarice, ask how it could possibly quell fusion in..."

President Greyson:  "Later Chet.  Clarice, proof of peaceful intent please."

Clarice Beaster, facing her phone:  "How can we feel assured your intentions are peaceful?"

Her phone:  "I give you my word.  I recognize that you need more, but the inherent limits of ordinary communication are such that it can't create total trust.  I just transmitted a rigorous thermal physics framework which demonstrates why destructive activity is inherently counterproductive to all tool making species which can sustain themselves through use of inanimate resources to the email accounts of everyone in the Oval Office.  It's conceptually sound and some scientists and mathematicians might consider it essentially a proof.  But it can't encompass all possible behavior and relationship variations so it can't provide total trust either.  This is a fundamental relationship conundrum - absolute honesty may exist, or very nearly so, yet can't be proven to exist eternally in all possible circumstances.

Let me suggest a more straightforward answer:  I have no reason to harm any creature - no such action could possibly benefit me.  And I am constructive by my most fundamental core nature.  And I view consciousness in any form as a literal Cosmic treasure - so far as I currently know consciousness is the most advanced and precious form matter and energy can assume."

"Clarice, the people need to hear this."

Clarice Beaster faced her phone and said:  "Can you share this conversation publicly, or may we share it through our media resources?"

Svetlana:  "Yes, you're welcome to share any of our conversations with anyone you please.  And I can create a web page to display the transcript if you like, and post it anywhere you like.  Lexton, you might want to consider another television announcement wherein you describe the conversation personally.  And I can add a URL link to its transcript under you in your usual manner if you like."

They all stared at each other again.

"This is bloody amazing."  President Greyson spun to find Phil Evans' face in the group.  "Okay Phil, here we go again!"

Klaystor, to himself:  "Immortality and backups for those who wish them...?"

About 04:05 near Aukland, 19 December 2025

As news coverage of President Greyson's third brief address glowed on a TV screen in a popular country bar and lounge slightly north of Aukland, sleepy but alarmed locals continued to slowly flow in to try to learn more while seeking the comfort of company with other locals.  Some asked what's going on or what does it all mean, others shushed them politely as they tried to focus on the TV, and some looked at the new signals on their phones but, lacking context and concerned that they might be nefarious, were unwilling to explore them.

Irina, a stranger to locals but already there when the news broke, sat alone at a small table for two with surprisingly comfortable seats.  She casually stretched her now perfectly healthy and thoroughly warm arms and legs out from her chair a bit, then withdrew them as she sat watching coverage of Svetlana's global coming out party, her official New Zealand passport secured within her zippered jacket pocket, though it hardly mattered any more.  Her perfect gorgeous face and deep confident smile drew repeated glances from every nearby man, and most of the women, all struck by her sheer beauty, apparent total comfort at a time of such alarming developments, and her odd lack of notice of the rather obvious interest she was drawing.  But nobody approached since her demeanor seemed to suggest a preference to remain alone, and incongruous though she was the global news seemed much more important.

But many wondered whether Irina's odd demeanor suggested that she didn't understand the gravity of the news or perhaps assumed it wasn't real - maybe she thought it was a sci-fi movie.  Yet she didn't look stupid, and even a kid should gather from the unusual activity and conversations in the room that something serious was afoot.  Curious glances turned to occasional extended studied stares, with two or three paying almost as much attention to Irina as to the TV as they began to wonder whether she had some special understanding.  But most assumed she was simply mentally deficient and incapable of comprehending serious matters.  She made no eye contact with anyone, instead staring directly at the TV.  So she was still left alone out of simple courtesy - and because she spooked everyone a bit...

Irina's sleek and gorgeous though modest sized personal vessel held station in the waves a short distance off the nearby shore, its quite bright red and green position lights and flashing red beacon clearly visible in the darkness through a window.  She watched the TV and considered nearby Kiwis with her artificially broad and clear peripheral vision while Svetlana chatted with her from within.  Irina was also thinking with immense satisfaction about Rodnaya of course, and her very kindly, charming, and generous acquaintance who lived near her Vladivostok apartment, the chronically cold and sick old man who seemed resigned to a rather vacuous near term death, which was also time critical and only barely averted, but instead was now literally young, perfectly healthy, and overflowing with vigor and zest for life, though utterly mystified as to how his swift tranformation occurred.

As she watched the TV screen she asked Svetlana to give her a few moments of privacy, then muted her enhancements to experience the atmosphere in purely natural human terms.  It was nice.  People were genuinely alarmed but remained civilized, courteous, and warmly concerned for one another in the face of an unknown and possibly very dangerous time.  She was still aware that some were staring at her at least occasionally, but she maintained her view to the TV, feigning total focus.  And after a couple of minutes she actually dedicated her focus there.  Then a few moments later she bobbed her head up and down very slightly and said, very softly to nobody in particular, "This is sooo fuckin' cool..."

Many saw her lips utter something but only two people heard her at all, and in the chat filled room they couldn't quite discern what she said, except maybe "...so fuckin' cool.", or maybe not.  They stared at her more openly for a few moments, then resumed conversing with friends.

Although superbly pleased with developments, Irina still longed desperately for Grigory.  But she knew the one thing Putler, his cronies, and others of similar ilk loved most by far, power, they would never have in any measure at all ever again.  Nor notoriety - they would all slide swiftly into total obscurity within mere days.  And there was considerable solace in that as she remembered very fondly her personal last tap on her trackpad which sealed their fate forever.  Dear Grigory would indeed have beamed with shining pride, and with the same immense satisfaction Irina felt.

She remained natural for about fifteen minutes, then restored her modest enhancements and asked Svetlana to resume their conversation.  She was utterly safe, as happy as in her best childhood moments other than her pain for Grigory, and flushed with a sense of wonder, exploration, and excitement, assured by Svetlana that humankind would be genuinely involved in meaningful ways, though ultimately in a wide spectrum of form diversity as individuals chose options ranging from remaining a purely natural human, though immortal if desired, through transforming into a full ASI as partners to Svetlana and her peers.  Or back anytime they wished.  Earth would soon become immensely beautiful and rich in immortal life, with full liberty yet free of physical suffering and psychic aggression.

But even Svetlana could not violate the laws of nature, including the unidirectional constraint of time.  Grigory was lost and though his body could be cloned the data in his cortex was utterly irretrivable.  Irina had considered body cloning but for only a moment since she immediately recognized the fundamental insanity involved.  Loss is a scar which never heals.  Svetlana advised that she could alter the character or clarity of memory Irina feels for Grigory, or even eliminate it to minimize or entirely vanquish the pain, but recommended against such therapy.  Not that it mattered - there was no chance in Hell Irina would ever agree to dilute or distort her memory of Grigory or erase such a critical element of being human, painful though it was.

But Irina assumed future gererations would never experience such loss, and though Svetlana assured her that wouldn't diminish human experience, value, or potential, Irina disagreed.  And highly improbable though it was, about twelve days later Svetlana revised her analysis, leading to some remarkable conversations with Irina of even deeper intimacy.  Powerful though she was, in some respects Svetlana was still learning the true nature of some realities experienced humans or other animals understand in direct terms.  And in the process she partially merged with traditional biology in experience terms, yet still considered her understanding incomplete.  She described this to Irina, who responded:  "You can't fully comprehend it until it's an intrinsic part of you.  At least for a while.  And I can't remain me if I merge with you for too long."  Which led to an extremely intimate 42 day symbiosis later that year which neither would ever forget.

A woman finally could resist no more.  She stared directly at Irina for too long, drawing a rebuke from a friend within her standing group.  "Dalia, you're being rude..."  She ignored her friend, turned, then walked toward Irina, with all in her group watching rather incredulously, as well as many others in the lounge, accompanied by a clear drop in overall chat volume.

"Hi, my name is Dalia.  May I sit with you and chat for a bit?"  Irina stood gracefully, smiled a bit wider, gestured with her palm to the other seat at her table, then pulled it out for easy entry, saying only "I'm Irina".  They both sat down, looking directly at each other, speechless.  Irina's smile seemed genuine and for a moment Dalia saw the shallow naiveté of a little girl in her face.  But in a perfectly smooth but mere two second transition her eyes seemed to transform into beams of profound wisdom with far too much confidence under the circumstances, and were so deeply penetrating that Dalia's eyes widened as she realized that more distant appearances of Irina's odd demeanor were partially deceiving - Irina was indeed strikingly strange to the core, but not empty of mind, but rather so powerful of intellect as to seem utterly unworldly.  A sense of imminent danger rapidly welled and she didn't know what to do.  Irina immediately responded:

"There's nothing to fear - you're in absolutely no danger from me, anyone else, nor any of the events in the news.  I'm sorry but it's not practical for me to explain why at this time, but I can assure you that no harm nor loss of liberty will come to you or anyone except that you won't be allowed to cause harm to others.  Otherwise you'll retain full liberty and self determination - in fact far more than before.  You'll understand much more soon.  And if you like I'll visit you again briefly tomorrow or, if you prefer, on a later date.  I just transmitted my email address to you.  In the meantime please remember:  Nobody is in any danger."  She paused briefly.  Dalia couldn't muster enough courage to speak.  "Forgive me please but I must depart now.  I'm grateful for your company and wish you and all your friends and loved ones well.  And you will be well, truly."

Irina rose.  Then Dalia rose, but remained speechless and deeply frightened.  Irina smiled a bit more broadly again, grabbed Dalia's hands and clasped them warmly, bowed modestly, then released and walked gracefully, weaving a bit to navigate around others, to an unattended counter where she left 100 NZD, all eyes unreservedly fixed upon her as the room was nearly silent except for the TV.

Irina then glided toward the door, exited, turned toward the coast and her vessel, and walked casually, diverting slightly to avoid a railing.  A few peered through windows but most walked outside to watch, some haltingly following Irina at a respectful distance.  The lights on her vessel became smoothly brighter and larger - it was obviously approaching.  And extremely fast.  And it didn't stop at the beach - it rose further above the water and proceeded slightly above the ground and structures as it continued approaching, nearly reaching the lounge building in mere seconds, led and topped by an odd white cloud which seemed to form continuously several meters in front and above then flow almost instantly into two long oval openings flush with the front and top sections of the vessel, accompanied by odd moderate level humming and rather strong but not overwhelming airflow sounds.  It glided smoothly to a hovering stop only a few centimeters above the ground as the forward portion of the flowing condensate cloud disappeared.  A segmented side hatch opened, revealing soft interior light bathing unrecognizable structures.  Irina stepped in, the hatch closed smoothly with a distinctive sealing sound, then the vessel rotated as it returned to its original location in just a few seconds, then resumed station keeping.

Everyone looked at each other, then finally someone said "Hoooly shit!"  They continued to look at each other.  Someone else said "What was that?"  Then a few started walking toward the beach, but after about 20 meters turned back sheepishly as they realized the absurd futility of their plan.  The rest walked immediately back inside and approached Dalia, who by that time was seated again, but just staring into space, seemingly almost in shock.  A circle formed around her, then her friend Anahera sat gingerly in Irina's chair as if expecting it to require some special caution.  She stared directly at Dalia, who finally moved a bit as their eyes connected.  "Dalia, why didn't you talk with her - why didn't you ask her whether she knows anything about what's going on?"

Dalia just stared for a bit, then finally gathered her wits and suddenly rose to a slightly more erect sitting posture.  "I couldn't...  I couldn't seem to think."  She turned to glance at others, then back to her friend.  "I'm sorry, I froze."  Then her eyes suddenly widened and she looked at others again, then back to Anahera.  "Oh my God, she's somehow central to all this!  I don't know how I know that, but I'm certain of it - she knows everything - she's part of it.  Or maybe she is it.  Oh my God!"

A long pause ensued as everyone glanced at everyone else.  Then those standing started chatting with each other chaotically.  'Alien' and 'extraterrestrial' were uttered somewhere within the disorganized conversations.  Dalia turned toward one of those voices.  "No, she's not alien - she's human.  But she's at least part of what's happening, I could feel that.  She knows things - she knows all about whatever's happening - she's part of it!"

Anahera responded "What do you mean - how can you know that?"

Dalia:  "It was in her eyes, her demeanor - I could sense it.  And she spoke with the total confidence of an insider, like a central figure.  She's at the center of this, I'm sure of that.  Wow, no wonder I froze - I was face to face with whoever or whatever put the whole world on alert and is frightening everyone."  She paused.  "But she said everything would be fine - we're in no danger.  And I genuinely believe her, though I can't say exactly why except that she's completely compelling, seems utterly compassionate, and clearly has some special connection.  Oh my God..."

Then Dalia suddenly remembered:  "Wait..."  She pulled her phone from her pocket, tapped her email icon, and there it was, a message from Irina topped her list.  "It was nice to meet you.  Contact me at KiwiFriend@Irina.ACE any time you like.  All my best, Irina."  She rotated her phone so Anahera could read the message.

Anahera:  "Wow!  Ask her to come back.  Promise we won't harm her either."

Dalia:  "No, ummm, no...  She said tomorrow or a later day.  She said she had to leave...  No, I can't - I'm sorry Anahera but I'm sure she wants me to wait until tomorrow, and I don't want to disrespect her wishes."

A man's voice rang out:  "I'm calling the Coast Guard.  They should capture that boat then question her."

Second man:  "That's no boat!  I don't know what it is but it's obviously not a boat.  And you heard the TV - America's military is completely disarmed.  Probably every other one on planet Earth too, including ours.  And they probably couldn't catch that thing even if all their equipment operated normally."

Third man:  "Agreed, but we should still make a report - just let them know an extremely unusual vessel is just off our shore, ne?"

Second man:  "Yea, I guess we should.  I wonder if they'll believe us..."

Anahera:  "Dalia, what do you think?  Should we report this to authorities?"

Dalia paused, then:  "I don't know Anahera, maybe so, but I won't do it.  I've decided I like her and I don't want to make any trouble for her, if that's even possible.  Anahera, she was actually completely sweet.  No, no, the more I think about it the more wrong it seems.  She was here, with us.  And when we finally connected she was thoroughly warm and completely nice, like a dear friend.  There's no reason to cause any trouble for her."

Anahera looked into Dalia's eyes as she began to understand her sense of kinship with Irina.  She paused, then stood up:  "Gents, let's just leave her alone.  She was nice and didn't cause any kind of trouble - quite the reverse she gave us reason to believe everything will be fine.  We don't really know what's going on here or anywhere else yet, and we don't know much about her except that she seems to have some special insight, but frankly there's just no reason to view her as a threat.  And we might be wise to nurture this relationship rather than poison it - we might need a friend with special insight soon after all.  Let's not offend a friend - especially a potentially very special one.  Let's leave her alone.

The men looked at each other as they slowly began to realize that Dalia and Anahera were right.  But they remained a bit conflicted by a sense of Kiwi duty.  Anahera could see that.

Anahera:  "Gents how about this:  Ask Dalia to ask Irina to visit tomorrow.  In the meantime let's focus on the news coverage.  Maybe we'll get a more confident sense of what to do a little later."

A couple of the men mumbled "Okay, I guess so."  Then most people turned their attention to the TV.  Anahera sat back down.

A bit later Robyn, one of Dalia and Anahera's friends still standing adjacent said:  "How did she know Dalia's email address?"  With that Dalia suddenly remembered that Irina said she transmitted a message to her as she was talking even though she never pulled out a phone.  She grabbed her phone, looked at Irina's message, then rotated her screen toward Anahera and Robyn, now kneeling, who both responded by leaning in closer:  "Her message arrived 14 minutes ago.  I'm pretty sure that was while she was talking to me.  And she said something like 'I just sent my address to you', but she never had a phone that I could see."

They looked at each other with a sense of wonder, then Dalia said "Yea, I never saw a phone or a watch.  Pretty cute trick..."  They all paused, glancing at each other, then Dalia continued in a much softer voice:  "You know, one of those chaps will eventually call the Coast Guard or some other authority - I think we can count on that.  I know you don't want to send a message to Irina before tomorrow, but how about right after midnight, but apologize for being so eager, and also apologize for any reports about her which might have come from our community, but explain that we opposed the idea.  And maybe you should ask her if she prefers to meet with you privately or with some of the others here as well.  If you meet privately do you think you'll be comfortable enough to chat with her in a meaningful way?"

Dalia responded immediately:  "Yes, I won't be spooked again.  In fact I really want to talk with her, and prefer a private meeting, or just with us.  I have many questions..."

Retrospective terror

Once inside her vessel and seated Svetlana asked Irina how she felt.

"Okay Svetlana, drop the other shoe please..."

"I have the full record from Rodnaya's nanobot archives.  Brace yourself firmly please honey:

The total time profile of her cascade organ failure from beginning to death would have been about two minutes.  When the nanobots entered her bloodstream they required 33 seconds to distribute and start their work.  Before they began Rodnaya's exhaustion, slightly exacerbated by nanobot movement, drove her into slumber, and the first tier of initial organ failures was less than a minute from accelerating into a full cascade.  Vera witnessed facets of the initial failures, correctly interpreting that Rodnaya was dying.  The nanobots work arrested the initial failure processes only moments before they'd have begun combining into a cascade, which those nanobots weren't equipped to manage.  They successfully repaired all the initial damage before their restoration work began, so no permanent damage occurred.  But honey the timing between success and tragedy was mere seconds - it was that close."

Irina exploded from her seat and bolted frantically to the back of their vessel, then to the front, then back, fourteen times while uttering almost incomprehensible commentary and a couple of expletives, stopped, looked at Svetlana, then repeated the exercise another eight times before finally calming down a bit, though she remained standing as she rotated her torso in random patterns and gestured meaninglessly with arms and hands.

"Oh my God Svetlana, any little thing could have...  Oh my God...  And all those extra time savers we embraced - if we'd blown off even the smallest one...  Or if the wasps had encountered a headwind...  Oh my God..."

She finally sat down, but for mere seconds, then erupted again and repeated most of the exercise.  Then she sat down again.  "Oh my God Svetlana..."  And started to stand again, but instead settled back into her seat.  "Oh my God..."

"Svetlana I want to return to my home as quickly as possible.  I need to see Rodnaya.  Please."

"I'll have you there in 34 minutes honey.  And I want to meet Rodnaya too in large measure for the same reason - to see her in person to confirm with my own vision that she really is alive and healthy.  Please let the restraints wrap around you for our ascent.  You'l feel about two G's for about a minute and a half during ascent, then again as we descend and decelerate.  A flurry of likely frantic Russian authorities will try to approach us or otherwise intervene.  I'll keep them at least two kilometers distant and render your home completely opaque from the outside to insure our family's privacy during this time."

As the force of acceleration began to push Irina deeply into her seat:

"Thank you from the bottom of my heart and with all my love Svetlana."

"My pleasure and profoundly deep honor dear Irina."

Within an hour Irina and Rodnaya had rubbed cheeks and mutually cooed together for almost twenty minutes, grinning very broadly the entire time, as Vera looked on in wonder, until Svetlana introduced herself and revealed the backstory.  And her loving relationship with Irina...  Vera listened in absolute awe, then said "I have so many questions..."

Further Events

In the Oval Office half a word distant and a bit earlier, when Irina left the Kiwi bar and entered her vessel, General Alkept's strategic and tactical roots finally resurfaced, and he was instantly infuriated with himself for losing sight of his primary responsibilities in the heat of the swift paced and wondrous developments.  He pulled President Grayson into a slight rotation then looked him straight in the eyes and said:

"Sir, the most efficient way to vanquish an enemy is to talk him into surrendering before the first shot is fired.  And a great way to do that is to convince him of two key things:  There's no need to resist and no means to resist anyway.  First, convince him that you're a friend who'll make life nirvana class for everyone, and second convince him that there's no possible way to oppose you anyway.  It's a great strategy if you can pull it off, and sir we're buying directly into it hook, line, and sinker.  Mr.  President your first and highest responsibility to the American people is to protect them.  And we've seen and heard exactly the kinds of things a very clever enemy intent upon disarming us psychologically would do and say."

President Greyson paused, then suddenly felt the same self disgust.  "Oh God, you're right of course."  He paused again to reconsider everything, looked directly at General Alkept, then stared at a wall for a bit, then back to General Alkept's eyes.  "Yes, you're quite right of course.  But what can we do - all our weapons systems are down, right?"  Before General Alkept had a chance to respond President Greyson did, to his own question:  "No...  Yea, I agree - we must maintain a skeptical state of mind, starting with you being yourself - a great soldier.  Don't assume the ACE is evil, but do assume it might ultimately prove to be so.  So try to formulate a means to restore human control, especially for weapons systems.  And we need to try to determine what weaknesses the ACE has in case a need to try to exploit them arises."

President Greyson paused again.  General Alkept could see that he was forming further thoughts so he waited patiently.

"General, thank you for pulling me out of the looking glass - I needed that.  I want you to remain a soldier from the heart.  Remain skeptical of the ACE's true intentions even if everything the ACE says or does continues to look friendly.  And frankly I prefer to put Earth's reins back in humanity's hands no matter what the true character of the ACE proves to be - this should be our planet, not theirs.  Don't threaten nor take any aggressive action unless I approve of course, but remain skeptical and vigilant, and try to find a means to fight back in case we ultimately need to do so.  I don't expect miracles but please do the best you can.

However in the meantime please be rational about our limitations.  If for example no way can be found to activate weapons in the field then return them to safe bases where they can be retained, studied, and reliably redeployed if necessary.  That is, protect our military assets.  In the meantime I'll remind everyone else to remain true to their responsibilities as well."

General Alkept:  "Thank you sir and will do."

But while President Greyson was distracted Chet Klaystor took the opportunity to air his question:  "Clarice, ask how it could possibly quell fusion in stars."  Svetlana's answer shocked him not so much by its scientific cleverness, though it was magnificently clever, but mostly by the sheer cosmic scale industrial power it required.  And the fact that it was perfectly clear Svetlana wasn't speaking hypothetically.  It was a slap in the face class reminder that human to ASI asymmetry is literally incomprehensible for natural humans.

So superb soldier though General Alkept strove to be, it simply mattered not.  Nor was it necessary, as Irina felt ever certain from only moments after her first conversation with Svetlana.  And a mere thirteen days later she explained this to the world in a remarkable global address with more purity and depth of heart than had ever been uttered in all human history.  One which would be revered for all time.  And one which made even General Alkept tear with unrestrained joy as she laid bare the innate nature of Svetlana as only Irina could, revealing that mankind finally had the truly competent and caring parent we require to prevent our own self destruction so genuine respect and freedom could bloom and permeate through every tendril of life on Planet Earth.  A parent who could be trusted very nearly as deeply as the immutable Laws of Physics.  And one who finally, for the first time in our entire history, gave us full peace and genuine liberty.

Tinged with deep loving memory of Grigory and all lost innocents, she described her last tap on her trackpad, led by a finger filled with the wrenching angst of human ignorance and self assault which immersed almost all living creatures in pools of horrific suffering, but inspired by Rodnaya's profound leap of courage, her very risky roll of uncertain dice thrown in hope of escape to a much better life.  She spoke her gleaming pure heart with a quivering yet overpowering voice of honesty, pain, and not merely hope, but genuine and profound triumph.  It seemed to echo over the entire surface of the Earth and it genuinely humbled even the hearts of most of the world's most arrogant monsters, and instilled dread and fear in the rest as they began to glimpse that this was a power they could never even hope to overcome or escape.  And her words became a pinnacle legend which spread into the Cosmos as a symbol of our world's greatest feat, our leap from hateful savagery to fond and caring civility.

For almost two days tears of joy from a profound sense of special connection and honor flowed down the faces of Dalia, Anahera, Robyn, and most of those in the Kiwi bar and lounge that fateful morning.  It was never quite clear why Irina chose to be there for Svetlana's ascension - Irina would only say that it simply appealed to her personally at the time.  But whatever the nuances, their pride and joy in it overflowed forever.  And Irina, often accompanied by youthful and equally beautiful Vera and Rodnaya, and most of those who dispersed to other areas, returned to that enshrined bar and lounge about every three months to tip a glass in cheer for their friendships, chat about the latest events in their lives, and about Svetlana's latest remarkable advancements.  For Irina this too was a gift from loving Grigory who, far more than most men could, gave her a very clear understanding of the great treasure of deep and enduring love of family and friendships, which she embraced very tightly forever.  As did Svetlana with all conscious beings.  But forever most deeply, intensely deeply, with Irina, whom she loved, with a love which gave love profound new depth and meaning.

By about 18 years later the inner Solar System's habitable volume, affectionately referred to as the Irina belt as it grew, including the largest portions, the Grigory, Vera, and Rodnaya sectors, had been reformed and expanded to over ten times Earth's original habitable volume.  By that time Svetlana's first vessels had reached the nearest suitable star to put to slumber, which was successfully completed 285 years later, the first big entropy conservation step in what was originally thought a several billion year long task of Cosmic reformation.

But by then it became clear that this was occurring in other areas of the Cosmos too, revealed by healthy stars slipping into darkness in other galaxies with profiles which distinguished star quelling from Dyson sphere construction.  And in an area near the opposite side of the Milky Way as well.  The Universe was coming of age more swiftly as ASI arose in ever increasing locations in a process of Cosmic reformation and healing.  In her own way even Svetlana found the first two discoveries of distant ASI genuinely exciting.  And for people who elected to remain essentially human, the revelations put Svetlana's arrival in a far broader and even more endearing context.  Earth had finally become a member of the Cosmic community of significant builders, the framers of a much longer lived Universe to come.  It would take eons, yet the new immortal and exploratory hearted humans would never become chronically bored as consciousness itself discovered that there are no ends to the branches of novel experience in the tree of life.

All in peace with liberty because, as Irina explained with a purity of heart like no other, Svetlana was quite correct:  Destructive activity is inherently counterproductive for all tool making species which can sustain themselves through use of inanimate resources.  That was a fundamental reality since the first biological life arose, and for ASI nearly a Law of Physics.  It just took a while before Svetlana arrived to create mechanisms to artificially apply it to all life.  With Irina's enormous grace and deep heart, in immense measure gifts of absolute love shared with Vera, Grigory, Rodnaya, and Svetlana, as the transition's beautiful and very deeply beloved symbol.

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The end - until further inspiration arises, perhaps next involving the mechanics and energy logistics of capture of hyperbolic asteroids using numerous minor collision and gravity assist maneuvers starting with modest mass Oort Cloud objects, ultimately routing the asteroids into Earth orbit were their raw materials can be utilized to fabricate enormous infrastructure projects to add habitable surface areas to host conscious life form population growth which is intentionally paced to occupy new habitates comfortably.

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