The following morning, right after breakfast, the family once again gathered in the living room in case anyone had any new ideas about selling the house or paying for Tammy's operation. Ironically, just as everyone got settled, the doorbell rang once again.
Jimmy answered the door for an older-looking couple and a hyper-beautiful, Mediterranean Goddess. Just as he was about to ask what he could do for them, he heard his aunt's voice behind him.
Jamie's eyes widened in surprised recognition as Jimmy opened the door. "Gran? Gramps? They told us you'd been killed!" She got up to hug the kindly-looking couple.
Once everyone was inside, and the door was finally closed. Janie got a hug and a good look at the visitors as well. "It's great to see you both again, but please give us some leeway. I saw what was left of the car; there is no way both of you could have been in it and lived. But the question I have is, since you did live, why did you wait this long to come back to us?"
Jimmy and Tammy gave up the love seat to sit on the floor, and Donna gave her seat to the young woman, before heading into the kitchen with Holly to get refreshments. Both Janie and Jamie were busy hugging the two newcomers. Janie turned to introduce them to the three remaining people in the room.
"Kids, let me introduce our grandparents, Wally and Glynda Archer." Turning back to the newcomers, she gestured at Jimmy. "This is my son, Jimmy. His girlfriend, and my wife's youngest daughter, Tammy, and the taller beautiful lady is my wife's oldest; Tina."
As she had been making introductions, the kids had gotten up to shake hands with the older couple. The pretty young woman that had arrived with the older couple was obviously staring at Jimmy. It wasn't a leer or anything, more like an evaluative stare.
While introductions were being made, Holly and Donna returned with a tray of coffee cups, and a carafe, cream, sugar and honey. After setting the tray down, Janie introduced them as well.
Both Wally and Glynda, being medical doctors, noticed that Tammy was in pain, and smiled at how Jimmy doted on her. However, Wally pulled out his diagnostic pad from his ever-present bag, and scanned Tammy while Glynda introduced Sheba.
"It's a real pleasure to meet all of you. In my turn, I would like to make known to all of you, our very good friend, Sheba. She normally isn't this rude, Jimmy, but I think you may come to understand why she is staring a bit later."
Jimmy smiled at the exotically beautiful woman, and chivalrously kissed her hand. "To have the attention of such a beautiful lady can never be considered to be rude."
Tammy giggled and slapped his shoulder. "Suck-up!"
"My dear, how long have your doctors forced you to live with this condition?" Wally asked Tammy.
"Uh, they haven't exactly forced anything, sir. They were waiting to see which way my body wanted to go before deciding on a course of action. Now that I seem to have made up my mind, we were discussing how to pay for the operation. Our insurance provider considers reassignment surgery to be a non-life-threatening (and therefore elective) surgery, and refuses to pay for it," Tammy explained, wondering how this stranger had discovered her secret already. "Sir, if I may ask, how did you know?"
Wally held up the pad to show the girl. "I noticed you seemed to be in pain, so I scanned you. Glynda and I are both medical doctors. Incidentally, we can fix you up right as rain, and it won't cost you anything."
Jamie groaned. "Yep, it's definitely Grandpa!"
Wally's rhyming did break Sheba's intense scrutiny of Jimmy and she rolled her eyes.
Janie ignored all of that, and cornered Wally and Glynda. "Eighteen years ago, Jamie and I attended your funeral. I'd like to know why you waited this long to contact us, and why you felt the need to stage your own deaths. I'd also like to know where you've been, and why you haven't aged. Lastly, and most important; you said you could help Tammy. How, and what, do we need to do?"
"That's all part of our story, Dear, and the reason we're here. It's bit of a long tale, and I doubt you'll believe us; but please try to keep an open mind. If, in the end, you still don't believe us, we'll prove it; although that'll take a bit of trust on your part," Glynda explained kindly.
"Okay, but if you start this with; ' ... a long time ago in a galaxy far, far, away... ' I'm gonna freak," Donna said. Sheba snorted in amusement, Walter turned white, and Glynda studied little Donna.
"That's almost exactly what I was going to say. Are you precognitive?" The woman asked.
It was Donna's turn to look shocked as Walter began the tale for Glynda.
"A long time ago, in a galaxy much like this one, a great Empire rose, and governed hundreds of thousands of different peoples. The Empire grew until it spread to neighboring galaxies, and still it grew.
"Like any living body, it had its problems, but by and large, it worked as a fair and just governing body for the people that were its members. However, it got so large that issues began to arise about policing and protecting the member states. So a solution was offered and accepted by the congress.
"The Citadels were the solution. The space-borne super-cities became home to hundreds of millions of beings from all walks and races. Businessmen, farmers, laborers, merchants, military, and even a pirate or two. A Citadel is a super-fortress controlled by very powerful Sentient Artificial Intelligences and their crews. They was charged with law enforcement as well as military protection of entire sectors of galaxys, and given more than enough tools to carry out their missions. Since a Citadel was a center of Imperial Law in a sector, so it also became the center for commerce as well.
"A Citadel's ultimate command was the Empire, but on board, over-all command was handled by the two joined parts of the Arbiter. The first part is an artificially intelligent, non-embodied life form, and the second is a very-specially-selected resident of the Galaxy in which the Citadel is assigned, preferably also from the same sector. They co-exist; sharing one body in a symbiotic synergy that can potentially survive for hundreds of thousands of years." Walter paused to take a drink of his coffee, and Glynda took over.
"The 'artificial' portion of the Arbiter is technically an AI, but only because that's as close a description as this language will allow. She is, however, as different from an AI as AI's are to us. So only for the purpose of this explanation, I'll refer to the true AI's as 'lesser' AI's even though there is nothing 'lesser' (other than their duties) about them.
"In order to perform their myriad duties, each of the lesser AI's needs have differing and diverse programming. That being said, generally all AI's that have access to weapons of any type have the same core commands basically burned into their brains. These commands supposedly make it impossible for them to go rogue, fire the weapons or to kill without orders except to protect sentient life.
"In certain AI's the 'protect life' rule carries more weight because of their duties. The navigational AI is one of these special AIs. So, when an insanely hostile being created a weapon so powerful that it basically destroyed all life in the universe, her course of action was already determined by her core programming.
"A Citadel, and the ecosphere attached to it, has the ability to move not only between places in the same space/time, but it can move into others as well. What that means is that a Citadel has the ability to travel to different universes.
"Now, even moving between points in the same space/time is dangerous, and the dimensional 'path' has to be well mapped out and plotted before the 'crossing' is made or any unshielded biological material will be canceled out during the crossing as waste energy. The whole process of plotting and mapping is called 'bridging' because the AI is building a virtual bridge between two separate points.
"I'm explaining all this so you'll understand this next part. When the insane ruler I mentioned earlier performed a small scale test of his doomsday weapon, it triggered a chain reaction. Sheba described it as being a trans-galactic, hyper-nova. Space itself began exploding.
"As I explained earlier, the navigational AI has a priority for preserving the station because even the components of a Citadel are dangerous. So, since she had no way of guaranteeing complete destruction down to the sub-atomic level, she was forced to push the Citadel and the ecosphere into an unbridged, universal crossing." As Glynda spoke, Sheba put her head in her hands and began crying.
"Sheba is the AI that made the crossing, killing five million, four hundred seventy-three thousand, six hundred and fifty-two sentient beings that were resident on the station. Her programming didn't give her any choice in the matter, but she still blames herself for their deaths. As atonement, she has stayed functional since our arrival to help repair and recharge the fortress.
"It is also our duty to help repopulate the Citadel and ecosphere, and search for a new Arbiter Avatar." The last she said looking right at Jimmy.
"Wow, I haven't heard a story that good since the psych ward at Bethesda!" Jamie replied sarcastically, and Janie chuckled at her twin. Jimmy however, didn't giggle. He approached Sheba, and gently touched her hand to get her attention.
"Sheba, how long to create a bridge between Earth and the Polaris system?"
Sheba's eyes lost focus for a few moments, then she refocused on him. "Bridge created, however, I would recommend leaving this solar system prior to the crossing due to gravimetric sheer, sir."
"Jimmy?" Janie asked.
"None of them are lying, Mom," Jimmy said simply.
"Are you sure, sweety? I know you always seem to know, but this?"
Jimmy looked at a very skeptical Jamie. "Aunt Jamie, have you ever been overseas?"
"You know I have, Jimmy," Jamie replied.
Jimmy nodded. "True. Have you ever killed a person?" When she hesitated, Jimmy added. "Just yes or no, Aunt Jamie, I know there are some things you can't elaborate on. This is to prove to you I can tell truth from fiction."
"I understand," Jamie replied. "No."
"Lie. You've told us you were sent to Iraq, have you ever been sent to Afghanistan?" Jimmy asked.
"I can't answer that, Jimmy."
Jimmy nodded. "True. Have you ever been a prisoner in a non-training situation?"
"I can't answer that either, Jimmy," Jamie said, but it was clear she was getting very uncomfortable.
Jimmy cocked his head at her. "Lie."
"Fuck me! That's enough, I believe you, Jimmy; just don't ask any more about my past." Jamie said shaking.
Jimmy hugged the older woman to him. "I'm sorry, Jamie, I didn't mean to hurt you, but I knew you'd lie about that stuff."
"After that impressive show, I hate to point this out, but Sheba is incapable of lying." Glynda said.
Jimmy chuckled. "That's a lie you believe is the truth."
The older woman looked confused. "Huh?"
Jimmy formed his hand into the shape of a pistol, and put his finger to Tammy's temple. "Sheba, If I hypothetically held a weapon to Tammy's head and demanded that you tell me I am the Arbiter, what would be your response?"
"As you surmised, I would tell you that you are indeed the Arbiter, even though I do believe you are the right choice for the Arbiter Avatar. However, I must point out that even if selected as the avatar, you will still not be the Arbiter, not by yourself," she clarified.
Jimmy nodded. "The point is, you would tell me a lie."
Nodding, Sheba replied, "That is correct, sir."
Glynda looked a little troubled. "I didn't know that.
"Sheba, it's also possible for you to mislead by telling the absolute truth, even without such drastic circumstances, isn't it?" Jimmy asked. Winking down at his lover, he said "I got this one from an online story."
Sheba nodded, getting into the spirit of his questions, and grinning when she realized that Walter wasn't even aware of this. "Yes sir. Either by order or by choice, I can be purposely misleading."
"How so? And are all AI's capable of this?" Walter asked, looking at Sheba like she'd grown a new head.
"Let's say I get tired of your constant rhyming, and get mad at you. If you ask me were Jimmy currently is, and he isn't at the Citadel, I can honestly reply that I don't know, even if all I have to do is request his location from the communications AI. At that moment in time, my answer would be the absolute truth. To answer your second question, yes, all AI's are capable of it, in fact, I'm surprised Prinea hadn't already told you; perhaps you simply didn't ask."
"Okay, time-out here for a second!" Janie said, getting everyone's attention. "If Jimmy says you're telling the truth, I believe him. But I honestly thought you two were our grandparents; is any of that true?"
"This is kinda complicated. We're not really your grandparents, no, but we are related to you, even though we're not human," Wally explained. "You see, you and Jamie, as well as Jimmy and Donna were, uh ... adapted, from our viable embryos."
"I don't mean to disagree with you, but I remember giving birth to both Jimmy and Donna. Not even that dead-beat, asshole, David challenged paternity," Janie said.
"It's actually a good thing he didn't. You see, we did make sure you're human, but the four of you are special. You're a bit more ... evolved, than other humans. All of you have rather unusual DNA. It's human, but like I said, it's more advanced. We needed to find a new Arbiter, and the specific mutation that makes a good one is very rare." Glynda explained.
Wally bit his lower lip. "There is also the somewhat troubling side-effect of the naturally occurring mutation. With Jimmy, we don't need to worry about it."
"What was the side-effect?" Tina asked, finally joining the conversation.
Wally smiled at her. "The last person on the planet that it occurred naturally in was named Josef Mengele. However, Stephen Hawking is very close to what is needed.
"You're picking me over Stephen Hawking?" Jimmy asked incredulously. What do I have he doesn't?"
"Dr. Hawking has a very impressive intellect; however, he lacks your other qualities. For example, your built-in lie detector. That's required of an Arbiter Avatar by the way. Then we must also consider the amount of damage that's been done to his central nervous system. Granted as long as he lives, it can be fixed, however, the 'scars' would take centuries to heal," Wally finished. "There's also no guarantee he would be able to bond with Pollux because of the damage."
"So what happens now? How can you help Tammy?" Holly asked.
Glynda smiled. As she looked over the pad Wally'd handed her. "This is a simple one. We'll take her back to main medical, give her a dose of nano's and drop her in a tank for a few days. When she comes out, she'll not only be fully and completely female, she'll also be perfectly healthy."
"Sheba will escort Jimmy up to the tower to meet Pollux, and she'll begin testing him to make sure he can handle the duties. If he passes, then she'll take him into their special medical tank where Pollux will make him her avatar. Basically she enhances the hell out of him, and they start the bonding process. That'll take the better part of a week," Wally said, picking up the explanation from his mate.
"Who's Pollux?" Tammy asked. Then jokingly added, "Do I need to be jealous?"
"Pollux is the Arbiter AI. As far as you being jealous; the two of you should talk it over before hand, because becoming the Arbiter Avatar is a lifetime commitment, and you'll be living a long, long time. Pollux, through Jimmy will also be a part of your relationship. They'll be sharing each other's minds after bonding. However, Pollux will slowly alter her personality to compliment her Avatar," Sheba replied, smiling at the girl. "She explained it to me as a bonding of souls."
"As for what we do now, we all make the crossing back to the Citadel and get started," Wally said.
"Wait, you implied that the forced crossing was made years ago. Plus Janie's right; neither of you seem to have aged. When you were talking about Dr. Hawking, you said it would take centuries to heal him. How long ago was the original crossing into our universe, how old are you, and why do you want all of us to go?" Tina asked.
"We don't want to separate the family; love being a very rare commodity that any universe could use more of. As for how old we are, it's difficult to say because of the differential between the two universes. Relative to ourselves, we are just over three thousand of your years. We don't seem old because we aren't old. We don't age. That's also the reason we staged our deaths; we'd been here too long without aging," Glynda answered. "Now, before you ask; no, once we get you treated, and your bodies cleaned of all the pollutants and contaminants from Earth, you'll stop aging as well. In fact, the nano's will most likely restore your body to its peak physical condition."
"If we're going to be gone a week, I'll need to take my computer. Right at the moment, I can't leave the sites unattended that long. Jamie has her job, so I don't know how she'll want to handle that," Janie said. "Plus, we'll need to pack some clothes and toiletries..."
"You can bring your laptop of course, but you don't need to worry about the rest; it can easily be provided for you, since you're all there as guests." Amid groans, Wally relented. "Besides, any of you can return here anytime you want. Oh! I should mention that the view is also breath taking; the rings are beautiful when seen from below."
"The what?" Jamie asked.
Glynda chuckled. "The Citadel is currently in the upper atmosphere of the planet Saturn. I do have to admit that it does have a pretty spectacular view."
"But, what about Aunt Jamie's job?" Donna asked.
"Actually I put in my resignation to the department last week. My Captain asked me to take some time off and think about it. There's nothing for me to think about; I've been retired from the military, so I don't have to work. I became a policeman because I thought I'd like it, and that's where my skills lie. I was wrong," she shrugged. "I don't know what, if anything, I'd like to do, but I really don't need to work anymore. I can take off anytime I want too, I just need to stay in cell range. Somehow, I don't think Saturn is in my local calling area."
"Actually, Grista knew we would most likely get a good portion of our new population from Earth, so she made sure to tie into the television, telephone, and internet of the planet. The last I heard on it, she was in discussions with the Internic and various other groups to modify the existing net for basically infinite expansion. Part of that would be the creation of 'Nodes' and include a dedicated node just for the Citadel," Sheba explained.
"How is she doing that without divulging the existence of the Citadel?" Jimmy asked.
"As I understand it, all parties involved are almost desperate for the new addressing protocols, however, negotiations are slow because Grista is not doing it in person, and an explanation has been demanded for the reason she would need an entire node to herself."
Jimmy looked thoughtful a moment. "Would you be willing to pass along a suggestion to her?"
"Of course, sir, but you could tell her yourself since she will be there to greet us when we arrive," Sheba replied.
"It's a long trip, so maybe we should make lunch first," Janie said.
"Ma'am, we only need to go across town to our warehouse. Approximately five point nine two three miles as the Tarloc flies; after that, it takes eighty-three point six nano-seconds," Sheba said matter-of-factly.
"Saturn; the Planet Saturn, the rather large one with rings, is only six miles away?" Jamie said in sarcastic disbelief.
Sheba looked at Jamie like she was a slow child. "Saturn is eight hundred eighty-six million, six hundred ninety-six thousand, six hundred and ninety-one point three-two miles away at present. However, the nearest bridgehead is 'only six miles away'."