Joe Haldeman - The Forever War

The book stated this as a bald fact. I asked a Man to explain what it meant, what was special about clone-to-clone communication, and he said that I a priori couldn’t understand it. There were no words for it, and my brain wouldn’t be able to accommodate the concepts even if there were words.

All right. It sounded a little fishy, but I was willing to accept it. I’d accept that up was down if it meant the war was over.

Man was a pretty considerate entity. Just for us twenty-two, he went to the trouble of rejuvenating a little restaurant-tavern and staffing it at all hours (I never saw a Man eat or drink — guess they’d discovered a way around it). I was sitting in there one evening, drinking beer and reading their book, when Charlie came in and sat down next to me. Without preamble, he said, “I’m going to give it a try.”

“Give what a try?”

“Women. Hetero.” He shuddered. “No offense … it’s not really very appealing.” He patted my hand, looking distracted. “But the alternative … have you tried it?”

“Well … no, I haven’t.” Female Man was a visual treat, but only in the same sense as a painting or a piece of sculpture. I just couldn’t see them as human beings.

“Don’t.” He didn’t elaborate. “Besides, they say — he says, she says, it says — that they can change me back just as easily. If I don’t like it.”

“You’ll like it, Charlie.”

“Sure that’s what they say.” He ordered a stiff drink. “Just seems unnatural. Anyway, since, uh, I’m going to make the switch, do you mind if … why don’t we plan on going to the same planet?”

“Sure, Charlie, that’d be great.” I meant it. “You know where you’re going?”

“Hell, I don’t care. Just away from here.”

“I wonder if Heaven’s still as nice—”

“No.” Charlie jerked a thumb at the bartender. “He lives there.”

“I don’t know. I guess there’s a list.”

A man came into the tavern, pushing a cart piled high with folders. “Major Mandella? Captain Moore?”

“That’s us,” Charlie said.

“These are your military records. I hope you find them of interest. They were transferred to paper when your strike force was the only one outstanding, because it would have been impractical to keep the normal data retrieval networks running to preserve so few data.”

They always anticipated your questions, even when you didn’t have any.

My folder was easily five times as thick as Charlie’s. Probably thicker than any other, since I seemed to be the only trooper who’d made it through the whole duration. Poor Marygay. “Wonder what kind of report old Stott filed about me.” I flipped to the front of the folder.

Stapled to the front page was a small square of paper.

All the other pages were pristine white, but this one was tan with age and crumbling around the edges.

The handwriting was familiar, too familiar even after so long. The date was over 250 years old.

I winced and was blinded by sudden tears. I’d had no reason to suspect that she might be alive. But I hadn’t really known she was dead, not until I saw that date.

“William? What’s—”

“Leave me be, Charlie. Just for a minute.” I wiped my eyes and closed the folder. I shouldn’t even read the dammed note. Going to a new life, I should leave the old ghosts behind.

But even a message from the grave was contact of a sort. I opened the folder again.

11 Oct 2878

William—

All this is in your personnel file. But knowing you, you might just chuck it. So I made sure you’d get this note. Obviously, I lived. Maybe you will, too. Join me.

I know from the records that you’re out at Sade-138 and won’t be back for a couple of centuries. No problem.

I’m going to a planet they call Middle Finger, the fifth planet out from Mizar. It’s two collapsar jumps, ten months subjective. Middle Finger is a kind of Coventry for heterosexuals. They call it a “eugenic control baseline.”

No matter. It took all of my money, and all the money of five other old-timers, but we bought a cruiser from UNEF. And we’re using it as a time machine.

So I’m on a relativistic shuttle, waiting for you. All it does is go out five light years and come back to Middle Finger, very fast. Every ten years I age about a month. So if you’re on schedule and still alive, I’ll only be twenty-eight when you get here. Hurry!

I never found anybody else and I don’t want anybody else. I don’t care whether you’re ninety years old or thirty. If I can’t be your lover, I’ll be your nurse.

“Say, bartender.”

“Yes, Major?”

“Do you know of a place called Middle Finger? Is it still there?”

“Of course it is. Where else would it be?” Reasonable question. “A very nice place. Garden planet. Some people don’t think it’s exciting enough.”

“What’s this all about?” Charlie said.

I handed the bartender my empty glass. “I just found out where we’re going.”

From The New Voice, Paxton, Middle Finger 24-6

Marygay Potter-Mandella (24 Post Road, Paxton) gave birth Friday last to a fine baby boy, 3.1 kilos.

Marygay lays claim to being the second — “oldest” resident of Middle Finer, having been born in 1977. She fought through most of the Forever War and then waited for her mate on the time shuttle, 261 years.

The baby, not yet named, was delivered at home with the help of a friend of the family, Dr. Diana Alsever-Moore.