"North American Logistics Officer Martin Weir reporting sir. How can we help?"

"Martin," the voice said slowly, "I'm trying to get a hold of someone with, what are they calling themselves? The Family? A bit reductive if you ask me, but no one ever does."

"Of course Samurai, to whom do you wish to speak or how can I direct your- um"

"I've got just over thirteen thousand points and one token left. I want to gift that to someone before I go."

Martin opened his mouth and then closed it. John Ride was quick enough with the rolling chair to get it behind the older man as he backed up a step and sat. John snapped his fingers in front of the stunned man and then pinched Martin's ear.

Martin pulled his head away.

"Of course we can help. Where is it you are going?"

"I'm looking down the tunnel of eternity Martin, and it looks lonely and barren and cold. The problem isn't where I'm going, it's that wherever I go, I'm there. I can't escape myself or the things I've done, not in this life."

"Of course sir. One moment."

Last confirmed communication of Samurai Cerberus. Presumed Suicide. Accounts of his locations during the Cleansing of West Bank remain unaccounted for. Data leaked during a Samurai led breach of The Family's Utah data storage facility. The Family's public stance remains that no Samurai has ever committed suicide, they had simply changed identities to live a more normal life.

----------------------------------------

The two oddly shaped and armored carts were parked on the six lane highway that ran along the edge of the Gila River Indian Reservation. Hovercars and trains were great but most freight was still carried on roads. Once self driving trucks were in common use and cargo could be shipped factory to factory. The limiting factor was roads. Were the roads maintained enough for self-driving vehicles?

The border was a hard line. Minority groups of all kinds experienced an uprising after the birth of Samurai, for both good and bad. Ton-lui was born into a Tribe in the Amazon. Upon becoming a Samurai he systematically butchered cattle, as he assumed cattle were the reason people were cutting down the rainforest for grazing land. When that didn't work he butchered people. Elephant poachers were all but wiped out in a six month span. Indigenous people in various locations suddenly found themselves with the army the other side always mentioned when they asked, "You and what army?"

In North America the first resettlements were peaceful, in the sense that they did not result in deaths. Residents and land owners of the Black Hills were informed that the land had been granted to the Sioux Nation in the Treaty of 1868 and that the Sioux Nation would be taking ownership of the land currently. Residents had four days to pack up and get out.

A Sioux native named, ironically, Detroit, took the Samurai name White Buffalo. He arrived, on foot, at homes. Removed the people and burned the buildings to the ground. As resistance became more violent, so did his responses. Yet he did not take lives, merely began destroying access to the land, power lines, wells, and roads. He did kill livestock and pets, but no human lives were lost.

Reservations, once the worst land in North America, were changed. Roads and schools were created, and as governments and institutions fell, reservations became the last bastions without corporate influence. Some did expand, but most focused first on the land they had, improving it to improve the lives of their people.

We'd stopped some distance back and sprayed each other with some sort of foaming spray. It didn't harden or anything but as it evaporated the stench and remains of the sewer were gone.

Now we waited.

To my left was a green and brown stretch of land where people tried to cultivate life slowly and limited how many children they had to the carrying capacity of the land. To my right rose the buildings were people tried to engineer tools and infrastructure to increase that carrying capacity. I'm come to the conclusion a long time ago that neither was right, nor wrong, but living in a border area shined a light on the flaws of each.

"You think there is any chance they aren't bickering already?" I asked.

"I've been in contact with the soldiers we took into the sewers," Sara said. Which I took to mean she knew they were fighting.

"Any dead?"

"Nothing like that. There are differences of opinion on how to best relocate the people who were displaced."

"Max," I subvocalized, "can you show me an aerial real time photo of the-" I paused trying to think of what to call it, "Refugee camp."

The photo was sort of blurry and when I manipulated it I could zoom way out.

"This is from one of our drones?" I asked.

"It is not. This is a satellite image."

"Is that why it is at such an odd angle?"

"I have a message concerning this," Max said.

A window opened to display a nervous looking man in a shirt and tie that was struggling to get into his suit coat. He was in a larger interior room. There were three other people visible at desks with large monitors and stacks of three ring binders scattered around. The visible people were wearing lanyards with badges.

"Who is this?" I asked Max. Except apparently the man could hear me too.

"umm," he said thrusting his arm into his coat and pulling the coat closed, "It's Doug Herford. Umm sir."

"Max can you put an icon up on images like this to indicate if they can hear me or if I am talking to you please."

"I can," she said and it appeared, "but you need only focus outside the window to speak to me privately.

I wondered if Doug and these others had heard that too, as I'd been looking at them when I spoke to Max.

"Someone had a message?" I asked.

"umm," Doug said glancing over his shoulder at the others who all shook their head.

"I'm not sure Samurai, I can try to track it down."

"Just a minute," I said not wanting him to do any work if the problem was on my end.

I couldn't really shift my 'eyes' off the screen as it was part of my Heads up Display so it moved where ever I looked. I could sort of shift my interest. Kind of like how you could stare at something while concentrating on something at the edge of your vision.

"Max what was the message you received?"

Words replaced the image of the men in the room.

This is an automated message for the AI accessing this satellite by hacking it directly. To better juggle multiple needs please inform your Samurai that proper protocol is to contact the The Family to schedule satellite time or message the operations room in an emergency and access the feed through the ground based stations.

I studied the man. The name Doug Herford appeared next to him.

"Doug we received a message when we inadvertently hacked the satellite for a visual. Do I talk to you about that?"

"You can," he said looking at something, "but you may wish to speak to a member of The Family first as the equipment belongs to them but is available to any Samurai who has a need of it."

"So I just schedule it?" I asked.

"It is open right now," he said quickly, "So you can schedule it currently if you wish, but since you are not listed as a member of The Family, I suggest you speak with them first."

"Who would I contact to do that?"

Doug nodded at one of the other men who gently reached out and pulled out a red button. One of those red buttons that were protected from accidentally closing. A red button that looked for all the world to be very important.

"What was the button?" I asked, invisioning a fine of millions of credits a minute from whatever clearly Samurai organization this The Family, was. And I could clearly hear to capital letters in his voice.

"We've asked for non-emergency aid, someone should join us shortly."

"There is a waiting connection," Max said, "Shall I allow it?"

"Is there any danger to me?"

"Only in an informational sense."

"I don't know what that means."

"Only in a sense that they could covey information that causes emotional or physical damage, such as blackmail or strongly worded language."

I didn't really know how to respond to that. Was she saying that the only danger was it what they said to me, but not that they could fry my brain?

"So to be clear," I asked, "they can't fry my brain or anything?"

"Not through the communication connection, but they appear to control satellites with that capability."

I glanced at Sara, who sat up straighter. She was waiting on me after all and knew nothing about all of this.

"Make the connection," I said.

"The Taxman," a woman said. The view wasn't a live feed but a picture of a woman in clown face paint with a red nose.

"Did you pick that name?" she asked.

"No." Max hadn't provided a name for this person so I didn't know what to call them.

"So you met up with a Samurai who thought them self experienced enough to give you a name but who didn't inform us you exist?" she asked.

"Cold Brew," I said.

"Ah," she said, "Likely slipped his mind. How is he doing?"

He came off as a lonely man who enjoyed laughing while he was doing it, but who went back to being morose otherwise. He'd lied to Mr. Wu about the man giving him hope, but he'd done so because it honored the man's choice to stay and fight.

"He laughed some," I said carefully, "but I think perhaps he was lonely."

This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

The screen with the clown picture winked out and a woman was looking at me. She had a perfectly bald head but had eyebrows that were maintained with whatever voodoo women at all financial levels did to keep them perfect. The poor had to pluck and pick and the very rich had them genetically modified.

I tried to look away when I noticed she was naked, but the viewport came with me.

"Max," I said and she flicked the video off.

"Sorry," I said to the small round icon that said 'video only.'

"Oh. Because of the nipples?" the Samurai asked, "I just wanted to get a look at you. Do you know who he is?"

"Cold Brew?" I asked.

"I can't tell if you are being deep and profound or jerking me off. He is Cold Brew now, but do you know who he used to be?"

"My-" I didn't want to call Sara an employee, but didn't want to pause for too long either, "My Operator recognized him, but he asked her not to tell anyone, and I didn't ask."

The image switched to live video again and this time there were no nipples on the small breasts.

"You seem interesting," she said, "Normally I'd have you travel to meet up with someone higher up the food chain and have them give you the tour and all that but I think I want to meet you."

"I'm not interesting," I said seriously.

"Perhaps," she said, "Come join me."

The window winked out and Max informed me she had given me a location far to the north in what had to be Alaska or Canada.

"Sorry about that Doug," I said to the room of men, "keep up the good work."

"Yes, sir," Doug said.

Max cut that connection as well.

I let out a long sigh and then leaned back.

The carts were basically a big flat black wall from the front. From inside you could see through everything. More importantly the guns mounted, fired, aimed, and reloaded by the cart could shoot through the shield wall substance. There were two tank tracks but they just ran in small wide loops though the treads could extend metal spikes out to about an inch long or have no spikes at all leaving a fat soft pad for traction.

The sides were open, which seemed crazy, but that's how they were. there was another seat directly behind the seat I sat in where another person could sit and look and fire out the back. From the front back and behind the carts were well protected.

"Fred?" Sara said and I looked at her. I realized I was drumming my fingers on my leg and stopped.

"You don't have to deal with them," she said.

"I know," I said, "I was invited to go meet a member of The Family actually, and I was just thinking that might be interesting. Then I just kept thinking about all the shit I need to do here. I have to move cases around and make sure everyone is safe. I want to shit in my own bathroom, and listen to my neighbors argue in that indo-french gibberish I swear they are making up half the time. But I can't leave. Who'd deal with the tier two tech? Or the rez. They aren't going to wait forever and then they will force people off their land. But they don't have the numbers, so they will have to call a Samurai in. Then it's a bunch of homeless people trying to sort out food and water. Even if they had jobs to go back to nothing will open for a week or more. Sure charities will show up to feed people, but that's all short term-"

Sara let me rant and ramble for a while.

When I finally stopped I realized I couldn't even remember what I'd been saying. I'd lost my place and if I had a point I wandered so far from it I'd lost that as well.

Sara was watching me. She had the look of someone ready to jump up and cheer if their kid did well in sports. She was moments from action, but also sitting there. Waiting.

Waiting on me.

I sighed.

I should just start driving, the longer I put it all off the longer it would take to get through. Should I destroy the tier two weapons? It seemed like a waste. It wasn't like there weren't weapons like that floating around either sold or discarded by other Samurai. Could I sell them? Would that be worse than giving to All Bright or the Rez?

"Can I ask you for advice" I asked Sara. I expected her to say 'yes' and then I'd ask about selling the weapons, giving them away, or destroying them. Instead she took the question to mean I was asking for advice, and she gave it.

"All the problems you listed can be handled by normal people. Maybe you don't want to give up control, or think they won't handle it as well as you can. But none of the things you listed NEED a Samurai. The Family is a huge organization with information, training, blue prints, catalog, advice, and is very squarely something only a Samurai can do. It seems to be the choice is clear. Do the thing that needs a Samurai and delegate the rest."

It took half a minute but I saw the wisdom in her words and made my decision right there. I thought I'd be well on my way ten minutes later. Instead it was almost two hours later, that I slapped a car-go sticker on an hover car that had lost it's roof and rear quarter panel.

The one time use hack gave me access to the vehicle's controls, and we lifted off and exited the ruins slowly, wary of all the other traffic.

"What?" I asked Sara. We had our helmets on because of the wind but we were on the same coms channel.

"You didn't have to waste the points with the car-go, your- Max could do that for you for free."

I frowned and looked at the sticker. It was just white and round and extra thick.

I frowned at it and then looked at Sara.

"It should have been you," I said sadly.

I saw her hands flex on her thighs and then she looked out her window.

"There is envy of course," she said without looking at me, "and some anger. I feel full of loss and disappointment. Not that you were picked, not disappointment that I wasn't, but disappointment that I don't feel joy for you. That I'm not proud for you. And I'm not saying I'm not proud of you," she said looking at me, "but everything is so jumbled up it's hard to sort it out."

"I shouldn't have said anything," I said by way of an apology.

"Perhaps," she said, "or perhaps it is better to air the wound out instead of letting it fester."

"Almost out of fuel," I said several hours later, "so we'll be stopping briefly and then getting back into the air."

She was strapped in, but passed out.

I glanced at the auction results, more than a little shocked by the number of credits everything had sold for, I was rich. Not like actually rich, but working man rich. More money than I had ever had before. Enough maybe to lease a place in a building that had a green floor with trees and grass and what not. I'd always wanted to live in a place like that.

The broker Sara had contacted had arrived within minutes of our own arrival at the gear. I let the PMC and Rez soldiers keep the armor and weapons, but we added the drones, and shield walls to the pile and the broker conducted the auction within the hour.

We landed at a small police station I informed one of the cops that I was refueling then it was back into the air.

I let her sleep and told Max to wake me before we landed.

The train we boarded was stopped when we did so. I was sort of hoping to have to jump onto it from the hovercar like the did in the action vids. It was a cargo hauler though with no passenger cars. I bought inflatable sleeping bags for a single point each and they acted somewhat like shock absorbers. I was out minutes after I secured the side.

For those brief minutes before sleep I had a massive smile on my face. I'd become a super hero, saved people, killed the baddies, and now I'd run away from home to meet a mysterious Samurai by way of stolen car and riding a cargo train. It didn't dawn on me that was now a Samurai as well, not really.

When I woke Sara was sitting on top of her puffed up sleeping sack, back against the wall and staring off into nothing.

A moment later she made the hand gestures to save whatever documents she'd been working on and stood up.

"Breakfast?" she asked.

I cracked my helmet and pulled it off and was suddenly made aware of how much noise there was. I didn't realize the helmet had a noise canceling feature. The train was moving, but not insanely fast. Most of the rail lines were now maintained not by human crews but huge robotic trains. This might be a Samurai owned line, as it ran from Great Bear Lake way up in Canada down into Central America.

There was a sliding door on the car we were in and I directed Max to open it.

The doors slid away from each other showing a stretch of brown land. Global warming and the tendency for humans to bunch up into mega cities changed the water situation of the planet so much that whole stretches of land that used to be green were now akin to deserts. Little rainfall and having their rivers diverted, as well as near constant wild fires left much of the land wasted and worthless.

With the birth of mega cities six or eight rail lines between any set of two made financial sense, both highspeed people movers, and slow lumbering cargo pullers. With hovercars being the norm everywhere except the most rural of places, it was cheaper to have roads dip under the rail than have any crossings where collisions might occur.

Max plotted out the route and this train shouldn't even stop until Edmonton. At other places it would be directed to the outer most track where a local loop would run along side.

A train on the local loop would match speed with this one, which would slow down as much as needed to get the work done in the needed amount of track. The two trains would come along side each other and robotics would transfer the large shipping containers from one flat bed to another swapping containers from train car to train car.

I stood there, hand on one of the doors where it had rolled back, as I looked out.

"Don't stick anything out," Sara said, "The trains can pass very close together."

"The air pressure of a passing train could suck you out as well. And the doors are not designed to ride in this position. A significant bump could cause them to jump their rails," Max said.

"Max says we could get sucked out as well," I said to Sara while indicating to Max to close the door.

I paused and examined what had just happened. I hadn't said anything, nor was I aware that I made any gestures. Yet my directive was followed. There was a chill that ran down my spine. That same chill that ran down my spine whenever I avoided thinking about the brain damage once I knew about it. There was something utterly terrifying about the prospect of things happening with your brain that you didn't understand.

"Max what are the choices we have for breakfast?" I asked out loud.

"There are a significant number of choices. So many so that it would take several hours just to get through the sandwich choices."

"You have any recommendation?" I asked Sara.

"Something that maximizes the value of the point spent on it, prioritizing volume, shelf stability, nutrient content, and taste in that order."

I was hoping she was going to say eggs.

"Max why don't you let her pick," I said.

"Point limit?" Max asked me.

"Point limit?" I asked Sara.

"One," she said without hesitation.

I saw her blink then she reached out a hand to touch the wall behind her as she backed up by feel to sit. Her throat was twitching as she subvocalized while speaking with Max.

I too sat back down. First I opened the map and looked over the planned route zooming in on places and then, like a fool realized I could speak to Max about it. There was no way two of us could overpower her.

That thought lead me down a winding path until I interrupted Sara with a question.

"These operator forums do they have tasks for AI to carry out?"

Sara blinked at me?

"Tasks?" she asked.

"Computational things, design or otherwise, tasks that an AI like Max could do to help people out."

Sara's eyes grew wide.

"I'm not sure. I can ask. Is that- wouldn't that be beneath her."

"Would it?" I asked.

"It is beneath me in the sense that it is mundane and trivial, but I exist to assist you. If you find value in such a task, for instance to garner good will with the Operator network, than I will of course comply." Max's words had no emotional attachment but I wondered.

"Does it- is it insulting to you or something that should be avoided? I don't want to anger you or make you think you aren't valued by giving you tasks that are beneath you."

"I am the most valuable piece of equipment you will ever interact with should you live fifty thousand years and visit every star in your galaxy. Every task you give me in beneath me in that respect. I am not angered by any task I am given, and while there are emotions of a sort they do not exist as they do for you. I am, in my own way, happy to serve."

"Let's map out interesting places to watch then as we pass. Maybe we can open the doors or put a camera drone outside or something."

"You can see all of the places you pass via satellite or I can compile data into a virtual replica you can explore," Max said.

"It's not the same," I said.

Sara was working, her fingers twitching and throat working as she communicated either with Max over breakfast or the Operators over tasks Max might be able to help with.

"Can you show me the JoJo guides Sara had mentioned please."

After ten minutes or so I realized I could just have Max read them all. I directed her to do so and then asked for a summary.

"The guides are, in short, advice to Samurai on ways to maximize killing of Antithesis, maximize actions, minimize time, maximize point accumulation and efficiency when spending points, minimizing-"

"What is the printings advice specifically. I take it to mean instead of buying ammo I have a printer that produces it as a way to save on points?"

"For the most part yes," Max said.

"And they've come up with a plan to do that efficiently?"

"There has been much debate and discussion and refinement of various guides. There were however some things that were missed that make their suggestions imperfect."

"What was missed?"

"Samurai can buy blueprints, items, and material from catalogs they did not unlock but that another Samurai has unlocked. This means if a Samurai spent four tokens to unlock a Class Three catalog, other Samurai may purchase items from that catalog without needing to spend tokens which are the limiting factor as you become more powerful. Further once a blueprint has been purchased it can be traded, sold, or given away for free. This action is not bound by the physical proximity that purchasing an item has. Further if a Samurai wishes to purchase a blueprint from another catalog, they need not travel at all, but instead set up an exchange where they give the needed points to the Samurai with the catalog, who buys the specified blueprint, and who sends a copy back. This is independent of purchase distance but does require locations to be within the same spatial-temporal manifold which mostly means your local solar solar system. You'd be able to buy blueprints from every human Samurai save one."

"One? Why not that one?"

"He is outside the spatial-temporal manifold by way of acceleration-induced temporal dilatation."

"I still don't understand."

"He created a space ship and is currently accelerating towards relativistic speeds. In addition his sleep/wake schedule is such that he will not be available for roughly thirteen hundred years."

"Fucking metal!" I whispered.

"Sara!" I said before I realized she was in the middle of something. I saw her do a hard switch, basically pulling the plug on the virtual to come back to reality. She blinked and glanced around with some disorientation for a moment before focusing on me. I worried I'd interrupted her and she wouldn't see value in what I had to say, like a child pulling on their mother's skirts to show them a frog or something. She was a cultist. Of course she knew everything about the Samurai. She'd known who Cold Brew was and he as tried to hide his identity or whatever.

"Did you know there is a Samurai, a human, shooting off through space in a space ship trying to hit warp speed or whatever?"

She blinked at me and I felt my mood start to dip, then she said, in almost a whisper, "No way! Who? Where are they headed? How did they build it?"

I linked her coms with mine and what followed was a back and forth with Max as we questioned everything about Bob Johansson.