Somehow, this woman, Randi Johnson (nee Alba), now known as Nichelle Firth, was implanted with Bean's and Petra's missing child. This child is afflicted with Bean's genetic giantism. He will be brilliant, but he will die in his twenties (or earlier) of growth that simply does not stop.

And he is being raised by a woman who, for some reason, thinks it is important to spit on me. I am not personally offended by this, but I am interested, because this action makes me suspect that, unlike the other surrogates, she may have some knowledge of whose child she bore. Or, more likely, she might have been told false stories. In any event, I cannot quiz her on this because by the time I secured this information, she was gone.

She is going to Ganges Colony, which, like yours, is headed by a young Battle School graduate. Virlomi was not as young as you when she left — she had had enough years on Earth post — Battle School to become the savior of India under Chinese occupation, and then the instigator of an ill-fated (and ill-planned) invasion of China. She became quite the self-destructive fanatic by the end of her rise to power, believing her own propaganda. She is back to sanity now, and instead of trying to decide whether to honor her for the liberation of her own people or condemn her for the invasion of the nation of their oppressors, she has been made the head of a colony that, for the first time, takes into account the culture of origin on Earth. Most of the colonists are Indians of the Hindu persuasion — but not all.

Bean's son will be brilliant — like his father, plus his mother. And Randi may be feeding him with stories that will bend his character in awkward ways.

Why am I telling you all this? Because Ganges Colony is our first effort at colonizing a world that was NOT originally a formic possession. They are traveling at a slightly smaller fraction of lightspeed, so they will not arrive until the XBs have a chance to do their work and have the planet ready for colonization.

If you are happy governing Shakespeare and wish to spend the rest of your life there, then this information will not be of any particular interest to you. But if, after a few years, you decide that government is not your metier, I would ask you to travel by courier to Ganges. Of course, the colony will not even be established by the time you have spent five (or even ten) years on Shakespeare. And the voyage to Ganges will be of such a distance that you can leave Shakespeare and reach Ganges within fourteen (or nineteen) years of its founding. At that point, the boy (named Randall Firth) will be adult size — no, larger — and may be so shockingly brilliant that Virlomi has no chance of keeping him from being a danger to the peace and safety of the colony. Or he may already be the dictator. Or the freely elected governor that saved them from Virlomi's madness. Or he might already be dead. Or a complete nonentity. Who knows?

Again: The choice is yours. I have no claim upon you; Bean and Petra have no claim upon you. But if it should be interesting to you, more interesting than remaining on Shakespeare, this would be a place where you could go and perhaps help a young governor, Virlomi, who is brilliant but also prone to the occasional very poor decision.

Alas, it's all a pig in a poke. By the time you would have to leave Shakespeare with time enough to be effective on Ganges, the Ganges colonists won't even have debarked from their ship! We might be sending you to a colony with no problems at all and therefore nothing for you to do.

Thus you see how I plan for things that can't be planned for. But sometimes I'm oh so glad that I did. But if you decide you want no part of my plans from now on, I will understand better than anyone!

Your friend,

Hyrum Graff

PS: On the chance that your captain has not informed you, five years after you left, the I.F. agreed with my urgent request and launched a series of couriers, one departing every five years, to each of the colonies. These ships are not the huge behemoths that carry colonists, but they have room for some serious cargo and we are hoping they become the instrument of trade among the colonies. Our endeavor will be to have a ship call on each colony world every five years — but then they will travel colony to colony and return to Earth only after making a full circuit. The crews will have the option of completing the whole voyage, or training their replacements on any colony world and remaining behind while someone else completes their mission. Thus no one will be trapped on any one world for their whole life, and no one will be trapped in the same spaceship for the rest of their life. As you can guess, we did not lack for volunteers.

Vitaly Kolmogorov lay in bed, waiting to die and getting rather impatient about it.

"Don't hurry things," said Sel Menach. "It sets a bad example."

"I'm not hurrying anything. I'm just feeling impatient. I have a right to feel what I feel, I think!"

"And a right to think what you think, I feel," said Sel.

"Oh, now he develops a sense of humor."

"You're the one who decided this was your deathbed, not me," said Sel. "Black humor seems appropriate, though."

"Sel, I asked you to visit me for a reason."

"To depress me."

"When I'm dead, the colony will need a governor."

"There's a governor coming from Earth, isn't there?"

"Technically, from Eros."

"Ah, Vitaly, we all come from Eros."

"Very funny, and very classical. I wonder how much longer there'll be anybody capable of being amused by puns based on Earth-system asteroids and Greek gods."

"Anyway, Vitaly, please don't tell me you're appointing me governor."

"Nothing of the kind," said Vitaly. "I'm giving you an errand."

"And no one but an aging xenobiologist will do."

"Exactly," said Vitaly. "There is a message — encrypted, and no, I won't give you the key — a message waiting in the ansible queue. I ask only this: When I'm well and thoroughly dead, but before they've chosen a new governor, please send the message."

"To whom?"

"The message already knows where it's going."

"Very clever message. Why doesn't it figure out when you're dead, and go by itself?"

"Promise?"

"Yes, of course."

"And promise me something else."

"I'm getting old. Don't count on my remembering too many promises all at once."

"When they elect you governor, do it."

"They will not."

"If they don't, then fine," said Vitaly. "But when they do elect you, as everyone but you fully expects they will, do it."

"No."

"And here's why you must," said Vitaly. "You are best qualified for the job because you don't want it."

"Nobody in their right mind wants it."

"Too many men crave it, not because they want to do it, but because they fancy the honor of it. The prestige. The rank." Vitaly laughed, and the laugh turned into an ugly coughing jag till he was able to get a drink of water and calm the spasms in his chest. "I won't miss that sort of thing when I'm dead."

"Rank?"

"I was speaking of my cough. That constant tickling deep in my chest. Wheezing. Flatulence. Blurred vision no matter how good my glasses are and no matter how much light I have. All the nasty decay of old age."

"What about your bad breath?"

"That is designed to make you glad I'm dead. Sel, I'm serious about this. If someone else is elected governor, it will be someone who wants the job and won't be happy to give it up when the new governor comes."

"That's what they get for deciding, clear off in Eros, that along with supplies, equipment, and expertise, they'll also send us a dictator."

"I was a dictator at first," said Vitaly.

"When we were starting and survival looked impossible, yes, you kept things calm till we could find a way to handle the things this planet came up with to kill us off. But those days are over."