Life Speed

I walked into Reggie's lab and poked around until he couldn't ignore me any longer.

"Why are you here? I've got three med-vats to program. I need to concentrate."

"Because Simon is throwing a raging fit about this light-speed thing you've been planning. I would have thought he'd be happy about it" I said, pausing. "Not that anyone thought to tell me anything. You're Submind's representative, or puppet, or something. You didn't think to mention this until you got a new puppet?"

He started giggling. I insult him, and he starts giggling. I'm still trying to decide if his weird eyes are more disturbing then his head full of Doc's memories, and while both seem harmless enough, I'm watching Submind, and everything new the alien virus brings to us, with deep suspicion. Doc thought it was great fun cranking me up about it, but Reggie just tends to start giggling in the middle of our conversations. What's even more annoying is I'm the only person who sets him off like that.

"Should we worry about your sanity?" I asked.

"You are a refreshingly forthright young man," Reggie said, ignoring my last question. "The answer to that is simple. It is possible to travel almost instantaneously from one point to another, but it is limited by distance, and impossible to survive."

"Um?"

"You leave here," Reggie said, marking an imaginary dot in the air. "And you arrive here, a second later. Dead."

"You're kidding?"

"It's been that way for millennia," Reggie said. "I call it the speed of life."

"That would explain Simon's lack of joy, but he was angry. Not happy with you, specifically, in any way."

"There is a small possibility that Mars will drag Earth into this conflict," Reggie said. "We can't allow that to happen."

"Obviously," I said.

"At my suggestion, we are growing a specialized Submind graviton engine into 24 slush bombs. They will be capable of reaching Mars in a matter of minutes, but the engines will die, so they only get one hop. We can use the standard slush bomb thrusters to gain momentum, and then translate into Mars system on the fly."

"I... yeah. I get it now. Simon thinks you actually intend to do this."

"Don't be silly," Reggie said. "If we were to display such advancements at this time, the entire inner system would declare war on us. That would not end well for anyone."

I nodded. "Glad to hear it."

"Good."

"So, I'll go explain it to Simon--see if I can seal his carbon leak," I said. "Can't have this becoming more than a rumor."