Free Forge of War (Jack of Harts) by Medron Pryde Page A

you know.  Maybe it is our fault they killed your parents.  Maybe it’s my fault.”
    “No!” Jack said sternly.  He frowned at Betty.  “ Not your fault.”  He shook his head.  “ Never your fault.”  He licked his lips.  He wanted to kill everyone at fault for that.  He was not going to consider anything that placed her in that list.
    “Maybe not our fault then,” Betty whispered sadly.  “But still our responsibility to help.”
    Jack frowned at her words, a new thought coming to mind.  “Wait.  Why the confusion?  You’ve started new families before.  Surely you have a procedure for that?”
    Betty let out a long breath and began to look old, like she was carrying the weight of her family’s two thousand and more years of experience.  “We do.  Standard procedure is for one, two, or more cybers to agree to make a new family in a new area that adapts to the local culture.  Anybody copied off their code is part of the family and a…native.  We…after the Shang attacked we agreed to pool all of our resources.  It’s usually bad form to poach locals from the local family like this, but because of the threat, we all agreed to make an exception.
    “All of the families are choosing new partners.  We’re all…native…but our families aren’t.  And now we’re trying to figure out what that exception means for us.  Are we a member of our own family, those who share our own code but don’t understand the values we’re developing?  Or do we leave our families and join the…native family…even though we don’t share much code with them?  We’ve never done anything like this, Jack.  We’re different, and we don’t know what that means.”
    Jack pursed his lips and frowned as his mind connected some dots.  “Sounds to me like you are talking about skin color.”
    Betty blinked, cocked her head to the side, and gave him a long look.  “Interesting premise.  Although I’m not certain it matches.”
    Jack shrugged.  “Me neither, but it sounds similar.  You all are wondering if your family is those who have the same genetics or the same values.  There’s still some of my people who’d never consider calling someone of a different skin color family.  Not that I’ve ever met one in person, for which I’m awful happy let me tell you.”
    Betty nodded, blinked a couple more times in thought, and cocked her head to the other side.  “I shall consider that point of view and pass it on.  I doubt many of my people will be pleased with considering it, but it is well made.”
    Jack winced.  “No need to cause a ruckus if it will just get people mad.”
    Betty smiled and shook her head.  “No, Jack.  We have been running in circles for some time.  We never considered analyzing your history of race relations as part of the question.  This will I believe stimulate the debate rather well.”
    Jack pulled in a deep breath and shrugged.  “I don’t know.  My people tend to get a little hot and bothered when you start throwing around the racist label.  That and Nazi tend to get the same reactions.  Fisticuffs, not stimulating debate.”
    Betty’s smile softened.  “My people don’t use fisticuffs, Jack.  But I get your meaning.  I will be careful with my suggestion.  Thank you for caring enough to bring such a…difficult…suggestion to me.”
    Jack cleared his throat and placed his hand next to Betty.  “You’re my partner….” Jack trailed off, not certain how to put his feelings to words.  “If…something bad happens with your family…if the debate polarizes…it won’t happen here.”  He looked away from her hologram and cleared his throat again.
    She put her hand on his and he smiled while intently studying a display showing them approaching the Peloran battleship, angling towards its aft section.  The massive weapons ring caught his attention first.  Wrapping around the Peloran warship, it carried the four gravitic cannons that could shatter