Gray ran through other reports, skimming for importance. Most of this stuff was for Koenig’s virtual eyes, but Gray was servingas interim secretary and IT processor. He wished he could just chuck it and step through into the Singularity, but for thetime being, at least, his duty lay here. He’d encouraged Laurie to go on up, but she’d elected to stay with him—somethinghe quietly appreciated.
It might, he thought, be a long stay. He and Konstantin had spent a lot of time over the last few days discussing the Singularity Defense Force—the SDF—which was in the process of arising from Gray’s concerns of a few days before. Earth right now was terribly vulnerable, as much from power-hungry factions within Humankind as from hostile alien threats, and the Singularity shared that vulnerability so long as it depended on Earthside servers and network infrastructure to keep it up and running. That had to be protected at all costs; Earth had to be protected at all costs, and Gray was determined to see this through.
There was, Gray knew, a concept within Buddhism that applied, that of the bodhisattva. These were beings, humans, who’d purifiedthemselves to the point where they could end the cycle of reincarnation and enter nirvana, but who voluntarily remained onEarth in order to help those who’d not yet made the transition.
Gray had decided to remain on this side of the Singularity until the rest of Humankind had crossed over.
It wasn’t a renunciation of the Singularity, of course. He could step across to the other side, enter the gestalt, enjoy thesheer scope and power of existing as an ascended transhuman without a problem. But he wasn’t going to cross over in full untileveryone who wished could follow.
And they were following. Billions of them.
Eventually, they would have some sort of automated defense system in place, or, possibly, a system that had military personnelrotating between duty and the Singularity.
Somehow, it would all work out. He already had some ideas—
“Sandy?”
He looked up. Laurie stood there in the doorway, beckoning. “Back to bed, Admiral,” she told him. “I’m not finished with youyet.”
“Hi, Laurie. I just need to—”
“Hit the save button and come back to bed. There are priorities, you know.”
“Yes, ma’am!”
She was, he knew, absolutely right. If he was going to remain human, then there was nothing more important than connectingwith another human.
The species—both those who transcended and those who had not yet reached Singularity—would survive a few hours without him.
And across the planet, within the sprawling facilities of Synchorbital, within a thousand space habitats, on Luna, on Mars,within ships in deep space, within the strangeness of the Godstream, Humankind transcended. The change, the apotheosis wasnot immediate, could not be immediate, nor was it complete, because transcendence was an act of individual human will.
Not all accepted the Transcendence. Many held back because of fear, because they didn’t want to change, because the changeitself did not fit what they believed was the true destiny of the species.
Humankind transcended . . . and became, not gods, but beings of light with power and scope and depth far beyond anything imaginedby the mythologies of mere humans.
What humanity as a whole did not yet comprehend was that the Transcendence was an ongoing process, one that in some ways hadbeen ongoing since the rise of certain bipedal primates on the African savanna millions of years before. It was simply movinga lot faster now.
Nor did they understand that this was simply the first in a long, long line of Technological Singularities, that humans—andtheir machine offspring—would continue to evolve, continue to change, continue to grow, and that they now stood on the brinkof a dizzying new perspective.
A galaxy awaited them.
About the Author
IAN DOUGLAS is one of the many pseudonyms for writer William H. Keith, the New York Times bestselling author of the popular militaryscience fiction series The Heritage Trilogy, The Legacy Trilogy, The Inheritance Trilogy, The Star Corpsman series, The AndromedanDark series, and The Star Carrier series. A former naval corpsman, he lives in Pennsylvania.
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By Ian Douglas
Star Carrier
Earth Strike
Center of Gravity
Singularity
Deep Space
Dark Matter
Deep Time
Dark Mind
Bright Light
Stargods
Andromedan Dark
Altered Starscape
Darkness Falling
Solar Warden
Alien Secrets
Star Corpsman
Bloodstar
Abyss Deep
The Galactic Marines Saga
The Heritage Trilogy
Semper Mars
Luna Marine
Europa Strike
The Legacy Trilogy
Star Corps
Battlespace
Star Marines
The Inheritance Trilogy
Star Strike
Galactic Corps
Semper Human
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiouslyand are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead,is entirely coincidental.
stargods. Copyright © 2020 by William H. Keith, Jr. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions.By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the textof this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered,or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronicor mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins Publishers. For information,address HarperCollins Publishers, 195 Broadway, New York, NY 10007.
Digital Edition DECEMBER 2020 ISBN: 978-0-06-236904-8
Print Edition ISBN: 978-0-06-236903-1
Cover design by Amy Halperin
Cover illustration by Greg Bridges
Harper Voyager and the Harper Voyager logo are trademarks of HarperCollins Publishers in the United States of America and other countries.
HarperCollins is a registered trademark of HarperCollins Publishers in the United States of America and other countries.
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