Yeah, I'm one of the famous 5 Rickies.  Okay, it must seem
pretty weird to anyone not used to ReGen Copies, but once you
get accustomed to us, it's no big deal, we're just people
like anyone else--except that there's more of us.

I'm designated Ricky #3, being the 2nd copy made, since they
call the original Ricky #1, but really it doesn't mean anything
because there's absolutely no difference between us.  We're all
the same guy. None of us feels more or less Ricky-ish than the
other.  

So when I talk about who I am, I have to say that I was born
Ricardo Guerrero, July 17th 2075, and tell the same life story
all of the others would tell: grew up in Arizona, family moved
to LA at age 13, finished high school and joined the USNA
Army-- then the Pan-American War came along and I was sent into
action, where I became a decorated war hero and a career
soldier.  Yeah, brag brag.

War affects people in different ways, some guys love it, some
are too afraid to function.  I was in the middle, I liked the
action, the strategies, even the danger, but I never liked to
destroy what men had built, or to kill indiscriminately. 
Everyone says I was a hot soldier, they gave me all sorts of
medals to prove it, so I guess I was.

Anyway, when the military wanted a subject for the ReGen Copy
experiments, they chose me.  Okay, I had an impressive battle
record, but I think they picked me partly because I looked
good.  Actually, I'm NOT bragging, it's just what I suspect--
they wanted to make a presentation that would impress Congress 
and keep the fund allocations rolling in.  Take some sturdy 
looking GI with a good smile and turn him into a troop of 5 
identical soldiers who think and cooperate as one man.

It was all top secret at first, the military had some pretty
radical plans for setting up an assembly line of super
soldiers, ReGen Copies who could fearlessly march off and fight
and die, fearless and obedient because they were only copies
and had no real lives of their own.  And they were to be 
totally expendable, because you could always produce 
replacements as long as you had raw elemental material in the 
vats, with no angry parents complaining to Congress about the 
slaughter of their sons.  I guess we fucked that up royally for 
them.

It wasn't very secret any more after the 5 of us took over Camp
Rawson and arrested the commanding officer and called the
newspapers.  They were going to start killing us copies--
because we were only experimental units, not real people--but 
we refused to accept that decision, so we mutinied, and got 
away with it.  That story's been in the media so much, I won't 
even bother telling it.



People wonder how it is being around 4 other copies of your 
self.  Well, it's not like having 4 brothers, we didn't grow 
up together--in fact we have one older brother, it's more
weird for him than for us!  It's more like being in a house of
mirrors.  We don't really talk to each other so much, we all
know what the other is going to say anyway.  And we all can see
in which ways those other guys are irritating jerks...and we
all know what that means, so it can be kind of painful to hang
out with each other.  

But as a combat group: holy shit, no wonder we took over that
base, just the 5 of us, we're really good.  If I ever go into
combat again, I want them with me--and I want to be with them. 
We're not normally especially telepathic, but under stress and
danger, I think we are.  Unconsciously perhaps, but we react as
a team, we make instant unanimous decisions without discussion,
and we calculate tactics so fucking fast that it scares us, as
if we were a group mind.

We were last working together as martial arts instructors at
Project Procyon, training the colonists who would be UpLoaded
and sent with Starship Zeus to Procyon 5.  There were 30 men
and 30 women volunteers.  We were very popular with the girls,
but most of them were after the thrill of having all 5 of us at
once.  Okay, we went along with it, it WAS fun having all those
women, but I really would have preferred the one-on-one at a
time with a real girl friend.  

Especially one--Juliana--but she never took us on anyway, being
faithful to a boyfriend.  And of course, we had reputations as
nothing-but-fun guys, party party party, handsome GI thugs. 
Yeah, okay, we deserved the rep--we'd earned it fair and
square.  But in the end there weren't many women who took us
seriously.

Okay, okay, I'm being unfair.  There were some women who took
us--I mean ME--more seriously than I took them.  I'm just
complaining about how the one I was most interested in never
did.

And when the Procyon Project ended the ground phase, the
colonial volunteers were UpLoaded, and off they went to their
various lives and destinies.  I watched Juliana leave
hand-in-hand with Vance, he'd gotten a good job offer as a
meteorologist in Denver, and she was following him.  She waved
goodbye to the 5 of us and was gone.

Well, life goes on,  Our assignment at the Project was also
over, and we were broken up as sent to different posts.  The
Army wanted to split us up for a while (to see what THAT did to
us psychologically, I suspect).
 
The last time the 5 of us talked together as a group we did
mention the women we had had on our own.  And the big question
was, "Did any of you ever get Juliana?"  None of us had, but we
had all been infatuated with her.

We remained at the project after all the volunteers had left. 
There was a lot to do: final preparations for launching
Starship Zeus, setting up the EnActivation Lab on board,
installing the UpLoads to be sent, testing the robotics for
automatic operation, it took 6 months to get the launch ready. 
We finally sent it off to the stars from L5 Orbit Station in
2104, and most of the job was done.   

The other 4 left for other assignments, but I continued on at
the project compound supervising technical maintenance.  I was
also promoted to captain in that period.  



It was quite liberating to be without the other 4 around. 
Instead of being one of the freaky 5 Rickies, I was just
Captain Rick Guerrero, a respected career officer.  There were
some girl friends.  I was doing all right.

But there was an incident on the compound that changed my 
life.  An UpLoad technician, Wilbur Gregors, was found dead in
the EnActivation chamber itself, his throat and wrist cut, eyes
popped.  Locked in the chamber with him was Juliana, naked,
starving, and obviously abused.

She admitted to killing Gregors in self defense.  Then she said
that the technician had EnActivated her--that she was actually 
a ReGen Copy of Juliana--for the purpose of abuse and murder, 
and that he had done the same to several other copies of women
volunteers in the UpLoad archives of Project Procyon.  The
project supervisors immediately put a security blanket on this
case and sent me in to investigate.

She was taken to the clinic for treatment and testing.  It was
readily proven that she had been bound and had intercourse with
Gregors, but not that it was rape, as she had claimed, or that
she had killed him in self defense.  She hadn't been beaten,
there was no sign of coercion.  She insisted that Gregors had 
recorded vidies of all his victims, but they could not be 
found.  

As it was, she was under suspicion of murder.

But when I arrived we recognized each other, and both of us
thought the same thing at the same time: now I've got a chance
after all!  

I knew she was telling the truth.  Even without being 
interested in her, I would have believed her--her very
existence was proof!  The original Juliana was in Denver,
married to Vance, I had that checked out at once.  There should
not have been an unregistered ReGen Copy of Juliana floating
around, therefore she was an illegal copy, and the only one who
had access to the hardware and the UpLoads was Gregors.  She
certainly couldn't have EnActivated herself.

I searched for the vidi recordings Gregors had forced Juliana 
to watch, but couldn't find them anywhere.  Which was not 
surprising, one could hide anything on the Overnet--as everyone 
does, you know, even the 5 of me have our own secret web 
station hidden out there.  Rather than have confidential or 
compromising documents lying around on your own private 
computer, you safely encrypt all data into small blurbs of 
digital code and spread them out over the planetary network. 
Without the proper decoding passwords no one could find all 
the pieces and assemble them, not even a government.  Total 
privacy.

So I concentrated on finding hard evidence of any other ReGen 
Copies Gregors might have EnActivated, but he had covered his 
activities too well.  Every EnActivation sequence should have 
registered a time and name file in the computer archives, but 
if one knew the military's software overrides for any top-
secret "exceptions to the rule", it was theoretically possible 
to avoid registration.  

The element vats were something else, there was so much mass
and weight to each human body copied.  I checked them, and
there was a deficit amounting to Juliana's body, but not for
the two or three other girls she had mentioned.  However, if 
Gregors had recycled them back into the vats as elemental 
stuff, breaking their bodies back down to the molecular level, 
any evidence of that was erased.

There were some hard-nosed Army staff who were for eliminating
ALL evidence of this case--meaning Juliana--in the interests of 
"national security".  I had to make a stand and remind them 
that ReGen Copies were protected by law.  There was a remark 
about "that case with those 5 Rickies having fucked up 
security", the stupid bastards didn't even know who I was.

So I had to convince them that this particular Juliana Copy was
protected by ME.

I investigated Gregor's apartment on base.  He was married, but
his wife stayed at their home in Fresno, and he lived alone on
base while working on the project.  He had lots of vidi
discs, all marked with popular movie titles, so I had my staff
quickscan through them to see if any of them contained copies 
of the alleged vidies, just in case.  

They didn't.  But we found some cryptic addresses.  I showed 
them to Juliana, who had seen Overnet addresses onscreen when 
Gregors showed her the vidies, and had memorized blocks of 
them.  She was certain that it was them.  But we needed a code 
word.  "Übermensch," she told me.

And there they were: recordings of the other girls; Lissa, 
Cheryl, Wenda--all being raped and murdered gruesomely by 
Gregors.  The guy was really sick.  By the time I had seen the 
vidies I was sick too, but the worst was yet to come.  Tapes 
of Julianas, 2nd and 3rd copies--I couldn't even watch them.  
I never saw them finished.  

Except for the last one: the vidi of Juliana 3rd copy--My 
Juliana--which showed how she finally blinded and beat the 
bastard, clearly proving self-defense.  

I considered releasing the vidis to the media, to blow away the 
military secrecy that they'll kill anyone to protect, but 
decided that neither Juliana--copy or original--should ever 
have to endure that sort of publicity, because I knew what the 
media would do with those vidies.  But I presented them as 
confidential evidence and got her out of jail.



After that, well, I was her hero.  I'd say that we fell in
love, but I already was, and she was pretty screwed up about
men after the technician.  She had survived by being coldly
practical and unemotional about what a man was doing to her. 
Actually, she was still "in love" with Vance, just as when 
she'd been UpLoaded, but he was married to the original 
Juliana, so she simply let me have her out of gratitude and 
practicality.  

I couldn't complain, I was happy to have her under any
conditions, to help her, to be with her.  It was a learning
experience being the one who was more in love than the other,
humbling even.  She was never horny but I could have her if I
wanted; she would tolerate it.  That's how our love affair was
at the time.

So when I got her a new identity via government channels,
rather like a witness protection program, she went off to
Seattle to start a new life without me.  I was pretty useless
for a while after that, took leave, travelled.

I was being a tourist in Singapore when I couldn't take it any
more.  I called her.  She was really glad to hear from me, it
had been three months.  So I invited her over, she said yes,
and I arranged a flight for her on Overnet.  

When she arrived she loved me.  It was a miracle.  She even 
more or less raped me.  I could hardly believe it.

"It took me some time to put things into perspective," she told
me that night, "and to find out who I am if I can't be who I
once was."

"So who are you?"

"You know who I am, you tell me."

I knew what she meant.  "You're a copy, like me, ferociously
insistent that you are exactly the same as your original.  But 
really we copies change apart from each other every day due to 
whim and circumstance, the little--or big--things that make our 
lives gradually become different from one another's.  For 
instance: I have Juliana, my other selves don't, and that 
changes everything. Including ourselves."

"Ooo, how eloquent for one of the 5 Rickies," she teased.

"Who loves one of the Julianas."

"Who finally loves him back."

"Uh, yeah--why is that?"

"I discovered that it wasn't Vance I was missing at all.  It
was actually good for me to lose you for a while--showed me 
that it hurt a lot more than losing him.  

"I'd always thought of him and me as the perfect couple, but
I've followed Juliana's e-post (I know her access codes, of
course) and now the cracks are beginning to show in the gloss. 
I don't envy her anymore."  She rubbed up against me, "She
should envy me."

"I don't envy Vance any more either," I said, "I've got the
Juliana I want.  But then, I never really considered Vance the
major problem."

"Yeah, oh, well let's get that damned technician out of the
way...I felt that his sickness touched me because I was
something like him, truth is I came every time he raped me,
even though I hated him."

"You did?"  I was surprised because she had never come with me,
until this time.

"That really made me feel perverse, like a whore, tainted,
spoiled.  Certainly not good enough for any man who wasn't
perverse."

"And now?"

She smiled, "I've come to accept that I'm perverse, no big
deal.  Bring on the 5 Rickies."

"Oh, they'd love that."

"I was kidding.  I guess...tee hee."



She had a job in Seattle and had to go back, my leave was up
and I had to go back to the project in Santa Cruz.  But I flew
up to see her almost every weekend.  

I was in sporadic contact with my other selves, so they knew 
that I was seeing her.  They were all a little bit jealous--I 
would have been too--but were civilized about it.

One day #4 stopped by to visit me on his way to another
assignment in L5 orbit, he was going to launch out of LA in a
couple of days. 

It's pretty hard to hide our thoughts from each other, so I
said to him, "No, you can't go visit her pretending that you're
me."

"She'd never know.  I just want to experience her, at least
once in my life."

"Yeah, at the VERY least.  Once would never do it, you know
that."

He knew that, shrugged.  "We've always shared before."

He had me there, we had shared, it was fun.  "But this is My
Woman, I really love her, this is special!"

"Don't you think I know that?  She's special for me too."

"Sorry, I want to see her myself, not send off a proxy instead. 
And if you do it, all the others will demand their turn too."

"Well, yeah, I guess they will."

The thing is, it's hard to say NO to yourself.  I couldn't help
sympathizing.  But I refused to swindle Juliana.  Ended up I
gave her a call.

"Hi Rick."  She smiled onscreen from Seattle, "I can hardly
wait for you to come up here and give me a good...oh my,
there's two of you!"

"Hi Juliana," #4 said.

"Are the 5 Rickies in town?" she asked.

"Only 2 of them," he said.

"And that's way too many," I said.  "Look, Juliana, my
copy has a problem about you."

"Poor baby.  Sure, bring him along this weekend."

"Really?" he said.

"I told you I was perverse," she said, and clicked off with a
big smile.

"Well, well," both of us said in surprise.

We had a nice weekend the three of us.  Especially Juliana, she
was very turned on by the both of us.  Reminded us of the 5
Rickies days at the project, except that this time it was THE
woman we loved.  I couldn't get jealous, we loved her as a
team: it was just like in combat, the semi telepathic timing,
paced effort.  We definitely put Juliana over the top, and
loved doing it for her.

I don't need to tell you what happened next.  Oh but you're
waiting to hear it anyway, aren't you? 


 
Yes, they showed up out of the woodwork, the bastards.  The
next time I went to Seattle I was 5 guys.  We all went out on 
the town, drinking and dancing with Juliana.  We got some stares, 
no doubt about it.  There were even some women who tried to join 
our group, but Juliana was fair-but-firmly possessive and wouldn't 
allow it. "Not this time anyway," she said, "maybe next time."

"I'd always sort of envied Wenda and those other girls who
spent a night with the notorious 5 Rickies," she admitted to us
over mai-tais, "but I couldn't do that because I was
being faithful to what's-his-name."  She was a little drunk by
then, so we took her home.  Hey, we were all a little drunk,
and everybody just fell asleep.  None of us were as young as we
had been.

But we were there all weekend, and everything that needed to be
done was attended to.  Not just sex, but saying things--those
guys loved her about as much as I did.

But still there was a difference.  I had been her hero, I had
helped her and won her, she was mine.  And it made me very
happy when she said exactly that to us all.  But the real
thrill was when she came to me and sat on my lap as she said
it: she could tell me from the others!  

But this couldn't go on.  It was special, not routine.  Oh the
others came by once in a while, but my relationship was
respected by them all.  They were happy for me, in fact.  And
eventually they got girl friends or even wives of their own.

Juliana and I are soon getting married ourselves.  I'm quitting
my military career for a job in stardrive development at
Boeing in Seattle and we'll get a house together.  Kids too, I
think.  Amazing that two "copies" can end up with such a normal
everyday life, how mundane.

I have a few loose ends to tie up at the old Project Procyon
compound, and I'll be finished with that chapter in my life.  



Ricky #4 here.
  
I found this document on #3's computer while looking for clues
as to his disappearance.  I don't know who he was writing it
for, but I feel a compulsion to finish it for him.  We always
do everything the same.

But the only clue to be found was that he was on his way to the 
project compound, and we already knew that.  He had been 
electronically registered going into the main building, the 
UpLoad area, then the EnActivation Lab...and there his trail 
ends.  He never left the building.  It's been two weeks
now with no word from him.

But someone's been in his apartment since then, searching for 
something. His computer had been tampered with, files had been 
erased.  Fortunately he backed up onto our own secret web-site 
on Overnet, so I could see what had been deleted: everything
concerning Wilbur Gregors, the project technician who had
secretly EnActivated ReGen Copies of those girls only to rape 
and murder them, including our beloved Juliana.

I dusted for prints, found none.  I didn't have the equipment
for detecting hair and skin flakes or pheromones, but I
intended to get it.

When #3 had been gone three days the military had called
Juliana, aware that he was engaged to her, to see if he was
there.  When she asked what was going on they told her Top
Secret and hung up.  She got worried and called us--we had
given her our secret web number "in case she ever dumped that
jerk".

We tried to find out what had happened and also met a wall of
Secrecy, even through military channels, so it was decided that
one of us had to infiltrate.  I was in the position of being
between assignments, so it was me.

I've replaced him, in more ways than one: not just his job but
his identity as well.  As far as the local staff knows I am the
same Captain Rick Guerrero #3.  I gave them a story that he/I'd 
just been away on a top secret assignment (confirmed by #1 at 
USNA Army HQ, thanks to some connections we've accrued in our 
military service), and that was that. 

None of them had ever seen the 5 Rickies together, they
apparently didn't really think about it: my optic scans worked
the same as his did, voice identification, fingerprints;
there's no way they can know the difference without looking at
the little tattoo under my left heel.  But I haven't showed
them that.  They have their secrets, we have ours.  

I also convinced them that something had come up in the Wilbur
Gregors case, and that I would have to confirm some findings at
the EnActivation facilities on base.  It's wonderful what you
can get away with when you use "top secret" or "national
security" as a smokescreen.  I even had an investigative staff
at my disposal. 

I found what I had feared: there was a new discrepancy in the
weight/mass readouts of the elemental vats.  But a funny
amount: not equal to a person's weight/mass, only about 17
kilos.  I looked for any transactions records, but the facility
had been closed down for months.  

Then I checked the base power bill: bingo.  There had been a
lot of voltage used on base upon two different occasions,
three weeks ago and two weeks ago; almost nothing before or
since then.  Someone could have been EnActivated.  And I feared 
that #3 had been DeEnactivated, returned to the vaults.  I 
checked the files of the Wilbur Gregors case, found his weight, 
compared it to my own (same as #3's), and there it was: Gregors 
was 17 kilos lighter. 

I took my staff and equipment to "my" apartment and did the
microscopics.  We found what I had suspected.  But I already
knew who had been there.

Wilbur Gregors was alive again--as a ReGen Copy.  He had
evidently hidden an UpLoad file of himself somewhere in the
system, or on Overnet, and programmed a EnActivation sequence 
to be automatically engaged under certain conditions.  

Somehow the bastard had killed my fellow Ricky #3 and run him
through the DeEnactivation process, disassembling the molecules 
of his body and putting the elements back in the vats.

How did I feel about that?  More anger than sorrow, this had
been done to ME!  Well, no, sorrow too, of course; #3 wasn't
really me anymore, he'd been developing his own life, his own
self, and we grew more different with each year that passed. 
More like brothers.  And Juliana loved him, that was something
special, we'd all been happy for him.  Now he was gone.

Then my guts went cold.  I knew what Gregors wanted.  It hadn't
made sense: it wouldn't do the guy himself any good that there
was a copy of him running around after he was dead--HE'D still
be dead.  Unless there was some mission he wanted to be
completed.

Juliana.  I just knew.

I called her immediately.  Of course it was on #3's teletalker,
so she thought I was HIM.  She answered the call with great
relief: "Rick!  Oh god, I was so worried!"

I didn't dare tell her who I really was, my call could be
monitored by the military, and there was a more urgent message 
than the sad one about #3.

"Juliana, you've got to get out of there, quickly!  I think
you're in danger!"

"What..?  Where are you, Rick?"  She could see behind me on her
own screen.   "Isn't that the EnActivation Lab at the project?" 

"Yeah," I didn't need to say anything else, she's a smart
woman.  I could see her figuring everything out, even me, then
her face went sad and afraid and angry all at once.  But no
panic.

"The technician copied himself?" she asked, but it wasn't
really a question.

"Yeah.  I think he's after you."

She nodded.  There was almost a tear, but she firmed her chin
and set her mouth resolutely.  "I hope so," she said.

"Don't do anything foolish, Juliana.  Go to the bar where we
all went out on the town that night.  I'll meet you there as 
soon as I can get to Seattle; I'll just commandeer a hopper."

"No, I'm going to wait here.  I'll take care of him myself,
just like last time."

"I'm sure he knows about last time, he probably had the vidi 
of you and him backed up somewhere on the Overnet, don't 
underestimate him."

"It's he who underestimates me."

"Damn, Juliana, don't do this!  Run!"

"Absolutely not."

"Then I'm coming to you now."

She looked at me sadly.  "Okay.  And we'll pretend that you're
my Rick."

"I AM your Rick.  No matter what."  I signed out, called the
base, made arrangements, and was flying a Q89 hopper north to 
Seattle within the hour.  



I'm a very tough, highly-trained soldier, I can kill with my
fingertips, absolutely ruthless when it comes down to fighting
for survival or a cause.  But I was almost weeping like a baby
all the way to Seattle.  I feared finding Juliana raped and
murdered when I arrived.

And then the rage!  What I would DO to him when I got my lethal
hands on him!  He'd killed one of my other selves, he'd killed
all those women--and two Julianas.  I had seen the vidies of
his perversions, and (just like #3, of course) I hated him in
a very unprofessional way.  I kept that in mind: it's never
smart to let anger take over, it gives your enemy an advantage. 

I had a weapon as well as other equipment, a stun gun.  It
wasn't lethal, but I didn't want it to kill him anyway.  I'd do
that myself.  There was no consideration of arresting the guy
and taking him in for a fair trial, I might have to be careful
how I did it, but the technician was doomed...if I ever got
a hold of him, that is.

I kept calling her along the way, keeping in touch.  But as of 
when I was approaching Seattle, she didn't answer any more.  Or
couldn't.

I landed the hopper in the park a block away from Juliana's 
apartment on Capitol Hill, beside the old water tower.  That 
was as inconspicuous as I had time for.  I knew where she 
lived, I'd been there twice with the rest of the Rickies, and 
I ran as fast as I could.

It was an older apartment building from the 40's, but in good
shape.  I didn't know the access code, but figured that #3's
handprint was registered, and it was.  I caught the elevator up
to the 15th floor, and then I was outside her door.

I was afraid, really in fear as I stood out there.  Was the
technician already in there?  Would she blow me away if I did
knock, thinking I was him?  Or had she left anyway?  

I called her on my teletalker.  No answer.  She should have had
hers with her, no matter where she was.  Now this was serious.  
I buzzed her door.  Nothing.  

The door was a Calvinite plate, I wasn't getting though that
without pyrotechnics.  I headed for the window at the end of
the hall and opened it by busting the lock.  It was 15 floors
up but I could go around to her balcony with the help of the
suspension field device I had been level-minded enough to bring
along.  

Her balcony window was open, I rolled in with pistol ready. 
Nobody there.  Next room, the kitchen, no signs of any
struggles, on to the bedroom.

There she was, sitting on the bed, not moving, covered with
blood.  

My heart almost stopped.  Then I saw her eyes move to look at
me.  "Rick, honey," she said so weakly that it was like a
whisper.  I thought she was dying.  I moved toward her.

Stumbled on the body of the technician.  The blood was his,
he'd had his throat cut, and his wrist.  He was dead.  Juliana
still had the knife in her hand, just a little one.

I was...well I was everything I could be: shocked, happy,
angry, worried.  Disappointed even: that I hadn't gotten to him
first.  I mean, it would've been GREAT to teach that bastard
one last final lesson.  And especially to have spared Juliana
the horror of having to do it herself.

"He must have wanted me to do it," she was saying, almost
mumbling, "he wasn't that stupid a man.  Just like before.  I
always wondered how I'd tricked him the other time, when he
knew everything I would try to do.  This must be what he
wanted."

I sat beside her.  Took the knife from her bloody hand.  She
studied me closely, trying to see #3 in me.  Then she gave up
and lay her head on my shoulder anyway.

"Are you my Rick?" she asked, but without emotion.

"I am.  Are you my Juliana?"

"I guess so.  I hope you can convince me.  I really loved you."

"I'll convince you later tonight.  First we've got to do
something about this guy and all this blood.  I'll make some
calls.  Military operation, top secret, national interest, etc. 
Are you in shock?"

"A little.  Not so bad as last time.  Next time will be even
better," she said.

"Next time?"

"His UpLoad is hidden on the Overnet.  They'll just keep
coming.  He promised."

"A promise he can't keep.  He can't EnActivate without access 
to the project Lab. and there is no other, so I booby-trapped 
it. He can't EnActivate a valid copy again."

"Are you sure?"  There was hope in her eyes.  A little bit of
emotion now. 

"I was pretty angry, so I programmed a virus to attack any
UpLoad with his DNA and turn it inside out.  If he does
EnActivate, it will be as a quivering slab of meat."

A weak but silly smile came to her lips.  "Oh, that was sweet
of you.  My hero!"

So now I'm her hero, her Rick, her man.  Lucky me.  I'm
quitting my military career for a job in stardrive development
at Boeing in Seattle and we'll get a house together.  Kids too,
I think.  Amazing that two "copies" can end up with such a
normal everyday life, how mundane.