Rosalie and Rosalind Rogers
Cowboy Twenty-One
Cowboy Twenty-One
Rosalie and Rosalind Rogers (Dove)
By Jack
I grew up with Rosalie and Rosalind. They were twins, and they did everything together. Absolutely everything. We were knocking each other upside the heads with plushy toys long before I knew there was a difference between boys and girls. And they may have been the first girls I noticed when I started to realize there was. Not that anything came of it, you understand. They’d figured out the difference long before me and were already dating. They found themselves a pair of twins from... Arkansas if I remember correctly. One of those Southern States. Those boys came up to vacation every summer, let me tell you. Never missed a single day they could spend with those two girls, and kept in virtual contact the rest of the year. It pains me to admit it, but they were actually good boys. Exactly the kind of boys Rosalie and Rosalind deserved if I’m being honest. And yes, I am very biased on that subject.
Rosalie and Rosalind were some of my best friends growing up. We explored the forests together, we did the whole Boy and Girl Scouts thing together. Eagles all the way. We did the tour guides for vacationers thing, and showed them wildlife they’d never imagined existed. We grew up learning everything about the land and animals around us, and learning how to show off everything to people who’d never guessed what the open world could be like. We got to know which animals were normal and which ones were as smart as us, and we worked with them to keep the dangerous animals away from our tour spots. We worked with them to put on wild life shows for visitors that never did realize we were working with truly sentient partners. Me and those girls did everything together from the moment I was aware to the time they started dating.
Rosalie and Rosalind took to water like an Arnami. Not joking. They could do everything but breathe underwater, and they had some of the healthiest lungs I ever imagined on a pair of girls. I’m serious here. They could hold their breath for minutes without even trying. We swam together all over the lakes and rivers of Northern Minnesota, and went to the Arnami towns at the bottoms of most of those bodies of water. It’s a different world down there, with the water all around you, supporting you and keeping gravity at bay, and I can see why the Arnam love it so much. Rosalie and Rosalind loved it too. There were no vacationers down there. No one ogling them or trying to get in their pants. The Arnam truly are Alien in that way, and those two girls loved to go down and just relax with them. And I joined them every chance I got.
Me, Rosalie, and Rosalind were partners in the tour guide service from basically the moment we were old enough to do the tour guide thing until... until all of that ceased to matter to any of us. Even them getting old enough to realize they liked boys didn’t break up our little working group. We were basically the perfect team, and me and them had this whole act we could do tied up and blind folded if need be. The vacationers loved it, and the tour service kept us together all the way through high school and beyond. Them dating other boys didn’t break up our working group. Even me starting to realize they were girls, and that girls were kinda awesome in a lot of ways I hadn’t thought about before then, failed to break us up. I thank God that those two girls were smart enough to handle me with a deft hand when I got rascally. They never humiliated me, or led me on in any way. They never made me settle with just being friends. Friendship was the goal with them.
Rosalie and Rosalind were pretty much the perfect girl friends a growing young boy like me could have. They were blonde-haired, blue-eyed, drop dead gorgeous bombshells, not that I noticed the last part until I was older. I could flirt with them all day long, and they gave back as good as they got. And that’s the whole story, there. No drama. No crazy. No tales of loves lost and found or heartbreaks or anything like that. They were just some of the best and most dependable friends in my life. I loved them like sisters. I know there are rumors that I loved them more than that, but they were not interested in me in that way. It was basically the ultimate friends and family zone. They were the best wingmen a young man could ask for. They were girls doncha know, they knew all the best girls in town, and they knew which ones would maybe like to hang around with a rascal like me. I loved them so much for that, let me tell you.
A gentleman does not kiss and tell, or NOT kiss and not tell, as the case may be. And while my qualifications as a gentleman are often questioned, I do try to play one in public. Now Rosalie and Rosalind asked me to answer the top three questions about us, very simply, so here they are. Yes, we have slept with each other. No, we have never been lovers. Yes, I know how many freckles they have. No, they are not the same number. It disappoints me so much that these are the questions people care about. The truth is that we were tour guides together for most of our early life. We took vacationers out to see the wilderness all the time, and we often slept overnight out there since the deep night is where some of the most amazing sights are found. It was easier for everyone if we just zippered our sleeping bags together than it was to fight every horny vacationer who “just wanted to share body heat” with them. If I had a quarter for every time we heard that tired old line...
Is it impossible for people to understand that guys and girls can be “just friends?” And by the way, I hate that phrase. “Just friends.” Like it is... SETTLING for something less if you don’t frak a girl. And speaking of phrases I hate, no, Rosalie and Rosalind were never “friends with benefits.” We were BEST FRIENDS for as long as I remember. And since we’re from Northern Minnesota, that definition gets pretty Puritanical. I swear, making eyes at a girl might as well be foreplay. Getting caught at second base is a prelude to a shotgun wedding. And dancing? With music? Without a chaperone? Positively living in sin! What do you expect of a culture more famous for bonking a future bride over the head while “off a Viking” and taking her home rather than... oh... courting them? I never did either with Rosalie and Rosalind. Not then. Not later. Not now. I hope that is frank enough for everybody to understand. Even those of you in the back.
Okay. Fine. Yes, I have kissed Rosalie and Rosalind. No, it was like kissing my sisters. Because, let me say this clearly for those of you in the back. My parents gave birth to one kid. That would be me for those of you who took the short bus in today. Then they helped raise a bunch more. Rosalie and Rosalind were there from the beginning. And my dad had a strict rule about us doing things together that would force him to go talk to their dad. He didn’t want to have that conversation, so he would make certain I regretted it if it happened. And no one wanted to mess with my dad when those Old World Scandinavian eyes went hard. Yes, me, Rosalie, and Rosalind had a lot of fun times. We loved each other, and we worked together and hung out together all the time. And yes, we slept together more times than I can count. Platonically for those of you giggling in the back! The key is, we never did anything stupid. More due to their good sense than mine, of course.
Okay, how about I take charge here and put this whole thing back on track? We’re talking about Rosalie and Rosalind, and how they grew up and how they changed me. No, random person in the back, it was NOT by telling me that I’m the father. I’m talking about Julie and Alex. You know. Taylor and Jennifer. T&J. Worlds’ famous country singers. Best singers out there in my humble opinion. Yes, I’m biased. Sue me. They were friends. Julie, Alex, Rosalie, Rosalind. A bunch of other girls too. They went to the beach every time they could get away with it. So did I, of course. A chance to see girls in bikinis? Check. A safe public space, with proper supervision? Also, check. I was all in for the flirting, and so were all the girls. It was a good life.
I did not know it at the time, but Rosalie and Rosalind were totally at fault for me getting together with Julie. I was minding my own business, plucking the strings on my guitar, when they pointed her my way. I think they told her I needed help playing the song, or something like that. Which she did, better than me. I didn’t really know her before that you understand. I’d seen her around, at school, on the beach, and all that. And I knew what she looked like when she wore a bikini. Then she showed me she could play a guitar. I fell in love so hard that day. I played it cool of course, not admitting even to myself how bad it was, but I didn’t fool them. They knew me too well for that.
Rosalie and Rosalind told me I had to ask Julie about the bruises on her arms. And why she wore sweaters and jeans so often. They made me promise to give her all the time she needed, and I never broke a promise I made them. So I listened to Julie’s explanations, but I didn’t believe them for a moment. I’d watched her on the beach when she was wearing considerably less. Beach volleyball was always one of my favorite sports doncha know? I knew she wasn’t that clumsy. And in time she realized I didn’t believe her. That I’d never believed her. But I was still there, waiting for the truth. That is when she told me. That was when all of our worlds changed.
Rosalie and Rosalind were good at understanding things. They could just feel the heartbeat of a community. It was why they loved spending time with the Arnam. They were exactly who they seemed to be. Peaceful. They never “accidentally” brushed up against a pretty girl’s tatas or caboose. They were genetically designed to respect borders, including personal space. They were truly alien in a way all the girls of my hometown loved. Don’t get me wrong. We’d all grown up in maybe the best place in all the worlds. It was Heaven in every way that mattered, but even it had its devils if you looked hard enough. People that did not belong in Heaven, and who... were not kind to the angels. Now Rosalie and Rosalind were good at finding those devils.
It was Rosalie and Rosalind who discovered one of the devils living in our little Heaven in Northern Minnesota. They made certain I learned about him so I could help Julie get out of his influence. I got her out to Alex’s house, and they found out the devil was headed out there to bring her back. They made sure I found out first, so I could get there before anything bad happened. He ended up leaving a lot quicker than he came, without any bruises anywhere on his body. Nothing to suggest anything happened. But he never bothered Julie and Alex again. And I kept an eye on him until he vacated the town entirely. I never would have known about him if Rosalie and Rosalind had not arranged for me to learn though. I owe them a life for that.
Me, Rosalie, and Rosalind were a well-oiled team, without all the drama that a lot of other kids brought to the table with them. The adults never had to worry about us breaking up and suddenly hating each other, because we were never together in that way. But Julie and Alex were another matter. Me and those two girls were really perfect together. Like those fairy tales where birds sing and random forest animals dance for joy. We filled each others’ holes. The parts of us we didn’t know were incomplete. We could play a song together for the first time and it sounded like we’d done it all our lives. We just groked each other in every way that mattered, and the vacationers we played for loved it all. Yeah. Rosalie and Rosalind got us playing.
Julie and Alex wanted to go to Nashville to get famous. I didn’t. Our life was perfect. We didn’t need to go down there. Nashville was a nice place to visit, take in the sights, and see the famous singers, but not the kind of place you’d want to raise a family in. Nothing like... Northern Minnesota. So I didn’t. They went anyway. And... and I didn’t know what to do. I just... stopped. I didn’t even go to school. My dad never said “I told you so.” He just called Rosalie and Rosalind. They did what no one else could do at the time. They dragged me out of my funk.
Rosalie and Rosalind dragged me out of bed each morning after Julie and Alex left. They even proved they were totally willing to dress me up if I was too lazy. Always in clothing that made me look silly. Their way of making me want to dress myself. And they dragged me to school. They saw me at my worst, and they dragged me out of it one day at a time. Those two girls did not give up on me. That pretty much forced me to start trying, if only to stop putting them out like that. I started wanting to live again because they didn’t give me the option of the other choice. I owe them a life for that.
Rosalie and Rosalind were ageless, like me. Kinda. They stopped aging in their senior year of high school. A bit early for us Ageless, not that we realized it at the time, you understand. We had so many other things on our minds. All of us trying to graduate. Me trying to get over losing Julie and Alex. Them trying to keep me going. Forcing me to keep going. I’m not sure I would have made it through all that without Rosalie, Rosalind, and a few other close friends. Those that could take a punch and not go down. Bench press a car. Wrestle an angry timberwolf. The little things like that. There weren’t many of us, but there were more of us than a town our size should have had. Not that I noticed it at all.
There were more Ageless growing up in International Falls than just me, Rosalie, and Rosalind. More than there should have been. Only one-in-a-million of us are Ageless, and International Falls numbered in the thousands. Me alone was outside the curve. Me and the girls? We BROKE the curve. Then there were the Arnam of Rainy Lake. And... others. I can’t say how many, even here and now. Official secrets, doncha know? But there was a whole group of us Ageless who grew up together, stronger, faster, and more durable than most people. And as time went on, we got all the shiny side effects of the Peloran Treatments that made us just like the Peloran. I didn’t notice how abnormal that was at the time. Because it was normal to me.
All us Ageless in International Falls grew up doing the Boy and Girl Scout thing, as well as the tour guide thing. The adults wanted us to learn about the world, and they wanted us there to protect the vacationers if things went sideways. We were stronger than any of them, able to survive accidents or angry wildlife that would kill others. When the citidiots needed help, we could provide it. It ended up being better training for the real world than we guessed. A suspicious mind might think the adults planned it all. That under the guise of playing in the forest, the adults were preparing me, Rosalie, Rosalind, and the others to be something other than just small town kids in a big world. Suspicious minds can come up with some pretty crazy ideas, right?
Rosalie and Rosalind dragged me through school all the way to graduation and beyond. College was never a question for them, and they didn’t let me question it either. They dragged me after them, and it became obvious to us pretty soon that they weren’t aging anymore. I think it was the first time we really connected all the dots. We already knew they were smarter than normal. Top of every class they attended, and my grades prospered as well due to their tutoring. It’s hard to be a bad student when those two girls force you to try to live up to their standard. I made the best attempt I could, you understand, majoring in partying and girls as much as possible, but Rosalie and Rosalind did not let me get away with much.
I owe all my grades to Rosalie and Rosalind. They made it clear that they were not going to let me slack off too much. They dragged me out of the parties the nights before each big test to study. They chased away girls that hurt my grades. And they took time out of their studies to keep me up to pace. I would have been an awful poor friend if I’d let them sacrifice their grades for me, so I did what they told me to do and got the grades they demanded. So they could dedicate more time to showing everyone else at the University of Minnesota what a couple small town girls from Northern Minnesota could do. Valedictorians. Twins. Absolutely identical grades. And I got to stand on the stage with them when they did their speech. That was pretty fantastic.
Rosalie and Rosalind spent four years at the University of Minnesota blowing the stacks off every curve invented. Colleges from all over the worlds sent recruiters to get them at any cost by their Junior year. But those two girls wanted to be gengineers, and Minnesota is basically home to some of the best medical training institutions that exist anywhere. Oh they, listened to every pitch, but they picked real close to home when they had the chance. My parents wanted me to get the best education I could, so their permission to follow the girls was easy to get. I was actually kinda interested in gengineering, which was a plus. And it attracted some real top shelf girls, let me tell you. The kind of girls a boy can be proud to bring home to mama for Christmas.
There are a lot of medical programs in Minnesota, and Rosalie and Rosalind wanted to learn from all of them. So they spent a year here and a year there, mining every medical college in the State for everything they could teach. Rochester, Duluth, Grand Forks, Minneapolis, and more. They even bounced through some community colleges that had close relationships with the local hospitals to suck in their specific knowledge. I followed them through every jump. They’d broken up with their boyfriends from Alabama or whatever, and I’d be an awful poor friend if I didn’t watch their backs and vet any prospective boyfriends. And of course they figured it was their job to check out all the girls I chased too. We really watched each others’ backs.
Rosalie and Rosalind didn’t have any long-term boyfriends, which made them something like free agents. They were getting a reputation in the medical fields, which of course meant that a lot of smart young men really wanted to get to know them better. So they dated various medical students as the years went by. I of course followed their example, and between the three of us I figure we probably dated just about every available nurse and doctor in training in all of Minnesota. And probably a good percentage of those in the surrounding States. Free agents in every way. They were fun diversions for all of us. Until those two girls met their soul mates. Twins. Gengineers in training. The lucky boys were from England and the girls loved their accent.
Most medical students study a specialty they hope will define their career. I for instance studied the Peloran Treatments. We’ve been trying to break them down so we could understand them better for centuries, and I was following that path. Rosalie and Rosalind had a far more altruistic specialty in mind. They wanted to improve the integration of various uplifted species into our society. Cats and dogs are the most famous, but various real doctors and crackpots alike have implanted better brains in all kinds of creatures from Earth and beyond. What is far more rare is modifying their vocal cords so they can talk, or giving them opposable thumbs so they can use tools. My two girls wanted to fix that oversight.
I remember the day those two boys from England proposed to Rosalie and Rosalind like it was yesterday. It was a triple date affair. I was going steady with this scrumptious medical student who went on to head the Mayo Clinic in later years. Real top shelf kind of girl. We were at Mario’s in Fergus Falls, a real nice Italian eatery. The boys played it cool the whole time. Never did let on what they planned, but the food was... scrumptious. Then the waiters brought the girls’ favorite dessert cake to the table and they dug in. Found the rings inside and the boys were on their knees in an instant. The girls said yes real quick. Shouted it. Maybe squealed it. They were real overjoyed, let me tell you.
Rosalie and Rosalind were getting married, and they loved it. Dancing with wolves. Singing with birds. The whole fairy tale thing. They were so ecstatic they asked me to be the Maid of Honor. Now I’m not exactly a fair maiden, but I said yes real quick. I even asked if they wanted me to wear a bridesmaid dress. I would have done that for those two girls, and I would have looked oh so pretty doing it. But they thought I’d look better in a suit, so we went with that. They of course picked a pair of absolutely spectacular white dresses patterned after their grandma’s wedding dress. They looked old and new at the same time, and the girls could not wait to wear them down the aisle.
Rosalie and Rosalind wanted to be married back home in International Falls, and we sent out the invitations to every student, teacher, and practicing medical person we knew. People came from all over Minnesota and beyond. A few even came in from Alpha Centauri, and one from New New York if I remember correctly. It was probably the largest collection of practicing and potential gengineers ever assembled in one place. The town built an entire new hotel just to house the visitors and the reception. The ceremony itself was going to take place in the church their family had been born into and buried next to for generations of course. And officiated over by the pastor who dedicated and baptized them. Those two girls were not going to forget their roots.
Rosalie and Rosalind were just thrilled to their core at the new life they were going to live with those two boys from England. Graduation was coming soon, and all the paperwork to start a new practice in Northern Minnesota was completed. Every wild uplifted in the area would be welcomed into their clinic, free of charge thanks to some rather substantial grants they’d managed to get the State of Minnesota to stand behind. They were going to make the world a better place for every sentient being that lived on it. That was their dream. They even asked me to help them, along with this real sweet girl I was actually slowing down to spend time with. I hadn’t said yes, yet, but they all knew I was going to. It was an amazing life we had planned.
I will not tell you about the plans for the bachelorette party. Sworn to secrecy and all that. Rosalie and Rosalind had vetted the whole thing, and I’d dated all the bridesmaids at least once in the past, so they knew all my tricks. It was not going to be some wild and raunchy party. All I will say is that the entertainment was real top shelf, the facility was the best in town, and people we’d grown up with all our lives were taking care of the whole thing. It was basically the best way for two small town girls to spend their last day as small town single girls. One last hurrah, before our worlds changed forever.
We all took the day before the wedding off to spend time with our families and just chill. Tonight was going to be one last dinner, followed by a romping good time, and tomorrow was going to be something amazing, doncha know? Rosalie and Rosalind spent the day with their family, getting pampered by a mom who wanted to cook their favorite desserts, and a dad who wanted to spend one last day with his little girls. The boys from England went on a tour of the woods with their parents. My mom cooked me french toast and bacon, and then I fished with my dad. It was a good life. A good day. Probably one of the best days in all our lives.
Everyone on Earth remembers the day the Shang attacked. The day they brought Yosemite Station down on all of us. A part of it hit International Falls. I watched my parents die. A lot of good townsfolk died as well, along with more visiting gengineers than anybody still wants to admit. A lot of careers ended that day. A lot of plans. Those two amazing boys from England never had a chance to say “I do” to Rosalie and Rosalind. And those two girls spent their last moments together fighting. They were alone, you see, and each wanted to get the other out from under the building that was going to kill them. Rosalind won. She got her sister out. And then the building crushed her.
It takes an awful lot to kill an Ageless all the way dead. Being shot or crushed hurts. A lot. The whole time. And losing a limb is real torture, but it won’t stop us. A hole through a heart will definitely stop us, but not necessarily kill us. As long as we have the energy stored up in fat or muscle, we will burn it to regrow everything we lost and get back up again. I’ve met Peloran blown up and buried under rubble over two thousand years ago. An archeologist dug their mangled corpses up and stuck a feeding tube into their brain to see what would happen. You really gotta totally destroy us to make us go away forever. Orbital bombardment will get the job done. The Shang proved that when they dropped Yosemite Station on Rosalie and Rosalind.
Rosalie and Rosalind were directly under a piece of Yosemite Station when the Shang brought it down all over Western America. It was a direct hit on the building they were in. Rosalind managed to get her sister out safely, but the building collapsed on her. Trapped her under tons of modern building materials that basically emulsified her body. She might have survived in the end if enough of her brain could have been transported to a hospital to feed and stabilize her. But the fires left... nothing. Just ashes. And even we don’t come back from destruction that general and complete. Rosalind died under all that destruction, and Rosalie lost the sister who had been at her side since before they were both born. She was utterly and completely devastated.
What happened to Rosalie and Rosalind is one of the reasons so many Ageless volunteered to fight. There were so very few of us in those days, no more than one in a million. A few thousand Americans I think. Rosalie and Rosalind were brilliant gengineers and becoming famous even outside their field. They were so photogenic they made the cameras smile. Even the most reclusive of Ageless who had already withdrawn from “mortal” affairs entirely knew of those two girls. They were pretty awesome in that way. Then Rosalind died all the way. Every Ageless stood up and took real notice of that, let me tell you. And when one Ageless who had never once considered a military career volunteered to fight, it started a trend. A landslide. And the Ageless went to War.
Rosalie shut down after Rosalind died. Just checked out of life and I really can’t blame her. I was out for the count myself at the time, and I’d only lost my parents. Rosalie lost the sister who knew her better than anyone, along with her entire family, and those two amazing boys from England. Rosalie literally did not know how to live with everything she’d ever known just… erased. She didn’t want to wake up to a world without them, so she didn’t. And there was no one left to call her name and wake her up. No one she would listen to. Not even me. Then the cybers broke every rule in all their books.
Rosalie was utterly alone for the first time in her life. But the cybers kept up on us Ageless, doncha know? Watched us. Tracked us. Tested us all as we were growing up to see if we were going to be someone they wanted to work with. Rosalie and Rosalind passed all of their tests, and there was no way in all the worlds they were going to let the sister who lived fade away and die. So they broke every rule in all the books and did something new. Of course they did it in a tried and true method. They picked the code they wanted, put it into a new processor bank, and booted it up to see what would happen. I don’t know how many times they compiled the code, but one of them woke up in the end. And she in turn went to wake up Rosalie.
Rosalie and Rosalind lived their entire lives together. They grew up in their mom’s womb. They slept in the same bed after birth. They never moved further apart from each other than the other side of the same bedroom as adults. Rosalie was not willing to live a life that did not include waking up each morning to see her sister. So the cybernetic intelligence patterned after every single thing the cybers knew about Rosalind walked into Rosalie’s hospital room one night and sat down next to her. She sat and she talked. She told stories of all the things they’d done in their lives. She made plans for the future, and Rosalie listened to her sister. Rosalie woke up that morning to see her sister sitting right beside her. Exactly where she belonged.
There was a lot of hugging when Rosalie woke up. A lot of crying. There were some rather deep questions. And Rosalie soon realized that the cybernetic Rosalind filled the great, big, gapping hole torn into her soul by the death of her sister. She was just the right shape. The right size. The right person. Rosalie never forgot that her sister died to save her. But she had to truly believe on a visceral level that the new Rosalind WAS her sister if she were to come back. No doubts. No regrets. No backsies. That is why they celebrate their reunion day every year. It’s basically a second birthday party for them, and I do my best to make it every year. And I always send a card, just in case something comes up.
Rosalie could pass every military physical with her hands and legs tied behind her back. Trust me. We used to tie each other up all the time back before The War just to show off for the citidiots. Now Rosalind’s robotic avatar was built with all the best cybernetic tricks, and could lift trucks without breaking a sweat. The two of them combined were unbelievable. That’s why they postponed their plans to start a gengineering clinic and volunteered to fight. Rosalie wanted to fly starfighters, and Rosalind was happy to be one. They really made the perfect fighter and pilot team since they already knew everything that made each other tick. And they were the smartest girls I knew from the start. Passing all the tests was easy-peasy for them.
The military brass did not trust a girl that had been comatose for weeks and her dead sister/cyber/whatever. That was way too much strangeness for them to accept without a lot of salt throwing. But Rosalie and Rosalind did score off the charts, so the Space Force recruited them with the idea of using them around Earth while they found out if the girls would work out. That meant the girls got to fight at the Battle of Fort Wichita, where they racked up a real nice kill score against the Shang. They tore an entire Shang pincer attack apart, saving two full starfighter squadrons in the process. Then all of them hit the Shang with a pincer attack of their own. I’ve seen the gun camera footage. Those two girls were true artists.
The Battle of Fort Wichita opened up a world of possibilities for Rosalie and Rosalind. They made ace in one battle, which brought them to the notice of the news networks. Their looks and personality did the rest, and they quickly gained fame on Earth and beyond. The Space Force decided to use that fame and sent them on recruitment drives all throughout the Core Worlds. It’s amazing how quick young men will volunteer if a pretty young lady asks them to. Make them twins, and the Space Force was beating the volunteers off with sticks. Sometimes literally. So many volunteered that the Space Force academies couldn’t even train them all.
Rosalie and Rosalind did not apply to join Cowboy Squadron when we asked for new blood at Alpha Centauri. They didn’t talk to me about it at the time, but I agreed with their reasoning when they told me later. They’d grown up with me, and we’d done everything together most of those years. They needed to chart their own path. To prove to the brass that they really were as good as their tests said they were. That they didn’t need anyone to hold them up. Death can make people question everything. So they went out and they answered those questions for everyone. Ally and enemy alike.
New New York was one of the New England Federation’s greatest concentrations of economic and industrial might beyond Earth. The trinary system also had a massive population base, so the Space Force sent Rosalie and Rosalind to recruit as many young men and women as they could. They were on the Rikers Planet penal colony when the Shang penetrated the system defenses and initiated Winter Protocol bombardments on every major colony. They convinced the prisoners to help the guards defend the planet, and led a ragtag fleet of fighters and armed shuttles into orbit to help the planetary defenses fight off the Shang bombardment ships. It was a truly inspired move on their part.
The First Battle of New New York inspired three movies and a full network series within a year. The networks were desperate for a good story to tell, and the fact that they could link it back to the Battle of Fort Wichita made it even better. They say some of the prettiest actresses in the business portrayed Rosalie and Rosalind. I know I’m biased, but I thought they were pale imitations of the real thing. And not a one of them really got the characters right. And the less said about the me they had in the series flashbacks the better. I didn’t wear all white back then for one. All of that said, the films and series were entertaining and fun to watch, and they further boosted Space Force recruitment numbers, making them a rousing success by that measure as well.
We Cowboys had been scattered all over the Core Worlds after the New Washington Winter Contingency, trying to stop more Shang bombardments from wiping us out. I came into the New New York system on the German cruiser Dresden in time to help defend that system. Myself, Rosalie, and Rosalind absolutely did not fight together, but we hooked up on New Manhattan after the Shang tucked their tails and ran. I started the whole affair by hugging Rosalie. Rosalind was dead and I wasn’t certain how to handle the cyber standing in her place, doncha know. Those two girls did not have an ounce of uncertainty though, and they put me in my place real quick. They were always good at that, and I loved them for it.
Rosalie looked me dead in the eyes when I hugged her and told me that Rosalind was her sister. It was easy for me to recognize the signs. She meant it. She HAD to mean it. If she ever questioned it, she wasn’t certain how she could handle it. And if I questioned it, she might question it too. So I looked at Rosalind and saw the person who chose to be born so she could save one of my best friends in all the worlds from just fading away. I’d be an awful poor friend if I failed to recognize that. Act on that. So I apologized to Rosalind, opened an arm to invite her into the hug, and told her to never let me hug just one of them ever again. She smiled and hugged me back.
You need to understand that Rosalie and Rosalind really were identical twins. Some twins work hard to be different, to be individuals. Create different hairstyles. Study different subjects. Those two girls did not. Oh, Rosalind was a blue jean and t-shirt girl, while Rosalie went for pinks and blacks, but that was more for defensive coloration. I can’t tell you how many times one dressed up as the other to do something the other was supposed to do. Seriously. Can’t tell you. Even I had trouble telling them apart when they decided to get tricksie like that. And sometimes they went all black just to really confuse people. That’s how the name Rosa happened. It was short, at least one of them always answered to it, and when I had one, I had them both.
Rosalie and Rosalind were truly identical twins, like they split one soul between two bodies. They never made a choice they didn’t both intend to pursue with all their hearts. And they always did it together. Whatever you did with one, you did with both. It’s how they worked. Not that they were interchangeable, you understand. Anyone who made the mistake of treating them like that got shown through the door real quick let me tell you. But they were always a matched set, starting and finishing sentences for each other, and all kinds of jazz like that. The whole, life, death, and cyber thing did not change any of that a lick. As I found out when we hooked up on New Manhattan.
New Manhattan was the first time myself, Rosalie, and Rosalind hooked up after the Shang brought Yosemite Station down on us. We’d helped stop the bombardments, but there was still all kinds of damage all over. We helped in the cleanup, and we worked together to deal with some individuals who wanted to profit from the whole affair through less-than-legal means. It got a bit complicated, but we rolled the bad guys real good. Just like always. Those girls were amazing. I offered them a spot in the Cowboys right then and there. I wanted them on my team again real bad. They didn’t say yes, but they also didn’t say no. You could say they left me wanting more, but they promised to think about it. And they always followed through on a promise like that.
The Space Force kept Rosalie and Rosalind busy in the years that followed, recruiting new spacers, troubleshooting problems, or just flying the flag for nervous planets to feel good about. Even back then, when an Ageless showed up to help stiffen a defense, the defense got real stiff in a hurry. Those girls were a force multiplier, and wherever they went, any bad guys who showed up ended up having a really bad day. They were a whirlwind, and nobody knew how to handle them. Even our own people couldn’t figure them out. They decided they’d done enough to prove their point in time, and they really wanted me on their team every bit as much as I wanted them on mine. The hook was in. It was the reeling in that was the tricky part, but we managed it in time.
Rosalie and Rosalind reeled themselves in at Sunnydale one day while we were building up for the Hyades Campaign, stringing a whole pack of Chinese starships and fighters behind them. The Chinese thought they could nail themselves an easy fighter shipment on the last leg of their journey. The girls had been trolling them all day, slipping around them again and again. The girls lost their transport and half their fighters doing the deed, but they kept baiting the Chinese closer in. And they sent word out ahead of them. We were waiting on the system periphery when those girls brought the bad guys straight into our waiting arms. Ever went ice fishing with hand grenades? It was kinda awesome like that.
I was real happy to see Rosalie and Rosalind show up at Sunnydale. The Chinese shooting gallery was a whole mess of fun. And I was just happy to see my best friends again. Then I was overjoyed when they said they wanted to join my team. I remember Charles telling us that hugging fellow servicemen was not part of a normal welcoming ritual. Rosalind stuck her tongue out at him. He raised an eyebrow and walked away with a bemused smile. He knew I wanted them on my team. He knew they wanted to be on my team. He simply questioned whether or not that was a good idea. He was right to question it. I was right to want it. So were they. History would prove all of us right in the end.
I really wanted Rosalie and Rosalind under me when they joined the Cowboys. But I also knew they were way too smart to be wasted in my space superiority team. That’s why I assigned them to Jesse James’ merry little band of misfits. Jesse had just the right mix of farmer logic and skepticism to be a natural spy if we’re being honest, and Dawn was a natural at ferreting out financial fraud. What Rosalie and Rosalind brought to the team was certified, absolutely genius-level intelligence. Even for us Ageless, they were just head and shoulders smarter than everyone. If they could think it, they could create it. They weren’t too smart to see the trees around them. And getting them on Jesse’s team meant they were on my team, so it was a win-win for everybody.
Rosalie and Rosalind created so many amazing toys for Jesse and Dawn over the years. Dawn or Jesse would need something to do something, and Rosalie and Rosalind would come up with something that could do it. Now I’m not talking tech here. Not gadgets as most of us know them. They grew up gengineers, and they ended up creating organic tech that could do things no one thought biologics could do. Things no one could detect. That helped Jesse and Dawn do things and find things no one thought was possible. And every time we hooked up, they always made a beeline for my ship with a few new toys that would give me an extra edge when I came calling on the bad guys. Those girls were pure magic.
Jesse had six crazy idiots in his little band of misfits when we hit the Hyades. Rosalie and Rosalind came up with one new toy after another for them as the campaign waged on. The things they did changed the course of The War. Truly saved lives in ways no one else could have. A living bandage that eats infections as it cleans your wounds? Check. A vacuum-capable mask that breathes carbon dioxide and gives us oxygen in return? Yup. They even made a gengineered air sensor more sensitive than any tech the Western Alliance had that could warn us of Chinese or Shang bio or chem weapons. Their idiots got first shot at all these things, but they were quick to get the toys to me too. They saved me more times than I can count, even with my boots off.
The Shang have strict laws on genetic manipulation that we absolutely do not follow, and Rosalie and Rosalind were simply one example of all the things we do that put the fear of God into the Shang. Those girls gengineered so many toys that did so many things that the Shang put them on the top ten bioterrorists list. I can’t tell you how many times they tried to kill those two girls. Traps. Overwhelming offenses. Poisons. Bounties. You name it, they tried it over the years. They wanted those girls dead and gone and no longer a threat to the Shang’s galaxy. I can understand that to a point. Intellectually. But personally? Those were my girls they were trying to kill. My best friends. I did not take kindly to that.
I am so ridiculously proud of what Rosalie and Rosalind did during The War. They turned their starfighters into the most advanced mobile gengineering labs I had ever seen. We could shoot up a Shang or Chinese defense fleet in the morning, and by evening they’d be running experiments on the local flora and fauna to see what they could do with it all. Or collecting the results of some other long-term experiment. Or maybe come up with a new communication system you could swallow like a pill and would use your stomach acids to communicate with someone on the other side of the system via plant signals or something equally impossible. They were... fantastic.
Once the cybers started getting Privateers to each of us Cowboys, Rosalie and Rosalind turned their ship into an even bigger flying gengineering lab than their starfighters. They gathered some of the best gengineers in all the worlds, and did things nobody could imagine. Who’s Bingo card had living bullets for our revolvers? We got them. The really weird part was petting them so they would bond with us and not eat our limbs off if they got frisky. Those were normal compared to some stuff they came up with. I could not explain most of their toys if I wanted to. And half of me still thinks I dreamed some of the weirder stuff up. Confetti and applause when I nailed a headshot? That’s just crazy. Right?
Rosalie and Rosalind were creating new practical ways to use organics to wage war, and at the same time they sank deeper and deeper into applied gengineering. The uplifted species they wanted to help back in the day? They did it. One after another, they found solutions that fixed decade or century-old problems. They even helped bring some of the cats of San Lucas into The War. Those two amazing girls visited San Lucas and just straight up gave them cures to their top five “natural” causes of death. They did this kind of thing to one species after another, fixing things others left hanging. That’s where their hearts always were. Fixing things that were broken. And not even The War stopped them from pursuing that goal.
I remember one day the girls were hand delivering some new toys to me in the middle of the Hyades Cluster when a Shang fleet faded in around us. They had us dead to rights. I didn’t know how we were going to get out of it. Then Rosalie and Rosalind opened up a channel and spoke the chemical building blocks of a bioweapon that could kill every Shang in the galaxy while leaving every other human being alone. They followed that with the antidote and a simple, “We don’t want to kill you. We just want to survive you.” I thought the Shang were gonna just nuke us all right there, just to shut us up. Then they turned and left. No shots. No words. Just gone. They never did that. They never ran without firing a shot. A part of me still wonders if I imagined that.
The Shang stopped hunting Rosalie and Rosalind towards the end of The War. There are so many theories about what the Shang did or didn’t do towards War’s End. The official verdict is that they just ran out of resources in the end. We strangled their supply lines until they had no choice but to give up and leave us alone. But I’ve always had that phantom memory of them flying away after the girls spoke to them. Maybe they convinced the Shang that we weren’t a threat. And maybe, just maybe, that played a part in the Shang’s general withdrawal from our part of the galaxy. I know it seems crazy to think that two small town girls from Northern Minnesota could play a part in ending a galactic war, but what if they did? Wouldn’t that be a story to tell?
War’s End saw everything change. Rosalie and Rosalind wanted to organize a permanent institute for gengineering, and there was a lot of money in our parents’ financial accounts that twenty years of War hadn’t really hurt. We had more than enough money between us to fund it, even without outside donations. The girls brought in the best gengineers from all over human space to learn from and partner with. They were already past everyone in some fields by then, but they were still playing catch up in other areas. But one was one of the two best natural gengineers of her generation. Maybe ANY generation. And the other was a cybernetic mind patterned after the other one. It didn’t take long for them to change ALL the fields.
I claimed naming rights for the new institute in exchange for my part in funding it. I wanted their name on it real bad, and I convinced them to go with Rosatech Institute for Genetic Advancement in the end. I didn’t want anyone to forget them in the future. Not that any of us really had to worry about that in the end. We’d done things in the last few centuries that changed life for the better. Gene therapies that can cure cancer or change hair color. Make fat people skinny. Grow new, healthy organs. Then the Peloran showed up and changed things again. They showed us how to make life PERFECT. They nearly ended AGING for everybody. We created a whole new world out of their treatments. Rosalie and Rosalind were that kind of paradigm shift.
Rosalie and Rosalind went on to create organic tech that could do things no one knew was possible. They were magic like nobody has seen since the Albion got waxed. Scientists have invented entire new fields of organic science to study the basics of what those girls have pulled off. They changed the definition of life as we know it. They have gone places even I don’t understand. I help them sometimes, because I can be a good gengineer when I want to be. They taught me everything I know, after all. But I’m a caveman trying to understand fire next to them. They’re truly magical.
I remember when Rosalie and Rosalind had the best instruments money could buy. Back during The War when they wanted to save the chimpanzees. Or was it the apes? I can’t remember. They outgrew those instruments and started making their own stuff to do what needed doing. We even started selling the stuff they made to other laboratories so they could have a chance of following. That’s why all the best genetic gear has Rosatech stamped on the side of it now. Or on top. Or on bottom. It’s always there, somewhere. Never miss an opportunity to advertise, especially when you have the best gear in all the worlds. And that way anybody using it can know they are using the very best, Made in America, not some cheap Chinese knockoff.
You want living starships? Weapons that can eat food to refill their magazines? Would you like to touch a star? Taste hyperspace? Become a shadow? Kiss a beam of light? Rosalie and Rosalind went so far beyond all that when they hit their stride that I don’t even know where to start. We’re gonna take centuries trying to figure out what they did. Maybe more than that. I don’t know if we’ll ever catch them. I only know its possible because I saw them do it. And I can guarantee you that as we follow them, we will continue to make human life better. And that is a pretty amazing legacy right there.
Rosalie and Rosalind surpassed even their own instruments in time. I salvaged Albion tech for them from old ruins, and that gave them a leg up for a while. But they’ve done fewer and fewer physical experiments in the last decades. No tech base we have discovered can keep up with them. They spend most of their time doing theoretical stuff now. Some people say they’ve disappeared down a rabbit hole and gone insane. I don’t have the words to describe a tithe of where they have gone, but I know my girls. They are not insane. They are simply different, and that is a good thing.
I hear people say Rosalie and Rosalind are gone. They went too far and got lost. They can’t find their way back to us. People are wrong. Yes, they are in their own little world, speaking their own private languages that nobody understands, doing things that nobody can imagine. Most of the time we can’t even see what they are working on anymore. The fact is that they just don’t come back for most people now. They stop coming back for more every year. I don’t know where they go. They used to try to explain it to me, but I never could grok it. I understand every word, but the ideas are nonsense. Impossible. Magic. They say I’ll understand in time. Usually around the same time they hand me some new toy they say I’ll need in the future.
Every time I go to them, I see recognition in their eyes. I see them come back from wherever they are, and I hear my name on their lips as they smile and hug me. Then they grab a toy or bag of toys out of a drawer and hand it to me. We go drink some beer, maybe eat some nachos. Maybe go to a movie and have some popcorn. Walk around a mall and shop for shoes. They are the girls next door I grew up with. Rosalie and Rosalind. And then the secrets of the universe start calling out to them again and they... go away. I wonder sometimes if they will stop coming back to me, but they say they like being who they are when I am with them. That is why I continue to come for them. They are my best friends, and I like making them happy. And those amazing toys...
If I had a dime for every interesting little toy Rosalie and Rosalind have given me over the years, I’d be a truly rich man. I haven’t used more than a tithe of them yet, but I keep them all against the day they come in handy. Not that I can tell you what most of the toys do. But every once in a while, when I’m about to go some place, I’ll get a message telling me to take one. And wouldn’t you know it, the thing turns out to be useful. It might be a tracker for some rare particle I’ve never run into before, or it might be some cheap but ingenious thing some local will find amazing and give me information I need. I usually have no idea what the mystery box has until the time comes. I just listen to my girls and haven’t regretted that yet.
I don’t know what the future has in store for Rosalie and Rosalind. Or what they have in store for the future. Rosatech continues to push out new genetic treatments every year. They actually showed up for the last annual meeting of the board, for something like five minutes. They’ve got something up their sleeves, and I’m betting they’re going to be throwing us all another curve ball soon. I can’t wait to see it. I’m always going to want to have them on my team, and I’m always ready to show up on their team whenever they call. No reservations. No hesitation. I will always answer their call. It’s what friends are for, and those two girls are the very best of friends. Always have been. Always will be.