A Closed and Common Orbit (Wayfarers #2)(5)
– Your body will give the appearance of aging, and will deactivate at a time concurrent with your chosen species’ expected lifespan. A warning notification will occur one standard before this happens, giving you ample time to decide if you wish to continue life in a new housing.
– Yes, you can have sex! You’ve got all the parts for it, and unless you’re coupling with an expert physician who spends a lot of time looking at your bits under good light (hey, to each their own), no one will be able to tell the difference. But before you get to it, please do plenty of research about healthy sexual relationships and proper consent. Ideally, ask a friend for advice. Similar to the recommendation about hand washing, you should also practise good hygiene and disease prevention practices for the sake of your partner. There’s no guarantee that xyr imubots are up to date.
– If part of your body becomes damaged, send me details via the same contact path you purchased the kit through. I can’t promise that it can be repaired, but I’ll see what I can do.
Though you are welcome to contact me if there are issues with the kit, I ask that any communications be strictly limited to the operation and maintenance of your new body. I will not reply to any messages regarding cultural adjustment, legal trouble, or other social matters. I’m sure you can understand my position on this. Talk to a friend instead.
Feed source: unknown
Encryption: 4
Translation: 0
Transcription: 0
Node identifier: unknown
pinch: hey, comp techs. this isn’t my area of expertise so i’m hoping you guys can help me out. i need some advice about altering AI protocols. got a new installation i’d like to make adjustments to.
nebbit: good to see you over in our channel, pinch. it’s a pleasure. two questions: what protocols specifically, and what intelligence level?
FunkyFronds: pinch in a newbie channel? i never thought i’d see the day
pinch: level S1. whatever protocol it is that makes honesty mandatory
nebbit: hope you like complicated code. honesty protocols are rarely a simple on/off deal. for us organics, it would be. either you lie or you don’t. easy. but the architecture for AI communication is hugely complicated. you start pulling threads, you can f*ck up the whole tapestry. what’s your programming skillset like? can you write Lattice?
pinch: i was afraid you’d say that. i don’t know lattice. i can write basic tinker, but only enough to get me around mech repairs
tishtesh: yeah, do not go anywhere near an AI
FunkyFronds: there is no need to be rude, this channel is for beginners
tishtesh: i’m not being rude. i’m just saying, tinker isn’t worth shit here
nebbit: you ARE being rude, but you’re not wrong. pinch, i hate to say it, but you need to be very, very comfortable with Lattice before you dive into a project like this. if you’d be cool with someone else doing the work for you, i’d be happy to work out a trade.
pinch: appreciated, but i’ll pass. do you have any resources for learning lattice?
nebbit: yeah, i’ll message you some nodes to download. it’s dense stuff, but i’m sure you can handle it
LOVELACE
The crowds beyond the massive shuttle dock were thick, but Pepper held the kit’s hand, leading the way with the certainty of someone who had done this dozens of times. Lovelace tried to make sense of the throngs of sapients they weaved past – merchants lugging cargo, families embracing however their appendages allowed, tunnel-hopping tourists staring at maps on their scribs – but there were too many of them. Far too many. It wasn’t the excess of information that frazzled her, but the lack of boundaries. There was no end to Port Coriol, no bulk-heads or windows to provide a context, no point beyond which she could cease her directive to pay attention to every tiny detail. On and on the crowds went, stretching off down alleyways and pedestrian paths, a calamity of language and light and airborne chemicals.
It was too much. Too much, and yet, the restrictions that were in place made processing the Port all the harder. Things were happening behind the kit, she knew. She could hear them, smell them. The visual cone of perception that had rattled her upon installation was maddening now. She found herself jerking the kit sharply around at loud noises and bright colours, trying desperately to take it all in. That was her job. To look. To notice. She couldn’t do that here, not with fragmented views of crowds without edges. Not in a city that covered a continent.
What little she could process led to questions she couldn’t answer. In the shuttle, she’d downloaded as much as she could to prepare – books about sapient behaviour in public spaces, essays on socioeconomics, profiles on Port Coriol’s cultural mix. But even so, she kept seeing things she hadn’t anticipated. What was that instrument that Aandrisk was carrying? Why did some Harmagians have red dots painted on their carts? Why, anatomically speaking, did Humans not need breathing masks to shield themselves from the smell of this place? She filled a file with notes as she steered the kit forward, hoping she would have the opportunity to answer them later.
‘Blue!’ Pepper called, letting go of the kit and waving high above her head. She was lugging an overnight sack and an enormous, clanking bag of tools, but she quickened her step all the same. A Human man beelined for her, meeting her halfway. He was tall and slimly built, but not thin, like Pepper, and not hairless, either. Lovelace rummaged through her visual reference files. Human genetics were too varied to conclusively pin down by region without asking the person in question, and indeed, Blue’s golden brown skin could’ve been anything from Martian to Exodan to the product of any number of independent colonies – but from sight alone, it was clear that none of those heritages were his. There was something different in him, something a little too smooth, too polished. As she watched him hug Pepper, watched Pepper stretch up on her toes to kiss him, Lovelace couldn’t help but notice the separation between them and the other Humans scattered through the crowd. Pale pink Pepper with her shiny, hairless head, Blue with his . . . whatever it was. Lovelace couldn’t pin down the difference in him. They stood out, no question. She, however, did not, or did not believe that she did. The kit looked like it had been pulled straight from the ‘Human’ example in an interspecies relations textbook: brown skin, black hair, brown eyes. She was thankful that the kit’s manufacturer had seen the wisdom of blending in.