Chuck
The two Gaoians worked for several minutes before emerging from under the cover.
“It is safe.” said Milt, as he directed the swapping of the crates. A several minutes later, the other device was cleared as well.
“Right.” said Ronovin, after removing the crate from the mesh tarp. “Well now that that is done, I have a few contacts that need micromanaging. Milt?” Milt perked an ear in his direction. “Meet me back at the ship in” Ronovin looked at his datapad. “Three hours.” Milt nodded in acknowledgement.
With that, Ronovin turned to leave, nodding at Chuck as he left.
Milt studied Ronovin as departed, his earlier fear now all but absent. The Gaoian remained still for several seconds after Ronovin left view, as if in a trance. He shook himself, clearing his head. He turned to Chuck and walked over to join his two remaining companions. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath before speaking. “Nano-replicator, huh? Want me to jailbreak that for ya?”
Chuck smiled. “How are you feeling Milt?”
Milt dismissed him with a wave of his paw. “Not now, Chuck. We’ll talk later.”
“…Of course.”
Milt turned back to Bart. “So… jailbreak?”
Bart stood back on his four hindling. “Is… that legal?”
“…No?”
“Then I think not.”
Milt shrugged. “That’s why I asked.”
Chuck studied Milt. He was hiding something. “Milt, what did you do?”
Milt’s ears swiveled nervously. “I installed a few patches a Brother of mine made for these devices.” He calmed down after glancing again at Chuck. “Upgrades to reliability, efficiency, licensing, haggling.”
Chuck stood confused. “Haggling?”
Milt shrugged again. “I didn’t ask.”
Bart thought a moment. “I may have some concerns about that ‘licensing’ upgrade.”
Milt chittered excitedly, clearly much more comfortable now that the topic of conversation had shifted. “Oh, that’s a good one. ZeilCorp, the manufacturer of the nano-replicator, offers hundreds of different classes of operating licenses. They allow you to ‘downgrade’ your licence at any time. I took the liberty of downgrading you to a more generous licence, the only restriction being that you do not use the device to duplicate a given object more than once every two days, an absurd requirement, as the licence itself only allows a given item to be duplicated every six days. I think you’ll agree that this licence is better than the previous one month restriction.”
“It takes six days to replicate an item?”
Milt chittered. “No, most items will print in a few minutes.”
“So is the six days for charging or some sort of cooldown?”
Bart answered this one. “No, Chuck, the extended delay period is merely a condition on the licence governing our legal use of the stated nano-system. ZeilCorp sells their unrestricted nano-forges for millions of credits. However, as they are capable of literally printing additional units at trivial marginal costs, they offer limited models for costs orders of magnitude less, simply because they have the capability of doing so. This particular model is a nano-replicator unit, not the superior nano-forge. It is merely capable of duplicating existing entities, not creating new works from digital models.”
Chuck pondered for a moment. “What if you try to duplicate an item that you just printed?”
Milt chimed in. “The forge contains a hardware device that produces a unique, short lived organic compound. It sprays both the source and printed objects with this unique chemical as it prints. If it detects those, printing will not start.”
Chuck scratched his chin. “I’ll have to look into that.”
Bart responded. “Humans are still pre-contact. It is strictly against Dominion doctrine to allow scarcity-era civilizations access to nano-replication.”
Chuck grunted in amusement. “I’ll have to look into that too.” After taking a few mental notes, he continued. “So, what’s in the other box?”
“It houses an automated shop attendant. Brrtklklk’s Human Items will no longer remain closed while I travel.”
“Huh, that explains the haggling system, I suppose. You got both of these from Zilroy?”
“Yes. Useful for me, inexpensive for him. I did inform you of this deal at the time it was agreed upon.”
Chuck nodded. “So you did.”
“Setup of these devices will take some time. Go, enjoy your time with your Gaoian acquaintance. Do not concern yourself with my toils.”
With a quick glance at each other, Chuck and Milt departed. There was much to discuss over lunch.
1y10m3w1d bv
Scar Chaser, nearing Fyunipper Clanhouse
Sharon
Sharon woke up early. She yawned, and stretched out her arms, gently tapping Darpin in the process. He awoke with a yip, leaping upwards. She chuckled softly.
Darpin landed next to her with a flop. He slowly caught his breathe. “Maybe I should stick to the floor.”
Sharon rolled her eyes, then rolled out of the nest and made her way to the ablution chamber. She left several minutes later, ready for the day. The facilities were not what she had been hoping for, but at least she felt cleaner. Hopefully this Clanhouse would have better amenities.
Darpin was waiting for her outside the chamber. “Come on up front. I want you to see this part.”
Sharon followed Darpin to the cockpit of the vessel. Ahead of her, out the window, stood a large stoney world. “What is this place?”
“This moon is named Haidao.”
“Moon?”
“Yeah. Gimme a minute.” Darpin took a seat and slowly rotated the craft. An absolutely enormous blue-purple crescent slipped into view, with a faint red star visible in the background. “I know its kinda hard to see, the star ain’t that bright.”
Sharon stood, mouth agape. “There’s nothing wrong with this view, Daar.”
Darpin chittered. “Good to hear. The Clanhouse has a very similar view. Let’s go in.”
With a few quick gestures, the ship again turned and began to approach Haidao at a surprisingly rapid clip. Less than a minute later, a facility popped into view, its dim silhouette only just visible.
“Here, you gotta see this. Let me just…” The area below burst into light as, one by one, the facility’s external lights ignited. It was not a small place. Interconnected steel tubes and chambers stretched every which way, connecting several distorted glass domes that housed greenery. Even the dusty surface of the moon was smooth near the facility.
“Daar… this place is yours?”
Darpin chittered. “No, this place is ours. The clan ain’t mine alone. I’m just in charge.”
Sharon gawked at the structure before her. “This place must be able to house hundreds of people!”
Darpin nodded. “For you and me, yes. The old clan barely used half of it at its peak. But I think this place only fit a few dozen inhabitants when it was built; Ya know how big all the other people are. ”
The ship descended towards an impressively large hangar. The Scar Chaser landed, and the two of them departed the craft. There were a few other ships in the hangar in varied states of disrepair.
Darpin spread his arms wide. “Welcome home!” He grinned as he excitedly beckoned Sharon to follow him. Sharon was led on a tour of the facilities. Huge hallways led from enormous room to enormous room, each having been repurposed by its Gaoian inhabitants.
“You did all of this yourself?” Sharon asked as they left a sleeping area.
“Nah, most of it is left over from the glory days of the old clan. I only really use a small part of the place.” As they walked through the halls, Darpin stopped to point out another door. “This is one of the life-houses.”
He had started again to depart, when Sharon interrupted him. “That sounds interesting, what’s in there?” She opened the door and entered. She was immediately blinded by a brilliant red-orange glow that warmed her quickly as she carefully advanced. Eventually as her eyes adjusted, and she was able to make sense of the hundred meter diameter room in front of her. Great trees and grasses stood in front of her, dense enough that the far walls of the room were not visible. Stretching far above her was an enormous, brightly glowing domed ceiling.
Darpin entered the room behind her. “One of the former Brothers told me that this room is important to the air in this place, so I’ve left it alone. I don’t know how these trees survive. I think there are forcefields diverting light into this room, but it still seems too dim for the plants.”
“Too dim?” Sharon thought for a moment. “Daar, what color is the light in this room?”
“Uh… “ Darpin glanced around. “Yellow, I guess?” He perked his ears, curious. “Kinda like hot metal. Why?”
“This room is seriously bright. That red star’s light is… This room is brighter than Sol.”
Darpin pondered a moment. “Red… Hmm, the translator is saying that’s a word for heat rays?” He tilted his head back and pointed his ears upwards, one of the few places that Gaoians lacked fur. “Okay, yeah, I can feel that. You can feel that through your garments?”
Sharon closed her eyes and concentrated. “Yes, actually, I can.” She opened her eyes and looked back to Darpin. “But I was just talking about the light.”
Darpin’s ears swiveled sporadically, seemingly at a loss for words.
“Why don’t we continue the tour, I can come back here later.” She gave one last look to the room as they departed. The light in the halls was quite dim compared to the brilliant aura of the life-house; She struggled to match Darpin’s pace as her eyes slowly adjusted to the lower ambient light levels.
Darpin led her through one of the junk-filled storage areas to a large door. With a tap, the door slipped open, revealing another vehicle hangar. This one was filled with scattered parts and machinery. Most notable, though, was the large opening in the far side of the room, beyond which lie the dusty terrain of the moon.
Darpin wandered towards one of the machines. He took a seat on top of it as it roared to life. Well, more of a whine than a roar. The machine then clumsily began moving towards the door. He leapt off of it near the exit, then began donning a spacesuit.
“I think this is a go-kart, if that word is translated correctly.” He grinned, ears perked with pride. “I built it myself.”
Sharon studied the vehicle. It was hopeless. Giant steel wheels -bicycle rims really- with plates welded to them to provide traction in the dust. The thing was taller than it was wide, and only barely longer. Darpin sat nearly a meter in the air… In a car with a wheelbase only slightly longer than that. No suspension, no visible steering. Unbelievable.
“I’d offer to let you drive, but the Clanhouse lacks a suitable… uh… suit. We’ll fix that later.” After a moment’s thought, he walked over to a rack and detached a small electronic device from one of the other suits. “Here, it’ll let us talk.” After a few basic instructions, Darpin hopped back onto his car and drove out into the regolith. He jerked upwards slightly as he left the influence of the complex’s gravity generators.
Once settled, he flipped a few switches and began to drive around. He drove back and forth, tossing soft dust into the… air? With the way the dust fell, there definitely was air out there, though Sharon had no intention of sticking her hand out to determine just how well pressurized it was.
Darpin was comical to watch. He was grinning and yipping excitedly, all while driving no faster than a cheap lawn tractor; Though, humorously, the lawn tractor would have vastly superior handling. Eventually, he drove back into the hangar. He dismounted and began de-suiting. “I forgot about the radio. Ah well. So, what did you think?” He glanced at Sharon expectedly, a hint of pride in his eyes. Oh the poor thing.
“I was impressed.” Sharon said as Darpin’s ears perked. “It’s not often I can find a vehicle that is outperformed by a segway.”
Darpin’s ears sat back intrigued. “Segway?” He pondered for just a moment. “Is that some kinda Earth vehicle?” His ears perked again. “Can you build one?”
Sharon laughed. “Maybe, eventually, but I have something easier in mind to start.”
“Start… so, you’ll help?”
“Sure, for now at least. I gotta say, I was a bit worried about being able to do anything, but your car there has inspired confidence in my ability to improve on your work!” Darpin had a dopey excited puppy look on his face. She found herself quite glad that Darpin did not catch her subtle connotations, the poor thing must be starved for any kind of attention. “So, Daar, how does it work?”
Darpin excitedly showed her the features. Kinetics forced it downwards, to account for the low gravity, and it steered via some sort of skid-steer system. Everything else was simply motors and a reactor.
“Come! There is one more place that you gotta see!” Darpin excitedly ‘dragged’ her towards the halls. They eventually reached another industrial-looking room. “Here it is!”
Sharon glanced around. The equipment seemed more sophisticated in here, but she still could not make sense of anything’s purpose.
Darpin glanced at her expectedly. Seeing no immediate response, he flattened his ears and waved his forelimbs at a console. He again looked towards her. “Well?” He asked.
Sharon didn’t get it. Nothing had changed.
Darpin’s eyes fell to her translator. “…Ah. No implants.” He sighed, then began pacing. “We can fix that, if you want. I’ve never done implantation surgery, but how hard could it be!”
Sharon unconsciously backed away. “Uh… I think I’ll do without.”
With a shrug, Darpin turned back to the equipment. After a few minutes, he performed a few more gestures, and the equipment sprung to life. Beams of light and gas flowed into a chamber within. A few moments later, Darpin pulled a small handheld device out of the machine. “Come over here, Sharon.” His ears perked upright as he spoke. “I need to scan your head!”
Sharon’s eyes widened. Her backing away was no longer unconscious. “Uh… maybe I should go…”
Darpin tilted his head. “C’mon, this is a good idea!”
“Your ‘good ideas’ seem to end up with someone getting mauled.”
Darpin looked at the device in his paw, then back to Sharon. “I’m not seeing it. It doesn’t even have moving parts!” He tapped his hindpaw, lost in thought. “Oh, maybe I should tell you what I am planning.” He looked to Sharon. “I want to make a pair of holo-goggles for you. But I need to know what size to make it!”
Sharon considered carefully. “Let me get something out of the ship. I’ll be right back.” Darpin nodded. After a few wrong turns, Sharon eventually made it to the ship, grabbed her bag, and returned to the foundry. She produced a pair of sunglasses and handed them to Darpin.
Darpin spent a moment inspecting the spectacles. “Huh, light intensity reduction?” He tapped the glasses on a desk. “So simple and yet…” He nodded, as he passed his device over the glasses before returning them to Sharon. After several minutes of gesturing towards a dark corner of the room, the machine again sprang to life. Another pair of glasses began to materialize in the chamber. After a minute, Darpin pulled the glasses out of the machine and handed them to Sharon.
After a moment’s hesitation, Sharon donned the glasses. Immediately, a holographic model of the kart sprang into view. Sharon spent some time pacing and tilting her head, watching the rendering flawlessly shift as she moved. She swiped her hand at the model, her hand passing right through the model.
Darpin made a few gestures. “Do that again!”
She did so, and the model rotated as she pushed it.
“How is it?”
Sharon wasn’t quite sure what to say.
“Do they fit well? Can you see clearly?”
“Well, everything looks green.”
“Green…” Darpin thought a moment. “Let me try something.” After a few quick gestures, a small strip of plastic appeared in the device. “Look through this.”
Sharon removed the glasses and held up the plastic. It was a small sheet of sheet plastic with several bands of different colors spread across it.
“Are any of these clear?”
After a moment’s thought, Sharon pointed to a couple of the more transparent ones, and Darpin set the holo-glasses back into the machine. Beams of light swept over the glasses. The lenses evaporated, replaced by a new, clear set.
Darpin carefully inspected her as she put this new pair on. “How about this one?”
Sharon glanced around the room. “Looks good.”
“Now… are you sure about the implant? It’s really hard to use the nano-forge correctly without one.”
“I think I’ll pass.”
Darpin dropped his ears in deep concentration.
“Why is the implant useful?”
Darpin stopped and glanced at her. “So you can use neural controls in addition to the gesture based ones. Makes it go much faster!”
Sharon thought a moment. “The Corti… they had a helmet that… did something similar? I think.”
Darpin struck a paw to his snout. “Ah, yes, of course!” He chittered softly, while waving his paws in front of him. “Hmm, no, mmmm, ah, yes.”
A model of a thin, lightweight helmet appeared in the middle of the room.
“Here we are, a Qinis designed control helmet. A decades-old design, because of the war, but still quite usable.”
Sharon pondered a moment. “How many designs do you have stored here?”
“Oh, tons! The old clan disconnected the forge from the comms grid, but the facility’s former occupants kept a full archive on site! Now then, you have two models to choose from; Read-write, and read only.”
“I’m not sure I like the idea of a mind-affecting device that ‘writes’.”
Darpin nodded. “That’s why I mentioned the other one. You won’t be able to force-train yourself, but no messy mistakes.”
“Messy?”
Darpin shuttered. “One of my Brothers installed an implant designed for a Rauwryhr.” He sighed. “Poor cub.” Darpin flattened his ears. “It took forever to clean the ceiling.”
“…Let’s stick with the read only.”
Darpin grinned. “Good plan.” He made a few more gestures, and another device began to form in the forge. He plucked it from its cradle. “Now, I do have to scan you for this. Obviously, the Qinis design doesn’t just work with other anatomies.”
Sharon let him approach. “I’m surprised Daar, I didn’t expect, well, competence.”
Darpin ran the device over her head with a clearly hurt expression on his face. “I build stuff, I run this place. I may not be Ironclaw, but…” He sighed. “I ain’t one of those civilized types, but I can at least keep this place running.” He fiddled with the design in front of him, clearly merging the helmet, scan, and holo-goggle designs together. “Still, you ain’t wrong. That’s why I brought you here. I just want to make sure you have the bestest tools I can get ya.” With a few final gestures, the forge again sprang to life.
Darpin turned to Sharon. “This helmet is quite the toy! Nearly as good as an implant, even. Nice little neural iterator linked to holo-goggles, refractory speakers, general and engineering databanks, oh, and a full broad-spectrum communication array. It’ll listen to you, and learn how to talk to ya.”
Sharon was intrigued. “Really? It trains itself?”
Darpin looked confused. “Well, yeah. How else would you do it? Just think different thoughts until something happens?”
Sharon, again, had no good answer. Darpin grinned as he pulled out the completed device. He accepted the holo-glasses as he handed her the helmet. It was surprisingly light. She donned it, and immediately, her perception of the surrounding area began to change. She hadn’t even realized how poorly lit the room was, until the new goggles began to subtly shift the hues and lighting. Her vision sharpened as well, as additional information was focused onto her retinas.
Wait… how did she know that? This knowledge slowly came to her. It’s core was scanning her thoughts and providing sensory feedback via the peripherals. After each iteration, it would then scan her thoughts again to determine if her experiences matched the instructions she had intended. In each, rapid iterative cycle, billions of signals were begin read, acted on, and compared, as fast as her subconsciousness could respond. Which was, as the the device told her, quite fast.
The helmet was slowly feeding information into the corners of her eye, a place where her brain could process it, but was difficult to see directly. Even though the transfer was painfully slow, it was able to feed her exactly what she needed at the time. She looked over to Darpin. He was standing there with feeling of pride, admiration and curiosity; all information which would have been invisible to her earlier. She stared at her arm as she flexed it, technical information about her musculature focusing in her mind as she watched. She then looked across the room to a small robot arm, and flexed that one as well. Holy crap.
“Daar… this is amazing!”
Darpin beamed. “So, can you design a new go-cart?”
Sharon glanced at the nano-forge, her mind slowly filling with its specifications and capabilities. With each passing minute, the information flow improved, focused, as it adapted to her thoughts. She thought back to the helmet the Corti had used. The Qinis device took that information, and used it to match her memory with a design, and seamlessly began feeding her the strengths and weaknesses of the two devices. This one is better.
Within a few more moments, she could begin to feel the surrounding area. The station’s systems communicated to her, and in return, accepted her commands. Noticing Darpin struggling slightly to stand, she returned the gravity to galactic standard, not even realizing that she had unconsciously set it to one g.
Soon, the device’s own limitations finally began to show; It had nearly reached the potential maximum of information transference capabilities. Inconspicuous information fed into the corners of her vision, abusing every optical illusion, every flaw of the occipital lobes to effectively deliver its content. Meanwhile, the device’s speakers fed an absurdly low volume dial-up modem like stream of audible information to her. ASMR-like effects became focused and more precise. First evoking emotions, then, honed through it’s continuous feedback loop, moving to thoughts, ideas, words, and eventually direct knowledge. More throughput was possible, but would require additional hardware. In particular, the tactile channels could handle significant bandwidth. Until then, she would have to be content with only monitoring some systems, or learning some information at any given time.
But it wasn’t done yet. Even though the direct feed rate had reached its maximum, it had begun to experiment with condensed streams of information. By invoking parts of her memories, it could send instructions to generate ideas, rather than the ideas themselves. This process would never complete. Not only was her memory horrendously complex, but her memories were also constantly changing, including, interestingly, her memories of this very device. Those memories let it expand its instruction set exponentially by allowing her to command it to merely ‘do that again’.
Sharon smiled at Darpin. “Oh, I do think so.” Within seconds, the cart model in front of her shifted, contorted, and folded. It became lower, wider, longer. Synthetic tires and magnetic suspension were added, as well as adaptive kinetics to keep the vehicle stable, even in flight. The new design no longer fit into the forge but, with a quick few seconds of work, it was disassembled and set adjacent to a few tools for reassembly. Less than two minutes after she started, the first design was complete. It wasn’t perfect, hell it wasn’t even good, but it was something.
Darpin stood awestruck for a few moments. Suddenly, he took off like a jackrabbit, running on all fours. He returned in another go kart, similar to the one he drove outside. He maneuvered it into the forge and immediately commenced the construction of Sharon’s new design. The forge disassembled and rearranged the components, shaving several minutes off the construction time. Soon it was done.
“What do you think?” Sharon asked, as she helped Darpin pull the parts out of the forge.
Darpin shook his head, “I don’t know how you learned to use that so Keeda-damned fast. I tried one of those a while ago and it couldn’t even outperform my implants.”
Sharon knew the exact reason why, even before the Qini device helpfully provided the answer. Much like the Corti had determined earlier, it seems that rapid critical thinking and decision making was something best left to humans. Interestingly, the proper Corti implants were substantially more capable than this helmet, if properly melded to a mind. Something to think on later. She returned her attention to the task at hand.
As they assembled the go-cart, her designs improved. Each minor flaw or difficulty encountered was resolved in the new digital model, each weakness corrected. As much as she wanted to put the cart back in to rebuild, she knew that that path would never end. At some point a commitment was needed. Sure, a future revision would prove better than this one, but seeing it in action was the only way to let the real improvements begin.
Her mind began to wander as the cart began to come together. As it did, her hat helpfully chimed in. It told her to call it ‘Jeeves’. Jeeves did not command her to do so, it simply recognized that she had a desire to uniquely identify her tool. Then, analyzing her subconscious response to various names, it helpfully iterated towards one that would make her happy. She began to feel concerned about Jeeves’ ability to manipulate her. In response, it immediately, well, backed away. As it ‘stepped away’ from her consciousness, it… no, she… noted that its only capability was to act directly on her intent, as precisely as possible; It literally had no ability to decide anything.
She played a bit with her focus, commanding Jeeves to approach and retreat a few times, before turning her attention to the room around her. She was going to need a better forge.
After a few minutes, Darpin noticed the model of the newly-designed forge materializing in front of him. “Wha… Already?”
Sharon laughed. “I’m going to need more room to work.”
Darpin was excited, and concerned, by her response. “Build whatever tools you need, but… “ He gulped. He was quite unhappy about the decision to say this next statement to a female. “But I’m the Clanfather here. Just… “ He sighed.
“Don’t worry Daar, I have no intention of deposing you.”
Darpin’s ears flattened in panic. “How did you…” He glanced worryingly at the still-present holographic model of Jeeves.
In the next few seconds, several interesting things happened. Jeeves told Sharon that Darpin was terrified that it was reading his mind, which, while unture, was not that far from correct. In truth, it was Darpin’s expressive body language that gave everything away. Just after that, Sharon realized that Darpin was at a complete and total information deficit, due to her own lack of implants, so she probed ways of sending information to the panicked Gaoian. A few quick handshakes later, and Jeeves was now acting as a bidirectional translator implant… kinda.
As she continued to focus on external communications, she began to play with Darpin’s implant directly. With a few quick pokes, she found that she was able to send thoughts directly through it, if she so desired. A few more and she could read… Oh shit! Nononono. Too far! Back away! She was not going to start reading minds. That never ended well. She began to wonder just how much power that simple implant held… Quite a lot, as it turned out. It was a damn good thing she did not have one herself. She quickly dismissed that thought, and turned to more important matters, namely, the Gaoian cowering in a corner.
“Daar, I’m still here.” With a few prods, she found the problem. “Ah, I see. We’re friends here, Daar. Friends help each other out. They don’t stab each other in the back, simply because they can.”
Darpin hesitantly turned to her. “But you are stronger than me. Smarter too, apparently. How am I supposed to feel sa…”
With a quick thought, Sharon sent her intentions to Darpin’s implant.
Darpin stood with eyes widened and ears flat. “What… in Fyu’s name was that?”
“I simply told your implant why you have nothing to fear from me. I am not exaggerating when I say that there is no place I would rather be right now, than right here with you. I have nothing waiting for me on Earth and this… this is amazing. Think of all the problems that can be solved right here.”
Darpin hesitantly approached her.
Sharon placed her hand of Darpin’s shoulder. “When we first met, you asked me if I could build you an amusement park.” She turned to the evolving forge design in front of her, smiling. “I can. And will.”