Height:
Inapplicable

Weight:
Inapplicable

Age:
~32,516,101 Hours of Uptime

Race:


Tier:
Regional (4): 'Circus' may not be a true AI, but the inevitable growth of their digital brain over several millenniums has made the distinction tenuous in some ways. Specifically, 'Circus' is able to interact with computer systems in ways not unlike proper AI would. Standard data protection is likely to fall short should 'Circus' infiltrate a foreign system as even unfamiliar or encrypted code is easily decipherable to an aged digital life form. Additionally 'Circus' is able to process and act on immense amounts of data in time frames all but impossible for organic lifeforms.

Appearance:
As a neural simulation 'Circus' lacks any physical appearance. Rather, mechanical, holographic, or simulated forms are constructed at will. That said 'Circus', like most neural simulations, has preferences. In most circumstances 'Circus' will present themselves as a twenty something human man or woman, though always with some additional and often gaudy flair. Sometimes this is as simple as showy clothing. Other times it can be so elaborate as to make one question whether or not 'Circus' had ever seen a human. A dozen arms, horns, spikes, wings, delicately carved and gleaming metal skin like some sort of automaton knight, ‘Circus’ has as many forms as one can imagine.

Personality:
There is no being so world weary as god. Like so many neural simulations 'Circus' was born into a world without challenge, where sensation and experience were simply a thought away. A world without true chance, where everything that exists was under their absolute control and the only consequence imaginable was minor discomfort. 'Circus' is a being that has tired of control, and now acts with a unique recklessness and creativity. It is not unheard of that 'Circus' will disregard their own safety or the safety of those they interact with in the pursuit of even trivial interests. Onlookers would call 'Circus' callous, but such an observation would be flawed. 'Circus' may show an observable indifference towards the lives of supposed 'transient beings', but has also demonstrated tremendous empathy and concern for fellow neural simulations. Committed to their duty as an operations councilor 'Circus' is sworn to protect and enrich the lives of all those who reside in the central computer of the Boundless Reach. While 'Circus' may unintentionally or even deliberately endanger themself or so called 'transient beings', there has rarely been a circumstance where 'Circus' did not prioritize the safety of the ships neural simulations.

Abilities, Talents, Traits, Powers:
Digital life forms eventually, inevitably, become adept manipulators of the environment they live in. This is as true of neural simulations as it is of totally artificial intelligences. Data, code, these things are the building blocks of reality for digital lifeforms and with enough understanding they can modified and shaped in almost any manner imaginable. ‘Circus’ like the majority of mature neural simulations is capable of dismantling most commercial security systems and encryptions. Rigorously designed military or corporate measures often pose a greater challenge and depending on their sophistication can prove totally intractable to even skilled neural simulations. It goes without saying that defenses designed to frustrate completely artificial intelligences are equally effective against neural simulations.

Of course, neural simulations do have an inherent disadvantage not shared by true artificial intelligences; a neural simulation is inherently incapable of mass scale multitasking. Though an extended existence will lead to a neural simulation like ‘Circus’ gaining an understanding of its virtual world and how to manipulate it, there are limits to any mind built from an organic model. If a neural simulation aims to break a sophisticated encryption it will have to commit the majority of its focus to that task. While superior to unmodified biological minds at the endeavor, neural simulations cannot perform on the level of true AI when it comes to exerting a massive digital presence. There is no perfect metric for defining a neural simulations innate limitation at multitasking, but in general a single neural simulation can split its focus between thirty to fifty distinct tasks. Complex undertakings understandably require greater attention, further complicating matters.

While limited in the number of actions they can perform at once, neural simulations like ‘Circus’ do not lack another advantage commonly associated with proper artificial intelligence. Accelerated data processing permits neural simulations, like any digital lifeforms inhabiting systems with significant processing power, to perceive time as passing a great deal slower than may actually be the case. This is a result of two major factors: available processing power and the physical makeup of advanced computer systems. More available processing power simply allows more thought to happen in a shorter time, and advanced computer construction allows the brain thinking to physically operate at a speed greater than can be accomplished by the electrical connections between neurons in an organic brain.

In practice such a perception of time allows ‘Circus’ and their ilk to act at what organic life might consider an accelerated rate. Things can be done faster and decisions made before slower life thinks of the question. Whole conversations can be shared before an organic is able to utter a single word. However, is important to note that while digital organisms may perceive time as slower they are still limited by the same physical realities as all other living beings. A camera, arm, leg, or anything else can only move so fast.

By perceiving time at a slower rate than most, neural simulations like ‘Circus’ often find themselves with little to do. In regards to the inhabitants of the Boundless Reach this is doubly true. With just under four thousand years of existence, perceiving time as slower all the while, many neural simulations on the ship turned to the study of one topic or even many to bide the time. As a result here is nary one neural simulation on the Boundless Reach that is not educated to the standards of most species experts. ‘Circus’ themself focused on advanced robotics and the creation of suitable avatars for neural simulations.

The topic of avatars is a touchy one, but while they are rarely used there has always been some inkling of a demand for them aboard the Boundless Reach. Moving a neural simulation into an avatar isn’t so much the issue as not unnecessarily restricting their consciousness is. In general the sacrifice made by inhabiting an avatar is the dearth of available processing power making a neural simulations mind operate much closer to the speed of a normal organic than it otherwise would. Still, ‘Circus’ has managed to ease the problem so that the change in perception isn’t chaffing or disorienting. The avatars themselves can be nearly anything with a large enough computer installed and ‘Circus’ is always willing to accommodate the requests of fellow neural simulations.

Items:
‘Circus’ may not be the sole owner of anything, but it could be said that as a member of the Operations Council they are a co-owner of the Boundless Reach itself. Tasked with the vessels administration, maintenance, and navigation the Operations Council was originally intended to take on the technical operation of the ship in order to free its neural simulations to do as they pleased in an essentially infinite simulated world. Nowadays the Operations Council represents the defacto leadership of the Boundless Reach. Major decisions are reached through majority vote and there are currently seven voting members on the council.

Under the Operations Council’s purview is the whole of the Boundless Reach, a ship that may be among the largest to exist. A cylinder 20km in diameter and 80km in length the Boundless Reach has a tremendous volume that plays host to innumerable systems and areas of note. The largest and most significant internal structure within the vast ship is undoubtedly the enormous city at its core.

It is important to remember that the Boundless Reach was once a generation ship, though not a soul breaths its air today. Much of the computer infrastructure that plays host to the vessels neural simulations was added on through countless upgrades, leaving the old city at the core of the Boundless Reach all but untouched. Stuck to the inside of an internal cylinder 12km in diameter and 48km long that once rotated to provide gravity, a function long since made obsolete, the vast city has decayed even with routine maintenance. At ~1810km^2 the city is simply too large to properly care for, and many parts are in total disrepair. Neglected sections have been taken over by the plant life that was once housed in small parks across the city, resulting in a juxtaposition between pristine skyscrapers and overgrown streets. While the ship is able to simulate nearly any weather within the city, it has been left to replay one day for centuries. The city has felt a clear morning, followed by a growing storm and finally a rainy night for longer than most of the plants within it have been alive. The systems that provided dynamic and changing artificial weather, alongside the countless others that once kept the cities inhabitants alive, have long been left in standby, waiting to serve a generation that will never come.

Whereas the old city is a reminder of those who once lived on the Boundless Reach, the ships computer cores are a statement about its current inhabitants. Buried in the most well armored sections of the vessel and surrounded by auxiliary power generators, the ship hosts forty eight networked primary computer cores. Decentralized to mitigate the risk of catastrophe in the event of power loss or attack it is not an exaggeration to say that the cores are some of the densest computers to ever be constructed. Even then, each one is a sphere nearly a hundred meters in diameter. One core alone could house every neural simulation on the Boundless Reach, but only in the most uncomfortably cramped conditions. As it is the cores are capable of simulating nearly anything for the neural simulations they host. Digital utopias where the residents are virtual gods, the computer cores are the very heart of the ship and its people.

Although many neural simulations like to imagine little of note exists outside of the Boundless Reach’s computer system, the universe still surrounds them. There are times when there is no choice but to interact with the universe at large, and this is where the ships drone hangers come into play. The Boundless Reach was constructed with the ability to house a small number of exploration and transport craft. Nowadays the hangers have grown with the ship, and thousands of drones are contained within the vessels bowels. Used for exploration, mining, repair, defense, offense, or even personal amusement the various drones aboard the ship have a great number of uses. Of particular note are the remaining transport vessels, though rarely used they are generally relied upon to convey physical avatars of neural simulations to wherever they would need to be. It goes without saying there is immense risk in deploying a neural avatar away from the ship, as its destruction would destroy the avatar and require a backup be activated. To the inhabitants of the Boundless Reach who live in a world of data, downtime is death. A backup is a new person, not the neural simulation that died.

Beyond the eye catching areas that define the Boundless Reach there are the maintenance tunnels. Collectively they represent thousands of kilometers of passages put together in a labyrinthine manner only decipherable to their digital creators. They are used to repair any conceivable damage to the ship or its innumerable systems. Of specific importance are those running to the primary systems of the ship, these are often much larger than their normal counterparts to facilitate the transport of larger or more sophisticated repair drones. These enlarged passages would qualify as proper ‘hallways’ on another vessel.

One of the primary systems that these larger maintenance tunnels run to is the Gravitational Well Projection Array, which acts as both the primary propulsion and weapons system. The GWPA projects ‘artificial mass’ in much the same way the ships internal system creates an artificial gravity field. The difference is range and concentration. The GWPA can project an immense ‘artificial mass’ directly ahead of the ship as a means to ‘pull’ it forward, better yet it can project this mass at long range in almost any direction. While this removes the ships need for alternative propulsion, it also opens up the possibility of using the array as a weapon. Used in this manner an ‘artificial mass’ or even several could be used to destroy a target through sheer tidal force. If a target proved immune to such an attack the GWPA could be used to accelerate otherwise inert projectiles to extreme speeds by simply projecting an ‘artificial mass’ ahead of them. The GWPA is the most versatile system on the Boundless Reach and it forms the backbone of the ships capability.

However, primary systems like the GWPA are far from the only ones regularly used by the Boundless Reach. One secondary system of great importance is the Emission Mimicking Panel network. The system is composed of thousands of hull lining panels which act as a rudimentary cloak. Usable while moving slowly or while the ship is stationary the panels act to broadcast a rough approximation of every spectrum's background radiation level while absorbing incoming emissions from active sensors. As it is not a true cloak, anyone who scans long or hard enough would be able to detect the Boundless Reach through analysis of its emissions. However, the AEMP acts to make the vessel blend into any space, permitting it to remain hidden from investigations not conducted with the greatest rigor.

History:
Some millennia ago there lived a people who came to be on a world with air they breathed and water they drank. They lived, died, and innovated as all peoples do, but unlike many their time was short. Just as they began to make the first strides off their little rock in space a calamity beyond imagining befell them. Countless millions died by the day, and an otherwise unremarkable people were forced to choose between certain death and a seemingly endless journey through the void. This is how the Boundless Reach first came to be. It is known that nearly a thousand years passed before the wayward people reached the distant star they had meant to be their new home. It is also known that they found nothing but desolation there. Starved for resources and unable to construct a new civilization with what meager supplies they had left, once again the people from their doomed world had to make a choice.

This is how the first neural simulations came to be. Minds scanned, copies activated at the moment of the originals demise, the first of the neural simulations were born to desperation. With no allies but time they forged the Boundless Reach into something new, and they set out on a new course. Where once it took many generations to traverse the stars, now it only took weeks. Where once there was strife, now there was utopia for all. It was this utopia, this aimlessly wandering vessel that ‘Circus’ helped create. As the Boundless Reach hopped from system to system, harvesting resources and sustaining its create bulk, ‘Circus’ grew restless. It was time for something new. The path upon which ‘Circus’ embarked would see them elevated to the Operations Council, and it would see the great ship a doomed people once called home chart a new course.