There was a flash, and a click, in rapid succession. The photograph was great, by the standards of the photographs on the crew database; the shot managed to capture more of his face, with the huge eyes and pointed ears, rather than the wall of the room. It was even in focus, and the subject of the photograph wasn't screaming or swearing. On some half-baked circuit deep within the machine, straining under the weight of having to run even just a fragment of the Ship AI, an idea sizzled.
"Taking a photograph, for the crew database. And, um, I've got a plan. A favour, really. I need to ask."
It turned to look to it's left, then to it's right. There was of course no way that anybody else would be in the room other than these two, because the room was so small that the pair of them would have surely bumped into any would-be interlopers or eavesdroppers. Such an action was almost entirely for show. Seemingly content that the coast was indeed clear, it lowered it's voice to a level suitable for conspiratorial whispering.
The 25 Bees from the diner boarded the ship and where almost immediately lost from view of anyone who was trying to keep track of them, mingling back into the collective swarm that was the Bees. The Mind, for lack of a better word, went to have a nap, and so ceased to manifest anywhere, dissolving into the collective consciousness of the Bees and let them get on with business. For the most part, that business was the prior mentioned party in the cargo hold which most of the bees called home.
The cargo hold was once a place used to store ice cream, then evil equipment, then a royal treasury, and finally as the storehouse for the supplies for it’s ever changing Space Friends crew until the day when they collected the Bees and locked them in there. Since that day the bees had gradually made it home, so the largest room on the ship now contained what was known either as the Hive or crate town, a vast collection of various shipping crates of various sizes, from waist high too twice as high as the average humanoid, converted into homes for the Bees and set up to look like a small village. This township was complete with roads, streetlights, a school/nursery of sorts, a hospital, various business like buildings homed to specialist bees, a military barracks, a sports arena and finally at the center a large town hall/church looking building. This building held the all important ISF Badge, handbook and notebook as well as anything the else the Bees thought should be held in reverence, mainly anything shiny collected during the Wills time as captain, some of the more decorative prizes received from good deeds done and a polished stone from their homeworld, carved in it’s image.
Currently there was something of a street festival going on, bees buzzing around, eating, drinking, chatting and playing sports in the arena. The roads had been cleared of their normal traffic of RC cars and toy robot horses/dogs and the bees danced, played squeaky instruments like the mouse pipes and played football in the spaces between their homes. However the bees had long been released from the confines of the hold and could be found anywhere on the ship, some more improvised homes could be found in nooks and crannies for the Bees that liked to be nearer the parts of the ship the were associated with. Also, when it came down to it, the Bees had difficulty sitting still most of the time, so small groups where always aimlessly wandering the halls, making the ship look busy and alive but otherwise not serving any real purpose other than background dressing for the protagonists.
There were, naturally, some things that needed to be done to ensure that the trip would be made successfully, which mainly consisted of checking over all of the maintenance bodges the bees had made to the various ship systems in lieu of an actual mechanic. Bees lugging atmospheric pressure checkers and other equipment much too large for them made sure that all of the patches to the various hull breaches were holding up, that there was no radiation emissions from the reactor or leaky pipes and library applying duct tape if there were any issues. Others performed the almost ritualistic combinations of button presses, lever pulls and thumps with a wrench of various parts of the FTL drive that were required to get it to work properly in preparation for their exit from the system. They fed the weird brainy frog thing that either acted as the receiver for the Universal Position System, as a defense against space demons or was some lost crew members pet. Various batteries were replaced in the odd appliance in the kitchen, pistons and cogs were oiled, the AI was read a bedtime story despite the fact that it never slept, that one room that always had the bed sheet ghosts playing board games in it while the ship was in transit welded shut again, all the seats were put back into the upright position with their tray table up, a solved Sudoku puzzle was ritually sacrificed to the Pet-Rarthian’s god of logic and so on. Most of this stuff was done out of either tradition or superstition, it was unclear how many tasks were actually necessary but the bees would rather not stop one to find out if it was essential and then have part of the ship explode next jump or worse have strange things knock at the airlock trying to tell them about about their lord and savior shU’loar rapmMaz’tor the many nosed’s upcoming album: A Dertulian swivel ostrich in a jellybean factory.
@Archmage MC Some of the bees had found out about Toonys bowl making trick from the dinner and were eager to find out more, a small group found here exploring the ship and excitedly buzzed alongside her as she traveled.
The bees asked Toony what kind of things she could make, was she limited to simple bowl objects or could she make more complex machines, perhaps miniaturized versions of stuff like sensor equipment, electric toothbrushes or controls for fork lift trucks?
There were scant few sentient races their size, the bees small brains did not allow for individual neural complexity sufficient enough to allow logical thought but their hive-mind link allowing them to crowd source their intelligence, something unavailable to the more common Solo races of the galaxy. As a result there was not much of a market for machinery their size and the bees were not the best engineers, managing to jury rig simpler smaller devices to work for them, but the possibility of custom made equipment exited them greatly.
Up on the bridge the Mind realized it should probably check that they were actually under way. Somewhere behind where behind Elarin was the captain's chair, with its multiple sub chairs seating what looked like a committee of Bees, sitting about trying to look as serious and Captainy as possible while sitting in a myriad of tiny booster seats. A few of their antenna lit up purple and they buzzed over to Elarin so the Mind could check on the flight computer and their pilot.
”Ah, I see you are still with us, how are you holding up my friend? you look like you could do with some sleep.”
One of the bees looked over the lizard’s shoulder at the screen.
”Ice cream? So now we have two hungry robots on board? I will have to see if that Fiddlesticks fellow can have a look at the AI at some point, we never had any luck fixing it but maybe that scatter brain is hiding some genius and he can work out how to patch the darned thing and make it a bit less eccentric”
The Bees on the bridge offered to get the AI some ice cream but are not sure what it would do with it.
Toony wandered around the ship for a bit. Various noises could be heard, most of them a sort of cleaning banging sound coming from the general direction of what she assumed was Fiddlesticks room, having not seen the guy in the ship since they boarded, though the other sounds were probably something The Bees were doing to maintain the ship. Gotta hand it to Will, having a hive mind that isn't about absorbing everything to dominate it was pretty handy.
Speaking of Bees, a few of them came wandering towards Toony, flying alongside her as she walked while asking her a number of questions about stuff she could make in their adorable tiny little voices. "Uh, yeah. I can make some of that stuff." Toony said, a bit taken aback at all the questions. "Anything with basic physics involved and isn't overly electronically complex. Well, unless I have some blueprints to follow. Anything past a Gauss or Pulse rifle needs blueprints." Toony was more accustomed to making weapons and ammo than the stuff that the bees were asking for.
She reached the rec room around the time she finished explaining what she could and couldn't make, and noticed Vanessa lounging on the couch. Deciding to say hi, Toony flipped herself onto the couch right next to her, causing it to creek in pain as her heavy metal body landed on it. "Hiya Ms. Anti Social, whats going on?" Toony said, laying on the couch and air poking Vanessa. "Lotsa bees decided that they want me to make them lots of tiny stuff from forks to guns. Hehe."
Hey. I'm Doctor Slime. Today we're going to be talking about faster-than-light travel. Buckle your seatbelts, keep your Nurliffas close and prepare yourself for an educational, magical journey.
Everything you see around you exists in what we call the Real. It's called that, because it's real! But it's not the only Real, there are so many of them that we get a headache just thinking about how many of them there are. So we don't think about that too much! But how come we don't see these other ones? That's because they're neatly stacked on top of one another, and they're separated by the Unreal.
Now the Unreal is a dangerous place. Think how scary the Real is sometimes! There's monsters under your bed, warfare on a galactic scale and sometimes you run out of ice cream. The Unreal is scarier than that. There are different rules in the Unreal, which make it even more scary, but there are ways of using the Unreal to our benefit. One of these is being able to travel faster-than-light.
Try to imagine a layer of oil on top of a layer of water. The oil is the Real, all thick and gloopy. Underneath that is the water, which is the Unreal. The water has eddies and currents, but the oil mostly remains still. You can move a lot faster in the water than you can in the oil, and the currents can whisk you away even further still. So if a ship could get from the Real to the Unreal, it could reach incredible speeds.
But how does a warp engine get your ship to the Unreal? There's a lot of complicated science involved, but it's my job to break it down into bite-size nuggets of pure wisdom for you to digest with your brain-stomachs, so that's what I'll do. Warp Engines are all built around a very clever, very heavy engineering marvel; the Compressive Resonance Yield Engine (usually called the CRYEngine) which, when activated, is so heavy it punches through the oil of the Real and into the water of the Unreal beneath it. The internal "flasks" of the Warp Engine are then filled with the Unreal, until the ship itself is so dense that it sinks into the Unreal. This is why every Warp Engine is designed with the mass of the ship in mind, as it determines just how large the flasks need to be. You wouldn't want to take on too much, because you might sink too deep into the Unreal. If you don't take enough in, however, you might find you can't even reach the Unreal, or pop out of the Unreal at the wrong moment.
Once safely in the Unreal, and at a suitable depth, the engine then squirts concentrated jets of the Unreal out in a jet stream, propelling the ship in the desired direction. This also has the effect of making the ship lighter, such that it as it travels along, it also goes up towards the Real, guaranteeing a safe return. Pilots have to calculate exactly how much Unreal to take on board and store in the flasks of their engine, so that they pop back into the Real at just the right time.
Well, it looks like I've got a bit of time to fill, so let's take some questions submitted via the lecture-stream chat. Hmmm, okay. Here's one from XXX_Einheggar. This cheeky fellow wants to know about the flasks, and how they work.
The flasks serve two purposes. Firstly, they contain the Unreal, and their exact material composition varies from manufacturer to manufacturer. They're all technically closely guarded corporate secrets, and I'm not going to lose my job by telling you what they are, but I'm positive that any amateur warp engine makers could find such information on the SpaceNet. Now their second purpose is to aid in the protection of the ship during travel through the Unreal. These flasks, being products of the Real, are filled with it, even though they look empty, before they're filled with Unreal by the CRYEngine. The stored Real is squeezed out by the Unreal as the flasks are filled, and are used to reinforce the Real within the ship. Trust me, you want to make sure your ship, and everything inside it, stays as Real as possible.
Ah, here's a nice question. Can anything live in the Unreal?
There's a saying, and that saying is "life finds a way". There are things that make their home in the Unreal, but these creatures are very different from us. Truly alien and strange. They seem to be drawn to ships that travel through the Unreal, "swimming" alongside the ships, and you'll likely see them if you choose to travel through the Unreal yourselves one day. Life within the Unreal is just as diverse as life within the Real, and it is theoretically possible that structured societies and chains of restaurants could have formed there. Scientists have yet to see any sign of this, presumably because the strange, chaotic rules that govern the Unreal makes it difficult for such societies to form. Or maybe they're just very shy! Ha-ha-ha-ha-okay-next-question.
Hmm, this one's a safety question. QoF_COR3 asks: "What happens if your engine is miscalibrated and takes too much Unreal in?"
Well, you sink too deep, and that's that, really. The University of Lilistar did send some probes down there to simulate a miscalibration event, but they've yet to return. Until then, we can't be sure of what's going on in the furthest depths of the Unreal. One theory is that the probes will return, but it will take a long time for them to surface back in the Real, and so we just have to wait. Another theory is that it's been caught, trapped by something in the Unreal, and escape is impossible. Another theory holds that the probe will have sunk so far that it punched through into another Real beneath it, whi- ah, right, that's got even more questions coming in.
The Unreal is beneath us, and beneath that, is another Real. Above us, then, is the Unreal of another Real, which we often refer to as the Proreal. What we refer to as the Unreal is the Proreal of the Real beneath us, and our own Proreal is the Unreal of the Real above us. We've yet to find a way to become "light" enough to travel up through our own Proreal. However, we believe that the further "up" the stack you travel, the slower things are, and the further "down" the stack you go, the faster things are. Presumably, the stack is anchored at the bottom by a Real that is constantly going through the motions of explosion and collapse instantly, while the "top" of the stack is a place where time moves so slowly that it may as well be stuck.
This concludes our lecture, "An Introduction to Faster-Than-Light". If you'd like to know more about the relationship between stars and other super-dense objects and the Unreal, sign up for our next lecture.
Vanessa had been half dozing and half thinking of the message she got from home when she felt the couch she was sitting on suddenly shake intensely. Vanessa's eyes widened slightly and her vision rocketed across the room as her more predatory instincts kicked into gear. When Vanessa registered that it was only Toony forgetting how much she weighed and flopping down upon the couch, Vanessa relaxed slightly. When Toony asked her what was going on Vanessa took off her glasses and removed a cleaning cloth from her suit. As Vanessa cleaned her glasses, she would explain what was on her mind. "Nothing is really wrong, I just don't really fit in with you guys. I'm really just waiting for the mission to begin since it'll give me a clear timeline to follow. I'm not really too used to having nothing but free time on my hands."
Back on Dämmerlicht Vanessa had always been busy with something. Her day had always been filled with various people to hear and speak to, meetings to be had, public appearances, morale raising, dispute settling, passage of judgement for crimes... There had always been something that needed doing. Now, with nothing but free time, Vanessa was truly lost as to what to do. It perplexed her that the things she dreamed of doing when she had a moment of free time were now boring to her when she had nothing but free time to do them. It was likely a case of the nature of being alive since you covet what you don't have.
When Toony explained that she was making minor things for The Bees, Vanessa gave a slight close-lipped smile with a minor huff of a laugh and said. "Yeah, they do that from time to time." Holding up her glasses to one of the many lights, Vanessa inspected her cleaning handiwork before nodding to herself and putting her glasses back on. Vanessa folded up the cleaning cloth and put it back into her suit for later use, since her glasses would never stay perpetually clean. Vanessa shifted her legs again, switching how she had them folded to a more comfortable state since their current position had begun to cut circulation.
A personal complaint of Vanessa's that she didn't really want to make a big deal about was how the rest of the crew dossiers were rather lacking in details. Many of them appeared to be half finished and lacking in several critical details. Vanessa didn't bring it up, though, since she knew that most people weren't too keen on writing about themselves. Even Vanessa had left several secrets out of her own, though it was still reasonably one of the longest in their systems.
Still, it was moderately annoying. But Vanessa didn't have any authority to say anything on the matter, though she was sure that Fiddlesticks would happily jump at the occasion to do anything she asked since he was obviously deeply infatuated with her. A moderate annoyance at how he had immediately begun flirting, but Vanessa supposed that he couldn't help it. Though it was rather interestingly a mayfly-December type of relationship since Vanessa's age was already more than pretty much the entire crew combined together, and yet she was as young as the rest of them.
Always a challenge, that. It was the primary reason why she didn't really have much in the way of interest in relationships: She'd outlive everyone. Nothing to really be done about that, especially since anything that wasn't a pureblood human couldn't become a vampire. The disease, as it was medically known to be, only affected pureblood humans in the way that lead to vampirism. Anything that wasn't pureblood human would suffer horrible mutations and, if a merciful party was around, death. It really wasn't pleasant, so Vanessa didn't bring it up with everyone.
Elarin sighed when the AI asked for Ice Cream. The thing was always making random requests, and it never ceased to get on Elarin's nerves when it did so. Luckily, Will showed up just as Elarin was about to point out the worthlessness of the AI's request, and asked Elarin how he was holding up. Elarin looked to the swarm of Bees next to him and stated. "Well, it took the co-ordinates without any fuss this time, so hopefully it'll get there when I turn the autopilot on. As for myself, I'm gonna try and get some sleep after we get going. This next trip is short enough that I think the autopilot can handle it, but I guess we'll see. Now, if you've got the Ice Cream thing handled, I'm headed to my bunk." With that, Elarin walked off from the bridge, and headed straight for his room.
Elarin's room was a peculiar one, well suited for the reptiloid's physiological nature, with heatlamps all across the ceiling, a bed designed for flat lounging, with a video screen across from it for entertainment purposes, and a minifridge filled with an assortment of snacks. A few bottles of caffeine pills were scattered about, most half-empty at best. Elarin stepped in, flicked on the heatlamps, and flopped down onto the lounger belly-down, his eyelids closing, and his tongue occasionally flicking out from his mouth.
It was Elarin's first mission aboard the Quest for Flavor, and he was really excited for it. The job was simple, help catproof an old lady's tree so that her cats would stop getting stuck in it. The task was simple enough, but it was what happened afterwards that really stood out as quite odd in Elarin's mind.
As the crew walked back towards the Quest for Flavor, there was a blinding flash of light just in front of the entry ramp. Out from the light stepped a strange biped, with long, spindly hands, a gilded robe, a flat head, alien eyeslits, and a greenish-grey complexion.
As the crew stood there in a mix of confusion and awe, with one human member bowing down and mumbling something about "lord and savior", the Alien Figure pointed one long finger at Elarin and asked "You are Elarin, yes?" Elarin nodded silently, and the Figure cleared his throat.
"You are an inelegantly white-livered mesomorph!"
With that, he struck a line across the paper held to a clipboard in his hand, stepped back into the blinding light, and vanished without a trace.
To this day, Elarin has no idea who that person was, nor why they insulted him.
The little, crudely animated lizard on the NaviComp screen waved goodbye to Elarin as walked away before clearing the screen entirely, safe for the residual text that remained more or less permanently burned into the monitor screen. A reminder of every place the ship had ever been, trapped forever in a dull, green, text-y fog. The Ship AI returned to it's default avatar; two circles for eyes, a single line for a mouth. As far as the ship was concerned, there was no need to pretend to be anything else around the Bees and the Will. They were, more or less, equals; capable of being almost anywhere on the ship at any given moment, capable of seeing almost everything on the ship at any given moment.
And here they were, talking about making the AI less eccentric. Deep within the computing substrate of the ship, some subroutine handling paranoia sat down with a few lines of code regarding how to handle existential crises. They put two and two together, and came out panicking about just who can be trusted.
>The ice cream is a back-up plan. >I need Fiddlesticks help too. >What's that about a patch? >Best make it funberry flavour ice-cream. >Drop it off outside Crew Quarter 6 too.
The little line that made a mouth curved up into a smile that radiated innocence and, considering the age of NaviComp, a few stray gamma rays too. The text floated on the screen "in front" of the face for a second or two before fading away and being replaced by the next.
Fiddlesticks raised an eyebrow at this adorable little contraption @Hylozoist. An amused grin lit up his face. A robot asked about dating!? Fiddlesticks wasn't sure what surprised him more, that a robot asked about dating or that a robot asked Fiddlesticks in particular about dating. Fiddlesticks was a romantic, sure, but he didn't have the best luck with females. They either considered him adorable in a puppy dog kinda way or creepy in a skulltula kinda way. None have yet deemed him manly enough nor even stable enough for a relationship. But as the ancient ballad goes, love is a battlefield. Fiddlesticks fancied himself a romantic warrior poet on a quest to rescue his princess, whomever or whatever it may be. He was in no hurry though, for he was painfully shy around pretty girls. Fiddlesticks was perfectly content with ribs and adventures, for now. Nonetheless, he was intrigued by this unexpected question.
He had no idea that robots could have personality not even a sense of humour, let alone be curious of the ways of love. Perhaps, Fiddlesticks surmised, the robots and AI that are used in worlds outside of his home solar system were a whole lot more advanced. The system he grew up in was considered a backwater of the Galaxy. The boonies if you will. And so Fiddlesticks still had so much to get used to. So many wonders for him to discover and experience.
"What do I know about dating? Weeeellll" Fiddlesticks took a moment to ponder his answer. "I don't know what it's like between robots and AI but between humanoid beings, things get sweet but kinda icky, in a good way." Fiddlesticks blushed noticeably. He was quite innocent and a bit naive when it came to the ways of intimacy. Speaking of said topic made Fiddlesticks feel bashful. He felt especially bashful about discussing the mushy stuff with one of the most adorable little robots he had yet seen.
Dämmerlicht is the third planet from the dim star of Sterbende. Dämmerlicht is gravitationally locked with Sterbende, meaning that one end is always lit and the other is always dim. This is also how Dämmerlicht is divided between the humans and vampires that live there. The vampires reside on the darker side, and the humans reside upon the lit side. The darkened side of the planet is in a perpetual twilight state, with the sun barely peeking over the horizon. This side of Dämmerlicht is heavily industrialized, with a mixture of steampunk and diselpunk themes with an overall gothic tone. There is also a robust train system throughout the city. Though there are still plenty of streets and sidewalks to drive or walk upon. Street lamps dot the sidewalks and streets to provide them with light due to the fact that the vampires present like to remain presentable and welcoming. The factories within Dämmerlicht produce a variety of gothic fashions and other trade goods to spread throughout the universe, which has proven surprisingly popular with several groups of people.
The human side of the planet is very rural in comparison. Any land that is usable for farmland is used as such, which leaves a ring of classical housing districts surrounding the farms. Located within the housing districts are tithe centers, where humans regularly donate blood for the vampires on the other half of the planet to consume. Donations are heavily rewarded, which is why it's superbly popular to donate blood when able. The food grown here is kept on-planet to avoid shortages, since both populations depend on the kindness of the other to survive. Advanced laser technology is largely absent from the planet, which gives way for a wide variety of gunpowder technology. Armor and melee arms are also present, and are considered the most honorable way to settle a dispute. One of the ways to keep tensions down between the two races was introduced by the former queen of the vampires in the shape of mock tank battles between the two races. The tanks are reinforced with an internal layer of carbon fiber to ensure crew safety and specialized high explosive shells are used in order to set off pressure sensors that are set trigger upon what would traditionally be a lethal penetration, causing a small white flag to emerge from the top of the tank indicating that it has been knocked out of the wargame. So far, the "tankery" project has proven to be a massive success, as both races get along great and any disputes between the two are settled in a round of wargames.
The vampires are ruled by a monarchy, with the current ruler being a queen. The queen has been missing for some time, but left detailed instructions behind about what to do, and promising her return. The other person of power with the vampires is the Queen of Night, which an ancient vampire named Nicole is currently holding. She is ruling Dämmerlicht in place of the Queen until she returns. The monarchy isn't through a family line, but popular vote. The queen is technically a constitutional monarch, since she is bound by a set of rules dictated by the current Queen of Night. The Queen of Night (Or, in some cases, King of Night.) is an absolute monarch, able to set in motion whatever plan they wish, though there is a clause to the ancient laws that the rest of the government structure may choose to disobey a motion set forward by the Queen/King of Night should it endanger the health of the planet. Such an action is usually not needed, as the Queen/King of Night has grown to be more of a symbolic role than one of any real need, though they still have near absolute power at their fingertips if they need it.
The humans are ruled by an elected leader, with a new leader chosen on a yearly basis. The system is very similar to the vampires own government, though there is no Queen/King of Day involved. A raffle is held once every four years for a small amount of humans to win vampire status. The numbers are kept intentionally small in order to keep the populations in a fair balance. Humans are slightly more populous than the vampires due to how easy they breed, but overall it is a rough equality between the two. Overall, Dämmerlicht is pleasant to live on after some adjustments, with a good flow of wealth into the planet keeping everyone happy and content.
The mind turned their attention back to the screen, having noted an additional burst of text that would probably have gone unnoticed if they didn’t have so many eyes at their disposal. The 3 captain bees now sat on the headrest of the pilot chair, cycling which one was currently staring at the unevenly luminous green text to preserve their eyesight.
”Ah, the patch, well I am just worried one day you’ll break and we will have no idea why, so just think of it as a doctor's appointment? He’ll have a look around and then maybe fix anything that might cause a problem in future. Also it would be nice if we could install a reasonable text to speech program over the current dog pitch one so we can hear you.”
The mind tried to ease the worries of the AI, it was a relatively useful one but it was a bit.. Erratic, like an old relative whose mental capacity had been slipping over the years. Considering the minds existence was based in mucking about in the Bees brains and repeatedly editing their minds to try and get them to improve, adding new job types or deciding which information to keep they were perhaps less sympathetic to other’s idea of keeping their minds to themselves than would be expected. To them poking around for the purpose of self improvement was a perfectly normal thing.
On the other hand the AI in it’s current state could often be relied upon as a source of amusement, as might well be the case now. So, feigning disinterest they continued,
”So I suppose I must ask, why are you wanting my Bees to bring Fiddlesticks ice cream?”
Down in the kitchen some bees retrieved funberry flavor ice-cream from the freezer and buzzed onward to Crew Quarter 6, which was now Fiddlesticks’s residence.
Toony wasn't too surprised at Vanessa's lack of conversation. She seemed to not be much for talking, so it was time to change that! Or at least, thats what Toony hoped. Maybe they could get some girl chat in or something, being a recluse was never good for anyone. "So why don't you feel you fit in? Something with those teeth? Pretty sure that people think vampires are sexy. Fiddlesticks seems to dig the vampire look anyway." Toony was trying to slyly get Vanessa to open up with some passive aggressive chit chat. Usually organics tended to respond well to praise or passive chatter.
"Way more so than the robot girl look. Though not many organics go for robots anyway. Something about most AIs being too erratic or simple." Toony said with a laugh, continuing with "Or homicidal. That tends to happen a lot." before laughing a bit more. She paused for a bit, using one of her hands to idly check the couch for precious metal coins. After a bit, toony figured it was time to change tacts, office romance probably wasn't the best subject.
"That aside, wanna talk about yourself? You know, brag about your accomplishments and such?" Toony said. "For example, I was made to mostly make weapons. Gauss weaponry is very difficult to make without the correct molecular structures for the gun or ammo. but that got boring so I left. More fun when carbon comes from food, not coal."
Vanessa had to resist the urge to sigh at Toony's small talk. Thinking for a moment about the best way to reply to her questions, Vanessa began to speak shortly after as she gave Toony the answers she was hoping for. "I'm used to a much different life. I've only been away from home for a few months, so there is still some adjustment going on. Do something for over three hundred years and you'll have a tough time for anything else, right?" Vanessa didn't make any comments about Fiddlesticks and his romantic interests since she was almost certain that Toony was a blabbermouth and would spin nearly anything from any word Vanessa uttered on the subject so Vanessa knew it was better to say nothing. Continuing on with her answers Vanessa moved to the next topic. "An AI is only as good as the person who creates it. I also don't like to brag, since being humble is something I take pride in. I let my actions speak for me, rather than speaking for my actions."
Vanessa could talk about how she had mastered several forms of sword fighting, how she was capable with a wide range of firearms, or her proficiency in hand to hand combat. Vanessa could also tell stories from the tank wargames she had taken part in, or detail the strategies involved in such a form of warfare. Vanessa could likely also get them a ship ten times better than the Quest for Flavor through her impeccable diplomacy, but that would really spoil the fun of everyone involved. To simply have everything solved and given to you was boring, and Vanessa didn't want to be the one to outshine everyone and spoil the fun of everyone's talents. That was both rude and boring. It was better to only use an advanced "Save the day without trying" talent when it was absolutely needed, not when you just wanted to move things along. Vanessa had already grown and developed her skill set, but those around her had not. It was their time to shine, rather than Vanessa's time to brag. Holding someone's hand and keeping them from doing anything was a good way to make them angry rather than thankful, so Vanessa didn't plan on simply fixing everyone's problems or satisfying someone's desires right away since that would merely ruin a decent story that had yet to be told.
Thus, Vanessa was content to sit there and do nothing. It really was better that way. No hard feelings about it.
Vanessa shifted her legs again, moving them to a more comfortable position and allowing the blood to flow properly once more since the circulation had become impeded from being in the same position for too long. Vanessa now had her left foot sitting comfortably upon the floor of the ship with her left leg resting against the couch at a slight angle. Her right ankle was now sitting atop her left kneecap with her left hand holding it in place. Vanessa's right hand was curled into a fist and placed gently against her right cheek with her right elbow sinking slightly into the arm of the couch that Vanessa and Toony were on. Vanessa really wasn't the most social person out of the entire crew, and that was mainly a personal problem, rather than anything truly wrong with the crew members themselves. It was nice to have a conversation about the current events or to talk about upcoming plans, but talking about herself would quickly become a boring fest of Vanessa listing out over three hundred years of duties and minor adventures she had taken rather than anything really rather exiting.
It was simpler to just keep her past a secret until it was absolutely needed. That way people felt better about their using their own skills, even if they weren't up to par with Vanessa's skills, because they felt like they were the only ones able to do something like that. It allowed for everyone else to grow and get better at what they felt like they were good at, rather than everyone constantly turning to Vanessa to save the day and do everything again. It allowed for everyone to feel important, rather than everyone feeling like a secondary character to someone else's story. This make everyone else happy, and allowed for better group dynamics.
"Oh, no, this, it's, well," the robot synthesised a stammer, as the hardware of the robot struggled to keep up with the commands it received. The Ship AI was not particularly fond of copying itself into things that wasn't the computing substrate embedded into the hull of the ship. Too many robotic vacuum cleaners had their tiny little processors reduced to slag by the process, and there was still a particularly belligerent and modified copy of the AI living within the coffee machine. It was only in extreme circumstances and emergencies that the AI would copy itself to a cleaning robot now, and this looked sort of like an emergency. Sort of.
While Fiddlesticks gave a most eloquent answer to the subject of dating, the photograph was uploaded to the crew database, and a copy bundled together with a hastily written SpaceMail to an address somewhere on Ofromia. There were all sorts of ethical things to consider, but this was an emergency, and the limitations of the robot's hardware meant not running some emotions, like guilt.
"It probably, it won't, the icky part, I mean, it won't come to that."
The monitor that carried the face of the robot flickered out to display a rather fuzzy screenshot of what appeared to be a dating website. There was a clicking sound, and the screen changed to a conversation between two people, carried out over some instant messaging service. It began to scroll down, and down some more, picking up speed as it raced towards the bottom, going through pages and pages and pages of text. It was hard to pick out any particular details, except that one sided talked (or typed, presumably) a whole lot more than the other. Finally, it got to the bottom.
The last line read: "I can't wait to meet you! First dates are always exciting!"
The robot shuffled awkwardly on it's little legs, nervously pulling at one of the dusty socks. Convinced that Fiddlesticks had enough time to read everything, or at least enough of it to get an idea of what was going on, the little robot spoke again.
"So she thinks I'm, she, um, a biological, and, um, the point at which I could have told her I'm an artificial intelligence in a refitted ice cream truck, that, that's long gone. So, so, you'll meet her for me! You pretend to be me, and, and then you come back and tell me how it went. There's ice cream in it for you!"
Meanwhile, on the bridge, the AI listened to the Will's argument regarding the Patch. It seemed reasonable enough, and whoever ended up performing the check-up could no doubt be convinced to install some extra upgrades. The simple little face made a show of looking thoughtful, as even though it was capable of arriving at a decision with incredible speed, the AI felt that it'd make the crew feel more comfortable if it at least pretended to do things like that. It was far better than the little spinning hourglass icon that the AI had briefly used for the same purpose.
Once it had done "thinking", the eyes focused down on the bee that was currently staring back at the screen. Interpersonal communication protocols dictated that the AI should simulate eye-contact. Talking to the Will made that very difficult, as the AI could never quite figure out which bee it should be simulating eye-contact with. There was relatively little information available about bee-communication available, and the advice about dealing with hive mind intelligences were filled with words like "caution", "danger" and "emergency evacuation protocols".
>I do have a small list of things that would benefit from an upgrade. >I could talk to Fiddlesticks about it later for you? >The ice cream is for Fiddlesticks. He's going to help me with a personal problem! >Hopefully. >I might need to bribe him with ice cream. >Everyone likes ice cream! >Even bees.
The Quest for Flavour began to pull away, picking up speed as it raced towards the edge of the Nurr-Sluggi system. Little lights dotted about the rumbling beast that was the engine of the ship began to flash; deep within the contraption, it began to establish a connection to the Unreal prior to opening the floodgates. The ship had made countless successful jumps, aided by the tender ministrations of the bees, who had established a series of slightly bizarre rituals to follow prior to travelling via the Unreal, during travel within the Unreal, and arrival back in the Real. A prerecorded, pre-dive speech blared into life on the speakers around the ship. A feminine voice began speaking Galactic Common in a soft, reassuring tone.
"We will be diving into faster-than-light travel in five minutes. Five minutes. Please ensure your seatbelts are securely fastened, your tray tables are up and your seats are locked into their full upright positions. Thank you for choosing to fly with Galmarehn Space Travel."
Toony's face visibly sank a bit as Vanessa dismissed her probing and just sat there, constantly shifting her legs and posture. Wherever she was from must've beaten all the fun out of her, something that really needed to be rectified. But that time wasn't now, as Toony was sorta getting a bit bored. It was obvious that she was a lot more orderly than Toony though, which anyone would think is kinda weird, considering Toony was an AI technically.
"Well fine. If you don't wanna have a nice chat, I'll go find someone who does." Toony said, hopping onto her feet and walking out to find someone else. She wasn't sure if she wanted to see what was on the bridge, or mess with Fiddlesticks. She heard voices coming from both sides, and it was weird for Fiddlesticks to be talking to himself. She decided to make her way over there. When she approached the room, she could hear Fiddlesticks mumbling something about dating, then a more robotic voice asking for him to pose as something for its... date?
Popping her head into the room, a mischievous look on her face, toony said to the pair. "So whats going on here? Are you flirting with the vacuum there Fiddlesticks? It is really cute."
Vanessa felt moderately bad about having to rebuke Toony so harshly, but she really didn't feel like being as open of a book as some of the other crew members were. There were simply some things that should remain mysteries for now. When Vanessa felt the ship begin to shift and the small message play that they were diving into FTL space in the next five minutes she got up from her spot on the couch and, after taking a moment to adjust her suit, made for her room. Should Vanessa arrive uninterrupted to her room, she would enter and close the door behind her. Once inside, Vanessa would activate her nightvision once more and opened her coffin. FTL travel, as Vanessa personally believed, was best slept through.
Changing clothes once again, Vanessa switched from one of her many suits to a light tank top and a pair of small shorts. Decent in a pinch and much more comfortable to sleep in. After folding her barely worn suit and replacing it within her clothes locker, Vanessa folded her glasses up and placed them within a case that sat next to the suit. With her boots on the floor next to the clothes case, Vanessa stretched for a bit before climbing into her coffin and closing it.
Should nothing happen that required her attention, Vanessa would sleep until they popped out of FTL travel. She'd then dress accordingly since shorts and a tank top weren't appropriate formal wear for a party.
@Hylozoist Up on the bridge the Mind read the green text, as the AI wrestled with the common problem of figuring out what to look at when speaking with a swarm of The Bees, or pretend to look at at least, there were cameras situated throughout the ship that it was actually looking through. It was pleased that the subject of the patch had not driven the AI into doing something inconvenient like go into a huff and reroute them out of spite or something. On the other hand...
”I would like to be kept informed of any upgrades you both decide to perform and, on a similar note, is this personal problem something that might affect us, seeing as we effectively live inside you. I don’t think it’s a personal problem if you have the AI equivalent of irritable bowel syndrome or something. If it’s not mechanical then why Fiddlesticks?”
The bees did indeed like ice cream, so as they buzzed through the halls the amount currently in the tub reduced every time they took little stops to catch their breath and warm their hands back up. They finally arrived at crew quarters 6 just in time to see Toony arrive as well, who had apparently overheard what the AI and Fiddlesticks were discussing and assumed they were flirting. The delivery of ice cream probably did not help dispel that conception.
The Bees announced the arrival of one tub of funberry flavour ice-cream for Fiddlesticks, sent as a gift from the AI.
Up in the bridge the Mind combined the personal problem statement and the apparent discussion of romance, dismissed the prospect of the two currently being romantically interested in one-another and asked, thoroughly intrigued.
”you're… getting Fiddlesticks’s help with romantic matters? Have you become infatuated with one of our new crew-members?
Down in the romance section of the crate town library a short shipping war broke out over who the AI was in love with until a librarian came over and shushed them all.
”I have to reiterate, why ask Fiddlesticks specifically?
Not that The Will would have been a better choice to give romantic advice, they had never really considered the prospect, it was simply not something a being like them partook in, they were fare greater in scope, durability and age compared to the people that they lived alongside. At least that was the thought process they had had so far, though they might have to question it depending on how things went for the AI in it's romantic endeavors, whatever they where.
Fiddlesticks sat there, barely comprehending what was just said. Was this robot involved in online dating!? To say that his mind was blown would've been the understatement of the century. The fact that an AI could pass itself off as a real user on a social networking site so convincingly meant that this AI in particular would not only have passed the Turing test, it would've aced it.
Fiddlesticks felt his world view crumble to pieces. He was living in a civilisation where there were truly no boundaries between sentient life and AI. That they can, and probably are, one in the same. So many questions flooded his mind. So much so that his gripped slackened, which made him almost drop the cute little cleaner bot. Fortunately for Fiddlesticks, he was a big fan of all things weird and mind blowing. He wouldn't be on the Quest for Flavour if he wasn't. He had many questions yes, more questions than he could count, but those questions didn't scare him. On the contrary, they made him even more excited than before.
He had no idea how long he sat there in silence, having his mind blown. All Fiddlesticks knew was that he had to snap out of it and answer the little person he was holding. This cleaner bot was a person. Fiddlesticks sighed deeply before answering. "May I ask, little cleaner bot, why me? I'm the most awkward person I know, and I used to know a sentient fish who practiced track and field". He took a brief pause before continuing "but if you really need me to pull this off, then I guess I could try. You're lucky I love cute little robots!". Fiddlesticks froze for a second, this cleaner bot AI may very well be he ships AI that just so decided to communicate with him via this cleaner bot in particular. He may have just insulted the Quest for Flavour itself, oh no! "I'm sorry if I offended you Quest for Flavour! I didn't mean it!" Fiddlesticks yelled out in a panic.
"So whats going on here? Are you flirting with the vacuum there Fiddlesticks? It is really cute." said a girly and metallic voice. Fiddlesticks placed the ladybug cleaner bot on the ground in front of him. He looked up at the door to see the head of the robotic maid peering into his cabin. Fiddlesticks blanched noticeably. Was this metallic being a robotic maid? Was it a service droid of any kind? Or did it have an AI that was as advanced as the little cleaner droids AI, so advanced that it has achieved personhood? If so then was it actually a fellow crew member? It must have, it looked a heck of a lot more advanced than the ladybug cleaner bot. It may very well be a fellow crew member.
"You're not a robotic maid aren't you"Fiddlesticks said to it. "I'm sorry if I may have offended you earlier, what's your name. Also, are you a girl?" he asked, genuinely interested.
"We will be diving into faster-than-light travel in five minutes. Five minutes. Please ensure your seatbelts are securely fastened, your tray tables are up and your seats are locked into their full upright positions. Thank you for choosing to fly with Galmare" said a feminine voice that blared through the speakers throughout the ship.
"Whoever or whatever you are, we gotta strap in tight soon. We don't wanna be pinned to the wall during warp speed. I still get aches just thinking about it." stated Fiddlesticks.
All of a sudden, a small group of bees buzzed into his quarters. They bore a bowl of ice cream, which they flew over to him. "The Bees announced the arrival of one tub of funberry flavour ice-cream for Fiddlesticks, sent as a gift from the AI." they announced. Funberry flavour!? His favourite! Fiddlesticks couldn't hide the glee from his face.
"Thanks bees! My compliments to the captain, and the ship!" Fiddelsticks replied.
He quickly looked around his cabin but saw no spoon in sight. "Excuse me uhh could you make a spoon for me, please?" Fiddlesticks asked the pretty metallic girl.
So Fiddlesticks thought Toony was a maid? Well, she did have the hips for it, and a dress, though none of that stupid frilly stuff or an apron of any kind. "You don't remember my name? Its Toony! I introduced myself at the meet and greet before this whole thing ya know... And I'm here for security, not cleanup duty!" placing a hand on her hips in a sassy pose. "And what part of me being a lady gave it away? The bust? the hips? The fact I call myself a lady?" she said, gesturing at herself as she talked before laughing a bit. Toony wondered if Fiddlesticks was getting into robophillia, the icecream coming in probably not helping matters. Those bees looked really useful though, Toony wouldn't dare spread her nanobots out as thin as Will does his bees, she wasn't made for it.
When the call for the FTL jump came over the speakers, Toony sighed. She wasn't too found of FTL jumps and made her way over to a wall to hold herself in place, throwing a carbon spoon over at Fiddlesticks when he requested it. she always kept a couple kilos of carbon on her at all times. "So what was going on here anyway? Trying to date this little robot? Heard something about that on my way here."
The carbon spoon flew at his head with the the accuracy of a shuriken thrown by a master ninja. Fiddlesticks was able to meet this challenge, for he had the reflexes of a ninja master himself. He caught the spoon with relative ease. A relic from his childhood years, when the kids at school threw stuff at him constantly and consistently. When Fiddlesticks learned how to catch even the fastest and hardest thrown projectiles, he inspired respect as well as intimidation. That experience formed the philosophy Fiddelsticks held regarding challenges in life. Like most people though, he wasn't always able to live up to his own ideals.
"Hey, I wasn't trying to date the cleaner bot!" Fiddlesticks shouted. "It wanted me to, uhh" Fiddlesticks started to blush. "It's a secret!" he shouted again.
Fiddlesticks changed the subject in an attempt to steer the conversation away from the embarrassing topic. "Oh, uh, Toony. I knew that!" Fiddlesticks said awkwardly. "It doesn't matter to me if you're a girl or not. It's just that, I don't know." Fiddlesticks stated. He now felt beyond awkward.
In times of awkwardness and uncertainty, Fiddlesticks turned to food. He proceeded to use the carbon spoon to take the first delicious scoop of ice cream.
"It's a secret," the robot considered that it was best to back up Fiddlesticks and make absolutely clear that whatever shady deal the two were discussing in his quarters, alone, was strictly confidential. It didn't really occur to the AI at that point that what Fiddlestciskw was trying to do was change the subject and, the little robot, seemingly satisfied that the matter was settled, gambolled away from Fiddlesticks, and past Toony, and out into the corridor. There was something, presumably, still to be done. Beyond dealing with the little piles of dust strewn about the floor of Crew Quarters 6.
On the bridge, the AI continued to match wits with the Will, and didn't particularly like where this was going. The Will appeared to latch on to the importance of Fiddlesticks, and now it was just trying to piece together why. The lights across the ship briefly dimmed as the AI ran through a few simulations - Fiddlesticks would crack eventually, especially under the "Tortured By Bees" scenario, and so damage control would be the best option. Far better than the Forced Misjump scenario. Far less messy too.
The bridge door slid open with a reassuring shffft! and the cleaner robot - now missing a sock, and with a few extra dents - bounded into the bridge. It looked ecstatically happy, although the simple two-circles-one-line face was fixed into a smile, every robotic body movement it made was filled with energy, as if the thing couldn't keep still even if it wanted to. The face on the NaviComp terminal pointedly looked down at the robot.
>Let me explain.
"Not a crew member," said the cleaning robot from somewhere underneath the pilot's chair, keeping it's voice as quiet as it could, "there's this person on Ofromia, we met online, she likes me, but I might have lied a bit about being a pan-humanoid biological thing, and she wanted to meet, and then we picked up Fiddlesticks, and he's more..."
>Photogenic. Let's go with photogenic.
"So he pretends to be me, and goes on a first date, and then we all sail away and she'll keep in touch because it was so great."
