ten_fwd | Practice makes Perfect

Current Location: Ten Forward

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Practice makes Perfect

"Tails."
"Tails."
"Tails."
It didn't take an astute observer to realize she wasn't just beating the odds of probability, she was calling them correctly before they landed. Time, after time, after time. The coin she was flipping might look familiar to any Andromeda crew still on board. Dylan had given it to her, back when she was purple. And still had a tail. It was a fun game she played. Messing with the right influence at the right time. Only this time it was with a coin and not people. That way Dylan wouldn't get mad at her.

He didn't understand. How could he, he was organic, mortal, trapped within his own limited perceptions and understanding. Still, that was part of the reason she needed him. He wasn't just any ordinary mortal. She needed him. All the possibilities, all the best possibilities, circled around him. She just had to get him to understand her methods were necessary. He needed to trust her. "Tails."
"Tails."
Trance flipped the coin onto the back of her hand, the motion practiced and almost boring. "Tails."

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Agatha didn't know just how long the replicator in her room would keep working, she hadn't yet taken it apart to figure out its capacity. So she used it for tools and parts, worked at the machine shop in the concourse for more parts...

So she came to Ten Forward to eat. Walking past with her tray she stopped to watch the woman, almost memorized by the flipping coin. Trance's appearance? Didn't register an eye blink. The coin... did.

"May I see the coin?" she asked, setting down her tray as she watched, eyes locked to the motion.

"Of course." Trance stopped flipping the coin to hand it over to Agatha. "Please be careful. It has sentimental value." Her hands were now unmoving, gone was the frequent twirl of her fingers, snap of her wrist in the same fine tuned, monotonous motions it took to flip a coin.

"It's a regular coin." She enjoyed watching the woman inspect the coin, try and find out the trick, how it worked. How she worked.

She looked at the coin, then hefted it gently. "If it's a gyroscopic stabilizer, it's about the best balanced one I've ever felt," she said, a bit awed. "The heft isn't notably different from expectations based on size and observable alloys. What's the control mechanism?" she asked offering it back. She was clearly fascinated by this tech that she couldn't even see.

"There isn't one. There's no trick." Trance started to flip the coin again back and forth, tails each time. Then she stopped.

"Do you want to try?" She held out the coin again. "You know, if you like technology, the person you really want to meet is my friend Harper. He's a genius--and he'd be the first one to tell you so!"

"I would love to try," she said, "And I would be happy to meet your friend. I'm Agatha, by the way."

She took the coin and gave it a few experimental flips.

Of course the coin worked normally with Agatha. After all, it was just a coin. "I'm Trance. And you wont be able to miss Harper. He's blond, human and has a data port in his neck."

"If we were back home, that wouldn't narrow things down much."

She handed back the coin. "So what's the science you were playing with?"

" Are data ports common where you come from? Supplementing organic, biological ability with technology?" Trance inquired.

"It's not necessarily science. I'm just...testing the waters.There hasn't been too much to do around here."

"A mix of biology and technology? You just described half or more of the living beings back home. It's odd how many people have so little obvious tech here, really," she said with a nod.

"Of course, not all technological alterations are necessarily obvious," she muttered, thinking of her locket, think about what her necklace guarded against.

"Experimentation is the heart of science," she said, dragging her thoughts away from their morbid bent.

"It's more common in my universe as well, although most of it is also not obvious on a visual level. Genetic alterations. Is that why your world combines the technological and the biological? For experimentation or another purpose?"

Trance idly flipped the coin, curious.

"Mostly experimentation. For Science! It is a wonder how much we can do when we try, and that is on all levels, biological and non. We've barely scratched the surface of the possible!"

"People experiement on others and themselves, out of curiosity? Do your people lack some sort of survival instinct?" After spending years with Nietzscheans, she had to ask. Even Harper wouldnt have done something like that without wondering about the risks.

"Well, not everyone is moral, so not all the experiments on others are on willing participants but.." she shrugged. "Science trumps survival," she said as if this were an absolute fact. "It's not like death has to be permanent, anyway."

"Death is a natural byproduct of life." Trance was really bothered by this assumption Agatha had, that death was to be ignored, conquered, by science.

"Death is necessary. Does no one die on your world?"

"Well sure, people die," she said with a shrug. "It's just not always permanent. We're always making advances in revivification technology. The biggest issue is dependency. Well, that and there is apparently a whole set of laws based on inheritance in royal families if the eldest child dies but is revivified."

Which is why if Tarvek or Gil ever let slip that Agatha had died, there could be all sorts of problems, but then they both were heirs to their respective thrones and had died right along with her. So only the minions, and castle Hetrodyne, knew, really....

"Do you think that may be a problem for you if anything happens to you and the medics here revive you? What can be done for this revivification mania? Besides the straps. Would a sedative work until the chemicals and reactions are balanced out?

"If the sedative were tailored to take into account the glandular output, perhaps," she said, thinking about that. "but to get the kind of data you would need to create the correct mix, you'd have to kill and revive me once first, to be sure...."

She wasn't crazy about that idea, however the science to allow someone to be revived without the revivification rush all but obliterated any hesitation.

Really, this was why she needed Maxim...

"Alright, I don't think we'll kill and revive you. But you're okay with nanobots? Nanotechnology? I can tailor the bots to take care of any excess glandular output and heal any necrotic or injured tissue."

Trance gave her a smile. "Let's just try not have you die or get injured, alright?"

"Nanobots?" she asked, fascinated. "I would like to see" and study, and improve "these, if you would, before we use them on me. How do you tailor them? How exactly do they work?"

Her eyes were getting that peculiar light to them, that first breath of madness...

Trance took a step forward toward Agatha and stared at her, her eyes glinted a peculiar orange glint for a moment. "Not until you take a breath." She recognized that look. Maybe not on Agatha, but on Harper. Not just when he was in the midst of a new, probably dangerous experiment, but when he had been overloaded with the information from the Archive. When his brain couldn't handle it.

"Tell me what you're feeling right now?"

"like I want to build, to work, to study, to improve, to create. I'm feeling GREAT!" The light increased in her eyes, she was in a borderline fugue state. This was a central part of what being a Spark WAS.

She rolled her shoulders, and whistled. A small army of Dingbots came rushing to her from the vents and ducts. "Prepare my lab, there is SCIENCE AFOOT!" They all raced off happily to do their master's bidding.

"Now!" she said, turning to trance, madness in full control of her eyes. "These nanos, where are they?"

"I don't think so."
Trance was stronger than she looked. A lot stronger. Strong enough to hold a planets in orbit. The Sun Avatar whirled around to hit Agatha. Thankfully Trance was hoping for unconsciousness rather than complete dismemberment.

This was far too much like Harper's experience with the All Systems University Database. She didn't like it. That had almost killed Harper.

Edited 2015-05-16 20:45 (UTC)

Agatha went sprawling, face first, into the carpet.

All the Dingbots that were still in the room stopped dead, and turned to face the two of them. They made no noise other than the clack of their various metal carapaces, they said nothing, made no overt threat, but somehow the army of them looked just a bit menacing, just then....

Trance spent a moment looking at the woman, before reaching down to pick her up and put her somewhere more appropriate. Like a nearby chair. Then she arched an eyebrow at the little army and smiled.

"Bring it."

All the Dingbots snapped to and grimly advanced on the person who dared to hurt Agatha.

The sad thing, Agatha had no recollection of building half of them, HADN'T built all of them. She was just so used to this, it hadn't registered.

Mind, they are small, each about the size of a pocket watch with limbs to scale. They advanced - slowly.

Practice makes Perfect

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I need to fix her icons, best I have for the moment....

Re: I need to fix her icons, best I have for the moment....

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