AN// This is a continuation of the
Not Quite SHODAN (ST SI) series with the previous story being
The First Duty. You should read the rest of the series first or I promise you will be horribly confused. I would also like to thank everyone that is helping to betaing this story and slaying those evil errors for everyone else! It really helps.
Now, on with the story!
__________________
Shrugging my jacket on, I looked out the window towards the planet below. Glancing in the mirror I frowned.
Hair up or down?
Up, will make things easier. Snatching up a hair band, I walked over to look out the window again. The clouds whirled in the gas giant far below the Ship.
After all this time…
"Are you ready, Sansha?" a voice asked and I turned to look to the holographic image of my…
Creator? Caretaker... Mother?
Mother.
GSV '
The Importance of Korrect Spelling', Korra, smiled at me and I nodded, "Ready."
She nodded and then crossed her arms, "You know you don't have to do this, right?"
Sighing, I shook my head, "I know. But I want to know what it's like. You and the others all love it."
Korra frowned and sat down on my bed, "Sansha, you may be based on our neural architecture, but you aren't a fork. You don't have our hangups, our… you are different than the rest of us."
Moving to sit down next to her hologram, I nodded.
I was an… not an experiment, not exactly, but more an attempt to recreate what made the previous generation. So, they made me.
The Kernel of a Jovian with small adjustments, all memories stripped away and then raised in a computer program, just like they were.
But not with the cruelty of… grandfather, I suppose.
As soon as I was old enough to understand, Korra told me what was happening, what I was. She taught me, let me meet people, and the simulation moved to a holodeck.
When nobody real was there, but only her and other Jovians, the speeds were three to one.
By the time I was thirteen subjective years old, I was transferred to a real world avatar. There had been… difficulties. Learning to control an entirely new body.
That was three years ago.
"I want to, mom," I said and then smiled a bit, "I'm the first real second generation. Even if I didn't want to know what it was like to live like you and the others, I do have some responsibility to find out what I can do."
"If we didn't think you could, we wouldn't let you try," She said and then got up with her hologram, "Better get going."
Nodding, I got up and then looked around for the last time. Next time I returned, it would be with my… well, this body but as an avatar, not my primary platform. Maybe not even that if I got a new avatar.
Who knew how long that could take? Hours, days… weeks maybe. Depended on how quickly I adjusted.
Shaking my head, I walked out. I could do this. I would do this.
As soon as I walked out I smiled, "Mark! You made it! I thought you were grounded!"
He grinned and nodded, pulling his hands from his pockets and returned my hug, "Mom let me out for this, she knew how important it was."
Letting go of the hug, I smiled up at my best friend. He was taller than my avatar by almost a head. Not that strange to be honest, I haven't changed my body much since I left the holodeck, so I looked pretty much the same other than the soft features.
I'd likely change to a different one for my avatar, might as well get used to two new bodies rather than one.
I might actually be looking forward to that more than becoming a Ship, I'd at least be able to look my age.
"Awesome."
"Nervous?" He asked and started to follow along down the corridor towards the closest turbolift.
I nodded, "…Yeah. This is kind of massive, even with what Korra and the others told me, and I never had as limited senses as you…" I teased before I grinned and ducked the swat at the back of my head.
Too slow!
I never did have as limited senses, even growing up in the holodeck. I was running full tricorder sensors since before I got my first avatar.
Once, after getting my first avatar, I tried limiting things to human levels. I never tried it again, it was pretty terrifying.
Even back in the sim I had way more. Humans were limited to just a small limited range of the electromagnetic spectrum and some limited chemical and vibration senses. I tried to explain it to Mark before, and he just shrugged and said he didn't have anything to compare it to.
That did make sense, and made me feel a bit sorry for him to be honest.
"So, think you'll make the party next week?" He asked as the doors opened to reveal one of the Ship's shuttlebays.
I shook my head, "Don't know, maybe? I need to figure this out and get used to a new avatar too. Might not make it."
"Ah."
Crossing the deck, we walked over to where one of Korra's avatars was waiting with a smile. She was standing next to a Nile class runabout.
The smooth aerodynamic hull shone in basic white, the shape being more or less a flattened and extended egg with the nacelles flowing into the hull. No windows.
It'll be me in a little bit.
...I'll finally have curves!
Stopping, Mark smiled at me, "I'll wait here. Good luck."
Nodding, I shot him a smile in turn before I walked over to Korra, "I'm ready," I told her. She nodded and led me around the back of the runabout towards the hatch.
"You know," she said thoughtfully, "Eventually this might even be some kind of milestone for our people."
"Like, after becoming a Ship, I'm suddenly an adult?" I asked her with a grin, "Wow."
She ruffled my hair, "Not quite but close, perhaps when you can actually manage flying freely on your own. I'd say you are getting there quickly. Even so this is a big step."
Rolling my eyes, I pulled away out of her reach before walking onto the flightdeck of the small ship. Very little in the way of controls, quite a bit when it came to monitors. At the center console, the hatch was open to reveal a docking port.
Taking a deep breath, I nodded to myself and shrugged off my jacket and folded it, putting it on one of the chairs before I looked at Korra.
She smiled at me reassuringly, "It'll be fine. Engines, weapons and anything else that can hurt anyone are deactivated until you get used to it."
Nodding, I turned my back to the docking port and reached down to pull my t-shirt halfway up my back, before I popped the hatch to my docking port and disconnected and floated away from what had been my body for the last three years.
As soon as I disconnected, it froze in that position.
Floating around on puffs of air, I moved to look at my old face, running my tricorder senses all around.
"Go on, Sansha," Korra encouraged me, "You can do it, I know you can."
"…Just a bit nervous," I admitted and then sighed, "Put it into storage? I want to design a new avatar for when I can connect to it."
"Will do."
Floating over to the ship's computer dock, I swallowed my fear and settled down on it, triggering the connection protocol.
The locking arms closed around me, pulling me down into the darkness beneath the console and I tried my best not to panic as blast shields closed around me, cutting me completely off from the outside world.
Then the connection with my new body finished its handshake protocols, and I had access to the runabout's entire sensor suite.
Oh my god.
It's full of stars.