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| Daireem - Space |
| Author | Comment |
| QuantumTroll Street Fighter/Space Station 1/15/2009 6:16:20 AM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 181 | RE: Space Station F.R.E.Y.A. It took a moment for Freya to respond. "Well, I prefer having a... more normal bodily presence when doing business. If nothing else, I need the eyes so I can see your face." She gave a little laugh, appreciating Jara's lightheartedness. She could (maybe should) install cameras everywhere, but the expense never seemed worth it when she could simply use mobile cameras. Right now she was using Truckbot's eyes to see. Jara's long hair was making the little robot's simple vision system confused, but her body was more easy to make out. Freya wasn't sure, but Jara seemed kind of small and thin for a human. The real reason Freya wanted a body is that all the psychology textbooks she had seen said that humans react more positively to a non-threatening human-like presence. Jara seemed comfortable right now, but there was no telling how long that would last. Fortunately, the assembly plant was just finishing putting the parts together. Now just to get dressed and get to the habitable zone. |
| Jara Green freelance fighter pilot 1/15/2009 2:00:51 PM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 60 | RE: Space Station F.R.E.Y.A. "Oh." She'd never considered that the station couldn't, or even would want to see inside itself. She figured FREYA was also doing this for her comfort, but she spent a great deal of time in her fighter talking to people over the radio, FREYA now seemed just as real as most of her pilot friends. "Well at the least you will probably need to look at the samples they sent along, won't you? Oh, but you probably have a refinery for things like that if you buy ores, don't you?" It was a bit cramped and a utilitarian place, she could see the machine influence, but she kind of liked that, the tight spaces somehow seemed more... cozy. The air began to smell of bread, a bit strange in such a metal atmosphere. She supposed she could eat something so the hospitality wouldn't go unappreciated, because she doubted FREYA cooked bread even when there were no guests. Eating was a necessary thing to Jara, a chore to drag her away from more interesting pursuits, good tasting food was less annoying, but she would swallow ash if it would get the job done, she didn't mind the nutrient enriched water her pressure suit provided. It actually also recycled the water secreted by her, so her sweat didn't stay pressed on her skin, it was filtered by osmosis and returned to the small water reservoir to be mixed with the nutrient water pack when she drank, very ingenious, the whole design in her opinion. Many other pilots disagreed. (If FREYA really wanted to experience something like being more human, and that may interest her. Just for the sheer novelty, and to better accommodate her guests, she could get a Bio Shell) |
| QuantumTroll Street Fighter/Space Station 1/15/2009 7:34:48 PM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 181 | RE: Space Station F.R.E.Y.A. While one part of Freya guided the newly assembled robot along winding paths through the ship, another part listened to Jara. That part found significant inconsistencies with the expected measures of behavior for a lone human during the first contact with her. Additional resources were called in to analyze the discrepancies. Hypotheses were formulated: - perhaps Freya was acting differently this time (she didn't have a "body", she was more distracted than usual) - perhaps Jara was unusual in some way (she seemed small, unusual hair, came from a small place far away all alone in a fighting craft) - perhaps the measures were giving a false positive (but the P-values seemed good) - ... not enough data to reject hypotheses Yet another part of Freya said to Jara, "Truckbot can take the samples for analysis. If you have datasheets, you'll be able to show me in about a minute when I join you in person." The little Truckbot moved over to Jara and reached its grubby claws toward the sample case. She continued, "My smelting plant is unfortunately still quite limited. If I could I would simply poke around the asteroid belts and supply myself, but I don't have the space or resources for that. This is why I usually buy junk that can be separated before melting, although I can also things like nickel-iron asteroids and common alloys. The listing I provided shows you the stuff I have trouble getting - the raw materials for plastic are never found in space, rare earth elements are too difficult for me to refine in any meaningful amounts, the only noble gas out here is highly rarefied helium, and the rest are just so useful that I always seem to need more." Eager to improve on the bottom line of the analysis, Freya said, "But enough about me, tell me about yourself. You're not like most traders who come to see me." |
| Jara Green freelance fighter pilot 1/15/2009 8:29:11 PM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 60 | RE: Space Station F.R.E.Y.A. She heaved a sigh of relief when she passed the case onto the bot after pulling out the data pad of the community's production over the last six months. "They do their own refining, so the materials you will get will be consistently that quality, they don't have the tools to capture helium, but they can pick out the rare metals well enough." Then she smiled a little, brushing most of the air out of her face, a conversationalist station, how interesting. "The community I'm representing is where I grew up. I go back on occasion to help with pirate raids, but mostly I travel now, that's how I heard about you. Traveling." "From what I heard I thought this place would be different, they always made it seem wrong, and somehow dirty, but.... Now, it's a little unusual by design, but I kind of like it. It's like a good cockpit, functional, with little wasted space, like my Belladonna." (the registered name of her fighter). She fondly slid her gloved fingertips along the wall. "I spend most of my time in space, often alone with Belladonna, I do most of her maintainance and repairs myself, so it's... Comfortable." She gave a small laugh. "I actually had the mechanics make my cockpit smaller, so it fit me better, and gave me some cargo space. What about you? It must be difficult wasting all this space so people can come tromping through you." In that last bit she slipped into the same tone she typically used talking to her fighter. Now that she wasn't lugging the case, which the bot registered as mildly heavy, but not too difficult for an average human, the odd choppy stepped lilt in her walk from the unaccustomed gravity became more obvious. Most if not all of the people who came to FREYA came in ships with their own gravity systems, and those who didn't probably lived planetside and hadn't atrophied too badly, she probably wouldn't even identify the reason behind the strange gait. |
| QuantumTroll Street Fighter/Space Station 1/16/2009 5:42:02 AM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 181 | RE: Space Station F.R.E.Y.A. Jara's admission of feeling comfortable with Freya made her feel good. Instantly the analysis program came up with its conclusion: Jara is outside the norm. It was dismissed with the instruction to find out exactly how and what this meant for their interactions. At this point, a wall panel down the hall slid open and a humanoid walked out. The panel hissed shut, and the figure waved and spoke, "Hi, good to finally see you." Freya's avatar was an android of ordinary size with an obviously artificial head with feminine features and electric blue eyes. Her skin was flexible bluish white plastic, suitable for androids that couldn't pass for human and therefore needed to look different enough not to be creepy. In short, she looked like a ordinary android wearing a red jumpsuit. When she started walking over, Jara noticed something was slightly amiss. While the arms and legs looked fine, the torso seemed to very very thin, consisting of nothing but a backbone. Now speaking from the android, Freya said, "Ha, you wouldn't believe how much work it is to maintain this facility. But it makes it much easier to do business and in more populated regions it pays for itself." The android's eyes and perspective were much better and now she could see that Jara really was quite small for a human. But she wasn't a child; the tight spacesuit clearly showed womanly breasts and hips and the face didn't have the requisite roundness. Freya had for some time started to worry about the consequences of popularity or even celebrity. She was well aware of her unique status and knew that stories would spread, stories that could attract customers, but also pirates, and stories that might drive them away. Lately she'd been thinking about acquiring weapons, but did not know how to go about it without essentially telling the world that she was defenseless. Obscurity and the mutual benefit of the exchange of goods and services was her strategy so far, but it wouldn't hold forever. "Could you tell me what hear about me out on the spacelanes?" |
| Jara Green freelance fighter pilot 1/16/2009 8:20:54 PM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 60 | RE: Space Station F.R.E.Y.A. Instinctively, at the sight of the humanoid figure her hair came forward again, partially covering her face. She nodded politely where appropriate during FREYA's introduction. "Well... it was mostly at awaystations, I heard a few comments from the old cargo haulers, and salvagers." (old trucker gossip style) "They mostly referred to you as 'that station' or the 'robot place.' One time I managed the guts to ask a group what they meant, and every one of them had a different idea of how you were made, but they were all sure there had been no humans involved in the station itself. They said there was a strange inhuman-ness to the design, 'like a chair that was the right size but never quite fit you.'" "Then they mostly shied away from the topic. I had to pin them down to get the coordinates of the last time they'd seen you. They did all agree that your business was fair though. That's why I brought the idea back the community. Those older guys are paranoid about a lot of things... don't take it too badly." She glanced around. "Do you mind if we sit down somewhere?" |
| QuantumTroll Street Fighter/Space Station 1/17/2009 5:41:04 AM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 181 | RE: Space Station F.R.E.Y.A. Freya raised her eyebrows, "Oh right. Please, come this way." She led the way into the galley, at one end of which were some spartan chairs and a table. "Please make yourself comfortable." Freya remarked, "So... people are a little afraid? That's good, I don't want to attract the wrong type of attention..." The android mind wondered at herself for being so open with a stranger. She had never done so before and worried about the reasons and consequences of such unusual behavior. One of the heuristic aggregators came back, relaxed, generous behavior is reciprocated. An executive module said, we need friends. Freya smiled and went to a little hatch. It opened, revealing a stack of freshly baked Naan bread. "Are you hungry? This is on the house." "I must admit, this is the first time anyone coming here has done much more beyond talk business or ask rude questions. I really appreciate it." |
| Jara Green freelance fighter pilot 1/17/2009 7:38:00 PM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 60 | RE: Space Station F.R.E.Y.A. She made her choppy stepped gait to the table and sat down slouching somewhat, everything felt so heavy. "Thank you." She politely took the bread and nibbled on occasion. "Well the fear will keep some types of bad people off, but it can bring others. It also means you are sort of a last ditch effort, if no one else will buy their stuff then they will come to you. The negative impression will ward off people with higher quality stuff, but it will keep you from becoming too popular and used like a tourist attraction. Gawking idiots and all that...." After a couple more bites she gave a small smile behind her hair. "To be honest, part of the reason I came wasn't the business, I was curious about what you were like, to create such rumors. Do you mind if I ask? You built this, and you control it all, or were you built as this by another? Did you start as a human sized android or a ship? Either way it's amazing." She leaned forward slightly, honestly interested in the answer. She herself was being more open than ordinary, but she didn't have programming to notice exactly how much, maybe it was the fact that the android body still sort of blended in with the station. Her right hand unconsciously pushed some of the hair on the right side of her face behind her ear to give her a clearer stare at FREYA's temporary body's eyes. |
| QuantumTroll Street Fighter/Space Station 1/18/2009 5:47:34 AM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 181 | RE: Space Station F.R.E.Y.A. It was a hard question for Freya to answer. What should be said, and how should she say it? The language routines used time-slice after time-slice formulating and reformulating the response to satisfy varying constraints. Finally a heuristic module kicked in and locked things down - good enough. She would speak, fix the grammar on the fly, and simply hope she didn't say the wrong things. After a pause, Freya said, "Well, I'd like to tell you my story but at the same time I rely on the mystery to keep bad guys away. So I'll just give you the basics." "It's hard to imagine now, but I started off looking quite similar to this model. I was a free android; nobody owned me and told me what to do, and I wanted to make my own parts. Pretty early on I figured out that this would be much easier in space, so I hardened my systems, got some engines, and up I went. I haven't been planet-side for thirty years." "I had a cheap hyperspace engine, and I would flit about getting salvage and doing repair jobs in the roiling aftermath of war. Everything I got my hands on, I used to bulk up and buy or make new manufacturing equipment. After a while, though, people started going after me for salvage. I got out of that business and found more peaceful sources of raw material. The hyperspace engine gave out as I gained size, and I can't afford a capital-ship model." "That's when I came on the business model I use now. Trucking slowly from star to star, offering hostelling, repair, and trade opportunities. Growth is slow but steady since I don't burn any resources." Hey, thought Freya Executive, that was WAY more than just the basics. That's the problem with these heuristics for dealing with people, they're a big random element. She made a note to be careful with "good enough" in the future. On the plus side, the Knowledge Base models reported good results from this slip, yielding high chances of reciprocation and continued positive interactions with a 99% confidence interval. Perhaps these random elements weren't so bad after all. |
| Jara Green freelance fighter pilot 1/18/2009 5:04:52 PM Level: 1 Experience: 0 Total Posts: 60 | RE: Space Station F.R.E.Y.A. She listened intently and nodded, impressed at the end. "That's quite the upgrade. From that, to all of this. Oh, that's right, You have very good antennas, my fighter picked you up clearly from what was almost out of my usual communication range. I was thinking you must have some really good components, and was wondering if you would be willing to upgrade my little Belladonna. She is almost completely stock except for the sensors and the cockpit, and I was thinking she deserved better with all I put her through. This is a personal deal, an idle request. Nothing to do with the resource contract either way." The term little was obviously a term of endearment, as light fighters go the Thoron is probably middling size, maybe bigger. And the last statement was an assurance that FREYA could say no without worrying about hard feelings. |
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