Zana stepped back into her apartment the next morning, thoroughly relaxed by the night’s activities … all of the night’s activities. It had been a stressful term so far, even for a cyborg; of course, graduate studies were always stressful, but psychology was tougher than most. And add into that my personal psychotherapy starts in two weeks, she thought as she moved into her bedroom to change out of her finery, into a casual unitard. God knows what little gremlins will turn up then! She had always considered herself well adjusted and mentally healthy. Who but God could guess what a qualified psychotherapist would find …? Then her lips quirked back in a mercurial change of mood. Although her career would be made, perhaps, as the author of the first case study on a ‘borg in the literature!
The small jest improved Zana’s mood; but she still felt the need for some encouragement, or at least a shoulder to cry on for a few picoseconds. Glancing again at the holographs on the mantel, she regretted not returning home to her parents’ house. Still, there were other ways of getting together with family … not as satisfyingly tactile, but they would do in a pinch …. She said to the room, “Computer, please call Ariel Sherman, home code, full holo.” She sat on her couch as the computer beeped.
Shortly, a full-body image of her mother, wearing a green casual outfit and a purple silk duster, appeared in the holoprojection field created by the comm program. “Hi, sweet one! What makes you call on this fine Saturday morning?”
Zana Sherman checked herself over a final time in the mirrored closet door of her bedroom in her university apartment. Everything was nicely in place, everything was covered that needed to be, and the tips and tricks she had picked up from her mother’s makeup artists at The Land of Fantasy Theatre had allowed her to “put on her face” in under 10 minutes. Well, that and a ‘borg’s speed and accuracy, she added with a smile. Never let it be said there aren’t any advantages to being a member of this species.
She tapped at the panel, switching its surface back to a door instead of a mirror, grabbed her ident fold and slid it into a carry-pocket on the inside of a feathered sleeve, dabbed a few drops of cologne on her throat, and swung out of the bedroom. Thankfully, the 48th Century C. E. didn’t require university students to live in hovels; everyone had a personal set of living and sleeping rooms, with a mini-foodsynth for eating. It still wasn’t luxurious … especially compared to what Zana was used to at home … but it put a decently comfortable roof over one’s head, and good enough food, if not up to the same standard as, say, La Paloma Azul in downtown Vidran. Each living room in the complex even had an electric fireplace.
“Radio’s off; good … not that it was of much use anyway. And the water and air pumps are shut off, too ….”
“I suppose I should shut the doors. At least Ma would have said to do that; but nobody else is coming down here any more, so I’ll leave ’em for the critters to borrow.”
In the 48th Century, most organic lifeforms tended to carry several preconceptions about the way that Videran cyborgs lived their lives. The all-too-common impression was that all a ‘borg needed to do was glance at a filmpage or a screen, read the contents, and they knew everything there. However, as Zana Sherman could testify all too well, taking in data was not the same as actually learning. A ‘borg’s computer brain still needed to train on how to use the data, to analyze and discuss, in order to act on the information it received, just like an organic’s. And you needed to prove that acquired knowledge to the Powers That Be, in order to get the accreditation the law frequently required. Such as Ph.D.s in psychology.
Which was why Zana was now where she was, observing a shift of the operations crew on one of the private starbases orbiting Videra, gathering information for a paper due one of her professors. Psychology of xenospecies was her focus of study, and this shift was strongly populated by non-humanoid lifeforms. Indeed, by a fluke of scheduling, two sisters from the planet Tibeon were holding down the main operations chairs during this shift. Staying as unobtrusive as possible, asking the minimum of questions on what they did and why, Zana still found herself tapping reams of notes into her tablet.
One of the stories I work on periodically is entitled Isis’ Daughters, and I’ve used Second Life to shoot illustrations for it. Morgan was willing to help me reshoot the cover photo, as it needed revising (as well as updating to newer goodies such as materials). And, luckily for me, the same place I shot the original photo was still available! This is a much better piece than the original, I’d say ….
Second Life® with Harper, Conan, Jem, Diana and Morgan
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