I stare at Dandelion. “Reaching another exoplanet is the entire plan.”
“Yes, but it doesn’t actually solve anyone’s problems, does it? The Hylarans want to avoid having their settlement overwhelmed by a refugee population five times the size of their own, but don’t want to kill anyone. Captain Kae Jin’s crew are used to the spaceship and don’t have all that much interest in leaving it, and her crew and ours both want the sleeping colonists under our care to live out thei...
2024-05-18 23:30:01 +0000 UTC
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It takes about two weeks for Captain Klees to find an algae pancake recipe that’s halfway tolerable, and by then the first hydroponic root vegetables are almost ready. By order of our dear captain, we ground crew are barred from eating the root vegetables beyond a sort of good faith first taste (just in case any particularly paranoid Hylarans are worried we’re trying to poison them or something), which we joke about as him wanting to get as much mileage out of his new recipe as possible, ...
2024-05-14 23:30:01 +0000 UTC
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The dandelions have started to bloom. Specks of yellow dot the patches of green spread across the largely dead sands on the slopes just out of sight of the colony, and it’s well past time to take samples to see how the seeded microbial communities in their roots are doing. Hwaseonge Hnmang dandelions will grow in dead, borderline toxic soil with little complaint, but the same isn’t true of the complex ecology we’ll want to seed after them. That is, indeed, their job – to...
2024-05-11 23:30:01 +0000 UTC
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The next day is full of preparation. The first thing we do is set up a meeting between our ground crew, a handful of Hylarans (Hive, Celti, Elenna, Max and Dr Kim, chosen for their existing proximity to us and expertise in relevant fields), and the shipboard crew via radio.
“So the plan, as I understand it,” Captian Kae Jin says over the radio, “is to take advantage of modern technology to rebuild the Courageous to be able to last in space indefinitely. We need to re...
2024-05-07 23:30:01 +0000 UTC
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We tell Max that we have something important to talk about and there will be a big decision for the colony to make, and a setmeet is arranged for that very night. I know they’re expecting some sort of retaliatory demand for either the kill switch thing or for the forced medical treatment and I don’t bother to disabuse them of the notion. It’s less messy to just leave the full explanation until the setmeet and spend our time preparing for that.
There’s a speech to write, and ther...
2024-05-04 23:30:01 +0000 UTC
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I expect Max to show up sooner or later to try to figure out what we’re so upset about and start doing social damage control before we can relay our complaints to the ship and make a much larger diplomatic incident, so I explain as quickly as I can. I barely finish explaining the basic premise before Tinera cuts me off to say, “That’s the best idea anyone’s had since we got here. I’m in. Let’s get to work.” Tal just laughs and raises kes hand for a high five, which I provide. Th...
2024-04-30 23:30:01 +0000 UTC
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“What did you do?!” I ask the doctor, collapsed on the floor and struggling for breath. But he can’t talk right now, so I look instead to Max, who takes another step back.
“The doctors just provided healthcare,” they say. “You and the captain were reasonable, but your companions clearly had some kind of psychological block that – ”
“That’s not your call to make!” Tinera snarls.
“Of course it isn’t,” Max agrees. “It’s the doctor’s call to mak...
2024-04-27 23:30:01 +0000 UTC
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Tellyn Delphin looked up from the documents in front of her to survey her son. The fourth of her children and sitting there with that faux-apologetic look on his face, shoulders hunched, hands balled into fists like a toddler. In the privacy of her own head she wondered, not for the first time, whether she should have stopped at three.
“Dor,” she said. “How many times are we going to do this?”
“Is Katrina okay?”
“The protest leader?”
“It wasn’t… i...
2024-04-24 08:35:29 +0000 UTC
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We head back to our own living dome, dodging random Hylarans who want to talk about what just happened with the ship. That’ll still be fresh news tomorrow. Once alone, I explain calmly, neutrally, everything that has happened since I collapsed talking to Hive.
It’s been a while since I’ve seen the quiet fury that clouds Captain Klees’ eyes as I talk.
“Well,” he says. He looks down at his own foot, the skin jarringly young and fresh and unscarred compared to the rest of...
2024-04-23 23:24:55 +0000 UTC
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Captain Klees and Tal turn immediately to face the direction of the radio tower, way on the other side of the colony. I don’t waste time with questions. Sharing two breathing masks, the three of us make our way as quickly as possible towards the tower.
“Courageous to Hylara,” Xanthe’s voice says from Tal’s back, stressed. “What’s going on? Is everything alright?”
Tal pulls something out of kes pocket – a ring, one of the ones the Hylarans wear with ...
2024-04-20 23:56:59 +0000 UTC
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The chip in my hand isn’t mine, obviously. Mine is still in my own arm. Tal or Captain Klees would’ve had to load the code onto one of theirs and then cut it out. I wonder how secret this whole operation needed to be – did they have a doctor up there that they could trust to help, or did one of them have to dig it out of their own bone without professional assistance? It wouldn’t be the first time either of them had undergone ad-hoc ID chip removal. At least this time, nobody would ha...
2024-04-16 23:30:01 +0000 UTC
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Hey guys.
Can’t believe I missed soap making. If I’m not out in time to see a Hylaran cuddle their first tiny animal, I’m killing someone. You guys had better be taking video footage of all of this. Also, has anyone gotten those embroiderers some wool yet? Do we have wool? Cotton? Linen?
Thanks for the soap, Tal. I liked it so much I used it all up right away. Everything goes through a sterilisation process before it gets to me, but it’s safe for food...
2024-04-13 23:30:00 +0000 UTC
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I have a pen. I have the synthetic paper that the colony uses. I sit down to draft a reply.
It needs to reassure the crew outside that I’m fine, and it needs to not contain anything that Dr Kim would flag as something that’ll get her in trouble. It won’t be delivered, otherwise. But I also need to explain this bionic experiment thing, or at least get across that any DIVRs might be in danger. The details don’t matter at this stage but Captain Klees needs to watch his back. I shou...
2024-04-09 23:30:14 +0000 UTC
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Hey there, Aspen. How’re you doing?
Dr Kim says you’re too weak for visitors right now. She won’t let us send you a voice message either, says that you’re fighting the infection hard and getting to agitated could be a problem, but I finally managed to convince her to deliver this. I’m not sure how reading something is less draining than listening to it, but we work with what we have, I guess.
I think your were wrong, by the way. We absolutely are li...
2024-04-06 23:30:00 +0000 UTC
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We do the scan. Dr Kim doesn’t pretend it’s about anything except my brain this time. I go back to my room. I eat a resentful breakfast.
Would I have gone along with this if Dr Kim had been honest about her research project from the start? No, probably not. I’ve been too many people’s science experiment already. I’m sick of being a science experiment. But that doesn’t bother me overmuch – I mean, it would, under normal circumstances, but right now I’m a little distracted...
2024-04-02 23:30:01 +0000 UTC
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2024-04-01 07:41:26 +0000 UTC
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“Honestly,” Dr Kim says, “I have very little frame of reference for what you do and don’t know, so it’s hard to know where to start.”
“Start with the eye. What does it do?”
“It’s a bionic eye. It helps you to see.”
“Don’t fuck around with me.”
“I’m serious. It’s a standard bionic that I pulled from storage, same as any other bionic implant. We’re pretty well-stocked on eyes, because people tend not to lose them too often and when the...
2024-03-30 23:29:02 +0000 UTC
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“Hi, Aspen,” Dr Kim says. “I’d like to do another scan of your spine today.”
“Why? We all know the infection has basically cleared up, right? What’s the point of scanning it again?”
“It’s always best to be certain.”
“What’s the point of this quarantine? You can’t seriously be this worried about a bacterium in my spine somehow becoming a danger to the local population, especially since it doesn’t seem to be hurting Tinera or the Friend. ...
2024-03-26 23:30:01 +0000 UTC
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The Ask Me Anythings will be discontinued, and votes on the next TTOU bonus are moving down from Craftsperson level to Apprentice level starting next month. I am open to suggestions for a new Craftsperson bonus.
2024-03-26 03:41:47 +0000 UTC
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“What do you think about the Courageous finally coming here, Aspen?” the AI asks.
I shrug, not bothering to sit up in bed. “It brought me. It’s better to be here than in space.”
“Oh, yes. Of course.” It doesn’t elaborate. I don’t think the AI has much understanding, even simulated understanding, of what ‘space’ really is, or what’s involved in living up there. “I’m happy that you’re happy, Aspen. It’s so good that you’re safe here.”
...
2024-03-23 23:30:01 +0000 UTC
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“Mama, how many people currently live on Hylara?”
“397 people.”
I relax. 392 Hylarans plus my crew; that’s the expected answer. “Why is the colony being supplied for 464 Hylarans?” That’s a reasonable thing to do, to provide excess in case of emergency, it just doesn’t seem like something that people who’d starved a bunch of Hylarans to death to scare them out of ever striking again would do.
I love that nobody bothered to tell this AI to keep secrets fro...
2024-03-19 23:30:01 +0000 UTC
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All but the topmost level of the hospital was underwater, and the Friend was more worried for the structural integrity of the lower levels than the rain. Most of the building had already been evacuated by the swiftest, most silent boats and planes that the Silversky Collective could sneak past the border guards, and it was only this last load of thirty seven patients, collected on the top floor, left. Thirty seven patients and three Silversky members, including the Friend itself.
The Fr...
2024-03-17 01:10:46 +0000 UTC
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Tinera, Tal, the Friend, and Captain Klees gather outside the door, peering at me anxiously. I give them a little wave. “How is everyone?”
“How are you?” Captain Klees asks.
“Feverish. Not dying, I’m pretty sure. This isn’t causing any major impediments, is it?”
“There’s more rhetoric starting up about the ship bringing deadly diseases from Earth to kill everyone, but nobody’s really listening. The drop schedules are between the Hylarans and the ship at...
2024-03-16 23:28:13 +0000 UTC
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I wake up in darkness.
I’m sore, warm, and on a bed; not the stretched canvas of the Hylaran beds, but on a thin mattress on a solid surface. My muscles don’t want to move, but I force myself to feel my arms for ports and find a single drip line going into my right arm and a pulse monitor on my thumb. You collapse, they take you to medical. Makes sense.
“You’re awake!” a pleasant voice says. “How are you feeling, Aspen?”
I know the voice, I know that distinctiv...
2024-03-12 23:30:00 +0000 UTC
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It’s not a nice reminder of home.
I’d seen my fair share of storms. Arboreans had all sorts of responses to all sorts of different storms. Your high velocity winds with little to no ocean movement or pressure change? Get in a building, or as close to the roots as you can; if you’re in thewater, get in the diving bell. Heavy rainfall and lightning, high water movement? Get away from the water, let it drain away between the roots; if you can, get in a building. The true storms, wher...
2024-03-09 23:24:30 +0000 UTC
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If we played two truths, and a lie what would be your two truths, and one lie?
I can free dive over two hundred metres down.
I have a scar on my thigh from when I tried to ‘wrestle an octopus’ as a child. (It came up in our net.)
I was the best aluminium origami artist in our pod.
What jobs did you do in your cluster growing up?
My cluster? What are you talking about? I’m not Arborean, friend. My family did the same sorts o...
2024-03-09 09:16:42 +0000 UTC
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2024-03-06 13:05:46 +0000 UTC
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The light from the robot eye is even more distracting the next morning. I drag myself out of bed and stumble into the main living area, where Tal is already at the computer.
“Did you sleep?” I ask, fumbling around for breakfast.
“Yep! But now I’m doing this. How’s your eye?”
“Nnngn. I have to see Doctor Kim again today. I bet she’ll want to scan my brain every day over this.” I find a brick of food, take a moment to try to summon up enough energy to marvel ...
2024-03-05 23:30:01 +0000 UTC
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Captain Klees goes in to consult more about his foot replacement the next day and reports that the replacement is growing well. I go in to talk to Dr Kim about my eye. She’s very excited about me getting feedback from the eye, and gives me a set of visual exercises to ‘train’ it. “You should practice navigating and doing simple tasks for half an hour or so each day with your real eye closed,” she says, “to teach your brain how to use the information it’s getting. Nothing dangero...
2024-03-02 23:29:16 +0000 UTC
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The four of us storm up the hill, Tinera in the lead. The Hylarans picking through the scene are mostly strangers, but we recognise Elenna and Celti; Elenna inspecting a piece of wreckage, expression neutral, and Celti standing with arms folded, grim, eyes flicking from person to person. His eyes alight on us as we approach and he gives us a stiff, courteous nod.
“Captain. Crew. I don’t suppose you have any explanation for this?”
“We’ve been in our quarters,” Tinera sa...
2024-02-27 23:30:01 +0000 UTC
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