By David C. Daoust
It was like a long tendril, stretching through the room. She knew what they were, clouds of nanites, unperceivable to anyone else. Dakota, however, was in the body of her solid-light doppelganger, which allowed her to detect the nanites that flowed around her.
Plunging into the microscopic worlds could only take her so far with the ark tech. Ultimately, they all worked as a hive. Examining one’s circuitry, didn’t truly reveal much. Searching for some pattern, she began to study their movements. These tendrils stretched throughout the city-station, out into white void space, possibly into the stars beyond.
Studying these movements also gave her the added benefit of being able to keep an eye on Dop. Being trapped in a lab for most of her life, secluded from others, clearly did a number on her subconscious. Or possibly, on her consciousness, considering what all she had suppressed over the years; what she has sacrificed in the name of her pursuits. She pushed those thoughts aside, deciding she didn’t truly need to understand everything.
The nanites, however, amazed her.
As she sat studying the air, Vincent suddenly walked towards her- unknowingly, plunged directly through a tendril, that scattered like dust. As the girl-bot passed through, the tendril reformed behind him.
“Are you okay?” the gravelly male voice of Vincent asked from within the small girl-bot form. The apprehension on his face was clear, and Dakota did not have to ponder long to know its source. To Vincent, she was just sitting there staring at the walls.
“I’m fine,” Dakota said, half pointing at a tendril, she considered explaining it to him, though decided against it and just let her hand drop back down to her lap. “Did you need something?” She blinked a few times as she let her vision take in only normal aspects of the world around her.
“The guards are talking lunch,” Vincent said, “Are you hungry?”
Vincent had joined Dakota in the lab ever since the clothing incident with Doppel. Dakota had hoped for Bot-guards— as she had requested for a while. Mainly because the human soldiers were all uncomfortable around her… which really made her uncomfortable around them. For whatever reason, Dakota was once again denied her request. The caveat being, Vincent would now assist her in the lab. Whether or not he knew he was just there to keep an eye on Doppel, Dakota wasn’t sure. Doppel’s murmuring turned sour whenever the old bot in the little girl form arrived, though. Luckily, no one other than Dakota could truly understand what she was saying. No matter what noises Dop made, her meaning would pop up in Dakota’s brain like some sudden epiphany. It was a weird thing to experience, especially so often.
“I could eat,” Dakota said from her human body, having switched back with but a thought.
Dop, now occupying the solid-light form, suddenly threw her hands up in frustration, as whatever she was working on, was now in Dakota’s hands- on the other side of the room.
Dakota studied the small device intently; she could only wonder what it was. Doppel had been working on it since day one. It was like an undersized rounded cup on one end, with a small stem sticking off the bottom center, capped with a flat disk. ‘Chalice’ suddenly erupted into her brain. She nodded as she turned the stem down to hold it like a cup. ‘Like a little chalice,’ she thought just as her solid light counterpart suddenly snatched it from her hands.
“Sorry…” Dakota said sarcastically, “kind of need the body to eat- you want our brain to work right, don’t you?”
Dop pushed past, returning to her work station.
Not one to deny progress, Dakota put her hands up apologetically as she allowed Doppel to get back to work on her project.
Still puzzling what Dop might be working on, Dakota hovered over her solid-light shoulder. Suddenly an idea popped in Dakota’s head, scattering all her questions about Dop’s device to the winds.
The good doctor dropped back down at her own work station and started clicking keys. The small wisp of a thought, that Dop had just thrown her a bone, to get her off the subject of her device, dissipated as well, as her mind suddenly had answers she had been puzzling over for days.
No sooner had she plugged in the new data, then Dakota was stepping up onto the Holostage in the middle of the lab.
“So… no to lunch?” Vincent pressed from his position below her.
“I’ll eat later,” Dakota said, as the hologram of the surrounding city-station suddenly erupted around her.
Major had been missing for a while now. Several teams were out scouring the city- Dakota had hoped she could help by using the nanites to search parts of the city-station Suzanne’s soldiers had not yet gained access to. She had hit a wall and all but abandoned the project- it just hit her what she had been missing… it hit her like an epiphany. Something, lately, she was all too familiar with.
She cast Dop one last look, before she started her search– through the eyes of the nanites.
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