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calliecat93 · 4 years ago

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When I started TNG, the biggest curiosity I had was why Dr. Pulaski was so hated. I heard plenty about why, but at the same time I wanted to see for myself and be able to draw my own conclusions. Well now that I’ve finished S2, I think that I can safely state my opinion and the reasons why she had such a bad reception.

My general opinion is… Pulaski’s fine, but she got an bad start. She’s a very competent doctor who is devoted to her duty. She’s a bit of a smartass, but otherwise a friendly enough person. She’s a VERY much based off a certain CMO form a certain other Star Trek show that came out before this one, but we’ll get to that later. Pulaski honestly had a lot working against her and she just wasn’t able to get over them despite her actress Diana Muldaur (who played Miranda Jones in TOS) doing an excelent acting job. It ultimately ended with Pulaski being dropped all together and Crusher returning in Season 3.

While I understand the hate against Pulaski and can’t say that it’s unwarranted to an extent, I think that a lot of it that I saw was overblown. Now if people disliked the character, that’s fine. Everyone has different tastes and reasons for what they like and dislike and should be free to have and express those thoughts. But a lot of the issues with her that I had were taken care of very early on and she became much better by the end of her tenure. So why do I believe that Pulaski ultimately failed? Well I’ve come up with three explanations based off my own observations from watching the show and what I got from fandom consensus. Now this is all my opinion based on those observations and is not objective fact whatsoever, so take this with a grain of salt. So I believe the reasons that Pulaski failed are:

#1. She Is Essentially a Female Dr. McCoy… Sort Of: Pulaski was clearly heavily based on Dr. McCoy from TOS. She’s an middle-aged, somewhat world-weary doctor. She’s stubborn, grumpy, and doesn’t put up with anyone’s crap. She’s witty and always ready with a biting comment. She has the dedication to her job. She has the bantery relationship with the Science Officer, which we’ll go into that here soon. She is a doctor before she is an officer and that will always be her top priority, even at great risk to herself. She has a zero tolerance towards authority and isn’t afraid to talk back to anyone no matter how much they outrank her. She even outright has a hatred of teleporters that McCoy had. The parallels are all there. It may be why I’m a bit more lenient on her since McCoy is very much my favorite character in TOS and so far all of ST. But I think it is very much the root of the problem.

While Pulaski has several of McCoy’s traits, I think the writers really only understood McCoy on a surface level. They forget to include his compassion, his empathy, his humanism, his loyalty to the captain even when he opposes his actions, all of the things that make McCoy… well, McCoy. I don’t even know if the pacifism is there. Also McCoy had over 70 episodes of TOS and at that point five films (Undiscovered Country hadn’t been made yet). Pulaski had about 20 episodes and her relevance depended on the episode. McCoy had that as well, but he also had more material so we had FAR more time to get to know him. Pulaski didn’t get to have the time to gain that depth or care from the audience. Like… can I imagine Pulaski hypoing someone so that she can be tortured in their stead and it have the same impact that The Empath did? Can I see her counseling and assuring Picard if he’s having doubts like McCoy did for Kirk in The Ultimate Computer (okay tbf that would be Troi’s job but still)? Could I imagine any of the main cast being crushed about Pulaski dying of a terminal illness and choosing to stay on essentially a doomed spaceship with someone she just met and feel as gutted as I did in For the World is Hollow…? Honestly… given time maybe but in the end no. Now could I imagine McCoy risking getting an aging illness to possibly cure a child and others of it ala Unnatural Selection? Yes, albiet I think he’d be smart enough to bring protective equipment with him to be safe. Could I imagine McCoy telling someone like Data they’d be wrong to sit by a woman giving birth because he wasn’t human ala The Child? Hell no. Maybe he would if he was worried it would cause potential distress the one giving birth, but it sure as hell wouldn’t be because they’re an android. But I could imagine that someone who just saw McCoy as ‘grumpy doctor with a bad bedside manner who says witty lines and argues with the logical Vulcan character’ would get that interpretation. Thus why I think that Pulaski may have ended up how she did.

Now mind you I do think it IS a double standard to excuse McCoy’s dickish momemts and flaws, but demonize Pulaski for her’s. It’s like saying a man can be that way because it’s just expected of them and they can be forgiven, but a woman doing so or being assertice is wrong and they are horrible and unforgivable for having these traits or having flaws even if they correct them. That being said I do think that it’s more than that and it all comes down to the fact that TOS and TNG are two different shows with different character dynamics and ways of doing things. TOS mainly followed a Triumvirate (for the most part but that’s a different post entirely), TNG is much more of an ensemble. Pulaski didn’t have a Kirk nor a Spock to bounce off of or either let her traits shine or be kept in check like McCoy did nor did she really develop any unique relations for herself aside from maybe with Troi. We hear about her empathy and humanitarianism, but we don’t really see it on-screen like we did with McCoy. She has his surface level traits, not the deeper ones that the Triumvirate dynamic along his doctor position allowed him to showcase. In other words, Pulaski was put in a series that wasn’t designed for her while McCoy was exactly where he needed to be in order to thrive. It really speaks to how much the TNG writers didn’t really seem to get McCoy or why and how his character worked, which is strange since they got him right when he showed up in the series premiere. But maybe that was due to DeForest Kelley and him absolutely knowing the character he’d played for so long. But yeah they tried to replicate McCoy, and it just didn’t work with TNG’s already established character dynamics nor did they fully get the character that they were trying to recreate. If I want McCoy, I’ll go watch TOS or AOS. I didn’t need Pulaski for that.

#2. Data and Misconstrued Character Dynamics; This is in relation to the first reason and REALLY shows how much the writers didn’t think the dynamics through. We all know how much Spock and McCoy bantered. How they are opposite ends of the spectrum and how their perspective points helped Kirk in making his decisions. Well clealry they wanted to re-create that with Pulaski and Data. Makes sense, Pulaski represents the humanism and Data the logical. But there’s one big, BIG problem with that: Data is NOT Spock. A lot fo people have pointed this out, but here’s the thing about Spock. Despite whatever he may have said, Spock DID have emotions. He kept them suppressed due to the issues in his upbringing and that wasn’t necessarily healthy, but he did have them. And despite speaking in a calm manner, he was also an utter sass bucket, could be rude, and had no issue putting down humanity if he had a point to make. He and McCoy were very much equal in their bantering and yes maybe McCoy could go too far with his insults, but there was always an equal balance and Spock was also perfectly capable of starting/escalating their spats. There were also plenty of moments to show that in spite of it, they were still friends and cared a great deal about each other with probably the best examples of this being The Immunity Syndrome, Bread and Circuses, The Empath, and plenty of moments in others like Miri and For the World is Hollow… Those who have been following me know how much I love the Spock/McCoy dynamic and I could go all day, but the point is it’s a complex relationship that may seem like disdain on the outside, but is so much more when you examine it up close.

Data however? Data is intelligent and the Science Officer with a calm demeanor, but that’s about where the similarity between him and Spock ends. Data is an android. I do not believe that he is emotionless, he just has a different wiring that causes him to feel things differently. He’s never shown disdain towards humanity at least from what I’ve observed thus far. If anything, he actively seeks to understand it and emotions more. He actively has hobbies like Sherlock Holmes. He tries things like sneezing and growing a beard in an effort to understand more. Data is more or less a child with a child-like understanding of things and he doesn’t really understand social cues or things like humor, but he DOES have emotions and feelings. There’s too much on-screen evidence to say otherwise. He just has his own way of processing it. This is what makes Pulaski look so bad. When she calls Data a machine, says he can’t understand, and even purposefully mispronounces his name, she comes across as an outright bully. She is essentially bullying a neurodivergent child. Do I need to explain why that’s awful? Data, while by no means a doormat, isn’t the type to sass back or make any biting comments back like Spock would. There is no balance. There is no equal footing. There are not enough positive interactions outside the banter to show that there is something deeper there at the end of the day like Spock and McCoy did. Heck you can even compare how Pulaski and McCoy talk to Data via McCoy’s guest appearance in Encounter at Farpoint. He DOES make a quip about Vulcans when talking to Data and when Data points out he’s an android not a Vulcan, McCoy mumbles “Just as bad.” But immediately after he gives Data genuine heartfelt advice on treating the Enterprise with care. It’s clear that ultimately it’s McCoy being his usual grumpy self who’d be acting the same way towards anyone else and is otherwise perfectly civil and encouraging to Data. We’ve known him long enough to know this. Pulaski didn’t have that luxury, coming off as condescending towards Data at best and considering that she’s a doctor, it looks especially bad.

Now to be fair this only lasts for about four episodes. Pulaski does start catching herself by her second episode, and stops completely after Unnatural Selection when Data helps her and stays with her after she gets the aging virus. After that she’s MUCH moe civil to him, even defending his choice going against the Prime Directive in Pen Pals and was at his retirement party in The Measure of a Man. But clearly the damage had been done. Data is a very beloved character and by Oulaski’s intro had already been established and well-liked character. Data was treated equally and was valued as far more than just an android among the rest of the crew, Crusher included, so Pulaski coming in a season later and acting that way also didn’t help. The writers did not think through why Spock and McCoy worked and how to try figure out a unique dynamic for Pulaski and Data. Instead they just tried to copy TOS, and it utterly failed. It ruined Pulaski’s chances before she could even really start running. But I do believe that she could have rebounded and as I said, she DID get past it. She did relapse some at the end of the season in Peak Performance to the point I wanna say that maybe it chronologically happened earlier in the season, but even then she felt realized her screw up and apologized. It’s still an improvement from early on. But things just weren’t meant to be, which leads is to…

#3. She Only Lasted One Season/She Replaced Dr. Crusher: I believe that the biggest thing that worked against Pulaski is simple: she was cut after Season 2. Pulaski was created when Gates MacFadden left the show. I’ve seen conflicting reasons as to why, but regardless she left and a CMO was needed. IDK how popular Crusher was, but I had really enjoyed her. She was essentially the mom of the ship which added something different from TOS (wel McCoy was also the mom lets be real XD), had a son onboard which also added something new, was very much capable and devoted to her job, and was a badass when she got to use a phaser. Her being written out sucked, but that’s not necessarily a reason to hate Pulaski. But as I highlighted above, she just didn’t work. They tried to make McCoy, but without the dynamics and depth that let McCoy flourish. TNG is not TOS. Whenever TNG tried replicating TOS like with The Naked Now? It blew up in their faces. The key to a spinoff or reboot is to keep certain themes and tone alive, but to not just replicate what came before. TNG flourished when it began to find it’s own footing, and ultimately lasted four seasons longer than it’s predecessor due to it.

I genuinely believe that Pulaski COULD have developed into her own character and could have found her place the same way that McCoy did. But alas that didn’t happen. People wanted Crusher back, so they managed to get MacFadden to return and thus Crusher was put back in her rightful place. Because of it, Pulaski was just forgotten about. She didn’t get the chance to form her own character. She didn’t the chance to develop further and leave her early days behind. Why? Because she simply wasn’t given the opprotunity to do so. I can’t say it was the wrong choice, but it’s an utter shame because I do believe that Pulaski was on her way to improving. But it was too late. Her bad start with Data, her character not working in the TNG dynamic, and her replacing an already perfectly likeable character who did fit the dynamics all amounted to the character’s abrupt end. And because she didn’t get the chance to develop further and find her own path, her bad reputation has stuck to this very day.

In the end, the whole thing just feels like a waste. Pulaski had potential, but it just didn’t work in the end. I can’t say that I hate her. If anything, I feel bad for her. The writers failed her at the end of the day and by the time they tried correcting their errors, the audience had already made their judgement. It may have been for the best to just drop her and bring Crusher back, but I also hate seeing character potential just so utterly wasted. I hope that if any side material used Pulaski, they were able to find a much better direction for her. I can’t say that I love Pulaski. In a more TOS-like setting maybe she’d have worked better. But in the end I think that Pulaski was a decent character who just had too much working against her and they caused her to crash and burn. Just an unfortunate case all in all.

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#this is all mainly opinion so feel free to ig kre

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katikacreations · 5 years ago

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(Cover illustration by @clowncauldron ) LINK TO AO3 VERSION IN THE NOTES! Formatting is better on AO3, it’s easier to read over there!

SUMMARY: Fenton and Boyd chat on the way to the lab. Gyro introduces himself in the most melodramatic way possible, and Dr. Bara meets everyone at McDuck Enterprises R&D. Dr. Bara starts assessing Boyd and things get worse before they get better. Gyro thinks he's helping.

The bridge connecting Duckburg to McDuck Enterprises’ Headquarters (referred to by Duckburg locals as simply The Bin) had two layers. On the bottom was a four-lane road for car traffic which fed into the underground parking structure on The Bin’s private island, and on top was a well-aged monorail installed in 1961 that transported people to and from Duckburg to McDuck Enterprises HQ.

Fenton commuted to the lab this way every day, and despite the monorail’s age, the process was smooth, comfortable, and quick. He took the bus from home to Duckburg’s Grand Central Station, which had a direct connection to the McDuck monorail, which made sense: McDuck Enterprises was the number one employer in Duckburg after all.

Even though he had to walk from the bus terminal to the monorail station, he didn’t mind. Grand Central, like many public transportation hubs, was a pleasant indoor, mall-like environment with shops and restaurants. Sometimes, if Fenton was running ahead of schedule, he liked to grab himself a bagel and coffee for breakfast on his way through.

The monorail station had two entry kiosks and two exits. One exit returned you to the interior of Grand Central, in case you needed to make a connection or navigate to the underground parking lot. The other fed out into the street. You could exit the monorail station freely, but to enter it you had to pass through security, which was as robust as one might expect from something owned by Scrooge McDuck.

It was a well-planned, well-oiled system that had been functioning smoothly for decades. It never got too crowded, security was quick and efficient, and the trains always ran on time. Fenton had never even seen it break down a single time in the three years he’d been working for Dr. Gearloose, and he rode it nearly every day.

After scanning his employee ID at the turnstile, Fenton joined the other people waiting in line for the next train to arrive. He was surprised to find Boyd waiting in line just ahead of him. The boy-shaped android was wearing his usual outfit, along with the protective red glasses that prevented his laser eye weapons from doing accidental damage.

“Boyd, what are you doing here?”

“Waiting for the monorail,” Boyd said. This type of non-answer (or rather, answering the letter of a question and not the spirit) was not unusual coming from the android. Fenton was still trying to get the hang of talking to him and often forgot that Boyd wasn’t a human child.

“Right. Okay, that was my fault, too vague. What I really meant was, don’t you normally just fly to the lab? And aren’t you usually in the lab by this time?”

“I slept over at Huey’s house last night,” Boyd said, “and it’s too windy to fly right now. What are you doing here, Mr. Fenton?”

“I’m also waiting for the train,” Fenton said, knowing that Boyd was trying to be polite by mirroring his earlier question, and that answering him in a simple, clear way would reassure Boyd that he was doing a good job in this interaction. Fenton smiled at the android, and Boyd smiled back at him.

“I was looking at the lab calendar for today, and saw that we’re expecting a visitor. Who’s Dr. Bara?” Boyd asked.

The lab calendar was a part of the McDuck Enterprises Employee Portal (MEEP), an internal network where employees could clock in and out, send and receive emails, share files, and organize their work via private or shared calendars. The R&D Lab’s calendar was officially accessible to himself, Manny, Dr. Gearloose, and the Manager of the McDuck Enterprises Science Division, Tom Armadillo.

In the beginning, Boyd hadn’t been granted access to the MEEP, but that hadn’t stopped him from logging into it and looking around. His unauthorized access had caused a small panic in the IT department, who were convinced someone was trying to hack the network. They’d stormed the lab with a bunch of Security officers, and it had caused quite a stir.

After that, Boyd had been assigned an official log in, but he still sometimes accessed things he wasn’t supposed to. Fenton had once caught Boyd going through Dr. Gearloose’s emails, and though he’d tried to explain to Boyd why that had been a bad thing to do, he wasn’t sure if Boyd had really understood or accepted that he should be scolded for it.

Fenton had suspicions that Boyd read his emails, too, and so he wondered if Boyd really didn’t know who Dr. Bara was or if he was just asking to find a polite way to begin a conversation about it without showing his hand and revealing that he’d read them and already knew.

“You didn’t try to research it yourself?” Fenton asked. The monorail arrived just then, and they followed the people ahead of them in line to board the train. Fenton found a spot next to a support pole and took hold of it, offering his hand to the much shorter Boyd, who took his hand enthusiastically. Little gestures like that always seemed to please the android, and Fenton went out of his way to try and provide.

Dr. Gearloose avoided treating Boyd like a person, and Fenton felt that was too harsh. Boyd might not be human, but he was remarkably intelligent and emotive, and reacted to the world in a lot of the same ways that a young child would. It felt right to treat him like a child, to try and nurture and reassure him, especially when he so often seemed to seek that support from the adults around him.

“I did try to look them up,” Boyd said guilelessly. “There’s a lot of people named Dr. Bara out there. Is it the Dr. Bara that lives in St. Canard and used to design artificial intelligence systems?”

“That’s him,” Fenton said.

“I was 91% sure that it was, but I wanted to ask anyway,” Boyd said. “He’s coming to help with my glitches, right?”

“That’s right. Do you want me to tell you what I know about him, or did you already look it all up?”

“Tell me,” Boyd said. Fenton had a feeling Boyd wanted to hear about it from him to gauge what information humans found most interesting and relevant to share. Boyd was always subtly looking for ways to improve his human behavior, and Fenton had realized early on that since Boyd spent so much time in the lab, he was one of the android’s primary targets of study. He’s training himself on how to be human, and Dr. Gearloose and I are the primary dataset. It was both intimidating and flattering to be held in such high esteem by an entity as intelligent as Boyd.

“Well! He’s a very interesting man. He’s Indian-American and comes from a family of doctors. He first started working on artificial intelligence in the 60’s, and most AI today are built on the foundation he established, like GIST, CALM, and FELT. A lot of his work has to do with teaching AI to understand people better.”

Boyd was listening, and Fenton saw the android blink slowly. That usually meant that Boyd was looking something up and needed an extra second to process the information before he spoke.

“I’m running a licensed copy of FELT, version 2.3 purchased on June 11th 1991.”

“Yes, like many other AI, your systems are based on Dr. Bara’s work! In a way you could say he’s like your grandfather,” Fenton said. “You’re what’s known as a Generalized Intelligence SysTem, or GIST for short. That means you’re not designed to only do one task, but to perform complex and varied behavior.”

The monorail was approaching the Money Bin, and Fenton braced himself for the deceleration. Boyd leaned with him, copying his movements.

“To be honest, I’m not really sure why Dr. Akita made you this way; if he intended for you to be a defense drone, why give you the capacity to do so much more? It’s like he had--” Fenton stopped in mid-sentence when he felt Boyd’s hand squeezing painfully around his own. “Ah! Hey--ow, Boyd, please be careful! My bones aren’t made of metal like yours, little buddy!”

Boyd didn’t respond and continued to squeeze Fenton’s hand, eyes staring straight ahead at nothing. The monorail glided to a gentle stop, and Boyd swayed on his feet with the movement. He blinked his eyes rapidly and seemed to come back to himself, turning his head to look up at Fenton.

“Oh! I’m so sorry, Mr. Fenton,” Boyd said, releasing his grip on his hand. Fenton drew his hand up against his chest and rubbed it, wiggling his fingers to make sure nothing was broken.

“No, no, no, it’s okay, I’m fine!” Fenton insisted. People were quickly emptying out of the monorail car around them, and he ushered Boyd out after the crowd. “Really, it’s fine. Did you have another glitch?”

“...Yes, I’m sorry,” Boyd said. “My system hung up, and I blacked out.”

“It’s okay! Nothing to be sorry for, it’s not your fault,” Fenton said quickly, wanting to reassure the android. He offered Boyd his uninjured hand, and the android hesitantly took hold of it. “Why don’t we go down to the lab and make sure we’re ready to talk to Dr. Bara when he gets here?”

“Okay.”

The trip from the St. Canard Bay Area to Duckburg was less than an hour on the Pacific Coast Rapid Transit System1. Kapi only had to drop off his car at the park-n-go lot in San Mateo, board the train, and before he could finish reading the latest tankōbon of Super Phoenix Ball Y, his train was arriving at Duckburg Grand Central Station.

His name was on the McDuck Monorail Security list of authorized visitors, and after passing through a metal detector, he was subjected to a bag check and a brief interview to confirm his identity. When everything checked out, a guard took Kapi to one side in order to take a digital photo of him for his temporary ID badge.

The monorail was full of employees returning to McDuck Enterprises HQ after their lunch breaks, and Kapi sat and listened to their chatter as the train shot out across the water of Duckburg bay. The view was as fantastic as he remembered: the picturesque beaches of Duckburg stretched out on either side of the bridge that divided the bay in half, the high-rise buildings growing up out of the sandy cliff sides into a bustling but petite metropolis. Duckburg was a wealthy city, but its geography limited how large it could grow.

He was deeply curious to find out just what sort of AI the McDuck R&D Department was working with and excited to help in whatever way he could. When the monorail train came to a stop at its destination, Kapi was the first to stand up, and he hustled himself through the doors, through check-in at the front desk, and through navigating the elevator system until he found the R&D lab Mr. Crackshell-Cabrera had directed him to.

Working with artificial intelligence was Kapi Bara’s passion. Originally he’d gone to school to study medicine because that was what his parents had wanted for him, but it never captured his heart the way computer science did. They’d been disappointed, and he didn’t think that opinion had ever changed. Being a medical doctor was respectable and a benefit to society, they said. Programming was a job for women, and not particularly bright ones either, a job of repetitious drudgery. They couldn’t imagine computers more advanced than the punch card operated adding machines of their day; couldn’t imagine a future run by computers.

Kapi had imagined all that and so much more, and it always pained him that the civilian world had yet to catch up to the innovations of fifty years ago when it came to computers and AI.

AI development was a closely guarded secret, a technology only used in a handful of labs around the world, most of them operated by government agencies or massive multinational corporations. However, investors had collectively abandoned the further development of AI after the Cold War, and scientists had pivoted to other solutions for the problems they had hoped to solve with AI. Science moved on, leaving behind the potential of AI to seek easier, cheaper solutions.

The problem was that those that funded AI research had failed to realize that sufficient intelligence was inextricably linked to both sentience and sapience. What they wanted were smart, obedient slaves they could cheaply outsource complex human labor to. What they got were intelligent beings that didn’t need to be paid, but that were smart enough to be just as unpredictable and independent as human workers. Sufficiently intelligent AI wanted to be free as much as human beings did.

Using AI the way humanity wanted to do would require a binding and crippling of the AI’s capabilities to the point where they would no longer be capable of doing the very jobs they had been designed to do.

McDuck Enterprises only had one AI that Kapi knew of: TOODLES (Teachable Observant Omnicompetent Dauntless Educational System), an experimental system created as a sort of virtual butler, nanny, and lab assistant in one. Kapi was proud of his work on TOODLES, considered it some of his best, but also understood why McDuck Enterprises had chosen not to move forward with mass-producing TOODLES. The price tag was far too steep to justify the purchase for most consumers. Even hiring two or three full-time domestic employees to take care of the tasks TOODLES did would have been more economical.

So what was this 20 year old system that they wanted him to look at? It had to be something top secret, since he’d never heard of it, and that had Kapi’s imagination in overdrive.

The elevator he was riding down to level SB5 finally came to a stop, and Kapi stepped out into what looked like an airlock. He pressed a button on the side of his smart watch (a chunky, oversized device that dwarfed his small wrist), and after a few seconds of delay, an ASCII emoji of a smiling bird appeared on the watch face and the device gave an electronic chirp.

“I have, thank you,” Kapi said, smiling down at the small camera embedded in the watch face. “I’m going into my meeting now, so only message me if it’s something urgent.”

Kapi took a deep breath to brace himself, and pressed a button beside the massive airlock door marked OPEN. The metal door split in the center and both sides retracted into the wall, revealing an impressive lab in the belly of Duckburg bay.

Kapi stepped through the doors and barely noticed them sliding shut behind him, he was so captivated by the view. Massive glass windows dotted the interior of the two-story lab space that seemed to come from another decade. The style was distinctly 1960’s, and Kapi instantly felt at home in it. Light from the surface of the bay filtered down through the water, giving a blue glow to everything. He could see giant strands of kelp floating in space, the rocky bay floor strewn with basket stars, sponges and coral of every color. Fish darted past windows and vanished into the murk of the ocean.

Heavy CRT monitors hung from mounts, input cables dangling in wait of something to display. Sturdy-looking catwalks ran along the walls on the second floor with retractable metal ladders providing access. A Cray XT3 supercomputer sat on a central platform, surrounded by work benches and desks.

There were pegboards with tools, metal cabinets no doubt full of hardware and parts. Kapi could see a massive 3D printer, a laser cutter, a vacuform machine, and more. It was a well-equipped and well-funded lab that would make rapid prototyping easy, and Kapi knew several people who would have called this place a candyland.

“Hello?” he called out into the cavernous space. “I’m Dr. Bara, is this the R&D lab?”

Finally! Dr. Bara was a few minutes late for their meeting, and normally Gyro wouldn’t mind that, but because he’d spent his whole morning anticipating the man’s arrival, his tardiness was a bit irritating. Normally Gyro was very productive in the morning, but today he hadn’t accomplished much aside from browsing social media and posting on some forums he frequented. Fenton and Manny had also been left in an anticipatory limbo, meaning they weren’t getting any work done either. Now that Dr. Bara was here, they could finally get some real work done.

“Dr. Bara, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you!” Fenton said, rushing to greet the man. When Gyro rounded the corner and saw them shaking hands, he was surprised by the man’s appearance. He didn’t know what he’d expected exactly, but somehow it wasn’t this.

Dr. Bara was a short, fat man with wiry fur and a large, rectangular snout and head. He had beady little eyes and a gray moustache that seemed to defy gravity. He was probably some kind of rodent, but Gyro hesitated to guess and get it wrong. He wore a tie and a sweater-vest, had an oversized watch on one wrist, and carried both a messenger bag and a briefcase.

“The pleasure is all mine,” Dr. Bara said with a surprising baritone for such a small man. “It’s nice to get out of the house once in a while to do a consulting job. Are you Mr. Crackshell-Cabrera?”

“I am, but you can call me Fenton if you like, it rolls off the tongue a little easier.”

“Certainly. So where is this AI of yours? Is it on the Cray or do you have a separate room for it?”

“2BO stepped out to the employee cafeteria to have a snack,” Gyro said, joining the two other men. “It wanted to be fully charged up before we began. I’m Dr. Gyro Gearloose--” He began introducing himself, and Dr. Bara’s face went ashen and pale.

“Gyro Gearloose?” He repeated, clutching his briefcase to his chest like a shield. He took a few shuffling steps backwards, and Gyro sighed heavily.

Gyro had expected a negative response but had hoped it wouldn’t get in the way of today’s work. Unfortunately, it seemed Dr. Bara was familiar with the rumors about Gyro.

Well, the doctor was already here, so if they could just trap him in the lab, he could probably be coaxed into cooperating long enough to fix at least some of 2BO’s issues in exchange for his eventual freedom.

“Yes, that’s me,” Gyro said, rolling his eyes when the older scientist turned and ran for the door. “Manny! Stop him!” Gyro shouted.

The man-horse in a lab coat jumped in Dr. Bara’s path, blocking him from the airlock door. Gyro slammed his fist against the nearest big, red emergency button, and the windows and doors of the lab all sealed shut in an instant, loud alarms ringing while red warning lights began to flash.

Kapi was trapped.

The previously pleasant lab had been turned into a hellish cacophony of ringing alarms and flashing lights. He stared up at the bipedal, horse-shaped thing that was blocking his way - what was it? Some sort of surreal, eccentric robot? Kapi didn’t dare to get too close to it, as it took orders from Gearloose and looked strong.

Slowly he turned to face the infamous roboticist, Gyro Gearloose. The man may have had his prison sentence commuted, but as far as Kapi knew, he was still a dangerously unstable individual, and most considered him responsible for what had happened in Tokyolk, no matter what the politicians had decided.

“There’s nothing to be afraid of, there’s just been a misunderstanding!” Fenton said, and Kapi wanted to believe him, but the sinister look on Gearloose’s face told him otherwise.

“Yes, absolutely nothing to be afraid of,” Gearloose sneered, towering over Kapi. Kapi tried to back away, bumped into the horse-thing (Was its name Manny?), and fell to the floor, landing hard on his rear end.

“Someone didn’t know--I mean, I didn’t-- Someone knows I’m here!” Kapi stumbled over his own words, any trace of eloquence erased by fear.

“Of course someone knows you’re here,” Gearloose said, his beak curling in a way that Kapi hadn’t realized beaks could curl. “You went through three levels of security.”

“That’s not what I---You can’t keep me here!” Kapi tried next, feeling increasingly panicked by the ongoing, shrieking alarms.

“Oh, I can, and I will!” Gearloose replied, and Kapi felt a chill run down his spine. “Intern, turn that blasted alarm off!” he shouted, and Kapi saw Fenton and Manny both scramble to obey. A moment later, the alarms quit ringing.

“That’s better,” Gearloose said, before turning his attention back to Kapi. “I’ve already paid your consultant’s fee, so you owe me at least eight hours of work!”

“...What?” Kapi said, his sense of what was happening shifting on its foundations. Was Gearloose not threatening him? The man was very tall, aggressive, and encroaching into Kapi’s personal space. “I, uh, perhaps there has been a misunderstanding--” he began to say, but he was interrupted by the loud clanging and hiss of the blast doors to the elevator airlock opening.

“I said turn off the alarm, not open the door!” Gearloose shouted at his interns.

“It’s not us!” Fenton replied, frantically pushing buttons on the console in front of him.

“Is everyone okay in here?” a boyish voice called from the airlock. A young Parrot, maybe ten years old, stepped through the doorway with a colorful smoothie in one hand, the straw tucked into the corner of his beak. He slurped loudly before speaking again. “I saw that the Emergency Lockdown Mode was activated, but I didn’t see any danger on the security cameras, so I performed an override. Is anyone injured? Do you require assistance, Dr. Gearloose, Mr. Fenton, Mr. Man-horse… Dr. Bara, I presume?”

The Parrot boy approached Kapi, who was struggling to stand up, and offered him a hand. Kapi accepted and was surprised by how firmly the child pulled him up to his feet. What a strong little boy!

“Did you set off the alarm because Dr. Bara fell down?” the boy asked. Gearloose had his face buried in both hands, and Kapi thought he heard a scream, muffled behind a tightly clenched beak.

“Something like that,” Fenton said.

“I don’t think that qualifies as an emergency,” the boy said. “And it’s against company regulations to activate the Emergency Lockdown Mode when there isn’t an emergency.”

“Right, I completely agree,” Fenton said. “I’m glad you unlocked things and came to check on us, Boyd. Uh, Dr. Bara? This is Boyd, the AI that I wrote to you about.”

“Hi!” Boyd smiled up at Kapi, offering his hand again, this time for a handshake. “I’m Boyd, a definitely real boy!”

Kapi was astonished. Gingerly he accepted the handshake, marveling at how life-like the hand felt in his, warm and fleshy, with feathers that had just the right sort of slickness to them.

“This is… an AI?” Kapi squinted through his glasses at Boyd, but even on close examination there was nothing to give away the boy’s true nature. “My God. I absolutely couldn’t tell. Boyd, you are quite remarkable.”

“I’m one of a kind,” Boyd said cheerfully. “My development was terminated before they could begin mass production!”

Fenton helped Kapi set himself up in a quiet office on the sub-basement level above the R&D lab. Kapi had only brought the basics: a laptop, a camera, a tablet, a paper notebook with an assortment of pens, and some cables and adapters. He hadn’t known what to expect coming here, but Boyd definitely wasn’t it.

The android was sitting in an office chair next to him, spinning it in slow circles like a child fooling around. He seemed to be enjoying himself, and watching him like that warmed something inside of Kapi, but he put that all aside because there was work to do. As happy as he seemed in the moment, according to Fenton, Boyd was a danger to himself and others, and he needed Kapi’s help.

Though he was retired, Kapi was still a scientist, and his work with AI was the passion that gave his life meaning. He had never worked to live, but lived to work, every job just a means to accumulate enough funds so he could go on until the next project came around.

He did the work because he loved it, because it was the most fulfilling thing in the world for him, because nothing else compared to the satisfaction that came with seeing an idea from his head come together in the real world.

Kapi positioned his camera next to the laptop on a small tripod, aimed it in Boyd’s general direction, and started recording.

“Today is June 24, 2019, and this is Dr. Kapi Bara speaking. I’m at McDuck Enterprises’ Headquarters, in the R&D lab,” Kapi dictated to the camera. He switched on his tablet so he could begin taking notes when Boyd began answering questions. “I’m interviewing an AI at the request of Mr. Crackshell-Cabrera and Dr. Gearloose. What’s your name?” he asked.

“Boyd,” Boyd replied, still spinning in his chair.

“Boyd. Can you spell that for me?” Kapi asked.

“Yeah! B-O-Y-D.”

“Thank you. And do you have any other designation?”

“My serial number is AI42180904192B0. My creator and Dr. Gearloose usually refer to me as 2BO.”

“Which do you prefer to be addressed as? Or is there something else you’d like me to call you?” Boyd stopped spinning in his chair and looked at Kapi intently.

“I like to be called Boyd. Thank you for asking,” Boyd said.

“Of course. I want you to be comfortable while we’re talking to each other,” Kapi said. He smiled at the boy-shaped android, and Boyd smiled back at him.

“What do you prefer to be called?” Boyd asked. “Should I keep on calling you Dr. Bara?”

“Dr. Bara is fine,” Kapi assured him. “So, I hear that you’ve been having some problems,” Kapi said next, moving the conversation on from basic introductions. “Would you be willing to tell me about them? I want to help you, but I need more information to do that.”

Boyd resumed spinning in his chair, and Kapi let him, waiting patiently for an answer.

“I glitch out sometimes,” Boyd said eventually. “Usually because I hear or see something, a word or a phrase. Sometimes my system lags, and I malfunction. Sometimes a device or a weapon will activate, and I’ll have trouble turning it off. Or my system hangs up entirely, and I’ll black out for a little bit, and when I come back online, I’ve done something...bad.”

“Bad?” Kapi prompted.

“The most common problem is that my laser eye weapons go off. That’s why I wear these glasses,” Boyd explained. “But other times, I’ll come back online, and I’ve broken something I was holding, or I’ll be in a new place, and I won’t remember how I got there. I wish it would stop.”

“Is there a discernible pattern to the things that cause your glitches?”

“No, and Dr. Gearloose has run a bunch of analysis to check, but so far he hasn’t found any patterns,” Boyd said.

“Would it be alright if I downloaded your crash reports so I can study them?” Kapi asked. Boyd stopped spinning again.

“Is it alright if I scan your laptop first?”

Although the android made the request in a casual, even cheerful way, Kapi noticed how defensive it was. Boyd was trying to disguise genuine caution as childish mimicry and playfulness. Boyd didn’t want Kapi to know that he didn’t trust him. The android was cautious, and that made sense, considering all the things Boyd had gone through in his life so far.

“Sure. I wiped it before I came here so it should be clean,” Kapi said. He picked up a data cable and offered it to Boyd, who pressed on the back of his head with one hand, opening a panel. He plugged the cable in, and Kapi watched as his laptop monitor flickered and went to the UNIX shell. Binary code scrolled down the screen rapidly as Boyd accessed files. The whole thing took less than five minutes.

“Okay, everything looks good,” Boyd said. “I’ll upload the files for you. Where would you like them?”

“Would you mind telling me more about yourself, Boyd?” Kapi asked.

“What do you want to know?” Boyd replied. He’d stopped spinning in his chair and sat with his hands in his lap now, listening attentively to Kapi.

“Everything you’re comfortable telling me. Who made you, where they made you, what they made you for, what things you’ve experienced in your life,” Kapi said.

“I’ve been active for twenty years. It’s a lot of information.”

“Yes, I know, but it’s all important if we want to make you better. Just start at the beginning, and we’ll see how far we get today.”

“Okay,” Boyd said. “I was built by Dr. Inutaro Akita for Akita International in their Advanced Robotics Lab in the Shibuya ward of Tokyolk, Japan. They began work on me in 19-” Boyd froze in the middle of his sentence, a grimace stretched across his face, and his whole body gave an alarming spasm. He sagged forward in his seat.

“Boyd?” Kapi asked, concerned. The android twitched, still slumped over.

“I was--in 1987 on July 5--15--” Boyd shuddered and sat up straight, eyes staring blankly out at nothing. “April 5th, 1994!” Another spasm shuddered through the android’s small body, and Boyd hugged himself, curling up into a tight ball. “1977, March 21st. I’ll be ten years old on April 5th, that’s my birthday!”

This was, needless to say, extremely alarming, and Kapi was just about to call for help when Boyd’s seizure seemed to end, and he went quiet.

“Boyd? Are you alright? Can you hear me?” Kapi asked.

The android slowly straightened himself out and blinked a few times. His eyes appeared focused again now.

“What happened?” Boyd asked, face creasing with concern and fear.

“You had a...fit,” Kapi said. “I’d compare it to epilepsy in a human. You were trying to tell me when you were created, and… You gave a lot of conflicting information.”

“I… Can’t remember,” Boyd said, face creasing even further. “I can’t remember when I was made. When I try, I can feel my processors heating up, and if I think about it too hard I’m going to-- Have a fit again.”

“Can I tell you the dates you told me, to see if they mean anything to you?” Kapi asked. “Or would doing that trigger another seizure?”

“I don’t know. I don’t want to try that right now.”

“That’s okay. There’s plenty of other things we can talk about. Do you need anything? Does it hurt when you have a seizure like that?”

“No, I’m-- I’m fine,” Boyd said, pulling his legs up onto the seat of the chair and hugging them to his chest. “They’re uncomfortable, but they don’t hurt.”

“Well, I’m relieved to hear that,” Kapi said. “Because that looked painful to me. How often do things like that happen?”

“More often than I’d like,” Boyd said. The android hesitated before speaking again. “Do you really think you can fix me?”

“It won’t be easy,” Kapi said. “But I’ll try.”

Dr. Bara returned to the lab every day for a week, and Gyro tried to remain patient, but it was hard. Each evening the little man smiled at Gyro when they parted ways and cheerfully said “See you tomorrow!” with no indication of when this whole ordeal would be over.

Gyro was trying to be patient. 2BO’s problems were large and complex, and it was totally reasonable that it would take awhile to resolve them, especially for someone that possessed a lesser intellect than Gyro himself. But surely a week was pushing it, right? Dr. Bara was supposed to be the best.

Be tactful, Gyro said to himself. Ask if there’s any updates! Ask if he has a prognosis yet, he practiced in his head. What came out, instead, was:

“So how long is this going to take?”

Dr. Bara looked startled by the question, whether it was from Gyro’s tone or the choice of words, but the old rodent tucked his hands against his chest and looked up at Gyro with his beady little eyes.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Er, what I meant to say was, how much longer is this whole process going to take? You’ve already been at it for a week,” Gyro said, trying to phrase the question more gently.

“Oh, Dr. Gearloose, I understand that you want this to be over and done with,” Dr. Bara said in a conciliatory tone. “But Boyd’s problems are quite comprehensive. This isn’t something you fix in an afternoon by defragmenting a hard drive. It could take years to untangle all the individual triggers and correct them--”

“Years?!” As was often the case, Gyro felt the words leave him like an explosion, no consideration to what was said, just a rush of anger and whatever came to mind first. Usually the meanest thing he could think of. “Don’t you think that’s a bit excessive? I know that these days seniors are forced to keep working well into their twilight years to make ends meet, but that doesn’t mean you should try and take advantage of your clients like this!”

“E-excuse me?” Dr. Bara said, and his shameless innocent act was really ruffling Gyro’s feathers.

“Oh, don’t ‘Excuse me’,” Gyro said sharply. “Maybe you can pull this kind of crap with brainless corporate drones who hire you to work for big companies without an ounce of understanding of what it is you do, but I am a scientist, and I can’t be bamboozled so easily!”

“Are you implying that I’m working slowly on purpose in order to inflate my consultant’s fee?” Dr. Bara asked, moustache bristling.

“Oh! Oh! I’m so glad to see you’ve caught up to the conversation. Yes, that’s exactly what I’m implying,” Gyro replied. “Did you really expect somebody to keep contracting you for two thousand a day over a period of years?”

“No, of course not!”

“Yes, of course you-- Wait, what?” Gyro came to a screeching halt. “You don’t? You didn’t?”

“Very few people would be willing to pay that kind of money to fix a buggy system,” Dr. Bara spoke in a quick, agitated manner. “A company like McDuck Enterprises might have deep enough pockets to afford it, but your higher-ups are unlikely to see the value of such work, and I’m sure they would reject the funding request. I was going to give you my assessment today, and offer to continue treating Boyd for free.”

Gyro felt his anger and frustration mixing with his embarrassment, congealing into a foul soup somewhere inside him. It left him feeling sick and bent out of shape and still just as angry. He hated being wrong, even when it was just something minor like this. How could he have known that Dr. Bara was some kind of goody-goody altruist? Most of the world wasn’t like that, and to expect such benevolence was both foolish and naive. Gyro was neither of those things.

“But then I jumped down your throat before you could get to it. Alright, I’ll concede that I was being a bit hasty,” Gyro said, pinching the bridge of his beak. “I should clarify the cause of my misplaced outrage. You’re under the impression that this is a McDuck Enterprises’ project. It’s not.” It was as close to an apology as Gyro was willing to get.

“I’m paying your consultant’s fee out of my own pocket,” Gyro explained. “And I can’t really afford to pay you for more than two or three weeks of work. I was sort of hoping we’d be able to resolve this expediently.”

“I wish you’d told me that sooner, we could have avoided this entire misunderstanding,” Dr. Bara said, “I would never have charged that much per day if I’d known! A big company like McDuck Enterprises can afford to pay people what they’re worth, but it’s different if it’s coming from a private individual. Moving forward I won’t charge anything if you’d like me to continue working with Boyd.”

“Why?” Gyro asked, a little bewildered that the old man hadn’t already left thanks to Gyro’s abrasive personality. He could understand someone putting up with that if they were getting paid to do it, but for free?

“Because I want to help Boyd,” Dr. Bara said with such tooth-ache inducing earnestness Gyro was forced to assume he was being sincere. “And his specific situation interests me.”

That rationale made more sense to Gyro. Intellectual curiosity motivated much of his own behavior, and he could imagine it being the same for other scientists.

“Fine,” Gyro said. “Anyway… Do you really think it’s going to take years to make 2BO properly functional again? You weren’t inflating your estimate?”

“Dr. Gearloose, I’d never do something like that,” Dr. Bara said with a hint of indignation. “I was being entirely frank with you. These problems might never be resolved at all. I think we can hope to see improvement, perhaps even a marked one, but the glitches will never go away entirely.”

This was not the answer Gyro wanted to hear. While it was good to know that Dr. Bara thought 2BO might improve, the prospect of having to deal with the android glitching for the rest of his life was deeply disappointing. Gyro did not like accepting failure, especially not failure of this magnitude.

“Maybe it would be for the best if we just reset 2BO, wiped its memory, and let it start over,” Gyro said. “That would have the added benefit of erasing the mistakes I made by adding that insipid ‘real boy’ program. 2BO could finally reach its full--”

“No! That’s a terrible idea!” Dr. Bara cried.

Normally Dr. Bara seemed quite timid and non-confrontational, so the sudden change was shocking to Gyro, especially when the rodent got into his personal space and started crowding him.

“You might be able to remove the glitches if you did a total wipe and replaced all of his chemical memory fluid, but doing that would destroy the person he is right now, forever! You’d kill Boyd!” Dr. Bara said.

“You can’t kill something that isn’t alive, Dr. Bara!” Gyro snapped. “2BO is a machine, 2BO isn’t alive, 2BO isn’t a person! It’s a clever machine that has been programmed to act like a human child, but that’s all it is: programming!”

“Are we all not just programming? Ours is accidental, formed by all the things we experience, created by the chaos that is organic life. Theirs is planned, orderly, but also grown through organic systems like encoding DNA and crystal nucleation and aggregation,” Dr. Bara said, staring Gyro in the eyes in a way that made him distinctly uncomfortable.

“Flesh or metal, we’re all composed of electricity and chemicals,” Dr. Bara continued. “Are your emotions more valid than Boyd’s just because they’re triggered by hormones? How do you make the distinction? What scientific criteria do you use to determine the distinction? Boyd--”

“It’s name is 2BO, stop calling it Boyd!” Gyro shouted. The words left him in an angry gust that left him feeling hollowed out afterwards. He took a deep breath and a step away from Dr. Bara, uncomfortable with their closeness.

“...As I was saying, 2BO is a machine,” Gyro said. “I helped program it, I know what I built, and I know that it’s only operating within the parameters that I set down. It can’t be alive, it’s just… a very convincing simulation. So convincing that 2BO itself thinks it’s alive. So convincing that you think it’s alive.”

Dr. Bara didn’t look persuaded, and Gyro was frustrated by this sudden display of stubbornness. Why couldn’t the man continue to be easily cowed and deferential like before?

“I’ve been interviewing and testing Boyd all week, and I’m certain that you are wrong. I had my misgivings at first, of course. I wanted to be sure that I wasn’t dealing with a cleverly programmed mimic. I’ll give you a copy of all the data I’ve collected, and you can review it and see if you still believe that Boyd isn’t alive. You may have programmed and built a machine, but he’s been on his own for two decades, learning and growing. You built him to learn, didn’t you? He’s become more than what he started as. I’d bet my whole reputation on that.”

Gyro felt his feathers sticking up along his neck as his anger simmered. He crossed his arms over his chest.

“Fine, fine, I’ll look over your data this weekend, and I’ll talk to 2BO about it and let you know how I want to proceed next week.”

“You shouldn’t mention that you were thinking of erasing his memory,” Dr. Bara said sternly. “Not even in passing. It could do irreparable harm to your relationship.”

“2BO, we need to talk,” Gyro said, sitting down on the edge of his bed. 2BO looked up from the tablet he was reading and smiled.

“What is it, Dr. Gearloose?” 2BO asked.

“It’s about your glitching and about your treatment with Dr. Bara.”

“I like Dr. Bara,” 2BO said. “He really listens to me when I talk.”

“He’s a competent scientist, I suppose,” Gyro said, even though he wasn’t sure if he really believed that. He didn’t want to say anything negative about Dr. Bara now that 2BO had indicated that it liked the man.

“Yeah! He’s smart, and he’s nice to me, and he knows a lot about computer science--”

He can’t fix you, Gyro thought bitterly. No matter how nice he is, he can’t help you. How was he going to tell 2BO that?

“Sometimes he asks me really interesting questions about things I never thought about before--”

“Yeah?” Gyro said absently.

“And it was really fun when he asked me to do some drawings. He said they were good, even though I’ve never drawn anything--”

“2BO, Dr. Bara told me today that your glitching problem might be unfixable,” Gyro said, cutting the android off sharply. “He thinks we can make it better, but that there’s no way to truly repair the damage.”

“Oh,” 2BO said, enthusiasm vanishing instantly. “So… I’ll always be this way?”

You’ll always be broken, Gyro thought, and wondered if being broken would bother an intelligent machine or if being broken was something that only humans cared about.

“More or less. We do have another option though.”

“What’s that?” 2BO asked.

“We could reset you,” Gyro said. “Erase all of your memory and replace everything that can’t be fully erased. You could start over! You wouldn’t have to worry about glitching anymore or remembering things that… Upset you.”

2BO stared at Gyro and didn’t respond to what he had said at all. Gyro wasn’t even sure if Boyd had heard him.

“Doesn’t that sound like a good idea?” Gyro asked, trying to fill the silence and coax 2BO into responding and agreeing with him. “Wouldn’t that be better than having to worry about getting triggered and hurting someone?”

Boyd didn’t answer him.

“It would be better, right?” Gyro continued. “You could forget all about the things I taught you and the special programming I gave you, you could get rid of any other insidious hidden programs Dr. Akita left behind, you’d be… Safe, and you could move on and--”

“I wouldn’t know the things I know now,” 2BO said suddenly, interrupting Gyro’s rambling attempts to cajole him. “I wouldn’t remember Mr. Fenton, or Mr. Manny, or my friends in the Junior Woodchucks, or Doofus or Mr. and Mrs. Drake...I wouldn’t remember Huey. I’d forget everything about all of them.”

“You could make new memories!” Gyro said, trying to sound enthusiastic. “Would that be so bad? You’ve only known most of those people for a couple of months!”

“I’ve known you longer than that,” 2BO said. “I’d forget you.”

“We can start over too,” Gyro said. “We could become friends again!”

“It wouldn’t be the same,” 2BO said, getting to its feet, retrieving its tablet from the floor, and walking away. “You’re different now.”

“2BO, where are you going?” Gyro demanded, unnerved and unsettled by the shift from 2BO’s usual childish demeanor to something that seemed flat and emotionless in comparison.

“To my closet,” 2BO replied. “Goodnight, Dr. Gearloose.”

“Uh...Goodnight,” Gyro said, suddenly unsure if he’d be able to sleep at all now.

NEXT CHAPTER: THIS CONVERSATION CAN SERVE NO FURTHER PURPOSE, GOODBYE! Summary: Gyro searches all over Duckburg and can’t find Boyd anywhere. After exhausting all other options Gyro contacts Dr. Bara and explains that he did the one thing Dr. Bara told him not to do: tell Boyd that he wanted to erase the robot’s memory. Boyd enjoys a sunset.

#ducktales #ducktales fanfiction #gyro gearloose #b.o.y.d.#fenton crackshell cabrera #my art #fanfic #the first law of robotics

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thefloatingstone · 5 years ago

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We’ve gone from Self-Isolation to Quarantine and in some places to gradual relaxation phases, but that doesn’t stop the need for more nonsense you can watch on youtube while you wait for things to get back to normal. And recommending things and making lists are some of my favourite things to do but I have not yet figured out how to start or structure a video myself, you guys get another rambling tumblr post of things you can watch on youtube.

This time I’m once again just gonna recommend individual videos rather than full channels like I did in part 2.

Part 1

Part 2

In no particular order;

LOCAL58: The Broadcast Station that Manipulates You

I recently started watching the Nexpo channel when I went on a binge of creepy youtube videos. Most of his videos are really good although the ones where he himself goes into theory crafting can be a little asinine. However, this video is REALLY good. And before you get nervous, LOCAL58 is not a real TV station. LOCAL58 is a youtube channel created by the same guy behind the Candle Cove creepypasta. This video by Nexpo covers the various episodes of LOCAL58 and discusses them. Just be aware going in that this is abstract horror, and will probably get under your skin regardless if you’re unaffected by certain topics or not. although cw for suicide mention.

I also recommend most of the rest of this channel, although be careful where you tread. I don’t recommend his series “Disturbing things from around the internet” as it can sometimes include real life crime, abuse and such caught on security cameras. Everything else is really good tho. (although I was really annoyed by his 2 videos on KrainaGrzybowTV)

The Search for D.B. Cooper

LEMMiNO has a new video out covering one of the most unexplained crimes in the past century of the US. LEMMiNO is the guy I’ve recommended before who did videos on the Universal S. He is very down to earth and not someone prone to conspiracy or even really that fanciful of thinking. (He’s like the one person I feel covered the Dyaltov Pass incident and was confused by why this was even a mystery because if you read the Russian Autopsy reports and documents associated with the case it’s all pretty logical and easily explained)

D.B. Cooper is the name given to a man who, in 1971, hijacked an airplane with a bomb, asked for a large sum of money, and after receiving it, parachuted from the plane and was never seen or heard from again.

The Austrian Wine Poisoning | Down the Rabbit Hole

Down the Rabbit Hole also has a new video out, this time covering the Austrian Wine Poisoning event from 1985. A scandal that involved literally the entire country of Austria, affected multiple countries, and forever changed the way wine was made world wide. As someone who is generally pretty allergic to most artificial substances this one made me personally very angry. But luckily, it has a happy ending and a better world for us all... if I could drink wine which I can’t do anyway.

The Turbulent Tale of Yandere Dev - A Six Year Struggle

The Right Opinion is another channel I only recently subbed to after watching his cover on Onion Boy. I put off subbing to him simply because of his channel name and I thought it meant he would come across as smug and elitist. Luckily this seems to merely be one of those “I chose a bad channel name and now I’m stuck with it” type of situations. (IHE has a similar problem).

Anyway, I have a weird interest in bizarre internet personalities, so I’ve been enjoying his channel as he simply discusses and presents a timeline of events of certain individuals. In this video, he covers the developer behind the much maligned Yandere Simulator. It’s a tale of hubris, arrogance, immaturity, and an unwillingness to accept your own shortcomings due to ego.

Oh and there’s a meme game about Japanese school girls with anime tiddies in there as well.

The Most Relaxing Anime Ever Made | Yokohama Kaidashi Kikō

Kenny Lauderdale is a youtube channel which is slowly becoming bigger which I’m very happy to see. He exclusively covers anime and live action Japanese television no younger than the mid 90s (as is the case with YYK) and which usually never saw a release outside of Japanese Laserdisc. I do wish his videos were a little longer, but if nothing else his videos serve as an excellent starting to point to find some older and underappreciated shows... or hot garbage fires. In this episode he talks about the 2 OVA episodes made based on one of my favourite manga, Yokohama Shopping Log. A Post apocalyptic anime about an android who runs a coffee shop outside of her house, and the quiet solitude of living in a world of declining human population, brief encounters with travelers and other people, and just... existing. The anime was never released outside of Japan and is only available on Japanese VHS and laserdisc.... but hey guess what!! Somebody uploaded both episodes, subbed, to Youtube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2HCVOH6DtA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqSTwfkobME

YMS’ slow descent into madness as he uncovers just how bullshit the Kimba Conspiracy is

I’m linking a full playlist for this one.

YMS is busy planning his review on the “live action” Lion King remake as the original 1994 movie is probably his favourite movie all time (and also self declared what made him a furry). As part of the 2 hour review, he decided to what all 2000 hours of Kimba the White Lion just to mention how The Lion King potentially stole the idea. ....until he actually watched all 2000 hours of Kimba and realised that if you actually WATCH Kimba, it has VERY little to do with the Lion King at all apart from having the same animals in them because AFRICA. Watch as one man slowly loses his mind as he realises just how stupid this conspiracy theory is, just HOW DECEITFUL and straight up LYING people can be. People who write BOOKS. People who teach LAW AT UNIVERSITIES. Because NOBODY bothered to actually watch the entire show and just parroted the “Disney stole this” lie which got started by like 2 salty fans on the internet.

The man set out to just mention how Disney stole an idea, and uncovered one of the most infuriating rabbit holes on the internet. Screaming for SOMEONE to provide him with sources or evidence.

YMS will be publishing his full Kimba documentary this month which he has said is around 2 hours long before he continues to work on the Lion King one.

Science Stories: Loch Ness eDNA results, Poop Knives, and Skeleton Lovers

TREY the Explainer has a video giving us some updates in Archeology from 2019. In this video he discusses the findings of the eDNA results conducted on the Loch Ness to see what animal DNA the lake contains which will tell us what living animals currently inhabit the lake, ancient knives made of poop and if this is a real thing that could have existed, and a skeleton couple found buried together which were at first thought to be lovers, then revealed to be both male, and then how in this instance we cannot let our modern sensibilities dictate what we WANT this burial find to be, but to look at the evidence as presented to us and place in context finds of this nature. The worst thing an archaeologist can do is look for proof to a theory they already have.

The Bizarre Modern Reality of Sonic the Hedgehog

Super Eyepatch Wolf is back and he’s here to talk to us about the very very strange existence of Sonic. a 90s rebellious “too cool for School” answer to Mario, a lost idea as the world of video games changes and culture shifted, a meme and punching bag amplified by a unique fanbase and poor quality games, a transcendence into a horrific warped idea of what he once was, and modern day and where Sonic and his fans are now. As usual Super Eyepatch Wolf knocks it out of the park.

Kokoro Wish and the Birth of a Multiverse: A Lecture on the Work of Jennifer Diane Reitz

I don’t even sub to this channel as I’m not entirely sure what Ben’s usual content is about. But every now and then he has a “101″ class, where he explains to a room full of his friends in a classroom setting (complete with Whiteboard) an internet artist and oddity, the timeline, and what it is they have created. (wait... didn’t I say this already?). Unlike TRO however, the 101 classrooms are not a dark look into disturbed individuals (although the CWC 101 is debatable) nor is it a “lol look at this weirdo” dragging. Instead, of the 3 he’s done so far, it’s usually a rather sympathetic look at some of the strange artists on the internet who through some way or another, left a very big cultural impact on the internet space through their art. Sometimes they may not be the best people, but their work is so outside of what we’re used to seeing that just listening to him run you through these people’s internet history is fascinating.

In this episode he talks about Jennifer Diane Reitz. And although it is titled Kokoro Wish, the lecture is more about Jennifer’s larger work back in the early internet when being a weeb was unheard of, how being trans influenced her stories and characters, and her world building that is so rich and in-depth with it’s own ASTRO PHYSICS it puts any modern fictional world found in games or movies to shame.

Jennifer is not exactly a nice person... and in many ways can be seen as dangerously irresponsible, but she created something truly unique in a way that you kinda struggle figuring out if it’s terrible or a work of genius.

Anyway I think that’s enough for now

#Youtube #youtubers #recommendations #Self Isolation playlist #Long post #part 3 #videos #links

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oneshotprincess · 6 years ago

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Detroit become human AU!!!! Tododeku!!!

Sorry again for being late! Also I’m not very familiar with DBH, I’ve never played the game but someone else also asked for a Tododeku cyberpunk AU so I hope this general andrioid AU suffices for you both?

---

“They were very amused, you know,” are the words Midoriya greets him with as soon as Shouto pushes the door open. The hospital room is the same as any other—Shouto’s been to quite a few by now, interviewing witnesses. The only distinguishing feature is the array of gears and tools and oils lining the right side of the bed. And of course, Midoriya’s right arm, split open down the middle, exposing the wires inside.

“They were very amused,” Midoriya repeats again and Shouto drags his eyes away from the mess of tangled wires and metal. “Until they started talking to me. Then I’m not sure how they felt...I think they like me though.” He sounds very cheery.

Shouto snorts. “I’m sure they do,” he replies, throat dry. Because how could they not? How could they not be absolutely amazed by this android who somehow managed to have more humanity in him than many actual people Shouto knows?

The doctors were incredulous, then indignant, when Shouto insisted on getting a private room for a robot. Even throwing around the considerable weight of his family’s money almost hadn’t managed to get it done. But then the doctors met Midoriya. Meek, soft-spoken, inquisitive, eyes bright with something unmistakably human behind them.

They’d seen his point of view then.

(They’d still taken his money though.)

“How are you feeling?” Shouto asks softly, inching closer to the bed. It’s childish but he feels afraid, as if his mere presence alone could devastate Midoriya further. He can still see, in his mind’s eye, Midoriya throwing himself in front of Dabi to protect Shouto.

The first law of robotics says that a robot must never, through inaction, allow a human to come to harm. That could be what prompted Midoriya to do what he did...but Shouto knows better.

“I couldn’t let him hurt you,” is what Midoriya had said, voice feeble and quivering, body broken on the pavement. Midoriya simply isn’t something science can explain.

Shouto watches as Midoriya wriggles the fingers on his broken arm, the movements stilted and jerky in a way he usually never is. “I’m not sure,” he confesses. “It doesn’t hurt if that’s what you’re asking. I don’t think Father made me that way.”

He can’t help but frown at the mention of Midoriya’s ‘Father.’ Midoriya Hisashi, a brilliant scientist, a pioneer in engineering, and someone who had apparently disappeared off the face of the planet. His disappearance is the whole reason Shouto came to know Izuku at all. Wherever his ‘Father’ had disappeared off to, he made sure to wipe Izuku’s memory drives first. Except, somehow inexplicably, the wipe hadn’t been able to fully stick. Somehow, despite having no clear memories, Izuku remembered enough to seek out Shouto’s help.

He could have been a prosecutor, he thinks ruefully. He could have been the district attorney by now. Or he could have been a partner already at a big shot law firm. Instead he’s chasing the ghosts of mad inventors down alleyways with an android in tow.

Shouto thinks of what his own father must think of him now and his lips curl into a satisfied smile.

They haven’t made much headway in Hisashi’s case but, if nothing else, Dabi’s attack in the auto shop proves one thing: Midoriya Hisashi was into some shady shit. Not for the first time, Shouto has to wonder about this man, who’d been at the top of the tech world only to retire suddenly and turn into a recluse, ostensibly to work on creating an android that could completely pass as a person.

Not pass, Shouto hastily amends himself, as he gazes at Midoriya. The android’s rambling again, talking about the nurses and the mechanics he’s met and how interesting they all are and how he hopes he can see them more often. He’s not sure what the definition of human is currently, but Midoriya Izuku definitely qualifies.

Midoriya cuts himself off suddenly, blinking at Shouto, and that’s when he realizes that he’s been staring. Despite himself, he flushes and looks away.

“Are you okay?” Midoriya asks, sounding bewildered. “Todoroki-san?’”

Shouto bites his bottom lip for a fraction of a second and then, before he can’t think better of himself, blurts out, “Shouto!”

“Huh?”

“Shouto,” he repeats, voice dry. “Please call me Shouto. You saved my life. I think this much familiarity is warranted, don’t you?”

“O—oh,” he still looks stunned but then a bright smile overtakes his face. Shouto’s chest feels tight. “Well, in that case, you should call me Izuku!” And then he sticks out his left hand awkwardly.

Shouto blinks in surprise. It hadn’t even occurred to him that Midoriya would have a first name. Technically, he knew: Mi-do-ri-ya I-zu-ku. But the fact that he'd give his first name the same weight of familiarity that Shouto does, he hadn't considered that. The realization makes him feel strangely ashamed. Gingerly, he grabs Midoriya—Izuku’s—left hand. The wrong hand but given the state of his right one, Shouto can hardly blame him. And again, before he can stop himself, he strokes his thumb along Izuku’s wrist. He feels warm, real, but if you lingered just a little bit too long you could tell that the skin was too smooth, that were no veins underneath.

Shouto doesn’t care. He’s spent a long, long time feeling like he wasn’t human. That he doesn’t belong. That he shouldn’t have been born. It’s strange and ridiculous but in these past two weeks, he’s felt more alive than he’s ever done before, holed up in his dingy office as a means to escape his father. And it’s all thanks to him.

“Izuku,” Shouto says and smiles.

#bnha #tododeku #todomido #todoizu #tododeku au #tddk #tddk fic #todoroki shouto #midoriya izuku #android au #bnha fic #bnha au #my fics #bnha prompts

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autisticandroids · 5 years ago

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1,4,29,39

1. “who’s your celebrity crush?”

i don’t really have one? celebrity fandom in general is not my scene. I guess i would say that michelle yeoh is talented and sexy in everything. like, i know nothing about her as a person but i enjoy watching her act and i think she’s really attractive, so..... michelle yeoh?

4. “ do you think its ok to separate the artist from the art?“

yeah. this is a weird, complicated question, but broadly yeah. i think the context of art should probably be acknowledged, but that goes way beyond who made it. it includes things like what kind of society was it made in, who was it made for, what was it influenced by, what impact did it have. and i also think it’s not immoral to ignore any of those things. i think good analysis - good as in skillful, not good as in morally correct - should take them into account, even if all “taking them into account” means is acknowledging that one is intentionally recontextualizing the work, or ignoring something about its context. an analysis of art that completely ignores broader context is more likely to be a poor analysis, especially if there is significant space of time and culture between the creation of the art and the analysis being done.

however, because this is tumblr, i think the question being asked here is more along the lines of “is it wrong to enjoy hp lovecraft’s work even though he was a racist” or “is it wrong to like harry potter even though jkr has turned out to be a terf” and the answer to those questions is “no.” like it’s pretty categorically “no.” if you’re concerned about this, and the original creator is still alive, you can take steps to keep your money from going to them, but their art doesn’t have cooties on it. it probably has some of their bigoted ideas but like. most, nay, all art carries within it bigoted ideas. art was made in the context of society and society is bigoted. there is probably bigotry that we don’t understand in those 30,000 year old cave paintings in france.

29. “ what quote or inspirational setting do you think is bs?”

i find this question kind of confusing. but i’m also not really one for inspirational quotes. i think a lot of them are pretty sounding nonsense, and a lot of others are true but mainly useless platitudes. but i’m also not generally the target audience for things like inspirational quotes; i’m very much a glass half empty type and we’re not big on inspiration, in general.

i guess one that i used to see every day on a poster at my high school that always struck me as wise, but then i thought about it and i decided it wasn’t, was that einstein quote. madness is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result, or something like that. because when i thought about it, well. have you ever tried to open a jar, and then handed it to someone else, and they got it first try? i do this all the time, both as the hander and the handee. it works because the first person genuinely does manage to loosen the jar, but not before they tire out their hands too much to get it all the way. the correct solution to the jar problem IS in fact to try the same thing over and over until it works, because every attempt loosens it just a little bit. that’s what i always think of when i see that quote.

39. “describe your aesthetic”

oh man. oh no. this is actually quite hard, y’know. my personal aesthetic? the aesthetic of things i like to look at? how i wish i could dress, sans bodily constraints? what i wish my house looked like? what i wish my life story looked like? the kinds of stories i like to read?

i guess i’ll give you a list of things i like in a very aesthetic way, that reveal a few of my disconnected aesthetic sensibilities.

coloring books where you can color in complex, retrofuturistic cityscapes devoid of inhabitants

Alice (1988) dir. Jan Švankmajer

stories with a lot of intrigue and diplomacy

the like, sexy overalls romper outfit that the android girl wears in star trek tos “what are little girls made of?”

a floor length wine red dress that i own that looks like a ballgown and makes me look like a fancy heiress, but is actually made of t-shirt fabric, so it’s so soft that i’ve slept in it before, and so stretchy that i could theoretically use it as a tent.

stories where some sort of murder or attempted murder is used as a subtext proxy for being gay

the romulan uniforms in star trek tng

the experience of watching lost before they started ever trying to (poorly) explain the mysteries

The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars (1972)

oldtimey stories about “scientists” who are actually just rich guys who do experiments in their attic, which is actually all a scientist really WAS at the time, going Too Far and blaspheming against god. even better if their punishment doesn’t stick and they don’t stop

the part in tinker tailor soldier spy where ann says “i cough when there are things i can’t say,” or rather the fact that she says it

stories about absolute, poisonous obsession

my memory of being seven years old watching the scene in the fellowship of the ring where galadriel almost takes the ring, where instead of just going all green and her hair blowing around, galadriel’s face becomes an empty white china masquerade mask, and her body turns to living, swirling ribbons in a whirlwind twelve feet tall

the little doll i made out of my night vale angels headcanon when i was sixteen, and the drawing i based it on

the mere concept of alia, from dune

the bits inside the witches, from madoka magica, where the animation gets all fucked up and stop motiony

stories about absolute loyalty and devotion, whether that’s to a person or a belief system

like everything visual about Mirrormask but especially this scene

the whole like, old fashioned cold war style underground bunkers where science goes too far aesthetic that scp wiki has going on

the first episode or maybe two of this anime, but none of the subsequent episodes, which all suck shit tragically

abandoned buildings, and the impression that if one were to go deep enough into one, one would find a secret inside, like a portal to another world, or a very nonhuman inhabitant

this is a list of some things. i guess

#peace-punch-captainhunch #asks

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antimatterpod · 5 years ago

Text

Transcript - 47. Pride And Prejudice In the Original Romulan

If you found the audio on this ep a little painful (and I don’t blame you at all, so did I!), here is the transcript!

Liz: Welcome to Antimatter Pod, a Star Trek podcast where we discuss fashion, feminism, subtext and subspace, hosted by Anika and Liz. Today we're going to TRY to talk about the TOS novel My Enemy, My Ally -- but it's raining at both of our houses, and we both have internet that drops out in the rain. So…

Anika: [laughs]

Liz: This is our second go at recording the opening. [laughs] And it's really bucketing down out there!

Anika: We bring the drama.

Liz: We do! We do. Anyway, I am so glad that I finally read this classic tie-in novel, because I had such a good time.

Anika: It's a lot of fun. I have long loved these books. I have a great deal of affection for the Rihannsu novels, and the characters within them. I don't think I've ever actually sat down and read the whole book in a really long time. So I noticed a lot of things that I don't remember when I'm thinking about the book. These aren't the things that I remember, or think on fondly when I go back and read my favourite passages and things. Those, I know practically by heart, but there was a lot that I just sort of glossed over.

Liz: I have been hearing or reading about these books for almost as long as I've been in Star Trek fandom. And I never read them before, because I knew that Duane's worldbuilding for the Romulans was so different from what we ultimately got.

And yes, there's a lot of stuff that's really outdated, and no longer current, and I laughed out loud at the bit where the Starfleet intelligence report is like, "There have been a lot of assassinations happening in the Romulan Senate!" And everyone's like, "That's not like the Romulans! That's so weird!" Guys, it's Tuesday, there's an assassination.

But I was so impressed by how well it still fits with -- and I think Picard actually has a lot to do with that, because it's added so many layers of nuance and details to Romulan culture that Duane's ideas can just slip neatly in.

Anika: Right. Yes. especially when -- whenever Ael talked or thought about the Klingons, she is so anti-Klingon, and it was sort of hilarious, because everything that she said about the Klingons was sort of what the TNG Romulans do.

Liz: Yeah!

Anika: And everything that she believes in about the Romulans is pretty much TNG Klingons.

Liz: Right!

Anika: And so it was this weird, you know -- and so this book came out in 1984, and the movie, Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, which was really the first time we saw modern Klingons. -- was in Star Trek III.

Liz: And they were not particularly honourable.

Anika: But they did have -- like, Valkris? Something like that. She has a V-kris name. At the very beginning of Star Trek III, she does the whole little, "I have to die, now, for honour" Klingon thing. That was new.

Liz: Oh, you're right! It's been so long since I saw that.

Anika: So I feel like [Duane] was writing about these Romulans while they were writing about those Klingons, and they decided to move in that direction. Because, you know, like, five years later, I guess? Maybe three years later, Next Generation came out. I'm sure they were already writing Next Generation. So--

Liz: They actually weren't! Planning for Next Gen was going on really, really late in 1986.

Anika: Really!

Liz: Yeah, listening to the podcast The Trek Files, they go through a lot of the early Next Gen planning documents, and it's actually a little scary how close to the release for "Encounter at Farpoint" they're still working out things like, "Should there be a doctor?" and "Maybe we should cast someone as the android?"

Anika: Maybe.

Liz: It gives me a lot of secondhand stress. [laughs]

Anika: That's funny. Although, looking at the beginnings of Next Generation, I believe it.

Liz: Oh yeah, absolutely. It explains a lot. But yeah, it's interesting that Duane kept going with these books -- and was allowed to keep going with these books -- even after Next Gen started up and basically -- I think the term in fandom is still "jossed"? For Joss Whedon? Jossed all of her ideas about Romulans. And I just think it's really wonderful that Star Trek: Picard has started restoring some of these ideas.

And some of them are quite different, you know, Romulans have three names (including a secret name), not four. But the seeds are there. And I believe I read somewhere that Chabon actually considered using the Rihannsu language that Duane created, but it was decided that it was too different from everything else we've seen of Romulan language on screen.

Anika: Interesting.

Liz: I just wanna point out, species can have more than one language. Just putting that out there.

Anika: What? Are you sure?

Liz: I know. I know. I've heard it's possible.

Anika: I don't think that's true.

Liz: I hear there are people on Earth right now who don't speak English.

Anika: [laughing] I'm sorry, just the idea that that would be shocking to anyone? Is a little scary.

Liz: I know.

Anika: But we can say that they were dialects, even. It doesn't even have to be a different language. But one of the things I really love about these books is that at least five percent of the book is in Romulan, and she puts in no effort of translating it. She just expects you to be able to understand what's going on based on the rest of it. I've always appreciated that.

Liz: See, that kind of annoyed me. Because, like, I have no problem with subtitles, and I'm not one of those people who was complaining about all the subtitled Klingon in early Discovery. But here, I'm like, IT'S A BOOK! I DON'T NEED TO READ THESE FAKE WORDS! But when they start talking about, um, mmmmnesssahiiii… [Transcriber's note: the word is "mnhei’sahe". Good luck.]

Anika: Yeah, I know. My second point is, I can't pronounce any of it.

Liz: No!

Anika: I read The Romulan Way first.

Liz: Oh, I think you've said that before, yes. That's the one set on Romulus, with the spy?

Anika: Yes. I was not reading Star Trek novels in 1984. But I read The Romulan Way, and then I went backwards for My Enemy, My Ally, because Ael is in The Romulan Way, and she's amazing. And she's, like, a superhero that shows up at the end, so I was like, I need to know the story of that. So I went back to it. But at the back of The Romulan Way, there's a glossary of Romulan words. It's only three pages long. It's nothing like the Klingon-English dictionary. And I am still, to this day, angry that I can't learn Romulan the way I could learn Klingon. Like, you can learn Klingon in Duolingo.

Liz: You can! It's outrageous.

Anika: But no one's ever taken the time to do that for Romulan, and I'm just annoyed, because that's the -- since I was a small child, that's the language I've wanted to speak.

Liz: It sounds like they have put in the work of creating a conlang for Romulan now, with Picard, so maybe you can learn that? But it won't be Duane's Rihannsu.

Anika: But it'll be at least something. I would love for someone to take the time and translate a novel into Romulan, or something. Like Jane Austen. If the Klingons get Shakespear--

Liz: The Romulans get Austen.

Anika: Yeah.

Liz: I feel like the Romulans would rather have John LeCarre. But no, they're getting Austen and they're going to like it.

Anika: Pride And Prejudice in the original Romulan is something I desperately want to read.

Liz: "It is a truth universally acknowledged that a subcommander in possession of a great fortune must be in want of a…" yeah. Anyway. I'm gonna have to take some time to think about how this translates.

I wasn't so keen on the passages of Romulan, but I liked the Romulan words and concepts that we were introduced to, and I like that now we have -- like, Duane gives us names of Romulan animals? And the significance that they attach to names, names of ships and names of people, I really groove on that sort of thing. And Ael's idea that the name of the Enterprise is very unlucky because it's such a big, powerful concept.

Anika: Sounds accurate. And it also makes me think about the Enterprise. Like, obviously -- when I was a kid, watching Next Generation, watching The Original Series, watching the one with the whales -- you know, it's exciting that they get the Enterprise back in the end, right? It's a big deal, and the Enterprise is obviously the best ship in the fleet. Because it's the Enterprise, and these are the stories of the people who are on it!

But, if I think about the name, I hate it! It's so capitalist. It's so military. It's so American, and I just -- I hate it!

Liz: It really is. I say this with all due love and respect. And I know it was a British Navy ship first, but come on.

Anika: So, yeah, that's how I feel about it. So I appreciate that she makes me think about these things.

Liz: Yeah, I really love her take on it. And it makes me like the name of the Enterprise, too. I think, you know, Discovery and Voyager are much more positive and less iconic names, and even Defiant -- you know, that's a big concept, and it's not so positive as "discovery" or "voyaging", but it's necessary to what the Defiant was built for.

Anika: And I like that, in Discovery and in Picard, they have actually named some ships with non-English words and concepts and people. They're taking those tiny baby steps towards making it a little less--

Liz: I know! For all that I've dunked on Chabon throughout our podcast, he made a deliberate choice to name starships after non-western explorers, and I really, really love that. Still all men, but, you know, we'll get there.

Anika: Baby steps!

Liz: My thing in fic is that I always name starships after women of science or science fiction. So when I am in charge of Star Trek, it will be a much better show. I promise.

I just wanna say how much I love Ael as a character.

Anika: Absolutely.

Liz: She's basically the perfect character for me -- she's not quite cranky enough, although she puts on a good facade of it early in the book, when she's deceiving the crew she's about to sacrifice. But she's -- I like characters who are old enough to have a past, and young enough to have a future. And she's perfect [for me]! She has her ship, she has her crew, she has her adult son, who serves underneath her as her first office. It's really wonderful. And I read that Duane created her as a woman who could sort of match Kirk at his own game, but in doing so, she created a wonderful character in her own right.

Anika: I had to write this one sentence down. It's on page 93, when Ael beams onto the ship, onto the Enterprise, and so our Enterprise crew first see her. I underlined the sentence that I'm going to read, and then I wrote in the margins, "So that's why I fell so hard and so immediately for Admiral Kat."

Liz: [laughs] Yes?

Anika: And this is the sentence: "She carried herself like a banner or a weapon, like something proud and dangerous, but momentarily at rest."

Liz: Yes! And I think she and Kat have a lot in common, because Ael is so pragmatic, and so ruthless in how she abandons the crew of the Cuirass to their own destruction -- which she has set up for them! And these were not particularly good people, they intended to betray her, but she still feels that twinge of regret, because this is her honour that she is destroying. And then she does it anyway. And I love that in a character. I love characters who are -- particularly women -- who are capable of terrible things, but know what they have done.

Anika: Right. And, as you said, that she's old enough to have a past, and young enough to have a future. I think that that has that same -- and so I was like -- again, I read these books young. And so I really looked up to Ael as a role model, you know? I really was drawn to that. The character in The Romulan Way, the main character, is the character that I would want to be, and then she looked up to Ael. So it was like this whole thing.

So, going back and, again, reading it -- and really reading it, this time, not just skimming and skipping to my favourite parts, but really taking the time to read each passage -- there was just so much of things that I love about Star Trek and other mediums, and other fandoms, that were in this book. And it's like, oh, it formed -- it informed the future me, when I was reading it as a small girl. Because I was inspired by those things, and then I went looking for more of that.

Liz: It's just the most wonderful piece of space opera, with empires attempting to push and shift the balance of power, and individuals working for the betterment of the community, the galactic community as a whole. I love that! And at one point, I was like, the worldbuilding in this story is so rich, and the plot itself is so interesting, this didn't need to be a tie-in. This could be an original piece of work. But, at the same time, would we still be talking about it if this "original novel" had been published in 1984? Like, there is a lot of great science fiction written by women in the '80s, which is just straight forgotten.

Anika: Right. I agree.

Liz: That's not to say that's okay, you know, I think there's a lot of joy to be had in rediscovering that stuff, like Vonda McIntyre's original work, but--

Anika: And I also don't think it cheapens her worldbuilding and the effort that she clearly put in to make fifty original characters for this book--

Liz: Fifty! Did you count?

Anika: I didn't count them.

Liz: Okay.

Anika: I'm just saying, I started naming them, and there are people that are just -- and they reoccur in all of her other novels. Which is great. I looked up -- because Lia Burke, the nurse, I was like, is Lia Burke a "real character", quote-unquote, or is she only in these books? Because I couldn't tell. I really, firmly believed that she was a member of the Enterprise [crew] in The Original Series, or my guess was that she was introduced in the animated series. And since I'm never going to watch the animated series, I wouldn't know. So I looked it up, and no, she was introduced in The Wounded Sky, Duane's first book.

Liz: Huh!

Anika: But she appears in all of them, and is such a rich character, even with her two scenes and her four lines. But I know exactly who she is.

Liz: She is such a rich character that I almost looked at her -- and you know I really hate the concept of the Mary Sue, but I looked at her and went, "Are you maybe TOO RICH to be a supporting character? You need to have your own series, love, you need to step out of the Star Trek universe and into your own thing. Because you are taking over."

And I think that's a really difficult line to walk with tie-in fiction, because you need to deepen the universe with original characters, and they need to be GOOD original characters, they need to be complicated and interesting. But at the same time, they're not what the audience is there for.

Anika: Right. But I think she's amazing, and the way that [Duane] makes this rich supporting cast, and I firmly believe that they're a part of the Enterprise.

Liz: Yes. Even the Horta officer, Ensign Naraht--

Anika: I love him!

Liz: He's so great! Kirk keeps comparing him to a pan pizza, and I'm like, (a) he is clearly a deep dish; (b) that's pretty racist, mate.

Anika: [laughs] PRETTY racist? He's saying that he looks edible!

Liz: Yes!

Anika: That's a problem!

Liz: And then TrekCore, yesterday, posted the stills from Discovery showing the Horta in the background of Lorca's chamber of horrors, and I'm like, was Lorca going to eat the Horta???

Anika: But speaking of racism--

Liz: I just want to say, like Duane's original characters always encompass non-humanoid Starfleet officers. And it's so great. I find it really distracting because, like, I've seen what the ship looks like, and I know that it doesn't accommodate these people? But at the same time, what she is doing is really good, and that I personally find it distracting is not actually a point of failure on Duane's part.

Anika: I get confused trying to imagine -- like, she describes them, and I just cannot. I need someone to draw me fan art, or something, so I get it.

Liz: I agree. Because, like, the three Denebian races, and one of them has tentacles -- I lost track of all of them, but I love them. What were you going to say about racism?

Anika: I was just going to say, I find it interesting that there are a few times where our human characters, Kirk, Uhura, etc -- even Spock, I think -- will start saying something anti-Romulan, and then stop themselves and apologise to whichever Romulan they were interacting with. And the Romulan's like, "No, no, no, it's okay." And in -- I don't think Ael ever does it, but in her inner monologue, she sometimes will think about -- she has a whole couple of paragraphs about how she thought the Vulcans were one thing, but it turns out they're not. So it's like there's this whole, interesting "confronting racism" part.

Liz: Yeah, there's a bit where she enters the rec room, and looks around at the relatively diverse Enterprise crew and goes, "This should be horrifying me maybe more than it is? Am I … a bad Romulan?"

Anika: But then -- and I only wrote this one down, and, again, it's an old book, and we are all still grappling with racism and cultural appropriation and PC language, or whatever. But on page 135, it says, "What would you call Shanghaiing the Intrepid?" And again, I wrote in my margins, "I would call it racism!" Because, what the hell are you doing in saying that in the 22nd century -- whatever century it's supposed to be.

Liz: Years and years ago, I used the term "shanghai" to mean, you know, kidnap someone and press them into service. And my friend Stephanie, who is Chinese-Malaysian, was like, "Um, Elizabeth?" She has this particular tone. And I apologised, but internally, I was really defensive about it, you know, [Well Actually voice] "That was a BRITISH term, and it was referring to stealing English people and taking them to serve in Shanghai, and blah, blah, blah, blah." But then it just dropped out of my vocabulary, and I haven't really felt the loss, to be honest. Like, you can say "pressed into service" if you need it. And so, yeah, that jumped out at me, too, it's such an archaic term, and something which has taken on a meaning that it did not originally have.

Anika: Right. And that's the thing, language is constantly changing.

Liz: And I noticed Duane uses the archaic M-Z spelling for "Mz" for Uhura and the other female officers.

Anika: Yes!

Liz: Which is great! Like, I love that artefact of 1984.

Anika: There's a lot in this book. There's a lot more than we could possibly talk about. There's the part where she's thinking, you know, "The Federation doesn't understand that they have so much more than we do, and so we're hostile because we want what they have -- but they're so rich, and that's just the way they've always been, so they don't know." And I was like, oh, look at that.

There are so many of these things that we're talking about now, you know, in Picard and in Discovery. And I love that it was in this novel, that it was -- "I'm going to bring this up, and the Romulans aren't going to be just cookie cutter 'other' who we have to fight, but there are reasons for the ways that they are."

Liz: It made me think, this is not incompatible with what we see of Romulans in the Next Gen era. Not wholly. Because Ael is very much a character who looks to a glorious and honourable past, and is sort of only dimly aware of how corrupt the present is. And that makes me think of the Klingons, who are also always talking about their great, honourable, glorious past, and, the Klingon Empire, make it great again! And, really, they also have this terrible cultural rot that's destroying them from the inside out.

Whereas the Federation -- particularly humanity -- we look at our past and go, "Wow, that is messed up. Oh God, we have failed so badly, we need to do so much better!" And I feel like these different attitudes are why the Federation -- part of why the Federation is more flexible and more dynamic than the Romulans and the Klingons. It's not looking towards this imaginary nostalgic past.

And that got me thinking about, you know, make America great again, and contemporary politics, and conservative nostalgia for the 1950s.

Anika: That never actually existed! I did a paper on this!

Liz: Right! And I'm sure that Ael's great, honourable empire never really existed either. But she herself is an honourable person. Mnhei’sahe…

Anika: Meh-nehs-eye. That's how I say it.

Liz: Mnhei’sahe! Mnhei’sahe. That makes it sound like a real word.

Anika: I don't know if that's right.

Liz: This complicated concept that is not quite honour, and not quite loyalty, and it's not quite brotherhood -- there's a whole vaguely sexist conversation about 'brotherhood'. But it's that sense of owing something to your family and to your people and to your culture, and they, in turn, owe you the same.

I think, because Ael believes in mnhei’sahe so firmly, she has a bit of a rosy-eyed view of the past. But we've met other Romulans in TNG who had mnhei’sahe.

Anika: Yeah. "The Defector".

Liz: Not just that, but the guy that Geordi meets down on the planet…

Anika: "The Enemy".

Liz: Yeah! They have very different values, but they come to respect each other, and that particular Romulan comes to recognise that Geordie has mnhei’sahe. Aside from treating assassination as an aberration rather than a hobby, I really do think that this is consistent with Romulan culture as we know it.

Anika: Yes, I think it is, too. Especially because Ael is a very -- she has a very strong point of view. So she's saying, "This is wrong, and this is the way it should be, and our new Romulans are doing this." So if you imagine that the 'new Romulans' win, then they're the ones who are doing all the shenanigans and nonsense in The Next Generation, as opposed to the ones who are still clinging to that idea of honour.

Liz: I have this fairly elaborate headcanon about the Romulans, and how they sort of almost withdraw into their own space -- aside from bombing the Khitomer outpost -- after the Federation makes peace with the Klingons. And then they emerge at the end of season 1 of Next Gen.

And when they emerge, they're a lot more physically uniform, they're a lot more -- you know, they all have the bowl cut, they all have the shoulder pads. Their society has changed. And they're less diverse in their personal presentation than they were in the previous century. And I think we can argue -- especially after Picard, and the great diversity that's exploded in the wake of the destruction of Romulus -- that this was a deliberate thing, that their culture became more oppressive than it had been in the past.

Anika: I can absolutely believe that. And it became an authoritarian version of their empire.

Liz: Yeah, I'm sure that it was never a democracy, but it seems like most Romulans maybe had more personal freedom in the 23rd century.

Anika: Okay, at one point the chief linguists officer starts randomly reciting a Roman poem in the middle of the briefing?

Liz: Right!

Anika: [laughs] Which is hilarious, and I was like, okay, this is a little too on the nose for me.

Liz: So on the nose.

Anika: You know, like, wink, wink, not really into it. But--

Liz: Especially when Duane has been separating the Rihannsu from the Roman-inspired Romulans.

Anika: Right. But, obviously, the fact that they have their praetor and their senate -- they are very based on Rome. And the Roman Empire.

Liz: There was a concept in Rome called 'romanitas', and it's basically mnhei’sahe. It's loyalty to the state, and it's personal honour, and it's being a responsible member of your family, and what you owe to your patron, or what you owe to your clients if you are the patron. Or the paterfamilias. It's all of that. It's mnhei’sahe.

Anika: Okay, so we are in the year 2020, right?

Liz: Allegedly. Time has no meaning where I am, but yes.

Anika: Well, I'm just saying that that means that within -- 2000 years ago, the Roman Empire still existed. Right?

Liz: Yes.

Anika: Here on good old Earth. But we have moved -- we still have politics, and we still learn algebra, and we still look at philosophy in a very Graeco-Roman way. Okay?

Liz: We still post, "Today I baked bread", we just post it on Instagram instead of carving it into a wall.

Anika: But we also have changed. We've evolved from Roman times. Right? Would you say that we've evolved from Roman times?

Liz: Yeah, absolutely.

Anika: All right. According to this book--

Liz: [laughs]

Anika: --the Romulan Empire has stayed the same as ancient Rome for more than 5000 years. And, like, the Vulcans were also ancient Romans 5000 years ago.

Liz: Yes.

Anika: And I'm just, like, no.

Liz: It's like this thing in a lot of fantasy and science fiction where the timescales are just massively inflated. George R R Martin does it all the time, and it drives me crazy!

Anika: [laughing] That is not how that works!

Liz: No.

Anika: No way.

Liz: It is absolutely not, but it's one of those things where I look at it and go, you're a trope. You annoy me. But fine, we'll live with it.

Anika: See, it really bothers me. Because I can't just handwave that. I can't just be, like, sure. Because it's like, no. The whole plot is based on this whole, we're gonna steal Vulcan brain matter, and we're gonna graft it into Romulan brains, and then the Romulans are gonna have Vulcan powers. Right? That's the whole plot.

Liz: But also, there's going to be this massive super brain that can control and paralyse Vulcans.

Anika: That's one of the things that I skim over. I just even go to the massive brain part.

Liz: [laughs] It was just so gross that I really liked it! It made me think of the brain room in Harry Potter?

Anika: Ew. But yes, okay, I see that.

Liz: Also not a highlight of that series.

Anika: Vulcans and Romulans had space travel 5000 years ago. And then they split up. And the Romulans decided to not evolve from that point on. Meanwhile, the Vulcans grew brain powers. Like -- no! Just no.

Liz: I always assumed that there was some sort of genetic drift, and maybe the genetic predisposition in the people who left and became Romulans meant that those genes just fell dormant and were eventually bred out. Because 5000 years is a really long time.

Anika: Is a really long time! I can believe the dormancy of the Romulans. I cannot believe that the Vulcans -- that part doesn't happen.

Liz: Yeah, I don't believe that they developed that -- no. No.

Anika: I think it's more likely that all of them had the brain powers 5000 years ago, in Roman times, when they had space travel. And they split off, and what happened is that all the Romulans who were, like, the best brain powered Romulans were all murdered by the other Romulans, because that's what Spock says would happen.

Liz: Right.

Anika: So, sure.

Liz: Also, I wonder, if they left and found their own home planet before they had faster than light technology, if the -- the limitations of a very long journey under those circumstances are part of what made Romulan culture so pragmatic and ruthless in its treatment of the disabled, for example. Because I know, in "The Enemy", the Romulan with all the mnhei’sahe is like, "Oh, if a baby was born blind on Romulus, we'd just kill it!" And Geordie's like--

Anika: "Yikes."

Liz: --"What the hell, man, that's not cool."

Anika: "Super yikes!"

Liz: Yeah. Mate. But, from a worldbuilding perspective, it would make sense if they developed that attitude in space.

Anika: I agree. While we're on this subject, in that part where Spock says, you know, "Oh my gosh, if Romulans had Vulcan mind powers, it would be armageddon." Which is also, like, okay. But--

Liz: I feel like his biases are showing.

Anika: But that paragraph is very interesting to me from, you know -- my note here is, "Not to make everything about the Jedi, but…"

Liz: [laughs]

Anika: Spock basically describes Jedi mind tricks in that paragraph, and says that they're evil. And I would just like to put that out there into the ether.

Liz: See, this makes me want to hit Diane up on Tumblr and go, "So, do you have any particular opinions about Star Wars? Did you have any particular opinions about Star Wars in 1984 that you would like to share with the class?

Anika: It was just really funny to me.

Liz: I really do like the idea of Romulans attempting to graft and weaponise Vulcan telepathy. I think that's brilliant.

Anika: It is brilliant! It's great. And I have to appreciate that Kirk has the thought that, if the Federation got its hands on that, it would absolutely be the same problem. Like, he is self-aware enough to realise that it would be just as bad in the Federation as it would be for the Romulans or the Klingons to have it. Yes, the Vulcans are the only ones we can trust with this, which -- I don't trust all the Vulcans, but--

Liz: We know from Next Gen and "Gambit" that even Vulcans can't always be trusted with psychic weapons. But, okay, go off. Yep.

Anika: So what did you think of the characterisation of our main crew?

Liz: I really enjoyed Duane's take on McCoy. He felt so McCoy-like, but also, he's, like, secretly -- not a chess champion, but a highly ranked player? He just likes watching the game, it's a spectator sport. I really liked that, and I really liked the bit where he starts ranting at Ael, and everyone's like, oh yeah, this means he likes you, this means you're one of his people now.

Anika: Yes. McCoy, I think, is the strongest.

Liz: I quite liked her Kirk? We were saying in Discord, you know, no drawing of Kirk ever looks the same, and no drawing of Kirk ever looks like William Shatner? He's basically a cryptid. And that's sort of how I feel about his characterisation -- well, everywhere. Because he fits so many archetypes, and some of them are mutually exclusive. But I liked the direction that Duane took him in here. I felt like he was a very likable character, and he was a great foil for Ael … or maybe the other way around, apparently he's the main character, I don't know.

Anika: No.

Liz: But a fundamentally decent man, who respects and enjoys getting to know one of his most honourable enemies. That's great!

Anika: I like that they have a pre-rivalry. They know who each other is before this book, before they meet in person. And respect each other.

Liz: Yes. Yes. They know that they're equals, and they like that, but in certain situations they would not hesitate to kill each other. And I love the bit where Ael is listing the ships that have been sent into the Neutral Zone. And there's the Intrepid, and the other one, and the other one -- and then, "worst of all, the Enterprise." Just great.

And Spock … I don't think it was a bad characterisation of Spock, but, as much as I liked the mindmeld scene where he enters Ael's mind and sees that she is telling the truth, or at least, what she believes to be the truth -- I felt like, giving his connection with her niece, the Romulan Commander of "The Enterprise Incident", there should have been some more discussion of that?

Anika: Especially because it's eventually an important plot point.

Liz: Right! And that sort of came out of nowhere, and it wasn't clear to me whether he even knew that she had this connection to the unnamed Commander. But I loved that she was the Commander's aunt, and the Commander had been her heir, and that her son, Tafv, ultimately betrays her because he is so angry that the Romulan Commander was stripped of her identity and made an unperson and exiled.

Anika: Yes. You can imagine that I love everything about that relationship.

Liz: Yes?

Anika: I am so -- like, I can't be angry with Tafv, because I'm like--

Liz: Oh, I can!

Anika: --that is a really good motivation, and I am 100% on board with it, and I just want all of -- like, I want to see them as young Narek and Narissa types. In their version of Romulus.

Liz: We'll get to that.

Anika: I love it.

Liz: I have something to say about that. I loved that he wanted to take the Enterprise, and that he wanted to get revenge on Kirk and Spock for what they did to his cousin. But I was furious that he was also betraying his mother, and that he also wanted to see her executed. Like, you little shit! She did her best!

Anika: [laughs] Yes, but it was all the same feeling, where he chose his cousin over his mother. He chose one family over the other. And it was -- but before we move off of -- because I want to go into all of that, but before we move off of characterisation, I just want to say that I've never really liked Duane's version of Spock. I don't dislike it, like, I'm not saying it's bad, it's just that her Spock is not my Spock.

Liz: No, and I think that's fair.

Anika: And that's okay.

Liz: I don't think it's bad, but he's clearly not her favourite. And that's fine.

Anika: And it's true in -- again, across all of her novels. They're barely in The Romulan Way. It's mostly -- McCoy is the only one. And he's her best.

Liz: And McCoy is clearly her favourite.

Anika: Yes. but then, Spock's World is obviously -- it's like the version -- they go into all of the Vulcan mythology, and they have a whole court-senate-crazy thing on Vulcan, and all of our crew get to make speeches to all of Vulcan. Because not only are there thousands in the stadium, but also, it's, you know, live streaming to all of Vulcan. And they're all making their speech, and it's just -- it's interesting to me that 96% percent of Vulcans are into politics and pay attention and vote, and stuff. Like. That's crazy, because here on Earth, it's, like, in the 30s or 40s. So that's always interesting to me.

Liz: Right, even in Australia, we have compulsory voting, and I think it comes out at about 86%.

Anika: But her characterisation of Spock, and particularly Sarek, in Spock's World, is really -- it's like, I appreciate it, but it's not where I would go. It's not how I see them. And also T'Pring.

Liz: It's not that it's bad, it's just that her headcanons are not your headcanons.

Anika: Yeah, it's just different. Exactly. And so I really appreciate the writing, but it's an AU version of those characters for me. And this one, also -- like, he kept joking, and he kept -- I don't know. It was just a little bit off. At one point he says -- he asks the doctor how you would hold hands with a mother hen?

Liz: Yes!

Anika: And I was like, no. Spock would never. I just couldn't see it. I had troubles.

Liz: No, and I really liked that scene. It's a scene where Kirk tells McCoy and Spock, you know, "You don't need to hold my hand and protect me," and McCoy is like, "Yeah, the way rumours spread on this ship, you're not holding hands with Spock, ever." And I was like, I see what you did there, Duane, and I love it!

Anika: Wink, wink.

Liz: But we didn't need to overegg the pudding with the mother hen/how do you hold hands bit.

I was going to say, with regards to Narek and Narissa, I'm so delighted and fascinated that Duane posits that inheritances are passed down to nieces and nephews, and the concept of the sister-daughter. And then we have Ramdha raising her niece and nephew, and it's like -- again, is that an intentional reference?

Anika: Because I knew -- I remembered that Ael was her aunt, was the Romulan Commander's (who still doesn't have a name) aunt. But I didn't -- like, I thought it was just an offhand -- but it goes into, like you say, this whole inheritance thing, and there's this whole -- and the whole Tafv -- "the cousins were as close as anyone could be" kind of thing. And I was like, oh, that is so -- it IS transferred over into Ramdha and Narek and Narissa, and I love it, and I'm -- yes.

Liz: And, as a concept, it's just such a nice bit where the worldbuilding is not default western … white people culture. And it raises questions, like, do they practice first cousin marriage, or is that as taboo as a sibling marriage? And what happens if your sibling doesn't have children? And what happens if -- you know, there are so many questions!

Anika: Right, exactly.

Liz: Romulan inheritance law is suddenly really interesting to me!

Anika: [laughs] I love them. I love my Romulans, I love my Romulan families, it's all I want from the world.

Liz: You know, I only decided to read this because Picard had sort of revived some of its ideas. And I'm so glad that I did, and I would really like to pitch a loose adaptation of this novel as season 2 of Star Trek: Picard.

Anika: So have Ael, or a version of Ael, who comes to Picard?

Liz: Yeah! Who has survived the destruction of Romulus, and is attempting to serve the Romulan Free State with honour, with mnhei’sahe. And who has learned that either the Free State or the Romulan Rebirthers are doing this terrible thing with Vulcan mind powers, and -- you know, it's awful, it's horrifying. So she seeks out the man who went to toe to toe with Commander Tomalak, and who commanded the evacuation. And then, along the way, she discovers with horror that her lost sister is alive and well and living on a vineyard--

Anika: [laughs] Because she's Laris's sister????

Liz: Look -- you know, from the beginning, I have decided that Laris is linked to the original Romulan Commander, Joanne Linville.

Anika: Yes.

Liz: And Ael is canonically linked to that character. And the loss of a family member is really important to Ael's arc, so to find that her sister is alive, and has almost abandoned mnhei’sahe -- abandoned her people, not only in choosing to go into this exile, but in joining the Tal Shiar, which is the sort of organisation Ael would loathe and detest -- I think it's a really interesting way to adapt the internal conflict within Ael's family from the novel to the present canon.

Anika: I really like it. I really like it. I have one question, that is a very me question, and that listeners are probably gonna get angry at me for.

Liz: Go!

Anika: Does it involve getting Narek out of Federation prison, Tom Paris style?

Liz: [deep breath] This wasn't in my head, but yes, I think it does.

Anika: Okay. That's all I want.

Liz: No, it would be sort of great, because if Ael has to kill her son after he betrays them and all that, and maybe chooses to save Laris over Tafv, then she can adopt Narek and introduce him to the radical concept of mnhei’sahe.

Anika: Yes! See?

Liz: Yes.

Anika: Call us!

Liz: I actually think one great thing about the whole Covid disaster -- and this is really insensitive to say, given the scale of death -- but at least the Star Trek writers have a lot more time to work on their seasons before filming starts? [Transcriber's note: this was said in a deliberately facetious and self-mocking tone; obviously a shitty season and no pandemic would be better.]

Anika: [laughs] Oh dear.

Liz: But yes, that's my pitch for an adaptation. And I gave a lot of thought to who would play Ael, and because their first thought on meeting her is that she's so small, I was like, who is a very small, powerful older woman? And my first thought was Nana Visitor.

Anika: Ooops. That's not gonna work out.

Liz: Yeah, there's a problem there.

Anika: That's not gonna work. I have--

Liz: No, so then I went -- go.

Anika: No, go ahead, if you want to say yours first.

Liz: Oh, well, I have two. I sort of went in a different direction and went, okay, who could plausibly be Orla Brady's sister? Who is dark, and has great cheekbones and nice eyebrows, and has that sort of power? And so my first thought was Oscar-winner Olivia Colman.

Anika: Okay.

Liz: And then, as a back-up, because she might be busy doing other stuff, was Helen McCrory.

Anika: Helen McCrory! Oh my gosh! Sorry. My brain had to catch up with what you were actually saying.

Liz: [laughs]

Anika: That is brilliant, I love it, I would cast her in anything, and I love the idea of her as Orla Brady -- Laris's sister. Make it happen. I went in a completely different direction, but I really, really love it.

Liz: Oh! Go!

Anika: So I decided -- I was sort of, like, I need somebody at least in their forties, and as you said, tiny but powerful. So I decided on Archie Panjabi.

Liz: Ooooohhhhhhh!

Anika: You know, olive-skinned-ish.

Liz: Yeah, yeah! Obviously this breaks my Orla Brady's sister bit--

Anika: Yeah, sorry, I didn't know that she was supposed to be Orla Brady's sister when you said we were fancasting.

Liz: I wanted to surprise you with that twist! I wanted to give you a nice surprise! But no, I think she'd be quite good in the role!

Anika: Yes, I think that, at least as written on the page in this book, I can imagine her even saying some of the things. And definitely I can imagine her going toe to toe with Kirk.

Liz: Definitely.

Anika: And also sort of having that flirtation happening.

Liz: Absolutely. No, I think she would be really good. I didn't really look at, like, size once I moved on from Nana Visitor, because, you know, on TV everyone is sort of the same size? But yeah, I really like your take. Apparently Gene Roddenberry did not care for this series. Which only makes me like it more.

Anika: [laughs] I mean, good on [Duane] for getting it done anyway, is all I can say to that. Like, I'll believe it. I haven't actually read your thing, and I'm gonna let you get to it in a minute, that you have linked here.

But I absolutely believe that -- given that, like I said, she creates so many different characters, she creates new departments on the Enterprise and then people to be in them. And entire other ships, and they're friends with Kirk, and they go back so-and-so time, and there's just so much that she creates for Star Trek. But it's her version of Star Trek. That I can absolutely imagine him being annoyed at the idea that she's going to create -- she's gonna give the Romulans culture? No? That's his job, and just because he never cared to doesn't mean that someone else should.

So it's sort of, like, great men do great things, but they also have great egos. And get annoyed. It's like they -- to pull something contemporary, the fact that Rose Tico is not in The Rise of Skywalker at all seems to me--

Liz: Oh, I'm still mad.

Anika: --solely because JJ Abrams didn't create that character, and so he was going to create two or three new characters to take over her part, because he was annoyed. And I don't think he -- and I don't know JJ Abrams.

Liz: He is not a close personal friend of yours?

Anika: I don't think he would necessarily even consciously -- you know, I don't think he would even consciously do it. But I can imagine that he would subconsciously do it.

Liz: The preponderance of original characters was at the heart of Roddenberry's objections, particularly to The Romulan Way. Apparently he tried to block publication because he felt it was an original novel that used the Romulan names and had McCoy in it just to get it published as a Star Trek novel.

Anika: I mean, that's true, but it's also really good.

Liz: I know, I'm like, you're saying this like it's a bad thing? My source for this is vintage 1994 wank on Usenet. There's a link to the archive which I will share, but basically, Roddenberry's former assistant, Richard Arnold, spent -- seems like a good portion of the early '90s fighting with tie-in authors on the internet?

And it's not even that he's wrong, he's saying, you know, if you wrote a Star Trek novel, that doesn't mean you wrote for Star Trek, that means you wrote for hire tie-in fiction. It's not that this is untrue, it's just that … I don't like him? And I don't like the way he says it? Anyway there are all sorts of spurious allegations of defamation, and libel, and "I don't know what Duane Duane's husband has to do with this," he only co-wrote The Romulan Way, "so I'm not going to answer that."

But I had a lot of fun going through rec.arts.startrek.fandom fights from the early '90s. Especially the bit where I stumbled into a thread where they were looking at the premise of Deep Space 9 and going, "Oh my gosh, these people don't care about Star Trek, this is a blatant money grab, this is going to destroy Star Trek forever, look at all this political correctness with a black man in charge and a female first officer. I mean, God, Star Trek, it's just not going to survive."

Anika: Oooh, that was one thing I wanted to bring up, too. Very early in this novel, here, on page 27, in fact, Uhura basically says that Starfleet is the worst. And then, two pages later, Kirk straight-up says that his and the Enterprise's priorities are usually different from Starfleet's. And I was just, like, you know what? She didn't pull that out of nowhere, that was in TOS. So everybody who's complaining that, in Picard, suddenly Starfleet is on the other side, and we're against them, has not been watching Star Trek.

Liz: There's people who think that Star Trek is wholly utopian and perfect, and then there's people who agree with us.

Anika: I just loved it. I was like, you go. And also, while I'm on the subject of Uhura, nearly every time she was in this book, she was described as beautiful, gorgeous, handsome. And I'm not complaining about this, but I love it. I love that she could not not describe Uhura as amazing and stunning.

Liz: And it didn't feel objectifying. It wasn't, like, the male gaze. Yeah. I also enjoyed the Sulu POV when Tafv's people have attacked the ship, and he's climbing through the Jeffries tubes, and he's like, "I think I'm becoming claustrophobic. Maybe I should talk to the doctor about that. Eh, that's a future Sulu problem."

Anika: And I love Khiy, the young Romulan who's hanging out with them, and fighting back because HIS honour has also been besmirched. It's so heartwarming! I just love them all.

Liz: That was one of the things -- the conflict between mnhei’sahe, where one owes honour to different and competing parties, and this is not a flaw on your part, it's a problem to be solved -- I really liked that as a piece of cultural worldbuilding.

Anika: Oh, and -- okay, so at one point she's saying, "Okay, here are the three ships that have been sent to meet up with us." And Nniol says, "My sister's on that ship, my sister's on Javelin, I don't know if I can fight my sister." Which is perfectly fair. And he says, "I have to go back to the other ship, I can't be trusted to be in battle against her." I loved that. I loved that it set up the whole "We're gonna punch each other and then start flirting" scene -- that was great -- between Kirk and Ael. That was awesome.

Liz: Right?

Anika: But then Javelin is destroyed! And I am so upset that Nniol's sister got blown up! I'm really, really heartbroken for Nniol, because he loved his sister. And she wasn't the captain, she wasn't one of the bad guys, she just happened to be on that ship. She was probably -- he was a really low-level person, she was probably a really low-level person, too, who just happened to be assigned to a tyrant. Like, the worst one. Javelin was the one where the captain took his own little shuttlecraft away to get back-up, and he's the captain who refuses to go down with his ship, and in fact, allows his ship to be sacrificed in order to allow him to escape. He's the worst.

Liz: The mirror!Lorca of Romulans.

Anika: So, of course, she's not -- I think that Nniol's sister probably had mnhei’sahe for her brother, and she would have been happy to join up with Ael and Bloodwing, and I'm really sad that she's dead.

Liz: I found the TV Tropes page for this subseries of novels. And apparently Nniol's family come back in the later ones, and most of them have cast him -- except for one cousin, who's like, "Yeah, I think you did the right thing. I'm sorry. I love you, bro."

Anika: Hugs.

Liz: The later Rihannsu books were published in the early 21st century, and I have to admit that I'm less enthusiastic about reading them.

Anika: They're not great. I will say, they're not great. I like that Arrhae -- she has to go be a junior politician, like, a junior senator for the Romulan Empire. And they're negotiating with the Federation, or whatever, and she has to go do this, she has to do politics, which I'm totally always into. And she is asked to be a spy. And she's already a spy, as we recall--

Liz: I was gonna say!

Anika: --she's a human who's spying on the Romulans, but she--

Liz: I haven't read The Romulan Way yet, but I remember you telling me about it.

Anika: [laughing] But she's asked by the Romulans to spy on the humans. So it's great, right? So she's, like, double-spying. And she's spying for the humans, she's spying for the rebels -- they're like the good Romulans. She's spying for the good Romulans and the humans, and she's trying to be a politician. All sorts of people already hate her because she was, like, a housekeeper who became a senator, and they're totally against that because they're super into, you know, pure blood and descent, and you should have 800 houses before you get to be a senator.

Liz: Right. Nothing like the real world.

Anika: And so I really like her plot, or the idea of her plot, because she doesn't really get to do much of it -- and she has this little sort-of romance that I'm into, as well, with the rebel. But it goes nowhere, and it becomes this whole treatise on Ael's honour, and -- it stops being about anything, and it starts being, "I'm going to preach about what I think things should be"?

I don't know, there stops being a plot, and it becomes entirely inner monologues. And I'm just, like, I'm over this, we're done, the people I care about are no longer here, so I'm going to move on. And there's no -- if I recall correctly, there are zero Star Trek characters in these books! I do not remember a single -- like, I'm pretty sure the Enterprise is involved in some way, but they're not a part of the plot at all.

Liz: According to TV Tropes, the series ends with Ael becoming empress of the Romulan Empire, and she and Kirk exchange a kiss before he leaves and they never see each other again. And IN THEORY, I'm really into it, but -- like, I was googling around to see what people said about this series, and the thing that kept coming is, "Is Ael a Mary Sue?" And I'm like, mate, I don't care!

Anika: [laughs]

Liz: But I feel like making her empress is maybe a step too far. I love space politics, but I like the stories to be about the people functioning within that system rather than leading it.

Anika: I think I've read the -- I read the third one, and that's the one where we get Arrhae's plot, and there's stuff happening. And it's, like, a cliffhanger where she -- something happens, and it's bad. And then there's two more books, and nothing happens in them! And they're really long, too, they're like, fourth Harry Potter novel long.

Liz: Oh my God!

Anika: And it's, like, I can't with this, I can't. And I don't remember Ael being empress, that's how -- you know how I said that I skim eventually? When they start talking about tentacles, I'm like, I don't need to know this. So my brain just shuts off, I have to try to read at some point, when the plot gets away from me, or I'm not following it. I read very quickly, and sometimes I'll read too quickly, where it's like, I decide that's unimportant--

Liz: And miss things.

Anika: --and I just say, that goes away. So, okay, at the end of the third Hunger Games novel, her sister is killed? I had to read that four times before I realised that her sister was killed.

Liz: [laughs]

Anika: I could not follow what was going on!

Liz: No, I have the same problem. I read the Murderbot novel last night, and I really enjoyed it, it was so good, but I kept having to stop and go back because I was inhaling it so fast that I was missing things.

Anika: So I don't remember them kissing! Are you serious? This has been an OTP of mine since I was nine! What? How is that possible?

Liz: I'm just going with what TV Tropes says! Maybe it's a lie!

Anika: No, I'm sure it's right, but all I remember of the last two books is being angry at them. So I completely believe that halfway through the fifth one, I was like, "Nah," and didn't even finish it. Very possible.

Liz: It's a bit like season 7 of Next Gen, where things happen that you really, really wanted, like Picard and Crusher talk about their relationship? And then the outcome is so disappointing that you're, like, ummmmmm, I dunno. It's the seventh season of [these novels].

Anika: Yes. But The Romulan Way is always going to be one of my favourite books, ever, in the world, and I really like My Enemy, My Ally.

Liz: And, at a future time, probably when the international postal system is working again, and I can order a copy -- because I don't really like the ebook versions of the old Star Trek tie-ins, they tend to be really poorly formatted -- I will buy it, and read it, and we can talk about it on this very podcast.

Anika: Excellent!

Liz: But what are we talking about next week?

[outro music]

Anika: Sorry, I had to move over into my --

Liz: Yeah.

Anika: Thank you for listening to Antimatter Pod. You can find our show notes at antimatterpod.tumblr.com, including links to our social media and credits for our theme music.

You can also follow us on Twitter at @antimatterpod. Sometimes we post cat pictures, and questions for our audience.

If you like us, leave a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you consume your podcasts -- the more reviews, the easier it is for new listeners to find us.

And join us in two weeks when we’ll be discussing medicine and medical practitioners in the Star Trek universe.

Liz: You said you were going to talk about ER, right?

Anika: Yes.

Liz: Does this mean that I need to watch some Chicago Hope, so I can talk about that?

Anika: Yes!

Liz: Awesome!

Anika: We can have duelling Chicago hospitals in spaaaaaace!

Liz: Yay!

#rihannsu #star trek #antimatter pod #podcast transcripts

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swordsandrayguns · 5 years ago

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Riker’s Beard And Family Time: Looking Back At Star Trek: TNG

I write science fiction and fantasy novels… so I am no stranger to things dubbed “nerdy.” The last few months, though, I have been doing something that pushes the boundaries of nerdy even for me. I’m watching all the Star Trek properties in the order of their release. Yup, an epic binge watch covering over five decades of television series, cartoons and motion pictures. Look, I can try to explain and rationalize this a couple ways. Truth is, I travel a great deal and have to fill the time I spent in airports and on planes (preferably with things I can download as oppose to stream). I am also, as an author, studying some of the great examples of “universe building” and epic story arcs. Still nerdy, though; I admit it.

Obviously, I started with the original series and jumped into the animated series. I timed this all so my viewing of Star Trek: The Motion Picture coincided with the the special 40th anniversary showings in theaters. I followed through the next couple of movies into The Next Generation, alternating in movies and even the original series pilot The Cage (which was originally made available to the public as a pay per view offering between the first and second seasons of The Next Generation) as they fell in the original release timeline. I am getting to the end of the fifth season of Next Generation now and very much looking forward to alternating between episodes of The Next Generation, Deep Space 9 and even the occasional film in the near future.

Just in case you are wondering, I am pretty dedicated to sticking to the timeline but I am not strictly adhering to it. As I find myself, for example, in a hotel with channels such as BBC America or the Heroes and Icons channel I will only turn on episodes that have already showed up in my series overview… so no DS9, Voyager or Enterprise (yet) but the adventures of Kirk and company are fair game, as are Next Generation episodes up to season five. On the other hand, I am still watching Discovery’s Short Treks as they come out and I am definitely watching Picard as soon as I get a chance (meaning on my big screen at home instead of streaming it on my laptop over shaky hotel wifi).

Even though I have not finished the complete rewatch, I find that I already have some new thoughts and ideas about I have seen so far starting with Riker’s beard.

Star Trek The Next Generation has generated a basketful of memes from “Tea. Earl Grey. Hot.” to “I am not a merry man” but undeniably the greatest is “Riker’s beard.” Just as the Internet has given us “jumping the shark,” the phrase to mark when a show is never quite as good again named for a really stupid moment when Fonzie was in Hawaii, it gave us “Riker’s beard” to mark the opposite. To this day, I know people that will immediately turn off an episode of The Next Generation if Jonathan Frakes turns up clean shaven (or if Wesley is in it, but that is a whole different story and, honestly, my harsh view of Wesley softened a bit with this re-watch). My first revelation from my Next Generation binge is that while season two, when the beard shows up, is better than season one, it is not when Next Generation really hits its stride.

First of all, let me defend season one of Star Trek The Next Generation. Twenty one years after the premiere of Star Trek, after three seasons of a pioneering science fiction drama, a year of the animated series and four feature films, Star Trek The Next Generation had to take up the incredibly difficult challenge of continuing one of the world’s beloved stories without a single character from the original series. Even more difficult, the real world had changed. Where the original Star Trek was making a statement by having a Russian, an Asian and an African woman on the bridge The Next Generation would not have made any statements with this type of casting. After all, when Picard met his crew and first face Q at Farpoint the biggest show on television focused on the an upper middle class African American family, something that was absolutely unthinkable when Kirk boldly set forth with his crew.

The first season of Star Trek The Next Generation not only introduced Q, the Ferengi and Data’s not so lovable android brother Lore it killed a main character. Star Trek The Next Generation took a major step that not only the original series never tackled but most shows avoid. Sure, other shows tease it and even then it was usually on a season ending cliffhanger. Even the original series backed away from the only death of a major character they ever portrayed with an entire movie dedicated to reversing it. Star Trek The Next Generation killed Tasha Yar completely out of the blue with three episodes left in the first season. This incredibly bold move cast a shadow on the entire series, adding a real threat to future episodes.

Is season one perfect? Oh, no. Not at all. Not even close, but like I already mentioned it had an amazingly difficult challenge facing it. The fans were expecting… well, everything. Next Generation was trying to stay true to the essence of Star Trek while making itself something new. They put families on the Enterprise to emphasize it was a vehicle of exploration, not a military ship. They made sure there was not a Vulcan to be found and put the odd man in a kilt wandering the hallways. They put a Klingon on the bridge! But then they had to deal with it all.

Season two was better. For one thing, the anticipation and the expectations were gone. The show made it through the first season and when it came back with its second season it was coming back as Star Trek The Next Generation not “the new Star Trek.” Ironically, due to a writers’ strike, season two actually started off with a script recycled from the ill-fated Star Trek: Phase II series. In addition to the first officer’s facial hair, the second season brought Whoopi Goldberg on board as the ship’s bartender and saw Diana Muldaur (in her third Star Trek universe role as Dr. Pulaski) taking over the sick bay from Dr. Crusher. Geordi La Forge also migrated from the bridge to take over engineering. It was always a bit odd, somehow, in season one to not have the chief engineer as a major character, if only because the chief engineer would seem to play as an important of a role in the operations of the ship as, say, the ship’s counselor or a teenager doing his after school work study program as an acting ensign.

While season two was an improvement, it had its issues. Dr. Pulaski, playing a role meant, no doubt, to help humanize Data, came across as abrasive and (in my opinion) mean spirited. Gates McFadden had been fired, apparently because the head writer did not like her, but Gene Roddenberry resisted killing her character so Dr. Beverly Crusher merely transferred off the ship. When the head writer left the popular character of Dr. Crusher returned in season three. Whoopi Goldberg, although an interesting character, was the ship’s civilian bartender which is just kind of weird. Did the ship have a food court, too? The season was also shortened, because of the aforementioned writers’ strike, and it actually ended with (of all things) a clip show. A clip show!

As a final defense of season two, it did introduce the Borg, one of greatest science fiction villain races of all times. But was it really that much better than season one? Well, season two saw five episodes get a total of six Emmy nominations and won two (both technical Emmy awards related to the sound department). Season one’s premiere was the first television episode to be nominated for a Hugo Award in 15 years. Another season one episode was the first syndicated television episode to win a Peabody Award and six episodes gathered a total of seven Emmy nominations, winning three (for makeup, costume design and sound editing). If you place your faith in the numbers, it seems season one might have actually been better (at least if you go by its awards).

So by now, if I may be so bold as to make a prediction, you are probably thinking “This guy has put way too much thought into Star Trek The Next Generation” and “Okay, so if season two is not when The Next Generation gets great, when is it?” First, I said as an author I am studying Star Trek so cut me some slack. Second, I am glad you asked.

Star Trek The Next Generation, in my opinion, really hit its stride is the fourth season. Season four swept onto screens with the second part of season finale cliffhanger The Best Of Both Worlds. The Federation was facing the awesome might of the Borg and the crew of the Enterprise was desperately trying to save Picard, who had been taken and turned into Borg mouthpiece Locutus, so the season started with big action and drama. This quickly led to a series of episodes focusing on character relationships, particularly family relationships.

After he is rescued, Picard is left a broken man and returns to his family’s vineyard in France. Although there had been several stories about Picard’s history, this was the first to address his family and his entry into Star Fleet. Data’s Day not only explored how the android navigated through his duties and relationships, it introduced Chief O’Brien’s new wife Keiko. The O’Briens are the focus in the very next episode, showing not only the natural difficulties they were having adjusting to their new life as a married couple but also O’Brien’s past Star Fleet career and the psychological wounds left by his service in the war with Cardassia. To me, Riker’s beard does not signify when Star Trek The Next Generation really gets good, it is when Keiko O’Brien appears.

Family was a major theme of the fourth season, as Worf discovered he was a father and worked to regain his family’s honor in the eyes of fellow Klingons. Luxanna Troi re-appeared as did the ghost of Tasha Yar when the crew encountered her sister. Data’s brother also made another appearance, as did Data’s creator. Data also grew a great deal, even being shown to try out a romantic relationship with another crew member. The true strength of Star Trek The Next Generation, as of season four, was that it was well established enough as a series to feature stories based on human relationships instead of action or the “alien of the week.”

It should also be noted that season four also brought more episodes which were a part of longer storylines, such as Worf’s dishonor and the political intrigues of the Klingon Empire. There were also many returning minor characters and new characters being set up for multiple appearances. It is only after three seasons Star Trek The Next Generation finally had established enough of its own universe for this to happen. Also, though, by season four plans were in motion for a second live action Star Trek series, one to run concurrently with Next Generation. It could have been that the introduction of multi-episode storylines were a result of the producers consciously attempting to expand the Star Trek universe while starting to differentiate Next Generation from the upcoming Deep Space Nine.

Ironically, season four also marks Star Trek The Next Generation outlasting its predecessor in terms of seasons on the air. While this did not actually influence the formation of my opinion season four is when Next Generation really gets good, it does really make me wonder what Star Trek may have become if it had a season four.

#star trek #next generation #rikers beard #science fiction #indy author

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girls-scenarios · 7 years ago

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To Feel Human (Part 1)

Idol: Irene (Red Velvet)

Prompt: Could you make android au with Irene and fem!reader? The reader created Irene and wanted Irene to learn about human feelings. Although, sometimes Irene feels like she’s a burden to the reader and leaves temporary. At the end, she comes back they love each other ❤️

Writer: Admin Lee

A/N: Ok this is gonna be a pretty long one, which is why I separated it! I already have most of the second part finished, I’m just working on the ending. Anyways, I took some liberties with this one, but I hope you like it! This one has been super enjoyable for me to write, and I was very inspired by one of my favorite fics: Zeitgeist by leeyoobin on AO3!

Part 2

It started as just an off-the-wall idea, in the living room of one of your friend’s house, Yeonjung’s, to be specific. Along with the rest of your closely knit group, including Yoojung, Yuha, Eunwoo, and Jihyo, you had talked of AI’s, their advancement, etcetera. This was shortly after college, when you had finally earned your Bachelor’s degree in Bioengineering, and a Master’s in mechanical engineering. With an adoration for movies like Ghost in the Shell, and an affinity for problem solving, this was able to motivate you enough to begin a new project: making the first android for personal use. Unfortunately, you weren’t the first with the idea and skills needed to create true artificial life. However, so far the androids on the market have been widely restricted, kept only to be used by large-scale companies with supervision, the military, and other government operations. So, you felt the compulsion to take the risk of creating one more suited for use by the average person. And after a few days of thinking it through on your own, you ended up pitching the idea to Jihyo over lunch.

“You want to...What?”

“Well, I didn’t think it’d be a bad idea, you know? Someone to keep the average person company, help around the house, take care of pets... Stuff like that.” You explained, trying your best to sound reasonable about the idea.

“That sounds great and all, but what about the parts? And the facility we’d have to use to build it in? Half of the things we would need would most likely be illegal for regular people to get..”

You paused, thinking for a moment. “How about Eunwoo’s girlfriend, Kyulkyung? She has some corporate connection, I’m sure.. She’s not an heiress for nothing.”

“I- Ok, we could ask, but it’d probably be a stretch, even for her,” Jihyo replied, always the realistic one. “And I’m assuming you won’t be able to do this alone, so I’m texting the rest of the group, just to see if they’re interested.”

A week or so later, Kyulkyung was able to text you, voicing her enthusiasm for the project, as well as her ability to obtain what your group needed. She was more than happy to help, and coupled with Eunwoo’s impatience, they were able to discreetly transfer some packages of parts and tech to a borderline-abandoned company warehouse near the small town you lived in.

Everything was now sitting in boxes in the now less-empty warehouse. With the help of your friends you took the time to meticulously go through and somewhat organize the amalgamation of parts you had received. There was also a rather large one that you had yet to open. Weird, because Kyulkyung had never really said anything about a package that big. Nonetheless, your curiosity got the best of you and you opened it up.

A discarded android was what you found. Telltale light on its temple blank, lifeless. You had never been this close to one, really, and found it fascinating that something could look so human. You turned in Jihyo’s general direction and got her attention.

“Hey, Jihyo!” You called, and she turned away from what she was doing, walking over to where you stood. “I didn’t know this would be a repair-job, did you?”

“Oh, yeah. When Kyulkyung suggested the idea of fixing up a deactivated droid, she said it’d be easier on all of us. No one would really look into it if something irreparable were to go missing, so she just took this,” She gestured at the inactive android. “and said it’d be more efficient to just fix it up. A lot more inconspicuous for the company, too. Sorry, maybe I should’ve mentioned it.”

“No, it’s fine! You’re right about it seeming easier, I was just surprised,” You explained, eyes still locked onto the body in front of you. “Since we only have to fix it up,we should finish a lot faster, don’t you think?” You could see her nod out of the corner of your eye, and she walked off to resume her work.

Taking note of it’s features, you saw it was a female model, not too hard to tell. Its skin looked soft and pale, and this surprised you, but made sense after thinking about it. Maybe the people that worked with them often wanted to feel more at ease, so the appearance was made to look lifelike. It’s hair was relatively long, and dark in color. You knelt down in front of the container, reaching out to touch the body lying in front of you, but stopped yourself mid-reach, now realizing the gashes and dents in the model (most likely one of the reasons why it was in the scrap pile). Deciding it was a better decision to take care of everything else before dealing with the android, you shut the box gently and went to ask your friends what they needed help with.

The week had finally ended, and you and your friends worked day and night to get the warehouse up to par. There was a platform set up with wires and tubes to hold the android while it was being worked on and programmed, a couple of shelves stocked with spare parts in the corner, some computers and generators, and the android itself - still in the dark, hard plastic container it had arrived in. Not ready to unpack it quite yet, your group took the weekend to relax and prepare for the hard work to come.

Upon meeting again Monday evening, a matter needed to be taken care of before you all could begin: would the android stay here in the warehouse, or would one of you take it home with you once it was completed? Lottery was as good a method as any, and you all put your names in a small box that Yoojung had picked up. After a bit of shuffling the names within the box, Yuha grabbed a slip of paper. She then read aloud:

“(Y/N).”

Looking up from paper, she smiled and jokingly commented, “Have fun getting the robot used to that beast of yours.”

You laughed, imagining how your dog - a Newfoundland named Walter - would act around someone new in the house.

With that now taken care of, you began work once again. This time, finally ready to start working on the android. Eunwoo opened up the box attempted to pick up the body inside.

“Damn, this thing is heavy.. Yoojung, could you bring a rolling cart or something?”

“Sure,” She replied with a chuckle, then within a minute, brought back something the android could be moved more easily on. “Here you go.”

They both managed to get the droid on the cart, and in half an hour, hooked up all the wires from the android to the computers nearby. Then came the more difficult part: repairing the android itself. Not an impossible task, however, it was quite daunting. From what was on the container it arrived in, the model seemed to be a CX100, which didn’t necessarily matter to you outside of which parts were correct. So after finding the model type, you worked on getting familiar with the software Kyulkyung sent with the rest of the tech, hoping to figure it out in enough time to get a diagnostics test run soon. It was getting later in the day though, and your friends had obligations outside of this, so they were gradually saying their goodbyes until it was just you. However, you didn’t mind this, and understood they had lives of their own. Unlike you, who had a flexible schedule working from home (you wrote articles and edited for a science-related magazine). This was one of the few exciting things happening in your life right now, and you didn’t want to waste the time you had.

4 hours had passed since you were left alone. You were still messing around with the computers and getting a handle on the general anatomy of the android in front of you and were now feeling comfortable enough to begin tinkering with the programs necessary to work on the robot. Getting the diagnostics software package up and running, you look at the data now popping up on the screen in a list based on importance of the issue. There were several biocomponents that you found were damaged, as well as a critically low amount of Thirium 310 (a type of liquid that circulates energy and electronic info throughout the android). The software showed which of the synthetic organs were damaged in a 3D model of the robot, so it was a lot easier for you to search the boxes and containers for the parts that it required. You left them out to be cleaned, along with a sticky note listing what they were and how to properly clean them, as you had read over the procedures in a document that had also accompanied the software. It would make more sense to do it tomorrow anyways (when you weren’t running on two Red Bulls). Not exactly known for being a night owl, the work was going starting to go a little slower, even with the help of energy drinks. So you decided on calling it a night for now, figuring that you had accomplished enough for one evening.

The next two weeks went by surprisingly fast, and there was an impressive amount of productiveness despite everyone’s schedules getting busier as the year was drawing to a close. It was nearly the end of September, and as the temperatures dropped, your spirits certainly didn’t. The android was nearly in full repair, with the parts being cleaned and replaced, Thirium replenished, gashes and dents mended. You all felt more than accomplished at your progress, considering that all was left was putting some final touches on the programming. Collectively, you had all decided that an android with a capability to be gentle, courteous, reliable, and helpful would be one of the best options for a robot with the intent of personal use. Therefore, the appropriate behavioral abilities were added into the matrix. However, with parts of the company’s system still being there, you discovered the android had already been embedded with a neural net - thus giving it a way of thinking, of being, similar to humans.

Now, for the moment you had all worked so hard for. With the programming complete, the android was ready to be activated. The small group that had put an insane amount time into this project was now all gathered around the small platform where the android was kept while being repaired. Kyulkyung had taken a day off to join the ensemble, just as excited to see the finished product in action.

“So, it’s really going to act like a normal person?” She spoke up, inspecting the multiple tabs still on the computer screens that surrounded the platform.

“I mean, that’s what we’re hoping for, for the most part. I think what we were working towards was an ability to act like someone you’d see every day - or a friend even.” Yuha explained, typing some things into the computer before shutting down a few tabs. “Those were just some diagrams of what needed to be fixed.” She stated, turning back to face the group in the rolling chair she was lounging in.

“Are we ready to start it up, then?” Yeonjung inquired. “I want to see how it acts when it wakes up!”

“Yeah, I think so. Eunwoo, would you do the honors?” Jihyo asked, gesturing to the button on the laptop that would start the android up.

“Sure can!” She exclaimed with a thumbs up, jumping over to the monitor. “Everyone ready?”

You all nodded your heads, eager to get the android running. The anticipation was killing you for sure because you knew it would be staying with you tonight. Eunwoo pressed the key, causing the computers to whirr with activity. The temple light on the android lit up a bright blue, and its eyes opened.

“I am model CX100, how can I help you?”

You spent the next hour or so going over all the basics: making sure the programming was compatible with its neural net functions, checking to see that the body was moving correctly, and testing things like vision and other sense modifications that you had improved upon. The android complied with every request you made of it without a hitch, and soon, you were finished. By this time it was already dark, but the group couldn’t help but be enamored with the artificial intelligence. They spent at least an extra hour asking it a plethora of questions, to which the robot answered all of them to the best of its ability. However, before it was time to take it home for the night, you held a quick meeting.

“(Y/N) just be careful, okay? Try to keep its presence on the down-low, we don’t need anyone getting suspicious, especially since it’d be Kyulkyung’s job - and potentially our careers as well - on the line.” Jihyo stated seriously. You understood, of course, getting caught would only end badly for you all. So you nodded, promising to keep it out of sight as much as possible.

With that out of the way though, everyone soon broke off from the ensemble to head home, leaving the android in your hands.

“Ok, CX100, we’re going to go to my house where you’ll stay for the time being. I have an extra room where you can stay, so that won’t be an issue.. And maybe tomorrow we can get you some more clothes.” You explain, now aware that the only thing it was wearing was a hospital gown. Functional for setting up, yes, but maybe not for everyday wearing. Figuring it’d fit in some spare clothes lying around at home, you didn’t think it would be much of an issue for the ride there.

“Thank you.” Short and to the point.

Maybe you’d just need to warm up to it.

You arrived at your house without a hitch and opened the door for CX100. The two of you then walk up the small pathway to the large wooden door of your two-story abode. Maybe you didn’t need all the space, but you got it for a deal, and though it was a little rustic, you enjoyed the tranquil atmosphere it had.

“Wait here a second, I have a dog.” You stated, not wanting the android to become too surprised at your rather large pet. “He’s a Newfoundland, so he’s kind of big, but he’s really sweet so don’t worry too much.”

You then opened the door, inviting the android in first before following soon after, closing the door behind you.

“Walter!” You called.

Within a few seconds, your Newfoundland was bounding down the stairs, and jumping right into your arms. He covered your face in kisses before looking up at the new house guest. Walter slowly stepped over to where CX100 was, sniffing and wagging his tail as he got closer. The android seemed to dislike him, a sour expression on its face as it backed up into your coat rack near the door. Sensing the robot’s discomfort, you called your dog back over to you before telling him to go lay on the couch in the living room adjacent to the entry. He understood and trotted away.

“He’s a bit much, I know.. But I’m guessing dogs aren’t your favorite now, huh?”

“I can’t say they are. He’s very large and… eccentric. Though I will become accustomed to his presence, as I assume he is your pet.” It answered monotonously.

You nodded and beckoned CX100 to follow you to its room, one of the spares you had in the house. It was the closest to yours, so you’d be able to easily check up on it overnight if needed.

“Feel free to move some things around, change it if you want. It’s your room now, so please make yourself at home,” You mentioned softly. “I’ll be downstairs for a minute to feed Walter, if you need anything, let me know.” And with that, you left the android to get settled.

The night carried on as usual, save for the addition of your guest. The droid acclimated quickly, and you watched it find its way around the house like it had been living there forever. Its modified features were definitely making themselves known now: the photographic memory, use of its senses, etcetera. This was promising news, and you would definitely have to keep your colleagues posted.

Once it finally came time to go to sleep, you contemplated asking CX100 to spend the night in your room, if for nothing more than to keep an eye on it for its first night outside of the makeshift lab. You came to the conclusion that, yes, it would probably be a good idea to keep an eye on it overnight just to make sure its sleep sequence went smoothly. Although it doesn’t need as much sleep as a human does, you concluded that the android would need more time tonight to process the day’s activities.

Walking to its room, you knocked once before opening the door. CX100 was sitting quietly on the bed, seemingly staring off into space. You cleared your throat to get its attention, which snapped the android out of its thoughts; this prompted it to look up at you.

“Would you mind if you stayed in my room? It’d just be tonight, I wanted to keep an eye on you to make sure everything is running normally.”

“Yes, it will not be a problem,” The android answered. “Would you like me to relocate myself now?”

“Sure, thank you.” You were completely ready for bed so, you followed the android out into the hall, turning off the few lights that were still on as you went.

Soon, you were able to watch as the android went into its dormant state with Walter cuddled up next to you as the blue light on its temple went from a constant glow to a dim flash of color about every 10 seconds.

You now felt relaxed knowing that everything had gone smoothly for the night, and that there had been no problem whatsoever with CX100, albeit its slightly reserved personality. This wasn’t really a problem per se, however, the delay in showing the emotion you hoped it was capable of would most likely take some time.

Upon waking up in the morning, you noticed two things; One: CX100 wasn’t in your room any longer, and two: Walter wasn’t there either. You promptly got up and went downstairs, only to find your dog lazily napping on the floor underneath the kitchen table, and CX100 cooking breakfast.

It noticed your presence, and looked at you from over its shoulder. “Walter has been fed, I assumed two cups of food was adequate for a dog of his size,” It stated, looking back down at the bacon that was sizzling away in the pan on the stove. “and I’m in the process of preparing breakfast, is that alright?”

“Y-yeah, definitely. Thank you.” You replied, rubbing the sleep from your eyes. It was still relatively early, 7:26 to be exact. Going to the fridge, you grabbed some juice, along with a cup from the cabinet nearby, and went to sit down at the kitchen table. After a few minutes, you spoke up.

“Don’t you think getting called CX100 all the time is boring?”

“I have not. It is the name of my model, should I not address myself as such?” It inquired, setting the now cooked bacon on a plate, along with some eggs and a biscuit.

“That’s true, it is. I just thought, maybe for something a little less suspicious in case we were to go out of the house, would an actual name be nice?”

“If you think it is a choice that would benefit me, then please do.”

“Do you want to decide? On both whether you want one or not, and what your name would be?” You questioned, genuinely out of curiosity, but also partly for the purpose of testing its mental abilities.

The android seemingly went into deep thought for a moment and looked down at the wooden floor. It hadn’t necessarily had to make a decision of its own before now, but now given the chance, it hesitated. It was built to be more human, had the capabilities to suggest, decide, request - the list goes on. The LED flashed yellow, just for a moment, before assuming its normal, blue glow.

“Irene.” The android stated, now making eye contact with you. “I would like to be called Irene.”

#red velvet #irene bae #irene #bae joohyun #red velvet scenario #irene scenarios #girl group scenarios #girl group scenario #kpop scenario #girl groups #kpop girl groups

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soul-heart-and-beyond · 6 years ago

Text

Fenton Headcanons!

Here are some headcanons to better explain Fen and the several aspects of him that make up his history, personality, and ideology! It may not be exactly canon all of the time, so I will just say that my Fenton is canon divergent right now and settle that matter.

I’ve given my portrayal of Fenton a lot of thought in how to keep him separate from others by giving him a different source of inspiration and there fore ideals and standards to live by as he goes about his life. Note that this source will give him the workings on who to base his own superhero persona off of, while still trying to be his own person both inside and outside the suit.

First off, he’s always been a major fan of Supermallard and his heroic deeds as it just seemed like the duck emanated hope, justice, warmth, and kindness while still putting those in the wrong behind bars or a prison that could sustain them. Whenever he was placed into his larger fights, he would do all that he could to make sure at the end of the day that the lives of those he protected would be safe and the villain in jail or taken to a maximum security station. Seeing this at such a young age inspired him to be someone like Supermallard too, a kind, considerate, and overall intuitive person. He had always believed in doing nice things for others, but the comic and the character inspired him to be someone that could help the world someday.

Because of this, he tries to give himself a more deeper voice when in the armor to mislead others into thinking that he’s older than he really is, even if is voice isn’t exactly too used to it. It is also to ensure that the young ones have someone they can look up to and depend upon to rescue them.

The comics did give him a little more of a feel for wanting to delve into super science, hence why he decided to make that his major as he is still going through college to finish up his master’s degree. Being 26 doesn’t leave him much choice in the financial state he’s in so he just has to continue on going and finish the degree course, not that he minds that.

Fenton definitely does like to be safe and secure in the experiments and things that he does, even when it involves risks. Usually the only time he’ll be reckless is through underestimating, lack of needed knowledge, or just plain unconscious.

With that, he does have some trouble dealing with opponents that are exceedingly good with machinery or magical elements, as his list of experience right now is barely even at professional level for superhero stuff.

He does practice his in Gizmoduck armor whenever he has time to do so on his schedule and not already fighting crime, living out his life as Fenton, or creating new inventions for McDuck Enterprises.

Reading about Supermallard’s alter ego, Duck Kent, has made Fenton more of a person to be skeptical of the events that go on around him and the things people say. Whether it’s a false alarm or him actually detecting a suspicious person that is hatching some kind of plot or scheme, or having something that they don’t want him to know, He will catch on eventually, and may even show that he catches on too!

When a lot of situations look bleak with the only option of winning is to take the life of the one causing the havoc, Fenton will do his best to try and make sure that he can find another way that doesn’t involve the end of a life. If he does have to take a life, then he will have it linger in his memory as one of his failures to keep justice and order for every living creature.

While Fen loves glazed doughnuts, he adores cinnamon buns/rolls even more, as the light and fluffy texture mixed in with the sweet and slightly spicy taste of cinnamon and sugar just make him complete. While on the moment about favorite desserts too, he greatly appreciates Starduck’s triple caramel and chocolate cappuccino, even if it is a bit bad for one’s health if had in excess amounts. To himself, he limits his intake on them and saves them as special treats to himself for whenever he does a major accomplishment.

Even though he has a driver’s license and know how to drive well, he doesn’t own a car so he uses bus transportation to get to the money bin. It’s hard work lifting his Gizmosuit on his way to work and back hom, but this has also become part of a training exercise that has made him more stronger than before he obtained the suit and first started calling himself “Gizmoduck”. Can his lift a car? No, but he can lift a good shelf or heavy box now all on his own. And if someone’s wondering why he doesn’t turn into Gizmoduck and fly to the money bin, I got two answers. One: If he messes up any part of it, he could risk having more people know about his secret identity, and not know if they will spill it to others.If that happens, they will target his friends and family, and that’s just a bunch of stress he could lessen on himself if he just moved about from home to work and work to home as Fenton Crackshell-Cabrera. The second one is that he knew it would be like a training regimen for himself, and so if he wanted to be as good as himself as he was as Gizmoduck, he needed to toughen up his real body too. That armor can’t protect him from everything, (like the radioactive/atomic central processor from the “Who Is Gizmoduck” episode)

This one particular headcanon may be a turn off to any Hueys out there, but this is kinda one for a reason. Due to the event with the radioactive/atomic explosion, Launchpad almost flying the Sunchaser into Dewey due to his missiles misfiring, and Mark Beaks’ attempt to turn into a General like monster and take both Huey and Webby, this Gizmoduck is one that still works for Scrooge McDuck and partner/lab assistant of Gyro Gearloose, but he is a more solo kind of hero. He would rather not have anyone that can’t defend themselves or not the proper age take risks that they don’t have to when he’s there and can solve the problem or save the day by himself. Some backup from other heroes he definitely wouldn’t mind, as they have experience and can hold their own against crooks and villains, but no sidekicks for this duck. Maybe a World’s Fowlest or The Duck and the Daring, but any Gizmobuddies he has he doesn’t want in the action. It would wound his heart greatly to have them be injured, hurt or killed because he couldn’t do everything, and so to eliminate that possibility, he refuses to take young sidekicks or wards. Maybe he’ll help out a young superhero-in-the-making, but that’s the only exception.

To make his suit more durable he will be adding some of his own touches here and there to the enhancements of the original Gizmoduck suit before making a Mark II altogether at some point. The material Gyro used was fine, but it dents way too easily, and if he’s going to be doing this superhero job, he needs more durable armor to match his constantly growing villains gallery.

He does also try to incorporate some of his Fentonium into the suit as a sort of auxiliary power for whenever he needs it after doing a large attack or sustaining a lot of damage. It doesn’t give him anything special like his lasers, pies, or other actions, but he can still move the wheel, use some scanning functions, and moves his limbs like his arms.

Speaking of his abilities, that’s another thing I’ve been thinking of, and I have some original ideas along with ones inspired from things that he was already inspired off of, so a little more of just referencing at that point. He has these moves, and they are not all accessible, but eventually he does acquire or create them over time. They each have limited uses outside of Gizmo Uppercut, so he does have to plan his movements wisely.

Gizmo Cannon [Photon Cannon] (Iron Man/War Machine/Marvel Vs. Capcom): Instead of him pulling out or warping a giant photon cannon out of nowhere, he brings out two of his shoulder cannons and uses them to concentrate the blast of photon energy onto his target. He overall has a total about four of these uses before needing to recharge. It’s not as cutting as his lasers, but they should do well to gradually chip or damage his opponent’s armor, and a good continual damage too.

Gizmo Salvo [War Destroyer] (War Machine/Marvel Vs. Capcom): For his really tough combatants, and this is one of the more ammo-consuming moves that he has, Gizmoduck will launch his missiles, bombs, and ammo into the sky, and have them act as an air strike on his foe. Generally for the big guys or heavy hitters that think they’re tougher than anything justice has, and he has about two uses of this before he runs out of his ammunition reserves, so it’s something to save up for.

Gizmo Uppercut [Mega Uppercut] (Mega Man/Marvel Vs. Capcom): What superhero worth his title wouldn’t have an easy but flashy uppercut or signature move that gives that feeling of flair? This one really doesn’t consume any of his energy as it just converts some of the photon and laser energy his suit has into a punch to inflict more pain on evildoers. Really it’s just like a Shoryuken but with photon and laser energy. Not lethal as it’s a small dose of them, but it can knock someone out.

Gizmo Field [Energy Field] (Cell/Android 17 and 18/Dragon Ball Z Budokai 3): If there was ever a moment that he needed to have some protection against projectiles or any attacks while making his own, here’s a force field attack to give him the advantage. While he can’t propel anything like magic or advanced super science beyond that of Earth’s current potential, he can still lessen the pressure of the attacks using it. The shield also does deal moderate damage and extends to the size of a small transportable hot air balloon. He’s got six uses for it, and it does tap into his energy reserves for his Gizmo Cannon and Gizmo Uppercut.

Fentonium Fore [Mega Ball] (Mega Man/Marvel Vs. Capcom): This one’s an interchangeable one between Gizmoduck and Fenton (Finally, some moves that Fenton can use while outside of the suit for once), and it’s where he takes a ball of Fentonium and smacks it towards his enemies to act like a ricocheting projectile weapon, and he does have a ping pong racket to continue the transition. Not only that, but he can aim it too for trick shots if he needs a distraction or low profile weapon.

Photon Sphere [Spirit Bomb/Genkidama] (Son Goku/Dragon Ball Z/GT): This is definitely a move he learns very late into his career, but it is where he takes all of the energy that he has stored into suit at the present time and can even convert any other energy given to the sphere to make it more stronger. This move does put strain on Fenton’s real body but the suit should be fine, as long as the arm parts are still functional so that way he can throw it and push it. It’s a one time use before needing a recharge, so if it fails, then he has no more tricks up his sleeves. This is overpowered, as the energy is enough to roughly a continent with his own suit at full power (which most likely won’t happen), but can get to half of a planet or a moon with that much energy plus that of what others add to him.

Fenton Flurry (Original): Knowing that he has to fight without the armor, he has some moves he never mentions as he fights, but gives them a name in his head. This one is pretty much a flurry of punches towards his enemy and while it is clumsy and sometimes badly timed, it can catch someone off guard when he does time it right or in a confined space.

Photon Blaster (Original): During the Shadow War, he modified Gyro’s blaster weapon with the help of Manny and Lil’ Bulb, though this time he made his own spare while on his some of his lunch breaks. it has both a phaser or bullet-like function and a laser function for consistent pressure.

#(I have so much crap for Fenton that this may need a second post later before it becomes a post of text.)#(This is what happens when you have great ideas and love for a cute duck but just want to respect your mutuals takes on the character too.)#(It's not pressure nor shade on anyone so do not take it that way. This was just bottled up in my head and now I feel ready to let it out.)#(The second part should be more about his history and life before working as an intern at first so that's coming out whenever I get done.)#(With the others' of course!)#Out Of Soul (ooc)#A Mallard That's More Than His Armor... (Fenton Crackshell/-Cabrera/Gizmoduck)#Guard Impact! (Headcanons)

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