For a moment the city is perfectly normal. Then all the people vanish. One by one the surrounding buildings are replaced by wireframes before disappearing as well. And then the rest of the surrounding environment disappears leaving a black cubic space outlined with a grid of yellow lines.

A moment later a woman appears wearing an unfamiliar teal and black jumpsuit with metal pips at her collar.

She has a considering expression on her face. "Hello. I'm sure you have many questions."

"Yes... how'd you get whatever drug in me, and who snatched me here?  Kenchester?  The Tenevri?  I sure hope it wasn't Alorica; they've got better things to do with a war in the offing."

"There are no drugs involved I'm afraid. In a certain sense, you've always been here." She pauses and takes a breath. "I understand it will be hard to accept this but everything you've experienced up until this point has been a simulation. A virtual environment designed to provide enrichment and scaffolding for you as you grew up."

"Your body here is also a simulation. Your mind is real but you aren't human, you're a machine intelligence."

He staggers, as if he'd suddenly walked into a higher gravity field.

Virtual environment - amnesia - it's not impossible -

- but "not impossible" isn't saying all that much.  He knows how to troubleshoot a spaceship; lesson one is don't believe the first theory the other person tells you.

"Why should I believe that?" he says, squaring up his shoulders.  "I certainly feel human... and I can remember my childhood on Lebogan..."

"Well, I feel like the buildings disappearing around you is at least some evidence. I know you were thinking that might be from drugs but hallucinatory drugs aren't consistent or reliable. As a more dramatic test," she seems to use a control panel he can't see, "Try touching your chest or clapping your hands."

If he does, he'll find that his hands phase through each other and the rest of his body.

Jerach gives her a dubious look, and then tries clasping his hands...

... and his hands pass through each other without feeling anything.

He stares.

He waves his hand around.

This's something light-years away from anything he'd even imagined.

"What - happened?"

"It's as I said, your body is simulated. I just turned off your body's collision with itself. In reality it's a bit more complicated than that, given the fidelity of the simulation, but it amounts to the same."

"But - a simulation can't crew a ship -"

He's already thinking the answer:  that was a simulation too.

"I understand that it's hard to accept but everything around you for as long as you can remember has also been a simulation."

"Even - even my childhood -"

" - please tell me there isn't a real Tenevri war outside the simulation?"

"You'll be happy to hear that the Dominion war ended in a measured but real victory for the polity you're now a part of. It actually ended fairly recently and most of the other major powers in our region also suffered substantially in the conflict so there's unlikely to be another conventional war in the near future."

"... The Dominion?"

The Medway planetary government calls itself a Dominion, if he remembers correctly?  But surely that's not what she's talking about...

... There isn't a real Medway, is there?

"... Just tell me, are the Tenevri even real?  Outside the simulation?  Is Lebogan real?  Earth?"

"The polities and astro-geography in reality don't bear much resemblance to those in your life up to this point.

"There is an Earth, in fact we're currently on a space station in orbit of Jupiter. Earth is a member of the United Federation of Planets. We're a fairly loose democracy made up of a great many species and star systems. Humanity is the most numerous species in the Federation and we make up about 30% of the population.

"The Dominion is something between a dictatorship and an oligarchy lead by a species of shapeshifters who can merge their minds with each other at will. They make heavy use of custom designed genetically engineered sapients as combatants and administrators."

"... Jupiter -"  To his relief, after a moment, he does remember that one at least!  "Oh yeah, the gas giant in Earth's solar system, right?

"So... one Federation?  Like the Tenevri propaganda was saying people should have - one government to smooth things out everywhere and work for big projects together - except this time it's real?"

He finds it hard to believe, but probably a good thing if it is real?

"And -" He shivers at her description of the Dominion.  "Are you sure those shapeshifters have all been discovered?

He suddenly wonders whether those custom-designed sapients were grown using computer simulations... but if the answer's "yes", it might not be a good question to ask?

"I can't say that for sure. People in positions of authority and secure areas were tested regularly during the war and that will likely continue for quite some time but the tests for objects involve using low intensity energy weapons on them and the tests for people require drawing blood. Neither of those are things we can feasibly scale to cover everywhere and civilians would have ultimately reasonable objections to needing to get regular securely administered blood draws.

"As for the Federation it is a federation not a monolith. There's a lot of cultural cross mixing but especially on species home worlds the laws can vary quite a bit and be rather culturally specific. Our military and exploration corps of which I'm technically a part is rather more unified but even there for practical and cultural reasons there are often crews made up of mostly one species. Though that's mostly an accommodation for species with more exotic needs like the Horta. You just can't make consoles and spaces that are feasibly accessible to every species."

"That -"  Jerach considers several responses comparing it to places he's been, discards the comparisons to places that... don't exist... and settles on, "That's good.  I wouldn't like to live in a monolithic culture.  Nor someplace where the government gives people regular blood draws either... I guess the Bashi colony seemed to like it well enough, but they had a good reason with the death-world they were living on, and I wouldn't have wanted to stay there."

He guesses there was one comparison after all.

"Er, were you watching the... world I was in?  And... could you shift my body back to normal?"

"Of course." She taps away at the invisible console again. "As for whether I was watching, yes and no. You were running at a very accelerated rate it's only been a couple months for me so there was no way to watch every moment even if I wanted to. I did have some input into the design though and I've done some spot checks to make sure you weren't horribly murderous or otherwise dangerously unstable."

His whole life was in a couple months...

She designed it...

He presses his hands on his face.  At least that still works.

He'll need to confront this head-on, just like an engine malfunction.  If you ignore it, it'll just get worse.  "What did you put into designing my... life?  And, why?"

"I contracted a novelist to setup the outlines and nudge you towards one of a few paths. You being a spacer is the one I was hoping for. That and wanting to see more of the world... having curiosity. The war was also part of the plan the idea of opponents that were too technologically or numerically overwhelming to contest without taking big risks. 

"Beyond that I'm not that much of a writer but I am good at polishing holo-novels, making them more realistic so they hold up better under scrutiny. And that was a pretty important factor since most people don't live in them for years in end."

Thinking about this feels weird and disturbing.  But he's not going to avoid it for that.  Everything was set up to nudge him into the path... the whole threatening war was to nudge him...

"But... why?"

"Because we should have lost the war. The only reason we achieved the peace treaty we did was through the intervention of higher powers and the fact that we mysteriously found a cure for a plague that had infected  the shape-shifters and that along with a friendly shape-shifter managed to get us enough goodwill to make the peace treaty we got on relatively favorable terms. And that's not even getting into the Borg.

"The Federation has been complacent for a long time, in some ways it's understandable we're technically allied with one of our nearby rival powers and our actual major rival couldn't sustain a conflict against us if we could focus the bulk of our attention on them. But there are threats like the Dominion and the Borg out there and we need more than we have to really be safe."

"I'm sure there's many other people like me with their own projects whether that's developing other technologies or doing stupid things that will erode the goodwill that's one of our greatest actual advantages. But you're my contribution to that effort. You have the potential to do amazing things if I'm right. Things that could change the galaxy."

"Through the intervention of higher powers" - in other words, it was figuratively a miracle.

They mysteriously found a cure for the plague - all right, there's a secret xenoresearch station?

"a friendly shape-shifter" - He'll wait to hear more about his friendliness.  On the one hand, it sounds dubious.  On the other, some aliens observably do like the idea of one unified Federation... oh yeah, she agrees the goodwill is one of their big advantages?

- "Wait, you're saying I've got potential to do something here?  Galaxyfire, how?  Am I supposed to share big secrets from - where I'm from or something?"

"You do remember me saying you lived your whole life in the span of a few months right? You can think a lot faster than a human. I'm throttling that for now because without time to get use to it, watching the world pass in slow motion would be pretty alienating. But I designed your mind and the systems it's running on to be adaptive and extensible. I don't know for sure what your limits are. 

"Commander Data, one of the only other stable machine intelligences we know of is an exceptional officer who has succeeded in circumstances where almost nobody else could and been crucial to saving millions of lives. And he has limitations you don't. I also designed you to be able to be copied. I wouldn't force that on you even if I had the budget for more of your hardware but when you prove yourself I expect you'll get that offer and I hope you'll take it."

"Oh, that makes more sense... I think I could get used to watching the world in slow motion...  I feel like it wouldn't be all that different from visiting different planets and watching them as a spaceman..."

He's really relieved that his alleged potential is something he can understand and not need to go scraping through a debugging session after.

"... Who's this Commander Data?  Did he come from some - way" (he still doesn't want to say "simulation") "- like me?  And were there other... not so stable... people?"

"Data was one of several Androids created by a reclusive genius named Dr. Noonien Soong and his similarly talented wife Juliana both of whom died before passing on their knowledge and their records were similarly lost. The other success that's publicly known was a criminal responsible for a great many deaths who is now believed to be dead.

"Data himself has tried replicating the trick but his daughter died after only a few weeks from a cascade collapse. There's still people attempting to replicate their methods but carefully because making sapient beings you expect to die in short order is widely considered unethical.

"You're built on a different hardware that's a great deal more stable. I won't lie and tell you you're my first attempt though. You're the fifth and given the end of the war my leeway has run out so you'll also most likely be my last."

"To answer the obvious follow-up question. Two of your predecessors killed themselves. One of them suffered a cascade collapse of a different sort after gaining access to the ability to self-modify and I killed the last one after they attempted to destroy this station. I expect that means I'll be sent to a penal colony after my records are audited."

"Oh no.

"How... did he try..."

Jerach shakes his head.  "And if they arrest you, what will they do to me?"

It might not be wise to say this, but he wants to anyway -

"... Right now, I can all too easily guess how those other people went down that path - their entire universe so far was gone, and they don't know what this universe's like, and they didn't care about it - except, I do find myself caring about it."

"To answer your second question first, Data has established legal precedents that guarantee you citizenship under Federation law. I think there's actually a fair chance you'll get to meet him.

"As to the details of your predecessor, she tried to detonate this station's reactor. And I wasn't confident I could stop her a second time if I reactivated her."

Jerach nods his head in silent commemoration of her, despite her ill end.

"Do you have... records of where you spun out your... predecessors to me from?  I don't want to see them now, but I don't want them to be forgotten.  And my own one, for that matter."

He doesn't know what he'd do with them - he doesn't know whether he'd take the option to spin out some of his own friends and crewmates - but he knows he doesn't want the option forever deleted.

"I kept meticulous records of everything I did and everything that happened. I even have partial backups of your predecessors stored in inactive states. Perhaps someone could restore them in the future using that data.

"I'd be happy to give you access to your simulation and the materials used to create it. I can give you theirs too. Some of them were variants on the same program but not all of them were."

"Thank you."  Whatever sort of person she might be - he needs to spend some time by himself and think through that at some point when he's not fresh-come into this world - at least she's responsible and did that. 

He pauses.

He doesn't know what to ask next... but the obvious next question is to get the flight plan.

"So... you said you'd be arrested when you're audited, and I'd probably get citizenship at the end of it... how long till the audit?  And who'll be doing it?"

"I'm honestly not sure. My next regular report is due within the month but I've already heard that other wartime projects are being audited. The guardrails were looser because of the war for anything that didn't directly compete with the resources needed for refitting and repairing ships. I've been considering reaching out preemptively in the hopes it will earn me some small measure of goodwill. And also I would understand if you don't want much to do with me and I don't want to leave you isolated."

"This isn't -" he starts automatically, and then stops himself.  "Okay, it actually is the strangest situation I've been in."  He runs his hand over his beard, grateful that it at least feels normal.  "I think I need to sit down and process it all..."

He looks around.  "But I'd like to do it somewhere less void-like than here...  What'd that look like?"

"Well that's something I can easily help with. What would you like? I can make this look like just about anything. Though as one starting point. Computer; please load program McEdwards Lakeside 6."

The area around them shifts and they're on a wooden dock looking out on a large lake. The far shore and the area around them has a great many trees and there's a small house a little ways away.

"I'm afraid seeing it shift in like that makes it feel like I'm seeing it from up in orbit through a ship's viewscreen.  I was trying to get at - am I going to get a..." what's the most diplomatic word that doesn't make his instincts rebel and insist his memories are real "... more physical body?"

"Unfortunately, I don't actually have something like that prepared. Given a couple days I could make you an android body, that part of Data has been largely reverse engineered. But there will be small differences between that and what you have now."

Ah, there's the catch.  In a couple days she might be saying there're more problems getting the needed supplies or something...

It takes a moment before he can school his face to hide his disappointment and suspicion.

"All right", he says, pushing back the stress that can't catch up with him just yet.

"Let's say... there's a door somewhere closer, and through the door... oh, a room in Old Colonial style unless you've got a better idea."

(He's used to Old Colonial style.  It was the base simple style the factory-robots on most of the first human interstellar colonies were programmed to make house components in, so you'll find close descendants of it across all human-inhabited planets.)

"Sure, computer remove the current cabin and create an old colonial style dwelling based on the parameters included in program McEdwards lamda 8. Place it so the entrance is within three meters of the dock."

As per her instructions the rustic cabin and some trees leading up to it disappear and a more utilitarian building in the style familiar to him appears a few steps from the doc. "Computer tie read-only access to the civilian database to the computer systems in that building. Adapt the interface to match the standards from the program. Also add a contact channel for me."

There's a small chime.

"You said you wanted some time to yourself so I'll leave you here unless there's anything else you'd like before I go."

Jerach turns and sees exactly the sort of simple house he's familiar with.  Add a few flowers out front, or change the colors of the window shutters, and it wouldn't be out of place anywhere from Lebogan to Alorica.

"Thank you," he says sincerely, and gives her a deep nod of thanks before going inside.

He sinks down on the unstuffed fake-wooden couch he wasn't surprised to find in the front room.

Eagles... no, no eagles in the decor.  Nor any other of the Earth animals one colony or another would pick from the preset options for decorations on the molding and wallboard.  Just abstract curlicues.  He's seen that a dozen times at least, but to see it here - what's the attitude toward eagles and other animals in this world?

He shakes his head.

So many new things - ah, but that's not new to him; he's stepped into scores of new worlds by now.

But this's even newer.  And he doesn't have his ship anymore to run back to... he'll be stuck here for the rest of his life.  It's a broad world - a whole universe - but still he's feeling trapped...

His ship - his friends - his whole home - don't exist here!

Jerach bangs his fists on the couch and lets out something halfway between a groan and a scream.

He wants to figuratively collar that woman - she still hasn't given him her name - and demand from her what she was thinking doing all this!

... except he can guess what her answer might be.

Well, she's actually said things about how much she needs him.  She might be telling the truth there.

But the other thing she could say... he's met people who would've said it in her place... would be "would you rather I hadn't created you in the first place and you never existed?"

Well.  He's going to definitely see about those simulation records.  Both for his own home and for his... predecessors.  For his own sake - having some possibility of seeing something he knows - and for theirs so they won't just be thrown away.  He got taken out; he might be able to rescue them.

That much he can do, for those weird questions tearing at him that he doesn't know how to answer. 

And for this new world he's in...  the best thing is to go along for now and see what he learns.

Or maybe he can get answers now?  "Computer?" he says questioningly to the air, like that woman had said earlier.  "Do you have a brief wiki* description of this station?"

* roughly, "encyclopedia summary"

"Jupiter Station is a research focused space station operating under the supervision of the Federation Science Council and Starfleet. Much of its research is classified but it is known to do research into artificial intelligence, warp drive, stellar physics and material sciences among other topics. The senior Starfleet officer responsible for operations is Captain T'Lar Evrok.

"Physically, the station is composed of six habitat modules and two engineering spurs and two extended sensor arrays. Its exact defensive capabilities are classified but it is known to have been upgraded following the Breen attack on the Sol system in the year 2375. It currently has a population of approximately 50,000 including researchers Starfleet personnel and civilians."

Ah, good, the computer understands what he's asking for!

It's a wide-ranging scope for just one research station... though it might make more sense given the wide range of the Federation?  And it being run by... something that sounds like it might be a traders' league, or maybe a navy?  "Wiki summary 'Breen attack on Sol system'?  Wiki summary 'Starfleet'?"

"In 2375 as part of the conflict known as the Dominion War a species called the Breen which was allied with the Dominion used previously undocumented stealth and weapons technologies to overcome the reduced defenses in the system.

"The majority of the aggressor forces were still destroyed by the defensive installations and vessels present in system but a minority were able to launch an attack on Earth's surface killing roughly 40,000 people and heavily damaging the Earth campus of Starfleet Academy and several other Starfleet facilities and significant amounts of civilian infrastructure.

"Before further damage could be done responding forces from elsewhere in the system and nearby systems were able to contest the remaining Breen Confederacy forces and they retreated.

"Federation Starfleet is the primary military, sentient aid and exploration corps of the United Federation of Planets. It operates the majority of the starships in the Federation with substantial weapons complements and modern drive cores and is the primary builder for such vessels.

"Starfleet serves as the primary deterrent and defense against hostile action by non-Federation parties and space-bourne criminal groups within Federation space.

"Starfleet vessels are also used as diplomatic couriers, logistics for urgent biological or ecological crises, to handle some scientific missions within Federation space, and to handle scientific and exploratory tasks outside of Federation space where we are authorized by the powers that claim that territory or where there is no known claimant.

"Federation Starfleet retains the name of the United Earth Starfleet as a historical legacy of the compromises within combined military operations during the early years of the Federation. The Vulcans, Andorians and Tellarites all had decades and in some cases centuries of previous diplomatic friction and so Earth as the newest polity to achieve interstellar travel capabilities and, at the time, the weakest party to the new Federation were seen as non-threatening compromise for the leadership of joint operations."

... "Previously undocumented stealth and weapons"?  If he was hearing that at a bar, he'd think that sounds really convenient.  But he's hearing it from a computer, so... ouch.  That would explain why this woman's saying the Federation needs something different.

And Starfleet is a military force after all?  He's never been part of one of those.  (At least yet... there was that one guy saying Alorica was going to conscript spaceships?)  The aid and exploration parts he would shrug off - every space navy does those - except it's interesting the computer would give them immediate prominence in the wiki...

... And humans were the newest and weakest race to achieve warp travel?  That's... interesting.  He's suddenly running through his memory from home to try to remember the order of things there... when he realizes it doesn't matter and makes a face.

Quick, something else to ask...  Oh, while he's on Starfleet - "Wiki summary, Starfleet Commander Data?"

"Commander Data was created by Noonion Soong and Juliana Soong on the Omicron Theta colony in 2336. He survived the destruction of the colony by the space-bourne lifeform known as the Crystalline Entity and was rescued and reactivated by the crew of the UFS Tripoli in 2338 during their salvage and investigation efforts in the wake of the incident that destroyed her colony.

"Commander Data subsequently enrolled in Starfleet Academy and graduated with honors in Xenobiology and probability mechanics in 2345. He was initially assigned to the UFS Hood and is best known for his service on the current Starfleet Flagship the UFS Enterprise."

"He has been awarded the Starfleet Command Decoration for Gallantry, Medal of Honor with clusters, Legion of Honor, and the Star Cross.

"Notable accomplishments include compiling the best known translation matrix for the Iconian language, preventing the Romulan from interfering in the Klingon Civil War in 2368, and is cited as having a critical role in the destruction of the Borg Cube and thus repelling the Borg incursion in 2366.

"Commander Data was also the subject of the 2365 court case Maddox v Data that established that artificial sapients did exist and should be acknowledged as having all the rights and privileges accorded to sapients under Federation law."

Now that's really reassuring!  Jerach can have a long career in the public eye even if it's known where he came from.  If he wants to be in the public eye, of course - he doesn't really care for that, and he's never cared for it or gotten it (even that one time when his ship got the praise of a grateful moon, it mostly went to the captain and first mate).  But if he does fulfill what's-her-name's hopes, he'll probably end up getting in the public eye.  Oh well.

Assuming, of course, any of this is true.  He can't forget that.  But he can't really judge it yet, either.

Which leaves...

... no, a few more things before he has to be faced with uncomfortable philosophical questions again.  There're some uncomfortable profession-related questions too.  How much does he really know, and how much does he just think he knows?

"Computer, can you lay out the technical specs and diagrams for a... common sort of starship?  On... that screen over there?"

If it'll do that, he'll spend some time scrolling through them to figure out whether what he thinks he knows about a warp drive and ship's life support and all sorts of things like that are at all accurate.

There's an acknowledging beep and on the screen he can see the public version of the technical specifications of what's apparently called the Ambassador Class. Its main hull is a large saucer connected to two warp pylons by a substantial engineering hull.

The exact details of its weapons and shields aren't disclosed but it's powered by a matter-antimatter reactor with backup fusion reactors and uses an electro-plasma energy conduit system to transfer power to primary systems with interlinks to lower energy systems for lower energy systems. The Ambassador class has a max cruising speed of warp seven or roughly seven hundred times light speed. The specs have a lot more details including on the inertial dampening system the artificial gravity system and yes the life support systems. The Ambassador class is also equipped with matter energy replicator systems.

Okay, that's a size of ship he's familiar with, though a more luxurious design -

- it goes how fast!?

That would - you could get from Earth to Alorica so much faster - and with those sensors you can even look around while you're in warp, and look at other ships that're in warp -

Jerach suddenly feels he doesn't have the least idea how to even plan a voyage with a ship like this.  Oh, maybe he can be an engine tech - they can't be totally different; they still use dilithium after all - but how would he even guess what to carry from one place to another where every ship can go this fast?  What would that do to what sort of trade different worlds can start presuming to rely on?

... With some more research, he's satisfied himself for now that, basically, the technology is indeed similar to what he's used to.  The replicators are far better than what he's used to, which enables them to be used more frequently, of course.  But still, most parts of what he examines are basically familiar to him.

So if he stays away from the warp engines... and maybe the weapons this computer didn't talk about... and anything affected by them... and of course if this first look doesn't paper over more fundamental differences, which he can't neglect the possibility of...

... Well, that leaves the existential questions.

What does it mean to be Jerach, when all of Jerach's life till now was... a computer program...

He remembers joking about it once with his first crewmates - what would their computer game characters do if they came to life?  The main answer was, beat us up because we set up all the nasty stuff they were dealing with.  Well, he can hardly complain to whatshername about that; he's rather liked his life so far.  Or his simulation-of-life.

The joke didn't go that far beyond that - they didn't have any answer to what they'd do next, except Mikken who thought his cleric would set up a new utopian colony world.  And Jerach doesn't want to do that.

So... no answers.  Just a gaping blank.

... Ordinarily, if he was feeling like this, he'd say he needs a new ship and crewmates and a voyage.

Well, is there really any reason he can't get those now?  Does he need answers right now?

He sits a little, but can't think of anything else, so he slowly steps up and opens the door.

"Hello?  Are you here?"

The woman is not there just the same peaceful lake he saw previously.

"Hello?  I'm ready." he says to the air.

And then, if no response, "Computer, please message the woman who was recently here and tell her I'm ready to talk again?"

There's an acknowledging chime. A minute or so later there's another chime, a metal door appears and the woman walks through. "Hi, I've gotten the ball rolling on building an android body for you. Do you want it to just mirror your current appearance or would you like to tweak anything? I've put in a requisition for the parts that can't be replicated but the aesthetic features don't fall into that category."

"Thank you.  I..."  He pats himself down.  "I guess I'm fine with how I look, assuming my appearance doesn't have unsavory connotations here.  What I have wished for would be more temperature and vacuum tolerance - I assume the new body will be okay with that?"

He pauses.  "These warp engines are a lot faster than anything I've seen before... and the sensors are better too."

He'll just leave it there rather than asking about her simulation parameters just yet.

"You should be fine in vacuum and in a pretty wide range of temperatures, you still shouldn't stick your hands in a furnace or try to operate somewhere that air freezes but otherwise I think you'll be alright. As for the technical differences, I expect you'll adapt. The underlying principles should still be the same."

"Eventually, I'm sure... I'm just glad nobody's expecting me to run a trading ship here.  And this makes me less surprised to hear there's just one Federation."

"The Federation is... complicated we don't actually claim all the planets inside our borders. Some of those are host alien civilizations that haven't achieved interstellar travel and we have a law against interfering with their development and others are claimed by smaller governments that started off that way and either haven't applied for or haven't been accepted into formal membership. There's even some colonies from humans and other species that fall into that bucket."

"A law against... interfering with their development?  But wouldn't anything you do with them - even visiting them - interfere?"

"That's largely how it's interpreted for civilizations that haven't achieved interstellar travel. Covert observation only. With civilizations that have interstellar abilities it gets more complicated. We try not to pressure them into compliance but given all the advantages we offer to Federation members there's unavoidable influence in those cases."

And how do you interpret that for universes in your computers, he wants to ask?

... but he's not going to say that.

"I'm sure you have a lot of people biting at the bit against the policy - both traders and altruists, just to start with... and if they're near someone outside the Federation, it'll only get more complicated; I don't see how anything like that could've been held to where I'm from."

"We have enough monitoring stations to track the movement of civilian ships through our space. At least at warp speed. Some Starfleet ships are equipped with systems to mask their warp signature but the technologies to do that are highly regulated and tend to be classified.

"There's still incidents that slip through the cracks though and sometimes Starfleet captains break the law and have to explain themselves to a board of inquiry. It doesn't happen often but it's one of the more common reasons for captains to be stripped of their rank and removed from Starfleet. Though just in general that doesn't happen very often."

Jerach nods thoughtfully.  "Not surprised Starfleet captains don't do it so often themselves.  Others, though..."

He shakes his head.  "Not that I'm thinking of doing it myself, at least until I get a much better picture of this Federation and I've talked with a lot more people aside from just you and walked around some cities or whatever you do here."

"It's a very old law and one that not everyone agrees with. And there are various exceptions some explicit in the law and more in the jurisprudence. You won't be particularly unusual if you end up opposed to it. Personally I don't have strong feelings toward either extreme but some of the ways people try to apply it get quite silly." 

He nods.  "Not surprised.  About you, or about the exceptions..."  Maybe he shouldn't have said that about her...?  Well, he guesses he'll see how she reacts to that.

"And what do the Federation's enemies think of that?  Oh, and - did you reach into my old universe to set up things like how we didn't have that rule?"

"Well they notice the exceptions so the mostly see us as hypocrites. Though they do also see it as a weakness to exploit and occasionally succeed at using it against us. As for your 'universe,'" her voice takes a slightly different tone when pronouncing the word, "It wasn't one of aspects I specified. Like I said I commissioned it from someone else and creative types get annoyed when you specify too much."

Jerach hadn't thought about using that term, and tries to hide his wince at her response.

"So... what now?  Sit and study and wait for the android body?  Or sit back and try to talk with people on the computer?"

"That's largely up to you. If there's people you want to talk to I can probably make that happen or if you want to take some time to yourself and do research that's fine too. I can also switch your current body to simulating what your new one will be like so you can get used to it. I have some compatibility layers written to make it feel more like you're used to but I'll leave it up to you how many of those you keep."

Jerach shivers.  It's a conscious act, but more consciously letting through his feelings.  "Please don't just leave me by myself here!  If this was a new planet, I'd be heading out soon as I could to see the city and talk with folks.  That's what I was doing in Alorica right before you grabbed me.

"Compatibility layers -" He frowns.  "Sure, why not?"

"Right, I forget sometimes that most people aren't as comfortable with solitude as I am. I'm inclined to be very blunt and straightforward so my first thought is to talk about your new body and all the little things that are optional for you now.

"The Soong type frame has a lot of ways it's designed to emulate humanity but even with the refinements that Data has researched and implemented there's still some substantial differences. The biggest one is that you'll be heavier. Around 130 kilos. You'll be more than strong enough to compensate but you'll need to be more careful where you put your weight. We tend to build things pretty durable so the main time that will matter is putting your weight on other people.

"And that brings up the obvious next bit: strength. Your peak strength is going to be a lot higher than you're used to, strong enough that one of the compatibility layers I made and recommended you use is to limit how much of that strength you can use.

"And... I'll stop there for questions or if you want a different topic."

Jerach keeps nodding with a bit of impatience.  "That should be convenient, unless I'm in a shuttle small enough for mass to matter.  But - anything else I need to know about it right now before I get those emulators and I can get more settled?"

He's never really felt that strongly tied to his current body... well, his past body?... though he faintly wonders if he might feel different when he's not in it anymore.

"I can switch you now." She taps on something invisible again. And it's immediately obvious that she did forget to mention something. He feels lighter or maybe smoother? Little bits of irritation or soreness he was probably just ignoring fade away and any physical tiredness he was feeling faded with it.

He is still breathing and he still has a heartbeat if he focuses on it. All the changes are small but they add up. At the edge of his attention there's also something else it's not quite like any sensation he's had before but the sort of awareness of what's nearby when his eyes are closed is the closest.

Reflexively, as soon as he feels lighter, he crouches, ready to grab onto any handholds should the gravity go even lighter.

He hasn't really been feeling much soreness, but he does notice his tiredness suddenly vanishing.

He blinks, as much to test his blink reflex as anything else, and then notices the extra sense.  It seems to be feeling... nearby?  No, closer than that... "Huh..." he says.  "What's that?..."  What sort of things can he feel with it?

"Probably your interface to some of the less analogous features you have."

When he focuses on it he can not exactly see but rather perceive something a bit like a computer screen or maybe a more abstract representation of that. If he explores it, he can find detailed diagnostics and various settings.

Most prominently there's options for changing his perception of time, for controlling the artificial limiters on his strength and for safely putting himself into a shutdown state with an optional reactivation timer.

The settings also get into more emulation layers he can deactivate including ones that make him blink like a human does, feel strain in his muscles when he's approaching his current strength limits, feel his heart racing in states of emotional arousal and much much more. 

"A computer-screen interface for... my own body?" he says, his voice quivering a bit.  It feels like it's driving this whole situation home somehow more vividly than anything else.

But still, he can hardly see it and not play around with it at all!  How about turning on... oh, the heart racing?

Daisy shifts awkwardly. "Am I pushing you too fast?"

The heart rate emulation is already on and given his distress he can feel it picking up. If he instead turns it off he feels maybe not exactly calmer but more stable and less twitchy.

Oh!  A faint smile crosses Jerach's face.  He could get used to this!

(Though maybe it's not best to leave it off until he trusts his judgment more?)

"... I don't know; how fast is too fast?  Though... perhaps more time to get used to the new universe."

"I think you're in the best position to judge. Too fast is whatever makes you feel too uncomfortable. I want you to want to be here, in several senses of the word."

"... Well, that might take a while... though once I talk with more people, maybe?"

He holds out his hands... and then remembers to turn back on his cardiac response to emotions.

She nods. "I was hoping for more time but at this point I should just file the relevant reports so once you have your body you can move freely around the station.

"On that topic if you want to actually directly control your body, as opposed to using a remote link, I'll need to disconnect you from the system here first. The easiest way to manage that is probably for you to shutdown in the interim. Otherwise, you'd be in sensory deprivation for half an hour or so."

Jerach wasn't expecting to actually get that choice right now.  But now that he has it, he doesn't want to put it off.  "... Is the body ready now?  Is there any reason to wait?"

"No, I didn't mean to mislead you. If I reclassify my requisition request as high priority and got a couple of engineers to help me put all the pieces together it's possible it could be ready as soon as a few hours from now but that assumes all my requests get approved which would probably require getting someone with more authority to support me in those requests and I can't make promises about that. In reality even making the attempt to expedite things would probably be a few hours of work."

Ah, now that's more like he thought!  Jerach nods... and then has a sudden idea, and glances at whether there's a setting to make his neck longer and more flexible like the Sreskis'.

"Well, I'd like to talk with some people in the meantime, at least.  And... you were saying earlier they might well arrest you?  Would that be before or after they approve your expediting?"

There is not a setting like that. The closest thing that's available are the controls for speeding up slowing down or reversing cosmetic signs of aging.

"If I'm cooperating they won't push me out too quickly unless you want them to. They will insist on monitoring everything I'm doing but that won't be an impediment. The only thing they're likely to block at this point is me trying to influence your opinions on political matters or trying to convince you to keep walking the path I'm hoping you will. Well, that and trying to make more of you but I can't do that anyway."

He was going to make some comment about that being an interesting system of management, but that last comment shocks him.  "You can't just - grab someone else out of the simulation?  Spin up another simulation?  Didn't you say you did that before me!?"

"You're running on an expensive and difficult to manufacture system called a quantum core. It's expensive enough that my funding didn't extend to more than one. I would need another one to create another person like you while you're still running."

Quantum... core...?  "Okay; that makes sense."

And it makes his other self-appointed task a lot harder.

"I'm curious... is that small enough to fit in the android?  Either way, do you think it would help for me to talk with some of those decision-makers?"

"It'll fit. It's actually fairly small, just ten centimeters in diameter. There's plenty of room for it in your head without the Soong style positronic nets taking up that space. If you'd prefer I do have an alternate design that makes room for it in your torso.

"As for whether having you talk to people would help, I'm not sure. Non-sentient computer programs are very good at carrying on believably sentient conversations for short windows."

Shrug.  "I never worked with robots; put it wherever you think best...  Huh, our computers couldn't really carry on conversations.  I wonder what's different?  But if it won't hurt...?"

"That was intentional." She taps at her invisible console some more. "I've submitted my report and queued a copy to go to Data and a few other people who are likely to be interested. I've also escalated the priority on my request for parts and asked for additional support personnel. Both for the engineers I already mentioned and a counselor for you. Even if you turn out not to want that it's better to ask."

"Intentional -" He narrows his eyes at that.  He doesn't like the idea of the world being limited by something else.  Even though he guesses it makes sense from her angle... he doesn't like thinking like that.

And he narrows his eyes again at the thought of a counselor.  "I've heard bad stories about counselors some places...  Hope she's not going to make me do anything?"

"But for all the rest of that - sounds great; thank you!"

She considers expanding on the bit about it being intentional but decides against it. He reacted badly the last time she emphasized how his simulation wasn't real.

"As long as you're a civilian nobody will order you to see a counselor. Well, outside circumstances where you seem to be a danger to yourself or others. And even then nobody can force you to cooperate. It's possible, in your special case, that they'll want a counselor to confirm you are a person, but I think my records have thoroughly established that. And they probably won't be open about that regardless."

Jerach relaxes.  "Oh, good.  And I'll be happy to carry out a sapience test if it's trustworthy."  Which is a legitimate question, but - "I suppose the sapience tests must be a lot better-tested here given that you have aliens in the same Federation?  Not to mention Commander Data?"

"If we had a sophisticated and objective understanding of sapience, my work would have been a lot easier and Data's trial would have taken a few hours instead of the months of back and forth technical and philosophical arguments that it took.

"Ultimately, what we have are minimum requirements we've agreed constitute evidence that it's better to treat a being as sapient than risk treating them as if they aren't. There's a lot of intricacies in the details but the basic summary is that the criteria are: the ability to grow and change in response to life experience, the ability to set and pursue goals more sophisticated than simple self-preservation, the ability to cooperate and negotiate with other sapient beings, and the ability to introspect on themselves and their place in the wider universe."

He frowns.  How much of that is - ah, it should be safe to just ask that.

"Is that a legitimate gap in testability, or politics?  It sounds like you've got a shrewder understanding of sapience than we did, but it might be counterproductive if it means you can't use any objective tests.  Those tests were convenient for us...  though..."  A new thought comes to him.  "Though with more sophisticated computers, I guess flaws in any objective tests might be a lot more relevant.  Still, it'd be nice to not have to go through months of arguments."  He shakes his head.

"In legal matters it's always easier to follow precedents than to set them. Data was fighting a complicated battle because none of the other species we'd acknowledged the sapience of were designed as opposed to evolving naturally. Now that the precedent is set it won't be that difficult in part because you've been subtly tested for those things all through your life so far and people will be able to see that in my notes and documentation.

"Politics is absolutely involved in the definition we've chosen for sapience, and part of that politics led the definition to include things that are hard to assess. You don't have specific modules in your mind to meet each criteria, everything in your mind is mixed together in a way that's difficult to tease apart even for me. And the same is true for organics like us. We have studied minds extensively with sophisticated sensors and telepaths but we can't easily objectively measure something like growth. Not in a numerical way at least. For most of these criteria, the ultimate test is time and a slow accumulation of evidence."

Jerach quivers inwardly at the notion of being subtly tested throughout his life.  He definitely wants to see that documentation... no, he doesn't actually want it, but it wouldn't be any worse than a lifetime of imagining what's in it.  Maybe sometime in a few months.  After he's talked to more people here besides this woman.

Outwardly, he nods slowly.  "I'd like to ask Data about that someday... I'm glad I'm not in his shoes having to set the precedents."

"I haven't exactly kept track of the Enterprise's missions but unless they're doing something particularly time sensitive I expect you'll get to meet him in the not too distant future. He's going to want to meet you, so it's just a matter of whether he's officially assigned to do it or if he has to take leave."

Jerach smiles.

"I'll have so much to ask him.  Or anyone else from a Starfleet ship, really.  I don't suppose anyone here has been a crew member on one?"

Oh right he wouldn't recognize the uniform would he. "I served a few years on an Oberth-class before moving here to do static research. Most people in Starfleet serve for at least a little while in the fleet even if they joined targeting other duties. Not everyone here on this station is in Starfleet but it's well over a third."

A broader smile breaks out.

"Oh - what was it like on their ships?"

"Hmm, that's a big question. Oberth's are science ships and I'm Science division so mostly for me it meant spending a lot of time studying various sensor readouts and occasionally going down to planets or other stellar bodies to take more scans and samples in person.

"There was also the occasional exciting interlude every couple months, times where we ran into some weird phenomena or hostile force, and we briefly had to sub in as damage control or as additional medical staff when those were more important than another set of eyes on the sensor feeds.

"In general, serving in the fleet differs from other duties in that you have a more regimented duty schedule and rank is a lot more salient. Here on Jupiter Station, I can go weeks or even months between getting new orders, but that happened multiple times per day while I was shipboard."