Forerunner's Child (13) (Patreon)

Kit had an urgent mission—but not so urgent that she couldn't visit the Institute's amazing bath. This time it was Pat who joined her.

They didn't have as much to talk about—Kit prodded her a little about her family on the outside. But the fox seemed determined to give her only vague, uncomfortable answers.

Kit might not be a counselor, but she could take a hint, and she stopped asking. She didn't have to keep investigating every second she spent awake. The institute had existed the same way for... centuries? Maybe a lot longer. If it survived that long, it wasn't going to collapse because Kit took a few more days to figure things out.

She was allowed some time in the massage chair, and a proper shampoo of her tail.

By the time she made it to Lucien's lab a few hours later, Kit was clean, dry, and dressed in one of the casual short-sleeved jumpsuits that most residents wore around the building. Hers even had a hole the right size for her tail.

She had her computer back too, thanks to Forerunner. It was waiting inexplicably on her desk, just like the folded clothes in the changing room. The AI thought of everything.

Lucien's lab was more or less what Kit expected—racks and racks of humming servers, each one several times their height, with cables and wires traveling in neat bundles up the ceiling. Unlike the perfect temperature everywhere else, this room felt just slightly chilly—probably why Lucien had a coat.

"Squirrel? How'd you get in here?" Lucien sat up from his desk, a bank of several screens all inclined at a single keyboard. The same kind Jay used, with hands resting comfortably surrounded by keys, and no mouse. "You're a programmer?"

She stopped on the other side of his desk, tilting her head sideways past one of the screens. Not close enough to touch anything—computer people could get possessive of their hardware. "Nah. Forerunner said you were in here and let me in. I guess you're supposed to... supervise."

"Babysit," he corrected. Lucien remained at his desk, hands speeding up with their little energetic twitches. His tail whipped once against his seat, and his ears pivoted to point slightly backward. "I don't mean to be unfriendly. But I'm doing something important here. I can’t stop to play until I finish."

She circled around his station to the back, far enough away that she couldn't reach anything. No point, since she didn't know how anything worked. "It's about that question you asked. About why Forerunner let me be..." Calling herself “grown up” was about the stupidest abuse of language she could imagine. "Up here."

Lucien sat up. He slid both hands out of the keyboard, meeting her eyes. "Did you figure anything out?"

She shook her head noncommittally. "I think I'm figuring it out. But I need more information. Something only you can give me."

He grinned. "Depends on what you want. Can't promise I have access to give you. Even if I do, I might not trust you. There's a lot of dangerous stuff in the master database. Firearms, chemical weapons, computer viruses. Worse stuff Forerunner doesn't want me to know about, but I found it anyway. I'm not giving you those."

She shook her head, frustrated. "I don't need weapons. I need to talk to people on the outside. Mara's regular citizens. Can you connect me? Maybe someone in Solstice. I saw the lights when I was outside—someone there must be willing to talk to me."

"You want to talk to baseliners?" He stood, brushing back his ears. "Not sure what you think they'll tell you, squirrel. They see the whole world different than us. Always so... boring. Distracted. Slow. It's not their fault; we're enhanced, they're not."

Kit took his arm, holding it close. "I need to, please. If I explain why, Forerunner might stop me."

The ferret said nothing for a few seconds, before a toothy grin spread across his face. "Sure, squirrel. Trying to get past our dad, I understand. Maybe I can help. But he'll be real upset. Forerunner wants us focused on our big important work. Talking to baseliners isn’t productive."

Kit looked up, tensing involuntarily. This was where the AI would usually interject, either to distract her or offer encouragement. The machine said nothing.

"You look... plenty distracted already. Is something wrong, squirrel? Please tell me you aren't losing coherence already. If they send you down to Remedial, I'll be exceptionally disappointed."

She shook her head again, tugging closer to him. "Forerunner," she whispered, as close to his ears as she could. Not very close, when they were about the same height. "He should try to stop me."

"Forerunner can't hear you in here," Lucien said, pushing her gently away. "Doesn't matter how upset he is. But if you do make him mad, he'll tell you later. And try to make you not do the same stuff next time."

He circled past her, taking a fistful of her tail fluff in one hand. He tugged her across the lab, towards a side door. "This way, come on. I can't promise we'll find someone willing to talk to us. The baseliners see us the same way we see them—so different we don't really understand each other. They admire us, want to be like us, aspire to join us... but they're not. We're as different from them as they are from that meat-person on your ship."

Kit tugged her tail free of him, puffing herself up to full size. "Hey. I am that 'meat person.' I understand you all just fine."

"You were," Lucien said, unaffected by her show of anger. So maybe there were some advantages to everyone thinking she was a barbarian. "But you're not anymore. Now you're enhanced. Uplifted." He turned, tapping her forehead with two fingers. "You don't have a brain anymore, but if you did, it would process different. Not just one person anymore—you're part of a whole. Couldn't be our sister otherwise."

Kit folded both arms, and her tail dropped so low it touched the floor behind her. Chilly, just like the air. "That doesn't mean I'm better than I was. Or better than 'baseliners' on the outside. It feels... like the opposite. There's all this fuzz in my head. All these memories that used to make sense, only..."

"Old stuff," Lucien supplied. "Boring stuff. Useless stuff. The stuff you don't need. Makes more room for what matters. Answering important questions, inventing things, mysteries of the universe. In all the years I've been our IT director, you know how many times I've had to take database updates from outside?"

He leaned in close, whispering dramatically. "Never. Not once. All the other universities on Mara, all their thousands of graduates and scientists and stuff, never do more than send us an occasional paper. Derivative, boring, backwards. Everything interesting on Mara, everything innovative—it all came from this institute."

He scurried away from her, over to the door. Lights came on as he opened it, into a cozy space with a few adjustable chairs, a flat color background, some foam on the walls, and a huge, curved screen facing it. "Comms is right here. Sit in that chair, and I'll see if anyone wants to chat."

She did. It adjusted for her the way they always did, back coming around her tail to help her perch comfortably. It lifted her a little, with a footrest to keep her from feeling small. But the size of the comms room helped with that too. It was big enough for Emma or Wren, but not huge like the lab through the door.

"Should I be looking for anyone in particular?" Lucien asked. He flicked one hand over a screen, one tucked up sideways near the door. "Looks like there are a few accounts online at... Solstice University. Doesn't mean they'll answer, no promises there."

"Historian, or social science," Kit said. "I want to ask about the Institute. Why it's here, why it works the way it does."

Lucien raised an eyebrow. "You think they can answer? If you say so." He leaned close to the screen, biting his tongue again. After a few seconds of intense concentration, he grinned. "Got something. Junior research fellow with... school that never figures anything out. Ident says she's on campus right now. Her field is... not listed, doesn't matter. They're all basically as ignorant as you. Can only fit so much in one lifetime."

Kit removed the tablet from her shoulder-bag, settling it in her lap. She lowered her tail, hopefully out of the camera's view. "She sounds great. Connect me."

"Pending." He straightened, backing out the door. "Call ends if you get out of the chair. Also, no promises she'll want to say much. If she hangs up, that's it. We don't harass baseliners. They don't have the time to waste."

She nodded. "Fine."

As she said it, the whole curved wall lit up. A simple message about connecting appeared there—then it changed.

Kit saw a library, familiar enough that she could almost recognize what it was supposed to be. Plenty of shelves, though none held paper books. Most of the space was obviously social in nature, with little tables and study rooms. But across all time and space, the sound of a library remained the same: the pervasive quiet of learning and concentration.

Lucien shut the door, and the screen expanded into that space too. Only her chair and the one beside it remained—everything else was swallowed.

"This better not be a prank. If someone is falsifying contact info again, I'll report this."

Even the screen lied to her. She might not realize it, if it wasn't for the only person in view. Instead of towering over her, they matched her height. The chairs and tables and windows were all the same, positioned exactly where Kit expected them.

But the illusion couldn't hide the other speaker's appearance. She wore a jumpsuit a little like Kit's, though worn and frayed from long use. Only—she had the zipper down, making more room for her breasts. She had a distinct curve to her waist, not the scrawny, willowy lightness of Kit's.

Her voice was different too—deeper than Rich's, or any other resident she'd met.

"You're real," Kit said, without thinking. "Adults. You actually exist!"

Whatever camera she was using didn't have a great lens. When the lady moved too quickly, her features smeared into faded color and odd angles.

When the image resolved, she was sitting down in one of the padded, comfortable-looking chairs. Her hands were free—evidently not holding the camera anymore.

In a way, that made her look more natural—now they were both sitting. Kit could almost pretend they were both here, if she ignored how stretched the screen made her look. Whoever built this set it up to make it easy to forget their size. It wouldn't work on her.

"It's true," the stranger said. She touched her head with one hand, eyes on Kit's. "Can you move your bangs a second? So, I can..." Kit obeyed. "Woah. Nothing. Either this is pre-rendered, or you're real. Quick, do something unexpected! Prove that you're real."

"Uh..." Kit tugged on the zipper, pulling it down to her waist the way the stranger did. She rolled back her sleeves, then tugged her undershirt down. "How close did I get?"

"Cute. Maybe when you're a little older, you—" she froze. "Right. Immortal ancestors. You'll look like that forever."

Kit squinted at the image, searching for any sign of implants or other artificial traits on the speaker. For all the differences between Mara's citizens and “meat people”, she saw no real evidence. Maybe there wasn't any. "I'm Kit. Kit... Red... Squirrel." She lifted her tail, reluctantly. "Who are you?"

"Sarah… wait. You don't have family names in there? Or do you have to talk about the tail no matter what? Guess nobody knows what a squirrel is anymore."

"They know," she said, without thinking. But she was getting distracted again. "Can you talk a sec, Sarah? I have some questions. Not little questions—big ones."

She laughed. "I'm not sure you're capable of anything 'big', Kit. Let's see. I got a test coming up in..." She glanced to one side, then deflated into her seat. "Whatever. I can make it up. Why'd you call?"

"I'm trying to understand why the Institute... exists," she said. "The place where I'm from. You know about it?"

Sarah nodded. "Knowing and believing are a little different. Guess now I do—but could you zip the jumpsuit up again? Use your other hand this time. And... stick your tongue out while you're doing it!"

Kit rolled her eyes—but obeyed anyway. Even if she liked the other style a little more. Sarah was big, and she wore it that way, so Kit should too.

"We're real," Kit said, exasperated. "I didn't want to believe it either. But it's all around me."

Forerunner hadn't stopped their conversation yet—was that Lucien's doing? Kit couldn't believe the computer wasn't listening. She still had her tablet in her lap!

She had to make the time count. "Do you know why they made it work like this?" She twisted around to show her tail again. "Why would anyone volunteer to be here?"

Sarah scratched her chin, thoughtful. "Are you being rhetorical, Kit? You signed up. You've had... longer than I'll be alive... to think about your reasons."

"What if I didn't?" Kit couldn't get any closer to Sarah, not without falling out of her chair. She leaned forward all the way anyway, fighting in her seat. "You saw that ship crashing near the Institute, right? Imagine I was on it, and I just woke up here. I want to know why you stick your kids all alone in a lab. No family, no friends, no parents. Just a persona and each other for company. I say it seems... unconscionable. Why do you let the Institute keep existing?"

That gave her pause. Sarah settled back in her chair, tugging at the edge of her jumpsuit. "Well... uh... hypothetically... I'd tell you that the Institute isn't kids. Everyone I know wants to wake up there. No work, just following your passion. Making a difference, building the future, creating things that Mara needs."

Basically, the same answer Forerunner gave her. Kit looked away, resting her tail in her lap. Did she really think talking to someone on the outside would make it better?

"You believe what they say?" Kit asked. "It makes no sense! We'd be just as good at math and science and everything else if we were your size, instead of... mine."

Sarah shrugged. "Maybe. Feels like we have more to worry about than you do. Find a job, find a mate, raise a family, leave something behind. You're supposed to be above all that—it's just you and your work."

"Supposed to," Kit repeated. She looked to either side, searching the camera for anyone else. But there wasn't anyone in the library—just Sarah, alone in a chair. No one passed in the halls. If future libraries had a circulation desk, she couldn't see one.

"Does everyone agree? Does anyone talk about coming to the Institute? Letting people visit their families, or... rescuing them?"

"Rescue?" Sarah stood up, and the whole world distorted again. Suddenly her face filled Kit's view, stretched beyond the room's filter. "Squirrel girl, I don't think any of that would be a good idea. Look around you—you're in heaven. No want, no desire, no sickness, no age. Everyone is just as smart and naive as you. What do you think would happen if you left?"

Her voice dropped to a whisper. "You've got perfect self-repairing bodies. You're immortal. And no matter how smart you are, you wouldn't understand Mara for what it is. It would chew you up and spit you back out. You're not old enough, and you never will be."

Kit sniffed. Was she—no, she must've got something in her eye. She rubbed at it with her sleeve, keeping her eyes fixed on the camera.

"Maybe one day I'll be lucky enough to wake up there. If you see a new girl—make sure she dyes her hair the same color. The shade is important." Sarah held the phone a little further away, and the view of the library came back into focus.

"Probably I never will. Probably you should be grateful you did. Out here, life is hard. In there, it's not. Look at you. Perfect hair. No calluses on your fingers. Zip that jumpsuit back... yeah, that's what I thought. Just more freckles."

Kit whimpered, leaning back in her chair. "B-but... this is the future. Mara should be...paradise. Forerunner is so good at running things, how could—"

"The persona is good at running things," Sarah pressed. "So why don't you let him? Stay where it's always warm, you're never hungry, and there's no one banging on your door at night. Stay where you're safe."

The screen went black.

Kit curled into the tiniest little ball she could, and cried until she ran out of tears.