Episode 67
Travelling Light E067S02 Transcript
[Title music: rhythmic electronic folk.]
H.R. Owen
Travelling Light: Episode Sixty Seven.
[The music fades out.]
The Traveller
Entry SH85116-2. A discussion of the culture and subcultures surrounding synthetic body parts
Key words: health and well-being; identity; Potfarne Station; technology.
Notes:
I did not have chance to see very much of Potfarne Station during my brief visit. Anything that was not located near either the docks or the radio station, or on the route between the two, was unfortunately, irrevocably out of my way.
However, I would not let that stop me seeing what I could. When I came upon a pub advertising the finest beer on the station, I saw no harm in stopping in for a swift half, even if I had no comparison by which to test their claim.
“What’ll it be?” asked the barman. He moved behind the bar with easy confidence, eyes sparkling with humour.
“Half a pint of the best beer on the station, please.”
[laughs] “Coming right up.”
It was quiet enough that he did not have to rush off as soon as he served me. Instead, he took up a glass to wipe and watched for my reaction.
“What’s the verdict?”
“It is good,” I allowed. “But, uh… Well. I suppose it is a fairly small station.”
The barman’s head knocked back with laughter. [laughing] “You cheeky bugger! You’re getting the second best, next time!”
With the ice broken, we fell into an easy, undemanding conversation. His name was Kualo, and he had moved to Potfarne Station from Driskius some years ago.
“After the accident, you know,” he said, gesturing to… Well, to the whole of him, really. I took too long finding a polite response, making him laugh again. [laughing] “Go on. Pretend you haven’t noticed!”
“I was not going to pretend anything! I admit, I have never met anyone with such extensive prosthetics. That is – they are prosthetics? You are not, uh…?”
“I’m not a bot,” Kualo confirmed. “I was 100% flesh and blood, long time ago.”
I had already told him about the archive earlier in the conversation. It seemed a good time to offer to hear his story if he was willing to share it. And he was.
“Like I said, it started with an accident. I don’t want to talk about it. I’m happy to be in your collection but I’m not going into the details of the worst day of my life for a bunch of strangers. I was hurt and cybernetics were the best treatment.
“The trend, if you can call it that, when I was getting my first pieces was to try and make the synthetic elements as unobtrusive as possible. The skin on my face, it’s synth skin, designed to look more or less exactly like my original wrapping.
“I didn’t really care either way, at first. But then I started to notice how people talked about my synthetic bits. ‘You’d never tell,’ they’d say, like it was a compliment. Like we all agreed, being partly synthetic was something hide.
[laughing] “Well. I’ve never hidden from anything. Next time I went in, I told them to leave off the covering. Let the wire-work show. Let people see me.
“By then, I’d started talking to other semi-synth folk. I had friends who were fully robotic, but it’s different, you know. Similar but different. And I started to find people who didn’t just not mind their synth parts. They liked them. Wanted them.
“I started branching out. Went from prosthetics to augments – not just replacing something I’d lost but building on what I had, improving and tweaking. It’s really something, you know? Making your body so… yours.
“There’s a whole subculture around it. People incorporating synthetics into their bodies, replacing bits and adding bits and whatever else. Some of my pieces are practical, some were necessary, but some of them are purely aesthetic.”
“Is it too personal to ask how you pay for it? I presume medical augments and prostheses are covered by municipal funds?”
“Don’t cover electives, though,” Kualo said. “I just save up, like anything else. I’ve got a friend who does my installs – licensed and all, but she does mates’ rates for us in the community. And the parts aren’t so expensive, specially second hand.”
“Oh! I had not thought of that.”
“Oh yeah. Most people don’t buy their parts new. Some people even swap. This wrist joint,” he said, holding up his right arm and rotating the fitting at the end, “used to belong to my best mate. I like it. Keeps her close when she’s off on a long haul.
“Now, I know what you want to ask. Same thing every bio person wants to know. How much of me is original? The easy answer? Not much. [laughs] I’ve never calculated a percentage but I’m more synthetic than not, that’s for sure.
“Some people want to make a big deal about that. They want to talk about what counts as ‘you’, how much you can change a thing before it’s a new thing altogether. They get themselves very het up.”
I took a pull on my drink and considered this. “I suppose I can sort of see where they are coming from. But I am not what I was 20 years ago, physically or in any other fashion. Nobody makes me argue for my own authenticity.”
Kualo leant his elbows on the bar with an emphatic gesture of agreement. “My thinking exactly. Those people like to draw a line and say, ‘this bit is you, this bit is not’. Like ‘Kualo’ is an objective reality instead of whatever I say I am!
“Thing that gets me is, so many of them draw the line at the brain. Like a person is nothing more than a pile of soggy, salty blancmange sparking with electricity.”
“I thought brains were more gristly than that,” I said, getting a bit distracted.
“No. No, they’re like mousse. Hold ’em too long and they’ll seep right through your fingers.”
“Urgh. I wish you had not told me that. [sighs] And what about your brain? Is it all yours?”
Kualo wiggled his eyebrows. “Ah. That would be telling. Another drink?”
[The sound of the data stick whirring fades in, cutting out when the data stick is removed with a click.]
The Traveller
16th Shebath 851, continued.
After the broadcast, I took myself for dinner in a nearby restaurant. Nothing on the menu was familiar, so I let my waitress choose for me, and ended up with a bowl of heavily spiced… something and nutty, slightly chewy grains.
As I ate, I watched the other patrons and was reminded, suddenly and fiercely, of doing almost the exact same thing one night in Glisco.
I had been acutely aware of my own solitude that night; not lonely but profoundly alone, on a planet where nobody knew me. Or, nobody but Scarry, somewhere in the city docks, awaiting my answer to his unexpected offer.
We were scheduled to leave Potfarne Station the small hours of the morning, something about avoiding unnecessary docking fees. The ship’s rule is that all passengers and crew have to be back aboard at least an hour before take off.
It is a stark difference to the lackadaisical time-keeping of the Tola. I do not think I ever told you about the time we [laughing] accidentally left Doctor Tsabec behind, did I? A story for another time. Suffice to say, they were not impressed.
Anyway, I had some time til then and so took a turn around the station’s central atrium, which serves as a large market square. The interior of the square is filled with more or less temporary stalls, while shops fill the units around the outside.
Despite the lateness of the hour, there was still a healthy crowd of shoppers, both residents and visitors. I needed some toiletries and thought I might pick some up. But local tastes tend towards heavily floral scents – not my preference.
I was resigned to returning to the Guillemot empty-handed when a lone merchant caught my eye. Hers was less a stall than a single box perched on a folding stand, and she waved her arms at the passers-by, calling out her wares.
“Protection! Vitalisation! Powerful positive energies! Yours for pennies!”
How could I resist?
The seller’s face lit up as soon as she saw me approaching. “Good evening, friend! You have the look of someone in need of powerful positive energy?”
She ended the sentence with an up-tick, as if she were not quite sure of the state of my energies after all. As I drew close, I saw her tray was full of rocks, all laid out in tidy rows, from the size of my thumbnail to the size of two fists put together. They glittered, black and green and orange and pink.
“Each element closely aligns with an energy, a mood, a purpose,” the seller explained. “Place them in your home and feel the amplification of all your desires!”
She beamed at me, hands spread towards the rocks to encourage me to look closer. I pointed at a shimmery orange lump.
“So this one…?”
“Resonates with the signature of inquisitiveness, boosting curiosity and learning.”
“That is very specific,” I observed.
“Of course. The energies of the universe are not vague!”
“I see. And what would you recommend for a traveller such as myself?”
Without hesitation, the seller reached for a rich green piece. “Ombraline,” she said succinctly, “to encourage perseverance and forward motion.”
“She’s making it up,” came a voice – another shopper, a local to judge by her hair. “Whatever you ask, she recommends the second most expensive rock.”
“Shut your mouth, Arnad Dothua,” the seller shot back. “If I were making it up, why wouldn’t I just sell them the most expensive thing?”
“Too obvious, innit,” replied the local. “Want people to think they’re getting a bargain.”
The seller glared, but the other person was already off, a smile on her face. I bought the rock anyway. It was pretty! And the ombraline reminded of… Well, of Kerrin, actually. The rain-soaked hills, and Óli’s travelling cloak.
The ship was all but silent when I got back. Music drifted down from the cockpit – Masha, singing along to the radio, adding to the quiet with her unselfconscious noise-making. I was nearly at my cabin when a new sound made me turn.
At the other end of the corridor, Scarry was coming out of the crew lounge, rumpled in shirtsleeves with a book under his arm. I was keenly aware we had hardly been in each other’s company, and certainly not alone, since the attack.
He stood for a moment, no more sure than me about what to say.
“Well done on the broadcast,” he offered at last. “I enjoyed it.”
I could not hide my surprise. “I did not think you were going to listen.”
“Why wouldn’t I?” I had no answer. He went on. “You spoke well. I… enjoyed it.”
His face twitched, grimacing at the repetition. I took refuge in politeness.
“Thank you. I am glad to hear it. I worried my nerves might get the better of me.”
He had come closer by now, enough that I could see his black eyes glittering in the dim light. “And here, I did not think you capable of getting nervous, little feist.”
I tried not to react to the nickname. It irritates me. But he has been so distant these last weeks. I have almost missed it. And then I remembered Sandé’s absurd assertion and my face heated.
“I should, uh. You have things to do, I am sure. I will leave now. Goodnight.”
I tried to retreat to my room, but my fingers fumbled on the handle. Scarry watched, looking as if he were holding back a profoundly irritating grin.
“What’s that?” he said, nodding at something.
“What is what?”
“Your little rock.”
I stopped messing with the door and looked at the ombraline in my hand, as if I did not know it was there. “It is good for travellers.”
“Good for them? Do you mean to eat it?”
“No! It is... resonant. With energies.”
“Energies,” Scarry repeated.
“Yes. Energies. And… vibrations!”
“Vibrations...!”
“Oh shut up!”
“No, no, I am- I am sure it vibrates very nicely.”
“It is a decoration! There is more to interior design than storage, you know.”
“Just because I don’t waste money fitting out the crew lounge with glow-lights and a skyt table…”
“Or pictures,” I said, “or colours on the walls, or rugs, or furniture less than three decades old and upholstered in anything finer than industrial cladding.”
He stepped into my space as he always does when an argument is getting under his skin. “A functional space does not need to beautiful. It needs to be functional.”
“Many people believe a thing can, in fact, be both,” I answered. “But I will concede, I have never seen your cabin. For all I know, it is a veritable bastion of style. And the next planet we land on may have an ocean made of custard!”
I swung open my cabin door, glad for a more graceful exit than my earlier attempt.
“I have rugs,” Scarry said as I stepped inside.
“Good for you. And goodnight.”
I did not shut the door immediately. I lingered, just long enough to see the spark of a smile in his eyes as he answered, “Goodnight, little feist.”
So. At least we seem to be back on good terms. That is… good to know. I have put my piece of ombraline on the shelf beside my bunk. I was right: it does brighten the place up. Whether it does anything for my energies, time will tell.
Now, I really must get this sent. We are leaving in a short while, and though I can use the ship’s array to transmit the message to the station comms office, that is only true as long as we are in range. If I do not go now, I shall have to wait until we are next in port. I will write again soon. I love you all.
[Title music: rhythmic instrumental folk. It plays throughout the closing credits.]
H.R. Owen
Travelling Light was created by H.R. Owen and Matt McDyre, and is a Monstrous Productions podcast. This episode was written and performed by H.R. Owen.
This week’s entry to the archives was based on an anonymous submission. You can see Matt's illustration for the entry on our social media accounts.
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