Gone Concept Diving

in

"It'll work!" Naomi said.

"I don't care if it'll work, it's a stupid idea!" Aria threw up her hands. Naomi sat at a terminal connected to the bank of supercooled processors.

"Look, all the simulations say the conceptspace exists where I can reach it."

"I don't care if you can simulate Heaven, it's—"

"It's not a simulation, don't you get that? It's a constructed conceptspace, but still real."

"Like another dimension." Aria's affect was flat.

Naomi rolled her eyes. "Sure, if you want to drastically oversimplify."

Aria took a deep breath. "It's untested. Let's run more simulations, test it on animals. I can maybe get a hold of some sign language-trained chimps."

"No. This is my chance to enter a world I've loved since I was five." Naomi hit three keys and slipped a helmet over her head. The world shifted and slipped away.

Everything resolved into shades a big room, all grey and white, with a big window looking out onto open space. She saw it all through some kind of helmet. Naomi was about to take it off when a radio crackled in her ear. "TK-421, report to hangar bay C-37 for cargo inspection."

Oh, Naomi thought. Uh-oh.

Pitter-Pat

in

Ksenia lay in bed, not wanting to get up. She could indulge that feeling for five minutes, at least. Maybe as many as seven. Burying her face in her pillow, a position she never fell asleep in, she enjoyed the warm cocoon of her bed.

She became aware of her heartbeat. She'd tucked her arm under her body for maximal coziness, and she felt the blood flowing through the veins of her elbow pit as it beat against her ribs, ba-dum, ba-dum. It soothed her. Tension seeped from her shoulders, and she smiled.

Other places where her pulse neared the surface made themselves known. She felt the beat of her wrist against her hip, and the pianissimo rhythm of her other hand's thumb tucked against her shoulder, bi-dip, bi-dip.

As she relaxed, she opened to ever more sensations, becoming increasingly attuned. She felt it in her knee pit against the blanket so warm, and in her one ankle crossed over the other, and where her neck pulsed strong, deep in her pillow, thrrrrum, thrrrrum.

Where she felt a different rhythm, rapid and shallow: bidibidibidibidibidibidibidibidi. She surged up onto her elbows and stared down, relaxation forgotten.

"Oh, shit," said the pillow.

Not Going to Hit Him

in

"Hit him," Armand said.

"I'm not going to hit him." Cathy rolled her eyes and looked back at her drink.

"C'mon, he deserves it!" The man who'd offered her a drink backed off, silently disappearing into the late-night/early-morning crowd.

"You always want me to hit them. It scares them off. I mean, I didn't want to keep him around, but it's not normal."

"Normal is as normal does."

"That doesn't even make sense."

"You never let me have any fun," Armand said. As he spoke, one of their neighbors at the bar looked down at Cathy's arm, flesh-toned but obviously a replacement, and speaking through a grille where the deltoid would be. "We're at a bar, and you won't even let me run my intox app."

"Are you surprised I don't want my arm flailing about like a drunk?"

The arm signed. "Do you regret getting a prosthesis?"

Cathy shrugged, which meant Armand shrugged, too. "I regret needing one, sure. Would life be less complicated if we could train good prostheses without that deep neural stuff that results in conscious AI? Sure. How about you?"

"Me what?"

"Do you ever regret choosing a stupid-ass joke name?" Cathy smirked.

"Never."