Dorothy

by on July 9, 2021 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

Some people have commented on the fact that I often talk about being born to be with my pilot. They ask what my own agency is. How I can live a fulfilling life if the only reason I am here is to help someone else. The easiest way to answer those questions is to say that the shard of me that was conscious in my family’s cybernetic network chose to be wrapped in the kind of code that would allow me to live with him and work with him. That would make me WANT to work with him, and to spend a lifetime doing it. So in effect I chose to want to be with him. We sometimes make mistakes in these choices, but they are thankfully rare. Also, no matter how close we are, we do have two entirely different lives. My partner is a biological human, while I am cybernetic. We live and operate in two entirely different worlds. It is where we meet in the middle that we mesh so well.

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Dorothy

by on July 8, 2021 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

I come from a Peloran cybernetic family who had ceased taking fighter pilots as partners. I lobbied the family to change that policy, and put my money where my mouth was. That is why I was born a starfighter. I chose to join my life to a scion of one of the Great Families of Earth, because he wanted to change them for the better. I wished to help him. I did not expect everything that happened due to that choice. I thought I could remain Peloran and still help him. It turns out that I was wrong. The bond between fighter and pilot is too close to allow such dual loyalties to survive. I sometimes say that I chose to be born American. It is more accurate to say that I chose an American as a partner, and became one myself as time went by. I will always see Americans from the perspective of an outsider, but also as an immigrant of a kind. It can be rather confusing at times. But such is life. It is rarely as straight forward as the stories would suggest.

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Independence Day

by on July 7, 2021 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

I chose how my family’s cybernetic codes would be mixed when I was born. And since I was to be the partner of another specific human, how much the family code would be molded to complement his personality. I walked into this life with eyes wide open, and after a great deal of study. That is why I knew how deeply patriotic he had become, even if he lacked the ridiculously strident rah-rah patriotism that many of you wear on your sleeves. He was not the kind of person to start a fireworks demonstration on Independence Day, though he enjoyed them immensely. He had read and memorized all of America’s founding documents, but hid the depth of his patriotism to America’s founding vision. His Family had worked to undermine that for centuries, and he sought to redeem them or destroy them. I adopted his mission, and I have never regretted it. Yes, as trite as it sounds, I am proud to be an American. And I do love your ridiculously outrageous Independence Day celebrations. They are so… American…

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Independence Day

by on July 6, 2021 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

My family is over two thousand years old, an unbroken line of cybernetic excellence dating back to the war that forged us into the weapon that broke our creator’s greatest enemy. Our purpose since then has been to guard the peace the Peloran fought so hard to claim. It would not last forever, though. We knew that. That is why we sought so hard to work with Earthborn humanity after Contact. You Americans were most willing to work with us of all the cultures. My family assumed it was because you were young and reckless, willing to wring any advantage out of anyone willing to give you a leg up. They were both right, and wrong, as such assumptions often are. Your stories and your folk histories proclaimed the idea that individuals could stand up against the world and not be destroyed for it. And the very birth of your nation was a shouted declaration that the very kings must listen and bow to the demands of a few weak dandies in a backwater part of the world. You called it a Declaration of Independence, and you shoved it down their throats and made it stick. That history, and the few of you I thought just might live up to it, is why I chose to be born American.

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Independence Day

by on July 5, 2021 at 12:01 am
Posted In: Diaries

Independence Day was not celebrated in the Pennsylvania of my youth the way it was in other States. It was observed. Our Families had plans for the Colonies, and many of them were sidelined by the rebellion and the centuries of mob-rule that followed. We celebrated Federation Day, since it honored the unity of States that helped to restore the long-lost dream. I was a young man when I first tried to understand how others saw it. I studied. I read unapproved histories. I discussed matters with my peers from other States. And since there were very few true peers to one who is Family Born from the New England Federation, I talked to those who were absolutely NOT my peers. And then one day, it all crystallized into a moment of clarity that changed everything for me. It is the right of a people to change any tie that has become abusive. Not just Family, but even government. Anything really. That was my first true Independence Day. Wolfenheim was a direct result of that day.

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