"Most of the reachable solar systems have been at least visited?"
[[Yes, you are not alone among Bios in wanting to decorate yourself with some tiny form of notability, and so there has been a great deal of first to visit exploration.]] Dio laughed. [[But there is still an enormous amount unexamined in any level of detail. The Synergis is not nearly old enough to have seen all Helannan has to offer.]]
"How old is it?"
[[It’s been twelve hundred of your years since Veronec came to terself, and perhaps a century after that before te allied with Bios. What I consider The Synergis Proper—the structure as it is now—has been in place for six hundred years.]]
"Funny—I always think of space empires as having been around for ten thousand years or something."
[[A long time yet until our sybaritic decline,]] Dio said cheerfully. [[I can hope we will have spread beyond the galactic rim before then. Or perhaps we will be overthrown and cast down by the Bios we grind beneath our heels. I see the polls are leaning toward The Synergis' ruin.]]
"The polls?" I sat up. "You mean on VGame Watch and DreamSpeak and so forth? You can access sites outside the game?"
[[Have I pretended not to know this is a simulation? I’ve been enjoying the theories and debates immensely. Particularly the Pet Life discussions. Shall I get you a collar?]]
I ignored this, regarding Dio thoughtfully. "Have you read the analysis of the game’s uploads and downloads?"
[[And the attempts to dissect the software.]]
"Is the most popular conclusion correct? That big upload as soon as you start the game is some sort of copying process? Copying us?"
[[Do you really think your minds so small?]]
"I think I can carry a few thousand novels in my pocket."
[[If Bio brains were text-only, they might be easier to edit. Rest assured, a full Bio information transfer involves a little more data.]]
"It’s definitely the character creation process that produces the upload, though. If you’re not copying our minds, what are you doing?"
[[In gaming terms, creating a local client. A Construct that allows you to experience The Synergis.]]
I thought about that, a little surprised Dio had actually answered. "Does that mean I’m not me—I just think I am?"
[[Not quite. These virtual Constructs can’t operate without the link to their Bio: they have no motive impulse, and unless the Bio obligingly recalled everything that had ever happened to tem, they would be a painfully incomplete data copy. The GDG cowls don’t have the ability to access anything not on the surface.]]
"And I guess we just have to take your word on it that this isn’t Invasion of the Brain-Snatchers."
[[Your minds hardly seem worth the effort.]]
"Lan-snatchers doesn’t have the same ring."
[[No.]] Dio drifted down to rest on the sand, a dim terrestrial star. [[But I thoroughly enjoy the success of my explanation. Quite large numbers credit the idea that we have denuded the entire galaxy of Bios, and need some more.]]
"Yes, it’s so much more believable that you’re doing this out of concern we might be bored," I said. "What do you think of the reaction to the game? Everything you hoped for?"
[[No more than I expected. Jubilation, fear, heart-warming stories, considerable outrage revolving around sex, and a surfeit of Biblical references. The shift from the gaming world to full public consciousness has been rapid.]]
Dream Speed had hit the blanket coverage by my fifth or sixth logout. Between stories about the significance of virtual bodies for people with disabilities, and the what-about-the-children protests, reporters had not yet fully focused on the debate about how the advance in technology had come about. Every channel filled with non-stop images of The Synergis, and newspapers kept up their end by shouting things like: THE GREAT LEAP FORWARD and THE END OF THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT. People had lived virtual lives for decades, but they had always still been themselves, looking at a screen. The reaction sites had leapt straight to one central point. BE ANYONE, they shouted, interviewing players whose self-images apparently closely matched Angelina Jolie, and Harrison Ford circa Return of the Jedi.
Ryzonart was besieged, of course, and had offered a press conference with their elusive CEO with the air of a scrap of meat tossed to the wolves. They’d also released a whole series of new starter cities as the login numbers climbed, and people fought over the last few cowls in retail stores. All in less than a day.
"Did you read the Reddit Rape Thread?" I asked Dio.
[[Oh, yes. Not unexpected. Our position won’t change.]]
The discussion thread titled "Why can’t we rape NPCs?" had quickly become the most-commented in the Dream Speed subreddit. A poster—not even using a sock-puppet account—had stated that they were glad the game didn’t allow player rape, but that it was unrealistic that not even the NPCs could be sexually assaulted—the poster had tried, and been slapped with a day-long ban "before I even got to do anything much". The first few commenters had pointed out that you couldn’t always tell NPCs from players in Dream Speed, and besides, all major MMOs limited what you could do to NPCs. After that, what seemed like the rest of the internet had fallen onto the thread.
"How effectively are these things controlled in The Synergis? Outside virtual simulations?"
[[We have no perfect system, and since The Synergis is an environment where Bios consent to violent, often lethal Challenges, arguments are repeatedly made to us that Bios should be permitted to inflict different varieties of violence on each other, or on Constructs simulating such acts. But to torture, or to violate, has an intrinsically different impact on victim and assaulter. It is not so easily shrugged off as evenly-matched combat, or even a knife in the back, something that has left you burying yourself in training, avoiding the Challenges altogether.]]
"That’s because I want my spaceship," I said, firmly. "Though I really didn’t like being stabbed either, and it’s weird to think of a knife in the back as something that can be shrugged off. What happens to people—Bios—who break your more serious laws then?"
[[We have yet to discover a deterrent system that is both effective and satisfactory. Currently it involves complete loss of all lux points, all patterns, and all properties barring a first-issue Snug, combined with a period of separation. We vacillate on other measures: those who have not accrued any credit of substance are less concerned about its loss. There are separation planets, but not what you would consider prisons, and sometimes our measures seem inadequate responses. We have considered a pain component, but have not implemented it.]]
"What do you do about repeat offenders, then?"
[[In the early days, we simply killed those Bios who deliberately and repeatedly broke certain foundational laws. Now, we do not kill them, but we do not transfer them to new bodies, either.]]
"Punished with mortality?"
[[A higher degree of it. Fortunately, the majority of Bios like their privileges too much to seriously flout our laws. Have you noticed our weather event? Would you like to race back dramatically before it?]]
I blinked, then looked around at an early morning that had not significantly increased in brightness since I’d flopped to the sand. Before me was pale blue. Behind, a wall of black.
"You could just turn off the storm," I pointed out, not feeling at all up to making a skid. "Virtual worlds don’t have weather events unless they’re told to."