Entry 54

It's been a long time, I know, so I'm going to give a short recap. Here we go:

I learned my brother was an android when he was shot in a convenience store. We were immediately transported to a ship and taken to the headquarters of the Society of Anthropologists. There I was put in a zoo and John was essentially waiting to be killed.

We were then rescued by the dashing, android-hating Ven Barker. I forced him to rescue John as well, even though he did not want to. Ven is supposed to take me to the human colony but can't because androids aren't allowed. So instead we've been residing on Ven's ship, Blaue. Blaue is pretty much an awesome Artificial Cognizant. An Artificial Cognizant is a sort of like bodiless android - just the mind. Though they can create hologram projections of bodies.

Now we are stopped on a space station so Ven can do business. He has set John and I free to do as we like while on teh space station. Currently, we are standing outside of Blaue, but we're still in the ever annoying Ven's way. He wants us to move.

Got it? Good. Now let's move on.

"We're going to be in someone's way no matter where we go," I protested. Aliens and cargo were everywhere. Stepping out of Ven's way would put us in someone else's way.

"We need to get out of the cargo area," John said. "Follow me." John grabbed my wrist and led me through the maze of ships.

"See the black pathway?" He pointed towards the black strip of floor that ran between the ships. "That's the pedestrian walkway. It will take us out of here." I did not respond. I simply let John lead me as I marveled at the ships and aliens.

We were passing a sleek, lime green ship, no bigger than a fighter jet. This I imagined was the sports car of spaceships. Why else would someone paint it the danger color? The ship screamed, "hey, look at me. I'm dangerous."

An alien was walking ahead of us on the black pathway. The alien walked across the ground with dozens of legs, like a centipede, but it was covered in blue feathers and about six feet long. Instead of a beak or mouth it seemed to have a trunk like an elephant, but I could not begin to guess what sense the trunk was used for. What strange evolutionary path had led to this?

"Star Trek always made aliens look so human," I said as my eyes landed on an alien that seemed to be dripping mucus from every orifice.

"Well, Star Trek didn't get everything right," John responded. "And they had a low budget. Not to mention the lack of CGI. Even Next Generation's graphic weren't good. You can't expect better considering the time period."

"How do so many strange aliens get along?" I asked. "How can we talk to an alien if it doesn't have ears?"

"Artificial Cognizants," Blaue answered in my ear. "Almost everyone has one and we're programmed to understand most anything. The alien without ears would haven an Artificial Cognizant who would hear your words and translate them into whatever sensory mode the alien could understand."

"Cognizants are very necessary to every day life in the Universe," John said. "Without them, it would probably fall apart."

"I don't control physics," Blaue joked.

"No, but you do allow everyone to understand each other," John answered. "Without you thtere would be no government." I'm still sure to this day if that comment was foreshadowing, but it sure felt like it at the time. I could just imagine Artificial Cognizants pulling out of society - refusing to participate - and the government falling apart.

It seems strange that a society that needs Artificial Cognizants so bad and relies on them so desperately would despise androids.