Personal Log: April 3 [Apto April 2022 Part 3: Circus]

I stopped by in the Rigel System to go to the big magitech expo and take a look around. It didn’t seem much like an expo, there were a lot of performers around. Of course, I walking around as basically a big balloon animal, got mistaken for one of the props. They didn’t believe me when I said I was just a nanite synth, they didn’t bother scanning me until after the act was over to validate my ID.

But, I didn’t mind.

It was kind of fun being bopped around in the air by nanite-reconstructed animals from far off worlds I haven’t seen before. This wasn’t just a circus act, it was a demonstration of how far along synthetic life has become, how real everything looked, how responsive the synths were to transform into props for their next act. These weren’t filled with an AI or anything, just a basic routine preprogrammed to run through a scripted scene.

I was flattered that nobody noticed I was a full being, obeying their commands, shifting into the things that they told me to. Elephants, monkeys, the trapeze setup… During the intermission, I was turned into a big beach ball for the audience to get “hands on” with new technology. For every bop into the air, I heard a couple people comment at how real my vinyl felt. Luckily I have a lot of experience in replicating that!

Alas, all things must come to an end, and once the show was over they found their missing malfunctioning prototype rolling around the docking terminal corridors…

As consolation, they did let me keep an inflatable elephant that they were selling at concessions. Another fine addition to my collection…
…
…shoot I was supposed to keep that room secret. Computer, end recor–

See this year’s Apto April prompts by Caudle (Twitter @Caudlewag)