Coronation Ceremony & Gifts

[kaolinandbone]

The gentle but insistent tink-tink-tink of a silver spoon against a teacup carries through the crowd, followed by a clear, confident voice as Lioncourt addresses the gathered guests.

"Ladies, gentlemen, and other various but no less incomparable sentients, the main event of the party will begin shortly. If you have a coronation present for the Lady Lioncourt and have not yet placed on the central table, please do so now: everyone is likewise encouraged to take a seat on one of the benches if they wish to observe the ceremony."

Comments

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[scatteredstars]

The screen flashes again a few times, and gives a closeup of the first letter. It makes the relevant sound.

"Change the letter to match the local one," Tyche says helpfully, handing Lioncourt the tablet. "If the sound doesn't match, wait until it finds one that does, or say it."

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[kaolinandbone]

Lioncourt goes through the list of characters, speaking most of them herself. It seems that the consonants in her version of the language are more often voiced than the model being presented.

"It seems a bit incomplete, but..."

She shrugs.

"It's the best we can do at the moment."

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[scatteredstars]

"Is it missing characters?"

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[kaolinandbone]

"Yes, it is. ... I need a piece of paper and a pen again. I should start carrying a notebook."

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[scatteredstars]

Tyche retrieves something that looks vaguely like a stylus, and gets the tablet to give her a blank square to write on. "There."

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[kaolinandbone]

Lioncourt adds three additional characters, then hands the stylus back to Tyche.

"That should fix the major discrepancies."

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[scatteredstars]

Tyche touches the tablet, and it flashes and resolves on a page of text in the modified script.

"Comprehensibility check," ze says.

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[kaolinandbone]

Lioncourt frowns.

"Well, the characters are recognizable, and I can even read some of the words... the others are close enough that I can attempt sentences, but it's hardly easy. This language's very old on my world, and it's not the one I speak day-to-day. I have a working knowledge at best, even of my own version."

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[scatteredstars]

Tyche nods. "I'm going to set that as the interface language for now, in case we don't find one you're more familiar with, unless you object?"

Then they can proceed to look at the other languages.

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[kaolinandbone]

Lioncourt nods: It's better than anything else she's seen so far.

And, alas, it is in fact the best of the whole onboard set.

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[scatteredstars]

The next step, since there were recognizable pieces earlier, is to go into the language families and look for the one(s) closest to Lioncourt's native language.

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[kaolinandbone]

It appears that Lioncourt's native language is in a family that would be East Asian in Eclipse.

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[scatteredstars]

It records this, and any further matching information, and then Tyche hops out of what appears to be a long involved process to teach it Lioncourt's language, with an explanation that it is that thing.

The next thing appears to be biometrics setup to get it to consistently respond to Lioncourt, since Tyche noticed that being a problem before.

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[kaolinandbone]

Lioncourt might not have a pulse or a bioelectric field unless she wills it, but she is in fact composed of DNA, and she has eyes and fingerprints and seventy years of paranoia. A casual comment about 'biometric security' from Tyche turns into Lioncourt locking down the device with every level of authentication available to her.

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[scatteredstars]

That is certainly a thing she can do! Although (as Tyche mentions when Lioncourt starts on this), if Lioncourt wants zir to be able to help finish setting this up, she needs to leave Tyche access.

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[kaolinandbone]

Lioncourt does so, since it's Tyche's technology anyway and ze can probably just take access of it.

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[scatteredstars]

That would be impolite and would not foster good diplomatic relations. (But yes, given how good of a hacker Tyche is, there is a fair chance ze could).

The next thing to configure is appearance. It's made of smart-material (Tyche says this as though it should mean something), so it can look however Lioncourt wants it to at rest, and the only limitations on its appearance while operating is what is required for functionality.

The options here fail fairly badly at being transparent, but Tyche can talk Lioncourt through them.

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[kaolinandbone]

Lioncourt would prefer for it to look like a small wooden box, which she can fit in a pocket if neccessary. Is such a thing possible? How does it produce its screen? She inquires quite a lot about the specifics of 'smart material' and the exact degree of customization available.

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[scatteredstars]

Tyche will happily talk about those things! 'Smart material' appears mean that most of the thing is made of thousands of tiny machines that change what it looks like as needed. The main limitations is that some of the internal circuitry needs to be kept the same, and that the total mass cannot be changed. The effective size can be changed by altering the density, however. The screen can be any sufficiently large flat surface, but is fairly obvious in use. It can also project images and track movement to determine interaction, but that is generally considered less precise and more obvious. (Tyche keeps having to cut zirself off when ze starts on tangents about the normal ways to use things on Eclipse, which appears to involve implants)

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[kaolinandbone]

Lioncourt lets Tyche cut herself off, while trying not to look like she's deliberately pumping her for information.

She may or may not succeed at this.

She settles on one of her jewelry-boxes to use as a model for the interface, though the necessary increase in density is slightly annoying.

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[scatteredstars]

While this may be observed later, Tyche does not seem to notice it. Ze is having enough trouble trying to stay on topic.

The cube is shortly disguised to look like a jewelry box, and is not substantially heavier than an actual jewelry box with jewelry in it would be.

It might be wise to choose something with a larger visible surface for reading the contents, however.

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[kaolinandbone]

Lioncourt hums, and expands the jewelery-box-cube along one side, making it more the size of a notebook while retaining the same lacquered-wood-and-brass exterior.

"So... I understand that this is some form of advanced Eclipse technology, but... What exactly is its function?"

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[scatteredstars]

Tyche looks at her in puzzlement, then after a moment makes a comprehending sound.

"After the Fall, Firewall put a great deal of resources into making sure that there would be survivors, and to help rebuild, if another happened. One of the products of that was a set of technology modules to rebuild modern civilization if necessary, designed to be as accessible as possible. This," she gestures at the transformed cube, "is one of the series for medicine, chosen based on our best guess at your world's current technology level."

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[kaolinandbone]

Lioncourt smiles.

"A worthy gift, then. Is it merely a pocket library, or does it have additional functions?"

Re: Tyche & Thorn's Gift

[scatteredstars]

"It self-translates," Tyche says, "given information. And... are your existing databanks not very portable? I think you may be able to load more things on this, once you're content with your translation, because that will free up space."