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'We have merged with many intelligences, along the way...'

And why did that line spring to mind? The voice of the puppeteer's dying self was haunting as he merged and separated, whirling away into nothingness even as they linked, dragging Motoko with him. But that was only memory, and none of it showed on her face, only in the way she hesitated before speaking.

"I've always found gender to be irrelevant," she murmured in reply, following or seeming to follow Sheeana's directional gesture.

Puppeteer's words would probably prove more relevant after some thought later. For the moment, Sheeana just took the hiccup in her speaking rythms as a sign of discomfort in unfamiliar sorroundings.

"It's relevant in a biological way." She said as she she motioned to a nearby table. A mug of hot spicecoffee (it smelled of flint and cinnamon) and flaky, sweet baklawa had been set out for them. "The Spice Agony kills almost every man who attempts it. I wasn't jesting with the offer of refreshments by the way."

A biological way that they'd already established as irrelevant for a cyborg's needs. Motoko considered the hot drink without touching it, examining her options as intently as one might when staring at a bear trap, then took up the drink smoothly in one hand and drank.

The taste spread smoothly over her tongue, chocolate and mint tea, bitter somehow— a mixed sensation, and even as the chemical composition analysis scrolled across her vision Motoko jerked back and looked at the drink as if it'd delivered an electric shock.

Sheeana was in a blur and next to the other woman almost immediately. "Forgive me, I hadn't considered what effect Spice would have on you. Are you alright?"

"I can taste it," Motoko replied, not taking her eyes of the dangerous, intimate drink. Unperturbed the Spice-infused tea continued it's gentle steaming, "Visceral sensation."

The chem stats had faded, but she called them up again— there was nothing in this that should have garnered that reaction, no flavor locked in biochemical memory to evoke the visceral sensation of taste. Heat and texture...she might assign it the memory of tea, but it was taking on partial memory patterns of itself.

"It should be impossible."

Sheeana sat at the humble, rickety chair across from her. Motoko, despite her cyborg nature was behaving much like anyone else taking the drug for the first time. "That you can taste it or that it should have an effect on you? Spice makes many things possible that previously weren't."

...and it was gone, shuttered away under that cold exterior, the surprise gone from her face entirely. As if forgotten, Motoko set the drink aside.

"Generally speaking, a cyberized individual isn't capable of tasting new things. The sensory memories previous to the surgery are preserved, but the actual sensation of taste is muted and comes across more as chemical analysis than anything else," She explained as clinical and dry as a textbook. Something she'd never before tasted shouldn't have been anything more than numbers telling the ingredients, "It's probably just a byproduct of the hack."

"Spice always tastes like your most beloved food. It's theorized that this is your body telling you to eat more of it." She took her own mug and sipped, felt a number of flavors that managed to not clash: pastries from the market at Keen, fish soup at Chapterhouse (the first time she'd tasted any kind of seafood), protein bars after a hard workout. "Hack? How have I cut you?" She asked bemusedly, for that was the ancient meaning of the word and she was completely ignorant of the computorial meaning.

She almost wanted to smile, too-raw for her own liking after even a sip of Spice. Motoko folded her arms and explained curtly, "It's also a term denoting the fact that I'm currently accessing a brain not my own. Usually it's applied towards computers."

Sheeana's expression was pleasured, fraught with the sensation of taste. The newness and vulnerability of such an emotion had caught Motoko off guard, "I guess I should just be grateful I can still feel this way."

"I am not a computer. But since you are in my internal landscape, it does make sense that you obey the physical laws of my universe."

Sheeana watched her reactions with interest. She had wondered what Motoko would feel, how much. It reminded her too much of Leto 2, that deadening of human nerves and surrender to something alien. Obviously the Agent didn't think of it that way, but Sheeana found herself almost pitying her. And here she could awaken something within the other woman. She saw no reason not to see if melange could help her more. "Then you are more than the thing that encases you. In fact, with less body to saturate, Spice should effect you much more powerfully. Not that I suggest it, but with time and training I could awaken Other Memory within you too."

"There's a few flaws in your theory, but you're probably right about the amount," She replied, dispassionately. Spice's flavor may have come to her, but it's presence would never touch her brain, if all her filters and mechanisms had anything to do with it. It wasn't easy for someone to tell their stomach to simply pass on whatever they were having without absorbing any of it, but the Major had an intimate connection and the software complied willingly under her command. It was an irrational revulsion...but it was human.

Pity? Motoko would not thank you for it, Sheeana, "Just as well, I don't intend to make a habit of letting just anyone into my brain."

She sipped her mug, projecting a sagaciousness far older than her 17 years. It should be noted by all involved that Sheeana had a tendency to condescend. It was a Bene Gesserit stereotype, but in this case, it completely applied to her. That she brought Motoko here as an equal (albeit as an equal that she doesn't want destroying her brainscape) says quite a bit.

"Does it repulse you? Who do you let in then?" There are those who think Other Memory a form of possession. Ironically, the Sisters are the most zealous guardians against that, executing any new Reverend Mother who shows symptoms of what they call Abomination.

Who? Not even Batou, or Kuze or even Aramaki. There was only ever two people who had violated Motoko's barriers, and of those only one she had given permission to.

"Just one person," And said in that half-nostalgic tone it did seem like it had been a lover, "I'm not someone who lets others just waltz in and out of her cyberbrain like that. More often I'm the one in theirs. Personal preference aside, I'm in possession of a few choice military and political secrets. Unnecessarily risking a leak would probably mean losing my job."

But that threat was more than just livelihood. Mil-spec bodies were expensive and deadly— Motoko's belonged to the government of Japan, along with all her classified memories. If she lost her job, they'd take everything she'd seen or done for decades, and there'd be pitiful little left of her without the prosthesis or those memories. Quitting was one thing— you had warning and time to prepare. Being fired was something else entirely.

Edited 2009-11-08 14:34 (UTC)

And Sheeana did leap to that conclusion, opened her mouth to say something pithy. But she stopped mid-leap. This woman was complex and simple explanations would not work.

"I would be a hypocrite if I condemned you for that. Before the Tyrant gave us purpose, we Bene Gesserit had become little more than a society of secret collectors, like packrats in a Pharaoh's tomb."

"I've known my share of people like that," There is no condemnation in her voice, perhaps even some grudging seed of respect. It's easy to curl your lip at the rotund, shut-in data-miners surrounded by their discs and hard-drives, building a modern day hermit's hut out of the so-called wisdom of the Net.

Until you wanted something from them.

"The Tyrant?" Mild curiosity, too mild to be genuine colored that question.

Bene Gesserit are hardly otaku. That's more a Mentat thing.

"The Tyrant." There's an offer of information implicit in her tone if she wants it but she's not going to force it at her.

Conspirarcy theorists, mostly...but even they get things right once in a while.

"That's a fairly harsh title," prompting for that information as if prodding a bear awake; the trick was patience, and to not appear a threat, "Care to tell me why?"

She sure does! "It was accurate. That is not to be taken to imply a judgement, however." Slurrrp.