Chapter 8

Intrepid City

Hospital.

I looked at the woman, tilting my head, I was the only true human in this cesspool.

"So no one else is normal here?" I asked furrowing my brow.

She raised an eyebrow at that.

"Is anyone really normal?" She asked.

"I guess not, what I mean I am the only human?" I asked.

She shook her head.

"We are all human Sir, we just have some enhancements" She said getting a far away look for a moment. "Your file states you have nanites, our genetic enhancements are comparable." she said.

"Whoa what did you just do?" I said with mild alarm.

She gave me a blank look.

"You just found out I was here, how did you get my file?" I asked.

Realization showed on her face.

"oh the hive mind? Thats part of our enhancements, we all have this kind of shared access to certain memories and information." She said.

I frowned at her.

"How extensive is it?" I asked.

She smiled.

"Its nothing sinister or anything, we use it for education purposes and information sharing, it has its limits though." She sad non-nonchalantly

"What kind of limits?" I asked.

She seemed to think for a minute.

"Well like I said we use it for education, so I am a Doctor, all I had to do was meditate for a few weeks on the subject of medicine and the information was transferred from our collective to me, but it only transfers information, not experience, once I had the files I needed I still had to intern with a Doctor for a year to get the actual hands on part of it." She said smiling.

The implications of that astounded me, that would be very useful.

"Really? What determined you would be a Doctor?" I asked.

"I did, I wanted to try something new, I used to be an engineer, and before that I was in the security service." She said.

"Wait you just picked what you wanted to do? And how old are you?" I asked, still taking it all in, in the colonies careers were assigned to you based on amplitude for a subject.

She smiled.

"Why yes, we all can pick what we want to do many of us go through several careers before we settle for what we want, and I am only 58." She said.

"Only 58?" I said, she looked 18 at most.

She nodded.

"Yes I know, so young to have gone through 3 careers, I get bored easily, I am actually of thing of leaving the medical field too boring, we only are needed for accidents and births." She said

I was shaking my head.

"Thats amazing." I said honestly

She frowned.

"Why is that amazing Commander?" She said puzzled.

"All of it, everything, I am sorry I didn't catch your name?" I asked.

She smiled again and I noticed this time her teeth looked more normal.

"My name is Coral, nice to meet you Commander." She held out her hand to shake my hand.

I took it and noticed her fingers were less claw like too.

"Coral, you're different than the Governor, why is that?" I asked releasing her hand.

"OH the Governors an old one, her generation had the first treatments, we have improved on them since than, some of the old ones kept the original augments" She lowered her voice "Some think they are more feral than the newer ones"

I nodded, the Governor had acted decisively and aggressive to my attack, she had seemed much more predatory than Coral.

"Coral I am supposed to explore your city and culture, do you have any suggestions on where to start?" I asked, she had been very informative, no point in losing someone who gave intelligence so freely and unguarded.

She looked around, she typed something into her station.

"I am off in an hour anyway, we are slow here I am sure I can take off early to show you around." She said smiling.

I nodded.

"Come on I have the perfect place to start." She said smiling.

She led me out of the hospital, she was right it was pretty dead there, we walked the clean city streets, I was amazed at the way everything was built, it had a natural almost organic look, she noticed me looking at the buildings.

"We combine human technology with the aliens, you see this city was built on the ruins of the old human city, you see this planet was a human colony for over 1000 years before it fell." she said as we walked the streets.

I shook my head that made no sense.

"What do you mean 1000 years? Man didn't establish its first colony until 2035 and that was on the moon?" I said.