I accidentally drew that apple way too realistically.

You’d think that “trying to steal my body” would put Lapha on “The List” (which come to think of it, we haven’t seen in quite a while) but, Sydney also has a checklist of superhero tropes that she’s working her way through, and it would be unfair for her to add someone to both lists for the same action, so instead she’s trying to be magnanimous.

People who lose a limb are often said to have Phantom Limb Syndrome, where the brain is just used to that limb being there and starts making up sensations for the missing bits. It’s far less common for someone to have a limb added. Not reattached, but like someone born with one flipper arm having it replaced with a donated limb from some generous motorcyclist. Actually… I’m not sure if that ever has happened. But if it does, there’s probably some reverse P.L.S. situation, where they poke their new hand and their brain is like “Nope. Didn’t feel nuttin’!” And of course there’s probably a considerable adjustment period where that guy is walking around just bangning his new arm into everything the moment he stops thinking about having a new arm. But that would still be different that having a new limb that your body and nervous system is not evolutionarily equipped to handle. Like if you woke up with wings, the adjustment period just from your brain learning to process the sensations would probably be considerable.

But for races like Lapha’s, the meatblanks they customize are always sold with the appropriate motor and sensory bits all ready to go. Sure, there’s still a bit of a learning curve, but they have the software to match the hardware. That doesn’t mean you remember to tuck your tail when you sit down. Even Garamm’s race needs to learn that, but usually they’ve figured it out by the time they’re about 5 years old. (Their tails aren’t long enough to dangle on the ground when they’re very young.) Garamm has a vested interest in Lapah liking her tail, so he’s trying to be helpful.

I think it would probably kind of suck to go from living in an technologically advanced society to a much less advanced one. Sure, all the isekai to the past books are fun to read, mostly because it allows we the readers, who mostly have an average modern education, to imagine that we could become the grand sage of metallurgy, steam, warfare and medicine. Of course, those books usually never really dwell on just how awful those first few months would be until you got established somewhere and invented hot showers and food that isn’t mostly stew.

Let’s say the tech level Lapha is used to is ST:TNG levels, and now she’s stuck living on our early 21st century world. Imagine reading about tech news, like the next Playstation or whatever and seeing that it can store a terabyte of information and render games at 120 FPS with anti-aliasing and volumetric fog and clouds! To a 2-dimensional screen. Using the same controller that the PS1 debuted with, (except for the updates that happen after Nintendo does something innovative). Playing games with pre-set dialog trees and no face-scan emotion recognition, etc, etc. It’d be like handing a Gen-Z an Etch-a-Sketch and telling them it’s the cutting edge.

Knowing you have to wait like 200 years for these people to catch up to what you’re used to would probably be a little exhausting. Sure, there’s the argument that there’s such a thing as too much tech, and going to a restaurant and seeing half the tables just staring at their phones supports the idea, but I think that says more about the people and culture using the tech than being any sort of criticism against particular technological milestones.

Although, given that Lapha will be working with Arc-LIGHT, I’m sure whoever her handler is will be taking notes whenever she is grumpily tapping away at a phone screen and grousing about “You people really should invent [billion dollar idea.]” And the handler is all, “Oh? That sounds useful, how does that work?”

Huh. I didn’t think I’d have much to write about this page, but I hit the ADHD button and off I went.

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The new vote incentive is up!

It’s Escorpia/Sciona, fresh off her successful… extortion campaign? I’m not sure if extortion is the right word. Addicting someone to superpowered narcotics then withholding to compel directed behavior? Kind of a ransom/extortion/generally being a butt kind of thing. There’s probably a better word for that. Anyway, check out Sciona’s business casual getup at TWC, and Patreon has a bunch of… let’s call them increasingly casual variants.

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Double res version will be posted over at Patreon. Feel free to contribute as much as you like.