Void Piercer

Chapter 5: Because Life is a Game

With only minimal help from Yont IT, the two Sat Magi managed to cobble together VR goggle adapters and crank out enough for the entire crew in little under an hour. The two of them lament the lacking in details that the system will allow. That an entire virtual reality universe had been built with full inclusion of texture, smell, and even taste, and we would be limited to an adjusted color range, and nondirectional sound, was an almost palpable insult to their abilities as engineers.

As a species with limited hue perception, internalized ears, thick skin, and no taste buds, I told them to suck it and ripped the adapter from their hand. I've slapped a piece of duct tape over the gash into my skull, upon request from my fellow crew members, and then applied more duct tape to keep the Human specific VR goggles from sliding down my earless head. I tap the red string transmitter to the glasses, connecting the two, and plug the device into what looks exactly like a UP port.

The screen is initially black as the system creates a new account without downloading a full mental copy. Then it lights up white, and then from the white objects emerge. First walls and floors, but then roughly defined objects in wire frames followed by texturing to the wall, and then the hitboxes of other Yont light up.

Sound comes next, first ambient sounds, and then the sounds of all the Yont whispering around me. I'm wondering why they're whispering, but the wall finishes texturing and the words 'Quiet zone, volume caps are in place' is splayed across the wall in plain Terran.

The computer running my simulation finally catches up with translating the visual data and everything comes into breathtaking resolution. Unlike all the Yont in real life, the ones here have a variety of exotic details. At least a third are missing the computer terminals ever present on their living counterparts. Many have hair, not like Pīērin of Terrans, but a layer of glossy fur covering everything short of their eyes. There are a variety of ear sizes, with everything from what I've already seen up to and beyond those of the Blait. Among the many other exotic attributes, I note a large number have enlarged mammary glands of sizes similar to Human females.

Above each head is also a block of data. The first line is an incoherent grouping of letters I presume to be a name. Following this are two blocks, one containing a single letter, the other containing a random string, seamingly composed from the letters found in the first. The third line is inhabited by three different numbers that I can only guess the meaning at. The first is in the three digits, the second tends to be in the two digits. The third and last number tends to be one to three, but I catch a glimpse of a seven somewhere in the group. The fourth and final line is luckily self explanatory, it simply lists their career.

"Hey," whispers one of them. I check there name tag and am happy to find its Q'vic. The next thing I notice is their third number, the one usually under five, is currently at twenty three.

"Your number," I whisper, not realizing I don't have to regulate my volume. "What up with that." I try pointing at it, but I haven't put on my tracking bracelets yet, leaving me without any control below my neck.

"Start an individual chat," they instruct me.

"How?"

"Just open your config menu."

"How?"

"What do you mean how? Just think it open."

I'm not sure how well the goggles translate eye rolls, or how they're interpreted in Yont body language, but I hear them clicking inside my skull as the action moves them far from any position they where ever intended to be.

"My wetware is not linked in," I remind them.

"Oh, uh, the IT guys say shaking your right hand should toggle a master menu."