Somehow, I feel like I should have expected that.

Zax mused about the current development. Namely, the humming girl walking beside him. Her not going back to her home was expected, but following him wasn’t. Sure, she had expressed curiosity about him earlier, but he thought she would appreciate the distance to think about the situation in a more controlled environment. Maybe talk to someone about it; keeping nanites in their body for undetermined period would unease most people.

Unless she doesn’t have anyone to talk to?

It seemed too sensitive to ask, but he felt confident in his conclusion. And slightly miserable, but it fit with his nanites’ data on human behaviour and his theory about mutations.

He wanted to initiate a conversation, but he couldn’t figure out where to start. Fortunately, Aran had way better social skills.

“Say, Zax, Can I ask you something?”

“Of course. You can even do it again if you want.”

“Ha, nice one.” Her tone showed how untrue that was, but she still smiled a hint. “I wondered, why do you have a bracelet? You told me you constantly had a better one in you.”

“It’s a mix between compatibility and social acceptance.” The nanite expert had already been asked that question many times, so he didn’t have to think about the answer.

“The memory and computing power of my nanites are far superior to a standard bracelet’s, but any of their software would have to be extensively modified to be used by nano-technology. The basic principles and components are just too different. Some would even have to be made from the ground up, which poses a whole slew of other issues, like bug fixes and any updates.

And when interacting with other people, they tended to be… uneased, when I used a bracelet’s function without bracelet.”

“Meh, how bad can it be?” His tailer shrugged.

“The bracelets are so integrated in our daily lives we don’t even notice, but they are used in every aspect of every day. Remember when we exchanged contact information? We tapped out bracelets, without thinking about it.”

“Yes…?”

“Now; what would you feel if I didn’t with a tiny tap with any part of my body?” He illustrated with a flick of his finger at an imaginary nose.

“Creepy.” She grimaced. “Like my bracelet obeyed you or something. But I know about your nanites, so it wouldn’t be that surprising.” She showed off the Zax-box in her hands. She was to keep it around but she didn’t have a handbag and it was too big for pockets.

“I’m not going to explain to the whole dot that I have nanites in my body, that would just be endless annoyance.”

“I… guess it would.”

“The bracelet is also a safety. If I buy something and leave the shop, but the security or the owner don’t see me use my bracelet, or do anything to show I paid for what I took, what do you think would happen?”

“Yeah, not a good idea.” Aran winced at the thought.

“Oh? You have experience with the enforcers?”

“Ye-What?” Her tail started to bristle, but his smirk told her she had just leaped straight into his trap. A playful trap. How new. Not that unpleasant either.

She forced herself not to take it seriously but as the innocent banter it was intended as.

“Oh, shut up.” She playfully shoved him without breaking their strides.

“Haha. Last point, the bracelet is not inconvenient at all. There is no point in wasting my nanites to reproduce its functions just so I can… not have to wear it. There is such a thing as too much nanites in your body, and while I am not that exactly close, I don’t like wasting.”

“A true doter to the core.” The tailed girl approved aloud.

The conversation paused as they joined the crowd boarding the light road. Zax quickly spotted the right colour and put both feet inside the yellow disc. A small yellow square lump grew from it, lengthening into a rectangle and pulling the human’s compatible shoes along the magnetic road. Aran grabbed his hips and put her feet on just the right parts of the starting point just as he started to levitate, forcing it to adjust and pull the both of them along the path.

Zax threw her an unamused glare over his shoulder, but didn’t try to stop her. The road took some training to use safely, but he could balance a passenger as long as they didn’t move too much. This one just smiled innocently as if it was natural. At least she knew better than to use that as an excuse to hug him tight, but he couldn’t tell whether it was respect for him or fear of his girlfriend.

They moved fast to his destination, snaking between the residential area and the entertainment area, then a longer but faster part along the large and straight main road connecting the core of the Shelter to the one access point to the first circle, then straight to the Supply and Service area.

“Can I do that too?”

Aran continued the conversation, raising her voice to be heard over the wind of their speed.

“Do what?”

“Use my body as a bracelet? Since I have your nanites in me for now?”

“Haha no, no way.” The human found the idea hilarious.

“Rmm. Why not?” The foxy girls insisted, exaggeratedly puffing her lips.

“You don’t have the right type. Yours can only scan your body, then store and transmit the data. Even if I changed the program, they would not be able to interact with anything. Except the box, that was specially made for that.”

Said box was currently stuck under the stowaway’s shirt, the elastic cloth pulled tight against it and ensuring it wouldn’t be lost.

“What? How come?”

“If I put a software for a military laser in your bracelet, would it become a weapon?”

“Of course not, there is nothing to produce a laser and I’m not even sure the battery can produce enough energy for that.”

“I can assure you it doesn’t. It’s part of the technical specifications.”

“Well, can’t you just give me the right type?”

“I could sell you the right types of nanites, their installation and their configuration, but that brings us to the second point: everyone’s brain is different, so a proper mental interface must be tailor made. Something simple like an on/off command can take a few minutes to hours to calibrate, depending on the person and a few things, but a more complex command like up/down/right/left would take four times that – yes four, not two- and I’ll let you imagine how long it would take for something like “transmit that specific amount of unit to that specific account, yes to the security checks, and tell me when you’re done or if there is a problem”. No, it’s way more than that. And all that is just the calibration so the nanites can recognize you are giving an order. Making them understand that order, then act on it are a whole other matter, but that one mostly depends on the programmer’s skill. Although that part should be easier, since it’s mostly building a buffer between your personal interface and the standard material. There are bases to work from.”

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Aran frowned but kept going:

“So it IS possible.”

“I don’t see any option where it would be worth the price, time and effort, but yes, it is possible. And just to be thorough, I’ll add that it would all have to be done again at your next mutation, no matter how small it is, and that if you deactivate the nanites too long, we’d have to rebuilt the interface from scratch. Brain cells don’t reproduce, but brain chemistry keeps renewing itself all your life.”

“Because “It takes only three days to be a different person” or something like that?” Aran joked.

“Actually, yes, it is exactly that reason. Which reminds me, can I get your medical record?”

“What? Why?”

They were leaving the road by now, the adaptive magnetic rail softly putting them down on a yellow circle.

From full disc to empty circle.

That redundant children motto came to him, it happened from time to time when he used the road. He shook the though away as he answered, in a more measured voice:

“They should have enough data to build a draft of your body’s template. Or part of it, at least. Past injuries, growth and weight curves, vaccines and medications, and so on. That would give the nanites a theoretical foundation to build on. I don’t know how much time it would earn us, but it would definitely help.”

“I’d… rather not. Sorry.”

Her serious tone and fleeing eyes told him there was very unpleasant reason for that, so he just dropped the topic.

“As you wish, but the proposition still stands if you change your mind. Now, I don’t know what you wanted by following me but I arrived.” Zax stopped walking and pointed to the door in front of them.

“I just wanted to see you at work.” Aran smiled innocently, looking around.

They both knew she was definitely not that innocent, but Zax didn’t see the harm in getting her in. He didn’t put his sensitive material there.

“I don’t mind you going in, but you can’t go in the backroom so you won’t see much, and even if there is always something to do, there is not a lot of action, so you’ll just be bored.”

With that said, he entered and she followed beyond the nondescript door amid the other nondescript doors in the street-sized corridor. The central computer automatically guided any potential customer to the most appropriate place, accounting for customer’s needs, distance, budget, and so on. Advertisements and brand awareness were a thing of the past, but it did make the different shops and suppliers hard to distinguish and remember.

The shop itself was an ordinary selling workshop unit stuck between two shops and under a specialised workshop. It was compact, bulky, worn from use, but perfectly clean and very sturdy. like most of the dot, it was made to withstand anything for a long time. The inside was more recent, the only original parts being the walls, having outlasted both the last inhabitant and their furniture.

Zax’s workshop was a standard affair too, although the specific combination of goods and services he offered would raise a few eyebrows. There was a front area with common products for sale; mostly clothes accessories, games and their consoles. Mostly VR/AR, Aran noticed. A counter sat at the back with a till for payment and personal commands such as special clothing adjustment, game mods, and all kind of repairs. Literally, all kind. Aran was reminded of their discussion last night, was there really nothing he couldn’t fix?

After brief presentation of the place to Aran and suggestion to see if she wanted to buy something, Zax left her for the backroom.

The back area was where Zax’s eccentricity was more obvious. The main clothes altering machines were there, but offline and stashed in a corner in a way that made them impossible to use. The nanite expert never had, the only reason he kept them was because it was a legal requirement to be officially recognized as a clothes adjuster.

Which was the only way to have the central computer send him customers, and that itself was the only way to have any business for the clothes altering part of his shop. It was the most common orders he had, so it was best to.

The rest of the space was filled with workstations for nanotechnology, some of which Zax had to make with spare parts taken from other machines or even from scratch. Some were made for nanite production, others for their programming, some for their storage. Most people would be able to recognise only a few of those, namely the ones less commonly associated with nanotechnology, like the sanitation field, preventing any unwanted particles or micro-organism to get in unwanted places during production.

The most unexpected feature though, were the potted plants around the window. Work places were not supposed to have such frivolities, space was too precious for that. In truth, Zax used them as backup storage for all types of nanites and programs, though mostly for the replicating types. If a mutation occurred too near to his workplace, the disrupting field wouldn’t penetrate the living beings and he wouldn’t have to rebuild everything from scratch. He already had to, and he didn’t fancy the experience.

And as a bonus, it made the place more pleasant to be in. All in all, it was the same as his home’s workshop, with larger machines for larger scale of work, but less plants and less freedom of action.

Not a bad tradeoff in Zax’s opinion.

He started his routine: checking on the plants’ health, checking for new orders and progress on the old ones, preparing his tools, then getting to the actual work.

< Workday start. >

[Work type?]

< Precision Repairs. >

[Repairer mode: On

Interface: Precision mode

Tool mods: Ready]

Nothing too fancy today, starting with the last batch of seismic recorders to repair kept him busy around two hours, the long-term order for the sensitive devices finally reaching its end; then one headache inducing VR set requiring some calibration, and a few easy orders that didn’t require his specific touch. Those were mostly holographic projectors and portable extension for bracelets memory storage.

Ah, right. The school cycle is nearing its end.

… that’s where this troubling feeling was coming from, isn’t it?

The workday went by smoothly, only interrupted a few times by calls to the front shop. A few withdrawals, some urgent new orders, one of them even bought a few accessories on the way. Marketing was not totally dead.

It was a full day of intense work for a single non-mutated human with his skills, as measured by the central computer, but he was done well before midday. Which meant he was free to dispose of the rest of the day.

It was basically a daily occurrence for him, but the central computer never increased his basic workload. He was already at the limit of what a human should be able to accomplish in a day without nanotechnology, and for some unfathomable reason the powers that be refused to recognise his proficiency in nanotechnology as a meaningful factor. ‘It would set a harmful precedent’ the official answers stated.

Politics. I rue the day I understand how it works.

The central computer was not able to go against their directives, but at least he was free to use his free time to increase his revenue in other ways and his personal space for venues they wouldn’t approve of. Within legal reason, of course.

But today, he had other priorities.

Back in his front shop, he found Aran playing one of his AR games with a demo console put for that purpose. She had already been there the last time Zax had come out front.

The tailed girl didn’t react to his approach, so he just observed her a bit, connecting to the Z-box she had put down nearby.

The game was simple, chasing the coloured spots appearing around her hands to get points. Bonus if she touched several in one movement, bonus if she touched several with a single finger, penalty if she touched her own body. Difficulty increased over time. The spots stayed less long, appeared closer to the skin, further apart from each other, they could be smaller, with less flashy colours. With more recent updates, the type of difficulty could be controlled, and optional challenges were added, making it fit for many small mutations and all ages.

The gamer was really pushing herself in the game, focusing all her attention to figure out where the next spots would appear and the most effective way to the next points, trying not to block her own way. It was always pleasant to see the results of his efforts.

“Finally!” Her exultant shout pulled him from his thoughts; the muted ‘stage clear’ animation filling the game space.

“I see you’ve kept yourself busy.”

“Gyah!”

The human chuckled at her jump.

“Quick Hand, uh? Good choice, it’s very popular.”

“Thanks. But this one is- different from- the past versions. Where’d you get it? Be careful, you know how- serious they are- about copyright.” She was talking between pants, but her smile showed how much fun she had.

“Ah, right, I haven’t sent the update yet.”

< Command: send / games updates / all / public domain. >

[Command Execution in progress…]

[Command Executed.]

“There, now they’ll match. Anyway, I’m done with work for now, I just have to stay in the shop until midday.”

“Cool. What did you plan?” Aran felt they were overlooking something relevant, but she couldn’t put her finger on it.

“I have a few things to do later, so I’ll spend most of the day outside. For now, I thought we could work on your template. I never had to force build one before, so I’m not sure how to start, but you gave me an idea. Since you enjoy games so much, I’ll make one whose goal is to make as accurate a template as possible.” Zax explained his idea.

“What? How would that even work?” She was understandably confused.

“Stat Finder: if you were a game character, what would your stats be? Come and find out!” He exclaimed with his best announcer voice, which was not saying much. “And you already have a lot of points in eye-hand coordination. Not so much in perception though.” He added that last part as an afterthought, reading from the ongoing scan.

“I’m in!” That sounded exiting.

“Haha, glad to hear that, but calm down, girl. I barely started and I’ll need time to finish.”

“Let’s not waste it then! Go on. Go on.”

“Haha, okay, okay. I still have to leave around midday though.”