The Guild Capitol: Chapter Two

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"Now we can find something for kids." Dawn said and moved to look around the place.

"You get used to it really. " Matt shrugged. "Kay can hear your surface thoughts, Web can feel your emotional state AND see the damn future and Esk's crazy unnaturally perceptive. No hope of privacy, ever." He grinned. "That's probably why I have no filter anymore."

Kasi tried to work something out and asked. "Esk is your brother?"

"foster brother, yeah... " Matt blinked, oh yeah, he hadn't mentioned that had he?

"Curious. he did not mention he was related to the Ishvara."

"yeah he doesn't mention a lot." Matt shrugged.

"I mean I'm not crazy about privacy, but I think I'd have issues with that," Ellie said. "Man, no secrets ever? Boo." She smiled at Kasi, "Esk is grumpy and doesn't like telling people things."

Matt smiled. "Well it's all I ever really knew growing up. If I wanted privacy I would go mope about at the bottom of the river or something. It's useful sometimes though, I mean, you can avoid misunderstandings sooooo easily if people can read your mind."

"I do not think I would like someone reading my thoughts." Kasi mused. "It is a little too... intimate."

Matt nodded to Ellie "yeah, he kinda went the opposite way to me. Never talk about anything, ever, all secrets, all privacy. I admit, we did kinda... often forget he was about. He was so quiet as a kid. But damn he's observant. Like, he sees everything. At least Kay tries not to read your thoughts and Web can only feel your emotions. Esk's able to like... see through everything. It's freaky."

"I guess not having misunderstandings is good, but still!" Ellie shook her head, "Too stressful. At least here on Vestia we can pretend they aren't reading our minds." She paused, "Do you know if metal reflects mind reading rays?"

"what you mean like wearing a helmet?" Matt asked, laughing at the image. "I have no idea, never occured to me to try."

"I was thinking homemade. We have some aluminum foil I think," Ellie said. "Could be great, right?"

Matt snickered. "hey give it a shot, if nothing else you'll have a sparkly new hat."

Ellie nodded in agreement. "There was some talk about using metal hats to block alien probs rays back on my home planet," she said. "Great idea, huh?"

Matt chuckled. "Totally test it out on Kay. if he gives you that long suffering look it hasn't worked. Man, he must get so sick of our surface thoughts though." He smirked.

"alien probes?" Kasi asked.

"My surface thoughts are amazing though, maybe he likes them," Ellie said, yeah she was being sarcastic. Her surface thoughts were all about plants and cereal and how cute Shane was, mostly, and she knew it. "Probes, you know. The aliens send in drones to spy on us Humanists, according to the Humanists. We thought about blocking their beams with foil hats."

"Are you humanists particularly interesting or threatening?" Kasi asked curiously.

"They are just paranoid." The Swarm told them helpfully. "Generally insular, Humanists regard alien life as threatening and believe all aliens are "out to get them", despite there being no evidence to support this delusion. They believe they are a superior life form. Magic abilities: Very rare. Defensive capabilities: Very little. Threat level: Minimal. " They recited stiffly.

"wow... " Matt looked amused. "does tinfoil work?"

"unlikely." The Swarm replied. "though the practice is one stretching back centuries among the Terran races. Once believed to fend off microwaves, mind control rays and CIA spies listening in, the term "tinfoil hat" in old Terran English became synonymous with mental instability and paranoia. There is no evidence it does much more than make you look a little silly." They had a really flat level way of speaking, like they were reading off an encyclopedia entry.

Matt looked disappointed. "well that's a shame. Could have been funny."

"Hey! Humanists are the awesomest, of course aliens want to probe our minds!" Ellie paused, then grinned sheepishly, sometimes she sort of forgot that she wasn't really a Humanist any more. "Awww, tinfoil hats are a joke?" She looked suspicious, "Either you're messing with us, or someone was trying to make the Humanists look funny," she decided.

"We do not... "Mess around."" Swarm told her flatly.

Matt shook his head. "let's go like... touch everything" He suggested. Man, this other Swarm was humourless.

"Man, you're more like a robot than our robots are," Ellie said to the swarm. She followed Matt in search of things to touch. Weird how different this swarm was from theirs, she wasn't sure she liked it.

Shane came out again and looked around then followed Ellie and Matt to the next thing to see.

"oo instruments!" Matt rushed over to go play with a display about music.

Kasi followed the others. "The crew said Swarms were like... biological computers. All information, no personality." He nodded.

Swarm went back to watching them from a distance.

"Hey Shane!" Ellie gave him a random enthusiastic hug. "Swarms are so dang weird! Kasi says they're like computers, isn't that crazy? A whole species like a computer except ours who are cool and unique! How great is that?"

"Ours do have a personality" Shane said with a laugh and hugged her back before moving to the instruments also "Hey, Ellie, ever want to be in a band?" He asked and picked an instrument to try, guitar of course.

"well ours did say they were probably nuts didn't they? " Matt shrugged. "another misfit among a whole ship of us." He smiled softly.

"they act as translators and e... encyclo... pedias." Kasi struggled with the word. "They feed off knowledge... somehow. I do not understand quite how that works, but they also seem to need to share that information. The crew said that on the biological ships that are grown not built, they use Swarms instead of computers."

"we function as security cameras, communication systems, perimeter alert, information, intelligence, cultural, political and linguistic assistance... " The swarm droned.

Kasi nodded. "They scared me a little when i first encountered them. they would not stop asking me questions. But I have become used to them watching all the time. Does yours ask a lot of questions and watch everything?"

Matt was tinkering with a drum because hey, he could.

"They watch us constantly. I think they just took over the whole ship, probably they and the ship like to compare notes on everything everyone does," Ellie said. She chose a whistle and blew into it, making a horrible PEEEEEP noise.

Shane played with the guitar, not the best since he had no training, but it was fun to try

Matt laughed. "man, the stuff they must see." Something occurred to him, he hesitated. "Good thing they don't gossip huh?" Yeah, that was... awkward. Ahem.
He shook his head and beat the drum a bit.

Kasi came over to prod a few instruments and picked up a trumpet.

"Hey my brother plays one of those." Matt remarked with a grin. "Web that is."

"The Ishvara can produce sound from this thing?" Kasi asked, attempting to blow on it and getting nothing.

"Yeah. I bought it for him years ago as a birthday present." Matt snickered. "i asked the guy in the shop for the loudest most obnoxious sounding instrument they had, but the recorder was just too horrible. So i picked the second most obnoxious thing they had. I always loved the image of him practicing and annoying the hell out of the elders but them not being able to do anything because they can't just ban him from playing music." He grinned.

"That is... remarkably devious." Kasi nodded and continued to examine the trumpet.

"yeah. I hope he does it. It'd be great." Matt laughed.

Ellie giggled. "Oh man, they must know EVERYTHING. Bet Thalia hates it." She laughed at the trumpet idea, "Oh man, that's awesome. Gotta annoy those elders!"

Matt snickered. "Thalia hates a lot of things." Hey it was true, she was super cranky. he thought it was cute.
"The Elders are so easy to annoy man."

"immortality seems to make people irritable." Kasi nodded and set the trumpet down. "I think I would get extremely bored if I were so long lived, the antics of those around me would start to grate." He shrugged.

Matt tilted his head, this guy was weird. "You don't resent them?"

"Why would I resent them? they did nothing to me. " Kasi replied

"well, they could have said hey sure, go explore, come back, bring cake and technology."

Kasi looked at Matt amused. "Cake?"

"Yeah, everything's better with cake. Or so i'm told." Matt laughed.

"Do you resent them?" Kasi asked.

Matt shrugged. "I dunno... " He rubbed at the back of his hand. "I guess... a little bit. I can't like... go hang out with my brother. Then again he's so busy all the time anyway... I haven't seen him in.. such a long time." He looked grim.

Kasi bowed his head.

Matt forced a smile. "It's okay, forget about it." He moved to the keyboard to play a little ditty.

Shane moved, looking at a pair of cymbals then picking them up to play with them a little.

Ellie smiled and went to pat Matt's arm, not blowing on the whistle since she knew his ears were one of his senses that actually worked. "We'll find a way to chill with your bro someday, it's on the to-do list, she said."

Matt nodded, smiling softly. "Hey, he's coming to the wedding. He's not getting out of it. "