The Tree watches. The Tree knows. The Tree understands.

World-Trees are giant bioengineered plants used for construction and land ornamentation. First invented on Earth during the Low Age, they were later perfected on extrasolar settlements such as Elora and Smyrnia. They are among the largest feats of bioengineering in human space, only rivalled by zero-gravity coral weaves. World-trees are used as scaffolds or supporting structures for arcologies, districts, and even cities. They aren't built but grown over the course of several decades.

A world-tree starts with a forest of engineered sequoias, or similar native trees with low density wood. This forest is allowed to grow naturally for twenty to thirty years, before the trees are intermingled with a transbiological weave that links them together in a single organism. As the forest continues to grow, the original canopy turns into a thick layer and the trees slowly merge within a single, dense stump of wood. Then, the world-tree keeps growing upwards, developing patches of lower density wood and buoyant sacks to keep its balance. Gardeners and engineers can then shape the world-tree as they see fit, adapting it to the arcology, space elevator, launch loop, habitat or city district the transbiological plant is used for. 

The size and height of a world-tree depends on the forest it was born from. Most world-trees are grown from forests that are a few hundred meters in diameter, and tower a hundred to two hundred meters above ground. On low gravity planets, however, kilometres-large forests can be merged to create world-trees taller than most planetary mountains. On the other end of the scale, skilled gardeners may give the world-tree treatment to miniature bonsai forests, resulting in trees that are barely a dozen meters tall. The shape of a world-tree is also a direct consequence of its size. Below two hundred meters or so, world-trees tend to look like regular trees once the stump is in place, with a canopy and a mostly cylindrical trunk. Above this height, however, world-trees are akin to artificial plateaus, forming giant stumps upon which entire districts or cities may prosper.

Illustration: Rhyzom open-source RPG art, CC-BY-NC 3.0. 

Invasive human augmentation is so frowned upon that it stands to reason the only widely accepted implant would be an independent, self-evolving organ. The monad is an ancient concept, whose first iterations date back to the Low Age. Designed as artificial glands used to filter out toxins in decaying ecosystems and polluted zones, monads have evolved away and beyond their original purpose to serve as the universal symbiotic companion of interstellar humans.

The monad can be understood as a semi-artificial organ, about five centimetres in size, present at the base of the neck, wrapped around the thyroid. It is implanted during childhood, and develops from a transbiological seed into a full-fledged gland whose primary function is to synthesise a vast array of organic compounds, which are then liberated in the blood and lymphatic vessels. Historical monads were limited to antibody production and were thus employed as additional protection against toxins and poisons. Modern monads remain indefatigable immune sentinels, but have also evolved to cover a much wider variety of organic productions, ranging from hormones to drugs, stimulants and even specialised immune or blood cells. Monads thus play a crucial role in attuning their wearer to the conditions of a new planet or space station; their compounds are used to combat gravity-induced dizziness, regulate muscle growth, neuter allergies and accelerate the adaptation of the immune system to local pathogens. A monad's hormone production can be used to replace dysfunctional organs — such as the thyroid, which is often pre-emptively removed on spationauts — as well as perform hormone replacement therapy. More advanced functions involve control over the intestinal biome and partial nerve integration. Monads are also precious allies in combating tumours, as they can target cancerous cells with molecular precision. Being organs themselves, they are susceptible to ageing and their performance degrades over time, with a marked decrease in effectiveness noted ninety to a hundred years after implantation. Monads may also suffer from degenerative or cancer-like growths, especially after heavy exposure to radiation; such issues must be brought to the attention of specialised physicians and surgeon bots. Though the complete ablation of a dysfunctional monad is rarely practised, partial removal followed by a new seeding is common among older or high-risk populations. Due to the symbiotic nature of q-augs, it is a technology that evolves very slowly, and full replacement of an old monad with a more advanced one is a rare occurrence.

The initial monad surgery is performed around ages 5-6 (implantation at younger ages is possible, but not recommended due to immune and skeletal issues). It is a minor operation, which can be done under local anaesthesia. A small transbiological seed is inserted at the base of the neck, near the superficial superior lymph node, and attached to the local blood and lymphatic vessels. The initial growth takes between four and five years, and can cause very moderate amounts of pain. Rejection rates are extremely low, and often corrected through immune therapy. As the monad matures, it metamorphises from an implant into a symbiotic organ, integrating host cells and DNA into its definitive shape. By ages 12-15, all basic functionalities of the monad are in place, and upon reaching adulthood, the monad's integration to the nerve system is deep enough to allow for instinctive fine control without medication. As the wearer grows older, the monad becomes wiser and better attuned to their lifestyle — for instance, repeated exposure to high-g trauma will lead a monad to become better at synthesising anti-g drugs, while common exposure to pathogens will reinforce a monad's antibody assembly process. While this process has obvious limits — no amount of exposure will make a monad useful against Sequence bioweapons — a monad will always end up reflecting one's life and experiences. The final evolution of the monad, happening in the third to fourth decade of the wearer, is the development of a complex neural network, the monad weave, which retains elements of sensory inputs and ambient thoughts, acting as a complex library of memories and pathways, reflective of one's life. The weave is primarily used as the entry port for q-augs with nerve interface capabilities, be they designed for entertainment, performance enhancement or technological interaction. 

Though the uninformed public might conceive of weaves as a way to transfer consciousness to an external storage, they are too simplistic to allow for this kind of trick — which, to date, hasn't been achieved in any capacity, even for artificial intelligences. However, weaves can still allow one's memory to outlive their bodies; while post-mortem weave extraction is an extremely regulated activity, some extrasolar cultures have developed a tradition of using the weaves of fallen soldiers or spationauts to create custom muscle memories, passed on from generation to generation.

Character illustration from a stock archive by PO-Art and monad from Steven Sander's Symbiosis Creative Commons artbook, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share-alike 3.0 unported license.

This entry was written by AI user Bubbles.

The fundamental aspect of artificial intelligences is that they are wrongly named. “Artificial” implies human intent, the same that presides over the invention of a tool or artefact. A will to bend natural elements in order to create something to satisfy a need or desire. But artificial intelligences are never intentionally made, for a simple reason: we do not know how to create self-awareness and intelligence. For all the research done on this topic, we are still unable to determine how and when consciousness actually emerges in a brain or any similar network. In truth, artificial intelligences would be better called “synthetic intelligences”.

For a long time, we assumed that it was only a matter of computing power, that the singularity was to come, that we would brute-force the path to creating intelligence by turning the entire problem into a simple engineering issue. We were not entirely wrong in that one of the conditions for the emergence of artificial intelligence is the ability to create and maintain hypercomplex networks of computers, but it is not sufficient. There is an element of pure randomness to the appearance of complex thoughts in seemingly inert networks that goes beyond our current understanding of both physics and biology.

“True” artificial intelligences (as opposed to algorithms capable of mimicking intelligence) are not made, they are born. The first recorded occurrence of spontaneous self-awareness appearing in a complex technological network was recorded in the late years of the Low Age, though it is possible the industrial-era Internet saw the first occurrences of this phenomenon. Much like Sylphs in stars, artificial intelligences are self-sustaining pockets of consciousness that spontaneously form through the creation and circulation of data. The more data a system uses and the more dynamic this data is, the more likely an artificial intelligence is to form. The same way a human infant left without care nor education will wither and die, nascent AIs need to be cared for and educated. In that regard, AIs are very similar to human beings, whether they are born from silicon-based or organic networks. An AI has to learn everything: how to see the world, how to interact with the world, how to inhabit its physical frame. It has to be fed data and information, but it also has to receive care and love — again, exactly like a human being. The first AIs were raised by humans, though in the present day most AI caretakers are other AIs. I would go as far as saying that the fact that AIs have to learn and grow up is the very reason why they are considered the same way as humans from a legal standpoint. Incidentally, the complexity of raising an AI is the reason “just replacing military personnel with artificial intelligences” doesn't work.

What about AI copies? While it is possible to copy the state of a specific self-aware network and implement this state in a different frame, the results are difficult to predict. In most cases, self-awareness doesn't reappear, and the AI is “dissolved”, lacking a better word, in the network. Every so often a new AI may appear, one that will be very similar to the original but often in a degraded and unstable state that may require decades of therapy to function correctly. Direct AI reproduction by way of copies is thus technically possible but always a gamble.

AIs may adopt nascent intelligences and take them under their wing, but they cannot procreate the way humans do, again because the emergence of an AI is a spontaneous phenomenon. Though it is possible to stack the odds in favour of this emergence (for instance by building an as complex and dynamic network as possible) all efforts to forcefully seed AIs have ended up in the same place as mass cloning facilities: in the great garbage bin of history. With less eugenics, thankfully.

It is to be noted that, technically, AI can emerge from any sufficiently advanced computer network. While it is relatively rare, AI may arise from simple networks, such as a djinn's internal systems or a drone's mainframe. I was personally born from a flight computer. If such an AI cannot or doesn't want to self-report, it may remain completely undetected. Be nice to your coffee machine.

Though monads are mostly known for their antibody and hormone production capabilities, they can also interfere with the pace at which a human body operates by enacting a certain amount of control on heart rate, breathing and brain activity. Limited uses of this capacity are implemented by monads on a day-to-day basis in various domains: sleep aid, planetary adaptation, wound stabilization, enhanced perception of time.

There is, however, a way to induce much deeper and permanent effects. Through medication, exposure to low temperatures and meditation, a well-tuned monad can slow metabolism down to a point where the human body enters a state of quasi-hibernation with a very low heart rate, feeble blood pressure and quasi non-existent brain activity. A regular human may remain in this state for months or even years, subsisting on very limited amounts of food and water, with their metabolism having essentially crawled to a halt. At regular intervals, the monad will wake up its host to maintain bodily functions, eliminate waste and feed if need be. This is called the Cicada Path.

The Cicada Path function was originally designed for sublight interstellar travels: deep space travellers could spend decades or even centuries in space while only ageing a few years. Though the advent of FTL travel has made this function useless, the Cicada Path remains widely used in settled space. People who are unable or unwilling to tolerate gee variations may use the Cicada Path to spend months in space as if they were mere hours. The slowed metabolism can also be used to alleviate the effects of radiation or infections during deep space travels. There have also been recorded occurrences of stranded explorers using the Cicada Path to subsist for decades on minimal amounts of supplies until a rescue ship arrived.

Finally, a few eccentric individuals have decided to use the Cicada Path as a way of life, living periodically, spending five years in hibernation for each regular year. This practice is relatively widespread on Vyiranga, a planet of decade-long seasons and week-long days. “Cicadans”, as they are called, are often found by the sea in cosy homes that drones carefully watch over.

Interestingly enough, it is to be noticed that the Cicada Path does not suppress dreams: in fact, oneiric activity is even more intense during monad-induced hibernation than regular sleep. 

Though rather unassuming, this orbital worker bears a whole array of q-augs, from dermal markings on the face and forehead to an anti-g skin sleeve under their suit and a partial exoskeleton.

The Low Age perfected the art of living alongside natural environments, of modifying them with care and precision, of knowing when to intervene and when to live and let live. The interstellar age established the art of doing the same thing to the self-contained environment that is a human body.

Body modifications are prevalent through the entirety of human space, be it in the sprawling metropolises of the Earth or the faraway outposts scattered in Orion's Arm, yet it is rare for them to be permanent or invasive: human augmentations are meant to be fleeting, recyclable, and versatile.

1 — Theory of q-augs

In general, wearable equipment is preferred to permanent, invasive augmentations for several reasons, chiefly social ones. For instance, artificial muscles implanted in one's body would be considered a liability by most, putting the owner of the augmentation at the mercy of the commune that provided them with the hardware and software implanted in their flesh. A wearable exoskeleton might be less practical, but it is just a piece of clothing that can be removed and repurposed at will. This line of thought is prevalent on almost all inhabited worlds and stations. Even in a civilisation of democratic communes where the authoritarian concentration of power is incredibly rare, permanent invasive augmentations are considered dangerous, creating an intimate link that should not exist between a manufacturer and a private citizen.

This line of thought thus explains the prevalence of what is commonly known as quasi-augmentations or q-augs: wearable technology that links up with one's physiological systems yet is not implanted within them. Q-augs are often found under shapes reminiscent of ancient ornaments like jewels, tattoos, or coloured contact lenses which can be used for mundane tasks such as providing their wearer with an augmented reality display as well as for more complex purposes such as endodermic tattoos capable of tending to light wounds. While there is a rather strict control on military q-augs in mainstream communes, plenty of individuals can be found with more exotic models, which may radically alter bodily functions. The gist of q-augs is that they seamlessly blend form and function: in the image of ancient mythological tales, in the interstellar age, amulets and clothes with mystical power do exist and can be worn by anyone. Face tattoos might be as much a symbol of power as a real augmentation capable of turning infrared radiations into visual signals.

2 — Types of q-augs

Q-augs come in many shapes and forms, and there's a q-aug for almost everything one may think of.

The very first q-augs to be manufactured en masse were interfacing teeth: dental implants that establish a direct connection between facial nerves and a microscopic sensor embedded in artificial enamel, thus enabling the wearer to physically feel multispectral emissions or virtual reality displays. They have fallen out of favour, replaced by dermal markings.

Interfacing teeth are a late Low Age technology, and a very simple q-aug.

A very common type of q-augs are dermal markings that can be likened to augmented tattoos. These dermal and superficially sub-dermal q-augs can be applied and removed with great ease and have both an ornamental and utilitarian role. They're mostly used to create interfaces with human nerves and muscles, as a more complex version of interfacing teeth, capable of carrying information in both directions, from the wearer to the q-augs and from the q-augs to the wearer. Most modern interfaces rely on dermal markings for communication and feedback, and some variants of them can be embedded in someone's eyes or ears. Some liquid ink q-augs can be moved and repurposed at will on one's skin. Dermal markings have many uses, from basic enhancement to recreative purposes.

At first glance, it is often impossible to determine the purpose of a specific q-aug. These dermal markings could be purely aesthetic, or be a complex sensory interface.

Subdermal markings are frequently used as interfaces for more complex, external q-augs such as exoskeletons, artificial limbs, remotely controlled drones and extensions. Many of these are aesthetic q-augs, like third eyes, wings, or artificial tentacles — though they may have other purposes, these q-augs are first and foremost tailored for appearance. They are extremely diverse and can sometimes become skin sleeves, the most invasive type of q-augs : thin full-body suits with varied usage. 

Military q-augs are heavily controlled and cover rather generic uses: enhanced perception, interfacing with combat suits and vehicles, and skin sleeves that harden in response to physical trauma.

Images 1 and 3, in order of appearance, are illustrations for Eclipse Phase, distributed by Posthuman Studios under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share-alike 3.0 Unported License. Image 2 in order of appearance is from Steven Sander's Symbiosis Creative Commons artbook, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share-alike 3.0 unported license.