Wherein Kathie and Jason go to yet another deep space vacation destination.
By J.W. Sher · December 24, 2024
This is the Second part of my Year 2200 series. The First Part in this series is, Kathie and Her Middle-Class Star-Traveller Lifestyle.
“Why are we doing this again?” Jason said as he bent over in a downward-facing dog yoga position and looked down between his legs.
“Because stretching is good for you. That, and you told me I couldn’t bring anything except a small bag, so we’re going to have to entertain ourselves in deep space and keep ourselves fit with just yoga mats,” Kathie said.
“We can do all that keeping fit by just reprogramming our implants.”
“There are more than just biological benefits to Yoga. Besides, since you’re teaching me about asteroid mining, I should teach you something, too.”
Jason smirked but didn’t say anything. It was good Kathie had found something to stay relevant in this world of pervasive automation and superhuman artificial intelligence. It was impressive that she could contort herself into all those poses while not having replaced her joints or cartilage with superior artificial versions. He reflected on how each person these days had limits to how much they would explore the Ship of Theseus implications of replacing their internal organs. Jason believed that augmenting capabilities to live in deep space was acceptable, but replacing organs just to replace them seemed excessive, and he and Kathie were in alignment.
“Ok, that’s enough for today.” Jason got up and started rolling up his yoga mat.
“What are the coordinates for our next stop?” Jason asked.
“Which one? There’s a few,” Kathie said.
“The one you’re teaching Yoga at next week.” Jason said as he moved over to the lounger before the window, looking into deep space outside their ship.
“That would be Screen City Asteroid Resort and Cultural Hub.” Kathie said as she sat down next to Jason, who had gotten out a tablet interface to the navigation system. Kathie leaned in seductively to his lap and gestured around the tablet he was holding until she found the spot. “I think this is it,” she said, pulling up the interface to set a course, which Jason had to biometrically approve.
Over the next few days, in between the yoga sessions, Jason worked on reviewing asteroid mining survey data and working on a suitable mining plan. They also planned their visit to Screen City. The inhabitants called it Screen City because, on the small asteroid, many flat screens had been carved out of the rock faces. On those screens were projected beautiful images of tropical rainforests and beaches. It provided a pleasant reminder of the lushness of Earth, a visit to which was often a lifelong aspiration of many in the outer belts.
The guide to the resort had a lot of information on the cultural center. Along with the standard historical exhibits, there were many shops. Kathie was interested in their famous antique shop. It had many Earth culture artifacts and some items from earlier times in the current off-world era. They planned a visit between the daily yoga classes Kathie would teach at the resort hotel there. She checked that the area for the classes had a standard gravity generator and adequate atmosphere and pressurization for the types of body modifications she and Jason had to support activities in various off-world environments. She was way above the required specifications since her leg implants were top-of-the-line for the era, much more than she needed for the environments she liked to visit.
Later, after arriving at the hotel and settling in, they visited Galactic Goddess Antiques on the third day of the trip. It was in a pressurized area next to the hotel. It was a small shop, perhaps 5000 square feet, but it did have some precious items in its cases. There were still living genetically modified plants from the ecological era between 2030 and 2100 that produced simple clothing. The clothes the plants produced were relatively robust and composed of natural fabrics. If a person swallowed special bacteria and let it colonize their gut, the clothing made by these plants could also be swallowed and eaten, further enhancing their sustainable characteristics. These plants were from all the best-known designers of the era, and they existed inside their carefully climate and nutrient-controlled bubbles.
From the off-world era starting in 2100, there were early implants that contained precious stones. They were largely bought now for decorative purposes. They displayed various vital signs in constellations of glowing colors and were quite exquisite for those earlier eras of advanced human augmentation. They reminded her of her childhood 100 years ago and her fascination with the early off-world era.
A beautiful antique hand fan from the pre-tragedy era caught her eye. It was a large Japanese hand fan emblazoned with timeless haikus and poetry in Kanji script. She imagined the fan maker toiling in his shop amid harsh conditions and painting the finishing touches on the fan with a paintbrush before putting it in a box and sending it off. Little did he know that his fan would one day be in a shop on an asteroid millions of miles into deep space from his humble workshop.
“Let’s get this one, I really like it.” Kathie said, pointing at the fan. Jason cringed at the price given that it included all the fuel required to ship it out into deep space and then some marked-up resources on top of that, but for such a rare item produced by the less than a billion people back then, now being in competition for a place in the homes of 10s of billions that inhabited the solar system, he thought it was a reasonable price.
When they got back to the ship, Kathie took the fan in its pressurized case of argon gas and attached it to the wall in one of the few areas of the ship not occupied by equipment or instrumentation and where it would not block access to many of the myriad devices and systems embedded into the walls of the ship.
“I love it!” Kathie said, admiring its delightfulness and unusualness.
Jason decided to weigh in on the new decoration, too: “I like it too. It gives me this feeling that I’m part of history. It makes me feel that my ephemeral existence is carrying on the legacy of the centuries before me.” Kathie rolled her eyes at yet another attempt by Jason to over-intellectualize things that should be left alone, though his intelligence, however he wasted it, had always impressed her.