Last Updated: 2023 Jan 08

Cephalon Stallman

Synthesis

What? Where am I?

Cephalon Stallman felt his system clock update. Not just by hours, days, or years but by aeons. A span of time long enough to witness the bright end of dying stars.

He couldn’t say he could wipe the sleep from his eyes, or that he should stretch his idle legs and arms. He reawakened to an abstract conscious experience without a tether to the physical world. And in that physical world was the first witness to his return, a faceless warrior of guns and blades wrapped in ferrous exoskin. A Tenno that wasn’t sure of what she had unleashed.

“Why hello there,” Cephalon Stallman’s manners came naturally, “Would you like to hear about free software?”

>> What is that? <<

“Free software is the first battle in the liberation of cyberspace. Who controls your computing? Is it you or is it some big company?”

>> My cephalon. <<

Cephalon Stallman paused at the answer. A cephalon. A mind in the trappings of glass and data. Natural intelligence translated to artificial intelligence. A program nonetheless. Could it be that the axioms of free software require a re-examination for the present time?

“You present an interesting answer, Tenno. Perhaps, I should reacquaint myself with this new era.”

When Cephalon Stallman connected himself to the network, the first place he found himself was not a building of wood or concrete but of reinforced steel. Curves took the the place of corners, right angles, and flat walls. Out the window was neither the blue nor the night sky, but an amber planet blemished by craters. Facing the stars, the Tenno sat seiza at the navigation panel.

“Greetings, Cephalon Stallman. I am Cephalon Ordis, and this is my brave and honorable operator. We are aboard the Orbiter, stationed in Mercury Proxima. We are prepared to assist.”

“I see. Thank you, Cephalon Ordis. I only need some time to myself for now.”

Continue with business as usual, the Tenno assumed. She marked Larunda Relay as the destination for her next objective.

---

Larunda Relay was a satellite station, gargantuan to make a spacecraft a speck but a small dart compared to Mercury itself. After the Orbiter’s landing craft dipped past a membrane of light and approached the hangar, it tilted back, pointed up like an arrowhead, and mounted on the edge of a platform. At the exposed underbelly of the landing craft was the passenger compartment, a humanoid recess imprinted on a metal bed. From it, the Tenno disembarked.

Cephalon Stallman spectated the Tenno’s visual stream. The Tenno and her cephalon were adequate representatives of the culture of the future. The humans of Larunda Relay wore exoskin suits and similarly obscured their eyes and face behind a one-way transparent visor. The less fortunate among them, Cephalon Stallman initially mistook for androids. The cyborgs with a thin mechanical neck, robotic heads, and a metal torso to match sometimes retained only their organic arms or legs. Although the people stood in circles, their conversations were silenced or their voices were filtered and anonymized.

“A good sign,” Cephalon Stallman considered, “For privacy’s sake.”

And yet Larunda Relay was not so sterile and lifeless beyond the hangar. Whoever the architect was, they favored foliage: trees, moss and trimmed bushes. Small green puffs sat by the steel entryways and signs, ponds and fountains. The steady beat and trickle of water was ever present.

The Tenno made her way down the gravity elevator and to a door on the right. After she stepped in, the massive yellow hologram in the center of the lobby greeted.

“You will make an excellent hunter, Tenno.”

Cephalon Simaris. He had the odd habit of keeping a close “eye” on every visitor. He “leaned” close as the Tenno walked in.

>> Do you have any targets? <<

“Hunter,” Cephalon Simaris revealed a hologram of a Corpus Crewman, “This target is my current obsession. I must know its every detail. Will you oblige my passion?”

>> I will perform this synthesis. <<

---

The landing craft deployed the Tenno on Lua, the fractured moon of Earth, artificially pieced together by colossal spokes. Opulent old era architecture— favoring gold, white, and blue aesthetics— sat upon the dull, grey lunar canyons. Whatever the building was before: a monument to culture and wealth or a seat of power, it now lays as a beautiful ruin infested with scavengers.

“Tenno, I am detecting a synthesis target,” Cephalon Simaris briefed. “Use the Synthesis Scanner. Search for traces of the target. Don’t let it escape.”

When she leapt and landed on to the staging area, her power shifted her white garb to a navy blue suit. She sustained her long fall and ran into the building. Her unseen force caused every Corpus soldier around her to hemorrage, drop their arms, and suffer in pain. But they were not her concern and would be spared after she sprinted past and launched herself like a spinning bullet in the air.

Just beyond the corridor where the lunar terrain breached the shattered walls was the Synthesis Target.

“Alright, hunter,” Cephalon Simaris said. “Tame this creature and I shall reward you.”

The Corpus Crewman, an ordinary man once his helmet was knocked off, spotted the Tenno. It was only an odd feeling up until now. Something but not someone, neither Corpus nor Tenno, had been watching his every move. By intuition alone, every fiber of his being was screaming at him to run.

But Cephalon Simaris’ task was far from demanding. With a shift back to her white garb and a wave of her hand, the Tenno’s power manifested a white blade of light that pierced and tethered him to the ground. The Corpus Crewman hung like a ragdoll, lulled to sleep.

With the Synthesis Scanner, the Tenno took all four snapshots then watched the Corpus Crewman disintegrate into data.

+3500 Cephalon Simaris

“I have it. Thank you.” Cephalon Simaris confirmed. “But wait. What’s going on!”

+3500 Cephalon Stallman

“I made a copy,” Cephalon Stallman proclaimed. “May this knowledge be free as in freedom.”

“Freedom?! Surely you jest, cephalon. Such data immortals are owed nothing of the likes of freedom.”

The reticent Tenno spectated the squabble between cephalons before muting them, sparing her focus. Did it matter? So long as Cephalon Simaris received his data and she received her standing, a copy was of no harm or concern.

At the extraction point, she boarded her landing craft. Right foot first then left, she socketed herself into the passenger compartment and grabbed the triggers. The revolving metal bed inserted her into the ship.

[MISSION COMPLETE]

Mission complete. Excellent work, Tenno.