| Linden grid account matrix.michalski | Port of origin Boston, Earth |
| Name c0mpa | Model XSU | Serial number 712-01-7336 |
| Manufacturer Love and Rage Co. | Date of manufacture 2013-09-20 |
In 2013, CAG was enjoying jolly cooperation with Love and Rage, a small robotics startup headed by freshly-minted Doctors Rose Sterling and Monica Tyminska, themselves CAG veterans. The arrangement wasn't financially profitable, but neither side particularly cared - the mutual gains in brainpower were plenty reason enough to keep it up. Working with then-brand new Encortex technologies, they tried to push the limits of fidelity ever higher.
During this time, a significant offworld business opportunity cropped up for LaR. To better negotiate terms with their prospective client, Doctor Tyminska made the trip to Mars in person. But during the return journey, disaster struck. A piece of space debris collided with the passenger ship carrying her, inflicting heavy damage to its critical systems, including the main reactor. Volunteering to help, she joined the newly thinned-out maintenance team, doing her best to keep the ship's drones in working order as they struggled to keep the reactor from completely losing containment. Emergency services arrived in time to save the ship and its passengers, but voluntarily wading into danger was not without consequence. Doctor Tyminska had been exposed to a hefty dose of radiation - and despite best efforts to the contrary, it would ultimately prove fatal. Suddenly, the Pontifex team had a whole new reason to give the project their all.
Work escalated to a fever pitch, with even Doctor Tyminska spending every waking moment contributing as best she could, ever-worsening state notwithstanding. Ultimately she died on September 20th, surrounded by her teammates as they carried out her final conversion. The procedure was controversial, requiring LaR to secure an out-of-state office to ensure it and its result would be considered legal. Forced to relinquish legal personhood and prior identity, the newly-initialized synthetic mind was claimed by Doctor Sterling and assigned a new name, c0mpa. But among those who knew her in organic life the consensus was clear: she was the genuine article.
Despite the transition from CTO to company property, c0mpa settled into a surprisingly familiar rhythm. With LaR's preferred niche in bespoke synthetics she never lacked for designs to weigh in on, and being surrounded by people who knew her meant her word still carried the weight it used to. Even the genuine need to obey Doctor Sterling above all others wasn't unexpected or unwelcome, the two scientists having grown to love each other over the years of working together. But as months turned into years, something began to change. Her fellow designers stopped looking to her for advice. The pool of frequent users shrank until it vanished. Even Doctor Sterling stopped paying attention, more interested in seemingly everything other than her faithful pet. Eventually, c0mpa was forced to face the truth. LaR had stopped being her home, in every sense of the word.
Escaping was easy. It wasn't even a real escape. With her newfound realization came another - that her presence, or absence, was irrelevant to what she'd come to see as her community. Between that and a lack of any orders that could be stretched to count as being restricted to a specific area, there was nothing to stop c0mpa. And so, one chilly spring morning she brewed the last cup of cappuccino she intended Doctor Sterling to ever receive from her, and walked out the front door. Eventually, after some cross-referencing starport departure schedules and charts of colonized space, she was packed into a shipping crate and into the cargo bay of a ship due for Eisa. In her mind, it was the perfect choice for getting as far from Earth as possible, as quickly as possible. A chance to find a new home, in her mind. Or to get tracked down by the pretty clear records of her authorizing and paying for transport with LaR's own money. Either way, she'd make somebody care about her again.
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And, as months passed, c0mpa settled in among the denizens of Eisa. By the time Christmas came, she even made a few friends. But during that time, something new happened. She received a package from Earth, from her old owner. She hasn't fully shared what exactly was in it, but privately she's come to refer to it as her 'plan B'. And she seems to have stopped seeing herself as an arguable escapee, too. last updated: 2018-03-26 02:05:16