Chronometrics: Chapter 2

Elsewhere, a female Dr. Chrono was rifling through a swath of papers scattered across her desk.

The West Regional Uplifting Center had tons of data and paperwork that needed to be stored by virtue of the work being done there. Bringing apes and robots to not just sentience, but sapience created a lot of data that needed to be filed away. Even in this computerized day and age, Dr. Chrono swore that some work just had to be on paper out of spite. Something about tracking the acquisition of written language, or so she had been told. She preferred spite as the reasoning for the papers cluttering her desk right now.

With a disgruntled grunt, Dr. Chrono set the papers to the sides of the desk and booted up her laptop to begin transferring the paper records to the database. If she had her way, these records would have been put right into the database in the first place so that she wouldn’t have to do some grunt’s work. Then again, everyone had to do grunt work at some point, even esteemed scientists in the field of uplifting.

Uplifting was the official term given to enabling apes, robots, and other “less evolved” beings to achieve sapience. Dr. Chrono was unsure of how she felt about the term; uplifting sounded too light and happy to her, considering what often had to be done to these beings to grant them sapience, but she couldn’t think of a better term to replace it. The uplifting process involved a lot of genetic engineering and chemicals for the organics, not all of which was painless, or even consistently successful. She had a feeling that the papers on the sides of the desk contained at least one case of “failure” where some poor creature either had a bad reaction to the chemicals or was otherwise unlikely to “awaken” to sapience. Alas, receiving such bad news was part of the job.

Working with the AIs and robots was easier, though a bit less directly under Dr. Chrono’s purview. The best coders and AI specialists in the region had been recruited to write original code and patches for uplifting robots and less tangible AIs, and generally, this process went smoothly. In the case of “raw” uplifts where an AI was created as sapient, the process could be as simple as downloading the code into the robot “shell,” or activating the internal AI process (in the case of “virtual assistants” without bodies). If everything had been done correctly, a sapient robot or program would “awaken” and begin learning about the world.

Patching existing AIs could be a bit trickier, as it meant formatting the code around the pre-existing format. Often, the sapience-granting code wouldn’t even be compatible with the original format, resulting in the completely new code has to be written anyway. From there, the specialists would have to recover the memories and reformat them if possible, though this would occasionally be impossible due to compatibility issues as well. In fact, it seemed that more previous AIs were entirely remade than ever truly upgraded. This fact created something of a moral quandary: if a robot was sentient without being sapient before being uplifted, was it really okay to just discard those memories in the name of gaining true reason?

While there were people arguing for either side of the question, the official stance was somewhere in the middle. While there were some sectors attempting research on ways to encourage compatibility between the new programming and the old, nothing noteworthy had come of the research yet, and so the complete rewrites continued.

As Dr. Chrono mused over the various uplifting processes, she entered the various data into the system. Her ability to divide her attention and still get things done (and done well, and done accurately) was something she was quite proud of. When she was just a rookie some decades ago and her hair was still blonde instead of that odd greying off-yellow, her data entry was described as “fiendishly accurate” by a superior. In her mind, that just made it all the clearer that someone a bit lower on the corporate ladder should be doing the work she was currently stuck with. Data entry was something she could do (and, if an old roommate was to be believed, had done) in her sleep.

Soon, however, something happened that required Dr. Chrono’s full attention. Her door swung open, and a small ape child charged in with a child-sized, blue-plated android in hot pursuit. “Karina, just because you can take my limbs off doesn’t mean you should!” The android wailed as he chased the ape girl around Dr. Chrono’s office.

Karina looked back only to give the android a prolonged raspberry. Her energy seemed to be nearly endless as she zipped around the room. “Too bad! I wanna see this up close!”

Dr. Chrono’s irritation hit first before her amusement. “Both of you, stop right there!” she yelled, her voice sharp enough to halt them both and send the android skidding into the ape, which caused him to fall on his behind. That finally drew a wry chuckle out of Dr. Chrono. “Karina, give Alan his arm back.”

“Fine.” With a whine, Karina handed Alan his arm back, and the android child plugged it back in like it had never been detached in the first place.

“I don’t take your arm off to see how it works, do I?” Alan quipped, his childish voice bitingly sarcastic.

“That’s different! If you did it to me, it’d be attempted murder. In your case, it’s just maintenance.” Karina folded her arms and gave a huff.

“I see the double standards are already being drilled into our heads,” Alan mumbled.

Dr. Chrono couldn’t help but smile. Alan was becoming a bit like her with the tendency towards sharpness. She wasn’t entirely sure that was a good thing, and she hoped she could find someone to help him lighten up a little bit before it was too late. After all, it was a matter of handling code that was constantly updating itself; surely, he could update himself to be a bit happier someday.

Follow for Chapter 3

Did you get a chance to read chapter 1 - (Chronometrics Chapter 1)

So you want to create Dystopian Stories, exploring the fascinating cyberpunk landscapes.

When writing stories about dystopias, whether they are futuristic or not, there are a few aspects of building the world that the writer should keep in mind. Some world building concepts work better for different types of dystopias, but there are a few general rules that should serve you well to start out.

The first concept can be applied to writing in general, but it is still very important to keep in mind when focusing on the topic of dystopias: know your scope. If you're writing a story that's less than 1000 words, you clearly don't have that much room to cover the concepts of the world you're building. For those types of stories, it's best to pick one or two aspects of your dystopia and flesh those out within your framework. Trying to cram too much into too small space will cause problems for the pacing of your story, confusing the reader or making them lose interest in what they can understand. Pick an item of interest, form a structure around it, and keep the focus around that.

If you're writing a full novel, or there is no limit on your words or plot, this tenet applies somewhat less because you can control the scope more directly. You have more time and writing space to work with, so you can cover what you please and when you please. Still, getting wrapped up in minutiae can distract from the focus of your story.

The second concept is to be mindful of your tone when detailing events within the world. Contrary to what some might think, going as dark as possible and then some do not a good dystopia make. If nothing but awful things happen in your story, let alone your world, the reader will most likely tune out your story's events until they all blur together and interest is inevitably lost. While you don't necessarily need to jump directly to comedic relief, there needs to be a medium between suffering and joy that happens in your events. Even daily life events where not everything is terrible will go a long way in making sure the events don't blur together for your reader.

The third concept focuses on the building of your dystopia itself: make sure that the dystopian concepts you're using make sense in the context of your story. To a degree, it goes together with the previous two concepts. Knowing your scope will help you define the context of the story and the world, and being mindful of your tone will prevent you from introducing elements that are too jarring in your setting. How this concept applies to your worldbuilding varies depending on the core of your idea. If you're making a dystopia that's "descended" from the present, making sure your concepts have some tie to something occurring in the present will take you a long way. If you're focused on futuristic technology, define the limits of that technology and don't break them. Steampunk? Similar issue, except the aesthetics and expectations, is a bit more rigidly defined at times depending on your audience.

These guidelines can be met with careful planning, especially for longer stories. They can all be distilled into one tenet: know what you're doing. Decide on your focus, your tone, and what you intend to explore in your dystopian world before you charge off into your own brave new world. Shorter pieces do not necessarily require less planning; if anything, they require more structure to ensure that they have a payoff. The stronger your foundation, the stronger your writing and the better the payoff will be for the reader. Whether your goal is to shock, mesmerize, or simply entertain your reader, a strong support goes a long way.

Dystopian Futures - Discord Group

This post is due to many people wanting to Create the voice files for The Short Stories I create which revolves on Dystopian Futures, Humanity, and many other ideas. This is the Discord group keep in mind it is still in RAW format.

Dystopian Futures - Discord Group

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I am looking for voice talent see post below for more details.

I would like to make some AudioBooks out of them, I am looking for people who are very great at reading with personality and are able to give the listener a sense of being part of the book.

I am not looking for experienced Voice Over talent I am looking for Steemians that are English speakers, character actor, and improv artist. A smooth, professional and polished vocal style. That is capable of delivering recorded material to me in mp3, m4a, wav, or aiff formats.

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If you are able and willing to provide I will pay 5 SBD per AudioClip of the story done, please keep in mind the Stories are very unique and should require a unique voice. They are between 500-800 words, I currently have about a dozen short stores on steemit and will continue to write more, thus giving more opportunities to people that want to earn and help out.

Some things I am looking for

• Voice must be dark, with emotion
• Must understand this is a dystopian setting
• Able to make the listener be part of the story
• Above 55 Rep just means you know how to get around here and you are somewhat active.

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If you have not yet read some of my stories please have a look below.
The Meth Effect, cheating humanity - A ChronoCrypto Short Story
So you want to create Dystopian Stories, exploring the fascinating cyberpunk landscapes.
Dr. Chrono discovers how to stop human aging - A ChronoCrypto Short Story- (Narrated by @voraces)
Futuristic Dystopia – Literary Expression banned - A Chronocrypto Short Story
Steampunk Dystopia – Only “useful” inventions - A Chronocrypto Short Story
Dystopia new species of humans - A Chronocrypto Short Story - (Narrated by @avesa)
2045- the year of the apes, ft. Dr. Chrono - A ChronoCrypto Short Story
Dystopium: It’s not better, it just feels that way - A Chronocrypto Story - (Narrated by @voraces)
Reptilian Alien Precursors- Human POV Part 2 - A Chronocrypto Short Story
Reptile Alien Precursors – Alien POV - A Chronocrypto Short Story
Minds Can be Hijacked - A Chronocrypto Short Story - (Narrated by @voraces)
Robots and their rights - A Chronocrypto Short Story - (Narrated by @voraces)
Current Tech leads to Dystopia - A Chronocrypto Short Story - (Narrated by @voraces)
AI Drones - A Chronocrypto Short Story
A Chronocrypto Short Story - Corporate Conglomerate Dystopia - (Narrated by @voraces)
Singularity - A Chronocrypto Short Story - (Narrated by @voraces)
A Donald Marshall Inspired Story. (Narrated by @voraces)
A chronocrypto short Dystopian Story: The Creation Animid Unit S-01(Narrated by @voraces)
Technology and its upcoming dystopian effects.
Robot Equality - Is it here?
Beta JR World's AI Server(Fiction/Non-Fiction)(Narrated by @voraces)
Clone A-2 (Fiction/Non-Fiction)(Narrated by @voraces)

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In order to be a good fit please read some of these stories to get a feel for how they should engulf the listener.

If you are interested in doing this small project with me and earn some SBD and of course your name as the narrator please contact me on Discord name chronocrypto. Hopefully, we can get a wide variety of voices for the project.

The piece will be read in addition to this introduction.

[Title]Written by: @chronocrypto[Narrator]

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The Audio files will be uploaded on SoundCloud and posted on steemit by @chronocrypto, you will send me the audio clip through Discord so that everyone can listen to the stories.

Finished AudioBooks

Please Like and Follow if you like my work, Also a big thank you to @voraces and @avesa for the voices.