Despite multiple times being told NOT to do it, a Knomira ends up mixing multiple cleaning chemicals to "Clean their room properly." Ends up in an ICU pod with many in hazmat suits trying to clean the mess. -- Lessons
When she woke up, Iyn had the terrifying realisation that she was not breathing. She could glimpse the edges of some complicated machinery on her face and chest. She could not move. The screen above her eyes faded out from colourful blobs to a cutesy cartoon avatar.
"Welcome back," said a character clearly designed for children. "You've done some dangerous, dangerous things and had a BIIIIIIG oopsie. We found out that you were told not to do the dangerous thing, so these educational messages have been adjusted to your learning level!" This news was associated with a canned cheer from an offscreen audience.
Iyn wanted to scream. She wanted to throw things. She especially wanted to punch the too-cute cartoon avatar in the face. The thing that made it worse was that she was paralysed for her own protection.
Most importantly, she wanted to positively shred the person who wrote the cheesy, ear-wormy music that was teaching her about every "big oopsy danger" available on a space station like this one. Or the idiot who engineered the Calming Time Game that forced her to keep her fury to a slow boil while dippy cartoon characters did dippy cartoon things.
They couldn't do this to her! She knew her rights!
Unfortunately for Iyn, those rights and responsibilities were read to her by another automated messenger. "You have the right to an environment of your choosing, and the responsibility to maintain that environment without impeding on the rights of others. You have the right to clean air, and the responsibility to maintain it for others who share that air..." on and on and on and on. It was interminable.
They had no right to tell her what to do!
"You have the right to safety," droned the avatar. "And the responsibility of maintaining the safety of those around you. Iyn Rampans, you have violated several of these responsibilities. Do you recognise which ones they are?"
Just as she wondered how she was meant to respond, a cursor appeared wherever she happened to stare. Down in the corners of the screen, two boxes appeared with YES and NO on them in large, friendly letters. Another automated voice said, "Please stare at your selection and slow blink to activate."
Iyn aggressively chose NO.
"Very well. We are downgrading your responsibility level to just verbal and re-starting the educational cycle."
These blobby characters were colourful in a way that hurt her eyes. There was very little in the way of dialogue, and the music did most of the heavy lifting. This was a safety education stream for toddlers! How dare they!
Words scrolled across the screen, You acted like a child, they said. Now we are treating you like one.
[Image (c) Can Stock Photo / lineartestpilot]
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