Private A Brain with A Person

[Griet van Vliet]

Now that Griet could finally set foot inside her new penthouse in the Valley of the Machine Gods, on Iokath, after a long busy season, a grim realization dawned on her: there were a lot of questions on her mind that she put off asking. And that she knew not just anyone could possibly aid in answering. Yes, she was an accountant that became an icon for the profession in Wild Space, just that the guest of the day was someone she only knew by name on Svivren, if that. And somehow, she saw fit to extend an invitation to her penthouse to that person, believing that Amilthi would have no real assurance needs (in the accounting sense) and therefore have no independence issues arise. Yet she still believed Amilthi Camlenn to have more intellectual inclination for the questions she wanted to ask than everyone else she knew about, client or not. And she suspected that Amilthi was much smarter than the average Jedi, and maybe even smarter than Griet herself was. The only two people I knew by name that were smarter than I am were Jess and Janick. As Janick said, there had to be other people, but it seems that high intellect is very sparse these days, she thought. Plus few clients would actually believe that she was, in fact, a Jedi. On the flip side, she knew some people believed that Jedi shouldn't, or, less commonly, outright can't practice accounting. It would definitely come to a few people's surprise that she would own a lavishly decorated penthouse on Iokath. However, because there was, as of yet, no other organic Force-using residents in the Valley, she could feel another one coming very clearly...

 

[Amilthi Camlenn]

Everything about this place was strange. It was a world artificial to the core, menacing in appearance, but more so through its alienness and mystery than due to any palpable maliciousness or destructiveness. In that, it was very different from location that were, as the phrase went, strong in the dark side of the Force. But Amilthi very much felt that she didn't belong here, and the fact that she had been invited did little to assuage the feeling. That, in itself, was an unusual occurrence, and Amilthi was not above feeling a little insecure about seeing the fellow Jedi who had extended her this courtesy, because she was ultimately a stranger. She didn't know what to expect, or what was expected of her.

And yet she was tranquil and at peace, noted, observed these feelings of her, but treated them no differently than the myriads of sensations that fell every moment into the still pool of her mind and dissolved. They were just emotions, as real as any, but they did not constitue her, did not possess and control her. She carried herself confidently and upright as always even if she did not feel so, and in her austere black robes did not look altogether out of place.

She had not interacted with a single living being since her arrival in this place. She had seen some, but everything of practical importance so far had been operated by droids. Droids had registered her landing and purpose, and droids had let her into and led her through the rather secluded housing complex in which Griet's flat was located. She wondered what could have driven this woman to chose to live in such a location. Perhaps for her, solitude in such deeply alien environments was just what she needed for her own development.

A protocol droid led Amilthi into an anteroom and alerted the lady of the house to her guest's arrival.

Griet van Vliet

 

[Griet van Vliet]

"Your guest has arrived, Griet" the protocol droid told her by intercom.

"Send her in!"

Griet needed to ensure that her guest of the day, Amilthi Camlenn , would be as comfortable as was feasible in a place such as the Valley of the Machine Gods. It would be unsettling for someone unfamiliar with the planet for people that first come here and see an abundance of droids handling much more of the menial tasks than would be the case elsewhere in the galaxy. I know, given what I invited Amilthi for, I would need to get a feel for her brain and her mental functionality from the beginning and the same in reverse: she would benefit from getting a feel for mine also. I fully expect both her brain and mine to light up and get very active as we proceed, hyperactive even. And, of course, my brain will eat up a lot of my body's energy, she thought, while Amilthi would soon arrive to the penthouse and enter a somewhat lavishly decorated place whose decorations would be more consistent with an upper-class assurance partner in an accounting firm than with a Jedi, with the centerpiece being a rare and ancient print that was only, back in its day, made to 320 copies (10 copies for each original owner, times 32 original owners): Terror from Beyond, bought from an insolvent fuel depot operator.

"I am Griet; how does the Valley of the Machine Gods feel to you?" Griet greeted her guest of the day.

 

[Amilthi Camlenn]

What Amilthi was entering was eminently a household, that was to say, not a monastery in the same way that a civilian installation was not a military facility. And it was a wealthy household at that. Given that this was not, as far as she understood, a place of business - at least she had seen no indication to the effect that there were offices here -, it was difficult to see a pragmatic justification for this, and it was difficult to escape the conclusion that the interior was simply a reflection of the fact that its owner liked making money. That, of course, was a strange quality to encounter in a Jedi. But at the same time, Griet's work was of undeniable value to the order. It was simply a practical necessity for the order to subsist on charitable donations, and Griet increased the magnitude of those donations not insignificantly by assisting prospective donors with optimising the tax savings those donations could yield. It was very possible that in order to do this kind of work, it was simply necessary to be the kind of person who liked making money.

"It feels strange. Sorry to be so unoriginal", said Amilthi with a wry smile. "Given that it's hardly out of necessity that you have set yourself up here, I can't help but be curious. What is it you find attractive about it?" She half expected the answer to involve the local taxation rules.

Griet van Vliet

 

[Griet van Vliet]

"To answer your question, Iokath's taxation system is focused mostly on industrial excise. As a result, corporations, and even unincorporated businesses that are involved in manufacturing, are taxed based mostly on their cost of goods manufactured. For individuals, however, Iokath was a tax haven, albeit little-known as such. It also offers easy access to material necessities"

Alas, industrial excise was also levied on the sale of real estate, regardless of whether it was new-build or second-hand. Which meant that it just wasn't attractive for real estate speculators because not only capital gains were taxed, but what would, in other jurisdictions, be the cost base. Now that her guest was here, Griet looked at Amilthi Camlenn in the Force, and focused mostly on her brain. Yes, it was true there were some parts in Amilthi's brain that would appear very well-developed, and operate very fast. Hence these parts in question feel pleasurable to Griet on some spiritual level. Much like Janick would feel as such to her, even when the latter was downloading knowledge from her: that was probably the reason why Griet tolerated Janick downloading from her years ago, even when Janick tended to push Griet's mind very hard when downloading. Yet, it was clear that Griet's knowledge of neurology was not on the level of a healthcare professional such as a Jedi healer, even though she still needed some knowledge of that area to use Neural Storm properly. As a result she couldn't quite say what part, nor what functions.

"With that said, for what's to follow, I would like you to get a feel for my brain and my mind, as I currently am getting a feel for yours; I feel that our mental activity will get very intense and that our brains will light up at some point"

 

[Amilthi Camlenn]

Amilthi seemed bewildered and tilted her head to look at Griet ponderingly for several seconds. She had no idea what to make of this woman, nor of her request which, for lack of a better word, Amilthi found exceedingly clumsy.

"Who cares about brains?" she said smilingly. "Neurologists do, to be sure" - her own mother being a case in point, a curious reminiscence that intruded upon her consciousness, perhaps primed by the household environment - "but that's only because they have no direct access to the mind and wouldn't know what to do with it if they did. But we do." She gave a shrug. "At least in principle, and to varying extents. I'm not very good at it myself, I understand the workings of someone's mind better through words.

"So what it is you actually want to achieve?"

Griet van Vliet

 

[Griet van Vliet]

"Often what happens in someone's brain can have effects on how one speaks also, and how one's mind works. In addition, what conversation one is carrying could have effects on someone's head as well, and sometimes even lasting effects, but that's as far as I could say for the time being. But once you understand one's inner workings and where they come from, you will understand someone even better. I apologize if I come across as clumsy, and/or long-winded, it's probably some subconscious process that led me to ask such a question"

Clumsy? One could then be led to think that I had clients operating in the biomedical industry, regardless of where they lied in the industry's value chain, she thought, realizing that Amilthi Camlenn 's mind definitely didn't work like hers. She could feel, however, Amilthi had a lot of intellectual depth worth exploring. She could also feel her own brain working a lot harder. However, Griet knew that few people actually cared to, or were able to, understand their surroundings on a level deep enough to enhance their efficiency with the Force: despite the limitations of her own neurological knowledge, she still knew enough to make Neural Storm work. And even to get more out of someone's mind. Yes, there are times where the purpose of one's activity may not be obvious before it starts, but only becomes clear when it gets underway, and sometimes only late into it or even after completion. And there was no going around that in public accounting: often the point of performing a certain audit procedure was difficult to understand for a client before it was performed, but the client gets it ex post.

"Which, at first glance, may not be obvious, but it has to do with how someone approaches the Force and its relationship to the physical realm"