?


    The growing crowd inside the games centre greeted them with a cheer as Max and Nico walked in the door, along with a stomping that substituted for pping in the noisy environment, where the music was thumping and there were constant cheers from the spectators watching the head-to-headpetitions within the gaming pods.


    The cashier smiled and held up the payment terminal for Max to tap, while the man behind the bar poured both of them a shot of something dark.


    "It''s our house specialty. A mixture of Reaver Rum and the nutrient packs designed for Cyborgs. A lot of our workers are augmented, you see, either due to injury or for other purposes, so they need the extra juice." The bartender informed them.


    Max caught a glimpse of what was in his mind and then looked around the room more carefully. This Moon Base was really a body modification haven among humanity. There were augmentics and modified options for everything avable here.


    Many of the changes were work rted, with enhanced sight being the mostmon option, usually in one eye for cost savings, or to maintain some sense of natural sight, but quite a few of the older soldiers had gone straight to a partial conversion when they were freed from their duty, which removed all the old aches and pains from their joints, reced lost limbs and digits, and gave them superior precision in their motor controls.


    Cyborg fingers did not shake if the procedure was done well. So, once they had adapted, they were very well suited to precision work, like surgery or manual testing and repair.


    The Replicators could rece basically anything, but the charge was by energy used, and recingplex electronics was expensive, so having a tech go over the circuitry and rece only the damaged capacitors or chips was much more cost-effective. It also kept the repairmen up to date on current electronics, which made it easier to find and diagnose faults instead of cutting humans out of the loop and trying to let a malfunctioningputer system diagnose and repair itself.


    Uncle Lu believed that no matter how far Replicator technology advanced, it was still essential to have humans know how to build and maintain everything on their own. That way, if there was an attack on theirputer systems and the database was corrupted or destroyed, they wouldn''t lose all that they had achieved.


    But in more practical terms, what it led to was a lot of artificially perfect appearances, and superhuman stamina on the dance floor.


    Nico dragged Max out into the middle of the floor when a hard rock song came on, and the crowd surged forward, creating a small mosh pit in front of the DJ booth filled withb coats and iling sensory tentacles.


    The DJ saw how animated the crowd got when the song came on, and kept the vibe going for four more until the crowd started to wear out, then moved to a slower song for everyone to go get a drink and refresh.


    Max ordered a round and moved to one side of the room, where the music was lower and there was arge crowd betting on one of the game matches that was going on. They were doing an asteroid race in shuttle craft, a test of precision piloting and high-speed reactions that would test any ship''s pilot. It was one of the more popr video games in the room, Max noticed, as others were ying it as well, though notpetitively.


    Unlike Mecha, which had nearly fifty buttons between the two control sticks, the controls of a race shuttle were rtively simple. You could ignore everything but the directional controls and throttle for most of the race, and only adjust the fine-tuning a few times, or when you wanted to try something tricky.


    "Are you two going topete?" One of the bystanders asked as Max settled into the open chair near the disys of the in game content.


    "I think that might be a bit unfair, don''t you?" Nicoughed, while the rather drunk young man looked offended.


    "Hey, we''re pretty good. I think that Robbie might be able to beat even the professional shuttle racers in the game." The man countered.


    "Alright, once they finish their race, I will log in, and we will see how well they can do against a trained Pilot." Nicoughed, highly entertained by the fact that the man didn''t recognize her.


    The race wasing to an end, so Nico jumped up into one of the pods that was mounted for the upants toy inside, stacked like a pod hotel or crew bunk on an older starship.


    [NICO has logged in]


    [Warning, Smurf ount detected, wager at your own risk]


    Maxughed at that. He hadn''t seen the warning about a ranked yer using an alt ount in a long time. It was nearly impossible to bypass, so they would only log into it in private, not in a public venue like this, unless it was part of a setup for the audience to guess who they were.


    That wasn''t a bad idea though, and the crowd was going to be guessing soon anyhow, though they should realize pretty quickly that it was her, since she used her own name as the alt ount.


    [Challenger NICO has entered the staging area.]


    That attracted a lot of attention when it shed across the screens at the top of the wall, and Maxughed as the eager spectators began to fight for position, even going so far as to attempt to im spots on both of his thighs before they realized who they were sitting on.


    "Sorry, Commander. We got a bit too energetic about finding a good spot." The researchers apologized in unison.


    "It''s not a problem. But why don''t you try that fellow two tables down. He looks like he wouldn''t mind." Max teased them.


    They gave a stealthy look then shook their heads.


    "Nope, not happening. I''m sure he would love it, but he''s already bad about keeping his hands to himself. It''s a shame really, such a nice ass, but such a lousy personality." The researcher sighed.


    "Well, you can stand here anyhow. The race is about to begin, and her opponent hasn''t realized who she is yet. He was in the pod when we all came inside." Max informed them with a wink.