Awakening
You open your eyes to the soft hum of machinery, feeling disoriented and a bit cold.
The space around you is dimly lit and confined.
As your senses adjust, you realize you’re lying in a pod.
It's locked.
You hear a voice.
Mysterious Voice
Ah, good to see you awake. I trust you had a restful nap. Please identify yourself.
You try to recall your name, but your memory is fuzzy.
You
I don't know who I am.
Mysterious Voice
It appears you have temporary memory loss. Let’s run a diagnostic. Your brain must be active during the diagnostic, so please do the activity that comes up inside the pod.
Some words flash on the inner wall of the pod:
Mysterious Voice
When pressed for time, most crew members answer these questions incorrectly. When given time to think about them carefully, they are more likely to answer correctly. Let’s do a few more.
Mysterious Voice
Puzzles like this help to show us that our intuition can mislead us. Slow, careful thought is likelier to lead us to the correct answer. The diagnostic is almost complete. Just one more question.
You have a hypothesis that StarFlakes cause space sickness.
You go to the ship’s Space Sickness Clinic.
You ask all the patients if they have eaten StarFlakes in the last week.
They all say yes.
The words fade from the screen.
Mysterious Voice
Diagnostic complete. No physical anomalies detected. Excellent! You’re not physically broken, just a bit forgetful. And you’ve learned about the importance of not jumping to conclusions. Now let’s get you out of that pod.
A gentle hiss sounds as your pod’s cover slowly retracts.
You sit up and rub your eyes.
There are seemingly endless rows of pods all around you.
You wonder who the mysterious voice belongs to.
You
Who are you?
Mysterious Voice
Perhaps I should introduce myself. I am Sigma, the AI overseer of the Starship Numerica. You can talk to me just as you would speak to a human. I’ve recently been updated to take on more human-like characteristics. You can communicate with me from anywhere on the ship. I’m always around.
You notice that there are people in the other pods.
You
Who are all of these people?
Sigma
Those are your 200 crewmates. Don’t worry about them, they are taking a rather extended nap. Now, let’s head to the Data Hub to see if we can jog that memory of yours.
You exit to the ship's maze-like corridors.