Microstory 687: Book of Marsali

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Marsali Porra was not a Lightseer, nor did she ascribe to any religious beliefs. She was a completely unbiased historian, and she was not human. Some believe Peter Fireblood to have built the Marsali model himself, but most of that conjecture is based solely on how close they were. They were associates and contemporaries, but no historical record suggests that he had anything to do with her creation. She was a Class MI-9 artificial intelligence, which means that she was purported to have a soul. Salometers are one of the few technologies that are illegal in Fostea, so we’ve not been able to prove this one way or the other. Marsali, whatever her condition, dedicated herself to—or, to the skeptic, was programmed to—observing and recording history, particularly the events in our galaxy. She is capable of transferring her consciousness to multiple substrates, and can in fact, exist within our interstellar data network. There have been no confirmed sightings of her since the Sacred Savior was revising the Book of Light, and starting to work on his memoirs. There are those who believe her to have not avatared herself to an android body in centuries, instead choosing to remain without our datawork. This would certainly make sense, as it would allow her to monitor everything we lowly humans are doing simultaneously. She is one of few independent automated systems in the galaxy. They’ve not been banned, but we value human ingenuity and hard work above all else. Though full automation on par with the dirty communists in Lactea is possible, we choose to do everything ourselves. Regardless, we have no cause to prevent someone like Marsali from existing, and most Fosteans seem to be okay with it. Over time, Marsali has released volumes upon volumes of our collective history, which is a service she apparently provides completely free of charge. She has now changed tactics, however, in order to align with taikon predictions. She has released the Book of Marsali, which reexamines the events surrounding Sotiren Zahir’s birth, life, and death; reportedly giving the audience a fresh new look on how his teachings impacted the shape of things to come, through the lens of hindsight. It will be released later today.