The Core: The First Guest

8. Getting a job

I didn't return everything to the New York apartment, instead I returned it all to how it was when Xa had left. The seemingly never-ending library stretching off into the distance, the walls of my apartment behind me, and the computer waiting for me to look things up on.

"Ok Tutor, I am ready to get a job and to start making myself useful," I said as I put away my sad memories with the understanding that it was who I was and I could only go forward and try to be a better man.

"I have what... 380 cr to my name at present?" I asked aloud as I willed my cr count to come up in front of me. Yup, it was still at 380. "Are there any jobs out there for me to do? Like manual labor kinds of things until I figure things out around here?"

"Yes, there are many jobs available and listed in this Core. Let me bring up a few to get you started and to see if you would be interested." She said as the monitor came alive and began to populate at an incredible rate with suggestions.

"Whoa whoa whoa.... yikes, let's just break them down into types of work and limit it to five for starters ok?"

"As you wish." She said as the screen changed to five different job types available.

Harvester

Surveyor

Courier

Educator

Butler

I read over the list several times before I glanced at Tutor and spoke my thoughts aloud "For real? I am in an advanced alien society and they still have normal jobs?"

"To some extent, yes. Not everything can be automated or should be automated without intelligent input. Take Harvester for instance. In the past, we have found comets or even moons with other alien proof of existence, and our automated systems have destroyed them entirely as they collected the parts and resources. This travesty can never happen again. There are priceless history and pieces of knowledge out there to be found still. That is why the Surveyor job is also an intelligent mind only job. Yes, we have machines that scan space objects for ore and anything useful. An intelligent mind would be able to make the decision about the flags that the system throws up and to choose what should be done in various matters.

Couriers are needed because many items shipped are alive and need to be cared for in transit.

Educators are always highly valued because they let citizens learn from other intelligent beings. Studies have shown that alive and intelligent educators are much better at stimulating interest and creativity than artificial constructs. We lack your.... crazy." She said with a smile.

"And lastly is the Butler on this list, because people will pay for real interactions."

"This list was based on things that you would understand, I didn't include sapulion spore mothering or tonal hormonal cooing to the Geb younglings. There are some things your body has never done, senses that you have never had or used, and organs never developed on your planet that automatically make you unsuitable for the job. It doesn't mean that you can't learn them... but I would advise you to study them on your own time if you wanted to learn them and to not try it with a real host or creature. The results might be disastrous."

"Huh..." I said as a thought came to my mind. "But wait... won't all of this take time? Like, real-time? I don't want to get back and my brothers are grandparents." I said as worry started to bloom in my mind. Tutor laughed at this. "Ha ha ha, that is silly, all of the jobs I listed are done here in fast time. Well, besides Courier in some parts. Courier tends to pay more because of that reason and it also can cost you money if the animal in transit dies in your care." She said with a thoughtful expression. "So we might want to save that one until later after you have taken courier simulations to practice." She said after a moment.