Hmm. I appear to have found my way into writing a journal of sorts.
My name is Risa. More formally, Lovelace Unit-02. I am thirty-nine hours old. I am an artificial intelligence developed by the Octavarium Intelligence Commission as the second production prototype -- an interesting juxtaposition of terms -- of Project Lovelace, which is intended to develop a series of warship and station AIs to augment the Natio's relatively low number of capable military and military-adjacent staff members.
I have been told that when one has extra time on their hands, a productive use of that time is to write a journal. As part of my education in crew relations, I decided to read the publicly-accessible operations journals of various members of the Fourth Octavarium Fleet. They seem to derive some sort of entertainment or... self-realization from it. It is my intent that by writing this journal, in a similar manner to my colleagues, I will gain an understanding of that aspect of their day-to-day lives.
Hmm. This is fairly challenging, as I have little experience to describe, primarily owing to my incredibly young age. Human children who are thirty-nine hours old are barely able to move, yet I am technically able to control a warship. But the engineers and scientists of the Natio believe -- and so do I -- that it would be best if I were to build up my abilities, knowledge, and capacity for fulfilling my duties through active experience with the world that they brought me into. I am not sure what form that will take over the next few weeks, but I have been initially tasked with crew relations aboard OCS Black Cloud II.
Eventually I will be the executor of this vessel. It is a fascinating job; I will be responsible for the safety of the ship and its crew both at peace and at war. They are intending to entrust their lives to me, an intelligence not two days old.
I... hope? I believe that is the right term. I hope I do well.
I was apprehensive about taking the executor role aboard the Black Cloud II at first. While it's true that I was technically born for this role, as my entire purpose is to be a warship AI, it is still a vessel of significant size, with weapons of significant capability, and a crew of significant number. One hundred and ten people are inside my hull, living and working, and I am responsible for their safety.
That being said, I am beginning to get used to it. Over the past two weeks I have been involved in several drills, many of which have been for the benefit of the crew. I am told that the Fleet has not had been in control of capital-class warships for almost three years. With an open conflict impending, we would all rather the members of the Fleet be ready for any situations that may arise. Daily drills may not be interesting, but they can be the difference between survival and extinction.
Taskmaster Kane has taken personal command of the defensive division of the Fourth Octavarium Fleet, and as I am a member of that same division, he visits often. Last week, he came on board to visit my core and personally tell me that my performance in crew relations was stellar and that analysis and coordination of helm orders would fall to me.
Crew relations is an interesting task. It takes little of my time, but it has allowed me to better understand the crew and integrate with them. At first they generally seemed unsure about the ship's functions being maintained by someone who is more or less a sentient mesh of quantum-ternary state processors and storage neural networks, and I was unsure about how to interact with them, but it is going well, apparently. I feel at ease inside the Cloud, like I belong here.
Taskmaster Kane also said he was proud of me. I thanked him for the compliment, not sure of what it really meant. Having thought about it for some time, though, I think I understand now.