Not so much a pet as a prison, aquarium pets are transgenic aquarium animals such as koi, plecos, or axolotls that have been implanted with a ghostrider module. The ghostrider module has no control over the animal’s body but is fully wired into its sensorium as if it were living a real-time XP recording. An ego “sleeved” into an aquarium pet experiences being a sh, from the sensation of swimming to autonomic drives such as hunger and urination. Many of these sensations, such as the pleco’s rasping at the soft aquarium wood to which it clings with its sucker-like mouth or the koi’s constant ri ing of lthy bottom gravel with its mouth, are deeply revolting to most transhumans. In addition, the animals used often have good hearing, meaning the sleeved ego can make out conversations outside the tank.
Aquarium pets are physically helpless, as the ego cannot control the animal. The animal behaves instinctively, avoiding nets with a Fray skill of 40 in water, flopping around helplessly out of it. The ghostrider module imposes no modifiers to the ego’s mental stats and is usually connected to a cortical stack, but it has no access to control interfaces.
Egos unwillingly placed into an aquarium pet must make a WIL x 2 Test when rst “sleeved” and every week thereafter. The ego takes 1d10 SV on a failed test. If the aquarium pet dies with the ego in it, the ghostrider module ceases running and may only be re-instanced from the cortical stack (if any). Most aquarium pets have a DUR of 1 or 2. The ghostrider module and stack take up enough space in these creatures that an observer who makes an Academics (Biology) Test or a Perception Test at –20 realizes the animal contains implants, though they won’t know what kind of implants.
- Skills: Fray 40, Swimming 60
- Augmentations: Access Jacks, Cortical Stack, Ghostrider Module