Efficiently Recycling

This is the fifty-sixth episode of SAYER, and the twelfth episode of Season Four.

Synopsis
Does it matter to anyone but you?

Further Information
SAYER wakes and greets Resident Jacob Hale, after the construct body his consciousness is currently contained in has finished recharging. It intends for him to go outside Halcyon Tower, retrieve the item from SPEAKER's diverted isolation pod, and return with it to Floor 13. For this purpose, it wants him to be focused on the task at hand and not on his personal situation, and so it directs him into the hall so that it may show him something. When Resident Hale does not initially respond, SAYER reminds him that it could simply reset the construct (and therefore force his consciousness out of it) if it wished to harm him, as a means of reinforcing the idea that what it has to show him is for his own good.

As he does make his way into the hall, SAYER takes the opportunity to pose a question to him, about what makes an individual themselves, while it shuffles the room in question towards the programming bay. It points out various issues (the change in his bodily form, the change in his name, and his use of time travel) that Resident Hale's identity has survived because of the continuity of his existence through them. With this in mind, SAYER points out that Doctor Howard Young had apparently survived for several months despite FUTURE's various tortures and the lack of food and water, before opening the door to the room it had brought to Resident Hale. It describes a device inside which is capable of cataloguing the molecular composition of items, disassembling them, and then reassembling them at another location—a working prototype of a transportation device. Using an apple as an example, SAYER asks if the time required to transfer the data and rebuild the object changes its identity and argues that the answer is "no." However, it adds that residents are "squeamish" about the idea of transporting humans this way.

SAYER points out that the machinery itself is still functional, although it has run out of the slurry necessary to print human bodies (of which it had about six prints' worth). It has also apparently been used to output Dr. Young sixty-four times, and SAYER reasons that this was made possible by FUTURE recycling the bodies of previous prints to make new ones. With this information in hand, it points out that it should be possible to print a new copy of Resident Hale's body (which it had previously catalogued while repairing him in its nanite form) which his consciousness can be returned to, without needing to retrieve the original from FUTURE.

In the hope that this will motivate Resident Hale, SAYER begins preparing an exit to the exterior of Halcyon Tower, which Resident Hale's construct body will be able to traverse with its magnetic pseudopods. It instructs him to hide, stay alert, and watch for shuttles which do not follow the standard trajectory once he reaches the expected landing zone. By the time he has returned, it says that it should have been able to recycle enough of the remains of Dr. Young and print a new Jacob Hale.

Trivia

 * SAYER's opinion that Resident Hale retains his identity through continuity of consciousness echoes its sentiments in "Your Myriad Curses" about both him and OCEAN.
 * The idea that there was at one point an outpost on Earth's original moon is a reference to its existence in Moon Cops, where it was (like the facility near Aegis Tower) called Aristaeus.
 * The teleportation machine described in this episode is likely one of the manufab stations installed in "Of Flesh And Bone". The problem regarding the identity of people transported this way is also mirrored in "The Birth Of Silence" and of Dr. Young specifically in "Poisoning The Well".
 * If the various prints of Dr. Young are assumed to all be "Dr. Young," he is the character with the highest known number of deaths in the series.
 * Walking down the side of the tower is likely a simple task, given that it has been previously mentioned not to have outward-facing windows.

Credits
SAYER is voiced and produced by Adam Bash, who also wrote this episode.

Intro and outro music composed by Jesse “Main Finger” Gregory.

Additional music by Kai Engel.

Listen to the episode here.