The Most Fundamental Assistance

I watch the two of them move through the misty streets from my seat in the café, while I wait for the thin rain to stop.  The one, tall, pale and dark in the manner of the eseldrae – and clad in rather a nice set of blue-black formal robes, too – but with the very distinct no-expression and flickery eye-hand motions of someone very much occupied with their augmentality feeds, and yet somehow smoothly staying on course; the other, much more alert, trotting at his heels and weaving in and out of obstacles to stay close, golden fur obscured by panniers stuffed with…

Wait, is that a whisker laser reflecting off the droplets?  On a hunch, I call up the local network overlay.  Ah, dedicated high-bandwidth links.  Well, that’s nothing I’ve seen before.

A thinking-brain dog.