Cybernetics

Cybernetic augmentation is one of the technologies alternately embraced and feared by the Solar Union. While extensive augmentation is the norm for high-ranking Union personnel, and the wealthy and powerful similarly embrace it, the surgeons and fabricators necessary are too few in number and too expensive for the common man. As a result, most middle-class and lower either have relatively little in the way of augmentation, or have larger amounts of low-tech or otherwise cheap cybernetics.

The Link

One augmentation is universal: the Link. Almost all humans in Union space are implanted with their Link around puberty, allowing them access to the ubiquitous Iris. The Link also serves as a personal computer, an augmented reality display and interface, and an interface for other cybernetics to link to the mind. Only those outside Union space, the very old, and those born into poverty do not (typically) possess Links; these groups typically make do with external augmented reality interfaces.
Upgrades to the Link, typically exclusive to the elite (though occasionally found among the lower-class, or even outside of Union space), include enough storage and processing power to host an artificial intelligence, known as a Ghost, within the user's implants. Ghosts serve as personal assistants and companions, further augmenting the already-prodigious capabilities of the user they ride along with.