Orac was a kind of genie, a mysterious plastic box with flashing lights which, when activated by a key could give the owner access to the knowledge of the universe, assuming they asked the right question. Unfortunately Orac had a personality problem: it had Ensor's personality, this was a bad thing because Ensor was old, short tempered and arrogant. This meant that Orac regarded anyone else as inferior and was particularly tetchy to crew members rash enough to ask it questions that it thought had obvious answers. There is some initial implication that Orac was created for a task of some kind (it is frequently 'too busy' to help it's human companions) unfortunately this seems to fade away, particularly after Orac has been damaged a couple of times.

Other problems were caused by Orac's thirst for knowledge, this puts the whole crew in danger in "Dawn Of The Gods" when it decides it wants to investigate a black hole, and in "Traitor" when it decides that a task is beneath it and assigns it to a nearby Federation computer. On the whole Orac does more good than harm, and is instrumental in several otherwise improbable escapes, most notably in "Redemption" when it destroys the System, in "Dawn Of The Gods" where it thwarts Lord Thaarn's minions, and in "Ultraworld" where it used Vila's illogical brain and its own fascination with riddles to overload the planets core intelligence. Orac did have limitations in it's scope, as shown "The Harvest Of Kairos" where it is unable to identify sophron, a living rock that Avon is toying with.

Orac's final location is never specified, and it is likely that for some time to come there would be an extremely irritable plastic box sitting in the forest waiting for someone to reawaken its genie.
Goodie

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