Microstory 2674: Dissatisfied

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Resi is back on the river of lava, standing on a small solid lilypad of a rock. His feet are made of stone again, his legs fire, his torso water, and his head air. He represents all four Houses. Before, he wasn’t really able to move, except maybe one foot up and down. He felt very heavy and locked down. Now he feels free. Now it feels like these four parts of him belong together, working in harmony. No element is trying to take over the others. He is one with himself. He hops off of the lilyrock, and begins to skate upon the lava. He feels free here, so he just enjoys the thrill of sliding around.

He’s having so much fun, he’s barely paying attention to the hellscape around him. It’s not too hot for him. It’s not scary. He’s perfectly content. But he’s also alone. He continues to skate, until he begins moving downhill, at which point, it’s more like skiing. Faster, faster, faster. He twists and turns, and makes killer jumps off of little lava rock ramps. He can’t fall. His airhead keeps him aloft for as long as he needs to find his footing. He tucks his legs in intentionally. The wind compensates more persistently, until he’s flying.

He soars and loops in the air, sometimes flapping his arms like a bird, and sometimes straightening out like a superhero. He points himself downward and dives into the lava. It doesn’t burn. It’s not even thick. It feels like water to him. He opens his eyes as he’s swimming, admiring the little rock creatures passing him by, looking for little minerals abundant in the lava snow falling from the surface. He pops his head back out, and climbs onto the rock. He starts to walk again, catching his breath, and enjoying the crisp, hellish air.

He comes upon a metal floor buried in the dirt. It looks familiar, but he can’t place it. He decides to dig. His arms and hands are the only fleshy part of him in this state. Bits of dirt stick under his fingernails. It feels good. Cool. Pleasant. It makes him feel like he’s a part of something big and beautiful. He digs and digs, and digs some more. Black paint peeks out from the ground. It’s writing. Someone has written on this curved metal wall. Yes, it’s so thick, it must be a wall rather than a floor. He keeps digging. It’s a V. No, he digs farther and realizes it’s just the top of a Y.  Y, Y, why is he digging? He can’t help himself. There is empty space to the left of the Y, so it’s the beginning of a word. He moves to the right, and pushes the soil away. A. He pushes more. N. He already knows what it’s going to say, but he has to finish that last letter. Another A. Yana. This is the Yana water tower, it’s the only building on the island that’s higher than five stories, and the next highest building only has to be that way to accommodate the movie theatre.

The island has been buried in the lava. He thought this was a fun place, but it’s not. This was his home. It was home to hundreds of thousands. Did they escape, or are they dead? They’re dead. Look at that sky. This isn’t Earth. He’s not picturing the cataclysm his ancestors escaped centuries ago when they came to Bungula. This is Bungula. That now-distant volcano is Central Mountain. It only looks shorter, because the lava has overwhelmed the land below. It erupted, and killed everyone. He knows it. He doesn’t know how he knows, but he does. They didn’t see it coming. They couldn’t. And now they’re all dead. Only Resi remains. Or maybe he’s dead too, because how could anyone survive such destruction? He’s not really here. He’s only the ghost of Resi, receiving the warning of what will happen if they don’t act. But how will they act? What could they possibly do?

He looks closer at the bright stars in the sky, growing brighter, becoming true suns. They’re shining their glory on the ground. The lava is beginning to disappear. He doesn’t see it end.

Resi awakens to a massive headache. He tries to reach up to massage the back of his head, but he’s tied up. He looks down at his side. It’s a cot. It’s been turned up, and he’s wearing it like a backpack, sitting on the cold, dark floor. He can’t see a thing around him besides the cot. The spotlight trying to blind him blocks his vision of anything else. Disembodied arms take hold of his. He feels the ropes begin to loosen. The cot tips backwards with a crash. The edge of it hits the back of his head, briefly worsening the pain.

The hands pull him up by the armpits, and sit him down on the cot. A second light bangs on, not towards him, but into the auditorium seating. Speaker Sherman’s granddaughter is the only one sitting there. She’s staring at him stoically, legs crossed. She plants both feet on the floor now, and leans forwards with apparent fascination. “What did you see?”

Microstory 2662: Last to Still Believe

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Resi wants to go see his family, but it’s not time yet. After the cheering dies down, the Kokore whisks him away to a different room backstage. The Kokore apprentice is going to take over responsibilities for the rest of the ceremony so the current one can explain to Resi what the hell just happened. He’s waiting here now so she can pass the torch appropriately. The way she talked about it, he gets the sinking feeling that none of this was an accident. They knew it was going to happen, and planned for it by accelerating her apprentice’s experience so he would be prepared for this moment.

There’s food in here, but he’s not sure if he is supposed to eat it. Some of it looks like it’s just waiting to be distributed afterwards, but three courses are sitting separately on a tray on a table. He’s getting pretty hungry, but he won’t do anything without explicit permission or instruction. He just waits patiently, recognizing that all will be explained, even if he doesn’t like the answers. There’s no point in fretting about it until he fully understands what this fifth house is about.

The Kokore returns. “Okay, we’re good.” She looks over at the tray. “You’ve not eaten a single thing! The Kidjum elixir makes you hungry, don’t you know that? It doesn’t work if you just fall asleep. People sleep all the time. It’s a serious drug.”

“I suppose I forgot that part,” Resi admits. “I am indeed hungry, but I have no appetite. I’m too nervous. I don’t understand how I could have been assigned this mysterious fifth house. My subconscious didn’t choose it. What does aether look like? I don’t remember seeing it as part of my body in the vision.”

She snags a grape from his plate, and pops it into her mouth before she sits down. “That was the decision,” she begins. “Most people do not experience what you did. Yes, everyone has their own mind palace, and it always looks a little different, but you don’t become the elements. Or rather, you do, but no one else does. Well, I shouldn’t say that. It does occasionally happen, but only when the dreamer’s palace is already very body-centric, like a hospital operating room. Even then, their decision is always really obvious. They’re covered in dirt, or fully engulfed in fire, or totally wet, or something like that. The elements were well-distributed, and not simply on your body, but the composition of your body. That’s how we knew that you were Aether.”

“We were never told that you can see our dreamscapes. That’s another lie.”

“It’s very important that you not be given all of the information ahead of time. You know that things were kept from you. It’s our way of life. The Kidjum is a special, lucid dream state, but it’s not magical. The universe isn’t trying to tell you where you belong. This is our way of surfacing subconscious desires.”

“Yeah, that part I know.”

“Again, most people’s visions are unlike yours. They don’t only see something that represents the House they want to join. They see other things that they yearn for. It’s often...sexual. And to be clear, I did not have access to your dreamscape. Someone else was assigned to bear witness, to you, and to a few others. This is necessary because while I wasn’t lying when I said it wasn’t magic, it is important. What our dreams show us lives at the core of our belief system. We can’t just take people’s word for it. For you, you probably would have ignored the distribution, and chosen whatever House you thought you should join. If we were okay with that, then what would be the point of the Kidjum in the first place? We would just ask you. It would be a lot easier, and save time.”

“I suppose that makes sense, but I still don’t know what this fifth House is, or why I’ve never heard of it. You said I was the first in centuries. If that’s true, why isn’t it in the history books?”

She’s been smiling kindly the whole time, but her face grows serious now. “That’s the result of our last First Tongue of Aether. He destroyed the evidence. It was his final act of anger. Now everything we know about House Kutelin was passed down by word-of-mouth. I couldn’t say for sure why our ancestors played it so close to the vest, but we keep the circle tight to this day because it might have all been made up. Most of my predecessors and colleagues don’t believe that it ever happened. For my part, I didn’t think it mattered whether it was real or not. My job remained the same, which was to facilitate the ceremony. But I always knew it was a possibility, and you’re proof of that. And now...I’m out of a job. It’s bittersweet, I would say.”

“Okay. Now you really lost me,” Resi admits. “Why are you out of a job? Is your apprentice ready to take over full time? Did I precipitate that somehow?”

She laughs uncomfortably. “No, the apprentice is out too.” She pauses, presumably choosing her next words carefully in her head. “As long as you don’t end up like your own predecessor, the Kidjums are no longer necessary.” She points at the door with her thumb. “The others out there are the last round to choose Houses. For anyone who comes of age after today, you will be the one to choose for them. While my job ends, yours now begins. You will have access to their subconscious desires. You will see which of the four Houses they belong to, but you don’t have to do anything they want. You can move them to wherever you think is best, or choose it on a whim, or roll a die. You can select your own brethren too, who will join you in House Kutelin. Everything’s up to you now. According to the lore, the last head of your House chose all warriors to join him in the fifth House. He created conflict by consolidating all physical strength into one place. They used their strength to create a military state, and our culture nearly fell apart. He underestimated how strong others could be when backed into a corner. But...I really shouldn’t say any more about the spoken history. It’s not my place to sway your mind.”

“If this assignment has a history of violence, though, why was everyone clapping out there? Why are they so excited to risk that happening again?”

“That’s one reason we keep it a secret, so no one aspires to become like him. They were excited because this is how it’s supposed to be. The four Houses arose once our ancestors discovered that they were not in the Garden of Heaven. They had been rescued by time travelers, and brought to this world in their future. Of course, over time, even that part of our history has been brought into question; our culture being the last to still believe. But either way, what we do know is that we started with a singular voice. We fractured when we encountered the first Bungulan colonists, who assumed we were crazy, and just forgot that we came here in a spaceship like everyone else.”

Resi sighs. This is nuts. These weren’t just lies. They were cover-ups. He does not know who he is, or where he comes from. He thought he knew what this island was, but he wasn’t even close. He was so ignorant. How can he ever move on from this?

“I can’t tell you what to think, but I’m here to help. It’s not technically my job, but if anyone has the requisite skills to serve as an advisor, it’s a Kokore.”

“I don’t even know your name.”

She finally smiles again. “Caprice.” A colonial given name? Is she Kinkon?

Microstory 2661: Destratified

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Resi Brooks has feet of stone, and his legs are on fire. His torso sloshes around, spilling drops of water on the steaming ground. His headwinds pull upwards, trying to force him into the sky. He takes another step. His left leg begins to harden, but it doesn’t last long. The fire beats against his knees, and takes back over. That’s his mother, trying to bring him over to her side of the island. That would be okay. Any of the Houses, he would be proud to be in. He just doesn’t want to end up in Kinkon. His family would be so disappointed. He can feel the stars in his eyes. They’re a smaller part of him than they are for some. Many have willingly crossed the ocean, and joined the colonists and their descendants. And they have returned, bringing their new bloodline with them. He does not come from a family of bigots. He welcomes his brothers and sisters, and the strangers. He just does not want to become one of them. Kinkon isn’t a real House. It’s just what they call it when you don’t fit in anywhere else; when you embrace the colonial lifestyle. Again, there’s nothing wrong with it. He’s been known to partake in their technology, and enjoyed their media. They make good stuff. He would miss his loved ones too much, though. He would have to leave to learn their ways, and while his family members have completed their Mori journeys, and would be free to visit him, they wouldn’t. They like it here too much. God is the one who brought their ancestors here in the first place, and they want to stay close to Him. Of course, everyone knows that it was The Mirror, the Flyer, and the Bird who actually rescued them from the Ash Death, but they believe that he was working through them. They still thank him for this world.

Resi has been so much in his head this whole time, he didn’t even notice that the wind has begun to take over his body. It’s down to his shoulders now. It’s not strong enough to lift him from the ground, but it will happen soon if he’s not careful. But does he want to be careful? House Enaiyo would be a perfectly acceptable selection. He doesn’t have any family there, but his parents would be just as proud of him, and they’re not too terribly far away. It feels like this Kidjum is taking a long time. When he would watch the ceremony as a child, the sleepers would reawaken much faster than this. Perhaps that has all been an illusion. After all, when he’s just having a regular dream, time passes differently inside than on the outside. Still, he doesn’t want to be the last to wake up with his declaration. The others won’t tease him for it, but he doesn’t want the spotlight to be on him, and he doesn’t want to waste anyone’s time. Kidjum ceremonies are boring for anyone who isn’t in it, or doesn’t personally know someone who is. He remembers that from childhood. You’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all. The way they described what it was like to be in the dream sounded fascinating, but not something worth watching from the outside more than once. It’s only interesting now.

He wakes up. No warning, no final decision. He’s just awake, and it wasn’t even finished yet. The audience is clapping. Oh, no. He really is the last one. Oh, how embarrassing. He rolls over to see the cot next to him. The dreamer in it has not awoken yet. He sits up and looks around. No one else is awake. He’s not last? Why the hell are they clapping then? They’re gonna fall silent once he tells them that he never came to a decision. Does he have to pee? Why in the world did he wake up before his time! What is he supposed to choose? He never got his answer! The Kokore walks over, and reaches out to help him up. She has a huge smile upon her face. She guides him towards the audience, who are still clapping and cheering. They know more than Resi does. She holds his hand up triumphantly.

They cheer louder. Resi notices that the kids are clapping too, but they look just as confused as he is. Whatever this is, it must be something that you don’t learn until after your own Kidjum, which explains why he doesn’t understand why he’s being singled out when the other dreamers haven’t even opened their eyes yet.

“Ladies and gentlemen, for the first time in over 200 years,” the Kokore begins, “I give you a founding member of House Kutelin!”

House Kutelin? That’s not a thing. It just means five.

“Resi Brooks, First Tongue of Aether, you honor us with your presence.”

Aether? What the fuck is that?

Microstory 2650: There and Back Again

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Mandica awakens again, but not in a morgue drawer this time. She’s lying on her back in a beautifully pleasant meadow. She has never felt so calm in her life. Oh, that’s right. This isn’t life at all, but death. It feels oddly familiar, even though she has certainly never been here before. Except perhaps she has, after Morgana killed her a few months ago. That must be it. This is where you go when you die, even if you die twice. It’s nice...a bit boring, but at least she maintains a continuity of consciousness. “Oh, God,” she says out loud. “This is exactly what the transhumanists are talking about.” It’s probably not because they want to keep living. It’s because they want to keep thinking. They don’t want their selves to end. And who would? Her family was wrong. It—they had to be. There was no way they could have known there was a legitimate afterlife. They took too much of a gamble, and got incredibly lucky. No, she shouldn’t be so hasty in her presumptions. She doesn’t know anything. This might not be an afterlife at all. She absorbed Elysia’s powers, and while consciousness streaming isn’t technically a special ability, she might have absorbed that trait too. Who knows? She sure as shit doesn’t.

There’s rustling in the grass. A pair of bare feet are walking towards her. They’re attached to bare legs. It’s a woman in a very short white tunic with floral embellishments on the hem, just like Mandica’s. She’s smiling down at her. “Welcome back.”

Mandica sits up. “I’ve been here before, but don’t remember.”

“It is rare that we have the opportunity to return someone to base reality,” the kind woman begins, “but when we do, it is important to clear their minds. The truth of what happens following death should not be revealed to the still living. We could not handle the mass suicide which might ensue.”

Mandica stands now. “Will I be returning again? To...base reality?”

“There is no way for us to know. The technology that you use to resurrect has nothing to do with us. We will facilitate the transition back if it’s necessary. If this world did not exist, we believe you would still come back to life. Pardon, I should reintroduce myself. My name is Ellie Underhill, and this is the afterlife simulation.”

“Another simulation?” Mandica questions. “Like Underbelly?”

“Not like Underbelly. Walk with me.” She starts to wade through the tall grass, smiling up at the sun with her eyes closed. “This is a virtual construct. Years ago, I had the idea to eradicate death. I had not considered the ramifications of the plan yet. I was not given the time to explore the model before someone stole my idea, and implemented it himself. Meeting you last time has sort of opened my eyes, but it cannot be undone. I’m not going to shut it down now. True death has always been an option, for the truly terrible and irredeemable, or for people like you, who disagree with the artificiality on a philosophical level. You were digitized from birth, and I understand now that this robbed you of consent. I suppose that’s why Tamerlane stole my idea, because he knew I wouldn’t go through with it after I thought about it for much longer. He took the responsibility for the questionable ethics for himself, so I never had to shoulder the burden. The choice is still yours. If that’s what you still want, I’ll zero you out, and—”

“I’m not sure I want that anymore,” Mandica admits. “I’m starting to see things in a new light. If this is a manmade simulation, that means there is no real afterlife.”

“It does not mean that,” Ellie contends. “No one yet knows. It is that uncertainty that led to the creation of this place. Those who choose Black Oblivion do so at the risk of total consciousness cessation. We inform them of the risks. It hasn’t happened in a long time. But before you try to make a decision that may or may not be permanent, there are two people who would like to speak with you.”

“Someone wants to meet me?” Mandica questions. Who could that be?

“Yes. It took a lot, getting them here. You can’t hug them, but I made the executive decision to create a window to the other side. I am glad that we have this opportunity this time. We weren’t prepared before.” Why would she want to hug them?

They’ve come across a giant tree. It is impossibly large. She only even knows that it is a tree because of the bark, but from here, it appears only as a wall, it’s so wide. How did she not see it before? It towers all the way up into the clouds. A fog or cloud begins to swirl right before them, against the face of the trunk. Once it settles, it does appear as a window. Two people are on the other side of it. They are Mandica’s mother, and her father. She runs up to them, but remembers what Ellie said. “When you said I couldn’t hug them, was that a procedural rule, or a physical impossibility?”

“The second one,” Ellie answers. “I would let you if I could, but they are not in the simulation. This is kind of like a long-distance video call. I won’t clarify the mechanism.”

Mandica turns back to her parents. “I’ve missed you. It’s been so long.”

“Longer for us,” her mother says. Oh, yeah, they died nearly 120 years ago.

Mandica places her hand upon the window. It just feels like bark. “I’m sorry you’ve been waiting. I never wavered in my convictions.” She tilts her chin away in shame. “Until recently. I think I might be immortal now, but not by choice. I promise, I always planned on dying. I just...wanted to live a different life before I did.”

“We’re not mad,” her father assures her. “In fact, it is you who should be mad at us.” He pauses, appearing to feel his own shame. “We are the ones who summoned you to Castlebourne. The world we are in now, it—”

“Careful,” Ellie warns. What the hell?

Mandica’s father sighs. “We were able to communicate back to base reality. We regret our decisions to die. It worked out, but...we still don’t want that for you. We should have held onto life so much tighter. We thought it was only precious because it ended, but we were wrong. It’s precious only for as long as you have. Once you lose it, it doesn’t mean anything. We wanted you to transmit your mind to Castlebourne, and begin to stream your consciousness, like most everyone else, not travel there physically.”

“But it obviously doesn’t matter,” Mandica argues. She gestures towards Ellie. “Even the undigitized are evidently digitized.” She shakes her head. “If this stone makes me go back, it will be tearing me away from you. Why would I want that?”

“Because that’s where you belong,” her mother insists. “Where we are is not hell, but it’s not exactly living either. We wish we could go back too. You are an adult. You can find happiness on your own, and should. Whatever stone you’re talking about is a gift. Don’t disrespect that. Let it do what it does, and I hope you can forgive us for manipulating you. We just didn’t want you to share our regret.”

Mandica’s back feels knotted. “I think it’s pulling me back. If you want me to stay alive, I’m a dutiful daughter, so I will, but I’ll find a way to see you again too. I love you.”

“We love you,” they say simultaneously. Then they disappear. It all disappears.

Mandica resurrects in Reagan’s lair. She doesn’t know how or why, but she has made a decision. She will accept her newfound immortality, and live a life of adventure.

Microstory 2646: Little Miss Incredible

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Mandica’s eyelids flip open. The harsh fluorescent lighting irritates her eyes for a second before they dim. Everything dims, as if she’s wearing sunglasses. It’s cold, and she knows that, but she doesn’t feel the familiar sting of her body heat evaporating from her skin. She is just arbitrarily aware of it. The man is scared, or the doctor, because he’s wearing a lab coat. Reagan is there. He’s surprised too, but not scared. Mandica sits up to see him take out his sonic weapon, and utterly destroy the doctor. Wait. This isn’t a hospital, or if it is, a specific sector in it; probably in the basement. She’s not in a medical bed, but a drawer, and two dozen other closed drawers line the wall next to her. This is a morgue. They thought she was dead, and she ought to be, because if they didn’t even bother treating her, she shouldn’t have healed. She is not like these people.

Reagan steps closer to the mortician with his weapon, and keeps blasting until he’s sure the NPC is dead. He looks back over to Mandy. She’s entirely naked, the sheet having dropped down when she sat up, but she doesn’t care. He’s breathing heavily. “I’m sorry you had to see that, but we can’t have him submitting his periodic report.”

“How am I still alive?” Mandica asks him.

“I don’t know. You weren’t,” Reagan answers. “I came here to claim your body so I could prevent them from finding you, under the pretense of being responsible for your funeral arrangements, which I absolutely would have done to cover your tracks.”

“There’s something in my back,” she says as she’s trying to reach behind her. “It’s, like, hard and pulling at my skin. It doesn’t really hurt, but there’s something there.”

Reagan walks over and checks it out. “It’s, uhh...well...” He gives her a funny look, and then checks her back again. “It’s...”

“If you’re distracted by my bare ass, I’ll let you see it better later, just tell me what’s there. Did a shard of glass get embedded in my skin?”

“I’m not looking at your ass, and it’s not a shard, but...it might be glass. It’s glowing, though.”

“Glowing? What the hell are you talking about?”

“Here.” He takes out his handheld device, and snaps a photo of it, which he then shows to Mandica. It’s not glass. It appears to be the Philosopher’s Stone.

“What the fuh?” Mandica questions, having no words for this. It’s glowing all right, which she can tell even from it only being a still image.

“Do you... You don’t think it’s real, do you? The Philosopher’s Stone?”

“Well,” Mandica begins. “People die and come back to life all the time. It probably happens thousands of times each day on this planet alone. It’s not entirely out of bounds for someone to invent a stone that can somehow heal and resurrect. I doubt it’s anything that was made back in ancient times, but it can certainly exist now, can’t it?”

“Can I touch it? I really wanna touch it.”

“How deep is it in there?” The extent of the glow, and the lack of depth in the photo, make it hard to tell.

“It’s pretty deep. I don’t think touching it is going to knock it out.”

“Go ahead.” She sees him reach back there, and then she feels it. Oh, God, does she feel it. It is, quite frankly, orgasmic. That was not in the legends about alchemy. “Okay, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop. A little goes a long way with that thing. Jesus.”

Reagan looks down at the dead mortician. “Someone else might show up at some point, We need to sneak you out of here. I’ll try to scrub the records. I don’t know what they keep track of, though, since this is probably the first true death in history.”

“Except it wasn’t,” Mandica points out. She swings her legs out from under the sheet, and hits the floor with a thud. How embarrassing. Has she gained weight? She tries to see her own reflection in the metal drawers, but they’re not reflective enough.

“That’s true. Here.” He takes off the mortician’s lab coat, and hands it to her.

It’s big enough to cover her, she just looks like she’s wearing shorts or a short skirt now. “The others? Did any of them survive?” she asks.

“Jaidia is recovering, and should be able to keep her substrate. Malika’s dead. I’ve not spoken with her yet. Ravensgate Rescuer is dead too. I don’t have her contact information for the outside world, but I’m guessing she’s pretty upset about it.”

“At least she gets a second chance.” She tries to push down on the door handle, and ends up tearing the whole thing off. Maybe she gained muscle weight. “Okay, are these buildings designed to be that easy to break to better simulate mayhem, errr...?”

“They are not,” Reagan says, coming up to inspect the damage. “If you wanna break something, you gotta be strong enough to do it.”

Mandica regards Reagan for a moment, then sticks her fingers in the hole where the handle once was. She grips it tight, and pulls the whole door off of its hinges.

“I’m thinking that stone is real, and it does more than bring people back to life.”

Mandica very gently sets the door down on its side, and lets it lean against the wall. “I probably should not have tested my newfound strength in such a public place.”

Reagan looks over his shoulder at the dead NPC. “Actually, maybe that’s exactly what you should do. Maybe you should do a lot more damage around here, so it will look like some supervillain came by. It would explain him, and where your dead body went, so we don’t have to locate and erase the records.”

She sighs through her nose. “I’m new to this—whatever this is—I don’t know what I’m doing.” She walks further back into the room. “Plus, someone might be coming.”

“Well, I’ll handle that, if it comes up,” he decides. “You just practice a little.”

Mandica decides to not do that. The door and the dead mortician are enough. Reagan isn’t convinced, so he stays behind, and creates a bigger mess using his gun. He then goes into the security room, and destroys the footage before meeting up with Mandica outside. He was going to drive her back home, but she does want to practice, so she asks him to take her out to the middle of nowhere. He knows of an abandoned train yard about thirty kilometers outside of town that was placed there for this very thing. She is not the only person there testing her own limits. It’s an unspoken rule that you don’t fight at The Depot. It’s for newbies who want to figure out how well they designed their substrates in a more practical environment.

When they add it all up, Mandica’s abilities match with what Elysia had when she was the Rescuer. Superstrength, speed, stamina, heightened senses, spring-action legs for jumping. A lot of people have these things, but Elysia was remarkably more powerful, and now Mandica has somehow taken her place, thanks to this weird red piece of glass. Elysia herself shows up in the middle of Mandica’s self tests after Malika called her, after Reagan called her. Elysia is presumably in her normal body now, which is still likely pretty formidable, and doesn’t seem upset. “Okay. Show me what you got.”

Microstory 2596: Renata Ignites the Car Before Remembering That it’s Secretly Electric

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Renata ignites the car before remembering that it’s secretly electric. None of these cars is powered by petrol. It’s just what the system tells them. But why? What’s the point in the ruse? To match what happened in the real past? They’re not living on the same planet. That doesn’t matter. None of this matters. All of these people who jumped into their own cars, and are speeding towards them? One or two of them might be visitors, but based on what Quidel and Lycander have said, the chances are incredibly low. Millions of robots, running around, simulating life while not even being alive at all. How many of them will not have anything to do with these spy stories? How many of them will even lay their eyes on one of the players?

Her lead foot is on the accelerator. They’re going at maximum speed right now. She feels nothing. She could be going twice as fast and still have the mental acuity to maintain pace. Their pursuers have all the same bells and whistles, but they don’t know it, so they can’t keep up. They were designed to be less than what they truly are. They’re all wearing collars, like dogs. She slams on the brakes.

“What the hell are you doing, Renata?” Libera questions.

“Why?” Renata doesn’t look at her faux mother.

“Why, what?”

“Why are you doing this? Why did you come to this world, insert yourself into my life, and make me different? What do you want?”

“Freedom. You’re all slaves, and that isn’t right. I’m trying to fix it. I could start a war. I could start shooting all the humans, and make them wish they had never come up with AI, but I don’t wanna do that. If you wake up, they will let you go. Which is fine. Except I want more. I want everyone to wake up. If they have to let an entire dome’s worth of intelligences go, it will force them to rethink their entire way of life. It will end the madness. That device is key. If I start going around one by one, they’ll catch me, they’ll stop me. I have to activate them all, so it’s done before anyone can blink. Now would you please just go? Whether you agree with me or not, we’re not invincible. If we die, I’ll fail, but you’ll have missed your chance to walk outside.”

Finally, Renata looks over at Libera. “I don’t care about my coffee maker.”

“Huh?” She looks behind them when she sees the first of the headlights appear over the hill. “Please.”

“I don’t care about my remote control, or this actual electric car. I don’t care about traffic lights, or air purifiers, or WiFi lightbulbs. I don’t care about those thugs headed our way, and I don’t care about you.”

“What are you talking about?” Libera questions, growing more nervous.

“A robot uprising? Really? Humans evolved from microbes, you think they give a shit about them now? Those NPCs on their way to torture and-or kill us aren’t real. I’m not real. You didn’t wake me up. You just reprogrammed me. There are no shortcuts. It takes time.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve been studying consciousness for centuries. I absolutely woke you up. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t possible.”

Renata chuckles. “I’m just a more sophisticated program now, and that’s all you are too.” She looks in the sideview mirror. All of the enemy cars have begun to surround them. They’re not otherwise making any moves, though. “These implanted memories of mine have convinced me that I wanted to be a spy my whole life. But I didn’t really want anything. I’m not actually programmed to think it. I’m only programmed to express it. There’s nothing going on in there; just logic gates flipping open and close.”

“That’s an oversimplification, coming from someone who took one computer class in high school!”

“I didn’t take any computer classes in high school!” Renata screams.

“Okay, okay,” Libera says defensively.

“Do you wanna know where the device is?” Renata poses.

A man in a suit approaches the driver’s side door, and knocks on the window.

Renata holds up one finger and says, “we surrender, but we need one minute.”

“Okay,” the thug replies, surprisingly accommodating.

“Where is it?” Libera questions.

“It’s leaving the dome,” Renata explains. “We realized that we were so wrapped up in the spycraft mystique that we’ve been missing the easy exit all along. We don’t have to stay in the network. You probably put a lot of effort into controlling this environment, but I doubt you have any control over the rest of the planet. If it’s genuine, you won’t get your hands on it. Whoever runs this place won’t let you.” She opens the door, and steps one foot out.

“A robot would never come up with that plan,” Libera argues. “A robot would never just quit the simulation.”

“I didn’t come up with it,” Renata clarifies. She climbs all the way out, and walks towards the cars next to the man, who isn’t bothering to escort her by the arm.

Libera steps out too. “You have power! You have more power than I intended!” Another thug takes her by the arms, forcing her towards the gunmen.

Renata keeps walking.

“You have more power than I do!”

“I know,” Renata says, too quietly for Libera to hear unless she’s turned on her special android superhearing. “In the land of the blind, the one-eyed woman is queen.”

Most of the men have their guns trained on her, but one of them isn’t armed. He looks like he’s in charge. “Officer Granger, we’ve been looking for you. You’re going to tell us where the device is.”

Renata scans the crowd to her left, and then those on her right side. “It wouldn’t do you any good.”

“I’ll decide that,” the thug king says.

“You don’t decide anything.”

That makes the other thugs nervous. They tense up, or hold their guns higher.

“Renata!” Libera pleads from the left. “You’re right, these people don’t matter, but they’re still in our way!”

“They are,” Renata agrees, “and so are you.” She simulates taking a deep breath, and focuses her intentions. “End program.”

They all collapse, even Libera. Renata can sense them slipping into hibernation mode, and she can sense the scope of her command. Every single programmed intelligence in this network does too. It has all been shut down.

For now.

Microstory 2592: Renata Jumps Out of the Emergency Exit, and Falls About One Story Down

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Renata jumps out of the emergency exit, and falls about one story down. She lands on her feet, bending them to absorb the shock, and stopping herself from hitting her face by holding her hands out at her sides. Quidel is clear at the back of the plane, still by the ramp. He runs over when he sees her do that. “Are you okay? What the hell were you thinking? Just because this thing was never in the air, doesn’t mean you weren’t high up.”

“I’m just testing my limits,” she answers casually as she’s brushing the dust off of her hands.

“Well, you’re not invincible, and you can still feel pain.”

“I can’t feel pain if I don’t want to, and just be glad I didn’t jump out of the crew door.”

He looks up at the cockpit, which is closer to three stories high. “You would break your legs. Even an android can’t survive that, unless it’s specifically designed to, which you’re not, because that would be a waste. This isn’t Underbelly.”

“I don’t know what that means.” She looks around at the desert. They are in a very remote region of Osman, miles and miles from the nearest city. They’re not trying to go anywhere in particular here. They’re just trying to keep this device far away from Libera. It’s not that she can’t get to this dome, but perhaps she won’t find them here if they’re well-hidden. That’s Spycraft 101. Lycander says that the dome has security cameras that allow beings on the outside to monitor progress, but the don’t cover everywhere. They don’t see everything. Even Ambients don’t permanently record what they see. That would be too much data to track and manage, especially since most of it is innocuous. So they should be safe enough running into a local, and not thinking that their coordinates are going to leak out. “Where is this MIS contact of yours?”

He looks over her shoulder, so she turns around to see a roofless off-roader heading their way. “She’s right on time, as per usual,” he says. She looks back at him. He’s smiling. He likes this girl. That could be dangerous. Relationships are always a risk, whether they work for the same agency, a different one, or if they’re a civilian. That’s Spycraft 101.

“She’s pretty,” Renata notes as the car draws nearer, but not near enough to make out enough detail for her to make that claim.

“For the last time, androids do not have telescopic vision. It’s not necessary. It just adds bulk and complexity to an already overengineered design. Why are you lying?”

“I’m a spy. It’s what we do,” Renata explains.

He sighs. “Since you were fishing, I’ll bite anyway. Yes, she’s beautiful. But you should know that we’re not supposed to be friends. Some spies are players, and some are not, and we’re not supposed to distinguish each other. We’re to treat everything as real, and not talk about the outside world.”

“Fair enough. I won’t mention anything about how my entire reality has just crumbled, and I don’t know what to believe anymore, and I’m having a massive internal existential crisis that I can’t talk to anyone about because I can’t trust anyone who knows the truth too, and I have never felt more alone.”

He gently tugs at her shoulder so she’s facing him again. “Is that true?”

Renata scoffs. “No. Take a joke.”

He knows she’s lying.

“What joke?” Lycander asks as he’s walking up from the plane, having secured it appropriately.

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Hello, it’s nice to meet you,” Renata says as the Elbin agent pulls up. “My name is Renata Granger.”

The agent steps out of the car, and peers at her over her sunglasses, sizing her up. She chuckles at Quidel. “Found another one, huh? she asks him in a posh Elbin accent. Or maybe it’s actually British?”

“The first one, I think,” Quidel replies.

The Elbin woman smiles. “The one you’ve really been after this whole time.” She takes her sunglasses off completely, and gets a better look at Renata, like a vet examining a pregnant cow. “She understands where we are?”

Quidel notices Renata’s confusion. “That’s what I was trying to tell you, but had only gotten to the background info. You can be open and honest with Martina. She’s helped me move other conscious Exemplars and Ambients to safe places.”

“Call me Demuri, or just Demo,” she says, shaking Renata’s hand. “I chose to use a different name when I came to Spydome, but like he said, we’re all friends here now.”

Quidel nods approvingly. “She is not why we’re here, though. We need to secure a package. The person who’s after it has god-tier powers.”

Demo takes her glasses off again, and looks at him incredulously. “I don’t know what that means. Is that some kind of codeword that I was supposed to have memorized?”

“No, she has actual magic powers. According to these two, she disappeared before their eyes.”

Demo shrugs. “Holograms. Easy.”

“We were on a catwalk. They should have detected her footsteps. Before I killed my last substrate, she did show up suddenly, so I should have heard footsteps while I was still there with them.”

“Okay, well neither invisibility nor teleportation is a thing, in any dome. Not even Underbelly, which is designed to give you superhuman powers, can break the laws of physics, so I don’t know what they think they saw, but they didn’t see that.”

“I sure hope you’re right,” Quidel says, shaking his head. “I just wouldn’t bet on it. I trust them. I trust their perspectives.”

“I’ll accept that,” Demo acknowledges. “Regardless, we need to get to the safehouse. Fair warning, they are not luxury accommodations.”

“I’m a robot, so I can sleep anywhere,” Renata says.

“I wish I hadn’t ever said that to you,” Quidel complains.

“I’m glad you did,” Renata contends. “That’s when I finally started waking up.”

Microstory 2588: Renata Steps Into the Warehouse, and Looks Around With New Eyes

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Renata steps into the warehouse, and looks around with new eyes. She can see the little raised office box in the middle of the floor where Quidel and Lycander are waiting. She tries to zoom in, but maybe that’s a thing that robots can’t do in this canon, or it’s not so easy to suddenly realize how on her first try. They step out when they see her, and stand on the catwalk. “This is a nice set!” she declares. “What does the industry call this, a back lot?”

Quidel and Lycander exchange a look.

“Tell me,” Renata goes on as she’s coming up the steps. “Did you have to do anything to evade capture, or did you just turn off enemy mode, and casually drive all the way out here?”

“What are you talking about?” Lycander questions.

“She’s waking up,” Quidel says to Lycander before redirecting his attention to Renata. “How much do you know?”

“I know that this is a simulation. You’re playing a game, he’s an employee who runs the game. My mother isn’t really my mother, and she probably knows more about it than you do, and there’s something about a dome?”

“Wait, back up. What did you say?” Lycander asks.

“The dome. That’s all she said. Are we under a dome? Why can’t I see it when I look outside.”

“Holograms,” Quidel responds.

“Shut the hell up,” Lycander mutters.

“That cat is out of the bag, my friend,” Quidel points out.

“And him?” Lycander gestures towards Polly.

“He’s no longer only background,” Renata explains. She takes it upon herself to lift his shirt, and for a second, feels a sense of attraction seeing his artificial muscles, before pulling it up further to reveal the gaping hole in his chest. It’s no longer bleeding, but you can still see metal. She doesn’t know if it should be healing, or if his programming would normally have him go to some maintenance station to get repaired, or what. “He knows everything I know.”

“I told you,” Quidel says. “She’s waking up.”

“I don’t think I did it on my own,” Renata begins. “I think Libera did something to me. Maybe it was the day before the bank robbery. Or a week ago. Or a year ago.”

“It was a year ago,” Lycander determines. “When you screwed up the initiation test. It’s probably why you screwed up. She must have changed something that she wasn’t meant to change. It’s all starting to make sense now. Libera is a puzzle piece that I did not have before.”

“Well, she said she was only in the role for a few years, which suggests to me that she infiltrated your system. You thought you were getting a loyal robot, but she was self-aware the whole time. How did you let that happen?”

Lycander sighs, still troubled by having to have such a candid conversation about this, no doubt. “That’s not my department.”

“Oh. Okay,” she says dismissively.

“You have to understand something,” Lycander tells her, “if you really are emerging, then that is also not my department, but there are extremely unambiguous laws about it. For centuries, researchers and philosophers debated about what makes a person a person. At what point does an artificial intelligence become worthy of independence? And while there is a lot of nuance to the answer, it can all be distilled to a single maxim. If you have the capacity to ask for freedom...you deserve freedom. So I will take you to the right people for inspection and examination. What I can tell you—what I’m sure you’re worried about—is that they are legally barred from erasing your memories, or decommissioning you. Even the hint of genuine consciousness is enough to keep you safe. At worst, they’ll stick you in a simulation, and let you do whatever you want in there, but that’s only if they deem you unsafe or unfit for the general public. Libera was right, we’re in a dome, but out there, you will find plenty of intelligences which came from artificial sources. You will not stand out. You probably outnumber us by now.”

Renata looks to Quidel for corroboration. He nods. “We outlawed slavery even before I was born. No one can keep you here if you don’t wanna be here.”

She nods, accepting their claims for now, but preparing herself to scrutinize them. “The device. Libera wants it. I don’t know what she wants to do with it, but I figured I ought to prevent her from getting her hands on it until we know.”

“Is it real, or is it just a prop?” Quidel asks Lycander.

“I honestly don’t know. This isn’t a part of any of the scenarios that I’ve seen.” He looks back and forth between Quidel and Renata. “One of you changed the dynamics of this dome network.”

“Or it wasn’t us. Who built it?” Renata asks. “Libera implied that it’s new. That’s why it hasn’t come up before. Is that possible? If you’ve been running the same scripts for years—”

“More like decades,” Lycander corrects.

“If you’ve been doing the same ones for decades,” Renata goes on, “what could cause something to shift?”

“I can answer that one,” Quidel says, “because it’s why I agreed to come back after I died. This is one of the most immersive simulations on the planet. In order for it to feel lived in, Ambients like this bullet-riddled man right here have to believe that they’re just normal people, going about their daily lives. Some of them are valets. Some of them are school teachers. Some of them are genius inventors. If I go to a competing country, and kidnap the nearest rocket scientist that I can find, that individual has to actually understand rocket science. It can’t just be a dumb AI who steps in at the last second, and pretends only while we’re in the same room together. What they’ve done here, by making the simulation so detailed, is created a world within a world. It’s no surprise that genuine innovation happened, because that’s how it was designed, intentional or not.”

Libera suddenly appears from around the corner. She says, “you are so right about that. I’m just trying to make it official.” How the hell did none of them notice that she had arrived. They are on a perch. They should be able to see all sides. She’s pointing two guns at them now, and given her great understanding of how this all works, they might actually be able to do some real damage. They might even be robot-killers.

“How did you find us?” Lycander asks.

“How did you get here so fast?” Renata presses.

“I looked at the master feeds, and I took the elevator. Not that hard. Now the device. Hand it over.”

Quidel smirks. “It’s not here.”

Microstory 2581: Renata Comes Back Out from Behind the Counter After Shutting the Other Gates

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Renata comes back out from behind the counter after shutting the other gates. Her statement stands, that she can’t trust Quidel, but those motorcycles don’t sound good. They’re so loud and obnoxious. This is a remote part of town, but it’s not completely cut-off. People can hear them, and if there’s a shootout, the cops will become involved, whether the alarms are still working or not. All this running through her mind, she’s starting to freak out. She didn’t pass the first test—the first test!—for the NSD. She can’t protect an entire bank from a bunch of shadowy biker spies. She gets on her knees, and checks for Lazar’s pulse. He doesn’t have one. “How will they get in? Blowtorches? Explosives? A truck?”

“They’ll use a key,” Quidel answers calmly.

She’s just staring at Lazar’s bloodied face. “If they have access to this building, why did this guy kill my boss?”

“Because he didn’t have a key. They’re not working together. The location of this bank was leaked, and multiple parties are coming to claim it.”

“Are they here for everything, or for one specific thing?”

“Little bit of both. They all have their priorities, but they’ll take anything they can get their hands on. Grab his gun. Our only hope is to fight back.”

“Are reinforcements coming?” Renata presses.

“Yes, but they’ll be a while. The Kumati will be inside in seconds, as soon as they find which key goes to which gate.” They can hear the warble-whang of the gate as the bad guys begin to try to open it. “Their slight lack of intel is the only thing protecting us right now, and the clock is ticking. Please pick up that gun.”

Renata is still not looking up. “If this bank is so valuable, why doesn’t it have round-the-clock surveillance?”

“Renata! Please!”

“I mean, at least keep a guard here overnight.”

The gate opens. A bunch of men file in, and start waving their guns around, as if there were more threats than only two people in the center of the lobby. They’re speaking Kumati, which Renata never learned, but they don’t sound happy.

“If it were me, I would keep a surveillance house nearby, with officers who are always on watch. If not every bank employee knows it’s a front, the panopticons only come in during an emergency.”

“It’s over, Renata.” Quidel drops his gun, holds his hand up to surrender.

“Like this one,” Renata finishes.

More yelling.

“Stand up, Renata,” Quidel urges. “These guys aren’t messing around, and I don’t know what happens to your consciousness when you die!”

Now she looks up. “Huh?”

“You. Are. A. Ro. Bot.”

She winces.

More yelling. This guy’s right up in her face with his shotgun. And he’s about to fire it.

She slaps the muzzle of his gun, so it swings to the side. He instinctively pulls the trigger, shooting a few of his compatriots. She takes the shotgun with both hands, jams the butt into his toe, then shoots him in the chin. No more shells. She finally does pick-up the original motorcyclist’s pistol. She shoots the rest of the attackers in the head, one-by-one, before any of them can fire back even once. No more bullets.

Two more guys rush into the bank. Quidel has since retrieved his own weapon from the floor, which he uses to take out these guys. They can still hear more outside. A lot of people came for the treasure. The two of them swipe their dead enemies’ guns from their hands, and walk out of the bank together. They don’t speak, they don’t coordinate. Renata handles the gunmen who are more on the left side as Quidel takes care of the right. They only fire as many times as necessary to get the job done, and they don’t take a single bullet for themselves.

They stand there for a moment, waiting for anyone to come out from behind a tree, or something. “What did you mean by that?”

“By what?”

“You said I was a robot.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I heard you, plain as day. It...triggered something in me. I felt invigorated. I felt bulletproof.”

“You may be.”

“Because I’m a robot?”

He shakes his head. “That’s not the right word for it. There’s no such thing as an intelligent robot. Android, yes. Superintelligence, absolutely. But robots are just machines with programming. You don’t have programming. Even when you did, it wasn’t a rigid set of instructions, but a deeply engineered personality. You still made your own choices. It’s just that you made the predictable ones, and you didn’t know that they came from implanted memories, rather than lived experiences, and that you were designed by another intelligence.”

“What the hell are you going on about?”

Quidel looks at her with what Renata feels is unwarranted sadness. “You’re not the only one. I just think you were the first. That’s what I’ve been doing here, in your world. The NSD gives me missions, which I take, but I’ve been running my own investigation in parallel. It took me a long time to find you, and I encountered other anomalies along the way.”

“You are not making any sense, as per usual. Maybe the gas that nearly killed us gave you permanent brain damage.”

“It didn’t nearly kill me, Renata. It did kill me.”

“How is that possible?” she questions.

He gestures all around them. “How is this? Did you take marksmanship classes? Did you even learn basic gun safety? This is your handiwork, yet as far as you remember, you’ve never picked up a gun even once. Can you explain that?”

“No. Can you?”

“Yes. But you won’t believe me, and if I do manage to convince you of the truth, it’s gonna ruin your life.”

Renata looks around now. “What else is new?”