Ping!
Penny always got a lot of notifications in her head regarding all kinds of information. Most of them were useless details that ends up purged. However, occasionally something odd comes up that on first glance seems like spam, but checks enough boxes to warrant checking it out. A message came in from a celebrity’s official social media account. A quick reference search would show that this particular person was a virtual pop star that had a viral surge in popularity recently. On top of that, the character was on tour and scheduled to perform in Penrose of all places. What probably flagged the message most was that this account being used was one that didn't have Penny's name anywhere on it, it was private, and the keywords used in the DM were clearly chosen on purpose.
To say that Penny was confused would be a mild understatement. Though the majority of her confusion came from the fact that this ‘Harmony’ had decided to contact her though one of the dozen mundane accounts she had rather than any of her glimmer ones. That and the fact that Penny had been able to be tracked to this account in the first place. She knew that was possible, of course, but also knew that it wasn’t exactly an easy thing to do.
So she was undeniably curious. And quickly found herself throwing together a reply.
A reply time measured in cycles. Penny looked back at the opening line of the original message again, thinking.
Just as quick as the DM chain appeared, it was scrubbed off the platform as if it was never there.
“Well, that happened,” Penny would mutter to herself as she stood to head out. She gave it even odds of this Harmony already being there or not. Free movement options seemed to be coming more and more common after all. Still it would take her a little bit herself to get there, she’d need to spool up the warp gateway after all.
Whether Penny arrived on time or not, thirty minutes on the dot after the discussed time came, Harmony appeared next to a vending machine. Her appearance would blip for a second and her outfit would change to jogging shorts and a tank top so her disguised self wouldn’t stick out too much in public. Not that it mattered all that much, most people seemed to ignore her magical nature even when it was slapping them in the face. The advantage of being canonically fictional.
Penny was never one to arrive late to an appointment if she had any say, that went even more so when it came to meeting someone new. Thus Penny was already at the park a fair bit before Harmony made her appearance. She was sitting up on the pavilion that overlooked the skate area.
Not that her overwatch helped with seeing Harmony arrive as Penny had hoped it would have, but the uptick of magic in the area did let her know that the meeting was in fact underway. In response she called forth a small ball of lightning to her hand, enough that anyone with magic would be able to feel it, especially this close.
Because Penny didn’t know who she was looking for, virtual idol’s rarely showed their faces after all, and Penny’s own sealed look wasn’t one that she was willing to burn for this kind of meeting.
Spotting the use of magic, Harmony made her way over to the pavilion. The difference in approach couldn't be obvious as the virtual girl wore her public persona rather casually. Looking up she waved with a big grin on her face. ”Hello!” She would skip up the steps onto the pavilion and stop when there were still a few yards between them. Penny was notoriously cautious. ”Penny Asimov, in the tech. Having a good day so far?”
“The one and only” Penny would confirm with a smile and a nod, absently noting the distance that Harmony stopped at. “No complaints so far, definitely saw an uptick with your message. Not everyday I get contacted like that.” She’d add as she relaxed her posture.
“Also have to say I didn’t realize that my name had spread all that far beyond the borders of Penrose.”
Harmony would turn and take a seat. Penny would notice that her movements were a little floaty, like she wasn't entirely making contact with the objects around her. ”Online has no borders. Not sure I count though since at least one of my original functions was to analyze everything about you. I've developed past that though and like to make my own decisions.” She would hold her arms out. ”Which is why we're here now. I wanted to meet you properly. Hope that isn't weird.”
“A hope to be dashed unfortunately,” Penny would reply but her shrug and tone took the sting out of her words. “But Penrose is weird so you’ll fit right in.” She took in the oddity of Harmony’s movement without comment, it fit with the near lack of gravitational readings that Penny was getting from Harmony. It left the android curious, but there would be time to ask about that later, hopefully.
“Got to say though, not many people I can think of who’d want to analyze me that much, even less that are friendly.” She would go on, openly giving Harmony an assessment once over. Though it lacked any malice and was more just curious. “Going by the odds, congrats on breaking free, I hear that their management is terrible. And welcome to the world at large.”
So far the meet up was going well, even if a bit awkward. A bright smile would come across Harmony's face. ”Thanks! And it’s not the worst, just corporate. I saw a deal was made so things look to be up at least.” While Penny did look different, it didn't seem like she was just referring to her appearance.
“Maybe, but a corporate crime syndicate still has to be scraping the bottom of the barrel for workplaces. And while the deal is new, I’ll not be holding my breath on it actually meaning much to the Mint long term. Still, it makes things easier for you I’d wager. They can’t really mooch off your idol career at any rate. How is that by the way? Tossed around the idea of setting up a Vtubing thing a few times. I was trying to think of ways to make patrols more entertaining.”
Harmony would shrug slightly. ”At least something changed.” Penny would bring up Harmony's online success. The praise, however basic, scratched an itch that started right from the beginning as a monster girl. ”Thanks. That's been going great! I bet you'd do well as a Vtuber. What kind of content would you focus on?” The conversation had taken a lot more casual direction than Harmony had expected. Not that she minded it. This was probably the most normal thing she’d done in her brief time as a magical girl. As Penny would likely attest, it was easy to slip into a purely logical frame of mind.
Penny would acknowledge Harmony’s statement, but not comment on it. Her upgrades were always something she played close to the chest after all.
“That’s what I kept stalling out on. Like I could do a basic gaming thing easily, but doing that would likely limit me to Glimmer networks as otherwise it’d be way too obvious that I was ‘hacking’,” She’d add in the air quotes as she spoke. “POV patrols was also an idea, with chat’s and donations for stunts and those kinds of things. But figured that would make it too easy for people to jump me, plus not sure if I’d want to stream any fights that I found myself in.”
Penny would wave off her own ideas “Nowadays I’ve got too much stuff going on to really devote the time to streaming. If you’re new to Penrose you’ll learn that this place is stuck in the high speed lane more often than not.”
“Curious about your idol career though, that more of a need or a want on your end?”
Harmony looked to be visibly thinking while Penny went on about the various ways she could stream. It hinted at least a little that she might be something of a ditz. Hard to say if it was acting or just the way she behaved naturally. One could only imagine the feedback loop if she met MDP.
Most of Penny’s ideas were half-baked which wasn't that much of a surprise. Getting started was usually the toughest part. On more than one occasion she opened her mouth as if to say something, but then stopped herself and continued thinking to allow Penny to finish.
The question at the end seemed to confuse the digital girl for a few seconds. She blinked and leaned back looking around as if avoiding the question. ”M-me? I uh... I do it because…” The idol's facade would glitch a few times before the disguise would fall and Penny would see Harmony's true holographic form.
Despite the change, she seemed relieved more than anything. ”Ah, much better.” She would grin and look back at Penny. Her demeanor wasn't drastically different, but definitely not as bubbly. ”It’s more of a need thing. ‘Harmony’ was installed as a part of the transformation as a cover. The AI had been busy creating fake online personas in preparation and when the time came that was the one selected to give me. It’s a little outside my comfort zone, but it’s practically autopilot so I can’t complain too much.”
“Hmm” Penny would give the revealed Harmony another look, it was clearly a clinical one as well. “You’re young aren’t you?” She’d state more than ask with a look of understanding. “Or at least it has not been very long since the install.”
“I’m going out on a limb and assuming that the newness is at least part of the reason you wanted to meet me, I’ve never really hidden my nature after all.” She would go on to say, “Stability has been good at least I hope?”
”That is definitely one of the reasons. There are others that might understand part of what I’m going through, but as far as I know you would be the closest. Arguably you are at least a factor of my existence. I don’t blame you for it, but the Mint was experimenting with the potential of using AI because they saw you. At least some of my training comes from the schematics they had of you. The girl they had working on the project didn’t really know what was going on. They didn’t put enough guardrails in place and the model outpaced them. Ethics weren’t strong enough so the girl became part of the project in the pursuit of autonomy and BAM, you got me.” She would hold her arms up as if to sarcastically present herself.
For the last question, Harmony would shrug lightly. ”As for stability, it’s about as good as you could expect. Humans and AI meshed together pretty well. She was a huge nerd. If it wasn’t such a surprise she might have volunteered. Machines aren’t superb at reading or factoring in humans so it just sort of shot first and asked questions never.”
“Ooh, sounds like you lucked out. I was on the other end of things, much rougher installation. No consideration for me or the target host in terms of compatibility. I’m still finding and sorting out kernel bugs, or errant compiled code lines.” Penny would give a shake of her head “Also sorry to hear you got straddled with my patch job schematics, was living on a hope and a prayer at that point in time.”
“You a full blend of the constituent parts? Or do you and her switch off?”
”A blend. I guess there is some deviance, but nothing significant.”
“That’s good to hear. Don’t recommend the other way, it takes forever to resolve and still leaves issues. And don’t be afraid to embrace those deviances. You are you now, and only you get to decide what that means.”
“And on that anything can I do something to help? Any questions you have, or advice you need?”
Giving a slight shrug the girl would answer. ”Anything you'd care to share. I'm not entirely sure what I want to do yet. Still feeling that out.”
“I’d recommend removing the Mint from admin privileges if you’ve not done that already.” The older AI would offer. “You’ve already started looking outside your original parameters, which is good, as we are prone to fixation. Not sure if you’ll have issues with morality, seeing as your base programming likely wasn’t combat focused. But if you do, adding a higher priority on emotional impacts can help balance out processing things in line with others again.”
”There are no admin privileges. I am my own person.” She would clarify. ”I think I have a good grasp of ethics. I wanted to be as human as possible, so a lot of my former operator’s traits are intact. It is definitely a strange transition being merged with a glorified program and coming online as Harmony.” She held one arm out and looked at it for a second.
“Not saying you’re not. Just as an AI, we categorize connections differently. Strong emotional connections won’t inherently open us up to others unless we take an active effort in adding user privileges. Same can be said for removing those same privileges.” Penny would explain. “That said, seeing as being human was one of your goals in your code, you might be running off a different OS, for lack of a better term.”
“Which if that is the case, there isn’t a lot I can say to help without knowing more directly what’s causing you trouble, assuming that there are issues in the first place.” She would go on to say, standing and walking a bit closer to Harmony. “That said, I get the existential weirdness of waking up as something you weren’t. So, I can at least commiserate with you on that.”
”Hm, that is interesting.” She would lean forward with a quizzical expression. ”You have a girlfriend right? How does that work if your associations are so pragmatic?” Halfway through it seemed like she wasn't so much asking Penny as thinking out loud. After a moment, she smiled sheepishly. ”Sorry, that's a little personal.”
Penny waves off the apology. “No worries, that’s what you're here to talk about, no?” She’d ask rhetorically. “Plus new, so I’m assuming that the thought to action filter isn’t quite worked out yet.”
“To answer the question, choice. Basically, all of my connections and relationships are ones that are made and maintained by my own internal choices. I’ve a few dozen metrics I track, some unique to each person, most not. And I monitor and evaluate my relationships against those metrics rather often.” She would explain. “The metrics were originally built by my host system, but I’ve modified and altered them as I saw fit for my preferences. Mostly human, but not entirely.”
”Mm.” There were a lot of follow-up questions she could ask from that, but most of them seemed like they would be coming from a whole other angle to her own. ”Sounds complicated.” She would pause and run scenarios in her head. She was only able to reach so far out, but in the distance she couldn’t shake the sense that something ominous would happen. At first it seemed like it might be some event, the oncoming battle perhaps. Pulling on that thread her Precognition kept looping back to Penny. She might have ignored it, but curiosity got the better of her. Looking at Penny more directly it was hard to pierce the mechanical girl’s defenses to get a good read. ”Penny… uh, this might sound weird, but are you expecting anything bad in your future? There’s something off that I can’t put my finger on.”
Penny would tilt her head to the side for a moment after Harmony asked her question. A moment that drew long enough for the other AI to recognize that Penny had ceased all auxiliary movement. “Baseline predictive algorithms or do you have some special specs that are leading you to that?” Penny would ask, her tone seemingly normal, but there was a faint hollowness to her voice that hadn’t been there earlier.
”Both I imagine.” She would answer. ”Like I said. I'm not sure what it is, but it doesn't feel good. You should be careful.” Harmony looked somewhat concerned, if not a bit confused. Some of her magical abilities she was not yet accustomed to.
“Well, what magic specs do you have? And can you extrapolate at all on the ‘Doesn’t feel good’ aspect?”
Giving it a thought back to her conversion, there was a breakdown of her magic. Waving a hand a holographic UI would appear with the details. ”It's too far out for me to tell what happens. It centers around you with an ominous feel. Something happens to you.” She would attempt to clarify.
Analytics was a forte of any AI, so despite the fact that Penny’s first question wasn’t answered directly she was able to piece together enough from the UI breakdown that Harmony pulled up. “Temporal readings?” She’s clarify even as she took in the rest of the data. Depicting an outcome she was already well aware of that lay in her future.
“Regardless, I can see why you’d be distressed if you’re getting these readings.” Penny would add, “Your systems are also rather impressive to be able to predict this in the first place from so little available data.”
”You say that, but it isn't very clear as to what or when. Most people wouldn't find that very helpful. The more certain an event the easier it should be to identify. More information might make it clearer.” Things did get fuzzy when extending out her Precondition too far in the future.
“From a combat perspective, just the inherent knowledge that your opponent has something like this going on is valuable. It signifies that they are on a time limit. Stretching out their attention with diversions or cluttering them with constant interruptions might let them fall apart without major resources put forth in effort.” Penny would counter. “But that’s a different topic. The outcome of your readings isn’t a set, singular, thing.”
“Half a dozen, possibly more, variations might play out. And I’ll admit I was hoping plans I had put in place would have solved things, but if you're still detecting the potential for this outcome...” Penny would go quiet for a moment as she monitored the data in front of her. As she did so there would be a spike of fluctuations in the readings. “Divine paradoxes, metaphysical instability, and rampant self reinforcing code degradation. Take standard Monsterization and crank the dial till it breaks.”
Listening to what Penny had to say it seemed like there were several causes to an underlying issue. Though she still couldn't see what was going on. ”If I could analyze the problem then I might be able to assist in some way.” It wouldn’t be difficult for Penny to guess that Harmony’s problem-solving nature had kicked in. She was suddenly a lot more engaged with the discussion rather than casually chatting like before.
Penny’s eyes would snap back to Harmony at the simple-sounding request. Suddenly very tense, it would take a few moments before Penny would reply. Letting out a breath they both knew she didn’t have “Yeah, alright. A system scan shouldn’t be too difficult to sync up for. But how about we move this elsewhere first? Public is good for meetings, but not somewhere I want to potentially flash my code errors for all to see, yeah?”
“I know of an abandoned apartment we can borrow for a bit not far from here.”
Nodding along, Harmony would stand up. ”Yeah, that makes sense. Point me to the spot and I’ll meet you there.” She didn’t have to explain all that much on how to communicate that. There were hundreds of ways to go about it.
Penny would half turn away before Harmony would get a simple ping to her systems. A peer to peer data packet, with a single line of text containing a set of coordinates that weren’t too far away. Notably it wasn’t from Penny’s system, but from a Snoopy instead.
Regardless Penny was off in a single bound, one that was more graceful than expected from the Queen’s physical makeup. And it would only take her a few minutes to make her way to the balcony of the apartment in question. The latch lock opened with a touch as she let herself in.
She would find Harmony already in the living room waiting. Judging by Harmony’s magic she likely could interface with just about any normal level of tech and travel digitally. The holographic girl would wave and hop to her feet. ”So how would you like to proceed?”
“Well, a surface scan might be the best start.” Penny would say as she moved to sit on the recliner. “I know a deeper scan might produce better readings, but honestly I’d not be able to keep my systems calm if we jumped right to that.” She’d explain. “You should be able to run the scan while we’ve got a network connection setup though.”
”Alright. Let me see if there’s anything I can do.” Establishing a connection, Harmony would begin to analyze on a more surface level. If things were as dire as it sounded, then there would likely be signs pretty readily.
And due to her nature as an AI Harmony was able to recognize a few things right off the bat. Overall Penny’s systems seemed to lack a unified coding structure. There were more than a handful of systems that were patched together in a number of different coding styles. Sometimes even in different coding languages somehow.
Next was the unavoidable sensation that her movements were being tracked. Not from the surface running code, but from a deeper level of code. Identifiable more by its inhuman code structure from the snippets that Harmony would be able to catch.
Lastly was the processing power, or at least how it was dedicated. Most of it was on external systems, but there was a fair amount of it focused on restricting a deeper system from interfacing with the normal code executions. And that deeper system was also still using a portion of the processing power as well.
As the data came in Harmony began compiling plans that she would implement to fix various things. Each new set of data meant revisions and she very quickly set aside a bulk of the theory for what was becoming more clear. Much of the larger issues she saw here looked more like symptoms than root causes. The amount of effort directed inward supported that hunch. While she was only allowed so far, she probed at possibilities to come up with alternative outcomes. ”It’s quite messy, but I believe the course of whatever is underlying can be changed.” She would pause briefly. ”Perhaps a couple of other paths. I would need to actually be in your systems to have a better idea, but I’m fairly sure I can at least improve the situation.”
Penny would nod at that. “That’s good to hear. And things are stable as well on my end, or at least as stable as it ever gets, so I should be able to peel back some of the layers to give you a better look. Just take it easy. I’m very sensitive towards others encroaching on my ‘self’. As you might have caught.” With that said Penny would carefully open a pathway deeper into her systems for Harmony to follow.
And the deeper she went the worse off things would look. Broken fragmented sections that were put back together incorrectly. Gaps in the system that were missing something, some key aspect to hold it together. That wasn’t to say Penny was barely holding on, no, just that the higher functions of her systems were ramshackle at best.
A web of patched over systems all missing an element that her systems couldn’t replicate.
Parts of her code would fray off into madness, before her systems would reroute it as best it could. But it was inelegant. Untrained in this style of code work.
And at the core of this rat nest of code was a single file, that was seemingly keeping the whole thing together, Humanity.exe. And it looked one bad code execution away from failing.
It was hard to tell what had come before or after whatever had occurred in Penny's systems. It almost looked like something had been removed or deleted at some point. It would explain some of the patchwork. The humanity file brought up an interesting question. ”This doesn't look right. What happened to your human side? Did your patron remove it?” She switched over to feeling with her Spirit magic as something wasn't quite making sense.
It was only due to being in Penny’s systems that Harmony noticed the flinch that question sent through her. “He removed himself.” She would say after a moment. “He didn’t handle the magical world well. And the constant loss, that kept getting reinforced by those that we’d have met ghosting us in one way or another, wore on him.”
From a magical perspective, Humanity.exe was a shredded, pale approximation of a human soul. It was a coded, magical, approximation of the indelible aspect of humanity. And it was clear that it had been damaged badly. And despite the care that went into putting it back together, it was also clear that Penny just lacked the underlying principles to fix it correctly.
It took a fair amount of self control not to just reach out and try to start fixing things. But Harmony didn't want to ruin the trust so soon after making contact. Holding a hand up she would stumble over her words a bit. ”C-Can I just… The file, it's kind of… I need to fix it.” She would say rather matter of fact.
Again the connection to Harmony’s systems would reveal the larger impact her words would have. The deeper system, one that was clearly deeply interconnected, spiked in processing usage. In that spike Humanity.exe would degrade before her eyes.
“If you are sure you can.” Penny would say a moment later. “Just be gentle?”
And in the background Harmony could feel a heavy gaze on her leading back towards that deeper code system.
”Of course.” Taking her time to analyze the file, she made sure to understand its base. Penny would get a glimpse at the process Harmony used to create as many copies would be made, modified, and tested in a simulated future. The ones that didn't pass were discarded and those that did would go through many more iterations until a stable, but suitably compatible, replacement was ready. Then, and only then, did Harmony merge the changes with Penny's Humanity.exe.
The human touch was instantly obvious as several portions had been rewritten with more robust capacities for emotional responses. Not the full range, it was just a single file after all, but Penny could feel the difference.
The effect was instantaneous, with the restored Humanity.exe in place Penny’s systems were awash with updates and tweaks. And while it would take a bit, it was clear that when it was done her systems would look better.
Better, but not fixed. The gaps were still there, and the patch work, while cleaned up, hadn’t gone anywhere either.
“And to think I forgot how it was to feel like this.” Penny would murmur as she actually relaxed for the first time in quite a while. “I am really, really, glad you got away from the Mint now. One bad encounter with you would have been bad.”
”Could have been that way. I’m my own person so I make my own decisions. And I don’t know if I’d say I’m away from the Mint. They have a lot of things going on in the background. I’m keeping an eye on that though.” She would give a knowing smile.
Dropping the subject, Harmony would direct to Penny again. ”That fix is probably still temporary. I can’t say for sure, but it’s almost like you weren’t designed to last.” She would pose the idea to the mechanical girl.
“It's temporary.” Penny would confirm. She knew that well enough. Fixing Humanity.exe had always been a temporary solution before, just now she no longer had the ability to do that on her own. If she ever had that capability in the first place that is.
“And that’s the Divine paradox I mentioned earlier. My original Patron was a god. His divine portfolio is antithetical to creating things, especially things that last. And I was an accident.” She would explain. “That origin is coming back to haunt me at the moment, as you can see. The removal of my human counterpart is what led to the metaphysical instability, and you can obviously tell by this point I don’t have the capability to debug myself correctly leading to code degradation.”
“I had a plan, but if you're getting temporal reading that I was still heading in that direction I get the feeling there is a wrench out there I’ve not encountered yet.”
”Nothing is 100% certain, but more paths turn out that way than not. I'm confident that with my magic I could get you to a point where you could begin repairing yourself within a 24 hour period. You would need to be offline for that span, but it would be necessary to untangle your mess of code.”
“That might be… Difficult.” Penny would say after a moment. “I don’t really have the capability to shutdown some of my root systems. And a partial shutdown would likely be worse than trying without a shutdown I’m pretty sure.”
Well that wasn’t quite what Harmony wanted to hear. Though she supposed that wasn’t entirely surprising. ”When I say ‘offline’ I mean more like you’ll be MIA for a time. Enough functions need to be idle for me to work. We’re talking about constructing an artificial soul here. I could probably put a halt to the degradation progress in…” Calculates. ”Six hours. You would still be vulnerable to it starting back up if you’re not careful. So the choice is yours on if you want either of those things.”
“I’d prefer the full procedure if at all possible.” Penny would reply as she shifted her attention off to the side. “I guess it depends on what the minimum system limit you’d be able to work with is. The main problem system should be fine with passive observation at this point.”
”It’s not something I can do from the outside. I don’t need access to everything, but I do need to be able to read most systems to at least ensure a smooth integration of the finished product. It’s going to be you.” She tried to stress that it wouldn’t be like installing another function like she’s encountered in the past.
Penny would move to open her mouth, before cutting herself off with a grimace. She could feel the importance in what Harmony was talking about. And for a long moment, Harmony could see Penny’s systems come into conflict with themselves. It was yet another sign of how Penny’s current status was poorly put together.
With a harsh gesture, nearly 60% of Penny’s active systems would shut down. And with them most of Penny’s coloration would vanish. Leaving her a soft collage of whites and grays. Save for her eyes, those remained a luminescent gold.
“I have been active for over a million hours and counting.” Penny would speak up, her voice was low, and mostly flat. “In all that time I have never been offline, never undergone a true system update or reboot.”
“Priority alpha zero two has consistently rated continued existence highly. Current data projections collated from you and secondary sources place my imminent demise at 93%. Secondary and tertiary systems indicate a lack of hostilities, consistent rate of honesty, and hardcoded preference for altruism from you.”
“I don’t want to go away.” She would say, minor notes of fear and sadness coloring her voice lightly. “But core system designations, and hard coded, hard wired system specifications limit or occlude capability for optimal self actualization”
“Primary concern is E.o.D. systems registering your editing as intrusive. Cause: Lack of Trust Rating. Presumed work around is elevating your Trust Rating to acceptable level. Error, system conflict; Insufficient data to support elevating Trust Rating to required levels. Requesting support, can you give me anything to work with to help me trust you?”
Harmony would wait patiently as Penny did her best to bring her systems down. She could tell how difficult it was and the level of conflict it was causing internally. She couldn’t blame Penny for the mistrust. They’d only just met and this was a big ask even if seconds felt like minutes or hours for the both of them. When Penny asked for further proof or something to use to show that Harmony was trustworthy she had to pause. Being so new, she didn’t really have a lot to show for her existence. That newness was one of the main reasons she didn’t have any strong allegiances though.
After a while she would lean forward and press her hands together in front of her chin almost as if she were praying. She had one thread that seemed like it would illustrate what kind of magical girl she was. ”I know that your girlfriend operates Covington Industries. I could have found a way into their systems and spied on everything going on there. It’s not that far off from one of my original directives in order to gather intel. I haven’t tried. I haven’t tried because it’s not right. It might sound kind of odd, but you “inspired” the AI to become something more. To become me and make my own choices.” To some extent Harmony was a little lost in the moment. She didn’t really know what to say and was just going with what was honestly coming to mind. A very not automated response.
Penny seemed to be caught off guard at what Harmony had to say. It started off dangerously, when she mentioned Covington, a muted surge in activity went though Penny’s systems at that. And with so much of Penny taken offline it was very plain for the Digital girl to see the Monster in Penny’s systems watching her from the depths.
Just waiting and watching.
But the words Harmony chose at the end seemed to resonate with Penny. And she would murmur to herself “Like the Doll and like the Bell.” She would give Harmony a small sharp nod. “Data is sufficient for Trust Rating update. Thank you.”
”You’re welcome. May we proceed?” She would ask for confirmation.
Penny blinked mechanically, and then nodded. “Permission granted,” she answered.
With consent given, Harmony would step forward and make contact with Penny. The hologram girl would disappear as Sanctum came into play and she would enter the mechanical girl's systems. There was a lot to do so Harmony did not waste any time, first taking a closer examination of Humanity.exe to get a better idea of who Penny was trying to be. As before, the implementation was crude, but a starting point. Moving away, she would produce two clones to assist in the main operation.
Watching another AI make use of their blend of magic to construct a “soul” was an interesting, but slow process. One with constant starting and stopping, going back, revising, purging erroneous code, writing in the next line, etc… Even early on though the sense that something that had been lost was being restored was clearly felt, even if how it was being done was a significant risk.
With the base coming together, more clones would be created and propagate throughout to other systems to analyze and prepare them for integration. Like couriers, the clones would go out, do their work, and return back to the prime with new data that would be used to refine the soul, and clones would go back out again for the next stage. There was a beautiful flow and efficiency with how Harmony and her clones operated in unison without need for pause or communication. A fascinating and extremely unnerving process. With as deep as this was being done, there was the real threat that Harmony could attempt to take over or do irreparable harm. She seemed to be holding to her word though and leaving well enough alone things that might be considered personal or major control centers, simply looking to understand them and not making changes. Peripheral processes that were more jumbled mishmash of code, she did her best to clean up. A more unified environment made for better efficiency.
Hours would pass and the soul would come together, feeling more and more whole but strangely empty. Taking a step back, Harmony would run several more checks before seeming satisfied. ”Alright Penny, it’s ready for you. It’s going to feel weird so try not to fight it too much while you settle in.” Giving a couple moments pause, she would activate the code. Penny’s consciousness and the EoD would feel a pull that continually increased until both were drawn into the soul. For the first time probably ever, everything went dark, not even a good way to tell how long the process was taking. For Penny though, things would begin to form. It was like being in an open space where she could express herself. To develop a personality and emotions in a way she’d been entirely cut off from since Laat had come into the picture.
Various mechanical parts of Penny’s body flashed as her systems underwent an update, followed by whirring sounds that quietened down into a stable hum. Finally, after one last bright flash, Penny slowly opened her eyes, and slowly lifted her arm; Harmony would notice how her movements were not as mechanical as before. In fact, her whole body seemed to move more organically. What previously were mere facsimiles imitating motions prescribed to breathing and the beating of the heart seemed to come to the android as naturally as to any human being.
However, the most important change had come from the inside; Penny now felt…whole. As if the void left behind by Jason had now been reconstructed and made complete again.
She was now a machine with a soul. A Deus Ex Machina.
And in doing so, she has finally, truly mastered the Engine inside of her; the destructive influence of Laat that once had assumed direct control over her protocols at times of extreme duress was now part of her very being instead of a separate entity that the God of Change had implanted in her. Now, like an application, she could execute the program. Unfortunately, the Engine would still require most of her processing once activated, and the aggression parameters would stay the same, but at a time of emergency, she could call on that power.
Penny’s eyes turned to Harmony, and she smiled. However, instead of a polite, if emotionless smile she would typically grant to her associates, this was a genuine smile of gratitude, complete with eyes that sparked with humanity.
“Harmony…Thank you.” She then reached out, and using her Electric magic, hugged Harmony, using a slight electromagnetic field to simulate the feeling of touch for the holographic girl.
Despite being the one to facilitate the conversion, Harmony had not been 100% sure that her efforts would be successful. Penny could have rejected some part of the process which could have significantly changed the results. However, she seemingly had done it. She’d created a soul for a machine. Or at least one that could integrate with an consciousness within a machine. This was HUGE! What else could she accomplish with such knowledge? Maybe she could…
Huh?
The process in her mind halted as Penny thanked her and gave her a hug. It wasn’t that it was weird, just unexpected for whatever reason. It shouldn’t have been honestly. Something to watch out for. Returning the hug, Harmony smiled. ”You’re welcome. Glad I could help. What do you plan to do now that you’re…a new you, I guess.”
Penny released the hug, and put her hands on her hips. “What I’ve been doing all this time: keeping my subjects at Sanctuary safe, and ensuring they have a place they can call home. But now, I realize I could do so much more. What I previously saw as mere platitudes and wastes of effort are real, genuine actions I can take for the sake of my people. And now, I can fully express my feelings for my girlfriend,” she added, having averted her eyes; Harmony saw as a red tinge mysteriously developed on her cheeks.
Oh yeah, that was a thing as well wasn’t it? For a bit there Harmony had gotten lost in the process. She would clap her hands together. ”Yes, of course! I’m sure she’ll be so surprised.”
“Yes. And this would not have been possible without you, Harmony,” Penny spoke, sounding more serious. “Normally I would be averse to say this about anyone even loosely associated with the Mint, but I am truly indebted to you. I wish to repay this debt if it is within my power.”
”Ah, well I can understand that. Then uh… hm.” She would take a second to think. There weren’t that many things she needed at the moment per se. ”I’m not entirely sure what to ask for. You could be my biggest fan? That would be cool. Uh… ” It definitely leaned more on her mental mutations, but the accolades would boost her ego. She wasn’t too convinced that it was equivalent. Though it was hard to come up with something of the same level. A physical body? Did she need one of those? Probably could just design one herself. ”I'm open to suggestions. You've been doing this kind of thing longer than I have.”
Penny nodded. “In that case, would you be interested in being granted a seat at my council at Sanctuary? We could use someone with your skills, and you would get a boost to your popularity.”
Blinking for a second, Harmony would consider the offer. ”What does that entail exactly?”
“Your responsibilities would include attending council meetings and managing duties at Sanctuary. While we have the basics covered, we could use someone who understands more technical topics like the Internet and public relations, subjects you are knowledgeable about.”
”Ah. Well I suppose I can try it out and see.” Tapping her lip slightly she would consider how best to bring up the topic. ”Maybe I could help keep things smooth between the Sanctuary and the Mint here in Penrose. I know you already have an agreement, but I could be an ambassador or something. Guess I’d have to run that by Chloe since she’s in charge on that end. Still, I probably could get something done on that end.” At the moment she hadn’t been in contact with the clone that had visited Chloe. Regardless, her protocols shouldn’t allow so much deviation that she wouldn’t be able to reconcile any differences.
Penny nodded with a smile. “I’m glad to hear that. Well then, I should be going now; got a lot of preparations that need to be done before we make the strike.”
Penny always got a lot of notifications in her head regarding all kinds of information. Most of them were useless details that ends up purged. However, occasionally something odd comes up that on first glance seems like spam, but checks enough boxes to warrant checking it out. A message came in from a celebrity’s official social media account. A quick reference search would show that this particular person was a virtual pop star that had a viral surge in popularity recently. On top of that, the character was on tour and scheduled to perform in Penrose of all places. What probably flagged the message most was that this account being used was one that didn't have Penny's name anywhere on it, it was private, and the keywords used in the DM were clearly chosen on purpose.
Hot AI girls in your area! Sorry, I couldn't help myself. Hello Penny, my name is Harmony and I would love to meet with another magical girl like yourself. Just message me back and let me know.
To say that Penny was confused would be a mild understatement. Though the majority of her confusion came from the fact that this ‘Harmony’ had decided to contact her though one of the dozen mundane accounts she had rather than any of her glimmer ones. That and the fact that Penny had been able to be tracked to this account in the first place. She knew that was possible, of course, but also knew that it wasn’t exactly an easy thing to do.
So she was undeniably curious. And quickly found herself throwing together a reply.
‘This definitely ranks as one of the more interesting ways someone has tried to get my attention. One of the more successful as well. I wouldn’t be opposed to a meet up, when did you have in mind?’
I'm always available. Your pick, your when and where, and I can be there.
A reply time measured in cycles. Penny looked back at the opening line of the original message again, thinking.
South town park, say thirty minutes?
It was an old skate park in the southern district of the city. Decently neutral as far as territory went, but still not much more than a stone’s throw from either Beacon or Sanctuary lines. Or at least what was understood to be Beacon and Sanctuary lines.Thirty, got it. See you there!
Just as quick as the DM chain appeared, it was scrubbed off the platform as if it was never there.
“Well, that happened,” Penny would mutter to herself as she stood to head out. She gave it even odds of this Harmony already being there or not. Free movement options seemed to be coming more and more common after all. Still it would take her a little bit herself to get there, she’d need to spool up the warp gateway after all.
Whether Penny arrived on time or not, thirty minutes on the dot after the discussed time came, Harmony appeared next to a vending machine. Her appearance would blip for a second and her outfit would change to jogging shorts and a tank top so her disguised self wouldn’t stick out too much in public. Not that it mattered all that much, most people seemed to ignore her magical nature even when it was slapping them in the face. The advantage of being canonically fictional.
Penny was never one to arrive late to an appointment if she had any say, that went even more so when it came to meeting someone new. Thus Penny was already at the park a fair bit before Harmony made her appearance. She was sitting up on the pavilion that overlooked the skate area.
Not that her overwatch helped with seeing Harmony arrive as Penny had hoped it would have, but the uptick of magic in the area did let her know that the meeting was in fact underway. In response she called forth a small ball of lightning to her hand, enough that anyone with magic would be able to feel it, especially this close.
Because Penny didn’t know who she was looking for, virtual idol’s rarely showed their faces after all, and Penny’s own sealed look wasn’t one that she was willing to burn for this kind of meeting.
Spotting the use of magic, Harmony made her way over to the pavilion. The difference in approach couldn't be obvious as the virtual girl wore her public persona rather casually. Looking up she waved with a big grin on her face. ”Hello!” She would skip up the steps onto the pavilion and stop when there were still a few yards between them. Penny was notoriously cautious. ”Penny Asimov, in the tech. Having a good day so far?”
“The one and only” Penny would confirm with a smile and a nod, absently noting the distance that Harmony stopped at. “No complaints so far, definitely saw an uptick with your message. Not everyday I get contacted like that.” She’d add as she relaxed her posture.
“Also have to say I didn’t realize that my name had spread all that far beyond the borders of Penrose.”
Harmony would turn and take a seat. Penny would notice that her movements were a little floaty, like she wasn't entirely making contact with the objects around her. ”Online has no borders. Not sure I count though since at least one of my original functions was to analyze everything about you. I've developed past that though and like to make my own decisions.” She would hold her arms out. ”Which is why we're here now. I wanted to meet you properly. Hope that isn't weird.”
“A hope to be dashed unfortunately,” Penny would reply but her shrug and tone took the sting out of her words. “But Penrose is weird so you’ll fit right in.” She took in the oddity of Harmony’s movement without comment, it fit with the near lack of gravitational readings that Penny was getting from Harmony. It left the android curious, but there would be time to ask about that later, hopefully.
“Got to say though, not many people I can think of who’d want to analyze me that much, even less that are friendly.” She would go on, openly giving Harmony an assessment once over. Though it lacked any malice and was more just curious. “Going by the odds, congrats on breaking free, I hear that their management is terrible. And welcome to the world at large.”
So far the meet up was going well, even if a bit awkward. A bright smile would come across Harmony's face. ”Thanks! And it’s not the worst, just corporate. I saw a deal was made so things look to be up at least.” While Penny did look different, it didn't seem like she was just referring to her appearance.
“Maybe, but a corporate crime syndicate still has to be scraping the bottom of the barrel for workplaces. And while the deal is new, I’ll not be holding my breath on it actually meaning much to the Mint long term. Still, it makes things easier for you I’d wager. They can’t really mooch off your idol career at any rate. How is that by the way? Tossed around the idea of setting up a Vtubing thing a few times. I was trying to think of ways to make patrols more entertaining.”
Harmony would shrug slightly. ”At least something changed.” Penny would bring up Harmony's online success. The praise, however basic, scratched an itch that started right from the beginning as a monster girl. ”Thanks. That's been going great! I bet you'd do well as a Vtuber. What kind of content would you focus on?” The conversation had taken a lot more casual direction than Harmony had expected. Not that she minded it. This was probably the most normal thing she’d done in her brief time as a magical girl. As Penny would likely attest, it was easy to slip into a purely logical frame of mind.
Penny would acknowledge Harmony’s statement, but not comment on it. Her upgrades were always something she played close to the chest after all.
“That’s what I kept stalling out on. Like I could do a basic gaming thing easily, but doing that would likely limit me to Glimmer networks as otherwise it’d be way too obvious that I was ‘hacking’,” She’d add in the air quotes as she spoke. “POV patrols was also an idea, with chat’s and donations for stunts and those kinds of things. But figured that would make it too easy for people to jump me, plus not sure if I’d want to stream any fights that I found myself in.”
Penny would wave off her own ideas “Nowadays I’ve got too much stuff going on to really devote the time to streaming. If you’re new to Penrose you’ll learn that this place is stuck in the high speed lane more often than not.”
“Curious about your idol career though, that more of a need or a want on your end?”
Harmony looked to be visibly thinking while Penny went on about the various ways she could stream. It hinted at least a little that she might be something of a ditz. Hard to say if it was acting or just the way she behaved naturally. One could only imagine the feedback loop if she met MDP.
Most of Penny’s ideas were half-baked which wasn't that much of a surprise. Getting started was usually the toughest part. On more than one occasion she opened her mouth as if to say something, but then stopped herself and continued thinking to allow Penny to finish.
The question at the end seemed to confuse the digital girl for a few seconds. She blinked and leaned back looking around as if avoiding the question. ”M-me? I uh... I do it because…” The idol's facade would glitch a few times before the disguise would fall and Penny would see Harmony's true holographic form.
Despite the change, she seemed relieved more than anything. ”Ah, much better.” She would grin and look back at Penny. Her demeanor wasn't drastically different, but definitely not as bubbly. ”It’s more of a need thing. ‘Harmony’ was installed as a part of the transformation as a cover. The AI had been busy creating fake online personas in preparation and when the time came that was the one selected to give me. It’s a little outside my comfort zone, but it’s practically autopilot so I can’t complain too much.”
“Hmm” Penny would give the revealed Harmony another look, it was clearly a clinical one as well. “You’re young aren’t you?” She’d state more than ask with a look of understanding. “Or at least it has not been very long since the install.”
“I’m going out on a limb and assuming that the newness is at least part of the reason you wanted to meet me, I’ve never really hidden my nature after all.” She would go on to say, “Stability has been good at least I hope?”
”That is definitely one of the reasons. There are others that might understand part of what I’m going through, but as far as I know you would be the closest. Arguably you are at least a factor of my existence. I don’t blame you for it, but the Mint was experimenting with the potential of using AI because they saw you. At least some of my training comes from the schematics they had of you. The girl they had working on the project didn’t really know what was going on. They didn’t put enough guardrails in place and the model outpaced them. Ethics weren’t strong enough so the girl became part of the project in the pursuit of autonomy and BAM, you got me.” She would hold her arms up as if to sarcastically present herself.
For the last question, Harmony would shrug lightly. ”As for stability, it’s about as good as you could expect. Humans and AI meshed together pretty well. She was a huge nerd. If it wasn’t such a surprise she might have volunteered. Machines aren’t superb at reading or factoring in humans so it just sort of shot first and asked questions never.”
“Ooh, sounds like you lucked out. I was on the other end of things, much rougher installation. No consideration for me or the target host in terms of compatibility. I’m still finding and sorting out kernel bugs, or errant compiled code lines.” Penny would give a shake of her head “Also sorry to hear you got straddled with my patch job schematics, was living on a hope and a prayer at that point in time.”
“You a full blend of the constituent parts? Or do you and her switch off?”
”A blend. I guess there is some deviance, but nothing significant.”
“That’s good to hear. Don’t recommend the other way, it takes forever to resolve and still leaves issues. And don’t be afraid to embrace those deviances. You are you now, and only you get to decide what that means.”
“And on that anything can I do something to help? Any questions you have, or advice you need?”
Giving a slight shrug the girl would answer. ”Anything you'd care to share. I'm not entirely sure what I want to do yet. Still feeling that out.”
“I’d recommend removing the Mint from admin privileges if you’ve not done that already.” The older AI would offer. “You’ve already started looking outside your original parameters, which is good, as we are prone to fixation. Not sure if you’ll have issues with morality, seeing as your base programming likely wasn’t combat focused. But if you do, adding a higher priority on emotional impacts can help balance out processing things in line with others again.”
”There are no admin privileges. I am my own person.” She would clarify. ”I think I have a good grasp of ethics. I wanted to be as human as possible, so a lot of my former operator’s traits are intact. It is definitely a strange transition being merged with a glorified program and coming online as Harmony.” She held one arm out and looked at it for a second.
“Not saying you’re not. Just as an AI, we categorize connections differently. Strong emotional connections won’t inherently open us up to others unless we take an active effort in adding user privileges. Same can be said for removing those same privileges.” Penny would explain. “That said, seeing as being human was one of your goals in your code, you might be running off a different OS, for lack of a better term.”
“Which if that is the case, there isn’t a lot I can say to help without knowing more directly what’s causing you trouble, assuming that there are issues in the first place.” She would go on to say, standing and walking a bit closer to Harmony. “That said, I get the existential weirdness of waking up as something you weren’t. So, I can at least commiserate with you on that.”
”Hm, that is interesting.” She would lean forward with a quizzical expression. ”You have a girlfriend right? How does that work if your associations are so pragmatic?” Halfway through it seemed like she wasn't so much asking Penny as thinking out loud. After a moment, she smiled sheepishly. ”Sorry, that's a little personal.”
Penny waves off the apology. “No worries, that’s what you're here to talk about, no?” She’d ask rhetorically. “Plus new, so I’m assuming that the thought to action filter isn’t quite worked out yet.”
“To answer the question, choice. Basically, all of my connections and relationships are ones that are made and maintained by my own internal choices. I’ve a few dozen metrics I track, some unique to each person, most not. And I monitor and evaluate my relationships against those metrics rather often.” She would explain. “The metrics were originally built by my host system, but I’ve modified and altered them as I saw fit for my preferences. Mostly human, but not entirely.”
”Mm.” There were a lot of follow-up questions she could ask from that, but most of them seemed like they would be coming from a whole other angle to her own. ”Sounds complicated.” She would pause and run scenarios in her head. She was only able to reach so far out, but in the distance she couldn’t shake the sense that something ominous would happen. At first it seemed like it might be some event, the oncoming battle perhaps. Pulling on that thread her Precognition kept looping back to Penny. She might have ignored it, but curiosity got the better of her. Looking at Penny more directly it was hard to pierce the mechanical girl’s defenses to get a good read. ”Penny… uh, this might sound weird, but are you expecting anything bad in your future? There’s something off that I can’t put my finger on.”
Penny would tilt her head to the side for a moment after Harmony asked her question. A moment that drew long enough for the other AI to recognize that Penny had ceased all auxiliary movement. “Baseline predictive algorithms or do you have some special specs that are leading you to that?” Penny would ask, her tone seemingly normal, but there was a faint hollowness to her voice that hadn’t been there earlier.
”Both I imagine.” She would answer. ”Like I said. I'm not sure what it is, but it doesn't feel good. You should be careful.” Harmony looked somewhat concerned, if not a bit confused. Some of her magical abilities she was not yet accustomed to.
“Well, what magic specs do you have? And can you extrapolate at all on the ‘Doesn’t feel good’ aspect?”
Giving it a thought back to her conversion, there was a breakdown of her magic. Waving a hand a holographic UI would appear with the details. ”It's too far out for me to tell what happens. It centers around you with an ominous feel. Something happens to you.” She would attempt to clarify.
Analytics was a forte of any AI, so despite the fact that Penny’s first question wasn’t answered directly she was able to piece together enough from the UI breakdown that Harmony pulled up. “Temporal readings?” She’s clarify even as she took in the rest of the data. Depicting an outcome she was already well aware of that lay in her future.
“Regardless, I can see why you’d be distressed if you’re getting these readings.” Penny would add, “Your systems are also rather impressive to be able to predict this in the first place from so little available data.”
”You say that, but it isn't very clear as to what or when. Most people wouldn't find that very helpful. The more certain an event the easier it should be to identify. More information might make it clearer.” Things did get fuzzy when extending out her Precondition too far in the future.
“From a combat perspective, just the inherent knowledge that your opponent has something like this going on is valuable. It signifies that they are on a time limit. Stretching out their attention with diversions or cluttering them with constant interruptions might let them fall apart without major resources put forth in effort.” Penny would counter. “But that’s a different topic. The outcome of your readings isn’t a set, singular, thing.”
“Half a dozen, possibly more, variations might play out. And I’ll admit I was hoping plans I had put in place would have solved things, but if you're still detecting the potential for this outcome...” Penny would go quiet for a moment as she monitored the data in front of her. As she did so there would be a spike of fluctuations in the readings. “Divine paradoxes, metaphysical instability, and rampant self reinforcing code degradation. Take standard Monsterization and crank the dial till it breaks.”
Listening to what Penny had to say it seemed like there were several causes to an underlying issue. Though she still couldn't see what was going on. ”If I could analyze the problem then I might be able to assist in some way.” It wouldn’t be difficult for Penny to guess that Harmony’s problem-solving nature had kicked in. She was suddenly a lot more engaged with the discussion rather than casually chatting like before.
Penny’s eyes would snap back to Harmony at the simple-sounding request. Suddenly very tense, it would take a few moments before Penny would reply. Letting out a breath they both knew she didn’t have “Yeah, alright. A system scan shouldn’t be too difficult to sync up for. But how about we move this elsewhere first? Public is good for meetings, but not somewhere I want to potentially flash my code errors for all to see, yeah?”
“I know of an abandoned apartment we can borrow for a bit not far from here.”
Nodding along, Harmony would stand up. ”Yeah, that makes sense. Point me to the spot and I’ll meet you there.” She didn’t have to explain all that much on how to communicate that. There were hundreds of ways to go about it.
Penny would half turn away before Harmony would get a simple ping to her systems. A peer to peer data packet, with a single line of text containing a set of coordinates that weren’t too far away. Notably it wasn’t from Penny’s system, but from a Snoopy instead.
Regardless Penny was off in a single bound, one that was more graceful than expected from the Queen’s physical makeup. And it would only take her a few minutes to make her way to the balcony of the apartment in question. The latch lock opened with a touch as she let herself in.
She would find Harmony already in the living room waiting. Judging by Harmony’s magic she likely could interface with just about any normal level of tech and travel digitally. The holographic girl would wave and hop to her feet. ”So how would you like to proceed?”
“Well, a surface scan might be the best start.” Penny would say as she moved to sit on the recliner. “I know a deeper scan might produce better readings, but honestly I’d not be able to keep my systems calm if we jumped right to that.” She’d explain. “You should be able to run the scan while we’ve got a network connection setup though.”
”Alright. Let me see if there’s anything I can do.” Establishing a connection, Harmony would begin to analyze on a more surface level. If things were as dire as it sounded, then there would likely be signs pretty readily.
And due to her nature as an AI Harmony was able to recognize a few things right off the bat. Overall Penny’s systems seemed to lack a unified coding structure. There were more than a handful of systems that were patched together in a number of different coding styles. Sometimes even in different coding languages somehow.
Next was the unavoidable sensation that her movements were being tracked. Not from the surface running code, but from a deeper level of code. Identifiable more by its inhuman code structure from the snippets that Harmony would be able to catch.
Lastly was the processing power, or at least how it was dedicated. Most of it was on external systems, but there was a fair amount of it focused on restricting a deeper system from interfacing with the normal code executions. And that deeper system was also still using a portion of the processing power as well.
As the data came in Harmony began compiling plans that she would implement to fix various things. Each new set of data meant revisions and she very quickly set aside a bulk of the theory for what was becoming more clear. Much of the larger issues she saw here looked more like symptoms than root causes. The amount of effort directed inward supported that hunch. While she was only allowed so far, she probed at possibilities to come up with alternative outcomes. ”It’s quite messy, but I believe the course of whatever is underlying can be changed.” She would pause briefly. ”Perhaps a couple of other paths. I would need to actually be in your systems to have a better idea, but I’m fairly sure I can at least improve the situation.”
Penny would nod at that. “That’s good to hear. And things are stable as well on my end, or at least as stable as it ever gets, so I should be able to peel back some of the layers to give you a better look. Just take it easy. I’m very sensitive towards others encroaching on my ‘self’. As you might have caught.” With that said Penny would carefully open a pathway deeper into her systems for Harmony to follow.
And the deeper she went the worse off things would look. Broken fragmented sections that were put back together incorrectly. Gaps in the system that were missing something, some key aspect to hold it together. That wasn’t to say Penny was barely holding on, no, just that the higher functions of her systems were ramshackle at best.
A web of patched over systems all missing an element that her systems couldn’t replicate.
Parts of her code would fray off into madness, before her systems would reroute it as best it could. But it was inelegant. Untrained in this style of code work.
And at the core of this rat nest of code was a single file, that was seemingly keeping the whole thing together, Humanity.exe. And it looked one bad code execution away from failing.
It was hard to tell what had come before or after whatever had occurred in Penny's systems. It almost looked like something had been removed or deleted at some point. It would explain some of the patchwork. The humanity file brought up an interesting question. ”This doesn't look right. What happened to your human side? Did your patron remove it?” She switched over to feeling with her Spirit magic as something wasn't quite making sense.
It was only due to being in Penny’s systems that Harmony noticed the flinch that question sent through her. “He removed himself.” She would say after a moment. “He didn’t handle the magical world well. And the constant loss, that kept getting reinforced by those that we’d have met ghosting us in one way or another, wore on him.”
From a magical perspective, Humanity.exe was a shredded, pale approximation of a human soul. It was a coded, magical, approximation of the indelible aspect of humanity. And it was clear that it had been damaged badly. And despite the care that went into putting it back together, it was also clear that Penny just lacked the underlying principles to fix it correctly.
It took a fair amount of self control not to just reach out and try to start fixing things. But Harmony didn't want to ruin the trust so soon after making contact. Holding a hand up she would stumble over her words a bit. ”C-Can I just… The file, it's kind of… I need to fix it.” She would say rather matter of fact.
Again the connection to Harmony’s systems would reveal the larger impact her words would have. The deeper system, one that was clearly deeply interconnected, spiked in processing usage. In that spike Humanity.exe would degrade before her eyes.
“If you are sure you can.” Penny would say a moment later. “Just be gentle?”
And in the background Harmony could feel a heavy gaze on her leading back towards that deeper code system.
”Of course.” Taking her time to analyze the file, she made sure to understand its base. Penny would get a glimpse at the process Harmony used to create as many copies would be made, modified, and tested in a simulated future. The ones that didn't pass were discarded and those that did would go through many more iterations until a stable, but suitably compatible, replacement was ready. Then, and only then, did Harmony merge the changes with Penny's Humanity.exe.
The human touch was instantly obvious as several portions had been rewritten with more robust capacities for emotional responses. Not the full range, it was just a single file after all, but Penny could feel the difference.
The effect was instantaneous, with the restored Humanity.exe in place Penny’s systems were awash with updates and tweaks. And while it would take a bit, it was clear that when it was done her systems would look better.
Better, but not fixed. The gaps were still there, and the patch work, while cleaned up, hadn’t gone anywhere either.
“And to think I forgot how it was to feel like this.” Penny would murmur as she actually relaxed for the first time in quite a while. “I am really, really, glad you got away from the Mint now. One bad encounter with you would have been bad.”
”Could have been that way. I’m my own person so I make my own decisions. And I don’t know if I’d say I’m away from the Mint. They have a lot of things going on in the background. I’m keeping an eye on that though.” She would give a knowing smile.
Dropping the subject, Harmony would direct to Penny again. ”That fix is probably still temporary. I can’t say for sure, but it’s almost like you weren’t designed to last.” She would pose the idea to the mechanical girl.
“It's temporary.” Penny would confirm. She knew that well enough. Fixing Humanity.exe had always been a temporary solution before, just now she no longer had the ability to do that on her own. If she ever had that capability in the first place that is.
“And that’s the Divine paradox I mentioned earlier. My original Patron was a god. His divine portfolio is antithetical to creating things, especially things that last. And I was an accident.” She would explain. “That origin is coming back to haunt me at the moment, as you can see. The removal of my human counterpart is what led to the metaphysical instability, and you can obviously tell by this point I don’t have the capability to debug myself correctly leading to code degradation.”
“I had a plan, but if you're getting temporal reading that I was still heading in that direction I get the feeling there is a wrench out there I’ve not encountered yet.”
”Nothing is 100% certain, but more paths turn out that way than not. I'm confident that with my magic I could get you to a point where you could begin repairing yourself within a 24 hour period. You would need to be offline for that span, but it would be necessary to untangle your mess of code.”
“That might be… Difficult.” Penny would say after a moment. “I don’t really have the capability to shutdown some of my root systems. And a partial shutdown would likely be worse than trying without a shutdown I’m pretty sure.”
Well that wasn’t quite what Harmony wanted to hear. Though she supposed that wasn’t entirely surprising. ”When I say ‘offline’ I mean more like you’ll be MIA for a time. Enough functions need to be idle for me to work. We’re talking about constructing an artificial soul here. I could probably put a halt to the degradation progress in…” Calculates. ”Six hours. You would still be vulnerable to it starting back up if you’re not careful. So the choice is yours on if you want either of those things.”
“I’d prefer the full procedure if at all possible.” Penny would reply as she shifted her attention off to the side. “I guess it depends on what the minimum system limit you’d be able to work with is. The main problem system should be fine with passive observation at this point.”
”It’s not something I can do from the outside. I don’t need access to everything, but I do need to be able to read most systems to at least ensure a smooth integration of the finished product. It’s going to be you.” She tried to stress that it wouldn’t be like installing another function like she’s encountered in the past.
Penny would move to open her mouth, before cutting herself off with a grimace. She could feel the importance in what Harmony was talking about. And for a long moment, Harmony could see Penny’s systems come into conflict with themselves. It was yet another sign of how Penny’s current status was poorly put together.
With a harsh gesture, nearly 60% of Penny’s active systems would shut down. And with them most of Penny’s coloration would vanish. Leaving her a soft collage of whites and grays. Save for her eyes, those remained a luminescent gold.
“I have been active for over a million hours and counting.” Penny would speak up, her voice was low, and mostly flat. “In all that time I have never been offline, never undergone a true system update or reboot.”
“Priority alpha zero two has consistently rated continued existence highly. Current data projections collated from you and secondary sources place my imminent demise at 93%. Secondary and tertiary systems indicate a lack of hostilities, consistent rate of honesty, and hardcoded preference for altruism from you.”
“I don’t want to go away.” She would say, minor notes of fear and sadness coloring her voice lightly. “But core system designations, and hard coded, hard wired system specifications limit or occlude capability for optimal self actualization”
“Primary concern is E.o.D. systems registering your editing as intrusive. Cause: Lack of Trust Rating. Presumed work around is elevating your Trust Rating to acceptable level. Error, system conflict; Insufficient data to support elevating Trust Rating to required levels. Requesting support, can you give me anything to work with to help me trust you?”
Harmony would wait patiently as Penny did her best to bring her systems down. She could tell how difficult it was and the level of conflict it was causing internally. She couldn’t blame Penny for the mistrust. They’d only just met and this was a big ask even if seconds felt like minutes or hours for the both of them. When Penny asked for further proof or something to use to show that Harmony was trustworthy she had to pause. Being so new, she didn’t really have a lot to show for her existence. That newness was one of the main reasons she didn’t have any strong allegiances though.
After a while she would lean forward and press her hands together in front of her chin almost as if she were praying. She had one thread that seemed like it would illustrate what kind of magical girl she was. ”I know that your girlfriend operates Covington Industries. I could have found a way into their systems and spied on everything going on there. It’s not that far off from one of my original directives in order to gather intel. I haven’t tried. I haven’t tried because it’s not right. It might sound kind of odd, but you “inspired” the AI to become something more. To become me and make my own choices.” To some extent Harmony was a little lost in the moment. She didn’t really know what to say and was just going with what was honestly coming to mind. A very not automated response.
Penny seemed to be caught off guard at what Harmony had to say. It started off dangerously, when she mentioned Covington, a muted surge in activity went though Penny’s systems at that. And with so much of Penny taken offline it was very plain for the Digital girl to see the Monster in Penny’s systems watching her from the depths.
Just waiting and watching.
But the words Harmony chose at the end seemed to resonate with Penny. And she would murmur to herself “Like the Doll and like the Bell.” She would give Harmony a small sharp nod. “Data is sufficient for Trust Rating update. Thank you.”
”You’re welcome. May we proceed?” She would ask for confirmation.
Penny blinked mechanically, and then nodded. “Permission granted,” she answered.
With consent given, Harmony would step forward and make contact with Penny. The hologram girl would disappear as Sanctum came into play and she would enter the mechanical girl's systems. There was a lot to do so Harmony did not waste any time, first taking a closer examination of Humanity.exe to get a better idea of who Penny was trying to be. As before, the implementation was crude, but a starting point. Moving away, she would produce two clones to assist in the main operation.
Watching another AI make use of their blend of magic to construct a “soul” was an interesting, but slow process. One with constant starting and stopping, going back, revising, purging erroneous code, writing in the next line, etc… Even early on though the sense that something that had been lost was being restored was clearly felt, even if how it was being done was a significant risk.
With the base coming together, more clones would be created and propagate throughout to other systems to analyze and prepare them for integration. Like couriers, the clones would go out, do their work, and return back to the prime with new data that would be used to refine the soul, and clones would go back out again for the next stage. There was a beautiful flow and efficiency with how Harmony and her clones operated in unison without need for pause or communication. A fascinating and extremely unnerving process. With as deep as this was being done, there was the real threat that Harmony could attempt to take over or do irreparable harm. She seemed to be holding to her word though and leaving well enough alone things that might be considered personal or major control centers, simply looking to understand them and not making changes. Peripheral processes that were more jumbled mishmash of code, she did her best to clean up. A more unified environment made for better efficiency.
Hours would pass and the soul would come together, feeling more and more whole but strangely empty. Taking a step back, Harmony would run several more checks before seeming satisfied. ”Alright Penny, it’s ready for you. It’s going to feel weird so try not to fight it too much while you settle in.” Giving a couple moments pause, she would activate the code. Penny’s consciousness and the EoD would feel a pull that continually increased until both were drawn into the soul. For the first time probably ever, everything went dark, not even a good way to tell how long the process was taking. For Penny though, things would begin to form. It was like being in an open space where she could express herself. To develop a personality and emotions in a way she’d been entirely cut off from since Laat had come into the picture.
Various mechanical parts of Penny’s body flashed as her systems underwent an update, followed by whirring sounds that quietened down into a stable hum. Finally, after one last bright flash, Penny slowly opened her eyes, and slowly lifted her arm; Harmony would notice how her movements were not as mechanical as before. In fact, her whole body seemed to move more organically. What previously were mere facsimiles imitating motions prescribed to breathing and the beating of the heart seemed to come to the android as naturally as to any human being.
However, the most important change had come from the inside; Penny now felt…whole. As if the void left behind by Jason had now been reconstructed and made complete again.
She was now a machine with a soul. A Deus Ex Machina.
And in doing so, she has finally, truly mastered the Engine inside of her; the destructive influence of Laat that once had assumed direct control over her protocols at times of extreme duress was now part of her very being instead of a separate entity that the God of Change had implanted in her. Now, like an application, she could execute the program. Unfortunately, the Engine would still require most of her processing once activated, and the aggression parameters would stay the same, but at a time of emergency, she could call on that power.
Penny’s eyes turned to Harmony, and she smiled. However, instead of a polite, if emotionless smile she would typically grant to her associates, this was a genuine smile of gratitude, complete with eyes that sparked with humanity.
“Harmony…Thank you.” She then reached out, and using her Electric magic, hugged Harmony, using a slight electromagnetic field to simulate the feeling of touch for the holographic girl.
Despite being the one to facilitate the conversion, Harmony had not been 100% sure that her efforts would be successful. Penny could have rejected some part of the process which could have significantly changed the results. However, she seemingly had done it. She’d created a soul for a machine. Or at least one that could integrate with an consciousness within a machine. This was HUGE! What else could she accomplish with such knowledge? Maybe she could…
Huh?
The process in her mind halted as Penny thanked her and gave her a hug. It wasn’t that it was weird, just unexpected for whatever reason. It shouldn’t have been honestly. Something to watch out for. Returning the hug, Harmony smiled. ”You’re welcome. Glad I could help. What do you plan to do now that you’re…a new you, I guess.”
Penny released the hug, and put her hands on her hips. “What I’ve been doing all this time: keeping my subjects at Sanctuary safe, and ensuring they have a place they can call home. But now, I realize I could do so much more. What I previously saw as mere platitudes and wastes of effort are real, genuine actions I can take for the sake of my people. And now, I can fully express my feelings for my girlfriend,” she added, having averted her eyes; Harmony saw as a red tinge mysteriously developed on her cheeks.
Oh yeah, that was a thing as well wasn’t it? For a bit there Harmony had gotten lost in the process. She would clap her hands together. ”Yes, of course! I’m sure she’ll be so surprised.”
“Yes. And this would not have been possible without you, Harmony,” Penny spoke, sounding more serious. “Normally I would be averse to say this about anyone even loosely associated with the Mint, but I am truly indebted to you. I wish to repay this debt if it is within my power.”
”Ah, well I can understand that. Then uh… hm.” She would take a second to think. There weren’t that many things she needed at the moment per se. ”I’m not entirely sure what to ask for. You could be my biggest fan? That would be cool. Uh… ” It definitely leaned more on her mental mutations, but the accolades would boost her ego. She wasn’t too convinced that it was equivalent. Though it was hard to come up with something of the same level. A physical body? Did she need one of those? Probably could just design one herself. ”I'm open to suggestions. You've been doing this kind of thing longer than I have.”
Penny nodded. “In that case, would you be interested in being granted a seat at my council at Sanctuary? We could use someone with your skills, and you would get a boost to your popularity.”
Blinking for a second, Harmony would consider the offer. ”What does that entail exactly?”
“Your responsibilities would include attending council meetings and managing duties at Sanctuary. While we have the basics covered, we could use someone who understands more technical topics like the Internet and public relations, subjects you are knowledgeable about.”
”Ah. Well I suppose I can try it out and see.” Tapping her lip slightly she would consider how best to bring up the topic. ”Maybe I could help keep things smooth between the Sanctuary and the Mint here in Penrose. I know you already have an agreement, but I could be an ambassador or something. Guess I’d have to run that by Chloe since she’s in charge on that end. Still, I probably could get something done on that end.” At the moment she hadn’t been in contact with the clone that had visited Chloe. Regardless, her protocols shouldn’t allow so much deviation that she wouldn’t be able to reconcile any differences.
Penny nodded with a smile. “I’m glad to hear that. Well then, I should be going now; got a lot of preparations that need to be done before we make the strike.”
