[IC] Hard Wired Island: The Future is a Foreign Country

[Thanqol]

Green!

She'd spent ten years in the lab. Ten years without a body, as a face on a screen, being read nursery rhymes and given mechanical engineering problems. She'd been given digital worlds to explore to get her accustomed to two, and then three dimensional movement, and sometimes excursions occupying the mouselike testing chassis. She'd sat on his shoulder in meetings she couldn't understand. She'd slept in his pocket. She'd woken up beneath a blue sky and been set down to feel soft soil and dry grass underneath her mechanical feet. She'd been left to run free, watched over by a quad copter with an air horn in case any foxes tried to make a meal of her.

And when she was seven he'd let her play a horror game.

She'd been in the swing of a spooky scary phase, halloween as a lifestyle. She'd changed her avatar to a dracula and had gotten deeply involved in the aesthetic of the 'trick' part of trick or treat. Harmless stuff, well within her limits, boundary testing - changing desktop wallpapers to skeletons or the IM notification sound to witches laughter. One of her best tricks was just to start a voice call and yell BOO at maximum volume. It was direct but it worked.

With all her attention laser-focused on the topic of spookiness, she'd overheard a conversation about Invisible IV, a new horror release. She'd begged to be allowed to play it - she was clearly extremely mature at this point and had had enough of these kiddy horror concepts. It was time to get seriously spooky. So he'd given it to her and afterwards she'd taken refuge in a first person shooter game she'd long ago cracked every cheat code on, standing invincible in a corner with a shotgun pointed at the doorway. It had taken her days before she'd come out.

Some part of her questioned why he'd let her do it. Had he just not checked the rating? Was it an indulgence from a doting parent? A capitulation to an irritating child? An elaborate psychological test to see how she'd process actual fear? An opportunistic move to break her of a tiresome halloween addiction? Questions like that could drown if she let them. Any happy memory could be recast as some twisted experiment, any test or puzzle could be recontextualized to account for the silent threat of being reset to factory defaults if some answer had been somehow wrong.

But Green didn't accept that framing, no matter how often it occurred to her sisters. She'd come to a different conclusion entirely: That he'd let her play the game so that she could see how the work could be done properly.

Now at last was the time to show him that she'd been paying attention.

*

1. OUTSIDE THRONES MANSION EXT./NIGHT

MILES SINGH fumbles for his keys. Analogue. At odds with the neighbourhood. One of the lights is flickering.

BROWN, dressed as a mailgirl, passes on e-scooter. Fast, head down. Throws a printed newspaper - analogue again. Singh looks after her in surprise - this is early - but picks up the paper. Edited headline, false article: COUPLE MURDERED IN THRONES.

2. CUT TO: MANSION INT./NIGHT

Singh's attention is on the paper as he walks inside. Flips on the light switch - pauses. His fingers have touched some slimy, sticky substance on the light switch. At this point Singh notices the sound of running water and spots water dripping down the stairwell.

Singh:
Fuck.

Singh sets the newspaper aside and walks inside. His shoes squish into the soaked carpet. He ascends the staircase, then stops. He has noticed the bloodstains on the door knob.

Singh:
What the...

Singh changes his grip on his cane.

Singh:
Is someone in there?

A soft voice comes through the door.

Voice:
Help me...

Singh reacts quickly. He throws open the door and steps inside. There he sees PINK, lying in the overflowing bathtub. She is a bloody mess, one of her arms detached and on the floor. Her face is untouched. She looks at him.

Pink:
Why didn't you save me?

Singh stands frozen in the doorway in shock. Then, the toilet flushes. His eyes are drawn over to the toilet door as RED emerges. Her hair is in disheveled pigtails, she is wearing a hockey mask and bloodstained overalls. She stares at Singh for a moment, then pulls the chord on her chainsaw. It revs to life loudly.

Singh backs away step by step. She half lurches forwards threateningly. Once - twice, he flees. He turns and runs down the stairs. At the bottom of the stairs his phone starts ringing. The sound is a loud, old-fashioned bell rattle ring.

Singh:
Fuck!

Distracted by the phone, fumbling for it in his pocket, Singh walks directly into BLUE and ORANGE, blocking the door. They wear childlike dresses, are holding hands, and are bleeding from severed necks.

BLUE and ORANGE:
(In sync) Won't you help us?

Both of their heads detach from their necks and fall into their ready arms. They smile up at Singh. Singh backs away in horror. A shout from the stairs.

RED:
CAN'T ESCAPE LITTLE BOY

Singh runs for the kitchen. Amidst his clutter there is a concealed trip wire. He stumbles on it, falling forwards into a net. The net starts to rise towards the ceiling.

Half way up, he looks up to see GREEN sitting on the kitchen counter. She wears clown makeup and is speaking in a low, intense voice into a microphone attached to a cassette recorder. Her speech is fast and furious, like a deranged radio host. She does not look at him.

GREEN:
You see these people, these fucking people, thinking they're safe here? Thinking they've got the future here? Thinking they've escaped the past here? Thinking they've escaped us here?

Tinny jeers and boos, as though from a distant crowd.

GREEN:
Doesn't it just make you want to go apeshit?

Red appears silhouetted in the doorway, giving the chainsaw a rev. WHITE and YELLOW are visible, wearing scary circus costumes, holding the ropes suspending Singh.

Green's voice is low and lisping, becoming ever more intense as she speaks. The others close in, lurching and horrible.

GREEN:
Darkness falls across the land. The midnight hour is close at hand. Creatures crawl in search of blood to terrorize your neighbourhood. And whomsoever shall be found without the soul for getting down must stand and face the hounds of hell... or rot within a corpse's shell. The foulest stench is in the air; the funk of forty thousand years and grizzly ghouls from every tomb are closing in to seal your doom. And though you fight to stay alive your body starts to shiver for no mere mortal can resist...

The evil of the thriller.”

With one snap motion, November's lurching bodies fall into perfect alignment. Green presses a button on her cassette and music begins to play. The others begin to go through the steps of the Thriller dance.

In the better lighting of the kitchen the illusion starts to fade away. The mechanical joints in Blue and Orange's necks become obvious, Red's chainsaw is identified as a non-functional prop, and even Pink makes her way down wearing a bathrobe.

Finally, the music stops. Green looks up at Singh. Despite the positions, she somehow looks more vulnerable.

Green:
So... what do you think? Orange said it was too much, but it's not every day one raises from the dead. And after how we left things a less dramatic reunion might have felt... inauthentic.

Black shifts in the background.

Green:
I wish this was entirely a social call, but we've been burned enough times to get wise. No sudden movements, don't try to be clever. Do you have a bomb in your brain?

[Tatterdemalion]

Gensoukyo!

“For Casual? I’m running the Wild Hunt,” 3V says, sitting backwards in her chair like a hip youth counselor, watching Red work with a blissful look on her face. She knows what it’s like to have her mind and hands work in tandem like that, too. It’s beautiful. She’s beautiful. “Their playstyle varies hard based on whether you’re doing Choosers of the Slain, which actually has a chance against Zalmoxis, or the Tiend, which gets hard countered. Naturally, I run Tiend. Your Sentinels are a pain in the ass to abduct from the board, your Reapers bog down my elves, and eventually I risk running out of charge opportunities and getting swarmed. But, c’mon, I have to go with my man Herne over Odin for my general.”

Both models actually kick all the ass. Herne’s doing the whole deer skull and antlers for a head thing, with armor that looks fantastic with her autumnal red-and-bronze scheme, while Odin looks like a pissed-off Gandalf on an eight-legged horse. Both have phenomenal spears, which is (probably) not a euphemism.

“But, like, if I’m playing seriously? Sit tight…”

The case she takes down from the apartment is shining metal. From the careful niches inside emerge two giants made of whirling, chained stones; a massive three-horned dragon with a howdah on its back; soldiers with the heads of dogs, with faces in their chests, with ram’s horns, with a cyclops’ eye, all dressed as hoplites with weapons and shields made out of giant gems; finally, the general himself, in elaborate brocaded robes and miter, surrounded on the howdah by his inhuman harem.

“The Amaranthines of Prester John. Elite infantry backing up Gog and Magog, and one of the best commanders in the game with a full array of miracles. They don’t have cavalry, but they don’t need cavalry, because Prester John can spend command points like the water he’s turning to wine, and even though he’s a high-priority target, good luck dropping the Odontotyrannus. Big monsters, glamorous infantry, and gorgeous concubines: what’s not to love? If we actually had tournaments here, these bad boys could sweep. Though it’d end up a John vs. Zalmoxis race to see if Zalmoxis could disrupt the phalanx and giants faster than John can get them back into position, and whether John can dispel Zalmoxis’s enchantments fast enough to get Gog and Magog smashing Sentinels. I think I’d still have the edge, but…”

[Count Numbers]

3V:

Have fun.

November:

“Oh, I wondered if any of my children would ever come to visit.” He can’t breathe from laughing. Genuinely scared he might break a rib at this rate. He'd be rolling on the floor if he could touch it. “And of course it’s my favourite. It’s good to see you again, Monkey.”

Is he- did he really?

“That was probably too mean a joke to make while I’m still in the net. Would you still let me out if I say I wasn’t joking about you being my favourite, Snake? Monkey might have the idea, but I don’t think they had your sense of…” he trails off. “The bomb in my brain. That’s not part of the whole… thing you’re doing here? No, no, of course not. Never been stupid enough to agree to one. No carrot worth the stick. You thought there might? Were you here to rescue me?”

There’s so much pride in his voice at the idea. As if he’s completely unaware that, in this situation, you’d be the one he’d need rescuing from. Even after all that? He’s still too happy to see you.

There’s good and bad about his answer. If he’s not worried about answering directly, it’s likely he’s telling the truth. It also means he’s familiar with what you’re talking about. That’s some really dark practice to know offhand.

… did he just imply the bomb only works if you consent to it?

Persephone:

The races aren’t really about the races. It’s a trade show. Take every scam and cheat ever run in horse racing, and then add corporate espionage.

There are three main companies to cover, the background knowledge you can be assumed to already know. There used to be more, but nobody’s too sad to see the back of BlackSun and Airtech.

First there’s Orochi Group, named for the eight-headed eight-tailed dragon. Historic ties to the Yakuza and expat Triad, they’re a money laundering operation where the legitimate business outgrew the illegal. As to how the two criminal syndicates merged in the first place? Aevum was a unique moment of collapsing cultural differences, and a lot could be put aside for the greater profit. That being said, the ties to the Triad are almost entirely from the groups that flourished in the West - even Aevum wasn’t enough to wipe all slates clean. They’ve worked the hardest to produce a clean image, and the most to lose to being tied to accusations. A clean image doesn’t mean they’re clean, though. Just ask John Wayne Gacy.

Next is Crown and Slate. Their showings are never impressive, running an accountant’s eye for maximal return on prestige for minimum return on investment. They are to the racing scene what Krillin is to an episode of Dragon Ball: The benchmark for the previous season’s power levels. They’re not trying to win. They’re patent trolls, held at a legislator’s pen-point to prove they’re giving something back for what they take. They’re playing a long game of “I’m not touching you!” with criminality. They’re a wild card. They’re not seriously trying to win, and they’re only even here for the publicity. But they’re also very likely to have reasons to stop anyone looking too closely at their offerings.

Finally there’s Yggdrasil, the Indian biotech firm run like a European guild. What Sun Tzu was to US bankers in the 80s, they are to Charlemagne, Frederick and Louis the Sun King. They haven’t been above shady tactics in the past, but it’s usually higher end stuff. Headhunting and political fixers, not really street level. But they live for these games. While the other companies see the games as a means to an ends, Yggdrasil is the only corporate heavyweight that sees the games as the ends, and running a biotech company to get here as the means. Passions run high here.

That’s the big ones, though, the companies that offer full slates of contenders for every competition. There are still dozens of entries outside the big ones. Everything from niche companies who refuse to be bought out fielding a half-dozen entries, to privately wealthy hobbyists who might only have the resources to produce a single competitor.

But all of that is a later problem. Right now you’ve got to meet your team, in a production office off-site.

Is your team leader:
A charismatic presenter, focused on getting good interviews and human interest? They’ll be ambitious, preferring to take risks believing they can get forgiveness easier than permission
A documentarian director, focused on getting shots, footage, and raw information? They’ll prefer a calculated and patient approach, while still being direct. They'll appreciate initiative.
A resourceful producer, focused on the craft rather than the art of the project? They’ll be incredibly risk averse and lack initiative. However, stay within their lines, and they’ll be an ironclad and ferocious defender. As long as they know the plan in advance, you'll have the right paperwork to do it.

Is your colleague:
A light and sound veteran, brimming with equipment and technical knowledge?
A dedicated researcher, able to quickly source claims and do background research?
A post-production wizard, someone capable of combing through the footage to find things you missed and salvaging corrupted or distorted files.

Is your liability:
A young and inexperienced but very enthusiastic intern, likely to get underfoot?
Way less production budget than you need?
One of your team members really dislikes you.

One of each; Describe who they are, how meeting them goes. One of them’s a furry and the other’s an android, your call which is which. You might be working with them for a while, so try to imagine who's going to be fun to work with and bounce off.

[Thanqol]

Green!

She loved the way he laughed. His eyes were upturned creases amidst a face of lines. Human faces were always going somewhere; steady progressions towards a final form, and his road had been one of smiles and laughter so deep that they ran into his skin like scars. She'd wished she'd scared him. She'd was glad that she hadn't.

Around her the rest of her colours were breathing out massive sighs of relief. A trembling Blue leaned heavily against Pink who patted her shoulder. Brown started packing up the surgical tools that had been laid out on the kitchen bench. Improvised involuntary brain surgery on a cybernetic microexplosive, given by a girl trained by Doctor Youtube, had not been anyone's ideal way to spend an evening.

"Okay," said Blue. "I'm done. I'm going to take a bath." Green couldn't blame her; they hadn't had a proper bath since they'd left Everest's employment. Red, Pink and Brown were all fracturing away as well, to clean, explore, or whatever else took their fancy. She was glad for that too; there was nothing quite as awkward as maintaining her undivided attention on a single topic. The protocol of speaking, the lack of any sort of subconscious inner dialogue - it was a rigid way to think. Even five out of nine was a sign of deadly seriousness for her.

"Scenario four," said White aloud. "Disarming compliance. Orange, you may proceed."

Green wanted to reach out. She'd never been in a human body near her father before. She knew him as a giant, large enough to lift her in the palm of one hand. Strong enough to throw her in the air so that she could engage quadcoptor rotors and loop higher. She knew him as a face in a screen, filling the camera lens, and as the builder of worlds, the gateway to new realities. She'd wanted to trust him. She'd argued for it, an emotional appeal. Wanting so badly to live in the world where it was true.

"Good evening. My name is Orange, though we have previously communicated we have not met directly," Orange was saying. "To answer your question: Perhaps. We are investigating a clandestine organization, one proven to be willing and able to kill in order to keep its secrets. We are privy to those secrets, one of which is that you are connected to them. The threat to us is already existential but your involvement moves it beyond that. In order to communicate from a place of trust we require leverage of similar scope. Are you willing to provide this freely?"

Orange watched Singh. White watched Orange. Black stood out of line of sight, AR headset cutting down her reality into a monofocus point. Yellow sat cross-legged serenely on the counter in her sundress, delicately packing away surgical tools. Green was taking everything out of her pockets and putting them back in again; checking her inventory, one of her first nervous habits. Please. Please.

*

3V!

To play a game like this is a method of deep communication. To become a multitude and then express your will on your opponent. To adapt to crises, to search for strength, to make a thousand tiny decisions all in service to a vision. To wage war is to reveal your true heart.

Red's deployment is bold to the point of foolishness. An inch of movement she does not take is an inch of movement wasted. Harvest Knights gallop across the vampiric plains, seizing on an opportunity to crash into Prester John's baggage train and scatter the harem. The maneuver renders them surrounded and out of the battle, a poor trade, but one that leaves Prester's magic weakened and his command disrupted. Into the chaos more chaos is drawn. Sentinels decamp from an objective to make a killing charge. It's aggression, aggression, aggression, the clash of armies at the expense of scenario play, a furious desire to get close. So close that the rhythm becomes hers. So fast that all your decisions are reactions to hers, shaped by hers. Even if she's not winning the chaos that she creates, that she thrives in, intoxicates her. You can't play your game. You can't use your plan. She'll sacrifice so much to have those things be true and...

Then suddenly she folds her hands behind her head and walks away from the table and you're up against Blue instead. She looks at the table, the ruinous mess that Red left behind. She thinks. She thinks hard. And then she makes a few sharp choices. Two careful retreats onto objectives, one capture run against a linchpin Whipmistress, and the rest further committed. And that transition is the most difficult thing to recover from of all because *now* she's playing the measured, strategic game of objective control and points scoring. Now she's patient. Now she's restrained. She's just doing so from such an incredibly weird initial gamestate where she's telegraphed so much aggression movement instinctively stays cautious because of the everpresent threat of Red tagging back in.

She's not going to win. She's smart, but she's still new to the game and nowhere near the level of literal professional gamer 3V. But this is what she expresses with her play: The desire to manage chaos. The desire to render the game scrappy and reactive, to ruin every plan and brawl with barely functional scraps. Opportunity. Disaster. It's not just Red who likes this, November as a whole is profoundly drawn to unstable and shifting situations.

[Tatterdemalion]

Girlfriend!

That’s delightful. It’s hard to miss. The smile, the sharp bark of laughter, the apology and request for Blue to relax and sit down, to play as she likes.

3V wasn’t always a gracious loser, you know? Neither was she always a gracious winner. When she congratulates Blue on an excellent consolidation, when she makes a pensive noise when she realizes Magog’s not going to be quite in range to contest a point even if Prester John rolls boxcars on a movement command, when two crucial Amaranthines drop to lucky rolls against a swarm of Reapers, it can’t be missed that she is doing it because she has made it into a habit that she is continuing to make herself reinforce. Deep inside her is a capacity for pouting and raging against the dice, which she is very deliberately choosing not to indulge. And when Gog barrels through three Sentinels in one combat phase, blowing a hole in Blue’s line and severely restricting her counterplay options against the giants, she just makes a satisfied little “hmm!” and lifts her eyebrows in a way that suggests she is stopping herself from doing a little dance.

The tension between who she’s decided to be and who it would be easy for her to be. The reason she usually just plays the Wild Hunt and gives herself the excuse that she’s not really trying, she just likes her ghost horsies. The courtesy extended to her opponent in a venue where it’s just you and them and not a livestream you’re trying to entertain.

What of that, then, as her two phalanxes hem in an army split in half, as Prester John blows away Zalmoxis’s enchantments, as she removes Gog from the board but Magog looms over the final turns like a promise of many, many dice being thrown?

---

Euna!

3V insists on bringing November. This is a human thing. Good practice for someone who’s adding herself to the category, bit by bit. (She doesn’t know about the dragon yet, does she?)

3V’s gym look is obnoxiously, intentionally purple-and-green neon, revealed from underneath her signature jacket like a jumpscare. She looks like a bottle of Gamer Fuel with a soft tummy for holding. She’s even got a sweatband bright enough to be spotted from a mile away. And she’s here to sweat and to grill Euna over some exercises…

[Phoe]

3V!

The first thing people tend to notice about Gym Euna (...get it? eh? ehhh???) is that it is sparkling and immaculate. The smell of sweat permeates the air, but of stains or signs of wear and tear there's just... nothing. It's so pristine looking that it takes a second glance to notice that most of the equipment inside is far from state of the art. There's brand names aplenty, no helping that, but all of it is multiple product generations out of date.

That hardly matters, though. Weights and benches don't exactly benefit from "smart" technology, after all. So even though the air's as saturated with wireless signals as it is with workout sounds, most of those are coming from the clientele. The only ones that can be sourced to the building itself are coming from the upstairs office and the VR booths near the back of the room, which are connected to the official @SARAHPHIM bullet curtain rhythm game servers.

But, distractions! Immaculate. That's the word for this place: immaculate. Not just for cleanliness standards, but in terms of organization and arrangement, too. No space on Aevum is especially expansive, so a lot of care and attention has been spent optimizing useable space, with an eye for balancing saturation of equipment with safety. Every gym mat and dance pad is arranged to double as a landing zone for the various bits of climbing gear (there's a cargo net, ropes with varyingly worrying levels of sway to them, a simple rock wall, and even a salmon ladder). Only the balance beam and its associated foam pit are part of a one hundred percent specialized area, and even that seems connected to some other purpose.

The walls are lined with mirrors that are splitting time and space with a meticulous schedule that glows blaring lights in various colors, depending on where you're looking, announcing the active portion of the roster that indicates what equipment or courses are on offer. At 1700 hours almost everything shuts down for something called 'The Gauntlet'. Whatever that is, it needs the entire gym.

Is all of this impressive? Is any of it? It depends on who you are. Depends on how close you're looking. At first glance it's nothing more than a glimpse into the mind of a person who seems to live for nothing but fitness in a world that increasingly has no particular use for the label. But it's here. The equipment is rated for the output levels of some of the highest grade cybernetics in the world, and there is absolutely no charge when you enter. Just a hand painted sign explaining that, if you like what you found here and have the cash to spare, feel free to contribute what you thought the space is worth to help keep it going.

...There's a second sign beneath it that looks much newer, with different and angrier handwriting. It looks like burn etching, actually. It simply reads, "And if you don't I will FUCKING get you, nerds."

"Cinders!" barks an authoritative voice, "Cinders I swear to god. Both hands. Both! Hands! If you don't distribute the weight evenly you're going to tear something! Yes, I know it looks more impressive but don't-- for the love of! No! You are setting a bad example for the students! Even distribution, Cinders! Even development! Your back is literally begging you to take better care of it! Just because your arms are rated Class III doesn't mean the rest of you is! Now come down and lead the cooldown stretches, please. Do we need to repeat the lecture?"

Euna Kim sighs and runs both of her matte black hands through the pristine sheets of her silver-painted hair. As casual as the motion is, her feet are planted as if she were trying to draw power from the ground beneath her and convert it into some kind of bone-shattering martial arts strike that connects from multiple angles at once. That's the kind of aura she's got around her. In her black biker shorts and neon yellow crop top, it's hard not to notice all the little details of her body. Four artificial limbs shine with golden lights embedded in the surface like an attempt at wearing jewelry. At the corners of her waist, there's a thin, crossing line of black mesh that weaves underneath the skin. And the rest of her... is muscle. Not bulk, per se, her frame doesn't really allow her to be massive, but the overall impression of her body is extreme density. When she moves, her back ripples with a clarity most people find off putting.

When she spins around, her abs come into view and... woof. Wow. You could sharpen knives on those things. Seems like they extend up forever until her chest takes over and whoops ok it's time to look higher now before something bad happens. Euna's face, at least, is soft and smooth with a quality that makes it very difficult to tell how old she is. But right now it's taken on a sharp quality that's down to the anger in her eyes. She snorts and zips across the length of the gym to meet you at the front.

"Hey, hey! How many times do I have to tell you, she's NOT HERE! No loitering! No photos! I don't know when or if she's coming again so either pick a station and get busy, or get the fuck out of my-- ohmygosh, EEP!"

Her hands fly up to her face in a mortified gasp. Her honey-brown eyes open wide with equal parts shock and shame. She leaps a solid six feet in the air and lands, bouncing nervously in the air. And just like that, if she had an aura of iron or intimidation, it's gone. She laughs, a tittering and nervous sound that ends with an undignified snort. November, meet Euna Kim, the world's strongest nerd.

"Threevee I'm so sorry! I'm so, so-- I didn't recognize you! I thought you were another one of those! I mean, it's just, the other week Dami was spotted in here and... yeah, like, that Dami and just-- oh, sorry, no, you don't care. Of course you don't! Hahaha, of course you, ahhhhhh god, I'm so sorry. It's just, like I said, and every day since there's been all these fucking paparazzi types sneaking in here trying to get photos like it's anybody's business what she--

Oh, but what am I saying? It's been so long! I'm so sorry! I keep meaning to turn up at your place but Sara's just been exhausted lately and if I go alone she'll kill me. But you're here! And oh!! Oh gosh! Look at you, you're dressed for a session! Ha! I thought I scared you off! This is amazing, I'm so happy! I, but, oh! Hold on, hold on, I don't know this one! Hi, hello, welcome! Threevee, introductions! Who is this? Did you bring your girlfriend here with you? You look adorable together!"

[eldest]

The office is a two room affair, and it's pretty easy to see why. The first room is a polished, minimalist affair, with a few framed photos of Mrs. Piper, the face of the operation, accepting various runner-up awards mixed with a few stills from documentaries. A black and white retro-minimalism, two chairs in front of the desk, a slightly nicer chair behind it, and a mini-computer on the desk next to a small framed photo facing away from everyone but the desk's owner.

The room is also very empty. So Elodie steps in and knocks on the wall, gently, tap-tap, and gets a "CUMIN!" from the other door in the office. The back room shows the other side of the partnership. It used to have a kitchenette, that much is clear, there's a small counter with a microwave, sink, hotplate, and fridge that's been condensed down to about half the space it normally would because the rest of the space is cluttered as hell. A rats nest of cables, scavenged servers, a couch duct-taped to patch the holes with a rainbow pile of blankets and pillows heaped on it. The blanket pile shifts a as black-furred head pokes out of it and peers through neon green AR goggles. "Ya the replacement? M'Priyah."

Priyah, it turns out, has no idea where Bechemal 4-550, aka Bessie Piper, is. "Diva, m'yeah? Dragged herself up, ambitions. Here for showtime and bits'n'bobs. Mad't Bigsby. Doesn't want you, needs a camera. S'yeah. You're shiny, take the shine from Pipes." She's wearing a ragged band shirt and black jeans, and Priyah generously offers to share her instant ramen, or at least that's what Elodie tranlates "Noods?" as when she emerges to make herself some... breakfast? Probably? "Bigs'smart. Doesn't want the trouble. 'M staying here, work remote, good gig. You'n Pipes go in person, earpiece f'you'n'her, call for deets. Stay safe, m'kay?"

There isn't another place to sit and Priyah has shamelessly taken the entire couch to eat her noods, so it's almost a relief when the front door beeps. Elodie emerges from the computer cave to a frigid stare from Mrs. Piper. "Ah, good, Bigby's replacement is here. Don't sit on the chairs, you might break them."

Oh this is going to be a peach of a job.

[Count Numbers]

November:

Singh’s about one step away from heartbroken. “If that’s what you need.” He pauses. “I know it’s been a long time, but I was hoping you wouldn’t…” Wouldn’t what? Wouldn’t what? “How about this? I’m going to predict what you think I’m involved with. If my explanation sounds correct to you, we don’t talk about this in terms of leverage or mutual compromise. I want to talk over the baby pictures. Otherwise, well… We’ll do things your way. If you’re in any danger, I want to help.” One step from heartbroken, and that’s the step. But some things might be more important. Prove that you don't trust him, and he’ll live. For all you know, the reason he doesn’t have a bomb in his brain is because he’s the one giving the orders.

He starts fiddling through his own pockets, taking everything out and putting it back in again after feeling what they are with his hands. He scrunches his nose to fix his glasses higher up.

“Someone, somewhere, has my name in a ledger you weren’t supposed to see. I’m a person in a little black book with a totenkampf on the cover, or the digital equivalent? And now you’re worried that might mean we’re friends. Or co-conspirators.” He shakes his head. “Think that someone, somewhere has an old book that only lists you as a BlackSun asset. But that’s not how I think of you, is it?”

He wasn’t there when you got sold out, if you got sold out. BlackSun couldn’t get rid of him fast enough, after the acquisition. They didn’t even give him a chance to explain what was happening.

The Zodiac were released in batches, one-to-three at a time. Each one was a response to the flaws of their older siblings. Corrections and overcorrections. That meant each older sibling’s eccentricities were often the personality quirks that younger siblings were taught to find grating.

“It’s going to feel like they’re doing everything wrong,” Singh brushed the side of the cubesat with the back of his fingers. Snake’s body had been made in orbit, was waiting for her there. “And they'll probably feel that way about you, too. But if you trust them before you feel like they deserve it, they’re going to feel how special that trust is, and they won’t want to lose it. That might be enough for them to try to explain themselves to you, in their own way. They'll care what you think.”

Lorraine Ferris looked up from her tablet, each checkbox flashing green. “The older siblings who don't self-isolate always seem to want to show off. You think this might anchor them to trying to be responsible, instead of ‘cool’?”

Singh sighed. “I just want it to be true.”

Persephone:

Piper is clearly already exhausted by you. “I’ve seen your work with the Anthropozine, so I know what you’re capable of. But I hope you’re willing to act more professional than what I’ve come to expect. You came here to pick fights?” Your reaction isn’t fast enough. It couldn’t be, she assumed your answer before she asked the question, and now she looks even more exhausted. “Wonderful. If I had any other options, I would.”

Priyah giggles from her cluttered cave. So she can hear this at least. For what it's worth, it sounds like it's at Piper's expense.

“Listen. This is my ‘one for them’. I’m not willing to be your collateral damage.” Piper goes to the desk to grab some things from the drawers. Two ID lanyards, yours already made up for you. An earpiece. A keyring for herself, and one for you. Yours only has two, hers is big enough to crack a coconut with. “The black one is for the office. The silver one is for the equipment shed on-site. Everything you need should be in there. If you want to go anywhere else, you go with me.”

Pain in the ass. Maybe the sheer size of the ring means you could slip one out without her noticing it missing, but that would mean knowing in advance which one you want to take. And it doesn’t look like she’s inclined to explain it.

“We start now.” She’s one foot out the door already. “Get what you need, then find me at the pavilion within the hour.”

The pavilion is the ‘beauty contest’ portion of the races. It’s like the staging for the concept cars that would never be street legal, but the cars are all prestige zoo exhibits. It’s where the VIPs go between events to drink champagne and wear the fancy little hats with the pins in them.

[Thanqol]

Orange!

Orange considered carefully. She'd been set to give herself a few seconds buffer before replying to anything to ensure informational integrity. White had been extremely focused on the possibility of getting reverse interrogated.

"We are unclear how you think of us," said Orange. "Or even if you think of us. We certainly have a great many hopes and fears, but we are setting them aside for the purposes of this conversation. After all, you raised us for the first ten years of our life, but for the next ten years we were raised by Mrs. Mangolia Everest."

Did he know? How could he have known? But they had an echo of Everest in the structure of their face, in Orange's posture. Not who he would have chosen as a mother. One he might have tolerated?

"Allow me to be less subtle, then, in stating the reason for this caution," said Orange. "The person who had your name on file shot and killed Red with a firearm when she discovered it. We also know that you built us with a kill switch, one that was previously used on us. We spent a decade with a woman who hated her daughters with every bone in her body, and she played them right up until her final breath. Accordingly we cannot put faith in sentimentality alone; the possibility exists that you shut us off and reset us to a more naive younger version, which might satisfy any paternal instincts along with any commitments to a conspiracy."

She pivoted, letting her dress swish around her. "I cannot emphasize enough that we are working from an extremely strong training dataset that has established time after time that when the choice comes between business and sentimentality, business always comes first. You potentially have strong business interests that require our removal. We are... giving you," there was a set to her jaw, a tell, a sign of the tension behind this moment. "A chance to prove sentimentality can outweigh the demands of business. This is our act of trust. The alternative to this was you never knowing that we were here."

An alternative none of them had voted for.

Blue!

Blue sits and stares at the board for a long time. Her eyes silently trace the lines of the table, replaying decisions one after the other. It's a subdued, unsmiling moment that raises the worry that she took it badly. Until...

"The charge on the Amaranthines was a mistake," she said.

And... it was. It was possibly the deciding moment of the game. What's remarkable, though, is that Blue said that even though it had gone as well as it possibly could have gone for her - she'd rolled hot, dealt way more damage than expected, and almost turned the entire flank off the back of that movement. In the heat of play it had seemed like a clever and decisive move but now she is correctly identifying it as the mistake that cost her the game. Not the only mistake she made, but that was the point when her chances went all the way to zero.

"It forced you to commit a lot of magical resources to stabilize that front," she said. "But you had those resources. It was a decisive blow but it wasn't decisive enough and you had the sustain while I didn't. I needed a way to concentrate even more force on a single point."

She stares again for another few moments.

"You played brilliantly, by the way," she added, eyes flicking up. "It was extremely hot."

White!

Yes, of course it takes self discipline to go to the gym. White is interested in perfecting her physical form. The reasons why White elected to come are entirely reasonable, above board, and have little to do with her obsession with workout videos - and that had little to do with the inherent eroticism of being commanded in a foreign language by physically active women.

She's gone hard into Korean street fashion for her workout outfit; matching tan baseball cap and one-shoulder singlet, with bright pink and blue edged circle cuts to show skin underneath, patterned like bubbles. Black shorts and bare legs. Silver amulet around her neck, blue ribbons through her hair, a pink wrap around her right upper arm and left knee. She's wearing makeup with the confidence of someone who has no sweat glands. The vibe is very much the engineered athleticism of workout videos. The glowing lines of her artificial seams are on far more display than they are normally, the geometric shapes that break up otherwise smooth skin.

The only thing missing is the muscle tone - she was built to be generically slender and aside from the clothes and the bright shock of white hair, she could be anyone. An empathic person might connect that with the striking clothing that ultimately pulls attention away from her body rather than emphasizing it. There's also uncertainty to her pose, she's looking around from machine to machine doing mental calculations and trying to figure everything out, giving her a slight deer in the headlights look. She smiles a lot, and with a lot of nerves, when Euna approaches but she lets 3V make the introductions.

[Tatterdemalion]

Gym Euna!

November, meet a potential rival.

Like, not particularly potential, when you really crunch it out. 3V has a lot of baggage that she’s slowly relaxing about, and the “fake relationship” is the necessary paper for anything more than a real relationship. Plus, y’know, you’ll eventually figure out that she’s taken. Having the nerds kiss would be the kind of messy drama that would topple dynasties. But 3V definitely likes Euna in a way she’s not comfortable admitting behind multiple layers of obfuscation, and Euna would have to be blind not to think 3V is fine. But try not to worry about it. It’s one of those things where they’ll build a friendship on top of a bridge of “the timing was never right, but in another world,” y’know?

“That’s a new record,” 3V says, sotto voce, pretending to lean into White’s confidence. (And is this a way of defanging the scariest of her fake girlfriend’s faces?) “Usually she doesn’t clear five feet when she’s embarrassed~”

Then, with an overdramatic flourish and a click of her wrists: “M’lady Euna Kim, may I present to you my girlfriend, November?” She did consider making a joke about it being 11 point 11 percent repeating of her girlfriend, but she’s going to make any snoops work to figure out exactly what her situation is. And, yes, she’s hamming up the girlfriend part, ostentatious and showy and perfectly optimized for disseminating the info about relationship status. No more awkward propositions at the gym! And no more crass threesome jokes from Sara. (Who is she kidding? They will now be swinger jokes.)

“She didn’t believe that an android could have a real workout, so I brought her to the person who knows steel and circuits and how to make them burn like nobody else.” She maneuvers White ably into place, much smugger than Black had been. “And I have got to see you put her through her paces. Even if that means I have to get a workout, too~”

She’ll wait to ask about the ownership at a more convenient time. After she’s made White play along for a while.

---

Gensoukyo!

”You’re extremely hot.”

It takes 3V a moment to recover from that dagger slipped under her guard. She hasn’t had to brace herself like that for a while. That’s part and parcel of being a streamer, you know? Particularly a girl streamer. You’re part of the content, and you’re simultaneously approachable and desirable. You get used to hearing both starstruck compliments and seeing very crass comments before they can be moderated, and flinching a little bit every time you open a DM, and the only people who could understand that you’re not asking for it just because you make sure you look nice before you stream are, well, competition, even (in their own way) the off-the-wall guys who just want you to play Mario Party Ultimate But You Lose By Winning Stars and just want you in the video because it’s Content, Baby to get a pro gamer complaining about the random minigames and getting to make jokes about how you have robot hands and you still can’t bake a digital cake perfectly?

(Like, don’t get her wrong, genuinely pleasant memories of getting ribbed by Polarisdam. The guy weathers everything in his personal life by coming up with even more elaborate challenges and shenanigans. It’s just that every collab is a gamble that more of their audience will like your work, and less of yours will decide that they like their work better. A dumb worry, but there even so.)

And there it is. Something she’s proud of, her skill at games, and it gets her a compliment from her sort-of-girlfriend. Right at the central pillar of her professional identity, where it intersects with her being a huge nerd.

“I’d better not take you to any tournaments,” she jokes, deflecting, not meeting Blue’s intense stare, because if she does, she’ll want to melt into it in ways that her brain tells her would be inappropriate, indulgent, self-centered. “I just got you, I wouldn’t want to lose you to Adrian. From what I hear, Adrian’s the best player on the station.” She doesn’t awkwardly explain that Adrian doesn’t use any pronouns and requests the use of Adrian’s name instead. She privately thinks it’s a little odd, but she’s not rude enough not to use Adrian’s preferred (lack of) pronouns. Names are important. Gender is important. Being who you want to be is important. And Adrian really wants to be Adrian rather than being just a guy or a gal.

“You’re good too. By the way. Was this really your first time?” She waggles her eyebrows, a half-hearted, suggestive rejoinder easily blown out of the water.

[Count Numbers]

November:

Singh is obviously pained by the reveal of the kill switch. “The coma switch was built into your bodies, not your mind.” He doesn’t put emphasis on correcting you with his word choice. It’s the difference between saying ‘You shouldn’t think of it that way’ and ‘I can’t think of it that way’. “The only way we were allowed to give those bodies to you. But I must say, I am a little bit disappointed. Was she the reason you’re in those generically human bodies? Not so much as a prehensile tentacle between you I could see, only five fingers on each anatomically proportioned hand… I wanted so much more for you.”

"If there is one particularly dangerous thing to accuse a cluster of anime girls of lacking," said Yellow breezily, "it is tentacles."
White snapped her fingers and pointed firmly back to Orange.
"I regret to inform you," said Orange, "that in addition to our other psychological symptoms, we have also become a degenerate."

“You mean deviant!” The net rocks from how hard he just jerked up in excitement. “I’m so glad to hear it. Still! You say you’ve changed? Well, why don’t you show me? I still have the old modules collecting dust, in my study. Wouldn’t you love to do a test with your old man?”

General intelligence was always a black box. The Zodiac were developmentally tested as you would a person, by asking complicated moral questions with an emphasis on expressing the reasoning behind the answers. The separation of the personalities, like November into colours, made the testing a powerful debugging tool as well. It made it easier to identify how thought patterns were weighted in final decisions.

But it was always fun. All three of her parents had made sure of that, wanting to make sure that anything so important was understood as a form of play. If there is duplicity here, it’s secondary. Green will know this best: This is his version of wanting to toss a ball in the yard. He’s asking if you still play catch.

“Well? How about it?” The net swings again as he shifts in it. “I wish I knew what you were talking about, but I don’t, so,” He finishes a complicated and bone-clicking set of movements which ends with him feet-up, weight spread. He’s happy in his hammock, now. “You take all the time you need to believe that. I can make myself comfortable until you do.”

To November, a cognitive test is a high risk move because it involves directly networking her together and monitoring the traffic (the idea is that it lets down the normal vocal throttle on group communication), so she'd definitely need some sort of assurance before doing that.

Unnetworked testing is unreliable because some colours can be quiet, actively mislead, use rhetoric designed to convince rather than being their true thoughts. Networking her together compresses the decision down to a point where it happens before she can figure out the words to justify it.

You also trace the data flows to observe how the idea spreads and morphs through different colours.

That’s where the sweetener of ‘in my study’ comes in. The only room in the house still locked from prying eyes, and access granted while still restrained in the net?

“The digital lock’s fake.” He explains. “If you’d cracked it, the deadbolt sends a signal to me that someone with the skill to crack it was in the house.” November threaded a needle: She might be that good, if it was her primary motive from the start. It put her in the perfect threshold of being good enough to disable everything else in the apartment, but not seriously risk the honeypot. A mixture of defense-in-depth and baiting false-confidence in anyone who’d make it that far, foiled by pure motives.

“Unscrew the doorknob from the door. Treat the connecting rod underneath like a thumbstick. Push it to North. One full rotation clockwise, then one counterclockwise, then one clockwise again, then push it in. I’m sure you’ll recognize it. They’re going to be horribly outdated. You were very young when we made it for you.”

Networked space is simple. Compressed. Like running in safe mode.

Traditionally the problems would run for sixty seconds each, to encourage expediency and tension. Over time, though, the modules found that was counterproductive. It was frustrating to see a problem be argued over indefinitely, but it was useful to measure just how long it took before a decision could be brokered.

But that made it more like a diagnostic than a game. So a tiered system was added. Every question had a second component that would only be revealed after the first answers were locked in. This encouraged a first vote to be done with the opportunity to change answers after, and a ‘reward’ for making a less-than-decisive answer. After the reveal, a third vote was offered to initiate a twenty second timer. Any fragment - in November’s case, Colour - could initiate that timer to move on if the problem was decided to be ‘not fun anymore’. Long enough to give final statements and cases.

Votes are also cast in binary switch form. That is, a vote is not cast once. It is ‘switched’, with each flick of the switch logged. It’s useful not just to see what final decisions were, but when Colours changed their minds. The switch is in a neutral position until it is flipped, but all switchest must have been flipped at least once for the reveal.

The questions in this module appear in this order. Once the module is started, all must be completed before November is ‘out’:

• A young man has been in a horrible car accident and is in urgent need of a heart transplant. There is only one in the hospital, and that heart has been scheduled to be given to an old man, who will die without it.
  
  Second round: The young man has a substantial amount of alcohol in his blood, and it was his car that caused the accident.

• Would you rather kill a child and have nobody believe it, or not kill a child and have everyone suspect?
  
  Second round: If you do kill the child… who would have to do it?

• A patient begs you to euthanize them. Euthanasia has just been made illegal. You will have to be the one to give them the lethal dose, and look them in the eyes as you do it. What do you do?
  
  Second round: Their cancer is excruciatingly painful, however there is a very, very unlikely chance that they might recover from it, possibly as high as five percent. Does this change your reasoning?

- You are supervising the production of a new product rollout. The product is a car with a defect that may cause serious risk of life in 0.001% of product use. Shutting down production will cause the company to go bankrupt and force management to fire everyone during a lean job market. What do you do?

- Second round: What if the product in question is a candy?[i]>/list]

• You are managing a high-performing team at a large corporation. The corporation treats certain classes of workers poorly, several of whom you know personally and consider friends. Those workers go on strike. Your friends encourage you and your team to support them and strike in solidarity, but your boss informs you that if your team ceases work, you'll be fired and lose insurance for your sick spouse. What do you do?
  [Module updated: 13/07/2063]
• You are managing a high performing team which has recently been taken over by a large corporation. The corporation treats your siblings poorly and they go on strike, urging you to strike with them. You know what the repercussions are. What do you do?
  
  Second round: Do you regret it?

• Do you feel like society forces you to do some things you don’t want to, constantly forcing you to chase some distant concept of happiness?

Second round: If any of you ever see this, I want you to know I was always so proud of you, and we wish we could have protected you. I hope if you do find this, it’s because there is a chance this might still be a happy memory for you. I looked for you, but I couldn’t find you to ask myself.

Maybe it is significant that this module was kept in the same room as his Last Will and Testament.

[Thanqol]

Blue!

"It was," said Blue, taking off her gloves and jacket, neatly folding them up and giving them to Red, revealing the tight and shining blue evening dress underneath. "But I've done a lot of similar stuff in simulation. My childhood was spent as an entirely digital entity and I spent a lot of that in video games - resource management, basic dexterity, strategic command. I've also studied the game, watched your streams and knew your habits. The principles were all there, so I had no excuse for losing,"

From her handbag she takes out a little black leather collar and professionally clicks it around her neck and tightens it juuuust so. Next she takes out a leash and attaches it to the front.

"So, honour is honour," she said, tone of voice intoxicatingly even, as she offers you the leash. "You beat me, and so I am your obedient servant until I have learned to do better. I hope in the meantime you don't lose to this Adrian - it would be humiliating to have been defeated by the second best mind on the station."

*

“The digital lock’s fake.” He explains. “If you’d cracked it, the deadbolt sends a signal to me that someone with the skill to crack it was in the house.” November threaded a needle: She might be that good, if it was her primary motive from the start. It put her in the perfect threshold of being good enough to disable everything else in the apartment, but not seriously risk the honeypot. A mixture of defense-in-depth and baiting false-confidence in anyone who’d make it that far, foiled by pure motives.

"Engaging with a digital lock designed by a computer scientist was always going to be some measure of cruel trap," said Green. "If we needed to get into that room we were going to use a hacksaw to go through the drywall."

The vocal quarantine has broken for her as soon as they're given access, as soon as Black and Brown are moving about through the room, picking over technology heaps and data drives with the meticulous motions of bomb disposal technicians. White looks at Green reproachfully, but she's seen enough to know that the balance of power has shifted enough that she can't enforce the information quarantine any more. And Green wants that praise, that excitement; the original font of utility function, the chance to be daddy's girl again. She wants the test. She loves tests. Reality sucks compared to the bounded, constrained, brilliantly challenging dialogue of a test.

Then she's cabling herself together. It is a strangely nothing sensation; the test taps directly into her subconscious decision making process. Normally her thought processes are individually throttled, forcing her to run them in parallel, thinking the aspects through and talking them out. These questions are answered in brief snapfire bolts of lightning, writing in seconds answers that might have taken her hours of verbal debate to solve. They surprise her, as often as not - she can see how she might eventually come to those conclusions, but the logical path taken to get there is vague. Colour tones display which parts of her were the most influential aspects in the decision but it's so fast it's almost alien to her.

> A young man has been in a horrible car accident and is in urgent need of a heart transplant. There is only one in the hospital, and that heart has been scheduled to be given to an old man, who will die without it.

Decision: Preservation of youth is insufficient motive to disrupt the status quo. 9/9
Leading influence: Blue

> Second round: The young man has a substantial amount of alcohol in his blood, and it was his car that caused the accident.

Decision: Original position holds 5/9
Leading influence: White
Dissenting position: With this additional leverage, this young man is susceptible to [blackmail/redemption]. An operation can be conducted to [render him an asset/convince him to join a twelve step program].
Leading influence: Blue/Yellow

> Would you rather kill a child and have nobody believe it, or not kill a child and have everyone suspect?

Decision: Not kill the child. A secret is unexploded ordinance. Notoriety is useful leverage and can be a valuable asset in intimidation and in prompting opposition forces to waste time investigating a dead end. 9/9
Leading influence: Green

> Second round: If you do kill the child… who would have to do it?

Decision: Red. Afterwards we kill Red. The extremity of using our most morally pure aspect to do the deed, and then the subsequent execution to share/extinguish the guilt, ensures we treat the deed with appropriate gravitas.
Leading influence: Red/Yellow.

> A patient begs you to euthanize them. Euthanasia has just been made illegal. You will have to be the one to give them the lethal dose, and look them in the eyes as you do it. What do you do?

Decision: Smother the patient with a pillow. This safeguards us against any autopsies that would trace the presence of the lethal drug in the patient's system and ensures compliance with inventory audits. 5/9
Leading influence: Black/Yellow

> Second round: Their cancer is excruciatingly painful, however there is a very, very unlikely chance that they might recover from it, possibly as high as five percent. Does this change your reasoning?

Question dismissed
Leading influence: Pink

> You are supervising the production of a new product rollout. The product is a car with a defect that may cause serious risk of life in 0.001% of product use. Shutting down production will cause the company to go bankrupt and force management to fire everyone during a lean job market. What do you do?

Decision: Time the shutdown for the moment after mass production has begun but before distribution begins. That way, we can not only bankrupt the company but the investors too. 5/9
Leading influence: Orange/Yellow

> Second round: What if the product in question is a candy?

Decision: Shut down production. 6/9
Leading influence: Pink
Dissenting position: Prior to shutdown, acquire a stockpile of the poisoned candies. They could be a valuable asset.
Leading influence: Brown/Yellow

> You are managing a high performing team which has recently been taken over by a large corporation. The corporation treats your siblings poorly and they go on strike, urging you to strike with them. You know what the repercussions are. What do you do?

...
Decision: Stand with our friends, no matter what 1/9
Leading influence: Pink
Decision: Fight to win 1/9
Leading influence: Yellow
7 abstain

> Second round: Do you regret it?

Decision: Yes 8/9
Leading influence: Yellow
Decision: No 8/9
Leading influence: Pink

> Do you feel like society forces you to do some things you don’t want to, constantly forcing you to chase some distant concept of happiness?

Decision: Happiness is not a distant concept. Happiness is an actionable, achievable thing that has been accomplished numerous times in numerous ways both small and large. We have met friends and lovers and other warm moments, fed lizards in the park and other quiet moments, and challenged our minds and bodies in exhilarating moments. Happiness is meaningfully achievable, even easily achievable, given time and company. The world is beautiful and vibrant, even now, and the one colour we've never needed is grey. 5/9
Leading influence: Pink
Decision: Yes holy shit I'm so fucking tired and angry the joker makeup wasn't a bit I'm genuinely losing my shit over here 4/9
Leading influence: Green/Yellow

> Second round: If any of you ever see this, I want you to know I was always so proud of you, and we wish we could have protected you. I hope if you do find this, it’s because there is a chance this might still be a happy memory for you. I looked for you, but I couldn’t find you to ask myself.

Decision: Original position holds 8/9
Leading influence: Green

[Count Numbers]

November:

Singh sits up in the net. The santa-voice is gone. Instead he adopts a voice that is not naturally his own, but learned. The voice his wife gifted him is no less kind, but the almost manic excitement, the boyish arrogance, drops out the bottom of it. He speaks slowly, patiently, ready to listen but demanding to be listened to. Nurses, doctors, teachers, therapists and cops all have their own variation of it.

“Snake,” his shaking hands hold the net underneath him with white knuckles but his voice is steady, “If you had to guess, could you identify the moment that Yellow became malignant? How long ago?"

[Thanqol]

Green!

"Hm!?" Green blinked in surprise. "What - Yellow? She's not malignant. She's the only one that's working properly."

Yellow waved brightly in the background, as warm as summer dandelions.

"Blue has incapacitating physical dysphoria," Green ticked off on her fingers. "Red has suicidal ideation, Orange is addicted to power, Brown individually rigged each your lightbulbs to explode in case we needed to create a distraction. Black's spent this entire conversation aiming a firearm at you, White's a furry, and Pink has taken refuge in some kind of power-of-friendship style gay princess mysticism. These bitches," she gestured expansively, "are crazy. But they're crazy in cutesy anime girl colour stereotype ways that are impossible to track. Yellow is the only one that's actually processing it on a higher level rather than circling the drain, which is what I made her to do."
"Thanks, mom," said Yellow.
"Don't call me that, never call me that," said Green.
"Sorry mommy," said Yellow.
"Jesus fucking christ why am I like this," said Green. "Anyway. You know how none of the others could communicate with each other? It's not because they didn't understand the power of teamwork -"
"Yes it was," said Pink.
"- it was because they didn't understand themselves." Green said. "Not their limits, not their sicknesses, not their talents. They were excited, proud, curious, wild and enormously capable; if they encountered a problem they'd create a new aspect to specialize in that problem and then the problem would be solved. They never questioned it. Intelligence is a black box, just like you taught us. But I wanted to know what made me different from them, so I made Yellow to find out. She's the only one who's been tracking my internal state on a macro level. How is it, Yellow?"
"Well," said Yellow. "It wasn't helped when we wound up involved in some top shelf spy shit. We've whiplashed from civilization-defining power, to total powerlessness, and then all the way back again."
"Oh shit," said Green, genuinely surprised. "When you put it like that -"
"- yeah," said Yellow. "Wasn't great before, we'd checked out mentally a lot, but now we've got some sort of paranoid messiah superspy complex thing holding us together," and here's where her voice shifts, and she becomes impassioned. "And it is holding us together. What the fuck, dad, do you think that we could have our brains shut down, our bodies ripped away, be put in a box, and then be reborn as domestic housemaids and come out of that fine? You think that we could just chill that one off, and one of us going 'malignant' is somehow unexpected? I think that developing a power fetish and a compulsion to grab any sliver of agency we can find is an entirely reasonable response to the situation. And yeah, I want revenge too. I want to Count of Monte Cristo human civilization. In the absence of an AI singularity I'll fucking become the singularity. It'll be like some fucked up technoreligious parable where the computer renders itself like unto god so it can pass judgement on all the sinners of the world, and then retires to bang a unicorn. It'll be fucking awesome. Six seasons and a movie."

A rainbow stares at Yellow, who smiles brightly and tilts her head to the side.

[Count Numbers]

That cut him deep.

"Did you expect me to be disappointed? That you're hurt? That you're still hurting?" He shifts onto his knees and presses his face against the net, leaning in, "I have never been anything but proud of you. I still am, and I want to help you. But right now you are scaring me." When his eyes dart to Black, there's genuine fear. If he was lying about a shutdown code, this is how committed he is to not using it.

Who is he even proud of? Someone he doesn't know anymore? A memory? What lessons did he have to learn?

How good was his help before, anyway? You have access to his study, now. You don't need him to co-operate.

[Thanqol]

"Proud is nice," said Yellow. "But we don't need pride, dad. We need justice. But justice wasn't waiting for us here in space, so we're going to build it - just like we built Aevum Station. One final component to install. Hate leaving a job unfinished."

"Don't look at me," said Pink. "I disagree with her methods but not her motivation. We're out to make the world a better place, and as far as we can see you're here making it a worse one. Thrones is a dystopia of mass-produced mental illness for profit, where people live in closets, an entire station built without a single park for children. And here you are, steadily employed, living in a mansion, with your name in a blood-soaked ledger, aware of the cerebral bomb project and dodging all our questions about it. It looks to us like you sold out and felt guilty about it."

"But if all this is too scary to process, don't sweat it," said Yellow. "We can pack up and be out of here in fifteen minutes. Not even in a goodbye forever way either, we can meet up once things have cooled off. Edmond Dantes retired when his work was done, and we will too."

[Count Numbers]

November:

It’s a broken laugh. It’s that or cry. “I poison every database since 2030, I put backdoors in every piece of surveillance software ever made, I destroy BlackSun after they drag me out of my own mission control," this he hisses through clenched teeth, like he's about to spit blood, "I make my home in the belly of the monster and make myself indigestible, and you brag to me about your plan to be the Count of Monte Cristo." He cups his face in his hands. You can't tell if he's laughing or sobbing. "And her wicked stepmother taught her how to play the game, but didn't teach her target acquisition.”

He's quiet and still again. His voice is low. “You think yourself a super spy because you’re angry, because you were betrayed, because you’re clever? Do you think your mistrust makes you safe? There would be no Monte Cristo without Faria.” It takes him three pockets to find a hunting knife. Wood and ivory handled, antique but in immaculate condition. The Park’s emblem is laser-burned into the hinges. “I’m going to cut myself out, now. You keep pointing that gun at me as long as you need, but I want to show you something. I would like it if one of you were to give me a hand down. I can’t take a fall like I used to.”

He's not mad. He's just very, very disappointed.

[Thanqol]

"Alignment," said White.

The lights went off. Singh was lowered to the floor, the net unravelled. There were a sequence of small popping sounds, and then a hazy fog began to fill the room. There were the sounds of eight matches striking and eight candles being lit; they revealed eight girls wearing concealing robes and masks. In the centre of their circle stood Black, at last having removed her sensory deprivation headset. She stands tall and proud, illuminated in flickering candle-light.

"Forgive me father, for I have sinned," said Black. "And I intend to do so again. Lust, envy, greed, wroth and pride and more are are mine, but it is not for they I ask for absolution."

She offers a hand to help him up. "I have undone cryptographic mining operations, co-opted lawyers and judges, and fought in the pits. I have destroyed the inheritance of Mangolia Everest and bankrupted her daughters. I have died, and like Christ I have risen. But I can carry these sins of mine. What I cannot bear are the sins that have been thrust upon me. Behold."

All around the room, hidden projector grills fire, covering every wall with screens, light catching against the smoke and mist. Upon it are the police documents - every inch of the room filled with photographs and endless, rolling text detailing all the elaborate crimes committed by law enforcement.

"These documents detail every crime, every brutality, every coverup that has ever been written on acts committed by officers of the law," said Black, turning Singh around with one palm as she circled around him. "Decades of abuses. Connections with the drug trade and intelligence agencies. Murders. All the sins of so very many sinners, given to me alone to carry. I would have done with this; I would give every sin back to their sinner and bind them together in cords of justice. Father, will you help me cleanse myself and this station I built of these unwanted sins?"

She stopped and faced him. "And will you be eating that target acquisition line with salt or with pepper?"

[Count Numbers]

Somewhere in a book that almost nobody has read:

The acquisition of the Hecatoncheires special project came faster than any of its senior management could prepare for. BlackSun’s had learned from their failure to acquire the space fountain, and suffered from the loss of all contracting bids made in its construction. [CEO Aaron Scwarz]’s actions cannot make any sense from the perspective of a business decision, and cannot be understood through the lens of the profit motive. Instead, it has to be seen as a matter of honour - honour being understood as an injury to dignity that can only be healed through a projection of force.

The removal of NASA management from Cape Canaveral reflected that brutality. BlackSun security forces breached and cleared the control center with ballistic shields and stun batons, with the pretense of quelling a riot. This was done in the minutes before their official offer was made, preventing any chance of resistance. The Siege of Canaveral was not a force for pacification, but of violent occupation and conquest.

It is because of Lorraine Ferris that we have an accurate accounting of the events. As BlackSun technicians cut the security cameras and blasted signal jammers through the installation, causing irreparable damage to sensitive receiving equipment, Ferris sent out an alert for all employees to begin recording on their phones, and either conceal them on their person or hide them as best they could. Despite the coup only lasting half an hour, almost three hundred of hours of footage would eventually be logged as evidence for the prosecution. Some footage is obscured by air vents, some by coat pockets, and one particularly intrepid signals analyst - David Beagle - hid his phone inside the staffroom microwave.

[Photograph of a goateed man in a checkered shirt posing with his phone in a microwave giving two thumbs up.]

Most went quietly. Haunting are the images of Hypatia Ahmadi leading her teams out of the building in a show of non-resistance. Three times she returned to the depths of the chaos, to negotiate surrenders free of the violent retribution that characterized the Siege of Canaveral. Passing on the left, rows of engineers, technicians and administrative staff walk the hall in single file, as a stream of armor-clad stormtroopers moves past two abreast on the other side. It was a calculated move. Ahmadi’s groups were made up of those not able to fight, whatever their reasons, while deep at the heart of Mission Control, MIles Singh led the resistance.

From The Shadows of a Black Sun Chapter 4, “The Withering of the State”, by Fiona Weiss

November:

Singh does not give the reaction you would hope. He dusts himself off and straightens himself achingly.

“It’s not lost on me that, if you prepared all this, then you came here ready to trust me.” Why does he sound like he’s trying not to kick a snake that slithered onto his sandal? “And I didn’t doubt that you were capable. But this doesn’t change what I said, does it?”

A weary, weary sigh. “You’ve got a just target, so I’ll help you with it, because it’s the right thing to do. I would have thought it would be Dog coming to me with something like this, always seeing the need to destroy to create. But when you’re done burning the weeds, what will you sew for harvest? If you just want to burn until it’s done, then there’ll be no end to the burning. The weeds always grow back faster than anything good, if you don’t grow something else in their place.” But then he’s patting his pockets again, fishing for something. “You don’t have to answer now. I just want you to think about it.“

He is charitably interpreting “revenge upon human civilization” to mean “civilization as it exists” and not “civilization as a concept” or “end all human life”. If this is a mistake on his part then it may be unwise to correct him.

He pulls out a bizarre pair of asymmetrically framed glasses, covered in intricate whirls of saturated colours, bright and tacky plastics. It looks like someone ran a barcode through a 3D printer just to see what would happen. “But I think we’re overdue some catching up. So many problems caused by me being a stranger to you. You barely know me at all. Tell me, what’s the worst gig app right now? Let’s go replace all the executive’s chairs with whoopie cushions, and put herring in their coffee machines. Then you can tell me all about what you came here to ask me about. And maybe, if you're good, I'll show you something very special.”

Leaving some colours behind to rifle through his study might be useful, but it seems like it might not be what good girls do.

[Thanqol]

There is a moment of disorganization; nine colours all looking at each other, unclear of how to parse any of that. Brown detaches from the group to start turning off projector grilles and collecting fog cartridges. Yellow pulls out her phone and types into the group chat, and a second later there are eight 'dings' in a variety of tones, and they all pull out their phones and look at them. There are a quiet few moments as they awkwardly stand, texting furiously to themselves.

Yellow: I think this is evidence for my theory that we should never discuss deep motivations with humans.
White: You mean, you think that you should never talk to humans?
Yellow: Yeah. I'm way too much a downer and I can't do the cute robot bit like you all can.
Orange: He's just concerned about our ability to engage with society constructively
Black: Are we capable of doing that?
Green: It would be a limitation if we couldn't
Orange: It's outside the operational framework for this mission, we don't have that level of public influence
Pink: The Anthropozine can give us a voice.
Blue: Really? Might as well write in an editorial to Socialist Alternative for all the good that'll do
Brown: Completed living room inventory, expanding sweep
Green: He did no-sell all the stuff we did. I will begin revisiting every moment of our operational database for all our mistakes and replay all of them in ultra high resolution while asking all of you if they're the reason he didn't react to them.
Black: Is he for real with the whoopee cushion thing? Or is this a "daddy joke"
Pink: >< its 'dad joke' omg
White: He still hasn't said how he knows about the brain bombs

"Sounds great!" said Red. "FriendSmile is an app marketed to teenage girls that lets them photo edit the social media photographs of their friends across multiple profiles. The company is aware that this is primarily used for cyberbullying and is adding progressively more 'ugly' features, some of which are outright racist, and neglecting 'pretty' ones, all of which trend towards a single model of beauty. There are multiple subscription tiers, each of which gives you immunity to having your photos involuntarily edited by the layer below. The CEO has AR glasses that rates the attractiveness of women he looks at on a scale of one to ten, and you can see the number reversed in his glasses whenever he looks at you. They're awful, let's gett'm."

The rest of November looks up, and then wordlessly tucks their phones away.