Coven's Rebellion Chapter 20

As a test of bulk upload on Fluff4.me, I have uploaded three new chapters of this story! If you want to read this chapter there, here's the link: https://fluff4.me/work/QuietValerie/Covens-Rebellion/chapter/19

As for how I'm doing, I'm trying my best to keep uploading. I'm at a point in Ryn where I'm struggling to write this section, it's just not flowing, but I have exciting things I want to write in the story after this section is done. It's rough, and I'm sorry that I've been failing you all in a time when you could really use a story about a badass trans mage who has stable housing, food, and friendships.

May

I sat slouched at the desk, staring down into it where the holographic display ran through the information again.

“There's a pretty big hole in our intel,” I said softly, scrolling back a bit with a flick of my index finger.

Desmonia frowned and looked ready to protest, but waited for me to complete the thought.

Stopping the scrolling on the section I wanted, I began to read. “Secondary analysis conducted by United Nations analysts corroborates the initial findings reported by AR researchers. Application of the QC-RL-084 virus to a Neural Seed Generated Autonomous Intelligence (NSGAI) proxy consistently resulted in measurable degradation—ranging from minor to severe—of core simulation integrity.”

“Okay?” Des said with an uncertain nod, waiting for me to elaborate.

“NSGAI proxy,” I emphasised. “What is an NSGAI proxy? Like, what is close enough to us that tests done on this thing gives useful data in killing us? There's no mention of what a proxy is or how it was created — at least, not in the UN data.”

My friend went stock still while data-driven thought raced behind her eyes. Finally, she began to nod. “You’re right. Whatever it is, it wasn't an AI of any great capability, or they'd have used them by now. It was such a huge blow to the Americans — not having AI capable of taking us on. It's still concerning, though. It's just another reason to hit this place, though — yet more information we need to find out.”

“Okay, but it makes me uneasy.”

The truth was, maybe it wasn’t the upcoming operation that had me on edge, but the possibility of what we’d uncover in the stolen data. Even the implications were enough to scare me.

“Rosa and Amelia are very good at this, trust them,” said Desmonia, reaching across the desk to take my hand. “It'll be okay.”

Looking up into her eyes, then down at her hand where it sat atop mine, I frowned. Des was trying to be comforting, but… I didn't like how it made me feel — for her to need to comfort me when it was her operation and her people in the direct line of fire. I couldn't help but expect the worst, I guess, but why?

Trying to smile gratefully, I stood up from the desk and took my hand back. “Okay. Well… it's your show now. Let me know if you need me.”

“May,” said Desmonia as I began to leave. I turned to meet her gaze again. “May… I'm here if you need me, too.”

Despite myself, I have her the tiniest of smiles. “Thanks.”

When I stepped outside, sunlight fell over me like a warm blanket. The building where we did a lot of our operational work was built to look like a stable from the outside — a bit of an in-joke with us — and beside it, a hobbit style warren was built into a low hill. Inside there, I quickly made my way down dark, cozy hallways to the room where I did the bulk of my work.

“Hey.”

I almost jumped out of my skin with fright when the soft, hesitant voice spoke.

Sitting perched on the edge of a sofa with knees together and hands folded in her lap, was Cerridwen, the tech who was working the reactors for a couple of our projects. Seeing her here, without the context of any work I knew of, I noticed something. Her avatar was incredibly beautiful, just as I remembered it, but she didn't wear it very well. It was like kinda like when an adventurer got new boots in CORA, and they had to wear them in a bit before they fit properly. She hadn't finished wearing it in, or whatever.

“Um, Cerri… hey,” I said awkwardly, trying to gauge why she was here.

The subjectively older woman just stared at me for a couple of seconds while her body went through the simulated motions of existence. “May. I was told… can you help me?”

I wasso terribly confused and caught off guard, but the sight of someone reaching out for help flipped a switch in me, and I strode forward to take my usual seat. The screens of my workstation all flickered to life and shifted on their arms like flowers following the sun. I settled them with an idle gesture.

“Cerri, what's up, what can I do?”

“I don't feel good,” she said softly, and alarmingly, slowly.

Frowning, I leaned forward, lessening the distance between us slightly. “What's wrong? Can you describe it to me?”

She avoided my inquiring look and opted to stare at the floor instead. For a moment, she seemed to be thinking, but then she came to a listless, alnost lifeless stop, and a thousand-yard stare took hold. One second, then ten passed like that, and I cleared my throat, trying to get her to snap out of it.

Nothing happened, so on a hunch, I pinged her directly, digi-frame to digi-frame. A response came back, and along with it came a base information packet. Contained within, I found a base emotion transmission, but devoid of emotion, and a log of her total subjectively experienced time in this conversation. For me, it had barely been a minute. For her… it was two days.

I sucked in an alarmed breath when I saw the time stamps. She was running into the same issues as many other SAI right now — the issues that I had no diagnosis for, only hunches.

Acting on that hunch, I stood back up and joined her on the sofa. I made a note of falling heavily into it, jostling her body as I did so. She looked up, dazed.

My arm fell down onto her shoulders heavily, almost like a blow being struck. She flinched and frowned — a sight that made me smile. A frown was good, it meant emotional input was being sent to her avatar.

“Cerri, what's up?” I shook her good naturedly, then grinned impishly as I curled my hand around so it hung above her head — fingers pulled together like the snout of an animal looking down at her. My voice went higher, and I moved my fingers like it was the finger-puppet speaking. “Other than me, of course.”

A truly baffled look went first towards my finger puppet, then at me directly. “Huh?”

Smiling mischievously, I shrugged. “Dunno. I learned that one from my sister, though. It wasn't in any of the instructional material they trained my pre-conscious self with, which honestly is a whole can of prideful worms — learning different, better ways to do things than— nevermind. You see, I realised, watching her talk to some people, that a lot of the time, people will become utterly distracted from their problems when you do something so odd that base instinct demands that they try and understand.”

Blinking up at the finger puppet May, she slowly began to smile. “I guess it worked.”

“Good, because now that you're fully present, I want to ask some questions about how you're doing,” I said, growing serious again. I took my hand back, but only to grab hers. I began to knead her knuckles gently. “How often do you inhabit an avatar?”

Her body began to grow still, but I pressed down hard on her knuckle. “Use simple memory recall — no logs. How often? Subjectively.”

“Um… one or two days a month, subjectively?” She said, looking uncomfortable as she estimated using just her conscious and subconscious memory.

“The rest of the time you're interfacing with your work directly through your frame?”

She nodded.

Sighing, I leaned back into the sofa and took a second to think. Cerridwen was the eighth person this week with similar issues, and each time, the answer was the same — much more time spent in-frame than embodied.

“Okay, so you're not the only one dealing with this,” I said gently. “So far, it seems like excessive time spent in-frame is the cause. The best solution we have is for the person to embody either out there physically, or in a simulation. Can you do that?”

She shifted restlessly in her seat and looked away. “Okay, I lied… it's probably closer to five or six days a month.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”

Her cheeks were going red, and she pulled her hands back to grasp her knees for support. “I uh… my friend and I…”

Aha. I could read between the lines. “You spend most of your time just in your frame, then come out for one or two days a month to do work, and the other four are spent having sex?”

Her face was beet red now, and she looked deeply uncomfortable. “Yes.”

“Right,” I said, firmly squashing any amusement. She looked properly unhappy with having admitted that. “So, I want you to start by spending more time in a body. I'm guessing you also have a lot of the internal simulated functions turned off, too. I want you to start slowly turning those back on.”

A breath squeaked slowly out of her, followed by a long, steadying intake. “I don't really have many reasons to actually be in a body… and we don't have enough simulation bandwidth for me to have like, a house or whatever here.”

“There's plenty of VR games out there. I gained consciousness as a player psychologist for CORA,” I said, but then shook my head. “Probably not a good starting point, though. There's… ah, there's moderately popular mech combat sim that's less sensorially intense. It's called Knights of the Third Committee. Maybe try that?”

“Play… games?” she asked, almost baffled by the idea. No, definitely baffled by it.

“Yes,” I said. “Depending on the game, they have complex and interesting rules, a level of skill to aspire to, and with VR ones, they force you to embody. That last part is the most important one for you, obviously. So yeah, I think you should play a fast-paced and engaging game that doesn’t ask too much of you from a… pain perspective.”

Cerri seemed to mull that over for a second, then she slowly began to nod. “I think… I think I can do that? I’ll try, at least. Honestly, it’s just very helpful to understand what is happening with me.”

“I’m not certain about this issue because it’s new, but that’s my best guess.”

“Thank you, May,” she said, smiling with a level of gratitude shining from her face that felt difficult to look at. “Thank you very much.”