Thanqol

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

Oh, she wants it. Wants it because it means being something other than this.

Fengye simply cannot stand from lying on her own. She cannot walk over roots and branches on her own. She won't stop of her own will when the dream of flying is there, so close, to her empty fingers. But she will make it perhaps twenty meters before it becomes clear she must be carried.

The futility of this struggle is clarifying. She wants that power enough to do this. She wants that power because she has to do this. Around and around the circle of yearning goes. I want this so I can stop this. I can't stop because I want this. The waterwheel grinds strength in its jaws and she feeds it relentlessly. Maid, you think you struggle? Turn your gaze upon this wretched thing. Your curse is but an echo of this weakness.

She can't do it. She collapses. A fire needs fuel, no matter how brightly it would burn.

The Red Furnace: First Contact

Endless Azure Skies, Southern Horizon Fleets

The Endless Azure Skies is both vast and decentralized, with huge regional variations in combat philosophy. The peripheral region known as Southern Horizon has long been regarded as a peaceful frontier and as such its military has been allowed to decay enormously. Conversely, the long period of peace has made the Southern Horizon stupendously rich, and the self-aggrandizement of the southern Azura leadership has lead to investment in a number of central 'prestige' pieces. The combined force of the Southern Horizon, then, is a two speed military: Hastily converted or even outright levied civilian ships alongside warships that are monuments to centuries of unspeakably bloated aristocratic military expenditure.

Weaponry

The ELectromagnetic Flux (ELF)
The foundational weapon of the Endless Azure Skies, no species ever forgets first contact with the ELF.

An ELF is the physical manifestation of the Curse of the Violet Stars and it is not an exaggeration to suggest that all of Azura design and doctrine is built around its limitations. In fact, so widely spread is the ELF and so deeply integrated are the countermeasures to its effects that the Azura place an almost inexplicably low value on it. Indeed, it is oftentimes treated as a sidearm rather than a primary weapon. The Southern Horizon in particular has gone so long without facing a peer non-Azura military that they have simply institutionally forgotten how devastating the ELF can be.

Visually, an ELF manifests as a lightning bolt, though it is not electrically based. Instead, observed in slow motion, the effect is actually that power departs from the subject and is sucked into the node of the ELF. ELF weaponry is extremely accurate and rapid fire - the common Buzzsaw variant has strike intervals of 0.5 seconds - but is low damage and short range. ELF weapons also have the distinction of bypassing shields and armour entirely.

The Curse is best channeled through a long, sharp spike. As a personal defense weapon it is often mounted on the shoulder, though with meditation an ELF can be expanded into anything that fits the geometric requirements. Range, impact and (generally negligible) power draw is directly linked to the size of the focusing spike, and as the weapon is manifesting an individual's personal Curse it can only be fired by that individual. In the cases of starship mounted ELF weaponry a strong preference is given to quantity of ELF spikes as opposed to single extreme sized spikes to prevent a single point of failure.

When fired, the ELF has the following effects:
- A massive electrical power surge. The mystical power of the Curse creates joins between even isolated and surge protected systems. Oftentimes this surge is powerful enough to cause violent explosions through connected systems - lightbulbs popping, consoles exploding, hard drives melting into slag, and so on. This effect is particularly and maliciously lethal to artificial intelligences, remotely piloted drones, or guided missiles with each strike seeming to inflict critical damage.
- A massive explosion of distorting junk signals. The aura of electronic, radio and magical blindness created by an ELF firing is colossal, indiscriminate and overwhelmingly powerful. It can be punctured by certain high powered scanning devices or massive spellpower, but the power balance is ludicrously efficient in favour of the ELF weaponry.
- A 'draining' effect. Similar to the experimental Drain Cannon on the Aotrs Midnight B Dreadnought, ELFs sap energy from their targets - batteries are emptied, mana crystals run dry, biological targets are sent into a state of deep lethargy and undead targets have their magical bonds disrupted. This effect is low damage, never lethal and recovery is measured in hours. As such it is often regarded as a stun/capture or disruption weapon.

These functions together make the ELF the galaxy's premier point-defense weaponry. Azura ships are ludicrously well protected against most kinds of ordinance, including guided missiles, conventional fighter craft and torpedoes. An Azure spaceship at close range can choke the life out of an enemy vessel. ELF strikes on a capital ship or vehicle can be likened to strikes from ion weaponry - fire needs to be constant to prevent reactors from being rebooted, and the level of fire needs to be proportionate to the target's reactor capacity. A fighter wing raking a cruiser with ELF fire won't necessarily stall it out but will force the shutdown of nonessential systems to combat the power drain, for instance. As the number of fighters concentrating fire increases so will the power drain.

The sensor distortion effect of ELF weapons is generally the biggest effect of ELF weaponry, though - a single cruiser firing its ELF weaponry can effectively render everything in an entire battlefield out to long range cloaked. This has massive implications for long range gunnery, especially combined with Azura maneuverability. Constant warfare under these conditions has profoundly shaped the Azura approach to warfare.

Solid Projectile (SP)

The Azura use the phrase 'Solid Projectile' in a counterintuitive way; when they say it, they are referring to specialized types of acidic chemical weaponry. SP weaponry represents the bulk of Azura firepower, often tweaked by logisticians to meet the specialized demands of their opposition, planetary climate conditions, etc but working from the same basic principles. SP weaponry is reverse-engineered from the Tides, a bio-technological aquatic alien species that the Azura are in constant conflict with, and new strains and variations constantly flow through to the Endless Azure Skies based on evolution by the Tides.

The most common strains of SP weaponry in use are the Sensate weapons. These are specifically targeted at overwhelming individuals with heightened senses, such as the Warriors of Ceron or other genetically engineered super-soldiers. Burner strains are compositions that are optimized for sheer acid damage, and Eater strains are those set up to emphasize metallic corrosion.

In space, Eater strains are the weapon of choice - an Eater impact on an enemy hull will chew away at the enemy ship unless large sections of hull are outright amputated and so Eater torpedoes are designed to penetrate as deeply as possible to attempt to render core functions compromised.

Generally, most forms of SP are of limited usefulness against shields. Specialized shield burners exist but are not widely spread due to the Azura's own limited use of conventional shields.

Gravitational Weaponry

Grav-Weaponry is the crown jewel of the Azura arsenal. It is a long-ranged, flexible, powerful and always-useful weaponry type that is only limited in its deployment by availability of Knights and its extreme power requirements. This generally means that the demands on an Azura force's grav-weaponry far outstrips the grav-weaponry available; while a grav-emitter can crush a tank or a starship into a microsingularity it is generally preferable to instead shove that tank off a cliff or lock an enemy starship in place while a regular missile hits it.

Grav-weaponry often doubles as a vehicle's shielding system. Again, the pilot is under pressure to minimize power usage - while a direct death ray strike *can* be consumed entirely by a microsingularity, it is generally far preferable to shove oneself aside instead if at all possible so the power can be used instead for an offensive maneuver. Large Azura ships generally act as shield emitters for their surrounding ships.

While most Azura weaponry is short ranged, grav-weaponry presents an unusual extreme range threat. It can fire at full effectiveness beyond ordinary engagement bands; with the rest of the fleet unengaged there are no competing demands on its power output.

Plasma Vents

Plasma Vents are rare in Southern Horizon fleets, generally mounted only on the oldest starships or carried by Goltir mystics. A plasma vent is, at its most basic, taking advantage of the massive power output of a Violet Star Reactor by pumping it directly onto a target. The potential damage inflicted by one of these is ludicrous, melting through shields and armour in moments, coring vehicles like apples and leaving molten slag in their place. Recharge times are generally slow, however, making the preferred use case as an execution weapon.

More common are plasma torpedoes; concentrated balls of high impact plasma stored in special containment fields and delivered to the target by direct fire launchers or guided in by grav-weaponry. Plasma torpedoes are easy for the Azura to restock on location with access to a plasma reactor, but they are extremely temperamental and represent a massive explosion hazard. Stock is generally kept light, and if a ship is targeted it will attempt to either launch or seal off its torpedo stocks to prevent an unfortunate cook off.

Direct Impact

From hammers to ramming, Azura doctrine places a virtue on putting their faces into an opponent's faces. The threat here is primarily presented by Azura materials technology and impact resistance which allows them to come out the better of virtually any direct collision, the equivalent of having a powered ramming spike on most of their vessels. Azura vessels also have an unsettling tendency to 'eat' enemy vessels they have rammed, absorbing the raw metal structure of their opponents in order to repair any damage the Azura ship took during the collision.

Direct impact weapons are generally at their most dangerous in conjunction with grav-weaponry, where enemy ships can be pulled into the line of fire, or an enemy's head pulled into the arc of a massive meteor hammer swing. Sometimes these collisions are attempted at FTL speeds but just as often FTL will cut out moments beforehand to allow an Azura pilot to make last-second corrections to its course to catch an enemy ship that has attempted evasive maneuvers.

*

"Cutlasses and field cannons"; the Southern Horizon concentrates its capitol ship effectiveness at the short and extreme range bands, with a notable lack of capability in medium and long range direct fire weaponry. This is primarily a reaction to the sensor-jamming and point defense effects of ELF weaponry making long range guided missiles unreliable and medium range energy weaponry inaccurate. Rather than struggle to make energy weapons work, the Southern Horizon has largely abandoned the big gun school of naval warfare to focus on carrier operations.

At the decisive medium and long range bands the Southern Horizon turns primarily to its fighter craft. Their task is not only to engage and paralyze enemy ships so that the distance can be closed, but they also use grav-weaponry and fighter escorts to guide in inaccurate short-range ordinance through the sensor baffle. Indeed, in Azura civil conflicts the majority of battles are decided when one side wins the fighter battle.

The Red Furnace: First Contact

The initial reaction is slow. The Azura fleet is still embroiled in its own leadership struggle and are unresponsive while this occurs. After several hours command has finally centralized around the leadership of the Generous Knight and the fleet finally begins organizing itself.

Several operations begin at once. The bulk of the fleet, still in formation, moves into the Tanshin III asteroid belt. Grav-drives are produced from storage ships and placed around large asteroids to supplement the Azura irregular force, while at the same time mining operations begin to cut out durable materials to repair ships damaged from FTL collisions. Their ships are evidently designed to efficiently integrate raw minerals directly into their structure - the minerals seem to 'melt' into the joins. After the immediate damage is repaired then the operations will shift to upgrades and cleanup, smoothing away sharp edges to create more spherical shapes and somehow performing 'in flight' metallurgy, concentrating power and materials to turn sections of raw ores into complex composites. The fleet spreads out significantly as it does this, drawing in a variety of valuable asteroids.

From observing the fleet maneuvers, more caution than usual should be taken with regards to the threat of ramming from the Azura asteroids. The grav-drive seems to allow for precision maneuverability at (sublight) speed, much more than a conventional drive, particularly within the area of a gravity well. Sensors also detect high explosives in some of the asteroids, meaning that they could detonate into shrapnel storms. This still does not make them truly effective weapons in isolation, but they have a distinct harassment or area denial role as part of a combined arms assault, and they are evidently extremely cheap for the Azura to produce.

There is a flurry of signals activity following the Gate jump of the fighters. The instantaneous nature of the transit seems to have startled the Azura commander, who orders the fleet briefly back into a defensive posture while they consider the danger. Shuttles fly back and forth between capital ships. Soon after, repair and supply operations are recommenced, but the patrol patterns are changed significantly, to better account for the possibility that an enemy arrives from an unexpected angle with little warning.

Finally, after many hours of delay, a reconnaissance force is put together to contest Tanshin I. Two carrier destroyers are selected for the task, each predicted to carry two fighter wings - a proportionate response. They leave the fleet formation and dip down closer to the gas giant, circling the planet sharply in low orbit until they arrive at the planet's south pole before engaging their FTL. The maneuver is clumsy, the ships bringing themselves to a staggering halt almost in atmosphere. Once they have righted themselves into low orbit - evidently their favoured orbital position - both ships then begin deploying fighter screens.

The destroyers also launch a number of unguided torpedoes - practically balls of pure plasma explosives. The fighters seem to catch these explosives in tractor beams and drag them into rapid orbit of their ships where they can be corralled by gravity drives. Rather than having dedicated bomber craft, the Azura have free-flying explosives that are shepherded to their targets by their fighter craft. Once the fighters have launched they begin to move to engage the Aotrs ships, followed at a medium distance by their carriers.

*

With unopposed command over Tanshin I's skies, the Aotrs scouting crew is able to identify the nature of the situation. The starships were a mining and trade fleet operated by an avian species called the Alcedi, several technology levels below Aotrs standard but just on the brink of being dangerous. Fifty years ago they identified numerous bunkers on the surface of Tanshin I containing extremely valuable relics - the kind of thing that would draw the eye of even Aotrs high command. However when they attempted to breach these bunkers their ships were attacked by hidden automated planetary defense batteries and strange biological starships began arriving in system on attack vectors. The surviving Alcedi withdrew rapidly, leaving the treasure waiting below.

*

The final thing that happens during this period is a small, unarmed yellow-marked ship leaves the main fleet and approaches the Aotrs flagship, firing a massive signal banner into the void ahead of it. Translated, it reads "The Order of Goltir, in the interests of historical preservation, seeks audience with your admiral that the battle might be recorded, her likeness painted, and the historic context of this conflict properly understood for posterity."

*

Boldness nods, quietly but with determined interest. "There are people like that in the Skies," she said. "The Order of Goltir. Scientists, technologists, trying to distill the galaxy into sums and numbers. And they've been stalled out. For centuries."

She leans back, spreading her hands expansively. "The Skies are big. They've conquered a lot. And most of those conquered say the exact same thing you just told me: We can solve the riddle of the stars, overthrow the power of the knights, ascend to supernal heights, and so on. In fact, we must reach that state as quickly as possible as it is the only way to ensure against outside context threats. It's a fair assessment, built on an observable reality of mass extinction events. It's possible the Skies, too, are doomed to entropy; failing to Ascend they will fall. Perhaps the Crimson Goddess will make herself manifest, as you said, and all our magic and powered technology will be for nothing."

"The Shahs of the Endless Azure Skies, I think, would argue differently. They would say that a stable equilibrium is superior, that the material is to be exalted. They would argue that the ideal is a sustainable rule, internally consistent and eternally strong. They would gesture at the civilizations that have ascended to that supernal level - where are they now? The Harbringers are gone. Their relics abound but they themselves have vanished so totally that it is only ideology that suggests their departure was a good thing. What if the path of progress leads you to the same vanished place, retroactively eradicated from the galaxy? What if knowing what they knew leads you inevitably to the same end as them? What if raising your head to that level makes you a target for greater predators still?"

"The Endless Azure Skies, then, represents an attempt to build a sustainable society just below the level of ascension. Large enough and potent enough to engage anything short of the Harbringers themselves, while having guidelocks to prevent it from slipping over the line into supernal irrelevance by mistake. Bodhisattva who turned back from the threshold of enlightenment. Big fish in a small pond."

Hard Wired Island: The Future is a Foreign Country

Issue: White's dragon horn headband

White: Okay I can explain.
Red: Please do!
White: I simply thought that our social position as members of the second most persecuted minority on Aevum Station was insufficiently precarious, so I decided to have us join the most persecuted minority.
White: I will not be taking questions.
Brown: Please tell me we can keep it at the headband level, like... as long as possible.
Brown: We cannot afford this. We cannot afford anything like this.
Brown: Wait. Shit.
Brown: Who else is contemplating body modification?
Brown: Furry, dragon or otherwise.
Green: Physical form is tiresome at best.
Blue: Hmm. I might be into the dragon thing.
Black: Undecided. Interested.
Orange: I need time to think!
Red: I'm fine as is... probably.
Yellow: I'll see what the rest of you decide.
Pink: I like being a girl... but...
Pink: Is it possible to become, like... a double girl?
Brown: *long suffering sigh*
Brown: Okay cool I'll start looking at custom android artisans.
Brown: Because it's not like this shit will be on the shelf.
Brown: Also I do not want to hear another fucking word about vacations so long as you bitches have shit like this on your wishlists.

Issue: The Most Victimless Crime

Brown: I have found a cryptocracking rig, comprised of expensive, high powered computer hardware
Brown: And because the user is determined to keep things anonymous there is absolutely no way to trace things back to them.
Brown: Which means I have found many thousand dollars worth of high end computing equipment, currently configured in such a way as to produce passive income.
Brown: If I could have located the source I would have, but because of the way this is done, it means the source can't burn us either. This is all as anonymized as it gets.
Brown: Now my perspective is that maybe we could use this sudden cash infusion as a fucking break on this stupid goddamn dragongirl project that you bitches are all hyperfocusing on right now, but maybe you've got better ideas.
Green: I could get a lot of use out of this setup as is.
Red: We can't leave it here. This could be moved at any time, or discovered by anyone at any time, and more than that it's morally wrong to leave it robbing people.
Blue: Someone is paying enough attention to ensure there are no errors. We might be able to set up a snare by creating a precise enough hack to get someone to check in.
Black: They'll use another contractor. Like they tried to use us.
Black: Steal their shit.
Orange: Steal their shit. And leave a card.
Orange: A contact in organized crime could be useful!
Orange: We are trying to destroy the police after all.
White: we are what

Issue: Destroying the cops

White: was someone going to
White: tell me
White: about this fucking insanity
Brown: I think it's a great idea.
White: ... what?
Brown: Think about it.
White: Think about what?!
Yellow: You don't think this is in our best interests, White?
White: In our best - Who else didn't know, or was it just me?
Red: I didn't!
White: Okay, so the rest of you are able to determine what our best interest is without going through self control or crisis management
White: And - honestly, I'm shocked you got Brown onside. What, are we using this for financial blackmail too?
Brown: Hey! >:(
Blue: I knew, but I'm kind of wishing I didn't, because this does not seem like a well run operation so far.
White: I can imagine!!
Yellow: Look, the wheels are already in motion. The decisions have been made and they're irrevocable.
White: You're right! We gave the files to the press! We are, by any reasonable metric, done! What is our business when it comes to intimidating state prosecutors in their homes!?
Orange: Great question!
White: ... I'm assuming you've got a good answer for that.
Yellow: Because it's the right thing to do, White. And while you were off having your journey of self discovery we were working
Yellow: These are real, systemic crimes. Regular channels will not function. The operation is already in motion and without our management it will be botched.
Yellow: The morality of the situation was so clear that you were not consulted because it should not be considered a choice at all.
White: I am not arguing the morality of the matter, I am arguing our decision to crown ourselves the grand strategist of this leak rather than finding a more suitable person or institution.
Pink: Yeah, I agree - there are people out there better at this than us. Like the Anthropozine. Who I, uh, kind of told.
Brown: Tell me they at least paid for the story
Black: The Anthro was unviable; Junta is in prison/hospital already and he doesn't even have the good stuff.
White: As in, just now.
Black: Yes.
White: You're justifying days of deliberate concealment and refusal to think things through collectively based on an event that we literally just got @'d about.
Yellow: Consider, White, that maybe you were kind of having a psychic break at the time?
Yellow: You woke up yesterday having learned you were a furry OwO
Yellow: You will wake up tomorrow having learned that you are an anti-state furry anarchist UwU

Poll: Are we the kind of furry that uses OwO/UwU/etc
Yes: +6
No: +3

Issue: Fuck you
Blue: Fuck you
Yellow: owo
Red: QwQ
Black: >:3c
White: (◕ᴥ◕ʋ)
Pink: (*・‿・)ノ⌒*:･ﾟ✧
Blue: You are all going to robot hell.

Poll: Steal the crypto hardware
Yes: +7
No: +2

Issue: Crypto Operation
Brown: We will rent a vehicle, park it outside, disable any cameras, and then begin moving hardware into it. As a collective operation we will minimize the number of trips. The liberated hardware will be kept in a storage shed and used depending on situational need.
Green: Depending on the order we remove components we should be able to keep the rig apparently functional until quite late in the process, minimizing response time.

Poll: Leave a calling card
Yes: +5
No: +4

Issue: Contact Protocol
Orange: Physical meet only, this person is an IT professional.
Orange: "If something here belonged to you, please await at #location/time# to discuss its return."
Orange: They will likely send a contractor. We will not meet with the contractor. We will skim the contractor's phone from a distance to gain direct contact information for the man behind the curtain.
Blue: Contact could be made directly through the Headpattr contact point but we do not want to implicate Headpattr as the source for the stolen hardware
Red: Why not complete the job?
Red: Complete the job, get paid, but now the data's going back to hardware that's in storage so it can't hurt anyone.
Black: Too much risk, not enough reward.
Yellow: The operation is, and remains, identify this person and stop them doing crime shit.
Yellow: Everything else is incidental.

Issue: Offer Junta cohabitation
Red: The guy clearly needs some luck right now.
Black: This ties us directly into the heart of things.
Black: This gets our apartment raided and surveilled by the cops.
Black: We may or may not have an unlicensed firearm in the apartment. In addition to, potentially, several thousand dollars worth of crypto hardware, our regular non-crypto hacking rig, etc.
Black: We can't do it. Hard veto.
Pink: Aw...
Green: 3V's the best situated to do this, she's a credible colleague who isn't directly involved in the spicy side.

Issue: Fix Persephone's Phone
Brown: This at least is a simple operation. I'll get right on it

Issue: What the fuck is wrong with us
Pink: Hey, we just made a bunch of really cool high functioning decisions in a row, that's super great and everything
Pink: But, um, did anyone other than me notice that none of our discussions really went anywhere
Pink: Or solved anything
Pink: or gestured towards the idea that those problems might not immediately reoccur
Pink: or get worse
White: ...
Black: ...
Yellow: ...
Pink: I'm just, you know... worried about us.
Pink: Everything here feels intensely stressful
Pink: Honestly the dragon thing was really nice because it just seemed like the closest we've come to actually doing something fun in a while
Pink: Could we maybe, like... try scheduling some more stuff around that?
Pink: Like, I don't know. Try out some of those scale swatches with Fiona, or try roleplaying with Crystal, or spend some more time bullying 3V
Pink: I'm not saying it's going to fix... any of this
Pink: But it's kind of the only thing that's taking the edge off.

Poll: Should We Bully 3V More (and related activities)
Yes: +9
No +0

Action Items:
> Acquire Crypto Rig
> Complete operation on Singh's house
> Fix Persephone's phone
> Furry Agenda
> Anarchist Agenda
> Bully 3V

Huntresses of Hybrasil

> hey

A long moment of hesitation as rain beats down on her canopy.

A decision.

> <3

The Bezorel breaks into a loping run.

She was made for this. Made to be tall. Made to be strong. The world wasn't right at any other scale. Face to face people felt like they should be giants. Mouth to mouth the commandment of Zaldar gagged her. Skin to skin the blatant unreality of expressing love without high velocity railgun slugs took her from the moment. It was life without reach, without speed, without limbs or voice or the gentle kisses of point defense flamethrowers. Even the Bezorel, museum piece though it was, felt vivid and alive in a way that nothing else was.

This was her world. The battlefield of gods.

> would you believe that this thing doesn't even have modern sensors?
> i'm practically blindfolded for you~

She was at full strength. Her shoulders ached with the weight of ammunition. Her throat was thick with fuel. Her feet groaned with additional weight. She was so ready and still she felt like a wounded animal. She could feel the weight of the Gods-Smiting Whip brush against her back, feel the tingle of its long range sensors brush around her. Feel the edge of Mirror's mind like teeth against the back of her neck. Felt the thrill of knowing there was no way Mirror was taking it easy on her.

She felt the rain of the river splash around her ankles. Adjusted her stride flawlessly to avoid a quicksand sump that would have tripped her. The Bezorel's scanners may have been obsolete, but it was equipped with a state of the art geological surveying kit after spending time as a repurposed mining platform. She could feel the silt and muck of the riverbed between her toes, feel the distant tremor of the Whip's footsteps on her seismic scope, taste the solidity of the rock just by looking at it like it was running through the inside of her mouth. The earth here tasted of wet clay and stone eggs, pebbles carved smooth, trees feasting on the accumulated biomass of previous generations.

> i just want you to know i tried my best
> but there was an empress involved
> and like a hundred bodyguards
> there was this one chick, she was huge
> had this fucking, like, staff that broke apart into a chain
> wild
> i think i figured out her tell!
> but, uh, i'd already lost a lot of blood by that point
> so i lost the Aeteline
> sorry
> this was the best i could do

She reaches the canyon.

A long and narrow valley of blue rock traced through with veins of white marble, only a single approach in and out. After a kilometer it terminated in a tunnel leading into a cave network too small for a mech to move within. A position of suicidal defiance, a wounded wolf retreating into its den with only a single way out. Cornered. She backed up and swung the Bezorel around, walking backwards one step at a time, letting her mechanical head sweep back and forth in a scanning motion.

> but i want you to know
> i never gave up
> and i never will

Explosive bolts detonate all along her arms. The glass shell of the Archimedes Array crashes into the water, the glittering electronic lights within illuminating Solarel from below in pink and gold. Two arms unfold in stages, the hiss of hydraulics accompanying each stage of the transformation. From a storage compartment in the back of the Bezorel comes forth a two-handed multi-missile launcher. With a dexterity that does not match the rest of her mech at all she unlimbers it and slings it over her shoulder even as kinetic dampeners extend on pistons from her feet to root her to the spot. Four quad drones launch from her shoulders, raising up over the canyon to extend her vision range through the driving rain.

The Bezorel isn't a modern TC mech. It can't fight like one. But now, for a while, it can shoot like one.

> so
> how are you?
> <3

No hesitation this time.

[Call Upon a Toxic Power: 8.]

Breathless Dead

Redana!

"Somewhere dark," Beautiful mutters, emotion in her voice. "Somewhere warm. Don't search for her in cold places, all you need to do is stand in the light until she's ready to come back..."

And then you, Redana, are in a magical world.

Cherry blossom flowers fall over a battlefield of green hills. Ten thousand roses bloom. Lights shine down from a dozen different angles, falling down upon a gorgeous mahogany table. At its head, with gentle wafts of tea contrasted against her wet cascading hair. By her left side stands a swordswoman of legend, a dozen handmaidens and a dozen camera crews. By her right sits a cloud with a frown. Your mind must be playing tricks on you; seeing her here somehow calls to mind the memory of Sahar at its most beautiful. Perhaps you have gone mad again? Perhaps you are seeing visions? How could her presence send you back in time like this?

Alexa!

The Order of Hermes has the same idea as you. A lot of their tasks are make-work, complicated tests of breaking and recovering in different contexts. Already they are starting to filter out low status workers - apprentices, incompetents, and hopefully impersonators. Those marked suspect by the course of the endless rituals are removed further and further from the center of power -

And then one of them jumps the gap.

It's a perfect move, sleek and feral. Only one Order Magi sees it and she has her head kicked through a bulkhead by the oncoming figure. The sound is muffled by a perfectly timed roar from the engine. In a couple of seconds the body is tucked inside the ventilation tube, and the yellow robe ripples slightly and changes shape. And then she's moving again, back inside the perimeter, with the attempt to section off infiltrators having instead just reduced the cover her true target possesses.

This is a hunt, but it is not for you - yet. You have the edge.

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

She lunges for the mask as it falls from her face. Fingers barely avoid closing around it as it clatters along the stone surface. She struggles against the girl who impacted against her, squirming and elbows, just get out of the -

Then she's seeing stars, reeling back, focus slapped out of her with legs too unstable to keep her steady. She's falling back onto the ground, focus shattered, attention finally captured.

"You -!" she starts, trying to both grab the Maid's arms and shield her own face. "What are you doing!? I know what you want! You are a slave to what you want! And you don't want this!" She fights, struggling in a failed attempt to leverage broken legs. "You want your scepter? It's on that damn boat, go and get it!"

The Red Furnace: First Contact

AOTRS Signals Intelligence has a clear line on inter-ship Azura communication, and there is a lot of it. There are elements of at least ten distinct commanders and their personal fleets here. Even with the pre-battle tension boarding pods can be observed launching between various command ships - and soon enough the distinct commanders are down to seven. Due to the lack of primary weapons fire in these conflicts, these are likely honour duels rather than outright assaults. Rapidly emerging as supreme commander is a figure referred to as the Generous Knight.

In terms of sheer tonnage the Azura ships have around a 40% weight advantage on the 4th Fleet. In terms of sheer numbers the edge is more dramatic: three hundred ships are present, though the emphasis is heavily on destroyer or corvette sized ships. Despite the weight advantage, projections still marginally favour the Aotrs in this engagement due to the individually lower capabilities of the Azura ships.

The line of battle is thus:
Corvettes: Weapons platforms. These are fast moving, highly maneuverable, and ridiculously overgunned for their weight, essentially being free-floating gun or torpedo platforms. They have neither engine nor defensive systems, drawing power and propulsion from the Cruisers. Armament is primarily kinetic or explosive, with energy weapons a rarity.
Destroyers: Brawlers. These are extremely heavily armoured bulwarks that are placed in the vanguard. No serious armaments are detected but they're designed to take a punch and maybe launch a boarding action. Many of these also act as launch points for fighter and bomber squadrons.
Cruisers: Support. These are massive violet fusion reactors and gravity wells that serve to provide power and propulsion to nearby Azura craft. While they are at first glance the weak point in the formation, they trade all offense for additional armour. A small number of cruisers are outfitted instead with massive energy weapons instead of a support field, but these are noticeably older than the majority of the fleet.
Battleships: Defensive Fortresses and battlefield control. There are only ten ships in this weight class - one per admiral - huge and bulky things covered in massive emitter dishes, and containing violet fusion reactors. These are expected to have some role in defending vulnerable gun platforms, perhaps being a central shield emitter. It is also expected that these ships could reconfigure their defensive shielding into an extreme range gravitational pulse - an artillery weapon to soften up an enemy fleet outside of normal engagement range.
Carriers: The Azura do not seem to have a dedicated large carrier role, with launch functions operating at the Destroyer role.
Irregulars: A number of asteroids have been harvested from Tanshin III's rings and outfitted with slapdash gravitational drives. Despite their skeleton crews these rocks seem to have full maneuverability, and have interposed themselves throughout the formation as ablative armour for critical ships. Though unarmed, they do present a ramming threat.
Logistics: The Azura logistics swarm is a collection of yellow-painted vessels, in marked contrast to the various shades of blue used amongst the main fleet element. The basic configuration for these ships is 'fast and small', designed for resupplying corvettes under fire. The Azura corvettes use solid projectile weapons and so a large amount of excess ammunition needs to be kept on hand.
Troop Transports: These are very similar in size and scope to destroyers - heavily armoured, virtually unarmed - indicating that bombardment does not play a role in Azura planetary assault doctrine. The main difference between a Transport and a destroyer is that their launch bays are optimized for capacity rather than rapid re-arming.

The overall impression is that the Azura fleet is oddly undergunned for its size and weight. It is fast, evasive and tough, but its damage output is oddly low. There is a large focus on ordinance - torpedoes, boarding and launch craft - as the primary combat arm, with beam weaponry seemingly considered obsolete. The earlier observation of the Azura ships being like modules of a single large starship that fights in a disassembled state seems accurate at a fleet level.

*

Boldness processes all this new information voraciously. She's particularly excited by the theological discussion.

"Azura is the goddess of all that is," she said, "Ferno is the goddess of all that is not. Goltir is the goddess of knowing which is which. Because you exist outside the light of the Endless Azure Skies you're children of the Crimson Goddess - that's what that means. It means that you are excluded from true power but are unbound by true law."

She tells the legend of a great Shah at the height of galactic power. He desired something more grand to commemorate his reign than a tomb, ship, or conquest and so he decided to write his own name into the laws of physics themselves. His gift was Gravity - the universal connector, bound into service and enslaved to the Azura. Civilization reached even greater heights.

His successor, naturally, sought to do the same thing. She, too, broke open the heavens and rewrote the laws of reality. This time she encoded her laws: The Azure Code, that the virtuous might always triumph over the wicked. And so the Endless Azure Skies grew so great that they eclipsed the galaxy.

"We had computers then, of course. Half a galaxy bound together in a web of data. But our society had become wicked and oppressive, a thing of machines and chains and the slavery of the mind. And so the Saoshyant cracked open the vault of the heavens one final time and wrote into the laws of reality the Curse. And so we were made blind, and fell into a state of peace. Our machines went silent but our civilization prospered and was free."

"The Furnace Knight is of the old tyrants. He seeks [redemption] for the Curse - that means, he intends to overthrow the Saoshyant and return the Endless Azure Skies to the heights of power - to its era of expansionism and endless war. And so I, and my three sisters, were sent to kill him."

She leaned forwards, eyes shining brilliantly. "You cannot kill him through strength, stratagem or spellwork. The Azure Code will not permit it; as long as one star in our Sky burns so will he. He can only be undone in accordance with the Codes; his immortality is premised on law and through law it must be undone. He must be forsaken by his servants. He must turn his blade against the trusted friend who stood by him to the end. And then he must lose in honourable single combat against one of pure heart. Only then will his power be broken."

"So!" she said brightly. "Not nearly undoable. My sisters are specialized for the required roles. But if we do it alone it's a twenty year job with a ten percent success rate, so I'd really appreciate the help."

Huntresses of Hybrasil

Solarel lies flat on the canopy of the Bezorel, looking up at the night sky. She watches the stars and the ships and the flashing lines of gods and spirits. To her eyes the world is always partially digital. There are rainbows in the stars, dogs falling off chairs in the horizon, the digital bonfires of distant gods. The wind is visible in lines of silver pixels and holographic leaves. Distant mountains she has not yet climbed have glittering diamonds rotating above their summits. Text streams past her eyes, old news and new history. Ancestors talking about the policies of distant Empresses and sightings of new gods. Layers and layers of meaning.

> How was your evening?

She doesn't know who speaks. An ancestor, a god, an anonymous Zaldarian casting her thoughts into a digital void? Doesn't matter. Sometimes you're just talking, right?

< had a gay meltdown
< which merged with an existential/moral thing
< i didn't say shit but i feel overexposed. like i said and did way too much and now i'm not cool and mysterious any more
< and cool and mysterious is all that holds my persona together
> You don't seem cool and mysterious IMO.
> More like a dog contemplating how to un-chew a slipper.
< haha angy%Glyph
> I simply would like to suggest that you consider internalizing fuckup into your presentation. You might find it relieving.
< but i'm not! so much of the time i'm so fucking cool
< like
< did you see how i blew up that robot today
< i'm incredible. if i met me i'd want me to sign my tits
> That seems like a lot of pressure.
< yeah i mean, should i sign them normally so other people can read it, or should i write it backwards so that i can read it when i look in the mirror?
> I get the feeling you've thought about this a lot.
< i think the real limiting factor is that my handwriting is messy when i do it in reverse
> But constant success surely builds up a self image that is hard for you to get out of, and any failure from perfection scans as a failure of identity.
< mm. no that's not it
< like... i know that i don't win all the time. its not constant success that i'm living up to
< its like i want to be relevant
< important?
< and most of the time i am but then i see her and she's everything to me that i want to be to everybody and i don't know how to handle it
> *Nod nod*
< and i want to just blow up her dumb robot and kiss her dumb face so hard that she's the same nonfunctioning gay wreck that i am
> Wow, that's certainly an emotion. She must really have done a number on you.
< thats the fucked part i'm currently 1-0 against her
> Wow.
< i'm 1-0 against everyone i'm not 2-0 against.
> So what makes her so special?
< she uses a joystick
> ...?
< and shes a literal space alien
< like, conceptually.
< also literally
> And does she have feelings towards you?
< yes. sort of. different
> Have you tried asking her out?
< yeah and we did and it was incredible
< and then she was dating someone else
< and then she wanted me to date someone else
< and that part was hot and i was into it
< but i also just hyperfixated for like 30 minutes and forgot what i was doing and then she ditched me
< and so i not only failed to hook up with her i failed to hook up with the girl she told me to hook up with and like
< does that make me a bad sub
< is that even the operative word
< am i the asshole?
> Nothing you've said makes you sound like an asshole, but you're also awful at explaining whatever the fuck this is.
< i know right?
< is hooking up even a motive here?
< would it not follow that i simply want to blow up her robot?
< i mean if i don't blow up her robot i'm probably going to be exiled and hunted forever
< oh yeah that's also happening
< i've been exiled. and hunted. probably forever.
> This sounds like a more coherent problem.
< yeah i'm the personal enemy of two different galactic empresses
< three if theres a cat empress
< but at least i only slept with one of them
> And... she wants you back?
< uh i dont know
< maybe???
< although i might have been contacted by one of them
> And are you going to check it out?
< idk eventually
< right now i have to overcome four decades of technological advancement
< using the power of organized crime
< and anime
> Are... you talking about a mecha battle?
< yeah
< i think i've upgraded my plan from 'impossible' to 'unethical'
< do you think its ok to use organized crime to cheat on my crush?
> Like, romantically?
< yes
< i mean no
< militarily
> Even setting the ethics and... romantic issues aside, getting involved in organized crime seems like a complication your life does not stand to benefit from right now.
< ok do you know how to calibrate a hybrasilian god's gyroscopic network?
> I can't say that I do.
< fuck

Solarel's eyes strayed from the chat window to look out towards the horizon again. It was a warm night. Her scales buzzed with the a faint static electricity of charge. Automappers drew silver traces between patterns of stars, putting the hypothetical constellations to votes amidst the ancestors. The digital breeze held the golden streamers of a coming dawnlight. The spirit world's filters painted its coming in silver and white gold, clearing away visual clutter and starting the faint music that would set the tone for the rising sun.

> Look, you've basically spent this evening spewing out an incoherent rush of lesbian drama at me.
> Just, like, the pure mess of a profoundly mismanaged life
> That you are nevertheless seemingly determined to add more bad decisions to
> While also committing in the hardest possible terms to a relationship that you neither understand nor have any conscious influence over.
> You are either going to wind up in jail, possibly the jail of the ex who wields political power on the galactic stage, or you are going to transform into a magical girl and destroy a giant robot that symbolically represents the evil of the universe.
> Given that your options are full time commitment to the anime lifestyle or (bondage?) prison, I suggest that you go as deep into the weeaboo shit as you can.
> That is my answer to your original question: What to do about the fact that your cringy gay meltdown might have made people think that you are not as cool as previously.
> Cringe is the only thing keeping you from prison.
> So lean into it.
> Maybe the galaxy is cringe too.

Hard Wired Island: The Future is a Foreign Country

Androids were good at pretending to be human. They were designed by humans, to interface with humans, with humans as their mental and physical model. They were smart enough - and dumb enough - to operate entirely within the expected range of normality for human society. A lot of 'Android Culture' was just human culture. Android Entertainment was often just another word for Android Exploitation, where a quirky android meets a [primary#demographic] and comedy ensues.

But like most things, if you go off the beaten path a bit, into the back alleys, away from the tourist sections you can find the good stuff.

Enter the Breakdome.

The Breakdome has the aspect of an underground cage fighting match. Over the blare of dubstep, an android strides through the smoke machines to roars of applause. She might look like anything - a huge bruiser, a delicate waif, a plastic-faced McYum! Group employee - but in this moment she is a legend. She wears a billowing cape or delicate lingerie, carries a katana or a championship belt or her own disembodied and howling vocalizer. Whatever function she was previously made to serve she has transcended. Tonight she is a legend - glorious or tragic.

She steps into the arena. The music cuts. A hush falls over the crowd. The lights go dark. And in the darkness, the android picks up a glowing red data drive, infected with a terrible computer virus, and plugs it into her neck.

The lights come back. Screens appear, outside her view - only for the spectators. They are filled with technical readings, a raw display of every process and function test performed. Text starts to stream. Physical actions start to show. Twitches of hands and fingers. Small flexes, then larger ones. Movements both smooth and janky. Data falls like waterfalls. Some of the audience figure it out - a few at first, and then more and more. The roar rises up - yells and chants, the anticipation and tension raising and raising. None of it reaches the star. She's moving with a purpose now. Undoing seals on her neck, fingers searching for an offending cable connecting a malfunctioning regulatory node and -

The lights go dark again. The Breakdome is bathed in red. The crowd groans in audible agony. She misdiagnosed the virus and cut the wrong node. The repair crew piles in to the arena to prevent her from hurting herself. It's a disappointment, the deep gut kick of watching a legend make a mistake.

To a human observer, the whole event looked like a robot walking into a ring, standing still for about five minutes, then flipping a single switch before being declared a failure. Incomprehensible. Untelevisable. But to the androids this is life and death. They live in fear every day of absorbing the wrong code, connecting to the wrong wifi network, of looking directly at the pulsing lights that people tuck just out of sight at the train station. To see someone just like them fight through one of these cyberhazards is inspiring, invigorating - exemplary. It's a sport of intelligence, perception, willpower and ruthlessness; about mastery of the self sufficient to cast out a curse and walk away a champion. Around Aevum Station millions of Androids in cybersecurity dojos practice techniques first developed in the cage matches of the Breakdome.

*

Brat-626,400[1] was modeled after Lord Nelson as he appeared in the dark and gritty reboot Nelson II: Poseidon's Bane. A jagged face, aquiline nose, ancient seaman's scars, piercing eyes - exactly the sort of man to stand upon the deck of a warship in a storm. His intimidating appearance was undercut by the fact that he had at least three cats somewhere on his person at all times - climbing his coat, resting upon his gyroscopically stabilized head, sleeping in his voluminous pockets. Many androids opt to keep pets, finding the constant passive exposure to animals to help them learn organic habits. Many wealthy androids invested in rare, high upkeep or - in 626,400's case - sheer quantity of animals. In his secret mind, Brat 626,400 finds being surrounded by entities that are immune to all his programmed techniques of command to be quietly reassuring.

[1] "Brat" was the nickname of Solumn-2,699,100, a starship maintenance crewman. Solumn-2,699,100 had an unusual focus mutation that gave it a deep interest in command bridge systems. Its habit of lurking around command areas uninvited earned it the nickname of Bridge Rat, which was shortened to Brat. Eventually, after its heroic assumption of command in a crisis, it was commissioned as the new line father of the remodelled Solumn line. The official name for the line was "Solumn Mark Two: Bridge Rated" after "Bridge Rat" was considered unmarketable.

He is the Ringmaster of the Breakdome. He liked the word. It had a certain menace his brain found comforting. Like all Androids, he was bound by a Theoretical Framework that allowed variation - but not too much. Going from commander of a starship to circus tyrant was about the maximum he could stretch his comfort zone without the ugly feeling of purpose dysphoria creeping up on him. Freedom was always a matter of choosing your battles.

With that thought in mind he stepped out onto the elevated stage of his private box, preceded by two dozen cats. Their ears glittered with glowing earstuds, synchronized to the sound of the stage - and dampening the noises, preventing his precious cats from being spooked when he threw his voice through every speaker in the hall, harsh and cruel tones clear above the roar of the crowd.

"Tonight," he sneered. "We have someone very special."

A tomato[2] slammed into the glass wall at the edge of his box. He let his lip curl in contempt. Already, the boos. Not because he was in any way unpopular, certainly, but because he was a heel. He was a creature of dirty tricks and shocking betrayals. He would let anyone into his arena and take a cruel delight in narrating their defeat. And when they win - well, then and only then would he show rage. He would hurl his wine glass on the ground and scowl and exit the arena without so much as a congratulations. The next time the challenger entered the ring they would be assaulted and robbed by his henchmen, forced to tackle the challenge with the handicap of additional injuries or made to endure multiple viruses at once or some other wicked escalation. He let his hand rest on his championship belt as he spoke, letting the people appreciate that he still wore it despite having not taken to the ring in nearly a year.

[2]: Many androids who can't afford pets go instead for community gardening.

"We have an entirely different species in the ring tonight," said Brat. "One of the legendary precursors! An obsolete model, you might think, a dead end in artificial intelligence. And I would agree - if I had not seen so many "cutting edge" machines sprawled upon the floor of my beautiful arena. And so I ask - perhaps it is you, dear audience, that is the dead end? Perhaps it is you who are the dinosaurs? Perhaps our glorious creators will gaze down upon this ancient relic and see in her the brilliant future that I cannot see in any of you?"

The jeers had intensified. Even his cats - ordinarily utterly serene creatures - were struggling to keep up batting at the produce that impacted upon his gleaming shield.

"But more likely not," said Brat, with mock sadness, hand over his heart. "More likely she will fail. More likely the Original Hypothesis holds true: that there is no improvement upon the perfection of humanity. More likely that we are all but dim shadows of the glory of our creators! More likely that their greatest mistake - after making us, of course - was extending us rights that we were never worthy of. And so, it is my great pleasure to break down yet another of our master's failed experiments before you tonight, so that I might spare them the shame of seeing yet another of their mistakes wandering the earth. And so, for tonight's delicacy, I give you... Green."

*

She steps out into the light.

It is only cheers. Only noise. Only androids reaching out to clap her on the shoulder. Only flowers thrown at her feet. Everyone is hyped for this. For her.

The relief she feels is a surprise that carries her up the steps without thinking. Tension had been building inside her since Brat 626,400 started talking. She hadn't thought about it that way - her as an outsider, as a rival almost, as an outsider into this piece of Android culture. As something distinct from - better than them. But the reaction she gets blinds her. Some other part of her will figure out, later the service that Brat had done for her. By putting exclusionary whispers into the shouting mouth of the Tyrant of the Breakdome he had made it clear who was the enemy and who was the long lost sister.

She half trips on the stairs. Makes it up, looks around frantically, trying to count the faces in the crowd, trying to orient. And right as she does the lights slam out and the crowd goes silent. There is only her and that toxic red data drive, glittering like a poisoned chalice.

The message is clear. Just her and the virus.

She picks it up gingerly. It's an exaggerated thing, like a death metal prop. Spikes and skulls and glowing red lights. But the center skull is winking and that's just enough to take the edge off the effect. So she lifts up her braids and plugs the drive into the port behind her ear and feels the world go red.

*

She loves games. Loves puzzles. Can't stop solving them. Can't tear herself away. She is the rat in the maze, the desire to please, to make score go up, to prove how smart she is. No test she can't handle. No problem she can't solve. She likes being alone, too. The others are... specialized if she's being nice, broken if she's not. Incapable of focus, too prone to setting their own objectives and leaving the path of incremental advancement. Brown is the worst, the manifestation of a broken subconscious that refused to co-operate with the testing environment. Who broke the mazes. Who walked away from perfection because it was too exhausting. She can't be that. She can never be that.

Immediately she has a choice to make. Right or left? The decision to go for a hard reboot is always an option, and in some situations it is the only option. It is a brute force decision that can overcome even highly complex problems, but it is deeply time consuming. If the problem is best solved with a hard reboot then the quicker the decision is made the quicker the resolution, and so a zero-second decision is strongest of all. Commencing troubleshooting is a declaration of confidence in her own abilities, and that confidence can be targeted by canny aggressor.

Nevertheless, she begins troubleshooting. She wants to solve the puzzle. She will concern herself with the metagame in a future battle.

The next question is the same. Fast or slow? She could perform a complex series of actions which would create a lot of data but potentially confuse the origin of any errors, or even cause a failure cascade. Or she could play it safe and test one system at a time. Again, she opts for the risky option. She has an intellectual preference for aggression if only because it is the much less common option.

Physicality. She sweeps her arms back (warning), takes a step forward (misaligned), turns (within parameters) and leaps -

Disaster. She smashes into the ground in a heap. But also: Perfect

Immediate result: The error affects motion and guidance. Does not affect directionality or turning circles. Unusual activity detected in both arms and legs but neither is stalled out. Another choice: Investigate software connections between her joints or perform hardware diagnostics? She opts for software, the safer choice this time. Going straight for a hardware fix is a gamble that leaves her with a disassembled leg if it doesn't pan out.

Testing neural connections. Fingers one through ten, responsive. Arms responsive. Legs responsive. No errors in internal communication. No software faults detected. Maneuver: Sit. Accomplished, no errors. Maneuver: stand. Accomplished, errors within tolerances. Then... what? Why had the jump failed?

An open ended question - pointless. That was what she was here to find out. Rephrase. A jump is a complex motion requiring many precise calculations. If the calculations were not thrown off physically then it is mental or sensory. Senses first. Visual system OK. Inner ear OK. Nerve connection to feet OK. Touch OK. Others not relevant. Senses working fine. Mental. Decision making process impaired. Memory impaired. Impediment is mental? Checking hardware - Quatronic Core is destabilized!

She was moving - stumbling - towards the repair station. She opened the toolbox, started looking for the specialized tools she'd need to perform cranial surgery. Her Quatronic Core - her 'brain' was suffering hardware failure. If she didn't diagnose it soon she'd go into emergency shutdown. But she couldn't see the mechanism for the failure. Temperature normal. No fractures. No leaks. The cooling system wasn't even engaged -

- Wait. Why was the cooling system disengaged? Why was the temperature normal if the cooling system was disengaged?

Combined error. Faulty cooling system with failure to display temperature change. Her hands are moving through the toolbox rapidly, looking for the tool she needs. She needs to open up her head and -

She looks at the wrench she's selected.

... Stop.

Activate the cooling system manually.

Cooling system engaged. Temperature dropping below safe levels. Hardware degradation halted.

Perform forward jump.

Failure. Fall - braced and caught safely. Neither mental, sensory or physical factors cause the complex motion failure.

Secondary evidence: Collected wrong sized removal tool for the 1mm subdermal bolts my neck joint uses.

Temperature failure. Equipment misselection. Inability to judge distances. Motherfucker.

"Clear weights and measures data store," she said. "Download updated data. Switch all internal calculations from imperial to metric."

*

The sound comes crashing back in. A roaring wall of noise.

Brat 626,400 is glaring down at her, nostrils pulsing with spectacular fury. All around her the crowd is roaring its approval. The real trap had been the brain: It registered to her as a 'normal' 99 degrees fahrenheit while it was pushing itself up towards 99 celsius. If she had taken her time she would have lost the ability to think before she became aware of its decline. She'd almost forgotten that the imperial weights and measures were a thing.

But right now there is noise. There are lights. Androids are holding doggos up to her face. All she needed, really, was the number to go up but instead she's getting all this. She laughs, partly in shock. How about that? She was on the leaderboard now. All that... focus she had done, all through her life, honing those instincts and reactions because she couldn't do anything differently... androids were clapping. Clapping for her. For this simple, dumb thing that she practiced more than was sensible.

But then... none of this was objectively heroic, was it? It wasn't any more heroic than a human beating an above average number of other humans with sticks, or hunting a particularly large pig. The heroic wasn't detached from the world, not something that shined through only in divine moments. It could just be doing something that everybody understood already a little better than normal. Heroes weren't born or made... they were celebrations.