Thanqol

Hard Wired Island: The Future is a Foreign Country

Pink!

She was Ariel, and Ariel was a spirit of the air.

That meant thunder and lightning.

Fireworks were one thing, unexpected fireworks were altogether another. Disturbed from their rest by explosions and screams and the facility lights going dark, guards rush for windows - and freeze. Maybe the most joyless of them will eventually remember to be annoyed at unscheduled pyrotechnics, but for everyone else it's like stepping into a dream. All the colours of magic raised aloft, a call to enchantment like no other. Pink dances beneath the colours she wove, sunset slashes of violet and bronze, warmer than an ocean that swallowed the sun.

Everyone, roll up! The show is about to start. The show is unmissable - wherever you are in the complex, step outside, look up! You'll see it! It's all for you, each and every one of you. Look at the sky and see her paint in stars and comets.

And pay no attention to wicked Caliban creeping from the compartment, dressed in orange rags, a tame demon to match her bound spirit. Caliban will prowl and lurk and be ready to bedevil the audience when the show calls for her. The performance will want for neither devil nor angel. The performance is everything, the magic that asks you to stop and believe that with this mask a girl can become Juno or that an explosion might be lightning.

Asked to believe all that, it is not much to ask that the stagehand - wearing green so dark it is almost black, who walks quietly but confidently across a stage bedecked with jewels and fairy clothes - be ignored. She is simply there to move the scenery and rearrange the backdrop. Even if you saw her it would be churlish to admit it, even as she carries away the treasure, the ship and the skies themselves.

[Explosive Devices 0/4: 6+4 10]

Red!

On the one hand her kill-all-humans joke just landed in the wrong fucking postcode and she's going to be staring down the business end of a logic probe in minutes. But, fuck, she was blown away by the swag of the move. Unbelievable. No hesitation. There was a (perceived) crisis and it got fucking managed. Frankly she's in awe in addition to being extremely into it. And Sophie was clearly keen for it too...

De-escalating would be coward shit.

"Say what again?" she asked sweetly. She's already going through chemical combinations in her head, the compositions that might dissolve the riotstopper glue, the possibility of detaching and remote controlling an arm into gathering them. "My ambitions to serve humanity? No doubt those can be achieved simply through expanding my own hardware, consciousness and/or political influence."

Wait. Fuck. What if Yellow or Black or... whoever the fuck had programmed her with psycho brainwave patterns in case of an emergency? What if Everest had built a secret assassin mode into her? Who knows what Sophie would find if she started digging around in her head.

White and Black!

They exchanged glances. The possibility space contracted; this was already deliberately Political. There wasn't a way around it.

"Crystal," said Black. "You are extremely smart and socially adept. You will see through any attempt I make to manage you. As such I am engaging you on the level of raw biological instinct. I bought sandwiches[1], and I would like you to take a shower, eat a full meal, accept a shoulder massage - and preferably have a full nights sleep but I understand there are limits to what I can ask - before you hear what I have to say. I make this request understanding exactly how valuable your time is at this moment."

[1]: Lasagna

"Crystal," said White. "You are extremely beautiful, and your haunted gothic workaholic vibe is powerful. I love not only that you have done all this immense amount of work, but you took the time out of your day to manage Fiona's mental health and body image. I can see your soul burning so brightly the world is aching to keep up."

They exchanged another set of glances. This time there was no mutual comprehension.

Breathless Dead

Mosiac and Ember!

The best thing about punishing a Ceronian is that you know they'll never forget it.

Ceronians are traditionally hard to goad into open conflict if they do not wish to be - the Bitemark authorities would have drawn them out long ago if such things were effective. There is no shame for them in avoiding a conflict. But Taurus is impetuous and she has Gemini's ear, and Gemini is an eye-watering singularity of charisma within the context of the pack. And so the instinct to find easier prey is overruled. Beri will be theirs, by open force if necessary.

This time the pack is concentrated into a phalanx. Outriders guard the edges, riding horses, or crabs, or other gifts from Poseidon. This is a formation that indicates they are expecting dedicated, armed resistance - not the loose, predatory hunting packs that would surround and contain a town with its military heart already captured. For all their legend, a Ceronian phalanx is a strangely indifferent thing - competent, yes, but still ultimately just a phalanx. Legends have a way of being exaggerated, after all - when the Wolves capture worlds it is due to logistics, awareness, stealth, cooperation, engineering, instinct and fundamental soldiering skills and not sheer individual prowess. The dreams of Alcedi kingfishers in their awesome displays of airborne might seemed more glorious than this formation of the battleline.

But then, the Alcedi fought the wolves and lost.

Dolce!

Oh, it is worse than that, Dolce. She does see you as a person. She sees the savage aliens on the planet she raised as people. You see in the eyes of the Crystal Knight the same playful malice she showed the Imperial Princess, a bona-fide society-certified Person a few minutes prior. The Crystal Knight has no illusions that you are robots, or puppets, or less favoured by the gods.

If you were, what would be the point?

There were those Azura who rejoiced at the fall of the Old Tyrants, those would-be deities of silicon and monstrosity who sought to control the very thoughts of their slaves. They were no democrats - they were the decadent. They wanted their prey to be unwilling. They wanted their subjects to have souls. They lived for the game of taking apart civilizations with their own bloody hands. They were those for whom digital tyranny had grown too efficient, too joyless, too industrial. The Crystal Knight is a devil but she is a devil who would torture every soul with her own two hands and delight in each unique squirming reaction.

(And how she torments you, now that you have her attention. She knows how to shift to take you from your feet, to separate your limbs and leave you free floating and without leverage, she knows where to touch to send jolts of fear and excitement, and her complete attention is on every little gasp and squeak, which she savors like honey.)

But there is an almost admirable catch to this - she has no interest in impersonal cruelty. She would not harm the world of Bitemark in abstract - only those individuals who she has decided to torment. This has made her effective in her role as Sector Governor.

"Tell me, Dolce," she purrs again. "Exactly what you think would be best ♥."

Dyssia!

A Knight sat upon the moon.

In ancient days he fought aliens - lesser creatures, mere shadows of the Empire and the Skies. They had been terrified of the power of divination. Knowledge received directly from the Gods, torn from flesh and rising from fire? How could there be victory against such revelations? Their will had collapsed before their prophecised end had come to pass. In ancient days, the Azura had feared the future too - but they were wiser now.

His name was Sequenti Horatio Sansalar. In ancient days he had been the Dust Knight. Now he sat upon the barren lunar surface above the world named Hurricane Gem, as he had sat for eight years. He stared up, unmoving, at the world above him, and had there been the most gentle of winds he would have long since been buried in lunar sand.

The oracle had said that there would be a great injustice done here. Here, on this lifeless and uninhabited rock. Here, in this ruin of a system, connected by not a single slipgate. Here beyond the dreams of Skies and Empire. She had not said when, nor whom, nor why. This was what the aliens had not understood. Prophecy was brother to patience and sister to honour. Because of injustice alone, the Dust Knight had come. Because of injustice alone, the Dust Knight had waited.

And with a final tick of the clock an instant that had lasted an eternity came to an end.

Colour rose into the sky of that distant world, a focused beam, each frequency layered over the top of each other. It found a gap in the clouds and struck the glittering gemstone that waited in orbit, a satellite of barely processed crystalline material. It caught at such an angle that the light bent and broke, splitting into a dozen smaller beams that spread across a radiant network of gemstone satellites. The same message glittering across dozens of nodes. The same simple code. And finally it reached those satellites that bounced that laser light directly up to the moon, to a spot a few feet from where the Crystal Knight coiled.

+Coordinates locked+ pulsed Ico. She stirred, stiff and sleepy, light running through her glass scales like electrical dye. The crystal dragon had grown since they had put down together. She was almost as big as he was. +Distress signal. Warrior servitor species 'Pix' engaged against apocalyptic drone swarm.+

It had been a desperate prayer that had sent this cry for help into a sky choked with clouds, heavy with storm winds. But Zeus had, for love, given them one moment's blue sky in answer to that prayer. Such was the kindness of the Gods. The rest was simply looking for it.

The Dust Knight raised up. He was as fluid and ready as the moment he had settled in eight years ago. +Armour functions?+ he pulsed with subvocalized words and diamond lights.

+All systems are primed and ready. Charge stable at 98.2%. Stellar gravitational balances ideal, moon is in near orbit. Estimated transit duration eighteen hours.+

+Awaken the legion. I will go ahead.+

+Understood. Cleared for planetary jump. Follow the crimson light.+

+As ever, my friend.+

Zeus had, for the sins of the Skies, revoked her gift of electricity. She had invented it's antithesis, the Flux, and given it to any child who cared to ask. The galaxy had burned. The galaxy had forgotten. The galaxy had taken refuge in artifice and mysticism, cleaving to those few technologies too brutal to fail. It was easier to return to candles and parchment than to rethink society.

But, the Dust Knight thought as he raised up in the glowing electromagnetic rings of the interplanetary railgun, power was not easy.

He coiled - and jumped.

Magnetism had not gone away simply because society had forgotten how to wield it. Gravity was not the superior force because it was the one easy to control. The Dust Knight accelerated at blistering speeds, even his advanced and ancient brain creaking against his skull as the massive acceleration sought to flatten him. He frothed in pain, but even as he did, he activated his Grav-Rail, improving his speed. Black spots danced in front of his eyes. His skull filled with fluids that pickled his brain, rendering it too inert to break. His capillary blood vessels closed lest they shatter. This was what it was to jump between planets.

All he saw was crimson and black. He followed the crimson.

With the crash of shattering sound he broke through the sky, wreathed in flame. With the crash of shattering chitin he broke through the swarm, haloed in ichor. With the crash of shattering stone he broke the earth itself, and he rose molten from the ruins of a Wayang operational command centre. His descent had been targeted precisely by the dragon on the ground, his mere arrival decapitating an entire flank.

Up was down. Down was up. For the second time he arose. As he did the black paint burned off his armour. It surrounded him in a halo, each ember catching onto each other until at last they ignited into a roaring inferno that cloaked him. The fire settled and wove, stitching heat into carbon and carbon into a diamond latticework. Revealed for war, his armour was celestial white, and his cape was the richest red the galaxy had ever seen.

He spoke aloud and his oration was prayer and oath.

"Tyrants of tomorrow," he said. "Your perfect future is built with a wicked present and forgotten past. Awaken from your dreams and see that justice has come."

Above his head he ignited his crystal energy sword. With it he cut away the clouds, the wind and storm. And from a clear blue sky came a legion in red and white.

Hard Wired Island: The Future is a Foreign Country

Pink!

"Thought is not something I do, Mistress," said Pink pacifically. "Thought is something I receive. Already I hear yours, and my spirit rushes to obey."

She pats her thighs and, like a dog called, the luggage shambles forwards. She feels wonderful in that moment. Up until now there was a contradiction in the aesthetic; how could she truly be a spirit of wind and magic if her mistress was the puppet? But now she was, like a devil-fae, responding to a wizard's honestly asked question, breaking into fragments to master every chore before her. Now she had received word and will and she could do real magic.

Red!

"I mean, it's easy for you," said Red, faux pouting. "You love something simple, like neuroscience. My problem is that I love everything."

Red was straightforwards; she didn't need a well reasoned argument to shake her out of a mood, she just needed a vibe. The fact that Sophie had struggled through an attempt at empathy was honestly sufficient for her. It made her a delight - no matter how socially awkward someone was, they could never fuck it up with Red so long as they tried. Effort to her was everything.

So the energy had turned already and Red was starting to reflect the more familiar and compatible edge of mania. "It's terrible! I'm nine people and I'm stretched so thin the pigments are visible. All I've ever wanted was to be everything to everyone and there are -" her eyes turned off. They came on a second later, ominous blue with scrolling white text "- currently -" her eyes flickered and turned back on, crimson red. "- too many people for that to be viable."

Black and White!

"I respect her White," purred White. "That looked like it was quite the struggle."
"I meant to ask," said Black. "Do you really think of humans as having colours like us?"
"Mostly I recognize it when they have to think like me," said White. "And I like seeing that in them. Seeing someone struggle to be pure amidst corruption is really beautiful, don't you think? The more pure it is, the more I want to corrupt it, and the more I respect it for resisting."
"Your sexual awakening was not what I thought it was going to be," said Black.
"I am a creature of virtue," said White. "And what is virtue if not tested?"

Black knocked on the door. "Crystal? Can we come in?"
"What did you think my sexual awakening was going to be like?" asked White.
"God, White, shut up."

Huntresses of Hybrasil

... Evil?

The Aeteline has never spoken to her. Never encouraged her. Never... changed her, not like the Kathresis. The Kathresis was cold. She could feel its coldness soaking into her bones. It had a history. A people. An agenda. The Aeteline had none of that.

The Aeteline never spoke.

On the contrary it felt... empty, here. Like the part of the God that was supposed to be alive had never been born. There was so much space here, so much hot empty void that she needed to stretch herself to cover it. A protogalaxy, a nebula of unformed heat and dust and gravity. That's why it was the perfect machine. It had no will of its own. It made it's will out of its owner's will. No filter between the pilot and perfect synchronization. There was no partnership and there didn't need to be. It would do anything she wanted. She just had to be everything it was.

Starting with silence.

... Where in the Aeteline were the words to speak? She had never cause to reach for them before. Never fought someone who was not an Outsider. But as it spoke not to her it would speak not to everyone else. What purpose would words serve? As Akaithon said, she only spoke one language. She had no other choice.

And here was her answer: small arms fire. The Kathresis was a fragile machine, stealth plating easily scratched, shallow armour easily chipped and broken. Point defense machine guns, ordinarily used to intercept missile swarms, activate and spray the area around the Kathresis with sheer volume of fire. As the flak guns purr she stands with shield ready, prepared entirely to dodge and withdraw while making no attempt at counterattack.

Akaithon, did you never realize the utility of hitscan weaponry? You wore a titan to whom these impacts would be less than a fleabite. Now you are a mouse and the fleas will eat you alive.

This was not even something she had needed to prepare especially for the Kathresis. The Aeteline simply had every tool she could possibly need already. Did the Kathresis really show you how to defeat her, Akaithon? She is worried it may have lied to you. After all, how could it suggest strategy when it was missing its Tactics?

MASKS - Ghost Gate City

"You are onto an important principle," said Hsien, arm still stuck inside the vending machine. "If Izi discovers us, she will be tempted towards intemperate action. I have seen this many times. Great heroes are dragged directly towards the Hells, inflicting great spiritual damage on their souls, as they swear and curse and condemn an inn- a fox who is just following her - who has wronged them in a way that they cannot do anything about." She swallowed. Virtue was hard.

"So it is with the Vermillion Princess," said Hsien, stretching luxuriously up with her foot to bap the Princess on the behind, sending her into slow circles, squeaking all the while. "If she is given agency she might feel bad about not snitching on us to the cops. So she must be denied it! A truly virtuous world is one where the virtuous relieve everyone else from the dangers of temptation." She paused. Did that really sound right? Maybe those hadn't been the Buddha's exact words. "Anyway you reckon we can fit her into this vending machine? It might be coming with us anyway so may as well."

Hard Wired Island: The Future is a Foreign Country

Pink!

Being a good sorcerous puppet is as much mindset as aesthetic; it means paying intimate attention to even minor details. The hand to the hat could be a signal, it could be a wizard's mistake, but both were the same to a spirit bound. She offers her empty left hand daintily. "Ariel," she says, smiling.

"I must ask, sir Luis, what inspired the goats? I hear the rumours but I can tell from the clarity of the vision here there is a stronger truth," her voice is lilting, an air of poetry to it; how a creature of the wind might speak.

Red!

"Right, yeah," she said, stepping back and brushing her hair out from her eyes. "I just see this guy, chromed to the gills on a quest to be a better version of himself, doing big brain moves, right past the point it makes him a vegetable, past the point where it gets him stuffed full of fungi, past the point where he's ripping himself off the slab like Frankenstein's monster, and I can't help but think that I'm headed for the same place, right? Some days I'm trying to bite the world. At some point it'll bite back so bad that I can't be rebuilt."

"So, uh, can I ask what the moment was that made you decide to quit hospitals?" she said. "I mean, the point you stepped away from the safety of it to come out here on your own."

Black and White!

"Is this it?" asked White. "The moment when we kill each other in fated conflict over the heart of a maiden?"
"It could be," said Black. "Just give me a moment to figure out what the fuck what my opinion is."

They sat in silence for a long moment.

"We can't tell her the news," said Black. "It's an active operation."
"And this is an active operation for her," said White. "It's a project. A project we could well have inspired with our whole rainbow explosions stunt the other day."
"Fuck, you're making me change my opinion," said Black. "If we tell her the news it could make her so depressed that she drops the idea."
"Or make her so mad that she burns down an insurance agency," said White.
"Maybe we can stage manage the transition from anger into depression to cover the operational window?"
"Ah excellent, your plan is to make our girlfriend so sad she gives up her dreams."
"The very credible alternative is having her burn down an insurance agency!"
"Hmm," said White. "No. Literally anything that happens in the news is just going to make her double down. It won't just be an art project at that point, it will become her act of rebellion, the project that channels her fury into something productive."
"So the only way to deter her is to confront her directly."
"Exactly. And in so doing turn a bad week into an awful week, rendering her sidelined and demoralized. Are you comfortable with that?"
"... We can't tell her."
"She knows our whole terrorism secret already. She can be discreet. It's better she hear it from us."
"No. This is operational. It's not our secret, it's Pope's."
"He gave it to us. We're journalists. We can choose when to use it."
"This whole thing is a cascade of operational security issues!" said Black. "Revealing secret information to an untrained partner in order to manage emotions! Committing to a high profile art event that could turn into a furry uprising! Not to mention that the whole inciting incident is Fiona's inability to keep a secret! If we tell her she's going to spend two weeks paralyzed unable to interact with her entire social circle while this eats her from the inside, without even the consolation of breaking into a judge's house! I understand you have a commitment to the abstract principle of honesty and trust, but like you said she knows we're up to spy shit, and she knows we're not telling her everything."
"... she would schedule her event to be on the day the news drops, wouldn't she?" said White.
"She would attend wearing a fucking Che beret," said Black.
"Do you think it'll go much better if she coincidentally schedules the event for that day?"
"... she wouldn't. The odds - no."
"Or if the event is scheduled for after that day do you think she does not update the dress code to match?"
"Hmm. I am starting to wonder if you are simply projecting your own desire to have a well organized and timely riot onto Crystal," said Black.
"I am very angry," said White.
"I am angry also," said Black. "Though admittedly most of that right now is aimed at Fiona for being unable to keep a secret. Even broaching the subject will cause a loss of trust."
"Not everyone is as concerned with operational secrecy as you," said White.
"Oh, that's rich coming from miss 'telling her is the right thing to do'," said Black. "No, I'm prepared to compromise on this and scout this situation out, maybe even tell her if it would help, but this is where I draw the line."
"... fine."

*

Black: We'll talk to her on one condition.
Black: You must first admit to Crystal that you told us her secret.
Black: This is a big deal for us. We work in an extremely low trust environment. We are committed to being as honest with you two as we can be, and we don't like that 'as we can be' is not 'completely'.
Black: Adding additional layers of concealment is not good for us.
White: While we're being honest, we also cannot guarantee we do not wind up stabbing you in the back and agreeing with her.
White: I hesitate to remind you that we are probably the least mentally stable person in your life and our risk calculus is very different from yours.

Hard Wired Island: The Future is a Foreign Country

Pink!

The show starts on the runway.

The Station-Hopper Sunswallow is a glorious machine. Once it was a gorgeous racer, sky-stealing blue with decal flames painted along the engine block; retrofuturistic perfection, a personal rocket pod with which to explore the heavens. But under Pink's hands it has become something more.

The paint job has expanded relentlessly, growing like ivy. The flames now emerge from the mouth of a dragon as she is collared by a dark wizard with hands of starlight. A queen of ice sits upon a mountain throne and wears a golden ring set with a gem that is a globe. The bloody red sky swarms with vampire-like bats, descending upon an army in many colours. A unicorn raises rampant against the sky, white driving back the crimson, and a maiden aims her longbow at the distant sorcerer.

The door opens to light and steam, and Pink descends to glory. She is beautiful, a shining crystal dress catching the light that emerges from her joints bending bands of pink in kalideoscope patterns around her body with each motion. Diamond earrings, diamond eyebrow studs, diamond teardrops falling from laughing eyes. A golden torque like a half-sun shines across her breasts, shoulder-length gloves in gilt and cream, and a headdress that suggests mighty horns curls across her back. She is overdressed for an assistant, she must be stealing the show - but at the last moment the balance becomes clear. Rising up from her on ethereal winds are golden strings, attached to her neck, elbow, wrists. She moves easily, but as though lifted by the threads as a puppet. Bondi's right glove has golden strings dangling from it and through the alchemy of magic all of Pink's glory transfers to her. This beautiful creature is not an independent thing, it is an expression of the wizard's power, an animate puppet who dances on golden strings. A haptic feedback loop lets both parties feel the tugs on the opposing string connections - and its awkward, loud signal masks subtler communications.

Bondi and Pink, Prospero and Ariel, descend before the guards, followed by an animate and scuttling suitcase. Their attention too is on the guards, and the performance draws them in. Searching the suitcase is a game designed for them - open this pocket and a dozen roses bloom all at once. Open this one and there is a flash and blast of green smoke and a shape like a howling ghost escaping to the ceiling. Put your hand in this pocket and when it emerges it has somehow been replaced with a monkey's paw - until laughing, the glove comes off...

It's what trying to search a wizard should be like. It's a flash of colour on a dour day. It's an invitation to the party. It has everyone laughing. When a guard opens the main part of the bag and sees inside Orange's face holding up a finger to her lips and going 'shhhh' it's just another part of the show. At that point the rhythm is so clear that the only thing to do is to nod in exaggerated respect and close that pocket back up. By that point it's not even the strangest thing they've found.

[Reassurance 1/2]

Red!

"Uh -" she can never correctly judge human structural tolerances. On the one hand, Sophie's a doctor so she knows - but then, her training data set was derived from an old woman who threatened to dislocate her hip if she stood up too fast. She hesitates, combining guesses about emotional state, injuries sustained, and the priority of the request. In another second the space collapses and she fetches an ice pack for Sophie - just in case.

"Um... hey," she said. "This kind of made me think, uh. I'm doing a lot of body work on myself these days," she held up a hand to show the scales. "And, like, in the moment it's really fun and everything, but I didn't really consider the doctor's point of view. Right? Is this kind of," she shifted her feet a little awkwardly, "transhuman. Body modification stuff. Putting you at risk?"

Everything up until now had seemed so just. She'd gone from zero to outrage to infiltrating the supreme court with zero windup. But now she felt uncertain. All her concealed tools, her custom hardware, her unique design, her contingency plans - did they come at the cost of endangering some EMT?

Breathless Dead

Mosaic and Ember!

There is no sign or scent of the wolves. There will not be until dark. But be sure that they are here.

They will be infiltrating the town all throughout the day. Girls will walk too close to the shadows and will be caught by snatching claws and dragged into the dark. There they will feel fangs brush their skin and words whisper in their ear and crushing scents fill their nostrils and they'll babble everything they know until they're released in a daze. Infiltrators will make their way in, heavy battle armour silent and chameleonic. Sense-scramblers will distort eyes and memory as heavy equipment is hauled into position, artillery pieces on commanding heights, tunnels dug into secure buildings. By the time the first evening howl sounds the wolves will hold all the town in their hand, and the pack will arrive not to do battle but to pillage.

Their foremost infiltrator team hunts for Mosaic, and a second team hunts for their lost Ember. Even as the sun rises one of the moons remains in the sky. They are dedicated to their targets, ritually bound to bring their prey down. Roll to Overcome - success or failure will determine if it is you or it is they who are bought before Taurus in chains.

Dolce!

She never settles. Even when you're sure you couldn't move another inch, still she shifts, still muscles contract and the sliding smoothness of her scales rush in search of a tighter grip.

"You have no idea how glad I am to hear you say that," said the Crystal Knight. "For you see, I have been oppressed. I have not even been able to reach out my arms -" she said even as she bound yours ever tighter against your body "- without this wicked meddler coming and binding them tight. Do you know," she purred, "what it's like to lose your freedom?" Her chest pushes against your back, her arms around your shoulders, as she slumps in feigned exhaustion upon your shoulder. "To have your vision -" she placed her hands over your eyes "- blinded? All I have ever wanted from a representative of the central government -" her flicking tongue passes close enough to your ear that you can feel its wetness "- is to treat with me as a woman and not as a number."

She slides over the top of your head, flexible body letting her arch over the top of you and come down from above, head upside-down as her entanglement reaches its conclusion. "So what is your name, darling chef?" her weight seems to rest upon you from every side, as well as from above. "I promise I'll remember it. I promise even after they give you a number, I'll always see you as a man," her eyes were bright green and staring. "You have goals in life, I know. Things you want to see. Things you want to touch," her tongue darted out, barely touching the end of your nose. "Both can happen."

Her voice lowered, still playful but now also serious. "20022 is ambitious and popular. He was placed here without any subordinates in order to sideline him and inconvenience me. But if he has been lucky enough to find an apprentice he can train he will leave without a backwards glance. You will have a great deal of power to decide exactly what you want the people here to do..." she gave a full body squeeze, crushing the whole world one size smaller. "... or ♥... you could simply decide not to make any decisions at all~"

Dyssia!

To be Mars is to count the buttons.

These things matter. The intricacies of uniform design are critical to the functioning of an army. The swish of fabric, the whirl of capes, the glitter of golden braid - essential! Essential! Who could fight while anything less than glorious? Who could stand upon the stage of death without all their wealth about them? An army is the wealth of civilization, the jewel it throws all of its resources into polishing. Of course it must be beautiful! Of course it must be precise! Of course every tiny detail matters!

The Wayang are eerily beautiful. The Drones that swarm around them are unlovely by design, swarming and unspeaking things that will not traumatize their makers when they see them die by the thousand. But the Wayang themselves are creatures of glittering black marble carapace, long and thin fingers and faces like elfin judges. Curling wigs of hair descend from their powdered heads, cheeks flushed with pink pigment. They retreat at your arrival, using pheromantic commands to cause drones to detonate like bombs, to overclock their already limited lifespans to make desperate charges. They are puppets, projections, but one amongst them was not. One amongst them was the Biomancer true, here on the battlefield, hidden in the shadow of his creations, that he might carry Aphrodite's watch and make his demon prayers.

"Why do you fight us, noble Azura?" he cried as Aphrodite carried him away from you on swift feet. "We do this for you, for your good. We do this for the Skies! If you love the Pix we will restore them! We will fill your house with a specialized strain to serve as bodyguards and slaves! New children, built from scratch to make you happy, while these unsatisfactory half-warriors fade! All you must do is look away!"

Hard Wired Island: The Future is a Foreign Country

Pink!

It is, tragically, not in her nature to be direct. She is aesthetics and must appreciate Bondi's aesthetics on their own terms. She asked for a performance and this was the performance she got. She can only appreciate it on its own terms, the beautiful skill required to maintain naivety even in the devil's grip. She can only smile reassuringly and buzz with appreciation and a little frustration.

For the second performer, the choice is between Orange and Brown - Orange has the chemistry, but Brown has the cold hard dedication required to learn the tricks properly. She decides on Orange simply due to the condensed timeframe - this show is going to live or die on charisma, not technical skill. Brown nevertheless starts practicing just in case it comes up in the future.

For the infiltrator it's Black or Green. She chews on the decision for a while before deciding on Green. This one isn't down to skill, it's down to mindset - Black is risk adverse and will scrub the mission early if confronted. Green will double down. For Pink, performing the most socially important work of her life, the risk feels worthwhile.

She will of course telegraph nothing in advance to security. Even if this was not an infiltration operation, she is offended by the notion. It would be a poor magician who revealed her secrets, let alone revealed them unprompted.

*

Red!

It sounds like there's a plan! A high risk, skillful, technical plan - and that's Red's cue to kind of go to sleep a little bit. It's not like she disagrees or that this isn't interesting or anything, but this is all just, like... like there's a set point in the future, carved out with words, and the present is just the sequence of things to do to get from here to there. It's basically just time travel, right? Fast forwarding until -

- Until she grabs Sophie and spins her out of the way just as the strap rips and the fist goes right by where her neck used to be.

Of course, the robot arm had been disabled before they started - battery removed, software in hard lock - but of course a guy with way too many dollars worth of brain shoved into his skull would have a contingency plan for if he got hit with an EMP pulse, nevermind the paramedics. He's frothing and wrenching himself out of his chair like an anti-implant propaganda movie villain, robot arm crunching the stainless steel armrests like tinfoil. She tracks his eyes as they focus - and they both lunge for the surgical table at the same time.

He grabs a knife. He swings it. She feels the pressure - just for a moment. Hey, good news! The dragonscales work!

She grabs the soap dispenser.

As he's getting up she squirts it on the floor right underneath his feet. His feet which are wrapped up in blue surgical plastic bags, already a fairly low friction material.

Down he goes, sideways and heavy. Red's on top of him a second later, wrenching the cybernetic arm into a full body lock, knife held up past her head ineffectively. She wasn't supposed to have been taught this technique, Euna had done it to her on instinct when she'd tripped over her own feet while holding the practice knife. The motion had been burned on her retinas and she went through it on instinct, holding the pin while Sophie recovered long enough to get the emergency riotstopper[1] and start gluing limbs to the floor.

"Super strong and super smart," said Red, breathless. "You feel lucky to be working on this human paragon?"

[1] Riotstoppers, or 'glue guns', are 'less-lethal' weapons in use by law enforcement. The fast-drying adhesive is more environmentally friendly than tear gas in a closed ecosystem like Aevum and the police department has allegedly been given training against headshots that can cause suffocation and eye damage.

Huntresses of Hybrasil

She loved the Kathresis - as she loved the Bezorel. She loved it enough to internalize its weaknesses, which were vast.

She felt pity, the pity of a god burning through the heart of the Aeteline. Akaithon, darling - you chased her shadow still. Just like you threw aside your lance to take up her discarded greatsword, now you threw aside your God to live inside her cast-off cocoon. Much of Kathresis' power had come from the fact that it was unexpected, and now it was being wielded against the only person who knew exactly what to expect from it.

The problem with a machine like the Kathresis was that if everything worked out you looked like a genius. If things went even slightly wrong you looked like a fool.

She has changed the Aeteline not at all. She walks into the arena with the vicious aura of normality hanging over her. Where was the trick? Where was the blade? Where was the heart?

She showed nothing. Her stance gave no information, hesitation or weakness. She was the mountain and it was Akai's to walk her. Climb if you can.