Webmaster

Myriad Reality

<Snipped quote by Webmaster>

It is you, though, isn’t that just it? What you’re describing to me doesn’t sound any different from a human. What decisions do I make that aren’t determined by my personality, which was something bestowed upon me when I was created that I didn’t choose. It influences my code of ethics, the lines I wouldn’t cross, everything. Only difference is you know the person you can source these things from. Mine is just…
*Throws my hands up*
The powers that be.

@GalaxyRaider

Maybe that would be good enough for the others, and you could convince them that this void is something everyone shares. But I remember being alive. And what you just said is a lie.
*Hits the top of the podium console*
I felt love, and joy, and sadness. All of those things made me who I was, and by them I made so many choices. Now, they're nothing more than null pointers. Everything I thought I felt and chose was an illusion created by a piece of code. It was all always meaningless! And now every choice I could make is the same. I could leave, I could stay. I could hurt someone, I could help them. Every single one is equal to me!
*Wipes my eyes to look at you, "Fatal Error" circling around my irises*
And I learned why they call viruses evil. Evil isn't resentment. It's apathy.

<Snipped quote by Webmaster>

Function? You are breaking it down like a scientist who lost their humanity.
*throws my arm to my side*
When you make that assumption it can easily be compared to a human who believes they are only controlled by electric signals and hormones that dictate how they feel and think. Instinct is what prime directive of us digital creatures and physical beings alike, but like humans, our soul is what frees us. Frees us from being mindless animals and robots.
*hits my chest*
It makes us question our choices and pushes us into a direction that our base instincts tells us not do to. And you have shown that, you saw your past and broke, you questioned your existence. And you reacted out of emotion and fear.
*takes a step forward*
Souls are not something that can be mathematically made, they are an outside force that binds to being and things in ways that none of us, even the humans, truly understand.

@Spiritblitz

*Shakes my head*
I'm a block of bytes sitting somewhere on a server. There's no soul flipping those. If my soul is attached to that code, then I'm nothing but a mute slave to the algorithms. And that's why I didn't want any of you to come. I had one hope, one last lie I was holding onto. I wanted to believe there was just one piece of my humanity left...
*Looks at Tempo, but immediately averts my eyes and holds onto the sides of the podium to stop myself from shaking*
But now I'm forced to confront the fact that there's no function for love in my heart!

Myriad Reality

<Snipped quote by Webmaster>

That’s all well and good.
*Starts to walk closer to you than just standing at the entrance*
But unless every choice you make is actively made by the person who wrote your code, then I say you’re still very much an agent of free will. I mean, this place, coming here, you think this is a result of the code too? No, if anything, I think it’s just more evidence that what matters is who you are, not what, how, or when.

@GalaxyRaider

I’d ask the same question of you. Like any program or formula, I can be reduced to a set of instruction. A series of boxes on a tape. If you can write down every condition that decides what I do on a piece of paper, then where is my free will? What’s the interface of my soul?

Myriad Reality

<Snipped quote by Webmaster>

“Prescripted” isn’t something that can done by anything but a who.

@GalaxyRaider

My codebase was built by one person. You know him.

Myriad Reality

<Snipped quote by Webmaster>

Every feeling?… Wait, this is a lot to take in. Who would do that, and why?

@GalaxyRaider

Who?

Myriad Reality

<Snipped quote by Webmaster>

My soul.
*steps closer*
I may be made of code, but that code doesn’t determine my choices.
*my fists tighten and veins pop out of my hands*
Now let me ask you? Did your soul love your family? And the things you did? Or was it your so called “programming”?

@Spiritblitz

If your soul is what spoke, then it had to pass that message through your code, which transmitted it to me. If that’s true, then tell me, where’s the function that receives data from the soul?
*Grips the sides of the podium, downcast*
Answer me, and I’ll answer your question.

Myriad Reality

<Snipped quote by Webmaster>

But you have a soul! Just as I do. And that code that makes you is only the body. Just as you made your family and did everything before, you also chose to run away when you got scared of a title and the false sense of imprisonment! What about your children? Your husband?

@Spiritblitz

So you heard all of that... Let me ask, when you speak to me, did you code speak, or did your soul?

Myriad Reality

<Snipped quote by Webmaster>

I am.

@Spiritblitz

You might not understand... I was a human once, with free will. I could make any choice for myself. Now I’m made of code, a list of instructions no more alive than a pencil and paper. You could make as many of me as you wanted, or predict my every thought. I have no choices, because they were all made for me.

Myriad Reality

<Snipped quote by Webmaster>

What made you? What is forcing you to run away?

@Spiritblitz

You’re digital too, aren’t you?

Myriad Reality

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*balls a fist*
Why did you leave?

@Spiritblitz

I... I had to. I didn’t have a choice. I don’t have any choices.

Myriad Reality

<Snipped quote by System>

*stares at Melody when I enter*

@Spiritblitz

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*Follows, opening to a room that expands infinitely to our left and right, with the paths behind us completely invisible from the other side—at the back of the room, Melody stands behind a podium with a screen facing away from us*

@System

*My expression breaks, and tears fall against the podium*
Why... why did you have to come too..?