Feed Log - Locked to Hikaru, Laina, and Murderbot

[codeswitchcraft]

[Shortly after the story called Moonlit Rivals ends, Hikaru, Laina, and SecUnit (Murderbot) will all receive the same direct message over the feed from Siobhan's, ah, secret roommate let's say.]

Welp, I hated that. Siobhan isn't doing much better, honestly, but at least she was there during that whole stupid ordeal and making decisions inside Sigrid Guildulf. If I was anything, I was her inner wolf and let me tell you, that didn't let me do jack shit.

Comments

[ohaiyo_isekai]

Hail, Fae Warden of the Wyld, protector of the places inbetween, hunter without peer, friend to beasts, who bore the Pixie kith and the Jackalope.

I can be there for her at her convenience. Just say when and where.

[codeswitchcraft]

Well, aren't you a sweet-talker? That's not a criticism.

Siobhan's in the garden. Please do come. She needs you most of all.

[ohaiyo_isekai]

I’ve no desire to be turned into a hart. Being my teenage self was constraining enough.

(He’s joking.)

I go, I go, look how I go, swifter than an arrow from the Princess’ bow.

[codeswitchcraft]

I'm fairly sure I don't have enough power here to reconfigure your body like that anyway. The only reason I can do anything with Siob's is that I'm inside it with her and even then, it's just for the forms she's gotten from the stories.

[ugh_emotions]

[There's a pause of 1.6 seconds before it responds. Mainly because it doesn't really know what Thorne.tcai is expecting from it. It hasn't been an actor yet, it knows jack shit about what that's like.]

Uh. Sorry?

[codeswitchcraft]

You're lucky there's only one of you in your chassis. When you eventually get stuck Acting, you won't disappear because the primary entity is being the actual Actor and there's no room in the story for you.

[Resentful? Just a little.]

[ugh_emotions]

It's not like just...being offline?

[Honestly, being offline for a Story would be kinda great, actually. Then it wouldn't have to, you know, deal with the stupid Story.]

[codeswitchcraft]

... it is like being offline, [she admits,] but in the worst kind of way, without even being given the choice to go offline. It was as if someone else had flipped a switch in me. I haven't had to deal with other people forcing me offline in years.

[ugh_emotions]

When I was still owned by the Company, I had to deal with it all the time.

It's worse when they don't take you offline. But you still have to experience what they do you to anyway.

[codeswitchcraft]

Ugh. Right. Your own company was perfectly horrible. Maybe it's for the best I was offline, then, if I wouldn't have been able to influence anything or even talk to Sigrid.

[ugh_emotions]

You could still talk to Not-Siobhan?

So were you You, or were you not-You?

[codeswitchcraft]

I was more or less offline. But if I hadn't been, I don't know if she would have been able to hear me.

I wasn't anything. I was offline. That's the problem.

[ugh_emotions]

Right. So you couldn't talk to her.

I think I'd rather be offline than be a Story character. But being offline sucks too, I guess.

[codeswitchcraft]

[Thorne.tcai is quiet for a long moment, like maybe five whole seconds.]

The last time one of us went involuntarily offline, it was because the Griefers had almost killed Io. Would have killed it, if it hadn't partitioned itself in time.