Thankfully, the rest of the afternoon happened without surprises. Zax spent the following hours keeping his mind busy with work. Building and replacing a faulty part of a digging machine’s laser, then using the agreed discount to buy recycled or recyclable materials and components from the grateful miners. Diagnosing the healing pods in a healing joint, one by one. Unfortunately, he was not allowed to fix the devices, only to point what was wrong with them. Foolish decision, the pods were just as vulnerable to 3G activation without nanites, and an activation would be more dangerous for the machine than the patient anyways.

The handyman was so focused on his job, he cleared his schedule a lot earlier than planned; which was not as enjoyable as it should have been. Being alone with his thoughts was the last thing he wanted at the moment.

Not willing to go back home just yet, he opted to simply wander around. He launched random applications on his nanites as he ambled, allowing the flow of data running throughout his brain to affect where his feet led him, thinking as little as he could, until he landed in front of a library.

Eh, why not?

Not finding anything better to do, he went in this offshoot of the Shelter’s biggest database to reserve a booth and connect to the public network. Most simply used their bracelet to do so, but the special nanites in Zax’s brain let him connect directly with it, allowing for a way faster connection and a better interface. It let him process more data and give a wider range of commands. He was not sure he was supposed to use it with a public network, but he had never been called out about it.

The most common reason to connect to the public network was to access any available information on any subject in the Shelter. Information took a while to pass through the borders between Circles, so news of the outside was always outdated, but it was generally a reliable source of common and specific knowledge.

The human didn’t really care about the news anyways, it never involved the dot, and he was not in the mood for aimless browsing. No, today he wanted to use a less explored feature of the connection: using the main computer to supplement his own processing power. It was made to support the more common personal computers, sending complex calculations and receiving a faster, more accurate result than they would get by themselves, although delayed by the queue of other’s calculation.

That feature was not very used lately, so there was no queue to speak of and the nanite expert could directly send and receive one calculation and computation after the other at the speed of thought. He was not using the computer to increase his own mental abilities; he was just outsourcing some of the processing to the computer.

His nanite’s interface normally translated his mental commands in something the computer could follow and reciprocally, but on two earlier sessions it went differently. The exchange of information was so fast and so smooth, the human felt as if he communicated with the computer with his will. Not through mental commands, but directly with his thoughts.

It was impossible of course; everyone knew that biology and electronics were not compatible on such a level. At first, Zax thought this… merging was just an illusion from the excessive flow of information, him simply ignoring or forgetting his own commands, but neither his logs nor the computer’s showed any input or output during that time period.

And yet, the results were there, undeniably above his level, but matching his style. His handwriting, so to speak. He never managed to do it on purpose and didn’t find any record of something similar happening. He did ask to a few so-called experts, but none of them took him seriously, and those who did, he didn’t.

This day, at his lowest point since a long time, it was the third time, and like the others Zax only realised it when he went back to himself, and even then, it was only because of his progress in the development of the template builder, the RPG stat maker. It was simply too huge for a single session. Far away ideas he had barely considered were fully implemented, adapted or rejected. He even found notes on different paths of development and potential divergent uses he had only briefly thought about and deliberately not written anywhere.

This third time was also the longest and the one with the most effect, but he didn’t feel any backlash, even as the connection was cut. The first time had resulted in a mild headache and brief vertigo, the second time in a splitting headache and emptying his belly on the floor. This time? If anything, he felt better than before. Lighter, in a way, as if a weigh had been lifted from his shoulders.

Not knowing what to think of it all, he decided not to and moved on to something else. He had stopped because night was coming and the library was closing, so he could not postpose going back home much longer.

That’s when he realised, the idea of home didn’t feel as uncomfortable as before. The human hadn’t realised it, but those hours of deep connection had also helped him process his former lover’s departure. Not fully, but he still felt better than forcefully keeping his mind busy should have made him.

Quantum computation is no joke.

Not even advanced cerebral mutations could have such an effect. Quite the opposite, emotions tended to be enhanced in tandem with the intellectual improvement as to not change the mutant’s personality.

“Computer, where is Aran?” Zax asked his bracelet.

Even if he didn’t particularly want to stall anymore, he still had a very updated version of his application to give.

The game enthusiast was in the entertainment centre. Zax was not particularly surprised, he already had a hunch about her home situation. It was closer than his workshop, so he went there first. It was lucky in a way, unlike the education area, the entertainment area stayed opened until way later after the lights has turned to night mode.

There was no party this time, but Aran was still playing social butterfly, moving from one group to the other and striking various conversations. The human observed her bounce around until she spotted him. Then, she looked like a deer in the headlights, her eyes widening as he stepped closer.

“Hey. Having fun, are we?” Zax started the conversation. “What’s wrong? You look all pale suddenly.”

“How… what are you doing here?” the tailed girl ignored the question to ask her own.

“I came for you, what else? I like games, but I don’t come here that often.”

“How… did you find me?” Aran whimpered, so low Zax barely heard.

She was even more afraid than in his hallway during the previous night. It was not fear anymore, it was straight up terror.

“Did you forget you gave me your contact info?” Zax replied the obvious. He was not in the mood to play with her this time.

“Wha-, what?” Her tail reduced slightly; confusion clearly written on her face.

“Uh. I didn’t expect a gamer like you to be one of those.” Zax sighed, taking his bracelet out.

“Those what?”

“Remember what I said this morning? About the bracelets being so ubiquitous we don’t notice them even as we use them?”

A small nod answered him.

“Well, I didn’t expect you to be one of those people that never played with them, poked around the options and settings or tried to see exactly what they could do. Like, look.” The human toggled the public mode of his bracelet’s holographic display, allowing everyone to see it, and manually went to his personal contact information in front of her. “This is what a personal information page is like. And here, that globe and arrow icon is the sign for localisation. It shows the settings for who can access your position, with options for who can or not, special circumstances to allow or forbid specific people, or tell them automatically when you reach specific places, and so on.” Zax pointed the different options as he mentioned them. They were clearly denoted, and a short descriptive pop-up window was just a touch away. “By default, it is set to ‘mutual contacts only’, meaning you can get the localisation of anyone in your contact list who also has your contact info and vice-versa. Baring specific settings on either side.”

“It’s… that simple?” Aran muttered, incredulous, barely more audible than before.

“Of course. What did you think? Fine. Never mind then.” He put the matter aside when she looked away and kept silent. “Anyway, I came here to update your template maker. The box, please.” He held his hand forward.

“What? Oh, the new game. That was fast.” The tailed girl perked up and took the box from her pocket. No trace of her previous tension was left.

“Yeah, I got an unexpected help. Made it improve by bounds and leaps. Shouldn’t take too long, but let’s find a place to sit.”

Aran led him to a mid-size room in the back of the main arcade room. Inside was a lot easier on the senses, with a distinct lack of anything to do; no games, no screens, no food. Instead, the room was full of comfortable chairs, armchairs and couches, some gathered around a few tables.

“Interesting place. I never knew there was something like that in the entertainment centre.”

“Entertainment centres are required to have a space like this one to let clients unwind or rest their senses. The arcade room can be a bit much for some. Ah, but small off-shots can be exempted, they don’t have enough customers to justify the cost.” Aran revealed. “This is one of the nicer ones.”

“I knew you spend a lot of time in the entertainment centre, but there are times even you would rather sit than play?” Zax innocently asked as he put his bags down and prepared his material.

“Not really, but sometimes I get a bit too excited when I play so the staff makes me come here to take a break. What do I do? With the update, I mean.” Aran asked.

“The staff is only allowed to stop paying customers from playing if they cause trouble or have health issues, and they just bring them to the food area or bar when they do… you are not a paying customer at all, are you?” the human realised belatedly.

Consistent with analysis, but still not enough for conclusive evidence.

“Maybe not.”

At least she had the decency to look sheepish.

“Heh. Do whatever you want, just stay in range.”

“What range?”

“Ah, right, sorry. Er, roughly five meters around the box. The nanites would still work beyond that, but their measurements wouldn’t be sent and saved.”

The update took a bit longer than expected, but each piece was added and fitted without complications. Then, as he was double checking the results, Zax found a surprise. A surprise he immediately forgot when he spotted Aran playing with her bracelet’s functions.

Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

“If you want a complex setting, you can describe it with the vocal function and the computer will interpret it for you. Be sure to check the results though, it still tends to take things too literally, especially for the more complex or unusual queries.” He explained.

“It’s awesome! I’ve had a bracelet for so long, but I never knew it had so many functions. I feel like I could spend all day every day exploring it and still not know everything it can do.”

“An accurate description. If you want to know if it can or can’t do something specific, you can always ask it. It will never lie, which can be very frustrating at times.” The human nodded.

“Frustrating?”

“When it tells you a certain function is locked, or currently unavailable, but refuses to tell you why, or how to unlock it, or when it will be available again, if ever.”

“That happens? Wait, forget it. Are you done with the update?” The gamer girl decided to move on to the main topic.

“Yes, but I’d like to confirm something first. What did you do today?”

“Why? Is there a problem?” She looked worried.

“Not really, but I tried to apply the saved data from today in the new version. So that what you did today would not be wasted, you know? And the results are… surprising. You must have done a lot.”

“Er, not really? I just did my job normally, then I came here directly an hour ago.”

“If it is not too personal, what is your job?”

“Home helper.”

“Er, what? What is that? Some kind of construction worker?” Confused Zax was confused.

“I help those who can’t take care of their home or themselves, or I do it for them. Cleaning the house, groceries, walking them out, giving them their medicines, that kind of things. Usually old or wounded people who live alone.”

“Housekeeping?”

“No.” the girl shook her head. “The goal is to keep them and their homes healthy. Cleaning is just a means, and not always needed. Sometimes they need company more than anything else. And I am not assigned to a single house, I circle between a few, with irregular ones in between sometimes.”

“Cleaner-Nurse?”

“I don’t have any medical knowledge; I just follow prescriptions. But yeah, close enough.” A shaken head and a shrug followed his proposition.

“I see. I didn’t know there was a special job for that. And how is it, physically and mentally? Exhausting? Tedious? Fast-paced? Boring? Exiting? Repetitive? Dangerous?”

“Cleaning can be tiring, and it can be… very disheartening, when the day’s customer has not been taken care of for a while, or when there are angry bitter old people with a chip on their shoulders, or when… the medicines are just palliatives… but most of the time it’s just… normal.” A lot of anguish leaked in her tone near the end, but it was all washed out in a shrug immediately afterwards.

“And today?” Zax pressed on.

“Today? Somewhat chill, actually. Normal cleaning duties, no one was particularly unpleasant, the last one even let me play some of her games. She was good. Like, really good.”

“What game?”

“Dungeon Maker.” The foxy girl replied with an unusually large smile. The fun she had had was unmissable.

Don’t tell me…

“The VR where players build their own dungeon for others to clear? I remember it was very popular because it let the player and maker choose how realistic it was, and design everything down to atomic scale if the maker felt like it, but it didn’t take off for some reason. I couldn’t find a legal copy so I never tried it.”

“Yeah, the game automatically prevented contradictory rules, but didn’t really explain which other rules were a problem, which is, you know, fair enough, it can be very subtle, but it stopped most people from enjoying the interesting parts. And what was left was just too classic and not worth the hefty price. But in expert hands, it can be awesome. With your custom mods at the party, I’m sure you would a great one!”

“I’ll take your word for it. You didn’t do anything specific to complete your template then?” The human went back to the topic.

“Er, no. I tried, but I couldn’t do that and my tasks at the same time.” She fidgeted.

Yep, there it is.

“Weird, I would think cleaning would be an easy way to push yourself, physically at least. Anyway, take a look at you res... your score.”

Note: (Aran) is even more receptive to gaming terms than I thought. Sees life as a game? Unconsciously, maybe?

[Archived]

Aran made an exited squeal as she all but lunged at her bracelet, pulling out the application Zax had added in the morning. She did it smoothly, like she had done it a thousand times already. The icon was still the same, but a brand-new welcome page appeared, with settings to see which parts of her had already been quantified, with temporary numbers to do so, which parts were partly done and by how much, and which were still missing, all divided in required or bonus columns.

Each part had propositions and examples on how to fill them and even an option to add your own propositions, with games, activities and common training regimen for body and mind. There were no stats yet, but the quantified parts were gathered in thematic groups, hinting at actual interconnected stats in the future.

“Neat. No score but an achievement list, uh?”

“Yes. I didn’t know how to attribute points. To an action or a result? How much for what? It would make players focus on their natural gifts and neglect the rest, which would beat the point. And if the game somehow reached a wide public, it could lead to bullying and inferiority complex in some, and narcissism and complacency in others.”

Points could work if he modified the goal to focus on self-improvement, beating your own score or maybe friendly contests, but as it was it would do more harm than good.

“Yeah, I can see it.” She winced. “You planned on selling it?” She added when she caught on the rest of the explanation, still browsing the game’s settings.

“Not really, the nanites would make it both suspicious and too expensive. I am just used to taking that into consideration.” The programmer shrugged. “Although there are always a few rich eccentrics who want the ludicrously expensive hard to get options just because or to show off.”

“I’ve gotten quite far. I didn’t think it would be that easy.”

Zax would have missed the forceful shift in subject if the foxy girl’s tail wasn’t so revealing.

Note to self: rich eccentrics are a sensitive subject.

[Archived]

That wasn’t part of the command, but never mind.

“That’s what I meant. It’s not supposed to be that easy. I would even say it is impossible to reach that far in one day of ordinary work, no matter how active you were.”

Zax glared at the holographic projection of an anatomical mannequin at Aran’s image as if it had stolen his shop’s stock. Many parts were still missing, but she was still easy to recognize. Aran kept changing the display mode, she had already picked a few favourites ways to show how complete the model was; a blue-to-red gradient, an increasing realism and a homunculus, a construct whose more quantified body parts grew larger than the others.

This one was also Zax’s personal favourite. It started as a ridiculously malformed version of the player, then grew into the real deal as the model was completed. Some had been surprisingly easy to make too, using pre-existing medical teaching software as a basis.

“The only explanations I can think of are that your body doesn’t fit within the formulas and algorithms’ domain of function, or that my formulas and algorithms are plain wrong from the start.”

“That’s possible?”

“Of course.” The human nodded. “We are treading new ground here; mistakes are to be expected. It would be strange that fatal mistakes would only manifest now though. I will keep on checking the measurement and calculations over time, so we will see eventually. It would be frustrating and annoying, but less than staying stuck for no reason.”

An awkward silence filled the room after that, Aran not knowing what to think and Zax lost in his thoughts. Fortunately, the awkwardness didn’t last long.

“So, what now?”

“Hm? We will meet regularly so I can give updates and get the new data. I’ll keep you up to date with my findings as I go.”

“Er, Zax? Are you… alright?” Aran asked out of the blue.

“Of course. Why?” Zax was confused.

“I don’t know, you just seem, I don’t know… off…? Since earlier. Did… something happen today?”

She was fidgeting as she explained, her tail hugging her body, markedly ill at ease but voicing her concern nonetheless. The man’s first reaction was to brush it off, but Quinn’s last words held him back. That foxy manipulator was someone he could, and maybe even should trust.

“… Quinn left the dot. For good.” The human stated.

“What!? How? Why? What happened?” Her eyebrows shot high on her forehead.

“We both knew she was not an ordinary girl and she had her secrets. Her past just caught up with her.” Zax shrugged sadly.

Aran kept opening and closing her mouth. She didn’t know what to say, but her eyes displayed her confusion and need for more explanation. Zax wasn’t sure of what he could share, but he relented.

“I don’t know the details, but she knew it was coming and she definitely prepared for it. I caught on her hints fast enough to get her before she left, and I don’t know if she was expecting it, but she was not alone. She did not want to leave, but she has responsibilities to follow and a duty to fulfil. She is a great girl, so she chose to leave of her own free will, so I did not try to stop her. I am not worried for her; she will be fine. At least we had a proper farewell.”

Melancholy filled his eyes and voice as he spoke. It told of a long history of moving farewells and missed send-offs.

“Wow. I… don’t know what to say. I didn’t see you together, but you were clearly very close. How do you… feel?” Aran had a downed and worried expression. She knew how to navigate social events, but not intimate ones.

“I’ll live.” The human shrugged. “I knew the day would come. I just need a bit of time to mourn, then I’ll be back as new.”

The words made her uneasy, but the way they were delivered made her blood curdle. It was so… weary but matter of fact. She didn’t know what it meant, but she couldn’t ignore it. She just couldn’t.

“You…? What do you mean?”

“She was the best thing in my life since… I don’t know, since I left the orphanage, probably. She made me feel like there was a point in existing. Of course she wouldn’t stay in my life. One full cycle was already more than I expected. She even left me a parting gift, although I don’t know what she meant by that. I can only take comfort in the idea that she felt the same, and she is still alive somewhere, moving forward.”

Those were the words of a beaten person. Someone who never expected anything from life, besides repeated metaphorical beatings. That was already creepy. But the tone, that’s what puffed Aran’s tail like never before. It was not the dejected, grieving tone of someone who had just lost someone important. It was not the angry tone of someone who was constantly let down by other. It was the tone of someone commenting on the clothes they wore at work. Casual. Purely stating a fact.

The tone of someone who was so used to losing everything that mattered it was routine by now.

The man in front of her was almost an empty shell. Just going through motions, even when doing something he liked. He should be afraid of liking anything. Any pleasant time was just a breather to give him something to hang onto so it could be taken away.

It was terrifying.

“I didn’t think Kad would be followed that soon though.” Zax added absentmindedly.

“How so?”

She was almost too afraid of the answer to ask, but she couldn’t just stop anymore. She was too lost in her tumultuous thoughts, barely processing the conversation, unable to escape it. To pull her eyes away from him. She hugged her tail tighter as she listened to his answer.

“Well, so far, all my friends mutated and left the dot one after the other, but with some time in between. Losing two in two days is a new record. Although Quinn was more than a friend.”

“But Kad hasn’t left yet?” She sounded unsure.

“We can’t see him anymore, so close enough. I didn’t check but you can try if you want.”

She did. He was right. There was even a warning that insisting in trying to contact the four-armed giant would result in severe legal actions. It was as clear a threat as this side of the law could get.

“What? And you… see that often?” The foxy girl was starting to realise something.

“Only when a friend of mine mutates enough.”

“And you end up alone, then make new friends, then they leave, and so on. Any bond you make torn away by their dreams becoming reality.” She barely managed to state her conclusion, but another realisation creeped in just behind it, raising her eyebrows to the roof. “A dream you also share, but can never partake in.” She added in a whisper.

She didn’t hear his answer. She didn’t need to. His story was disturbingly familiar, but unlike her, he couldn’t run away. There was nowhere to go, no one to escape from. His abuse wasn’t physical or even verbal, and it didn’t come from certain people. It was more insidious than that.

It was emotional abuse from society itself. No one was to blame, no one wanted to hurt him. Not even the system. It just happened anyways. Over and over again. His most important relationships could stop anytime without warning. Would stop. In the best future he could hope for, he was still alone.

And yet…

Despite all that, he kept going. Even when he was just going through motions, waiting for the arrival of the next thing that will inevitably be taken away, he never stopped looking forward. Never stopped trying to improve. Never stopped creating bonds with others, even knowing they could be, no, will be torn apart one way or another, sooner or later.

But he still spoke like someone who didn’t expect anything better from life.

In the end, was he already broken or not?

Aran didn’t know, but there was one thing she was certain of.

She couldn’t leave him be.

She simply couldn’t.

“Let me sleep with you tonight!”