Ryan splutters in indignation. “You’re being ridiculous, these new strains have the potential to massively increase crop yield while cutting the amount of resources we have to invest to make that happen. There’s absolutely no reason to oppose it.” We’ve been at this for a couple hours, and it looks like viewership on both channels is starting to drop off, right on schedule.

“Well sure, these hybrids may hold economic advantages over natural wheat, but we still don’t really know what they’re worth nutritionally. Anyway, why mess with things? What we’ve got is natural, it does what we need it to, it’s better to keep it how it is than risk ruining things with unnecessary changes.” I’m bullshitting, of course. Much of what I’m saying is questionably accurate at best, and more importantly all of it is immaterial. It’s better this way. I’d rather bullshit about bullshit than bullshit about something that matters.

"Of course, why mess with things, why try to improve our lot in life and make the world a better place, right Alice? I don't know why I expected anything better from you, we all know that you'd rather see all scientific progress outlawed so we can all go back to the dark ages of shitting in the woods and cutting each other's heads off for heresy." His voice is coming through pretty tinny on my end, I'm sure it sounds awful for the viewers. I expected him to have better equipment given the size of his following, but I suppose he's enough of a firebrand to make up for it.

"You know that's not what I'm saying, all I'm asking for is a little caution to be exercised around the food we eat. Not that I'd expect a follower of Kairss to understand that." I think I'm doing a commendable job of making it sound like this non-issue actually matters, but I don't expect too many to really be fooled. We're talking about a minor change to the structure of genetic modification testing in certain segments of the wheat industry. I've been gradually moving my brand away from discussions of hot-button culture war issues and presenting myself as more of a policy wonk, but this isn't even policy in any meaningful way, it's a slight shift in scientific best practices. This is frivolous and we both know it.

I let my mind wander a bit. I'm not really trying to convince the other guy, and he's not here to convince me, either. We're both just putting on a show for the people, getting our talking points out there, trying to catch each other in rhetorical traps. A handful of onlookers who previously didn't care about the issue will decide to take one side or the other based on this, maybe one or two will change the stance they already hold, the rest will become more entrenched in their current beliefs. Business as usual. A delicate equilibrium, forged over years of struggle, both social and physical, and one which is mirrored at most levels of society.

The debate goes on for another hour or so, and eventually one of us invents a reason why the other is being too unreasonable to keep talking to. The call ends and I begin winding down the stream, bantering with the chat as I prepare to hop off for the night. My "opponent" is assuredly doing the same on his end. After spending an appropriate amount of time answering questions and joking around about the stream, I switch to my endscreen, a pleasing little piece of graphic design incorporating a circle with a dot in the center. The insignia of my patron deity, Herrid. Finally, I can turn off. I lean back in my chair, clenching my eyes shut and stretching my arms out behind me, and a moment later get up and head to the bathroom.

My reflection stares back at me as I strip off my clothes. Everything’s exactly as it always is. Same shoulder-length dirty blonde hair, same messy bangs, same downturned brown eyes I’ve never cared for. Nothing has changed, yet, somehow, I barely recognize any of it. With every passing day there’s more evidence that I’m not the same girl I was five years ago, but… it doesn’t feel like it. As much as I’ve changed, I still feel like I’m trapped in that moment. In the person I committed to being, when I accepted the final feature ruining my reflection. The halo that hangs just above my head. The mark of an angel, which ensures my ongoing loyalty to the god I'm bound to. Of course, officially speaking, I’m free to defect whenever I please. There are plenty of other gods in the sky, or I could just strike out on my own. In practice, once the halo’s on there aren’t many good ways to get rid of it short of getting another god to replace it with theirs, and most aren’t willing to take a chance when I could just be hiding horns underneath it. Officially speaking, no one has horns either, but, well… There are lots of things in this world that don’t exist, officially speaking.

So here I am, locked into ideological battle on behalf of one of the countless Divinities endlessly warring for influence. This has been my life for 5 years. Back then, I actually believed what I was saying. At least, I think I did. It's hard to remember. I was 17, still struggling to orient myself in the world, every word that came out of my mouth still dripping with self-doubt and reflexive qualifications. It's hard to say what I really thought about anything, how much of what I said was an elaborate maze of self-justification. I at least know that I was scared, and it felt… comforting, to commit to a cause. It felt right, like something I needed. And all that was asked of me was that I keep doing what I'd been doing.

I avert my gaze from the mirror, stepping under the stream of hot water and letting it wet down my hair. I know that I need out of this. It’s killing me. But it’s just not as simple as walking away. Even the thought of escape provokes action from my halo, I can feel it tugging me back to the center even now. The best I can do is soften my rhetoric, undercut my efficacy as an informational tool. I can’t actually stop.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

The fog on the mirror protects me from having to see myself again when I shut off the water and step back out. I sigh, toweling myself off as I face down the prospect of 3 more days of streaming before my next scheduled day off. 3 more days of passionately arguing points I couldn't give less of a shit about. 3 more days of helping to erode myself out of existence.

I should probably eat before I think about that anymore. Unfortunately, when I open the fridge the pickings are pretty slim. I was planning on making a grocery run tomorrow, but it looks like I'll need to do it tonight. I usually prefer not to go out this late, but, well, I don't really feel a strong sense of self-preservation tonight, and I'm hungry. I quickly throw on a t-shirt and some shorts and head out.

The air outside in the city of Karnassus is pleasantly cool. It'll be dark soon, but I should still have a couple hours before the store closes. The part of the city I live in isn't much to look at, peppered as it is with potholes and boarded up windows. The irony is not lost on me that I spend my days advocating against societal change while a shithole like this is the best I can afford to live in on my meager income. In fact, it’s been eating at me since I moved here, to this graveyard of a neighborhood, abandoned and forgotten by the rest of the city.

Of course, my mind starts wandering as soon as my door shuts behind me. It's not a particularly long walk to the store, maybe 20 minutes at a relaxed pace, but it's long enough that my brain immediately wants to occupy itself when I start. As usual, the only place it seems to want to go is the circumstances that got me into this mess. I suppose I shouldn't really be surprised, in retrospect. From what I hear, Herrid tends to get a lot of young recruits. He's sort of the default god that a lot of unaffiliated people like to gravitate toward unless someone in their life influences them in some other direction first, which makes a certain degree of sense. His agenda largely involves preserving the status quo of society, after all. I don't think he even really wants to shift the balance of power in his direction, he seems to mostly just want to make sure no one else gets too much. Which, again, makes sense. The slightly rickety equilibrium we live under means things don't change much, and when they do, it happens nice and slow. That's more or less what he wants, right?

And it's easy to get on board with. At least, it was for me, as a teenager. As much as I was struggling to find a proper place for myself in the world, I was ultimately pretty comfortable, so of course the first place I'd look for meaning would be in trying to preserve that comfort. I had my complaints, sure, but I didn't really want to change anything, not in a meaningful way. So what do you do if you ultimately don't want to change the world, but yearn to feel like you're contributing something of value to it? Well, you start attacking the people who do want to change it. It's pretty easy to do. Unfortunately, some of those people have a point.

My thoughts are interrupted by a banging sound to my left. I blink, glancing over at the empty alleyway. It's really just a cramped little walkway wedged in between two warehouses. It's late enough that the sun has already dipped below the city's skyline, the air above a pale gray just starting to turn deep purple, and the path in front of me is mired in shadow as a result. A little ways down, there's an air conditioning unit attached to one of the building walls forming the sides of the alley, maybe something fell on that? I start making my way toward it, too curious not to at least take a look. It's not like I'm in a hurry or anything.

Rounding the corner of the unit and peering into the darkness beside it, I find a tall, pale woman, so pale her skin looks almost gray, with one hand clamped over the mouth of a boy who looks to be… 15 or 16, maybe? It's a little hard to tell in the dark, and I can't get a good look at his face between her hand and his bangs. The woman’s probably around my age, maybe a little older, with a web of scars criss-crossing her face. Her other hand grasps the boy’s wrist tightly. His is balled into a fist a couple inches from the metal side panel of the AC unit. The woman’s orange eyes glow like a cat's in the dark, fixing me with a hard glare.

I blink in surprise, my brain struggling to catch up with the information my eyes are taking in. "What are y-" I sputter, but I'm interrupted as her hand releases his wrist and jabs into my stomach in the blink of an eye. I reflexively double over as all the air leaves my lungs and refuses to come back, despite my best efforts. Before I can make any headway, she grabs my arm and pulls me into the shadows next to her.

"Alright," she says in a gruff, low voice, "listen up. Neither of you should have seen me here tonight, so you're both coming with me, quietly. I would prefer not to hurt either of you any more than I have, and I don’t intend to, but I promise I can become very flexible if you give me a reason." As she says this, a spiked halo flashes above her head for an instant, and I'm so shocked that I forget to gasp for air for a brief moment. What the hell is a combat angel doing here? It's not the nicest part of town, sure, but part of the reason for that is because there's nothing here that's important enough to warrant their involvement. Without giving me so much as a moment to recover from the shock, she finishes with a curt "Nod if you understand."

We both do. I don’t have anything approaching the appropriate experience to fuck with a combat angel, and while I can’t speak for the boy, I definitely don’t have anything important enough going on to be worth risking my life over.

“Good. Blondie, catch your breath and then head about 15 feet further down the alley and open the manhole cover you find there.” I do as I’m told, struggling a little bit to lift the heavy iron disc. It reveals a ladder leading down into darkness, I think I can make out some tubes and pipes running alongside the nearest wall. As soon as it’s pulled to the side, she drags the boy over and climbs down. “Follow me, and close the cover behind you.”

As the cover slides back into place, near-total darkness surrounds us, broken only by the soft glow of my halo. I follow… my kidnapper, I suppose?... down the tunnel, wondering just how long it’ll be before I see my home again.