London Mallory Quinn was hurtling through time and space.
Now, most might think such an experience would be either exhilarating or terrifying, depending on the circumstances.
London knew better.
It was bloody effing boring.
The trip was interminably long and tedious, mostly owing to the abstract, relativistic effects of pandimensional/transuniversal transference mechanisms interacting in a queer and atypical manner with the nonmaterial properties of souls, which in turn resulted in dilating the perception of what should have been near-instantaneous passage into something one would have to suffer through over an unpleasantly long period. Objectively and subjectively.
(Quantum, that quintessential delinquent of modern science was suspected of having gotten caught up in the entire kerfuffle and really bolocked it up for everyone involved)
To make matters worse, London knew they were incomplete.
Damaged.
While they were a greater part of a single soul - of that much, at least, there was, thankfully, no doubt of - there were definitely bits and bobs missing.
And not knowing what the parts that had been lost in transference had contained was like suffering from the worst possible form of phantom itch; the one that they couldn’t scratch even if they had anything to perform the action of scratching with.
Like their gender for instance. They knew that they had been gendered before they had died and been unceremoniously and messily thrown out of the universe, but dickens of it if they knew what their actual gender had been. And their given name did not help one bit. Blazes be, but their parents, which were also a great big blank, must have been bloody insane to name them as they did. Even if London did not remember the details, they knew to the marrow of their mutilated soul that they had been bullied over their name in their past life. And, even if they could not remember the younger sibling at all, they did remember they had had a younger sibling, whom had been even more poorly named!
And trying to think all in gender-neutral pronouns was clunky and tiring…
Objectively, they could’ve tried to decide on gender and stick with it, but for the small, yet currently insurmountable, problem that the properties of various genders were also one of the things they no longer knew.
London huffed in annoyance. Or at least they performed the mental… spiritual? Animistic? Equivalent.
Too much time with nothing to focus upon other than their issues was not conducive to anything’s mental health, leastwise to something as rent and tattered as they were at the moment… And there they went again concentrating on the negative…
Desperate to shift their attention to something more productive London tried to remember how they got into the situation they found themselves in.
They were an adult, definitely out of their twenties, but comfortably distant still from middle-aged …
They were not of good health, and thus had great difficulty finding and keeping jobs…
They were rather passionate about doing something, and it really, truly grated not remembering what their passion was.
They were generally considered quite bright, and did well academically, but were more interested in the arts than sciences. They were pretty sure they earned a degree in something related to the arts.
They had been invited to an event of great significance, and then…
Pain in their chest! They couldn’t breathe! Blackness! …
Then a kindly, almond-eyed face telling them… they had a heart attack…? It was just there, on the edge of their cognizance…
They thought that they had agreed to some type of surgery…
And then... And then… everything went into a kaleidoscope… and sounds… Voices?... As if listening against a thin wall they heard things. An indistinct number of voices roaring… Over a dozen voices arguing and… under a palpable amount of strain? One voice… they thought it was a female... Speaking in clear ringing tones… The words seeming to be too great for the universe to contain them… The other voices joining in making the words... Bulge? Expand further? That could not be it; words were immaterial, they had nothing to expand and shrink, but try as they might, London could not find better means to express what it felt like.
Finally, calm… Kaleidoscope pulses… Contracts… They feel an indescribable pressure building all around them…
Incongruously, and against all sense a notification window appears before them advising them to stand by for their transfer between universes and wishing them a happy and fulfilling journey.
And here they were, traveling the great divide.
Well wasn’t that a complete and utter bollocks. And it still did not explain in the least what happened to the rest of their soul.
Completely out of nowhere, their grumbling was interrupted by a sort of dinky chime just at the edge of their awareness announcing another notification screen.
>Soul transference complete...
>>Soul cohesion calculated at %80.2607911978...
>!ERROR!
>>Soul degradation levels exceeded any projected parameters.
>Please stand by... Investigation in progress… … … … … …
There and then, if London had still been in possession of a body, they would’ve suffered an apoplectic paroxysm. Seeing as they were quite literally a mauled soul missing almost a full fifth of itself, the best they could accomplish was a gloomily sarcastic proclamation:
“Woopty-diddly-do! Ain’ that a peach fer ya…” At the very least, they re-learned something about themselves – the fact that when they felt snarky, they did it in ridiculous accents. That was a real breakthrough right there, a real insight into their psyche…
Luckily for their already dubious sanity, they were not left to stew in the complex mix of emotions they were currently experiencing due to a new barely-there chime baring another window, this one much more welcome.
>Soul transference routine investigation completed
>Results inconclusive… … ...
>In depth analysis authorization queried… … ...
>Authorization granted
>Analysis in progress … … … … … … … … …
Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
>>Do you wish to go through a short system tutorial while you wait?
YES
NO
That sounded like such a terrifically good idea, that London was all up on bashing on that yes like button-mashing was going out of style (which is patently ridiculous – button-mashing, and the angry bovine sounds of thusly defeated elitist scum, never goes out of style!). There was just one teeny-tiny, itsy-bitsy, widdle-diddle problem with that glorious course of action.
Namely, they had no idea how in the seven mickeys (like circles of hell, but more family and less wallet friendly) were they supposed to interact with the blasted screen. Thinking at it produced exactly jack and squat – in that exact order - in the way of results.
>That will not work. What you need to do to interact with it is pull on your reflexive layers, as if you are trying to consciously do something the body usually does by itself. Like moving your ears, or modulating your voicebox to get specific voicework.
Moving one’s ears? London wondered who in their right mind would waste time and effort mastering a skill as useless as that, but working the voicebox? That they knew how to do, and pardon their immodesty, they considered themselves to be darn good at it too, soo…
It took one or two false starts, but then, just like that, with a minuscule twitch of mental gymnastics, the screen disappeared to be immediately replaced by a new one.
“Oh, wow, that actually worked! Thank… Waaaaaaiiiiit a bloody bit. Who the blathering blue biscuits are yah?! And for that matter, how are yah talkin’ to me?!”
>The answer to both those questions is simultaneously extremely simple, and yet entirely too complex for discourse. In the simplest possible terms, I am your bodymate? Coremate? We two inhabit the same corporeal space, and thusly I can speak to you directly spirit to spirit as I am doing now. If that is disturbing to you I could always use the system screens to converse with you, but that would be inefficient.
If London still had a body, or more precisely, if they had a body they knew how to operate, seeing as this new entity kinda implied that they were embodying something, and the new entity had an individual body also, London would’ve given them such a flat stare. No, really. It would’ve been flatter than a flat-earth atheist’s brainwave.
“Let us pretend that I understood about… Oh, less than half of that. Or even better yet, let us act as if the previous statement was the gold plated truth, which, point of order: it totally is. So, could you perhaps elaborate upon thine own elocution? Or better yet, wait until I go through this honking big page of tutorial, and as many others there might be beyond it, so I could, yanno, get some blasted context?!?”
>…Point acknowledged as valid. Nonetheless, I must advise you that your interest would not be appreciably served by reading that thing. It was never meant for anything even remotely alike the situation you and I find ourselves in, and anyway it is… a moment, checking… huh?... almost a full decamillennia out of date. Well, isn’t that promising in regards to the state of the remainder of the entirety…
“Are we still pretending, or… Because, I gotta tell ya’, ya’ ain’t gettin’ any clearer buster…”
>… I am trying. The problem is that the amount of data I have access to compiles to well over thirty millennia; on a planetary and geo-centric orbital scale. It is exceedingly difficult to parse what is contextually appropriate, what is necessary, and what is needful out of all that intelligence… The truth of the matter is, that I am almost as confused as you are. I have all the information, yes, but prior to your ensouling, for all reasons and purposes, I, as I am right now, did not exist. There was general awareness, and system connection, but no guiding intelligence. So, please, be as patient with me, as I will no doubt have to be with you, otherwise, our coexistence will never amount to anything more than mutual torture, since, to my best knowledge, there is no force in this world that could separate us…
London felt like a brute.
A scum of the earth.
As if they looked into a mirror and found the sneering smugness of a vegan hipster.
Oh! A new recovered bit of background! They despised hipsters and vegans, and utterly loathed the combination of the two…
But, that was a thought best saved for another time.
They had vented their frustrations on, what was for all reasons and purposes worth taking into consideration, a kid. A child. A young’un…
That stung.
Really, really, stung.
Their inner elder sibling was really laying into the rest of their tattered soul.
On the plus side, another bit of themselves recovered.
“Look, I’m sorry. I am angry, and bewildered, and scared, and… and… and… And my soul has literally been mutilated, and I’m lacking proper concepts for all that I am feeling and experiencing at this moment, but that does in no way excuse me for taking it out on you, so, can we please start over? Hi! I’m London Mallory Quinn, but you can call me Mal!”
>… Acknowledged. I am a fragment of Cna…
The last word felt simultaneously too large of a concept for mere words and not enough of formed concept to be conveyed properly.
“Sorry, sorry! Can you pause for a bit? That last… whatever it was… What you are a fragment of. It doesn’t seem to come through. I get… Call it a lot of echo and withe noise, that I think I might just understand bits and pieces of.”
>Oh dear.
“What? What! Was that a good ‘Oh dear’ or a bad ‘Oh dear’? Speak with me.”
>Neither. Both. A hundredfold pseudo-fractal variable permutation that holds, defines and redefines both sides? It is not something that is possible for me to define or describe at this point. But, nor is it something that particularly affects either of us at the current turn. You will be notified further on the issue if and when it becomes relevant. Would that be satisfactory?
“Sure, I guess? If it is not something we can do anything about no use wasting time or worry about, eh?”
Huh. Were they covering for worry with shallow humor by using that Canadian accent, or were they actually Canadian? And, for that matter, what even was a Canadian?
To their abject horror, London realized that they would probably never learn. At least, they would never be sure…
Curse you soul-rending afflicted amnesia!
Blissfully unaware of the turmoil ravaging London (hopefully) the other voice returned to their introduction.
>You can consider me your interactive user interface to the system governing this world. Please refrain from comparing me with the abominable paperclip even in the recesses of your own mind.
“Wait, how can you even know about Clippy?”
>Sufice to say, some travesties transcend even the transuniversal lines. There are categorically infernal places within the multiverse and even the denizens of such hold that atrocity in high contempt.
“Figures. So, what do I call you?”
>Currently I have no designation. If you find it to be necessary, feel free to give me one.
“Well, I can hardly call you ‘Hey you’. Well, no, I could, it just would not sit well with me. So, name… name… what would be a good name for an intelligent UI assistant? Gotta keep it short and sweet, though… Ada maybe, after lady Lovelace? Might be too gratuitous...And this might be a bit too arcane for techno-nerd references… No! That’s it. Arcane! Arky for short. So, what do you think of Arky?”
>Designation ‘Arky’ acceptable.
“So, Arky, what do you propose we do now since you claim that the tutorial is both useless in general and outdated in specific? Not that conversing with you is not lovely, but there must be more to this existence of ours than that…”
>The First thing I would suggest is for you to learn how to open our awareness to the outside world. There is a situation in progress at this moment with the sophonts that are sheltering under our protection, that might benefit from our involvement.
“Wait! What! There are actually people around us!?! Why didn’t you say anything sooner?!?”
>The user Mal never expressed any reason for me to do so.
“Rassum-frassum…and the little dog too...”
>Phrase ‘Rassum-frassum’ unknown. Clarification necessary. Also, query as to whether the second part of the sentence should be interpreted as a request to activate system action ‘minion entity -little dog- creation’?
“What? No! Don’t do anything! Abort, abort! I was just quetching and grumbling. Geez-Luise, don’t ambush me like that. I told you, I know nothing about what is happening, do not interpret any of my words as orders or directives or whathaveyou without first explaining to me what the action might entail.
>Acknowledged. My apologies. To clarify, we, as a major sapient focal nexus of arcane energies can use that power to affect the world around us, which, among other things means we are capable of creating physical entities to serve our needs and wants.
“...Magic. You are telling me we can do magic. That is what arcane energies means right? I’m not misunderstanding you there. And with that magic I... I mean we, can create creatures to serve us, such as, oh just spitballing here, little dogs?”
>While the statement is somewhat limited in its scope, yes that would be correct.
“And there are people, right now, around our physical form, that are worshiping us? And that have some kind of situation that necessitate our involvement?”
>Not as such. The collection of sophonts in question are not aware that we are also fully sapient. Which is fair because until your arrival just now, I was not actually sapient, merely sentient. They have simply deduced that our presence provides protection against the hazardous conditions that are prevalent just beyond the immediate range of effect that I, and now we passively exude. And, our involvement in their issues is not necessary, simply something I considered you would find advantageous.
London suppressed a sigh. Or maybe a groan. They were not entirely sure themselves. What they were sure was that by the sound of it, their situation bore more than a passing resemblance to a plot by some hacky web-novel.
“Well, hell. Screw me sideways with a stick of celery. No, no, ignore that Arky, just show me how to, whadidya call it? ‘open our awareness’? that. And no more of that user nonsense, just call me Mal”
>Acknowledged, Mal. First thing you need to do is...