Time went racing by, and a few years passed by. Midnight had fully grown out from relying on the network, and had begun to learn things on her own, to Abby's surprise.

The first thing Abby taught her to do was read. Midnight had never needed to learn how, since the network would feed information directly to her brain. It wasn't as hard as she had thought, Midnight was able to recall everything perfectly, not just limited to study materials too.

In these few years, Midnight had grown to like learning new things, although that came at an strange cost - she wasn't worried for her safety at all when doing so. One time, Abby found her sinking while trying to see how fish swim. Even after Abby managed to barely get her out, she didn't seem perturbed at all. Instead, she seemed to want to go back in the water.

Eventually, she learned how to swim, but this had taught Abby that she could not be left alone. She contacted an old friend of hers, who made her a watch that would allow Abby to keep track of Midnight's location and safety at any given moment. Granted, it wouldn't keep her out of danger, but it would allow Abby to keep her out of danger.

Next, was teaching her basic danger awareness. From a few tests she made, she was able to see that Midnight had an uncanny sense for danger directly targeting her life, almost to the point of foresight. Even without her connection to the network, she was able to preemptively avoid danger and take action to it. Abby surmised it was the result of passive feedback from her core, adding on to her own racial instincts.

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The only downside… it was not really effective on indirect sources of danger, like environmental effects. She could certainly drown, or suffer heatstroke, or freeze to death, solely based on her own decisions and lack of knowledge on such topics. She had grown to rely too much on her instincts, which wouldn't go well when logic was needed.

And so, after an arduous 5 years, Abby was able to teach Midnight the basics of reading and writing, and danger avoidance. Her persistent curiosity remained, but the best she could do was prevent her death due to it. Deciding that this was as far as she could go, she removed the watch she had given to Midnight, and finally decided to let Midnight go on to formal school.

There was no other reason, other than that Midnight had shown interest in it multiple times over the years, and she had let the others before her go free to do whatever they desired. They never contacted her again, but she hoped it would be different with Midnight.

That maybe, something would change.

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Midnight woke up, habitually looking around her grey world for Abby holding that glass she so hated by now. But strangely, Abby was absent from the room, despite never having missed a single morning for the past few years. Confused, she left the bed and changed into something more presentable, as she always did since coming here.

She left the room, and ran into Abby, who was poised to open the door.

"Good morning, kid." Abby paused, then smiled.