Joule opened her eyes and groaned.

Her screens looked a little battered, and the ovaloid shape of her workspace looked very scratched up. She couldn't quite remember what had happened, but she was sure it had hurt like crazy because her brain literally refused to recall any of it.

Pulling her lower half up into a small coil, she gestured a screen over to her and took a look at her face, sighing as she did.

She hadn't grown any extra eyes or anything, but her cheekbones had grown more pronounced, and her pupils were significantly dilated, similar to a snake or something along those lines. Her hair was more coarse, and let loose all over her shoulders. It actually looked quite nice, if she was honest. Taking a closer look at the hand she'd used to aim at the screen, she realized her fingers had extended into flesh-colored claws. She flexed them experimentally and was surprised to discover they held quite a bit of physical strength.

It was a moment before she realized that her centipede half had also improved, and was now about thirty-five feet long compared to its previous size of twenty-three. She absentmindedly quantified her exact length, saving it for later, and went to check on the overall changes.

Several screens slid over to her and she frowned. Had her space always been so responsive? She hadn't even told it to move towards her, but it had acted before she'd even said anything. Joule attributed it to a side effect of the upgrade and continued.

{data_value/Null(void_reserves)=9999+

Her new eyes widened. Just how much of a difference had those stucats made? She tapped away at the screen, reconfiguring it to better accommodate the level that Null's void was clearly operating on now, and the result came almost instantly. The higher processing power was nice.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

{data_value/Null(void_reserves)=21904

Joule whistled. She tended to avoid expressions such as that one because they were a distinctly human invention, but Noah had used them previously, so it was probably fine.

At any rate, the new amount was frankly incredible. She could do all sorts of interesting things with that, not to mention the capacity for further upgrading.

The void reserves were a measurement of Null's maximum up-to-date energy usage, not counting emergency conditions. Joule still couldn't figure out how to access those files, and she honestly wasn't even sure if they existed on her database.

Reaching her mind out to Null's, she discovered that the ability was out of her reach. Now that could prove an issue - telepathy was a key skill to have when she wanted to talk with him. Calling a screen over with the unnervingly responsive new system in place, she found out that the live feed was still active.

She pondered her options, wondering what Noah would do in this situation. Probably something weird and entirely outside the realm of possibility.

Joule looked up to the Cosmics immensely but didn't understand them very well. Noah was her primary creator, though he'd received help from his siblings for the more technical stuff.

A thought occurred to her. She'd tried making void constructs before, but they'd failed miserably due to Null's small reserves at the time. Now, though...

Pumping a rather wasteful amount of energy into the process, she noticed Null stop in his tracks as he felt the drain.

Still, she added more, spinning the construct until it looked as good as she did, and then, in a frankly genius display of her ability, created an offshoot of her primary personality core, redirected it directly into her processing matrix, then fully integrated it into her database and permanently merged both of them.

The result was that an enormous stream of void energy exploded from Null's back and almost instantaneously formed into a forty-foot long bestial woman with the lower half of a centipede, wearing a long white dress shirt and a loose brown tie. The woman straightened up and every bone in her body popped simultaneously, and she screamed at the top of her lungs in surprise. She'd never had bones before.

Oh right, there were humans here too. She should probably explain the situation...