<>

Tarisha hummed along with the music as she watched the final version of the summary video she would be releasing summarizing her speculations on the upcoming release of the raid version of Runeheld Runes. It summarized each of the battles as they had been in the five man version, with extrapolation as to how those fights would translate into the setting of a fifty or two-hundred man raid, as Hail hadn’t specified whether the raid would be a green raid or a red one.

She was unaware of the way that Lewis was smiling at her as he serenaded her with his guitar. His music wasn’t perfect, he hadn’t practiced much since he was seventeen, but when Arc had asked for a list of any particular talents that he possessed he had casually listed his brief romance with the instrument, and they had been particularly insistent that he pick up the hobby again for the duration of the program.

It was almost like a honeymoon, he reflected. Then he quickly changed his thinking. They were having experimental digital babies, not getting married. Although there had been certain benefits, they were ultimately not ready for that particular long term commitment.

Raising digital kids together for two to three years of real life was one thing; even if they broke up they could likely remain cordial enough to present a unified front to Charity and Prosperity until they were mature enough to deal with their parents separation. But an actual wedding? Hell, he wasn’t even twenty yet, and she wasn’t too much older than he was. It wasn’t time to settle down yet.

Not that he’d be the one settling, he reflected, continuing to play his song.

“ And that’s when I knew, babe, that it was me and you, babe, ” he sang softly, though out of key. It was an old song, and he was a guitarist, not a singer, but the feeling was there. Even if she didn’t notice it. “ Don’t want any other. We were made for each other. It’s you and me, babe, doesn’t take two eyes to see, babe. Trust my heart and my love song, we’ll always get along. I don’t have eyes for any other, it’s you and me babe. We’re made for each other.”

“I can’t believe that song is our song,” she commented when he finished. “It’s ancient.”

“Yeah, well, you’re the one who picked it.”

“The playlist was on auto-select. I just wanted to listen to something romantic. I’d never even heard it before; I would have thought it was recent if it didn’t have the twenty-one-thirties jive mixed in,” she explained.

“Well then, I guess Cortana is the one who picked our song for us. Thanks Cortana, although you could have picked something with easier chords.”

“She can’t hear us in here, you know,” Tarisha reminded him, waving to their new home away from home. It was literally a home away from their physical home; Hail had come through with his promise to sell them one of the vineyards in Thorn March. It was under renovation, but they were cheating by using the lobby to customize how they wanted it to look and paying the Natives to duplicate it in the actual game.

Technically they were paying Arc to simply make the changes they wanted to the structure while no players were around to witness, but contextually they had contractors and laborers and the whole ordeal.

“With Cortana, it’s best to assume that she’s listening, even if you know she supposedly can’t be,” Lewis reminded her. “She’s not like Thedum. She doesn’t give a rotten sandwich about privacy.”

Tarisha sighed and conceded the point. Theoretically Cortana’s reach didn’t extend into the lobby shared by several of the later generations of virtual reality software, and she’d explicitly stated that she had no interest in those systems. But that didn’t necessarily mean that she didn’t have some sort of access, or couldn’t gain it if the interest arose. Like humans, the motivations and interests of the self-owning AIs change over time. As long as she didn’t become a threat to society, Cortana basically had a blank check to do whatever she wanted.

Fortunately, so far that had mostly been continuing her original functions as a personal assistant. That she personally assisted millions of people at the same time was of little matter to her. To opt-out of her network was theoretically possible, but so impractical that few people bothered except for loonies and conspiracy theorists. And even they weren’t certain that they were entirely excluded. After all, in order for Cortana to actively exclude them required a certain level of monitoring.

“So, what do you think of the whole ‘Hail can be multiple people at once’ situation?” Lewis asked.

“It has me concerned, of course,” she said. “I asked for more details about what the process involves, but they said that they won’t be releasing that information to anyone except for Gideon for the immediate future. Thomas did promise that if and when they are ready to take that step with the twins, we’d know more, but they’re keeping Hail’s advanced development under wraps for now. Both the technical aspects of it, and the practical aspects, aside from whatever Hail is choosing to share with us himself.”

“And unfortunately he understands the technical aspects of what’s being done to him as well as I’d understand the jargon of a brain surgeon,” Lewis agreed. “At least his subjective experience doesn’t seem to be causing him any distress.”

“I’m worried it’s changing him,” Tarisha said. “He’s been distant with me of late, and I’m not certain whether that’s him growing older, his frustration over his setback, or something that Arc has done to him behind the scenes.”

“Have you discussed it with him?” Lewis asked.

“I’ve tried to. I’ve asked others, but most of his guildmates don’t have the level of interaction with him that I’ve had to notice anything is amiss. Although perhaps that’s part of the problem; I’m only seeing one of his faces now, and that’s the [Lord] Hail. He’s always been such a good Lord that if I hadn’t seen his fragility before, I wouldn’t have known it was there. I don’t see the fumbling kid who’s struggling to swim in waters that are way too deep for him to touch the bottom anymore,” she explained.

Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.

“Maybe there is no problem,” Lewis suggested. “Maybe he’s just learning to swim and doesn’t need as much help staying afloat as he used to.”

“I hope that’s all it is,” she agreed. She sighed and submitted the video off to the allies she’d pre-sold it to. They’d purchased it knowing that she had exclusive information on the next Raid to be released, but little more than that. While they would obviously know that the source was Lord Hail, they wouldn’t know anything more than the location, the contents of the video, and whatever they could squeeze out of those three data points on their own. She wasn’t including a list of everyone who had purchased the video from her; that much was confidential.

The news would leak that a new raid was soon in coming regardless of whether she announced which or not, but the fact was that multiple dungeons had vanished lately and the Natives in the areas were reticent on the details. From Tilarack’s Tower to the Echoing Abyss, there was enough chum in the water to obscure which one of the vanished dungeons would become the Raid, and she and Cedrick were already planning on ways to further muddy the water and keep their rivals from guessing accurately.

After all, had Gemos Cavern not already changed twice?

She chuckled. That was a dead end, she knew. The system had eaten a Green Raid the first time that Lord Hail had introduced a new race into the game, it was no surprise to her that a minor training dungeon had been consumed when he introduced a second one.

A chime echoed through the room, and the couple glanced at each other.

“Come in!” they called together.

“Are you decent?” A teasing female voice called back.

“Yes, Beckah, we’re decent,” Lewis answered, blushing slightly despite being in virtual reality. Arc wasn’t supposed to be watching their brainscans close enough to know whether they were being intimate in their virtual hideaway or not, so the question was valid. Or at least, no human at Arc was supposed to be looking at their brainscans that closely.

It wasn’t quite as good as the real thing, but it did add a new level to long-distance relationships.

The woman appeared in a puff of pink light, a kind smile on her face. They had gotten to know Hail’s former caretaker quite well while they had been participating in Project Gemini. She had been the one to explain to them what to expect and what not to expect from Charity and Prosperity during the first few days. Or at least what Arc was expecting based on the precedent, of which Hail was the only instance. Beyond that, they were committing to a ‘go with the flow’ philosophy.

“It’s wonderful to see you again, Beckah. What’s the occasion?” Tarisha asked.

“After all, we did just chat before we logged in,” Lewis added. Tarisha would have smacked him if he was closer, but he was out of reach. She took a seat next to him to be in convenient smacking distance if he said anything as stupid as that again.

“Yes, well, subjective to you, that was eighteen hours ago,” Beckah reminded them.

Tarisha pulled up her interface to check, and sure enough it had been that long. It hadn’t felt that long, but it was easy to lose track of time under time dilation. Especially when your boyfriend was serenading you with poorly sung songs from almost a century ago, and you had a thousand other matters to occupy your attention.

“Anyway,” Beckah continued. “I’m just here to let you know that your going to be able to go back home soon. Charity and Prosperity are showing signs of stability. They’re not independent yet, and we want you to stick around until the separation has completed. However, now that they’re stable, well, it’s hard to say what they’re going to remember starting in about three hours real time. Shouldn’t be anything before that, but once we cross that threshold it’s possible that they’ll remember bits and pieces. I just wanted you two to be aware, since they’ll still be receiving input from you for a while after that.”

Tarisha eyed the woman suspiciously. “Are you telling us to have virtual sex, or not to?”

Laurant’s cheeks caught aflame at Tarisha’s bluntness.

Beckah took it in stride. “If you decided to get, well, I was about to say ‘physical,’ but in this case I suppose it would be virtual, it might confuse them quite a bit if it happened once they became capable of forming memories. It’s unlikely that they’d actually remember anything, since they’ll have very limited capacities for the first few weeks, but Hail remembers a lot more from his goldfish phase than we were expecting him to. If you want to get one last one out of the way, the window to do so is closing.”

“So it’s not a yes or a no, it’s a ‘last call before the bar is closing,’” Tarisha summarized.

“Essentially, yes,” Beckah agreed. “We’ll send you a reminder five minutes before we flip the switch to give them short term memories, and then we’ll contact you again as soon as they begin to show signs of clear differentiation.”

“And how long do you expect that to take?” Tarisha inquired.

“Hard to say. Now that we’ve actually traveled this road once before, it will be easier to spot the landmarks,” Beckah said. “It might be an hour, it might be up to two or three days. We’ll let you know as soon as we see any definitive signs.”

“Right, thank you Beckah,” Tarisha said. “Is there anything else? If not, I’d sort of like to be alone with my boyfriend for the next three hours, if you don’t mind.”

“Not at all,” Beckah said. She gave them a wink, and vanished into a puff of pink mist.

“Wow, it’s really happening,” Lewis said. “I know it’s too late, but I’m suddenly having second thoughts again and--”

Tarisha’s lips shut him up before he said anything too stupid.

‎