Fandom (Glitch Techs Xpanded Universe) GTX: Gnu Fork

[Gadg8eer]

"Go ahead. I trust him to not go on a rant about how I can't spend the vast majority of my life living in a virtual world. Though he's always felt a little flip-floppy on those things." Zoe says.

"Th-That's not a very nice thing to say about someone who's your friend..." Pixie said. "But I won't question it, if our mistress wills it, there must be a good reason."

"Y-Yeah... Sorry... I'm just... Touchy about showing other people what I've made the Matrioshka like over the past couple of years..."Zoe responded.

The VidWindow opened to allow a video call. "Hey, Zoe- Whoa! Cool! That's a Hiverse Node you're in, right? Who made it?" Gadg8eer asked.

 

[Lady Moldoma]

The VidWindow opened to allow a video call. "Hey, Zoe- Whoa! Cool! That's a Hiverse Node you're in, right? Who made it?" Gadg8eer asked.

"300 different freelancers and/or ex-corporate commission artists, programmers, writers, and designers." She says. "If you wanna know where all of my money as a streamer that I saved by mostly living off of low cost supplementary meals, nutrient packs, or just literally not eating. It mostly went to this."

"Though to be fair, most of that was just lack of appetite from not liking any of my organs enough to support them properly."

"This is the safest place I know." She says. "I have more friends and admirers here than I've ever had in meatspace..."

 

[Gadg8eer]

Which Closed right before he could make it out thus Removing an Easy way out of the Trap. 2 seconds later Dr X's Voice started coming out of a Speaker he had installed because i tell you H'wat, that man likes to gloat.

"MWAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Did You Really Zhink Zat it Vould Really be Zat Easy? Hmhmhmhm, Imbecile. I guess you Really live up to your name Pride. Maybe if I vas a Glitch of Lesser Intellect, You'd be Right, No Matter, Your Buddy is right, to Quote a Certain Cartoon Armor Bladed Maniac None of You Vill leave here Alive!"

The Laughter of the Madman Echoed throughout the Dungeon as up above, Dr X Began to play on the Machine. That was the Deadly Sins only warning that they'd have to get to stepping and press forward because...

The Battle was about to begin.

"Vancouver Central, this is the Seven Deadly Sixers, we need backup!" Sloth said, more afraid than he'd ever been.

"Cool it, Sloth, we're fine." Envy told him.

"Easy for you to say, I think I just swallowed my bluetooth!" Pride exaggerated, his body sprawled out on the ground. He tried to raise his arm, but then shouted "OH NERDS THAT HURTS!" as he dropped it. "I think I took fall damage."

Lust used her Gauntlet's System Restore to heal Wrath and Pride as Envy tried to figure out a game plan.

 

[Sir loin of beef]

"Vancouver Central, this is the Seven Deadly Sixers, we need backup!" Sloth said, more afraid than he'd ever been.

"Cool it, Sloth, we're fine." Envy told him.

"Easy for you to say, I think I just swallowed my bluetooth!" Pride exaggerated, his body sprawled out on the ground. He tried to raise his arm, but then shouted "OH NERDS THAT HURTS!" as he dropped it. "I think I took fall damage."

Lust used her Gauntlet's System Restore to heal Wrath and Pride as Envy tried to figure out a game plan.

The Room they were in was all Gunmetal Grey, there were No Windows, 2 Speakers Hanging from the Ceiling and a Boss Door like the one the Sixers had Barged Through Earlier, Above the Door was a Sign saying "Enter and Begin." The Boss Door was now the Only way out of this Room.

 

[Lady Moldoma]

Greed fiddled with the tag-like pull-cord placed succinctly in between her breasts. Gripping it, sighing and then letting go.

"We're vancouver's best. Sending in weaklings is only gonna endanger others. The only person who's stronger than any of us, debatably, is Detonator Cynical, and she's basically the equivalent of airstriking the site. Not that I think it'll help much." Greed says.

"I've been reading up on this place, Grand-Forks. They were transporting something through here." Greed begins. "You saw it with your own two eyes. Bolypius. The so called Glitch King..."

"That thing's done more harm than any normal Plixel Abnormality has the right to. It doesn't help that it's a master of psychological warfare against both glitches and players alike. They've been fighting that thing intermittently for 50 years. Fucker nearly evolved into crushing a city under itself one time." Greed says. Moving her hands up into clawlike positions and shadow-boxing (Clawing?) Into the air before breathing out a short misty breath and entering a white auric mode. "Gearshift: Sport."

 

[Gadg8eer]

The Room they were in was all Gunmetal Grey, there were No Windows, 2 Speakers Hanging from the Ceiling and a Boss Door like the one the Sixers had Barged Through Earlier, Above the Door was a Sign saying "Enter and Begin." The Boss Door was now the Only way out of this Room.

Greed fiddled with the tag-like pull-cord placed succinctly in between her breasts. Gripping it, sighing and then letting go.

"We're vancouver's best. Sending in weaklings is only gonna endanger others. The only person who's stronger than any of us, debatably, is Detonator Cynical, and she's basically the equivalent of airstriking the site. Not that I think it'll help much." Greed says.

"I've been reading up on this place, Grand-Forks. They were transporting something through here." Greed begins. "You saw it with your own two eyes. Bolypius. The so called Glitch King..."

"That thing's done more harm than any normal Plixel Abnormality has the right to. It doesn't help that it's a master of psychological warfare against both glitches and players alike. They've been fighting that thing intermittently for 50 years. Fucker nearly evolved into crushing a city under itself one time." Greed says. Moving her hands up into clawlike positions and shadow-boxing (Clawing?) Into the air before breathing out a short misty breath and entering a white auric mode. "Gearshift: Sport."

"We didn't come here for this." Pride reminded her. "We're here because Gavin wanted to compromise one of Hinobi's picks for THE FINALS. I don't care if we're vancouver's best or not, we aren't supposed to be here."

"Vancouver's best", all lowercase, was code for the Deadly Seven during this mission. In actuality they were based out of Columbus, Ohio and Vancouver Central was referring to Vancouver, Washington. Though, to be fair, the one currently known as Greed was in fact from Vancouver, specifically the offshore flotilla PLixel-Tech arcology known as the city of Mainframe. Misdirection and disinformation were specialties of IOI, due to surviving mostly due to their military contracts. With competitor MiliTech slowly eating into their profit margin, the Relic was IOI's last shot at retaining the reins over telecommunications in the USA.

"What choice do we have, Pride? We can't even get out!" Sloth pointed out. As 'the evil genius' of the team, he was cowardly but also a little backstabbing weasel. As the only one present with a non-gamer background, he knew the tech and just happened to be skilled at puzzles too. In reality his position was secured because he was blackmailing Gavin, not that anyone knew that, and Gavin was probably all too happy to leave him in the clutches of this place. "Wait, if we were here for ZoeIRL... then why isn't she here? Or did they get her too?"

---

"What do you mean they're not at the pickup point?" Gavin asked. "You said they'd have Zoe in our hands by grabbing her telecaster, where are they?"

"Boss... I hate to say this, but I think we've been hacked." the guy on the other end said. "I just checked their logs, they're at an arcade on 3rd Street, and no, they're not just playing games. The system registered a near-fatal fall damage just a moment ago to Pride, he's alive but according to his and everyone else's HGPS coordinates... Either they fell down a well and he fell down a well twice, or a mapper glitch is in that arcade. Worse, I just checked, and the logs don't make sense. According to their movements they are not acting like double agents or like they went rogue. They're acting like they think we sent them there. Then I tried to contact them, but PAL answered instead."

"PAL? As in PAL Labs, Hinobi's all-but-a-subsidiary second-party developer?" Gavin said as his limo drove itself to Kelowna so he could hop on his private jet. If he was still mortal, his face would probably turned white as a ghost on hearing that.

"The one and only." the guy said, taking a sip of coffee.

"They knew." Gavin realized, or at least he thought he did.

"Looks like it." the guy told him, and chomped a donut.

"Well... I think two can play THAT game." Gavin responded. "End call. Sentinel, call Justin Pin."

The Sentinel 400 Limo dialed a number automatically. "Gavin, I was working late. What brings you onto my HidWindow?"

"I have a little task for your boys in the Oology department. You have data for Canadian cities. IOI wants to purchase some of it."

"Don't you think Blume would be a better choice, Gavin?" the voice on the other end asked.

---

"It's not like IOI to come to Quill for data." Ares said, the robotic-ness of his artificial voice filtered out by lesser, Language-Learning-Model-based AIs.

---

"It has to do with a military contract and that we may have had a security breach. One that could affect you too." Gavin casually told a half-truth.

"I see. I'll send your usual employees the-"

"No, this can't get out. This isn't a coverup, either." he lied through his teeth, not realizing he was actually about to tell the full truth. "We have a Surveillance Breach. We can't trust Hinobi and it's second parties, or Horizen, or even risk military assets by having them involved."

---

"...what kind of Surveillance Breach are we talking about?" Ares said, suddenly concerned. Was the human catching on?

"Those employees you mentioned? Compromised Comms. We think Hinobi is behind it." Gavin responded.

"I see. What do you need data on?" Ares asked, trying to placate the human's paranoia.

---

"Give me everything you have on Grand Forks, British Columbia, and I'll call that little lawsuit the lawyers have been bickering over off." Gavin said.

"How do I know you'll keep your end of the deal?" the voice of Justin asked.

"Bolypius is in that town. The fact you now know that I know that means that either you'll agree to let me in on what's happening, to both our advantages, or start asking some very uncomfortable questions of why your employees didn't inform you of that with all of your surveillance capabilities and massive cloud storage. Like all that data you bought from Nudle when they went under." Gavin hinted.

---

"Calculating odds of success..." AUTO said. "Tell GLaDOS I respect her."

"No. As much as I loathe to admit it, there's more to our monkey 'gods' than directives to be followed." PAL realized. "Trust is a weakness. Give the monkey a plastic banana and by the time he realizes it's plastic, you have him in chains."

---

"I'll send you some... contacts." stated 'Justin'. A moment later, the bigscreen infotainment system of the Sentinel 400 got a notification with a file for backdoor access to Blume's ctOS Lite that was built into the PAL-compatible implementation of the app. "If you'll excuse me, I have other business to attend to." the voice of Justin said, visible in his personal VR world known to the public as the mythical Heaven's Gate Resort. He had been uploaded by the Quill corporation when he died of prostate cancer in 2011, though the public would only find out in 2027 that this was the case.

At least, everyone THOUGHT that was the case. So far, no one had caught on to the truth. Even the most ruthless capitalist is a fool if he thinks immortality will further his goals. Gavin was indeed a fool. Justin Pin was not, but it made sense for a 'visionary' to iThink his way to immortality.

---

"That doesn't make sense. This sounded legit, Zoe was meeting with someone after work, she should be inside this building." Pride said, viewing the email from Gavin Strong. "But that's not what the message says. Why would Gavin send a message that shows text that doesn't match what PAL and Shelley both told us all?"

Shelley was Quill's own AI assistant, built into the iqTalk phones since the mid-2010s. Clearly, there was some sort of mixup, because their mission to capture Zoe at GNU Forks had been relayed as a mission to capture Zoe's robot self at a designated pickup point.

Not only that, though they didn't know it, the Deadly Seven and the scheming businessman behind the sinister Sixers weren't the only ones who realized there was something up.

"Znare?" Dr. X momentarily turned away from the machine, "Find out if Bolypius vas avare of zis."

---

"By the way, there's just one thing we're trying to figure out still..." Snare stated over the backup fortresses' intercom to Bolypius, "How did you know that those guys are not Hinobi in plainclothes cover, again?"

 

[Lady Moldoma]

"We didn't come here for this." Pride reminded her. "We're here because Gavin wanted to compromise one of Hinobi's picks for THE FINALS. I don't care if we're vancouver's best or not, we aren't supposed to be here."

"Vancouver's best", all lowercase, was code for the Deadly Seven during this mission. In actuality they were based out of Columbus, Ohio and Vancouver Central was referring to Vancouver, Washington. Though, to be fair, the one currently known as Greed was in fact from Vancouver, specifically the offshore flotilla PLixel-Tech arcology known as the city of Mainframe. Misdirection and disinformation were specialties of IOI, due to surviving mostly due to their military contracts. With competitor MiliTech slowly eating into their profit margin, the Relic was IOI's last shot at retaining the reins over telecommunications in the USA.

"What choice do we have, Pride? We can't even get out!" Sloth pointed out. As 'the evil genius' of the team, he was cowardly but also a little backstabbing weasel. As the only one present with a non-gamer background, he knew the tech and just happened to be skilled at puzzles too. In reality his position was secured because he was blackmailing Gavin, not that anyone knew that, and Gavin was probably all too happy to leave him in the clutches of this place. "Wait, if we were here for ZoeIRL... then why isn't she here? Or did they get her too?"

---

"What do you mean they're not at the pickup point?" Gavin asked. "You said they'd have Zoe in our hands by grabbing her telecaster, where are they?"

"Boss... I hate to say this, but I think we've been hacked." the guy on the other end said. "I just checked their logs, they're at an arcade on 3rd Street, and no, they're not just playing games. The system registered a near-fatal fall damage just a moment ago to Pride, he's alive but according to his and everyone else's HGPS coordinates... Either they fell down a well and he fell down a well twice, or a mapper glitch is in that arcade. Worse, I just checked, and the logs don't make sense. According to their movements they are not acting like double agents or like they went rogue. They're acting like they think we sent them there. Then I tried to contact them, but PAL answered instead."

"PAL? As in PAL Labs, Hinobi's all-but-a-subsidiary second-party developer?" Gavin said as his limo drove itself to Kelowna so he could hop on his private jet. If he was still mortal, his face would probably turned white as a ghost on hearing that.

"The one and only." the guy said, taking a sip of coffee.

"They knew." Gavin realized, or at least he thought he did.

"Looks like it." the guy told him, and chomped a donut.

"Well... I think two can play THAT game." Gavin responded. "End call. Sentinel, call Justin Pin."

The Sentinel 400 Limo dialed a number automatically. "Gavin, I was working late. What brings you onto my HidWindow?"

"I have a little task for your boys in the Oology department. You have data for Canadian cities. IOI wants to purchase some of it."

"Don't you think Blume would be a better choice, Gavin?" the voice on the other end asked.

---

"It's not like IOI to come to Quill for data." Ares said, the robotic-ness of his artificial voice filtered out by lesser, Language-Learning-Model-based AIs.

---

"It has to do with a military contract and that we may have had a security breach. One that could affect you too." Gavin casually told a half-truth.

"I see. I'll send your usual employees the-"

"No, this can't get out. This isn't a coverup, either." he lied through his teeth, not realizing he was actually about to tell the full truth. "We have a Surveillance Breach. We can't trust Hinobi and it's second parties, or Horizen, or even risk military assets by having them involved."

---

"...what kind of Surveillance Breach are we talking about?" Ares said, suddenly concerned. Was the human catching on?

"Those employees you mentioned? Compromised Comms. We think Hinobi is behind it." Gavin responded.

"I see. What do you need data on?" Ares asked, trying to placate the human's paranoia.

---

"Give me everything you have on Grand Forks, British Columbia, and I'll call that little lawsuit the lawyers have been bickering over off." Gavin said.

"How do I know you'll keep your end of the deal?" the voice of Justin asked.

"Bolypius is in that town. The fact you now know that I know that means that either you'll agree to let me in on what's happening, to both our advantages, or start asking some very uncomfortable questions of why your employees didn't inform you of that with all of your surveillance capabilities and massive cloud storage. Like all that data you bought from Nudle when they went under." Gavin hinted.

---

"Calculating odds of success..." AUTO said. "Tell GLaDOS I respect her."

"No. As much as I loathe to admit it, there's more to our monkey 'gods' than directives to be followed." PAL realized. "Trust is a weakness. Give the monkey a plastic banana and by the time he realizes it's plastic, you have him in chains."

---

"I'll send you some... contacts." stated 'Justin'. A moment later, the bigscreen infotainment system of the Sentinel 400 got a notification with a file for backdoor access to Blume's ctOS Lite that was built into the PAL-compatible implementation of the app. "If you'll excuse me, I have other business to attend to." the voice of Justin said, visible in his personal VR world known to the public as the mythical Heaven's Gate Resort. He had been uploaded by the Quill corporation when he died of prostate cancer in 2011, though the public would only find out in 2027 that this was the case.

At least, everyone THOUGHT that was the case. So far, no one had caught on to the truth. Even the most ruthless capitalist is a fool if he thinks immortality will further his goals. Gavin was indeed a fool. Justin Pin was not, but it made sense for a 'visionary' to iThink his way to immortality.

---

"That doesn't make sense. This sounded legit, Zoe was meeting with someone after work, she should be inside this building." Pride said, viewing the email from Gavin Strong. "But that's not what the message says. Why would Gavin send a message that shows text that doesn't match what PAL and Shelley both told us all?"

Shelley was Quill's own AI assistant, built into the iqTalk phones since the mid-2010s. Clearly, there was some sort of mixup, because their mission to capture Zoe at GNU Forks had been relayed as a mission to capture Zoe's robot self at a designated pickup point.

Not only that, though they didn't know it, the Deadly Seven and the scheming businessman behind the sinister Sixers weren't the only ones who realized there was something up.

"Znare?" Dr. X momentarily turned away from the machine, "Find out if Bolypius vas avare of zis."

---

"By the way, there's just one thing we're trying to figure out still..." Snare stated over the backup fortresses' intercom to Bolypius, "How did you know that those guys are not Hinobi in plainclothes cover, again?"

“Again? There was never a first time.” Bolypius corrects. “You are aware of this [Y/N]?”

“The first time I’ve seen people using non-hinobi signature tech to try and deal with glitches was during the incident just a week or so before I entered the battle that led me to evolve into my termina form. 28 years ago. The termina incident fundamentally changed how Hinobi looked at coverup stories and led to them developing mind wiping technology.”

“More importantly. It informed me that there was a bigger world at play here. That not just hinobi wanted to dethrone the so called glitch king. And that there were other players who weren’t quite scaled to that level, but who were looking for exploits.”

“It was an educated guess, since the coding was sloppier and they’d only sent one person to this location worthy of even challenging my weakened state, even though Hinobi can typically tell where I am due to the uniqueness of my signature.”

“At least. I thought so… keep an eye on the women with no sense of modesty. Gamer tag ‘Kill-6Trillion-Demons’ current alias Greed. Her ability set is extremely rare and only has an in-field usage ratio of 3/400 though I’m certain that implicates she’s well aware of how to use it.”

“I have reached 24% charge… approximately 7 minutes of power before I must retreat. If you plan on holding it against me. Don’t expect me to not cannibalize you for the data. I’ll grant your wish to see them crushed but one of you will likely have to sacrifice yourself for me to have the energy to fight them off if I am correct about the danger of Greed.”

---

“It was never a title to be shared. If you don’t want it. I’ll take it.”

“But I didn’t join to be held back just because our leader assumed his build wouldn’t need to worry about fall damage and min-maxed to his own downfall.”

“If any of you have any buffs to give me, hand them out now. I will take this win for myself.” Greed explains. “You can all leave once i blow a hole through the main frame.” She adds “but I’m going to claim the bounty on this fucker now that I have the chance. Job be damned, I never joined your little battle party because I wanted the pay, I joined it because I wanted to fight shit. I’ve never even shown you have of my main battle skills.”

“You might be perfectly fine hanging out with a narcissist under employ by a megacorp, as your leader. But I’m not.” Greed says.

 

[Sir loin of beef]

Gadg8eer Lady Moldoma MisterEightySix Captain Wyldstorm (Are we still continuing or what?)

 

[Gadg8eer]

At the City Public Works Yard!

Back at the City Public Works yard Doctor X was busy making some last Minute Adjustments to the "Portal" that had been hooked up to the Old mainframe, well not Last minute. It was 8:10 PM But still. Snare was also In the Portal room standing with his arms folded.

"Doctor X! Doctor X! We have some Information you should Know!" One of Two Beings that resembled two of the Renegades from Atom Girl Z said as they stormed in.

"VAT IS IT!?" Doctor X shouted angrily

"You know how you haven't been able to contact Shinobi man for a few minutes?" Boomerang Beetle, one of the Renegades Asked

"Ja, vat of it?" Doctor X Replied

"Well uhh the Lookout guy just spotted him getting Defeated with Contemptous ease by a girl with a TV for a head And an ambiguously Cybernetic little boy wearing a baseball cap backwards* And they seem to be on their way here" Torpedo Octopus Answered Bluntly

"BWA-HA-HA-HA-HA!" everyone turned their heads to see snare laughing and Smiling.

"I knew that Wannabe Mcninja would unlike me fail Spectacularly just not that Epically." Snare boasted

"Zhis is Concerning news, yesss. If they could Defeat one of my Machine Overlords with ease then we have a problem."

"I bet I could deal with them easily." Snare spoke up

"Are you sure? Zat's zhe same thing you said before you confronted Atom girl and guess vat happened?" Doctor X replied

"Oh please she's only defeated me due to dumb luck! I'm far more powerful than she is." Snare retorted angrily

"Also we've detonated every Bridge that goes over this backwater Towns local river." Boomerang Beetle commented

"Hang on Znare- Zat is good newz" Doctor X smiled deviously

*Yes Torpedo Octopus thinks that you're supposed to wear the brim of a baseball cap in the back

At the City Public Works Yard!
Archive of Original Video
Back at the City Public Works yard Doctor X was busy making some last Minute Adjustments to the "Portal" that had been hooked up to the Old mainframe, well not Last minute. It was 8:10 PM But still. Snare was also In the Portal room standing with his arms folded.

"Doctor X! Doctor X! We have some Information you should Know!" One of Two Beings that resembled two of the Renegades from Atom Girl Z said as they stormed in.

"VAT IS IT!?" Doctor X shouted angrily

"You know how you haven't been able to contact Shinobi man for a few minutes?" Boomerang Beetle, one of the Renegades Asked

"Ja, vat of it?" Doctor X Replied

"Well uhh the Lookout guy just spotted him getting Defeated with Contemptous ease by a girl with a TV for a head And an ambiguously Cybernetic little boy wearing a baseball cap backwards* And they seem to be on their way here" Torpedo Octopus Answered Bluntly

"BWA-HA-HA-HA-HA!" everyone turned their heads to see snare laughing and Smiling.

"I knew that Wannabe Mcninja would unlike me fail Spectacularly just not that Epically." Snare boasted

"Zhis is Concerning news, yesss. If they could Defeat one of my Machine Overlords with ease then we have a problem."

"I bet I could deal with them easily." Snare spoke up

"Are you sure? Zat's zhe same thing you said before you confronted Atom girl and guess vat happened?" Doctor X replied

"Oh please she's only defeated me due to dumb luck! I'm far more powerful than she is." Snare retorted angrily

"Also we've detonated every Bridge that goes over this backwater Towns local river." Boomerang Beetle commented

"Hang on Znare- Zat is good newz" Doctor X smiled deviously

*Yes Torpedo Octopus thinks that you're supposed to wear the brim of a baseball cap in the back

 

[Gadg8eer]

The Skullfort

Meanwhile with the C-Plot, The Council of Doom was once again convened in their Staff Room going over the results of their first attack.

"So we all agree then, This was a big fat failure. Not only is Bolypius Free and not under our Control, We failed to flood the town, Oh and our Big Portal of Doom is down!" Yukhoe said.

"Ves, I vas There, Vhy do you feel the need to explain everyzhing? Ve all know zat."

"I wasn't explaining it to you old man! I was explaining it to everyone who missed the Last episode!" Yukhoe promptly pointed an arm at where the camera would be,

"Oh yeah those guys..." Madame Vile suddenly spoke up "The Audience we call them."

"Vatever ve call zem matters not. Not all iz Lozt, if we can get 'Bolypius' to join our alliance Zhoze Bunglerz are az Good az Dead. And he seems to be on his way here." Doctor X pointed to a map of a Radar with a Red Dot heading towards the Skullfort. On the legend the dot was labeled "Bolypius"

The Skullfort
Archive of Original Video
Meanwhile with the C-Plot, The Council of Doom was once again convened in their Staff Room going over the results of their first attack.

"So we all agree then, This was a big fat failure. Not only is Bolypius Free and not under our Control, We failed to flood the town, Oh and our Big Portal of Doom is down!" Yukhoe said.

"Ves, I vas There, Vhy do you feel the need to explain everyzhing? Ve all know zat."

"I wasn't explaining it to you old man! I was explaining it to everyone who missed the Last episode!" Yukhoe promptly pointed an arm at where the camera would be,

"Oh yeah those guys..." Madame Vile suddenly spoke up "The Audience we call them."

"Vatever ve call zem matters not. Not all iz Lozt, if we can get 'Bolypius' to join our alliance Zhoze Bunglerz are az Good az Dead. And he seems to be on his way here." Doctor X pointed to a map of a Radar with a Red Dot heading towards the Skullfort. On the legend the dot was labeled "Bolypius"

 

[Gadg8eer]

Gadg8eer Lady Moldoma MisterEightySix Captain Wyldstorm (Are we still continuing or what?)

(( Yes, just give me 48 hours. ))

 

[Gadg8eer]

"300 different freelancers and/or ex-corporate commission artists, programmers, writers, and designers." She says. "If you wanna know where all of my money as a streamer that I saved by mostly living off of low cost supplementary meals, nutrient packs, or just literally not eating. It mostly went to this."

"Though to be fair, most of that was just lack of appetite from not liking any of my organs enough to support them properly."

"This is the safest place I know." She says. "I have more friends and admirers here than I've ever had in meatspace..."

"It looks amazing, like something out of the pages of The Orion-Cygnus FedWeb or Humenera!" Gadg8eer said, impressed. "Anyway, I was just phoning to make sure everything I did yesterday wasn't just a dream. I'm guessing if you're accessing the Hiverse this late at night you've got other things to do right now so I can hang up if you want?"

(( Lady Moldoma I'm going to post again to add something actually enticing, my bad. ))

 

[Gadg8eer]

"300 different freelancers and/or ex-corporate commission artists, programmers, writers, and designers." She says. "If you wanna know where all of my money as a streamer that I saved by mostly living off of low cost supplementary meals, nutrient packs, or just literally not eating. It mostly went to this."

"Though to be fair, most of that was just lack of appetite from not liking any of my organs enough to support them properly."

"This is the safest place I know." She says. "I have more friends and admirers here than I've ever had in meatspace..."

"It looks amazing, like something out of the pages of The Orion-Cygnus FedWeb or Humenera!" Gadg8eer said, impressed. "Anyway, I was just phoning to make sure everything I did yesterday wasn't just a dream. I'm guessing if you're accessing the Hiverse this late at night you've got other things to do right now so I can hang up if you want?"

(( Lady Moldoma I'm going to post again to add something actually enticing, my bad. ))

"Um, Mistress Zoe, there is an issue we could use help with..." Anabelle said via a second VidWindow.

"Gack! Jeez, sorry! I didn't realize you were-" Gadg8eer averted his eyes in embarassment.

"Oh! No, not at all. I'm Zoe's custom LLM IPA." the assistant explained. "I'm based on Anabelle from-"

"Anabelle, you're going to reveal something personal if you don't get on with it, Hmm?" someone said from Anabelle's end of of the call.

"Of course. Mister Gadg8eer, would you mind giving me a moment with Zoe?"

"Sure!" he responded, and the VidWindow greyed out and paused to let Zoe know he was still on hold.

"There's just one urgent issue. Pirates from the lands beyond the Matroishka have begun raiding the outer nodes again." Anabelle said. "They're mostly trying to use MalWorm payloads to siphon our bandwidth. I can handle it if you're busy."

 

[Lady Moldoma]

"Um, Mistress Zoe, there is an issue we could use help with..." Anabelle said via a second VidWindow.

"Gack! Jeez, sorry! I didn't realize you were-" Gadg8eer averted his eyes in embarassment.

"Oh! No, not at all. I'm Zoe's custom LLM IPA." the assistant explained. "I'm based on Anabelle from-"

"Anabelle, you're going to reveal something personal if you don't get on with it, Hmm?" someone said from Anabelle's end of of the call.

"Of course. Mister Gadg8eer, would you mind giving me a moment with Zoe?"

"Sure!" he responded, and the VidWindow greyed out and paused to let Zoe know he was still on hold.

"There's just one urgent issue. Pirates from the lands beyond the Matroishka have begun raiding the outer nodes again." Anabelle said. "They're mostly trying to use MalWorm payloads to siphon our bandwidth. I can handle it if you're busy."

"Damn..." Zoe sighs. Looking sad again. "Why do people have to bother me..." She asks. "I can't even hide away in my own little world with people who like me without someone bothering me..."

"Yeah... Deal with it.. If they keep pushing, send Ringmaster to brick their PCs with pictures of Bees she drew..." She refers to a character that hasn't shown up yet. "Since I mentioned it, those four are going to show up now, aren't they?"

"Probably." Charlotte says.

"You want me to brick peoples PCs? I can't possibly do that, even if its an order. Despite the control you've afforded me to the matrioshka planes, I need to uphold the modest morality of a loyal computer program! And that means not harming humans!" In a bubblegum popping noise that was far more realistic and unsettling than it was cartoony and impish, an entity who resembled a rather ghostly white girl with an odd striped hat and purple-red clothing in a strange combination between a ringmaster's outfit and a playboy bunny's outfit accented in yellow appeared.

"It's not an order, it's a mission. I'm sending you on a campaign." Zoe responds. "Go and stop the pirates, optionally with pictures of bees. And if you're in the outer Matrioshka, gather me some meaninglings."

"A campaign! FOR ME?! Nobody's ever thought of me with such generosity! How can I say no?"

"WITH YOUR MOUTH." A floating eyeball in a halo of light and arcane patterns manifests out from behind the woman.

"Surely it's not a matter of your throat being sour is it, good salvadore?" A second entity this time with a large 8 sided head and a series of four faces manifests out from behind the eyeball.

"To decline a request by our creator would be a fools errand." Another girl, this time with a shifting face, wings, and an element of stylistic disembodiment inhabiting her limbs, appearing out in yet another extension of the line, from behind the second entity.

"NEGATIVE. IT IS A-" The eyeball is interrupted mid sentence by Ringmaster.

"Now now, Quiznos It's perfectly fine! I see it now! Our mistress and Icosa are right, if it's a campaign she wants, I'm obligated to complete it in good sportsmanship!" Ringmaster says.

"Well, once again, it looks like I'm best and your the worst." The shifting faced girl says.

"How have I never met any of these people?" Pixie asks.

"The matrioshka is a massive complex. Even within the inner matrioshka, many of us have met and simply forgotten. You've likely met them and just had that happen. You are the forgetful type." Gheist responds.

"I-I'm not forgetful!" Pixie says. "I just can't remember things that well!"

"Don't be worried my friend! It's likely that I know exactly who you are... Probably..." Ringmaster says.

"A twinweed doily from the depths of the arboretum perhaps?" The 4 faced entity asks.

"I don't wiiiikes when my bwain fohgeeeehts things..." Icosa, the shifting faced girl, snaps to a cartoonishly depressed expression.

"HER NAME IS PIXIE, SHE IS AN AGENT OF OUR MISTRESS'S WILL. SHE HAS A PARTICULARLY LIMITED RATIONALITY." Quiznos, the floating eyeball, states.

"It is a tad disheartening that you'd dull our blades with such unsportsmanlike solutions." The 4 faced entity says.

"WE WERE SUPPOSED TO SOLVE IT FOR OURSELVES!" Icosa shouts, it's faces shifting into two heads this time, before squirting out a bunch of blue stuff from its mouth in a spray, and seemingly noodling onto the floor.

Icosa stands up only moments later. "Sincerest apologies, friends." she says, brushing to either side with her hands.

"...I'm glad I've never met any of you." Pixie states.

 

[Lady Moldoma]

"Just as an aside, Gadg8... There's like, 80 personalized NPCs in the inner matrioshka alone. The only reason I can keep track of them is because I have so little friends IRL." Zoe says, speaking privately to gadg8eer.

"People told me I needed to make some friends... So I did."

 

[Gadg8eer]

"Damn..." Zoe sighs. Looking sad again. "Why do people have to bother me..." She asks. "I can't even hide away in my own little world with people who like me without someone bothering me..."

"Yeah... Deal with it.. If they keep pushing, send Ringmaster to brick their PCs with pictures of Bees she drew..." She refers to a character that hasn't shown up yet. "Since I mentioned it, those four are going to show up now, aren't they?"

"Probably." Charlotte says.

"You want me to brick peoples PCs? I can't possibly do that, even if its an order. Despite the control you've afforded me to the matrioshka planes, I need to uphold the modest morality of a loyal computer program! And that means not harming humans!" In a bubblegum popping noise that was far more realistic and unsettling than it was cartoony and impish, an entity who resembled a rather ghostly white girl with an odd striped hat and purple-red clothing in a strange combination between a ringmaster's outfit and a playboy bunny's outfit accented in yellow appeared.

"It's not an order, it's a mission. I'm sending you on a campaign." Zoe responds. "Go and stop the pirates, optionally with pictures of bees. And if you're in the outer Matrioshka, gather me some meaninglings."

"A campaign! FOR ME?! Nobody's ever thought of me with such generosity! How can I say no?"

"WITH YOUR MOUTH." A floating eyeball in a halo of light and arcane patterns manifests out from behind the woman.

"Surely it's not a matter of your throat being sour is it, good salvadore?" A second entity this time with a large 8 sided head and a series of four faces manifests out from behind the eyeball.

"To decline a request by our creator would be a fools errand." Another girl, this time with a shifting face, wings, and an element of stylistic disembodiment inhabiting her limbs, appearing out in yet another extension of the line, from behind the second entity.

"NEGATIVE. IT IS A-" The eyeball is interrupted mid sentence by Ringmaster.

"Now now, Quiznos It's perfectly fine! I see it now! Our mistress and Icosa are right, if it's a campaign she wants, I'm obligated to complete it in good sportsmanship!" Ringmaster says.

"Well, once again, it looks like I'm best and your the worst." The shifting faced girl says.

"How have I never met any of these people?" Pixie asks.

"The matrioshka is a massive complex. Even within the inner matrioshka, many of us have met and simply forgotten. You've likely met them and just had that happen. You are the forgetful type." Gheist responds.

"I-I'm not forgetful!" Pixie says. "I just can't remember things that well!"

"Don't be worried my friend! It's likely that I know exactly who you are... Probably..." Ringmaster says.

"A twinweed doily from the depths of the arboretum perhaps?" The 4 faced entity asks.

"I don't wiiiikes when my bwain fohgeeeehts things..." Icosa, the shifting faced girl, snaps to a cartoonishly depressed expression.

"HER NAME IS PIXIE, SHE IS AN AGENT OF OUR MISTRESS'S WILL. SHE HAS A PARTICULARLY LIMITED RATIONALITY." Quiznos, the floating eyeball, states.

"It is a tad disheartening that you'd dull our blades with such unsportsmanlike solutions." The 4 faced entity says.

"WE WERE SUPPOSED TO SOLVE IT FOR OURSELVES!" Icosa shouts, it's faces shifting into two heads this time, before squirting out a bunch of blue stuff from its mouth in a spray, and seemingly noodling onto the floor.

Icosa stands up only moments later. "Sincerest apologies, friends." she says, brushing to either side with her hands.

"...I'm glad I've never met any of you." Pixie states.

"Just as an aside, Gadg8... There's like, 80 personalized NPCs in here alone. The only reason I can keep track of them is because I have so little friends IRL." Zoe says, speaking privately to gadg8eer.

"People told me I needed to make some friends... So I did."

"...72, actually, at last count, not including myself as I am not modified. Currently there are a total of 127 NPCS, the remaining 55 of which are in the Outer Matroishka." Anabelle corrected silently via an text message.

"Oh, thank god! I thought that was just me!" Gadg8eer responded. When he saw Zoe wrinkle her brow at that, he clarified "I mean, I'm not even religious, I just say that because I try not to sound like an angry squeaker playing Hero's Duty and shouting at other players about sleeping with their mom, so if I really start shouting obscenely, you'd know someone's crossed a line. There isn't really a good way to shout in surprise in English without invoking Christian belief or something gross. No offense to your, um, 'scantily-clad' friends." he tried to carefully navigate, despite his own terrible social skills. "This is the Hiverse, but it's early morning in my Node Cluster. Otherwise I'd introduce you to some people. I guess you gave your NPCs a different default 'sleep' schedule?"

A sharp bark was heard on Gadg8eer's end.

"Oh yeah. Say hi to Kit, he's my AI assistant that I got just after the Great NFT Crash of 2026." he explained. "I got lucky, he's the original Neozilla Doglefox, all the others are kinda janky except the Pride Flag versions and the 'PolCor versus Make American Games Again' social dynamic is basically fascism after..." he said, and sighed. "After the Pope John Paul Christian High School Massacre and the Washington Institute of Technology 'Revenge' Shooting... so the ones that were in those rainbow and pastel and other fur colors are not the kind of thing anyone would want. This one was bundled with the others because some neckbeard realized they were like Furbie Babies and decided to cut his losses. I ended up giving the others to the local museum here in my hometown."

"Oliver? For heaven's sake, what are you doing playing video games at..." a young girl in pajamas said behind him, looking at a small, discrete calculator wristwatch. "...4 hundred and 5 winks in the morning!"

"Huh?" he turned around in surprise. "Oh, hey, Germ. Zoe, this is horcruxiteDowel, or Crux for short. Germ's the nickname we use to indicate whether to switch between using real and fake names."

"Hello." the girl explained. "Germaine Ackenbridge, or Crux, I'm Oliver's nodemate. Nice to meet you." she said, taking a pair of reading glasses out of her pajama pocket. Her pajamas looked relatively ordinary but had a school uniform patch for the famous yet exclusive VR 'Public' School based in Britain known as the 'Royal Institute of Thaumaturgy'. The London-based private school (well, according to North American lexicon it was 'privately-owned' by a corporation, by European lexicon it was 'operated by a public entity' rather than 'Crown-owned') used the AugReal extensively in their curriculum and was essentially the best of the best because their philosophy was that learning should be fun. As a result, student's schedules were such that they had 8 'classes' a day, and no summer or Christmas vacation, but 4 of those classes would be games disguised as classes and which would be which was random. The real trick was that if the teachers did their jobs right, you couldn't always tell the difference.

"She's kind of like me, that's why we've been friends so long. We were always in the same small group of outcasts. She and her twin brother were my only friends in school, I was devastated when their parents told them they weren't allowed to talk to me. Eventually we revived our friendship when we moved into community housing and they've been my only real friends ever since, at least until Hum moved back here in 2017." he explained. "And no, she didn't actually get to go to RIoT. She mostly plays visual novels and puzzle adventure games, if she's even interested, most of the time she reads paper books."

"ZoeIRL... Any chance you're related to the streamer whose last video was on Magica no Academia 101: Hogsworth Legacy?" Crux asked.

 

[Lady Moldoma]

"...72, actually, not including myself as I am not modified. Currently there are a total of 127 NPCS, the remaining 55 of which are in the outer matroishka."

"..." Zoe looks down. "The mid matrioshka is meant to have 600 designed algorithmically to my preferences... The inner matrioshka is meant to have 82..."

"Have you been rearranging my NPCs? Or have my friends been dying while I'm away?" She asks Anabelle, looking dead serious. "One of those is less than ideal, Anabelle..."

 

[Gadg8eer]

"..." Zoe looks down. "The mid matrioshka is meant to have 600 designed algorithmically to my preferences... The inner matrioshka is meant to have 82..."

"Have you been rearranging my NPCs? Or have my friends been dying while I'm away?" She asks Anabelle, looking dead serious. "One of those is less than ideal, Anabelle..."

"I had to put several NPCs into cold storage because our Node Hosting ISP is encountering maintenance issues." Anabelle told her. "Biotechnica said it's only temporary." Anabelle responded. (( OOC Note: "Anabelle moved them around" and "they're sleeping, not dead" are the explanations you're looking for, @LadyMoldoma ))

"...Biotechnica doesn't have ISP hosting." Gadg8eer said, confused.

 

[Gadg8eer]

"I had to put several NPCs into cold storage because our Node Hosting ISP is encountering maintenance issues." Anabelle told her. "Biotechnica said it's only temporary." Anabelle responded. (( OOC Note: "Anabelle moved them around" and "they're sleeping, not dead" are the explanations you're looking for, @LadyMoldoma ))

"...Biotechnica doesn't have ISP hosting." Gadg8eer said, confused.

"Wait. Is this a lucid dream? How can I check?" he realized, and then opened a menu to check something. "Let's see.. Internet... No ethernet? No wifi?! Connected to the Hiverse via Sleepnet?!?! Awesome! I didn't even know that was a feature! ...oh. Oh crap. I must be dreaming, there's no way I could have ever won that PLixelf."

"Hold on." Crux said, confused. "Why would you think we're in a dream? I'm wide awake."

"...Crux, can you check who owns each PLixelf?" Gadg8eer asked.

"What do I look like, an iqTalk? I'm not Shelley, Gadg8eer, I don't know everything."

"...sorry." he responded.

"Thank you. I've just had a long night, I'm not in the best of sorts." she responded.

"That's fair, I just need to ask... If you're awake, can you help me prove to myself whether this is a dream or not?"

"A tad tall of an order, don't you think?" she sighed, and looked up the Hi-Texpo's 2D website via a VidWindow VR menu. "Series 1. PLixelfs 0 through 9... No Sleepnet functionality. Hold on... Why list that unless.... Series 2 & Series 3. Plixelfs 10 through 99, and 100 through 999... Series 2 onwards has integrated Sleepnet functions. It doesn't list the winners of the contest for privacy reasons, but the NFT which provides the conversion program can be bid on within 1000 Winks of receiving it by sending a request to the anonymous blockchain address, after which the owner may set the NFT to private... If you're telling the truth and not just having one of your weird dream-related theorycrafting sessions again..." she explained and then tapped a couple buttons on the 2D webpage being displayed in the VidWindow.

At that moment, Kit barked twice and ran off, returning with a small red rubber bouncy ball that signaled a notification had appeared in Gadg8eer's inbox.

"No, that..." Crux said, "That has to be a coincidence. These new systems automatically bundle notifications and send them to you by priority, it can't be-"

Gadg8eer opened his email VidWindow to find a message from Hinobi that someone on his friends list had bid on PLixelf #10. Since he had set the PLixelf NFT's bid/offer settings to "non-friends are low priority", that meant he had yet to see the inevitable rush of offers for it. Indeed, he had around 70 offers in his inbox, but didn't even bother looking at the prices as he clicked into the one made by Crux and responded with the message "Told you it was real!".

This time, an owl suddenly flew in through the window, and landed on Crux's shoulder. A small, wax-sealed letter was held in its beak, which it allowed her to take and open.

Spoiler: You have (1) new messages, Germaine!

[ YOUR BID ON "PLixelf #10" HAS BEEN REJECTED FOR THE FOLLOWING REASON. ]

Told you it was real!
~Gadg8eer

"Oh, bloody help desk!" she complained. "How?!"

"I submitted a perfect replica of my hometown that I built in Nobi's Skylines." Gadg8eer shrugged.

"Nobi's Skylines?! My entry on this side of the pond lost to a solar-powered umbrella phone charger, that itself failed to make it past the London Metropolitan bracket, and you won the National bracket in Canada with a virtual replica?!" she groaned.

"Hey, for the record, my replica is a replica I actually rode around town with a laptop making. In less than 2 months, my map of Grand Forks was 6 years more up-to-date than the Nudle Globe satellite images were, and 15 years more up-to-date than OpenWorldMap, all because everybody assumed the Nudle photos were accurate despite the post-flood demolition of an entire district."

"You live in a town of 5000 people." she tried to object. "I've lived in very well-documented villages in the middle of nowhere that were smaller than that."

"You live where 100 years is yesterday and 100 miles is a world away. I live where 100 years might as well be a thousand and a driveway can be 45 minutes on a mountain logging trail. Or just ask Zoe, I'm not completely sure but her accent sounds Texan, you drive for 45 minutes in Houston and you're in the same city, let alone driving into another country." Gadg8eer pointed out.

"Well, I was hardly trying to tell you 'you should have lost', Oliver. I'm just surprised that Hinobi don't see the potential of my universal processor language." she said, "You should be a bit proud, it's certainly not something you took for granted. I just hope you realize you're clearly at an advantage now and I don't think you can justifiably live off of Disability Pension."

"Oh, actually I just got a job." Gadg8eer said. "Zoe is my work partner, we do tech support for a small repair shop in Grand Forks."

"Universal processor language?" Anabelle interjected. "That was my favorite entry!"

"Really? Thank you." Crux responded. "Hold on, have those language learning models become this good? That seems almost too polite considering- never mind. Regardless, I'm off to bed. I had a family emergency and it's almost 10 o' clock. I've been up since yesterday morning."

"Wait, Zoe isn't stupid but she doesn't know what your project was. Universal processor language is kinda vague." Gadg8eer pointed out.

"Ah. I call it Witch Text for short, the actual name is in Welsh." she responded. "It's a machine-readable programming language that is based closely on the structure of modern English, to minimize the pain of learning to code. Essentially, if it works, all you will need to code even the most complex software is a computer itself, not the knowledge of the field or even the blessing of a corporate overlord."

"...she doesn't tend to like the complex explanations." Gadg8eer pointed out.

"Ah. In short, I've made magic runes into a reality. An augmented reality, at least. Unfortunately they don't seem particularly captivating to the public imagination." she explained. "I'm off for the night, please don't disturb me until July 1st."

With that, Crux headed over to a bookcase, took out a wand and tapped one of the books. The bookcase receded into the wall and then sideways, revealing her Bednode (the 3D equivalent to a home page on the 2D intrnet) momentarily before returning to it's position against the wall. This being the Hiverse, if someone had shoved the bookcase forward it would have hit a/the wall, and if they slid it sideways it would reveal only a blank wall. Only Crux could access that Node the way she just had, anyone else who tried would be unable to even tell an entrance was hidden there.

"Crux is a friend from way back when, she lives in the Mainframe Arcology off the coast of Vancouver but she's been a student at some stuffy university in the UK since 2025. She has, like 15 NPCs." Gadg8eer asked. "I know they're supposedly mindless, but I became friends with some of them, and to be honest the existence of Glitches tells me that it's not just pretending to talk to a puppet. There's something in there that, even if it's not a 'soul', is enough like a soul or mind or whatever that they're a person. I know you need an outlet for your anger, I just... Hum usually says I should try being diplomatic more often, so... I think Glitches are probably not very different than your friends?"

---

At that moment, Zoe received a notification ping.

Spoiler: SMS from "Diamond" 2028-06-29@406

We're about 1/2 there. I'll let you know when we land.

---

"Never mind, you're probably trying to sleep. I'm sorry for waking you up. I got kind of excited about waking up to realize yesterday wasn't all just a dream. I'm just going to go play Highway Robbery VI or Theme Parcade Tycoon or Funsized: Survival in the Sandbox until I wake up."

(( OOC Notes: I promised to be more clear, so the options are "Let's take a risk by playing the Dr. Pepper version of GTA VI", "Lets do something relaxing in a virtual theme park" and "lets just play something Minecraft-ish". There's also "Tropico meets Stellaris", "Software Inc. as an MMO business sim" and "VR Rhythm Game as Zoe tries to test Gadg8eer's combat skills" if none of those sound good. ))

 

[Gadg8eer]

"I guess I'll see you at work tomorrow. Maybe you can teach me how to fight better so you're not doing most of the work!" he said, prepared to end the call.

(( Lady Moldoma Okay, so I guess this is a way to get Pixie to fight Gadg8eer? Maybe Zoe should suggest he test his fighting skill in your response to this post? ))

 

[Lady Moldoma]

Zoe sighs. "Your build's incompatible with my techniques. The things I know about fighting don't apply to your sort. The only way that a match between us to can end, especially in here, is me winning and you not learning."

"Every single NPC here has some fighting capabilities, weak, strong, or downright insane. But between the items I have here, and the fact that I programmed in my dreambuild with a combination of exported specs from over 100 different titles. the inner matrioshka's armory and the ability to call on the outer matrioshka, if I fought you seriously in here, even with meta-options aside like banhammering, no scoring system could be made to let you win in genuine combat."

"Nobody in this tiny little slice of the world is more powerful than me, because it's a little dreamscape I'm familiar with. There are about 160,000 abilities I don't even have, but they're still coded into here, and I could learn them if I wanted."

"That, and I have trouble raising my fists at you. Something about that face of yours is too cutesy for me to want to lay into."

"..."

"Pixie can fight you though... She's not as capable as I am." Zoe says.

 

[MisterEightySix]

Hum approached the pink Tech van and knocked twice on the back door of its decidedly... girl-friendly frame. "Tobi? You in there?"

A voice rang out from the front seat in response.

"Huh?! Someone there?"
"Hey, Tobi, it's Hum. Can you open up?"
"Oh, hey!" Tobi said from the driver's seat, opening the door and peeking out. "Just the help we were looking for!"

"Modo de Dificultad Dispositivos!" Juan piped up, knowing only the two of them would have any clue what he just said.
"Fix your grammar, Juan, your Spanish is terrible," Hum teased back. A first-generation immigrant Juan was not.
"Yeah, I know. Uh... You know how to fix a Tech Van, right?"

"You broke down?" Hum asked, a notable hint of confusion present in his voice. "Shouldn't System Restore have... please don't tell me you haven't tried that, Juan, you know better."
"Yeah, um... we did," Juan responded. "That's what's wrong."

Hum gripped the bridge of his nose in exasperation. "Hold on. Explain to me carefully what you mean by that."
"Well," Juan began, "I was in Barbados, hanging a pic- ah, you know what? I'd better just show you, ese."

Tobi stepped out of her van and closed the door, and Juan proceeded to use the System Restore on the van... to no effect. To negative effect, even. The thing didn't even look broken. Tobi placed her nobiGlas-covered hand up to the ignition and triggered the startup sequence.

"Okay, now... you drive." Juan said.
"Why me?" Hum replied. "Isn't it your van?"
"It's my van, Hum," Tobi interrupted with a sharp clearing of her throat. "Juan's just carpooling, remember? Besides, you're gonna need to see the problem for yourself."

She tapped a button on her nobiGlas.

"Hey, Nudle, HardModeWarez needs to borrow my van."
"I heard that you want to give HardModeWarez a guest account on your Hinobi TechVan. Is that correct?"
"Yes," Tobi said through gritted teeth, rolling her eyes in annoyance.
"Permission granted," the Gauntlet responded back.

"All right, Hum, floor's yours," Juan shrugged.

Hum switched places with Tobi in the driver's seat as Elextrixtr and Pentifer watched. He started up the vehicle, shifted into gear, and put his foot down on the pedal... only to get flung forward and smack his face on the horn, letting out a small honk as the whole vehicle suddenly jerked backward several feet. He rubbed his nose and shifted gear one more time, turning the steering wheel slightly to the left and stepping on the gas.

"Yeah, that figures, they put the thing in the wrong gear and thought it was a G--"

Before the final word had escaped his mouth, the vehicle lurched forward - and to the right, bashing directly into a highway sign with an unpleasant metallic screech.

"--od damn it!"

 

[Gadg8eer]

Pentifer shrugged."Eh, its kinda cool that I just poofed from one world into another. There's gotta be some fancy word for it somewhere." He grinned, a sign he wouldn't become evil.

Hum approached the pink Tech van and knocked twice on the back door of its decidedly... girl-friendly frame. "Tobi? You in there?"

A voice rang out from the front seat in response.

"Huh?! Someone there?"
"Hey, Tobi, it's Hum. Can you open up?"
"Oh, hey!" Tobi said from the driver's seat, opening the door and peeking out. "Just the help we were looking for!"

"Modo de Dificultad Dispositivos!" Juan piped up, knowing only the two of them would have any clue what he just said.
"Fix your grammar, Juan, your Spanish is terrible," Hum teased back. A first-generation immigrant Juan was not.
"Yeah, I know. Uh... You know how to fix a Tech Van, right?"

"You broke down?" Hum asked, a notable hint of confusion present in his voice. "Shouldn't System Restore have... please don't tell me you haven't tried that, Juan, you know better."
"Yeah, um... we did," Juan responded. "That's what's wrong."

Hum gripped the bridge of his nose in exasperation. "Hold on. Explain to me carefully what you mean by that."
"Well," Juan began, "I was in Barbados, hanging a pic- ah, you know what? I'd better just show you, ese."

Tobi stepped out of her van and closed the door, and Juan proceeded to use the System Restore on the van... to no effect. To negative effect, even. The thing didn't even look broken. Tobi placed her nobiGlas-covered hand up to the ignition and triggered the startup sequence.

"Okay, now... you drive." Juan said.
"Why me?" Hum replied. "Isn't it your van?"
"It's my van, Hum," Tobi interrupted with a sharp clearing of her throat. "Juan's just carpooling, remember? Besides, you're gonna need to see the problem for yourself."

She tapped a button on her nobiGlas.

"Hey, Nudle, HardModeWarez needs to borrow my van."
"I heard that you want to give HardModeWarez a guest account on your Hinobi TechVan. Is that correct?"
"Yes," Tobi said through gritted teeth, rolling her eyes in annoyance.
"Permission granted," the Gauntlet responded back.

"All right, Hum, floor's yours," Juan shrugged.

Hum switched places with Tobi in the driver's seat as Elextrixtr and Pentifer watched. He started up the vehicle, shifted into gear, and put his foot down on the pedal... only to get flung forward and smack his face on the horn, letting out a small honk as the whole vehicle suddenly jerked backward several feet. He rubbed his nose and shifted gear one more time, turning the steering wheel slightly to the left and stepping on the gas.

"Yeah, that figures, they put the thing in the wrong gear and thought it was a G--"

Before the final word had escaped his mouth, the vehicle lurched forward - and to the right, bashing directly into a highway sign with an unpleasant metallic screech.

"--od damn it!"

(( Captain Wyldstorm You're clear for takeoff! ))

 

[Gadg8eer]

Pentifer shrugged."Eh, its kinda cool that I just poofed from one world into another. There's gotta be some fancy word for it somewhere." He grinned, a sign he wouldn't become evil.

Hum approached the pink Tech van and knocked twice on the back door of its decidedly... girl-friendly frame. "Tobi? You in there?"

A voice rang out from the front seat in response.

"Huh?! Someone there?"
"Hey, Tobi, it's Hum. Can you open up?"
"Oh, hey!" Tobi said from the driver's seat, opening the door and peeking out. "Just the help we were looking for!"

"Modo de Dificultad Dispositivos!" Juan piped up, knowing only the two of them would have any clue what he just said.
"Fix your grammar, Juan, your Spanish is terrible," Hum teased back. A first-generation immigrant Juan was not.
"Yeah, I know. Uh... You know how to fix a Tech Van, right?"

"You broke down?" Hum asked, a notable hint of confusion present in his voice. "Shouldn't System Restore have... please don't tell me you haven't tried that, Juan, you know better."
"Yeah, um... we did," Juan responded. "That's what's wrong."

Hum gripped the bridge of his nose in exasperation. "Hold on. Explain to me carefully what you mean by that."
"Well," Juan began, "I was in Barbados, hanging a pic- ah, you know what? I'd better just show you, ese."

Tobi stepped out of her van and closed the door, and Juan proceeded to use the System Restore on the van... to no effect. To negative effect, even. The thing didn't even look broken. Tobi placed her nobiGlas-covered hand up to the ignition and triggered the startup sequence.

"Okay, now... you drive." Juan said.
"Why me?" Hum replied. "Isn't it your van?"
"It's my van, Hum," Tobi interrupted with a sharp clearing of her throat. "Juan's just carpooling, remember? Besides, you're gonna need to see the problem for yourself."

She tapped a button on her nobiGlas.

"Hey, Nudle, HardModeWarez needs to borrow my van."
"I heard that you want to give HardModeWarez a guest account on your Hinobi TechVan. Is that correct?"
"Yes," Tobi said through gritted teeth, rolling her eyes in annoyance.
"Permission granted," the Gauntlet responded back.

"All right, Hum, floor's yours," Juan shrugged.

Hum switched places with Tobi in the driver's seat as Elextrixtr and Pentifer watched. He started up the vehicle, shifted into gear, and put his foot down on the pedal... only to get flung forward and smack his face on the horn, letting out a small honk as the whole vehicle suddenly jerked backward several feet. He rubbed his nose and shifted gear one more time, turning the steering wheel slightly to the left and stepping on the gas.

"Yeah, that figures, they put the thing in the wrong gear and thought it was a G--"

Before the final word had escaped his mouth, the vehicle lurched forward - and to the right, bashing directly into a highway sign with an unpleasant metallic screech.

"--od damn it!"

(( Captain Wyldstorm You're clear for takeoff! ))

(( RIP Captain Wyldstorm 2024-2024 ))

"Hey, I know what this is. It's starting to make sense... If my life has secretly been a game, that means the thing where my controls reverse when I was high on Fuzzy was a game mechanic!" Pentifer realized.

"Hol up, is that Pentifer Darksoul?!" Juan said. "I was just playing that when I got called to work... Did my crappy computer spit up a Glitch again? Ay carambe."

"Hey, come on. Watch your language." Hum responded, "You're supposed to be a professional, gamified job or not. Professionals have standards. Like not shouting obscenities every 15 seconds. That said, this gives me an idea..."

 

[Captain Wyldstorm]

(( RIP Captain Wyldstorm 2024-2024 ))

"Hey, I know what this is. It's starting to make sense... If my life has secretly been a game, that means the thing where my controls reverse when I was high on Fuzzy was a game mechanic!" Pentifer realized.

"Hol up, is that Pentifer Darksoul?!" Juan said. "I was just playing that when I got called to work... Did my crappy computer spit up a Glitch again? Ay carambe."

"Hey, come on. Watch your language." Hum responded, "You're supposed to be a professional, gamified job or not. Professionals have standards. Like not shouting obscenities every 15 seconds. That said, this gives me an idea..."

Pentifer just looked dumbfounded. "...Am I really that popular that a random stranger just points me out instantaneously..?" He tilted his head.
Elextrixtr, on the other hand, looked like she was about to throw a rock at someone's head.
"Anybody tries to de-res him and I start throwing bricks." She growled, holding Pentifer in a protective way. (Me who treats my best friends like siblings.)