TO994M | day 4 | morning | audio

[cactusy]

[There's the sound of footsteps on sand; she's walking as she talks, heading away from the beach and up towards the scrubby jungle.]

So I got got by what I think was a crossbow bolt. Kinda hard to tell for sure; it all came at me pretty fast. Got an arrow to the leg not long before that, but the one that came for my head seemed bigger in the point-two seconds of reaction time I had before it hit. And it did hit. Should've been difficult-to-impossible to survive, but here I am. Which tells me some things.

[She relays the news of her almost-certain death matter-of-factly, in the same flat-ish tone as her previous radio contributions. If anything, she sounds a little more upbeat here: it's not by much, but having (what she thinks are) answers is a relief. At least now she (thinks she!!) knows what she's dealing with.]

Look, guys; this isn't real. Fifty-fifty odds whether you're a part of it or not - maybe you're all artificial constructs and I'm the only real sentient person here, or maybe we're all hooked up to machines in a lab and we've been tossed into this simulated... thing together. Gonna be nice and assume the latter, for now. Point is, signs have been pointing to this for a while, and this proves it. But this is good news, kind of. It means that whatever happens here doesn't really matter. We die, we screw up, we do something our monitor overlord doesn't like - we just reset. I fired off three bullets, and they're back now, because the gun and the bullets are just lines of computer code that can be rewritten in whatever way the people running this want.

Priority number one shouldn't be escaping the island or long-term survival or whatever. It should be figuring out how to get out of the simulation. Then the party can really get started.

Comments

VL121R | voice

[meadqueen]

Is there anyone near you who can confirm this happened?

[Randvi doesn't understand half of what this message was about but she's seen some pretty severe head injuries in her time and this is concerning. A warrior that she’d sent on a mission had once encountered a man with an axe buried in his skull who, while having difficulties with movement and coordination, could speak quite coherently and had no idea he’d been injured.

Picturing this woman wandering around lost with a crossbow bolt in her head is upsetting enough that despite the fact that the other woman will definitely be angry she feels like she should reach out]

[cactusy]

[There is, surprisingly, no anger here: as far as Shaw's concerned, it's a valid question, albeit one with a disappointing answer.]

Honestly? No.

[meadqueen]

Are you still near where it happened?

[cactusy]

I don't think so. I came to on the beach again - a different beach.

[meadqueen]

Ah.

[No, that doesn't make sense but what here has so far?]

I'm concerned that you may have a lingering injury. Trauma to the head can play strange tricks on the mind.

[cactusy]

There aren't any physical signs of that.

Look, I'm-- speaking from experience. I've been here before. Only difference between then and now is the setting, and the fact that they used to wake me up for a little while between simulations instead of throwing me straight back in.

[meadqueen]

There aren't any physical signs that you know of.

[There’s probably not much of a point in arguing it but Randvi would feel a little better about this if someone was looking for this woman who hadn't threatened to kill her first]

Have you decided yet whether we are real people or if this is simply your own dream?

[cactusy]

Point one - I went to medical school; I know the symptoms of brain trauma. I don't have any.

Point two - there's no way to know that for sure. Experience tells me you're all probably as fake as the setting, but I don't think figuring out a way to put multiple people in the same sim is... impossible.

[meadqueen]

And these people who design your dreams, would they include incongruous or outlandish details for no reason?

[cactusy]

They might.

I think they've decided to change tactics.

[meadqueen]

To what end?

[cactusy]

Getting information.

I don't know what their goal is in making you think you're from the 9th century. No idea how they managed that.

[meadqueen]

[Ah, so that's how she's going to justify that to herself. Sounds like the logic of "how would your enemies kidnap someone from the past" isn't going to work]

And this is information that they expect you'll share with us?

[cactusy]

If you're not real, then yeah, that's probably what they're doing. Switch up the scenarios, lull me into a false sense of security, hope that I'll decide this can't possibly be fake and reach out to my team.

[But then why wouldn't they have provided her with long-range communication equipment by now? Why would they have poofed her back to life within the simulation, rather than waking her up and starting fresh? Why all this bullshit immersion-breaking magic stuff?]

[meadqueen]

And if we are real? I don't think there is much that I could provide to people from the future.

[Of course, people from the future are using a simulation to look through the eyes of someone who lives with her, but she doesn't know anything about it]

[cactusy]

No clue.

[meadqueen]

All right. If it's the same thing, how did you escape it before?

[cactusy]

That's no longer applicable. Apparently.

[meadqueen]

... I see.

We don't know yet whether it's just you who will return, so I hope everyone remains cautious.

[Says the woman who free-climbed the air traffic control tower. Oh well]

[cactusy]

It being just me only makes sense if you guys aren't real. If you are real, there's no reason that I'd be some kind of special exception to anything.

[meadqueen]

If you're the target of this information-gathering operation, why would it matter what happens to us?

[cactusy]

If I'm the only target, why bother bringing other real people into it at all? You guys are targets, too.

[meadqueen]

Even the child? And the, uh, spaghetti...

[cactusy]

I've seen these people use a ten-year-old to their own ends.

[meadqueen]

Oh, I'm sure.

[Not surprising that people who created a supposed dream torture labyrinth would be morally equivalent to Ivarr the Boneless]

But for their knowledge?