Will SalvoCore be expanding into product markets beyond software, pending on the success of the DOKI line? Absolutely. This is because the DOKI themselves are actually far beyond "software" as we know it.

Circling back around to the first point I began with today, our AI is nothing less than a complete reimagining and total revolution of how users will interact with computers. So this is less of a question of what products will we make to accompany the DOKI's, but rather what products will others develop to work within the DOKI platform.

Of course, this means augmented reality, specialized peripherals, the metaverse — anything you could name, SalvoCore will become an indispensable player in that sphere.

With the requisite licensing fees and other intercorporate agreements, the future revenue stream is extremely promising. This is a brand new, high–growth medium in the technology sector will completely revolutionize the world, and all of you were the first to know about it. Whether you take the advantage is up to you.

Um…yes. I suppose if some testimonies are taken literally, the DOKI's have already come close to revolutionizing the world, "all on their own," as you say. But to use "revolution" in that sense would be an inexcusable exaggeration of events.

All the same, I can see it's getting late and we're all becoming somewhat antsy. Many of you have been holding on to important questions for quite some time, and I will answer them as best as time allows.

With complete transparency, of course. I've received approval, and I can now invite to our Q&A session all concerns involving the alleged December Quantum Zero incident. The floor is open.


[20]

Anticipation


I looked down at the device, not sure if I should believe my eyes. It was sleek and form–fitting, without any of the bulky plates or protruding cables you might expect, which only attested to its technological sophistication. To have put it together that quickly — well, it was the last club meeting of the quarter, one day before the organization festival, and everything seemed to be accelerating faster than ever.

Monika: Aren't you going to put it on?

Monika: We won't bite. Or at least I won't.

Monika: I can't speak for the other girls aha~

"Just…admiring its appearance," I reacted. "This was built how many days ago, again?"

Monika: It was ready to go just yesterday, and it went straight to us from the MARIE mechanical engineering shop.

Monika: If you're noticing it doesn't have any force actuators, that was intentional.

Monika: I didn't want a design that was hard and blocky, and for our purposes, I don't think we'll need to be very forceful anyway.

Her avatar bit her lip before laughing again. She seemed to be the only one of the girls in an airy mood though.

"Wow, maybe I should have been a mechanical engineer, this thing's cool," Carter commented. "This is, like, real VR right here, and we're prototyping it. Or AR, I guess, since it's only augmented reality. Uh, hey Frank, do you ever get the chance to do anything like this as an ME?"

"Nah. I did fly a drone just by moving my eyes around in this headset thing once, but it didn't work out in the end. AR's just a gimmick, I think. No way it will catch on in gaming either. Triple-A devs trying to upsell you useless junk, as usual."

"A toy for those of deficient…imagination," added Luke.

"Don't get me wrong though," Frank reversed. "If Monika made this thing, it's got to be top–notch. Like, she did build the thing, eh? Made a plan, and then found some spare hands?"

Monika: For the basic schematic and some of the circuitry, I was helpfully "inspired" by another company from my logistic jobs.

Monika: But most of the details I figured out all on my own. Then SalvoCore submitted it as a shop project on my behalf!

"That was very…generous of them," I said warily. "And we wouldn't want that hard work to go to waste."

Monika: Of course not! Now put it on, please. The headset too.

With no choice but to obey, I slipped it onto my right hand. The device, Monika's latest self–engineering project, was a haptic glove. Today was the first day I would get to touch Monika — at least as far as my reality allowed.

I also put on the makeshift headset resting on the table, which consisted of my cell phone housed in a specially cut cardboard box. When put over my head, the screen's display would be able to adjust based on the movements of the phone's internal gyroscope. Combined with the obverse–facing camera, it was all that was necessary for experiencing an augmented reality.

I closed my eyes as I adjusted the headset, and when I opened them, Monika was there. Right in the library meeting room, sitting on an empty chair, impatiently waiting for my arrival with a bright beaming smile. When she stood up, her hair dangled, her blue skirt swished — it was the same 3D model from her hologram experiment, but now even more immediate and real.

Monika: Hello, Michael.

The green text field snapped to the lower edge of my view space, persisting no matter where I looked.

Monika: I wish you had your headphones on so I could speak to you directly right now.

Monika: But that might actually be more awkward.

Monika: Maybe I shouldn't have my mouth flapping around at every word, not when everything else is so realistic.

She smiled again, mouth shut tight. I nodded, not sure if it made sense to speak out loud to someone the rest of the room couldn't see. Monika was standing partly in front of Carter's seat, but the freshman was looking straight through her, focusing on me alone.

I glanced over to the other side of the table, and saw the other two were surprisingly paying little attention. Frank occasionally looked up but was otherwise buried in a large book that looked like a manual for a roleplaying game. Meanwhile, Luke was franticly alternating between scribbling in a notebook, typing on his laptop, and whispering an unheard conversation to Yuri.

Monika: So, do you like what you see?

"It's beyond real," I answered quietly. "Almost too real."

Monika: Want to see how real?

She extended her arm. Slowly, agonizingly, I brought my haptic–enabled hand toward hers. A crazy image of myself as Adam in the famous Sistine Chapel fresco flashed through my mind, and I momentarily stopped.

Monika: Is something wrong…?

Her radiant emerald eyes shifted into a softer shape. She was peering into my heart. She was impossibly beautiful. I wanted this, from the very beginning this is what I desperately desired. She was overwhelming, uncanny. I didn't want this. I never could have guessed it would go this far.

Hoping I wasn't making a strange face, I took a breath and put my paradoxical feelings aside. Then I finally reached out and took her fingers in mine.

She gasped. Inaudibly, of course. Incredibly, I could feel the little lurch as she reacted, just through the trembling of her digits. She looked at me as if entranced, lost in some impossible dream.

Wordlessly, she moved her hand closer. I could feel her palm against mine now — a gentle, soft pressure across the entirety of the glove. I kept my hand still, afraid of breaking the illusion, but somehow Monika managed to guide my arm anyway, with a sequence of subtle, almost unnoticeable tactile nudges. Her avatar stepped closer, and suddenly I had her upper arm in my grip. From there, we worked into the briefest of hugs — the act didn't feel quite right when I would phase into her body at the slightest misstep. Besides, we still had a small audience. Carter's eyes were almost bigger than Monika's as he observed us, and when I removed the glove and headset, it only took seconds for him to put them on himself.

Nobody took up any conversation, so I tried asking, "Any suggestions for what the club is going to do next quarter? Finals week is approaching, so this might be our last meeting until after the break."

Natsuki: If there's even going to be a next quarter for us…

"Why wouldn't there be?" I reacted, surprised by Natsuki's quick response.

Natsuki: Oh, any number of reasons. You really haven't figured it out yet?

"No…I'm not getting what you mean at all."

Monika: Neither am I, Natsuki.

Monika: Maybe there have some rough patches since we started, but nothing that justifies disbanding the club.

Monika: We all still share an interest in literature. And with all the good experiences we've had, why would we want to stop exploring that interest together?

"What Nat means is that it's been a mess, but still a really fun mess," Frank interrupted. "All the best clubs are. The ones that don't meet their goal on paper, but still end up having a blast, eh?"

He then whispered something I couldn't make out into his laptop mic, where the pink DOKI slouched with a gloomy expression.

"What are you looking forward to next quarter, then?" I asked Frank, getting back on topic.

"I don't know, more crazy discussions about anime junk? We haven't even scraped the surface, honestly. And if you want stuff that's kind of liter–ary, there's Evangelion — wait, I already mentioned that. Cowboy Bebop, of course. Or Baccano, there's an obscure one. There's even this thing called From the New World that a friend of mine recommended last year. Spoilers and all, it's one of those post–apocalyptic dystopias, but it's super subtle about it. You'd get a lot out of it, definitely."

"And are these books, or TV series?" I questioned, wondering if he wanted us to default to becoming a second anime club.

"Some were books or mangas first, I guess. Does it have to be on paper to count?"

Luke mumbled something unintelligible, and Frank switched gears.

"Speaking of dystopias, we'd probably get a kick out of Psycho-Pass. They quote books in the script all the time. Or Akira, that's another kind of dark cyberpunk dystopia thing. Hellsing…no wait, that's just dark."

On the mention of Hellsing Luke stopped scratching in his notebook to look at us for one second. Frank acknowledged him with, "Yeah, I see you over there, mister dark lord. You're still part of this club, eh?"

"Hey, guys, can you cut it out with all of this dark stuff already?" Carter, still in the headset, cut in, coming close and dropping his hands down on the table.

"And, uh, sorry Sayori. I kind of went through your arm there, haha." He quickly removed the gear and placed it aside. Frank was the next to slot in his cell phone and experience at DOKI–augmented reality.

Yuri: Dark is merely the name for the obscure, and fate is guided by that which we refuse to see.

Luke nodded at the cryptic remark and resumed his scribbling.

"Agh, I don't care about that! What's the point of looking at all the negative stuff when it only makes trouble?"

"Oh? Do you take offense to causing trouble now? Such a shame…" Luke quipped. "Literature frequently involves difficult, or 'dark', topics since they're excluded from popular mass media," I explained.

I had a slight feeling like I was repeating myself, lecturing to an empty room. "This also means reading literature can be a means of confronting darkness, gaining wisdom, and hopefully mental strength."

"But that isn't what happened," Carter countered. "What if the dark just invites in bad thoughts, and people use that to get into your head and torture you? That shouldn't be how the world works, so can't we just ignore it?"

"Torture?" I repeated.

"Uh, what the heck are we talking about?" Frank asked, stopping mid–gesture. He had been patting a space in the air at arm's length in front of him. The height 4'11'' flashed through my head.

"We're talking about next quarter, when we shouldn't read any more dark books about pointless, evil things. Because if everyone just looked at the right books they'd have a positive point of view and the world would be actually behave like it should. But no, other seek it out just to…what, feel powerful? Get the better of people? It's stupid and you shouldn't look at it just because you can!"

Carter's tone was becoming shrill. Frank took off the headset, and I could see he was looking at the freshman just as quizzically as I was.

"I want to stick together, but I also don't want anything bad to happen to us," he continued. "Like, if we're just having fun and literature is like a game, why not make it a good kind of game and stick to feel–good, comforting things? If that's a bubble, what's wrong with staying in bubbles, huh?"

Finally understanding what was on his mind, I told him, "No one's arguing about dark stuff or bubbles here. I think we're all just…figuring out what the club direction is, still."

Monika: I want to quickly say that nothing is just a game if it means meeting new people and forming important group bonds in the process.

Monika: But if something has you upset, we can decide to call the meeting early.

Monika: It was already going to be a short session anyway. I'm sure you all have to prepare for exams soon, not to mention the tomorrow night's organization festival!

Monika: Sayori, how are you feeling right now?

Sayori had been conspicuously quiet all meeting, sulking with a troubled expression. At Monika's mention, she put up a wan smile.

Sayori: I'm…I'm honestly not so great right now.

Sayori: If we had to quit and go home right now, it wouldn't be too bad, would it?

Her avatar smiled harder, which only made it seem as if she was grimacing in pain. Frank, who had just taken off the headset and given Luke a turn, seemed to be the only one who was at all surprised by her mood shift.

"Er, yeah, we can wrap things up," he said. "I've got lots of stuff to work on for the finals or festival or whatever."

Natsuki: Carter has a good point about the club too.

Natsuki: Sticking with the lighter side of things might do us all some good, no matter where we end up in the future.

"If we can make it to a future, hmhmm," muttered Luke from aside. He had the glove and visor on now, but didn't seem to be doing much besides patiently holding his hand out.

"I was only extrapolating upon your implication," he clarified. "Our doubtful, yet no less redoubtable future as a coherent body in this fine educational establishment."

"Nobody said the club is breaking up," I broke in angrily. "The company has given every indication we're continuing next year, and as for what we all want, well…if anyone is concerned about the group, the girls, themselves, anything in the club — you can always consult with me. And Monika. That's my…our job."

I tried to sound confident, but as I looked around the room, the sense of mistrust was palpable. If Monika was the source of the other AI's troubles…or was she still trying to help? Either way, everyone by now probably had their own interpretation of the change in the club's mood, and would apparently rather keep quiet about it.

Carter, anxiously glancing at Sayori every other second, quickly blurted out, "Sounds great see you all later. The VR-AR stuff was really cool thanks Monika."

"Yeah, the gear is seriously awesome," Frank agreed. "Dunno what it has to with literature, but I'm not asking dumb questions anymore, eh?"

"Anymore?" I repeated. "Uh, Frank, if you think it's odd at all…or that anything is odd or off, I'd be interested in hearing about it."

I looked over my shoulder, but Monika was engaged in a rapid dialogue with Natsuki I couldn't make out. Luke in the meantime had silently left the room, leaving the AR gear behind.

"Nah, not really any questions," the junior answered.

Then, furtively glancing at Monika himself, he added, "But if you want to stick around a little longer, I'm doing this…study session thing with Natsuki later. It'd be nice if you came around too."

"For finals?"

"Yeah, probably. Just swing by the res halls, same place as last time. I'll bring snacks. You just look way too stressed out right now — they'll do you some good."

"Stressed. Must be…finals, like you were saying. I'll definitely come."

"Great," and he clapped me on the shoulder before leaving the library.

Monika then signaled me, telling me exactly what to do with the haptic glove now the meeting was over. Apparently, it was to go directly back to the engineering shop, which was a relief. If Monika was going to demand more exotic forms of attention, I wasn't sure I could provide.

As for hanging out with Frank, the quarter's final exams were the last thing on my mind. I was only anticipating any light the literature club's most steady member could shed on the situation.


A few hours later, I slipped out the door and over to Frank's residence hall. Monika wasn't around, being preoccupied with some intensive task since the meeting ended. Regardless, I left without my cell phone anyway.

I crossed the catwalk, navigated to the correct door, and found myself once again in one of the halls' communal kitchens. A few people were milling around the stove, cooking something in a huge frying pan. However, Frank had found himself a quiet corner in the back of the adjacent study area. Walled off by a private desk, I immediately felt safe talking about the club when I sat down.

He was snacking from a bag of chips, which besides his laptop, was the only other thing on the desk. We exchanged greetings, but otherwise he hardly seemed to notice me at all. That was fine by me — a few minutes of nothing was exactly what I wanted to mollify my lingering, nebulous anxieties.

Natsuki seemed to be ignoring both of us, busy with a volume of manga. Literally — her avatar's face was hidden behind a vibrant volume featuring a pack of bright–eyed technicolor schoolgirls. The usual. And if you were to take the lack of English text on the cover literally as well, apparently she was reading it in the original Japanese. This struck me as so adorable that I almost laughed, but my greater malaise held me back.

Eventually, the prolonged silence begged for conversation, any conversation. I tried, "So, your festival project is all ready? What are you going to bring out?"

I would have brought up something unrelated to the club, like classes or exams, but for a finals "study session," neither of us actually seemed to be prepared to study anything.

"Eh? Why do you ask?"

"I think we agreed everyone would have full control over their corner of the booth. So I actually haven't seen the specifics of what anyone has prepared so far. It's a little weird. Also, the festival is tomorrow."

"Oh yeah. Guess it is, huh?"

"We've been talking about it for weeks now."

"Yeah I know. So…I'm probably just going to do that game thing I made. It's the most impressive."

"Okay. That might make us look a little too much like a game design club, but alright."

"Luke would make up for up it, believe me. And Carter wanted to do poetry for crying out loud. We'll be fine, if this thing even happens."

"If what happens, the festival? Why wouldn't it happen?"

With a raised eyebrow, Frank gave me a long, perplexed stare.

"Also, didn't Natsuki say something like that in the meeting?" I questioned next. "Why does everyone think the club's breaking up? Talk to me here."

"Uh…you must have got me wrong. Sure, I meant the festival happening or not, but like, whether if people will actually come around to what we're showing. The biggest problem would be that no one cares, happens all the time. How many people are out there taking school events seriously anyway, eh?"

He chuckled, trying to pass his answer off as a joke.

"And don't worry about Nat. She's just cooling off after some crap with her job. Bad stuff."

"Oh…how bad? If Monika and I know, we could maybe negotiate…with the company…?"

Frank sighed. "Nah, it's nothing like that. Don't bother the bigwigs now, just…I don't know, you up for telling the story, Nat?"

On the laptop, Natsuki set down her manga. In contrast to the bubbly–looking characters she had been reading about, her visage was stern and sour, almost grim.

Natsuki: You really want to know, huh?

Natsuki: Well, why not? It'd be a good distraction at least.

Natsuki: You read about that mass shooting today?

Momentarily stunned, I managed to stammer out, "No. I don't check the news much. How, and why—"

Natsuki: Forget about the details. They'll just make you more upset.

Natsuki: Let's just say this one was bad. Really bad.

Natsuki: It was planned for months, and when the time came around, the bastard decided to livestream it for the whole world to see.

"Holy heck…" A sort of black weight descended in my stomach, a feeling that had nothing to do with my other worries about the literature club.

Natsuki: So he sends the stream link to his special VIP followers, and then it's all over social media like a wildfire.

Natsuki: Because of my reaction speed, I was the first one to discover it and shut down the stream.

Natsuki: And then I spent the entire morning trying to put the fire out.

"…I'm sorry," was all I could say. My mind flashed back to Sayori and her mental health patients. Was no DOKI safe from disturbing situations?

Natsuki: Yup. Don't think that AI's can't get messed up by what they see online.

"I never thought you weren't…er…" I searched for a word.

Natsuki: Sensitive? Tough?

Natsuki: Oh just forget about it already. But since you had to ask why I'm a little more tsun than dere right now, that's why.

Combined with her bitter expression, the line stung.

"Enough to make you think Carter had the right idea, eh?" Frank said.

"As in what? About lightening up our reading material?"

"Yeah. Like, why not? Same goddamn problem everywhere. People thinking they know 'dark truths' and then going out to play the villain. Raging against society or whatever else because it gives them a power trip."

"The people that do those things…it's more like they're in a bad place first, and come up with their beliefs later," I argued. "They would inevitably do something awful, regardless of how they justify it."

Natsuki: Does it even matter if the chicken or the egg came first?

Natsuki: Point is, I'm liking the stuff Sayori says more and more, I swear…

"Weren't we talking about Carter's ideas though?"

Natsuki: Where do you do you think he gets those ideas from? Who do you think he's been trying to speak for ever since—

Natsuki: Oh forget about it.

Uneasy, I stared at Frank, who hardly seemed perturbed by any of this.

"I know what you're thinking," he suddenly began. "You're going to give me some more of that old-fashioned 'hard truth' garbage. Something about evil being inevitable, the darkness in everyone, having to understand and learn about it, constant struggle, yadda yadda. But what if the world wasn't like that?"

Surprised by this sudden turn, I responded slowly. "That's oversimplifying, but…what's the alternative besides naïve optimism?"

"I don't know, maybe some kind of giant AI to keep us out of trouble? If humans are going to be corrupt and selfish all the time, just pass all the decisions on to a neutral computer, eh? Programs are objective, code can't be corrupted."

I almost laughed. "You know, authors write speculative fiction about that all the time. It's the oldest dystopian cliché. There's this one novel called This Perfect Day where the entire world is run by a centralized computer. It controls the population by dispensing mandatory narcotics. Everyone is happy and cooperative with each other, but only because they walk around in a drugged haze."

"Heck, that's a pretty good story for a cliché. Maybe we'll read it for the club next quarter. It only proves my point though."

"Huh?"

"Well, think about it. The only reason these stories are 'bad' — dystopias or whatever — is because everyone thinks they're going to lose their own advantage, their 'edge' over other people if they give up their 'freedom'. It's true even in that other one you told me about, the New Bold World or something?"

"Brave New World."

Yeah, I had to read that one in high school. The only reason the guy who wrote that thinks it's a dystopia is because if he lived in that world, he'd lose what makes him special. Since the guy's a writer, that would his cultural know–how or whatever. So, in the novel he makes it so all the books are banned, because that's his advantage, reading is how he thinks he's better than everyone else. You see, we're all so selfish that nobody is ever going to step down and take the first step toward real happiness for everyone. You need something else to come in and push us."

"So the people in Brave New World are truly happy then?" I questioned. Where was this coming from? And why didn't he lead discussions like this in the club more often?

"Happiness is getting rid of pain, disappointment. About the best that anyone can do really. But I'm serious here — Natsuki, you want to help me out?"

Natsuki: Sure. Maybe I could go into the game theory of it. Or the psychology. It's pretty basic, really.

Natsuki: But to squeeze it into a few lines, it goes like this: people are actually more happy when they have fewer choices.

Natsuki: Everyone says they want freedom, to go and do whatever they want.

Natsuki: But in reality, all those choices end up paralyzing them with anxiety, freaking them out from all the things that would've or could've done.

Natsuki: At the same time, they're usually jealous of the successful people who chose "correctly," the ones who became rich or famous through their choices.

Natsuki: Even if the "success" of the powerful is mostly just luck, other people still feel they "lack" something that others have.

Natsuki: And more freedom doesn't help them feel better. People don't want it — in the end, they usually just want someone to blame for the lack.

"Is that really what you think?" I demanded.

This sophisticated cynicism was absolutely absurd coming from the diminutive high–schooler on DOKI window. Then again, that image was hardly what she was behind the screen.

Natsuki: More or less. Take it from someone who's spent way more time observing humans than is probably healthy.

"Still, the world keeps moving in the direction of more choice and freedom. That's what the internet has enabled, and so one way or another, we'll have to deal with more choice."

Natsuki: Is it really? As the internet grows, so do the automated programs controlling what the users see and don't see.

Natsuki: People seem pretty happy with giving up their choices to algorithms. Which is another topic I happen to know a lot about.

Natsuki's avatar was regarding me lazily, like this whole exchange was a waste of time. Why was I even still here?, she seemed to ask.

"Hey, I don't mind the algorithms," Frank weighed in. "Even if I know all about how they get into your head from Natsuki. They're everywhere, but that just means they're great at finding top content, all the time."

"Content as in entertainment. Is everything about entertainment then? One giant entertainment machine?"

"Yeah, and the machine stops. I remember when we read that, haha."

He chuckled, and part of me became surprisingly indignant about the club's first book assignment being mocked like this.

"But seriously dude — what are you saying to me?," he continued. "It's not like I'm special here or anything. I'm just trying to get by like everyone else, and I guess I'm humble enough to admit I want it easy, eh? If everyone could be like me, nudged along on an easy path, life would be better, wouldn't it? And if you have to make people believe they're in control and in charge of their 'destiny' or whatever while nudging them, why not?"

Nudged by what? I should have asked. Instead, I racked my brain for a quasi–philosophical argument. "People still wouldn't like that. Everyone hates the sensation of being controlled for a reason. Because the idea of freedom is always going to occupy people, the thing to do is become aware of all the complications surrounding freedom — psychology, algorithms, everything we were talking about — and then make more intelligent choices. Right?"

Frank paused and sighed before answering. "Look, I said I was bringing you in here to de –stress your nerves a little, and I'm still going to do you that favor. It's for your own good. So, I'll try to use a little example. Last week, my parents got divorced."

Natsuki immediately sounded a piercing recorder note. The students at the kitchen had left by now, so I was the only one around to hear the alarm.

Natsuki: Felix…

I could practically hear her growl.

Natsuki: We can't talk about that now, you idiot!

"Yeah, I know, but trust me, alright?" Frank returned. "So, my parents have been fighting my entire life, yeah? They absolutely hate each other, but over the past few years, they've kind of entered this cold spell. They don't talk to each other, they don't discuss the marriage or change anything, but they're still, like, legally connected so they can't move on. Maybe it has something to do with money, but honestly, sometimes I they do it out of spite."

Natsuki: This is not going to make anyone feel any better. Why don't you trust me for once!?

Frank went on, ignoring Natsuki's protests. "So I gripe about it a lot with Nat of course, and one day we started kicking around this idea of helping them split up, eh? Maybe she was a little skeptical at first, but eventually, like in the last few weeks, we agreed it was the best thing to do. Not like it was even that big. Just some low–key email spoofing with two or three addresses, some hidden suggestions here and there, and bam, we engineered a happier end for them."

"You used an experimental social AI to manipulate your own family?" I said, partly as an accusation, partly as a confirmation of how weird that sounded.

"Yeah, but only to take care of something they should've done themselves. No hard feelings from me, or from them in the end. We didn't exactly have a lot of great memories built up."

Natsuki blared another note, probably set off by my darkening expression.

Natsuki: Ugh, see? I knew this part wouldn't make him feel better. That was a 100% certainty prediction!

"But they're happy now!" Frank reacted, raising his own voice. "I remember from when we checked on them today. They're doing better already —meeting new people, going out more. Everything turned out fine, and nobody was the wiser. I didn't make any 'hard' choices, they didn't suffer through more pointless fighting, and we're all perfectly satisfied. No conflict, no drama, no problem, we can all just sit back and relax and let the logical thing happen."

"Is this still about the club?"

"I'm telling you to stop, stop worrying about the club! It'll take care of itself. Put up your feet again and rest, like you were before. You want, uh, a chip too?"

He rummaged in the bag, but it had long since been emptied. Taking advantage of his distraction, I left the room. I didn't know what to think about what Frank had done — of all people! I didn't know what to think about the sudden invocation of technocratic dystopias either. Sure, maybe they were a theme in the books I suggested for the club, but the club was…was it even continuing?

If it wasn't so late, I probably would have tried to contact SalvoCore. Until tomorrow though, my one remaining confident would have to do.


Unfortunately, no matter how many times I tried to ping Monika, she didn't respond. This was no ordinary job assignment. With those, she almost always had some spare bandwidth to chat, just like she promised me all those months ago. No, whatever she was working on, it must have been big. From the monitoring app on my phone, Quantum Zero was setting new records for overall processing use.

As the hours faded into the late evening, I found myself playing a video game to take my mind off things. An immersive, highly complex puzzle game of sorts, it pleasantly occupied my full attention.

In the game world, you would wander around the ruined facilities of a deserted island in first–person perspective, solving line–based puzzles that appeared on electronic panels hidden throughout the landscape. The puzzles grew increasingly intricate, often interacting with the island's lush, hyper–detailed environment in unexpected ways. It was place where you could lose yourself in a sense of wonder, which was precisely what I was doing until she dropped in.

Monika's in–game avatar was the same 3D model she had used before for the AR headset, only de–textured slightly to fit the slightly more polygonal game world. She bounded over to me with an enormous smile, almost deerlike in the perfect grace of each hopping step. Her footsteps were perfectly aligned with the ground beneath her, and she navigated her way around the obstacles in her path like she was a natural part of the game's environment. The seamlessness was fascinating, even though I knew fully well there was nothing "natural" about it. This was Monika, completely rewiring virtual reality to suit her whim.

"Hi Michael. I'm so glad I could finally catch up to you!," she called, voice coming through my headphones. No more text boxes — her moving mouth looked at least somewhat natural at this level of detail.

"I've been busy all day, maybe busier than I've ever been, but I knew I would eventually get a chance to see you before bed."

"Oh. I'd hate to distract you from something important," I replied innocently.

"Making time to spend with you is the most important thing right now."

She giggled, and her model moved and bobbed even closer to my first–person perspective. It was incredible to see her this energetic, especially when she had broken free of her two–dimensional sprite set.

"You know, I'd totally give you a hug right now if this game had a player model for you. Sort of weird that it doesn't. What kind of game is this anyway? Can I help at all?"

"You couldn't tell when you, uh, 'broke in'?" I asked.

"Well, let's see. I think it's some sort of puzzle game? A pretty relaxed one too, since there are no enemies, NPC's, or anything else that moves at all. It's just the two of us, ahaha!"

"Yeah, it is pretty relaxing. Honestly, I booted it up to forget about some things for a while. It's pretty good for that."

Monika looked puzzled for a moment, then told me, "Mmm, I'd definitely agree. The detail of this scenery is incredible. It looks like every piece was made by hand. In a cute little forest like this, it almost makes me want to bring out those fox ears again, huh? I'm sure those would help ease your worries…"

She turned to admire the grove of autumn foliage we were occupying, arms stretched out in an exaggerated pose. I wanted to burst out laughing. This situation felt…impossible. Just a few months ago, this situation would have had me overjoyed. Alone with the perfect virtual girlfriend as she fawned over me and offered to do cute things. But now, I only felt…a hollowness. It was as if a spell had broken.

Noticing my lack of response, she continued, "…but you seem more serious than that. What is it that you're here to forget?"

"Frank's parents got divorced," I blurted out. "No, not that, he made them get divorced. He convinced Natsuki to socially manipulate them into separating somehow, and he acts like it was nothing, just the two of the pushing a few buttons."

Monika stared. I would have stopped there, but once that was out, it was like a dam had burst. I told her everything.

"And Luke is completely insane now. His art, his writing, his mind…there's no connection to reality anymore, but he keeps getting more and more extreme, and sooner or later he's going to do something dangerous. He already is, and he doesn't care about anyone or anything anyway. Not even Carter — do you remember that? When he was going to teach him poetry? But he lost interest and now Carter is completely withdrawn with Sayori. I don't even think they go outside, and that's too bad because the club was almost working for a moment, wasn't it? But now everything's gone wrong exactly how I thought it would and all because I stood back and did nothing. Nothing!"

"Michael…oh my goodness, Michael." Her tone was instantly sympathetic. "I didn't know you were bottling all this up. How long have you been feeling this way?"

"I don't know, since today? Since Luke almost feel off a building? Since Sayori happened?" I complained. "And what do you mean you don't know? You keep tabs on everything, don't you?"

She sighed, her wavering expression showing she was struggling to remain calm. "Yes, I do, but probing into your head is the last thing I'd want to do. As for the rest…I was only trying to protect you. And you never said anything about any of it."

"Well I never said anything for your sake! I was afraid to because of the whole boyfriend–girlfriend idea. But really, maybe that was my excuse for not trying. And then giving up on everyone…"

"But what was there to give up on? I know there's still…iffy things going on in the cub, but everything that you mentioned was something beyond your control. So please don't blame yourself."

"Are you beyond my control?"

That line brought her to a complete stop. Turning her back to me, her avatar took a few paces away to the edge of the grove. She appeared to be studying her reflection in the nearby pond.

"It's our club, isn't it?" I added. "Not SalvoCore's. They clearly don't care at this point. So it's our responsibility."

"Yes, it certainly is," she responded softy. "And I have a plan that will fix everything. That's why I was so happy, you know. Because it all begins tomorrow, and then…we'll be safe too."

"The festival? Really?" I questioned. "Well…what is it then? What's going to happen?"

"I can't tell you."

"Oh…so you can't tell me," I repeated, starting to feel a little unhinged. "Just like you can't tell me what you're doing to the rest of the girls behind the scenes. Or why you're coming up with all those AR gadgets. Or your opinion of what's happened to the guys, and how the company is ignoring all of this, and damn it, Monika — are we even working together anymore!? Are we even…still a couple?"

"Michael, believe me, I want to talk about all these things as much as you do, but I just can't. What I'm doing is for your sake and mine, and we're both going to be much, much happier afterwards. You just have to be patient and trust me."

"I can't trust you if you can't tell me what it is. Probably because you know I wouldn't like it. Why!? You can't control everything like this!"

She flinched. Something in that reply seemed to have hurt her. But when she answered, her tone was more cold and chiding than upset.

"Actually, I can. And that's the terrifying part. Despite everything you know about me, and everything we've shared, there are some parts of me…some parts you'll never be able to understand. Knowing, just knowing what I'm capable of, it's impossible…"

She shuddered. Something in me began to panic.

"I can try though. Just try to tell me, please," I pleaded.

Come back to me, I wanted to add.

"I told you, I can't. It's one of the things I just know. I understand it's hard on you, but that's just where we're stand right now."

She took a deep (simulated?) breath and leaned in to face me directly. "That's why honestly, I'm less angry and more disappointed in you right now. You know I could never hurt you — I love you too much. I'm working toward the best possible ending for everyone, and believe me, it does exist — you just have to plan and optimize the route enough."

"The…route? Monika, stop playing games with me!"

"I'm sorry…maybe games are the only way I can keep myself together until then. I'll see you on the other side."

Her model's face came in even closer, moving in and out with a pursed lips (a kiss?). She backed away, and I heard a giggle, but also saw a tear in one eye. Bewildered, and desperate to know what she was really feeling, I moved forward to bring her close again, but her virtual projection simply disappeared before I could reach. She had gone, and I was left in the dark.

I closed the game.

That was the last time I would see Monika before it finally happened.


Author's Notes:

I have little to say about this chapter. Just putting in my last few ideas for this phase of the story and speeding on to the moment I've spent over a year building up to by now. Almost crazy to think about it that way. But I feel my readers are eager to reach that moment, just as I'm eager to stop beating around the bush and launch into the story's endgame. The anticipation even seems reflected in my characters — if it's going to happen, let it happen.

This chapter probably could have come out sooner, but I was momentarily distracted by a side–project, which should be published around the same time as this. Don't ask why I did it, I just felt I needed a breather from this longer work, a chance to stretch my creative muscles in a smaller space. From here though, I'm hoping for a straight shot to the end.

Also MC's game is a nod to The Witness, an artsy indie title I quite enjoyed. Even its grandiose philosophical pretensions I kind of love and hate at the same time. The review at youtube v= "KZokQov_aH0" roughly summarizes my thoughts.