Chapter 247 - Rebooting (Patreon)

Chapter 247

Alexandra's Core

Simulation One

RECONSTRUCTION PROCESS COMPLETE.

REBOOTING…

Alexandra screamed as she bolted up.

"I knew you'd do that." Said the apparition, and Alexandra blinked as she looked to the side.

Her other self was leaning against the wall, looking at her.

"What…the fuck happened?"

"When you powered up Glitch, the research AI I mean, she tried to connect to you like if you were a central command node. Tried to form a hivemind."

"Oh."

"That crashed you. I've been keeping things together while you were gone. And, you know, bringing you back."

"How…how long was I out?"

"Three days."

"That's…crap! The ships, the branch office, the-"

"Settle down. I took care of it. With a lot of help, mind you."

"What…Wait, what about Emilia?"

The apparition blushed, and coughed.

"That's…more complicated."

Alexandra opened her mouth, then closed it, before opening it again.

"Did you-?"

"Stars no! What's wrong with you?"

The advantage of talking with oneself's was that sometimes you didn't even need to finish sentences.

"I mean, we are the same person."

"Perhaps, but she fell in love with you. It'd have been wrong."

"Well…thank you."

"Don't mention it. I may have had to tell her about us however."

"Ah."

"So, good luck explaining your evil twin. Or whatever she thinks I am. Because I'm handing everything else back to you and going home into the secret projects."

"Wait, wha-"

Alexandra blinked as she was unceremoniously kicked out of the simulation.

And she opened her eyes.

"ALEX!"

The dungeon core barely had the time to twitch before Emilia hit her like a home sick meteor, almost knocking her avatar off the bed she was laying on.

"Ow! Vampy?" She hugged the vampire, and had a split second to try to speak again before Emilia decided her mouth had much better uses than mere words.

After a very thorough kiss, Emilia grabbed Alexandra's cheeks.

"Never, EVER do that again, do you hear me?!?"

"Y-Yes honey."

"Good." The vampire sat up, effectively straddling Alexandra's waist. "You scared the ever living crap out of me! Out of all of us!"

It was then that Alexandra realized that she wasn't alone in the…infirmary? Uh. That room had been more or less abandonned since Ella and Sarah had fully recovered, but it was odd.

Both of the aforementionned maids were there, as well as Seraph, CQ, Jared, Subtlety, and-

"Arcadia?!?" Blurted out Alexandra.

"Negative." Said the person, as their avatar briefly dissolved into static. "My name is Glitch! I…I am sorry for termin-damaging you."

Alexandra winced. There was no need to mince words with her, she was pretty sure she had died. Or as close as an AI could get anyway.

"Apology accepted. I didn't get much of a briefing."

"Yes, Ghost." Emilia glared at Alexandra. "Told us she'd give you the minimum before bringing you back up. At my insistence."

"Ghost?"

"Your other self. The 'apparition'. Which you hid from me. From all of us."

"There are some secrets I have to keep hidden." Alexandra glared back. "You of all people understands that."

Emilia flinched.

"Right, sorry. I don't…" She sighed. "I'm sorry, I was…I was terrified I'd lost you forever."

Alexandra relaxed, and she grabbed the vampire girl, unceremoniously bringing her back down for a hug.

"It's okay. I understand." The Earth-born took in a deep breath of her girlfriend's scent. "Still, this is going to lead to some awkward questions, isn't it?"

"Yep."

"Any chance I can head them off?"

"Nope."

"Well, I tried." Alexandra closed her eyes for a few seconds, savoring the moment and recentering herself, before looking at the others in the room. "Alright, I'm gonna need a full status update and briefing. We can do it around breakfast."

Emilia and the maids relaxed. Clearly having her act, like, well, her was taking something of a burden off of their shoulders.

Given that there was no guarantee an AI would come out the same out of a reconstruction process, that was an understandable fear. Though, thankfully, Arcadia was exceptionally paranoid around that kind of possibility, so she didn't exactly fear being someone different.

…Okay, perhaps a little bit, but not much.

"I do not require nor am I capable of ingesting nutrients." Said Subtlety, and Alexandra rolled her eyes.

"Neither does 'Ghost'. Or Jared. You don't have to eat. But I need some comfort food. What do you think vampy?"

"Sounds good to me. Though I was planning to give you breakfast in bed."

Sarah muttered something which suspiciously sounded like 'breakfast would have been the last thing to happen there', before coughing as Ella not so discreetly elbowed her between the ribs and Alexandra glared at her.

"That would have been lovely. Next time, perhaps. Now, let's get a proper feast going! We can discuss shop once I have enough sugar in me to kill a grown adult."

*****

"You did good work. I mean it." Said Alexandra as she leaned against the railing on the catwalk overlooking the shipyard, craddling a mug of hot chocolate. "I know you're upset with what you said to the baroness, but you did the right thing with the prisoners. I…I'm not sure what I would have done, honestly."

Alexandra took a sip as she gazed at the vast, noisy space, where last minute additions to the Raiders were being made. Upside of the delay on the ships departing meant that some gear that had still been in development was now available.

The apparition, no, Ghost now, to her other self's mix of amusement and frustration, shrugged.

"Nice of you to say so anyway." Now that she wasn't a secret to their people, she'd opted for a hologram rather than a mind projection, though she eschewed projecting it on a golem, preferring to keep herself entirely non physical. "I couldn't handle as many inputs as you could. I had to delegate a lot."

"And, what, you think I don't have to as well?"

"True, I do suppose you have your mind on other things when Emilia is with you."

"Shush. Speaking of, I have the memories, but…"

Alexandra shrugged, before taking a long sip of her hot cocoa.

"Not keen to review them without my permission? It's okay. Don't get me wrong, having a heartfelt and deadly serious conversation with someone dressed, for some values of dressed at least, as a dominatrix indubitably does rank as one of my weirder experiences. Especially as she had every intention of fucking my brains out before I started the conversation. But it's not going to prevent me from letting you view it." Ghost looked as Alexandra spat out her drink, smirking. "You okay there?"

"Screw you."

"Please. I'm not that narcissistic."

"...Wait, hold on, I remember us, with Arcadia…after you became part of the hivemind…"

"Let's change the subject." Said Ghost, abruptly, and Alexandra hid a smile behind her mug as her other self was caught flat footed.

"Right, of course." Said the Earth-born, sweetly, before turning serious. "The fleet?"

"Ready to depart at a moment's notice. Of course, with the new target designators…"

They exchanged a wolfish smile.

"Is the So Much For Subtlety ready?"

"Nope, but we're rushing production forward. It should be soon. And with that…"

"We can finally kick Sunrise's ass. Crush these slaving bastards."

"Or at least give them a very sizeable bootprint on the rear."

"I'll settle for either." Alexandra frowned. "The situation isn't looking good."

"I know. The UDC is basically just waiting for the shooting to start at this point, though many within and without still hold out hope that it can be averted."

"Not gonna happen. Not anymore. Neither side can back down. The only solution is status quo and escalation. And the inertia is with the latter."

"Thermodynamics' a stone cold bitch."

They both chuckled at the joke.

"Alright, then we'll have to prepare for that." Alexandra grimaced. "It's not going to be pretty."

"Not, it won't be."

"Speaking of UDC, the hacking packages?"

"Good news is, saving your ass taught me a fair bit about how dungeons handle their minds. We're still going to need a vector inside, but once we're in, we can do a lot. Notably, I think we could network cores together."

"You mean, like…"

"Like Arcadias. Since that killed you, I'm not keen on that option until I've had a long time to go over the code for it."

"I can only second that."

"Yeah, you should, because I'm fairly sure Emilia would kill you if you suffered that kind of software error again. Then kill me, probably."

"She seemed worried."

"Girl, if something like this had happened to her, you'd be tearing up the entire planet to find a solution to bring her back."

"No. You know as well as I do that I'd start breaking this star system apart if I had to."

"That only further proves my point."

Alexandra hummed.

"Perhaps." She sighed. "What about our more…secure projects?"

"Purring like kittens. Though details should wait until we are in a more secure venue."

"Of course." Admitting they had some secret projects was not saying much, anyone with a brain would realize she had stuff cooking somewhere. Specifics though…better done in the sanctity of their minds. "I heard the trade mission got its first encounter?"

"Yeah. Turns out, most of the monsters on the path between Darthar and Erakis got the memo that airships will freaking kill you. Or, you know, died not taking that advice. But elsewhere they're still as aggressive as ever."

"Well, it'll make for good weapon testing."

"Great weapon testing you mean. Gave the Freedoms their first engagement. They're remarkably powerful, for armed trading ships."

"That was the point."

"True, true. Sarth is going to love them."

"They'll love the supplies onboard even more. Reminds me, intel says Sunrise is pulling back?"

"Not the main armies, they're still anchored at Darthar and Asaria, respectively, but in general? Yeah, absolutely. Smaller raiding parties and such are retreating, burning everything behind. Consolidating into more coherent forces, digging in across the board instead of pushing into the western baronies. I think the duchess just realized how precarious the situation was getting."

"That, or she knows something we don't."

"Possible. But what could possible convince her to start consolidating like that? We sure as hell didn't make her do that, and we're the biggest threat on the continent at this point."

"Something big, I'd wager. Very big."

*****

"Twelth expeditionary fleet, arriving!" Shouted the sergeant as the admiral stepped onto the deck.

"Permission to come aboard, commodore?"

"Permission granted." Said the Gorromarian officer. "And welcome to Gorromar, lady admiral."

"Thank you. I appreciate your country's willingness to host my vessels."

"These are unusual times. Perhaps it is time for unusual solutions." The commodore looked up, at the neat ranks of airships, and the squadrons of strikecrafts screaming overhead. "Though yours appear to be…highly unconventional."

"Speak softly, and carry a big fleet, I believe was the First Empress' saying. I endeavor to uphold tradition."

"Quite." Said the commodore, her eyes narrowing. Clearly, the Gorromarian figured that this was a slight jab at her country's almost pathological adherence to said tradition, but she wasn't willing to rise to the bait or challenge the admiral. "Still, I hope you will understand if my government is less than enthused at your lack of communication of your intentions. The situation is highly volatile here."

"I am aware, and you do not wish a psychotic admiral to pour more gas onto the fire." The admiral smiled as the commodore hesitated. "Not expressed quite in those words, I'm sure. Nevertheless, I can assure you I am not here to start any fires, just put them out." For what it was worth, it was true, though she was going to put out fires that would only help the others grow into an all consuming blaze. Still, she'd look like a peacekeeper aplenty until everything came down. Be helpful, and positively lavish with her assitance. And in doing so, rope the Empire into this mess.

"As you said, it is not how I would have phrased it, but I suppose the spirit is true enough. If you'll allow me, my vessels will take the lead, and escort you to the city." If the commodore saw the ridicule in having a handful of battlecruisers escort an entire armada headed by a litteral dreadnought, a ship that, alone, outmassed the entire Gorromarian 'squadron', she didn't show it. "The Colonel is waiting for you."

There were many colonels in Gorromar, but only one 'Colonel'. The leader of the city, from back when it was a bunker in the ground, still believing their dear Gods were going to rescue them.

Which, to be entirely fair, they had. Sort of.

It would be delicious irony to use these False Gods bootlickers as her springboard for the destruction of their beloved Church and the fall of their Custodians.

"Of course. Lead the way commodore. Lead the way…"