Shifting Gales has never felt this weird before in her decently long life. It was as if a fever was tormenting her. But not the real her, the Superstructure, which took hit after hit to assure her survival. No.

The heat she felt… it bubbled up in her very chest; her puppet frame was warming up.

Was she even crying, per what she has just told Suns? Or was that reaction something else?

Gales reached for her neck, fingers brushing along the formerly dry and useless vents. A thin, yet steady flow of liquid was running down all four of them, soaking her collar in a mixture of dirt and water… or was that diluted acid? Were the holes in her collar always present? Did the fabric already feel that thin and brittle before?

Questions upon questions. But she didn’t feel sad. In pain, yes, who wouldn’t be after what she did only a Cycle ago? Who else could state that they [REDACTED] up their [REDACTED] Rarefaction Cell to prevent a collapse? And that with a possibility for failure she would never share with anyone. A risk she would take to the end, probably a memory worthy of abandoning in the transition to the staff.

… No, that was a memory worth keeping. A reminder of what differentiated her kind from all other beings, which had ever existed on this planet. Iterators were logical beings. Any possibility for failure above 0.00001% was never to be practised outside of simulations. But the wildlife took risks far above that threshold. And so did the Ancients.

Was that mysterious figure one of these risk-takers as well? Or did he play his role safely? Didn’t appear as such. And her lack of conscious memories of that individual did tell her that his inclusion in her Benefactors came from taking a great risk… probably regarding the House of Forgiveness.

Gales shook her head and took a deep rattling breath, her vents gurgling and writhing in the flooded sensation of soothed pain. She attempted to speak a few of the grunting and screeching words of the Scavengers, for which she used her voice box. The gurgling took form and the words of her followers emerged, a deep hue, as if she spoke from the bottom of a barrel. But it didn’t hurt nearly as much as it did before.

What an odd occurrence. It felt oddly right, as if that function was meant to be active from the get-go. Yet another oddity of her unique body to add to the list. Gales took another three calming and bubbling breaths, slowly getting used to the inhaling part of the new function, learning how to stop the flow of water by sucking it back in time.

Was she drooling like an infant!? No way! It was a discovery, which caused her to chuckle brightly and encouraged her to pick up the Chat Device, in which Suns still waited for a response; a real explanation for what went down. A few calming words for her friends; her Benefactors.

Direct Message – Chat System 1.0 – 1695.452

Seven Red Suns, Shifting Gales

SG: I am not crying. It is something else.

SG: I don’t know what it is, but the loss of a Cell triggered something odd. My puppet, water is now coursing through canals unknown.

SG: A cooling system perhaps?

SRS: There is no shame in being sad or devastated. You don’t need to try to explain your feelings by pushing them aside with explanations, fabricated to soothe my mind.

SRS: The vents are there to amplify our voice, to add volume and depth to the divine tune of our preaches. Or, at least, that is what our late Benefactors would say.

SG: But I am not lying… If I could only send images.

SG: I AM BREATHING!

SRS: Are you sure you are alright? You sound delirious, no offence.

SG: No offence taken. But you must believe me!

SG: The more of my Superstructure is gone, the more sensations I notice in my puppet.

SG: It is difficult to explain.

SRS: Fine. I believe you. Try to. It is an illogical state of affairs, you must forgive me.

SG: I know. I would calculate it, but, given my current state, I can only give an estimate.

SG: 0.2% chance of me telling the truth?

SRS: 0.00432%. I am surprised that I didn’t get a Nat 0 result.

SRS: Are your followers alright? I assume you took their help to set up the explosion. Correct?

SG: Breaker and co are alright. They helped me so much; I couldn’t have done it without them.

SG: I sent them back to their Upper City. I needed some time for myself to process the blast.

Suns clenched their fists, stopping to type, and allowed Spearmaster to take part in their thoughts regarding the situation, catching the Slugcat up to the situation at hand.

Spearmaster looked up with alabaster white eyes, their presence in Suns’ thoughts a calming aspect.

‘ You don’t believe her. Why wouldn’t you? Does she have a reason to lie about it? ’

Suns slowly pet Spears’ head, sighing deeply, the overheating lava coils in his Can receiving a cooling rinse from a fresh push of coolant through their veins. Suns was conflicted, enraged. But their anger was not directed at Shifting Gales, it was instead a general dissatisfaction with the whole religious operation, which started their both existences.

The House of Forgiveness must have had a reason to set Gales’ Can up for failure, but what was it? It broke Suns’ metaphorical heart to witness their new friends slowly falling into illogical insanity.

…

Wouldn’t be the first Guardian of them, who went crazy through the hardships induced by the House’s decisions.

Sublime Virtue went loony after her humiliating purpose was stripped away from her. Gales’ status remembered her frustratingly much of the once-so-cheerful Iterator.

Ten Modici went unresponsive after the threat of Mass Ascension dumped too many belongings, possessions, and confessions into his Storehouse Can. Too many secrets to keep, forced to keep his mouth shut even regarding trivial questions.

And they had no clue what Wreathing Stratosphere was going through. They hoped that his group would keep him company, at least.

The only Guardians who haven’t lost it yet were Bloodless Promise and Shifting Gales… until this instance. Both had a supporting local group, trying their best to help them through the crisis reverberating from the past of the House to the present. They did make progress in unfusing Promise from the nuclear solution that was his Superstructure. But would the solution for Gales meet up with a sane Iterator? The Microstructure can save her life, but could it save her crumbling psyche as well?

Suns looked back at the Chat Device, reading the new messages, and, at last, answered Spears’ looming question.

“She has many reasons to lie. Too many. They are not of a malicious nature, however.

She doesn’t want to make us worry. Though I am now even more concerned about her status.

I just wish I could be sure she was telling the whole truth… Yes, Spears, maybe she is, after all. But be reasonable. You can type reassuring messages in any state in which you can still move your fingers across the keyboard. She does sound more illogical than ever.

I mean… breathing with your puppet body? What else will happen? Our puppets were designed to work independently from our Superstructure? Don’t make me laugh. Our Benefactors were not that resourceful, period. We were instruments in their quest for an end, and still are. To Iterate until it is done. Why should we be able to survive without what makes us capable of fulfilling our purpose?

No… I try to ignore my logical nature. I will at least attempt to accept her words. I didn’t accept Virtue’s maniacal development, and look where that ended up with her.”

‘ Listen to her and hear her out; be there for Gales. You are now more important than ever before. Keep her grounded until my protégé arrives. ’

SG: I was totally fine afterwards. A few more hiccups in my system, but that was to be expected.

SRS: Gales…

SRS: What you will say next I won’t share with anybody in your group. We both don’t want to worry them sick. You are a terrible liar, you know?

SRS: You weren’t ‘totally’ fine, were you?

SG: You promise that nobody will find out? I want Spears’ promise as well.

SRS: (SM) I promise.

SRS: We promise.

SG: … Fine.

SG: I… am in an indescribable amount of pain. I just want to leave this dissolving shell I only reluctantly call my body at this point behind. At least there is a shimmer of hope, thanks to you lots. A way to make it so. The staff is the sole reason why I haven’t given up yet, can’t give up.

SG: You are my lifeline; without you, I would grow insane. Especially you, Suns. Thank you, from the bottom of my Core, for being there for me till the very end.

SG: I haven’t run a deep analysis regarding the damage caused by the explosion. I literally can’t anymore. My processing power has run to a standstill, as the holes in my cooling system, and the repeated drainage of the acid, introduced me to a new risk factor.

SRS: Gales... ;-;

SG: I am running hot when I try to be what I was designed to be. Being an Iterator hurts me greatly and accelerates the inevitable by overheating critical weak points. I am dependent on my Scavenger friends, because my body and spirit are both crippled.

SG: And this is just the beginning. My remaining sensors make me aware of at least two other critical points which could cause a collapse. I must cut these parts away before they grow terminally.

SG: A goddess… don’t make me laugh.

SG: And, on top of that, my body is beggining to act strangely. No, I didn’t lie about any of that.

SG: But I did lie about me being content with my ability to stay intact until Irradiant arrives.

SG: 12,5%! This was the chance of collapse from the explosion of my Rarefaction Cell! 60% if I wouldn’t have interfered and guided the explosion.

SG: I am already that far gone from the concept of a [REDACTED] Iterator! [REDACTED]!

SRS: Calm down, Shifting Gales. I… understand.

SRS: Your secret is safe with me. I will only share with the group that you are still responsive and holding up, ready to do what it takes.

SRS: Is that good with you?

Gales was in a rough spot. Her body was malfunctioning many times throughout the conversation, her vision blurry, and sometimes she even needed multiple seconds to focus on the holographic screen of the orb.

The chat went on for over a Cycle by now, with each message requiring minutes until they arrived at the other end of the call. The latency was unbearable for an ordinary Iterator, but, for her, it was a blessing. It allowed her slowed mind to think and put together coherent words and explanations without utilizing the processing power of her Can. Even her Memory Array was only periodically receiving the necessary antigravity to process thoughts and requests for memories to be carried out to her puppet brain.

But her primary concern was the heat. She felt the water in her puppet’s body bubbling, unable to fully cool down the Iterator, who unknowingly started to utilize the newfound internal processor to process thoughts and actions. Any complex action would put further pressure on her small body. The bubbling breathing went away and was replaced by the sound of a steaming boiler; a silent whistling periodically growing louder.

She would need a longer period to rest, to cool down and to sort out any internal repairs to reinstate the external cooling cycle. But Gales was amid a, for her understandingly difficult, process of opening herself up to Suns far more than she ever did before.

Talking about her worries, her fears and anger felt good in ways she didn’t anticipate. And she allowed herself to tell Suns just a tiny bit more about her, about the holographic vision of the past night. More illogical processes for her friend to stomach and accept.

So, she held up the orb again, placed it in a floating position in front of her, and resumed typing, ignoring the strange whistling sound, letting the simple breathing algorithm she set up during the talk do its job of keeping the coolant flowing back and forth.

SG: Acceptable terms, thank you.

SG: But, Suns, there is something else I want you to investigate for me.

SG: It has to do with the research we have been doing regarding what my purpose truly was.

SG: The reason for my tinkered memory, the strange chapel in your city.

SG: I have a new leading point!

SRS: Despite all that, you still push forward on the mystery. Admirable.

SRS: What have you found?

SG: After the event from two Cycles ago, I used the first night to meditate and sort my thoughts, to cope with the pain and shock.

SG: I summoned my Overseers and allowed them to access my memories to construct images of all my Benefactors.

SG: Sky, Whisper, Lives, Irradiant, Breaker, Spearmaster and you.

SG: But a vacant spot had been taken by an unknown Benefactor for me. An Ancient!

SRS: Go on. Submerging badly wiped memories?

SG: Not exactly. I have no memories of him. The source of the unexpected visitor predates my construction date.

SG: My architect! Or, at least, someone, who felt responsible, leaving a fabricated memory of him in his worst shape inside me.

SG: He wore a brochure. I recognized a pearl design!

SRS: A lead… Who was it? Who might know more about you?

SG: That’s the issue.

SG: It is Far Whisper. She has the same pearl around her neck, down to the intricate design.

SG: If she knew something, she would have told me already.

SG: …

SG: Unless…

SRS: Gales? No false conclusions. You know of our late Benefactors.

SRS: They did many things, and only a fraction of it involved us.

SG: I know! What do you think I wanted to say!?

SG: Blame her for my existence!? No!

SG: I try to remember. Whisper was the first Iterator, who talked to me after my activation.

SG: Come on! Think Gales! Remember that [REDACTED] interaction!

Gales took a deep bubbling, no, steaming, breath, and reconnected herself to her broader consciousness, expanding her awareness from her current whereabouts, somewhere below the Monastery, to her whole body. The sheer audacity of Suns to even introduce the possibility that Whisper knows something that crucial was blinding her, causing a tunnel vision in her desire to receive results.

As she forced her Memory Array to reintroduce stable antigravity to aid her ability to process thoughts at the speed of an unstable supercomputer, her cooling system reawakened, and the bare pumping system reintroduced a fresh portion of burning Void-acid to her dried-out systems. The pumps were working overtime, forcing the dangerous water across dead zones where her Strata gave in a long time ago and holes were more common than intact pipe walls. The simple desire to remember reintroduced a flooding sensation to her whole Can.

Gales' eyes widened as the sudden sting of acid flooding the canals around her shielded Heart-Chamber caused her to wince back, alarm messages appearing all over her consciousness.

I-I called off the Overseer from maintaining and replacing the filters last n-night. I-It hurts so m-much.

This was a m-m-mistake. Abort!

“A-AABORT! STOP!”

Gales shrieked in agony as the grave mistake of getting triggered by her pride in her best friend backfired immediately. Her vision clouded as her command was followed in an instant, the pumps stopping in their tracks, allowing the acid to leave the cycle through the many holes, flooding her corridors instead. But she didn’t cancel her request for the memory, she realized, as the burning pain came closer to her puppet’s whereabouts.

Aborting the processing power of her Can rerouted the cooling process to the only intact system she had left; her own puppet, which, for some reason, had this fallback function as well. Trying to process the request and keep the antigravity in her brain up, she could feel her insides burning up as her small frame tried to process this huge undertaking.

Just like an integrated processing unit would overheat being faced with an impossible undertaking, her own body would not meet a fate any different to that. The steam from her bubbling vents turned dark as she burned out from the inside out, thick clouds of black smoke escaping her flaring-up body.

Her eyes widened even further, then glitched into the all-consuming symbol of threat, painted on her television face in a threat-inducing poisonous red. The Iterator, now barely able to even fathom what was happening to her, pushed through against her will, receiving what she desired from the foolish attempt to even think.

‘Two Eyes of the Infinite Cosmos’. Far Whisper asked her when they first met, if that Ancient became her Administrator. She… didn’t know who that person was. Now she did. He had been removed from her prior to her completion. But why?

The series of normal follow-up thoughts, amidst the burning hellhole that was her puppet, caused her concentration to give in at last, and her mind succumbed to the pain. She was reminded by the rapid spreading of a hot sear branded in her very chest of the hopeless situation and her inability to continue to think big. In a panic, Gales attempted to grab a hold of the situation and cancel everything she could to stop the madness.

…

...

The sound of a fist-sized orb colliding with the ground below and shattering on impact, the consequence of her removing her personal gravity bubble as well as her pushing the emergency stop button, filled her troubled mind. She didn’t need to consult anything, not her brain, or any other extended part of her Can to understand the source of that sound.

A sound that hurt her more than any overheating ever could. It was a sting to her immortal conscience, a mental pain that ripped her entire self apart, widening a wound all across her awareness.

Her… window to the outside, her connection to Seven Red Suns, to everyone she held dear. The shattering sound of her failure reverberated in her now single-minded brain, any other thought abolished for an endless replay of her sanity being broken apart.

She couldn’t believe it! She couldn’t accept it!

“I-I am i-in contr- S-Suns! Y-you are th-tehere!? Comeoncomeon!”

Gales forced her burnt-out body onto her knees and crawled blindly to the shattering point, her hands feeling the scattered apart insides of the orb. Panic rose as she forced herself to see, working against the many error messages and recommendation of an emergency shutdown.

Not n-now!

Her vision cleared and her panic was met with the dreadful confirmation of her deepest worries.

She held one half-orb of the Chat Device in her left… the other half in her right.

Her… only way of communication was cut apart by her pride in Whisper. Her agitation regarding the mere suggestion of her mistrusting her best friend.

It… didn’t matter anymore.

I must repair it! I can’t leave my friends with that conversation as my last. They will be worried sick and do things they will surely regret. Parts. Gales, gather everything that is broken-off. You can still fix that!

…

You have to fix that! Contact Suns… somehow.

Direct Message – Chat System 1.0 – 1695.453

Seven Red Suns, Sh1ft1ng G4l35[ERROR]

(Message not sent) SRS: You haven’t said anything in the past half Cycle. Have you found an answer?

(Message not sent) SRS: What in the Void!?

(Message not sent) SRS: This has to be a joke! Gales!

GALES!

command not recognized

get user ID SG

user ID not found.