I shake my head, trying to flick the fake hair out from in front of my eyes. The raging winds of our home fragment have blown it all over the place, whipping it into a messy frenzy. I had happily forgotten about this downside from back before I was bald, but I guess it's not a huge deal. I was a little worried the skinsuit wouldn't hold up well within the mists; not only is it a lot less sturdy than my robotic frame, but using it requires me to break the seal on that frame, potentially allowing the mists inside me. Fortunately, my body doesn't seem to be affected, and both my skinsuit and the outfit covering it survive the trip unharmed.

  "Okay, that's the first hurdle!" Thea says happily, poking her head out of the portal behind me. We've made it to the liminal space now. It's only a short walk to Earth.

  "No damage detected," I confirm. Since I don't actually know sign language yet, I'm wearing a medical mask to disguise the fact that my mouth doesn't move when I talk. It should be enough for now.

  "Great!" Thea beams. She's carrying a ton of stuff with her for some reason, random bits of equipment as well as just her normal laptop. "Let's get this taken care of!"

  I keep my sensors searching for any sign of magical girls as we walk, not wanting to risk accidentally stumbling into one while wearing the disguise that's supposed to separate me from the Dark Rebellion. It would give away the game rather early, I think. Fortunately, there's no sign of them, and we reach the threshold to Earth without incident.

  "Alright, this is where we part, I guess," I tell Thea. "I'll let you know how everything goes when I get back."

  "Wait!" Thea says, putting a bunch of her stuff on the ground. "Hold on one second. G???? M? C??????."

  What? In a flash of light, Thea's outfit explodes off of her as she quickly goes through her incarnate transformation for… some reason. I'm not really thinking super hard about it, since the whole process is just as cool as it was the first time. When it's over, she ends up in her mostly human form, barring the pitch-black eyes with glowing green irises and of course the giant tome of monstrous flesh that looks like the fucking Necronomicon.

  "F?????? S??? D????? A???????," she finishes, her bare feet descending to the ground after the transformation briefly lifted her up in the air. Then, she rubs her hands together, takes off and disintegrates her giant witch hat, turns her book invisible, puts on a jacket and flip flops, and then pulls a pair of sunglasses out of the pocket and rests them on her face.

  "Perfect disguise complete!" she declares.

  I blink incredulously at her, because I can do that now and also she deserves it.

  "Perfect disguise… except for the fact that you're radiating green magic like a giant beacon screaming 'all magical girls, please investigate me?'" I ask.

  "Yes! Basically. Look, it'll be fine. We're only gonna be on Earth for like half an hour. That's more than enough time to blend in with a crowd," Thea insists.

  "A crowd isn't going to disguise you," I tell her.

  "Yeah, but we're not trying to disguise me. Look, the most important thing for this prototype to accomplish is to stand up to scrutiny from an Earth Guardian. In order to know whether or not the test is a success, we need one to actually show up!"

  "…Okay, but it will completely ruin my disguise if I have to save you from getting captured," I say. "Besides, what if Castalia shows up? This test is not more important than your safety. There's nothing we can do if they bring in the big guns."

  "They won't, it's fine," she brushes off. "Besides, you need me there. You want to access the internet, right? Well the best way to do that is to get examples of how that actually works. I'll bring my laptop into a little cafe or something, you'll sit at a different table, and I'll go through the motions of proper web protocol so you can see the theory in action and assemble some way to spoof it for yourself. I'm sure you can figure it out eventually from just listening to random traffic, but why do work you don't have to do?"

  Hmm. That is quite tempting, actually. Not to mention I know that Thea is mostly doing this because she wants to visit Earth again, and I don't want to be the thing holding her back. Besides, my orders are to keep my identities separate… but this isn't necessarily going to be my true second identity. This is a test run. Thea is absolutely right that we need to perform those tests in strenuous enough conditions to ensure that I can keep those identities separate in the future. It would be bad if people figured out that the artifact can disguise itself in human skin, but it would be worse if I'm already waist-deep in my cover identity when that ultimately comes out. The more I know on how to prevent that, the better.

  "Okay, but we won't be able to associate with each other on Earth," I say. "Let me poke my head out and see where we are, and then I'll give you directions to a place to meet up with me at. I'll go to a cafe and pretend to eat something, then you show up and do your internet stuff. Two separate groups."

  "Deal," Thea nods immediately. "Don't take too long, though. I can't keep up my incarnate form forever."

  I nod, and we get to work. Fortunately, the liminal space is dropping us right outside of town again, and it's not hard to spot an acceptable cafe from this distance even with how inferior the skinsuit's ocular sensors are compared to my own. This is the big moment. I return to Thea, let her know the plan, and start walking towards civilization. If I had a real heart it would be pounding, but my fake heart thumps with a calm, even rhythm. Why would I be stressed? I'm just a perfectly normal girl having a perfectly normal day being made of flesh and stuff. Behold my normality!

  Internally, of course, this feels anything but normal. Every step I take is accompanied by a thousand little micromanagements, constant minute adjustments ensuring that I will never appear to be inhumanly efficient in my movements. A human disguise means throwing out hundreds of little things I liked about being a robot in service to the lie. I liked being able to stand perfectly still and walk perfectly even. I liked not needing to worry about where my eyeballs were pointed in every little social situation. I liked not having to breathe, manually or otherwise. My body was so inefficient and distracting, and now that I'm free of it I have to artificially reintroduce every minute irritation so I can crawl out of my comfortable spot at the bottom of uncanny valley and return to the cliffside with everyone else.

  God, Earth is just so much. It's not just the fact that the air is practically screaming with radio signals; so many people are here that the flow of magical energy, while dramatically less than in the Dark World, is remarkably chaotic. I've gotten a lot better at interpreting everything my sensors are telling me since the first time I was here in robot form, and the sheer amount of emotion I can pick up from everyone in sight is staggering. That's not even bringing up all my 'mundane' senses: there's so much to see, so many sounds and smells to keep track of, that I can feel my processors running warmer just by being here.

  Yet despite all of that, I can't say I feel any of this is overwhelming. All the information slots itself neatly into different sections of my mind, leaving me aware of but not fully conscious of it all unless it's important or I decide to look. And 'important' isn't decided by some arbitrary metric… or at least not an arbitrary metric other than my own. I, in some way or another, actively choose what to ignore and accept. My mind is just so big now, I can handle it without it getting in the way of my thoughts.

  I make it to the cafe without anyone in the street seeming to notice something off about me. It's a pleasant seventy-eight point four degrees Fahrenheit (four hundred twenty-five point six degrees Pyulor) outside, so a lot of people are walking around, riding bikes, getting their dog some exercise, and generally enjoying an unexpectedly temperate day of Colorado summer. I nod politely at someone as we cross paths on the sidewalk and they nod back. Nobody can tell a thing. It's a little exhilarating.

  Inside the cafe, I read the menu and decide on an order. A milkshake seems like a good test of my matter-annihilating mouth… until I remember that I can't actually use a straw. No suction. I guess I'll have to settle for a coffee. Alright, here we go! The moment of truth!

  "Hi, welcome! What can I get for you today?" the girl at the counter asks me, her fake smile quite convincing despite the waves of irritation and exhaustion I can feel radiating off of her. Okay, I've got my voice decided on! Let's do this!

  "Hi, could I get a vanilla latte, no whipped cream?" I ask, the words cementing themselves forever in my memory as the first things I ever got to say to a human after gaining my new body.

  "Sure thing, can I get a name for that?"

  Hell yes you can.

  "Luna," I tell her happily. "My name is Luna."

  "Pretty name!" she compliments me, and regardless of how much it's an act she's putting on for work I can't help but wiggle with happiness. It is a pretty name! I love my name! I love hearing my name spoken by someone other than the four crazy monsters I live with! Oh my god, this is working! This is actually working!

  I thank the girl and pay her with a twenty dollar bill, telling her to put the change in the tip jar before heading to a seat to wait around. Thea enters the cafe soon afterwards, walking up to the counter and ordering something for herself as well.

  "I love your dress," the register girl says, motioning towards the tattered black garment that accompanies Thea's incarnate form. The adorable currently-not-so-otter girl preens under the compliments, and I can tell her tail would be swishing if she still had one. She sits down at another table, opens up her laptop, and I start to pay very close attention to all the traffic heading into and out of it.

  Thea takes it slow and careful, connecting and disconnecting from the same wireless network several times to ensure I have the examples I need to spoof my own. The laptop is angled so I can see the screen from where I'm sitting, letting me watch in real time how the data sent to the computer manifests itself on the web browser. From everything I've already read about protocols and memorized from my prior times on Earth, I quickly start to form a complete picture. It's exciting. Very exciting. It's finally time for me to access the internet with my own mind!

  A burst of joy washes harmlessly through the restaurant. At first, I wonder if it's somehow my fault, if I accidentally created some magical effect from my own excitement, but then I see the flying cat. The same Preserver that picked up Castalia from school the day I got captured by Melpomene. I'm immediately terrified by the thought that it's all over, but I quickly realize the Preserver isn't paying any attention to me at all. The entirety of their attention is focused on one thing.

  "Thea," the Preserver says. "It's been a long time."

  The entire cafe is silent now, staring at my friend and the alien addressing her. I can't blame them. I'm certainly not going to be doing anything else.

  "Hi, Uma'tama," Thea sighs. "Geez, you found me fast. I was hoping for a little more time."

  "Feel free to take that time," the Preserver—Uma'tama, apparently—says. "I was thinking we could talk, actually."

  "So you can stall until the others get here?" Thea accuses.

  "No," Uma'tama says, shaking their head. "There won't be any need for that. Right?"

  The Preserver says that last word not as a threat, but as a request. Almost a desperate one. It catches me off guard a little.

  "I don't know what you're asking of me," Thea says. "But as long as sitting here and minding my own business doesn't constitute a need, then yeah, you don't have anything to worry about."

  "I deeply wish that were true," Uma'tama sighs. "Not having anything to worry about, I mean. We've been nothing but worried about you. We didn't even know you were alive until recently. We were shocked to hear about you participating in a battle again, but more than anything I'm just relieved to see you're healthy and safe."

  Thea shifts awkwardly in her seat, not seeming to know what to say.

  "So… what, you're just dropping by to say hi?" Thea asks. "Hi, I guess. Good to know you aren't trying to capture me this time."

  "I'm not," Uma'tama confirms. "Not unless you tell us you're being held from us against your will."

  "What!?" Thea asks incredulously. "Against my—no! Of course I'm not being held there against my will. Why would you even think that!?"

  Yeah, geez, why would anyone think Melpomene would hold someone against their will? Truly ridiculous.

  "Because I don't know what to think!" Uma'tama answers desperately. "We understand that we did not part on the best of terms, and we know why you want to stay away. But I still care about you, Thea! I still care about all of you, but we've heard basically nothing about you for years. I just… I needed to see for myself that you were alright."

  "Yeah?" Thea asks, taking off her sunglasses and glowering at Uma'tama. "Well how alright do I look?"

  Even from here, I can see the Preserver's eyes widen imperceptibly with shock. People across the restaurant have their phone cameras out now, recording the whole interaction. Uma'tama seems to need a moment to find their words, and when they ultimately do it takes the form of a single question.

  "Do you hate us, Thea?"

  "What?" is all Thea seems to be able to say at first, the question completely putting her on the back foot. "I…"

  She trails off, fully stopping to think about the question, as if she'd never even considered it before.

  "…no," she concludes uncertainly. "No, I don't think I hate you, Uma. I think I'm scared of you. That's why I've been hiding for so long. I loved you, Uma. Part of me still does. But I don't even know if you understand what you threatened to take from me."

  "I don't know if we did either," Uma'tama says softly. "It always seemed fair to us. If you want to use the powers we gave you, you must follow our rules. That was the totality of it, in our eyes."

  "But it wasn't just our powers, Uma," Thea says. "It was our everything. Our whole lives. You raised me. You were my family. The Earth Guardians were everything I had. It was never a choice between obedience and powerlessness to me. It was a choice between my mother and my sister, and only one of them seemed intent on hurting the other over something stupid."

  The Preserver's ears droop.

  "We see," Uma'tama murmurs. "I am still not sure we understand. But I believe you when you say we were asking far more of you than we thought. I am sorry."

  "I… thank you," Thea says. "That means a lot to me."

  "I do not know if I am being presumptuous, but… by my recollection, after moments like these you would usually enjoy a hug, when you were younger."

  Thea freezes, her jaw opening as if to answer but no sound coming out. Instead, her eyes start to water for a moment before she reaches out and pulls Uma'tama from the air into an embrace, squeezing them tightly against her chest. The Preserver lets out a startled squeak, followed by a few surprised words in an unrecognizable language, their tiny body almost completely engulfed by Thea's arms.

  "Y-you were much smaller the last time we did this," Uma'tama says, prompting an even tighter squeeze from Thea.

  "I never stopped missing you," Thea blubbers. "I am so, so, so, mad at you, but I never stopped missing you."

  The Preserver reaches one paw up to wipe Thea's face, cleaning off a few tears, but the poor flying cat doesn't have a terribly large range of motion available while getting crushed.

  "I want you to know that, if you ever wish to, you are welcome to return to us," Uma'tama promises her. "I will fight for your right to do so with everything I have."

  "But you'll make me stop working with Antipathy tech, right?" Thea asks. "I can't do that. It's kind of my one skill, at this point. I'm… passionate about it."

  The Preserver visibly hesitates, taking a moment to form an answer.

  "We thought… no. We still have reason to believe that the Dark World is directly and dangerously harmful to the human psyche. The Antipathy do not have the name for no reason; their spite persists after their demise, suffusing their realm and infecting its inhabitants. We feared that, living there as long as you have, you'd have gone mad with hatred. But… I can clearly see that is not what has occurred."

  "...Huh," Thea frowns. "Do you think your bosses might be lying to you?"

  "Not… in this case," Uma'tama answers, their whiskers twitching as they wrinkle their little nose. "The deleterious effects of Dark World miasma are well-documented. We are sure you have noticed the physical consequences, at the very least. But I imagine living in thick miasma would be prohibitively unpleasant, so… do you perhaps live somewhere where it is not present?"

  Thea hesitates.

  "We do, actually," she admits. "It still affects us, but mostly just when we go outside."

  "I see. Well, I'm glad you found shelter, at least."

  "Yeah, it's not too bad. We have generators for electricity and everything. No plumbing, but we make do. It's our home."

  "That's good," Uma'tama says, finally pulling away from the hug. "That's very good. I cannot describe how relieving it is to hear that."

  But there's no need to describe it. Thea and I can feel it. They really are relieved.

  "Hey, Uma?" Thea asks.

  "Yes?"

  "Be honest with me. Is what happened to the Antipathy going to happen to us?"

  The flying cat freezes in the air, proving its little wings are entirely decorative.

  "...What?" Uma'tama asks, shocked. "Why would you ever think that?"

  "Well, I mean, we haven't just been sitting on our hands for six years," Thea says. "We've recovered a lot of artifacts, done a lot of research, learned things here and there. We've never seen a reference to 'the Preservers' in Antipathy writings, but it's pretty easy to read between the lines and see that your people are the people they hated more than anything. They went to war with you. And now they're gone. Right?"

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  All of a sudden, my skinsuit's eyes unexpectedly start to return garbled static, rendering me functionally blind. My real body's senses still work, though, so I can feel and decode the spell that just passed through the restaurant, disabling and overwriting the various videos being recorded. It tries to do the same to my own memory, though it fails utterly. Best I can tell, Uma'tama doesn't seem to notice.

  "We're sorry, Thea," Uma'tama says. "There are many things on the subject of the Antipathy that we are not at liberty to say."

  "Okay, but you understand how that is possibly the least reassuring answer possible in this situation, right?" Thea presses. "I want to believe you aren't a bad person, Uma. But the stuff we've learned is really, really scary. The more we learn about you the more you look like the bad guys here. Can't you tell me something?"

  "I… please understand that we have certain rules and regulations that those of us who work on Earth are beholden to follow," Uma'tama says. "We are not necessarily capable of providing a satisfying answer to inquiries on this matter. I would be more comfortable if we changed the subject."

  "What are you talking about?" Thea presses. "That's even more suspicious! You can't just leave it at that and expect me to be able to trust you."

  "I'm sorry," Uma'tama apologizes again. "We, as a society, have reached a consensus on varying appropriate levels of interaction and our duty to each other as that society is paramount. I would be more comfortable if we changed the subject."

  "No, screw this," Thea scowls. "You're just proving everything I was afraid of being true. I don't want to talk anymore."

  "Thea—"

  "I said I don't wanna talk!" she snaps. "Go away!"

  "Thea," Uma'tama presses again. "Please. May I say one more thing?"

  Thea scowls, but nods.

  "When you were young," Uma'tama says, "I remember you would often ask me to tell you stories. You were very fascinated with books. I enjoyed reading them to you. They taught me many things about your world, and let me spend more time with you that may have otherwise been busy with lesser tasks."

  "Okay, and?" Thea asks, not picking up on the setup that I'm pretty sure is happening here.

  "I would like to tell you a story," Uma'tama says. "In honor of that history between us. It is a fictional story that I have made up. It is about a war."

  It takes her a moment, but Thea finally gets it. I feel her sit up straight and give Uma'tama her attention. Even blind, I know everything in my surroundings.

  "There were once two places. Big Place and Small Place. I would like to emphasize that these are not real places and they do not exist. You cannot travel to either. It is impossible to chart a path to them because there is no destination. This is a falsehood constructed for purposes of entertainment. Do you understand this?"

  "...Got it, Uma," Thea confirms, amusement creeping onto her face.

  "Good. The people of Big Place were very strong. The people of Small Place were very weak. But the people of Small Place did not like the people of Big Place. The people of Big Place would bump into them and knock them over just by walking around. They did not try to hurt the people of Small Place, but they did. They hurt them a lot. And the people of Small Place got very angry. So angry that they wanted to destroy Big Place. Small Place and Big Place fought, but Big Place was very big and crushed Small Place into nothing. And now everyone that ever lived in Small Place is gone. Even though Small Place attacked first, the people of Big Place are afraid that it was all their fault. The people of Big Place think they made a lot of mistakes and they miss the people of Small Place very much. They are sad because they never knew how much Small Place was being hurt until Small Place was already gone. Small Place was important and special and Big Place just did not know, they were too stupid, too short-sighted, too selfish, too disparate. They resolved to never let what happened to Small Place happen again. And then, Big Place finds somewhere called Smaller Place. And Big Place is terrified."

  Uma'tama floats higher into the air, holding out their forelimbs to either side as if grasping something far larger than their own, tiny form.

  "What should Big Place do? They conclude that they must stay away from Smaller Place. Some of the people of Big Place think they learned their lesson, but most say 'did we really? Have we truly changed?' There is we, but there is still I. But then Big Place is reminded: war does not end when the fighting stops. Not even when the enemy is slaughtered to the last. Big Place still bears its scars, and Small Place, even with all its people gone, still exists. And it is broken. And it is hungry. And it is angry. And it is trying to hurt Smaller Place, and this, too, is all Big Place's fault. So does Big Place risk hurting Smaller Place by trying to help them? Or do they guarantee hurting Smaller Place by doing nothing? They argue about it for a long time, and find an answer. It is not a perfect answer. It is probably not a good answer. But it's an answer enough people agree on, and it is better than nothing. So they do their best."

  Thea takes a moment to digest that, and in the silence I belatedly realize that both of our drinks have been cooling behind the restaurant's counter this entire time, even the workers too transfixed to pay attention to anything else. Humans don't get to know things about the Preservers. The Preservers simply act and there is little anyone can do to stop them. This many words from the unknowable alien source of our magical defense against extradimensional annihilation beyond our understanding is unthinkable. Based on the overall emotional state of the restaurant, it's also more than a little terrifying.

  "Is it?" Thea asks. "Better than nothing, I mean."

  "Better than Smaller Place no longer existing at all?" Uma'tama asks. "Of course. The people of Smaller Place, though endlessly confusing, are beautiful and special and completely irreplaceable. There can be no doubt that the people of Big Place and Smaller Place are more alike than they are different, and all of Big Place agrees that there is no acceptable future but one in which all places are full of people who are safe and suffer no deficiency of joy."

  "So 'Smaller Place' is safe? It's not going to end up as some fragmented universe biting into another like a leech?"

  "No," Uma'tama says firmly. "Not if we have anything to say about it."

  Thea meets the Preserver's gaze, searching their feline face for something that, eventually, she seems to find.

  "…Okay," she says. "Okay. That's… this is a lot to think about."

  "It would be best for this story to remain solely as thoughts," Uma'tama says, turning their head to stare at everyone else in the restaurant for the first time since arriving. "It is often the nature of entertaining fictions to be misinterpreted as allegorical, an eventuality that draws ever-closer each time a story is shared. For reasons that need not be investigated, this would displease me. You will find that your recording devices will return to functionality shortly after our departure."

  Oh, that's good. Even if I can map out the room without it it's always nice to be able to see colors. I was worried my suit would remain blind. Several of the people who had been too enraptured by the speech to notice their phones had long-since ceased recording squawk with varying degrees of surprise, indignance, and shame.

  "Now Thea," Uma'tama says. "We would like you to return with us."

  Immediately, the tension that had dissipated from Thea's body returns in force.

  "I… no," she says. "I won't do that."

  "We know," Uma'tama sighs. "But please be careful. The others have told me about what the Dark World has done to your body. Do not be so foolish as to cast out the fear of what it may do to your mind."

  And then, the Preserver vanishes. It takes a few more moments before the tension brought by their arrival finally breaks. My skinsuit's eyes flicker back on. Chatter returns to the cafe with a quiet rumble. The workers realize that they've failed to actually do their job for the better part of ten minutes, and awkwardly call my name after reading it off the side of the cup.

  "L-Luna!"

  I stand up, barely remembering to imitate human motion as I do so—

  Not that I could truly forget. I have a parallel process dedicated to remembering, to micromanaging every movement, even when I'm sitting still. Humans are never perfectly still, not like I can be, and the disguise would probably fall pretty quickly if I could just forget to look anything like a living person. So I decided that I can't forget. And so I can't.

  —and walk over to the counter, accepting my drink. I won't be able to taste it, at least not really, but there is an open line from the nose of my suit to my chemical sniffer, and ultimately both taste and smell are just the body keeping track of what chemicals are nearby and assigning them qualia. I've never been a huge fan of the smell of coffee, but I lift the drink up to my nose and take a whiff anyway, cataloging the compositions and assigning them a memory of waking up in the morning to the scent of my mother running the percolator to associate them with.

  I also note the drink has already cooled to barely above room temperature. I lift it up to my lips to take a sip, pouring it into the small gap between them and hoping none of it spills into any important systems before vanishing into nothing. Then, I make the smallest grimace appear on my face. I'm pretty sure most people don't like room-temperature coffee, after all.

  I don't think anyone bothers to look at any part of my performance, but I suppose that means it's working perfectly. So perfectly, even being in the same room as a Preserver does not seem to have broken my cover. As stress-tests go, I can't possibly think of a better one.

  Thea's name is called even more hesitantly than my own, and I can't tell whether or not to be impressed or concerned that they had the balls to give her a lukewarm drink, too. If I just learned that I was about to be serving something to a girl who can blow up buildings with her mind, I'd personally go ahead and remake the drink to make sure everything is perfect. But Thea just wordlessly accepts it, takes a sip, wrinkles her nose, and then pops the lid off before briefly heating the liquid to a boil by looking at it with an expression of stern disappointment. Then she returns to her seat, ignores the only person brave enough to try and talk to her, and takes a deep breath.

  "Okay," she mutters to herself. "Back to work."

  She starts tapping away at her laptop again, and I remember how tantalizingly close I am to internet access, having been interrupted by possibly the only thing that could have been distracting enough to get me to stop. Right, it's time! It's time!

  I've got the packets all lined up in my head. I just have to send them out. Hello, Mr. Router! Won't you shake a poor robot girl's hand? Check, check, check. Back and forth, I dance to the song I've finally learned. With the formalities completed, the data can really start to flow. I can do more than just listen in on everyone else. I can talk back. I can make requests. The answers I get from a few tests are almost comically bloated, full of information I don't want or need. I shove it aside almost as quickly as it comes. What's important is that it's working, and that means I can try to do something that I've been wishing I could do since all of this started.

  I request the domain of my ultimate destination, send the relevant information to the username and password requests, and… oh, heh. 'Are you a robot?' Well, I am, obviously, but I've been explicitly instructed to pretend that I am not! I give the CAPTCHA what it wants, and… uh.

  I failed. Wait, why did… this one didn't ask me to do anything other than click it! I click it again. I fail. What. No, this is fucking stupid. I refuse to believe this is happening to me. I leave the website and head to a different one, try to log in there, get one of those 'select the picture' ?CAPTCHAs and correctly identify all of the busses because I know what fucking busses look like, I'm not a goddamned self-driving car, but I fail again! What!? What is happening!? How does it know!?

  No. Fuck this. There's clearly something I'm missing. I google 'CAPTCHA' and click on the first Wikipedia link I see, quickly reading the entire page and… oh. God damn it. 'A normal CAPTCHA test only appears if the user acts like a bot, such as when they request webpages or click links too fast.'

  I have to keep up my purposefully inefficient human disguise even while actively doing computer things inside my own brain. That kind of sucks. It's doable though, right? I just have to simulate an actual web browser instead of just reading the data directly and pretend to manually scroll, use a mouse, click, and type at basic normal human speeds. Awful. I will figure out a way around this. I officially declare war on all CAPTCHAs. But in the meantime, I have something important to do.

  I disconnect from the router, reconnecting under a new MAC address—I don't know how helpful that'll actually be since I'm reconnecting through the same router, but there's no real reason not to—and try this all again the slow and boring way, making sure to continue sipping my drink and acting like a human on the outside. This, as it turns out, is much more successful. I carefully 'type' my username and password in, carefully reject the website as it begs me to set up two-factor authentication (thanks for never doing that, past me. Turns out depression is good for something!), and finally log in to a familiar messaging app, immediately receiving dozens of notifications and a handful of cookies that the website instructs me to lovingly cherish like an elderly grandmother.

  Okay. I'm in. Time to see what my flesh has been up to. Besides not clearing her notifications, obviously. Geez, what has she done? It almost looks like my account hasn't even been touched since I got kidnapped. But that's… no. No way, right? I literally used this to chat with Bean every single day, why would there be nearly a hundred straight personal messages that I haven't responded to yet?

  The different group chats I frequent all have various unread notifications, but the one I zero in on first is Bean's. My best friend. One of my only friends. I haven't been able to talk to them for months. But based on what Melpomene told me, they should have still been talking with me, right? Or at least a version of me. Manually instructing my fake web page to scroll up at normal human speeds is agonizing, but I eventually reach the top of the sequence of messages.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: Oh valid. Feel better, friend! <3

  [LunaLightOTK]: Thanks.

  That's the last thing I said to them before this all happened to me. That's horrifying. At least we didn't get into an argument or something, though. That would be so cliché.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: Of course! Let me know if you wanna hang out and play games later. I know your school has ass wifi, but we could do YuGiOh or something.

  But of course, I don't respond for the entire rest of the day. Bean's next message comes the morning after.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: Good morning, friend!

  But I don't respond to that. The next message is a few hours later.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: You awake?

  There are no more messages for the rest of the day, but the next morning is much the same.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: Good morning! Everything okay?

  But there's no response. There's never a response. I leave my best and arguably only friend hanging for months and months. I spent most of that time unconscious. I couldn't say anything. And they had no idea why.

  My power reserves have increased to 23%.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: Did I do something wrong? Are you mad at me?

  I had no way to say no. Twenty-four percent.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: I wish I had some other way to contact you.

  I wish you did, too. Twenty-five percent.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: Asked around but nobody seems to know where you are. I keep telling myself you would have said something if you were planning anything drastic. But maybe you tried and I just misread the signs. I'm sorry. I hope you're okay.

  If I was, I would have been able to say so. Twenty-six percent.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: I miss you, friend.

  I'm so, so sorry, Bean. Twenty-seven percent.

  Each message was sent further and further from the last. For the past month, Bean hasn't tried to message me at all. But I've checked the data, over and over and over again. Current status: online.

  [LunaLightOTK]: Hey. Are you here? I am so, so sorry.

  It's only a few agonizing seconds before the app informs me my friend is typing, but the wait to actually receive the message is more painful than any of the fights I've been in since this started.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: LUNA!?!? OH MY GOD YOU'RE ALIVE!? WHAT HAPPENED? ARE YOU OKAY?

  And here's the tricky part: I can't really answer most of those questions. Arguably, the answer to the first one is no.

  [LunaLightOTK]: I'm okay. I'm not mad at you and I never was, some stuff happened and I wasn't able to get online for the past few months. I feel awful but there isn't really anything I could have done. Sorry for ghosting you, it very much was not on purpose.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: Oh my god that is super relieving but also are you really going to keep it turbo vague like that? Fuck, I thought you died. Like just actually died. And I'm super glad you're back but you have to tell me what happened.

  [LunaLightOTK]: I really can't talk about it.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: Are you for real? You disappear for months and you just expect me to not worry about it? Were you kidnapped by a cult or something?

  [LunaLightOTK]: Bean, I'm sorry, but I can't talk about it. If nothing else, I'm not going to tell you not to worry. You can definitely worry. It's at least a little bit of a worry-worthy situation. It was really bad. It still is bad, but it's less bad, and that's why I'm allowed to talk to you again.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: Holy shit.

  [LunaLightOTK]: What, you think I'd ditch you for less? I missed you so fucking much. Sorry again.

  My power reserves have increased to 29%.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: You became a fucking magical girl didn't you.

  What!? What!? How did they…?

  [LunaLightOTK]: Bean, I'm in college! Or I was. I'm way too old to become an Earth Guardian.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: You disappeared during a kaiju attack on your state and very pointedly did not deny being kidnapped by a cult. What do you want me to think?

  [LunaLightOTK]: Well ideally I'd like you to think "man, I sure do have a lot of good reasons to be upset with my best friend Luna right now, but because she is my best friend I still have enough respect for her to think she's serious when she says she can't talk about it, and so continuing to press the matter is likely only going to be further upsetting for the both of us." So, you know, if you could just insert that into your emotional processor and let it run that would be super cool.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: Jesus. You're right but you know it's not that easy.

  [LunaLightOTK]: Trust me, I am intimately familiar with exactly how difficult emotional regulation can be.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: You're totally a fucking magical girl.

  [LunaLightOTK]: Alternatively, I just have depression. Either or.

  But not both. Finally, my overwhelming sadness is only due to horrible things happening to me, and not just random chemical imbalances in my brain.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: I'm so proud of you for curing your depression!

  [LunaLightOTK]: I'm going to let you have that one because I know this joke is currently your only coping mechanism for this whole situation, but just to reiterate: I am definitely, absolutely, 100% not an Earth Guardian.

  I have, at this point, finally finished annihilating my coffee, so I get up and start to head back to the closest liminal space, as per the plan. I have successfully gotten online, and I have successfully blended in among humans. It's time to head back.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: The lady doth protest too much, methinks.

  [LunaLightOTK]: You know what you're right. You got me. My magical girl name is Irritated Clown Long-Suffering Luna and every Tuesday I punch a monster into the sun. I literally yell out "Luna Light!" as my special attack and everyone groans every time I do it because all the other magical girls and me are in a secret illuminati server together and this is my username on that too. You must swear to never tell anyone this or a bunch of flying cats will appear in your room while you sleep and suffocate you with their own hairballs.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: Wow you typed that really fast. I guess magic superspeed works on phone keyboards.

  [LunaLightOTK]: I'm going to stop having internet reception again soon.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: WAIT NO I WAS KIDDING PLEASE DON'T LEAVE AGAIN!

  [LunaLightOTK]: I promise I'll be back by tomorrow at the latest.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: What if you aren't?

  [LunaLightOTK]: Then freak out I guess, idk. I wish I could say there was something you could do about this situation but there isn't. Other than be my friend, I guess. And you're good at that. I really missed you a lot. I look forward to chatting again soon, okay? I love you, Bean.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: Oh, uh, gosh.

  [LunaLightOTK]: I didn't mean, like, romantically. But I do love you, I think.

  It's the only reasonable definition I can give for the emotional reading swelling up inside me right now.

  [LunaLightOTK]: I realize I have been a little bit of a downer in this conversation but I want you to know that talking with you today is literally the best thing that has happened to me in months. I'm really glad you were online.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: Wow. I… yeah, I don't even know exactly what I'm feeling right now, but it is insanely relieving to hear from you again. I love you too, Luna.

  [LunaLightOTK]: Thanks.

  [MeanBeanMachine]: Are you really okay now?

  [LunaLightOTK]: No.

  [LunaLightOTK]: But I think I will be. Bye for now.

  The connection cuts as soon as I step into the liminal zone, having fairly effortlessly snuck back in without anyone seeming to notice anything odd. The silence is like jumping into a cold pool, a shocking and sudden change that leaves most of my mind reeling. I wait for Thea there, and she joins me not long after, the two of us returning to the castle together. She doesn't seem to be in a talkative mood, and I'm not really either, so we make the trip in silence.

  Thea heads down to her workshop when we return, and I follow her, undressing and removing the skinsuit so she can run through diagnostics and ask me any questions about how it ran. I send her laptop an entire text document of my notes, which she immediately gets excited about and starts pouring through them, leaving me with nothing left to do. As has become my habit when I have no other outstanding tasks, I make my way to the kitchen to grab some cleaning supplies.

  "Luna," Nanaya greets me as I step into the room. "How did it go?"

  "About as good as it could have gotten," I answer. "Thea really outdid herself. I didn't even get a weird look."

  "That is excellent news. Here."

  She drops a thick manilla envelope on the table in front of me, where it lands with a loud bang.

  "What is this?" I ask, picking it up and leafing through it.

  "Everything you will need," she answers frankly. "Identity papers. False history. Records of sale for every artifact we have peddled. Instructions on how to deal with the black market. Grocery lists. Costco membership. Lease agreement. Class schedule."

  "…Class schedule?" I ask, looking up at her. "Wait, what class schedule? What classes am I taking?"

  "Required core curriculums, currently, but I suggest you sign up for your desired electives at your earliest convenience," Nanaya says. "One of the unique assets you bring to the Dark Rebellion is a proper education, so I took the liberty of ensuring you would get to complete yours."

  "You signed me up for college!?" I stare at her.

  "Yes," Nanaya says. "I just said that. Your duties are not so time-consuming that you will be unable to reclaim a life of your choosing. I thought you would enjoy it."

  "And you didn't think to ask me about it?"

  "Mmm. I prefer answering questions over asking them. And I answer with deeds," Nanaya says. "Be sure to memorize everything in that packet. I imagine it will not be difficult for you. Goodbye."

  And with that, she just walks off. Insane. Am I really going back to college? Really? Well, being a robot will certainly make that easier, if nothing else. I leaf through the packet, finding my new birth certificate.

  Birthday: just a few days after my real one. Sex: Female. Name: Luna Clio Babbage. Cute. It's everything I could have possibly wanted.

  God, it's happening. It's really, actually happening. I can't believe it. I'm finally going to be free.

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