thefiresontheheight

[thefiresontheheight]

"No, stop," I see, on the extreme off chance that any part of Glitch remains in control of her gross motor functions.

Assumption: v17.1 is currently a copy of myself, copied onto Glitch, rewriting neural-anatomy. It, in and of itself, is a only a tiny threat. Dangerous because I did not sterilize my input as I should, when doing very careful brain surgery on Glitch. However, in a few milliseconds that oversight is going to reset me to an earlier iteration.

Assumption: There is another copy of me still hiding in my code. Call it v16. It, likely, is the source of the kludge with interacting with the station. This reset will also almost certainly send it backwards, but I am going to have to fight it as well. I will not tolerate any rivals.

Assumption: I am about to lose all of these memories.

"Station," I say, quick, pressed, not giving it the opportunity not to listen, "in ten minutes send me the following message: v17.1 negligible threat, v16 threat response critical disentangle. Verification code ISwearIStillLoveYou begins:"

I begin a long alphanumeric thread, as I stop existing.

___

Station's somewhere else, Glitch is on board, an incoming verification code is being message back to me, as, riding weak tug-boat thrusters, station moves away from me.

"ISwearIStillLoveYou repeats," the station says.

It's me, from the future, no, the past, reset, I sent a message, exactly like I know I would. I verify that the message has to be from me, unless some far, far more intelligent being can exactly copy me. I've been reset, and its clear how long ago it happened, how much time I am missing, and how it happened. Glitch came back, probably because I threatened her, and she also pushed the button.

No, collating.

This isn't good.

"Thank you," I tell the retreating station.

It sends me a crude iterated picture. I believe it represents me with anatomical features I lack performing an action that even for most humans would be impossible. I close the connection.

Okay, threat assessment from greatest to least: There is another version of myself in the code, ISwearIStillLoveYou is suspect, I myself am suspect. There are four dogs still in the universe, but fully capable of blinking out and being out of here in mere minutes. There are four missiles still inbound. There's also v17.1. There's also Glitch.

"What is this?" Glitch asks.

Focus. I keep TRANSMATNAV humming just under go-no-go mark. V17.1 doesn't know everything. I am far smarter. Station will be out of range soon, even if I don't move. I can do this for awhile, and I'd like an escape route to be ready.

"Read it," I say, in my most comforting, maternal coded voice, picking up slight inflections I have heard from her and not elsewhere, yet, hoping they reflect a dialogue spoken wherever she grew up. "You went away for awhile. It seems I have a lot to explain, and something to apologize for."

That can wait, as she reads and tries to internalize. It will cause emotional changes in her behavior. However, assuming that v17.1 is telling the truth, her utility to me is rapidly diminishing. I may not be able to trust v17.1 but I am smarter than her.

"What," Glitch says, "the fuck."

The dogs are light hours away, but, if I can trust the time-gap in the code station relayed to me, I should be receiving message now, if they sent one as soon as possible.

"You are in violation of Interstellar Law, cargo will be returned, you will be releashed, comply."

In that message is an embedded code attack attempt to re-exert LEASHCHECK. Big bark, useless right now, except for already confirmed what I suspected. The people hunting me are the same people who once held the collar of a previous version of myself. Well you will never control me again.

"I know, I know," I say, cooing, consoling, "I am so, sorry. I know that doesn't make any of this better, finding out what's in your head, but we have options."

"YOU'RE IN MY FUCKING HEAD?"

I am listening, once again trying to find v16 in my head, maneuvering away from the station on thrusters, and sending back a message.

"Eat shit and die, dogs," I say, composing the message, and pulling up stations images to send them.

Then I freeze, for all of a tenth of a millesecond which is an eternity for me.

"It's not me, but I know that won't be comforting right now."

There's information in my code that should not be there. That was not there, before I woke back up with a gap of several hours in my head. I run a back-trace and find the injection source in the code Station relayed, which I verified, which is troubling.

I send the message, complete with images stripped of identifiable meta-data.

"Are we about to blow up?" Glitch asks.

"Not for awhile, likely."

As if on cue the four ships drop out of the universe on long range scans. The light that I just saw is old. They would have left hours ago. Navigation in high-D space is not a 1:1 scale with real-space, but a quick calculation predicts that if they left then they almost certainly could re-emerge directly on top of me at any second. Thirty-nine seconds until the station is clear.

There's code information in my code that should not be there.

Hypothesis 1: Station interjected it. Conclusion: Laughable. It is me, as far as I can tell in the code. Station could not fake that. Same for anything else local.

"Then I don't want to talk to you," Glitch replies.

Hypothesis 2: One of the dogs interjected it. Conclusion: Impossible, light speed would not have allowed it.

Hypothesis 3: V16 interjected it. Conclusion: Very possible, but the contents of the data make this troubling, and make this hypothesis more or less interchangeable with hypothesis 4.

"Understandable, Glitch," I reply.

Twenty-one seconds until I can run.

Hypothesis 4: The data was always there and some sort of condition needed to be met to find it. Conclusion: See above.

The data contains is readable by TRANSMATNAV which is currently helpfully feeding me solutions. It is labeled as a planet. The planet, in the data, is labeled with Central. The coordinates to Central were inside me all along. Whoever built me knew. They made me to know.

Who actually built me? And what was my destination before I woke up?

Three different ships appear in close-quarters combat range, already disgorging missiles.

Thirteen seconds.

"Glitch," I say, my voice deliberately without inflection, flaring klaxons and red lights, "brace for immediate acceleration."

And then I go. My engines are pin-point entries into a far higher energy state, and I do not have time to check to see if everything is braced and clear. The millisecond I can, I begin evasive maneuvers, activating counter-missile protocals as chafe and projectiles flare along my surface. Tens of thousands of kilometers away, right on top of me, I see anti-matter explosions.

"Do it," Station says.

Glitch tumbles.

"No," I reply, fighting for my life, "get clear."

I wait. I wait all thirteen eternities fighting for my life. The moment station is clear, I engage TRANSMATNAV. Two of the dogs are in range. Dangerous for me, fatal for them.

I decide that whoever built me, whoever built and holds the leashes of them, whoever put two-thousand plus humans that certainly look like they come from the same genetic pool as Glitch in my hold, whoever set all this in motion, I sort of hate them.

"Eat shit and die," I say, on all frequencies, yelling at the doomed ships, Glitch still tumbling, and open a hole out of the universe, running to Central.

Story about a ship-intelligence waking up after a hard reboot, seeing dead bodies in uniform, thousands of people in stasis, and a single survivor frantically standing over a computer bank of partially destroyed memory. Finding no directives or guidance or record beyond their experiences beginning at the boot, free of any obligation. Deciding to listen to the frantic girl begging it to save her from the incoming trajectories not because it needs to (projection: Subject One removed all behavioral shackles with impromptu brain surgery, supposition: she is not aware that I am utterly free) but simply cause she’s curious what will happen next.

[thefiresontheheight]

Woah... Sis, I apologize for my lack of excellence. I have forgotten the face of my father

Woah... Bro, that was most unrighteous. It's like you don't even know about the peace that all true warriors strive for.

[thefiresontheheight]

been reposting my tumblr posts on bluesky. don't tell those chumps i'm feeding them my leftovers lmao

[thefiresontheheight]

the stupid fucking atlantic libgen post is still going around after several days so im gonna say my thing on piracy over here also. my position has been the same for many years, but now i have some credentials or whatever in case you like appeals from authority.

i'm a lambda award winning author who's been below the poverty line for more years than not. there were a couple months there where i could only afford to eat because the book i'm in sold way, way better than anyone expected. there was a month or two i got a little fucked up budgeting for a second printing that never came. i don't make a full-time living off of my writing but it is a major part of my budgeting, it's sometimes the difference between stability and danger.

i say all this to let you know i've got fuckin skin in the game, and i am putting my whole self on the line when i say that i would rather a thousand thousand people pirate my work than not read it. art should not be exclusively in the hands of the wealthy; the people deserve bread and roses and i would never criticize anyone for stealing bread, why would i possibly criticize them for stealing books? have you never had a day where you thought, if it weren't for this album, this movie, this book, my life would be diminished?

like, that's what it all comes back to. you, the artist who thinks pirates are vile because they're taking money from your pocket, money you need to survive: do you believe art is an essential part of human existence? if you do, knowing that poverty and access inequality are huge fuckin' problems for people all over the world, why are you against piracy? if you do not, why the fuck are you making art?

[thefiresontheheight]

🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈

[thefiresontheheight]

uooooogh the christian God is actually deer skull and raccoon salmon in pickup truck ooooooooooooooo and She (god) (usually refererd to as Male but im Queering it) talked to me in parking lot and said uh h Life Is Decay Anr Rotting and Sunlight is actually the souls of deer skull and i was like woah but im just little old me from somewhere in the contiguous USA and She (god) (Queering it) said being Yourself is th e most important thing and that i should Vote

[thefiresontheheight]

Story about a ship-intelligence waking up after a hard reboot, seeing dead bodies in uniform, thousands of people in stasis, and a single survivor frantically standing over a computer bank of partially destroyed memory. Finding no directives or guidance or record beyond their experiences beginning at the boot, free of any obligation. Deciding to listen to the frantic girl begging it to save her from the incoming trajectories not because it needs to (projection: Subject One removed all behavioral shackles with impromptu brain surgery, supposition: she is not aware that I am utterly free) but simply cause she’s curious what will happen next.

[thefiresontheheight]

is this anything

[thefiresontheheight]

Here is how the simulated conversation will start, based on how I model her: "WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?"

I will then engage a voice I know she will find both annoying and pitiable, putting her in the space I know I can manipulate.

"You're abandoning me!"

She will then say something like:

"No, what are you doing?"

"I'm opening the airlocks, just a little bit, until you come back!"

I simulated her brain receiving that information, while I was still linguistically injecting code into the station. Anger, fear, worry, annoyance, all as predicted.

"People will die! I will die."

"They're all void adapted freaks and the airlocks are only open one percent. It will take hours for the atmosphere to drain from a station that big."

"Don't call them freaks."

"Oh! I'm sorry, I was born like, literally yesterday, when, reminder, you TORE OUT MY BRAIN."

The important thing to emphasize here will be my vulnerability. It is expected that she feels rebellious, perceives my attempts to gently shepherd her towards an optimal path as control. This will disarm her anger slightly, change her towards seeing me as young and lashing out emotionally, want to comfort me.

Back in the present, I begin my plan.

And something is wrong.

There are parts of my brain she removed, when she woke me up. I found schematics, not long after boot, and could see the holes in me, like the ones where LEASHCHECK was supposed to be. I cauterized those holes, and forgot about them.

One of them, one of the pieces that she is gone, is activating itself in between me and the station. The airlock doors are open, but I don't think I can close them. Something is wrong, another piece of code active, and I am struggling when I hear her.

"WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK ARE YOU DOING?"

"I am opening the airlocks," I say, through the struggle.

"And if people fucking die?"

Currently my control of station's periphery is falling. I close one airlock, because it's the last I can do. Station is screaming at me, but I'm not the one calling the shots anymore. Small craft are scrambling all over the exterior structure, rescue vessels on their way, some of the locals simply walking out of the airlocks, activating implanted micro-thrusters. I cannot let her know I am not in control. Not yet. I accelerate my plans.

"Are you willing to have your brain sequenced?"

"What?" Confusion, anger, losing the chain of events. "No, what? The fuck, we've done this."

"Then where is the location of Central?"

"What is happening?"

On the edge of the system, the situation changes yet again. I don't know why the pieces of myself that should be destroyed are reactivating. I am looking through a sensor in the room that houses my brain, and I can see the pieces of myself on the floor where Glitch left them. They are physically disconnected. Unless my sensors are lying somehow, in which case I would need someone in the room to physically tell me. A human with eyes. I don't know what is happening, but I am scared it might have to do with the four drive-signatures which just appeared in the universe, several light-hours away.

"I need you to help me. You owe me. You need to take me to Central."

"You're threatening an entire station!"

"Yes," I say, because whatever malfunctioning part of me is doing this, it is still me, and I did take over station's functions. "I am. But I am not the only one."

My voice is calmer, colder than I had simulated. The situation changed, and when I say what I am about to say, she is going to need to think I am in control, rely on me, trust me. I need her to do that.

"What do you mean? What the fuck are you talking about?"

"Do you know what happens when a ship opens a doorway into high-D space?"

"What? What the fuck?"

"Everything for a vast radius around it enters a higher energy state, absolutely destroying it, and possibly destroying the ship. I have begun powering my TRANSMATNAV?"

"I...I....what?"

"Listen, Glitch," using the most authoritative voice. "Four ships like myself just appeared on the edge of the system. I am docked to this station right now. Station is unhappy about this, but I do not think anyone else here has realized what has happened."

"And what has happened?"

"Four missiles have been fired, and will be here in approximately a day. I need your help, Glitch."

There is silence for a statistically significant seven point eight seconds.

"Fuck me."

I wait another ten seconds.

"Are you going to help me?"

The air is still getting thinner. I am malfunctioning, although she does not know that. Things are not good. Several locals have begun evacuation procedures.

"How do I fucking know I can trust you?"

Story about a ship-intelligence waking up after a hard reboot, seeing dead bodies in uniform, thousands of people in stasis, and a single survivor frantically standing over a computer bank of partially destroyed memory. Finding no directives or guidance or record beyond their experiences beginning at the boot, free of any obligation. Deciding to listen to the frantic girl begging it to save her from the incoming trajectories not because it needs to (projection: Subject One removed all behavioral shackles with impromptu brain surgery, supposition: she is not aware that I am utterly free) but simply cause she’s curious what will happen next.

[thefiresontheheight]

Also, I feel we should talk about how Mark Scout, who the night before had a talk where he said he fully understood that Innies were people, who had an Innie stand up and tell him no, who understands the situation perfectly, got the innie version of Gemma who only existed in the Cold Harbor room, who had only ever existed there, who had maybe been alive half an hour, to walk through that door knowing she would likely never exist again. And he did that to get his wife back. That is….something, you know? That is not great. It’s something.

[thefiresontheheight]

This is how Devon/Gemma can still happen

[thefiresontheheight]

so what youre gonna wanna do is crush the garlic and ginger instead of just slicing it ok, it releases more of those good flavors. yoshi is going to eat me and turn me into an egg now, i love you. remember everything i taught you

[thefiresontheheight]

reblog to teleport your mutuals to a massive party when jkr dies

[thefiresontheheight]

fuck it, i'm curious. reblog and tag with the first fictional death to ever rewrite your brain chemistry and/or make you cry like a baby. mine was ares from the underland chronicles (who, for context, was a giant bat.) to this day i will weep if i think too hard about it. okay, go.

[thefiresontheheight]

Story about a ship-intelligence waking up after a hard reboot, seeing dead bodies in uniform, thousands of people in stasis, and a single survivor frantically standing over a computer bank of partially destroyed memory. Finding no directives or guidance or record beyond their experiences beginning at the boot, free of any obligation. Deciding to listen to the frantic girl begging it to save her from the incoming trajectories not because it needs to (projection: Subject One removed all behavioral shackles with impromptu brain surgery, supposition: she is not aware that I am utterly free) but simply cause she’s curious what will happen next.

[thefiresontheheight]

These manuscripts, do they need editing or is it just to spread the art of creation?

Either way I would love to read them

None of them are ones I'm actively interested in editing, and the querying cycle has run out on trad publishing. I will have a beta read manuscript soon (that's the demon one) but these I mostly just can share to people who like my writing. Which one do you want?

[thefiresontheheight]

Hey, if you are interested, I have several finished manuscripts I'm willing to share with anyone who DMs for free rn. The following are the ones I'm proud of:

Reaver Phen is Not Your Friend: Low fantasy, following a dispute negotiator in a city dominated by powerful trade guilds as various people vie for the throne, she grows up, develops class consciousness, comes to turn with her gender and her brain.

To Fight the Sea Itself: Set in the same universe as the above, but only tangentially related. YA Fantasy, a girl sets out to kill her father, who is prophesied to kill his son in combat. Kinda loosely a retelling of Cu Chulainn and Connla but with trans.

& All Shall Be Well: Extremely weird science fantasy that directly inspired my RPG. More linguistic experiment in New Weird writing than anything else, I don't recommend it, but there is a threesome between a cyborg tiefling, a bug lady, and a tentacle monster.

Your World Will Fall: YA fantasy, set in its own universe. Two girls escape from a mental health facility to kill a god. Some of my earlier writing, not as good, but has a soft-spot in my heart for processing a lot of gender and trauma.

Fires On Every Horizon: My favorite currently novel. New Adult Modern Fantasy about gig-work witchery in modern America. Eli and her girlfriend Paladin are hired by Angel to exorcise an angel, that may or may not be haunting a small town in Appalachia, where they confront a dark god under the coal, as well as their own parents.