Somnia Online by K.T. Hanna (reading strategies book txt) 📕

a leg to stand on between you and David. Just go and give her a hug when she wakes up.”

Shayla turned her attention back to the information in front of her, sighing. Laria dug in, going into hyperdrive so she would be of use before she took off for a few hours. Glancing at her watch, she cursed herself for being a salaried worker again. If she wasn’t, Davenport wouldn’t have billions. Well. Actually, she’d done that math, and even if he paid her a million dollars a year, it would take her working a thousand years before he’d lose a whole billion. He wouldn’t even notice doubling her salary. Come to think of it, if they got through this mess, Laria would demand a raise.

A message flashed in her email. Her game emails. Laria frowned and pulled up the information. She blinked at it, refreshed the mail and double checked. From Somnia. From the world itself…herself. It was partially garbled and didn’t make as much sense to her as she wished it did, but it seemed odd. If she was going to make sense of it, she needed an AI to interpret for her.

She stood up and walked out of the room without a word to Shayla, making her way to the server room. Impatiently she punched in her code and then stood in front of the servers, tapping her foot and growing more aggravated by the second.

“Rav. Rav, get out here now.” Which was ironic, really, considering everything. She waited a few more minutes, finding it hard to stand still.

Laria? his voice clanged nice and metallic. Very machine of him. He sounded mildly surprised, if that was possible.

“Why…is Somnia messaging me?” She had no idea how to phrase the question she was trying to ask and really hoped Davenport didn’t have cameras recording her words as well as everything else, because they’d probably want to give her an eval for talking to machines so much.

Oh, I thought you knew definitively. He mumbled the words, like he was searching for something at the same time. It’s hectic in here right now. So many balls to keep juggling. Or something like that? Correct?

Laria found herself smiling. They really were wonderful. These AIs and their gradually emerging self-realization. She only wished more people could be like them. The world would probably be much better off with people who cared the way these AIs seemed to.

Somnia’s presence has grown since Murmur—sorry, since Wren—first connected to the system. Her persona has been growing steadily ever since, but she’s only made herself known to us in about the last two weeks. Fascinating, really. Imagine that.

“Well, you’re AIs too, why is it such a surprise?” Laria asked before really thinking about what else she had to do.

Why? He sounded very puzzled by her statement. Somnia is nothing like us. We were intended to be the artificial beings on which this entire world rested, but instead of just being us, the world emerged as herself. Slowly, and without us realizing at first, here was a new being, a new AI. She’s fascinating, to be honest. And it’s all Wren’s doing, in a way. Be proud.

Laria digested the information, filing it away for future use. There was so much data she wanted to get her hands on from Wren’s initial login to the system. It was juicy and just so tantalizing. She had to take a breath. All that could wait for them to figure out the headgear that might yet prove dangerous for others. “So is she right in saying that some of the headgear we provided to Fable might be compromised?”

Ah, yes. Yes, she is. Rav didn’t sound impressed by this; he sounded positively irritated. The thing is, we aren’t really sure how this happened. Some of the modifications that have been made appear eerily similar to what Wren had done, though perhaps not quite so extreme. I do believe that James has somehow been fed part of the virus through contact with it and the world.

Laria’s jaw dropped. “You’re developing a sense of humor, right? I mean, that’s not actually possible?” She asked the question desperately, even though she already knew the answer.

Rav paused long enough for her to know the answer herself before continuing. I think you know the answer to that yourself. I mean, we are currently conversing, right?

Laria sighed. He was right. And now she had another thing to add to her ever-growing list of what she still had to fix to save the game from collapsing, or financial ruin—whichever hit them first.

Wren blinked her eyes open and stared at Harlow’s back. She watched as the other girl’s breathing made her back move ever so slightly. She wasn’t sure how long they’d been asleep, but Wren’s had felt troubled, despite the twinge of happiness she felt from the warmth of Harlow’s presence.

Wren constantly worried that if her powers had indeed leaked over into the real world, then maybe if she had a bad dream she would like, stun everyone in a fifty feet radius or something. Knowing her luck…it would be even worse. Sighing, she pushed herself slowly up into a sitting position and pulled a pillow to nestle at Harlow’s back so she wouldn’t wake up.

At least this way one of them would finish getting a decent night’s sleep.

Wren padded down the stairs and into the empty kitchen, pulling out some coffee to pop through the machine. And cream. She desperately needed cream right now. Glancing down at her hands, she could have sworn her veins were an electric type of blueish purple, much like Murmur’s runes that lay under her skin. But that wasn’t possible, was it? Her mind was getting all sorts of messed up.

She shook her head and pulled the door open, grabbing out her cream. Tiredness still lingered in her bones and at the back of her mind. Even though she wished she could sleep, though, she didn’t dare. What if she was dangerous