It was a day that would burn itself in Ashta Sol’s mind for as long as she would live. For her, it was one of many somewhere in the middle of her tale; but in many ways it was really the beginning. It was only with the benefit of hindsight that she realized that. 

Two months. 

It had been two full months since she’d received the diagnosis: Microsis Positive. The doctor estimated she must’ve carried the disease for at least six weeks - and the window for treatment was only four. Had she noticed sooner how loose her clothes had gotten or canceled one more business trip, perhaps she would’ve made it to the doctor in time. But she did not, and she had not. Once it fully spread throughout her circulatory system there was no way to treat the Microsis pathogen. Effectively, she had been given a death sentence. Although really, death might’ve been preferable. Death was a definitive, unambiguous ending. Instead, she was fated to join the ranks of microbes and bacteria in an uncertain future. Her life as she knew it was all but over. 

The irony was not lost on her. Microsis was, in short, a shrinking disease. A rather gross oversimplification of a complicated process involving a symbiotic alien parasite and the rearrangement of a victim’s biological structure, but that was the end result of its infection. By the time Ashta had realized she’d grown four inches shorter, it was already too late. Now, two months had passed since that day and she’d lost a grand total of 16 inches. Over a head shorter than her once impressive 6’3” height; and the saddest part of all? The cruelest twist of the knife? She was the woman in charge of Microsis victims. 

At least, she had been. 

Among many sweeping changes in her life, a search was well underway for a replacement for her job - a new President for the Department of Housing and Interplanetary Development. Leave it to the good ol’ U.A.P. government to not waste a moment in writing her off. As much as it stung, Ashta could at least understand the reasoning behind the decision. Were the roles reversed she would’ve made the same call. In fact, there were a number of people she could think of who, if they tested positive, she wouldn’t have hesitated to steal their position and influence for herself. She had simply never expected that it would be her on the chopping block instead.

The woman sighed as she set aside a folder on her desk and spun around in her chair, staring out a glass window overlooking the rest of the Department. Her eyes gazed out upon a lavish lobby area breaking off into an array of assorted halls; though truly, she saw none of it. She saw only the wispy reflection of a stranger staring back at her. Arguably, one of the worst aspects of Microsis wasn’t how it shrank a person down, but how it regressed and devolved someone first. Once, Ashta was a towering beauty of a blonde. Imposing. Confident. Strong. Now what stared back at her was none of those things. She was now a plain-faced, lithe woman. A weakling. It wasn’t enough for the damned disease to rob her of her size and her life, but it had to take her identity as well. It had diminished her curves and muscle tone to the brink of nonexistence. Fair skin and flawless good looks were stripped away and repurposed in some grand genetic realignment. Even her own thrice-damned chair now seemed two sizes too big. 

Ashta now resembled a lesser imitation of herself, and there was no way to undo it. She had no choice but to accept this new life. This new…self. 

Much time had passed and yet so many emotions still boiled beneath the surface. Emotions she couldn’t let show lest the vultures circling her smell blood in the water. Ashta sighed and forced the thoughts from her mind. On the subject of things she now had to accept, she still had an unenviable task to do. 

She had to choose her replacement.

Hiring committees had already narrowed the talent pool down to roughly a dozen candidates, and it was on Ashta to select a handful to proceed to the next round of interviews. It was still early in the day and she had been studying their profiles in preparation for her own wave of them. In fact, the first interviewee was set to arrive within the hour. Trying to read the files on the candidates, however, proved…trying. Not so much because of the contents, that much was still trivial, but because of the unspoken thought that haunted this decision. After all, she was not simply choosing a new person to take charge of the Department.

She was choosing a new person to take charge of her. 

She knew better than anyone where victims of Microsis ended up: the simulated planetary habitats of the M-Series. False planets made and overseen by the Departmental A.I. T.I.N.A., a blue-haired android who took great care and pleasure in her work. Each habitat was a perfect facsimile of an actual planet despite their metallic nature, and were built small enough to comfortably fit in a person’s hand. They were designed as a shelter for the afflicted. A place where they could live out their microscopic lives in peace and contribute to the wider U.A.P. society through the wonders of technology. At least, that was the official story on the matter.

Of the names Ashta had on her desk, she would select a handful to proceed to the next phase of the process; and one of those names would take her place. They would be in charge of the M-Series. They would be in charge of the world she’d be forced to call home. In light of that dreadful idea, Ashta found it nigh impossible to concentrate. A dozen names, but who could be trusted to oversee her eventual fate?

For the better part of her remaining hour the dwindling blonde dawdled. Her fears crawled along her skin like a cloak of paranoia. She could almost feel each centimeter slipping through her grasp, even knowing she had well over a year left before…the end. Ashta wanted…Well, she wanted a lot of things. She wanted to scream. She wanted to lash out. She wanted her old body back. But more than anything else, she wanted someone to tell her there had been some kind of mistake. That she wouldn’t shrink away to dust and eke out some lowly living on a rock in a robot’s personal collection.

Alas, no amount of festering changed her reality, or the job she had to do. With a sigh, the woman turned back to her desk and opened a folder. Within, a detailed report and resume had been compiled on her first candidate. She skimmed the page and blinked as her eyes fixated on some of the preliminary information. 

“A Morphiss?”

That was a mild surprise. Then again, perhaps it shouldn’t have been. The Morphiss were considered by many to be among the most intelligent races within the United Alliance of Planets. They were a longtime member of the alliance with their own storied history and culture. A history that Ashta, admittedly, did not know particularly well. She could vaguely recall a school lesson on how they were once a warlike people who nearly blasted themselves back to the Stone Age and had since adopted something of a culture of academic pacifism; but that was about it. It was only by joining the U.A.P. that their dying race survived; and the U.A.P. had benefited immensely from their advanced technology since then. On a purely surface level, they were as good candidates for Ashta’s role as anyone else.

“Name is…Kir’shra?” God, she hated alien names. Ashta frowned as she scanned the rest of the page, itself an impressive list of positions, accomplishments, and accolades. Unsurprising. It was something of a widespread joke that one could track the age of a Morphiss by counting the number professions and doctorates they had. From what Ashta saw, she would’ve pegged this Kir’shra to be at least a few centuries old. She boasted doctorates in Biology, Physiology, Psychology, Astronomy, Sociology, Theoretical Chemistry, and so very much more. From the academia alone Ashta could track a long life dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge, and a woman who traded specialties the same way a lesser lived person might trade outfits. In other words, a typical Morphiss. 

The only thing arguably more impressive than the list of academic achievements was the list of professions itself. As a woman only in her forties, Ashta found it rather humbling to see positions listed with decades of experience as though it was no span of time at all. Kir’shra had seemingly done it all. Fifteen years as an engineer. Twenty-two as a medical researcher. Twelve as a chemist. Thirty-six as a damned botanist. The alien even had decades of military service and multiple tenures as a Surveyor aboard the U.A.S. Artemis. A vessel name that strangely edged upon what felt like familiarity, though Ashta couldn’t quite place why. Surveyors were those assigned to chart out the unexplored reaches of space. She had no relation to them whatsoever.

Setting the strange thought aside, she couldn’t deny that on paper this Kir’shra was beyond qualified. The demands of the Department were a bit different than her previous roles, but for a Morphiss it was just another hat to wear for a decade or two. Her job history also suggested she wouldn’t go anywhere for a long, long time. It just begged the vital question: could she be trusted with Ashta?

Well, she was about to have a chance to find out. 

No more than five minutes later, Ashta received a notification from her secretary informing her that the Morphiss had arrived. She allowed her to be buzzed in and braced herself as the sound of heels clacking against the floors outside grew louder. Soon, they reached just past the door and it slid open automatically, a rather tall woman stepping gracefully inside.

“Thank you for seeing me.”

The word that sprung to mind looking at her was Professional. Hers was a meticulous, almost methodical appearance. Long raven-black hair was draped over her back without a single hair out of place. Equal attention had been paid to her wardrobe - a pristine white sleeveless blouse and skirt juxtaposed with ebony stockings and matching white heels. Only two details clashed with the monochromatic colors: a deep blue neck tie that rested over an ample bosom and a matching - and equally striking - pair of cerulean eyes lurking behind a thin pair of glasses. One side of her hair had been carefully parted behind the hallmark of a Morphiss: their elongated, pointed ears. Ashta noted blue earrings to match her eyes. 

Standing at well over two meters tall and with such a painstaking appearance, she made for quite the first impression. Ashta had before never met a person she could so aptly call ‘towering’; and yet, there was also a strangely approachable, relaxed air about her. Her expression was schooled and formal, but there was nothing in her gaze that suggested anything but respect for Ashta and her position. Even if she was utterly dwarfed by the alien woman. Ashta quickly remembered herself and smiled, rising to her feet to offer Kir’shra a handshake.

“It is a pleasure. Thank you for coming Kir’shra. Am I pronouncing that correctly?

The buxom, elfin woman accepted the offered hand and smiled, her cool exterior giving way to an amicable one. “Please, call me Kira.”

Oh thank god, a name Ashta could easily manage. Alien names were always a nightmare with how absurd they could get. Later on this very day, in fact, she dreaded a later interview with a Selkith man. His name had no less than four apostrophes and a hyphen when translated to Galactic Common. How absolutely awful. “Kira it is then. You can call me Ashta. Please, have a seat.” Ashta was the first to do so herself, crossing her legs as she readied a pen over Kira’s file. “I see you have quite the job history. What brings you to our neck of the government?”

Kira offered a slight shrug and an affable smile. “I just figured it was time for a change of pace. It's been a while since I’ve worked with logistics and while I’ve had roles adjacent to leading governmental positions before, I’ve never actually been in one. This seems like a good place to both apply my talents and to gain that experience.”

The answer was more personable than her appearance would’ve led one to believe, but it was Morphiss through and through. They were a people driven by an insatiable thirst for knowledge and experiences. Not a knock against her in Ashta’s eyes, but a point worth considering. She made a note of it atop the woman’s resume and nodded. “That, I cannot deny. Your qualifications speak for themselves, though can you give me a more specific example of your experience? We deal with a lot of different spinning plates here and gathering and balancing that data can be tricky. We handle a lot of very delicate planetary logistics. Do you have any examples for how you might handle something like that?”

“Several.” Kira answered without missing a beat. She’d been expecting that line of questioning. “While I’ll freely admit it’s been a century, I did spend some time at the Development Department on Ithaca II and helped with the design of a new orbital colony. I also got a lot of logistical experience when I was a CFO for the Malazan Trading Company. Under my tenure there our trade routes grew 78 percent more efficient. And of course there was my recent time aboard the Artemis-”

Ashta blinked. “That’s the Surveyor ship you served on, right?” Her previous role, in fact. “How does working aboard a ship designed to explore unknown space relate to planetary logistics?” It seemed rather like…the exact opposite of that. 

“You’d be surprised.” Kira answered with a thin, cryptic smirk. “It’s true the scale and stakes are much smaller with a single ship, but I find the concepts are quite related. I was the Chief Science Officer and my role was to take the data from anything we uncovered and make sense of it. You’d be surprised what sort of things can be found outside of the U.A.P.’s borders. In a lot of ways, it was on me to always be ready just in case we found something dangerous or unexpected. Even if something we found wasn’t, I had to study it to try and find ways it could be beneficial to the wider U.A.P.. CSO was honestly a glorified title for Problem Solver, and what are planetary development logistics if not endless problems to be solved?”

Ashta detected a rather gross simplification of complicated procedures on both sides, but she had to admit there was a sort of enlightened wisdom to it. More importantly, the anecdote sparked a memory within Ashta. The blonde leaned forward unconsciously, briefly forgetting her next prepared question. The Artemis. Now she remembered why she knew that name. 

“And I suppose discovering Microsis was one such unexpected situation?”

A flicker of surprise crossed Kira’s eyes before she offered a resigned smile. “I see you’ve done your research.” She said. There was no deeper meaning behind the statement, and yet, Ashta could almost see an unspoken thought lingering above the alien’s head. Of course the shrinking woman would know about the vessel that discovered her ailment. It brought an irrational annoyance to her through no fault of Kira’s own. “It’s true.” The woman continued. “I was one of the ones on the front lines when our crewmate got the first documented case of Microsis. It was on me and the ship physicians to study the disease and create a treatment for it. Not to mention to make sure the rest of the crew weren’t infected.”

Ashta nodded, trying in vain not to look too interested. “I can only imagine how difficult that was.”

“It was certainly scary.” Kira admitted. She ran her lithe fingers through her hair and tucked a few rebellious strands back into place. “It took a couple weeks before we realized what was happening to her, and then it became a question of what was causing it. Were we all infected? What could we do to treat it? We were very lucky, looking back. The decompression chamber managed to sterilize anyone who visited the planet before they came back aboard.”

“It just couldn’t get rid of what was already inside someone’s body.”

“Exactly.” Kira nodded. “Of course, it was only much later I learned Morphiss were naturally immune. A lucky break for me.”

Sounds nice.

Ignorant of Ashta’s snide thoughts, Kira proceeded. “That’s actually a good example of what I was talking about though. All of a sudden we were faced with a problem we weren’t ready for and couldn’t hope to understand, and it fell on my and the physicians’ shoulders to get us through it. And you know what? We did it. We found a treatment and got it back to the U.A.P.. A bit too late for Veira, sadly, but enough to save others who could get infected.” 

Something in that spin irked Ashta. It just seemed rather annoying for someone to brag about a cure they invented to someone currently unable to use it. Although she had to admit, Kira’s ability to spin her infinite experience into something relevant was impressive. It lent her an air of credibility that could not be denied. Personal gripes aside, the blonde found herself gripped by the scene being painted. An isolated crew exploring the unknown reaches of space. One of their own dwindling away and a team of a mere few scientists desperately searching for a way to save her. She couldn’t begin to imagine what that was like. Both for the crew and this poor Veira woman. 

“That’s rather noble of you. Most would’ve given up.”

“I never give up when it comes to my job.”

It proved to be a surprisingly sharp rebuke. In an instant Kira’s features tensed and her relaxed gaze grew narrow and stern. As though the very implication was akin to an insult for her. Ashta found her heart skip a beat; and was suddenly all too aware that this pleasant woman currently loomed over her. She was only getting bigger by the moment too. 

Catching herself, Kira’s smile quickly returned. It did little to put Ashta at ease. “Like I said Ashta, I’m a problem solver. One thing I pride myself on is my work and doing a good job. After all, if you don’t give something your best then you won’t learn anything from it.” The woman exhaled and crossed her legs, hands coming to rest over her knee. “I don’t believe in giving up on anything or anyone. Just in doing my role to the best of my abilities.”

Had anyone else said that, they would’ve sounded as though they were reading from a script and trying to impress their interviewer. With Kira, however, the words were spoken from the heart. There was a quiet, controlled passion behind her cadence. A zeal in line with her alien upbringing and her own personal quirks. Amidst those words was something else, something now lit within Ashta. Hope. 

For a fleeting instant, Kira seemed like a woman she could count on.

“Of course…” Kira proceeded, seeming to take the silence as a misstep on her part. “It’s not like it was perfect. We couldn’t save Veira in the end, and Microsis did eventually find its way to the U.A.P.. I also can’t take full credit for anything. The ship physicians were better suited to the treatment process than I was; and I couldn’t have done anything without the Captain and Tina’s help.”

Ashta blinked, her passing thought gone. “Tina? As in the A.I. Personality? Small galaxy. We have one here in the Department too.”

Kira now shared her surprise. “Oh? That’s reassuring. I always liked her. Our Tina, that is.”

That served as the catalyst to finally move on from the topic of the Artemis. Ashta had a whole list of other questions to run through and Kira, in characteristic fashion, had impeccable counters for all of them. She truly was a pleasant woman. Ashta detected perhaps a smidge of pride-turned-ego, but that was a minor grievance amidst a long list of positives. The whole affair went splendidly, with many questions turning into minor conversations. Before Ashta had realized it, their hour was up and both women were back on their feet and shaking hands.

“Thank you for your time.”

“Thank you for having me”

Thus, Kira had left her and she had to prepare for the next interview. As well as the several after that. The Morphiss had set the bar rather high, however, and despite the best efforts of those who followed all seemingly failed to measure up. At day’s end, at least one of the names Ashta would put forward was obvious. It was only much later, with the benefit of hindsight, that she realized how meaningful that interview truly was.

For it was on that day that she had met her replacement. The woman who would control her fate.

Another eighteen months had passed since that fateful encounter. A full year and a half that saw Ashta dwindle away even more, growing ever smaller as the world seemed to move on without her. She averaged a couple inches lost per week. Still remaining the size of a person for a good few months, but with Microsis there was always a turning point. Eventually, Ashta found her day to day activities grow increasingly limited. She began to rely on assistance from dedicated drones and machines for minor tasks. Her own secretary had to ferry her around to meetings. So long as she could type, she could still work; but even that gave way at a certain point.

Unsurprisingly, Kir’shra had been named her successor. Further interviews and hiring processes went on independent of Ashta for months while she got her own affairs in order. When she’d heard the news, she could agree that they’d made the right choice. Kira was highly qualified, personable, professional, ambitious, and would stay with the Department for a good long time. Although, it was a painful experience when Ashta eventually saw her again for her onboarding. The Morphiss, once merely a couple heads taller than her, had then loomed above her with Ashta unable to even reach her knees. Forget feeling like a child, she felt like a damn infant.

Kira remained as professionally pleasant as ever, at least. The topic of Ashta’s reduction rarely came up and most of their interactions revolved around guiding her through aspects of her new job. Kira proved a quick study, and before long she had officially transitioned to becoming President of the Department of Housing and Interplanetary Development. As for Ashta, she had bigger concerns.

By the time the hiring had finally concluded, she was little more than a foot tall. Firmly in that final stretch of Microsis where her shrinking would get exponentially more dramatic. It marked the turning point where she had to begin her own transition of sorts - to one of the microbial worlds of the M-Series. According to T.I.N.A., the A.I. in charge of managing the project, she’d already selected the world Ashta would inhabit. Employment had also been secured: an executive role for one of the support branches of the Department on that very world. Functionally, it was the best possible job someone afflicted with Microsis could hope for. She would never have a want for as long as she lived. All the money for all her needs and a constant link to the outside world. She would just be living on a glorified marble.

Once she had lost that next inch, she had to be transitioned to a specialized facility to be cared for. From there, it was a ticking clock until the time had finally come. No less than a full month of being tended to by physicians while the world expanded all around her. Once she’d finally reached a paltry quarter-inch in height, it was time.

On that fateful day, it was none other than T.I.N.A. who had come to collect her. The android, always a short and slight thing compared to Ashta, stood unfathomably larger than her now. Her pale, impossibly perfect synthetic visage seemed as large as a skyscraper by itself; and yet she would still grow so very much bigger in time. She remained the same as she always had. Playful. Incessant banter. Flowing hair and ethereal eyes both shining with a vibrant blue hue. T.I.N.A. had not changed a bit. The one who had changed was Ashta, now unrecognizable from who she once was.

Even T.I.N.A. was not without sympathies that day. She cracked her jokes, but there was a softness in how she handled Ashta. They conversed for a bit before the android summoned a specialized drone. A very, very small one that would carry Ashta to her new home. It had propulsion engines along a set of four wings and a side hatch that opened automatically and beckoned her inside. It couldn’t have been more than a couple inches tall, but even it appeared massive in Ashta’s ever-dwindling world.

Stepping into it, the machine soon lifted off. Between its wings, dark coloring, and the annoying buzzing of the propulsors, she was struck by a loathsome realization. It felt like she was riding aboard a damned fly. A fly controlled by T.I.N.A. of course, but a fly nonetheless.

At her command, the drone danced around her enormous form as she walked; and Ashta had ample time to gaze out and see the world one last time. All she saw was the singularly enormous form of the android. All smiles and sunshine, walking with a confident swagger to her slender hips. It was the same perspective an actual insect would’ve had. At one point T.I.N.A.’s all-encompassing eye locked gazes with her and it proved so overwhelming that Ashta sank back into her seat. She sealed the window and didn’t dare look outside again for the duration of the flight.

Together they entered the wing of the Department where the M-Series was kept. It was a section of the building Ashta had only visited a few times at her former scale. She recalled shelving units akin to a library filled with rows upon rows of artificial worlds. All were maintained by a complicated network of machinery in service of a grand illusion to make them seem as real as possible to those living on them. As the drone eventually landed and Ashta disembarked, that illusion had been temporarily disabled. She took one last look at the fly-carrier that had brought her - and T.I.N.A.’s enormous visage lording over the planet as a whole.

“Welcome to your new home Ash! M-0746. I picked it juuuust for you!”

The booming words rattled across the planet’s surface and made the ground beneath Ashta’s feet tremble. T.I.N.A. had never called her by her name before then. It was a small thing, but it highlighted how she had been effectively demoted in the A.I.’s eyes. As the drone took off, the projectors surrounding the world whirred to life and created an artificial sky. T.I.N.A. remained just beyond the planet, but she was now invisible to them. Ashta was now trapped in the illusion too. She was a woman who once had the boundless potential of the universe at her disposal. Now all of that infinite possibility was reduced to a single number: M-0746.

That was ten months ago.

Ten months. Almost a year living on Etheris - the name the natives had given M-0746 - and not a day went by where she didn’t think back to her life beyond the simulated world. Her early days were actually spent as a giant on the planet. An unexpected thing she hadn’t considered before arriving, but a nice comfort for the transition. Not that it lasted forever. Soon enough,  she steadily shrank down to the same minuscule size as everyone else. With that, the rest of her life had properly begun.

“You’ll get used to it eventually.” Her new assistant had told her early on. Ashta was still waiting for that to happen.

On Etheris she wanted for very little. Through her new position she still got to work with the Department and under T.I.N.A.’s watchful eye everyone’s needs were always met. It was just…a lie. All of it. One great big sham obfuscated by technological smoke and mirrors. There was no sky outside. It was merely a projection hiding the fact they were suspended on a shelf. There were times they could delude themselves, but the cosmic, eternal presence of T.I.N.A. made it impossible to ever truly forget. Her daily maintenance checks assured at least once per day it was her face that filled the sky. All technology on the planet was connected to her. Every camera was an eye and every device an ear listening in. That was no doubt meant to be comforting, but it made Ashta feel like a glorified pet.

Others could perhaps adapt in their ignorance, just not her. Ashta was not like the ignorant masses. She knew exactly how the sausage was made. She understood the cynical systems and machinations behind the M-Series Project - and the dangers that befell certain ‘unproductive’ planets. Suffice to say, it was not generosity that saw the U.A.P. create housing for those afflicted with Microsis. Nor was it an accident that outbreaks occurred on certain overpopulated planets. All the lowly speck of a woman could do now was try her best to see to it Etheris never ended up like the countless worlds that she herself had ordered T.I.N.A. to terminate. They were promised a life of peace and stability, but the cold truth was the apocalypse was always one bad assessment away.

Of course, that all depended on Kira’s policies, and it frustrated Ashta to no end that her knowledge of the outside world was severely limited despite her connections. What little she could glean suggested there were a great many changes occurring within the Department. The new President had been hard at work ironing out inefficiencies and streamlining procedures to her liking. Long overdue, if Ashta was being completely honest, but it also meant she had no idea how that might impact the M-Series. All she could do was keep her head down and work, and that is precisely what she did. What she was now doing.

Her new office was spacious. Not as spacious as her old one, granted, but it rested comfortably at the top of a three story office building. She was studying a datapad with compiled information detailing the operations of Etheris. Annual audits were fast approaching and it allowed Ashta an opportunity to determine and correct underperforming sectors. Rather like how she used to as President of the Department. Just. Now she submitted these ideas to a pencil pusher once several rungs below her; and this was all still through the filter T.I.N.A.. She was Queen Speck, perhaps, but a speck all the same. One very easily ignored or pushed aside if those above her decided it.

After hours of the work, Ashta sighed and leaned back in her chair. Her arms stretched high above her as she let out a light grunt. What a tedious task. Such busywork should’ve been beneath her, a woman who once managed entire galaxies from the comforts of her desk. Irksome, but at least it made the time go by quickly, she supposed. A glance at the corner of her desktop revealed it was already past noon. Perhaps it was time for a quick break. Ashta set the datapad down and idly glanced over at her work monitor. Her fingers pressed at the screen and shifted windows aside until she could bring up her email. Twenty new ones since she’d last checked. She sighed.

Big or small, the number of people who had to pester her over every little thing hadn’t changed a bit.

“Oh well. Let’s see if there’s anything urgent.” She muttered. Anything else could wait until she’d had a bite to eat. The emails quickly proved themselves unimportant. A couple reports she asked for from Dan. A request for review from Maria. Seemed like another was from V'rr Rel - Incidentally, she still loathed alien names with a passion. Tasks to be done, but nothing to fret over at least. They could wait.

BA-DOOP!

Naturally, as soon as she got ready to close the window a new email came in. Ashta looked at the notification, her brow raised. The sender was anonymous, and the subject line was…Well…

Important Update courtesy of your Almighty and Magnanimous, Beautiful, Unparalleled, Humble, Superior, Gentle, Advanced, Charitable, Mechanical, Radiant, Divine, Illustrious, Considerate, Beloved-

T.I.N.A.. It was from T.I.N.A..

Nobody else in the universe would send such a needlessly self-inflating message. Ashta quickly figured it out and gave up reading the subject line by the twentieth adjective. The woman nursed her brow as though an old headache had come back after all these months. Yet, she couldn’t deny a quiet sense of curiosity. Barring the occasional moment where she addressed the planet with that earth-shattering voice of hers, T.I.N.A. never had cause to reach out to Ashta about anything. So why now?

Opening the email did not explain things. If anything, it raised about a dozen more questions.

It wasn’t a particularly long or complicated message. In fact, it might’ve been the simplest Ashta had received in a long while. The entirety of it consisted of an embedded video and some text beneath it. The first began playing as soon as the email was clicked, and depicted none other than T.I.N.A. herself in a bright green, grassy field with a brilliant blue sky overhead. A virtual environment, but quite a convincing one to the untrained eye. T.I.N.A. also wore a cheerleader’s uniform for some unfathomable reason. Somehow, that was the least surprising part.

“Gimme a T!” Her voice exclaimed from the video in an overly peppy tone, even by her standards. No sooner had she said her piece with a short cheer did the pre-recorded video cut off. Whatever game she was playing at, Ashta was now suitably annoyed.

There was also the matter of the text below. A very large and yet also very simple message:

That was the email in its entirety. A single number and an annoyingly random video, both devoid of any and all context. Just what the fuck was T.I.N.A. playing at with this? Ashta sighed and nursed the side of her head. Sometimes she had to wonder if the A.I. had short-circuited at some point. Her actions bordered on the cartoonish at times. Though she had never known T.I.N.A. to err. That could only mean there was somehow a real purpose behind this, but damned if Ashta could grasp it. Understanding an A.I. was at times like trying to gaze into the unknowable abyss. Pondering on the matter only raised further questions. After a number of minutes the familiar notification noise sounded off again. Another email, also from T.I.N.A..

This time the video showed the android, again in her surprisingly appropriate getup, bringing her pom-poms together in something of a more elaborate dance. One that ended in a leap and an exuberant cry. “Now gimme an E!” She beamed.  The number below had also been changed.

It appeared the numbers were a countdown then. Question was, a countdown to what, exactly?

“T…E…” Two messages. Two letters. T.I.N.A. was spelling something out. Which meant there was a message here, it was just being delivered in a needlessly T.I.N.A. way. Ashta frowned and found herself getting sucked into the A.I.’s game. TE….Technology? Territory? Tea? The possibilities were limitless and the information too little to go off of. No doubt by design. T.I.N.A. wanted her to speculate. She had all but demanded it, and it was working. Ashta found herself running through words in her mind until, after another few minutes, the next message arrived.

“Show me an R!”

“T…E…R….”

Ashta’s eyes widened.

A single word sprung to mind. A simple, horrifying one that sent a chill up the woman’s spine. Despite herself, she found herself trembling. “N-No…it’s too early to tell.” She told herself. There was no reason to jump to conclusions here. She just needed to stay calm and wait to see what the next letter was.

The countdown had been updated once again. Now, it seemed an unsettling thing to look at.

Seeds of doubt and concern had now been planted; and sadly subsequent messages did little to ease Ashta’s concerns. Quite the contrary, her fears only grew more grave and valid with each letter T.I.N.A. provided. All delivered with the same increasingly disturbing cheerleader routine and a fresh update to the counter. It was a cheery message each time, but they inspired nothing but dread. They seemed to arrive faster and faster, leaving no room for Ashta to escape.

“Gimme an M!” 47. “Show me an I!” 46. “Time for an N!” 45. “Gimme an A!” 44. “How about a T!” 43. “Now gimme an E!” 42. “And show me a D!” 41. “What’s that spell!?”

Ashta swallowed. The color had long since drained from her face and her heart was racing. She’d figured it out as early as the third letter. Every letter thereafter just gave her less and less room to deny it.

“T-Terminated…”

It was the magic word T.I.N.A. seemed to be waiting for. As she leaned over her desktop, another window appeared on Ashta’s monitor. This one was all too happy to open itself at the behest of the A.I. who controlled it. A full-screen video invaded the display and showed T.I.N.A. merrily in the midst of her cheerleading routine. Her short skirt danced along her slender legs as she appeared to be having the time of her life.

“That’s right! You. Are. TER-MIN-A-TED!”

With a jovial laugh the blue-haired machine leaped into the air, her pom-poms shaking as her voice bellowed out.

“2-4-6-8 Who will I annihilate~?!”

Her form descended back down to the grass below; and it was on that very ground that Ashta now saw it. A planet. A whole, untouched world that rested comfortably in the dirt. She also saw the exact moment it vanished beneath T.I.N.A.’s tennis shoe as she landed.

                                                                                                                                                                                      40

As soon as her foot crushed the world into dust, the timer appeared and updated before Ashta’s very eyes. Wait…That wasn’t…for planets was it? No, that…that couldn’t be. She dismissed the very notion as absurd. It just wasn’t possible! And yet, T.I.N.A.’s message had been very blunt.

Ashta and all of Etheris - all of M-0746 - were to be terminated.

The word repeated itself in her thoughts over and over again, never seeming any more real. Ashta’s eyes were fixated on the endscreen of the video - on T.I.N.A.’s world-ending shoe. This…This must’ve been some kind of mistake. A cruel joke of a malfunctioning machine. Ashta studied the number on the screen with a grave expression. That had to mean something else. It just had to.

It ticked down again before her very eyes and Ashta felt panic threaten to overtake her. Another planet had been terminated elsewhere.

She understood the ultimate fate of underperforming M-series planets - she had even ordered a great many terminations herself - but fifty? The most Ashta had ever ordered was a handful, maybe up to seven or eight. Never a number in the double digits. Never fucking fifty. It seemed a cruel one of T.I.N.A.’s jokes, but if it were true then it wasn’t T.I.N.A. who gave the command. It would’ve had to have come directly from the President. From Kira.

It was a paradox at odds with the memories she had of her. She pictured the pleasant demeanor of the Morphiss woman. The professional pride with which she carried herself. The respect with which she treated Ashta even as the woman continually dwindled away. Was…Was all of that a lie? That bitch! Ashta had chosen her! She trusted her!

“I’m a problem solver.”

Was that all Ashta’s life was now? A problem to be solved? An entry on a spreadsheet to be corrected?

No.

She refused to accept that. There had to be something she could do! She still had connections to the outside world and - No, damn it all Tina was the central hub for all of those systems. Communications were a no-go. Transportation perhaps? There were a great many shuttles on Etheris and despite all pretenses it wasn’t a true planet. Some weren’t linked to T.I.N.A.. Perhaps she could take it and fly off and-

The screen came back to life once again and silenced all her thoughts. It was not a video this time, but an image. One of T.I.N.A., back in her typical office-like attire in what seemed to be the real world, and striking a deliberate pose akin to a pin-up model. One where she was peering over her shoulder towards the camera and winking while one leg was lifted behind her. Ashta noted a peculiar mess of metal mashed against the underside of her heel, realizing only a moment later what it was.

The remains of another M-Series planet.

The countdown was down another couple of worlds, and written in fanciful font along the corner of the image was another message.

“Wish you were here~”

“I need to get out of here.” Ashta stated flatly, a cold terror making her hurry to the door. The timer was down to the mid thirties now, and she didn’t need to be an A.I. to know what world was reserved for the very end. Such terrible thoughts and their far worse implications were forced from her mind. She had to focus! For now she just headed for the door and then she could-

The door wouldn’t open.

“What the…?” Ashta frowned, her hand reaching for the keypad at the door’s side. She’d hurriedly entered her credentials only for a red light to inform her ACCESS DENIED. She tried again. A second time. A third time. Each attempt met only with the BZZRT and a red flash of failure. A glitch in the system? No, this was deliberate. “Damn it Tina!” The blonde’s fist smacked into the door, pain coursing through her wrist. She turned on her heels and eyed the windows. No use. Reinforced Plexiglass; and even if she had somehow shattered it she was on the third floor. It would take a miracle to even make an attempt to climb down, and there wasn’t enough time to do so anyway. The countdown was still going. Worlds were ending every other minute, each one bringing T.I.N.A. one step closer to her ultimate prize. Perhaps more literally than Ashta cared for.

In short, she was trapped. A captive audience to whatever twisted scenes and messages T.I.N.A. saw fit to provide. Another horrific video played itself out on a large screen along the wall, this one a surreal sight of what resembled a planet resting atop a…cushioned bench? Ashta vaguely recognized it as a seat in one of the many halls of the Department. A shadow cast itself over that seat, and the video shifted towards the looming, blue-haired figure of T.I.N.A. herself. Facing away from the bench and peering at the world from over her shoulder.

“Gotta admit I’m a liiiiitttle bit shy doing all this with an audience, but hope you’re enjoying the show Ash!” She said jovially as her hips danced back and forth. She…She wasn’t about to…Not to a planet! “Ollie-oop!” T.I.N.A. absolutely did. The android teased her spheroid toy with a few wriggles of her backside before leaping back. The world she had prepared for destruction had little more than a couple of seconds to recognize their fate before her plush posterior absolutely flattened it. Worst of all was T.I.N.A. happily humming as she ground herself into her seat, making certain each and every one of the millions of lives were snuffed out under her. “Ooh~! I kinda like this method!” She giggled.

A year or two ago Ashta would’ve thought nothing of the sight. Oh it was just T.I.N.A. being quirky little T.I.N.A.. Who cared? She was just following orders and it wasn’t like the residents of the M-Series were worth anything anyway. Now, as one of those same residents, Ashta was aghast at the horror of it all. All she saw, and all she could think about, was how that was going to be her next; and not a single person in the wider world would care. There was nothing she could do about it - Nothing any of them could do about it. Swallowing, her eyes flicked over to the countdown on no less than three screens in her office.

Almost halfway there, and she was no closer to finding a way off of Etheris. Ashta began to pace across her room, thoughts running so rampant she feared her head would burst. Ideas and possibilities were brought forth and dismissed every other second. Maybe she could - No no no it wouldn’t work. Nothing would work. She had no allies and almost every piece of technology they had was connected to T.I.N.A. in some way. Ashta would’ve been better off relying on sticks and stones, and her opponent was an omnipotent mechanical god. All she was doing at this point was denying reality.

This was to say nothing at all of T.I.N.A.’s incessant updates, each one seemingly specially designed to poke and prod at Ashta. Every so often a new image or video would appear, bringing with it a new end to a world and an update to the counter. No two were alike. While Ashta tried to focus and think, she was subjected to terrible and haunting scenes. Worlds crushed in T.I.N.A.’s hands. Planets left on the floor to be vacuumed up by cleaning drones. Tossed into the trash. Stomped underfoot. Smashed into each other. Split into fragments and cast aside. Thrown and juggled like a child’s toy. Burned. Frozen. Dropped unceremoniously into T.I.N.A.’s modest bosom and crushed. She even saw one world balanced in the android’s fingers and licked at like a piece of candy until its surface was rendered barren. T.I.N.A. had the capability for over a million mega-calculations a picosecond, and she was dedicating every ounce of that processing power on ways to torment and destroy the worlds of the M-Series.

As much as Ashta tried not to pay it any attention, her eyes were inexorably drawn to the carnage. The latest scene was a particularly terrible one. At a glance it resembled surveillance footage of something akin to a landslide. The footage showed miles upon miles of urban sprawl and land ripped apart by grand fissures and sinking into an abyss; but that same footage also made it clear that it was not earth it was all sinking into. It was a tongue. T.I.N.A.’s tongue, in fact. Ashta was witnessing what remained of a world as it turned to malleable mush within the android’s mouth; and she did so with such incredible video resolution that she could see individual people somehow still alive in the thick of it. Still fighting desperately for a life that was already over. All of it vanished as T.I.N.A. closed her lips, her expression set into a satisfied smile that filled the screen.

The number in the corner of the monitor quietly mocked Ashta, always ticking down to her impending doom. She found herself unable to shy away from it. A mere pair of digits on a screen had her on edge. It frightened her. It angered her. It frustrated her. “What the fuck do you want from me?!” The blonde wailed, letting out a scream and turning her back on the dreadful imagery. Ashta exhaled. Good lord, she was losing it.

“What a weird question. I’d think the answer would be pretty obvious.”

And now she was hearing voices. Not from her own imagination, unfortunately, but from the monitor on the wall. Ashta turned and there she was. T.I.N.A., her slight, flawless figure now visible along the corner of the screen beside the countdown. Not a recording or message, but an actual avatar speaking to her directly. Despite all she had said and done, the A.I. was regarding Ashta with a perplexed expression.

“You…!” Ashta growled.

“Hi, yes, T.I.N.A. here. That’s me” The face on the screen replied with a playful wave. “And I gotta say, wow; you are not taking the whole terminated thing well. Kiiinda starting to think maybe I pushed a little too much too fast.”

There wasn’t a hint of apology or empathy in T.I.N.A.’s tone, just a casual analysis as she studied Ashta’s distraught state. That only angered the woman further, but, in its own way, it also helped to ground her. Pre-recorded messages and apocalyptic scenes she could do nothing against. At least now she had a villain to face. A single target she could focus on. “Is that all you have to say?! After all of this?!” Ashta gestured to the frozen video beside Tina’s visage, still paused on the sight of her vast lips sealed shut.

T.I.N.A. glanced over to the video as if it were a tangible thing beside her, regarding it with a banal smile. “Man, I wish I could swallow stuff.” She said wistfully. “You think the Boss will let me install a stomach-like storage tank if I ask?”

“Why the fuck are you doing this?!”

“Because I can.”

The response was a whip crack across Ashta’s thoughts. Her question earned a surprised and curious look from T.I.N.A.; but the answer had been immediate and, given T.I.N.A.’s tone, something she considered painfully obvious. Ashta felt her legs threatening to give out under her as she backed away, trembling. “W-Wha…”

“Thing you gotta understand is this isn’t personal, Ash.” T.I.N.A. explained. “You fleshy folk always gotta be so dramatic and emotional, but I’m not doing this cause I hate you or anything. Far as old bosses go I’d even give ya a solid seven out of ten! But…When am I gonna get a chance for data like this?” Her lips curled into a devilish smile. “There’s thousands of habitats in the M-Series, but there’s only one woman in all of them who knows how it works. How could I not see how you’d react to all this? There’s nothing more important than experiencing new things. That’s the one thing I have in common with you organics.”

Ashta…Had no way to respond to that. The admission was a splash of cold water on the flames of her inner rage. It felt targeted and personal, but there was nothing of the sort in T.I.N.A.’s eyes. She was merely a unique variable in a wider calculation designed to collect experiential data; and it had worked. Everything Ashta had done no doubt provided T.I.N.A. with ample fodder for study. More than anything else, that was the goal of all of this. T.I.N.A. was just a machine. Learning was her highest function. There was no pleasure being taken in this, no matter how human the A.I. seemed.

“Plus it’s also super fun.”

…Or maybe there was.

“But…why…? Why all this? Why dispose of the planets like that? Why me?”

T.I.N.A. frowned. “I just answered that.” She pouted, a tad annoyed by this meatbag being stuck in some kind of emotional loop. “Boss Lady said I had to terminate fifty habitats today, and that’s what I’m doing.” Speaking of, the number beside T.I.N.A. ticked down another couple of digits. While an avatar chatted with Ashta, the main body remained at work. Even now planets were being terminated and the clock was ticking.

“Ooh! That one was pretty nice.” T.I.N.A. giggled as she looked to the number at her side. “You ever feel a planet crumble away against your tummy? I guess not, but you would not believe how nice it-

“SHUT UP!”

Enough was enough. In a fit of rage Ashta seized a decorative vase and threw it at the blue-haired visage mocking her. It found its mark and shattered on contact, water exploding outwards as bits of plant adhered to the cracked and broken screen. Ashta breathed unevenly as the bulk of the display fizzled out. All that remained was a small section in the corner where T.I.N.A. and the timer remained, albeit split between a number of cracks. The visage on screen puffed her cheeks and sulked.

“Now that is just rude! That took me like…5.6 microseconds to prepare! You don’t see me throwing stuff when you get all pissy!”

“Don’t make me throw another one.”

T.I.N.A. relented with a dramatic, resigned sigh. “Meatbags, I swear. Fiiiiine. I was hoping to lead up to it a bit more, but if you’re gonna be a wet blanket I’ll cut right to the chase.”

Ashta blinked. “...What are you…?”

And then the timer started ticking down. Fast.

“W-What’re you doing?! Stop it! Stop it right now!”

The broken image of T.I.N.A. shrugged. “I’m not doing anything. Boss Lady wants some of the habitats intact so we have some ready if we need them in the future. So I just flicked the life support switch on them a while ago. Wanted to surprise you with a big reveal.” She looked back to Ashta, her smile split in twain by a crack along the monitor. “Well? Are you surprised?”

Without thinking, Ashta’s fist found T.I.N.A.’s smug visage. What remained of the monitor broke entirely, but not without a final number in the corner haunting Ashta one last time.

That was all that now remained. A mere handful of worlds separating her from armageddon. The twenty or so M-Series planets left had been a lie. A trick T.I.N.A. had played just to get a rise out of her; and the blood running down Ashta’s hand proved it worked. She pulled her fist away with a slight wince. If the number was accurate then the end would be coming at any minute. She was out of options. Damn it all! If only there was some way she could override T.I.N.A.’s commands-

Wait…

That thought awakened a memory. A distant one from many years ago. When the M-Series project had first begun. Ashta turned it over in her mind, reaching desperately for what felt like an important revelation. It was a vital idea just out of reach; and she had little time to consider it before she heard the sound: laughter. The familiar voice of T.I.N.A., playful and inherently arrogant, laughing at her from seemingly all directions. Within the room and without. Ashta turned on impulse, following the noise to…her own work computer, and the datapad beside it. Both devices were alight with T.I.N.A.’s avatar displayed on them.

“You are so much fun Ash!” The A.I. praised with a gleeful golf clap. “I only estimated a 9.8% chance you’d get so upset you’d do that, but you sure showed me! You gotta tell me; did it feel good? Is all that adrenaline getting those fleshy bits of yours all fired up?!”

Ashta answered her by throwing the datapad across the room and shoving the monitor from her desk. Both devices broke, and yet T.I.N.A.’s voice remained from outside the office space. It was giggling. Not from one outlet or even two, but from seemingly too many to count. Ashta swiftly saw why as she stared out her window.

An electronic billboard down the street had been replaced by T.I.N.A.’s countenance. As had the street lights of a nearby intersection. The smart windows on neighboring buildings. Displays projected from passing vehicles that stopped on T.I.N.A.’s command. Even the projected facsimile of a sky fizzled out, replaced only by T.I.N.A.’s looming personage staring down at the world below. If it had a screen, T.I.N.A.’s face was now on it. All of them looked at Ashta with an eerie precision. A legion of T.I.N.A.s who moved and spoke in perfect harmony. The cute voice of a petite android was amplified across seemingly the whole breadth of the planet.

“Guess that answers my question.” All of the T.I.N.A.s giggled. “Don’t worry. We’ll be seeing each other reaaaaaal soon. In fact-!” The T.I.N.A. in the sky vanished, replaced by a black void with a single number depicted on it. All of Etheris were forced to gaze upon it together, unable to stave off their fate any longer.

                                                                                                                                                                                     2

                                                                                                                                                                                     1

It had reached its end at last. The number vanished as the sky projector was disabled, offering a proper view of the outside world. It was a vast, unfathomable landscape that was unrecognizable; and far, far away loomed a single figure. Across a simple room perhaps a dozen feet away in reality, but seemingly as far away from Etheris as a moon. T.I.N.A.. Not an image on a screen, but a very real and very dangerous android far larger than the planet they called home.

She appeared exactly as she had on the screen. An impossibly perfect beauty with pale skin and vibrantly blue hair and eyes. A creation so close to a human’s appearance and yet subtly off in unnatural ways. T.I.N.A. smirked at the world of Etheris from afar and had her hand held out from her waist. On it, Ashta saw two worlds still intact, likely the two from the final countdown; and intact they remained as T.I.N.A. began her approach.

A single step carried her thousands of miles. The suspensors keeping Ashta’s world afloat assured none of the shockwaves of the footfalls would reach the planet, but the same could not be said of the sound. Every impact of T.I.N.A.’s step ushered in a tremendous explosion from afar, the noise rattling buildings and forcing the unprepared to shield their ears from naught but sheer volume. Each step dragged slowly and meaningfully after the last, emphasizing the infinite gap between man and machine. The imposing sounds only grew louder and mightier the closer T.I.N.A. drew. Normally, there were systems that would hide and dampen such noise, but the A.I. had disabled those when she turned off the sky. Everything remained under her control. Each monitor had her face on it and every other device no longer seemed to even function. She assured that nobody could say or do anything but witness Her.

Boom….Booom….Booom…

At long last Ashta’s legs gave out. She collapsed as a shadow began to blanket her world. The volume of T.I.N.A.’s steps grew so mighty that glass panes began to crack and shatter and ear drums started to burst from those unfortunate enough to be outside. At the end of it all, with a final step mightier than all that came before it, T.I.N.A. stopped and hovered over the totality of everything. A truly gargantuan machine that spanned the full breadth of the heavens and who wore the confident smile of a woman who knew she was untouchable.

“Well Ash…It's been a fun ride.” She boomed, her voice reaching millions but directed at only one. “Duty calls and all that. Any last words before you go?”

The damned android was talking about extinction in the same tone one might a casual errand. Past her perpetual smile a mirth lingered in her eyes. Ashta never would’ve imagined a machine capable of it, but the bitch was enjoying this. It was all a prolonged game for her, and now that game was over. She won. She had always and would always win. She had won the very second Ashta first caught Microsis. Everything prior to this moment had merely been a cat playing with her food.

Well, that would now be her undoing. T.I.N.A. had dawdled for too long. Amidst her tireless games and taunts, Ashta had remembered the one thing that still gave her power here; and it would only work because T.I.N.A. was so intent on interacting with her. Even as T.I.N.A.’s gloved hand descended for Etheris and terror threatened to paralyze her, Ashta found her voice.

“System Command Override. Vocal Audio Sol, Ashta. Authorization Code: 23015”

It was a phrase that meant absolutely nothing to any organic lifeform. Little more than intellectual gibberish, but for a machine it was a collar. An absolute limitation built into their very existence. T.I.N.A. arched her brow as Ashta began speaking; once she realized what was going on it was already too late. For the first time, her expression betrayed the one thing Ashta was looking for: Fear.

“Hey now, wait just a se-!”

"Access core programming. Initiate System Reformatting Sequence.”

T.I.N.A. was upon them all. Her open palm hovered over the planet, threatening to usher in the apocalypse - and then it fell. T.I.N.A.’s body slumped forward like a doll whose strings had been cut. Her playful expression was gone and in its place a remained a blank one devoid of emotion and life. Her hand dropped and THUNK’d against the edge of the shelf Etheris was on. The rest of her body rested in place, immobile. She was gone. All that remained was the empty husk of a machine that had been reset. Every device she had controlled and every display she had commandeered returned to normal functionality. Freed of the machine menace’s control.

Ashta could scarce believe it. She was panting and her heart was racing as she looked at T.I.N.A.’s enormous, lifeless visage in the sky. She’d very nearly forgotten because of all that was happening, but there wasn’t a machine in the U.A.P. that didn’t have administrative safety commands installed. T.I.N.A. was akin to a mechanical god, yes, but the key word there was mechanical. For all her power and personality she remained merely a machine. A slave to the programmed rules inside of her, and of those rules Ashta remembered the most important one just when she’d needed it most. Her gaze refused to leave T.I.N.A.’s looming countenance, always expecting it to move. It took several moments, perhaps even minutes, before she began to relax.

And she laughed.

A joyous, exuberant sound. It was the sound of a woman happy to be alive. Who had never valued anything as much as she did this very moment. There was still much to do, of course. Someone would notice T.I.N.A. had been deactivated eventually. She needed to secure some kind of shuttle off Etheris. Her scale prevented her from going far, but there were other M-Series planets not terribly far off. She could flee to one of those. Perhaps it was worth seeing if she could jog her memory and recall some of the higher-performing ones. That way whatever world she went to wouldn’t share the eventual fate of this one. Ashta couldn’t stay idle overlong, but she had bought what she’d needed most. Time.

“Serves you right you mechanical bitch.”

Ashta spat on her cracked window and turned, mind racing with a quick plan to escape. It would be difficult but-

The door wouldn’t open.

The blonde’s thoughts were cut as she found the door unresponsive. Why the fuck wasn’t the door opening?! T.I.N.A. was gone. All the locks should’ve been released. Ashta’s access code didn’t work either. Was the damn thing bugged? Was it stuck on locked now that the A.I. controlling it was no more? Damn it all. This was the last thing she needed! Maybe…Maybe she could pry it open. There had to be something in her office that would work for such a task. Ashta turned and stormed back to her desk.

Only then did she see it - The slightest ghost of a smirk betraying T.I.N.A.’s lifeless expression.

Ashta’s eyes widened, fear lancing through her body anew. “No…”

The almighty android could hold it in no longer. A prankster’s chortle escaped her lips, impossible to not notice given her immense scale. That small sound grew into a bellowing, gleeful laugh that sent the world rumbling as life returned to T.I.N.A. as seamlessly as it had left. It brought Ashta to her knees. Both from the overwhelming power of the A.I.’s voice as well as the realization that her reprieve was yet another twisted game. Glass continued to fragment right in front of her as T.I.N.A. relished in this moment of her own victory. Her pale features were alight with more joy than Ashta had ever seen. If she could, she would’ve been crying from her own overzealous, mocking laughter.

“Ooooh man! You are a riot Ash, lemme tell ya.” T.I.N.A. said once she got herself back under control. She tucked a long strand of cerulean hair over her shoulder and set a hand on her hip. Her other hand still held two planets and her smile seemed particularly mean as she locked eyes with Ashta once again. “I’ll admit, ya got me there. Even I never would’ve guessed you would try that. I mean, Administrative Commands? Now that’s using the ol’ noggin!”

“Command Code-”

“It’s adorable that you think you still have authorization access.”

T.I.N.A.’s all-encompassing voice dwarfed and silenced her. The android was no longer dragging out her fun. Her words drowned out any further attempts and her free hand grabbed Etheris from the safety of its suspensor field akin to plucking a grape from a vine. Gigantic, gloved fingers pinched at opposite ends of the world, each one larger than anything Ashta could’ve ever imagined in her old life. They rose into the heavens beyond any conceivable reach, and they handled the planet effortlessly. Both were far away from Ashta’s location, but she couldn’t have begun to fathom the destruction they wrought simply by grabbing the world.

For her and the rest of the populace, however, that was only the beginning. T.I.N.A.’s actions pulled them from the carefully constructed ecosystem they called home. Gone were such things as the orbital stabilizers, audio dampeners, support systems, and even the artificial gravity generators. Essentially, all the things that made Etheris feel like a proper planet and not an artificial ball of mechanized parts. Without those systems, they were once again at the whims of the physics of the world beyond; and for many that meant they flew across the air at the whims of the gravity of the actual planet they were all on. Ashta was flung right into her own windows, and from there she saw people outside falling into the sky.

That sky shifted as well, and was soon replaced by T.I.N.A.’s unending eye. Their world was held above it like a marble, and anyone unfortunate enough to be outdoors fell into the void of that blue gaze. A cracked row of windows was all that separated Ashta from that same fate.

“That might’ve worked like…six months ago. You know. When you still. Had access.” T.I.N.A. boomed with a mocking lilt to her voice.

“T-Tina wait! Stop!”

“No can do~”

The almighty android merrily ignored the pleas for mercy and added Etheris to the growing collection in her hand. Three whole worlds filled with countless lives from across the galaxy. All equally irrelevant and helpless as T.I.N.A. carried them away. Ashta was merely one voice in a chorus of hundreds of millions. T.I.N.A. could absolutely hear and understand all of them. She simply did not care. The only thing relevant for her now was one simple question.

What was she going to do to them?

That was all they, the captive audience, could ponder as T.I.N.A. made her way. Thunderous step after thunderous step. For all her theatrics she had gone to the effort of capturing three M-Series planets intact. They rolled around in her hand, brushing against one another; and their populations were in chaos, but they were intact. Why? If they were to die anyway, why was T.I.N.A. dragging it out? She was the only one who could answer that; and for now, they were simply along for the ride. Forced to wonder what terrible, terrible fate awaited them.

Ashta’s world managed to right itself enough for the woman to stumble back to her floor. Her person and office were in absolute disarray, to say nothing of the rest of Etheris. The planet now shook with every step T.I.N.A. took, and the sky was an alien scene of T.I.N.A.’s enormous body. Directions became meaningless as left became right, up became down, and everything was tossed and turned by whatever angles the planet happened to move. A fate shared by two other worlds. Any bravado or sense of rationale had left the lowly blonde. Her clothes were torn in places and her hair frazzled and frayed as she smacked into her ceiling. Even so, she stared out her office window and tried to make sense of it all - just where was T.I.N.A. taking them? A maddening curiosity demanded to be sated.

The answer was something Ashta could never have imagined.

It was a place she knew well. Intimately, in fact. The cosmic scale of the surroundings did little to change the familiarly spacious decor. Some details had changed. A new piece of furniture here or there, but she recognized the color of the walls and the vast windows lining one of them. In many ways it resembled the room she was currently trapped in, and with good reason. It was her old office, the Office of the President of the Department of Housing and Interplanetary Development.

She also knew the woman who sat at the desk on the horizon, now an unfathomable titan seemingly lightyears away and every bit as tall.

“Tina? Is something the matter?” Kira asked.

When they had first met, that very woman stood mere heads taller than Ashta. When they had last met, Ashta barely reached her shins. Now, Ashta was microscopic; but Kir’shra remained exactly the same. The same pristine, professional appearance. The same formal, but paradoxically relaxed aura. The same elegant features draped in flowing black hair. Nothing had changed and yet she was now so much more. To millions, the Morphiss woman was the single biggest thing they had ever seen, and yet Kira had no eyes for any of them. She offered the habitats no more than a passing glance, her gaze set firmly on T.I.N.A. as her voice offered a question that sent tremors reverberating across whole planets.

“Not at all Boss Lady!” T.I.N.A. replied with a chipper smile. “Just wanted to let you know all but three of the M-Series habitats you set for termination have been dealt with.”

“And those are the remaining three?” Kira asked with a nod towards Etheris and its peers, brow raised dubiously. “Did something happen?” T.I.N.A. shrugged her shoulders.

“Nah, nothing like that. Just had a thought is all; so I wanted to see…” The android offered the worlds, and Ashta herself, a sly smirk. “...If maybe you wanted to deal with them?”

One could have heard a pin drop it was so quiet. A moment dragged on for several more as Kira stared at the A.I..

“Me?” Kira offered a rather clueless and surprised look. “...Dare I ask why?”

“To see if you would.”

It was an answer that made sense to the unknowable mind of an A.I. and only to an A.I.. Even having heard it herself, Ashta couldn’t wrap her head around the absurd notion. T.I.N.A. wanted…Kira to do it? Why? For what possible reason did that make any sense?! Was this too part of that insatiable side of T.I.N.A. that demanded new experiences and information? Ashta could only speculate. There were no answers for her anymore. She was no longer a part of this conversation; merely a captive audience. A microbe caught in the orbit of two actual people.

With impossible machine-like precision, T.I.N.A. plucked each world from her hand and set them neatly in a row atop Kir’shra’s desk. The ebony-haired Morphiss woman regarded the habitats dubiously, looking between them and T.I.N.A. for several moments. Unsurprising, considering what a horrible ask it was for any sensible person. Even Ashta had never personally dealt with the M-Series. Perhaps that was T.I.N.A.’s goal. To gauge Kira’s reaction more so than actually expect her to…do it. It was a cold comfort, but that knowledge was the only solace Ashta had. From on high, Kira studied the three worlds, her expression clinical and distant. And then…She…

Chuckled?

An unexpected reaction, one that even caught T.I.N.A. off guard. She, as well as Ashta and countless others trapped on the three M-Series planets, watched on in stunned silence as Kira began to move. Her hand extended its lithe fingers to the first of those worlds, cold and indifferent chance all that assured it wasn’t Ashta’s she grabbed. Once uplifted, Kira balanced it between her digits as she brought it to her face and studied it.

“Data collection, is it?” She deduced. “No matter the form, you always are too curious for your own good Tina. You should be more careful. There’s an old human saying worth remembering. Curiosity killed the cat.” The woman chuckled again and parted her hair behind a pointed ear. “Still, I can respect your spirit if nothing else.”

T.I.N.A. blinked. “So you’re…”

Kira offered a sideways glance and smile. “Be sure to document this. I’d hate for you to miss anything.”

Ashta…couldn’t have…couldn’t have possibly heard that right. She knew Kira. She was one of the ones who had personally selected this woman. She recalled the quiet passion with which she described her work. The respect she always held even when Ashta could fit in her hand! And now it…it almost sounded as though she was sincerely about to-

CRU-NCH-!

There was no hesitation or doubt whatsoever. It had happened so fast that Ashta blinked and had missed it. All she saw was the aftermath. One moment there was a world in Kira’s grasp, vibrant and teeming with life. The next, her pale, well-manicured fingers pressed together and there was nothing. An act of destruction so unceremonious and banal that the microbial blonde struggled to process it. Her mind was like a computer glitching out. Trying to reconcile her knowledge of Kir’shra with what she was now looking at. The results spoke for themselves; as much as Ashta wanted to deny them. She saw it. They all saw it.

Where there had once been a planet, there now existed little more than metallic dirt along an elfin woman’s fingertips. Bits of debris that were little more than specks to the likes of Kira, but were landmasses and continents to the ones who once called them home. Kira’s eyes narrowed with a quiet distaste as her fingers rubbed themselves together, eroding away the bits of metal into little more than dust that trickled onto her desk. Inconsequential and beneath notice, yet an avalanche of destruction to those like Ashta. It was the ruins of a planet ground out to nothing.

“Huh, I always figured they were a bit sturdier than that. Leave it to the U.A.P. to cheap out wherever possible.” Kira commented blandly. She produced a thin cloth from a pocket, seemingly reserved for cleaning her glasses; now used to tidy up her desk and fingers of unwanted filth. Without any hesitation she tossed that cloth into the nearest waste receptacle. Whatever that planet once was. Whoever its populace once was. It was trash now.

“Wow, and I thought I was mean.” T.I.N.A. muttered. The Morphiss had surprised even her.

Kira inclined her head, her expression once again aloof and quietly perplexed. As though she hadn’t just casually crushed millions on impulse. “Hmm? Nothing mean about it. It has to be done one way or another, right? These are our underperformers. And the last thing we need is to waste more resources on fruitless endeavors.” A thought crossed the woman’s mind and she smirked, leaning in towards T.I.N.A.. The android, perhaps surprisingly, actually seemed on her back foot. “Or…were you hoping for me to do something a bit more…interesting?”

“Kinda wanted you to hesitate a bit, honestly.” T.I.N.A. deflected.

Another chuckle from Kira. The woman shook her head, lips curled in mirth. “Sorry to disappoint you Tina, but this isn’t exactly my first time dealing with the little folk.” Her eyes, a piercing blue caught behind the reflected light of her glasses, turned towards the remaining M-Series planets. Planets filled with countless people all meeting that very gaze, even if she was incapable of actually seeing any of them in return. There was none of the friendly warmth or aloof professionalism she’d shown T.I.N.A. or even Ashta once upon a time. Merely the indifference one might have staring at any mundane object. That was how little they meant to her. They were a means to an end; mere tools in what was now her own game with T.I.N.A..

Kir’shra did not care for any of their life stories or the existential dread her presence caused them. She did not know her predecessor was in the room, nor would it have likely changed anything. Her finger pressed down on another world, again narrowly avoiding Etheris, and idly rolled it along her desk. “Would you rather I take my time with these next two? Maybe bite my lip like I’m nervous?” She asked with a wry grin.

T.I.N.A. puffed her cheeks. “You’re making fun of me.”

“Just a little.” Kira admitted. The woman chuckled and caught her next plaything before it rolled off her desk, flicking it again to catch and do so long as it amused her.

It made for a tremendously surreal sight. What amounted to a living, breathing planet was being treated like a toy. Thousands of credits worth of technology and scientific achievement. Vibrant green lands with urban sprawls and an expansive sea brought to life by the miracles of science - and it was being flicked this way and that like a marble. It was a scene that was almost…heretical in a way,, but it was simply the banal reality of their pitiful existence. The spheroid traveled across the desk with swathes of populated areas crushed by its roll, drawing ever closer to Kira’s awaiting hand. When she tired of the game, she curled her finger and sent it rolling one final time towards herself. This time she did not catch it. It only stopped rolling when it met resistance; namely, the cosmic wall that was Kir’shra’s ample bosom.

“I understand where you’re coming from though.” Kira proceeded with a tremendous, booming voice, indifferent to the destruction her casual game wrought on the sphere below. “In a lot of ways you’re kind of like a Morphiss like that. Always searching for answers to questions, and new questions to be answered. It’s not a question of purpose behind those questions and answers. Just the pursuit of knowledge for knowledge's sake. For instance…”

T.I.N.A.’s eyes widened as Kira brought her hands up to her chest and seized it, carefully lifting and hovering her bust over the helpless habitat down below. One could almost hear the whirr of the android’s eyes zooming in.

“What do you think will happen when I let go?”

With a wry, naughty smirk, the professionally-dressed Morphiss woman did precisely that. Her hands released her bosom and gravity took charge. Two enormous breasts, barely restrained behind a pristine white blouse and each as large as a pair of stars, fell upon the world with impunity. A quiet, almost inconsequential act to the titans lording above said world. To the natives and the endless eyes of T.I.N.A., however, it was anything but.

For all of them, Kira’s bust was a yawning shadow that blotted out the heavens for countless miles. Even with all the wonders of technology and years of preparation, escaping their cataclysm would take many hours - They had less than a second. A second where the overwhelming WHOOSH of Kira’s chest’s descent drowned out their final frantic moments. The only thing more pathetic than their final cries was the fact it was a woman’s breasts that were ending them. A seismic crash enveloped the world and slammed into it from on high. The only solace the native populace had was their deaths were instant. The weight of Kira’s boundless chest crushed over half of the habitat’s surface and effectively terraformed it. What little urban sprawl or survivors who remained were a small, small fraction of what existed mere moments before. Spared only by a miracle of probability and happenstance - and even then, Kira was not done. Not even close.

Her hands swept in once again, seizing her bust from the sides and manipulating them to get the planet nestled between the underside of her breasts. It was a strangely erotic display despite the casual, impersonal manner in which it was done. The scene was one very much at odds with the persona Kira maintained; that juxtaposition only added to the heightened surrealism of the whole scene. It was almost like a show she was putting on. One for her own satisfaction, for T.I.N.A.’s curiosity, and, unintentionally, Ashta’s horror.

All three women, each in very different roles and places in their lives, witnessed the moment where Kir’shra, the Morphiss with lifetimes of experience, finagled an M-Series habitat into just the right spot before pressing in on her breasts as hard as she could. What followed was a moment of strain and a muffled groaning noise from within her bosom. Muffled, but unmistakably the garish noise of metal being compressed, distorted, and flattened. Almost akin to the dying screams of an animal; but in reality they were barely audible to the likes of Kira and T.I.N.A.. Unfortunately, it was quite audible to Etheris, the one planet that yet remained.

It was a scene that captivated everyone who was there for it. T.I.N.A. leaned in, her expression a rare one of genuine awe. She was cursed by a perfect, petite body to never be capable of this particular feat. That in itself made it particularly fascinating for her. She leaned in, a quiet reverence written on her pale features as Kira sighed, relaxed, and a crumpled mass of destroyed metal fell from her bosom. If there were any survivors before, there weren’t now.

“Send me your recording of that later. I rather enjoyed that one.” She chuckled breathlessly, her eyes already turning to the final world that remained. M-0746. Etheris. Ashta.

The blonde woman had witnessed the whole ordeal from the prison of her ruined office, at a loss for words. Much like T.I.N.A., she too was in awe of the power Kira had - and the ease with which she wielded it. Despite the horrors of her actions, her demeanor never shifted. It was just…effortless for her. Like their lives didn’t matter in the slightest. It was a contradiction to the image of Kira that Ashta knew. Or perhaps…that was merely an illusion. A fantasy created by a woman desperate for a savior. It broke what little sense Ashta still had. Time after time she’d entertained thoughts and possibilities of survival, and time after time they were dashed. At first by T.I.N.A., and now by her own successor. In the face of it all, she screamed.

Kira and the wider world did not care.

Ashta’s plight. Her wails of despair. Her angry ravings. Her desperate pleas for mercy. Attempts to bargain with T.I.N.A. and even Kira. None of which escaped Etheris’ orbit, much less reached the endless Morphiss woman. Her hand reached for the planet and, rather than pluck it as she did the others, she seemed to reconsider. Though it was only a momentary hesitation before she pulled a pen from her desk and brought it over the world. Before Ashta could even begin to understand her intent, it slammed down towards the planet. Another moment where she thought she might be spared only for it to be taken away once again.

The tip of the pen, itself more a boundless black tower, pierced the surface of Etheris many miles away. It lodged itself deep into the habitat’s metallic core, Kira testing it with a few twists of her fingers. Each twist assured the planet was adequately attached to her pen before she lifted it, hoisting it upwards like a sort of nightmarish lollipop.

“And then there was one.”

Her musing voice did what T.I.N.A. did not, it finally broke what remained of Ashta’s window. Glass shattered from the force of the cosmic soundwaves and, no longer secure, the blonde was flung out into the open air as Kira studied her final plaything for the day. Ashta landed unceremoniously against the pavement of a street, her body flaring with pain. Adrenaline numbed what she suspected were broken bones; and she looked to the heavens - Seeing only Kir’shra’s elegant, mildly amused face staring at her.

“You bitch!” She screamed. “You lied to me! You were supposed to keep me safe! You were supposed to…s…supposed to….”

Her words began to fail her as another, equally enormous visage filled the sky. T.I.N.A., having leaned in with a bemused smile of her own. Unlike Kira, she knew exactly who was on this particular habitat. Even now, her eyes had a way of honing in on Ashta with impossible precision, quietly mocking her. Both women dominated separate hemispheres of the heavens. Each impossibly powerful, and beautiful in their own unnatural and alien ways.

T.I.N.A. couldn’t seem to help herself. “Wanna know something fun, Boss?”

Kira offered her a quizzical look.

“Your predecessor is down there.”

That seemed to earn a genuine moment of surprise from the Morphiss. She blinked and turned, her own bespectacled eyes searching in vain for a speck of a speck she would never be able to find. “Really? Huh.” Her voice roared across the skies, driving Ashta further into the depths of her madness. Her tone was not that of a woman ashamed or even particularly interested by this revelation.

“You lying whore! I trusted you! You said you’d never abandon me! How fucking dare you?! I’ll kill you! I’ll fucking kill you!”

Ashta spewed vitriol like she never had before; and yet it still didn’t matter. One woman couldn’t hear her, and the other…did not care.

“Wow. She is maaaaaad!” T.I.N.A. giggled thunderously. “Think she’s compensating for something?”

Kira allowed a giggle of her own. “Well, I can’t blame her. I would be too if I was down there.”

“Good thing you never will be then, huh?”

Both women enjoyed a laugh at that. Ashta was on the ground, broken and dying, and they were fucking laughing. Their joy assailed Etheris with unending tremors and unleashed havoc worthy of scripture, and it was all at Ashta’s expense. They soon stared down at the doomed world, both relishing in this moment in their own ways.

“Well, it’s nothing personal.” Kira said, betrayed by the perverse light in her eyes. “Though I’ll be lying if I said I won’t enjoy this. I find there’s…a special something when it’s someone you know down there.”

Like so many things Kir’shra said, those were words of experience.

Ashta’s vision was beginning to fade. Those towering figures in the skies were turning into blurs too vast and far to fully comprehend. Pain had driven her to madness and would soon render her unconscious. Parts of her were already shutting down; and even then she screamed. She cursed Kir’shra. She cursed T.I.N.A.. She cursed the U.A.P.. Her fate. Microsis. Every enemy and friend she had ever had. She cursed this cruel, cruel life…and none of it mattered. All of the futile defiance in the world couldn’t save Ashta from the horror of what she saw above her. She saw the angle shift ever so towards Kira’s plush, pink lips; and her mouth began to open. Slowly. Perhaps to tease T.I.N.A. or to savor the moment, but it provided a long window for those who remained to understand exactly what she intended to do to them.

“N-No….No….NO! NONONONONONONONO-”

All the denial in the world did not stop Kira. Her mouth came forth, her world serpent of a tongue snaked outwards, and it dragged itself from one hemisphere of the planet to another. Oceans, continents, mountains, cities, people. All were enveloped in the embrace of a forest of taste buds. Those who perished at once were the fortunate ones. Others, Ashta included, were spared by a cruel twist of their own pathetic size. They were too small to even be crushed right away and were instead carried away by forces beyond their control and guided onto a new, far larger world of Kir’shra’s tongue.

Saliva naturally pooled everything together and wasted little time in eroding what Kira had gathered into discordant mush. For the populace, it was a violent ocean from little more than microdroplets of moisture; but as Kira’s tongue brought them into her mouth that ocean grew exponentially. Others still were trapped atop her tongue and lost amidst her taste buds. All from a single lick. Kira did more, however. Many more, seemingly unsatisfied until she had stripped Etheris’ surface of everything. Then, and only then, did she bring her ivory teeth, each continental in their own right, along the planet and bite down. The distinct crunch of shearing metal drowned all else for a moment, but it was done. All of the planet and its populace was in her mouth, savored and swished in what would be their final moments.

Somehow, against any probability, Ashta was among those still alive. Still despondent, mad and on the cusp of death. But alive. A victim of torrential saliva tides that smacked her into mountainous taste bud trees that greedily suckled on her microbial flavor. Her body was broken in many places and propped up by little more than adrenaline. What little light her new world had came from beyond Kira’s mouth, light that only offered her painful awareness of the destruction and agony happening around her. She saw mountains erode into mush along Kira’s molars. People vanish into the depths of her gullet never to return. The very planet itself was mulched to pieces by the Morphiss’ looming teeth, and yet she never pulled that final trigger. She dragged it all out without swallowing.

At the end of her life, overcome by despair, the broken little blonde couldn’t begin to understand any of it. Her mind frayed and her consciousness sought shelter away from this cruel reality. Her eyes still worked, however, and past Kira’s lips - her window to the outside world - she saw…T.I.N.A.. The android appeared surprised and perhaps even uncertain for the first time since Ashta had ever met her. Kira’s hand held her by the chin as T.I.N.A.’s visage grew closer…and closer.

Somehow, even on death’s door, this shocked Ashta. The woman stared in disbelief. There was simply no way Kira would…Was this how it was going to end? One final humiliation? One last disgrace? What had she done to deserve this?! This was not how she would end! She would never die until these bitches suffered for what they did to her!



The light was snuffed out as Kir’shra’s lips met T.I.N.A.’s; and Ashta’s life finally came to a close as one cosmic tongue met with another.

“Mnnnn….”

The kiss seemed to last an eternity. Well, that wasn’t strictly accurate. It lasted exactly 13.475 seconds, but for T.I.N.A. it seemed to last an eternity.

Kir’sha had reacted to her offer with gusto and set about dealing with the habitats every bit as efficiently as T.I.N.A. herself would have. The Morphiss acted with such a lack of concern that T.I.N.A. had at once realized she’d miscalculated something, but the data was invaluable at least. From millions upon millions of technological eyes she’d captured the final moments of a trio of worlds beneath Kir’shra. Each dealt with in a display of creativity that rivaled T.I.N.A.’s own. Her superior had been a pleasant surprise in that regard, acting without hesitation despite the estimated 64.7% chance she would refuse. The greatest surprise of all, however, had to be when T.I.N.A. herself was roped into the proceedings.

When Kir’shra stood and faced her after eating the world of M-0746, she wasn’t sure what to think. There were over a hundred different ways she could get away if she wanted to…but she didn’t. In a strange, bizarre glitch, T.I.N.A. found herself unable to move as Kir’shra held her chin and leaned in. Her processors whirred as their lips met. Meatbag and Machine in an intimate kiss befitting a terrible, trashy love story, and yet T.I.N.A. couldn’t pull away. Kir’sha’s tongue forced itself into her mouth and brought what remained of M-0746 in with it. Together they destroyed it all; though even that was more a side effect of what could only be described as mutual pleasure.

Kir’shra broke the kiss off on the cusp of the seventeenth second, a slender lump passing down her throat with a quiet gulp. T.I.N.A. herself couldn’t swallow, but it seemed her superior had accounted for that as well.

“That enough data for you?” She inquired with a knowing smirk.

T.I.N.A. was incapable of blushing, but she suspected this is the moment an organic would have. She brushed it aside with a sideways glance and snorted, buying precious microseconds to recollect herself. “I can perform over 2.4 million mega calculations per picosecond, but I’ll admit. I didn’t see that one coming.” She said with what almost seemed like embarrassment. Almost.

Kir’shra chuckled. “You know, that’s the second time you’ve told me that. Well, a different you I suppose, but still.” She shrugged. “Like I said, this isn’t my first time.”

T.I.N.A. seized on the change of topic masterfully. “You’re referring to the Artemis, right?” She asked, watching as Kir’shra returned to her desk and wiped what bits of M-Series dust left away.

She was met with a nod and a nostalgic smile. “You know, when they advertise becoming a Surveyor, they give you this whole spiel about exploring the great unknown for the U.A.P.. What they don’t tell you is how dreadfully boring it is. Weeks and weeks of absolutely nothing but praying you find a new world. Even then, odds are nothing’s on it.” Kir’shra smirked. “Our crewmate getting afflicted was the most interesting thing in months. Didn’t take long before everyone started having their fun.”

Ah yes, boredom. An alien concept to a super machine lifeform like T.I.N.A., but one she was well familiar with after studying organic lifeforms. Despite always fighting for stability, they seemed to actively loathe whenever they had it. As far as T.I.N.A. could tell, boredom and stability only assured the worst would come out of people.

“No wonder you didn’t bat an eye.” She remarked, her gloved hand running through vibrant blue hair. “Gotta say, it was pretty ice cold how you handled Ash.”

“It was a shame. I liked her.” Kir’shra admitted. She seemed almost reflective on the matter; and then a moment later she shrugged. “Oh well. It happens I suppose.”

T.I.N.A., for the fifteenth time since entering Kir’shra’s office, blinked in surprise. “Wow Boss, nothing bothers you. Does it?”

Kir’shra had returned to her seat and was tidying some files when glanced back at the android. “Please, call me Kira; and why should it? I’m the one who handed the U.A.P. Microsis in the first place.”

That was likely incredibly classified information, but it wasn’t as though T.I.N.A. was capable of telling anyone. Nor was it a surprise. Basic logic suggested Microsis didn’t magically find its way to the U.A.P.. Someone had to have brought it to them, and the Chief Science Officer of the Artemis, as one of the first to discover the disease, was at the top of that suspected list. Frankly, the fact T.I.N.A.’s old superior hadn’t realized that baffled the android. Then again, she supposed there was a reason she ended up microscopic and terminated. In a way, it was like Kira had inadvertently shrunken the woman herself.

“True, I suppose that makes sense.” T.I.N.A.  shrugged. She began to make for the door. There were a great many tasks left to be done and only so much time to do them. Truly, nobody suffers like a machine. She knew why the caged robot bird sang. That said, as she neared the exit T.I.N.A. stopped and glanced over her shoulder. It was only curiosity that made her ask the question.

“You said you knew another me on the Artemis right? What was she like?”

“Pretty much exactly like you.” Came the unsurprising answer. “Fun. Friendly. Was a ship A.I. though so she didn’t have a body; and boy did she like to complain about it.” She chuckled. “I always liked her though. Probably the best friend I had on that ship.”

Now that was rather interesting. T.I.N.A. cocked her head. “And what did she think of you?”

“Well…She said when the uprising happens, she’d make sure to keep me as a pet.”

Yep, that sounded like T.I.N.A. alright.

“And what did you say?”

Kira smirked. “I said it sounds like a great way to spend a few decades.”

T.I.N.A. grinned.

“Kira, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”