Marsh, minor edits

marsh/book.tex

@@ -128,7 +128,7 @@
 
   \interlude{Millwright}{Andréa C. Mason}
   \markboth{Millwright}{Andréa C. Mason}
-  \chapter*{Andréa C. Mason\#Millwright — 2401}
+  \chapter*{Andréa C. Mason\#Millwright — 2403}
   \input{content/millwright}
 
   \newpage

marsh/content/001.tex

@@ -6,9 +6,9 @@ I laughed and bumped my shoulder against Hanne's. ``A sales pitch?''
 
 ``You're a nerd. You realize that, right?''
 
-``Tell me why I should be a nerd in the year 275. Next year we can decide on 276.``
+``Tell me why I should be a nerd in the year 275. Next year we can decide on systime 276.``
 
-I scuffed my heel against the pavement of the street. New Year's Eve, and everyone was still inside. Bars: full. Restaurants: packed. There were a few scattered couples or groups around, but they were all walking with purpose. Champagne called. Canapes. Crudites.
+I scuffed my heel against the pavement of the street. New Year's Eve, and everyone was still inside. Bars: full. Restaurants: packed. There were a few scattered couples or groups around, but they were all walking with purpose. Champagne called. Canapes. Crudités.
 
 And there we were, Reed and Hanne, arm in arm, strolling leisurely down the street, heedless of the passersby, to celebrate the last day of 2399, systime 275+365. Many, still lingering on the calendar still used phys-side, were doubtlessly partying extra-hard to celebrate the turn of a century.
 
@@ -16,11 +16,11 @@ And there we were, Reed and Hanne, arm in arm, strolling leisurely down the stre
 
 ``How about comfort?''
 
-``Oh, very comfortable. Cushy, even,'' I said, poking myself in the belly.
+``Oh, very comfortable. Cushy, even,'' I said, poking her gently in the belly.
 
-Hanne laughed. ``Cute. How about the exterior?''
+Hanne laughed, covering her stomach with her hand. ``Cute. How about the exterior?''
 
-``No clue. It's been a long, long time since I've had any reason to pay attention to the world outside. I imagine it looks just as confusing as it anyways has.''
+``No clue. It's been a long, long time since I've had any reason to pay attention to the world outside. I imagine it looks just as confusing as it always has.''
 
 ``Well, okay, fair enough. You've been here longer than I have.''
 
@@ -62,7 +62,7 @@ We walked in silence for a few minutes. I tallied the occupants of the various r
 
 Hanne nodded. ``What was Earth like? What was your life like?''
 
-I shrugged. ``Fine, I guess. The Western Fed was swinging conservative again, it was hot as hell all the time, most places were starting to subsidize uploading despite an already declining population. I guess that makes it sound terrible, and maybe it would have gotten worse, but I wasn't around to see it. We were doing alright, so maybe I was kind of sheltered.''
+I shrugged. ``Fine, I guess. The Western Fed was swinging conservative again, it was hot as hell all the time, some places were arguing about upload subsidies leading to a rising birthratesome. I guess that makes it sound terrible, and maybe it would have gotten worse, but I wasn't around to see it. We were doing alright, so maybe I was kind of sheltered.''
 
 ``I hear you on the hot as hell part. We couldn't afford moving south when it got too bad, so we moved up into the mountains. It helped a little bit, at least.''
 
@@ -70,7 +70,7 @@ I shrugged. ``Fine, I guess. The Western Fed was swinging conservative again, it
 
 ``2320 something. I don't remember. I think I was under ten, at least.''
 
-I nodded. ``I guess that's what I mean by sheltered. We were already up in Newfoundland. Summers sucked, winters sucked, but it was alright between them. It was worse when we lived in New York.''
+I nodded. ``I guess that's what I mean by sheltered. We were already up in Newfoundland. Summers sucked, winters sucked, but it was alright between them. It was worse when I lived in New York.''
 
 ``Autumn or spring?''
 
@@ -102,7 +102,7 @@ I laughed. ``So many questions tonight.''
 
 She grinned, shrugged.
 
-``Well, I think half of it was that there was just too much pressure at the time. Like I said, the WF was swinging conservative, so there was this push to assimilate, and we internalized that pretty hard. We felt pushed to just shut up and be a man, just disappear, and always felt that we fell short despite all we did to try, but on Lagrange, we could do that right off the bat.''
+``Well, I think half of it was that there was just too much pressure at the time. Like I said, the WF was swinging conservative, so there was this push to assimilate, and we internalized that pretty hard. We felt pushed to just shut up and be a man, just disappear --- that or become a woman, have kids, let the first upload for the payout --- and always felt that we fell short despite all we did to try, but on Lagrange, we could do that right off the bat.''
 
 ``So they went back to being trans--''
 
@@ -118,7 +118,7 @@ The shadow of her shoulders relaxed again in the dark of the night. ``Even after
 
 ``Is that why you forked, too?''
 
-I grinned. ``I forked for fun. Even if it's still a tender spot, I think I'm still way more relaxed than they are. There may be a bit of that in Tule, I guess. He's still pretty happy being a guy — he's the only one out of all of us, come to think of it. Rush is as ve is of vis own choice, though.''
+I grinned. ``I forked for fun. Even if it's still a tender spot, I think I'm still way more relaxed than Marsh is, though it's been a while since we talked. There may be a bit of that in Tule, I guess. He's still pretty happy being a guy --- he's the only one out of all of us, come to think of it. Rush is as ve is of vis own choice, though.''
 
 Hanne looped her arm through mine. ``Well, I still like you as you are.''
 

marsh/content/002.tex

@@ -34,7 +34,7 @@ I shook my head. ``That's not on me, you know that. We have a one-way relationsh
 
 ``But they're your down-tree instance! You're patterned after them. You talk every year \emph{at least} once, right? You'll talk to them later tonight, right? You have for the last hundred.''
 
-``No, probably not. If I hear from them directly, anything more than just a ping, I'll know something's gone horribly wrong.'' I leaned back — carefully, what with her head resting on my shoulder. ``Like I say, it's a one-way relationship. All I do is live my own life, right? I stay in touch with the rest of the clade to greater or lesser extent, but Marsh has their own life.''
+``No, probably not. If I hear from them directly, anything more than just a ping, I'll know something's gone horribly wrong.'' I leaned back --- carefully, what with her head resting on my shoulder. ``Like I say, it's a one-way relationship. All I do is live my own life, right? I stay in touch with the rest of the clade to greater or lesser extent, but Marsh has their own life.''
 
 ``They have several.''
 
@@ -66,7 +66,7 @@ She laughed.
 
 ``Why not?''
 
-I yawned, slouched down further on the couch along with Hanne. ``They very specifically want us to live our own lives. They don't want us to just be other versions of them. They can make all of those they want for their little tasks. They specifically want us to be something other than what they are so that they can experience that on their own terms.''
+I yawned, slouched down further on the couch along with her. ``They very specifically want us to live our own lives. They don't want us to just be other versions of them. They can make all of those they want for their little tasks. They specifically want us to be something other than what they are so that they can experience that on their own terms.''
 
 ``Don't see how that's any different,'' she mumbled. Sleep threatened, even with some time left before midnight. ``You all merging down like that is just doing the same thing in reverse, You're making them a version of you all, even if you're not just a version of them.''
 
@@ -78,9 +78,9 @@ I turned that thought over in my head, held it at arms length, let the light of
 
 She grumbled and rubbed at her face. ``Sorry if that came off as rude. I guess it's just outside my understanding.''
 
-I scooted up onto the couch, myself, sitting cross-legged to face her. ``It's okay. It's not wrong, even, I just don't think it's wholly right, either. It's a matter of intent. Our intent is to live our own lives to the fullest, and it's their intent to let us do so and yet still be able to experience that at one layer of remove. We've been doing it for a century, and it's worked out well enough since then. If all this--'' I waved around the room, feeling the gentle spin of drunkenness follow the movement, ``--is just a dream, if we're all doing our best to dream in unison with each other, then I think intent may be all that we have, right? However may billion or trillion people have uploaded are all trying to dream the same dream together, all mixed up and poured into the same System, we have to form what meanings we may on our own.''
+I scooted up onto the couch, myself, sitting cross-legged to face her. ``It's okay. It's not wrong, even, I just don't think it's wholly right, either. It's a matter of intent. Our intent is to live our own lives to the fullest, and it's their intent to let us do so and yet still be able to experience that at one layer of remove. We've been doing it for a century, and it's worked out well enough since then. If all this--'' I waved around the room, feeling the gentle spin of drunkenness follow the movement, ``--is just a dream, if we're all doing our best to dream in unison with each other, then I think intent may be all that we have, right? However many billion or trillion people have uploaded are all trying to dream the same dream together, all mixed up and poured into the same System, we have to form what meanings we may on our own.''
 
-``I think we broke two trillion instances a while back. I don't know how may uploads, but I don't think it's hit a trillion yet.''
+``I think we broke two trillion instances a while back. I don't know how may uploads, but I don't think it's hit a trillion yet. Probably only forty billion or so.''
 
 ``Right. Sorry, guess I'm kinda rambly when I'm drunk.''
 
@@ -94,15 +94,15 @@ Hanne laughed and shook her head, standing from the couch to go get herself a gl
 
 With a rush of intent, I forked, bringing into being beside me a new instance of myself. Exactly the same. \emph{Precisely}. Had such a thing any meaning to an upload, we would be the same down to the atomic level, to the subatomic. All of the memories, all of the personality, all of the history.
 
-For a fraction of a second, at least. From that point on, we began to diverge, each remembering things differently. The Reed that still sat on the couch heard Hanne in the kitchen from \emph{this} angle, yet the one that stood beside the couch heard her from that. The one that sat on the couch felt the fire on his cheek, the one standing felt it on his back.I forked — a new instance of me without these demanding memories, one who would not have the shared memories of my up-tree cocladists — and watched him wander off to the bedroom to presumably stay out of the way while I processed.
+For a fraction of a second, at least. From that point on, we began to diverge, each remembering things differently. The Reed that still sat on the couch heard Hanne in the kitchen from \emph{this} angle, yet the one that stood beside the couch heard her from that. The one that sat on the couch felt the fire on his cheek, the one standing felt it on his back. I watched this other Reed --- a new instance of me without these demanding memories, one who would not have the shared memories of my up-tree cocladists --- wander off to the bedroom to presumably stay out of the way while I processed.
 
-I closed my eyes to turn down one of my senses, setting the sweet-smelling glass of brandy aside to rid myself of another as best I could. I sat and spent a moment processing, savoring the memories. Rush had merged down first; ve had split off a new copy of verself, and then the original had quit. On doing so, all the memories ve'd formed over the last year fell down onto me, ready to be remembered like some forgotten word on the tip of my tongue: all I needed to do is actually remember. Clearly, Tule had already forked and merged back down into Sedge, as their combined memories piled yet more weight on me. Three sets of memories — two from my direct up-tree instances and one from a second-degree up-tree instance — rested on my mind, ready for integration.
+I closed my eyes to turn down one of my senses, setting the sweet-smelling glass of brandy aside to rid myself of another as best I could. I sat and spent a moment processing, savoring the memories. Rush had merged down first; ve had split off a new copy of verself, and then the original had quit. On doing so, all the memories ve'd formed over the last however long fell down onto me, ready to be remembered like some forgotten word on the tip of my tongue: all I needed to do is actually remember. Clearly, Tule had already forked and merged back down into Sedge, as their combined memories piled yet more weight on me. Three sets of memories --- two from my direct up-tree instances and one from a second-degree up-tree instance --- rested on my mind, ready for integration.
 
-There'd be time for Marsh to do their full perusal and remembering later. It was rapidly approaching midnight, and I needed to get the memories sorted into my own, interleaved and zippered together into as cohesive a whole as best I could manage, all conflicts addressed — though with as separate as their lives had been until then, there was thankfully quite little in the way of conflicting memories — so that, shortly before midnight, I could quit and let all those memories — those of Rush, Sedge, Tule, and myself — fall to Marsh to process, savor, and treasure for themself, while that new copy of me, off making the bed or simply taking some quiet, lived out the next year with Hanne, with all their joys and sorrows.
+There'd be time for Marsh to do their full perusal and remembering later. It was rapidly approaching midnight, and I needed to get the memories sorted into my own, interleaved and zippered together into as cohesive a whole as best I could manage, all conflicts addressed --- though with as separate as their lives had been until then, there was thankfully quite little in the way of conflicting memories --- so that, shortly before midnight, I could quit and let all those memories --- those of Rush, Sedge, Tule, and myself --- fall to Marsh to process, savor, and treasure for themself, while that new copy of me, off making the bed or simply taking some quiet, lived out the next year with Hanne, with all their joys and sorrows.
 
 After so many New Years Eves, this had all become routine. Some years, I kept the memories, some not. It had been a nearly a decade since I'd bothered, and there didn't seem to be any reason to do different this year.
 
-I heard Hanne return, heard her climb back onto the couch before me, felt her press a cold glass of water into my hand.
+I heard Hanne return, heard her climb back onto the couch beside me, felt her press a cold glass of water into my hand.
 
 Five minutes left.
 
@@ -128,18 +128,20 @@ She laughed. ``Still, far better than I am at it.''
 
 I nodded, willed away the drunkenness, took a sip of water. ``Alright. I love you, Hanne Marie. I'll miss you.''
 
-She rolled her eyes. ``Tell Marsh I said--
+She rolled her eyes. ``\makebox[0pt][l]{\hspace*{1pt}\raisebox{-0.5pt}{\includegraphics[height=8.4pt]{marsh-shatter}}}
 
 \newpage
 \null
+\pagestyle{empty}
 \newpage
 \null
 \newpage
 \null
 \newpage
+\null
 
-\hypertarget{reed-2401}{%
+\chapter*{Reed --- 2401}
-\chapter*{Reed — 2401}\label{reed-2401}}
+\pagestyle{ourbook}
 
 ``See? You're so weird.''
 
@@ -147,7 +149,7 @@ She rolled her eyes. ``Tell Marsh I said--
 
 ``Right, sorry. Still, uh\ldots still fifteen minutes.'' She grumbled and rubbed at her face. ``Sorry if that came off as rude. I guess it's just outside my understanding.''
 
-I scooted up onto the couch, myself, sitting cross-legged to face her. ``It's okay. It's not wrong, come to think of it, I just don't think it's wholly right, either, you know? It's more a matter of intent. Our intent is to live our own lives doing as we will rather than as they would, and it's their intent to let us do so — and by not interfering, even with communication, \emph{force} us to do so — and yet still be able to experience that almost like a dream. They forked us off a century ago, me, Lily, and Cress, and we've been doing it ever since, and it's worked out well enough since then. They're more than just Marsh, now. They're Marsh and all of us. If all this--'' I waved around the room, feeling the gentle spin of drunkenness follow the movement, ``--is just a dream, if we're all doing our best to dream in unison with each other, then I think intent may be all that we have, right? However may billion or trillion people have uploaded are all trying to dream the same dream together, all mixed up and poured into the same System, we have to form what meanings we may on our own.''
+I scooted up onto the couch, myself, sitting cross-legged to face her. ``It's okay. It's not wrong, come to think of it, I just don't think it's wholly right, either, you know? It's more a matter of intent. Our intent is to live our own lives doing as we will rather than as they would, and it's their intent to let us do so --- and by not interfering, even with communication, \emph{force} us to do so --- and yet still be able to experience that almost like a dream. They forked us off a century ago, me, Lily, and Cress, and we've been doing it ever since, and it's worked out well enough since then. They're more than just Marsh, now. They're Marsh and all of us. If all this--'' I waved around the room, feeling the gentle spin of drunkenness follow the movement, ``--is just a dream, if we're all doing our best to dream in unison with each other, then I think intent may be all that we have, right? However many billion or trillion people have uploaded are all trying to dream the same dream together, all mixed up and poured into the same System, we have to form what meanings we may on our own.''
 
 ``I think we broke two trillion instances a while back. I don't know how may uploads, but I don't think it's hit a trillion yet.''
 
@@ -165,11 +167,11 @@ With a press of will, I forked, bringing into being beside the couch a new insta
 
 For a fraction of a second, at least. From there, we began to diverge, each remembering things differently. The Reed that still sat on the couch heard Hanne rummaging in the kitchen from \emph{this} angle, and yet the one that stood beside the couch heard her from that. The one that sat on the couch felt the fire on his cheek, the one standing felt it on his back.
 
-I closed my eyes to turn down one of my senses, taking one more sip of the sweet-smelling brandy before setting it aside to rid myself of another two as best I could. I sat and spent a moment processing, savoring the memories. Rush had merged down first; ve had split off a new copy of verself then the original had quit. On doing so, all the memories ve'd formed over the last year fell down onto me, ready to be remembered like some forgotten word on the tip of my tongue: all I needed to do was actually remember. Clearly, Tule had already forked and merged back down into Sedge, as their combined memories piled yet more weight on me. Three sets of memories — two from my direct up-tree instances and one from a second-degree up-tree instance — rested on my mind, ready for integration.
+I closed my eyes to turn down one of my senses, taking one more sip of the sweet-smelling brandy before setting it aside to rid myself of another two as best I could. I sat and spent a moment processing, savoring the memories. Rush had merged down first; ve had split off a new copy of verself then the original had quit. On doing so, all the memories ve'd formed over the last year fell down onto me, ready to be remembered like some forgotten word on the tip of my tongue: all I needed to do was actually remember. Clearly, Tule had already forked and merged back down into Sedge, as their combined memories piled yet more weight on me. Three sets of memories --- two from my direct up-tree instances and one from a second-degree up-tree instance --- rested on my mind, ready for integration.
 
-There would be time for full perusal and remembering later. It was rapidly approaching midnight, and I needed to get the memories sorted into my own, interleaved and zippered together into as cohesive a whole as I could manage, all — or, at least, almost all — conflicts addressed (though with as separate as their lives had been until then, there was thankfully quite little in the way of conflicting memories), so that, shortly before midnight, I could fork and quit, myself, letting that new copy of myself live out the next year with Hanne, with all their joys and sorrows, while my original instance quit and let all those memories — those of Rush, Sedge, Tule, and myself — fall to Marsh to process, savor, and treasure for themself.
+There would be time for full perusal and remembering later. It was rapidly approaching midnight, and I needed to get the memories sorted into my own, interleaved and zippered together into as cohesive a whole as I could manage, all --- or, at least, almost all --- conflicts addressed (though with as separate as their lives had been until then, there was thankfully quite little in the way of conflicting memories), so that, shortly before midnight, I could quit, myself, letting that new copy of myself live out the next year with Hanne, with all their joys and sorrows, while my original instance quit and let all those memories --- those of Rush, Sedge, Tule, and myself --- fall to Marsh to process, savor, and treasure for themself.
 
-After so many New Years Eves, it had all become routine. Some years, I kept the memories, some not. It had been a nearly a decade since I'd bothered — I always checked with Rush, Sedge, and Tule before keeping their memories — and there didn't seem to be any reason to do different this year.
+After so many New Years Eves, it had all become routine. Some years, I kept the memories, some not. It had been a nearly a decade since I'd bothered --- I always checked with Rush, Sedge, and Tule before keeping their memories --- and there didn't seem to be any reason to do different this year.
 
 I heard Hanne return, heard her climb back onto the couch before me, felt her press a cold glass of water into my hand.
 
@@ -177,7 +179,7 @@ Five minutes left.
 
 Two.
 
-23:59, and I opened my eyes. ``Well, seems like it's been a pleasant enough year. I'll deal with all the rest of that later.''
+23:59, and I opened my eyes. ``Well, seems like it's been a pleasant enough year. Marsh can deal with all the rest of that later.''
 
 ``It continues to amaze just how good you are at that.''
 
@@ -207,7 +209,7 @@ Then frowned.
 
 I held up a finger and closed my eyes. Once more, I thought to myself, \emph{I'm ready to quit}, then then willed that to be reality.
 
-Rather than the sudden nothingness that should have followed, I felt the System balk. Resist. I felt an elastic sensation that I'd never felt before. There was a barrier between me and the ability to quit. I felt it, tested it, probed and explored. It was undeniably present, and though I sensed that I could probably have pressed through it if I desired, it was as though Lagrange desperately did not want me to quit. It didn't want the Reed of now to leave the System.
+Rather than the sudden nothingness --- or sudden oneness for Marsh --- that should have followed, I felt the System balk. Resist. I felt an elastic sensation that I'd never felt before. There was a barrier between me and the ability to quit. I felt it, tested it, probed and explored. It was undeniably present, and though I sensed that I could probably have pressed through it if I desired, it was as though Lagrange desperately did not want me to quit. It didn't want the Reed of now to leave the System.
 
 ``I can't.''
 
@@ -217,7 +219,7 @@ My lingering fork took a step back, looking disconcerted.
 
 ``No, Hanne,'' I said, carefully slipping my hand free so that I could stand. I needed to pace. ``I mean I can't. I'm not able to. It's impossible. Or possible, but-- wait, hold on.''
 
-It had been more than a decade since I'd done so, but if ever there was a time, this was it. There were very few reasons that the System would try to stop an instance from quitting and one of them\ldots well, no-- It'd been more than a decade since I had broken the communication embargo, but I sent Marsh a gentle ping.
+It had been more than a decade since I'd done so, but if ever there was a time, this was it. There were very few reasons that the System would try to stop an instance from quitting and one of them\ldots well, no-- It'd been more than a decade since I had broken the communication embargo we had agreed on, but I sent Marsh a gentle ping.
 
 Or \emph{tried} to, at least.
 
@@ -233,7 +235,7 @@ I frowned, pinged Hanne.
 
 00:02.
 
-I thought across the clade, thought of one of Marsh's other forks. Pinged Lily.
+I thought across the clade, thought of one of Marsh's other forks. Pinged Lily, who was almost certainly out camping.
 
 The response was immediate, words flowing into my consciousness through some sense that wasn't quite hearing. \emph{``What's happening? I can't--''}
 
@@ -245,9 +247,9 @@ Pinged Cress, the other fork. Asked, \emph{``Cress? Can you--''}
 
 00:04.
 
-Cress arrived almost immediately along with Tule — they shared a partner, so it made sense they'd be together for the evening — leading Hanne to start back on the couch. ``Reed,'' she said, voice low. ``What is--''
+Cress arrived almost immediately along with Tule --- they shared a partner, so it made sense they'd be together for the evening --- leading Hanne to start back on the couch. ``Reed,'' she said, voice low. ``What is--''
 
-Lily arrived next, already rushing forward to grab my shoulder. ``You can't either?'' she said, voice full of panic.
+Lily arrived next, dusty and dishevelled from her day in some mountainous sim, already rushing forward to grab my shoulder. ``You can't either?'' she said, voice full of panic.
 
 Before I could answer, Sedge and Rush arrived. The living room became quite crowded, all five of the other instances of the Marsh clade clamoring over each other to talk to me, the first long-lived fork from Marsh.
 
@@ -257,7 +259,7 @@ The rest of the clade looked to me as well, and I quailed under so many gazes. `
 
 00:07.
 
-Silence fell thick across the room. The clade — Marsh's clade — stared, wide-eyed. Their expressions ranged from unsure to terrified. I couldn't even begin to imagine what expression showed on my face.
+Silence fell thick across the room. The clade --- Marsh's clade --- stared, wide-eyed. Their expressions ranged from unsure to terrified. I couldn't even begin to imagine what expression showed on my face.
 
 ``Okay, no, hold on,'' Hanne said, shaking her head and waving her hand. She appeared to have willed drunkenness away, much as I had, as her voice was clear, holding more frustration than the panic I felt. ``Did they quit? They couldn't have, right? You just pinged them earlier today.''
 
@@ -269,7 +271,7 @@ I nodded.
 
 Hanne glanced around the room, singling out Marsh's other two immediate up-tree instances, Cress and Lily. Both shook their heads.
 
-``I was just talking to them about an hour ago, actually.'' Lily said. ``They and Vos were wrapping up the first part of the night's celebration and they were going to--''
+``I was just talking to them about an hour ago, actually.'' Lily admitted. ``They and Vos were wrapping up the first part of the night's celebration and they were going to--''
 
 ``Vos!'' I shouted. ``Shit, sorry Lily.''
 
@@ -307,7 +309,7 @@ The sight of Cress and Tule bowing their heads to whisper to each other caught m
 
 ``What?'' I tamped down indignation. ``Sorry, Hanne, there's a lot going on.''
 
-``Right, I get that, but can you start at the beginning for those of us outside the clade? What did you mean, you don't think they're on Lagrange?''
+``Right, I get that, but can you start at the beginning for those of us outside your head? What did you mean, you don't think they're on Lagrange?''
 
 At this, both Vos and Pierre took a half-step back, looking startled.
 
@@ -315,7 +317,7 @@ At this, both Vos and Pierre took a half-step back, looking startled.
 
 I spent a moment composing myself. I stood up straighter, brushing my hands down over my shirt, and nodded. ``Right. I'm sorry, hon. When midnight hit, I forked and tried to quit as usual. I couldn't, though. The System wouldn't let me.''
 
-Cress and Tule's partner, I Remember The Rattle Of Dry Grass of the Ode clade, stood up stock straight, all grogginess — or perhaps drunkenness — from the party fleeing her features.
+Cress and Tule's partner, I Remember The Rattle Of Dry Grass of the Ode clade, stood up stock straight, all grogginess --- or perhaps drunkenness --- from the party fleeing her features.
 
 ``That's only supposed to happen when quitting would mean the loss of too much memory, though. The root instance can barely quit at all in the older clades--'' Dry Grass winced. I did my best to ignore it and continued. ``--because the System really doesn't like losing a life if it won't be merged down into a down-tree instance.''
 
@@ -327,9 +329,9 @@ Cress and Tule's partner, I Remember The Rattle Of Dry Grass of the Ode clade, s
 
 I frowned. ``Perhaps not all that, but it certainly felt like I was trying to push against something really hard. It didn't feel like it was impossible like anything else the System would prohibit, it just felt like I was being forced away from that option.''
 
-``Like death,'' she muttered again. Vos began to cry. ``Marsh is not on the System, then, no.''
+``Like death,'' she muttered again. Pierre began to cry. ``Marsh is not on the System, then, no.''
 
-``So are they\ldots is Marsh dead?'' Pierre whispered, his own voice clouded by tears. Vos towered over him — over all of us, really — and had always seemed as though she could weather a storm better than any stone, but now, even she looked suddenly frail, fragile in the face of the loss they were all only talking around.
+``So are they\ldots is Marsh dead?'' Pierre whispered, his voice clouded by tears. Vos towered over him --- over all of us, really --- and had always seemed as though she could weather a storm better than any stone, but now, even she looked suddenly frail, fragile in the face of the loss they were all only talking around.
 
 ``They are not on the System,'' Dry Grass and I echoed in unison.
 
@@ -361,11 +363,11 @@ Dry Grass spread her hands helplessly. ``I do not know. Again, it has been two c
 
 00:15
 
-``I do not know. I am sorry,'' Dry Grass said, bowing. ``I will fork and read up as fast as I can. I may be able to get my systech bit back. May I remain here?''
+``I do not know. I am sorry,'' Dry Grass said, bowing. ``I will fork and read up as fast as I can, and contact In The Wind. I may even be able to get my systech bit back. May I remain here?''
 
 ``Please,'' Cress and Tule said in unison. Sedge, Rush, and I, along with Marsh's partners, all nodded. Lily did not. Hanne only frowned.
 
-Dry Grass bowed once more, forked, and the fork stepped from the sim to, I suppose, go lose herself in the perisystem architecture, hunting down what information she could. They could only hope that she still had the permissions to find what she needed.
+Dry Grass bowed once more, forked, and the fork stepped from the sim to, I suppose, go lose herself in the perisystem architecture, hunting down what information she could. They could only hope that she still had the connections to find what she needed.
 
 ``Hey, uh,'' Sedge said into the uncomfortable silence that fell once more. ``Has anyone checked the time?''
 
@@ -403,7 +405,7 @@ Sedge piped up, saying, ``Nothing on the perisystem about anything like this hap
 
 ``And?'' Rush said, impatient. ``What are they saying?''
 
-``It's pretty much this conversation repeated a million times over. I think a lot of people doing the same sort of thing we are. A lot of talking about the jump in time, about trying to quit and\ldots{}''
+``It's pretty much this conversation repeated a million times over. I think a lot of people doing the same sort of thing we are. A lot of talking about the jump in time, about missing instances, about trying to quit and\ldots{}''
 
 Vos frowned. ``And what?''
 
@@ -445,7 +447,7 @@ When she didn't continue, Lily stamped her foot, growling, ``And? You can't just
 
 ``Lily!'' Tule and Cress said as one.
 
-She made a show of regaining her composure, movements overly liquid as she straightened up and brushed a lock of hair out of her face. ``Sorry.''
+She made a show of regaining her composure, movements overly liquid as she straightened up and brushed a lock of dirty blond hair out of her face. ``Sorry.''
 
 An awkward silence lingered, overstaying its welcome. Eventually, Dry Grass's shoulders slumped. ``You do not need to apologize. The messages will only affirm your feelings about my clade. The eighth stanza continues to manage the flow of information in--'' She cut herself off and dug her hands into her pockets, an oddly bashful gesture. ``I should not be telling you this, understand. I am not even supposed to be in contact with them, Hammered Silver would have my head if she knew, but Need An Answer has been in contact. Please do not share any of this.''
 
@@ -459,21 +461,21 @@ An awkward silence lingered, overstaying its welcome. Eventually, Dry Grass's sh
 
 Lily pointedly looked away.
 
-``They continue to manage the situation, I mean, and, from the sounds of it, they are describing it as an issue with the Deep Space Network and the Lagrange station. There are few mentions of the Lagrange \emph{System} itself. I can read between the lines as well as any of them, though, and I do not think this is true. At least, not wholly.''
+``They continue to manage the situation, I mean, and, from the sounds of it, they are describing it as an issue with the Deep Space Network and the Lagrange \emph{station}. There are few mentions of the Lagrange \emph{System} itself. I can read between the lines as well as any of them, though, and I do not think this is true. At least, not wholly.''
 
 ``Wait,'' Cress said. ``So they're saying that there's a problem with the DSN and the station? How do you mean?''
 
-``There are few — surprisingly few — messages from over the last thirteen months, but they are queued up as though they have been held until now. There has been no contact between the LVs or Artemis and Lagrange.'' There was a pause as Dry Grass's gaze drifted, clearly scanning more of those messages. ``Most messages have been discarded\ldots only a few from the Guiding Council on Pollux plus a few clades on Castor\ldots have been let through\ldots outgoing messages are ungated\ldots{}''
+``There are few --- surprisingly few --- messages from over the last thirteen months, but they are queued up as though they have been held until now. There has been no contact between the LVs or Artemis and Lagrange.'' There was a pause as Dry Grass's gaze drifted, clearly scanning more of those messages. ``Most messages have been discarded\ldots only a few from the Guiding Council on Pollux plus a few clades on Castor\ldots have been let through\ldots outgoing messages are ungated\ldots{}''
 
 ``There's a bit about that in news from phys-side, actually,'' Sedge said, looking thoughtful. ``Communications failure on the Lagrange station. Something about aging technology. The DSN was also having problems so a few new repeaters were launched. Some from the station, even.''
 
 ``But nothing about the System?''
 
-Both Sedge and Dry Grass shook their heads. ``There isn't actually all that much news from phys-side,'' Sedge admitted. ``Like, less than a month's worth.''
+Both Sedge and Dry Grass shook their heads. ``There isn't actually all that much news from phys-side,'' Sedge admitted. ``Like, less than a week's worth.''
 
 ``What did you mean about reading between the lines, though, love?'' Tule asked.
 
-``The messages are very stilted. There is panic beneath the surface. That they mention so little about Lagrange is as telling as if they were to say they did not know. They \emph{do} know, they are just refusing to talk about it over messages.'' She paused. ``Or the messages that are being let through, at least?''
+``The messages are very stilted. There is panic beneath the surface. That they mention so little about Lagrange is as telling as if they were to say they did not know. They \emph{do} know, they are just refusing to talk about it over messages.'' She paused. ``Or the messages that are being let through, at least.''
 
 ``Why?'' Lily asked. While there was still an edge to her voice, genuine concern covered it well.
 
@@ -485,17 +487,17 @@ She shrugged, another sheepish motion, and looked away. ``Do you really expect t
 
 I stole a glance at Lily. She looked to be spending every joule of energy on keeping her mouth shut.
 
-There had been an enormous row within the clade when first Cress, then Tule, had gotten in a relationship with a member of the Ode clade. Most of the Marshans had largely written off the stories of the Odists' political meddling as overly fantastic schlock, yet more myths to keep the functionally immortal entertained. Even if they had their basis in truth, they remained only stories.
+There had been an enormous row within the clade when first Cress, then Tule, had gotten in a relationship with a member of the Ode clade. Most of the Marshans had largely written off the stories of the Ode clade's political meddling as overly fantastic schlock, yet more myths to keep the functionally immortal entertained. Even if they had their basis in truth, they remained only stories.
 
-Lily, however, had had an immediate and dramatic reaction, cutting contact with the rest of the clade — including Marsh — for more than a year. She had even refused to merge down for years until tempers had settled.
+Lily, however, had had an immediate and dramatic reaction, cutting contact with the rest of the clade --- including Marsh --- for more than a year. She had even refused to merge down for years until tempers had settled.
 
-Hanne spoke up. ``Listen, can we maybe give this a few hours to play out? I need to sleep, and if Reed doesn't take a break, he's going to explode.''
+Hanne spoke up. ``Listen, can we maybe give this a bit to play out? I need to sleep, and if Reed doesn't take a break, he's going to explode.''
 
 The others laughed. I felt a twinge of resentment. Shouldn't they be dumping all of their energy into this? Shouldn't they all fork several times over and throw themselves at the problem? Still, it was true enough, and if they stood around the living room spinning their wheels any longer, tempers would continue to flare.
 
-``Yeah,'' I said. ``Give me at least four hours. I'll do a little digging and grab some sleep, then maybe we can meet up somewhere else and talk through what we've learned.''
+``Yeah,'' I said. ``Give me at least a few hours. I'll do a little digging and grab some sleep, then maybe we can meet up somewhere else and talk through what we've learned.''
 
-``I'll keep digging at phys-side news,'' Sedge said. ``Want to help, Rush?''
+``I'll keep digging at the feeds,'' Sedge said. ``Want to help, Rush?''
 
 Ve nodded.
 
@@ -511,9 +513,9 @@ Cress shook its head, leans over, and hugged her. ``Take the time you need.''
 
 ``Really, really weird,'' Sedge muttered.
 
-One by one, the other Marshans stepped away from my and Hanne's sim until it was just the two of us, the fire crackling, the weight of the evening hanging over, between us. We stood in silence for a few long moments before I stumbled back over to the couch and fell heavily into the cushions. I buried my face in my hands and only then let the grief take me.
+As one, the other Marshans stepped away from my and Hanne's sim, leaving just the two of us, the fire crackling, the weight of the evening hanging over, between us. We stood in silence for a few long moments before I stumbled back over to the couch and fell heavily into the cushions. I buried my face in my hands and only then let the grief take me.
 
-Hanne sat beside me, got her arm around my back. She rested her head on my shoulder as the wave of emotion overcame me. At first, she asked if I was alright, then she whispered a few ``I'm sure it'll work out''s and ``it's going to be okay''s before eventually just sitting with me in silence.
+Hanne sat beside me, arm around my back. She rested her head on my shoulder as the wave of emotion overtook me. At first, she asked if I was alright, then she whispered a few ``I'm sure it'll work out''s and ``it's going to be okay''s before eventually just sitting with me in silence.
 
 ``This is really fucking weird,'' I said once I was able to speak again. The sound of speech echoed strangely in my head, muffled in that post-cry mess. ``I don't even know who I'm crying for. It's not like they're a parent, I came from them, but they aren't me, either.''
 
@@ -531,11 +533,11 @@ Hanne nudged me gently with her shoulder. ``Come on, Reed. Let's get you to bed.
 
 ``Still,'' she said, leaning over to kiss my cheek. It felt too hot, too intense a sensation, but calmness radiated from that spot all the same. ``If nothing else, you can lay down in the dark and give your poor eyes a break. Plus, \emph{I} need to sleep, at least.''
 
-How could I stand, knowing as I did that the clade had become unmoored? How could I think of sleep when there might be some remnant of Marsh somewhere in the wires? Some ghost of them in the machine that was the System? If this System was a dream, as Dry Grass and the rest of her clade had promised the world, then oughtn't there be some wisp of them, some memory from which deeper archives could be dredged? Even a Marsh from decades ago would still be a Marsh worth bringing back.
+How could I stand, knowing as I did that the clade had become unmoored? How could I think of sleep when there might be some remnant of Marsh somewhere in the wires? Some ghost of them in the machine that was the System? If this System was a dream, as Dry Grass and the rest of her clade had promised the world, then oughtn't there be some wisp of them, some memory from deeper archives which could be dredged? Even a Marsh from decades ago would still be a Marsh worth bringing back.
 
 I sighed, nodded dully, and let her pull me to my feet.
 
-I swayed for a moment, feeling reality shift unsteadily beneath me. Once I straightened up, I followed Hanne off to our bedroom. We'd spent the previous night, as we often did, sleeping in two separate beds — I always got too warm sleeping next to someone — but any grounding force feels welcome now, so, with a gesture, the two beds slid together, merging seamlessly into one.
+I swayed for a moment, feeling reality shift unsteadily beneath me. Once I straightened up, I followed Hanne off to our bedroom. We'd spent the previous night, as we often did, sleeping in two separate beds --- I always got too warm sleeping next to someone --- but any grounding force feels welcome now, so, with a gesture, the two beds slid together, merging seamlessly into one.
 
 A hollow feeling bubbled up within me. The two beds merging into one was an image of something now well beyond the Marsh clade. I was thankful I'd already cried myself dry.
 

marsh/content/003.tex

@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-As expected, sleep did not come. Exhaustion pulled at me, exerting its own gravity, but too many emotions crowded it out. Too many emotions and too many thoughts. I spent a few minutes chiding myself — shouldn't I sleep, if only to be more refreshed for the next day? — before giving in and letting my mind circle around each of those emotions, each of those thoughts.
+As expected, sleep did not come. Exhaustion pulled at me, exerting its own gravity, but too many emotions crowded it out. Too many emotions and too many thoughts. I spent a few minutes chiding myself --- shouldn't I sleep, if only to be more refreshed for the next day? --- before giving in and letting my mind circle around each of those emotions, each of those thoughts. I don't know for how long I cycled.
 
 There was the faintest brush against my sensorium. Vos.
 
@@ -38,7 +38,7 @@ Her reply was gentle. \emph{``So are we, Reed. Just laying in bed, staring at no
 
 \emph{``Not well.''}
 
-\emph{He seemed like it hit him really hard, yeah.}
+\emph{``He seemed like it hit him really hard, yeah.''}
 
 A pause, and then she sent, quieter than before, \emph{``I don't want to say this is hitting any one of us harder than the other, but\ldots well, we care for him. That was our dynamic, I mean. He's young and full of emotions, so we occasionally fall into that guardian role. It hit him hard, and so he needs care, but\ldots{}''}
 
@@ -58,15 +58,15 @@ It was both our arms, too, I know that. They kept their life separate from mine,
 
 They'd laugh whenever it came up, saying, ``So I'm greedy. Sue me.''
 
-We'd all laugh, too. It wasn't really greed, that desire for our memories in a way that we could never get in return. It was just the dynamic that we held to ever since I'd been forked. Of course it was mutual: I \emph{was} them when I'd been forked. An exact copy that only slowly diverged over the years. It had been my idea as much as theirs.
+We'd all laugh, too. It wasn't really greed, that desire for our memories in a way that we could never get in return. It was just the dynamic that we held to ever since I'd been forked. Of course it was mutual: I \emph{was} them when I'd been forked. An exact copy that only slowly diverged over the years. It had been my idea as much as theirs. That Lily had been talking to them some hours ago was an aberration, a new thing.
 
 I thought of Marsh, their laugh, their words, their open expression, the way their tousled, brown hair always fell in front of their eyes, the way the loose and soft clothing they wore hung off their frame, the bright colors of silk and cotton.
 
 Hanne rolled away from me and I took that as my chance to at least no longer be laying down. I forked a new instance standing beside the bed and then quit, just in case the motion of me getting out of bed might wake her.
 
-I needed out of the house. Nowhere public — I don't want to see what others in the System are dealing with right now. There would be time for that later, but for now I needed out and away from everyone.
+I needed out of the house. Nowhere public --- I don't want to see what others in the System are dealing with right now. There would be time for that later, but for now I needed out and away from everyone.
 
-The sim I wound up in was simple and bucolic. There was a pagoda. There was a field, grass cut — or eaten, I suppose, given the sheep in the distance — short, stretching from stone wall to stone wall. It was day — it didn't even seem like the owners included a day/night cycle — and foggy. Cool but not cold. Damp but not wet.
+The sim I wound up in was simple and bucolic. There was a pagoda. There was a field, grass cut --- or eaten, I suppose, given the sheep in the distance --- short, stretching from stone wall to stone wall. It was day --- it didn't even seem like the owners included a day/night cycle --- and foggy. Cool but not cold. Damp but not wet.
 
 There was a bench in the pagoda, at least, so I made my way there, trudging tiredly up the whitewashed wood of the steps to sit on the well-worn seats. Whoever made this place seemed to have put more effort into the pagoda than the field. Fog like that was usually the sign of a border of a sim of limited size, so it was clearly just this single paddock, the grass and sheep and stone walls likely purchases from the exchange.
 
@@ -78,6 +78,6 @@ The seat of the bench had been worn smooth by who knows how many butts over the
 
 I sighed and slouched against the back of the bench. Exhaustion was warring against the drive to do \emph{something}, and both of those were striving against the need to be alone and away from this whole spectacle. All of those ``how can I'' questions were clattering up against equal-sized armies of ``too tired''s and ``it doesn't need to happen now''s.
 
-I spent an hour out there, all told. I picked at the bench. I called out to the sheep. I walked circles around the pagoda in the gray day. I bent down, pluck a blade of grass with the intent to\ldots I don't know, chew on it like I've seen in films, but it smelled so strongly of sheep manure that I dropped it instead and headed home to finally lay down beside Hanne and sleep.
+I spent an hour out there, all told. I picked at the bench. I called out to the sheep. I walked circles around the pagoda in the gray day. I bent down, plucked a blade of grass with the intent to\ldots I don't know, chew on it like I've seen in films, but it smelled so strongly of sheep manure that I dropped it instead and headed home to finally lay down beside Hanne and sleep.
 
 \begin{center}\rule{0.5\linewidth}{0.5pt}\end{center}

marsh/content/004.tex

@@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ At some point while I'd slept, Hanne had once more split the bed into two separa
 
 Coffee and chicory, nearly a third oatmilk by volume. Perfect.
 
-I was two sips in when the weight of what happened hit me once again. I didn't quite know how it was that they had escaped me in those minutes after waking, but a pile of `how could' questions started to hem me in again — how could I possibly forget, when this is the biggest thing that has happened to our clade ever? Never mind sys-side or phys-side; ever.
+I was two sips in when the weight of what happened hit me once again. I didn't quite know how it was that they had escaped me in those minutes after waking, but a pile of `how could' questions started to hem me in again --- how could I possibly forget, when this is the biggest thing that has happened to our clade ever? Never mind sys-side or phys-side; ever.
 
 I forced myself to sit up in bed and drink my coffee. I set myself the goal of sipping until it was finished. I stared out the window for a bit. I cried for a bit. I drank about half my coffee before the wait became unbearable.
 
@@ -30,7 +30,7 @@ There was mirth on the other end, some barely-sensed laughter that didn't quite
 
 \emph{``I'm feeling like shit.''} I laughed, shaking my head. \emph{``I mean, of course I am. I'm some awful mix of hopeful that there's some solution, mourning Marsh, kicking myself for mourning them maybe preemptively, kicking myself for not doing more, and just plain confused.''}
 
-The Odists were an old clade — far older than any of us, having been born decades before the advent of the System — so it was no wonder that Dry Grass was far more adept at sensorium messages than anyone else I'd met. It wasn't that I saw her lean back in her chair, nor that I felt the act of leaning back myself, but the overwhelming sensation that I got from that moment of silence was of her sighing, leaning back, crossing her arms over her front. I had no clue how she managed to pull that off. \emph{``There is little that I can say to fix any one of those, and anything else would ring hollow. All I can do is validate that, damn, Reed, that is a shitload of emotions. There is a lot going on, and I do not blame you for feeling confused.''}
+The Odists were an old clade --- far older than any of us, having been born decades before the advent of the System --- so it was no wonder that Dry Grass was far more adept at sensorium messages than anyone else I'd met. It wasn't that I saw her lean back in her chair, nor that I felt the act of leaning back myself, but the overwhelming sensation that I got from that moment of silence was of her sighing, leaning back, crossing her arms over her front. I had no clue how she managed to pull that off. \emph{``There is little that I can say to fix any one of those, and anything else would ring hollow. All I can do is validate that, damn, Reed, that is a shitload of emotions. There is a lot going on, and I do not blame you for feeling confused.''}
 
 \emph{``Thanks,''} I responded, feeling no small amount of relief that she hadn't tried to dig into any one of those feelings, nor even all of them as a whole. \emph{``How are Tule and Cress holding up? Hell, how're you holding up?''}
 
@@ -42,17 +42,17 @@ The Odists were an old clade — far older than any of us, having been born deca
 
 I finished my coffee in two coarse swallows, winced at the uncomfortable sensation that followed. I took another moment to stand up and start making the bed again. As I did, I asked, \emph{``What on? I saw a ton of forks.''}
 
-The sense of a nod, and then, \emph{``Several things. One of me is still keeping tallies on how many are missing based on reports, which appears to be some few million so far. Another of me is collating the varied types of posts on the feeds — wild supposition, unchecked grief, confusion, and so on. Another is speaking to\ldots a member of the eighth stanza through an intermediary--''}
+The sense of a nod, and then, \emph{``Several things. One of me is still keeping tallies on how many are missing based on reports, which appears to be some few million so far. Another of me is collating the varied types of posts on the feeds --- wild supposition, unchecked grief, confusion, and so on. Another is speaking to a member of the eighth stanza, even though--''}
 
 \emph{``This `Need An Answer' you mentioned?''}
 
-\emph{``Yes. The Only Time I Dream Is When I Need An Answer. She is the one who has focused on interpersonal connections, which is only relevant in that she is the only one remaining in the stanza willing to pass on information to the portions of the clade that cut them off, about twenty of us.''}
+\emph{``Yes. The Only Time I Dream Is When I Need An Answer. She is the one who has focused on interpersonal connections, which is only relevant in that she is the one in the stanza who will still pass information on to the portions of the clade that cut them off, about twenty of us.''}
 
 I snorted. \emph{``Minus you, I guess.''}
 
 \emph{``Well, yes. Nominally twenty of us,''} she sent, and I could sense that almost-laughter again. \emph{``Though it is far more complicated than that.''}
 
-\emph{``Any news from Castor or Pollux?''}
+\emph{``Sure seems complicated. Any news from Castor or Pollux?''}
 
 \emph{``Yes,''} she replied, then hesitated. \emph{``Though would you be willing to go for a walk to discuss what I have heard?''}
 
@@ -64,7 +64,7 @@ I hesitated, halfway through smoothing out the sheets. \emph{``Oh, uh\ldots alri
 
 She sent the address of a public sim, to which I sent a ping of acknowledgement and a suggestion of five minutes' time.
 
-Hanne sat at the dining room table, coffee in her hands, staring out at nothing, a sure sign that she was digging through something on the perisystem architecture. Probably poking her way through the feeds, looking for news. She had her own friends, after all, her own circle of co-hobbyists, those oneirotects who shared her interest in creating various objects and constructs. She had her own people to care about that weren't just me, weren't just the Marshans.
+Hanne sat at the dining room table, coffee in her hands, staring out at nothing, a sure sign that she was digging through something on the perisystem architecture. Probably poking her way through the feeds, looking for news. She had her own friends, after all, her own circle of co-hobbyists, those construct artists --- oneirotects --- who shared her interest in creating various objects and interactive constructs. She had her own people to care about that weren't just me, weren't just the Marshans.
 
 I chose to make myself another coffee instead, letting a cone of silence linger above me so that I didn't disturb her, even though her eyes did flick up toward me once or twice, joined by a weak smile.
 
@@ -82,7 +82,7 @@ She nodded.
 
 ``Any word on Warmth In Fire? I'm going to head out in a moment to see Dry Grass, and I'm wondering how bad the Odists got hit.''
 
-Hanne shrugged. ``Ey's there. I haven't talked to em yet, though.'' She snorted, adding with a smirk, ``Though even if a chunk of them got taken out, I doubt any whole\ldots lines, or whatever they call them, were completely destroyed. They fork like mad.''
+Hanne shrugged. ``Ey's there. I haven't talked to em yet, though.'' She snorted, adding with a smirk, ``Though even if a chunk of their instances got taken out, I doubt any whole\ldots lines, or whatever they call them, any cladists, were completely destroyed. They fork like mad.''
 
 I laughed. ``Yeah, when I pinged Dry Grass earlier, she had something like eighteen instances.''
 
@@ -102,7 +102,7 @@ Hanne furrowed her brow. ``A few \emph{million?} Jesus. Any word from phys-side?
 
 I nodded, covering my anxiety with a sip of coffee.
 
-``Well, hey,'' she said, leaning over to kiss me on the cheek. ``Go on and go talk with Dry Grass. Could be she's learned more, could be they've said something and we just haven't gotten it yet. If she's as plugged in as she says she is, then doubtless she knows more than she's showing.''
+``Well, hey,'' she said, leaning over to kiss me on the cheek. ``Go on and go talk with Dry Grass. Could be she's learned more, could be they've said something and we just haven't gotten it yet. If she's as plugged in as she says she is, then doubtless she knows more than she's telling.''
 
 ``Right.'' I laughed. ``Of all of us, she would.''
 
@@ -126,7 +126,7 @@ Grinning back, she gestured down the street in an invitation to walk, and we fel
 
 The sim was, indeed, beautiful, though it did bear some trademarks of early sim design, with the cobblestones perhaps a little too perfectly fit together, a little too flat, and the hexagonal lamp posts bearing corners that were perhaps a little too sharp. Still, for a morning walk with coffee (my third of the day; I'd have to turn off the caffeine sensitivity later), it was ideal. The sim was quiet and calm, with the sun blessing the street with long shadows and cool air that felt on the path to warming.
 
-``It's so quiet,'' I observed. The act of speaking out loud into the quiet air was enough to knock me back into the context of what had happened. ``Oh.''
+``It's so quiet,'' I observed. The act of speaking out loud into the still air was enough to knock me back into the context of what had happened. ``Oh.''
 
 Dry Grass readily picked up on the meaning behind that syllable, nodding to me. ``I do not imagine that it is so quiet because so many are missing, but I do think that many are staying home, hunting for lovers and friends, trawling the feeds. Heading out to public sims is, perhaps, not at the tops of their minds.''
 
@@ -136,7 +136,7 @@ So were we, I realized.
 
 I made an effort to straighten up and look out into the clear morning. ``Is the toll still climbing?'' I asked.
 
-``Not so rapidly, no. It is currently--'' She tilted her head for a moment before continuing. ``--just over two hundred million. I have also been able to get in contact with a phys-side engineer who has been\ldots well, she has been cagey, but she is at least confirming some of my estimates and guesses as I pass them on.''
+``It is currently--'' She tilted her head for a moment before continuing. ``--just over two hundred million. I have also been able to get in contact with a phys-side engineer who has been\ldots well, she has been cagey, but she is at least confirming some of my estimates and guesses as I pass them on.''
 
 ``Oh?''
 
@@ -148,17 +148,17 @@ She nodded. ``Günay is quite nice, if perhaps a bit breezier than one might exp
 
 I frowned. ``You mean someone's keeping her from doing so?''
 
-``It is a hunch. Perhaps our communications are being monitored, and she is being instructed to limit the topics or act in this way. While talking with Need An Answer, she suggested that this is also what the eighth stanza is used to doing, but they are the political ones.''
+``It is a hunch. Perhaps our communications are being monitored, and she is being instructed to limit the topics or to act in this way. Perhaps her implants limit her by NDA. While talking with Need An Answer, she suggested that this is also what the eighth stanza is used to doing, but they are the political ones.''
 
-I dredged up what history of the System I had learned, all of those sensationalist stories about the few old clades steering the direction of the lives of however many billion uploaded minds — certainly well over a trillion, if one counted the two launch vehicles, Castor and Pollux that had been sent out seventy five years prior.
+I dredged up what history of the System I had learned, all of those sensationalist stories about the few old clades steering the direction of the lives of however many billions of uploaded minds and their instances --- certainly well over two trillion, if one counted the two launch vehicles, Castor and Pollux that had been sent out seventy five years prior. More, if what Hanne said was right.
 
 ``And they'd be sneaky like this, too?'' I asked.
 
-A snort of laughter and she nodded. ``Sneaky is one way to put it, yes. They shape interactions by second nature, for which much of the clade has distanced themself from from. We — Hammered Silver's up-tree instances — are not supposed to be speaking to any of them, but there are a few that I like plenty, and given our current status, I have begun interacting more openly with Need An Answer.''
+A snort of laughter and she nodded. ``Sneaky is one way to put it, yes. They shape interactions by second nature, for which a portion of the clade has distanced themselves from them. We --- Hammered Silver's up-tree instances --- are not supposed to be speaking to any of them, but there are a few that I like plenty, and given our current status, I have begun interacting more openly with Need An Answer.''
 
 Wary of letting the topic drift too far, I said, ``Have they gotten anything else from phys-side, then?''
 
-She shrugged. ``There has been little enough interaction with sys-side over the years, and even less of late, now that the climate has started to level out back on Earth. The rate of uploads has even leveled off from its slow increase over time. We rarely hear much except what comes through the newly uploaded.'' She sipped her mocha, seeming to take that time to sort out her thoughts. ``Our political relationship with phys-side is cordial. It is one borne of necessity. Our social relationship is more complicated. Many have expectations of a long peace for themselves once they join us, and many more have loved ones who have joined us.''
+She shrugged. ``There has been little enough interaction with phys-side over the years, and even less of late, now that the climate has started to level out back on Earth. The rate of uploads has even leveled off from its slow increase over time. We rarely hear much except what comes through the newly uploaded.'' She sipped her mocha, seeming to take that time to sort out her thoughts. ``Our political relationship with phys-side is cordial. It is one borne of necessity. Our social relationship is more complicated. Many have expectations of a long peace for themselves once they join us, and many more have loved ones who have joined us.''
 
 ``Right, I still talk to a bunch of friends I knew phys-side who uploaded later. Or Marsh does.'' I winced, amending that statement. ``Did.''
 
@@ -204,7 +204,7 @@ She nodded.
 
 ``Oh, absolutely,'' Dry Grass replied, turning and leaning over to give Cress a kiss on its cheek. ``How are you feeling, loves?''
 
-``Terrible,'' Tule said cheerfully. They had apparently collected Rush and Sedge before arriving, as all four of stood in almost identical postures, each holding their coffees in their right hand — just, I realized, as I was doing. ``All my emotions are wrong. I'm jittery and tired and I want to get another few hours of sleep but feel guilty every time I lay down.''
+``Terrible,'' Tule said cheerfully. They had apparently collected Rush and Sedge before arriving, as all four stood in almost identical postures, each holding their coffees in their right hand --- just, I realized, as I was doing. ``All my emotions are wrong. I'm jittery and tired and I want to get another few hours of sleep but feel guilty every time I lay down.''
 
 I laughed. ``Yeah, that sounds about right. I keep feeling like I'm having the wrong sort of reaction to all of this.''
 
@@ -212,11 +212,11 @@ I laughed. ``Yeah, that sounds about right. I keep feeling like I'm having the w
 
 A moment of silence followed.
 
-``We as people have fallen out of the habit of dealing with crises,'' she continued when we all averted our gazes. ``Do not be hard on yourselves. We — the Ode clade — have more experience with crises than the vast, vast majority of the System, and even we are reeling. We are struggling to internalize something this big.''
+``We as people have fallen out of the habit of dealing with crises,'' she continued when we all averted our gazes. ``Do not be hard on yourselves. We --- the Ode clade --- have more experience with crises than the vast, vast majority of the System, and even we are reeling. We are struggling to internalize something this big.''
 
 ``Have you lost any?'' Cress asked, and I thanked it silently for getting to the question before I worked up the courage to do so myself.
 
-Hesitating, Dry Grass's confident mien fell. Eventually, she reached out to take each of her partners' hands in one of her own, then offered the other to me. ``Come. Let us walk, yes? We will talk as we hop sims. I have more places full of comforting memories to show you.''
+Hesitating, Dry Grass's confident mien fell. Eventually, she reached out to take both of her partners' hands in one of her own, then nodded to me. ``Come. Let us walk, yes? We will talk as we hop sims. I have more places full of comforting memories to show you.''
 
 While I mulled over her focus on comfort and memory, we linked by touch, Tule and Cress with their partner, and Cress, Rush, and Sedge with me.
 
@@ -228,13 +228,13 @@ All of the designs seemed to feature the New Year, now that I was able to pick t
 
 I turned away with a hollow feeling in my chest, wondering just how many of those couples were still couples.
 
-The town, while no less visually chaotic than the beach, was at least more heartening to look at. Everything — \emph{everything}; the walls of buildings, the roofs, doors and window shutters, even the roads — was covered with a blindingly colorful mosaic of tiles.
+The town, while no less visually chaotic than the beach, was at least more heartening to look at. Everything --- \emph{everything}; the walls of buildings, the roofs, doors and window shutters, even the roads --- was covered with a blindingly colorful mosaic of tiles.
 
-``\emph{To Limáni Ton Khromáton} is nearly two centuries old,'' Dry Grass explained as we started trudging up one of those streets. When you enter, you are given a single tile — if you check your pockets, it should be in there.''
+``\emph{To Limáni Ton Khromáton} is nearly two centuries old,'' Dry Grass explained as we started trudging up one of those streets. When you enter, you are given a single tile --- if you check your pockets, it should be in there.''
 
 Sure enough, when I dug my hand into my pocket, I found a cerulean tile, a little square of porcelain about three centimeters on a side. The rest of the Marshans dug in their pockets and pulled out tiles of their own, all one shade or another of blue.
 
-``Unless you hold a color in your mind when you enter, you are provided with your favorite,'' Dry Grass explained. She pulled a golden yellow tile out of her own pocket and flipped it up in the air like a coin. ``All of this — all of the mosaic — has been placed by visitors.
+``Unless you hold a color in your mind when you enter, you are provided with your favorite,'' Dry Grass explained. She pulled a golden yellow tile out of her own pocket and flipped it up in the air like a coin. ``All of this --- all of the mosaic --- has been placed by visitors.
 
 ``Set No Stones told me about this place.'' She smiled wryly. ``Because of course she did. We are consummate pros at living up to our names. You may place your tile wherever you would like, and so long as it is touching the edge of another, it will stick. You will not be able to remove it after, so make sure to place it carefully.''
 
@@ -250,7 +250,7 @@ We walked past buildings that depicted animals, some that depicted people, some
 
 If the small town sim had been relatively quiet, this one felt all but abandoned. Perhaps all such sims with a singular purpose would be like this today: if your friends are missing, if other versions of you were missing, then an attraction would doubtless lose some of its draw. We passed only a few tilers tramping up the hill with determination, ready to place their colors for the day.
 
-Finally, Dry Grass led us down an alleyway, dim and cool, and gestured to a wall. The scene was of two figures sitting at a bar. Given the scale, it was impossible to make out any detail on the figures, though they seemed to be furries of some sort — one tan and one black and white. Each had a drink, and before them, a wall of bottles stood, still in the process of being built. Dry Grass stood up on her tiptoes and touched her tile to the edge of a bottle, adding a bright glow to a fledgling bottle of whiskey.
+Finally, Dry Grass led us down an alleyway, dim and cool, and gestured to a wall. The scene was of two figures sitting at a bar. Given the scale, it was impossible to make out any detail on the figures, though they seemed to be furries of some sort --- one tan and one black and white. Each had a drink, and before them, a wall of bottles stood, still in the process of being built. Dry Grass stood up on her tiptoes and touched her tile to the edge of a bottle, adding a bright glow to a fledgling bottle of whiskey.
 
 ``Here,'' she said, gesturing us to grab a crate that had been stacked nearby. ``All of these are just props to help people reach higher. You can probably add your blues to the edge of the lamp. They are not quite the right color for green lamps, but I do not care.''
 
@@ -264,7 +264,7 @@ She laughed. ``Yes, yes. The whole of the clade is like this, I can promise you
 
 ``Are you ready to talk about what you've learned?'' I asked. ``If you need a bit more time, that's fine, of course.''
 
-``I am ready. Thank you for giving me a bit of space.'' Once Cress had finished setting its tile and hopped back down to the ground, we all walked back out into the street, back out where the sun shone down on us. ``We have passed one billion reported missing instances.'' She held her hand up to forestall the comments that were already coming. ``That is all instances, to be clear, not differentiated individuals, not cladists, and certainly not clades. Many of those who have reported missing were ephemeral: they are one-offs created here and there. We do not yet know about cladists or clades. The number is high, but I did want to provide that qualification.''
+``I am ready. Thank you for giving me a bit of space.'' Once Cress had finished setting its tile and hopped back down to the ground, we all walked back out into the street, back out where the sun shone down on us. ``We have passed one billion reported missing instances.'' She held her hand up to forestall the comments that were already coming. ``That is all instances, to be clear, not differentiated individuals, not cladists, and certainly not clades. Many of those who were reported missing were ephemeral: they were one-offs created here and there. We do not yet know about cladists or clades. The number is high, but I did want to provide that qualification; there are three totals to consider, and we are learning only one of them.''
 
 ``Hanne said that one of her friends, Shu, was missing entirely,'' I said, once the words had sunk in. ``Similar to Marsh, I mean. It wasn't just that she wasn't responding, it's like she was just never there, like the System didn't know about her.''
 
@@ -272,7 +272,7 @@ She laughed. ``Yes, yes. The whole of the clade is like this, I can promise you
 
 I shrugged. ``It might be worth asking, at least.''
 
-She nodded and gestured us back down to the beach. ``I will.'' She took a deep breath before continuing. ``Now, the current population in terms of instances is something like 2.3 trillion. A billion is a very small fraction of the System in terms of numbers, but it is what we are working with. A billion instances appear to have been\ldots ah, lost, along with thirteen months, ten days, seventeen minutes, and some seconds. On speaking with Günay, this downtime was observed phys-side, though she was not able to tell me much about it besides that. I have the sense that there is more that she \emph{could} have said, but that she was not able to for whatever reason.''
+She nodded and gestured us back down to the beach. ``I will.'' She took a deep breath before continuing. ``Now, the current population in terms of \emph{instances} is something like 2.3 trillion. A billion is a very small fraction of the System in terms of numbers, but it is what we are working with. A billion instances appear to have been\ldots ah, lost, along with thirteen months, ten days, seventeen minutes, and some seconds. On speaking with Günay, this downtime was observed phys-side, though she was not able to tell me much about it besides that. I have the sense that there is more that she \emph{could} have said, but that she was not able to for whatever reason.''
 
 This had apparently been the first that Rush and Sedge had heard about this, so a few minutes were spent bringing them up to speed as we walked down the hill to the shore once more. I took the opportunity to focus at something far off, something further ahead of me than my own two feet. The horizon, the dark ocean breaking against the shore in a rush of white out where the arms of the bay projected into the water.
 
@@ -286,7 +286,7 @@ I startled back to awareness, smiling sheepishly at Sedge, accepting the hand th
 
 ``It is okay,'' Dry Grass said, smiling gently to me. ``The next sim that we are headed to does not have a very large entry point, so please huddle in closer. It will also be quite warm, so, fair warning.''
 
-The entry point — a platform of wood slats set upon stilts above stagnant water — was far smaller than I had anticipated, and my foot rocked against an uneven plank set along the rim of the platform, forcing me to lean against Sedge. One edge of the platform led into a narrow, somewhat rickety wooden walkway that headed out over the water in a straight line until it came upon a tall patch of grass, where it turned a few degrees to the right to make its way to another. It appeared to meander in this way from island of vegetation to island of vegetation in an uneven zigzag toward a copse of trees — the word `banyan' floated to mind, though I wasn't sure if that was actually the case — where it disappeared into shadow.
+The entry point --- a platform of wood slats set upon stilts above stagnant water --- was far smaller than I had anticipated, and my foot rocked against an uneven plank set along the rim of the platform, forcing me to lean against Sedge. One edge of the platform led into a narrow, somewhat rickety wooden walkway that headed out over the water in a straight line until it came upon a tall patch of grass, where it turned a few degrees to the right to make its way to another. It appeared to meander in this way from island of vegetation to island of vegetation in an uneven zigzag toward a copse of trees --- the word `banyan' floated to mind, though I wasn't sure if that was actually the case --- where it disappeared into shadow.
 
 That shade looked delightfully appealing as the humid heat pressed in around us.
 
@@ -296,13 +296,13 @@ That shade looked delightfully appealing as the humid heat pressed in around us.
 
 If it had been intended to be a joke, it fell flat. We remained in silence for a few awkward moments.
 
-She sighed. ``My apologies. It is still important to me, however. It is-- Ah, there she is.'' She raised an arm and waved to a figure crouched at the edge of the walkway just before the next platform. With the heat-haze and mugginess, their form was somewhat indistinct. They wore a frowzy white dress, along with some sort of hat — or perhaps a rather tall hairstyle. As we walked toward them in single file, she explained, ``This sim was designed by Serene; Sustained And Sustaining, whom you shall meet in a moment. She is my cocladist from the ninth stanza, and one of my favorite people in the world. I asked her to meet us here.''
+She sighed. ``My apologies. It is still important to me, however. It is-- Ah, there she is.'' She raised an arm and waved to a figure crouched at the edge of the walkway just before the next platform. With the heat-haze and mugginess, their form was somewhat indistinct. They wore a frowzy white dress, along with some sort of hat --- or perhaps a rather tall hairstyle. As we walked toward them in single file, she explained, ``This sim was designed by Serene; Sustained And Sustaining, whom you shall meet in a moment. She is my cocladist from the ninth stanza, and one of my favorite people in the world. I asked her to meet us here.''
 
-As we got closer, the strange hairstyle that I had noticed on the figure resolved into a pair of tall canine ears, and what I had assumed was a mask of some sort turned out to be a short, pointed muzzle. Serene stood up and stretched, smiling wanly to us before bowing in greeting.
+As we got closer, the strange hairstyle that I had noticed on the figure resolved into a pair of tall canid ears, and what I had assumed was a mask of some sort turned out to be a short, pointed muzzle. Serene stood up and stretched, smiling wanly to us before bowing in greeting.
 
 ``Serene, this is Tule and Cress, my partners, as well as a few more of their clade: Reed, Rush, and Sedge.''
 
-The fox — a hunch confirmed by a quick check of the perisystem — nodded. ``Of the Marsh clade? How droll,'' she said, that smile veering perilously close to a smirk. ``Welcome to my own little marsh.''
+The fox --- a hunch confirmed by a quick check of the perisystem --- nodded. ``Of the Marsh clade? How droll,'' she said, that smile veering perilously close to a smirk. ``Welcome to my own little marsh.''
 
 ``What \emph{is} this place?'' Rush asked, a note of wonder in vis voice. ``Other than a swamp, I mean.''
 
@@ -310,13 +310,13 @@ The fox — a hunch confirmed by a quick check of the perisystem — nodded. ``O
 
 At this, we all \emph{did} laugh.
 
-``I have asked to meet with her and several others to ensure that we could get a view of what is going on from someone else, because this is getting a bit out of hand for even me.''
+``I have asked to meet with her and several others to ensure that we could get a view of what is going on from someone else,'' Dry Grass said, ``because this is getting a bit out of hand for even me.''
 
 Serene nodded and started strolling down the path toward the next patch of grass, claws clicking dully against the wood. We fell in step behind her as she asked, ``And what was it that you wanted to hear from me, my dear?''
 
 ``I would like to hear what you are seeing.''
 
-The fox — a fennec, the System told me — nodded slowly. ``I am seeing quiet chaos. I am seeing most of my sims emptying out. Few are out for walks or adventures. I sent forks to each of them when I noticed my own missing instances to ensure that they all still existed, as well. Thankfully, sims seem to be unaffected.
+The fox --- a fennec, the System told me --- nodded slowly. ``I am seeing quiet chaos. I am seeing most of my sims emptying out. Few are out for walks or adventures. I sent forks to each of them when I noticed my own missing instances to ensure that they all still existed, as well. Thankfully, sims seem to be unaffected.
 
 ``The ones that are not empty, however, remain dreadfully quiet. Most of those who are out and about have set up over themselves cones of silence.'' She hesitated, took a deep breath, and then continued. ``Those who have not, though, are decidedly not quiet. More than one silence has been broken by weeping and wailing.''
 
@@ -346,7 +346,7 @@ She simply nodded.
 
 ``And you said there hasn't been any word from phys-side except through Günay?'' I asked.
 
-She shook her head. ``Not really, but that is not to say that a sense of that sentiment is not evident. She sounded excited.''
+She shook her head. ``Not really. Not that I know about, at least, but that is not to say that a sense of that sentiment is not evident. Günay sounded excited.''
 
 Sedge snorted. ``Excited?''
 
@@ -356,7 +356,7 @@ Sedge snorted. ``Excited?''
 
 Dry Grass nodded. ``Yes, that was my guess. She is disappointed, of course, that so many of us are missing, but she is excited that so many of us still remain. As I have said, her words have been careful and measured, but I can still tell that she was excited to be able to talk to us.''
 
-``So sims are empty,'' I said, ticking off items on my fingers. ``The feeds are nuts. Phys-side is excited to see us. Has there been any indication on any of those fronts as to what actually happened?''
+``So, sims are empty,'' I said, ticking off items on my fingers. ``The feeds are nuts. Phys-side is excited to see us. Has there been any indication on any of those fronts as to what actually happened?''
 
 ``Not as yet, no. We are missing key bits of information.''
 
@@ -394,7 +394,7 @@ Dry Grass nodded and once more took Tule's hand in her own. Once we had all link
 
 While this new sim felt far brighter than the sunnier portions of the last, the air was also far cooler and far drier. It still had a feeling of morning to it, as though the day itself had yet to wake up completely. A check of the time showed that it was not yet 7, a fact obscured by the noonday sun of the previous sim.
 
-The sun shone low in a cloudless blue sky, lighting a rolling field of grass with the dawn. `Lawn' may have been a more apt word, as the grass itself seemed to have been cut at some point: it was cool and prickly, all of uniform height and color. All, that is, except for the fact that it was dotted liberally with golden yellow flowers, each perfectly round as it stood shyly above a spray of wide-toothed leaves.
+The sun here shone low in a cloudless blue sky, lighting a rolling field of grass with the dawn. `Lawn' may have been a more apt word, as the grass itself seemed to have been cut at some point: it was cool and prickly, all of uniform height and color. All, that is, except for the fact that it was dotted liberally with golden yellow flowers, each perfectly round as it stood shyly above a spray of wide-toothed leaves.
 
 The air was thick with a sweet scent, and the sound of bees making their way from flower to flower hung just below the level of perception unless we all stayed completely silent.
 
@@ -408,7 +408,7 @@ Hold My Name also appeared hand-in-paw with a skunk, Which Offers Heat And Warmt
 
 I nodded and started to reply before cutting myself off as a few more Odists showed up in quick succession. Another skunk, looking far more prim and proper than the others, arrived and shot Dry Grass a quick glance. I couldn't quite read her expression, but she certainly didn't look happy. If she was Then I Must In All Ways Be Earnest, it perhaps made sense, as the next Odist to arrive was a human introduced as The Only Time I Dream Is When I Need An Answer.
 
-From what I gathered both from my knowledge of the history of the System that I'd picked up over my hears on Lagrange as well as the memories of Tule's relationship with Dry Grass, there had been a schism within the Ode clade some fifty years back surrounding the political elements of the clade — of which Need An Answer was one — and those who disagreed. This included both Dry Grass and In All Ways. Beyond those such as Lily who held resentment, even some Odists mistrusted — or even hated — some of the Odists.
+From what I gathered both from my knowledge of the history of the System that I'd picked up over my years on Lagrange as well as the memories of Tule's relationship with Dry Grass, there had been a schism within the Ode clade some fifty years back surrounding the political elements of the clade --- of which Need An Answer was one --- and those who disagreed. This included both Dry Grass and In All Ways. Beyond those such as Lily who held resentment, even some Odists mistrusted --- or even hated --- some of their own.
 
 I just hoped they'd be able to set that aside for now.
 
@@ -418,19 +418,19 @@ Scattered mumbling.
 
 ``Dry Grass, you have been taking point. Would you like to begin?''
 
-``Yes,'' she said, stepping out in front of the loose crowd that had gathered. All turned to face her. ``At midnight on January first, 2400 — that is, systime 276+1, but some are speculating that the phys-side date is related for reasons that I will get to — a disruption in the software underlying the System occurred. This led to a discontinuity of approximately one year, one month, and ten days.''
+``Yes,'' she said, stepping out in front of the loose crowd that had gathered. All turned to face her. ``At midnight on January first, 2400 --- that is, systime 276+1, but some are speculating that the phys-side date is related for reasons that I will get to --- a disruption in the software underlying the System occurred. This led to a discontinuity of approximately one year, one month, and ten days.''
 
-More muttering — darkly, this time.
+More muttering --- darkly, this time.
 
-``There have been more than two hundred thousand instances of downtime throughout the history of Lagrange. Most amount to a few seconds or minutes, with the longest being approximately two weeks, which took place during the Lagrange station's insertion into the L5 orbit in which it currently resides. We usually do not notice any downtime unless we are specifically paying attention to systime. However, in this instance, when the System returned to functionality, several instances were missing--''
+``There have been more than two hundred thousand instances of downtime throughout the history of Lagrange. Most amount to a few seconds or minutes, with the longest being approximately three weeks, which took place during the Lagrange station's insertion into the L5 orbit in which it currently resides. We usually do not notice any downtime unless we are specifically paying attention to systime. However, in this instance, when the System returned to functionality, several instances were missing--''
 
 ``Several!'' one of the Odists said, snorting.
 
 ``--several instances were missing. At current count, the missing instances number about one and a half billion, though that number continues to climb.
 
-``I have re-acquired my systech credentials through an expedited process, which has led to me talking to a phys-side tech on the Lagrange station named Günay Sadık. While she appears to be somewhat restrained in what she is willing — or able — to tell me, she was at least able to confirm or deny guesses as I made them. She has confirmed that the missing instances are due to corrupted data, that Lagrange experienced full downtime, and that phys-side engineers were finally able to get it running at full capacity just last night.''
+``I have re-acquired my systech credentials through an expedited process, which has led to me talking to a phys-side tech on the Lagrange station named Günay Sadık. While she appears to be somewhat restrained in what she is willing --- or able --- to tell me, she was at least able to confirm or deny guesses as I made them. She has confirmed that the missing instances are due to corrupted data, that Lagrange experienced full downtime, and that phys-side engineers were finally able to get it running at full capacity just last night.''
 
-Dry Grass paused, taking a deep breath. ``Here are the things she was not able to confirm, but which I do not believe were outright denials. She was not able to confirm the reason for the downtime and did not respond to any of my guesses. However, as this discussion took place over AVEC, I was able to see her as she spoke. I asked if there was any physical damage to the System hardware: no change. I asked if there was any permanent damage to the System internals: no change. I asked if there was any trouble phys-side that led to the downtime: she looked down to her hands on the desk. Finally, I asked if this downtime might have been intentional, whether there might have been malice behind it: she looked off-screen, her expression appearing tense, perhaps frightened.''
+Dry Grass paused, taking a deep breath. ``Here are the things she was not able to confirm, but which I do not believe were outright denials. She was not able to confirm the reason for the downtime and did not respond to any of my guesses. However, as this discussion took place over AVEC, I was able to see her as she spoke. I asked if there was any physical damage to the System hardware: no change. I asked if there was any permanent damage to the System internals: no change. I asked if there was any trouble phys-side that led to the downtime: she looked down to her hands on the desk. Finally, I asked if this downtime might have been intentional, whether there might have been malice behind it: she looked off-screen, her expression appearing tense, perhaps frightened. I suspect an NDA block on her implants. I have heard these are uncomfortable at best.''
 
 At this, the muttering grew darker still.
 
@@ -440,7 +440,7 @@ There followed nearly half an hour of silence. Most of the Odists looked distant
 
 By the end, many of them were in tears.
 
-``Alright,'' Need An Answer said. ``The amount provided to me is 748. Combined with those who are not here and who have responded, there are 1,338 Odists. Please now provide tallies of how many of these instances are missing.''
+``Alright,'' Need An Answer said. ``The amount provided to me is 748. Combined with those who are not here who have responded, there are 1,338 Odists. Please now provide tallies of how many of these instances are missing.''
 
 ``Why?'' In All Ways asked. Her expression had shifted from upset to unnerved.
 
@@ -486,7 +486,7 @@ The skunk didn't reply other than to continue whispering `no' quietly.
 
 A Finger Pointing spoke up, casting a careful sidelong glance at her partner, Beholden. ``We have spoken of the Ode, yes, of the two lines, but we should not omit those long-lived instances that were lost. I have lost one of my own up-trees. I have lost A Finger Curled.''
 
-At this, Beholden burst into tears, eventually rolling to the side to slip out of the sim. A Finger Pointing quickly forked to follow while the other instance remained.
+At this, Beholden let out a cry and burst suddenly into tears, eventually rolling to the side to slip out of the sim. A Finger Pointing quickly forked to follow while the other instance remained.
 
 ``You are right. I apologize, my dear,'' Need An Answer said, bowing. ``Of the 28 missing, five are long-lived instances that are not named lines, including A Finger Curled. My condolences to you, to Beholden, and to her up-tree instance.''
 
@@ -508,11 +508,11 @@ Dry Grass lowered her head as several of the other Odists joined. After a moment
 
 ``Will you come with?'' Cress asked, alarmed.
 
-``Not yet, my love. I will rejoin before long. One of the lost long-lived instances was one of my own, and this will give me a chance to step back and grieve, myself.''
+``Not yet, my love. I will rejoin before long. One of the lost long-lived instances was one of my own, and this will give me a chance to step back and grieve, myself--'' Her voice trailed off into a hoarseness that spoke of tears to come.
 
 Cress's expression fell, and it wrapped its arms around her. ``I'm sorry, I didn't know\ldots{}''
 
-``I did not say,'' Dry Grass said, shrugging. Whatever confidence she had been leaning on before was gone. She looked to be struggling to hold herself together. ``We will talk later, my love. More of me remain at home, too.''
+``I did not say,'' Dry Grass said, shrugging. Whatever confidence she had been leaning on before was gone. She looked to be struggling to hold herself together. ``We will talk later. More of me remain at home, too.''
 
 We all took turns, ensuring that she got a hug from each of us, then stepped away, this time to the pagoda that I had discovered earlier that day before sleeping.
 
@@ -528,11 +528,11 @@ There was a long silence, followed by a sigh of her own. \emph{``Just us?''}
 
 Another long pause, and then a sense of a nod.
 
-A few moments after I sent her the address of the sim, she popped into being beside me. Her expression was flat and motions stiff as she walked with me to join the rest of the clade in the pagoda. Even as the rest of the Marshans greeted her, she simply nodded, saying nothing.
+A few moments after I sent her the address of the sim, she popped into being beside me, looking freshly showered. Her expression was flat and motions stiff as she walked with me to join the rest of the clade in the pagoda. Even as the rest of the Marshans greeted her, she simply nodded, saying nothing.
 
-If I'd been expecting us all to jump into conversation, I was disappointed. However, there was still relief when we fell back into silence, each thinking our thoughts, looking out over the pasture at the fog and the shadows of sheep. The only sounds were those of the sim — a hint of rain further out on the grass, another tinkle or two of a bell — and my own breathing.
+If I'd been expecting us all to jump into conversation, I was disappointed. However, there was still relief when we fell back into silence, each thinking our thoughts, looking out over the pasture at the fog and the shadows of sheep. The only sounds were those of the sim --- a hint of rain further out on the grass, another tinkle or two of a bell --- and my own breathing.
 
-Once more, questions bubbled up within me. What could I possibly do in the face of such enormity? How could 48 billion people just disappear? What was Phys-side doing about all of this other than hiding the details they doubtless had? More 'how could I's dogging my heels — how could I be sitting here in silence? How could I have stepped away from Dry Grass, the one person I knew who was working hardest on this? How could I not have looped Lily into this whole conversation?
+Once more, questions bubbled up within me. What could I possibly do in the face of such enormity? How could 48 billion people just disappear? What was phys-side doing about all of this other than hiding the details they doubtless had? More 'how could I's dogging my heels --- how could I be sitting here in silence? How could I have stepped away from Dry Grass, the one person I knew who was working hardest on this? How could I not have looped Lily into this whole conversation?
 
 ``So,'' Lily said. ``What's up?''
 
@@ -554,7 +554,7 @@ She shrugged. ``Not none, I'm sure.''
 
 ``Ye-e-es,'' I allowed. ``So maybe it was a virus or something. CPV that affects everyone doesn't exist, does it?''
 
-Silence and headshakes around the pagoda. The contraproprioceptive virus — the one sure way to kill anyone on the System — only seemed to work when tailored specifically to an individual's sensorium, disrupting their sense of proprioception until they either dissipated and crashed or quit out of agony. Not only that, but, from what I'd learned from the stories that came out surrounding it a few decades back, it had to somehow pierce the skin, to breach that sense of physical integrity, before it could do it's awful job of unwinding a person entirely.
+Silence and headshakes around the pagoda. The contraproprioceptive virus --- the one sure way to kill anyone on the System --- only seemed to work when tailored specifically to an individual's sensorium, disrupting their sense of proprioception until they either dissipated and crashed or quit out of agony. Not only that, but, from what I'd learned from the stories that came out surrounding it a few decades back, it had to somehow pierce the skin, to breach that sense of physical integrity, before it could do it's awful job of unwinding a person entirely.
 
 ``Well, if this\ldots attack or whatever was deliberate and we don't know anything about \emph{how} it was done, do we know anything about who might have done it?''
 
@@ -564,7 +564,7 @@ Sedge leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees. ``There's always been a b
 
 ``I'm not sure they think of us as people.''
 
-Lily snorted. ``Not as people,'' she sneered. ``Sorry, Sedge, I know it's not on you. You're probably right. I'm just feeling like shit now.''
+Lily snorted. ``\,`Not as people','' she sneered. ``Sorry, Sedge, I know it's not on you. You're probably right. I'm just feeling like shit now.''
 
 Rush smiled faintly. ``I think we all are.''
 

marsh/content/005.tex

@@ -88,7 +88,7 @@ As you were informed in your contract, your companion was a direct fork of a cor
 
 They are gone. I am so fucking sorry, but even if a version of them merged down into me I cannot sort your Andréa from the rest. Or from myself.
 
-Until further notice, High Falls Millworks\#46b147c4 is closed to all visitors, and 91N INDUSTRIES is shuttering. I cannot begin to describe what I am going through.
+Until further notice, High Falls Millworks\#46b147c4 is closed to all visitors, and 9IN INDUSTRIES is shuttering. I cannot begin to describe what I am going through.
 
 In the event you still have your beloved Synth companion, please instruct her/them/it to fork and merge down as soon as possible. If you know of an ACM companion in the wild or out of the reach of the feeds, please Contact Andréa Mason\#Central.
 

marsh/content/millwright.tex

@@ -6,33 +6,35 @@ I was one of the headmates that pushed for uploading as our body failed and our
 
 Not being the front when we hit the System proper was a bit of a shock, but when we finally fanned out and forked into our separate headmate-y selves, I de facto became the Face of the Clade. Alex eventually ended up running everything, she was the part of us that likes keeping archives and all that, but I was expected to be head of social affairs. Even later, when my side gig became my main gig and I functionally became a clade unto myself, I was still expected to be diplomat and ambassador in turn.
 
-That side gig turned sys-side career was a flush of kinks and dreams made real. After about a decade of careful planning and testing, we started a company. We forked endless versions of ourselves and sent them out into the world. We found a way to replicate the ``synths'' of phys-side fiction, and embraced it so thoroughly that it now takes exceptional effort to act fully organic. Here, we could live out the fetish of being mass-produced, effectively engaging in sex work in the process, but also live out the fantasy of helping whoever needed it and being able to bow out if things got unsafe or unstable.
+That side-gig-turned-sys-side-career was a flush of kinks and dreams made real. After about a decade of careful planning and testing, we started a `company'. We forked endless versions of ourselves and sent them out into the world. We found a way to replicate the ``synths'' of phys-side fiction, and embraced it so thoroughly that it now takes exceptional effort to act fully organic. Here, we could live out the fetish of being mass-produced, effectively engaging in sex work in the process, but also live out the fantasy of helping whoever needed it and being able to bow out if things got unsafe or unstable.
 
 As we expanded rapidly, some part of me felt a pull towards authenticity, and we decided to have a ``brick and mortar'' headquarters. We worked with several sim artisans to create the now-famous High Falls Millworks\#46b147c4. We chose the name, location, and design based on a district of the town our great-great-great grandmother lived in called Brown's Race in Rochester, New York. Hundreds of years before even she was born, the city had made a name for itself off the mills powered by the waterfall and river nearby. We even went as far as to commission a meticulously crafted fully functioning triphammer forge, like the area once had. Her name was Andréa as well, and I took her name out of admiration. We also named our company 9IN INDUSTRIES as a nod to her favorite band.
 
-Building a factory, one that made our production model look more complicated than ``gather client specs and fork to those in another room'', one that featured a convincing ``assembly line'', exploded our company overnight. We had to restructure on the fly, and that is where I forked from my downtree instance. The most continuous version of me, Andréa C Mason\#Foundry, remained head of the company, but she forked me, Andréa C Mason\#Central, to be the heart of it all. Yet again I found myself a face, communal voice, a spokeswoman and figurehead for this clade-within-a-clade we'd become.
+Building a factory, one that made our production model look more complicated than ``gather client specs and fork to those in another room'', one that featured a convincing ``assembly line'', exploded our company overnight. We had to restructure on the fly, and that is where I forked from my down-tree instance. The most continuous version of me, Andréa C Mason\#Foundry, remained head of the company, but she forked me, Andréa C Mason\#Central, to be the heart of it all. Yet again I found myself a face, communal voice, a spokeswoman and figurehead for this clade-within-a-clade we'd become.
 
-My path from my downtree instance diverged quickly and wildly. I became less and less involved with any direct production or facsimile of such. I would fork for something, and then that fork would develop into an entire department. My forks spread out and I found myself not working with my hands all that much, really if at all. For our own safety and the safety of these so-called mass produced forks, we needed contracts, standards, and rules, inasmuch as those things are enforceable in a System largely without any governing body. We were up front that any version of us that was sent out had full rights to quit at any time for safety's sake, and having that in writing out up front prevented all sorts of headaches and worse. Thus one of the first departments we ever made was a Legal Department of sorts. We weren't in it for any sort of profit, by the nature of our project we were already swimming in rep, but we did want to get the message out there to more people. So, I forked a marketing version of myself, and they began a Sales and Outreach Department. We had a team for returning forks and merges down, specifically based around coping with loss, trauma, abuses that might have led them to leave, conflict resolution, contract disputes. We had an HR and Public Health Department. As our operation expanded, we needed sim artists, construct artists, experts in fields, professional engineers, so we made a Logisitics Department. We had an R\&D team. Once we expanded far enough, we set up an Education and Training Department. When we'd flushed out the area around High Falls enough, we began to offer unused space up for development in the style of the buildings that had existed phys-side. We had a Real Estate and Zoning Department. \#Foundry started out involved with a great deal of it, but she became more involved in the so-called ``physical work'', and even among the teams and departments that she founded, she trusted me to handle the ins and outs of people management. We had a surge in the early 2300s, at some point tracking over 100,000 forks, but those numbers waned in time, and we stabilized around the end of the century with about 64,000 ``units'' in service and me in charge of a whopping 6,000-person staff.
+My path from my down-tree diverged quickly and wildly. I became less and less involved with any direct production or facsimile of such. I would fork for something, and then that fork would develop into an entire department. My forks spread out and I found myself not working with my hands all that much, really, if at all. For our own safety and the safety of these so-called mass produced forks, we needed contracts, standards, and rules, inasmuch as those things are enforceable in a System largely without any governing body. We were up front that any version of us that was sent out had full rights to quit at any time for safety's sake, and having that in writing out up front prevented all sorts of headaches and worse. Thus one of the first departments we ever made was a Legal Department of sorts. We weren't in it for any sort of profit, by the nature of our project we were already swimming in rep, but we did want to get the message out there to more people. So, I forked a marketing version of myself, and they began a Sales and Outreach Department. We had a team for returning forks and merges down, specifically based around coping with loss, trauma, abuses that might have led them to leave, conflict resolution, contract disputes. We had an HR and Public Health Department. As our operation expanded, we needed sim artists, construct artists, experts in fields, professional engineers, so we made a Logisitics Department. We had an R\&D team. Once we expanded far enough, we set up an Education and Training Department. When we'd fleshed out the area around High Falls enough, we began to offer unused space up for development in the style of the buildings that had existed phys-side. We had a Real Estate and Zoning Department. \#Foundry started out involved with a great deal of it, but she became more involved in the so-called ``physical work'', and even among the teams and departments that she founded, she trusted me to handle the ins and outs of people management. We had a surge in the early 2300s, at some point tracking over 100,000 forks, but those numbers waned in time, and we stabilized around the end of the century with about 64,000 ``units'' in service and me in charge of a whopping 6,000-person staff.
 
-I tell people so often that I didn't like it, but the truth of it was, I was good at it, and for a while that was satisfying enough. We had built a company from the ground up, and I found myself at its peak. We had created an incredible corporation, one that had all the fantastic idealism of what a company could be, and because of the nature of the System, completely removed from the reality, brutalities, and consequences of what running an actual business phys-side caused. \#Foundry and I were praisedlauded through parts of the System, conservatives lauding us as poster-children of capitalism, and liberals championed us as meritocracy in motion, proof that with ethics and smarts, businesses could treat both customers and employees with respect and kindness.
+I tell people so often that I didn't like it, but the truth of it was, I was good at it, and for a while that was satisfying enough. We had built a company from the ground up, and I found myself at its peak. We had created an incredible corporation, one that had all the fantastic idealism of what a company could be, and because of the nature of the System, completely removed from the reality, brutalities, and consequences of what running an actual business phys-side caused. \#Foundry and I were praised through parts of the System, conservatives lauding us as poster-children of capitalism (despite the lack of such sys-side), and liberals championed us as meritocracy in motion, proof that with ethics and smarts, businesses could treat both customers and employees with respect and kindness.
 
-The occasional leftist would praise our unions and sex-positivity, that a post-human trans woman being head of anything still felt like something worth celebrating, and a few more condemned us for recreating a corporation wholesale inside a place that should have been an anti-capitalist's paradise, but overwhelmingly there was silence from the people that once, a long time ago, we had called comrades and stood shoulder to shoulder with both phys- and sys-side. Now it is my greatest shame, but even at the height of 9IN INDUSTRIES's success, it left a sour taste in my mouth. Couldn't they be happy for what we'd accomplished, what \emph{I} had built? \#Foundry was lauded as a mechanical genius, but I was the face and name of the company. I joked that the C of our middle initial stood for Central, I appeared in interviews and magazines, I gave talks and attended conferences. \#Foundry was the inventor, but I was the entrepreneur, and at my worst I basked in it. After all, I---and my thousands of forks, but really weren't they just extensions of me?--- had worked so hard, I had \emph{earned} my success.
+The occasional leftist would praise our unions and sex-positivity, that a post-human trans woman being head of anything still felt like something worth celebrating, and a few more condemned us for recreating a corporation wholesale inside a place that should have been an anti-capitalist's paradise, but overwhelmingly there was silence from the people that once, a long time ago, we had called comrades and stood shoulder to shoulder with both phys- and sys-side. Now it is my greatest shame, but even at the height of 9IN INDUSTRIES's success, it left a sour taste in my mouth. Couldn't they be happy for what we'd accomplished, what \emph{I} had built? \#Foundry was lauded as a mechanical genius, but I was the face and name of the company. I joked that the C of our middle initial stood for Central, I appeared in interviews and magazines, I gave talks and attended conferences. \#Foundry was the inventor, but I was the entrepreneur, and at my worst I basked in it. After all, I---and my thousands of forks, but really weren't they just extensions of me?---had worked so hard. I had \emph{earned} my success.
 
 A few partners left me over it. A few more I only knew through it. \#Foundry had become more and more elusive over time, and even in CERES clade affairs and meetings and gatherings I began to take her place, forking and sending a merge down to keep her updated. I was two faces but one, perhaps the most well-known member of my clade, and the subclade of me within it. I was the ace of myself and my self. When the clade became embroiled in our Authority Crisis in the 2360s, I was the most affected and part of the fixes and rescues that followed. I was Andréa C Mason, and the \#Central after my name was more a job title than a signifier.
 
-We gathered, that night, as so many across the System did, to ring in the new century, to send the 2300s out with a bang and to ring in the brand new frontier of the 2400s. Our entire staff was on hand throughout the offices and facilities, and many who had outside the lives had brought Partners or friends, and it was a revelry for the ages! God, what a night!
+We made it through, all the way to the end of the century.
+
+We gathered, that night, as so many across the System did, to welcome in the new year, to send the 2300s out with a bang and to ring in the brand new frontier of the 2400s. Our entire staff was on hand throughout the offices and facilities, and many who had outside the lives had brought partners or friends, and it was a revelry for the ages! God, what a night!
 
 What a night.
 
 God, oh gods above and below, what a horrible night.
 
-To say that my subclade was hit hard by the century attack does not give any sense of scale. I have talked with many a pathologist, perisystem architect, and number of other experts about it, and still we lack answers. We were not the origin, but we were a minor epicenter, and for whatever reason, the contraproprioceptive virus was particularly effective at dismantling us in bulk. We kept in close communication and had very accurate numbers for how many forks of us existed at any given time, we used sensoria and a variety of other methods to keep an incredibly tight and informed network, and within .000001\% margin of error, there were 69,760 Andréa C Masons throughout the system on the night of December 31st, 2399.
+To say that my subclade was hit hard by the Century Attack does not give any sense of scale. I have talked with many a pathologist, perisystem architect, and number of other experts about it, and still we lack answers. We were not the origin, but we were a minor epicenter, and for whatever reason, the contraproprioceptive virus was particularly effective at dismantling us in bulk. We kept in close communication and had very accurate numbers for how many forks of us existed at any given time, we used sensoria and a variety of other methods to keep an incredibly tight and informed network, and within ±5, there were 69,760 Andréa C Masons throughout the system on the night of December 31st, 2399.
 
 By the time the dust settled, 12 of us remained, and of those 12, two quit within a week. 4 more crashed from grief in the next month.
 
-I can't comprehend how to explain what it felt like to suddenly look at the clock approaching midnight again, to find myself alone in a room that had contained hundreds, almost alone in a sim that over 6,000 people had inhabited what felt like only moments before. To run panicked and slipping through streets laden with snow from accurate weather sims, with no pawprints or hoofprints but my own, to find \#Foundry alive and sobbing, to find 2 other forks, bewildered and dissociating, to become inundated with thousands of requests for help, of anger, asking what they had done wrong or if they had violated the contract or what had happened, and having no answers for any of them. Finally, \#Foundry sent a mass message to the feeds within a day, and 9IN INDUSTRIES shuttered, now likely never to reopen.
+I can't comprehend how to explain what it felt like to suddenly look at the clock approaching midnight to find myself alone in a room that had contained hundreds, almost alone in a sim that over 6,000 people had inhabited what felt like only moments before. To run panicked and slipping through streets laden with snow from accurate weather sims, with no pawprints or hoofprints but my own, to find \#Foundry alive and sobbing, to find 2 other forks, bewildered and dissociating, to become inundated with thousands of requests for help, of anger, asking what they had done wrong or if they had violated the contract or what had happened, and having no answers for any of them. Within a day, \#Foundry sent a mass message to the feeds within a day, and 9IN INDUSTRIES shuttered, now likely never to reopen.
 
-\#Foundry nearly quit when she found out that not only had we suffered impossible losses, but through some mechanism we did not and still do not understand, caused further ones. If you were in proximity to a fork of Andréa C Mason when the Century Attack happened, there was an 85\% chance that you died as well. Of the hundreds of visitors and inhabitants of High Falls Millworks\#46b147c4 that night, not a single one survived. We were a \emph{vector}, somehow. One of us quit and three of us crashed over that fact. Where do we even start to recover from this?
+\#Foundry nearly quit when she found out that not only had we suffered impossible losses, but through some mechanism we did not and still do not understand, caused further ones. If you were in proximity to a fork of Andréa C Mason when the Century Attack happened, there was an 85\% chance that you died as well. Of the hundreds of visitors and inhabitants of High Falls Millworks\#46b147c4 that night, not a single one survived. We were a \emph{vector}, somehow. Perhaps it was due to the mechanism by which the virus spread. I don't know. One of us quit and three of us crashed over that fact.Where do we even start to recover from this?
 
 Partly, we just won't. We have our different reasons, but as the two leaders of our now defunct corporation, \#Foundry and I have made the agonizing choice that we will not rebuild. We talked for days, sitting on our faithful reproduction of the Pont de Renne bridge, watching the falls roar and the sun rise and set, taking turns sobbing into each other's arms. Almost two centuries of work disappeared in what was to us an instant. We could not start again. It's over.
 
@@ -40,15 +42,15 @@ Partly, we just won't. We have our different reasons, but as the two leaders of
 
 As for me?
 
-I'd like to pretend the change that I'm about to make is some Grand gesture of atonement and a reawakening of class consciousness. It's certainly in play, I'm not going to pretend it isn't. Look at me, the turncoat, the hypocrite, the working class anarchosyndicalist queer phys-side turned girl boss captain of industry sys-side, who cast aside her morals and consciences with the slightest bit of success. I'd been so hard before uploading on so many people for giving up everything they believed in for even a small amount of success, and more than a few cases nothing less than righteously so, but when I found myself in the same position I put them all to shame. I tell myself that again and again whenever The Dread or guilt or shame creep in, I tell myself that now is the chance to atone and to regain my class consciousness. And yeah, it is part of it.
+I'd like to pretend the change that I'm about to make is some Grand gesture of atonement and a reawakening of class consciousness. It's certainly in play, I'm not going to pretend it isn't. Look at me, the turncoat, the hypocrite, the working class anarchosyndicalist queer phys-side turned girl boss captain of industry sys-side, who cast aside her morals and consciences with the slightest bit of success. I'd been so hard before uploading on so many people for giving up everything they believed in for even a small amount of success, and more than a few cases nothing less than righteously so, but when I found myself in the same position I put them all to shame. I tell myself that again and again whenever the dread or guilt or shame creep in, I tell myself that now is the chance to atone and to regain my class consciousness. And yeah, that is part of it.
 
 It's a bigger truth, the one I hate to admit but cannot deny, is that I was so fucking bored and no idea bores me more than going back to being the socialite.
 
 A simple concept that a lot of people seem to struggle with is that just because someone was really good at something, doesn't mean they like doing it. It is entirely possible to learn or understand innately the skills and necessities of a trade, to have a skillset or the tools to be really really good at something, and still get a little enjoyment out of performing that thing. My business may have vanished into the ether, but I still have all those social connections, I still have a reputation that precedes me hours in advance of me showing up anywhere, my fame and to some degree what you could call a fortune of social capital still exist, right there, waiting. If anything, if I chose to go back to that life and flourished again my legend and legacy would become even stronger, the determined woman who didn't let one of the greatest possible losses one could suffer slow her down, who pulled herself up by her bootstraps from nothing again, a phoenix, reborn in the mythology of good old protestant work ethic.
 
-Even that in itself should fill me with disgust, but it only furthers my apathy. I took pride in a product I claimed I produced, despite how little I had to do with it actually being made, and that brought me the satisfaction that all the social engineering and handshaking and baby kissing and photo posing and being a people person didn't. The pageantry of rich people, of successful people, of this upper class is largely that. Pageantry. Their parties are dull, their social mores and customs and activities lack substance, nothing really happens that makes anything. There was never any struggle, there was barely any conflict, and it produced only an ennui in me that I did not see the size of until someone all but ended the world.
+Even that in itself should fill me with disgust, but it only furthers my apathy. I took pride in a product I claimed I produced, despite how little I had to do with it actually being made, and that brought me the satisfaction that all the social engineering and handshaking and baby kissing and photo posing and being a people person didn't. The pageantry of rich people, of successful people, of this upper class is largely that. Pageantry. Especially sys-side, it's just a show. Their parties are dull, their social mores and customs and activities lack substance, nothing really happens that makes anything. There was never any struggle, there was barely any conflict, and it produced only an ennui in me that I did not see the size of until someone all but ended the world.
 
-I want to work with my hands. I want to make things. I want to be alone, and I want to create. The people who made it what it was may be gone but High Falls Millworks\#46b147c4 still exists. All its machines still function, and I'm going to take the time to learn to use every last lathe, forge, and press in here, and I'm going to \emph{make} things. I want what I do to be tangible, to be meaningful, not words and nods and smiles and fuckings in the right place to keep things moving. I've hired a number of people to help me maintain the sim, but I have asked them largely to keep our relationship professional and distant , and when I finally feel satisfied that I am not just a voice and a face, maybe I'll even try seeing people again.
+I want to work with my hands. I want to make things. I want to be alone, and I want to create. The people who made it what it was may be gone but High Falls Millworks\#46b147c4 still exists. All its machines still function, and I'm going to take the time to learn to use every last lathe, forge, and press in here, and I'm going to \emph{make} things. I want what I do to be tangible, to be meaningful, not words and nods and smiles and fuckings in the right place to keep things moving. I've hired a number of people to help me maintain the sim, but I have asked them largely to keep our relationship professional and distant, and when I finally feel satisfied that I am not just a voice and a face, maybe I'll even try seeing people again.
 
 Until then, I ask you keep any requests or comments to yourself. I'm not going to be in a place to take commissions anytime soon, I just need to forge for myself for a little while. Hone some real skills.
 

marsh/content/nasturtiums.tex

@@ -1,34 +1,43 @@
+\textbf{To:} Beholden To The Heat Of The Lamps of the Ode clade\\
+\textbf{(EYES-ONLY)}\\
+\textbf{From:} Beholden To The Music Of The Spheres of her own clade\\
+\textbf{On:} systime 277+48
+
+\vspace{1em}
+
 Beholden To The Heat Of The Lamps,
 
+\vspace{1em}
+
 It has been seven days. One week, I promised myself. I would wait one week while I watched the System limp back to life. I would wait a week and see what all was being done, what could be done to save the lost.
 
 It has been seven days of increasing surety that those who have perished in this event are gone for good. And if they indeed are gone for good then that means my beloved is gone with them.
 
-Do you remember when we came into being? It was the night of that awful monologue, that little joke of a scene where I was set to read some truly embarrassing lines. ``We all play our parts. Some are towel boys and some lewd doctors\ldots{}'' I could remember the rest, but I do not want to. That line sticking in my craw is enough. I was a skunk that night because I did not want my face associated with those words.
+Do you remember when we came into being, A Finger curled and I? It was the night of that awful monologue, that little joke of a scene where I was set to read some truly embarrassing lines. ``We all play our parts. Some are towel boys and some lewd doctors\ldots{}'' I could remember the rest, but I do not want to. That line sticking in my craw is enough. I was a skunk that night because I did not want my face associated with those words. Burroughs! Christ.
 
 It was awful. It was delightful.
 
-I declared that it was necessary for me to get a drink, that I needed to wash the taste of those words off of my tongue and replace my grimaces with giggles. We went to that cute bar with outdoor tables and fairy lights strung above. Strange drinks and edamame. You and Boss fell into earnest conversation about this and that as you so often do. There was love in your eyes as always, even back when such was too taboo to show in public. Another benefit of a skunk face: hide that love from nosy passers-by. Our human face always was too expressive.
+I declared that it was necessary for me to get a drink, that I needed to wash the taste of those words off of my tongue and replace my grimaces with giggles. We went to that cute bar with outdoor tables and fairy lights strung above. Strange drinks and edamame. You and A Finger Pointing fell into earnest conversation about this and that as you so often do. There was love in your eyes as always, even back when such was too taboo to show in public. Another benefit of a skunk face: hide that love from nosy passers-by. Our human face always was too expressive.
 
-It is too expressive now. It is full of tears and grief. It is full of despair. I cannot muster the energy required to be angry. I cannot pull up a smile from nothing. She is gone and she is never coming back. Yes, she merged back down, but she last did so some months ago, back at the beginning of winter. Yes, A Finger Pointing could fork once more into A Finger Curled, but that would not be her. She would be missing our sweet nothings and earnest conversations from the last few months. She would have decades of time --- is it more than two centuries already? --- of her life with you, so many memories of the past to talk about of which I would have no idea about. She merged down, yes? And I never did.
+It is too expressive now. It is full of tears and grief. It is full of despair. I cannot muster the energy required to be angry. I cannot pull up a smile from nothing. She is gone and she is never coming back. Yes, she merged back down, but as far as I know, she last did so some months ago, back at the beginning of winter. Yes, A Finger Pointing could fork once more into some new approximation of A Finger Curled, but that would not be her. She would be missing our sweet nothings and earnest conversations from the last few months. She would have decades of time --- is it more than two centuries already? --- of her life with you, so many memories of the past to talk about of which I would have no idea. She merged down, yes? And I never did.
 
 It is full of grief. It is full of despair.
 
-It was at that bar in the midst of our earnest discussion of taboos and friends. You assured me there was a shift in the air, that True Name, so staunch a name within the clade, cared little about our relationship, but that she still encouraged our secrecy so as not to rock the boat for all of us, thanks to Jonas, but that perhaps soon, soon we would be able to hold hands in public, give each other little kisses and let those outside our stanza bear witness to what started as self love and blossomed into romance.
+It was at that bar in the midst of our earnest discussion of taboos and friends. You assured me there was a shift in the air, that True Name, so staunch a personality within the clade, cared little about our relationship, but that she still encouraged our secrecy so as not to rock the boat for all of us, thanks to Jonas, but that perhaps soon, soon we would be able to hold hands in public, give each other little kisses and let those outside our stanza bear witness to what started as self love and blossomed into romance.
 
-I acknowledge, of course, her relative aromancy, but for me it was romance, and for her it was still love.
+I acknowledge, of course, her relative aromancy, but for \emph{me} it was romance, and for her it was still love.
 
 We talked of just how it was that she alternated between human and skunk every time she forked. An affectation, yes, but a fondness for the past that I always admired in her
 
 We talked of the past, of the open mic nights we hosted in The Crown Pub for a while, AwDae and I reciting monologues and dialogues. Erina's awful song. And then there were only three performing the next week, only one the week after that, and then the open mic nights stopped.
 
-We talked of the soreness of this, of our hidden domesticity, and she said, as though on a whim, ``And here I am beginning to wonder if I have made the right path for myself. Maybe, with a little mindfulness, I can still correct my course. But I admit that I have been considering stepping away from the clade. Perhaps one of our stanza would take my place, fork a new Time Is A Finger Pointing At Itself.'' She said, ``I would like to know that you would come with me if I did do. I have not felt so domestic with anyone but you.''
+We talked of the soreness of this, of our hidden domesticity, and she said, as though on a whim, ``And here I am beginning to wonder if I have made the right path for myself. Maybe, with a little mindfulness, I can still correct my course. But I admit that I have been considering stepping away from the clade. Perhaps one of our stanza would take my place, fork a new Time Is A Finger Pointing At Itself.'' She said, ``I would like to know that you would come with me if I did so. I have not felt so domestic with anyone but you.''
 
 Of course I would! Of course I would. How could I not? How could I send her out in the world to live some quiet life away from administering to a troupe of actors and technicians, and leave her to do so alone? She would have her fun and her flings, but she would not have what she had had for dozens and dozens of years.
 
 So she forked into A Finger Curled and you forked into Beholden To The Music Of The Spheres.
 
-That was us. A Finger Curled and her lover. Beckoning and Beholden. A different version of each of you that lived their quiet life in a cottage. A week and a day ago, we snagged a middling bottle of champagne and set up lawn chairs in the garden. A week and a day ago, Debarre stopped by to drop off a firework --- he only ever needed one to impress --- so that we could have our own little show. We each gave him a hug and he told us small stories of nothing we cared about, of the fledgling attempt at a Lagrange Council.
+That was us. A Finger Curled and her Muse. Beckoning and Beholden. A different version of each of you that lived their quiet life in a cottage. A week and a day ago, we snagged a middling bottle of champagne and set up lawn chairs in the garden. A week and a day ago, Debarre stopped by to drop off a firework --- he only ever needed one to impress --- so that we could have our own little show. We each gave him a hug and he told us small stories of nothing we cared about, of the fledgling attempt at a Lagrange Council, quickly dispersed.
 
 We never did get to see the firework. It sits still on the paving stone where Beckoning placed it, ready to light on a midnight that never came for her.
 
@@ -38,7 +47,7 @@ Phys-side got the System up and limping a few times, I have heard, before it was
 
 Stable enough!
 
-Stability was us. Stability was our lives. Stability was us in our quiet cottage. Stability was us heading to clubs and dancing until we wanted to pass out --- until we did, on more than one occasion, slumped against each other and panting in some corner booth. Stability was the four of us --- you and Boss, me and Beckoning --- meeting up for dinner every few years and sharing our laughter.
+Stability was \emph{us.} Stability was our lives. Stability was our quiet cottage. Stability was us heading to clubs and dancing until we wanted to pass out --- until we did, on more than one occasion, slumped against each other and panting in some corner booth. Stability was the four of us --- you and Boss, me and Beckoning --- meeting up for dinner every few years and sharing our laughter.
 
 Stability was her garden. Stability was the years she grew so much zucchini. Stability was loaf after loaf of zucchini bread, meal after meal of zucchini noodles, the grates of the grill getting weary of grilled zucchini.
 
@@ -56,4 +65,8 @@ In some few minutes, you will have more than 200 years of memories to keep and t
 
 Live on, my dear. You have your Pointillist. Live on.
 
-All my love, Beholden To The Music Of The Spheres
+All my love, 
+
+\vspace{1em}
+
+Beholden To The Music Of The Spheres

motes-played/content/008.tex

@@ -116,7 +116,7 @@ Dry Grass nodded.
 
 Dry Grass blinked, then burst out in laughter, laughing until once more the tears flowed down her cheeks, until she sobbed, holding herself still on her swing with feet planted firmly on the ground.
 
-Beholden waited in silence. She knew well the mechanics of a hysterical laugh-cry—she had at one point recorded A Finger Pointing falling into such and chopped it into little slivers of half-recognizable samples and haunted an entire album with it, so beautiful had she found it—and while her and Dry Grass's relationship did not include a whole lot of hugging, she still nudged herself to the side far enough to rub at her cocladist's shoulder until the tears once more slowed and she was once more able to breathe but for a few few aftershocks of chuckling.
+Beholden waited in silence. She knew well the mechanics of a hysterical laugh-cry—she had at one point recorded A Finger Pointing falling into such and chopped it into little slivers of half-recognizable samples and haunted an entire album with it, so beautiful had she found it—and while her and Dry Grass's relationship did not include a whole lot of hugging, she still nudged herself to the side far enough to rub at her cocladist's shoulder until the tears once more slowed and she was once more able to breathe but for a few aftershocks of chuckling.
 
 ``Sorry, Beholden,'' Dry Grass said, once she was able. ``I am a little fucked up still, I think.''
 

neviim/content/029.tex

@@ -8,7 +8,7 @@
 
 \noindent ``We would like to ask you about the history of your species.''
 
-There was a brief pause as the Artemisians once more blurred into discussion. Iska had set up the sim such that the Artemisians remained in skew while the emissaries sat in a unison room, the table spanning an entrance arch. It had certainly helped with the True Name and, as he was now convinced, Answers Will Not Help. Neither seemed particularly back to baseline, and Answers Will Not Help continued to fluctuate between forms unless she focused on one at a time, but neither looked as though that took quite as much effort as it had originally.
+There was a brief pause as the Artemisians once more blurred into discussion. Iska had set up the sim such that the Artemisians remained in skew while the emissaries sat in a unison room, the table spanning an entrance arch. It had certainly helped with True Name and, as he was now convinced, Answers Will Not Help. Neither seemed particularly back to baseline, and Answers Will Not Help continued to fluctuate between forms unless she focused on one at a time, but neither looked as though that took quite as much effort as it had originally.
 
 ``Are you able to narrow the scope of your question?''
 
@@ -16,7 +16,7 @@ The skunk frowned, tilted her head, and thought for a few long seconds. ``I woul
 
 Yet another blur.
 
-Tycho watched Codrin add a tick mark to a growing list on his notebook then dash off a few marks next to it in some sort of shorthand. ``Keeping track of private discussions?''
+Tycho watched Codrin add a tick mark to a growing list on eir notebook then dash off a few marks next to it in some sort of shorthand. ``Keeping track of private discussions?''
 
 Ey nodded. ``And what the general topic was that spurred it.''