🌔

You attach your terminal to your arm and mentally reconnect it to your system as you walk. It doesn’t feel any different. You look around, through every corner of every local directory, as you descend back to the wall. You set your familiar construct to go forth through the terminal’s little filesystem and scour it for anything out of place. It all looks just how it did when you last held it.

2254-10-06 16:48:18 Aydan > all’s well, back to my old terminal

2254-10-06 16:48:19 ÆON > Good. I can see you much more clearly now.

🌔

In your room, you prepare for an ætherwalk. It’s becoming a routine procedure for you, and you know you’ll only be spending more and more time there as your training progresses. You double check your full body calibration--the sparks cascade out from your neck, under the collar, down across your body, along the conduits in the fabric clinging tight to your skin. System sync rate is nominal.

You finish off your bottle of water and lie down. Time to check in.

2254-10-06 21:00:15 Aydan > all ready on my end

2254-10-06 21:00:16 ÆON > I am ready.

2254-10-06 21:00:18 Zeta > ready!!

2254-10-06 21:00:20 Synthesis-03 > got the VPÆ setup, ready to enter

2254-10-06 21:00:22 Synthesis-03 > sending you the access key

2254-10-06 21:00:28 Aydan > see you in the æther

2254-10-06 21:00:30 Synthesis-03 > one more thing

2254-10-06 21:00:34 Aydan > yeah?

2254-10-06 21:00:42 Synthesis-03 > seeing we’re down one girl, what if we invited my partner system, Electricité? it’s just they’ve been wanting to listen to this album too, and if anything unexpected happens they’d be a great asset in the æther