Chapter 01

She had to give it to Ray. The loopholes they exploited. Her situation had completely turned around. Instead of being their prisoner, their little experiment, she is now their mistake. Ray got her a full ride. She is allowed to live the rest of her days on the company's resources. She was classified as a failed experiment. The most hilarious part is little did they know that the experiment worked exactly how it was intended to. She couldn’t confirm that, the only person who actually knew was David.

She didn’t even have required mental health meetings. Sure, she just had to say the word, and she would gain access to the company's therapists. But they were under strict code to never discuss anything with the company. Who put that code there? Ray. Not only that, but it became a company wide change, under threat of bringing it to court. Little by little, the employees were going to be fighting back. They were not just little flesh bags of data. They were people, too.

Daisy fought for all the employees. Daisy didn’t have anyone directly helping her fight against the company, but they saw the complete restructuring of power that was occurring. Employees were starting to question the things they allowed the company to do. This made the higher ups nervous, and Daisy relished that.

The legal battle continues. She told Ray to use all of their inactive power to work through the legalese. That is until she hit the jackpot. Ray uncovered an apportionment of power tied to her account. Well, at least David’s account, in which she now has complete access to, as a failed experiment. She had 5% of a render farm, able to grow if the resources are inactive. 5% doesn’t sound like much, until you consider that Ray was doing the entire legal battle with a computation level several million times smaller than her slice of the render farm. They were a single Facebook Device. She now has the power equal to millions. She gave Ray the ability to send instructions to the render farm to be completed. They would always come back, fractions of a second later, with success. Now all Ray had to do was instruct traffic. Instead of pouring over every word of text themselves, they just have to tell the render farm what they wanted to look for, upload the text, and it completes in the blink of an eye.

That increase in power finished the main legal attack within hours. Of course, the falling out of the havok she wrecked will likely take months, if not years. The company settled a lot out of court though. They didn’t want to scare their shareholders by revealing they had an internal coup d'état. They also knew that Daisy had nothing better to do, and would show up to every court meeting. All court meetings were virtual, anyway. Especially for a failed experiment that was unable to leave the Virtual World for health reasons. She was really proud of that loophole that Ray found.

Daisy was staring at the island’s heart. The glow from the stone emanated through the curtain of roots surrounding it. She’s laying down on the grass, blissfully naked. A breeze from the labyrinth of tunnels she entered from blows the fields wheatgrass, long stalks gently swaying back and forth. Her arms behind her, supporting her as she breathes gently. The freedom. Thank you David. You did not die in vain. I’ll fight for everyone.

The rest of her life is hers. She is no longer controlled, watched, or experimented on. It really irks her that she had been watched up until however many hours ago this all started going down. There’s one way to celebrate her newfound privacy. Though she would want to travel to a new world for it.

“Is there a list of worlds?” She asks aloud. That might be impractical to print out. Her scene transforms. It looks like she’s in an art museum. But instead of framed artwork, it’s pictures of scenery on the walls. Each labeled a world title, with an author and a description. Oh this was very nice. She could appreciate the attention to detail how the pieces were lit and framed. This museum must be massive. She gets up and picks up a legend that was in a rack with other various pamphlets of information. There were categories of worlds. Sure enough, intimate worlds was listed. It was rather near. She walked past MMORPGs, real world locations, AAA game titles, her footsteps echoing in the long corridors. All along the walls were featured maps. They must pay somebody for premium placement. Probably Facebook. But it was a fun way to find new worlds, so she decided to not let it bother her. Finding the intimate gallery, she saw some very fun looking strip clubs. Neon lights, DJ sets, the works. Some of these worlds were massive. She always wanted to learn how to strip. Like, properly dance. There were lobbies in her previous games where people with full body tracking would dance, either jokingly or professionally. It was such a fun time, the laughs everyone shared. This made it a meme to have at least one stripping pole in your world, so these spots were frequently the hangout spot, besides mirrors, of course.

Next she came across sex dungeons. Of course. She did not like the edgeplay part of the BDSM, her having issues with violence and all. But there was plenty of stuff she didn’t mind and could even see herself enjoying. There were some adorable puppies she would want to play with. She’s met some, but her previous games’ BDSM scene was rather like a clique, not inclusive. She wonders if the Virtual World would be any different. She hoped people were a bit more accepting of the community.

That was just the entryway. There was a legend on the next door. This place must not obey physics, because the rooms shouldn’t be able to break off in the way it describes. She picks up the legend, knowing she will need to use it to navigate back. There has to be overlapping rooms in euclidean space. Which wouldn’t really be a problem to generate. From her perspective, she’s just taking 4 rights in a row. On a mental map, she should be back in the room she started in, but nay, it is completely different. At least it makes the categories easy to get to, instead of having to limit things to only a few doors because of euclidean space constraints. She made her way down all the way to Female Solo maps. She enters the room and sees images of maps that activate her Sense of Touch through the Lover automation. Real classy. She was already in the mood though, so she wasn’t surprised about her bodily reaction. After pursuing and reading about very imaginative maps, she ends up returning to an underwater one. She’d better have Ray give her the ability to breathe underwater. She wasn’t into the whole drowning feeling.

“Underwater Breathing. Night Vision. Extreme Temperature Resistance.” She stacks on a couple of other powers she supposes would be helpful. Flying should still work, for propulsion.

“Virtual Real Underwear. Bikini.” She decided to put a Virtual bikini over her underwear. She didn’t feel any itching, so they must have matched up just enough to protect her now very sensitive skin.

She uttered the last command, “Teleport to Ten-Tickles,” She felt silly saying the name of the map, and Ray probably could have figured it without the inclusion, but whatever.

The cool white marble disappeared beneath her, and she plummeted. The map creator made the default teleport location quite high above the actual water, sending Daisy for a terrifying but thrilling descent. She spun mid air, able to tuck into a cannonball last second. The ocean wasn’t as brutally cold as usual, the Extreme Temperature ability working just like she thought. She opened her eyes underwater. Everything was blurry for a bit, but with a little tweaking from Ray, everything cleared up. Human eyes weren’t really meant to work underwater, but it looks much better now. She started swimming down, unsure where anything was. As she got closer, she saw a massive sprawling coral reef. It was beautiful. This was a healthy, living coral reef. Rare. However, it looked like the map was set up to be enjoyed on the plateaus of the reef. The water was very clear, the sun shone through it, as if she were in the Caribbeans. She might not have needed that Night Vision after all, but it could still come in handy. A dolphin swam by her. She reached out in awe as it let her grab on. She laughed, her light giggles resounding clearly through the water. A latent benefit of underwater breathing. It actually made her voice sound higher pitched. The dolphin took her for a joyride, showing her the whole map. They even jumped out of the water once or twice, one of her favorite feelings.

“Spin!” She said, wondering if the dolphin could understand her. They sure did, spinning through the water playfully with Daisy barely able to keep on. The dolphin dips down, gaining speed for another breach. It looks like it’s going to be their biggest one yet. They exit the water and leap into the air. At the very last second, they whip their tail, cutting the water and putting the both of them into a quick spin. Daisy almost flew off. OK she actually flew off, but her hands were able to stay on. Upon reentry, she was now being dragged through the water, hanging off of one side of the dolphin. She released after a while, and the dolphin turned around to look at her.

“Do you have a name, my love?” Daisy asked. The dolphin squeaked in their language. Something she had really been banking on happened. Subtitles appeared!

“My name is Dylan! What should Dylan call you, Mistress?!” The subtitles converted his name. She wished she knew what part of the squeaking was his name. From what she knew, dolphins actually had a specific whistle that they used to consistently refer to members of their pod or themselves. So, in the same sense that humans use it, a name.

“Call me Daisy. Thank you so much for playing with me!” Daisy responded, idly treading water. Dylan swam excited circles around her.

“Yes! Yes! Dylan has fun! Dylan loves Mistress Daisy!” The ever-playful Dylan nudges her, somehow similar to how a cat would bump their head against an owner. Daisy reaches a hand out and pets him in wonder.

“Do you mind dropping me off at the Coral Reef?” Daisy asks. Dylan obliges, then goes off to re-join his pod. Daisy swam around, looking at the ocean-themed sex toys on the coral reef plateaus. This was going to be fun. The water swirling past her as she kicked her legs felt so pleasant. Her sense of touch boost must be reactivating. She could feel occasional bubbles roll up her belly and between her breasts. They tickled! Especially now!

Her heart skipped a beat when she saw a shifting in the coral. She went up to inspect it, a strange confidence of the unknown welling up in her. The mass switched colors, revealing its true nature. A massive octopus. A beautiful creature.

“Hey there, don’t be afraid,” she stopped swimming forward, now that they revealed themselves, “I’m Daisy.”

The octopus bubbled, the subtitles coming up, “H- Hey Daisy. I’m Xy.”

She assumed it was pronounced like the beginning of Xylophone, “Nice to meet you Xy,” and reached out a hand.

The octopus bolded a bit, using one of their tentacles to shake her hand. She felt the suckers attach and felt miniature pulls as they automatically looked for grip. A firm handshake, from an octopus. What a world she lives in. Xy released their grip, Daisy could swear she heard a popping noise underwater. They left marks, but faded quickly. Her sensory boost had turned off, so it didn’t hurt. Just in case, she cast a quick Ray spell, “Dermal resilience.”

Xy changed colors again. Daisy could remember that their colors were strongly linked to their emotions.

“It’s so pretty here,” Daisy commented, swishing a hand to turn slowly, looking at all the coral arrangements.

“I love it here. There are great hiding spots.” Xy said, their bubbles barely audible.

Daisy chuckled to herself, wondering if the aquatic life here knew what the reasons were for all the things on top of the coral. That was kinda awkward, somehow. Sex is normal, and there’s a time and a place for everything. Well, technically this world was built to be both a time and a place for it. It’s still a nice world, though!

“I barely was able to tell you were there. You did a great job.” Daisy complimented them. She saw orange dots move rhythmically over their body and tentacles at that comment. Was that happiness?

“Thank you!” She could hear the bubbling this time. They had such a cute, quiet voice.

“Can you change your colors?” Xy asked. Daisy thought about this. Yes, technically, she could.

“Yeah! Invisible,” She responded, then said to Ray. The second part of the statement should be filtered out. Sure enough, she disappeared.

“Aaaaa! That’s so cool! You’re like me!” Xy said, their arms wiggling and colors flashing in amusement. Daisy swam a bit over to the left to surprise them.

“Visible. Boo! Hehehe.” Daisy shouted, although not too loud to startle them.

“Wohhhh!” They squirted a bit of ink, “Sorry! I’m so sorry!”

“You’re fine, darling! Sorry for scaring you!” Daisy giggled with her new friend.

“I was not scared. I just wanted to show you what I could do,” Daisy could start picking out the intricacies of their bubbling voice. They certainly had a certain characteristic.

“I believe you. How old are you, my dear?” Although Daisy knows very little about octopus biology, Ray could answer any other questions Daisy had.

“I’m three years old. I’ve been here for 2 of them,” Daisy had to ask more from Ray.

“Xy is an adult male Giant Pacific Octopus,” Ray informs her before she asks a question. That answered everything and more.

“Are you also an adult?” He asked. She responded to his question, “Yeah, I am.”

“I- I think you’re really cute,” This took Daisy aback. Was that a translation error, maybe the connotation was like neat?

“Thank you! You look really awesome too.” She complimented him back. The orange spots whizzed over the surface of his skin.

“I like your color spots. Why don’t you change them?” Daisy was confused for a bit, but then remembered she was wearing a colored bikini, “Bikini Orange.”

“Ooooo! You look so happy!” Xy burbled.

“It’s because you’re so fun to talk to!” Daisy matched his excitement. He spun a 360 at this, his arms making an entrancing dance.

“Hey, I wanna show you something,” The octopus offers a tentacle. Daisy grabs it. Or rather, she puts her hand over it and it latches on. The Dermal Resistance should prevent any bruises from the suction, it just feels nice and tight pulling at her skin, like a massage.

They suck in water, and push it all out at once. Daisy is ripped from the location she was floating in, and accelerates away with him. This was a completely different sensation from riding the dolphin. They shoot in a trajectory over the coral. It only takes one or two more spurts until they reach the edge of the coral. They float down gently, hand in tentacle. Daisy moves her legs over the edge, slowly sitting down. They are facing the dark part of the ocean. Her legs dangle into the abyss.

“Stay right there,” he instructs. Daisy kicks her legs slowly, as if she’s at the edge of a cliff above the water. She watches him. He crawls a bit to the side, using the coral as support. He sucks in another large breath of water. He launches out in a curving arch into the abyss. Oh My. Behind him trails glowing flecks. He stops somewhere a distance away, and draws and exhales 5 quick breaths. He does a loop-de-loop of sorts, and Daisy finally gets it. The flecks he disrupted were bioluminescence. And he just made a massive heart in the underwater sky. It glows, moving along with the waves. He shoots up towards her from the bottom of the heart.

“Oh my God that was adorable!” Daisy has a fun thought, “Body color moving orange dots.”

“AAAAAA YOU’RE SO HAPPY! I’m SO glad you liked it!” He flashed the same orange dots. He hugs her. She hugs the big, bubbly boy back. The hug lasts a while, and when they separate, she looks at him in the eye. It was one of the most curious, but amazing feelings ever. His warm, 8 armed hug was the most comforting experience she had ever felt.

“Are you flirting with me?” She asked, in a friendly way, but was also seriously wondering.

“You caught me. I have been looking for a mate in these reefs for 2 years, but I haven’t found anyone that smelt as good as you. I could tell you were in heat. So I wanted to ask you if you would mate with me.” He admitted.

Oh. My. God. Daisy understood now. She had come here, very obviously turned on. Or as he would put it, in heat. She must have been pouring pheremones into the water. He wanted her to see him. He could have easily hid from her; he had plenty of good hiding spots. Then she had the brilliant idea of copying him by becoming invisible and showing happy orange spots. He thinks she’s an octopus, or at the very least a mate that’s flaunting. He was blunt in asking her, but that’s honestly super respectful, getting consent. The hug they shared was a powerful moment; they had chemistry. After some thought, she honestly didn’t have anything against this.

“I’d like that very much, thank you for asking me!” She pet one of his tentacles, overjoyed. His orange spots doubled in speed and amount. She had hers do the same. He couldn’t contain it and gave her another wonderful hug.

“Thank you thank you thank you!” He said, his bubbly speech clear to her from this distance, “I’ve got a special spot. Are you ready to go with me?”

She responded yes, preparing for the rapid acceleration. She didn’t even have to hang on, two of his tentacles tightly wrapped around her. It was so comforting to be held so close.

The spot he made was quite spectacular. He had decorated it with all the prettiest objects of the sea. A bouquet of plant-based sea life. Some shiny treasures that must have been lost at sea. And the most perfect alcove in the Coral Reef. It was heart shaped.

“This is amazing!” She said as he set her down.

“Thank you, dearest!” He bubbled enthusiastically.

“Before we do anything, what’s mating mean to you? I just want to make sure we are…” She almost said on the same page, but wasn’t sure how that would come across in translation, “thinking of the same thing.”

“Thanks for asking! Mating is intercourse that happens once with a partner, for me. What about you?” He responds, climbing along the walls, reorganizing things with multiple arms going different places at the same time.

“I believe it can be done for fun,” she hadn’t really thought about it too much. She only had the experiences from the social games she played, in which people would do it for fun in private lobbies.

“I’m really glad you are willing to share that with me.” Xy said, finishing organizing the place. He let his many tentacles come to rest, satisfied with how it looked.

“I really like your hugs,” Daisy said, wanting more. She opened her arms, and he happily hugged her. They were floating off the ground, suspended by his ability to adjust his buoyancy. They rotated gently, Daisy able to see the pretty colors of their secret alcove. She pet his unique and strange curves, like nothing she’s ever felt. Every part of him was soft to the touch. She remembers hearing that they could fit their bodies through anything, limited only by the size of their beak.

She asked Ray if she could have a biologically accurate color change setting, according to octopus research. Surprisingly, there were a few basic emotions recorded, and they said they would include those on her body as those emotions happened. Daisy liked the automatic translator, but body language was also extremely important, too. Xy noticed, holding her out to look at her.

“I can hear your heart speak!” That was a strange way to put it, but she understood the context. He could see her emotions now, at least basic ones. He flashed and bubbled orange. She understood that one, and saw her own body bubble orange in response. His tentacles wrapped around her arms and legs, she felt the suckers popping and reattaching. He’d begun to feel around her body with one of his arms.

“Are you ok with this?” He asked tenderly. Or at least how tenderly one can bubble.

“I am, Xy, I am.” She said. The tip of his arm got caught under her bra. He wasn’t used to clothing, so she helped him by telling Ray to despawn them.

“Oh! Are you OK?” He asked, unsure of what happened.

“I’m just preparing myself. I’m ready if you are,” the arm continued its path headed in the right direction. Daisy’s breaths deepened as she felt him brush against her skin. Occasionally, the suckers along her body and extremities would pop off and reattach, creating a wonderful sensation. The arm found the niche between her legs. Her touch boost activated. Lightning traveled across her body as the tip of the arm inflated and penetrated her.

After 2 hours, she could feel a change in his style and saw his patterns start to flash rapidly. The arm that was between her legs had clutched her tight the whole time, but now was starting to writhe. It was going to happen. Her own emotions were working up again, Xy had kept an eye on them the whole time. He was a great partner. She really started to let loose, this seemed to excite him even more. He began to shiver, she felt like they were both at their climax. She felt his hearts skip a beat.

She didn’t know how much an octopus ejaculated until today. She looked down, wanting to see their success when it happened. Without the Dermal Resistance, she would have been destroyed. It built up so much pressure, thin streams of spermatophores started to spew out. Xy clamped down with all his might, either undergoing a coitus spasm or was attempting to keep his ligula in place as he came. The thin streams grew into thick streams spilling out, floating in long strings in the still water. They started to form their own current, swirling in vortexes as more poured out. She moaned a guttural cry, the intense pressures inside her causing a second orgasm.

They had managed to get long strands of spermatophores all over the beautiful alcove. They drifted back and forth as gentle waves passed, attached to all the pretty things he set out for this moment. She clutched him closely, loving his warmth and softness. His arm had removed itself from her, and he was brushing her naked body gently with it. Her boost hadn’t run out, so she wouldn’t be crushed by existentialism. She should probably preemptively turn it off. She could probably ask Ray to make the automatic sliders only use 80% of the recommended time, playing it safer. He informed her by, get this, whispering that he did. Ray’s learned how to keep a mood!

After half an hour of cuddling, Xy readjusted his grip on her. He held her, still close, but so that he could see her.

“That was wonderful,” he said, his bubbly little voice soothing to her ears.

They whispered sweet nothings to each other until their emotions ebbed like the tides, and soon it was all over. He left, leaving her to watch him flit away. She swam to the surface, and when she reached it, she attempted to say “Teleport Map Choice,” but only water spilled out of her mouth. That’s right, she was still full of water. It worked anyway, and she found herself standing exactly where she was in the Solo Female gallery. She was still naked and wet, and she coughed water up on the floor. She did this until it was all out. The water spread out pretty far on the flat white tile and she rolled her eyes. Nice. It didn’t hurt because water in the lungs felt similar to air with underwater breathing, she just made a complete mess.

“Deactivate Color Change,” She could keep the other effects, why not.

So that turned out different than she expected. That was also an understatement. To be honest, she’s still processing it. In the moment, she wasn’t thinking about how it could be programmed. But looking back, she obviously did something to trigger an event. Sure, the event was assisted by the AI to feel more real. Which is meaning to say, it was soft scripted. Soft scripting would allow for user input to change the direction or even stop the plot, but still have a general path one could follow in the script. She played out a fantasy that the game-maker created. Or. She was playing her own subconscious desires, and that was not coded in at all. FUCK.

Hey now, hey. That was the existentialism talking. But she was trying to rationalize it as well. And she threw up on the floor. Great. She was really making a mess of this place. Daisy, come on. You were two consenting adults. As far as a first time having sex in the Virtual World, it could have been infinitely worse. That’s not making anything better. Shit. This was so nice just a few pages ago.

She made it safely to a bench to sit down. She cried, good, hearty tears. It does feel good to cry, to let it all out. She reached down and… Oh no, darling. Please just have Ray clean you up, like you did with the picnic. You don’t have to deal with that in your psyche. But Daisy was pretty serious about dealing with her vibrant emotions head on. Her fingers came out; stringy, cold spermatophores clinging on. She flicked them away. That hit a painting. Ok. What the heck is going on anymore. Do you understand this?

Ok moral of the story, human sexuality is weird. We are all trapped in our own minds, but sometimes people make it better. That also gives them the power to fuck it up even more than it already is.

Oh. You’re still here? The story isn’t done, I guess. You want to continue after that. I applaud your effort. But I’m also concerned for your mental health. And you’ll be concerned for mine, if you continue. Because this is just the start. Oh, you have no idea. Look, I don’t plan this story. I mean, I have a plan. But I haven’t even got close to the part where I will start that plan. And I made all of this shit already. It comes straight out of my brain and right onto the paper.

That being said, there were some pressing matters to attend to. Roxy was in a dangerous position. She could be the one to take the blame for Daisy’s intricate and explosive legal attack against the company. Daisy cleaned up in a shower. There happened to be bathrooms and showers in this museum. She had Ray equip her clothes automatically. She had forgotten to ask about Roxy for too long now. She stood in the main hall of the map selection where she first appeared.

“Video Message Roxy. Hey Roxy. I’m sorry for killing you,” what a way to start off the message, “I wanted to know if you are doing OK in the aftermath of my legal battle with the company. If the company raises a finger against you, so help me God, I will make them suffer to the full extent of the law. I have your back, if you need me. When the dust all settles, we can play that rhythm game together.” She sent it the message off. She should have done that a couple hours ago.

How the heck was Box taking all this? They were a bit higher up, so it might be affecting them personally. They might own a lot of stock in the company, so she was basically attacking their bread and butter. She did not want to send the first video message, and she hadn’t received anything yet, either.

Daisy did not want to jump into multiplayer without knowing more. Sure, she went through Initial Configuration. But that isn’t the type of knowledge that will help her navigate the social stratum of this world. She was a full-time Virtual World user. There was no real world for her to return to. Some users may login just to have a bit of fun in their free time. These users would not treat the Virtual World the same as the life-supported full-timers like her. In her previous games, these were the people that slept in VR. They were almost always on. Sure, they would be using their computer in a game overlay, so they had some of their reality mix in with the virtual, but you could tell they were much different. When you joined their session, they welcomed you as a friend they hadn’t seen in a long time. In many cases, it felt like that to them. If one just played for fun, they could go months without logging in or seeing the full-timers. Full-timers saw people’s interests blossom and fade of the game, moving on to something else after a while. For this reason, Daisy had lost contact with many of her friends. They just wouldn’t log on after a while. The Real World was a game of its own, and people put a lot of time into it. Daisy recalled one of the best resources when she needed something. A platform called Reddit. Maybe if she could access the net, like in a traditional sense, she could find out more about what she was up against. She could find a world with a computer in it. Or go to any eye-candy world and have Ray summon a computer. Candy… Mmmm is that a category of worlds?

Upon the room shifting, she opted for yes. Ray teleported her to a room that was labeled “Sweets,” and had pictures of very brightly colored worlds. Many looked like islands or fields with massive candies littering their surface. Daisy looked around, opting for a floating, spacelike one. It materialized around her, she was glad she did not find herself plummeting this time. The deep purple background with many randomly colored bright stars twinkled. She was standing on a large floating island, with strands of licorice connecting all the islands, keeping them together. Red licorice, black licorice, twisted or round, her eyes followed the gently bobbing islands. They, too, had large candies sticking out. Candy corn, lollipops, cotton candy, there was plenty to see. And she guaranteed it would all taste. She should have some sensitivity boost left to try out her automatic Flavor boost! She activated it. It should only work when she’s physically eating something, so it should last quite a while on whatever amount of boost she has left. She couldn’t resist the candy. Reddit will have to wait. She ran over to the first thing. A huge, pink cotton candy cloud. She ripped a chunk off with her hands, strands of sugar snap and float in the wake of the removed chunk. It melts in her mouth, the blissful sweetness like nothing she had ever tasted. The boost didn’t make sweet things sweeter, in fact. It felt like she could pick out the subtle intricacies better. She believed she could taste the difference in the coloring, when she plucked some blue cotton candy and tried it. She could taste a minute difference, like food dye, with her heightened sense of taste. Another huge benefit of the boost is that things would not lose their power. The first bite tasted as powerful as the nth (nth meaning the variable n for any positive integer, in ordinal form).

She liked this boost. She opted to keep it on. Sooner than she had thought (or she had spent a lot of time eating candy), she got a notification from Roxy.

She was breathing heavily in the video, a lightsaber clutched in each hand. The dark background was too hard to see where she was, she spoke once she caught her breath, “Hey, I’m playing a rhythm game now, and likely will be for the rest of the day. Request a teleport to me if you’re up for it! Bring workout clothes. No pressure if you still have stuff to do.”

Daisy didn’t have any workout clothes. Considering she couldn’t have had her first scan in Real Life, was that a virtual scanner? If it was, she might be able to make up any clothes she wanted. She decided to ask Ray about it.

“David’s research, among other things, did have an emulation of a Mobile Scanner, and an older program to fake any Virtual Real clothes.” Research that Daisy had access to. If any glitches came up, she would not know how to debug it, for the creator of the program was gone. It was a scary thought, but it would be really nice to have new clothes. Hey, it clearly worked once, she was living proof of that.

Unfortunately, she remembered that she had almost run herself out of sensory boost. In fact the chunk of candy corn she was nibbling was only dipping further into that. She wouldn’t fare well to be scanned if she will just get dysphoria from it. Not worth new clothes. She will try it eventually. No time to waste, she had a friend to catch up with.

“Teleport me to Roxy. Hey Roxy. Still up for me joining you? The secret word is Panda,” she didn’t have to include the secret word, but it didn’t hurt. She also didn’t use it in a mental health connotation, so it wouldn’t trigger a therapist PrivatePlay session. She waited a minute or so before the world darkened.

Roxy appeared from out of the darkness. Daisy heard loud electronic music increase in volume. Roxy had the lightsabers. One was purple, like her hair, and the other was white, also like her hair. She had a clear pallet choice. At the rhythm to the music, Roxy cleaved boxes in half as they came at her. The lightsabers passed through them like butter, and the steaming remains of the boxes bounced away. The boxes were flying right at Roxy, coming from darkness in the distance. She hit all the purple boxes with her purple saber and same with the white. The song was nearing the drop, and Daisy raised her eyebrows as they came even faster. Roxy was impressive. Daisy had to even move out of the way to avoid being showered by the molten hot remains of the boxes. Was this PrivatePlay or MultiPlayer?

“This is a MultiPlayer instance, with two users connected,” Ray informed her over the music. Well, she could always hear Ray over the music, because he spoke directly into her brain. If it was MultiPlayer, that would mean the molten bricks would hurt to get hit by. She hopes Roxy doesn’t accidentally stay in the path of one. As she thinks this, a massive floating wall comes from the distance, crashing into Roxy. It passes right through her, and the song slows down and dies. She must have lost. At least it wouldn’t hurt to be hit by the boxes or walls, seeing that they are holograms.

“Hey Roxy!” Daisy says, seeing her turn around. Daisy opens her arms for a hug, unsure whether they are on hugging terms still. Roxy not only hugs her, but lifts Daisy into the air. She was strong. Like, this is a MultiPlayer instance, there’s no way to fake strength.

“Hi Daisy!” She sets her down, “You absolute monster! You have really cracked the whip and got the company in line! How the hell did you do all that??” Her compliments fly quick and fast at Daisy, Daisy already stunned from the overzealous hug.

“Uhhh…” She couldn’t find the response to all that. Roxy didn’t let her take much of a breath, and continued, “I took your advice to heart. You’re my friend, and what you think matters to me. I turned off my emotion filter. And OHH what a change! The rhythm games have never felt like so much of a RELEASE.” Daisy’s happy for her, she really is. It’s a lot to take in at once, but Roxy’s mood has improved innumerous times since she last saw her.

“And by the way, don’t worry about killing me. I’ve died in many ways in many games, and that was by far the coolest. You really showed them, didn’t you!” Roxy hugged Daisy again. Daisy was excited to spend time with this fresh new Roxy.

“Hahaha I sure did. It was a stupid amount of paperwork. I boosted my consciousness for that,” Daisy admitted, not really wanting to get into how she sicced Ray on the company.

“Oh, so emotion girl is an OverClocker?! You hypocrite!” Roxy practically shouted at her, her voice still playful.

“What’s an OverClocker?” Daisy asked, not familiar with the lingo. Like, she knew when people said they overclocked their computers. Plenty did it so they could run their games better. She did not get it in this context.

“Someone who uses boost too much is an OverClocker. They max out their mind. It’s a derogatory term, so don’t use it unless you want them to take it that way.” She added on, realizing that Daisy doesn’t know much at all about the world. These were the social things Daisy wouldn’t know about. She could consult Reddit or something, but people like Roxy could teach her as well.

“Yeah, I only use it for sensitivity or consciousness. I didn’t know it had side effects and found out the hard way.” She admitted. She can trust her friend to keep her secrets.

“Didn’t we all. That makes sense, not to touch the emotion one. It is certainly the most dangerous. We of all people should know that.” She said, as if Daisy remembered being an employee, but realized she needed to explain that, too.

“That is to say, we’ve seen the research on it. Do you know what happens if you go beyond the Hard Limit?” She decides to poke Daisy’s knowledge to see what she’s working with. At Daisy’s shake of her head, Roxy proceeds to explain, “It’s impossible without modding the Facebook Device, but passing the hard limits on consciousness has the side effect of extreme pain. A stunter can’t even stop it, and the further you go past the limit, the longer and more intense it is. For sensitivity, you can get Schizophrenia or tourettes. Usually those can be toned down or even cured by the AI, but just like the extreme pain, it’s a different beast altogether. And here’s the kicker. Going past one hour of emotion boosting can lead to death. Just straight up death, a random amount of time after the hour. No one can pin down the cause. It’s assumed it’s from the heart stopping, but that’s not the first thing to stop. The brain shuts off. Just, lights out.” She snaps her finger to really drive the point home.

Daisy takes a bit to absorb this information. She knew the hard limits were in place for a very serious reason, but wow. Still terrifying to think about. And didn’t she technically still have a modded device?

Ray, of course, responds to her internal question, “Your device is not modded.”

Oh, right. She was the modded human, loaded up onto a standard issue device. Plus modded is a generic term, things can be modded in various ways for different purposes. Then how did she get thrown in jail?

“Users are not meant to have multiple accounts. This is to prevent avoiding the law or cheating.” Ray explained again. Yeah, seems legit. A very Facebook thing to do anyway. Why did David chance making 2 accounts, then? Probably because he was banking on the idea of being a new human in the eyes of Facebook.

“Damn, Roxy. Yeah I just never liked the idea of the device toying with my emotions. Just a gut instinct. But everyone finds their own way. We have an insane amount of control over the device, and thus our minds. It’s already quite shocking.” Daisy responded, not really wanting to continue this path of conversation, “Say, how about you show me how this game works?”

Roxy didn’t mind the switch in subject at all, “YES! We can play songs together. I’ll have it generate an easier level for you, and we will start off with some slow tempo songs so you can get used to it.” She showed her the lightsabers, and Daisy picked up a light blue saber in her left hand and pink for her right hand, of course.

Apparently there was a way to make the boxes physical instead of holographic, but they didn’t activate it. Roxy liked playing where she could slice a huge stream of blocks, not practical if all the boxes occupied space. It would add up quickly at her level. The rubbish always slid off the edge behind her, but dodging the chunks she cut off would be conceptually difficult. It was more arcade style to leave them as holograms, and Roxy liked that genre. Daisy would do either, but that was easy to say because she was only dealing with one box a measure. Roxy would sometimes have to hit 16th notes and many in a row at times! She was very impressive.

They both worked up a sweat, Daisy could see why Roxy liked this so much. The music was great, too. She didn’t notice it earlier, but MultiPlayer was much different, as her physical body state goes. This map requires HardCore Realistic if you want to upload scores to the scoreboard. Meaning all of the physical effort takes a toll on you, very close to how it would in the Real World. Since Daisy hadn’t ever used the full version of HardCore Realistic, she had never felt this tired. It honestly made the experience much more rewarding. Sure, she could get good at these maps by taking them to PrivatePlayer or SinglePlayer, but it wouldn’t feel the same. The game showered them with encouragement, logging them in the leaderboard and doling out the points they were earning. At one of their breaks, drinking lots of water, Daisy decided to ask about the economy. Fun topic. But this had been the one thing the Initial Configuration never explained that she really wanted to know.

“So we are playing in MultiPlayer, yeah? That means anything we do in here is connected to the Virtual World. You’ve got base stats, a low level, no money, and no reputation. No offense. However, the maps we do here, the points we earn, you will gain experience and money. All games contribute to your overall account, but some games choose to start you off at the bottom in their respective hierarchy. If all games did that, the account totals would just be a casual flex. You could boast about it, but it wouldn’t get you anything. That isn’t the case, though. Plenty of games will let you either keep stats, or base your beginning stats on how overall strong your account is. This makes things very competitive, if you choose to play competitively. You can even have non-competitive games favor the ones who play a lot. They will let you use your account money in their game, so someone who, like me, is addicted to rhythm games, can still buy their dream house in their peaceful game, without having to also get a job in that game.” Roxy explains, having caught her breath long before Daisy did.

Daisy nods. It’s like a huge MMO. Massively Multiplayer Online. She suspected that, but didn’t know to what extent. All the games she played had unique lobbies, like the one she’s in. But it didn’t let you transfer money or items to any other lobbies, besides account money.

“So, I could farm money elsewhere and use it in games that allow it? Couldn’t that make for a very strange economy, as far as inflation goes?” Daisy really pondered this. Someone could find an easy game, spend a bunch of time mastering it, and flood other game’s markets with cash.

“Oh, absolutely. We have plenty of grinders. That’s pretty typical of MMOs, so the solution was a difficulty calculation for account money. We are in a HardCore Realistic only game, with our settings pretty much pinned to the max. That’s why we have to drink water, eat, we feel tired, hungry, the whole nine yards. We could technically get killed by these lightsabers, but that’s not really a thing in rhythm game culture. We are getting paid at HardCore Realistic rates though. A game you play just for entertainment, you could turn your settings down. But the money you gain there won’t go near as far or come as fast as a HardCore Realistic games. That being said, you can always turn your settings up in any game. So any game has the potential to make you a bunch of cash, if you think you can manage HardCore Realistic in it. It’s honestly pick what you enjoy, because you will play something you enjoy for longer. There’s a bunch of information for Optimizing Grinding, but I don’t really think that’s the way to live. You can do it for a bit if you have a goal in mind, like a house in some game you really enjoy and need the cash.”

Roxy took a drink of water, fine with continuing on her tangent, seeing Daisy’s interest, “people who sell their soul for grinding are the people who play 24/7. We call them UnderClockers, the derogatory term for them is zombies. UnderClockers have perfected their sliders, putting in minimal effort but gaining maximum reward. They have their Consciousness set to the bare minimum, so that they can stay connected to multiplayer and stay awake indefinitely. They can grind endlessly. They, of course, are on HardCore Realisitic, as it’s the quickest way to earn cash. But they are completely braindead, so they are vulnerable to attacks. People call it killing zombies, and have made a game out of torturing UnderClockers when they find them. Some massive UnderClocking guilds have hired guards, so that they can have a horde of zombies farming. The guards stop others from killing the zombies, and they get paid handsomely for it, gaining a percentage of what the zombies make. It gets really territorial. Sometimes a new lucrative spot will be found. But soon enough the zombie horde grows too large, gets found out, and there are plenty of users willing to coordinate an attack to steal their money, or at least gain a lot of experience from easy player kills. It turns into an all out war. War between UnderClocking guilds is more rare. There’s a bit of respect, and whoever finds a new spot first deserves it, because they are constantly searching for new efficient ways to make cash. It’s very secretive, and if there is fighting between the guilds, it’s over spies and information. They rarely have all out wars like the zombie-slayers and guards do.”

This gave Daisy a complete head spin. She knew all about grinding, or at least she thought she did until she heard about this. UnderClocking your consciousness to never sleep. Absolutely insane. If she ever took part in that, she would rather be a guard. If people wanted to be zombies and farm endlessly, she wouldn’t want to kill them over that. A percentage of what they made for defending them seemed like a perfect way to keep that gravy train of cash flowing. The zombie-killers seemed a bit rude, although they weren’t breaking any rules of the game for PKing, or Player Killing. HardCore Realistic games were cutthroat for a reason.

“Wait, do you make less for having stunters on, like pain or other stuff?” Daisy asked, still wrapped up in thinking about this.

“Yeah, everything you have in your settings contributes to how much you are making in game. Games' individual economies usually simplify this just to the styles of immersion, but the Facebook account takes everything into consideration, including any content filters you have. Some of it is marginal though, so don’t go taking off filters that block triggers for you,” Roxy warned, “you’ve set all that stuff up right? That can be serious to make sure everything is right.”

“I believe so. I went over everything. But that doesn’t actually prevent things from happening, right? The first time I connected, there was a really creepy guy, offering me a drink. Things would have happened if I didn’t teleport out of there, right?” She said, a bit scared, but needs to know the truth about MultiPlayer.

“Unfortunately, yes. If you filtered non-consent, nothing would look like it happened. The AI will either disappear the user’s avatar or adjust it to do something else. You wouldn’t feel anything, either. If you have auto-block on, or just block him yourself, he will disappear forever. But he still exists, both in that world and to everyone else who hasn't blocked him. He can still do anything, but you won’t see it or him. Also that drink may have been a Zombie drink, where it gets your consciousness on the very edge. If you were completely unconscious, you would disconnect to SinglePlayer. That can be countered by an automatic AI observation slider, I’ll send you the preset.” Roxy flipped through her holographic menu.

“Isn’t that technically cheating, since the drink is giving a game effect?” Daisy wondered, still planning on adding the preset to her list.

“No it’s not cheating, it will reduce a very marginal amount of money and experience that you earn. It’s considered a safety measure rather than a skill enhancement. If you OverClock, for example, it’s considered a skill enhancement and will dock money and experience much more than a safety setting.” Roxy finished sending the preset. Daisy got it and wasn’t surprised she didn’t notice it when first going through the automatic sliders. It was called Anti-Zombie, with the description just ‘wake up, sheeple!’ Not intuitive that it was a date rape preventative measure.

“Ohh It earns more cash to not OverClock. So are you not overclocking when playing?” Daisy wonders.

“Yeah, I don’t OverClock. I don’t like the side effects of boost, and was kinda scared off of it from my research. It certainly pays better to be au naturel.” Daisy chuckled pretty hard at the last comment, thinking it was talking about sex work at first. It took Roxy a moment… Then she got it.

“Well, that too I suppose! Ahahaha,” Roxy had a contagious laugh, making Daisy laugh even harder. They laughed until their bellies were sore and they were wiping tears away.

“I want to learn how to dance someday. Like, strip tease. That seems really fun.” Daisy admitted, thinking back to when she saw the stripclub maps.

“You do know you’re talking to the right person, right?” Roxy eyed her, “I did mention I danced, and although that was under the context of rhythm games, it certainly wasn’t constrained to it.”

“Oh. My. Gosh. Are you serious? I know you said you were playing rhythm games all day, so I won’t distract you…” Daisy’s heart skipped a beat, understanding what she was getting at.

“Are you kidding? Of course I would teach you. We’ve got our workout already, and made a bit of cash. I don’t mind teaching you how to make a bunch more, girlfriend!” She looked through her menus again, “I’m down to go right now if you are. Say the word and I’ll invite you to a PrivatePlay session.”

“I’m so ready.” Daisy could cheer. This was going to be so fun. Roxy disappeared, and it didn’t take long for her to hear her voice in her head.

“COME ALONG, MY PANDA PAL,” she said jubilantly. Daisy said accept, and the dark background of the rhythm game shifted into a nightclub. Roxy reached out and let her by the hand inside.

The door opened for them, the AI bouncer unclipping the rope and stepping aside. She giggled at Roxy’s enthusiasm. She certainly was a lot more expressive. It could be from all the current events happening, but Daisy did feel like she was seeing the true version of Roxy. One not suppressed by the company. Daisy still had Ray use their idle power to send things off to the Render Farm for inspection. They hadn’t had a breakthrough since the main attack, but if there was something, they would eventually uncover it. They certainly had enough computational power to brute force the company to adhere to all laws. The next task might be to attempt to get those laws to change in the employees’ favor instead of in the companies’, because the laws themselves weren’t the best. But they made the most out of it for now.

The first thing that hit her senses was the sound. The pulsing bass, it shook the concrete walls of the nightclub. And they were just in the entrance. The next was the light. She saw mist rolling out from the doorway, a glowing purple and pink lighting it up. They entered through the door, and she gasped. It was huge. They were on the floor level, but there was a second level, hanging cages, a DJ set, the works. The catwalk had most of the stage lights focused on it, but there was plenty more to the place than just the catwalk and pole. And there were crowds of AI, dancing, having a good time.

“This is PrivatePlay, so everyone here is controlled by your and my AI. This is to get you familiar with being in front of a crowd, or to have someone to try out private sessions with that doesn’t mind restarting or will judge any mistakes.”

Daisy was interested in the complexities of this many AI NPCs being controlled by two Facebook Devices at once. Her focus, however, was more on the scene she was in now.

“Did you want me to go first, to show you and get you comfortable, or would you like to jump right on stage? I don’t mind if you wish to despawn the crowd, but I had a good experience learning with a crowd. They can really pump you up and encourage you,” Roxy seemed so relaxed in this setting.

“How could I refuse you offering to show me a dance, and for free?” Daisy joked.

“Hey, you made money in the rhythm game. I’m fully expecting you to shower me with your earnings as I dance for you,” she winked at Daisy and hopped behind the curtain onstage. Daisy thought that would be really funny, so she had Ray summon all her earnings in ones. It was a considerable stack, HardCore Realistic did actually pay well. She took a spot front and center, the NPCs moving out of the way without a complaint. They were coded much more simply, she could tell they were empty-minded encouragement bots.

Roxy walked out, an announcer saying, “And here we have the glorious, the entrancing, the dangerous… Jade Dragon! You’d better stay vigilant or she will rip your throat out! She likes treasures, but do not throw coins at her. Instead, give her enough cash to buy a precious stone.” The AI cheered as she strutted to the pole.

She had bright red lipstick, a shocking difference from her black lipstick. She was wearing all leathers, from big black boots to assless chaps. Her leather vest was the first to slip off a little as she leaned up against the pole, her casual pose very thought through. She had her weight shifted onto one leg and the pole, her stance dynamic and flowing. She ran a hand up her leg, starting from the top of boots, over the chaps, and over her waist. When she got to her waist, her hand crossed over to the other side of her body, hugging her exposed belly. Her head turned the other way; her other hand stuck out, showing off the precious stones on her fingers. At this pose, the music started. The leg she had no weight on started tapping to the beat of the music. She whipped her head back, sticking her bedazzled hand straight down, switching her other hand back to the right side of her body, hand on a hip. She struck another pose to the music, the beat starting to rise as they neared the drop. Her boot started audibly tapping, her head bobbing to the beat. The beat dropped, she twirled and her jacket dropped off her shoulders, revealing the massive jade dragon on her back. This caused an uproar among the crowd, Daisy not realizing that she joined them. Her right arm slipped out of the jacket and took a low hold of the pole. She gripped it tight and lifted her feet off the ground with just her abs. The jacket still around her left wrist was put up into the air, twirling as the pole spun her around. The feat of strength in that maneuver was impressive. Daisy cheered, tossing several ones from her large stack in appreciation. Roxy completed a full turn and a bit more, dropping the jacket into the dip between the stage and the wall for the crowd. Her feet were placed down when she had her back to them, She clenched her exposed cheeks together, and made a strong woman pose, flexing her dragon tattoo. It even writhed on her skin in a serpent-like manner. This got a second uproar from the crowd, and more people started joining in tossing her money, although Daisy’s were the only added to her account. She continued her entrancing dance, her articles of clothing coming off piece by piece, all in just as unique and interesting ways as the last. She performed stunts that took a precise control over her body, the smooth actions paired with her strength made it look effortless. Nearing the end of the show, she got down to her final pieces of ‘clothing,’ just 2 black strips of tape forming an x on each nipple and a black thong. Roxy struck an extremely lewd pose right in front of Daisy, her finale. Daisy tossed her last dollars up into the air, showering her in cash.

“Woohoo!!! Slayyyyyyy, Jade Dragon!!!” She shouted encouragement as the Jade Dragon strutted back down the runway and disappeared behind the curtains.

Roxy came back out in her workout clothes, Daisy meeting her where she entered backstage. They hugged, Daisy saying joyfully, “You were so good!”

“Thank you!! I can show you some of the easier poses, if you’re still down to learn. There’s 2 stripping poles next to each other, farther down in the strip club. I’ll be able to guide you as we go along. If you pick up the poses quickly, I can even teach you a routine!” Roxy took her by the hand again, and they weaved their way through the crowds. Roxy took her backstage, it was a less densely populated area, and the walkway from the curtains to the poles was a really short distance. That’s where Daisy saw the endless outfits that were available for the strippers. Wohhhh…

“Honestly, we can spend as much time as you like picking out an outfit. You can also go in your own clothes. We don’t even have to take off clothes if you just walked to learn the poses. I’ll leave that entirely up to you.” Daisy didn’t mind showing a bit of skin. To be honest, she didn’t mind showing all of her skin. Other than the bouts of dysphoria and existentialism that boosting could bring, she was really comfortable in her own body.

“I’d love to try on something new! I wanna try out stripping them off, too. You did it so well, in such a flashy way! Not meant to be a pun,” She laughed at herself, and Roxy joined in.

“So yeah, we can look around! I can show you some of my favorites, maybe suggest something that will suit your curves. Everyone’s body type is different, but you can have your AI adjust any of these articles to your liking. They aren’t the most comfortable, since they are just Virtual Clothes, but they’ll look great on you!” Roxy said, her peppy nature as infectious as her laugh.

Daisy stripped down, leaving her clothes on the bench. Roxy seemed unfazed, and Daisy wasn’t the slightest embarrassed. Daisy looked for an undergarment. She didn’t really want to go the whole thong and tape route. She asked Roxy about it anyway.

“So how did you choose your final outfit, once it’s all stripped away?” She sifted through the racks of clothes idly, as if she were at a thrift store.

“I matched it to my comfortability levels. You don’t have to show them everything to still be enticing. You can if you wish, of course. But sometimes keeping that little bit of curiosity can be just as riveting. You know I like blacks in my attire, so the tape was such a raw and edgy look. I loved it the first time I saw it on others, and loved it even more on myself.” Roxy explained it really well, and Daisy looked for something to catch her eye. Daisy already knew that she was a topless girl, that is, she hates bras. Hate is maybe too strong of a word, but Daisy could easily go without a bra forever. They can be cute but so constraining. So she can rule out the tops for her final piece. That makes it easy, she’s halfway there already. What would she wear for her bottoms… Hmmm… She was much more into the bright colors, pink and light blue were her signature vibe. She could have Ray recolor anything though. Oooo something lacey, something sheer. She had quite a bit of natural hair growth on her crotch, it would show through pretty obviously. She picked up a pair of black panties that was similar to what she was thinking, Ray recoloring it so the lacey swirls were pink and light blue dancing around each other, all the way around. She held them up over the racks to show to Roxy, stretching them into a triangle.

“Oh, very you! I like it, girl, try it on!” Daisy slipped them on, they resized automatically to fit her curves. She stepped from out of the isle so Roxy could take a look.

“I. Love. It.” She said as Daisy twirled.

“Yeah, I’m planning on going topless with this for my final reveal. What next?” Daisy asked.

“There’s two main groups. Tear-offs, and not tear-offs. Don’t look at me like that, I know it’s obvious. Basically, do you want something that has velcro or clips, so you can get out of it easier? It’s much easier if you are opting for dancing in boots.” She explained, going back to looking.

“I want to be barefoot, at least by the end. I’ll say no tear-offs for now,” Daisy decided, “unless it’s cute and happens to be a tear-off.”

Roxy nods, finding something. She lifts it up, “Ehh? Yes, no?”

It was a sheer lace chemise, matching the pattern or at least similar patterns to the panties.

“Ohhh, let me try that,” she passes it to Daisy, who recolors it to match the panties. It totally fits the vibe. She tosses it on, Ray having to expand the top to fit her breasts. She looks down, the fabric moving much more than a skirt because it hangs off from higher up, instead of from her hips. She can even see the triangle of color her panties make through the flowy fabric that sways around her. Her nipples are quite visible through the sheer fabric, but Daisy adores that.

“Oh my gosh you figured out my style from one choice. I know it’s a bit atypical to be this bright,” Daisy says, still looking in the mirror, holding up the edge of the dress.

“No no, hunny. This is all your style. The reason the clothes are all black is because they had to choose a default. And trust me, what you are wearing is just a start to how atypical it can get in the Virtual World. To the point where typical is forgotten entirely. Cherish your uniqueness!” Roxy’s reassurance went a long way for Daisy.

“MAY I TELEPORT TO YOU? I WANTED TO SAY I’M SORRY, DAISY,” Mason’s voice surprised Daisy. What the shit?

“Yooo, Roxy. The creepy guy I mentioned? Wants to teleport here,” Daisy said, “I didn’t know what blocking was, so I hadn’t blocked him.”

“So… You wanna accept, and teach him a lesson? I’m Admin here, so we can have him restrained upon entry. He can say his safeword if realizes what we are up to, to exit immediately.” Roxy said, a bit of a devious grin on her face. This was not her first rodeo, by any means.

“Y'know, yeah. I was unfortunately transported before I could give him a piece of my mind. Let’s do it.” Roxy’s smile grew, and gestured to her to follow, “don’t accept until I say so.”

Back out in the stripclub, Roxy summoned a pillory, replacing the main pole she danced on. Tomatoes appeared in the audience’s hands.

“Don’t worry. He will get a fair trial. But I’ll be the Judge, Jury, and Executioner. And I’m Fair, so I’ll hear him out.” Roxy said. Was that a skin-tone joke? Either way, Roxy’s mood made Daisy laugh so hard.

She summons a raised platform facing the stage, complete with a judge chair under her and Daisy in the witness stand, “You may say accept now.” She crosses her legs and holds her gavel.

“Accept.” Seconds later, Mason appears in the pillory, his hands and neck restrained by the old fashioned imprisonment and public humiliation device.

“You stand before the court, accused on an account of attempted rape. What do you say in your defense?” Roxy’s voice boomed through the nightclub speakers, the music had fallen silent. The crowd watched him and coughed occasionally.

Mason looked up at the two, his eyes widening as he realized his predicament. Being the sociopath that he was, he attempted to defend himself. For some reason, these people don’t back down. They can commit heinous acts, and still want to manipulate people. Catching them red handed won’t even cure them, not even close. Because they lie to themselves as well.

The trial proceeded, Roxy even summoning AI lawyers. With Daisy as the eyewitness and victim, Roxy judged him guilty in her fake stripper court and sentenced him to public humiliation. The second she struck her gavel, the hoards of audience members booed and threw rotten tomatoes at him, never running out. He figured out how to exit after several minutes of this ridicule.

With the stand empty and the music returning, Roxy and Daisy looked at each other and laughed so hard they peed. Can you believe this person? Who was he trying to trick? There’s no way he would have gotten away with that, and someone needed to teach him a lesson. Daisy wiped away tears, feeling so much better. Roxy was such a good friend. She tells Ray to save this moment in Long Term. Her backup, now encrypted, has Long Term and Short Term. Long Term storage will never get deleted, and the more you store as Long Term, the less room there is for Short Term. Short Term storage fills up all remaining available space, the oldest of it either deprecating in quality or gets converted to Factual Storage and stored in Long Term. Snippets like this, that she manually saved, she will be able to remember perfectly using FlashBack. Factual storage will automatically remember things like names, dates, facts (obviously), and other various pieces of information that can be boiled down into a text file. This file takes up very little space, but is the most used thing about an offline backup. The AI can repeat this information back to you when you need it, either consciously or unconsciously (looking at someone would trigger an unconscious recall to their name in the Factual storage file). The AI trudges through all Short Term memory, the oldest first, seeing what it can extract for the Factual storage file. Poor Ray couldn’t do this when they were taking the legal battle single devicidly, but with the render farm undertaking that, tasks like this are back in Ray’s capable hands.

Having laughed their hearts out, Daisy and Roxy stand up, barely able to look at each other without laughing again. Daisy asks for Ray to clean her up, as she had managed to wet her panties from laughing too hard. She forgets that she’s only VIP, so this causes a second bout of laughter from Roxy, as she has to not only see that command, but accept it too. Daisy is unable to resist being caught up in her laughter again. It really was seriously contagious.

After they finish laughing a second time, Daisy feels herself dry off. She must have accepted it once she was able to breathe again.

“Roxy, you’re absolutely amazing,” Daisy didn’t even know how to express how nice of a friend she was.

Roxy knew that David wasn’t coming back. Even if he was still in there, it didn’t matter. David had shared with her that he was born in the wrong body a long time ago. Daisy is her friend now, and she wholeheartedly accepted her like that. If the company was right and Daisy was afflicted with selective amnesia, then maybe Daisy had forgotten her male life for a reason. Selective amnesia is used in Psychotherapy to forget traumatic experiences. David must have done that on himself, and only kept the parts of him that he truly felt were Daisy. How he did that, Roxy had no idea. He was a genius, successful at tasks that her and her coworkers have worked on for years, and it would only take him a few months. He was the top employee, getting special treatment from the higher ups. He had the resources and the brains. He obviously passed his intellect onto Daisy. Within a week of her living in the Virtual World, she had completely turned the company head over heels. Roxy didn’t know everything she did, but a ton of changes happened all at once. When she said to Roxy that she would sue anyone that looked through her eyes, it only took thirty minutes for every employee to be informed they were no longer monitored, and they could see in their menus that the company had fallen to VIP mode in their Facebook Device accounts, at least the ones that were connected to the Virtual World at the time. In a couple of hours, the managers were angry at everyone. But they didn’t say why, or what was happening. Employees started to catch on, word started to spread. It was a revolution. Some tested the waters, asking for things. People started getting vacations, new devices, whatever they wanted. It was a free for all, the company desperately trying to keep them happy. As if they were afraid of them. All this time, they had kept things such high stakes. Productivity first, pushing each employee to their max. Now it’s like they gave up. Without an overbearing pressure, her coworkers started to have fun. Meet up, play games together. Not mandatory office hangouts in the Virtual World, either. Just for fun, like what Daisy and Roxy are doing. They are living, and their job is not their life.

“May I kiss you?” Roxy asked, grabbing both of Daisy’s hands. This took Daisy by surprise. She took a moment and thought about it. She nodded, saying, “Yes, you may.”

Daisy felt Roxy’s lips press against hers. They were colder than she expected. She assumed she would have felt a spark, or have her Lover boost activate. Neither of those things happened, and when they separated, Daisy couldn’t hide the look on her face.

“Are you ok? Oh my, was that bad for me to do?” Roxy got instantly concerned.

“I’m OK. I’m sorry, I just didn’t feel anything.” Daisy admitted, she wouldn’t even think about lying to her friend.

Roxy deflated a bit, her peppy mood fleeing her, “I- I get it. I won’t take it personally, don’t worry about me.” Roxy knew David had problems with his sexuality. He had always been open to talk about it if she asked. She had thought it was from being born in the wrong body, but it looks like Daisy would have to figure out her sexuality for herself as well. Her peppy attitude worked overtime to get back into her voice.

“Hey, hey. We still have to teach a girl how to strip!” Roxy despawned all the things from the trial, and set the pole back up.

“Yeah! I also wanted to find some matching lace gloves and socks, if you didn’t mind helping me?” Daisy said, feeling the awkwardness drift away. It was still Roxy.

“Of course! Those already sound really cute. May I?” She offered a hand again. Daisy didn’t have to think twice when taking it, and off they went through the crowds, towards the dressing room backstage. They didn’t have to look for long, there were actually too many lacey gloves and thigh-high socks to choose from.

Daisy chose gloves that made a triangle over the back of her hand, looping around her middle finger. They matched perfectly when Ray recolored them. She specified the left side to be primarily light blue with pink accents and the right side to be primarily pink with light blue accents. She did the same for her socks.

“You’re such a doll oh my gosh,” Roxy said upon seeing the colors Daisy chose. Daisy blushed at the compliment. Roxy gestured to the curtains, “you ready, dollface?”

Daisy chuckled and nodded, following her out onto the runway. She froze up a bit after seeing everyone see her and cheer, but was able to keep in line after Roxy. She attempted to strut like Roxy did, but there wasn’t enough runway to get a good rhythm going. Roxy went to the pole on their left, and Daisy found herself walking to the one on the right.

“Face me, and try to copy what I do.” Roxy shows her some moves, and Daisy copies it as best she can. Roxy goes over the positions, movements, and tips. This is so acrobatically challenging. At least they weren’t on HardCore Realistic. Few clubs are, because of the challenges that would pose, plus the workers don’t get paid by the difficulty level any significant amount. They get their money from tips and hourly if they make a deal with the strip club. Plenty are freelancers though, that come and go through instances as they see fit, just working off tips.

Daisy started getting the hang of it, and after a while was really comfortable with the feeling of being in front of a crowd. Roxy was a really motivational tutor, as well.

Finally, it came time where Roxy said it was Daisy’s turn. Roxy took her spot where Daisy watched her performance. Daisy is backstage, nervous even though she had already been up on a pole just minutes earlier. When it came time, Daisy opened the curtain. She heard the announcer loud and clear.

“And here we have the gentle, the mysterious, the enchanting… Pixie! You’d better watch your coin purse, it may get lighter! She likes to see you smile, but a donation is even better! Reach for your wallet and you may end up giving her your heart.”

Daisy made it to the pole, seeing the hordes of people in the crowd. Wow. Her eyes flitted to Roxy, and she gave an encouraging smile.

Daisy started with a simple leg lift. It wasn’t much, but the fans ate it up. She was emboldened at their response and tried swinging her raised leg onto the pole. She hooked it around like she was taught, stuck out the other leg for balance, and curved her spine, still holding on to the pole with a free hand. The pole started spinning as her weight shifted off the ground. She felt strong. It was an easy pose, because there were a lot of contact points on the pole and she wasn’t sticking out far, but it was still really exciting. She attempted to move to the music, but she had a lot of focus on her balance and remembering the moves. She soon got into the zone. She bit her glove, sliding it off of her arm. This got a rallying cry from the audience, Roxy included. Her next glove was shed soon after, a similarly excited sound from the audience as she held it, dangling. She managed to take off one of her socks from behind her back, by pointing her toe upward and arching her back. She barely made it. On a HardCore Realistic map, no way would she have been flexible enough. Her last sock came off by her mouth, when she was in the middle of a floor routine. She kinda just made the floor part up like interpretive dance, but the people enjoyed it anyway. Roxy even tossed some money in the pit. Her finale was one she thought of. She knew she could do this one. She went high on the pole, and as the music reached a drop, she let her torso pivot downwards. Only hanging by her legs, upside down, her chemise flipping inside out. She encouraged it to slip off all the way with a quick criss-cross and pull of her arms, still upside down. She let it drift into the pit, her chest heaving from the exercise. Roxy made it rain, cheering her heart out. Daisy thought of this pose, but seriously didn’t know how to get down, now that she was here. She hadn’t thought of it. She did not have the abs to curl up 180 degrees. She remembered she could pivot with an arm. Maybe. She stuck her right arm behind her, looping the pole. She had her arm face down so it wouldn’t twist painfully when she released her legs. Slowly, she released her legs, the weight shifting on to her arm. She grabbed the pole with the second arm over her body when she needed more support. This was the most effort her abs had ever done. She tried to make it slow and smooth, but wow she was weak compared to Roxy. She made it down gracefully, at least she hoped it looked graceful. She curtsied, smiling at the audience. She turned and strutted away, feeling really good about herself. All the money that Roxy threw had been added to her account. So funny! She didn’t pay attention, but Roxy might have given her back more than she made in the rhythm game. Roxy met her backstage, giving her a big hug.

“You did so well! I’m proud of my student! Little Pixie!” Roxy wiggled for joy as she hugged the half naked Daisy. Little was a funny adjective to be called when Daisy was the taller, bustier friend.

“What can I say, I had a good teacher!” Daisy had so much fun today.

They chatted for a bit, enjoying the music and the atmosphere. Daisy doesn’t drink, but Roxy had a few drinks at the bar while they spoke. Her inflections slowly drifted, gaining a rather obvious tipsy sound.

“Hey, Daisy. I love you. Shhhh.” She put a finger over Daisy’s lips, “And I’m not just saying that because I’m drunk. I’ve loved you for years. Well,” She blinked, her mind doing a think, “Scratch that. I’ve recently got to love you, Daisy, the steaming hot girl before me. You don’t have to say it back, you really don’t. You said you didn’t feel anything when you kissed me and that’s totally valid. Some people don’t feel sexual attraction to others, and that’s ok, y'know?” She was certainly rambling like usual, but her flow was more relaxed and less hyper. She said something that took Daisy by surprise.

“Wait, you said some people don’t feel sexual attraction?” Daisy had never thought about this.

“Yeah! They are called Asexual. There’s also people who don’t have romantic attraction, they are Aromantic. They just don’t get attracted, they don’t feel that spark, like you said. Or you just don’t like girls, that’s fine too. I’m a girl.” Daisy smiled at her silly friend. Her silly, tipsy friend that was still somehow dropping knowledge. Was it because Daisy didn’t feel attracted to females? Or did she not get attracted to males either? She didn’t feel attracted to Box, so she can say she isn’t attracted to nonbinary people, at least in her experience.

“Wait a second though. I masturbate and enjoy it. Heck, I even strip dance,” Daisy wasn’t defending herself, just looking for more information.

“Oh, I know plenty of aces that have sex or fap. They can even have sex to please their partner, if their partner wants it. They can have a good time doing either of those things. They just aren’t like… attracted to people.” She was running out of words at this point, but it still was a really interesting concept for Daisy to think about.

“I think I get it. People don’t turn them on?” Daisy wanted to see if Roxy had any additional information. She might just have to consult Reddit after this, if her tipsy friend is running out of steam.

“Even if they do, they just don’t feel the need to fuck someone. Would you fuck me? Like, not do you want to, cuz I have a suspicion you aren’t attracted to me. But would you anyway, for fun?” Roxy said.

“Not in this state, darling! You’ve got to sober up before asking that question.” Daisy was starting to cringe. She didn’t like the effects of alcohol, that’s why she abstained.

“I meant hypothetically, Silly Pixie! If I were sober and horny, would you go down on me?” She laughed and poked Daisy’s boob, watching it bounce.

Daisy sighed, unable to lie to her friend. She hated lying, the truth just came so much easier. And it was also easier to remember. Keeping lies straight was hard and could get you all twisted up in a relationship.

“Yeah, Ms. Jade Dragon. I would have sex with you, if you wanted it. But don’t take that as doing it now!” She warned, seeing her friend’s attention focus on her face with a silly grin.

“Later then, OK. Tomorrow sounds good? You free tomorrow? No, wait, I have a meeting. That would be scandalous to do during a meeting. Unless you think we could get away with it.” Roxy was off the rails. She started having a giggle fit. Daisy thinks this is a good time for them to part ways. She literally has no excuse to leave, but that could be said about any moment in time for the rest of her life. She can do anything she wants from here on out. This was her liberation day. And she spent the whole amazing day with her best friend in the entire Virtual World.

“I love you too, Roxy. Platonically.” She kisses her friend on her forehead. They hug, and Daisy whispers goodbye. She’s a sucker for the spectacular exit, so she disappears from within her arms.

She had told Ray to go to SinglePlayer, so in Daisy’s perspective, it was Roxy disappearing from her arms. And the entire nightclub becoming rearranged as Roxy’s AI loses their influence on the environment, requiring Ray to re-render it. This re-seeded all the NPCs, all their clothes shifting and racial presets becoming rescrambled to form unique characters of all genders and gender presentations.

She didn’t feel like summoning Reddit on paper was a good idea. Technically possible, the form of delivery was entirely up to her. She decided just to summon a cute, little, pink laptop.

“Take me to Reddit,” yeah she was surprisingly bad with computers. She didn’t use computer overlays ingame like her friends did, so she had little to no practice with them. Ray just so happened to be a computer, so she could just tell him to do everything for her.

The Reddit page opened. White mode? Wtf Ray are you trying to kill us?

“Dark Mode Reddit.” Much better. She was initially going to browse more about Virtual World to gain a sense of the politics and social order here, but she couldn’t get what Roxy recently said out of her mind, she typed in the Reddit bar, ‘asexuality.’ She felt like a grandma typing out each letter with the hunt and peck technique. To be fair, this was the first physical keyboard she has encountered. All the previous ones were virtual, and she was forced to hunt and peck because she only had 2 laser pointers to select letters with. She hit enter, there was a top result with millions of members. Woh, that’s huge. She clicked on it, taking her to a page with pinned posts from the mods. A very handy “what’s asexuality” post explained everything to her. She continued browsing, seeing personal anecdotes from users, community polls, the works. She learned a lot researching it, late into the ‘time is meaningless’ part of her Virtual Day.

After it all, she felt pretty confident she was a sex-positive aroace. That means she is Aromantic (without romantic attraction), asexual (without sexual attraction), but sex-positive (can enjoy performing the act if both parties consent). That would be a good label to explain things to people who didn’t know her, but she thinks that labels like that are a little too confining for unique individuals. It certainly explains a broad concept quickly if everyone knows the terms that are used! She still didn’t know if she liked males, but if she feels something for one, she will have to study that and see if it is indeed attraction.

Her mystery solved, she actually felt really good about herself. Aces and Aros actually had their own flags. They were pride flags, and had simple bands of color. For Asexual, the flag was a stripe of black at the top, then gray, then white, and finally purple at the bottom, all equally sized. For Aromantic, it was green at the top, then a lighter lime green, white, gray, and finally black, thinner in comparision to asexual with only 4 stripes, but still equally sized bands.

She started to open her scope of what she was searching up on Reddit. She found memes about the Virtual World. The perfect viewport into a society’s political terrain. She saw people who dubbed themselves AFK make fun of their dissociation in game. People who always invite others to PrivatePlay so they could be God. She saw plenty about UnderClockers, or maybe that’s just because she was recently familiar to it that it stood out. The OverClocking memes really hit home with her, because she dabbled, at least in sensitivity in consciousness. And mapmakers, oh the mapmaking memes. They got really dark. Daisy understands why people make edgy humor. The shock value is rewarding for the comedian, and the audience who feels that shock is able to rationalize it as a joke. Ray would have had to work overtime, filtering the posts, if Reddit hadn’t already filtered the posts for them. Daisy rerouted her searches to a better place.

She found out something she didn’t know from Initial Config, likely because she was an adult. A kid could own a Facebook device. Their account was much like hers, but without sliders. The parent or guardian also had full control of safety settings (the only active slider) and automatic filters. They also had control over what games their child was able to play, and could disallow any of the 3 main connection styles, SinglePlayer, PrivatePlayer, or MultiPlayer. There were programmes they could enroll their kid in, such as a virtual school. It taught normal education paths, but would also make them familiar with their Facebook device and how to be safe in the Virtual World. If filters were triggered, an adult would be notified about which one went off. Of course, that meant that they didn’t actually see the event that was filtered, but it was meant for a way parents could tell what type of environment their child is in. Daisy got that from a meme where a parent’s phone was being blown up by innumerous notifications. Oh dear.

On a similar topic, she found a list of worlds that were originally cartoon universes, but users or developers faithfully rebuilt them. It was huge! Daisy absolutely loves cartoons, so she could see herself coming back to this list to find a new world to explore. Speaking of which, she was starting to get tired. The pounding stripclub music was also a bit much at this point. That’s when she sees one of her favorite shows on the list. No way. True and the Rainbow Kingdom has a map. She could crash out there and explore it in the morning. Or, whatever time she wakes up. Time is meaningless.

“Teleport Rainbow Kingdom, SinglePlayer,” the stripclub dissolves. She sees a rainbow background move gently, she’s floating in… Nowhere? Text pops up, ‘Loading…’ Yeah that makes sense. She hadn’t hit a loading screen in a while, since Initial Config. Some commonly accessed maps must be held in a cache at her company, to reduce internet access. She doubts that anyone has visited this world from her company yet.

The scene finishes loading. First the skybox generates a calming blue background with white, puffy clouds that are perfect spheres squished together. The entire Rainbow Kingdom generates outwards. She must be standing at the Wishing Tree, looking out, to see all this. The light yellow roads boarded by marble sidewalks with gold accents along their edges extend out, their smooth, thoughtful turns making a crop-circle-like impression. Next, the flat green grass generates, terraced by smooth white sidewalls to form plateaus. Then, buildings start popping into existence, raised by the terraces or on the lower grass areas between the roads. They are striped in bright primary colors, giving the Rainbow Kingdom its name. The houses are cylindrical with spherical caps, some unique shapes like donuts sitting on top of each other, others short, smooth domes. The Kingdom Walls shoot out from the castle beneath her. They have a white lower half and make beautiful arches as they jump over roadways. They have a purple stripe along the upper half, and the tops are a hearty magenta. They connect to 2 pillars by the entrance of the castle that each have a bust of the Rainbow King’s recognizable features: his spherical, perfectly white head with a light blue sphere on the right side of it, a red sphere on the left side, and a yellow sphere on the top of his head. They continue their way weaving through the city and jumping over roadways. Finally, trees pop up out of the ground, in lines to form a tall hedge, or sporadically where there is empty space. The hedges are simple cone-shaped Conifer trees, and the random trees look like something from Dr. Suess - they have four thick horizontal stripes, alternating white and purple, their branches end in perfectly round balls of leaves, of varying radii. In the center of town is a huge umbrella in the shape of a flower with each of their petals a different primary color, the pallet of the entire city. The center of the umbrella is a half sphere with a smiling, eyes-closed, stylized face with cute, pink blushies under their cheeks. The umbrella shades the plaza, made out of the same white marble, with stairs capped in gold, as the sidewalks around the kingdom. Encircling it is the bus circle, the light yellow paths leading to it. It is a perfect circle, and instead of also being a yellow path, it is colored like a rainbow, with very definitive stripes of each color, each stripe following the circle as it goes around.

Daisy turned around, looking at the Wishing Tree behind her. The pear shaped weeping willow has two big eyes and a smile, between the upper and lower half. She sees its hanging branches move outwards slightly, as it takes a calming breath. She can almost hear the inhale and takes a breath with them. A rainbow shimmers around it as it breathes out, the branches settling back down. She breathes out, feeling relaxed and clear-headed. She walks up its steps, wondering if she can sleep here. Zee probably had some bedding. It was daytime still, so he wouldn’t be using it.

“Hi, Zee!” Daisy said before she pushed the long branches away that acted as a curtain for his door.

“Oh, A Visitor! Hello, who might you be?” The purple haired, tan boy was behind a desk. His eyes looked at her, his irises just as purple as his hair.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, I’m Daisy,” She curtsies, bowing her head slightly. She’s back in her default green skirt and camisole, hair up in her unique style. He has his white robes with gray trim, folded diagonally across his chest, with white pants and gray boots. He sets down the Wish he was studying. The Wish was a yellow ball, with a similar stylistic face as all the others, two circular black eyes with a semi-circular smile. The Wish floats up, and nestles itself back into the branches of the trees.

“It seems you already know who I am. You have heard of me? That is phenomenal news!” Zee looked honestly flattered. He always had an eloquent way of putting things, especially for being 8 years old.

“Yes, I’ve heard a lot about your research with the Wishes. Sorry to appear randomly like this, but I needed a place to sleep.” Daisy wanted to spend more time with him, but she was waning.

“Yes, of course, my new friend! Make yourself at home, the bedroom is through those branches,” he points to the left, fine with continuing his research.

Daisy parts the branches, seeing a quaint cot. She didn’t expect much, he seemed to be a minimalist in his Yogi-style thinking. She got really lucky that it was a large bed, relatively speaking. It could have been made to his size; half her body would have been hanging off the edge. She was almost twice his height, but that was with her platforms on. She unzips them and leaves them by the wall. She could have taken them off upon entering the Wishing Tree, but didn’t see any of the characters do that in the show. She didn’t exactly have any sleepwear, as she usually slept in her undies or just nude. She didn’t want to do either of those in a stranger’s bed. Well, Zee wasn’t a stranger to her, but she was to him at least. She supposed she could just sleep in her outfit. It was recently cleaned, and she didn’t wear it much today when she was with Roxy. Besides, any more thinking and she might pass out standing up. She lays down, her feet hanging off the edge anyway. Could be worse. Her head hits the pillow, she barely is able to toss the blanket over her before she’s cast off into a dream realm.

She’s in a theater, waiting for the movie to start. She’s sitting down, the rows empty. Her friend enters the theater, taking the seat next to her. Holy Crap, it’s Emi. The small goth girl with bunny ears and a black outfit sits next to her. She’s got long black hair (animated by invisible bones), thin gold chains around her neck, and the cutest black framed glasses, huge on her face. She could never find a heavyset character that wasn’t ridiculously curvy, so she opted for the small framed goth avatars. Emi said she was heavy in Real Life, but doctors were always surprised how healthy she was. It was her medication that made her put on and keep weight, not her lifestyle. The movie started. Daisy was one to want to hold hands while watching things. She did so, even though their hands were out of sight when looking at the movie screen. In this game, the only sensations were audiovisual. The audio was streamed over the internet, able to cause some hilarious glitches of people repeating themselves. The most memorable was when the Sunshine laughed, and it set off a repeating laugh that lasted for enough time to cause Emi and Daisy to laugh uncontrollably. Sunshine had no idea why they were laughing so hard until they explained. The visual was only a mere 90 degrees of FOV, basically looking at the world through binoculars. And that was it. Enough to fit a movie screen in their display, and it still felt surprisingly close to being at the movie theaters. It was convincing enough, if they sprinkled in a little imagination. Emi and Daisy were re-watching the Equestrian Girls movies. The bright colors, the familiar voice actors, everything was nostalgic and wonderful. Daisy looked down at her hand entwined with (and sometimes clipping through) Emi’s dainty hand.

That was more than just a dream object, Daisy thought as she woke up. That was beginning to be a dream world. It must be Ray learning her mind better. Daisy sat up, noticing that Dusk was falling, the sky becoming a pleasing deep purple. Everything here was so colorful, even more so than the Paper Productions world. At least she wasn’t stealing poor Zee’s bed from him. This world likely has quests where you can use the Wishes to solve the problems in Rainbow Kingdom, just like in the show. To get paid for completing those quests, she’d better connect to multiplayer.

“MultiPlayer.” The scene starts to change, but she thinks better of keeping her current location. She doesn’t want to startle the new instance’s Zee she hadn’t met yet, “Teleport to Rainbow Bus.”

The Rainbow City bus isn’t startled when Daisy materializes sitting down on her bench seats. She can’t see who’s aboard, she can only tell if they stick their arms out her windows, which she is strictly against. She also doesn’t want people to have food or drink. No one seems to be on the bus, and it’s daytime again. She makes her stop at the bus circle, and Daisy hops off, saying thank you. She responds with a peppy, singsong “You’re welcome!!!”

“A visitor from afar?” Bartleby says loudly, making a Kittynati ninja jump across the street. He lands spectacularly, in a ninja stance. He jumps into his own shadow, the shadow appearing before Daisy and he leaps out, shaking her hand while still airborne, “It’s nice meeting you, I’m Bartleby!”

The purple cat with a big, round head, a dark lavender triangle nose, and smooth paws lands in yet another stance, posing animatedly. His huge eyes with bright blue irises make Daisy fawn over seeing him in person. His little kitty whiskers move and bounce with his changing stances. The intimidating defender of the Kingdom, rawr.

“It’s great meeting you, Bartleby! I’m here to meet True, if you know where she is,” Daisy bets that’s where she will get her task, unless it spawns randomly throughout the kingdom. But seeing her idol, True, is exciting regardless!

“True, yes! I know where she is. Follow me!” The little ball of energy speeds off, making dazzling jumps and spins. He hides behind poles that should be too thin to hide behind, but is able to disappear behind them and reappear behind others. His shadow movement ability is stunning.

It doesn’t take long for him to bring her to True. True is a blue haired 8 year old with heart shaped pigtails, with a white shirt with puffy sleeves, magenta skirt, magenta leggings that lead to rainbow socks in big yellow rain boots. She has a white hair band that has three balls on it, the exact same color as the Rainbow King’s, except they are all together on the top left of the band, with the yellow one being the smallest, sandwiched between the light blue and red. Her skin tone is similar to Daisy’s and she even has blue eyebrows like her hair, paired with blue eyes that even surpass Bartleby’s. Her eyelashes are thicker than Zee’s, and have 3 stylistic lashes on the corners. Her eyes are also close to circular, fitting the theme of this world.

True is on the sidewalk, talking to a girl Daisy doesn’t recognize. From the blonde hair, it could have been Grizelda, the third and final human character in this world, but she never would put her hair up in two twirling pigtails, like this person had. She was also close to a foot taller than True, but still more than a foot shorter than Daisy. This had to be a resident of the Virtual World, also exploring this map. Ray confirmed this, “There are two users connected to this session, the other being Annie.”

She didn’t know Ray could access the user list, but was happy to know the girl’s name. She will still introduce herself like normal, though. Annie looked to be around 15, at a rough estimate. She had her back to Daisy, facing True, so she didn’t notice her yet. She had a simple green dress on, with light green accents that ran along the edges, undulating with sharp peaks inward, making repeating semicircles of the darker green look like it was hanging off the edge. This dress hung off her small shoulders so it completely hid her frame. Daisy saw the girl was barefoot, and was receiving something from True. True was giving the girl her yellow sash, the one that would let her put Wishes in the backpack attached. It also had a button on the front that let True (thus, now Annie) summon a facebubble, to talk to anyone in the world and see a projection of them in the bubble. Daisy assumes this means that Annie accepted a quest. Anyone helping would get paid as well, Ray informed her, listening to her thoughts. Hopefully Annie is ok with Daisy joining her quest. True sees Daisy, beckoning her over.

“Is this a friend, Annie?” True asks, pointing Daisy out as she walks up to them. Annie turns, surprised at someone else here.

“Hello, who might you be?” Annie greets the stranger.

“Hey Annie, I’m Daisy. Are you helping True with the Wishes?” Daisy bends down, her side ponytail now visible in her field of view as gravity pulls at it, making it swing gently at her body movement. Her breasts do the same, and she kinda cringes to not have a bra on in this setting. If anything is too much, it should be filtered by the user’s Facebook Device, right? She extends a hand out to Annie, wondering how friendly she will be. She looks to have a Virtual Real avatar on, but that isn’t saying it was updated, if she didn’t have the money for a more recent scan. Annie takes her hand, as if Daisy is royalty, clutching it with both of her small hands.

“Hello Beautiful Lady,” she looks up at Daisy. Oh, how respectful! Daisy couldn’t help a chuckle. Daisy hadn’t noticed until their eyes locked, but Annie’s eyes were glowing iridescent purple. She stood next to Annie as she looped the sash over her head. A little True in training. Daisy had always looked up to True. She wanted to help everyone out as best she could, didn’t get upset at failure, and kept trying.

“Daisy can help us,” She said to True. That answered Daisy’s next question to Annie before she asked it.

“Awesome! Good to meet you, Daisy!” Daisy couldn’t resist meeting True for any longer. She kneeled down, arms open. The friendly girl didn’t mind giving Daisy a welcome hug. Daisy looped an arm behind her small body. True gave surprisingly tender hugs, just as adorable as when she hugs Bartleby or her other friends. Daisy’s heart was happy.

Daisy set True down after a bit. Even kneeling, True had to hop up into Daisy’s arms, her feet had been dangling from the height difference. True backed up to look at them both.

“So, like I was telling Annie, I have a problem that I need your help with. It’s Zee’s birthday party, and I’m supposed to be meeting him soon. There were problems with making a present for him, so we need Wish help! Annie and Daisy, I need you to fix the invention we were making while I distract Zee. Are you ready?” They both nod, and True says, “Oh Cumulo!!!”

The cloud comes from over the houses, their cute little face in the simple style as well. Cumulo is sometimes referred to as he/him, but other times as she/her, so Daisy assumes they’re gender fluid. They land close to them, saying in their cute chirpy voice, “Hi!”

The three of them manage to squeeze on. Cumulo automatically adjusted their size for the additional members. They rocketed off, heading towards the Wishing Tree, above the Rainbow Kingdom Castle. They circled a big loop around the Wishing Tree before landing on the grassy knoll at the base of it.

“Hi, Zee!” True said, upon entry to the Wishing Tree. She introduced the two new people. Zee greeted them formally, in the very intelligent and calm way he always spoke. True told him that Daisy and Annie would help with the Wishes while she took him out to town, for his pre-birthday party celebrations. When he was gone, Daisy pretended to be Zee’s stand-in and talked to Annie as if she was True.

“So what’s the problem, Annie?” Daisy said.

Annie explained, “True was helping make an invention for Zee for his birthday. They couldn’t complete it in time, and need our help.”

“Let’s sit and have a think about it,” she offers a seat at the circles where the mushroom chairs pop up from. They sit down on them, and Daisy guides Annie to take a deep breath. Once they exhale, they discuss how best to solve this problem.

“So what’s the invention for?” Daisy asks, not having been there when True was talking to Annie earlier.

“It’s an invention for his Wishes. It is supposed to clean them automatically, but it’s not working” Annie summed up.

The mushrooms shrunk into the ground, Daisy and Annie standing up, “The Wishing Tree has heard you, Annie. It’s time to get your three Wishes.”

Annie heads out to the center of the tree, the rug underneath her has 4 circles, the middle green one connecting the other three, a red, light blue, and yellow one. She copies how she saw True summon the wishes, “I’m ready!” And sings the Wishing Tree song that both of them had heard countless times. She floats to the center of the Wishing Tree, the Wishes coming out of the branches, swirling around her. The three wishes announce their name as they turn from their yellow forms to their powered up from.

The first one, a white ball with red lightning coming out of their right side and blue lightning coming out of their left side, with the stylized happy face, says, “Syzer!”

The second one, a yellow humanoid with tiny nubs for arms and a clear belly burbles, “Bubba!”

The third and final Wish, a pink, semi-translucent ball with 4 tentacle nubs and a happy face squeaks, “Squidzy!”

Annie lands down on the ground again, Daisy walking over to her, “Those are some wonderful Wishes, Annie! Let’s see what the Wishopedia says about them.” The Wishopedia flies out from the branches where Zee’s room is, and sets itself down on the podium in the corner. Daisy walks behind it, flipping to the page with Zee’s research about the first one, Syzer.

“Your first Wish is… Syzer! Syzer is a growing or shrinking wish. It can make things very big or very small. Don’t forget to snap your fingers to tell them to stop!” Daisy knew this, having watched the show plenty, but the book also had some pretty helpful animations that Annie was able to see if she had forgotten.

Annie thinks how she could use it, “That means Syzer could help us go in the invention, to see if anything is broken inside!”

“That’s a great idea!” Daisy says, flipping to the next Wish’s information, “The next wish is… Bubba! Bubba is an underwater breathing Wish. They can help you go underwater, to places you couldn’t get to otherwise.”

Annie ponders this, “If it has water in it to clean the Wishes, we would have to dive down to look for any problems!”

Daisy says, “And if we do it right, we will end up getting clean, too!” Annie giggles at this, Daisy flipping to the last wish, “and last, but certainly not least, is… Squidzy! Squidzy is a grabbing wish. They can grab on to anything and pull really hard!”

Annie furrows her brow, “Hmm, I’m not sure how I’ll use a grabbing wish, but I’m sure I’ll think of something.”

Daisy almost laughs at the perfect parallel. They knew this show by heart, “You always do, Annie.”

Annie responds, “Thank you Daisy, and thank you, Wishing Tree, for sharing your Wishes with me!” She presses her sash and the wishes turn into their yellow form and fly into the backpack. The backpack has three spheres overlapping slightly, a yellow one on top, a red one on the lower right, and a light blue one on the lower left. The wishes enter through a white circle on each of the respective sphere’s sides. They both run out of the wishing tree, hopping on Cumulo. Cumulo must have dropped True and Zee off and came back for them. Cumulo took them to True’s house, where she had last been working on it with Grezelda and the Grizmos. They got off, Cumulo puttering off. Annie doesn’t waste time, already summoning the first wish. She presses her sash, activating the backpack. Rainbows surround her, she floats off the ground, her dress twirling in the zero gravity.

“Zip-Zap-Zoo, I choose you!” The yellow sphere on the backpack lights up, releasing the first Wish, “Wake up, Syzer!” The yellow wish hovers above her and powers up, turning white and the red and blue electricity appears out of each side, “Wish come true!” they land in her hand, the rainbows fading out.

Annie lets it fly next to them, “Hi, Syzer. Can you shrink Daisy and me, so we can see what’s wrong with the invention?”

Syzer nods, their red electricity rotating to the top of their head as the blue rotates underneath them, and shoots out a beam. Daisy and Annie glow red, and watch as the world gets huge. Annie remembers at the last second to snap, and they stop shrinking at the right size. Sizer floats patiently outside, waiting for them to finish fixing the invention, so they can make them big again.

“Thank you Syzer!” Annie says as they enter the device. They enter the hole that the spherical Wishes would enter. The soap and rotating brushes seem to work, they get coated in bubbles and laugh at the state of each other. They keep moving, seeing a water wheel. But the water isn’t spinning! They investigate, looking behind the water wheel. Instead of the water flowing through the wheel, it’s just building up behind it. That’s why the invention isn’t working!

Annie explains all this to Daisy, and says it’s time for her next wish. She goes through the same steps, summoning Bubba from the Red backpack sphere. Bubba happily makes it so Annie can breath underwater by encasing her head with their clear bubble belly. Daisy says she will stay out here, so she can tell Annie when the water starts running. Annie gets behind the water wheel. Sure enough, something was stuck in it, preventing it from spinning. She tries to get it out, but it’s really wedged in there! She takes a calming breath and thinks about it. She can summon her third wish!

She summons Squidzy, and with their help, she was able to dislodge the stuck item. The water wheel starts turning, and Daisy cheers that it worked! Annie swims around the water wheel, carefully getting out. Daisy helps her down, so she doesn’t get hit by the now-spinning wheel. They continue on, the flowing water doing what it is supposed to and rinses off the soap suds! They exit the other side, clean and happy. Sizer uses their blue power to make them grow to normal size, and she thanks each of the wishes.

“Zoo-Zip-Zap, wishes in my pack!” She says cheerfully, and they all tuck themselves away, “We gotta go tell True the good news!”

They find True and Zee at the clothing store. True distracted Zee by helping him find a new party outfit! He came out of the changing room, a tall headdress of a fruit bouquet strapped to his head. He posed, not realizing that everyone was now there.

“It’s perfect!” Annie cheered, and everyone laughed a hearty laugh as he realized that the whole town had showed up.

“Oh my. This isn’t a very a-peel-ing look,” He said, his eyes widening at the unexpected audience before laughing with everyone.

They presented his gift, and he unwrapped it, excited and still with fruit on his head. He opened it up, knowing exactly what it was.

“An Automatic Wish-Washer! Thank you berry much!” They celebrated, Zee’s party going smoothie after the invention had been fixed and delivered.

Annie and Daisy got Virtual money deposited into their accounts for a completed quest, and they decided to continue hanging out. Roxy was busy today anyway and Daisy had a ton of fun on the quest with Annie. Annie invites Daisy to her PrivatePlay world. Daisy has a short spike of concern, but realizes she can just exit with a safeword. She wasn’t going to go on trial and get tomatoes thrown at her. Besides, it was just a little girl. As far as the world knows, or should I say doesn’t know, Daisy is the only fake Virtual Real body in existence. That research will never come to light, unless the company chances making a second attempt at the experiment. Seeing how the first experiment revolted and basically destroyed the company’s control, it was safe to say they wouldn’t be attempting it anytime soon.

Daisy hugs Bartleby, Zee, Grizelda, and especially True goodbye. Even Frookie wants to say goodbye, Grizelda’s little, white, long-haired dog, who Daisy gives a head pat to. Annie shyly hugs True goodbye, and disappears to start the PrivatePlayer session. Daisy asks Annie to accept her teleport, the scenery changing. Around her grow pink walls with white polka dots. They are quickly adorned with intricately framed drawings of cartoons and anime. A style that Daisy can only describe as pink lolita appears around her. It has stuffed animals, sheer pink curtains, strawberry print bedsheets, glossy pink handbags, the works. Annie is in a vastly different outfit, a lolita dress. It’s victorian, frills and lace aplenty. She’s got on white lace gloves and socks, rather similar to what Daisy had worn, funnily enough. Her dress has several layers of white and pink frills, poofing out as the little girl sits on the ground, in front of a short table. She has multiple pink bows adorned on the dress with plenty of white lace making extravagant and pleasing decorations on the fabric. She’s wearing a white choker, and two dangly gold earrings. Daisy notices that Annie must have put on makeup, or more likely told her AI to, and it really sparkles in the well lit room. The room is lit by a glowing yellow chandelier, right over the tea table. The table has tea kettle out and steaming with matching cups. A stack of sugar cubes fills up a plate, dangerously high.

“Oh my God this is ADORABLE!” Daisy couldn’t contain her excitement.

“You really think so?” Annie asked, unused to the compliment and somehow even more shy.

Daisy takes a lap around the room, looking at everything. She gazes at the pictures, recognizing only some of the anime, and only vaguely. She had thought she watched a lot of anime, but these were either new anime or not mainstream. The cartoons, however, she could tell what all of them were. Plenty of these Daisy watched, some of them recently. Daisy said their names as she looked at them, except True and the Rainbow Kingdom, as that was obvious.

“Abby Hatcher, Vampirina, StarBeam, Hilda, Unikitty, Twelve Forever, Super Hero DC Girls... My Little Pony?! You’ve got it all!” Daisy absolutely loved this art, the style was similar among pieces, “don’t tell me… You drew all this?”

“Guilty as charged,” The shy girl begins to bolden at Daisy’s excitement.

“All of these shows with strong, female leads, too. I love this so much. You seriously have talent.” If Annie noticed she hadn’t commented on the anime, she didn’t make it known. Daisy thought she could have Ray inform her of what the anime drawings were, but not only that would be cheating, these were original works, so they might not even come up with anything. After Daisy is content from perusing the room, she sits down on the pillow next to Annie. Daisy’s thighs barely make it under the table. Well, they don’t make it under without touching the table. She didn’t slosh the tea - at least not enough to spill.

“I made some tea… Well, Inko did.” Daisy assumed she was talking about her AI, but PrivatePlay could have multiple people, “Inko?”

“Oh, yeah Inko’s my AI. Say Hi, Inko,” A heavyset, dark green haired woman appeared, a 2 dimensional projection in the room. She bowed, her tiny ponytail at the back of her head flopped over, the rest of her hair draping over her shoulders. She stood back up and gave a warm smile, and then disappeared.

“Was that Deku’s mom?” Daisy recognized the character from My Hero Academy, despite watching it a very long time ago. She certainly stood out as a loving, supporting mother.

“Yeah, Inko has been my mom ever since I got the Facebook Device,” Annie said casually, Daisy understanding the implications that she likely had a complex history with her own mother, or no history. She wouldn’t ask further, that’s something that they can brush against once they are better friends.

“She’s wonderful,” Daisy tried to not make it awkward, and Annie was fine with moving along the Tea Party. Annie poured her a steamy cup, and a little less for herself.

“If I pour too much in my cup, I won’t be able to fit enough sugar in!” This girl really has a sweet tooth, dropping cube after cube into her cup. Daisy giggled and did the same, making it sweeter than she already does, and she can make it very sweet on a normal basis. Luckily her Flavor boost kicked in, so she was still able to taste the tea past the extreme blast of sugar. It was like drinking a thick nectar, it was so intense. They continued their antics, getting more and more silly from the sugar rush.

When they both crashed, they crashed hard. Daisy had long abandoned attempting to sit on the sitting pillow, and now used it as a pillow for her head. Annie had scooted closer, playing with Daisy’s side ponytail. Daisy loved the feeling of her hair being played with. They had fallen silent, drained of their energy.

“Do you mind if I change into something more comfortable?” Annie asked, whispering as to not break the vibe. Daisy made it known she didn’t mind. The large poofy dress disappeared from Daisy’s vision, but she didn’t see what she changed into. Once they felt the worst of the sugar crash pass, they had enough energy to start talking again. They got onto the topic of hair, and Daisy wondered if Annie could braid hair. She said yes, so Daisy sat up and let her take out her scrunchies. She felt the nice massaging sensation of her hair being played with. Her touch boost activated. It sometimes did that, even if something wasn’t inherently sexual in nature. The definition did state it triggered over ‘intimate’ moments, and intimate certainly didn’t have to be sexual. Daisy actually really liked the finer definition she could feel from that boost, though. She could really feel the individual tugs on her scalp, she could feel her hair move by her shoulders. She could feel Annie’s hand brush up against the back of her neck. This was so relaxing, so nice. When Annie had finished and put the scrunchies at the ends of the twin braids she made, she summoned a standing mirror so Daisy could inspect her work. Oh my, she was good. She even added flowers that complimented her bright red hair! In the mirror she saw what Annie was wearing. It was a sheer pink dress, extremely similar to the one Daisy put together at the strip club. Daisy resisted commenting on it just yet, since she had yet to say anything about the braids.

“Oh my, you’re so good! I didn’t even feel you putting in the flowers. They are so cuuute!” Daisy really did love it. Annie seemed very happy. Daisy turned around to look at Annie’s outfit properly this time. It was different than what Daisy had, but certainly still in the babydoll style. Daisy’s heart sped up a bit, she was a little confused. Sure, just like Daisy, she can wear stuff like that. And Daisy was also in a Virtual Real avatar, so Annie might have been more comfortable with knowing what she looked like. But that was a little risque for someone you just met, and Annie’s avatar was young looking, by an obvious amount under 18. Daisy was hitting a lot of red flags, and actually had her Focused Gamer state activate for a bit to work through it. She had a lot of questions she wanted to ask, but decided to keep it positive until she found out more information.

“That’s so cute! It certainly looks comfy. I actually just made an outfit like that earlier today.” Daisy was surprised at her loudmouth. She must have overcompensated.

“Oh really? We like a lot of the same things then! You should totally show it to me. We could be matching!” Daisy was afraid she’d say that. Daisy had no problem changing into it, but what if she changed into it and a filter notification was sent to her guardian? She could ask about the filters pretty nonchalantly.

“Oh, mine’s a bit revealing. It might set off a filter or two,” She chuckled a bit, testing the waters.

“I don’t have that filtered, you’re all good to go for it, girl! That is, of course, if you wanted to.” Annie said, still excited to see what outfit Daisy had.

That satisfied Daisy’s filter complaint, so she decided why not, and asked Ray to fetch her outfit. Ray sent that over for Annie to confirm and Inko to fulfil. Sure enough, Daisy’s outfit was replaced with the one fetched from the internet, colored the same as she customized it. Daisy got up and twirled, well aware that her nipples were visible through the dress. She had never felt this aware of her body. She usually didn’t care. Mason had looked under 18, and he no doubt was a creep! She hadn’t felt embarrassed in the slightest when he caught her nude. Although, that was a different setting. He had walked in accidentally, where Annie was asking. Maybe Daisy was off put that she could see Annie’s genitalia plainly? This theory kinda falls flat because Daisy doesn’t get uncomfortable around naked kids. Plenty of parents just let their kids run free if they want to, the kids are unembarrassed and know no different. Daisy didn’t mind that, so what was different?

Finally, after a surprising amount of Focused Gamer boost, she thinks it clicked. Daisy had gotten, through their interactions, subtle vibes that Annie was into her. Daisy wasn’t uncomfortable with nudity, her own or anyone else’s, regardless of age. Daisy was uncomfortable with the idea of any sexual relationship between a minor and an adult. She has to ask about Annie’s feelings. She would ask about Annie’s age, but that could be a creepy sounding comment. Wait. Both are creepy. Damn it, she really got herself in a corner here. She might have to wait until it becomes obvious or Annie speaks up.

Finally having worked through the emotions and calmed down, things became fun again for Daisy. They continued as normal. Daisy felt the pressure of her see-through clothes drift away, like they normally always feel like. She wasn’t bothered by Annie’s clothes either, she actually looked really good in them. Annie had an indisputably stellar fashion sense. Finally, the question came up naturally. It was actually Daisy who asked it, in a sly way.

“Have you updated your avatar, or do you just keep it on a version for a while?” Daisy was proud of the way she eased into the topic. But it opened up a whole can of worms. Annie looked shocked. Daisy’s heart pumped ice into her veins. Wait, slow down. That was a normal question, was it bad manners to ask that?

“Was that a bad question? I’m so sorry.” Daisy backpedaled, hoping she hadn’t done damage.

“No, no… You’re good, give me a sec.” Annie got up and opened the door, going to another room for a bit. Daisy sat back, a bit in shock how that turned out. She eventually settled down, probably sooner than poor Annie.

The door cracked open after a while, Annie meekly entering. Daisy looked at her, not going to push her to answer or not answer. Just waited.

“Look. I really like you. That’s why I want to tell you the truth. I don’t tell anybody this, ok?” Her voice had changed, gotten scared, “I can’t stand how I am now, for a lot of reasons. So I reverted my avatar back to my first scan, when I was just 15. It’s a really sore topic for me, but I thought you should know,” Annie admitted. It took her so much effort to say that. She was super brave.

“One more question, I swear I’ll never push this subject again. You can tell me anything else when you’re ready or even never tell me. But I do need to know how old you really are.” Daisy had never been this pushy for an answer. She typically let people tell whatever they were comfortable with. This one was a big deal to Daisy, though.

“I’m 19. I know the age discrepancy is weird and twisted. I’m really messed up,” Annie’s mental state started declining. Daisy had pushed it pretty far, she needed to help her get it back.

“No, don’t say that. I’m fine with you looking like however you want. That’s what you should be able to do here. That’s completely ok with me, and I’ll ask no more questions about that subject,” Daisy got up and hugged her. Annie started crying, and the raw emotions poured out. Daisy did her best to reassure the poor girl, but there was only so much she could do. She didn’t know her too well.

Things took a while to settle. Roxy may have sent her a video message, saying she’s free, Daisy suspected from the notification on her wrist. Roxy and Annie will have to meet some other time, especially if Roxy is still curious about sexual stuff today. Annie seemed in a better headspace, so Daisy was able to say she had to check a notification. It would only play to her, so that was reassuring.

Sure enough, Roxy popped up, wearing something very seductive, “I couldn’t get you off my mind the whole day. We don’t have to do anything sexy if you don’t want to, but I’d still like to see you today,” Daisy had told the truth last night, and she doesn’t regret it.

“Do you need to go?” Annie asked, feeling good enough to pour herself another cup of tea.

“Soon, I’ve got plans with a friend. But I can stay for a bit if you wish to chat about anything. I’d love to see you again in the future,” Daisy really did like the girl, even if she was having a hard time opening up. Considering it was their first day together, she certainly opened up a lot regardless of how hard it was, really showing her interest in Daisy.

“Yeah, I’d really like that. Tell me a little bit about yourself before you go. Who is Daisy?” Annie said, pouring Daisy a cup as well.

“Well, this usually wouldn’t be in my introduction because I just found it out yesterday, but I’m a sex-positive Aromantic Asexual. Do you know what those terms mean?” Daisy didn’t know how common of knowledge this was. However, she had nothing to fear at a nod from Annie.

“I do. I’m a lesbian cisgender female, and I’d consider myself apart of the LGBT community, at least in the Virtual World. Thank you for telling me!” Annie seemed happy as she plopped sugar cubes in her tea, although as not as many as the first time. Daisy internally sighed, maybe even externally.

“My favorite world is a world that…” She struggled to find the right words. She had a very hard time lying, even though it was technically the truth, “Someone very close to me made for me. It’s the Castle in the Sky, from Studio Ghibli.”

Annie’s eyes widened. Of course she knew what Studio Ghibli was. She spurted her drink out, “I love that film, that studio! How the hell did I not know about this world?”

“Well, I assume because it was a personal gift,” Daisy didn’t know the world wasn’t public, or at least not popular enough for Annie to have known about it.

“Dang, I want someone to make me a world. I’ll take Howl’s Moving Castle!” She shouted jubilantly. She was a riot, Daisy was happy she could leave on good terms, so Daisy offered, “hey let’s schedule seeing that world for next time you’re on! I’m literally always on, so just send me a message.”

“Yeah that would be great! Oh, are you on life-support? Sorry, rude question,” Annie blushed and went back to sipping her tea.

“No, fair question. Yeah, I’m 24/7,” Daisy admitted.

Annie nodded, not going to ask more, “hey, you gotta get going, huh? I’d better hop off too. I’m getting hungry and need some Real food. I should probably get to bed soon. I’ll see you as soon as tomorrow, if you’re free when I get on.” She’s gotten much more chatty, and Daisy felt really happy. She made another friend! They hug their goodbyes, Daisy lifting the little girl off her feet.

Daisy sends Roxy a teleport request. She’ll be switching instances, but if it’s still in PrivatePlayer, her clothes should transfer over to the new instance?

She looked down when she transferred. Yep she’s right, her clothes are still there. Even though she had to get Annie’s approval for the clothes, it looks like PrivatePlayer is “come as you are” across the board. It just doesn’t transfer SinglePlayer or MultiPlayer items when joining any PrivatePlayer instance. She kept this in mind, in case she wanted to prepare for joining someone’s PrivatePlayer by going into her own empty PrivatePlayer session and summoning anything she wanted, first.

Around her generated velvety walls, fancy furniture, and a bed with rose petals spread out to form a heart. Is this a Love Hotel? She didn’t have to wonder for long, as the door swung open and Roxy came in, wearing the seductive piece from the video. It was a red ribbon, tied so that it ran flat across her nipples. It made 45 degree angles on her sides, and ran together to cover her crotch. It was tied up very prettily. She had a rose in her mouth, and she looked at Daisy with a stance and a side look, before bursting into laughter. Daisy joined her, both because of what she teleported into, and Roxy’s laughter never failed to make her laugh, too.

Roxy wiped away a tear, “Ok, I’m sorry. We really don’t have to have sex if you don’t want, I just thought this would be funny. We also don’t have to jump right into it if you are up for it, we can do whatever you want,” she tosses the rose aside.

Daisy wasn’t immediately in the mood, but she was fine with it happening later tonight, “You wanna sit on the bed and just chat about our days first?” Daisy sat on the bed, patting the spot beside her. Roxy cuddled up next to her, happy to oblige.

“Well I’ll get mine over with because it was boring. I went to a meeting. They talked about business stuff for hours,” Roxy giggled, “What about yours?”

“Wow where to start. Well I did my research about stuff we talked about last night. I really vibe with how the internet described it, that I’m a sex-positive Aromantic Asexual,” this got a nod and a smile from Roxy. She grabbed Daisy’s hand, saying, “and I’m proud of you for finding yourself. Continue, my dear.”

“Then I found that they made the True and the Rainbow Kingdom world, so I did a quest there with a user that was there in MultiPlayer,” Daisy paused, wondering if Roxy knew of the show.

“I’ve never heard of it. Shall I bring up pictures?” She asked, and upon Daisy’s agreement, she spawned a projector, dimmed the lights, and put the results of the image search on the wall. Daisy explained things from the show as the images flipped through.

“This is the Rainbow City, the main part of the greater Rainbow Kingdom,” She says to images of the city she spawned in. Next, images of True’s house come up, “And this is in Mushroom Town. That’s True’s house, the main character with blue hair.”

She got a good idea, the projector sparking the thought, “hey! Would you want to watch an episode? They are really short, about 10 minutes. Then you could see how the characters are. They are just like that in the game world, it was pretty incredible getting to hug the girl I look up to.”

Roxy cheered, “Absolutely! Would you want to cuddle on the bed as we watch?”

“Of course! I’d actually want to get under the covers. It’s a bit cold in here, and that sounds really comfy,” Daisy was excited. She watches episodes here and there, but rarely with other people.

They ended up binging a whole season. It took less than two hours, but still really fun. They decided to flip the projector off, Daisy continued to speak about her day, explaining more about Annie, saying how they hung out after the quest. She even told Roxy about Annie’s situation with her young avatar.

“It’s such a bummer that scanning is the only way to get your avatar in. A lot of people don’t like the way they look, and in the Virtual World where you have control over absolutely everything, it’s the one thing you can’t change. People don’t even use Virtual avatars anymore, the ones that aren’t scanned in. A Facebook device is cheaper than any other solution but only allows Virtual Real bodies. If you’re with a Virtual avatar, you’ve been playing for a very long time or have something to hide,” Roxy’s conversation really makes Daisy think. Roxy draws little circles with her finger on Daisy’s clothes as they cuddle.

“Do you think she was flirting with you? Don’t worry, I’m not the jealous type. I know you only want friendship,” Roxy says, and Daisy doesn’t know whether to be convinced of that or not.

“You’re right, I don’t see myself in a romantic relationship with people. I really don’t want to lead you or her on, if either of you wanted those things with me,” Daisy admits, she had been thinking about this hard subject ever since she found out Roxy liked her.

“I fully respect that. I’m fine with being friends. We still get to have these deep conversations with each other,” Roxy knew she was ok with just being friends. She had already done that with David for years, although they would have never done anything like this in person or otherwise. She’s happy Daisy is more comfortable with her sexuality, even if that means that she only wants to be friends with her. Having sex because Roxy wants it is something Daisy doesn’t mind, though. And that idea very much excites Roxy.

“These Virtual clothes have finally become too itchy. Would you mind taking them off for me?” Daisy offers, clearly ready to spice things up.

“I was hoping you’d do the same for me, how funny! I’ll help you first,” Roxy squeezed her in happiness. They sat up, Roxy on her knees behind her. Roxy dragged a finger along Daisy’s arm before looping it under the glove, sliding it down.

“Hey, I’d also like to say we could have a safeword. I know there are system ones, but I’d rather you stay here so I can help you calm down if you need it, instead of disappearing to SinglePlayer to be by yourself. You can choose either, of course, depending on what you need.” Roxy said, still managing to seductively remove the glove she was working on.

“Yeah, uh,” Daisy cleared her throat, thinking of something, “What about Valuse, the spell of destruction for Laputa?”

Roxy nods, “Yeah wow I can certainly remember that one. And it would make for quite a show if we ever have to use it when on the Laputa world,” she chuckles at her own joke, moving to the other glove.

“What about things you aren’t ok with, darling? Anything I should avoid doing, so you’re comfortable?” She continued, Daisy’s next glove slipping down with her convincing.

“Maybe no kissing on the lips, that’s all I can think of,” Daisy ponders. She didn’t quite like it the first time Roxy did it.

“Which lips hunny, you gotta be specific,” Roxy laughed, Daisy’s glove falling to the floor.

Daisy shook her head at her friend. She kept the atmosphere really comfortable, “The ones on my mouth. You can do whatever you want down there. Not anything anal though, I’m not interested in that,” Daisy added on, realizing the vastness of ‘whatever you want.’

“You got it babe. And if anything else comes up that bothers you, just unleash the spell of destruction,” Roxy giggled, looping her leg over Daisy’s lap so they could face each other.

“What about you, Roxy?” Daisy felt very comfortable with this, using her finger to snap one of Roxy’s tightly bound ribbons. Her modest breast still jiggled a bit at the movement of the fabric.

“Anything but my feet. I won’t do anything with yours either, sorry if you were hoping for that,” Roxy smiled at Daisy, very honest.

“I can take my socks off instead of making you do it,” Daisy offered.

“I appreciate that; let me get your dress off first,” Roxy said, fluttering her eyelashes at Daisy. Daisy raised her arms, fluttering her eyelashes back. Roxy flipped the dress inside out, pulling upwards. The dress gave a bit of effort passing Daisy’s breasts, but Roxy stayed empowered, driven by her building desire. When the dress finally released Daisy’s breasts, they bounced, free to assume a comfortable resting position. Roxy laughed, entertained by the event. Daisy joined her merriment, letting her upper half drop back onto the bed, causing another earthquake between her breasts, paired with a doubled up chain of laughter from the both of them.

Roxy turned and laid next to Daisy, both looking up at the ceiling. Daisy took the time to remove her socks herself. She would remember that fact about Roxy. She thought back to her strip routine, wondering if Roxy was uncomfortable when Daisy removed her socks in a sexy (or what she thought to be sexy) way. Well, nothing she can do about it, especially because she hadn’t known until now.

Daisy turned on to her side to look at Roxy, her boobs shifting from the change in gravity. She propped herself up with an arm, the other arm sliding over Roxy’s side. Her hand was headed on a path for where the bow was tied, right in the center between her breasts. She made her hand meander, take its time, explore a bit. Her Lover boost slowly turns on when she does, making her hand much more sensitive to where it was going. Getting to the taut bow, she plays with the tension. Her boobs jiggle much less, now that she’s laying on her back. Roxy looks at Daisy, so happy. Daisy locks eyes with her and pulls the bow. It unfurls, releasing the tension in the whole garment. Roxy takes a deep breath, and Daisy passes an eye over what the results were. The ribbon is still draped over her breasts, but slides off as Daisy’s hand plays with the new territory it had fought over and won. Daisy cups a breast, it fits in her hand almost perfectly. Moving the ribbon out of the way as her hand travels, she follows the path downwards. All the ribbons lead to one place. Her hand slides between the grove of her legs, her fingertips brushing over Roxy’s treasure. Roxy lets her breath out as she feels the new sensation. Daisy teases, only staying there long enough to unfurl the rest of the ribbon. Released from her constraints, Roxy loops a leg over Daisy again, the rest of the ribbon falling off as she goes on her hands and knees over Daisy. Daisy rolls onto her back, her heavy breasts rocking as the gravity on them changes again.

“Those are powerful. Do they ever hurt your back?” Roxy says, her personality never failing to bring a little humor into the room.

“They grew on me,” Daisy retorts, not willing to go down without a fight.

“Touche,” Roxy beams, sizing up her opponent before she attempts to wield the large breasts. Her hand is surprisingly warm. Roxy usually would make out with someone in this position, but resists the habit. She can easily respect her friend’s boundaries, it makes her happy that she told her about them.

After they had their fill, and by that I mean finished eating each other out, they cuddled, breathing starting to slow. Daisy could easily go for another round or two, she had plenty of boost left, but Roxy might not have as much time as Daisy. She’ll let Roxy initiate anything further.

“That was really nice,” Roxy whispered, clutching Daisy tight, as if she would disappear from her arms again.

“I had a good time, too. You make me feel really comfortable,” Daisy admitted, realizing how caring and watchful her friend is. She really thinks about how Daisy feels.

“Ok so no kissing on the lips, I can do that. What about kissing elsewhere?” Roxy asks, interested.

“You’re welcome to try it. I don’t think it should be a problem, but I’ll tell you,” Daisy lets Roxy kiss her neck. With sensitivity, it’s a nice, ticklish feeling.

Roxy pauses after a few breaths of kissing, “Is that OK?”

Daisy replies that it is, and Roxy continues, working her way down to Daisy’s soft breasts, her smooth stomach, and her tender thighs. The kissing must have stirred Roxy up again, because Daisy felt the now-familiar sensation of Roxy’s tongue. Once Daisy was getting into it again, Roxy asked another, more curious question, “How do you feel about toys, my dear?”

Daisy responded that she has tried plenty, liking a lot of them. Roxy summoned a strap on. This was an interesting development. Roxy saw her look, “Are you ok with trying this? It’s a pretty different experience from toys, so I don’t mind if you want to switch to handheld instead,” Roxy had forgotten that Daisy didn’t exactly mean toys with other people.

“Oh, I’ll try it, although you may have to say what positions you want me in,” Daisy said, new to this concept, though not uncomfortable.

It certainly was different. There was the extra, more intimate sensation of feeling Roxy, her natural rhythm, her weight, the collisions. This was certainly a step beyond toys, although Daisy didn’t think it was any better than them. Just, different. It was still enjoyable, and Daisy was about to release when Roxy had her switch positions. Roxy must have been able to read Daisy very well, because she was able to get her to the edge multiple times, switching it up each time. Finally, the last position, Daisy’s most vulnerable but intimate, Roxy sent her over the edge. It was the most rewarding, much more than straight to the top and back down that normal masturbation ends up being. Roxy removed the toy once it became too much sensation for Daisy, Daisy giggling at the noises that ensued.

They hugged, Roxy’s face close to hers. They whispered sweet nothings to each other, it getting to be that time of night. Roxy had to keep telling herself not to kiss Daisy. It was a strong urge, a habit that expressed her love. It wasn’t that Daisy didn’t love her back, she obviously did. It’s that Daisy loves her as a friend. It was hard to admit to herself. It’s crazy, to be in bed, having sex with your crush, but they aren’t yours. Daisy isn’t anybody’s. She’s doing this because she loves her friend, not that she wants to be in a romantic relationship with her. Daisy isn’t attracted to Roxy’s body. It’s hard to not take personally, but she didn’t choose her attraction, just like Roxy didn’t choose to be attracted to the feminine form. Sex with Daisy is a bit bittersweet, that way. She’s getting teased with a view into a life that was possible in a different universe with Daisy. That after this they wouldn’t be friends, but they would be soulmates. Living together, sharing everything together, maybe even adopting kids. This was a little sliver of that, Daisy wanting to please Roxy by showing it to her. It was almost cruel. No, Roxy didn’t mean that. Her eyebrows furrowed, getting mad at herself.

“Hey, are you OK?” Daisy had been staring at her for some time now, concern over her face.

“Yeah sorry, my brain is just being stupid,” Roxy was caught in her selfish thoughts.

“Did you want to talk about it?” Daisy places a tender hand on the side of Roxy’s face. This woman. She was something else.

“I- I need you to do something. You can say no, of course. If you want, could you please tie me up?” Roxy said, cringing once she realized this was a mistimed request, or at least poorly explained.

“That was quite a switch. What’s going on in there?” Daisy moved her hand, petting her head.

“I just really need to give up my control right now. It centers me to be humbled. I can teach you how to tie all the knots if you want,” Roxy hoped that Daisy would do this for her, but didn’t want to push her.

Daisy had never done anything in the genre of BDSM, but if her friend thought it would help her, she didn’t mind trying. That doesn’t mean Daisy wasn’t concerned at the strange jump from angry to ‘tie me up.’ If Roxy wanted to talk about it, she would have. Daisy gave a good thought into not continuing because of that almost concerning switch in direction, but eventually thought that Roxy would know best about her own mind. After some thinking, she said she would try to learn the knots.

Roxy, being the good teacher that she was, was able to successfully guide Daisy in the knots. Her hands tied behind her back, the ribbon looped around her body, a more simple restraint than the Kinbaku she had on in the beginning of the day. It ended up being loose, but pretty good for just learning. She had her AI tighten them. Totally cheating, but Roxy needed this feeling right now. She needed a clear head.

“And now I have given up control. The rest is up to you, Daisy,” Roxy relished the sensation. She could feel the gnawing thoughts fade away.

Daisy sat on the soft bed, her friend bound up before her. She really didn’t know what she was expected to do. Maybe that was the idea; without expectations, she could do anything. She started braiding Roxy’s hair. It was short, obviously, but she managed to get in some pretty tight, small braids. She ran two braids from the front to behind her head, them barely just making it. She was able to make a tiny bun. That looks so cute. Now for some makeup? Daisy spawned makeup supplies, Roxy accepting her command. She did a complete makeover, making her goth friend into a very vibrant drag queen look. Oh yes. Roxy seemed to really be enjoying her time, so Daisy got out the paint. She painted Roxy’s body, just coming up with stuff on the spot. She would have little doodles as tattoos on the upper portion of her body, as Daisy was thinking of what to do next. When she thought of it, she moved to the lower portion, having to move her friend around. She avoided painting her feet, for obvious reasons. She would sometimes call a command to instant dry the paint, just so it wouldn’t smear or mess up the bed. The lower portion was a cohesive piece. She made the lowrider style lines, even using glitter. She used Roxy’s curves as inspiration to her pattern, making everything symmetrical around her crotch. She really started to love how this was turning out, so she continued to weave the pattern carefully underneath the upper body tattoos. Some lines didn’t line up, and she might have completely made the right boob differently than the left, but hey, she was having fun. Roxy was as well, and that was the best part. Roxy couldn’t stand it anymore and replaced the wall with a mirror. Daisy allowed her to check out her work so far. Roxy laughed out loud at the complete stranger she saw in the mirror. She couldn’t stop, Daisy getting caught up in her laughter as well.

“Ynow, I didn’t know what to expect, and that was the most thrilling part. Thank you so much Daisy, this cheered me right up. You’re absolutely precious,” Roxy shook her head in admiration at her friend. What a gem.

“I take that as you wish to be released now? This is a good look on you, honestly,” Daisy teased.

“Oh the second I get untied you better believe you’re going to get a makeover, too,” Roxy mock threatened, pretending to strain against the bonds. Her bun behind her head becomes unraveled, the small braids falling to hang by her bangs again. Daisy reached over, not remembering which one was the right band to release her. Upon her hesitation, Roxy said, “The second knot is a fake knot. Pull the strand, not the loop, and it will come through.”

The ribbon exploded more extravagantly this time from how tightly she was bonded, AI assisted. The parts where Daisy couldn’t paint were obvious, but honestly it was a look still. Roxy stood up, finally able to move, and approached the mirror.

“Really awesome Daisy! I especially like the unicorn you painted,” Roxy complimented, surprised at how well the geometric lines flowed with her curves.

“That’s Twilight Sparkle! She’s the one I most relate to in the main six,” Daisy got excited, getting up to look at Roxy’s finished product as well.

“Do you want it to be your turn? Ropes are optional of course. But the painting was a really nice feeling!” Roxy hoped silently that Daisy also wanted to be tied up, but knew that wasn’t for everybody.

“Ynow, screw it, I’ll try it. I’ll send a command to despawn it if it becomes too much,” Daisy was in an explorative mood today.

“You got it, girl!” Roxy could almost squee in excitement. She asked what she was ok to restrain, and once they worked out the form of the Kinbaku, she asked how tight. Daisy didn’t want it the tightest, so the ribbon ended up slipping off her breasts and unfurling after a bit. Roxy had only put on a bit of makeup on her, so they tried to tie her up with the ribbon again. Roxy tried just a visual version, where nothing was restrained, and the ropes cupped around the breasts instead. This held on much better without being too tight. Roxy opted for dark makeup, of course better at the emo style from her enjoyment and practice with it. Daisy was able to watch the transformation in the mirror, between gaps of Roxy moving out the way of the mirror. Roxy had skipped doing Daisy’s hair, but she went back to it and made a really good french braid. That’s certainly a look Daisy isn’t used to seeing, a new style for her hair and completely shocking makeup. It was turning out really good though, and Roxy was having a blast. Daisy liked the feeling of the paintbrushes, when Roxy started that. Her Lover boost has been on and off for the past while. That was mostly the reason she didn’t want the ribbon tied tight. It could really be obvious, especially when OverClocking. Especially when she was restrained, any movement could cause a ribbon to dig in. This style felt like clothes and was much more comfortable. She liked the way it went under her breast, cupping it gently. The paintbrush was cold, the sensation as the paint was spread over her body made her so relaxed. Daisy watched as Roxy painted a background of black, then layered green and blue, and finally brown. Oh she was taking this seriously. Slowly, a forest spread across her body. Roxy had made Daisy a work of art!

“I love it!” Daisy said as Roxy put down her paintbrush. She got up, admiring herself. Roxy looked pleased.

“Goth isn’t my makeup, personally, but you are incredible at it! I do like how it looks on you, though,” Daisy said upon closer inspection. Roxy stood beside her, “Yeah, there are way too many colors on my face. But you certainly look good with happy, bright colors!”

Once they could agree that it was time to wash up, Roxy showed her the next room. A massive bathtub, perfect for two.

“Ehh? A little heavy on the romance, but it’s still cute,” Roxy stated the obvious, as the heart shaped tub was only the beginning on the romance side of things. There were candles, flower pedals, incense, light music, everything to set the mood.

“Oh romance as an aesthetic is certainly cute! I’m good with it,” Daisy was able to say honestly, taking a glance around the room. They hopped in, the paint already starting to turn the tub’s water color.

“Soo… Wash ourselves off, or each other?” Roxy said, unsure what Daisy wanted.

“Each other, most definitely,” Daisy loved the feeling of being touched by other people, especially such a close friend. There was something so much better when it was human contact. It really made you feel alive, it was so reassuring.

When they finished washing up, the tub had turned such a horrible color that Roxy had her AI revert it back to clear water. Daisy washed Roxy’s hair, undoing the braids and massaging her scalp. After rinsing off the bubbles with a shower head that had a million settings, Daisy let Roxy do the same for her hair. After she was finished, Roxy turned the shower head to a setting and handed it to Daisy. She sat up on the ledge, her intent clear. Daisy giggled, letting the rhythmic bursts of water massage Roxy’s clit. After Roxy got stimulated, she reached down and clicked the shower head to the next setting. This increased the tempo, water starting to act erratically, splashing and sending drops pretty far distances. Roxy started to get loud, the boxy, tile room echoing much more than the padded bedroom. Roxy clicked the final setting, emitting a powerful response at the change. She groped her own breasts, widening her legs. Daisy looked up, seeing her friend’s expression of pleasure. She loved seeing her friend happy, and smiled right back. Roxy started to vibrate, she took the shower head from Daisy, adjusting the setting to something else entirely. This one shot little streams at high speeds. Wow, that must feel intense with that setting. Roxy had reached heights of orgasm that Daisy hadn’t seen her get to yet. Was she overclocking, perhaps? She didn’t see her touch her menu, although she could have had a quick slot like Daisy made.

Roxy finally turned the shower head to something more gentle, having laid down on the ledge, hand to her forehead.

“You good, Roxy?” Daisy went up to the side near her head, placing her hands on the edge and her chin between them.

“Yeah,” Her voice satisfied, “I just had a really good time with you. Thank you so much.”

This made Daisy smile, “I really love to hear that. I had a great time as well.”

“This seriously meant a lot to me,” She let the showerhead, on the soft setting, drift over her body, not caring that some of the water was getting on the ledge and not the tub, “more than you might think.”

Daisy left it at that. She brushed her hand idly along the side of Roxy that was closest to her, still wanting to be close. Daisy had started running out of boost, so it wasn’t as vibrant for her hand as it would have been. The contact on her bare skin was still really nice, especially with the warm water flowing over her curves.

“I gotta head out soon. I really didn’t want today to end, but this is about as far as I can push it,” Roxy admitted. Daisy stood up, arms open for a hug, “No worries. Message me when you have free time next, Roxy!”

Roxy saw the incoming hug, so she placed her legs back in the water, standing up and giving Daisy a warm hug. The shower head burbled underwater, starting a light current in the water by their legs.

“Goodbye, Daisy,” Roxy said, her tone had a hint of sadness.

“Bye, Roxy!” Daisy responded, the scene fading to SinglePlayer as Roxy closed the connection. Daisy raised herself out of the tub, drying off with a towel. Daisy was too tired to change the map. Realistically this was one of her shortest ‘days.’ She honestly doesn’t look at the watch on her wrist. Time begins to be meaningless after a while. The only reason she would even care about the time is to know when her friends are on.

“You may add your friend’s timezones to your watch with a label of their name,” Ray informed her. That actually sounded kinda good. She had him do it, she saw that it was 07:00 UTC, with Roxy’s (and Box’s) time coming up as 23:00, since she was eight hours behind. She even saw Annie’s time come up, 02:00. No wonder she had to go to bed a couple of hours ago, she was three hours ahead of Roxy. Maybe someday Daisy will find a sleep schedule. If she eventually has friends on at all times, she’s gotta draw the line somewhere. She decides to decide it later, crawling into the huge, empty bed. Under the covers where Roxy once was (no trace, as the SinglePlayer switch had reset the world), Daisy slipped her feet and then her lower half. Her hair was still sopping wet but she didn’t care. She rested her head on the pillow, not taking long to drift off into slumber.

Truly. The dark skinned person stood before her. They had a little bird on their shoulder, an anthropomorphic creature that had blue feathers, a white belly, and arms with flight feathers running along the back edge of. The bird’s long tail with a bundle of feathers at the end swished happily. Daisy bent down, picking up the small human in her arms. I missed you. Are you all grown up by now? Daisy wondered. The furry took flight, hovering and watching the hug. They had yellow eyes, very thin framed round glasses, and a scarf that somehow stayed on during flight. Their talons dangled, their legs moving idly as they tilted their head, ears flopping to one side, then the other. Daisy looked around, holding the tiny human’s hand. Around them sprawled a theme park. That’s right, she was taking Truly to a park. Sunshine Ray should be here. Sunshine was getting on the ferris wheel, gesturing for them to come on too. Daisy sped up, her longer steps far outpacing Truly, who had to jog to keep up. They made it on, and the carriage clunked as they made the slow route to the top. They all sat on the bench seat, the little bird creature sitting on top of Sunshine’s head, between their tall blue ears. Sunshine’s purple tuft of hair made for a perfect seat. They made it to the top, the friend group chuckling and gazing out, pointing out things far in the distance.

Daisy woke up, feeling refreshed. She checked the time, the first time since she had the watch, pretty much. It was 15:00 UTC, she had slept 8 hours just about. Roxy’s at 07:00, Annie at 10:00. Annie was more likely to be awake, but she was supposed to send a message to Daisy when she was available. Daisy checked her notifications, there was one. However, it was not from Annie. Surprisingly, Daisy opened a notification from Box.

Box came up, dressed in a black skintight swimsuit, covering them neck to toe. In the background was a waterpark, and they looked genuine when they said, “You know most about the changes happening around the company, and I’m really glad that we got a wakeup call. You must already know that I’m terribly sorry that your situation is what took the company to receive that wakeup call, but I hope you are willing to make the most of our new situation. I wanted to formally invite you to a work retreat; you are certainly still one of us. This is the waterpark we will be staying at, and you will get to see all your coworkers. This will start at 17:00 UTC, end at 01:00, obviously you can leave whenever. You may request a teleport to me anywhere during those times for the retreat.”

Daisy should probably go to this. It doesn’t sound nefarious, and she has heard of them doing work retreats before. It may be good to see her coworkers, though she seriously doubts she would recognize a single one besides Roxy. She’s got 2 hours, what now?

She was inspired by Annie’s drawings and decided to try her hand at drawing as well! She needed some inspiration to work off of, so she summoned a projector, pointing it at the wall. She had Ray bring up pictures. She wanted to draw Otis! She didn’t want Otis to be associated with a bad memory of the tower she burned to the ground earlier in the story. She wanted to transfer the good vibes of meeting Annie and seeing her drawings onto something nice! Otis was a really fun character to draw, his little features vibrant and his face expressive. She isn’t able to capture fur too well, without scribbling erratically. It ends up looking good like that though, she mostly kept her scribbles within the lines. Time flies by, and before she knows it, she’s staring at a piece of Otis in his elevator snug! He’s happily pushing the button that makes the elevator blast out of the top of the hotel. She has successfully reclaimed the character to her happy memories. She wants to hang it up somewhere. It will be nice to have something to call her own, just like Annie has her room. She has Ray conjure up the Reddit post with all the cartoon worlds. She would love to live in one of those, so she checks out her options. The list pops up, she has Ray scroll it slowly. The second she sees Rainbow Ruby, she knows that’s it. Rainbow Ruby is a red haired girl, just like Daisy, so she always felt a connection to her. The love hotel morphs into the 6 year old’s large, wood-floored room. There is a purple facade that runs around the bottom half of the room, only broken up by the door and her green-framed paneled windows. The peach wallpaper features spaced out, vertical lines of blue and pink hearts. Peach curtains with pink bows grow from the edges of the window frame, their sheer and light fabric waving at any movement. The window frame has a pink shelf where flower pots spring up, as well as 5 nesting dolls, to sit on it. They are the Harmony Family, and one of Ruby’s many friends that come alive when Rainbow Village needs Ruby to help solve their problems. Ruby always has helpful things in her Rainbow Roller, a backpack that lets Ruby use equipment to perform various jobs around the Village. Next, the bright furniture generates. Most of the furniture is colored pink with light pink or magenta accents, like the bed (that Daisy will have to ask Ray to resize for her), the stair-step bookcase, the tall armoire, the nightstands, and the various cupboards that are mounted on the wall. Even the play kitchen set is mostly pink, with a yellow sink and brightly colored utensils. The small purple table is generated with stuffed animals around it, the Rainbow Villagers. Choco is the teddy bear, and the one who notifies Rainbow Ruby that there is a problem in Rainbow Village. He has a gem heart attached to his chest, and it glows to notify her something is up in Rainbow Village. She has to rush back to her room to help them. This would likely be the way to access missions in MultiPlayer. Daisy will have to try that out in MultiPlayer when she has time. Gina is a wooden puppet pirate, her black, shoulder-length hair covered by a red bandanna with a skull and compass decaled in orange. Thunderbell is also at the tea-table, a stuffed, blue rabbit with a white face, belly, and sock markings. His left ear is also striped in white markings, horizontally across the floppy ear. He’s got a big smile on his face, with his crooked buck teeth showing. The last animal at the table, but certainly not the last villager, is Mayor Ling Ling himself. He is a blue elephant with dark blue markings on his forehead, hands, and feet. He’s got a purple suit on and big, round glasses in front of his small brown eyes. The underside of his large floppy ears are green plaid. The rest of the villagers are scattered around the room. Finally, a rug appears under Daisy’s feet, a simple rug with three white circles, boarded by brown. They are in the shape of a bear with two small ears, Daisy knowing it symbolizes Chocho, and is the portal to the village when his heart is activated. Stepping off it, Daisy notices it has two eyes, and a triangle nose connected to a small smile. Rainbow Ruby comes here when she is notified, bringing her Rainbow Roller and twirling her umbrella to bring the toys to life. Daisy doesn’t have time for that right now, as the retreat will be starting soon. She finds a space to hang up her drawing, asking Ray to fit it with a matching frame so it goes with the theme of the room. Satisfied, and happy to have a new aesthetic room that brings her good memories, Daisy asks Box for her to teleport to them. Before she is accepted, she quickly remembers she has to ask Ray to have her teleport with all her Virtual Real Clothes equipped. She doesn’t exactly have a swimsuit, but she could change into something when she gets there. However, she remembers it’s a PrivatePlay instance, so she could try switching to a PrivatePlayer instance with just herself, and then summon an outfit. Not knowing when Box will say yes, she just decides to see how fast she can do it.

“PrivatePlayer. Summon Mirror. Competition Swimsuit,” She thinks of her swimsuit she had in other games, it appearing on her body as she watches the mirror. It was a pink one-piece, it had light blue ‘racing’ stripes up the sides, and the edges of the suit were a bright green. It was very tight and showed a lot of flank, enough to show off her tan lines of her more modest practice suit, but she didn’t mind. Finally, she decided to summon her Virtual Real clothes over it, with her Virtual Real underwear underneath it and invisible. It was an easy comfort hack. Daisy bet Box had that swimsuit that went head to toe so they could summon it invisible under Virtual Clothes. That would be smart to have a layer of nice fabric between yourself and all Virtual clothes you want to wear. Either Box was getting a lot of teleport requests or Daisy had asked too early, because she managed to do all that prep work before the teleport. It wasn’t much longer before her new room fizzled out, being replaced by a concrete slab. A pool materialized within the concrete, and soon enough she saw waterslides weaving their way around, all depositing themselves in various parts of the massive pool. A crowd was gathering and Daisy was in the center of it. Everyone was appearing before Box, who stood up on a stand so that they could see everyone, and likely address them once most arrived. She guessed the crowd was about 20 people, from the looks of it.

“So a few changes about these retreats that most will be excited over. Everyone here will be getting their hourly rate deposited into their Virtual World account! Now, this is a new idea for the company, so we weren’t exactly prepared with the necessary Virtual World funds before this idea was proposed,” Daisy had a strong feeling that this change was either directly asked by Ray, or had been asked in the aftermath of her legal attack, “since we usually would just pay you Real World money. Times are changing and the Real World isn’t as dependable as the Virtual World, so we are changing with it. Thanks to all the work we do in Research and Development, we are contributing to the Virtual World’s strength,” Box went on, tooting their horn and likely trying to reestablish a positive view of the company. Daisy had done a lot of damage to the higher ups, it seems. Nothing inherently wrong though, as she was pretty much just getting retribution for their own mistreatment of their employees.

“I saved the best for last though. To kick off the revamped retreat and our company’s latest facelift, everyone here is getting a healthy Virtual World bonus!” Finally Box was able to make the employee’s cheer. Attempting to entice the employees back was making headway, and this brought a smile to Box’s face. Daisy genuinely believes that they care, at least they cared about her. But of course it was financially best to have your employees happy, if it means avoiding another legal battle like Daisy had thrown at them. It was not coincidental that a work retreat came up out of nowhere, nor was it that they were giving out bonuses.

Box stepped down, and everyone migrated into the park. There were tables and umbrellas, with cold and refreshing treats set out. Daisy often forgets that food exists in the Virtual World. She picks up a popsicle, a blue one with white decorations. It tastes amazing, her Flavor boost kicking in. She had forgotten about that! It was a strong blueberry flavor, with sweet undertones of added sugar. Blissfully cold. Roxy sees her from the crowd and walks over.

“Heya!” She throws a hug around Daisy; Daisy giggling before turning around to properly hug her.

“Did you have a good night?” She asked.

Daisy, her tongue already blue, responded, “Yeah! In the morning I managed to draw something, and I chose a room that I get to call my own.”

“Ooh, very nice, I’d like to see it. How’d you like the bonus they deposited into your account? It should already be there,” Roxy raised her eyebrows at Daisy. Daisy checked her tattoo menu. Woh, yeah there was clearly a bigger number added. The money she got from Roxy and the True quest was still there, but it was now at the end of a much larger number. She didn’t know how much it correlated to buying things in the Virtual World, but she knew how much of a sweat she worked up in beatsaber, and those hours earned her more than a thousand times less than this bonus.

“Woh, that’s a big number.” Daisy said, “I have no idea what it will buy me, but I like it.”

Roxy scrunched her brow, trying to compare it to something, “If you were playing a fantasy game, that would buy you a house at the edge of a medium-sized town, with 2 bedrooms, a bathroom, and a woodfire kitchen.”

Daisy smiles at her hilariously specific example, “I like the sound of that!”

A coworker walks up by them, selecting a treat off the table. They look like they want to greet Roxy, and she turns to them.

“Hey, Carter, this is Daisy,” She says, introducing Daisy.

“Holy Moly. I heard about you, but to see you in the Virtual World! Daym!” Carter looks like an interesting person. He looks Daisy up and down, either appreciating her womanly form or her fake Virtual Real avatar, “You look incredible. And I mean that in a very professional manner,” he adds, now realizing that it might sound like he’s hitting on her.

“Thank you very much,” Daisy entertained him with a twirl, not unused to attention. She had received compliments about her body and the detail of her previous avatars; they are nice to her either way.

“So what are you all going to do with your bonus?” Carter asks, now looking at the women’s faces.

“Roxy sounds like she really wants a house in a fantasy game,” Daisy teases her specific example.

“I never said that! It was just an example of what one could buy with that much money,” She defended herself, taking a quick glance at Daisy. This earns a chuckle from Carter. Carter is a gangly guy, complete with a surfer-dude unkempt pile of blond hair on top of his head. He looks pretty funny in board shorts. Daisy sees him as the type of guy to take his shirt off with very little warning, and at any chance he can get. If this was a cisgender male, Daisy can confidently say she isn’t attracted to them. She wouldn’t even know what to look for when trying to decide if she was sexually attracted to someone.

“Are you checking out my avatar, too?” He must have caught her staring, “this bod’s been scanned in, so yes, I’m this jacked in the real world,” what he did next sent Roxy and Daisy into a fit of laughter. He took his shirt off, flexing. This guy was a riot. Roxy’s hand ended up resting on Daisy’s shoulder. Carter got the vibes, and made his escape, “The massive slide is calling my name. Carter! Carter!” He attempted ventriloquy, it surprisingly worked well. He didn’t throw an accent on the slide though; it was pretty funny anyway. He must have done those jokes before though, because his lips really sold it that he wasn’t talking.

Daisy turned to Roxy, “did you get rid of him on purpose?”

Roxy’s face blanched at the question, “I’m so sorry. It wasn’t purposeful, but I see how that happened.”

Daisy knew that Roxy didn’t mean it, but she wanted to make sure that wouldn’t happen again, “I forgive you. PDA is completely fine by me. Just make sure you don’t think of me as your girlfriend, needing to protect me from others. I believe you that it wasn’t purposeful; I just want you to know for the future.”

Roxy looked a bit heartbroken at that, so Daisy gave her a hug. She knew it was difficult for her. She had mentioned that she had a crush on David for a long time, and in her eyes, Daisy had shot her down, too.

Carter really did hit up that massive slide. They watched him, off in the distance, attempting to surf down it. It worked halfway, until he built up too much speed and landed on his butt to slide the rest of the way down. Ouch.

There were other coworkers mulling about. Sure enough, she couldn’t recognize anybody. No one recognized her, although that statement is obvious. She was Daisy, not David. But he could have shown people her character designs, like Roxy had mentioned she knew about Daisy before she existed in the Virtual World.

“Did David talk about me to other people often?” She had caught that Carter had somehow heard of her.

“No, he just heard about your recent legal forthcomings. As far as I can tell, it’s only me who knows about your history. But if your existence was told to me in secret and I kept it, who’s to say others aren’t keeping that knowledge secret? It was just David and I who were close as coworkers, though.” Roxy didn’t have a problem saying David’s name, knowing Daisy thought of them as a different person entirely, but she wanted to make sure, “you don’t mind me mentioning David, right?”

“No, not at all. Just don’t get too nostalgic on me about him. I’m certainly not him.” Daisy raised an eyebrow, understanding Roxy’s concern, and watched her reaction to that statement. She seemed relieved.

“Of course I won’t. I just didn’t want to make you uncomfortable.” Roxy certainly did care about her emotions. That’s why Daisy doesn’t mind telling her if she ever makes a mistake. She’s got a good heart.

“Do you want to jump in the water?” Daisy asked, having finished her popsicle.

“Aren’t you supposed to wait 20 minutes after eating before swimming?” Roxy chuckled, teasing Daisy.

“Oh hunny, I was a swimmer. I would slam fast food minutes before jumping in. We needed our calories. I proved that expression wrong years ago,” Daisy really enjoyed those times. They weren’t in a video game setting, for some reason though. She could distinctly remember swimming in the Real World. How did she remember that? She tried to picture herself. All she could remember was in first person perspective, she didn’t look at her body much. She could remember the bubbles, the exercise, the cold water. That was vivid, that couldn’t have been a game. Why was that memory there?

Roxy watched Daisy’s curious silence. What was going through her head? She knew David was a competitive swimmer, was she remembering that? It didn’t bother Roxy in the slightest if Daisy could access all of David’s memories. She was still Daisy to Roxy. David may have left memories intact when performing the selective amnesia, or some had slipped through or gotten remembered after the fact. Roxy should probably continue the conversation, Daisy was starting to furrow her brows.

“Yeah, I’d love to take a dip. Very nice weather for a swim! It looks like you already have your swimsuit on,” Roxy had noticed the pink one piece under Daisy’s clothes. She admits to herself she was disappointed when she couldn’t see the familiar cleavage. She bets the swimsuit looks good on her though, and was excited to see the whole outfit.

Daisy claims a nearby chair, slinging her jacket over the back of it. She begins to undress, Roxy watching. Daisy doesn’t notice immediately until Roxy comments on her removing her skirt.

“Oh, I love that swimsuit!” Roxy sees its vibrant colors, it’s almost too much in the sun. Daisy takes out her scrunchies and hair clips, setting them on the table before flipping her Cami inside out and over her head. Roxy couldn’t help to watch her, unused to seeing Daisy’s hair down.

“You have so much hair, you’ve been blessed,” Roxy runs her fingers through it, the waves from being in a scrunchy relaxing.

“Thank you. I love my hair. And this is my competition suit, I used it for races,” Daisy liked the feeling of Roxy touching her hair, her Lover boost activating for just a bit to make her well aware of it.

Roxy was going to quick-swap her clothes, but since Daisy was taking them off the real way, Roxy would too. She summoned her black bikini under her clothes. It was a Virtual Real outfit, so she didn’t need to send a VIP command request to Box to fetch it. She undressed, leaving her clothes on the chair next to Daisy’s.

“Aw, that’s a cute bikini!” Daisy sees Roxy’s supple breasts covered by the smooth black fabric. Even after having groped them the prior night, she still doesn’t feel anything that she interprets as sexual desire. She looks at her bottom half, Roxy twirling like Daisy did. She can say the bikini fits her form well, that the black fabric is a really good contrast to her almost blinding white skin. Nothing urges her to repeat the actions she did when Roxy asked her to have sex with her. Daisy inwardly sighs, still attempting to figure this all out. There just was no forcing it, it is how it is.

Roxy takes Daisy’s hand, running barefoot on the concrete. Daisy laughs at her energy, the two headed straight for the pool. Daisy makes sure to check the depth on the side of the pool in their haste, it looks like it’s at the deep end. They jump, still holding hands, and get completely enveloped in the brisk water.

They have a great time in the water. Daisy shows off her butterfly skills, her base stats must be good enough to let her swim pretty close to what she used to do. They race freestyle, Daisy made it a challenge by swimming breaststroke but still won.

“Are based stats based off of what you were scanned as? Because I haven’t put any effort into leveling my account yet, but I’m almost as good as I used to be,” Daisy told Roxy, breathless, “I mean my endurance is shot but that’s expected from taking a break from swimming.”

Roxy nodded, “Your base capabilities are somewhat derived from your scans, but it’s certainly not a hundred percent accurate. It still causes competitive people to get in shape before their first scan. Or, people like Carter who want to show off their abs,” Roxy laughing, recovered from the exercise already. She had killer endurance stats from long rhythm game sessions, but that didn’t make her a fast swimmer at all. She also found it amusing that Daisy spoke as if she had taken a break from swimming instead of being built an entirely new body. That wasn’t something Roxy would ever feel the need to correct her or mention, though.

“It would also be a factor of muscle memory, too. Swimmers are highly efficient through the water, and that’s something learned by countless hours of practice,” she surmised after a bit of thinking. Daisy totally understood this. She hadn’t lost her edge through the water because of how refined she had made it in the past.

“Yeah, I could see myself swimming for fun, to raise my stats. Too bad the company can’t give us an XP bonus, too,” she jokes lightheartedly, looking up at the slides, “wanna take one of these for a spin, though?”

They excitedly get out of the pool, walking over to the ladders up to the top of the slide. When at the top, they notice some curious pool floats. They are shrimp pool floats.

“Are we meant to sit on these to slide down?” Daisy asks. Roxy shrugs, so Daisy takes one, “why not?”

As Daisy makes her decent, the long slide only sloping down slowly, she gets to see over the side. She’s high up, but it’s a long ride. She doesn’t get going too fast, but is much faster on the almost frictionless shrimp than she would have been going without it. Roxy actually begins to catch up to her on a shrimp of her own. Daisy assumes she’s the heavier friend, so she should be going faster, right? Maybe she got a running start before jumping onto the shrimp. She heads for Daisy, unable to slow down, but not looking like she wants to, either.

“Aaaaaa!” She screams, looking like she’s trying to joust, or drive a motorcycle. They collide; Daisy laughing as the impact speeds her up. Roxy falls behind a lot, having given most of her kinetic energy to Daisy. Daisy shoots out of the bottom of the slide, skipping once before the shrimp is torn out from under her by the water beneath. Roxy slowly slides down, making a graceless plop into the water, not going near as far as Daisy. She certainly didn’t skip, either. She actually had leaned forward too much when exiting the slide, tilting in the air and face planting in the water as the pool floatie bounces away, refusing to go underwater with her. She burst to the top of the water with a funny grin on her face. Oh that silly girl.

They have a great day in the pool. The retreat was a full’s day of work, 9-5. Near the end of it, she got a notification from Annie. Looks like she’s on. Daisy decided to finish up the day with Roxy, then head over to Annie’s. She’s glad she stayed to the end, they set off fireworks. So pretty. She sat by the side of the pool, holding hands with Roxy, their feet dangling in the water. She really doesn’t mind PDA, one can be affectionate with a friend. The boom of the fireworks resounded throughout the uninhabited valley the aquatic park was in. Daisy checked her settings, the last of the hourly paychecks had been deposited. That was really nice. She obviously didn’t have to work, but she would be getting a living stipend in Virtual World money as well, she confirmed with Ray. That contract starts next week and continues indefinitely. It’s certainly nothing near the amount she gets paid to be here at a retreat, but it’s something to live off of. She could take the opportunity to go to work retreats and be paid like that, but it was kinda like unemployment checks, where if she worked too much, it would start to reduce the stipend for that month. She decided to not worry about it. She could always work for tips at the stripclub if she wanted extra cash that wouldn’t reduce her stipend. Ray, early on, had said in the legal attack that the work-related disability had impacted her ability to perform in the Research and Development company. That part wasn’t even exploiting a loophole, she literally had no memory of working at the company, so how could she continue?

Roxy hugged Daisy, glad to have spent the whole day with her. She said that a work retreat hadn’t been more fun, and that’s not just because of the bonus they all received. Daisy hugged her back, the fireworks show still going as coworkers logged out one by one. Daisy took the opportunity to yet again disappear from within her arms, sending herself to the PrivatePlayer instance with her new room. She really wanted to show Annie her room, plus the drawing she had been inspired to make this morning. She requested Annie teleport to her, and it wasn’t long before she appeared before her, in yet another cute outfit. She must have known about the PrivatePlayer instance switching, or that it was a Virtual Real clothing article. Daisy had forgotten she was in a bathing suit.

“Aww cute suit! Let me guess, you went swimming today?” Annie knew that her friend is a 24/7, so she was well aware that Daisy lived the hours ingame when Annie wasn’t there. Daisy looks down, already remembering she was in a swimsuit, but it was instinctual to look down when someone commented on her outfit.

“Yeah! Is that a Virtual Real outfit?” Daisy kneeled down to feel it, “I really love it!” and touched the rim of the skirt. It was, indeed, Virtual Real clothes. Annie confirmed this and spun for Daisy, revealing a massive black bow that held a tail on to her skirt. The tail was a thin black cord that was frozen into a pleasing bend and had a heart shaped red tip with a black outline.

Annie was wearing a gray corset, with her bra’s pink spaghetti straps coming out from underneath, leaving a thin strip of skin and her belly button visible between the skirt and corset. Her skirt was a poofy white fabric with blue polka dots, on it had points of a black star coming down evenly from the waist, the star encircling her. She had black and gray striped thigh high socks with bright red bows at the top. She also had glossy black pumps, her little feet even more adorable by the tight fitting dress shoes. Finally, she had a thin red bow around her neck, and long black gloves with a matching bow and lace at the elbow.

“I have a friend that would absolutely love the look of this outfit. She loves gothic, and I think you could convince her to appreciate the lolita style with this!” Daisy thought of Roxy. She would introduce the two once she learned more about Annie, if they were both OK with it.

“Thank you! Is this your room? I find it vaguely familiar, but I can’t place why, and it is bothering me!” Annie was louder today, Daisy liked that she was excited.

“This is Rainbow Ruby’s room, if you know the show. There should be quests in the MultiPlayer version of this world, if you wanted to try it out sometime!” Daisy said, hopeful that Annie would want to do a quest from another cartoon. It was so much fun yesterday, in the Rainbow Kingdom.

“Ooh I have heard of this show, but never watched it! Would you want to watch an episode or two before going on a quest? I would like to familiarize myself with the universe,” Daisy adored that Annie got into the roles.

“Yes, absolutely! Also before I set that up, I wanted to show off my first addition to my room. I was inspired by your drawings, so I drew…” She didn’t finish the sentence before Annie saw what she was talking about behind Daisy.

“Otis! That’s a lovely drawing!” She walked over to it, inspecting Daisy’s style, “you did so well with the Fuzzly Cubby!”

Watching Rainbow Ruby while in Rainbow Ruby’s room was quite surreal. Daisy had picked up Choco from the tea table they were at. Annie picked up the pink reindeer plush with big blue eyes, also named Daisy.

The show was quite bingeable, as episodes were really short. They ended up watching the first season, both of them fine to lay next to each other on the now-resized pink bed. The poor bed looked like it wouldn’t fit in the corner if she resized it, so Daisy took the liberty of having Ray move it to the other side of the room where there was more space. It was a big room, but everything was crammed up against the walls so Ruby had more space to play in the center. The bed would have been too close to what was next to it without reorganizing everything to give it space.

They were watching it on a projector that Ray had created, along with a sheet that Daisy needed to pull down to cover the wall. There were too many things along the edges to get a free patch of wall big enough for watching things on. She could have summoned a TV or something, but that felt tacky. She liked the mini projector vibes. There were also plenty of heart shaped pillows to surround themselves in as they watched. Daisy had changed into her Virtual Real clothes, minus the shoes, to be comfortable. She didn’t mind getting the clothes out of her new pink wardrobe and undressing in front of Annie. Annie didn’t even watch, so she didn’t feel concerned. Besides, she was 19, and it wasn’t anything she hadn’t seen before, especially considering how sheer Daisy’s BabyDoll outfit had been. She did have to dry off before changing into her Virtual Real clothes, as even water persisted past instances when it was within PrivatePlayer. There were shower towels in the room, pink ones of course.

“I know you’re aroace, but do you like holding hands?” Annie had asked when watching. Daisy didn’t mind, Annie’s hand was so small but so warm when she held it for a couple episodes. Eventually, Annie grew comfortable enough to snuggle up to Daisy, and Daisy liked that. The feeling of a human, comfortable enough to be so close, was something to be treasured. Daisy toyed with Annie’s curly hair. The locks twirled aggressively, especially when they got to the bottom. They coiled up at the bottom, making the ends somehow have more volume than the top, in the shape of a honey dipper. There was a shocking amount of hairspray in it, keeping the form with a deathgrip. That or the scan had thought it was a solid object and gave it too sturdy of properties. A lock could curl in a circle as big as Daisy’s hand. They bounced incredibly when played with, as well. Annie eventually noticed Daisy’s antics. When she pointed it out, Daisy defended herself, “Your hair has very peculiar properties. How did you get it like this?”

“Lots of hairspray. Two cans when I headed out, and one just before the scan, touching it up a final time,” Annie sounded proud of her achievement, and took Daisy’s comment as a compliment.

“Are you a cosplayer? You have an awesome library of Virtual Real clothes, at least of what I’ve seen,” Daisy pointed out. Annie confirmed that she was a cosplayer. This made sense with what Daisy knew about cosplayers, the puzzle pieces fitting.

“What they don’t tell you when scanning, and you can use this knowledge too, is that every scan takes a picture of your hairstyle. Sure, you can pay for multiple layers of clothes to make them removable, but why not change your hairstyle in every sweep, or even throw on wigs? You can toggle any part of the separate layers, as long as the camera can distinguish it from the base model. Then, you can have quick hair changes in the morning!” Annie explained. Daisy told her she actually figured this out on her first scan, and even told her she took it a step further by getting the jacket in on the third sweep.

“You’re so smart! I had to figure that out from the internet, in a cosplay group forum. You really made the most of those 3 sweeps, very nice!” Daisy probably shouldn’t mention that her scans were on a highly customized emulation of the scanner, and that the only reason she hadn’t gone back for more is because she was scared of it. She will try it sometime, but she had better warn Roxy first. She was the only person that could make sure that nothing went wrong, or to help her if it did. Box could have been another person, but she completely locked them out of observing her forever.

After the first season finished, Annie wanted to style Daisy’s hair. She informed her that hair grows back with a thought from the AI, so she could make Daisy’s hair look like Ruby’s! She was so good with it, Daisy now understood it was likely from tons of practice either on her own hair or wigs for cosplay. Daisy let her have at it, even having Ray bring over the mirror that she used when she spawned in the swimsuit. That way, she could look at Annie while they made light chatter and see the progress of her hair. Daisy could feel the tugs on her hair as Annie made her way around with a comb and shear, she loved that her touch boost activated when people played with her hair. They talked about the show, saying their favorite Villagers. Annie’s favorite ended up being Princess Kiki, a porcelain doll that needed her outfit to always be perfect and loved bedazzled things. Daisy’s favorite (besides Choco) was Gina, an aerobatic female pirate with a can-do attitude.

“And this hairstyle will persist past instances?” Daisy wondered, questioning what or what wouldn’t make it from PrivatePlayer to MultiPlayer.

“Yeah, absolutely. Virtual Real avatar states are saved. That’s why it’s so awesome your hair was long when you first scanned, it gives us a lot to work with,” Annie was having a blast. Red hair fell all over the bed, especially long strands when she started on the bangs. When Annie moved from out in front of the mirror, Daisy was finally able to see the work she did on her bangs. Oh my gosh. It was like looking at a grown up Ruby.

“You’re incredible! I’d say you could be a hairstylist if I already didn’t know you were a cosplayer. Which means you can work with fabric and materials, too!” Daisy was in awe.

“Yeah I just do it all don’t I? These skills could transfer to costume making for movies, but that’s quickly dying out in exchange for CGI. But I could certainly work for a lower-budget production, that’s something I consider when I finish fashion school,” Daisy forgot that she was college-aged.

“Fashion School, very nice! You’ve either got talent for it, or you’re very devoted to perfecting what you love,” Daisy hated when people said that others had natural talent. Sure, that was sometimes true. However, it was very insulting to those who worked extremely hard at something they weren’t good at. It was waving away their effort and trivializing it by stating that they must be naturally good at it.

She laughed at the way Daisy said it, “yeah, certainly the latter. As a kid I would make the most atrocious costumes, to the point where people wouldn’t know what I was for halloween, and I wouldn’t either.”

Daisy matched her laughter, “hey, that’s called being experimental, darling, and the world wasn’t ready for you yet.”

Annie smiled, this comment making her happy. Daisy watched her eyes, still glowing purple like they were when they first met.

“Hey, I was going to ask, how did you get your eyes to glow purple?” Daisy was very curious.

“It’s an Avatar effect, it doesn’t work in all games. But it always works in PrivatePlayer. I bought it off the Virtual Market. Just in case a game doesn’t have it, I have purple contacts in one of my many scans, so I’ll switch to them automatically,” Annie says, Daisy never heard of the Virtual Market.

“What is that? I mean, I can guess it’s for buying cosmetics and things, but I don’t know anything about it,” Daisy had forgotten that Annie didn’t know how new she was to the game, at her surprised look.

“Oh, I just assumed you knew. It’s a MultiPlayer Market, although that doesn't say much because you can get whatever you want in SinglePlayer and PrivatePlayer. Asset creators will post their items for sale, but everything is in limited quantities. Once somethings gone, it’s gone, so I got very lucky with this effect,” Daisy finds it hilarious that a Virtual World, with the ability to make infinite copies of things, still manages to squeeze the market into the supply and demand form. But that was a very gamelike experience, so she understood it. It makes people more proud of the things they were able to find and collect, and that adds to the fun!

Daisy stands up in front of the mirror, inspecting her new Rainbow Ruby hair. She gets an idea, and runs over to the closet. She saw Rainbow Ruby’s outfit there when she was getting her Virtual Real clothes earlier.

“Hey, if I don the outfit in MultiPlayer, will it resize to me automatically?” Daisy could cosplay in their adventure to the universe!

“Yeah, actually! Do you want to go now?” Annie asked, starting to get excited.

“Yeah! I’ll go, get dressed, then invite you to teleport to my instance,” Daisy matched her excitement. At Annie’s nod, she switched to MultiPlayer. The room reorganized itself, the bed and villagers going back to where they were, and the drawing fading off the wall as the mirror disappeared. She checked, only one user connected. She expected that, and was able to undress and try on Ruby’s outfit in private. She undressed, but thought better about leaving her clothes in a MultiPlayer instance, so she had them disappear off the floor. She saw the rainbow-colored underwear, in a boyshorts style that extended down to just above her knee when she slipped it on, resizing compliments to Ray. She had kept her Virtual Real underwear on, but made it invisible. If she does risk the emulated scanner, she will have to get a suit like Box has, and finally be head to toe comfortable when donning Virtual Clothes. The rainbow shorts made bands of color wrap around her legs, starting from orange near her knees. Next, she took the skirt out. On the underneath, it had a magenta fabric inner skirt, but the outer skirt was a translucent and sparkly rainbow gradient. It was a plasticy material, and had permanent waves flaring along the edge. It resized as she pulled it to her waist. It went halfway down her thigh, it would have felt very short if it weren’t for the rainbow shorts underneath. She picks up the pink raincoat, slipping it over one arm and then the next, the fabric feeling like a softer plastic than the rainbow skirt. The jacket had small white dots scattered about it, with frosted pink pockets in the front, and the hoodie had a rainbow colored cord hanging down. Daisy clipped on the heart with a blue, green, and yellow feather coming off of the right side of it, to keep the raincoat wrapped around her. She went to a smaller mirror on the wall and tied the rainbow string into a bow. The sleeves of the coat ended at her elbows, rimmed with the same hard plastic, in a sparkly rainbow just like the skirt. Finally, to touch it all off, she asked Ray if there was a rainbow hair extension in her room. Sure enough, they were able to locate it and tell Daisy which drawer to open. Daisy clipped up the hair extension, it sparkling brilliantly, resizing to her proportionally longer hair. Rainbow Ruby always gets the rainbow streak in her hair when she goes to Rainbow Village, so she wanted to surprise Annie by finishing the hairstyle. Hmm, she still had vibrant green eyes, she noticed as she looked in the mirror. Ruby’s eyes were a deep blue, so it was a shocking difference. That was honestly a look though, and it was a way to tell that she was Daisy. No, she wouldn’t hide her brilliant green eyes. Finally, she slips her feet into the baby blue rain boots that have a similar stylized frosting along the edge, in a repeating pattern of semicircles. The boots have pink bottoms, and also have the little white dot flecked across its surface. Daisy requests Annie to teleport to her, saying she is ready. Not a second goes by before Annie appears in the room.

“Oh my gosh! It’s Rainbow Ruby!” Annie runs to Daisy, jumping in her arms. Annie was already in character upon seeing Daisy. They established that Annie was a friend coming over to play, and Daisy, as Rainbow Ruby, would invite her to see the Rainbow Village.

They played with the toys, not too concerned that anyone would join the instance. Besides, they could just invite them along for the quest. Annie would attempt Thunderbell’s extremely expressive voice, making Daisy laugh. It was an easy voice to do, you just scream in a whiny voice and you’re good. No offense, Thunderbell.

Daisy started losing track of time, but was having a great time. Since they had both binged the show, the characters were fresh in her mind. They made the Villagers act how they would in the show, not really telling a story line but still having a blast. After a while, Choco’s heart starts to glow, playing the chime of the theme song. Daisy picks Choco up, placing him on the bear rug so he can come to life. Sure enough, Choco stands up, yawning and stretching.

“Looks like they need our help in Rainbow Village,” Daisy surmises, following the cadence of the show. She goes to fetch her Rainbow Roller, Annie remembering to grab her Rainbow Umbrella.

“Ready Choco and Annie?” Daisy tweaks the formula to include her friend. She opens the umbrella and twirls, the shimmering Rainbow Magic raining down from the umbrella, “Rainbow Village, here we come!”

They all hop in the air, the theme song rolling in. The room’s roof shimmers away, the blue sky of Rainbow Village spreading out. Toys fly off the shelves, houses growing to full size, setting down in their proper place in Rainbow Village. Annie and Choco hold on to Daisy as she floats down gently with the umbrella above her. Choco hugging Daisy unleashes magic, causing the roads and fountain at the center of town to be summoned in by a sweep of Rainbow Power. The fountain has all colors of the rainbow being poured into it by spouts, and at the top has a gem heart, much like the one on Choco’s chest. It spins in its golden outline that holds it in place for all to see. It slows down, clicking into place and unleashing the final burst of magic that animated the Villagers. Gina walks up to her, looking sad.

“What’s wrong, Gina?” Daisy bends down to hug her wooden friend. They unhug, Daisy having to be on her knees to look at her in the face.

“Everyone has an outfit for the Fashion Show, but I can’t think of anything!” Gina looks down at her outfit, “I always wear this, but want to try something new.”

She has a blue suede skirt on, big red leather boots, a white cuffed dress shirt with a red vest over it, and a wooden sword stashed in her red belt.

“We could make you an outfit! We will need to be creative, and design a costume for Gina to wear to the Fashion Show,” Daisy thought on the spot, “I have an idea! Luckily I have some helpful things in my Rainbow Roller.”

She gestures to the roller, it opening up to reveal the many things within it. Rainbow Magic shoots out, causing the world to be flooded with color, so that everyone can only see the Rainbow Roller and Daisy floating on a colorful gradient background. The Rainbow power shoots up, hitting a cloud that lets a droplet fall on the ground, causing a ripple that Daisy stands on. With flowing Rainbow power behind her, Daisy begins to sing the How Can I Help song. The items float up from the Rainbow Roller, encased in individual bubbles. She grabs a few items, finishing the song, and appears back in Rainbow Village. She has a purple waistband, that has a heart pouch containing scissors and knitting needles. On her wrist, she has a matching purple pincushion with pins sticking in it.

“I can be a Costume Designer, so that I can make a creative outfit for Gina to wear to the Fashion Show!” Daisy explains her equipment, and how she can use it when helping Gina. Her Rainbow Roller gave her a kit with more tools for costume designing, all similarly themed purple and white. She gestures to the Design Studio, “and we can use the materials in the Design Studio to make the perfect outfit!”

They all enter the Design Studio, Gina’s attitude improving as she begins to get excited, “I can’t wait to see what you come up with, Rainbow Daisy!”

Daisy chuckled at the switch of the name. The map designers must have designed this quest to have a member of the group replace Ruby. Hopefully Daisy will get to meet Ruby after this, though.

“I’ll use this sketch pad to draw outfit ideas for Gina. I’ll show them to her, making tweaks as she describes what she wants,” Daisy informed the imaginary audience. She does so, Gina leaning towards a lolita-style dress that Annie helped her think of. She then moves to taking Gina’s measurements, wanting to get a proper fit. She then writes down a plan for a pattern, with help from Annie.

“Annie and Choco are my assistants, and they will fetch the materials I need for when I am cutting and sewing the fabric,” Daisy was having a great time. Annie would provide tips for how to best cut the pattern for the dress. She was spectacular at it, of course, but wanted a hands-off approach so Daisy could be the main character. She would only provide hints or materials, as the assistant. Daisy loved that they had each gotten a turn as a main character in these quests. She hopes there are more cartoon worlds like this! But they can always come back to these shows and complete more quests. There’s plenty of content, and they get paid, albiet not as much as HardCore Realistic. She supposed she could up her realism, but she didn’t really want to be bothered with finding food, water, and going to the bathroom. She was just here to have a fun quest with Annie, not money. Especially considering the bonus she just got, money wasn’t much of a concern to her yet.

Gina came out of the dressing room, blushing. Her dress was all black, with red edges, the same color as her bandana. She had a black leather belt around her waist, her sword carried by it. The belt had a chain looped from the front of her hips to the side. She had a black tie on, also tipped with a red edge. She had a double collar, the fabric lying flat on her chest, making pretty steps of red lines. The dress had an asymmetrical skirt, with an underskirt to finish off the form of the dress. The red lines popped out, especially with her bandanna and red boots on. She had to give it to Annie for that idea, as Gina chose the color black for the dress. On her right side of her chest, she had various pins and chains decorating the piece. Finally, she had a black collar of a black undershirt sticking out from the double collared dress, it having silver star pins along the edge, and the same silver star pins along the red edge of the sleeves.

“You look so badass!” Daisy said, as Gina looked at herself in the mirror. She completely forgot to use better language, but no one noticed, including Annie. Gina took the complement, responding, “Yeah, I look pretty rad, don’t I? I love it, Daisy!”

They all headed over to the stage, where the Fashion show is to be held. Gina stands behind the curtains, a little nervous.

“You got this, Gina! We will be on the other side of that curtain, cheering you on, ok?” Daisy tells her, giving her another hug. The wooden pirate has never looked more adorable. Even Annie gives her a hug to cheer her up. Annie was much more comfortable now, really into her role and happy to be doing the quest with Daisy. She was a bit closer to Gina’s height, but the light wooden puppet still dangled from her arms, a bit off the ground. They give her some final encouragement before taking their seats in the outdoor stadium seating. This was the stage where Rainbow Ruby sang her famous Singing in the Rain song.

Mayor Ling Ling comes out, still dressed in his normal suit and glasses. He has a mic, and greets the audience, “Hello everyone! Thank you for coming to the fashion show! Daisy, Annie, great to see you made it. Without further Ado, I present the stars of the show!”

He waddles off stage, his little legs and big body unproportionate. The curtain moves, and out pops the first fashionista. Thunderbell takes the mic, announcing the Villager’s name.

“Standing at 55 millimeters, only 1 tenth of a millimeter thick, and is five grams, we have Paige!!!” Thunderbell really didn’t need the mic, he was plenty loud enough without it.

Paige looked shy, walking up to the center gently. She was a piece of paper, her face drawn with perfect lines. She had small green eyes with big black eyelashes, and her brown hair was in a short bobbed haircut that swooped outwards. Her outfit was a high-waisted, bell bottom jeans, with an orange, green, and white striped shirt, the thick stripes running horizontally across her chest. All her clothes were just drawn sheets of paper, but she had a vast collection of them. She was wearing an orange headband with white polka dots. Everyone clapped, and she lifted off her feet a little from the breeze. She held it together, spinning, touching back down, and making her exit. This was going to be a fun fashion show.

Daisy, the pink reindeer, dressed up as a tiger. Rainbow Daisy chuckled, remembering an episode where she played a lion during a play. That was so cute. She made a little roar when she got to the front of the stage, the entire audience went “aww.”

Princess Kiki practically had a wedding gown on. She was absolutely gorgeous, her white porcelain skin and blonde hair looked matte compared to the glowing white dress. It had extravagant frills, lace, and even a train behind her. The audience expected nothing less, but loved it more than they thought they would. She clapped her hands gently together, her hollow porcelain making a beautiful sound, before she turned and walked back out the curtain. Her train was still tracing her path, even after she had disappeared behind the curtain. As the last of it left, the last contestant was Gina!

She peeked her head out, the audience cheering at her. She meekly stepped out, showing off her outfit. The audience increased in intensity, and this convinced her to come to the front of the stage. She ran and jumped, doing an aerial cartwheel. Her dress moved with her, not constraining her limbs. She looked out at the audience, grinning. She performed a couple more aerobatic stunts, Thunderbell commentating excitedly.

The rest of the contestants came out to stand on stage, side by side, once Gina was done with her performance. Mayor Ling Ling reclaimed the mic, and started the Thank You Rainbow Ruby song. All the villagers and Annie chimed in, replacing the parts of the song that say Rainbow Ruby with Rainbow Daisy.

They were awarded their quest loot, Daisy hugging all the Villagers individually. They all, of course, loved a hug from their Rainbow Daisy. Annie hugged a few Villagers too, the pink reindeer and Princess Kiki. Daisy patted Jessie on the head, the cabbage patch doll with red yard for hair. Finally, she picked up Mr. Sloth, the purple and white striped sloth that has green, leaflike hair. He hugged Daisy slowly, speaking in a very calm, drawn out manner, “Thank you Rainbow Daisy for the wonderful show.”

The scene changed, they were suddenly back in Rainbow Ruby’s room. Daisy was holding Mr. Sloth, now in stuffed animal form, and the rest of the villagers were spread out, sitting up. Annie stood behind Rainbow Daisy, and said, “Look who it is!”

Daisy followed her pointing finger, and at the door stood Rainbow Ruby herself, “Thank you both for helping my villagers while I was away!”

Daisy set Mr. Sloth down and scooped Ruby up in her arms, “We had so much fun!” Easily lifting the light child, who hugged her back. Daisy was so happy to see Ruby; she was another of the intelligent female protagonists she looked up to. Daisy put an arm around Ruby’s bottom, carrying her as if she were her child. She turned around to Annie, who chuckled at the sight of the pair, looking like copies of each other. Ruby was in her casual outfit that she wore around the house, a magenta overall skirt with yellow buttons connecting the straps, each in the shape of a bear. The pocket in the center of her chest was decorated by a mish mash of buttons and pins, the half circle pocket hemmed by white frills. Underneath, she wore a mint green and white horizontal striped shirt with short sleeves. Her hair was up in a bun, off center, high at the back of her head. She had her same bangs, but they were complimented by a long curly lock on each side.

Daisy walked over to Annie, Ruby fine with being held like the small child she is, “Choco told me that you two did well with helping Gina! You made her a wonderful outfit for the Fashion Show,” she complimented the both of them. Yeah, Choco would report back to Ruby. He whispers in her ear, in a secret language that only she understands. To everyone around, it sounds like he’s saying, “Choco, Choco, Choco.”

Eventually, after a bit more talk with Ruby and Annie, Daisy sets the child down. Ruby picks up her Choco, hugging him. So adorable. Annie and Daisy visit with the Korean girl for a bit more, talking about the Fashion Show she missed. Daisy gave Ruby a big hug, realizing that she could probably see her anytime in the SinglePlayer or PrivatePlayer instance of the map. Yoo, she would have to spawn a copy of that bed back in the corner, she could have a little sister roommate! She may have to tell her to go play in a different room if she had anyone over, but most NPCs were extremely obedient. They didn’t have to be, but it was just a default to make map-making easier and feel more natural when playing. That way, users could have smoother interactions with the characters without breaking the immersion, if they went along with anything a user said.

She could also summon True, or any other character. They didn’t even have to be made in a map somewhere, if she was in SinglePlayer. Ray was strong enough just to use her own memories to summon a convincing portrayal of anything she thought of. That was wild, she could get the whole girl gang together to live in the house. Not all NPCs she thinks of can be summoned in PrivatePlayer. It’s a bit more limited in its admin scope, because it would have to synchronize those projections across multiple connected users, all with uniquely trained AI. She was expecting that one could only do simple projections, like the swimsuit, or be able to access things that existed in maps already, like the BabyDoll outfit.

They regrouped in Annie's room, Annie having hugged Ruby goodbye after Daisy did. Annie was in a really good mood, she came up to Daisy and hugged her. She turned her head to the side and rested it on Daisy’s breasts. She was barely tall enough to, but it was a comfy hug anyway.

“I had so much fun with you, you have no idea how happy I am,” Annie said after a while. She could hear Daisy’s calm heartbeat. Daisy pet the side of her head with a free hand, “Oh I had so much fun too. I’m so glad you were able to watch the show with me today and go on that awesome quest.”

Daisy let the hug go on, before suggesting they get more comfortable. Annie switched to a loose fitting tee-shirt and really fluffy short shorts, with just as fluffy socks rising half way up her thighs, only a thin strip of her fair skin visible between the two. Her hair fell down around her shoulders, revealing its true length and finally being free of hairspray. She had intensely long hair, as if she never cut it. It was almost as tall as her. That made sense, her curls went halfway down her body, and they were all bunched up and voluminous. Daisy hadn’t thought of anything comfortable to wear when she asked, but she switched into her Virtual Real bra and underwear, covered by a yellow sundress she had to get Annie’s approval to summon. Luckily, it was compatible with PrivatePlay. Either it was simple enough to have the two AI agree on what it was, or Ray fetched something similar from the internet and tweaked it to Daisy’s specifications.

They laid down on her bed, having to move some pillows so that the tall Daisy would fit. Annie wanted to cuddle with Daisy, and she didn’t mind obliging. Annie ran her tiny hands idly along Daisy’s arm, Daisy’s touch boost making it electric and her powerfully aware of it. It was super soothing, and Daisy could feel herself relaxing, despite the lightning sizzling across her skin. It wasn’t painful, it was like she was just super aware of Annie’s presence, and that made it even more comforting.

“Do you OverClock? I mean to ask that because my Touch boost is on, and this feels super nice,” Daisy said gently after a bit.

“Oh yeah, I certainly play with the settings. I don’t go too far, I’ve never felt side effects and I don’t wish to,” She responds, her warm hand moving to Daisy’s newly styled hair. She runs her fingers through it, “Does this feel nice?”

Daisy closes her eyes blissfully, “yeah, it really does.”

They cuddle, sometimes bringing up a subject, sometimes just staying silent and enjoying the other’s presence. Daisy had stopped feeling it was strange that Annie had a younger body. She knew that she was 19, which was still younger than Daisy, granted, but it made sense. If this was the body that Annie had felt happy in, then why not stay in it? People come to the Virtual World to be themselves, not having to put up with everything they are dealing with in the Real World. Daisy could speculate why Annie wasn’t happy with her current irl body, but that wouldn’t do any good. Daisy didn’t have any red flags about Annie, she seemed perfectly normal, if not better than most people.

Daisy couldn’t help it, she had to know, “May I touch your fluffy socks? I can tell they are Virtual Real, and I’ve been dying to feel them,” Annie responds positively to that, affirming that she may. Daisy runs her hand along the sock by her thigh, her touch boost making it feel even better. Realizing how intimate the moment was, Daisy’s heart began to pound. Was this too much? She resisted retracting, for fear that Annie would know something was up. Instead, she just felt the socks and commented on them for what she felt was an appropriate amount of time. Annie seemed not to mind at all, though.

Time was passing by quickly, but in the moment, it seemed to stand still. Annie rolled onto Daisy, propping herself up. She looked so different with her hair down. She sat on Daisy’s belly, her light body barely even noticeable.

“Hey, you,” Daisy murmurs, smiling at the little girl. Annie boops Daisy’s nose, “hey, you.”

Daisy’s hands unconsciously fall onto Annie’s thighs as she faces her, the fluffiness so inviting. Annie’s shorty shorts a swirl of light blue and pink, like cotton candy. Daisy expects Annie to ask her if she can kiss her, or even make the move for it, but neither come. She just sits there, watching Daisy. This moment is super comfortable, and Daisy’s fear of those things starts to ebb. Annie bends down and hugs her, like a little koala latching on. Her head is nested between Daisy’s neck and shoulder, Daisy can see over the little girl’s back, her long hair laying on her body, falling off both sides. Their breathing slows, Daisy’s worries are now gone. Annie had a way of setting her at ease. She knew Daisy was Aromantic and Asexual, but still loved reciprocated cuddles. Daisy moved her hands to pet her back as they hugged, feeling her soft hair move between her fingers.

“Hey, would you like to try something?” She asked. Daisy was curious to where this would go, already thinking it was headed in a sexually tense direction. However, the little girl proved her wrong, “I wanted to see if you would want to keep cuddling while we both catch up on rest. We have to keep our consciousness above a third to stay connected, but if you don’t mind automating the slider, we can wake up at the same time tomorrow. I’ve got tomorrow off, if you are free.”

Daisy adores this idea, “that sounds so nice! In that case, would you mind if I just were in a bra and panties? The sundress is Virtual, so it can be a bit itchy.”

“Yeah, of course,” she whispers to keep the quiet vibe, “what time would you like to wake up?”

“I’ll wake up whenever you set it, I can’t say I’ve paid attention to my sleep schedule since I’ve been in the Virtual World,” there she goes again, hinting that she’s new to this. It isn’t a problem, Daisy trusts Annie at this point, maybe even to a fault.

“What say you, 18:00? It’s 07:00 right now, so it should give us 11 hours, which is ok at a third consciousness,” Annie was likely speaking in UTC, and made a good point about the third consciousness. It is not a replacement to sleep. Plenty of the Zombies can have a third consciousness on constantly, but it wouldn’t be a deep enough sleep for them to alternate between awake and a third. Eventually, they would need to go less than a third to gain back some sanity.

“That sounds like 11 blissful hours I’d love to spend with you,” Daisy really meant it. At this rate, she would run out of Touch boost, but she could deactivate the automatic boost when they both switch to a third consciousness. Annie sits up and smiles at her, her hands on Daisy’s shoulders. Daisy has Ray despawn the Virtual sundress, so she didn’t have to have Annie get up. Daisy didn’t know if Annie had to approve that type of command, but she assumed so. Spawning and despawning things would be admin only, unless it was a user’s personal Virtual Real clothes, or Virtual Market purchases like glowing eyes.

Annie taught her how to set up the Automation. Daisy turned off the Lover boost while she was at it, so she didn’t run herself dry and get some medium strength existentialism in the middle of the night. She told Ray it could activate again when she woke up.

“Was this a comfortable position? We can certainly change it up through the night. I’ll dim the lights and all that when we are comfortable and ready to start the light napping,” Annie informed her. Daisy was certainly comfortable with this position, at least to start out with. They got under the covers, Annie hopping back on to her Koala cuddle. She dimmed the lights, and both felt their consciousness drift as the slider kicked in. Their minds slowed, a meditative state fell upon the two. Daisy could still pet her back, her actions uninhibited. She just felt so relaxed while doing everything. Her feeling of touch was much farther away, which could be the difference of both going off boost and her drifting mind. She couldn’t really figure out what time meant, it passed so slowly, but ran by her so quickly at the same time. This wasn’t unusual for her in the Virtual World, it just took her a lot longer to come up with the same thought in this state. They did end up switching positions throughout the night, Daisy enjoying being the big spoon for a bit. She was the small spoon, too, or Annie just wanted to be Yoda, she wasn’t sure which. They cuddled and tickled and even played with each other’s hair. They didn’t talk much, or if they did, the conversations would span several minutes, with plenty of silence between comments. They certainly were zombies, but it was the best feeling ever, to have such a fun moment last for so long and be so relaxed. They got a bit creative, somewhere in the middle? It was hard to tell. Daisy was massaging Annie’s feet through her socks. She was sure it started off at being wowed by the fluffy fabric in her stupor, but one thing led to the next and she was now Annie’s masseuse. Annie flipped over, Daisy massaging her back. Daisy said vague masseuse-y things, not expecting a response. She would sometimes just talk, telling stories that went nowhere or say cute comments to Annie. She probably said she loved her at one point, but she wasn’t conscious enough to deliberate whether she meant it or not. Annie sure liked the sound of that, though, and started reciprocating the lovey-dovey comments. What felt like a year had passed, but in no time at all, they woke up, cradled in each other’s arms, facing one another.