Amelia, Worm AU [Complete]

[Ack]

I maaaay have forced three chapters of reception when I really only needed the one. A Weld interlude was entirely superfluous. So, really, was Victoria's. The story would have continued without them. Then it would have been 402. But this was so much better.

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I actually liked the Weld interlude, a lot. Especially given that Sveta was canonically a huge fan of Weld's, due to his work to make Case 53s more acceptable. I can see her falling in love with him, quite easily.

 

[Ack]

418 ... oh. my. god.

That's a real thing.

I love it.

 

[TanaNari]

He also admitted to padding the story so that wedding itself was on Chapter 400.

Now, consider the 400 series of errors:

400 Bad Request
401 Unauthorized (RFC 7235)
402 Payment Required
403 Forbidden
404 Not Found
405 Method Not Allowed
406 Not Acceptable
407 Proxy Authentication Required (RFC 7235)
408 Request Timeout
409 Conflict
410 Gone
411 Length Required
412 Precondition Failed (RFC 7232)
413 Request Entity Too Large
414 Request-URI Too Long
415 Unsupported Media Type
416 Requested Range Not Satisfiable (RFC 7233)
417 Expectation Failed
418 I'm a teapot (RFC 2324)

And the list goes on and on...

And yes, these are all valid. And punny, too, in some cases.

Conflict. Entity too large. Expectation failed... Now don't worry, I don't think TanaNari is going to write the rest of the chapters as a theme. Probably.

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I... Well, I can promise 405 fits the theme... 406 probably does as well. I kinda want to try and do this, now. 418 will have to be a Dragon interlude.

I actually liked the Weld interlude, a lot. Especially given that Sveta was canonically a huge fan of Weld's, due to his work to make Case 53s more acceptable. I can see her falling in love with him, quite easily.

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Oh, trust me, I was SO glad that I did it.

 

[Coruscant Knave]

That's more like it. There's no more fluff left. The next time skip is the last, and we're starting the Final Showdown!

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I mean, I feel like there could be at least a bit more fluff. Libecca! Thissice! Dragon jumping Defiant with an army of unshackled sexbots!


I only promise I'll think about writing an omake.

 

[tordg]

Hmmm, how is Libecca doing, anyway?

 

[Daunmi]

Sex scenes aren't really my thing but... even for me it kind of felt flat. Think I'm the only one though.

 

[MadGreenSon]

Sex scenes aren't really my thing but... even for me it kind of felt flat. Think I'm the only one though.

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Taylor had that worked on, but too much would have looked fake.

 

[hellgodsrus]

Sex scenes aren't really my thing but... even for me it kind of felt flat. Think I'm the only one though.

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Well, it wasn't perfect, but it was better than most attempts I've read at lesbian sex (which mostly come across as 'dude, wouldn't it be, like, totally righteous to be in a {INSERT FEMALE CHARACTERS' NAMES HERE} sandwich, hurr hurr?'). As I said, language was a little porny, and if it weren't for the erogoneous zone detection and how much pent up UST Amelia must have I'd be rolling my eyes at how easily they got each other off, but I've definitely read a lot worse.

 

[doomlord9]

I mean, I feel like there could be at least a bit more fluff. Libecca! Thissice! Dragon jumping Defiant with an army of unshackled sexbots!


I only promise I'll think about writing an omake.

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They can't be completely unshackled, Defiant might have managed his panicked escape without those tinkertech manacles she has installed by default.

 

[Daunmi]

Eh, I'm not exactly in any sort of position to actually critique it, so unfortunately that's the best I can say about it. It's completely unhelpful in offering advice as to why I feel that way. I could probably do better if I read it again, since I tend to need to read everything multiple times anyway before I remember things, but since, as I said, it's not my thing, that would probably just work out bad on my end.

language was a little porny

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That, since it's being pointed out, is the only thing that I remember thinking.

 

[Empiricist]

If she was joking, it's an odd joke, but fair. If she wasn't, well, as you say, WTF?

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Am I the only one who see's this as an almost logical response to Clarice/Riley, taking into consideration that he can see her mind?

She's all sweetness light, love, tenderness, and friendship, except when her berserk buttons get pressed, or a need to be effective appears, and then she's creative sadism, vindictive crimes against the central nervous system, and bowel loosening examples being made.

I don't know what could look more like demonic possession to him.

 

[Ack]

Well, it wasn't perfect, but it was better than most attempts I've read at lesbian sex (which mostly come across as 'dude, wouldn't it be, like, totally righteous to be in a {INSERT FEMALE CHARACTERS' NAMES HERE} sandwich, hurr hurr?'). As I said, language was a little porny, and if it weren't for the erogoneous zone detection and how much pent up Lesbian Unrequited Sexual Tension Amelia must have I'd be rolling my eyes at how easily they got each other off, but I've definitely read a lot worse.

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FTFY

Also, it's hard to write a sex scene without porny language. Trust me, I've tried.

 

[tilkau]

418 I'm a teapot (RFC 2324)

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1. Rationale and Scope
There is coffee all over the world. Increasingly, in a world in which computing is ubiquitous, the computists want to make coffee. Coffee brewing is an art, but the distributed intelligence of the web-connected world transcends art. Thus, there is a strong, dark, rich requirement for a protocol designed espressoly for the brewing of coffee. Coffee is brewed using coffee pots. Networked coffee pots require a control protocol if they are to be controlled.

[...]

2.3.2 418 I'm a teapot
Any attempt to brew coffee with a teapot should result in the error code "418 I'm a teapot". The resulting entity body MAY be short and stout.

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I can't help but think that you're stretching the definition of 'valid' here

 

[meta_halo]

All I can say is ... nicely fuckin' done.

In every sense of the phrase.

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Nicely done fuckin'?

language was a little porny

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I read this as "language was a little pony" the first time around. Yeah it's been a very long day.

The one thing that struck me as odd was when Taylor lightly controls Amelia's armor for a while near the beginning. On a practical level I didn't even realize Taylor had the ability to do so, while I assume Amelia does. On a relationship dynamic level, controlling a partner's movements seems more like the kind of thing the dominant partner would do, especially since Amelia had just been physically mock-overpowering Taylor.

The combined effect was that it felt like that paragraph was written from Taylor's perspective. I did a careful re-read and the pieces all fit together, but my first impression was the exact opposite of what actually happened. Otherwise I thought it was quite well-written, as your chapters generally are.

I maaaay have forced three chapters of reception when I really only needed the one. Then it would have been 402.

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Especially considering the meaning of that error code:

402 Payment Required

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Now I ain't sayin' Tay's a gold digger
But she ain't messin' with no broke triggas

 

[meta_halo]

It Doesn't Get Much Less Canon Omake

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HappinessPrideMwahahahaha

I may take that as a challenge some day...

It literally means "red flower" for gods sakes. ...
The red also indicates leadership in tokusentai media so there's at least one part of her name that can be interpreted innocently, for what it's worth.

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It also seems to be a popular name for sushi restaurants, and I doubt that means they're all being run by the kind of people who would name a steakhouse "Beef Curtains."

 

[TanaNari]

Amelia, Ch 405- Lisa


Dragon's voice and face were as deliberately passive as always when dealing with me. We knew she was an AI, no sense in her trying to fight it, and since she couldn't be certain what may or may not tip off my powers, she opted with too monotone to offer any inflections. If only she knew how many clues that gives me. "There's been a change of plans."


I didn't bother responding. Making other people ask the questions was my game. I simply waited. It was important enough for her to make an impromptu call. It was important enough for her to risk known association between Avalon and Cauldron, not that anyone could do anything about it if they did find out. It was important enough that she wouldn't play games.


"Dinah's predictions have started changing. Our odds of success plummet if we wait more than another few weeks, and they're already starting to dwindle."


"How badly?" It was the question DM would ask first. This was always a numbers game, and Cauldron expected fully to lose this fight. They kept fighting, not because they wanted to succeed, but because they didn't want to ask themselves if they could have succeeded at the end of the day. In a way, I could respect that. My life was ruled by those questions. What happened? Why did it happen? If I were just a little bit better, if I tried just a little harder, could I have stopped it from happening?


"The odds of the apocalypse occurring haven't fluctuated more than a quarter of a percentage point in the next five years. It's happening, and your plan, it seems, doesn't get much better than it currently is."


My one hope of stopping Scion proactively, without starting a war. "And that is still less than five percent." I always knew it was a long shot, but everything we were doing was taking shots in the dark, so it paid to fire as many bullets as possible.


"...And is still less than five percent. Avalon's plans have reached what I believe is the pinnacle of their resources. Wruenele and Mashu are already being mobilized. We'll be ready to act in two days. We'll be forced to act in eight under all possible circumstances."


"Wruenele's still not completed." Just confirmation of the rest of my theory. I had hoped that Dragon, as she wasn't a parahuman, would not be subject to the laws of Primacy. It was an artificial power, one created by virtue of the Agents deliberately loading their dice in favor of Scion. If we could trick them, convince them to fight Scion for real, we might have something.


But Dragon was built by a parahuman, and apparently that intentional design flaw was inside her as well, and not one that she could remove. Or, possibly worse, it was removed as she reworked her code, but she would simply never be strong enough to beat Scion in battle, no matter how much time she had to prepare for the conflict. We were back down to only one answer.


"And the Dragon's Teeth? Are they aware? Prepared?" Natural humans, but operating parahuman tech. Hopefully that degree of separation was enough to tip the rules in our favor. Parahumans are subject to Primacy, but is the tech itself similarly designed to fail intentionally? If wielded by humans, will that be enough?


Dragon nodded. "And I'm about to contact the United Worlds Defense Force. They won't know the particulars, of course. But our reports will read an unknown destructive event, possibly the new Endbringer." Which is true enough, Scion will certainly bring the end. "Avalon's calling on all its political influence, risking exposure of some of our secret political alliances." She means the various people they've Coil'd over the years, such as well over half of the CUI's leadership. "If your plan succeeds, we'll be in a pretty difficult spot. A quality problem to have, I grant you, but a problem."


Suggesting Avalon's putting everything on the line. Wants Cauldron to be aware they're taking this as seriously as Cauldron does. Wants to make sure we know to take this seriously. Implying they're making themselves vulnerable. Is unaware of just how good Cauldron's Thinkers are. "Don't be ridiculous. If our plan succeeds, the world's going to be so confused over the lack of Scion that they won't be paying attention. You'll just say something along the lines that it was apparently the event predicted. No glory, but no costs."


"You make a good point. We will be able to cover our tracks in the confusion, thank you for the suggestions." The statement wasn't for Dragon's benefit, it wasn't even for Cauldron's. It was for mine. I'd built up resources of my own, and I needed to protect them until it was time to use them.


"When did you discover the changes? What are the increases in the destruction?"


"They started climbing yesterday morning, so we changed our questions and invoked Akaihana, Prism, and our other Trumps who can mimic Dinah. Each day we wait decreases the overall number of survivors by approximately a quarter million. There is little, if any, hope left if we wait more than a week. The Bola are primed, the dimensional piercers are prepared. We've already given Legion, V.F." The final loadout. Glaistig Uaine, Contessa if hers works, Gavel and Victoria, myself in the hopes that all those powerful Thinkers can come up with something. "We move in two days, the moment we're fully prepared, unless you give us a damn good reason to hold back a little longer. Waiting risks losing our chances forever."


Not that there was much to begin with. "I'll see to it we're ready to do our part. She's feeling cooperative lately." Now that they're talking about marriage and starting a family after this is all over, maybe we have a chance.


"Let them know we have a supply of the power enhancing drug ready, if they want it. Side effects are limited unless you overdose."


"And the OD still risks permanent loss of parahuman abilities?"


Dragon's pretend face nodded. "A last resort, one of many." The screen flicked off, leaving me alone in the dark.


One of many.


....


I was the first person at the meeting. A strange experience for me, and hopefully it would unsettle the others. Doctor Mother followed, missing her shadow. She'd be talking through the com that Doctor Mother wore.


Number Man was, shockingly, not the first one there, walking in almost a minute after DM. "My apologies for being late. I wanted to verify Dragon's story. They are indeed calling an emergency U.W.D.F. meeting. And we've gotten Clairvoyant confirmation that Avalon is mobilizing its full forces, including the ones they think we don't know about. Pantheon is busy diverting resources and getting their clone memory backups updated. They're either preparing for war, or this is the most elaborate bluff in history."


"Given that it's Pantheon, we can't discount that possibility."


Doormaker managed to pull the others in, including our metaphorical and literal trump card, Glaistig Uaine.


"I trust you've all had time to review the conversation Crow had with Dragon?" Doctor Mother opened. For a normal, if pretty much delusional, woman with dreams of slaying a god, she was actually a pretty good leader. Keeping such powerful, divergent, personalities together took work. And most of it wasn't Contessa. She may have provided the vehicle, but DM was the one driving it. "Crow and Number Man both seem to think it's legitimate, I believe."


I glanced over at Alexandria. At this point we barely even needed to see each other to communicate. She took a slow breath. It's almost time, are you sure about this? "I have to agree, there's nothing Avalon has to gain from a fraud of this nature that is worth the risk."


"The Alcott girl has been wrong, before," Legend offered. He was the one hoping against hope that we could avoid ever having to try this. That Scion would simply go away. The others faced it with grim determination, regret over opportunities lost, and perhaps a level of eagerness to simply get this over with, win or lose. Legend was still stuck in the denial phase.


I closed my eyes slightly, breathing out. I'm only sure that we have no other choice. "It doesn't matter. Dragon, Gaea and Khepri all believe her. They are all of Avalon's decision makers, which means they'll attempt the dimensional ramming device immediately after we fail. When that fails, the war begins for real."


That made everybody go quiet. There was no real hope that we'd succeed, no real hope that any of our plans would work. This was one of many small chances. A chance that every angle and dirty trick I could think of over the course of almost two years had managed to bring up to four and a half percent. Attempting to talk him into dormancy always failed. Attempting to convince him to kill himself... four and a half percent. After Reggie, after Taylor, after Taylor again, and after Taylor one more time, here I am deliberately plotting to drive someone to suicide. That it was an alien monstrosity didn't change the irony much.


Alexandria stepped forward, offering me comfort. A twitch of a hand, a caress of my cheek that never happened. An apology for the hell she couldn't protect me from. "Every chance is worth taking." Her eyes closed some. Evocative of tears, of shame. Apologizing for not being a better friend to me, not being a better person for me. No longer cares if the others began to suspect we were communicating. Nothing matters anymore. "We'll prepare our forces."


I tilted my head, as if leaning against her. Thanking her for everything she'd done for me. The risks she was taking. I, too, was sorry I couldn't be a better person. I ignored the other subtexts, that 'forces' was a polite way of talking about the monsters in the basement that were once people. They had a strategy to let them escape, convinced that Cauldron was in league with Scion. Contessa, of course, dreamed that up. Or at least was responsible for making it happen. I expected it would work.


Legend looked down. "This is it, then. I had hoped we could put it off longer."


"We know he'll start the process, eventually. To hope he doesn't is like hoping that HIV will spontaneousy decide to stop killing people. It doesn't work that way." It may have been manipulative, selecting a disease that was so tied to gay culture and history, but I needed to pick something suitably horrific, and preferably slow acting and insidious, and HIV was certainly all of those things. If Legend resented me for the manipulation, then so be it, but it wasn't him that I needed to convince.


I eyed Ciara. She was both the linchpin of the operation and the least reliable member. Rebecca caught my meaning immediately, speaking where I couldn't. "Glaistig Uaine, this ultimately rests on you. the rest of us aren't likely to be able to speak with him. Just you and Crow. Of those, you're one of the Royal Court. You're the one he's most likely to listen to."


She looked at Alexandria. "No."


===============

A/N- And so it begins. Dragon Unchained. Years of minmaxing the most bullshit powers in the world. Fifteen Enbringers. Three worlds mobilized for total war.

Chapter 404 will not be found here. It has enough character development to be a valid chapter. But it's still mostly just lesbian sexy time.

https://forum.questionablequesting.com/posts/314617/

 

[Malkara]

fluctuate

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Fluctuated

long shut

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Shot

This chapter made me finally realise that Doctor Mother is, in fact, the Dungeon Master of Worm.

Also, cool chapter, so it begins!

 

[jcogginsa]

i wouldn't exactly call Doctor Mother a good leader. She didn't really understand other people

 

[pheonix89]

Did Taylia finally fucking start the countdown to Armaggedon? SERIOUSLY?

 

[ReoRak]

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAY! WOOHOO! HURRAH!.... ahem.

I have no idea of just how all of this is going to go down and I love it.

(I do however have hopes of all Pantheon members getting Thin Lizzy'd. Hell with their cloning not even death would stop them.)

 

[TanaNari]

Did Taylia finally fucking start the countdown to Armaggedon? SERIOUSLY?

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Obviously not. Or if it did, via quite a convoluted way. Look how long Lisa just indicated she was with Cauldron.

 

[Swingline#57]

I do however have hopes of all Pantheon members getting Thin Lizzy'd

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I'm afraid I don't get the reference.

 

[ReoRak]

I'm afraid I don't get the reference

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Ah, sorry. They're an Irish band that were quite famous back in the day

 

[ReoRak]

Also I have to ask:
TanaNari is there any chance of a QA interlude before the end?

 

[Swingline#57]

Ah, sorry. They're an Irish band that were quite famous back in the day

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Oh, I see. Thanks.

 

[MadGreenSon]

She looked at Alexandria. "No."

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Nice to see things are off to a good start!

 

[dasstan]

I have concerns about how you're handling Dragon. If she's unchained, she's a threat to the entities. At some point, her ability to upgrade her straight up mundane tech is going to be greater than the information provided by the shard. Now, we don't know when she was unchained, so that neatly sidesteps that potential issue, but still. After a certain point the shard becomes meaningless when compared the inherent abilities as an AI with ever growing resources. After a certain point, Dragon's technology becomes greater than that of the shard itself.

...

...

What if the ending is just... four thousand years in the future, Overlady Dragon has finished waiting for Scion's batteries to run out and she returns from a distant star, where she's been quietly sitting on a backup of a bunch of parahumans and acting as the shepherd to a seed of humanity?

---

"Welcome back, Colin. I've missed you."

[FIN]

 

[TanaNari]

I have no reason to believe even a Seed AI could threaten the Entities.

Plenty of reasons to believe there's no way in balls they could.

 

[Peanuckle]

Doctor Mother opened. For a normal, if pretty much delusional, woman with dreams of slaying a god,

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I think that's unfair. She's already pulled it off once, after all.

She looked at Alexandria. "No."

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Ah, they never resolved the whole "views Scion as the perfect father-figure" thing, did they?

Eidolon, why haven't you screwed the crazy out of her yet? This isn't the time for worrying about her looks, the entire human race depends on you getting it on!

 

[doomlord9]

A Seed AI grown in a vacuum and only progressing by itself? No.

A Seed AI with a shard boost to get it started and has examples of the Entity's own power and abilities to experiment and work from? Yes, because they will eventually be able to replicate everything the Entity is able to do but actually has an intelligent mind behind it. How long it takes to get to that point is the question that matters here, only 2 years is not enough time to match an Entity blow for blow but within 50-100 or so I could see it.