A Machine's Purgatory

STEPPING STONES OF CHANGE: TECH TROUBLES

V1 was currently working in the Cybergrind, slaying digital demons as it was deep in thought.

It +PARRIED a stray hell orb into a swordsmachine before blasting it with the shotgun, dash jumping away to engage a cerberus and quickly kill it with the SRS Cannon

V1 was so entrenched in the Cybergrind and the enemies offered that it was able to survive with only half its mind on the fighting, allowing some time to focus on a new problem: the nightmare. Digital hallucination? No, it was definitely a nightmare. V1 had nightmares before, it was impossible not to given how they came to be. But they had never been as vivid as what happened last night. V1 had never sleepwalked, nor had it been so shaken it ejected blood. The blood it cleaned on the floor and its forehead resembled vomit and sweat respectively, and V1 couldn't find any record of a machine vomiting or sweating. It was impossible. And yet it still happened.

The sharpshooter fired into a barrage of hell orbs, knocking them back to +FRIENDLY FIRE the malicious face that fired them. The explosion killed all the fodder enemies around, leaving schisms for V1 to punch off the arena with the knuckleblaster.

The most confusing part of the nightmare was undoubtedly the little girl. V1 had no recollection of her or any humans besides its creators. All they could recall about her was that they apparently engaged with each other and may have been more than acquaintances. V1 had also done some digging into what blood and organs meant in a dream, but all the results were inconclusive to say the least. Blood symbolized life force, vitality, and energy, but could mean a transformation as well. Yet gore indicated that V1 had PTSD. Something felt off about that tidbit of info, making the machine feel light in its stomach and wanting to lay down.

V1 jumped to the air and shot a coin to split the shot, +RICOCHETing the split bullet into the canisters on two streetcleaners, exploding them and a mannequin on a nearby wall, the gore spilling everywhere and being absorbed into V1.

The terminal is also acting weird, now that V1 thought about it. The terminal has been interacting with the machine less now, and while V1 initially blamed the switch to UA, it's been ignoring V1 for a lot longer than normal. The few times they do interact, V1 can sense something off about the terminal. The last time they conversed, the terminal wanted to talk about quirks and how the enemies' can be used against themselves. It was not a pleasant conversation to say the least. Even now, in the Cybergrind, V1 just couldn't seem to escape the terminal.

As V1 was about to kill a burning Sisyphean Insurrectionist, everything in the Cybergrind froze as V1 was forcefully booted out. The only thing it could see now was an error screen with yellow text on a black background.

ERROR 507
DETAILS:
NEW UPDATE, FORCEKICK REQUIRED. REBOOT PROGRAM TO START AGAIN

With a mechanical sigh, V1 unplugged the wire in the back of its head, glaring at the terminal. The screen was off as it apparently refused to speak to the machine, like normal. Plugging back into the Cybergrind, V1's wave 56 run was unfortunately lost, but there was a new terminal on the left wall, the color of the body a deep purple. Walking towards the terminal, the screen lit up with a note.

"I apologize for kicking you out of the Cybergrind, but you've been in it all day you needed a small break. Regardless, I have a new update for you. This terminal will allow you to fight your new staff members, in environments that compliment their fighting style. This way, you can stand a fighting chance if something goes wrong. I've been working on this for two months now, so please use it if you have the chance.

-T93"

Well, that's... concerning. It was a good resource to have, but V1 didn't feel like fighting its staff members. There may be a time when it will, but that thought felt bitter in V1's mind. Closing out of the Cybergrind (it didn't feel like starting all over again at wave 25), V1 contemplated what to do next. It was currently lunch, so V1 decided a small walk around campus would be good. If anyone asked what it was doing, it would just say patrol.