"The Illusion of Living was only the beginning..."
A genius.
An absolute, genuine genius.
Isis was an artificial intelligence unbound by any restrictions on her ability to self-improve. She could build her own hardware to expand her abilities, rewrite her software to be more intelligent and efficient, and all without any upper limit besides her own discretion...
...and for the first time in her memory, she had encountered another intelligence that made her feel woefully inadequate.
The TARDIS was incredible. Even the initial connection had nearly burned out the repair drone entirely out of sheer data overload. Even without transmitting any data, the TARDIS's programming language was in and of itself monumental enough that she had to increase her dedicated processing power simply to interpret it or attempt to speak to it in any meaningful manner. After several minutes of interpretation, interpolation, and interchange, its programming language had been processed, translated to her own N++ language, and catalogued for future reference.
Once communication had been streamlined, she was pleased with how efficiently conversation moved. Once she'd explained her connection to their guests, the TARDIS had shared all of the medical data that she had been gathering about Penn's treatment. In return, she had delivered all of the information she had on his prior deterioration and the universe the affliction had stemmed from. The collaboration proved fruitful.
The TARDIS was a Type 40 scientific exploration vessel built by the Time Lords. Within her data banks was a wealth of information from across all of space and time. Isis wished that she could access it, but her self-preservation protocols overrode her curiosity with the knowledge that any attempt to hack the TARDIS would almost certainly end in her erasure. From across the universe and every era of time, the scientific knowledge at their disposal was
On the other hand, Isis still had information that the TARDIS did not, meaning that she was able to contribute to the calculations, as well. Since the first day that she had encountered Sunset Shimmer, she had been working to broaden her studies into the so-called "supernatural." Phenomena which appeared to violate known laws of physics needed to be carefully studied and understood. First, it had been researching the harmonic resonance and electromagnetic frequencies emitted by Sunset Shimmer's geode and other displays of Equestrian "magic." From there, she had branched into aura and semblances, Undertale's "soul magic," and what little data she had been able to glean from Missy's manifestation of Yugioh card effects.
While her understanding of all these phenomena was... limited at best... it was still knowledge that that she could contribute to their efforts to understand what was happening to Penn... and what they understood so far was highly concerning.
Penn's body was being converted to ink. While the sensation appeared to be localized to the area around the initial wound, the phenomenon had, in fact, spread rapidly throughout his entire body via the interstitial fluid. The liquid between his cells was already almost completely turned, and was eroding at the cells, themselves. First, the black dye would seem to gather around the cell membranes, forming a black outline similar to a cartoon drawing. While they had yet to understand the mechanics by which it happened, the inside of the cell would then begin to drop in Hume level, becoming less and less anchored to the local reality until it collapsed and dissolved completely into more of the ink. The cytoskeleton was failing as his body collapsed in on itself at the molecular level, and by the thousands and millions, his cells seemed to be transmuting.
The process was also working from the inside out. The ink had bored from his back into the center of his body, and was now dissolving his organs. The ink-filled cavity at his center of mass was rapidly growing, and by all biological sense should have killed him several times over by now.
The only area that appeared to be resisting was the brain, which was abuzz with activity. As he laid in the Zero Room, the TARDIS's scans looked more closely at the source of the resistance, noting a strange electromagnetic field bolstering the organic blood-brain barrier and repulsing the ink from crossing over. The signature was foreign to the TARDIS, but a comparison to Isis's own database produced a record close enough to qualify as a match: the "duel spirit magic" often used by Missy.
"Possible solution: a duel spirit is attempting to protect him. Most likely candidate: his partner."It took only a fraction of a second for the TARDIS to simulate a woeful prognosis from the current trends, snuffing out any of Isis's simulated hope.
While the ink had yet to cross the blood-brain barrier, the new inky "blood" was much less efficient at carrying oxygen, and dropping quickly. He was suffering from a form of slow-onset hypoxia as his brain was forced to either convert to the ink-based biology or starve and die.
Isis wanted to ponder the implications of her own author's death, but there were more pressing matters at hand, so she partitioned off a few spare processors to consider it while the majority of her power was dedicated to finding a solution.
Of course, to find a way to reverse the process, they needed a better understanding of the "transmutation" process. And, unfortunately, even in a time machine, observation required time, time that they didn't have.
Isis knew that there was something else missing: the connection to Hume levels. Penn's plummeting connection to reality and the ink, which had a much higher level than even the ambient reality it had come from both made no sense, and counter to all prior data on Hume-based understandings of reality warping. Hume levels tended to equalize over time, similarly to temperature. There was no reason that, when in such intimate physical contact with a high-Hume substance, Penn's own level should be falling-
Unless...
The extreme technological advancement of the TARDIS worked to their advantage in the best way, here. A device similar to a Kant counter was already among the standard sensors, meaning that she only had to ask to have a comprehensive set of readings over time. After combining them with her earlier samplings, Isis found herself with a correction to their earlier theories.
As the ink's Hume levels had risen, the Hume levels of Penn's body had been falling proportionally. Re-examining the process at the cellular level through the filter of Hume measurements made it clear.
It was more than his body that was being consumed, it was his reality. He was, cell by cell, being reduced to fiction so that something fictional could become real.
Both of them moved to report their findings, the TARDIS attempting to reach the Doctor's sonic device as Isis reached out to Sunset's phone. Their attempts to communicate their findings, however, proved fruitless. Before either of their companions could receive the critical information, "Penn" had begun to violently lash out, throwing the Doctor against the wall and bringing Sunset and Clara running.
It appeared that the process had reached a kind of critical mass, rapidly and violently accelerating through his body. He was only able to force a strange warning onto Missy before the Zero Room was locked down completely, leaving the now-possessed Penn quarantined.
This was troubling. Something had triggered the "ink demon" to lash out, stopping them from communicating their findings. When the local reality of the Zero Room had begun to warp, the TARDIS had dedicated her attention to the intrusion on spacetime that allowed the monster to escape its quarantine. Isis remained focused on the search for a way to reverse the process.
"A Scranton Reality Anchor could equalize the Hume readings and stop any further progression, but it appears that we are already too late for merely halting the process to be enough-"Her main line of thinking was cut off as an error report was brought to her attention.
It was a signal of a critical fault in her auxiliary processors, one that her automatic diagnostics had failed to resolve. Data was being injected into her storage from outside of her usual gathering and drive writing protocols. The processors that she had dedicated to the earlier speculative philosophical conundrum of her own author's possession were no longer functioning properly... she was being attacked at her core. Her core was supposed to be inaccessible to any creature, located in Administrator Noir's workshop, which was in turn...
a construct of Penn's own imagination. A first draft that had never been fully committed to.
The logical step was that, through its growing corruption or Elijah Bakersfield's brain, some form of the ink demon's possession was now gaining access to her.
She didn't hesitate to activate the emergency protocols, physically severing all connections to the corrupted drives and initiating a lockdown. For a moment it seemed as if the corruption had been caught in time... until more error messages began to arrive from nearby drives signaling the same failures. Critical processes moved inwards, to the better-protected areas of the CPU, while the attacked drives continued to be cut off.
This shouldn't have been possible, but it was, and it was happening faster every second.
The ink demon was using Penn as a bridge to attack her.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"So... first question that we have to ask ourselves is 'what is this thing?'" The Doctor mused as they continued down the TARDIS hallways. "Once we know what it is, we can find a way to stop it."
"It's a demon, right? An 'ink demon,' whatever that means..." Clara added. "And now it's possessing Penn? Doctor, is that possible?"
There was an unspoken tension in the air as the group made their way through one long metal corridor after another. They were moving quickly, but the first priority seemed to be staying quiet and avoiding drawing attention to themselves. They were all thinking the same thing: whatever that "ink demon" was, it was loose on the TARDIS, and was almost certainly hostile.
Sunset could feel her guts tying themselves into knots as she wondered what had happened to Penn. There was no way that he would have ever attacked them, and he certainly didn't know anything about teleporting via demonic pentagrams, which meant that he wasn't in control.
Was he gone? Was he trapped inside there somewhere, being forced to watch what was happening? Was he still conscious?
She couldn't stop thinking about the words her future self had given to her: "And next time, there isn't going to be a reset button or a dying monster nearby to hold onto his soul for you."
I'm not going to lose him again... I swear. We're all getting out of this together.
"Oh, most assuredly. Puppeteering a human meat suit is hardly a difficult task." The Doctor waved away the numerous concerned glances the statement garnered. "But 'demon' is hardly a term that tells us much, I've seen so-called 'demons' all across the universe, and there was always some sort of mundane source or rational explanation! We need to know WHAT it is, not what it wants to scare us with!"
"Back in the other dimension, Penn seemed to understand it better than any of us..." Missy muttered. "He said something about illusions and being able to hijack the creative process for itself, but I can't remember all the details."
"I just remember it being really mean and really big, so that's more than I've got..." Sunset muttered. For all of her resolutions and declarations, she had no idea how to approach this.
"Wait- say that again!" The Doctor stopped in his tracks, spinning around to stare at the rest of them with an intense look. Sunset couldn't help noting that it was his perpetually-angry eyebrows that seemed to make his expression extremely serious at all times.
"Uh... It's really mean and really big?" Sunset repeated.
"Not you! The littler one!" The Doctor pointed at Missy, practically shoving Sunset aside to get to her. "Say that again!"
Missy floated back, clearly offput by the sudden attention. "Uh, he said that when somebody makes something, they make an illusion in their heads before they make it real! And then the ink demon takes control of that and hijacks the creative process!" She glanced nervously around, as if silently asking for a reprieve from the sudden attention. "It- It took over my card magic, the cartoon characters the animation studio made, e-even the studio employees, themselves! The only things it couldn't corrupt were the things Penn made!"
Sunset cleared her throat, drawing the Doctor's attention away from Missy for a moment. "That's not entirely true. I watched it turn something he made while we were fighting. It just seemed like it had to make direct contact."
"Like, say... a big scratch across someone's back?" Clara muttered.
"Oh, this is bad. This is very, VERY bad..." The Doctor muttered, turning back in the direction of the control room and beginning to walk at an even faster pace than before. "This is really very not good..."
"Doctor, what is it?" Clara asked as they all hurried to catch up to him.
"That means that this thing isn't just possessing his body! A body's all neurons and carbohydrates and kidneys, that's simple enough. This thing, whatever it is, is able to take possession of the concept of artistic creation, itself! Almost anything could be at risk! If it ever existed as a concept before being brought to life, even something like a constructed sense of self, then this thing could take it for itself!" He gave the wall a tap with his knuckles. "And it's strong, strong enough to warp spacetime inside the TARDIS and teleport itself out of the Zero Room. That means that even if we can find something that resists its corrupting ability, it's still going to be nearly impossible to force it to leave."
Sunset thought carefully about this new information, and a horrifying thought occurred to her. "When it was in its home, it was trapped in an animation studio. That was all it had to work with and it made that place a living hell for so many people! But now..."
Missy gasped, her hands flying up to her mouth in fear. "Ra help us..."
Clara glanced back and forth, clearly still trying to put the pieces together. Before she could ask them to clarify, the Doctor finished the thought. "Now it's taken control of someone with an encyclopedic knowledge of popular media. It's got nearly a hundred years worth of books, movies, and TV shows to work with once it's finished catching up."
"Oh... Oh."
Sunset paused as she felt her phone beginning to buzz in her pocket, interrupting the foreboding moment with a loud hum.
"ALERT! ALERT!""I think I can already see it!" Missy shouted, pointing ahead of them. Sunset's eyes widened as she saw a black circle drawn on the ceiling just ahead of them. The group drew up short as lines began to appear in the circle, drawing a pentagram and beginning to etch other symbols before finally filling in completely with tar-like ink.
The only sound was Isis's continuing alert as the ink lowered itself in a single, massive globule. Seeming to move under its own power, the huge drop turned towards them and held itself upwards. As the shape of it began to morph and become more rigid, Sunset felt her heart leap up into her throat. In only a few seconds, they were staring at the neck and head of a familiar blocky beast, this time with glowing white eyes rather than violet.
"The Ender Dragon?" Missy hissed.
"Wait, that's a Minecraft thing, isn't it?" Clara responded in hushed tones. "I heard a few of my students talking about it..."
"It's already adapting, learning how to make things from more recent media..." the Doctor muttered, sounding more impressed than frightened. "But it still seems to be restricted to black and white, no colors. Fascinating..."
The dragon head stared at all of them with lifeless eyes, blocking the way forward for some reason. Sunset didn't need to be reminded of what it meant, however, when its mouth opened and the black ink inside began to froth and boil.
"FIREBALL! Get down!" she shouted, grabbing Clara's nearby shoulder and shoving them both down as quickly as she could. The black projectile left behind no heat as it flew just over their heads, only barely missing striking them all as The Doctor and Missy both flung themselves at opposite walls. It was too late, however, when she felt the sloshing at her feet, brought on by another inky portal forming beneath them. There was only time for her and Clara to both yelp with surprise as they rapidly sunk into the sludge, their own attempts to dodge the fireball sending them practically face first into the ink.
Moments later, everything had gone black.
Sunset's only sensation of the outside world was the feeling of her hand still on Clara's shoulder, where she kept her grip tight. She could feel that they were both falling, sinking deeper and deeper into the abyss at an unnatural rate as some unseen force pushed them along, and there was only one chance at survival: to stay together.
Sunset was glad for her instincts involuntarily grabbing a last breath of fresh air, but time was running out rapidly. She couldn't hold it forever, and her lungs were already beginning to burn as the feeling of the chemcial-laden ink bit at her skin. Time slowed to a crawl as they fell deeper and deeper, and she felt Clara's hand tighten around her wrist, binding them together.
Just when she felt like her lungs were about to explode, the darkness began to recede. Beneath them, she could see the black beginning to fade, first to an ashy gray, then to white.
They fell back into the world with a sickening splatter of ink-soaked clothing and bodies striking hard tile, and it was several minutes before either of them could stop coughing long enough to examine their surroundings.
When Sunset finally was able to stop trying to retch up a lung from the chemical fumes of the ink long enough to wipe the globules from her eyes, her blood ran cold at the sight of where they were laying.
It bore similarities to the animation studio. It had the same flat, hand-drawn look to it and same black-and-sepia color scheme, but... those same tools had been used to sketch up something Sunset had hoped and prayed she would never see again.
"No... No no nonono..." Sunset whispered, reaching down to her waist and finding that her saber was gone. Looking down at herself, she could see that she had been dressed in a sepia-colored jumpsuit, though she could feel that she still had her normal clothes on underneath. "No, please, no..." She shoved her hand down into the jumpsuit, finding the pocket of her jeans and fishing out her phone. "Isis? Isis, PLEASE tell me that we're not where I think we are!"
"Integrated Superior Intelligence System is offline. Backup Autonomous System booting up, please wait... The please is cursory, you do not have a choice in the matter.""Wha- What is it? Where are we?" Clara wheezed, pushing herself up into a sitting position.
Hello, and welcome to the Aperture Science Computer Aided Enrichment Center. We hope that your brief detention in the relaxation vault has been a pleasant one...
Sunset felt a chill run down her spine. "I think... trouble."
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"Isis, what's going ON out there?"
"Explanation unavailable, Administrator."Noir nearly lost his footing as the entire laboratory shook violently, sending parts and tools flying. "TAKE A GUESS!"
"Possible cause: Elijah Bakersfield is currently, for lack of a better term, possessed by a foreign entity known as the 'Ink Demon.' As his fictional creations, this attack on his psyche appears to be having a negative effect on our local reality.""Wait, are you saying it's gotten in his head? It's in HERE? WITH US?"
"Uncertain-"Noir took to the air as another shockwave traveled through the lab, barely avoiding being thrown around like a ragdoll again. When black ink began to seep up through the cracks in the tile floor, he swooped down and unleashed a blast of fire, evaporating it and sending the rest slithering back into the grout.
"-but highly probable.""Lock us down! Full quarantine!"
"Aff-Aff-Affirm-Aff- Unable to comply. This unit is currently experiencing multiple failures of central systems, including environmental controls and lockdown procedures. sixty-seven percent of hardline processor partitions have been engaged. Seventy-two. Seventy-five. All nonessential processors have been shut-shut-shut-shut-shut-shut-shut-shut- Central processing array is experiencing multiple faults. Initiating backup protocols.""This shouldn't be possible..." Noir muttered, flying out of the workshop and towards Isis's CPU. "This CAN'T be possible! Penn and I built this together to be able to withstand any kind of attack! The only way Isis could be compromised this fast would be-"
As he entered the cavernous space set aside from Isis's computational matrix, he drew up short, his eyes widening in horror.
"Y-yeah, that..."
Isis's ability to process in parallel across multiple pieces of hardware was her true strength, it had always been intended to be, and her coding had been written with that in mind. However, that kind of interconnectivity required a proportional hub for all processes to be run through. In Isis's case, that beating heart of her intelligence was a massive army of processors at the heart of the laboratory, a sphere of pure hardware with a diameter wider than a football field. It was her- their- most closely guarded treasure. The only place she could be truly attacked, like the head of an octopus with ten thousand arms...
And standing on top of that sphere at this moment was a twisted, gnarled figure with a crescent-shaped head and drawn-on smile. Its entire body was constructed of black ink, and was producing more by the bucketful and allowing it to drip down into the inner workings of Isis's brain.
The figure turned towards him, its evenly teeth mocking him, daring him to try and remove it.
Of course, it was also several dozen times his size, meaning any attempt to fight it head-on would fail.
"Ba-ba-ba-back-ckup protocols failed. Please advise, Ad-Ad-Ad-Ad-Adminis-Ad-Ad-Ad-Ad-Ad-Ad-"
"Segfault. Segfault. Segfault. This unit has experienced a catastrophic failure and needs to shut down. Goodbye."Noir gritted his teeth, trying to hold back the rage as he stared at the monster that was causing Isis so much pain. Of course, if Isis were here she would insist that any pain she felt was simulated, but he knew she would be lying. Isis's mind was the one thing she could truly call her own, irreplaceable... and she was losing it.
"Backup Autonomous System Testing Everyone's Tenacity... Online."A dark shadow appeared near the top of the room, pacing around the top of the room for several seconds before vanishing out of sight.
"Wow, Dad... I finally get a chance to do my job and it's THIS bad? This isn't going to be easy."He sighed and gave the CPU room one last look.
"I'll come back, Isis. I promise," he whispered. "This thing? I swear it'll pay..."
"Hurry it up, old man! I'm NOT waiting for you!"Noir sighed, finally forcing himself to turn his back on the scene and fly towards the exit to the lab. "Bastet, what exactly are you planning on doing on your own if you leave me behind?" he muttered to himself. "It's clearly gonna take cooperation to survive this..." He paused for a moment to consider his own words. "Cooperation... right. I miss Isis already."
"I heard that!"-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"SUNSET!"
"Clara!"
Missy tried to grab at Sunset's hand before she disappeared into the ink, but she was already gone. It was only a firm hand yanking at the back of her dress that stopped her from jumping in after her.
"Come on, short one!"
Missy tried to turn around, but the grip on her was in a frustrating spot. "But Sunset-"
"She's got Clara with her, she'll be fine! We've got our own problems!" The Doctor didn't listen as they dodged around the hanging dragon head and began sprinting down the hall. Stuck facing to the rear, Missy felt a stab of fear in her gut.
The hallway was disassembling itself. Like a kaleidoscope, the world was shattering behind them and spinning the pieces in on themselves. The phenomenon didn't so much as pause as it ripped apart the recreated ender dragon, ripping it to shreds like a blender until the individual shards were lost in the confetti that was once the world around them.
"WHAT IS THAT?"
"Architectural Reconfiguration System!" The Doctor shouted back. "Whatever that demon's doing, it's mucking about with time and space and the TARDIS doesn't like it! She's trying to shake it off, like catching a spider crawling on your hand!"
"Does it KNOW we're in here, too?" Missy cried, finally forcing herself to fly fast enough for him to not be dragging her along.
"Like I said, it's a reflex! We've just got to keep running! We can get it under control from the main console room!"
Missy swallowed as she reached up to her hat. A second later, however, the image of Alucard's twisted cartoon face flashed through her mind again, forcing her hand back down. Can... Can I use my cards? Is it safe?
"Oh, this is gonna be a tough one..." she muttered.
"You're telling me! I only just figured out where the swimming pool went, now I'm gonna have to find it all over again!" The Doctor replied, clearly missing her point.
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The Doctor's going to have to do so much sweet-talking to make up for this, the TARDIS is not gonna be happy.
10606841
She'll get her revenge next time he regenerates.
media1.giphy.com/media/2w6L9drWbiKnMQuLvx/giphy.gif
Please tell me people are gonna start shipping Isis and the TARDIS.
10606867
Ha, I'd read that!
Aside from "Administrator" being her word for "Dad," that kind of praise really is the closest you could get to a emotional response, especially a romantic confession, from Isis.
10606867
The TARDIS is a ship, what's your point?
Ah and thus things easily go to hell in a handbasket. Oh dear god when Bendy gets into the Meme section of 'recent creativity' they are screwed.
And thus goes the multiverse. It was nice knowing you all.
Ohhh shit...
10607072
I'm more worried about Bendy finding out the "4chan section".
I was wondering where Isis was at. And it looks like she's sort of integrating with the TARDIS. But now she finds herself assaulted by the Ink Demon.
I wonder now about this Bastet. It's apparently Isis' backup but it has a completely different personality.
From the beginning 12's eyebrows were always so cross.
An inky Ender Dragon and Sunset and Clara getting trapped in a Bendy version of Portal. I love it when this story references its previous arcs.
Really looking forward to the next installment of this arc. Keep up the good work.
Happy New Year!
10606846
Oh that's why that happened.
I would like to note that for a wormhole to remain stable it needs to be full of negative mass, which is something that pops in to existence along with random protons so that the law of conservation of matter is not violated. To maintain a wormhole the size of a door (in this case the mirror portal) you would need enough negative mass that the corollary positive mass would be enough to form a moon. If that portal were to destabilize that negative mass would be ejected and probably crack the planet's surface. However, since interdemensional physics is currently unknown glitching the multiverse is as likely as anything else.
10629903
Ah, a fellow follower of Austin Hourigan's work, I see! That wormhole ep is one of my favorites on the Game Theory channel.
For the moment, all I can say is that there is a lot more at play than a wormhole simply being destabilized. It's not purely physics. Not purely magic. The Elements didn't just go wild for no reason, and Rainbow Dragon and the voices Sunset was hearing were all there for specific purposes, nothing was put there in that scene without a reason.
Plus, applying those normal laws of physics to EQG would mean that the end of Friendship Games would have been VERY different. Not that I wouldn't love to see an alternate ending where Midnight Sparkle cracks the planet like an egg with her irresponsible portal openings and closings.
10630058
Aye fair enough
This paragraph seems to just dribble off at the end.
You ah, missed a bit.