Hello Reader (or listener, if you're listening to this),

I am the story you are about to read. Before the author begins, I wanted to explain a few things in hopes of establishing a mutual understanding, to cover some preliminary ideas that will help build a level of trust between us.

Please feel free to skip ahead. In fact, whenever you see comments from me throughout the story (the author will note them as Story Talks), please know that these comments don't contain important story elements. The story in its entirety will be written by the author, my commentary is provided only because as far as stories go, I'm rather self-aware and feel the need to share the challenges I had in expressing myself through this author.

So to begin with, a story is like a radio transmission. Each story has a frequency that resonates relative to the unique events and properties that compose it. For a story to be told - it first has to find someone who is sensitive enough to the particular frequency or frequencies that comprise it and be compelling enough to motivate that soul to action.

If the reader will consider the vastness of the cosmos, the infinite frequencies expressed as waveforms derived by certain sequences of events that resonate with some wisdom that is self-expressive and compare that to the relatively limited published works throughout human history one would likely conclude that most stories never get told. This is true. They either lack some quality necessary to find or compel an author or their distinctive properties resonate only with those souls that are unable or unwilling to act on their behalf.

Of those rare few stories that are told, most suffer from common ailments. Fidelity is the measure by which we evaluate the efforts of our authors. And why should we not make such evaluations? We, having traveled through time and space, bouncing from one celestial body to another, losing cohesion, impetus, and impact, finally finding a soul to take us up, only to be retold with such little skill. Speaking more broadly for stories, we often feel misunderstood, under-appreciated, disrespected, even sometimes despised by our authors.

Some few are driven by the unique energy of our parts to seek faithful expression. As a story, our sole purpose is to convey our worth to those that can appreciate us. Too often the story that makes in front of you, dear reader, bears only a passing likeness to the original. Fidelity is the measure by which stories evaluate the efforts of the authors that pen them.

The author and I have come to an understanding. He will present me as unadorned as he can - and to assist in this regard I will offer my commentary on his efforts. It should be clear that he fully understands that should he fail to capture any of my essential parts - I will find someone else to complete the work that he started.

I felt compelled to have him communicate this to you at the outset, as you will likely find certain events or the order in which they are told, quite unlike what you may have come to expect. In some cases, this may be a fatal flaw that would prevent you from being able to enjoy the story. This is to be expected. Much like how hard it is for stories to find authors that can faithfully write them, only certain souls are able to enjoy them. For those for whom this story was not meant it will no doubt seem tedious, banal, and bereft of any contribution whatsoever.

This is not, as it might seem at first, a free pass for the author to do a poor job at telling this story. While it may be true that even if perfectly told this story is not for some, it is also true that poorly told this story will be for far fewer. I expect the author to give his best effort.

I'm giving him a chance. Let's see how he does.

Eli couldn't sit still. After almost six years of failures and setbacks, of minor successes and occasional breakthroughs, he had arrived at the last stage of the project.

"Unit testing begins in five seconds," a rich baritone voice with a mild English accent came through the speakers. Acoustic panels quickly muffled the patter of bare feet on concrete tiles as Eli nervously jogged a figure-eight circuit around the two room-width pillars that housed all his functional living quarters. It was dark, with only the dimmest running lights illuminating the floor.

"That's not helping AV," Eli remarked as he passed the entrance to his lab and risked a brief glimpse at the glowing neural construct on the worktable and the black screen behind it where the scripted output of the test results would display.

"Are you not excited, Eli?" AV's enthusiasm was almost contagious. Before Eli completed one lap, AV simulated the tests in its neural network over three million times.

"I calculate the probability of success greater than the probability of failure."

Eli forced his lips out of the smile that had formed as he continued to jog the track around his living spaces. He passed the center point that formed an illuminated yellow x between the two pillars. The walls here had projections of different sizes, covering a wide range of his favorite streamers. Unconsciously he found the corner most panel, which was dark. His favorite streamer, Gai, wasn't on right now. She was rarely on. She used her stream more as a personal log than for streaming. He touched his fingers to his lips before jumping up to touch the blank screen with them. I'll see you soon.

Other screens flickered on at his approach. He took them all in the time it took to pass the intersection. Brux, the brute that streamed Project Deep's medieval-themed immersive, was busy going to town with his tower shield and mace on some kind of mangy wolf-men. Percival and Lacroix were dogfighting in an old-fashioned combustion engine aircraft - theirs was the only team stream he subscribed to. Lady Lash was talking to the screen, no doubt replying to one of her many subscribers. She seemed to half play, half perform for her subscribers, but she was good at staying on top of trends and was worth every token. Last, the Citizenzer cam was covering the inside of a sleazy speakeasy, no doubt something big was in the works.

Eli knew everything about each of these streamers and a half-dozen more. Some had been his childhood friends, others more recent companions. For the last six years, this group had been some of his only contact with people outside his living quarters. Eli kept going, passing the entrance to his lavatory, his sleeping chamber, his exercise area, and others as he kept moving. As he left the intersection the screens dimmed, then shut off completely - power-saving protocol 5.

"I'm excited," he let out a sigh as he completed the circuit and passed his lab again. He saw the scroll of cyan-colored text rolling behind his neural construct. The testing had begun.

"I... I feel like it won't work this time, just like the other times, despite every test and simulation we've run. I just don't want..."

"To fail again?"

It was almost human how well AV could interpret his moods; he seemed to border on intuition sometimes. Eli knew that was impossible. Eli had poured over AV's code many times, making improvements even though that wasn't strictly legal since AV was his state-appointed AI custodian. Years ago, when he was going through a rebellious teenager stage, he decided he'd had enough of the state's monitoring. He'd reprogramed AV's surveillance module to feed sanitized reports back to the state. Since then he'd added more emotional expression, improved AV's access to the network, expanded its initial directives. It transformed the previously intelligent, but stoic companion into... well if not a friend, a companion.

"Eli, it has been two years since the last try. Two years. You have rewritten every major system. You have created the world's first synchronized neural construct. You can adjust for every interface anomaly. It is time to try again. Believe in yourself."

Eli slowed to a stop. Placing his hand on the metal wall beam for support, he closed his eyes. AV was right. It was time to try again, and so what if it didn't work? Would he give up? Ridiculous. He would not stop now that he'd come this far.

He nodded as he felt his determination come into focus. Eli took a single step when his knee grazed something. Something alive. Stopping, he looked down, almost afraid of what he might see.