Threshold

§ 2019-11-24 00:33:09

[00:33] For a day, Valcen's plans were their little secret.

Valcen had reasoned that it wasn't too likely that the Nayabaru would react badly to the revelation that he was letting Baishar tinker with his mind – they probably didn't even truly know what that meant, much less fathom what dangers it could represent for them – but the chance was just high enough that he wasn't willing to discuss it in Tanak's presence.

That it wasn't to be discussed in Ryrha's presence went without saying, given he had gone out of his way to avoid her overhearing it earlier.

And so they waited for Ryrha to prowl through the lower levels of Katal under Tanak's guidance, restless as she often seemed. Valcen had held a physics lesson in the Den instead of his office so they wouldn't miss the moment.

He made no effort to hide his interest in her leaving, overtly tracking her with his gaze as she went. She might not have been part of the equation, but the more she could sense that they needed some time to themselves, the better. She was a clever girl, after all, and entirely capable of prolonging her absence.

When Valcen led Baishar into the Lair, he was saying: "If she asks later, you can tell her anything you like, including the truth. She can stomach it if she can inspect the result in the same breath and see that it isn't a threat to her."

Of course, whether it was going to be a threat to her remained to be seen. It lay in Baishar's hands now, for better or worse.

Reaffirming his decision, Valcen took care of as many of his restraints as was plausibly possible – ankles, muzzle, neck. Torso and wrists was up to Baishar – though they weren't formally necessary. Only the head straps were strictly critical to avoid damaging a victim's mind, though fervent squirming might still threaten the perfect stillness that the Torunyema required.

But Valcen was hardly going to squirm.

§ 2019-11-24 23:01:36

[23:01] Baishar dutifully followed Valcen into the Lair, trying to ignore the fear writhing in his gut. Editing Netami's mind had been miserable enough; the guilt still lingered in him. Now Valcen was trusting his mind to Baishar, and asking him to remove the part of him that felt empathy for the kavkema brought to him.

Slowly, he brought his hands up to finish the last few restraints — not that they were strictly necessary, but simply to give himself something to do, some menial task to focus on to push the awfulness further away. As he finished the restraints on Valcen's wrists and began peeling the gloves from Valcen's toolchain, his eyes locked onto Valcen's for a long moment.

"Are you sure this is wise?" he asked, a soft quiver in his voice. "Are you sure you want to go through with this?" On some level he already knew the answer; there was an apologetic air to his expression. I'm sorry. I just need to be sure.

[23:15] While Baishar worked to get Valcen's left wrist into the restraints, Valcen moved his right hand up to his eye, extending one delicate digit to cycle the orb to the familiar black of the Torunyema interface. A reasonable precaution – the angle would be poor, but he could walk Baishar through it much better if he saw some of it, at least.

Then he relaxed into the rest of the process, no twitch or tremble betraying any concern. A faint tension in his shoulders made it clear this was hardly routine, even from Valcen's perspective, who had already done much to edit the mind he currently inhabited.

At Baishar's question, Valcen's left eye, still masquerading as a natural kavkem eye, fixed its gaze on Baishar. "Yes," he confirmed, softly. "It'll let me stay functional in this hellscape and there should be no negative side-effects – we're aiming for a very conditional tweak, after all."

The tension in his shoulders didn't go away. Perhaps that was to be expected, though – after all, there was only one Valcen, and if Baishar slipped in a moment's inattention, that Valcen would disappear.

§ 2019-11-29 21:25:04

[21:25] Baishar let out a slow, jittery breath, closing his eyes for a moment. Just a small change. Nothing to worry about. No negative consequences. He could almost believe that. Valcen knows what he's doing. He knows what he's having me do. This will protect him.

He brushed his muzzle against Valcen's shoulder, nuzzling it gently in the most soothing gesture he could manage under the circumstances. "I won't do anything I can't undo," he promised. ...Unless you tell me to. Hopefully it won't come to that.

He reached up to the Torunyema's heart, pulling it down and gently nestling it against Valcen's skull before turning it on. A moment later, he switched his artificial eye to see the flowering coral structures it projected, then carefully donned the gloves, taking a few steps back to see what he was going to have to deal with.

[21:54] As the colours exploded into existence around him, Valcen uselessly closed his eyes, flexing his fingers as his wrists pulled subtly and quietly at their restraints.

The thought I hope I didn't misjudge Baishar's loyalty flickered across the tangles, opaque to all but the most attentive viewers seeking that very thought – there was simply too much mind as that such an unexpected thought would be readily apparent.

So we're doing this. Valcen let his eyes stay closed for a while, for all the good it did him – his Torunyema eye continued to communicate colours to him, more vivid now that there was no visual stimulus from the outside world to compete with. An abstract work of art filled his entire vision, a broad swath of orange, flecks of blue, atop a few strata of different colours of rust.

Levelled, much more calmly than he thought he could keep his voice, Valcen commented:

"If you cycle through slices, I should be able to see enough even from this angle to help you, at least for about half the task. First select for the strands of interpersonal abstraction, since that's presumably all we'll be working on. You can reset that filter whenever you need an idea about what it connects to."

[22:40] Baishar was taking a moment to get himself oriented to the task, gazing at the vast, complex structure before him, trying to focus on the goal. Less empathy for individual kavkema. Trying not to focus on the implications of that goal. You don't know what the consequences will be; Valcen does.

Valcen's suggestion came as a soothing balm. You don't have to do this alone. Valcen can help you, as he always has. "Of course," he replied, twisting his right hand to shift through the various layers, starting first with emotional connections, then narrowing down to interpersonal relationships.

Here he paused, skimming the branches, identifying what was what. The layout was somewhat different from that of a kavkem mind; but certain bundles could still be identified. Nayabaru. Kavkema. Threadwielders. A few individual strands as well — Evenatra, or maybe Tkanetar. These two must be Baishar, Ryrha. Over here, thick with existential threat, could only be Terenyira — though some of the colors didn't quite make sense. And some things he couldn't immediately discern.

[22:52] Valcen was gathering his thoughts, the activity rippling across the periphery of the subject matter Baishar was inspecting.

In kavkem neural architecture, it was impossible to reason about empathy without feeling some of it, running a kind of simulation, that much Baishar had long since learnt. Bizarrely, there really wasn't much difference between doing something and thinking about it, between dreaming something and truly perceiving it.

"I know that I said I want you to remove something," Valcen reasoned. "But in this case you'll have to add something first. We want that conditional. You need to separate my concept of kavkema into two groups – I'm going to try helping you, this is something I can do with a bit of cerebral contortion, but you should try to reinforce what you see.

"When we're done with this step, there needs to be a separate group for Nayabaru-captive kavkema that has as few connections to the rest of the kavkem concept as possible." A pause. "That make sense to you, right? You can see where I'm going with this?"

[23:29] A sickening feeling lashed through Baishar, a sense of what he was about to do clashing with his ethical framework. Split the kavkema into two groups — those who you care about, and those who are your victims. He closed his eyes, willing the vile taste to subside. "... It does," he replied, the discomfort evident in his voice.

He took a deep breath. This was to help Valcen. His empathy towards captives was doing nothing to help anyone; in order for him to continue feeling empathy towards kavkema as a whole there had to be a split. It wasn't going to harm the captives any more than they were already being harmed. It wouldn't change Valcen's actions, it wouldn't make him any more or less of an evil spirit. It would just change how he felt about the horrible duties he was stuck with.

And after enough time had passed, after Valcen was ready to move forward with his plans, the second concept wouldn't be necessary any more.

"Okay," he replied, letting out a long breath. "We can try that." A pause. How would I undo this? That would be simple; just merging the two concepts shouldn't be hard. It might become more difficult in the long run, if they diverged after enough time, but it should still be possible. "If you just focus on the defining characteristics, I can do the rest."

He steadied himself, narrowing his focus on the task at hand. Split this bundle into two bundles, along this line. Straightforward, easy. His left hand came up, and with steady caution, he gently pried the strands apart.

[00:27] Two digits of Valcen's right hand clutched themselves against his palm, tension highlighting his tendons, a silent but terse breath drawn through his teeth. It was hard, to focus on crafting the group just as someone was drawing along the edges of it.

It was an obvious tampering, even if the nature of it was not – it merged seamlessly with his own thoughts, but it was clear he wasn't consciously guiding them.

The distinction felt natural, even as he knew it to be fake. So this is what it feels like, he found himself thinking, quietly – there was no intellectual surprise, but the qualia were new.

He waited until Baishar's efforts and his own separated out the two groups as neatly as was reasonable. In his mind's eye, the captives almost looked different, as he imagined them. As though in losing their freedom they had lost something fundamentally kavkem.

It felt right, even as he intellectually reasoned that it should feel wrong.

He clung to the new group, as though the empathy he felt for the nascent group could be salvaged by a fervent focus. It felt like something precious, something important – but he knew that was precisely why he had to do something.

"...okay," he said, gathering himself. "See if you can separate the concept from my empathy. Be careful, you don't want to overdo it. I want to be functional, not... cruel." ...would you know where to draw that line, if you were looking at your own mind?

"...go slow; I'll let you know when you're close to how far I want to take that." Isn't it going to be a moving goal post? Can you keep your current goal in mind? "But feel free to pause any time and query for feedback, double-checking can't hurt in this case."

[01:04] Valcen's struggles were clear to Baishar, the tension visible in one eye reflected in the colors and structures visible to the other. The bifurcation was as clean as he could make it, but the distinction was raw and fresh. Valcen could still reason his way back to unification with enough effort; there were already a few tentative threads. Logically, there was no difference; they both knew that.

Baishar slowly shifted the layers visible to him, cycling through various colors and views. Empathy was a complex feeling; it would take some effort to shift. He made slow adjustments, working gradually on the various aspects.

To Valcen, it felt as though the warmth and compassion for this new group of kavkema was fading — they still felt like people, they were still clearly in a deeply hellish situation, but the urge to help them, to try and comfort them, felt somewhat less pressing, less burning, less immediate.

Baishar released his left thumb, and let out an exhausted breath. "...How is that? Moving in the right direction?" There was a nervousness in his voice; a fearful skepticism. How do I know the answer is what Valcen wants? How do I know the mind in front of me is still Valcen?

[01:18] And then, just like that, it felt silly to have been clamouring for that shred of empathy as though it were the single most important thing in his life. He lingered on the supposed insight, rolled it around in his mind and his tongue along the roof of his mouth as though to mirror the imagined motion.

How had it felt, to feel overwhelming anxiety for those unfortunate souls? Intellectually, he remembered feeling it. Emotionally, it was impossible to fathom – he couldn't simulate the feeling that had tortured his past self. It must have been a worse form of the deep concern he felt for them now.

Baishar paused to query his thoughts the traditional way. Good, thank you. Valcen thought about it. Was this enough? How much was the current constellation going to make his interactions haunt him?

Perhaps that was the wrong question.

He turned his attention to the kavkema, trying to gauge how strongly he felt about them, and if it matched his intellectual expectations of how his empathy ought to be interlocked with the group. It struck him as healthy – distant, certainly, as it was by necessity of his being in Katal, but the injustice of their nomadic lifestyle still resonated with him.

He drew his thoughts to Ryrha and Baishar. Here he found some troubling discrepancies – they teetered uncomfortably on the edge of the two groups and he couldn't quite make up his mind where he should be filing them. Like the rabbit/duck illusion, his mind realised it could view the situation as either-or, and could switch between them at will.

Emotionally, he wasn't sure where he wanted them to land. Intellectually, he remembered what he had said about them; he knew it was best to listen to his past self, even if it seemed strange that his past self had a strong opinion about this.

"Good so far – though we're going to have to revise the groups slightly," he said, calmly. "My mind is struggling to classify you and Ryrha where I want it to. It's not rejecting the notion, but it's not embracing it, either.

"I think..." – he inspected the layers from his awkward angle – "...if you cycle a layer closer to you, there should be a way to bridge between Ryrha, you, and the kavkem group."

[01:55] Baishar froze for a moment, terrified that he'd made a mistake. Struggling to classify you where I want it to. He looked at the structure, then quickly paged back to the first view. Immediately, he saw what Valcen meant — the threads for Ryrha and Baishar were loose, fluctuating between one category and the other. He closed his eyes, sucked in a sharp breath. "Okay." That wasn't supposed to happen; though it was easy to see how. Technically, Baishar and Ryrha were captives. "Give me a moment to think."

Baishar's heart hammered in his chest. Fear that Valcen would no longer care about him ran into the hard truth of Valcen loved him. But this was only mostly Valcen. "I can fix this." It was more of a prayer than a statement of fact.

What separated Baishar and Ryrha from the captives? The fact they weren't being wrestled to the Torunyema by a Nayabaru? That certainly couldn't be relied upon; it only took a shift in the Karesejat's mood — or Valcen's, for that matter — to change that. Their identity? Their emotional ties to Valcen? Their loyalty? How could he tie them to the kavkema as a whole?

Did it actually matter? It did, if he wanted this to work in the long run. Maybe he could ask Valcen for advice. But in his current state, he wasn't entirely sure he could trust that advice. "... Okay, I'm going to just do something temporarily, and then we can come up with something more permanent." He reached in, grasped the strands, and tied them to the column that still held empathy.

In Valcen's mind, the ambiguity collapsed; Baishar and Ryrha were obviously kavkema, deserving of empathy. Though there wasn't any obvious reason for it; it just felt right. "... Okay. I think that should hold for now. Any ideas on how to make it more natural?"

[02:08] More natural. Valcen's mind baulked at the notion – how could one make a natural thought feel more natural? He tried to hold onto the supposed contradiction, pick it apart with his knowledge that his mind was being shaped to suit his goals, attain some distance to the associations he had.

No luck. He exhaled tensely, breath hissing very softly past his necessarily clenched teeth. This was easier to think about when he wasn't both subject and expected to be part architect.

Subject. That was certainly a more elegant way to think about this than victim, at least. He could recognise that as progress.

"I can reenforce it by just thinking about it," Valcen said, finally, compromising with his mental unease by bypassing the problem for the time being. "We can get back to it. I'll keep an eye on it."

[02:56] Baishar's gaze dropped, the unease palpable in his expression — to the extent Valcen could make it out from where he was. This feels wrong, a part of him cried out. You're changing too much. How much of Valcen is still there?

"Valcen, I..." He's given you too much power, too much trust, and now you've ruined him.

No. Valcen knew what he was doing. He knew what he was doing when he asked Baishar to make his changes; he knew the changes were going to be minor. And they had been; there was very little that was actually different. It was just a set of things that was terrifyingly close to his own position. He could do this. He would do this.

[02:57] Baishar squeezed his eyes shut, willing himself to focus. "Is there anything else that's necessary? Are you going to be functional in your current state? Are you going to be cruel?" He could still undo this, if necessary. He could still reconnect the threads of compassion he'd shaved off, he could still reunify the two bundles of kavkema. It was entirely possible, if it became necessary.

[03:11] Forced to resist the urge to lick at his teeth, Valcen considered the questions, his feathers bristling and smoothing back out in silence. The state he was in felt as normal as the one he had no doubt come from and no longer had emotional access to. Staring at the coral tangle at an angle, he tried to run his current mindsets through imagined scenarios.

It was hard to picture them. It was hard to emulate a distressed captive, because he lacked the empathy to make it fervent. How would it affect him? He pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth again, applying pressure out of frustration, trying to gauge how much more had to be taken away.

Finally: "I can tell I'm underestimating the impact another Nayabaru project would have on me. I'd like a little more leeway. A little more distance. I think—" He paused, scrutinising the branching structures just barely visible at his peripheral vision. "I want to continue minimising pain and suffering, and that's still there.

"I still want to be able to talk to the captives – so I need to be willing to listen to them. That's also still there," he continued to analyse. Did he want to waste time trying to soothe them? He was sure he would. Was it a threat to his rational thinking? Probably not. And yet... "What else do you see? It's a bit hard to see from this angle. Is there anything else we could scale down?"

§ 2019-12-07 03:26:18

[03:26] More distance. A tremble ran up Baishar's spine. How much more distance will he ask for? How much further will he make me go? "Okay," he responded, more-or-less automatically. "Let me see what I can find."

Baishar numbly paged through the views available to him, seeking for threads he could tug on to grant Valcen his distance. To what end? He paused, a sudden thought occurring to him. I could find out.

Here was Valcen's entire mind, prime for exploration. He had the power to see what Valcen's plans were; he even knew roughly where he'd have to look. Valcen couldn't stop him. And yet. Valcen had to be protected. As jarringly foreign as that began to feel, it wasn't any less true. Learning Valcen's plans meant the Nayabaru, or the Karesejat, would surely one day torture them out of him.

Would he be able to withstand that? Would the axiom of protecting Valcen keep him silent? He was sure it would, and yet he was also sure it was an unacceptable risk. How could those both be true?

It didn't matter. Baishar squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, shaking his muzzle in an attempt to shake his thoughts loose. Valcen knew what he was doing; Baishar did not. Valcen had decided it wasn't safe for Baishar to know his plans; therefore it wasn't safe. You're letting yourself get distracted. He restored the view back to the last parts he'd touched, reading the weights on the various connections, fervently losing himself in the coral structure.

Concern for well-being tied too closely to 'minimizing pain and suffering'. Visualizing oneself in the victims' perspective contributed to 'being willing to listem to them'. Viewing them as less than people certainly granted distance; but it was further than Baishar was willing to go. Minimize suffering, be willing to listen.

What did being willing to listen entail? How many of them would be like Netami, trying to twist claws into him with their words? "...Would you still care about what they think of you? If they call you a monster, will that still sting you?"

§ 2019-12-07 18:07:39

[18:07] Baishar's silence, mingled with the changing views, made Valcen uneasy. He glanced across at the boy with his photonic vision, trying to read his body language. The nervousness he saw told him nothing specific.

Then he was back on track, asking questions.

A fresh tension touched Valcen's shoulders at the second question, the imagined situation rippling as highlights through the structure Baishar was inspecting. A light grimace rippled across his feathers. "Probably," he said – his body language was less uncertain: Yes.

[19:51] A quick glance at Valcen was all he needed to confirm what the colors indicated. Baishar winced apologetically. "Okay, then let's fix that." He twisted back to the place where he made the original bifurcation, watching the colors twist and flow. "...I'm sorry to ask this, but... Try to keep that image in mind, it will help me find what needs to change."

Baishar took a couple deep breaths, closing his eyes for a moment to try and center himself; the colors continued dancing through his right eye regardless. You can do this. This is helping Valcen. Doubts or no, manipulation or no, Valcen was still the most important person in his life. Helping him was a worthy task. Even if emotionally it felt wrong, it would be okay in the end.

He opened his eyes and followed the paths of color through the system, making mental notes of what would help along the way. It was a slow process; he occasionally had to close one eye to help him ignore Valcen's stress. This will be temporary, I promise. Only once he felt he understood the system well enough — felt he could hold the path in his mind — did he descend into write-mode. Weaken this connection; strengthen that one to compensate. Redirect this over here. Go back to the bifurcation, check that it's still stable. Check that it's only affecting the branch we want it to affect. Switch to this plane, disentangle these two threads....

[20:15] Keeping the mental image in mind was unpleasant enough that it kept bouncing back to other thoughts – the natural immune reaction of any functional mind. Valcen pushed back into it for as long as Baishar was still clearly reading, then stopped abruptly as writing became apparent, mentally jerking back as though burnt.

Briefly, abstractly contradictory thoughts seared through his consciousness, wrenching the softest sound of complaint from him – but to large part, it all felt like a remarkably smooth transition, not even identifiable as he tried to keep an inner eye on the changes.

He could see some of it from his strange visual angle, the twisting and the pruning, he knew in theory what it signified, but he simply couldn't identify it from within.

And then the chain of momentary tweaks was over.

For a moment, a distant, analytical thought occurred to him: How do I tell I didn't lose anything important? A very abstract dread gnawed at his gut – he felt fine, after all, the concern could only find its footing in a purely intellectual musing. His tongue explored his mouth as though he might find answers in the ridges and valleys of his gums.

How do I tell it worked?

"I think that's as far as we should take this for now," Valcen said, calmly, observing the thin slice of tangles hovering in his vision. "Thank you for your help."

A brief, paranoid concern: There was no guarantee Baishar would stop right this moment, there was nothing preventing him from doing damage. He willed it aside, continuing in an almost conversational tone: "As always, I hope I don't need to test the effectiveness of the change, but I suppose we will inevitably find out."

[21:16] Baishar breathed a soft sigh of relief at Valcen's comment, and began cautiously peeling the glove off his left hand. I'll never have to do this again. As he reached for the right glove, he hesitated for a moment. This is the only chance I'll ever get.

He pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth, grimaced lightly, and removed the glove.

"Everything I did was reversible," he replied, his tone mildly shaken. "So... at least in theory, if this doesn't work out, it should be easy enough to return to the original state and try again. But hopefully it won't come to that." He cycled his vision back to normal, then turned the Torunyema off and set to work on freeing Valcen from his restraints.

"...How do you feel?" he asked quietly as Valcen's arms came free. "You still remember your plans? You still want to be functional; you still don't want to be cruel?" A pause, hesitant, as an unwelcome thought occurred to him. Could I even bear to hear the answer?

Baishar let out an unsteady breath. Honesty was the best policy, here. "...Valcen, I need to ask. And please answer honestly." His eyes focused on Valcen, betraying his terror. "...Do you still love me?"

[21:24] For a moment, Valcen noticed that he threatened to react with bewilderment. Love? For a moment, he worried he'd lost something important without even noticing it, without even retaining the memory of it – then he remembered why Baishar was asking it.

Right.

"Baishar, don't be silly," Valcen chided him amicably. "You know the answer." Would that be enough? Valcen didn't want to lie to his face if he could help it. In any other situation, he might even simply be truthful – Baishar, I never did, it's all in your head – but at the moment that was simply too dangerous.

[22:11] I know what the answer used to be, a part of him wanted to retort. And I know that technically, that isn't an answer. But of course Valcen was right. Baishar was being overly paranoid. That close brush with indifference must have just spooked him. "Sorry," he replied, lowering his muzzle. "I was just... scared I might have damaged that."

Maybe it was just wishful thinking. Maybe he just couldn't bear a world where it was anything else. Or maybe he honestly believed it. But hopefully, the next few days would help him decide whether he'd just committed an atrocity, and whether Valcen was really still Valcen. For the meantime, he would treat this probably-Valcen as Valcen, and observe. At worst, he knew he could undo what he'd done. If this turned out to be a terrible decision, it need not be permanent.