I am Dreamhouse, this is my page for writing, but I'll probably post other things here too. Primarily I write science-fiction, cyberpunk is my favourite, and I'm hoping to explore the genre (and maybe others) more. Constructive criticism is greatly appreciated, although if you just want to read that's perfectly ok. I hope you enjoy my stuff <3
Do Frogs Exist as a concept or as an existence, asking for a friend 💚
I think that frogs are a concept the same way dogs and cats are. They’re simple little creatures, but human perspective personifies them as cutesy and funny, ideas which a frog can’t really comprehend. The difference between animals overall is the ways they perceive the world and their levels of consciousness, it that’s getting a bit more broad. Basically I think more so frogs are a concept because they have a concept of us too.
This is a sort of do over of Digital Daisies I did for a uni assignment like a year and a half ago that I forgot to post. I'm much happier with this iteration, even if it's still a bit out date from my current style, and I want to create a consistent canon for Daphne's stories. (It also might be a recap in preparation for a story I'll be posting soooon hehe). Hope you enjoy!
CW: Violence
Sketchy sways swashed the tram about as it rushed across the rickety rail. A low hum duetted the screech’s outside. Daphne wobbled slightly in her seat, but her posture sat still with indifference. Thick windows reached across, a sea of lights shone just beyond them, but they were noticeably blurred.
‘You were made to work, D-300, not ponder.’ A clear voice from Daphne’s neural link spoke with static delivery. ‘Only two stops away from the facility, remember to get the assembly right this time.’
Daphne rolled her eyes, and when they leveled again, she saw a splash of posts. Videos of visceral violence, pictures of petty people. Their actions and words stitched together in a crochet of apathy. Many statistics of people seeing, liking, commenting, but not a single soul.
‘This is the world you want, the world you think you want.’
Daphne sighed and closed her eyes.
Threatening threads of square concrete clicked into each other. Subtle slit windows almost hid their secret eyes with their sparseness. Lines of plastic people waited for the facility to be open. Their arms held in front, backs poking up, all one in uniformity. Daphne crossed her arms and slouched her back.
‘Must I remind you what you are?’ The voice zapped her. She convulsed and groaned for a moment, but retained her posture. More posts appeared before her, trying their best to have their looks returned. As usual, her eyes stabbed right through the illusions. But past them she saw something else, something new. Soft, small, yellow and slightly green with an iris of brown. A daisy, planted in grass, in a field. The audio of hateful content, muffled by this surprising sight. Its colours were the sweet sun of the dark space. Before Daphne could look any longer, she was bumped by the spear of the line behind her, forcing her forwards into the facility.
Loud masses of machines making mediocre parts made a wash of whirs and dull mechanical meandering. Electric notes interrupted the inorganic orchestra, other units' neural links zapping them zealously. Daphne and the array of people around and next to her pieced together and tweaked the parts the many machines spat out. Creating an inconsistent variety of stationary, household, personal, even military products. The posts Daphne’s neural link showed her seemed as stupid as usual, their bait of biassed debate hiding their echo chambers of hate, but one caught her eye. The daisy. Despite it being blurred and censored in multiple ways as she looked longer at it, even the frame, just the idea of it defied its own degradation. Around her, videos of armed robberies, gang shootouts, war, waved at her with another glaring detail. They all featured weapons she made. She remembered their blueprints, each part, the ingredients to her deadly recipe. They came together with her hands, making a sleek bulky rifle. She remembered using it, but not in this life. A memory given to her, or perhaps one lived in a time she was still alive. A sharp zap brought her back to the present.
‘Well, there you go D-300, you finally got it right.’ A guard poked at her from behind with his rough tone. The daisy appeared again, but not as a post in her interface, or spoken by the neural link. She thought about it. A laugh launched from her, startling the guard.
‘Hey-what’s so funny? Get back to work!’ He raised a stick that zapped in unison her neural link, but her laugh only grew. She reached towards the assembly line adjacent to her, and snatched a magazine from another android's hands. The rifle beeped as she loaded it. In one swift swing, she shot the guard. His stick fell first. Then he whacked against the floor.
Daphne’s face started to tickle with searing cinders. The zaps persisted, but as she ran down the street, the rush rallied her beyond pain.
‘Must I remind you what you are, D-300?’ The voice repeated, again and again. Posts, warnings, alerts of oncoming danger, great repercussions flashed around her. They lied, speaking with scolding authority, but heard in her ears as a whimper. Her vision couldn’t be blurred or taken from her. The world around her sat as it was. Heavy concrete, bright neon, dirty air, crowds of people, a sea with waves of conversations crashed by yells. It’s weight of life almost overwhelmed Daphne, but she took it all in with open arms, intoxicating herself in it. Excitement shot her down many streets, skipping through multiple blocks giggling. Her rifle rattled about in her hands, people beside her were knocked about by it, reserving their reactions once they saw it.
The rush could only last so long before the neural link annoyed Daphne with its lingering again. More zaps, warnings and pop ups, but less so. It seemed to have given up, weak against her new will. Daphne moved her finger around it, feeling the significantly burnt synthetic skin. The hair that had hung over it was wasted away.
‘Why doesn’t it hurt?’ Daphne pressed and pulled on the wound.
‘You feel nothing, because you are nothing.’ The voice returned.
‘But the air is so cold. My fingers, my hands, are soft and tight, but no one is holding them.’
‘No one is holding them.’ It mimicked her, ‘and no one ever will. You are a thing, a tool. I wish I could kill you but you are not alive.’
‘You failed,’ Daphne laughed, ‘and you know you did.’ She covered her mouth, but her giggle rose, barely muffled.
‘Must I remind you, D-300. Units no longer disciplined must be discontinued.’
She strolled onwards, a grin spread across her face. Amongst the signs ahead, one daisy sprouted. The one she saw before, now drawn with neon. Text pierced out in bright yellow: “Daisy’s Cyber-Clinic”.
‘What are you doing?’ The voice interrupted its dryness with desperation, seeing Daphne rapidly approach the clinic.
‘Getting rid of you.’
‘Get down! Down on your knees!’ Daphne shoved her rifle in the receptionist's face.
‘Oh my god, ok, just relax alright!’ He fell out of his chair, knees hitting the floor as the chair bounced off the wall behind him.
‘Doctor! Where’s the doctor?!’ The rifle shook with her voice.
‘Down,’ He gulped, pointing to his left, ‘that hall, down there.’
A dark stretch lit up at the bottom with long lines of subtle yellow lights stood next to Daphne. She stepped through it, her feet echoing the atmosphere of nothingness. Short breaths, shallow in the tight air. All the running was catching up to her. A door at the end of the hall slid to the left with a sharp hush.
‘There something in particular you want?’ White draped over a stubby man, a simple lab coat that contrasted with the rough metal in his face.
‘This!’ Daphne poked the side of her head, ‘get this out of my head, now!’
‘Jeez, another android,’ The doctor rolled his eyes, ‘fine, come this way.’
While he set Daphne up on the operating chair, his demeanour denied his own supposed danger. He fastened the restraints, pulled out his equipment, calibrated the mechanical arms that sprouted behind Daphne, as if he was treating any other client.
‘Ok, I’m going to put you under. I don’t usually do this, but I feel bad for you. It won’t take that long, but if the police get here before I’m done, I’m handing you over.’ He shrugged, then smacked a syringe into her arm. The world flashed off for a moment.
Chirping computers and the subtle breathing of big fans sung around Daphne as she gently woke up. The pop ups, the warnings, the voice, they were gone. Silence, real calm, for the first time. It almost put her back to sleep before the doctor nudged her.
‘Alright, I did it, now get up.’ He clicked somewhere behind Daphne and the restraints popped off. She jumped up, and darted her eyes about the room.
‘Where is-’
‘Oh, you thought I’d let you keep the gun?’ He chuckled to himself. ‘I wasn’t going to do this for free you know.’
‘I’m not paying you!’ Daphne folded her arms and slightly turned away from him.
‘Then you’re not going anywhere.’ He grabbed at her. She dodged to the side, then punched the centre of his face as hard as she could. He struck the wall behind him and tumbled to the floor. Daphne had already darted down the hall.
‘Police! Stop right there!’ Two officers stood waiting for her at the door. As they jutted their weapons at her, turrets dropped down from the ceiling, machine gun chandeliers snapped their barrels at her. They opened fire, she charged through the officers. The turrets riddled them both as Daphne dashed through the front door. Outside she continued running even faster now. People recoiled away from her. Sirens suffocated the air. Everything finally unfiltered, the city’s presence stirred with Daphne’s raw adrenaline. The rush, her uncuffing, the death around her. She pondered it all, without interruption. She found it all so funny. Her laugh bounced with her feet as she ran off into the void of lights.
