[Cyberia] Cyberia: Down the Rabbit Hole

[Cyberia GM]

It was quite unnoticeable, unless you looked closely, and Dot did,
stretching the skin around it slightly with her finger.

"If you'll follow me, Dot?" Asha asked, stepping out of the enclosed area.

Dot quietly followed, looking rather like a stunned rabbit while she
continued to inspect the new addition.

She handed the device to Dot.  "Just put it over your head, and make sure
the pads at your temples align, and we'll get started."

Dot got comfortable and placed the 'trodes on her head, adjusting them for
maximum efficiency.  It took a few moments to get them just right.

"Ready?" she asked, her hand on a key on the terminal.

Dot nodded, feeling a pit in her stomach opening up as she did so.

+++++

Asha pressed the key, and reality yawned wide, revealing a layer of
electronic infrastructure behind it, rendered in a photo-realistic sepia
tones.  She could see two realities- Asha and Suhuy still stood there, but
there was a world that overlaid them.  Vertigo affected her as she saw what
appeared to be people moving past and through them so fast that she could
barely make them out.  She heard snatches of conversation, and could see
that they gave her a wide berth.

"...slow ... move...  mustbeon ... nodontdiscom ..."

Asha's voice cut through the haze.  "This is what living on two worlds is
like."  Her voice seemed disconnected from her body, and it was hard
associating the two.  "...why..."

"The images going past are avatars of people jacked into the Ether.  Right
now, you have only one advantage over them- you are still aware of your
'meat' body.  Now.  Close your eyes.  It will signal to the interface that
you want to plunge deeper."

As she complied, the vertigo disappeared, though she felt a foreigner in her
own 'body'.  She could see clearly that she was standing on what appeared to
be a 'street' of glowing material of some sort, and people and vehicles of
all sorts were whizzing by her.  A form rezzed in the street in front of
her- slowly enough so that it was non-threatening, as she could make out the
features before they were fully filled in.  It seemed to be Asha, but she
was in more of an idealized form- she looked to be an angel.

"In case you didn't figure it out," Asha said, "this really is me- or rather
my avatar.  Most runners can't do what I just did- you usually have to enter
the Ether through a designated port."  She gestured towards a door that Dot
stood next to.  "Because of how you entered, you didn't have the actual
experience of passing through the port- we'll get to that later."

"I have slowed down my interface to you so that we can converse.  But they,"
she waved her hand expansively, "have not.  That's why they are going so
much faster.  A 'trode interface has so much meat to pass through that it
slows the connection down."

"Let's go back into the terminal itself, and we can start your lessons," she
said, opening the door that she had referred to as a port and gesturing for
Dot to pass through.