Ever Expanding Universe

Interfacing with the ship in such a complete manner took a little getting used to, but once you understood it all it made controlling it quite easy. We discussed the interface quite a bit after testing it out, Nira even spent some time in it, and determined the changes we needed to make. The control would be active on one side of the simulation or the other to prevent two people from trying to control the ship at once. There would be support pods next to the main pod so we could hand off systems to another connected individual if we needed to and the structure was closed off and given added features of protection in case something were to make it on the ship. We also began having the ship evolve in a few different areas to accomodate our desires in its control, which meant some more defensive weapons and additional systems to allow more virtual functionality if you were the one in the pod outside the universe. We had also started adapting the rest of the systems to free Nira from having to control them, the ship would become mostly automated and we would spend most of our time in the virtual world together. We also began developing other virtualized portions of the world, ones that would allow us to do different things. I looked forward to trying each of them out, but there was one in particular that would be of great benefit to me.

I wasn't much of a fighter, never had been, but I knew I needed to keep up on my mindforce training and this particular little planet had everything I needed. We had virtual enemies on this world and they would adapt and expand their capabilities the longer you used them, which meant that I had to continuously vary my attacks and defenses against them. The simulation was made so much like the real world that my training here would improve my abilities outside as well. I spent hours doing this, racking up tons of points on the boards. We had discussed the boards, wanting to figure out if we really needed to compete with one another. We did want to see scores, but mostly we were competing with ourselves as the boards kept statistics of points per hour, per day, even per minute if we were really working hard. Ambri came and spent some time here as well, she was more of a defensive fighter, using her abilities to cause the virtual foes to wear themselves out if not cause their own attacks to bounce back. Nira, on the other hand, had been working on mostly non-lethal, but very effective forms of defense, not protective but preventative. She was learning to disable her foes, freezing them in place, putting them to sleep, anything she could try to do. Her powers stemmed from the technology she had been given and it would be interesting to try to match her abilities at some point. One thing I did notice, however, was that the more her control over the ship was disconnected the less potent the powers were. She knew it too but she was determined to grow in strength apart from the ship.

When not training or enjoying the other features of the world Nira would often be in the control chair working on her secret project. Ambri and I would wander around and discuss the world we were living in. We both loved it here, though it was always a bit strange knowing that it wasn't real. If we had been born in this we would never know any different, nothing seemed out of place except for our own knowledge of the simulation. We also speculated on what Nira could be working on, but without any of the information about the room we had no idea. She seemed frustrated at times after her session in the control pod, but would always smile when she saw us. Whatever it was she was trying to do was difficult and it was obvious none of us would be much help with it even if she asked, but it was something she desired to do and so we just did our best to get her mind off of it when she was taking a break. With so much to experience in this world it didn't take much effort or time before she was happy again and enjoying everything we were doing together.