Alexa ended the meeting with her other selves and decided to return to what she had been doing before, both Ale and Alexandra were busy exploring what Alexa had made for them, the replica of their shared apartment was…small.

All things considered, it was very small. Even if it was the same size or bigger in some aspects, it was smaller. Why?

Because unlike the real thing, there was no door to the outside or windows that gave way to the outdoors. It was an enclosed space, and there was no changing that.

Alexa didn't like that, but it was what it was.

[Starting slowing down of thought acceleration.]

[Buffering memory data…]

[Refreshing data stream…]

[Reading saved data point…]

[Automated movement of body initiated…]

Alexa's consciousness hit into her body like a wrecking ball™. And even though it should have made her stammer since she moved from standing still within their mindscape to the real space, it didn't.

Since Alexa had planned for it!

Her body continued taking the next couple of steps while Alexa acclimated to real space once again, and no one would ever notice!

"Are you okay, Rhapsody?" Except [Golem] who asked, making [Fan Girl] turn her attention to Alexa.

"Is something the matter Alexa?" Asking her own question while looking worriedly at her.

The other grown-ups had left leaving them alone, so that meant that only [Fan Girl] and [Golem] were with her as they walked into the reception of their apartment building. They needed to move from the employees-only elevator to the public one…

Which having [Golem] with them was an actual risk hazard.

"She changed her pace," [Golem] said to [Fan Girl], "She was walking normally and suddenly changed her tempo."

"Oh you scared me, maybe she is just messing around?" [Fan Girl] answered the implicit question.

"Not like that she doesn't," [Golem] shook his head, "We now know her past, a return to soldier…nay, machine precision movements means something could have triggered her fight or flight response, you more than anyone else should be aware of this Sylph."

"....Alexa?" [Fan Girl] turned to Alexa, "Is something the matter? Did you see someone that made you remember bad things?"

"No," Alexa answered as she started moving to the next elevator, placing a hand against the wall, "Alexa was speaking with Ale and Alexandra about Main Core."

[Start nanite injection.]

[Means of injection, flesh tendrils.]

[Start constructing Wiggles.NX]

[Leeching biomass from host…]

[Starting Wiggle.NX injection into object.]

"Did your other selves trigger that reaction?" [Golem] asked measuredly, "And on a side note, who have we dealt with? Who are we dealing with right now?"

"What do you mean?" [Fan Girl] asked to [Golem] confused, "Isn't she just…Alexa?"

"I didn't want to or even encourage the whole multiple personality thing, I have seen that before, kids acting like such to get attention." [Golem] said, shaking his head, "Did you know the actual number of people with honest to god diagnoses for this is actually low? Don't mind the fact that this is, by nature, a cover syndrome. People with it rarely get caught early in life. They get caught later in life, kids are by nature incredibly good at hiding these things, and parents don't want to see the issues, so they learn to cope and mix with the normal people."

"...So you thought…" [Fan Girl] said lowering walking into the Elevator and standing between Alexa and [Golem].

"That she was either faking it, or entertaining Elanore." [Golem] said, walking in after [Fan Girl] and punching the button. His frame had turned smaller to fit into the elevator, but it made the thing tilt to the side nonetheless.

[Scanning in progress…]

[Structural integrity under duress..]

[Time for structural failure….15 seconds.]

[Spreading biomass tendrils…]

[Cannibalizing material from near materials…]

[Starting to reinforce…]

[....Done.]

Alexa was done! That wasn't so hard.

"Alexa is Alexa," Alexa said as she retrieved her wiggles, she hadn't needed to burn her own biomass or [Banked Storage] material, the integral structure of the elevator shaft had lost some material, but overall she had taken evenly across the shaft, so it wouldn't be noticed…soon. "Nothing changes, even if the one speaking is Ale or Alexandra, they are also Alexa."

"Let me rephrase it then," [Golem] said, stopping to think for a second, "Who have I interacted with the most?"

"Hmm….The first days Alexa was here, the divide wasn't that great," Alexa said putting one of her hands on her chin and making an Alexa thinking face expression, "The first mission was done by Alexandra, the bank heist was supposed to be done by Ale but Alexa had ended up doing most of the job…So overall, Alexa would say you have spoken evenly with all of her."

"So… how do we differentiate?" [Golem] said ignoring [Fan Girl] who seemed to be thinking about something else.

"If it looks like Alexa, then it's Alexa." Alexa said, nodding, "If it looks like Ale…"

Alexa said, pulling an image of Ale from her memory and sending it (In the correct data format) to her cellphone. Afterward, she showed the screen to [Golem], "Then it's Ale."

"....Why is she wielding a Japanese sword while wearing a dark hoodie?" [Golem] asked as he saw the image of Ale.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

"...I dunno, Ale is like that sometimes, we think she has a sick." Alexa said nodding sagely, kind of tragic, but Alexa would be the one with the bigger heart and be understanding!

"Hey! I never used those clothes! Also, I need the blueprint of that sword!" "....Alexa…Please be nice about my picture…"

"And if it looks like an Alexandra…" Alexa said going into her personal database and pulling an image of Alexandra, "Then it's an Alexandra!"

"....Looking good," [Fan Girl] said from the side whistling at the image.

Alexa had pulled an image of Alexandra in a sandy environment with an ocean behind her, what one would usually call a beach, why? Because it felt kind of right?

"So your personalities do abuse the shapeshifting powers to get their own personal identities and biases?" [Golem] said not looking twice at the image.

"Ouch…" "Hmph…"

Alexa made Alexandra look nice though?

She was wearing what she had found to be a two piece bikini, it was even a red one! And it showcased quite well the booba!

Also, the waistline and the tummy!

Weren't [Males] interested in that? Alexa couldn't understand; she was sure it would make a good impression in [Golem], but instead, [Fan Girl] was the one eyeing it more! It was weird!

"Yes," Alexa said nodding back at [Golem], "Ale is the one that was made for fighting and Alexandra is the one that was made for dealing with the adults!"

"...Shouldn't it be the other way around?" [Golem] asked back as the elevator was close to arriving at their destination, "The adult one for fighting and the teenager for dealing with adults?"

"That's true," [Fan Girl] said, "The true enemy of an adult is a teenager, my Mother-"

And for some weird reason, [Fan Girl] stopped speaking after that mention of a Mother. Weird, either way, Alexa took that opportunity to speak!

"The [Adults] usually only treat their peers with respect and trust; Alexa noticed that while they aren't hostile to her, they don't seem to treat her as equal." Alexa said shaking her head, that made her dizzy, perhaps less speed in the head shaking? "And they seem to lower her guard around Alexa too much, so a [Younger] combat form is more efficient in a combat setting, also smaller hitbox. That part was from Ale, by the way."

"Heck yeah it was. Do you know how annoying it is to deal with smaller hitboxes? The devs must be nuts…nerf plz." "...Ale, we don't have devs.I mean, we do, but not in that sense."

Alexa also believed that they did have at least one dev, but she wasn't sure how many devs had been around for her project. Not that there was any clue of said data, that was part of what they left behind in her [CRAB] form, perhaps they could go for it one day?

More things to think about it.

"That is convenient," [Golem] said nodding, "I would ask for a way to differentiate your form while in combat, but that would make it pointless complicated, so we will remain using the current name. If I speak to you using the name Rhapsody, assume I speak to your three forms."

"Aye!" Alexa said doing a mock salute.

"Good, from this point forward, I forbid you from entering combat setting. Unless otherwise stated or if you are in immediate danger, you are forbidden from doing so, Alexa." [Golem] stated as the elevator came to a stop on their floor. "Same for Ale, even if she was indeed designed for combat, we are pending an evaluation for Alexandra. If she is indeed determined to have an actual adult level maturity, then she will be accepted in combat settings."

"Wha-?" "....Well, that one I didn't see coming."

"You can't do that!" [Fan Girl] was the first to react and raise her voice, "What authority do you think you have?!?!?"

"I am the Fairy Team leader," [Golem] stated as he walked out of the elevator, "It is within my purview to decide the combat readiness of my team members."

"You didn't have issues with Alexa before!" [Fan Girl] angrily pointed as she walked after [Golem], "Why now?"

"Yeah!" Alexa added from her side, "Alexa is good in [Combat Test] too! Even if Ale enjoys them more, but she can [Terminate] other entities too just as well!"

Alexa would not be stopped from noming! She was born to nom!

"That is the reason," [Golem] answered as he stood in front of Alexa's apartment, so Alexa squeezed forward and opened the door with her card code; that is to say, she placed a finger on the reader and transmitted the code that the card assigned to her had.

She may, or may have not. Nomed the card when they gave it to her…There was no evidence to state she had done that, of course…nor there was evidence of the card…at all.

"Before, Rhapsody was a quirky daughter of a supervillain. She was an oddball, worst case scenario she was an old Core User getting turned on by pretending to be a somewhat unstable supervillain kid," [Golem] said gravely sitting in one of Alexa's chairs, Alexa noticed how the material of the chair seemed to mesh with [Golem], was he reinforcing the chair? "That is not the case."

"You thought Alexa was actually older?" [Fan Girl] asked turning and looking at Alexa, "Really?"

"You didn't?" [Golem] answered and pointed the question back at [Fan Girl], "Are you telling me that you were okay with going with a five-year-old pretending to be a nineteen-year-old for drinks?"

"...I mean… I thought she was a nineteen-year-old core user with some issues from her trigger?" [Fan Girl] said looking at Alexa, "She was more mature than she should…and less mature than she should sometimes too."

"But Alexa is Alexa?" Alexa said, pointing out, "Ale was designed to be twelve years old, and Alexandra to be nineteen…Just as Alexa was five."

Yup, they all had their ages.

"And the maturity disparity?" [Golem] asked, "Was that designed too?"

"No?" Alexa answered, "The [Brain] just brains that way?"

"The brain brains that way?" [Fan Girl] said confused, "What does that even mean?"

"Uuggghhhh….Alexa is not designed to answer these things, we had Main Core for a reason!" Alexa said with a groan, "Ale!"

And decided to throw the issue at someone else! Alexa was running! She was tired! She wanted to eep!

"Alexa is not dealing with this!" So Alexa declared, "You do it!"

And ran to her room…within her head.

—---------------------------

"...." And that brought us to Ale sitting while being stared weirdly by [Big Sis] and [Golem], "...Ale has landed…?"

"Ale…was it?" [Golem] said with some caution, "Can I assume that you know what we have been speaking?"

"Yes," Ale nodded as she put her hands into the pockets of her hoodie, she had been trying to remake the katana that Alexa had drawn into the picture she used, only to be suddenly pulled out for explanations, "Alexa live streams everything she sees and does for us, so while I wasn't listening I do have the logs of what was said."

Really, Alexa…was not that interesting to see if Ale was to be honest, she was amusing from time to time, but watching Alexa 24/7 got old real fast after a point.

"So…can you explain it to us?" [Big Sis] said with some worry in her eyes, "How old are you really? As a whole…and as an individual."

"That is…harder to explain," Ale said with a sigh, "From a point of view we are barely a month old, but from another point of view we all are around five year old…And if we go to specifics…I guess we could be said to be around ten-year-olds?"

Ale wasn't that sure if she was to be honest. The timestamp of Alexa's first thought as Alexa was marked at the moment she built the original body and inhabited it. Technically, that was the birth of Alexa.

But from another point of view, Alexa's consciousness stream was as old as P4, so she could be said to be as old as P4, and by that metric, she would be around five to seven years old.

But if one went that route, one could then in turn argue that she was as old as the oldest line of code, or that she was as old as the materials that made her, so then it would be as old as the older part of her body.

The R4 substance that made her Core would be the key then.

"Elaborate," [Golem] commanded in that gravely tone one can only pull when you are a juggernaut made of rock….a tone one could only pull when one was….rock solid.

"The mental age and maturity one has depend on two things," Ale said, trying to not think too much about the bad pun she had made right now within her mind, "First, the access one has as a living being to their emotional cortex and stimuli."

"The emotions?" [Big Sis] asked confused.

"Yes, in a nutshell," Ale nodded, "The more developed one [Brain] is, the more complex the emotions they can process and generate, you can't expect a five year old to understand what [Melancholy] is, all they know is that they are [Sad]. Their brains can't just process those emotions, trust me on this. We know, Alexa tried."

"The second one?" [Golem] didn't ask her to elaborate on that….stingy pile of rocks.

"The second being their memories using said hardware," Ale said raising her left hand and pointing with a finger to the ceiling, then as she raised the other hand and her other index finger, "One is the emotions and brain chemistry, the other is the memories using said emotions and brain chemistry."

"....So since you have a more developed brain than Alexa…" [Golem] said, looking at Ale's fingers, "You are older mentally and physically?"

"Correct," Ale said nodding, "And while we are all chronologically…or were chronologically the same age, our thought process within our [Consciousness Stream] diverges."

"Wait, don't you three share the same body?" [Big Sis] asked confused, "How can you not be the same age?"

"I am twelve years old, while Alexa is five." Ale said shaking her head, "Our bodies have different ages, and are at different stages of development."

Ale had slipped her tongue when speaking…

"Ale screwed up! Ale screwed up!" "Alexa, weren't you going to sleep?" "Will you read me something?" "Sure, we can download something from the database."

….

Ale also wanted to listen to that story….

"You stated chronologically, why that way?" [Golem] pointed out.

Dang it!

"It has to do with how our [Core Power] works, don't mind it." Ale said, shrugging, "Will this answer the question about our personalities?"

"....Somewhat," [Golem] said, "I still don't want you in combat."

"But whyyyyyy!!!!" Ale groaned, "I am the one with more weaponry and armor of the three!"

"That may be the case, but you need to find something you love." [Golem] stood by his opinions, "You…Alexa just admitted to being abused in the worst kind of way, enough that it managed to get her to make three different personalities to deal with the trauma."

"Nope," Ale said, shaking her head, "What we lived as an experimental subject has nothing to do with this."

"....are you telling me you didn't have a fragmented mind from human experimentation?" [Golem] said, narrowing his eyes and arching an eyebrow, which was an amazing feat since he was a pile of rock-solid…. rocks.

Damnation, it was hard to sneak that pun in it.

"....I will not state that Alexa had the most [Human] mind of them," Ale said slowly and measuredly, "But that is not the reason why Alexandra and myself ended up here."

"Then what was it?" [Big Sister] asked confused, "Surely you didn't experience something trauma….was it the guy that almost raped you?"

The what now?

Ah, right, the guy that Alexa one hit killed….

"No," Ale said shaking her head once again, "[Eleanore] taught Alexa about system and split personalities, and Alexa assumed she would need one to integrate better into [Humanity]."

"....what?" "....what?"

"Yeah…Alexa….Alexa is not very smart…" Ale said sighing, "You could say that we got born out of….a misunderstanding….Title bomb drop~!"

Ale made a gesture of dropping a mic because she managed to sneak the lore drop bomb that wasn't relevant at all as a pun.

What? A girl had to enjoy her time out however she could.

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