Skirmish

Title: Skirmish
Series: The Stork Tower #8
Release Date: 18 July 2021
Pages: 552
ISBN13: 978-1-922336-16-3
ASIN: B099SD5HTH

A simple error leaves Leah with a unique Neural Enhancement Chip and a rapidly evolving AI implanted in her brain. In ‘Nascent’, she evaded kidnapping by virtual slavers and helped shut down some operations of the virtual crime syndicate that uses mind-controlled players as slaves.

In ‘Odyssey’, she not only found a way to escape, but she also uncovered deeper plots being carried out in both the virtual multi-universe and reality.

In ‘Change’, Leah began learning how to use the additional connections her chip has made throughout her body. The Pod facility she opened expanded as she helped others from her neighbourhood. Leah discovered that the crime syndicate has an even greater presence in the virtual multiverse than she’d imagined. As she begins to unravel some of their secrets, they tarnish her reputation and kidnap her mother.

In ‘Rescue’, Leah hacked the secure Vault where an AI friend of hers had been archived. She not only managed to retrieve her friend but uncovered a deeper conspiracy. Leah also managed to rescue her mother from the crime syndicate but not before her mother had an AI chip inserted in her brain. She discovers that her boyfriend’s family controls their own crime syndicate, and he was also being controlled.

In ‘Ipseity’, Leah discovers that the syndicate inserted a dangerous explosive AI chip in her mother. Leah’s neural architecture continues to change, allowing her greater awareness of what is happening around her and giving her the ability to multitask. She rescues her boyfriend as she moves closer on three virtual worlds to finishing significant quests. All the while, Leah works to win freedom and a future for her Personal AI, who is self-aware in a system that demands she be archived or deleted.

In ‘Contest’, Leah makes headway in all three quests as well as competing in the first Merkize Contest. Each quest is a contest of sorts, and she faces stronger adversaries than she has previously. Through all this, Leah struggles with her injuries and the threat of arrest overshadowing everything she does. In the end, she manages to rescue her mother but is arrested on suspicion of murder. She and her father, Michael, are abducted on the way to the police station.

In ‘Resurrection’, Leah’s chip is destroyed using a taser. The heat not only destroys the chip but leaves her blind, deaf, and dumb. She manages to escape those who kidnapped her and finds her way to a safe house by touch alone. Using her increased tactile sense and modified neural architecture, Leah constructs a way to see the world around her by imprinting the data on her body. After breaking into the hospital, she has two new, more advanced chips implanted. Now, with three AI in her head, Leah re-enters the multiverse looking for justice. In each world, she discovers that her role is expanding, and the smaller conflicts are threatening to explode in all-out war. In Dunyanin, she is the catalyst for the War of the Gods scenario. In Pneumatica, she has opened up a new world filled with Zombie-like creatures. She helps the resistance infiltrated one of the strongholds.

In ‘Skirmish’, the conflicts continue to grow, not only in the multiverse but also in the real world.

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