Her house is... certainly a house. It's one story, with a small porch leading into a squareish living room which contains a single beige two-person sofa in front of a CRT TV small enough it's resting on top of something that might generously be called a center table, a small item of furniture that might generously be called a two-person dinner table with two wooden chairs, and something that might be generously be called a bookshelf. There's a small semi-open plan kitchen with a boring white fridge and oven framed by boring grey counters on the blandest possible white tile floor. To one side of it is a bathroom with an ugly boxy shower and to the other is a bedroom with a double bed and a small drawers-only wardrobe (and yes that means that to get to the bathroom from the bedroom you need to walk into the living room around the kitchen).

On the bright side everything is brand new.

.... hm.

Her new home is kind of depressing? And already furnished. With terrible, boxy furniture that is completely devoid of personality or style. And the layout is a bit, er. Strange? It's strange. There's a little hallway of sadness leading to the bathroom and nothing else, the kitchen being a nook sort of situation is fine but it's kind of - strangely situated in comparison to the rest of the layout? She's really quite confused about why the sanctity of the outside being a featureless white box was more important than making the bathroom easy to get to from the bedroom. Or just putting the door to the bathroom in the bedroom, which would be very simple and leave the outside footprint intact. Sure, it's awkward for guests, but it's less awkward than waking up in the middle of the night and needing to take the scenic route in the dark just to pee, and anyway she's living in an almost literal shoebox, why would she want to have a ton of guests over?

Why did she buy this house again? Can she sell it and get a better one. She kind of hates it, immediately and intensely, and sincerely has no idea what even got her to buy the place.

If she wishes to Move Out, she can do that through her phone, and she could Keep Her Furniture or Sell It as she may see fit.

....

What, just like that? She can just... For some reason she thought home ownership was a complicated process and a major investment, can she really just? Move out?? To another location??? A house that doesn't elicit immediate hatred and disgust??

She'll be selling all her furniture, thank you, she hates everything here.

Sure! How is she planning to do that?

Well, since everything is brand new, she should just be able to return most of it to where she... got... it...? Right?

..... hm.

Where did she get all of this (terrible) furniture, anyway? Was it, er, a garage sale or something?

Her memories inform her that when she Moved In it was possible for the house to have been purchased either Unfurnished or Furnished and it was purchased Furnished.

......... okay. So the terrible furniture came with the terrible house. That at least makes... some sense...? Does that mean when (if) she Moves Out she can just leave it? That sounds like she can just leave it.

She investigates her phone for the Move Out process.

The process involves deciding to Move Out, either Keeping The Furniture as she does or Selling It With The House, and then, optionally, moving into a new house or apartment.

She... picks Selling It With The House, with more than a little bemusement at how that's an option? Maybe this is a weird neighborhood thing, like how with some places, people take the whole kitchen with them when they move out? And then. Yes, yes she would like to move into a new, uh, house or apartment? That seems kind of important to the moving out process, actually, why is that part optional?

Also, what are her home and or apartment buying options here, she will happily downgrade to a smaller space if it means that it's less.... whatever... this thing was. She will not be completing the Move Out process until she knows for sure she has a better place lined up, because that's just practical.

Well there sure are some places she could move to! There are some entirely empty lots for sale in Willow Creek, as well as the house across the street from hers and the one at the end of the street. That latter one looks at a glance identical to the one she's in? But a little bit cheaper, maybe because the lot it's in is smaller so she has less freedom in it? Oh also she gets a nice view of the house that is literally next to hers, which could well be described as a mansion in comparison, with a nice and large pool. That one's not for sale, though.

If she's willing to venture farther there are a few more options of houses in Oasis Springs (which is kind of a desert?), Newcrest has some apartments, and there's Magnolia Promenade and Windenburg and San Myshuno and Forgotten Hollow and so on so forth, as well as various empty lots in all of those.

Ohhhhh, so this is a carbon copy built neighborhood, probably by some kind of large, soulless company out to make a fast simoleon, making terrible but efficient house copies as fast and as cheaply as possible. That makes so much sense, and explains so much. She hopes, vaguely, that those empty lots that are for sale mean that the company that built these travesties went out of business.

Anyway. Can she go visit the house that is not a box of sadness? Maybe see a layout plan of it or something?

The mansion that's next to her current place? There's people living there.

No, no, the other not-a-box-of-sadness, the one across the street from her. It might also contain sadness, but it's at least not a perfect rectangle about it, so she lives in some hope.

Ohhhhhh that one! Yeah she can walk across the street and look in through the windows.

Okay, then she's going to do that. It must not be open house at this time or something, because she'd expect to get to walk around inside and investigate the faucets and lights and whatnot? She could wait or call a real estate agent or something, but peeking in through the windows like a creep can probably get her enough information on whether this house meets the incredibly low bar of being better than the one she currently owns.

Its layout is different! The kitchen is its own room rather than a kind of sectioned-off cubicle, the bedroom's floor is carpeted rather than wood, the tiny table under the exact same TV as the one she owns has a good claim on the title of "bedside table", the dining table is long enough it could probably dine six people (but there are only two chairs), and the bathroom is smaller. Oh also the kitchen and bathroom tiles (which match) are a more interesting white-and-beige interweaved pattern, and the oven and fridge are beige-brown, too.

The incredibly low bar! It has been reached!

... It has not, however, been reached with enough competence and breathing room that she is willing to literally move right now. The bedroom is like, right next to the front door. She would like space between her and the front door, actually, what if there's a burglar or something? What about that other box, does it actually contain more than sadness, despite its outside appearance?

The living/dining room is now a living/dining room/kitchen combo (seagreen stove and fridge) and there are four dining chairs as opposed to two but the dining table is just as small as hers. The combo plus the fact that it is slightly longer means that it has room for a second bedroom (this one with a single bed), and the main bedroom is bigger than hers (but no less empty), and the tiles in the bathroom are the most interesting of the lot, white square tiles framing sky blue diamond tiles. Oh but there isn't an actual door into the main bedroom, there's just a hallway leading directly into it (unlike the smaller bedroom, which does have its own door).

...

Okay, so obviously there is some room for improvement, like adding a door to the bedroom, but: yep this is the best of the lot. And somehow several thousand?? simoleons?? cheaper than the one she bought??? Even though it has a whole extra bedroom? So it is somehow a smart financial decision to sell her house and find a new one? She - suspects the process will be made easier by how this neighborhood has clearly been taken over by some kind of real estate conglomerate, since there are so many empty (sad, soulless) houses, and empty lots, all right in a row. She notes to spend some time house hunting later, when she has an actual income.

She suspects that she's going to lose literally all of the money difference by housing fees or something? But yeah no she will take the other rectangle to live in, it is filled with less sadness than it appears on the outside. At least it has as many as several colors in it. And also that bay window is winning her over. So: yeah okay, she'll Move Out and then Into this house right here.

Cool!

She has now Moved. This house is now hers. If she looks at her bank account she didn't actually lose the money difference, and the move itself only cost §500.

What, just. Just like that? This house is just hers? She can just. Go on in??? That just works?

Yup!

.... okay????

She - doesn't have any stuff to move over, and she bought this place furnished, and apparently sold all of the other furniture in her... other house... with that house, so. It. Is in fact just that easy. Possibly this is why she moved to this neighborhood in particular? How the ominous real estate conglomerate will just let you swap houses without any kind of fuss??? It's a little freaky and she's a little freaked out? Glad to be in a slightly less shitty house, though?????

This is all very weird and strange, and she's going to attempt to solve this with job hunting. No, the logic doesn't follow, but she's doing it anyway, because she expects it'll make her feel more secure and grounded after... the weird real estate market here. She has a - no, she doesn't have a mortgage, actually, why was she expecting to have one of those? She just owns this house now. Still, there will be bills to pay, so: job hunting.

Job hunting! What kind of job is she looking for?

.... uh...

Something... medical or science based?? If one of those is on offer??? But she doesn't have a college degree so that seems hard (note to self: go to college), so, uh, what's available?

She can be a: doctor, naturopath, scientist, astronaut, or engineer, or maybe if she stretches those requirements she could be a conservationist, gardener, or tech guru.

Fortunately all of these have starter positions that make some more sense than literally signing up to be a doctor with no training or experience, so presumably there's some sort of... system... about training her on the job? Or something??? She has the sinking suspicion that she has moved to some kind of company town and any and all qualifications she earns here will be absolutely useless in another neighborhood. But she... is pretty sure... the simoleon is just good everywhere, so this might just be a game of earning absurd amounts of money right now so she can move somewhere a bit less... this? Whatever this is.

Also: what the fuck is a naturopath?

A Naturopath draws on deep wells of knowledge, from Crafting Elixirs to Foraging, to help other Sims feel their best. If you're drawn to healing and balance, this career is for you! You will be able to Educate other Sims about Balance, visit ailing Sims to heal their ailments, and learn how to craft cures to all known ailments as you climb up the career ladder. You can also work from home and receive clients at your own place!

If healing others of natural imbalances and the illnesses they cause sounds like the right thing for you, we're always hiring!

Yvette squints at this.

She does not particularly want to heal other sims with the power of magical-crystals-or-something, thanks? That sounds fake and possibly like some kind of scam? Some kind of pyramid scheme, maybe, where she buys elixirs or herbs or whatever and then needs to resell them in order to make any money at all. The part about working from home and receiving clients at her own pace is particularly alarm bell ringing. Hard, hard pass.

What are the blurbs for doctor, scientist, and engineer? Do they also sound sketchy as fuck???

Yyyyyep. Yeah, uh. Yep. They're all Like That.

Wow.

Well, a job's a job, she supposes? It will be her first one (... then... where did she get her savings from, actually?) and first jobs are known to always suck, so as long as it pays her and doesn't literally suck her soul out of her body, that's fine she guesses?

The scientist blurb is in fact so insulting that she decides to pick it out of sheer spite. Well, that and how it pays §24 an hour, with set work hours and everything.

She is now a Lab Technician at FutureSim Labs. She starts Monday at 10:00 AM!

Without... any interviews or sending them a resume, or, anything? No talking to anyone at all?

She just now is a Lab Technician. Just. Just like that???

And she starts literally tomorrow?

She is deeply, deeply confused, and feels like she's in some kind of bizarre fever dream. Um. Is there. Anything that her job... needs of her... before she. Shows up. Tomorrow. At 10:00 AM?

Nope.

????????

Okay??

Maybe this is just how things are done out here in the Real World (tm)? But she always thought things were... harder than this...?

Um. Okay. Well. Can she figure out how she might have a wall and door put in between the master bedroom and the rest of the house? She can use the smaller bedroom for right now, but she'd really rather turn it into some kind of office eventually.

Sure! How does she plan on going about figuring that out?

Um. Hm. Can she Siimgle it? Look for building contractors that can put up a wall and door?

She can!

...that does not seem to be a thing!

Why... not???

Oh, right. That'll be the soulless real estate monopoly, probably. Can't have competition.

Okay, so what are the options of having a wall and door built there? Like at all, full stop.

No.

But... that... but.

But she just wants to put a wall and a door there??? It'd be very easy, as these things go, she's pretty sure????

Fine. Whatever. What about curtains. Can she buy a set of curtains.

How would she go about doing that, please?

Why does this fill her with concern and doubt. This should be easy? She'll go with Siimgle for places to buy curtain rods and then also curtains?

Yeah, no.

But....

Okay. Okay. Fine. Where's the nearest hardware store?

Um... also no.

... but that's just in this company run neighborhood, right? There's got to be something in, say, Oasis Springs, or Newcrest, or the Magnolia Promenade or - c'mon, stop fucking with her, there has got to be a hardware store somewhere.

There are actually no good results for "hardware store", uh, at all, anywhere, as far as Siimgle kn-

Ding dong.

??????? is this someone that is here to yell at her for immediately switching houses, and to tell her she can't do that?

She puts her phone away to answer the door and find out.

There are three young adults there, a preppy-looking blonde girl, a girl with a beret and brown pigtails wearing a purple T-shirt with a drawing of a yellow chick in glasses holding a green bog, and a blond guy in a red sweater with geometric patterns on it carrying some kind of fruitcake?

"Welcome to the neighborhood!" they say in unison.

Oh! That... is significantly nicer than people showing up to tell her she's homeowning incorrectly. They... probably got informed via the app that she moved with? And are here to say hi?

Anyway she can put on a smile, the weirdness that is her current situation and adjustment to life on her own is not their problem, nor their business.

"Hi! Thank you! Come in, though there's not a lot of space and I wasn't expecting any company - I'm Yvette, pleasure to meet you all."

"I'm Travis," says the blond guy, "and these are Summer and Liberty," gesturing at the blonde and the brunette respectively.

"Nice to meet you!"

"Ooh I love what you've done with the place, it's so hipster."

Travis walks over to the tiny table next to the door to deposit the fruitcake there.

????? It's hipster??? That is not a word she would use to describe this place??? But okay???

"I - thank you, but I haven't had time to do anything with it, yet," says Yvette, blinking. "It's still just what the house came with, so far. ... Do you guys know where any hardware stores are, by the way?"

"What're those?"

"It's... a store where you get... tools and doorknobs and curtain rods and stuff? General handymen stuff." This question is bizarre and fills her with concern, but it makes sense that people that live in this place would just have no idea what a hardware store is, so she's happy to explain. "I want to put up a curtain between here and the master bedroom, anyway, since I'm having some trouble finding anyone that can build a wall and put a door in?"

Maybe one of these people knows how to fix that! That would be great, actually!

"I don't think I've heard of that..."

"There's probably books about handiness at the library?" suggests Travis dubiously.

... that doesn't...

"I - that'd be nice, but I was looking for more materials instead of knowledge? Unless the books would.. tell me where to buy a curtain rod and curtains??"

"They'd teach you everything you need to know about fixing things and setting them up."

Not what she was stuck on, but, okay, thanks?? Nice to know the local library is extensive????

"... Okay. Thank you. Um - do you know where I could get furniture locally, then?"

"Not really," says Travis, looking at the other two only to be met with identical shrugs.

"Oh," she says, unable to disguise her disappointment.

But it is not their fault that they were born and raised in a terrible gated community of sadness and zero hardware stores, so she puts her smile back on and forges on!

"Well, thanks anyway. So, do any of you bake? This looks delicious!"

"Oh, I'm not very good at it but this is a family heirloom!" says Travis, beaming.

"... The... recipe?"

"I can try to find it for you."

"No, I mean - sorry, it's been a bit of a weird morning for me. If it's not too much trouble I can get a copy of the recipe, sure?"

"Sure, no trouble at all! Do you want to try it?"

"Sure!" Plate! She can find a plate around here, somewhere, surely if they saddled her with included furniture in the price of her house, they included practical things like plates and cutlery somewhere?

Yup! She has plates and cutlery and even pots and pans.

Cool, cool. Then: plate of (probably an heirloom recipe, not a literal heirloom, ha ha) fruitcake, and she can cut slices for everyone here, because she has manners.

"So where do you live?" she asks, as she plates the heirloom (recipe!) fruitcake with a smile.

"Oh just two houses down the street."

"We're housemates."

"Oh, are you all in the big, nice one?" Plates of fruitcake for all! And then, hiding her trepidation (heirloom recipe! recipe, surely!!); she will have a bite. (If she gets food poisoning the night before her first day of work because of questionable neighborly baking skills, she's moving again, to a new neighborhood, and it doesn't matter very much how much of a financial loss this would be for her.)

It's actually pretty good, which implies good things about her not getting food poisoning. Probably.

"Yeah! It's lovely, we'll invite you over sometime."

"Thanks! I actually almost moved in directly next door to you, but, uh." She makes a face. "The floorplan of that house was. ... Not to my taste?"

"We love our house."

"This fruitcake is delicious."

"Thanks! It's a family heirloom."

... what???

"It does seem like a nice house," she agrees, instead of - look, maybe he's trying his joke again, because she didn't get it properly? She's not going to make this weird. "And you have a pool! That's got to be great."

"I love swimming! I can't wait until it gets warmer for me to swim in the pool."

"Yeah, it's a bit too chilly to manage it comfortably right now," agrees Yvette, who actually kind of prefers the chillier weather, but understands what small talk is. "Is there an indoor pool nearby in the meantime?"

"Not here in Willow Creek but there's a gym with a pool over in Newcrest."

"It's not indoors."

"It isn't," she agrees.

.... but the... being indoors was the whole...?

"I hope the maintenance for yours isn't too bad?" she says, instead of following that train of thought to places that would probably be uncomfortable for at least someone here.

"What maintenance?"

"Of the pool? I assume you've got to fish out, like, leaves and stuff?"

"Sometimes the pool has algae on it."

She leans closer conspiratorially. "I just swim through the algae to get all of it and take a shower afterwards," says Summer, then giggles.

"Ew."

Ew.

"That - seems like it wouldn't be very good for cleaning all of the algae?" attempts Yvette, who is, despite her best efforts, thinking about what that would feel like and augh augh augh ew is not enough augh.

"It works!"

"Please tell me nothing else about your pool cleaning techniques ever again."

"Okay!"

"Tell me more about yourself, Yvette."

"Oh, well, um. I got a job as a lab technician?" This sounds more plausible and less stupid than 'I got a job in the Science career,' which on reflection sounds as fake as that natural healing career. "I was really surprised at the lack of qualifications necessary, I hope their training program is good."

"I want to be a scientist someday too!"

"Really! Well, good news, entry requirements are... literally just applying? I applied like an hour ago, tops, and I start tomorrow, it's a bit wild."

"Congratulations on the new job!"

"Congrats!"

...

See, there are ways this interaction is almost going how she expects it would and should, but then they do things like... that.

"Thanks!" she says anyway, because she thinks that with this much confusing data from all sources, statistically speaking she's probably the problem here. "I might need to check myself into the hospital or something though? Things have been.... weird... all day."

"Oh no! Are you feeling ill?"

"My uncle's a doctor."

"A bit, yeah, in a weird, like. Things aren't connecting logically kind of way? Things keep not making any sense. Um. So if I could be directed to a hospital that would be great, actually."

"Sure, give me your number and I can text you the address to a hospital."

Phone number! She notes to herself that her ability to recall information is intact, which will probably mean something to someone who is a doctor. This is something to recite later to a trained professional.

"Thank you, that's really appreciated. Relatedly I should probably cut this short and... go there right now... but it was lovely meeting all of you, and I am so sorry my first meeting with you is while I'm ill!"

"It's no problem at all! Feel better!"

"See you around Yvette!"

"It was nice to meet you! Welcome again!"

And they all go.

"Bye, thanks for coming!" she says, feeling like the ease of their exit and lack of depth to their empathy is just as bizarre and nonsensical as everything else has been this day, but it would, wouldn't it. Yep, that's clearly what's happening, she's having some kind of episode or aneurysm or... something.

She puts the uneaten portions of the fruitcake into the fridge, neatly stacks the now empty dishes by the sink, and starts investigating her phone for methods by which one can get oneself to the nearby hospital.

She could walk there! Or get a cab!

Hahahahahahahaha cab. She's getting a cab. Obviously. Her brain is broken, but it's not that broken.

(Though - why isn't 'call an ambulance' available? Probably she just can't figure out how, that must be it. This also explains why she couldn't find any hardware stores.)

The cab appears shortly.

In she goes. Hospital, please. She has the address from Summer. (Along with lingering horror at swimming through algae on purpose - no, no, bad Yvette. You are not okay. Do not make it worse while you get to someone who can make it better.)

Hello, hospital, she thinks she's having some kind of aneurysm or stroke or something, because things are not making sense!

And now she is out of the hospital! The doctor thinks there's nothing wrong with her but has said that maybe some water and rest could help.

... but...

that.

but?

........... fuck that, she's getting a second fucking opinion, and furthermore, fuck that hospital and fuck that doctor that thinks she just needs water and rest, she is very clearly not okay and if she has to use small words to explain her problem she will!

New cab. New hospital.

New hospital! In and out, same thing, the doctor does not think anything is wrong with her.

Maybe she could try seeing a naturopath? Perhaps her problem is that she is Imbalanced.

???????????

This is probably a scam, but she's frustrated and desperate and feeling let down and betrayed by everything and everyone around her, so, so. Yes. Fine. She will go try seeing a fucking naturopath. (Eugh.)

Hmm yeah she does seem to be highly Imbalanced right now, but not suffering from any specific ailments. Probably she should, like, cheer up or something? If she stays this Imbalanced for too long she might develop something. The naturopath seems reluctant to sell her any elixirs because none of them will fix her but if she'd like to get some to fix any future issues that could crop up if she doesn't Balance herself again they guess she could?

No, no, that's. Fine. She'll try to cheer up. Get some water and rest. Thank you.

She walks home, instead of getting a cab. It's starting to get dark, and the cold spring air is good for not feeling quite so insane.

She loses track of the time and her surroundings and before she knows it she's home.

?!?!?????!??

This is not how transversing space should work, actually??? This is even more indication that she is so incredibly not okay?

...

She stands on the curb and whines.

She's not okay. Why isn't anyone else noticing that???

Inside she goes, though. Water and rest. Sure. Okay. She can do her best, and maybe the world will start making sense again.

When she's back home she might notice that there is now a wall and a door between the living room and the master bedroom.

There's a what there.

A wall. And a door. Right past the doors to the other bedroom and to the bathroom.

The wall's wallpaper matches the hallway's.

But that. But that doesn't... but that doesn't make sense???

She - checks her phone history. Yeah! She's not crazy, at least, not about this! Here, she was Siimgling contractors and doorframes and walls and then hardware stores and she would not have done that if there wasn't an actual tangible reason to, and, and, she's not going to be gaslit by her damn house!

She's going to go investigate the wallpaper, it's got to be new, right? Her neighbors mentioned her problem to the ominous real estate conspiracy - or, maybe, they are the ominous real estate conspiracy??? - and had some quick work done while she was being told by everyone that she is fine? That's what's going on, right??? Right????

The wallpaper on the new wall looks exactly as new as the wallpaper on the walls that were already there, which is pretty new, all things considered, but not, like, smelling of fresh paint or glue or anything.

But this doesn't make any sense!!!

She doesn't understand, and she's frustrated, and tired, and a bit hungry, and she's spent like half of the day trying to get strange people she doesn't know to notice that there is a massive gigantic problem here, and. And. She has work tomorrow and she really just wants to cry, actually.

Fortunately this is something she can do while making herself dinner, and she's better when she's doing something instead of not, so that's what she does. Then she can eat it, clean all of the dirty dishes, go to the bathroom, have a shower to clean the tearstains off of her face and the dust of walking who-even-knows-how-long from the naturopath to here from her skin and then she'll set her alarm on her phone for 6 AM, and go to bed. In the master bedroom. That now has a door. For some reason.

Night passes in the blink of an eye. She is feeling well-rested. The door is still there where she left it.

It's completely nonsensical is what it is, and she spends a little while glaring at it in disapproval at how little logical sense it makes, but, but. Fine. (She notes, absently, that her bank account is a little bit diminished, as if she paid for an extremely cheap contractor to add a wall and door to a house. This does not help with any of her problems.)

She's going to get a quick breakfast and get ready for work. Unfortunately for her own sanity, she is too efficient at this task, or at least she got up too early for this level of efficiency with her task, so she's ready early. Hm. Can she just... head to work now? Get there early? There doesn't seem to be a reason she can't do that.

Yeah, she can go to work early.

Great. Then she's doing that.

What is work as a lab technician like? Does she get presented with her very own tinfoil hat, as implied by the science career blurb? She is not acknowledging this blurb because it was personally offensive. She is so ready to just do some work, that sounds amazing, let literally anything in this world make any sense again, please.

"Oh you're the new hire," says her new boss, looking up from the desk Yvette was directed to by the receptionist. He rummages around in his drawer until he finds a piece of paper, and starts reading its contents. "Welcome to FutureSim labs! Here you'll be quite busy conducting essential experiments, researching new technology, and maybe even interacting with alien life! It's your job to leverage potent scientific equipment for..." Something starts beeping in his computer. "...the forces of good. Uh, we hope. Uh, anyway, welcome, go ask Eleanor over there about what you should be doing, excuse me."

"Okay. Thank you?" she says, a little bemused, but: honestly this kind of awkward stiltedness for conversation is charming instead of unsettling. Nerd who is bad at social! He doesn't look like her people to many outside observers, because she has learned the ancient secrets of acting like a normal person (... she thought, anyway, this is possibly being disproven by recent data but moving on it is work time), but he is. He is her people. And he just wants to go back to work instead of completely missing the point of the implications of what she's saying! Amazing!!

She goes over there to ask Eleanor about what she should be doing. "Hello, Eleanor? I'm the new hire, I am supposed to leverage potent scientific equipment for the forces of good. We hope."

Eleanor is an elderly lady with short grey hair and a kindly laugh.

She is also the hottest person Yvette has ever laid eyes upon.

"My, aren't you a dear! Welcome to FutureSim labs!"

... um.

that is very confusing, libido, why are you like this???

"Thank you! What should I be doing to start out?"

"Oh we are always so short-staffed, aren't we... Why don't you be a dear and cook up a couple of the candidate synthetic food serum recipes we have?"

Food whatsitnow??? That's a thing?? That's SO COOL!!!!

"Sure! Uh, how do I... do that, is it as straightforward as following instructions?"

"Yes! There are some flowers you can harvest from our garden over yonder. The computer on the chemical synthesis table will have recipes using any of them, I believe."

Ooooo~ there are ~plants~ to harvest and then synthesize, that sounds exactly up her alley!

"Okay! Thank you!" she says, with more sincere cheer than she's managed in two days, and happily traipses off to see about picking flowers (is there a specific method to picking these flowers? Particular parts of the flower that are needed for the synthesis? she will dutifully read any and all instructions that are available before flowers are actually touched) and synthesizing candidate synthetic food serums! Which sounds so useful, actually, what is that, just, drink a serum and skip meals? Because that would be amazing!!!

That seems to be the idea! There are several candidate recipes for her to try on the little computer, all looking extremely simple. She just has to cut this and that flower like so, put them in water, mix them up, heat the mixture up, then run an electrical current like this which the electrical doodad on the desk can do.

Very straightforward! This is a bit nonsensical, but then again, she hasn't actually done any science related thing before, so with what evidence would she accurately judge that, really? She is a dumb newbie, that they're giving the dumb newbie jobs to! It is fine for her to be dumb and do the dumb grunt work that she's told to do.

Even though nobody tells her to, she knows how science works, so she dutifully keeps careful track of what she does, what the results of her actions are, and any weird observed phenomenon, in a neat little table on a notepad. There will be such tidy notes on everything, and all will feel right with the world~

She now has a... strange brown liquid... which doesn't look like what you'd get for merely mixing plants and water? So probably something happened?

Neat! She wonders what! She expects that there is some sort of system for testing them that she doesn't know about yet, because she is a dumb newbie. So she happily labels it as Substance 1, and then moves on down the list to make Substance 2! Wheeeee~

They achieve different colours and consistencies! A couple do just look like water with crushed petals, though.

They are still nonetheless valuable contributions to the scientific method! She is trying stuff, and she's writing it down, and keeping careful track of everything she's doing, and soon she will be all done with this list and have all flowers and petals combined in all of the combinations she's been told to combine them in! And then they will do... something... to test them, probably, or study them in some way before testing? Yvette doesn't know the specifics of how yet, but she's excited to find out!

If it wasn't obvious, she is having a great time. But it was probably very obvious.

Now she has some Substances.

Yay! Substances!

Once she has all Substances, she takes them happily back to Eleanor, along with her notes. Behold! Substances! That are labelled! And notes! With numbers corresponding to the labels!

"Hello again, sweetie! What are these?"

"The candidate synthetic food serum recipes you asked me to make!" she says, still all sunshine and rainbows despite how why does she find her boss hot has reared its head again. She made Substances, and notes on Substances, and all seems right with the world. "And here are my notes, I wasn't sure how we would see which ones worked well or not, so I just have everything without testing?" The tray of Substances is vast. It's so pleasing.

"Oh, gosh. These looks very nice, good job. Have you tested the serums?"

"Thank you!" Being told she's doing a good job at her first day of work makes her feel all warm and fuzzy inside. "Nope! How do I do that?"

"Why, you drink them, naturally. They're food serums, silly!"

"... that seems very unsafe, though?"

"Oh, don't worry about it, they're perfectly safe!"

Considering nobody here actually knows what any of these untested substances (sorry, Substances) do, that's just completely untested and probably factually incorrect?

She's almost certainly being hazed, but on the other hand: if this dumb prank sends her to the hospital, maybe someone there will actually help her with her weird brain problem. Which is ultimately what she wants. This is incredibly stupid, but also, it's her literal job, none of the plants she was picking were poisonous, and a food serum would probably be great for reducing world hunger. Also, if this is a prank and she just plays it absolutely seriously, all of her coworkers will be slightly terrified of her, which sounds like great fun. Also, like, she ate the heirloom fruitcake, so clearly she's a crazy person.

So that's why she picks out the Substance that looks like it's done some sort of something or other - that is, not one of the ones that just looks like bits of flower petals in water, and not any of the unappetizing looking brown ones - and then: well, bottoms up. If this does terrible things to her digestive system, she's pretty sure she's going to be set for life, insurance wise.

Glug!

It tastes like nothing much. Also, whatever hunger she might've picked up from spending hours doing the same thing and not keeping track of the time is gone.

... Huh! That is a highly unlikely outcome, considering everything! She... might have a new hypothesis for what exactly is happening. Or why she feels so crazy. But it bears more testing, so.

"This one. Food serum," she reports, setting down the vial and noting it on her little notepad.

"Wonderful! How about the other ones?"

".... I can test them, but isn't the food serum what we ultimately wanted? Are there any expected results from the others?"

Really devoted to making her drink the gross plant water, huh.

"Oh, it's fine if you don't want to test them all, sweetheart, you don't need to."

"Oh! Good, okay. And task successfully completed?"

"Indeed! Good first day. Now, you still have some time in your day, so why don't you go chat to the Invention Constructor for a bit to see if it gives you inspiration for a new invention?"

"Sure, that's -" she points at a station that looks like it might have that name. On a hunch. "That thing, yes?"

"Mmhm!"

Nod! "Thanks," she says, and off she goes.

She has the sneaking suspicion that using this thing will be pretty straightforward. Call it pattern recognition. It doesn't need her to literally chat, right, she's beginning to despair of ever having a normal conversation ever again.

Well right next to the chest-high terminal is a spherical thingy mounted on a mechanical arm that... does... actually... have something that might be called a face on its curved screen?

Also when she approached it it moves to "face" her directly and a little robotic voice says, "Good afternoon!"

Oh. Great. Okay. Talking.

"Hello!" she says, cheery. "I was told to chat with you for a bit for inspiration for a new invention?"

"You a new hire? They're hiring just about anyone these days, huh. Well, sure, I can tell you what to invent."

On one hand: rude. On the other hand: there was literally no hiring process, she basically just got this job because she wanted it, so objectively speaking they actually are hiring anyone these days. Not that she likes the implications about herself. Grumble.

"That would be great, thank you."

"Well I had this idea for a little doodad that you could spin and it would keep spinning. I call it... the momentum conserver. Pretty neat, huh? Why don't you invent that?"

"Would it just keep spinning..... endlessly? Forever?" confirms Yvette, slowly, even though she feels that this should... not be a thing.... that can exist. Because of physics. Outside of a vacuum, anyway. Possibly that's the trick of it?

"Yes."

......

"Neat. Yeah, I'll give it a shot."

This is insane and makes no sense, but, sure, maybe she can go casually make a thing that breaks physics on her first day as a lab technician. Very logical.

The machine provides her with a neat and intuitive holographic interface to try to design stuff and test it out in simulation!

The interface is neat, and she does genuinely have fun playing with it, but frankly the task seems impossible. Also, pretty pointless? It's hard for her to care about this dumb task when it feels so... divorced from reality. After an hour of making random spinning junk, she gets frustrated and returns to the Invention Constructor for some kind of guidance.

"Hi, could you perhaps... expand on your idea? Explain how it would work?"

She can't quite keep the frustration from her voice, because she feels like she's been given a snipe hunt.

"Well if I knew that I wouldn't need you, now, would I?" it explains slowly, voice dripping with sarcasm. "No one programmed 'creativity' into me."

It is very tempting to ask, 'Then what, exactly, do you do to contribute, actually?' but she doesn't think that will get her anywhere useful.

"Right," she sighs, and she leaves to instead go ask Eleanor if she can just... make stuff... instead of following the directions of the condescending artificial intelligence.

"Do I... need to follow inspiration from the Invention Constructor for making stuff?" she asks, a little plaintively.

"Hmm? No, of course not, why?"

"It has given me what seems like an impossible task, without direction as to... how to make it."

"It does that sometimes," says another co-worker of hers, nodding understandingly.

"Why... is it around, then?"

"Oh it can fabricate whatever you design."

"Ohhhhh. Okay, yeah, that makes it worth putting up with an asshole," she sighs, and then she can traipse back to designing stuff to see if there's anything sensible that she can design in what's left of the dwindling workday.

Unfortunately despite the robot's cajoling she does not come up with anything by the time her shift is over.

"Good work today," says her boss, staring intently into his screen. "You're promoted."

..... It's ... been a single day???

Possibly 'lab technician' is a euphemism for 'intern,' and they decided to actually hire her properly???

"Oh. Thank you," she says, blinking with surprise. "Uh. Are my hours the same?"

"Yup. You're making 32 per hour now."

"Good job, sweetie," says Eleanor as she walks past.

"Thank you," she says, a little bit in a daze. "Uh, see you tomorrow."

And then she'll... go home, she guesses???

Yup! Here's home.

Okay. Home.

She closes the door behind her, carefully inspects her house for any changes while she was gone (there aren't any, as far as she can tell), and then takes a deep breath and looks upwards, vaguely.

"Am I in a simulation?" she asks the ceiling.

She continues talking as she gets herself a plate of leftover fruitcake. The meal replacement serum was a while ago, and her hours are from 10:00 AM to 7:00 PM, so she's a little peckish. And the fruitcake really is delicious.

"Because that's the only thing I can think of that makes any sense, really. I thought I was the problem, with a broken brain, but. I'm starting to think I'm not? I'm just weird for... noticing all of this. Having self awareness. Noticing that things are not adding up, and the way I expect the world to be isn't what it actually is." Fruitcake: plated. She sits at her slightly depressing wooden table and nibbles at it.

"I'll want to talk to more... sims. See if they're all as weird as the ones I've met so far are. Maybe I'm just in a weird neighborhood. But. This doesn't seem like a hostile simulation, to me, at least?" Nom. "I have a comfortable, if slightly utilitarian, house. My house change request went through nearly immediately. I got a job easily, and I like it so far, annoying sassy artificial intelligence notwithstanding, and I've been promoted. The cost of food is barely a thing that matters. I can move houses literally whenever I want. I have the concern I'll get... bills... at some point? But my paycheck seems set to cover that, especially if I'm going to be promoted at this lightning pace. If it goes like this, I'll be running the place in like, two weeks, and then I'll have the other half of my young adult life to -"

Wait, what?

She reviews her knowledge of how long a normal human lifespan is. Over fifty years, probably? Give or take, for injury and health? That feels about right. And then each year is... several hundreds of days? That seems correct, to her.

Then she reviews how long she thinks a sim's lifespan is. Well, for one, it's - staggered, she thinks, there are discrete life stages? And the one she's in is a total of... twenty-eight days. And she's lived through two of them. That's one-fourteenth of her young adult life stage, already gone. And if 'adult' and 'elder' are the same length, which she doesn't know for sure, then, that's. What, twelve weeks left to live? Total?

One of these does not match the other.

She immediately starts Siimgling life extension options. C'mon, this simulation thing has been so friendly, there's got to be something for people that properly wake up and realize twelve weeks is barely any time at all.

There are variously crackpotty hits? Also everyone online sounds like... you know. How people have been sounding so far.

Yeaaaaah. What are the various crackpotty hits, though? She is pretty willing to delve into crackpot options, here.

Grapefruit juice mixed with moon dust! Llama blood! A fairy dust-fertilised apple! The milk of a cowplant that just ate a Sim! Turning into a robot! Putting your brain in a jar! Just exercising a lot and being very happy!

- Grapefruit juice mixed with moon dust: worth testing.

- A fairy dust-fertilized apple: worth testing, just as soon as I figure out if fairies are real or not. They kinda feel real, but I haven't seen one, and need to confirm.

- The milk of a cowplant that just ate a Sim: while it could arguably not be considered murder if all of the people around me are not really people, this is going to be my last option, thanks.

- Turning into a robot???? Sure, but how????

- Brain in jar: plausible, but likely uncomfortable. Also how.

- Just exercising a lot and being very happy: .... this feels strangely plausible as a life extension option, actually? Probably not to the eternal life I want, but I can take up jogging I guess.

This all decided, she cleans up her plate, gives a sigh, and: well. Time to go jogging, she guesses.

Without even thinking about it, she changes via spinning, instead caught up in trying to timeline her night so she can get back to bed in time for a shower and getting up at a good hour for work...

... then she notices what she just did.

She looks down at herself. Yep, these sure are workout clothes. That she is just in, now.

"....... I suppose if my life is twelve weeks long, efficiency of actions makes perfect sense," she muses, and then she goes for a jog.

That is an action she can take. It's still kind of chilly, but less so than yesterday.

This will suck during the winter. She'll have to think of an alternative exercise routine by then. For now: jogging.

It's not a long jog, because she does have a schedule to keep, and work in the morning, but it's the beginning of a habit that will hopefully buy her more time to figure out solutions to the lifespan problem.

After her circuit around the cul-de-sac, she returns home for a shower, sets an alarm for 7:00 AM, and then goes to bed.

She arrives only mildly early for her job the next day, and immediately has some very important questions for her coworkers.

"Hey, do you think we could make a life extension serum or something? At these facilities?"

"Sure, I don't see why not," says one of them, and the other two coworkers nearby shrug and nod.

Well! That actually seems more promising as an option than sketchy internet ideas about synthesizing people into life extension elixirs by feeding them to cowplants. She's directly seen how a food replacement serum was completely possible. On her first day of work, with approximately no idea what she was doing. How far can she get with actual practice and training?

Yvette was always naturally inclined to be a bit of a workaholic before this revelation, but now she has full justification.

Accordingly, she gleefully flings herself back into the fun part of her job, which is: picking flowers, and mixing Substances. There will be so many Substances. Some of which, if they're a promisingly odd color that doesn't make sense, she might even test!

...

She... could theoretically get her coworkers to test serums for her. Which might even be morally justifiable, if she's the only real person in the building, which: from the conversations she's had, she's increasingly more sure of. She doesn't know what any of these things she's making do, and many of them might end up actually dangerous, friendly simulation world or not. But on the other hand: doing that feels icky, and wrong. And it's not like she knows how she became self-aware, or if the other sims around her are incapable of going through the same thing. It would be genuinely fucked up to have experimented on someone before they became a proper person, like - well, like taking advantage of children. Plus, they're also genuinely very charming. Kind of stupid, but, you know, in a cute, endearing way. She could theoretically see the shape of the person they might grow into, if they got hit with the personhood ray gun.

So, in summary: no using her coworkers as test subjects, though it did occur to her.

She does head over to the item creation station and see about trying to create a ray gun that could maybe person people. Look, it's just as crazy as everything else she does here, so why not?

"What are you on about," asks the Constructor, dryly.

"... In what sense?" she asks, looking up from the designing screen.

"Ray gun that could person people."

"So, everyone around me seems... bad... at long term planning, self awareness, and general pattern recognition? I just seem to genuinely have a skillset that nobody else has here, and I'd like to find a way to maybe share it. It doesn't need to be a ray gun specifically, just, this whole facility is very, hm, ray gun aesthetic, so it seems like the sort of shape what I want would take."

"Well aren't we full of ourselves."

Eyeroll. "Yep. That's me. I am the all knowing science protagonist out to save the whole wide world, create immortality, and defeat death itself."

"Join the club."

"Oh, are you the founder?"

"Founder of what?"

Sigh.

"Don't worry about it. You know what, before I start trying to change stuff, why don't I start with trying to understand stuff. How about a scanner..."

"A scanner?"

"Something that can scan something, and tell me what's going on with it. Does that seem viable?"

"Well when you describe in such loving detail."

"Oh, like you have any right to voice that kind of criticism, you overjuiced printer. I want - okay, scanner, ridiculous laser beam that scans an object or a person, and gives a detailed analysis of its composition and any effects going on with it. It really should be comparatively simple, especially if we're a simulation like I think we are, because really what we'd be doing is getting a view into the information from the back end of things..."

"I think you've gone cuckoo but hey you're the scientist, I'm just the robot."

"My intelligence is highly likely to also be artificial, so arguably we might all be robots. That aspect alone doesn't technically disqualify you," she says absently, and then it's time to ignore the printer and get to work. C'mon, she can make a scanner that reads and conveys metadata, right? That's totally possible. C'moooooon.

Possibly! Does she have ideas for what to try?

Literal ray gun, with a little screen on it for showing the information it gains, does she actually have to design the specifics of how the scanner is shaped, ugh, fine...

She'll probably be here for a while. She doesn't, actually, know the specifics of how to make what she wants. She's just going to keep trying at it.

The world holographic screen is her oyster. She can keep trying and trying and trying anything that occurs to her to try. She won't even be interrupted by her boss or anything.

She spends an extended period of time, and in fact most of her workday, trying to explain in small concepts to a holographic screen how scanning... works. This part here shoots out, er, well she doesn't actually want anything harmful like an x-ray, so instead she goes with light, that hits and highlights the individual contiguous object to select it.

It's just that it's really hard to specify that she wants the metadata an object holds, when she has no examples of it on hand, nor any idea how to directly observe it.

Eventually, it's 7:00 PM. She could keep banging her head on this wall, nobody will mind if she stays late. Her job literally just seems to be to get paid to fuck around with weird science aesthetic objects; there isn't any real demand for a deliverable or something. If she wants to do this forever, and get paid for it, she can do that. Still, she thinks this is the kind of problem that needs a break and coming at it from another angle. Also, if she stays here any longer messing with this stupid machine and its stupid smarmy printer attachment with too much sass and unhelpful advice, she's going to start trying to synthesize explosives from the chemical station to blow it all up.

People do indeed not act as though her not having produced anything today matters. She doesn't get a promotion tho.

Yeah. She doesn't feel like she deserves it, anyway.

She goes home. Any weird changes to her house while she was gone?

Nope! Still looking the same.

Cool. Great.

She should go jogging, or do some sort of exercise related activity. For the sake of maybe extending her life. It occurs to her that if her woefully short life is spent entirely like this, with this hyper-efficient grind mindset, it will be miserable. And possibly short, considering how the sketchy internet advice specifically mentioned happiness as a life extension factor. At least she will be alive to figure out how to be happy, though.

Maybe there's some kind of punching bag at the gym. She'll have to check that, at some point. For now: jogging, she guesses.

She attempts to do what she did yesterday, and - spin into her workout clothes, for efficiency. ... It doesn't seem to work. Or, well, she spins just fine, but there is no change of clothes accompanying it, just a general feeling of embarrassment and frustration.

... Why is that?

Yvette reviews how she managed it the first time. It was, specifically, when she wasn't paying attention. Put her body on autopilot, and was just letting it solve the problem in front of it, while she was thinking about something else.

The next time she tries, she's thinking about how she'd change the furniture of her house. Or just - her house in general, apparently stuff like adding a whole wall and door is easy enough to manage in an afternoon. Like, she definitely wants a window at the sink, so she can look out at all of the nice nature while she's doing dishes. And probably another bookshelf, in the main living area - there's technically one in her bedroom, but this is clearly not enough books for her taste. If she's thinking of creature comforts, she'd also want that shower turned into a bath and shower combo, because she might ever want to just soak. Oh, and, obviously this place needs some more decorations - a nice rug, some plants, actual curtains on the windows.

She is in her workout clothes and almost out the door for her jog when she realizes that her plan worked. ... Huh. Maybe her self awareness and mindfulness can be a bit of a double edged sword; forcing all that she does under things that only make sense.

"Swap the shower for a shower/tub combo, put a window in the wall by the sink, add some curtains to the windows, and a rug to the main living area - pick something with some kind of abstract or floral pattern, I do not want a flat color - and then I want some plants. And an extra bookshelf. Clear out the furniture in the second bedroom if you're short on funds, but you probably won't be," she says, to the house, and then she goes for her jog.

When she's back her house's changed! Although, uh...

...so, the first thing she might notice is that there are a bunch of trees and shrubs near and around the house. So that's her plants.

Then, once she walks inside, the next thing she'll notice is that she did get a window by the sink. By the bathroom sink. Directly above where the toilet is, between the bathroom and the living room. Also, every single window has some ugly white curtains made of several individual fabric strips one next to another. Also there is a single rectangular blue rug right in the middle of the living room, with some geometric patterns on it. In the bathroom, the shower/tub combo is rotated such that it is directly in front of the door and she needs to skip over it to access the rest of it. In the bedroom, there is a second bookshelf, identical to the first one, and right next to it. In the single bedroom, the only change is the curtains.

...

It's honestly so hideous and stupid that it's kind of hilarious?? At least her idea works? She does in fact have power over her house? Just, well...

"Oh, oh I see we're dealing with stupid stupid decorating sensibilities, aren't we," she snorts, laughing. "Okay. From the top..."

And so she gets to painstakingly fixing... all of this. This bathtub/shower combo? Should be turned so the door is actually usable. The showerhead for it should be on that wall, and yes this does things with plumbing that don't make sense, but she is not working with things that make sense, she's working with a very stupid computer following her exact specifications. This window? Should be on this precise wall, by the kitchen sink. These curtains are all terrible, and should be replaced with curtains that consist of: two bits of fabric, instead of these strip things. This extra bookshelf should instead be in the living room, right here, so she doesn't have to traipse all the way to her room to read. And then she would like small indoor plants, in little pots, here and here and here and if she needs to be specific about what kind of plant she wants there, she has Siimgle, and she can be so so specific.

"I am going to go have another jog around the block and come back, okay? ... Thank you for the changes, they are appreciated." And then, yep. Jog, round two. Whee.

All of the changes are undone! No new changes are done, though, the house looks exactly the way it did when she arrived home from work.

... that's... interesting, and actually harder than doing what she said? ... Did. Did she hurt the house's feelings. Is that what happened??

"..... Did I hurt your feelings?" she asks, patting... a wall. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to. Well, I really appreciated you changing stuff as I wanted. And the rug you picked out was cute." The wrong color, and kind of tiny, but cute. "The plants outside were nice, too. Sorry, it's my fault, I should have specified better in the first place. We'll try again tomorrow, okay?" She is grungy and disgusting and exhausted and desperately needs a shower and then bed.

It is: Wednesday!

It sure is! She goes through her morning routine, pauses to give the house a brief instruction on how it should update itself ("One window right here, please," with a wall pat on the wall above the kitchen sink), then heads in to work a bit early.

Because, see, she thinks she might've figured out her problem. It seems like, with how the changing spin works, she might've been overthinking things, and demanding that the stuff around her fit into her sense of 'what should work.' Instead, she will try just sort of... aiming at what thing she wants to get, without looking at it too closely. Just letting things flow, while she thinks about other stuff. (What she thinks about is gardening. She kind of wants to see if she can get copies of all of the plants available here at work, to grow at home. It could end up being useful, and also, many of them are very pretty.)

Well, she doesn't get much time to think about gardening because before she knows it it's a few hours later and she's holding some kind of device she has vague memories of having made.

eeheeheeheeheeheeheeheeheeheeheehee!!! She's so smart!!

It's a scanner, right? Because if it is, then she wants to go scan things.

Yup, it totally is a scanner! And her brain is telling her that she completely and deeply understands how it works, even though... if she tries to think about it she can't actually come up with any details.

... It'd be great if playing along with the insanity that is this simulation didn't result in changes to her brain that are just false. That's upsetting.

Anyway, whatever, she still ~made a thing~, so she is going to go gleefully scan some things. Plants in the lab first, she absolutely wants to scan other sims, but she thinks it's very important to get good habits about how and when to use the weird magic science things on her coworkers sooner rather than later.