"It's impossible to say. Each SQUIP is uniquely catered to its user, their wishes and desires shaping our goals and behavior, even down to our visual presentations," it says, picking itself up from its seat finally. It swaggers over to the door as it speaks, passing rather close by Myr along the way-- hovering over his shoulder for just a moment, inspecting him, before it continues on.

"But I do know that Rich's SQUIP did what it did for a reason. Rich was a difficult user; things started off well enough for the first year, judging by the data I collected from his SQUIP, but, over time, he became rebellious, angry. Perhaps Rich's SQUIP was forced to use the only approach it knew he would listen to."