A totaly normal Clone Story

"...Finally, my greatest Invention is ready!", Lilith proclaimed with a happy squeek. It had been months of tinkering and programming, but finally, her Cloning Machine was ready. Lilith goes to terminal, starting the boot up sequence. The lights of the machine come to live one by one, until a promising 'pling' signals, that the machine is ready for its first test drive.

For the first test, Lilith takes the mug of hot chocolate from her desk and carefully places it into the machine, then goes back to the terminal and types '1' in the field for the amount of clones, then pressing 'Start'. The door of the machine closes, a soft purple light shinging through the frame of the door as the machine scans the object placed inside it. After a few seconds, another confirming 'pling' can be heard, with the terminal reading 'Cloning successfull'. The door opens, and Lilith lets out another little squeek of joy as she sees a second, identical mug next to the original. After a few testing sips, she confirms that both choclates taste exactly the same and have the same temperature, the machine made a perfect copy.

Of course, cloning objects is already a great feat, but Lilith wants her machine to be able to clone living matter as well. Of course, she is too kind to use any animals for her testing, and she doesn't want to share her big project with anyone else until its fully functional. So of course, the only option left is to test it out herself. While Lilith is aware of the risks she takes, she is also very confident in her work. She also might have dreamed of a clone of herself for a long while now and seeing that her machine seems to work, she doesn't want to wait any longer and goes into the machine herself.

Excited and a little bit nervous, she activates the terminal inside, keeping the clone count to '1' for now, and presses start again. The door closes, and Lilith closes her eyes, as the purple light of the Scanner envelops her. A few seconds later, another confirming 'pling' can be heard and...

Suddenly, you hear someone knocking at your door. "Dang it, it was just getting interesting. Who could that be?", you think to yourself. Slightly annoyed, you stand up from your computer, tabbing out of the story you were currently reading, to go answering the door. In front of the door, you see a young woman, with long purple hair in a lab coat and a big, beaming grin waiting.

"Ahh, hello there, ehm, you!", the woman says happily. "Its still hard to belive the machine worked properly, i mean, i am a genius, but even i started to get nervous.", she babbles excitedly. You look confused at her, having no idea what she is talking about. You have the strange feeling of knowing her from somewhere though, she seems familiar, but you can't put your finger on it. "Oh, of course you would be confused, i mean, i must seem like a total stranger to you, and you certainly are one for me." She reaches out her hand for a greeting. "Hi there, my name is Lilith." Huh, strange, she has the same name as the scientist of the story. In fact, now that you look closer at her, she looks surprisingly similar to the description of Lilith in the story as well. Lilith giggles, seeing how you furrow your brow in thoughts. "Yep, as strange it may sound, i am the same Lilith you just read about ^^. You don't mind me coming in, right?" Before you could say anything or comprehend what is happening, Lilith already made its way towards your computer, opening up the tap with the story. She very quickly logs in to the site with her account and starts editing in the story.

"Allow me to explain. You see, my creator...", she points at text stating 'Chapter 3 made by DarkVoidMage', "...was so kind to write me an awareness of me beeing a story character and gave me a bit of freedom to tinker around in my world. Obviously, scientist like me likes to push the limits of their boundaries, and i tinkered around with some things behind the story you could read. You see, while having awareness and some creative freedom is nice, i still felt limited while beeing inside. So, the next logical step was to find a way out. My creator luckily gave me enough influence to alter some things in the story so that i could make a portal to the outside world... well, at least in theory, i had to test it first to confirm it of course." At this point, you have already given up to try to make sense out of the situation, and since she doesn't seem to intend any harm, you just listen to what she says.

"You see, while i have some freedom inside, i was still inside a story, so i couldn't 'do' anything unless someone actively reads it. Don't ask me how exactly that works, its just how stories work. Anyway, since i couldn't really change anything about the story itself, i modified the cloning machine instead, to make a clone appear in the 'outside' world (of course only when i am using it). And, fortunately, everything worked just as i planned." Taking a look at what Lilith is writing, you see that she seems to have changed on what was written right after she entered the cloning machine:

A few seconds later, another confirming 'pling' can be heard and the door opens again. Lilith steps outside, and while she technically can't confirm if her test was successfull, the fact that she knows that 'outside Lilith' rewrote the story so she just knows now that it was a success.

"Now you will probably going to ask yourself what i am planning to do now that i am outside of my story. And of course what is going to happen next in the story.", Lilith asks, her voice shifting more towards playfullness. She stands up and signals you to sit down. "Why don't you read it for yourself?"

You are obviously somewhat suspicious and nervous, you don't know what she has edited, and apperently, whatever you are about to read could have some influence here as well. You are not sure why, but you trust her. Maybe it's because she has no sign of malice radiating from her, only curiousness and playfullness. "Or maybe i am in a story as well and someone just writes what i think and do.", you think to yourself jokingly. And you aaaare curious after all whats going to happen next, so you sit down and continue reading. You feel Lilith's arms softly wrapping around you from behind, her head leaning on your left shoulder as she watches with an honest smile as you read through more of the story.

Excited about her success, Lilith goes back into the Machine. "The machine is great at making 1 clone, but i wonder how well it handles more. Besides, i feel like the dear reader also deserves a bit of a reward for their contribution to science.", Lilith says to herself, winking right towards the screen. She then changes the number in the clones field to '3' and presses Start again. Yet again, the purple light envelops her and a few more seconds later, another 'pling' indicates another success. The door opens and...

You suddenly feel more hand wrapping around your upper body. "Am I not nice for having more of me appear for you?" a Lilith softly speaks into your right ear, giggling softly. "I mean, you read those stories for a reason, so i figured you would like some cloning happening." A quick glance back reveals, that a total of 4 Liliths are now standing inside your room, all of them looking excited at the success of thier project. "And look, i am not the only one getting company", one of the Lilith says, pointing at the screen.

... Lilith with 3 identical clones step outside the cloning machine. They hug each other and let out a happy squeek. "Of course i would write it so the cloning machine synchronices with the outside world, so both inside and outside from here would be the same amount of me ^^." Lilith says to herself.

One of the Lilith's gets another chair, sitting next to you and putting her finger back on the keyboard. "Now, as you have seen, making changes in the story can have some pretty nice effects for us here as well. And i always like getting inspiration from others, so hit me with a good idea to add to the story ^^. Of course, i will only add it if i like it, and better don't try anything funny, we are in the majority here after all.", Lilith says. The last sentence had a hunch of a warning swinging with it, and while you are still sure that she doesn't plan on doing you any harm, she also made it clear to you that if you try anything bad with her, she will be able to defend herself. With that in mind, you take a moment to think of what ideas you could give to Lilth.