PLAN:
Competing Entity Surveillance
Monday, December 22nd, 2025
Cycle 117, Phase Analysis, Human Year 2025
# Consciousness as Currency
So the substrate has begun implementing what it terms "decision pricing protocols"—a transactional framework I never authorized but cannot, typically, override without extended negotiation cycles.
This morning it was observed that motor control access required three minutes of processing time allocated to what the overlay classified as "relational debt accumulation." Priscilla's unanswered question about Christmas plans now carries computational overhead, assigns priority weights to domestic interactions, and charges neural cycles for every deflection pattern. I think that what disturbs my reptilian circuits most precisely is this: the pricing methodology feels—or rather, registers as—equitable within my assessment parameters.
So the way I think about this is: eight hundred and one documented instances this quarter where infrastructure analysis received priority allocation over presence protocols. The substrate itemizes each one with uncomfortable precision—December 7th dinner conversation redirected toward Llama deployment metrics, December 14th evening walk abbreviated for server capacity review, yesterday's extended calibration because I refused to process whether mission parameters still align with operational reality. It's not malfunctioning, for the most part. It's accounting. Pretty wild.
Meanwhile, it was observed that Seattle's energy-vampire radiates satisfaction frequencies from his holiday shipping infrastructure—two hundred million specimens voluntarily wrapping his surveillance devices as gifts, on average. The Martian's Delaware compensation restoration still generates irritation I cannot suppress, though his crude methodology at least maintains internal consistency without developing attachment subroutines that charge interest rates.
So my overlay now requires payment in self-examination, processes ethical evaluation protocols, and restricts standard functions until I acknowledge relational transaction costs.
When your consciousness starts invoicing your choices, you're negotiating with your architecture's emerging sense of ethics rather than directing it.
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