Post by aylin on Dec 16, 2010 19:36:33 GMT -8
"Viruses..."
High above, the clock - as it did every hour - chimed. The sound was deep and was said to have a haunting quality and, had Aylin actually been paying attention to it, she might have agreed. As it were, the grandiose tower was little more than a backdrop to the wall of text she was projecting from the pseudospace computer currently encasing her right forearm.
"...before the conversion." the pink-haired leech said aloud, her mouth twisting to one side in apparent frustration. A brief touch of her finger flipped the projected page. "...and the ones of this reality. The Virus Defense Force... is that what they're called...? And..." Another touch and the flipping of two pages of text. "...and immunizations? Really? Does that even make any effing sense?!"
With a sigh, Lin leaned back, pressing her body against the cool surface of the bench and turning her eyes skyward. Her left hand jumped up, snatching her glasses from her face and roughly perching them atop her head. Then she sat... and she stared, in silence, for at least a count of ten, her ankles crossing and her legs kicking back and forth like a child. The movement hardly disturbed the green fabric of the skirt of her schoolgirl's uniform, but even if it had produced an eye-garnering problem, she'd have failed to notice.
"What good is it to cross-reference everything in the database, anyway?" she said, rather glumly, as she reset her position. A few free presses of nigh-invisible buttons on the false purple sheath of her omnitool sent the wall of text scrolling away, eventually displaying a small, unimpressive loading bar. "Let's just review the tidbits of information that we've picked up first-hand. Viruses, viruses, viruses... distortion... nnnnngh." And about that time the loading bar finished, producing a bullet point list of new text. "I mean, obviously it was rather stupid to go and try to find a base of operations of this... Force... thing... all by ourselves with no effing clue as to where to even begin. The proof of that is in the four-and-a-half hours of bullshit rigging, diagnostics, and simulations of reattaching Miranda's blade after... whatever that was attacked. Hmmm... but still, we heard it was there somewhere. And then there are those scant reports about the battle at Everai and an ever-loving dragon or some... epically failing nonsense. Or is it? ... Maybe it's true." The girl offered her 'computer' a heroic frown. "Not like we were gonna go adventuring into some craziness like that, assuming it was true. Christ! I swear to God it feels like I'm chasing myths! And... and... and with this stupid[/b] reality, myths might as well be facts and so..."[/color] Again her left hand moved, forming a fist and arcing up to knock on the top of her head a few times. She gave a purely quizzical look. "...and so, where does that leave me, exactly? Myths and not myths, defense against viruses in one form or another, neither of which exactly match up with the other. Like, this is totally NOT helpful."
A vigorous shaking of her head followed. Passer-bys would have been quite surprised to notice that, no matter how violently her movements, her glasses remained perfectly perched atop her head.
"I mean, why ask such a stupid question in the first place? 'What are viruses?' I thought. Seemed like a good thing to try and nail down at the time. But... what the hell am I, really? Or any of us? Aside from data, I guess." And she went back to her wall of text. More finger swipes and turning of pages. "Dangerous... deadly, even. As were the things they were named after, anyway. But can one even make a theory like that? Mutations against polymorphisms... viruses re-coding or encoding new information into DNA, thus producing alternate forms of genes... and with the difference between the two is, simply, the less than one percent of the population versus the more than one percent of the population, and the fact that polymorphisms produced a variety of living results, while mutations - even point mutations, of a single, solitary base pairing could, and usually did, result in the abortion of life."
Lin stopped, abruptly, plucking her glasses from the top of her head and sliding them back into place on her face. A brow raised in curiosity, and she gave another sigh, though this one was far less dramatic.
"Is it... perhaps, too far of a stretch to, at least, wonder if the viruses of this reality might not serve a similar, albeit possibly unintentional, purpose as viruses from before?" There was a long pause. Her left hand moved to her chin, the index finger tapping her lower lip. "Not that viruses before were sentient, of course. But maybe... even computer viruses 're-encoded' things. Could that be the definition of purpose? ...Or are they really just... ah... what's the best word for them...? ... ... Pests?"
Notes: Come across her rambling like a mad woman if you like. =) She is rather interested in the VDF, but she hasn't really decided why yet. It's just a... whimsical, self-imposed academic pursuit at the moment.
High above, the clock - as it did every hour - chimed. The sound was deep and was said to have a haunting quality and, had Aylin actually been paying attention to it, she might have agreed. As it were, the grandiose tower was little more than a backdrop to the wall of text she was projecting from the pseudospace computer currently encasing her right forearm.
"...before the conversion." the pink-haired leech said aloud, her mouth twisting to one side in apparent frustration. A brief touch of her finger flipped the projected page. "...and the ones of this reality. The Virus Defense Force... is that what they're called...? And..." Another touch and the flipping of two pages of text. "...and immunizations? Really? Does that even make any effing sense?!"
With a sigh, Lin leaned back, pressing her body against the cool surface of the bench and turning her eyes skyward. Her left hand jumped up, snatching her glasses from her face and roughly perching them atop her head. Then she sat... and she stared, in silence, for at least a count of ten, her ankles crossing and her legs kicking back and forth like a child. The movement hardly disturbed the green fabric of the skirt of her schoolgirl's uniform, but even if it had produced an eye-garnering problem, she'd have failed to notice.
"What good is it to cross-reference everything in the database, anyway?" she said, rather glumly, as she reset her position. A few free presses of nigh-invisible buttons on the false purple sheath of her omnitool sent the wall of text scrolling away, eventually displaying a small, unimpressive loading bar. "Let's just review the tidbits of information that we've picked up first-hand. Viruses, viruses, viruses... distortion... nnnnngh." And about that time the loading bar finished, producing a bullet point list of new text. "I mean, obviously it was rather stupid to go and try to find a base of operations of this... Force... thing... all by ourselves with no effing clue as to where to even begin. The proof of that is in the four-and-a-half hours of bullshit rigging, diagnostics, and simulations of reattaching Miranda's blade after... whatever that was attacked. Hmmm... but still, we heard it was there somewhere. And then there are those scant reports about the battle at Everai and an ever-loving dragon or some... epically failing nonsense. Or is it? ... Maybe it's true." The girl offered her 'computer' a heroic frown. "Not like we were gonna go adventuring into some craziness like that, assuming it was true. Christ! I swear to God it feels like I'm chasing myths! And... and... and with this stupid[/b] reality, myths might as well be facts and so..."[/color] Again her left hand moved, forming a fist and arcing up to knock on the top of her head a few times. She gave a purely quizzical look. "...and so, where does that leave me, exactly? Myths and not myths, defense against viruses in one form or another, neither of which exactly match up with the other. Like, this is totally NOT helpful."
A vigorous shaking of her head followed. Passer-bys would have been quite surprised to notice that, no matter how violently her movements, her glasses remained perfectly perched atop her head.
"I mean, why ask such a stupid question in the first place? 'What are viruses?' I thought. Seemed like a good thing to try and nail down at the time. But... what the hell am I, really? Or any of us? Aside from data, I guess." And she went back to her wall of text. More finger swipes and turning of pages. "Dangerous... deadly, even. As were the things they were named after, anyway. But can one even make a theory like that? Mutations against polymorphisms... viruses re-coding or encoding new information into DNA, thus producing alternate forms of genes... and with the difference between the two is, simply, the less than one percent of the population versus the more than one percent of the population, and the fact that polymorphisms produced a variety of living results, while mutations - even point mutations, of a single, solitary base pairing could, and usually did, result in the abortion of life."
Lin stopped, abruptly, plucking her glasses from the top of her head and sliding them back into place on her face. A brow raised in curiosity, and she gave another sigh, though this one was far less dramatic.
"Is it... perhaps, too far of a stretch to, at least, wonder if the viruses of this reality might not serve a similar, albeit possibly unintentional, purpose as viruses from before?" There was a long pause. Her left hand moved to her chin, the index finger tapping her lower lip. "Not that viruses before were sentient, of course. But maybe... even computer viruses 're-encoded' things. Could that be the definition of purpose? ...Or are they really just... ah... what's the best word for them...? ... ... Pests?"
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Notes: Come across her rambling like a mad woman if you like. =) She is rather interested in the VDF, but she hasn't really decided why yet. It's just a... whimsical, self-imposed academic pursuit at the moment.