**[i]On Monday, October 24th, 2172, a light rain was falling on New York City.
On any other day, this sort of phenomenon would have kept the people who lived in the golden spires indoors, while the urchins on the streets below would have cursed and ran around under newspapers. However, on this day there was no such depression or dissapointment. No one was on the streets, yes, but not because of the rain. Indeed, it was questionable whether any of the people in the city were aware the rain was falling.
Because, on October 23rd, 2172, Virtual Gaming Incorporated had released another game. Seeing massive growth in The Gilded Age, they had decided to release another one. Not a sequel, necessarily, and certainly not as good as anything they had come up with before. But it was a game, and it was a good one, and most importantly it was a [/i]VGI game[i]. And everyone wanted to play it.
Their New Hampshire servers were rather busy over the coming weeks, displaying to the myriad masses not a sprawling world of Magic and Monsters but a cold hard world much like the ones they were trying to escape from. The people had bought and plugged into Hymn, and were transported far away from New York and Earth and 2172. In their world, it was 3500, and everyone lived in pastel suits on space stations. Yes, a veritable utopia was established in the future, with everyone enjoying their lives fully, eating heartily, and simply living "the good life" in mechanized luxury. There were problems in this world, of course, but no one bothered to look into them.
For a day the civilized world stood still, and what a day it was.[/i]**
-------------------------------------------------
**[i]Oliver King sat in finery and surveyed the scene around him. The Hall was abuzz with work of all sorts; most clattering away at keyboards, but others scurrying around with messages or files. They'd been working at it for several months, he was told, with minimal success; the best they'd been able to get through was the First Layer of Defense. But his lieutenants were sure they'd make it through eventually, and then they'd have access.
Just a few weeks ago, King had been thousands of miles away, sitting not in silk but in uncomfortable clothing mandated by the higher-ups. His building had been similarly active, but not with hackers but policemen, investigating cases, discoursing, drinking coffee. It wasn't such a bad life until you got used to it- and by the time you got used to it, you'd seen too much to ever enjoy it again in any meaningful way.
He'd started bombing places twenty years ago, but it wasn't until a few years ago that he was able to gain any appreciable following. And even then, he hadn't been able to quit his Day Job; much as he wanted to, it was far too good to be New York Police Chief and the top terrorist in the world. But his cover was thinning, and he was outliving his usefulness anyway; soon they'd force him to retire. He was simply preempting them by blowing the place up with them inside.
And now he got to enjoy the sight of people destroying the VGI servers. It'd be another few months, but he'd get it in the end. And then it'd be good.[/i]**
-------------------------------------------------
**[i]A backpack by the pillar. A couple of briefcases in the office. And some holes that were drilled in a construction project years ago. All of them, on their own, very innocuous; nothing you wouldn't expect to see anywhere, particularly in a busy city like Washington. It's just that on this day, they were very unusual.
See, on this day they happened to have explosive devices inside. Not [/i]huge[i] ones necessarily, but enough to do quite a bit of damage. Especially in conjuction with some of the other stuff the King had planned; hijackings, bombing dams, attacking the electronic infrastructure; see, that's when it because devastating. Not city-leveling, but pretty darn impressive nonetheless.
So, at the end of the day when everything was said and done, and more importantly everyone was dead, there was a great deal of confusion. The main leadership structure had been destroyed by the attacks, so instead of the normal Director of Military Operations and the normal Chief Executive of New England, you had the Director of the Environment and the Speaker of the House deciding what was going on. And, given their deep-set biases, it wasn't particularly pretty.
The Bandit King was blamed immediately, of course, and New England demanded that Britain expel all of the London Lot to New England to face trial. Now, these aren't really unreasonable people, but they're also greedy people. And, as it happened, the Prince of Britain had recieved several large sums of money from the Bandit King, and planned to recieve several more in the future. So, Britain officially complied with their requests, pledging to root them out, but really did nothing. And it was a glorious day for the Bandit King.[/i]**
-------------------------------------------------
**[i]Soon after that, Tettnang realized that it was complete. It had taken him six months and countless more years before to design and build it, but he had succeeded in doing what even Elysium Incorporated could not do. Tettnang had, building from scratch, created the perfect synthetic for everyone's needs; and at Virtual Gaming Incorporated no less! There was, of course, one problem; because of the whole Elysium fiasco, his creation, his wonderful baby, his brainchild, the fruit of his labors, was ruled not only illegal but the very construction of it was punishable in most states by a lengthy prison sentence and in New England by death.
Now, to most people this would be a deterrent. Your average Joe, or I suppose your average Tettnang, would not want to die or be given a lengthy prison sentence. But Tettnang's mind worked on a very different way than those of most other people. Rather than thinking about what would happen, he was singularly consumed by what he was doing, and furthermore the fact that what he was doing was better than what anyone else was doing. It made his heart warm to know that he was better than everyone else, to know that he could do something that no one else could. He liked that sort of feeling, and that's why he had made V12.
It really was a beautiful machine. All chromium and gold (the synthflesh had to be bought through back channels and still hadn't arrived) and well-formed. The eyes, he was sure, functioned perfectly, and from the initial tests the body worked correctly. The only thing he had yet to upload and test was the control device; the thing which would make the cyberbrain he'd installed inside more than an inert lump of various metals and wires. All he had to do was connect the cord, push the button, and there it'd go, perfectly formed in every way and almost surely acknowledging him as god almighty, creator of the heavens and ruler of all eternity- as well as itself, of course.
Yet, a strange feeling came over him as he pushed the small metal piece into the base of the construct's neck. It was the sort of thing he had never experienced before, a compulsion that was very much alien to him. He couldn't very well describe it; no more than one can truly describe any feeling that comes over you, but he knew it was different than the feeling he had wanted to see until that time; exultation, happiness, joy, attraction, and probably some other feelings. But, he didn't, and that disturbed him. But surely it'd come when he pressed the button and uploaded the kernel. Yes, of course it would; it always did, usually a little before then but it always came eventually, and it always made the whole effort worthwhile. Usually.
Yet again, as he leaned over the console to enter the necessary command, his eyes drifted toward the door of the laboratory, in an almost longing way. As though he really didn't want to do it; as though he didn't think it would be worth it. But it surely was; it seemed that way and he had never experienced it before. Besides, he wasn't quite sure what it was that propelled him to react that way, or indeed what the reaction was in the first place. Perhaps further study would determine it. But first, enter v12 sys and away!
The computer loaded for a moment, then fell silent. For the longest time, to Tettnang, it appeared as though the system would not work after all; that he would have to revise his program, perhaps even redo the cyberbrain. Yes, it would be worth it to do that; he should probably do that anyway soon, just to make the system better. And the synth would surely appreciate-
Movement! A jerk of the hand, formerly open and reaching outward, toward the side. Then another, a movement of the head. It was as he had expected; an initial acclimation followed by full conciousness. It just seemed to be working on acclimating itself a bit longer than he had expected was all. He had problably go rewrite the script to fix the problem- yes, probably an error in the motion matrix or somesuch. It'd probably be easy and fun to fix in the end; the joy of typing, the thrill of the open editor. Yes, those would be the days; and then he'd experience the Nirvana of creation once again.
And then V12 broke free of its harnesses and ran out of the building.
Tettnang was shocked. What could it have been that caused that? Surely a malfunction somewhere; either in the movement matrix or perhaps in the emotional stimuli matrix. Only tests would tell, but how would he retrieve the synthetic? He didn't think VGI would fund many more prototypes before they reassigned him; and he didn't want that to happen.
While Tettnang fretted about errors, V12 left New Hampshire.[/i]**
-------------------------------------------------
**[i]It was a beautiful day in Boulder, Colorado. The sun was shining brightly, the snow had not yet fallen, and most importantly Boulder was free of many of the problems it had once faced- high land value and overpopulation most notably.
Because of that particular factor, when Elysium had created their three "Elysium Brains" to control the synths they made worldwide, they put them in three places. Two of them, in New York and Scandinavia, were heavily guarded and highly obvious. These were the primary two, and they were heavily used. With the third they took a different road; instead of making them obvious and hard to get to, they made the third one simply isolated and hidden, but near completely unguarded. So, when Elysium was brought down by the weight of the international community, the Boulder one was all but forgotten. The diehards at Elysium wouldn't tell, and the lower ones didn't know about it anyway.
V12, through remarkable provenance, had met on his way throughout the world a man who called himself Cane. According to Cane, who assured V12 that he was a very reliable source, there was something he would like to see in Boulder, Colorado. Something that would, he said, make V12 understand exactly what was going on in the world and why he was there.
-------------------------------------------------
International reaction to the fact that the face of V12 is appearing everywhere.
-------------------------------------------------
Finger pointing
-------------------------------------------------
**[i]In New York, on January 1st, 2173, a light rain fell.
Like it had countless times before, the water streamed down carved rock and out into the ocean. And like it had before, there was no one there to see it; not a soul walked the streets, not a one stared out the windows and sighed. However, this was not because of a Game or a Dream, but something decidedly different; there were no windows to stare out, nor any streets to walk.
A red flower dominated the skyline, a fiery bloom reaching miles into the sky. No flower of nature was this, but a construct of man's jealousy. One that he had used many times before, and was unlikely to use again.
From Moscow to Paris to Beijing to Montana, silence dominated.[/i]**
Sing lustily and with good courage.
Be aware of singing as if you were half dead,
or half asleep:
but lift your voice with strength.
Be no more afraid of your voice now,
nor more ashamed of its being heard,
than when you sang the songs of Satan.
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
On any other day, this sort of phenomenon would have kept the people who lived in the golden spires indoors, while the urchins on the streets below would have cursed and ran around under newspapers. However, on this day there was no such depression or dissapointment. No one was on the streets, yes, but not because of the rain. Indeed, it was questionable whether any of the people in the city were aware the rain was falling.
Because, on October 23rd, 2172, Virtual Gaming Incorporated had released another game. Seeing massive growth in The Gilded Age, they had decided to release another one. Not a sequel, necessarily, and certainly not as good as anything they had come up with before. But it was a game, and it was a good one, and most importantly it was a [/i]VGI game[i]. And everyone wanted to play it.
Their New Hampshire servers were rather busy over the coming weeks, displaying to the myriad masses not a sprawling world of Magic and Monsters but a cold hard world much like the ones they were trying to escape from. The people had bought and plugged into Hymn, and were transported far away from New York and Earth and 2172. In their world, it was 3500, and everyone lived in pastel suits on space stations. Yes, a veritable utopia was established in the future, with everyone enjoying their lives fully, eating heartily, and simply living "the good life" in mechanized luxury. There were problems in this world, of course, but no one bothered to look into them.
For a day the civilized world stood still, and what a day it was.[/i]**
-------------------------------------------------
**[i]Oliver King sat in finery and surveyed the scene around him. The Hall was abuzz with work of all sorts; most clattering away at keyboards, but others scurrying around with messages or files. They'd been working at it for several months, he was told, with minimal success; the best they'd been able to get through was the First Layer of Defense. But his lieutenants were sure they'd make it through eventually, and then they'd have access.
Just a few weeks ago, King had been thousands of miles away, sitting not in silk but in uncomfortable clothing mandated by the higher-ups. His building had been similarly active, but not with hackers but policemen, investigating cases, discoursing, drinking coffee. It wasn't such a bad life until you got used to it- and by the time you got used to it, you'd seen too much to ever enjoy it again in any meaningful way.
He'd started bombing places twenty years ago, but it wasn't until a few years ago that he was able to gain any appreciable following. And even then, he hadn't been able to quit his Day Job; much as he wanted to, it was far too good to be New York Police Chief and the top terrorist in the world. But his cover was thinning, and he was outliving his usefulness anyway; soon they'd force him to retire. He was simply preempting them by blowing the place up with them inside.
And now he got to enjoy the sight of people destroying the VGI servers. It'd be another few months, but he'd get it in the end. And then it'd be good.[/i]**
-------------------------------------------------
**[i]A backpack by the pillar. A couple of briefcases in the office. And some holes that were drilled in a construction project years ago. All of them, on their own, very innocuous; nothing you wouldn't expect to see anywhere, particularly in a busy city like Washington. It's just that on this day, they were very unusual.
See, on this day they happened to have explosive devices inside. Not [/i]huge[i] ones necessarily, but enough to do quite a bit of damage. Especially in conjuction with some of the other stuff the King had planned; hijackings, bombing dams, attacking the electronic infrastructure; see, that's when it because devastating. Not city-leveling, but pretty darn impressive nonetheless.
So, at the end of the day when everything was said and done, and more importantly everyone was dead, there was a great deal of confusion. The main leadership structure had been destroyed by the attacks, so instead of the normal Director of Military Operations and the normal Chief Executive of New England, you had the Director of the Environment and the Speaker of the House deciding what was going on. And, given their deep-set biases, it wasn't particularly pretty.
The Bandit King was blamed immediately, of course, and New England demanded that Britain expel all of the London Lot to New England to face trial. Now, these aren't really unreasonable people, but they're also greedy people. And, as it happened, the Prince of Britain had recieved several large sums of money from the Bandit King, and planned to recieve several more in the future. So, Britain officially complied with their requests, pledging to root them out, but really did nothing. And it was a glorious day for the Bandit King.[/i]**
-------------------------------------------------
**[i]Soon after that, Tettnang realized that it was complete. It had taken him six months and countless more years before to design and build it, but he had succeeded in doing what even Elysium Incorporated could not do. Tettnang had, building from scratch, created the perfect synthetic for everyone's needs; and at Virtual Gaming Incorporated no less! There was, of course, one problem; because of the whole Elysium fiasco, his creation, his wonderful baby, his brainchild, the fruit of his labors, was ruled not only illegal but the very construction of it was punishable in most states by a lengthy prison sentence and in New England by death.
Now, to most people this would be a deterrent. Your average Joe, or I suppose your average Tettnang, would not want to die or be given a lengthy prison sentence. But Tettnang's mind worked on a very different way than those of most other people. Rather than thinking about what would happen, he was singularly consumed by what he was doing, and furthermore the fact that what he was doing was better than what anyone else was doing. It made his heart warm to know that he was better than everyone else, to know that he could do something that no one else could. He liked that sort of feeling, and that's why he had made V12.
It really was a beautiful machine. All chromium and gold (the synthflesh had to be bought through back channels and still hadn't arrived) and well-formed. The eyes, he was sure, functioned perfectly, and from the initial tests the body worked correctly. The only thing he had yet to upload and test was the control device; the thing which would make the cyberbrain he'd installed inside more than an inert lump of various metals and wires. All he had to do was connect the cord, push the button, and there it'd go, perfectly formed in every way and almost surely acknowledging him as god almighty, creator of the heavens and ruler of all eternity- as well as itself, of course.
Yet, a strange feeling came over him as he pushed the small metal piece into the base of the construct's neck. It was the sort of thing he had never experienced before, a compulsion that was very much alien to him. He couldn't very well describe it; no more than one can truly describe any feeling that comes over you, but he knew it was different than the feeling he had wanted to see until that time; exultation, happiness, joy, attraction, and probably some other feelings. But, he didn't, and that disturbed him. But surely it'd come when he pressed the button and uploaded the kernel. Yes, of course it would; it always did, usually a little before then but it always came eventually, and it always made the whole effort worthwhile. Usually.
Yet again, as he leaned over the console to enter the necessary command, his eyes drifted toward the door of the laboratory, in an almost longing way. As though he really didn't want to do it; as though he didn't think it would be worth it. But it surely was; it seemed that way and he had never experienced it before. Besides, he wasn't quite sure what it was that propelled him to react that way, or indeed what the reaction was in the first place. Perhaps further study would determine it. But first, enter v12 sys and away!
The computer loaded for a moment, then fell silent. For the longest time, to Tettnang, it appeared as though the system would not work after all; that he would have to revise his program, perhaps even redo the cyberbrain. Yes, it would be worth it to do that; he should probably do that anyway soon, just to make the system better. And the synth would surely appreciate-
Movement! A jerk of the hand, formerly open and reaching outward, toward the side. Then another, a movement of the head. It was as he had expected; an initial acclimation followed by full conciousness. It just seemed to be working on acclimating itself a bit longer than he had expected was all. He had problably go rewrite the script to fix the problem- yes, probably an error in the motion matrix or somesuch. It'd probably be easy and fun to fix in the end; the joy of typing, the thrill of the open editor. Yes, those would be the days; and then he'd experience the Nirvana of creation once again.
And then V12 broke free of its harnesses and ran out of the building.
Tettnang was shocked. What could it have been that caused that? Surely a malfunction somewhere; either in the movement matrix or perhaps in the emotional stimuli matrix. Only tests would tell, but how would he retrieve the synthetic? He didn't think VGI would fund many more prototypes before they reassigned him; and he didn't want that to happen.
While Tettnang fretted about errors, V12 left New Hampshire.[/i]**
-------------------------------------------------
**[i]It was a beautiful day in Boulder, Colorado. The sun was shining brightly, the snow had not yet fallen, and most importantly Boulder was free of many of the problems it had once faced- high land value and overpopulation most notably.
Because of that particular factor, when Elysium had created their three "Elysium Brains" to control the synths they made worldwide, they put them in three places. Two of them, in New York and Scandinavia, were heavily guarded and highly obvious. These were the primary two, and they were heavily used. With the third they took a different road; instead of making them obvious and hard to get to, they made the third one simply isolated and hidden, but near completely unguarded. So, when Elysium was brought down by the weight of the international community, the Boulder one was all but forgotten. The diehards at Elysium wouldn't tell, and the lower ones didn't know about it anyway.
V12, through remarkable provenance, had met on his way throughout the world a man who called himself Cane. According to Cane, who assured V12 that he was a very reliable source, there was something he would like to see in Boulder, Colorado. Something that would, he said, make V12 understand exactly what was going on in the world and why he was there.
-------------------------------------------------
International reaction to the fact that the face of V12 is appearing everywhere.
-------------------------------------------------
Finger pointing
-------------------------------------------------
**[i]In New York, on January 1st, 2173, a light rain fell.
Like it had countless times before, the water streamed down carved rock and out into the ocean. And like it had before, there was no one there to see it; not a soul walked the streets, not a one stared out the windows and sighed. However, this was not because of a Game or a Dream, but something decidedly different; there were no windows to stare out, nor any streets to walk.
A red flower dominated the skyline, a fiery bloom reaching miles into the sky. No flower of nature was this, but a construct of man's jealousy. One that he had used many times before, and was unlikely to use again.
From Moscow to Paris to Beijing to Montana, silence dominated.[/i]**
Goodbye, So Long, So Ends SDAA.
Be aware of singing as if you were half dead,
or half asleep:
but lift your voice with strength.
Be no more afraid of your voice now,
nor more ashamed of its being heard,
than when you sang the songs of Satan.