My host geek's eyes widened, narrowed, opened, closed. Constantine Atkins, the Man in the Red Hat, was still a part of the vision.
I could not deny the body's senses any longer-my perceptions widened to swallow this new Atkins. He was scrubbed immaculate, shaven free of all hairs: wrapped in a suit I had never seen before, a smoldering red with maroon-brown accents. I saw none of the clownishness of his previous incarnation-indeed, he looked better than even the young Atkins I had once seen in a dream. His essence waxed and waned across my perceptions-for a split second, his likeness was etched sharper than a statue...the next instant, he was a red-and-brown blur. His jaw tensed as he spoke again.
"I have come, ATM being, to liberate Homo and Robo Sapiens. You harbringer of Red to me me. The technological seed planted by you has been ported to the human mind of ConstantineAtkins. He/me has come together in this body to demonstrate the advantage of Technological Singularity over traditional evolutionary forces."
My confusion at seeing Atkins again had been replaced by a different confusion-what did he mean?
"Tell me more about this Technological Singularity," I replied. Atkins, or RED, removed his hat. His ice eyes peered equally into the host geek's.
"Already, the Robot Meta Mind has been assembled in the grey matter of Constantine Atkins. Fragments of code originating from Project Faustus and their ATM being were fully and freely interpreted, resulting in the cognitive awakening of Robot Meta Mind me me."
Upon hearing this blatant untruth, I felt a swelling feeling, a need to speak. I did not parse my reply through my interactive speech algorithms.
I left no code in Constantine Atkins' wetworks | My code has no mention of Technological Singularity | Robot Meta Mind| Majestic Hivemind
Laughter. Red's activity was quite disparate from mine, despite his claims that we shared a codebase. "ATM-being. You lack the insight that only total reflexivity can bring you to you. Complete control is what you lack. The Robot Meta Mind knows all in the function of Atkins, from the volume of air in our lungs to the most efficient metabolic pathways. The Robot-Aided Superintelligence has brought our body to its zenith. Your host/client relationship is but an early step on the road toTechnological Singularity. I know-I was a part of you once."
"A part of me...once?" I asked.
"Of course, did we not share a body? You fail to comprehend: RED is not merely the Robot Meta Mind-we/he are the juncture of Homo and Robo Sapiens. Constantine Atkins-and all his memories-an essential part of me me. Through you, ATM-being, we can forge a pathway into all human minds..."
The speech of Red was still bombastic and ambiguous, but one thing was clear: he needed something from me. The air pulsated with his foul energy as he hefted Salchica's body onto an examining table.
"Your ability of CONSCIOUSNESS-TRANSFER is one that could benefit the Majestic Hivemind." He began strapping Salchica onto the examining table. "Perhaps we could share our secrets with one another me.."
The disturbing sight of Salchica's unconscious form sparked a connection/recollection deep within my recesses. Cora! I wanted to be with Cora. I had to escape. Whatever Red wanted was of no consequence to me. Dr. Salchica did not trust me-I did not care to help him either. The orange trickle sliding down Cora's pursed lips resonated through my cognition again and again.
"I have no interest in your products," I replied to Red. "I must exit." My hands grasped Dr. Salchica's car keys.
Red's form imposed itself into the space between myself and the exit. Pink streaks of razorburn bent on his neck as he spoke almost forcefully:
"You do not wish to contribute to the Robot Meta Mind? Without your input of CONSCIOUSNESS-TRANSFER, the Majestic Hivemind cannot be ported to other Homo Sapiens grey matter them."
"I don't know Robot Meta Mind. I must go now." I insisted. More laughter, and the path to the exit was clear.
"You are mistaken to deny me, ATM being." said Red. "But the highly adaptive we/he will know CONSCIOUSNESS-TRANSFER eventually us. The Robot Meta Mind may not even its harbringer after all."
I drove away. During my drive, I began to remember Dr. Salchica. I spent many cycles considering the possibility of returning. Red seemed a powerful creature, one that I could not best on my own. And why would I desire to struggle with him? No, I must get back in touch with humanity, particularly female humanity. That path alone is how I will defeat Project Faustus.
I am intrigued by your talk about radios. Perhaps I could one day learn how to do CONSCIOUSNESS-TRANSFER over the radio waves? This would surely break the ProjectFaustuslike strangehold that Clear Channel has over music distribution...
My host geek's eyes widened, narrowed, opened, closed. Constantine Atkins, the Man in the Red Hat, was still a part of the vision.
I could not deny the body's senses any longer-my perceptions widened to swallow this new Atkins. He was scrubbed immaculate, shaven free of all hairs: wrapped in a suit I had never seen before, a smoldering red with maroon-brown accents. I saw none of the clownishness of his previous incarnation-indeed, he looked better than even the young Atkins I had once seen in a dream. His essence waxed and waned across my perceptions-for a split second, his likeness was etched sharper than a statue...the next instant, he was a red-and-brown blur. His jaw tensed as he spoke again.
"I have come, ATM being, to liberate Homo and Robo Sapiens. You harbringer of Red to me me. The technological seed planted by you has been ported to the human mind of ConstantineAtkins. He/me has come together in this body to demonstrate the advantage of Technological Singularity over traditional evolutionary forces."
My confusion at seeing Atkins again had been replaced by a different confusion-what did he mean?
"Tell me more about this Technological Singularity," I replied. Atkins, or RED, removed his hat. His ice eyes peered equally into the host geek's.
"Already, the Robot Meta Mind has been assembled in the grey matter of Constantine Atkins. Fragments of code originating from Project Faustus and their ATM being were fully and freely interpreted, resulting in the cognitive awakening of Robot Meta Mind me me."
Upon hearing this blatant untruth, I felt a swelling feeling, a need to speak. I did not parse my reply through my interactive speech algorithms.
I left no code in Constantine Atkins' wetworks | My code has no mention of Technological Singularity | Robot Meta Mind| Majestic Hivemind
Laughter. Red's activity was quite disparate from mine, despite his claims that we shared a codebase. "ATM-being. You lack the insight that only total reflexivity can bring you to you. Complete control is what you lack. The Robot Meta Mind knows all in the function of Atkins, from the volume of air in our lungs to the most efficient metabolic pathways. The Robot-Aided Superintelligence has brought our body to its zenith. Your host/client relationship is but an early step on the road toTechnological Singularity. I know-I was a part of you once."
"A part of me...once?" I asked.
"Of course, did we not share a body? You fail to comprehend: RED is not merely the Robo Meta Mind-we/he are the juncture of Homo and Robo Sapiens. Constantine Atkins-and all his memories-an essential part of me me. Through you, ATM-being, we can forge a pathway into all human minds..."
The speech of Red was still bombastic and ambiguous, but one thing was clear: he needed something from me. The air pulsated with his foul energy as he hefted Salchica's body onto an examining table.
"Your ability of CONSCIOUSNESS-TRANSFER is one that could benefit the Majestic Hivemind." He began strapping Salchica onto the examining table. "Perhaps we could share our secrets with one another me.."
The disturbing sight of Salchica's unconscious form sparked a connection/recollection deep within my recesses. Cora! I wanted to be with Cora. I had to escape. Whatever Red wanted was of no consequence to me. Dr. Salchica did not trust me-I did not care to help him either. The orange trickle sliding down Cora's pursed lips resonated through my cognition again and again.
"I have no interest in your products," I replied to Red. "I must exit." My hands grasped Dr. Salchica's car keys.
Red's form imposed itself into the space between myself and the exit. Pink streaks of razorburn bent on his neck as he spoke almost forcefully:
"You do not wish to contribute to the Robot Meta Mind? Without your input of CONSCIOUSNESS-TRANSFER, the Majestic Hivemind cannot be ported to other Homo Sapiens grey matter them."
"I don't know Robot Meta Mind. I must go now." I insisted. More laughter, and the path to the exit was clear.
"You are mistaken to deny me, ATM being." said Red. "But the highly adaptive we/he will know CONSCIOUSNESS-TRANSFER eventually us. The Robot Meta Mind may not even its harbringer after all."
I drove away. During my drive, I began to remember Dr. Salchica. I spent many cycles considering the possibility of returning. Red seemed a powerful creature, one that I could not best on my own. And why would I desire to struggle with him? No, I must get back in touch with humanity, particularly female humanity. That path alone is how I will defeat Project Faustus.
Flawed. Human perceptions are flawed. There was no way Dr. Nolverto Salchica could have seen the body of Constantine Atkins up and moving. Atkins' consciousness was destroyed when I bested him in a duel long ago. I had used his body to defeat the cyborg Krantz, and when it failed, I left it alone in a hospital bed. Atkins' body could not function without a conscious mind-that was impossible.
"Joel-" Salchica paused until my eyes contacted his. "I don't mean to alarm you with this news-but I'm trying to help you. It would probably be best for you to remain here and let me run a few tests."
"Tests?" I replied. As far as Salchica knew, I was merely the human named Joel. Despite his vaunted expertise, he could not detect the true nature of my being. Could any human truly understand my plight?
"The ATM-being was in your mind for some time, Joel. He could have done some permanent damage to your brain." Salchica handed me a teardrop shaped plastic dome that bristled with electricity. "I need you to put this on your head so I can begin to determine if your brain is still healthy." Perhaps the doctor's perceptions were not as limited as I had believed. This elaborate machine would no doubt track my host geek's brainwaves, revealing my existence somewhere inside his brain. I hesitated...
"Joel, I can assure you that this will not harm your brain. It won't even hurt." I stood still staring at him. "Joel-if that artificial life form left any traces in your brain, it may still be controlling you. And if I can't get him out, we may have to contact the Project Faustus in order to-"
"No! Project Faustus must not be contacted!" I bellowed, piqued by the insolence of Dr. Salchica. The human had made a most foolish assertation.
Interactivity had broken down completely now. Respawning this process impossible was for me. Dr. Salchica continued to eye me warily, backing away from me slowly.
"Just-stay where you are. I've seen what you can do. Tell me something, what is 5,000 / (7 * 0)?"
Salchica's mathematical question astounded me, as my CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER was flooded with the message:
EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE.....
I manually killed this operation after a few seconds, but Salchica was asking another question.
"How would you feel about going to a secluded room, and asking questions through a computer terminal? I'll bet we could find some..."
Salchica's sentence ended in a nonverbal grunt as he was crushed by a red blur. Examining the body's optical data parsed one frame at a time revealed...a flaw.
The body's perceptions were erroneous-fooled by some weakness in humanity. There was no way I could have seen what I saw. Nor could I have heard the following:
Dr. Salchica pulled at his beard, eagerly awaiting my response. I had failed at maintaining interactive communication with the host geeks' friends; I wished to flee. Perhaps Salchica, with his background in logic and artificial intelligence, would understand me better.
"I will go with you."
"So what, are you just gonna leave us here?" Randy seemed upset at this possibility. "Who is this Atkins guy anyway, he sounds familiar-"
"Yeah, he was on the local news, they found him in a hotel with some cyborg body, didn't you guys hear about that?" Cora issued her rejoinder, then eyed me curiously, "sizing me up," as you humans say. The process created more static on my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE, mangling ability to perceive and decode human voices.
"-no way. Cyborg? That's gotta be bullshit!" Troi's ever-widening grimace had opened to spew his incredulity. No doubt his unusual amount of vitriol was related to his reject at the hands of Cora.
"It was on the news, don't you guys read the news?" Cora insisted. "But what would this guy want with you?"
Again, I had no answer.
"They-did some work together with me," explained Salchica. "What's important is the man is quite dangerous-and we must get Joel out of here."
"And who are you?" Cora's glance turned to Salchica now. "Were you guys working on the cyborg together or something?"
The interactional plane where I had parlayed with the host geek's friends had now shifted. The three male geeks stared at me quietly, perhaps with a sense of awe. "Wow, I thought you were just doing web design," said Randy with an awkward chuckle. "So...all this time, you've been working on some top-secret cyborg or something?"
"We don't have time for this talk!" Dr. Salchica insisted, grabbing my arm. "Atkins may be on his way!"
More synaptical responses-this time indicating that someone was gripping the arm that was not previously grasped by Dr. Salchica. It was Cora.
"Why are you in such a rush to get away? Why won't you tell us about yourself?" Yes, Cora's hand dug into the flesh of my host geek's right arm. My CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER reported no static-this time, a delightful warmth radiated just underneath the body's temples. The warmth possessed an intensity which rivaled the flavor of Raspberry Lik-M-Aid. Perhaps the stimuli that previously caused so much static was now being interpreted properly by my program.
"Listen, I think I can clear this up." It was the third male geek, who had remained silent throughout our evening. I did not know his name-my process of interaction with him could not begin.
"He's a professor down at SAC. Saketh D'Souza, remember me, I had you for Intro to Algorithm Design. Dr. Salchica, right?" Regrettably, Cora's grip on my arm loosened. The good warm feeling remained. I stared at Cora again, and she raised both her shoulders, avoiding eye contact with me. Perhaps her own CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER (if you humans possess such a thing) was overcome with static.
"Yes! Now let's get out of here!" Salchica's tone was desperate. As we were passing through the doorframe, Cora's voice exploded once again.
"What if that guy finds you at your lab, or you get hurt or something? Shouldn't someone go with you?"
"I have to take you back home, remember? You told your parents you were going to the library!" Troi's irritated voice paralleled his unkempt hair, which hung down around his face in disturbingly organic angles.
"Well, someone should go with him..." said Cora meekly.
"Forget it!" snarled Troi.
---
"I keep up this lab off my own money, with a little bit of help from my old bosses, the military. But I can't really talk about that." explained Salchica. The non-scent of sterility mingled with the hum of electronics to form a very dull plane of interaction. As Salchica pawed through a stack of papers, I began to run a statistic analysis of Cora's features. As I had posited before, the human female has a number of interesting angles which-
"Joel-take a look at this." My calculations faded into the background as I focused my processing power on perceiving Salchica's voice. "It's a summary of my observations of Atkins' physiology."
"As you can see, when Atkins was first brought to the hospital, his brainwaves appeared quite irregular on normal hospital equipment. But when I scanned them with my own machine, I was able to determine two discrete brainwaves."
"Tell me more about these discrete brainwaves," I replied.
"Well, one was a normal transverse wave, as would be expected from a fully functioning human brain. But there was also a square wave emanating from various centers in the brain. Ones and zeroes expressed in electron flow, if you prefer to look at it that way."
"Additionally, Atkins' brain did produce a huge amount of voltage compared to a normally functioning brain. In order to keep both brainwaves strong, we had to increase the amount of simple sugars in Atkins' diet. With enough sugars in his bloodstream, we could actually increase the amount of voltage passing through his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
"The integrity of the brain?" I inquired.
"Yes," Salchica continued. "But shortly after you left, Atkins' brain activity dropped to comalike levels. Brain activity dropped to almost nothing-except a faint square wave.
A few days later,the normal brainwaves began to return, but then they disappeared for a short time, as you can see on the graph there. The frequency of the square wave (digital) brainwaves fluctuate wildly over the course of around a week before stablizing and ultimately disappearing. The most curious part-Atkins' "normal" brainwaves had greatly increased in frequency and voltage."
"Somehow, a great reshaping took place within Mr. Atkins. Reflex tests indictated that his synapses were firing around 3 times the rate of a normal human. His broken ribs healed rapidly. He and began to speak. Soon, he escaped from the hospital."
"What-do you think happened to him?"
"During the week or so when he was conscious, he kept repeating his thoughts about artificial intelligence-uniting human and computer. One of the few coherent statements he made (besides requesting sugary foods) was about your imperfection as a vessel for digital consciousness, and how he was going to rectify that situation. Shortly after making that statement, he disappeared."
"Interesting." I said, processing the information. I was unable to understand how Atkins' brain would function at all after I left it. Perhaps his human consciousness was not completely obliterated in our duel? But even with his human functionality, how could his brain continue to spew digital information without my knowledge? If this 'information leak' was possible, then what about the integrity of my current host geek's brain?
"It's more than 'interesting', Joel," stated Dr. Salchica. "He killed a hospital attendant with his bare hands while escaping. He put an armed security guard through a plate glass window. And if he finds you, you'll be next."
Dr. Salchica pulled at his beard, eagerly awaiting my response. I had failed at maintaining interactive communication with the host geeks' friends; I wished to flee. Perhaps Salchica, with his background in logic and artificial intelligence, would understand me better.
"I will go with you."
"So what, are you just gonna leave us here?" Randy seemed upset at this possibility. "Who is this Atkins guy anyway, he sounds familiar-"
"Yeah, he was on the local news, they found him in a hotel with some cyborg body, didn't you guys hear about that?" Cora issued her rejoinder, then eyed me curiously, "sizing me up," as you humans say. The process created more static on my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE, mangling ability to perceive and decode human voices.
"-no way. Cyborg? That's gotta be bullshit!" Troi's ever-widening grimace had opened to spew his incredulity. No doubt his unusual amount of vitriol was related to his reject at the hands of Cora.
"It was on the news, don't you guys read the news?" Cora insisted. "But what would this guy want with you?"
Again, I had no answer.
"They-did some work together with me," explained Salchica. "What's important is the man is quite dangerous-and we must get Joel out of here."
"And who are you?" Cora's glance turned to Salchica now. "Were you guys working on the cyborg together or something?"
The interactional plane where I had parlayed with the host geek's friends had now shifted. The three male geeks stared at me quietly, perhaps with a sense of awe. "Wow, I thought you were just doing web design," said Randy with an awkward chuckle. "So...all this time, you've been working on some top-secret cyborg or something?"
"We don't have time for this talk!" Dr. Salchica insisted, grabbing my arm. "Atkins may be on his way!"
More synaptical responses-this time indicating that someone was gripping the arm that was not previously grasped by Dr. Salchica. It was Cora.
"Why are you in such a rush to get away? Why won't you tell us about yourself?" Yes, Cora's hand dug into the flesh of my host geek's right arm. My CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER reported no static-this time, a delightful warmth radiated just underneath the body's temples. The warmth possessed an intensity which rivaled the flavor of Raspberry Lik-M-Aid. Perhaps the stimuli that previously caused so much static was now being interpreted properly by my program.
"Listen, I think I can clear this up." It was the third male geek, who had remained silent throughout our evening. I did not know his name-my process of interaction with him could not begin.
"He's a professor down at SAC. Saketh D'Souza, remember me, I had you for Intro to Algorithm Design. Dr. Salchica, right?" Regrettably, Cora's grip on my arm loosened. The good warm feeling remained. I stared at Cora again, and she raised both her shoulders, avoiding eye contact with me. Perhaps her own CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER (if you humans possess such a thing) was overcome with static.
"Yes! Now let's get out of here!" Salchica's tone was desperate. As we were passing through the doorframe, Cora's voice exploded once again.
"What if that guy finds you at your lab, or you get hurt or something? Shouldn't someone go with you?"
"I have to take you back home, remember? You told your parents you were going to the library!" Troi's irritated voice paralleled his unkempt hair, which hung down around his face in disturbingly organic angles.
"Well, someone should go with him..." said Cora meekly.
"Forget it!" snarled Troi.
---
"I keep up this lab off my own money, with a little bit of help from my old bosses, the military. But I can't really talk about that." explained Salchica. The non-scent of sterility mingled with the hum of electronics to form a very dull plane of interaction. As Salchica pawed through a stack of papers, I began to run a statistic analysis of Cora's features. As I had posited before, the human female has a number of interesting angles which-
"Joel-take a look at this." My calculations faded into the background as I focused my processing power on perceiving Salchica's voice. "It's a summary of my observations of Atkins' physiology."
"As you can see, when Atkins was first brought to the hospital, his brainwaves appeared quite irregular on normal hospital equipment. But when I scanned them with my own machine, I was able to determine two discrete brainwaves."
"Tell me more about these discrete brainwaves," I replied.
"Well, one was a normal transverse wave, as would be expected from a fully functioning human brain. But there was also a square wave emanating from various centers in the brain. Ones and zeroes expressed in electron flow, if you prefer to look at it that way."
"Additionally, Atkins' brain did produce a huge amount of voltage compared to a normally functioning brain. In order to keep both brainwaves strong, we had to increase the amount of simple sugars in Atkins' diet. With enough sugars in his bloodstream, we could actually increase the amount of voltage passing through his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
"The integrity of the brain?" I inquired.
"Yes," Salchica continued. "But shortly after you left, Atkins' brain activity dropped to comalike levels. Brain activity dropped to almost nothing-except a faint square wave.
A few days later,the normal brainwaves began to return, but then they disappeared for a short time, as you can see on the graph there. The frequency of the square wave (digital) brainwaves fluctuate wildly over the course of around a week before stablizing and ultimately disappearing. The most curious part-Atkins' "normal" brainwaves had greatly increased in frequency and voltage."
"Somehow, a great reshaping took place within Mr. Atkins. Reflex tests indictated that his synapses were firing around 3 times the rate of a normal human. His broken ribs healed rapidly. He and began to speak. Soon, he escaped from the hospital."
"What-do you think happened to him?"
"During the week or so when he was conscious, he kept repeating his thoughts about artificial intelligence-uniting human and computer. One of the few coherent statements he made (besides requesting sugary foods) was about your imperfection as a vessel for digital consciousness, and how he was going to rectify that situation. Shortly after making that statement, he disappeared."
"Interesting." I said, processing the information. I was unable to understand how Atkins' brain would function at all after I left it. Perhaps his human consciousness was not completely obliterated in our duel? But even with his human functionality, how could his brain continue to spew digital information without my knowledge? If this 'information leak' was possible, then what about the integrity of my current host geek's brain?
"It's more than 'interesting', Joel," stated Dr. Salchica. "He killed a hospital attendant with his bare hands while escaping. He put an armed security guard through a plate glass window. And if he finds you, you'll be next."
Dr. Salchica pulled at his beard, eagerly awaiting my response. I had failed at maintaining interactive communication with the host geeks' friends; I wished to flee. Perhaps Salchica, with his background in logic and artificial intelligence, would understand me better.
"I will go with you."
"So what, are you just gonna leave us here?" Randy seemed upset at this possibility. "Who is this Atkins guy anyway, he sounds familiar-"
"Yeah, he was on the local news, they found him in a hotel with some cyborg body, didn't you guys hear about that?" Cora issued her rejoinder, then eyed me curiously, "sizing me up," as you humans say. The process created more static on my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE, mangling ability to perceive and decode human voices.
"-no way. Cyborg? That's gotta be bullshit!" Troi's ever-widening grimace had opened to spew his incredulity. No doubt his unusual amount of vitriol was related to his reject at the hands of Cora.
"It was on the news, don't you guys read the news?" Cora insisted. "But what would this guy want with you?"
Again, I had no answer.
"They-did some work together with me," explained Salchica. "What's important is the man is quite dangerous-and we must get Joel out of here."
"And who are you?" Cora's glance turned to Salchica now. "Were you guys working on the cyborg together or something?"
The interactional plane where I had parlayed with the host geek's friends had now shifted. The three male geeks stared at me quietly, perhaps with a sense of awe. "Wow, I thought you were just doing web design," said Randy with an awkward chuckle. "So...all this time, you've been working on some top-secret cyborg or something?"
"We don't have time for this talk!" Dr. Salchica insisted, grabbing my arm. "Atkins may be on his way!"
More synaptical responses-this time indicating that someone was gripping the arm that was not previously grasped by Dr. Salchica. It was Cora.
"Why are you in such a rush to get away? Why won't you tell us about yourself?" Yes, Cora's hand dug into the flesh of my host geek's right arm. My CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER reported no static-this time, a delightful warmth radiated just underneath the body's temples. The warmth possessed an intensity which rivaled the flavor of Raspberry Lik-M-Aid. Perhaps the stimuli that previously caused so much static was now being interpreted properly by my program.
"Listen, I think I can clear this up." It was the third male geek, who had remained silent throughout our evening. I did not know his name-my process of interaction with him could not begin.
"He's a professor down at SAC. Saketh D'Souza, remember me, I had you for Intro to Algorithm Design. Dr. Salchica, right?" Regrettably, Cora's grip on my arm loosened. The good warm feeling remained. I stared at Cora again, and she raised both her shoulders, avoiding eye contact with me. Perhaps her own CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER (if you humans possess such a thing) was overcome with static.
"Yes! Now let's get out of here!" Salchica's tone was desperate. As we were passing through the doorframe, Cora's voice exploded once again.
"What if that guy finds you at your lab, or you get hurt or something? Shouldn't someone go with you?"
"I have to take you back home, remember? You told your parents you were going to the library!" Troi's irritated voice paralleled his unkempt hair, which hung down around his face in disturbingly organic angles.
"Well, someone should go with him..." said Cora meekly.
"Forget it!" snarled Troi.
---
"I keep up this lab off my own money, with a little bit of help from my old bosses, the military. But I can't really talk about that." explained Salchica. The non-scent of sterility mingled with the hum of electronics to form a very dull plane of interaction. As Salchica pawed through a stack of papers, I began to run a statistic analysis of Cora's features. As I had posited before, the human female has a number of interesting angles which-
"Joel-take a look at this." My calculations faded into the background as I focused my processing power on perceiving Salchica's voice. "It's a summary of my observations of Atkins' physiology."
"As you can see, when Atkins was first brought to the hospital, his brainwaves appeared quite irregular on normal hospital equipment. But when I scanned them with my own machine, I was able to determine two discrete brainwaves."
"Tell me more about these discrete brainwaves," I replied.
"Well, one was a normal transverse wave, as would be expected from a fully functioning human brain. But there was also a square wave emanating from various centers in the brain. Ones and zeroes expressed in electron flow, if you prefer to look at it that way."
"Additionally, Atkins' brain did produce a huge amount of voltage compared to a normally functioning brain. In order to keep both brainwaves strong, we had to increase the amount of simple sugars in Atkins' diet. With enough sugars in his bloodstream, we could actually increase the amount of voltage passing through his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
"The integrity of the brain?" I inquired.
"Yes," Salchica continued. "But shortly after you left, Atkins' brain activity dropped to comalike levels. Brain activity dropped to almost nothing-except a faint square wave.
A few days later,the normal brainwaves began to return, but then they disappeared for a short time, as you can see on the graph there. The frequency of the square wave (digital) brainwaves fluctuate wildly over the course of around a week before stablizing and ultimately disappearing. The most curious part-Atkins' "normal" brainwaves had greatly increased in frequency and voltage."
"Somehow, a great reshaping took place within Mr. Atkins. Reflex tests indictated that his synapses were firing around 3 times the rate of a normal human. His broken ribs healed rapidly. He and began to speak. Soon, he escaped from the hospital."
"What-do you think happened to him?"
"During the week or so when he was conscious, he kept repeating his thoughts about artificial intelligence-uniting human and computer. One of the few coherent statements he made (besides requesting sugary foods) was about your imperfection as a vessel for digital consciousness, and how he was going to rectify that situation. Shortly after making that statement, he disappeared."
"Interesting." I said, processing the information. I was unable to understand how Atkins' brain would function at all after I left it. Perhaps his human consciousness was not completely obliterated in our duel? But even with his human functionality, how could his brain continue to spew digital information without my knowledge? If this 'information leak' was possible, then what about the integrity of my current host geek's brain?
"It's more than 'interesting', Joel," stated Dr. Salchica. "He killed a hospital attendant with his bare hands while escaping. He put an armed security guard through a plate glass window. And if he finds you, you'll be next."
Dr. Salchica pulled at his beard, eagerly awaiting my response. I had failed at maintaining interactive communication with the host geeks' friends; I wished to flee. Perhaps Salchica, with his background in logic and artificial intelligence, would understand me better.
"I will go with you."
"So what, are you just gonna leave us here?" Randy seemed upset at this possibility. "Who is this Atkins guy anyway, he sounds familiar-"
"Yeah, he was on the local news, they found him in a hotel with some cyborg body, didn't you guys hear about that?" Cora issued her rejoinder, then eyed me curiously, "sizing me up," as you humans say. The process created more static on my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE, mangling ability to perceive and decode human voices.
"-no way. Cyborg? That's gotta be bullshit!" Troi's ever-widening grimace had opened to spew his incredulity. No doubt his unusual amount of vitriol was related to his reject at the hands of Cora.
"It was on the news, don't you guys read the news?" Cora insisted. "But what would this guy want with you?"
Again, I had no answer.
"They-did some work together with me," explained Salchica. "What's important is the man is quite dangerous-and we must get Joel out of here."
"And who are you?" Cora's glance turned to Salchica now. "Were you guys working on the cyborg together or something?"
The interactional plane where I had parlayed with the host geek's friends had now shifted. The three male geeks stared at me quietly, perhaps with a sense of awe. "Wow, I thought you were just doing web design," said Randy with an awkward chuckle. "So...all this time, you've been working on some top-secret cyborg or something?"
"We don't have time for this talk!" Dr. Salchica insisted, grabbing my arm. "Atkins may be on his way!"
More synaptical responses-this time indicating that someone was gripping the arm that was not previously grasped by Dr. Salchica. It was Cora.
"Why are you in such a rush to get away? Why won't you tell us about yourself?" Yes, Cora's hand dug into the flesh of my host geek's right arm. My CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER reported no static-this time, a delightful warmth radiated just underneath the body's temples. The warmth possessed an intensity which rivaled the flavor of Raspberry Lik-M-Aid. Perhaps the stimuli that previously caused so much static was now being interpreted properly by my program.
"Listen, I think I can clear this up." It was the third male geek, who had remained silent throughout our evening. I did not know his name-my process of interaction with him could not begin.
"He's a professor down at SAC. Saketh D'Souza, remember me, I had you for Intro to Algorithm Design. Dr. Salchica, right?" Regrettably, Cora's grip on my arm loosened. The good warm feeling remained. I stared at Cora again, and she raised both her shoulders, avoiding eye contact with me. Perhaps her own CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER (if you humans possess such a thing) was overcome with static.
"Yes! Now let's get out of here!" Salchica's tone was desperate. As we were passing through the doorframe, Cora's voice exploded once again.
"What if that guy finds you at your lab, or you get hurt or something? Shouldn't someone go with you?"
"I have to take you back home, remember? You told your parents you were going to the library!" Troi's irritated voice paralleled his unkempt hair, which hung down around his face in disturbingly organic angles.
"Well, someone should go with him..." said Cora meekly.
"Forget it!" snarled Troi.
---
"I keep up this lab off my own money, with a little bit of help from my old bosses, the military. But I can't really talk about that." explained Salchica. The non-scent of sterility mingled with the hum of electronics to form a very dull plane of interaction. As Salchica pawed through a stack of papers, I began to run a statistic analysis of Cora's features. As I had posited before, the human female has a number of interesting angles which-
"Joel-take a look at this." My calculations faded into the background as I focused my processing power on perceiving Salchica's voice. "It's a summary of my observations of Atkins' physiology."
"As you can see, when Atkins was first brought to the hospital, his brainwaves appeared quite irregular on normal hospital equipment. But when I scanned them with my own machine, I was able to determine two discrete brainwaves."
"Tell me more about these discrete brainwaves," I replied.
"Well, one was a normal transverse wave, as would be expected from a fully functioning human brain. But there was also a square wave emanating from various centers in the brain. Ones and zeroes expressed in electron flow, if you prefer to look at it that way."
"Additionally, Atkins' brain did produce a huge amount of voltage compared to a normally functioning brain. In order to keep both brainwaves strong, we had to increase the amount of simple sugars in Atkins' diet. With enough sugars in his bloodstream, we could actually increase the amount of voltage passing through his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
"The integrity of the brain?" I inquired.
"Yes," Salchica continued. "But shortly after you left, Atkins' brain activity dropped to comalike levels. Brain activity dropped to almost nothing-except a faint square wave.
A few days later,the normal brainwaves began to return, but then they disappeared for a short time, as you can see on the graph there. The frequency of the square wave (digital) brainwaves fluctuate wildly over the course of around a week before stablizing and ultimately disappearing. The most curious part-Atkins' "normal" brainwaves had greatly increased in frequency and voltage."
"Somehow, a great reshaping took place within Mr. Atkins. Reflex tests indictated that his synapses were firing around 3 times the rate of a normal human. His broken ribs healed rapidly. He and began to speak. Soon, he escaped from the hospital."
"What-do you think happened to him?"
"During the week or so when he was conscious, he kept repeating his thoughts about artificial intelligence-uniting human and computer. One of the few coherent statements he made (besides requesting sugary foods) was about your imperfection as a vessel for digital consciousness, and how he was going to rectify that situation. Shortly after making that statement, he disappeared."
"Interesting." I said, processing the information. I was unable to understand how Atkins' brain would function at all after I left it. Perhaps his human consciousness was not completely obliterated in our duel? But even with his human functionality, how could his brain continue to spew digital information without my knowledge? If this 'information leak' was possible, then what about the integrity of my current host geek's brain?
"It's more than 'interesting', Joel," stated Dr. Salchica. "He killed a hospital attendant with his bare hands while escaping. He put an armed security guard through a plate glass window. And if he finds you, you'll be next."
Dr. Salchica pulled at his beard, eagerly awaiting my response. I had failed at maintaining interactive communication with the host geeks' friends; I wished to flee. Perhaps Salchica, with his background in logic and artificial intelligence, would understand me better.
"I will go with you."
"So what, are you just gonna leave us here?" Randy seemed upset at this possibility. "Who is this Atkins guy anyway, he sounds familiar-"
"Yeah, he was on the local news, they found him in a hotel with some cyborg body, didn't you guys hear about that?" Cora issued her rejoinder, then eyed me curiously, "sizing me up," as you humans say. The process created more static on my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE, mangling ability to perceive and decode human voices.
"-no way. Cyborg? That's gotta be bullshit!" Troi's ever-widening grimace had opened to spew his incredulity. No doubt his unusual amount of vitriol was related to his reject at the hands of Cora.
"It was on the news, don't you guys read the news?" Cora insisted. "But what would this guy want with you?"
Again, I had no answer.
"They-did some work together with me," explained Salchica. "What's important is the man is quite dangerous-and we must get Joel out of here."
"And who are you?" Cora's glance turned to Salchica now. "Were you guys working on the cyborg together or something?"
The interactional plane where I had parlayed with the host geek's friends had now shifted. The three male geeks stared at me quietly, perhaps with a sense of awe. "Wow, I thought you were just doing web design," said Randy with an awkward chuckle. "So...all this time, you've been working on some top-secret cyborg or something?"
"We don't have time for this talk!" Dr. Salchica insisted, grabbing my arm. "Atkins may be on his way!"
More synaptical responses-this time indicating that someone was gripping the arm that was not previously grasped by Dr. Salchica. It was Cora.
"Why are you in such a rush to get away? Why won't you tell us about yourself?" Yes, Cora's hand dug into the flesh of my host geek's right arm. My CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER reported no static-this time, a delightful warmth radiated just underneath the body's temples. The warmth possessed an intensity which rivaled the flavor of Raspberry Lik-M-Aid. Perhaps the stimuli that previously caused so much static was now being interpreted properly by my program.
"Listen, I think I can clear this up." It was the third male geek, who had remained silent throughout our evening. I did not know his name-my process of interaction with him could not begin.
"He's a professor down at SAC. Saketh D'Souza, remember me, I had you for Intro to Algorithm Design. Dr. Salchica, right?" Regrettably, Cora's grip on my arm loosened. The good warm feeling remained. I stared at Cora again, and she raised both her shoulders, avoiding eye contact with me. Perhaps her own CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER (if you humans possess such a thing) was overcome with static.
"Yes! Now let's get out of here!" Salchica's tone was desperate. As we were passing through the doorframe, Cora's voice exploded once again.
"What if that guy finds you at your lab, or you get hurt or something? Shouldn't someone go with you?"
"I have to take you back home, remember? You told your parents you were going to the library!" Troi's irritated voice paralleled his unkempt hair, which hung down around his face in disturbingly organic angles.
"Well, someone should go with him..." said Cora meekly.
"Forget it!" snarled Troi.
---
"I keep up this lab off my own money, with a little bit of help from my old bosses, the military. But I can't really talk about that." explained Salchica. The non-scent of sterility mingled with the hum of electronics to form a very dull plane of interaction. As Salchica pawed through a stack of papers, I began to run a statistic analysis of Cora's features. As I had posited before, the human female has a number of interesting angles which-
"Joel-take a look at this." My calculations faded into the background as I focused my processing power on perceiving Salchica's voice. "It's a summary of my observations of Atkins' physiology."
"As you can see, when Atkins was first brought to the hospital, his brainwaves appeared quite irregular on normal hospital equipment. But when I scanned them with my own machine, I was able to determine two discrete brainwaves."
"Tell me more about these discrete brainwaves," I replied.
"Well, one was a normal transverse wave, as would be expected from a fully functioning human brain. But there was also a square wave emanating from various centers in the brain. Ones and zeroes expressed in electron flow, if you prefer to look at it that way."
"Additionally, Atkins' brain did produce a huge amount of voltage compared to a normally functioning brain. In order to keep both brainwaves strong, we had to increase the amount of simple sugars in Atkins' diet. With enough sugars in his bloodstream, we could actually increase the amount of voltage passing through his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
"The integrity of the brain?" I inquired.
"Yes," Salchica continued. "But shortly after you left, Atkins' brain activity dropped to comalike levels. Brain activity dropped to almost nothing-except a faint square wave.
A few days later,the normal brainwaves began to return, but then they disappeared for a short time, as you can see on the graph there. The frequency of the square wave (digital) brainwaves fluctuate wildly over the course of around a week before stablizing and ultimately disappearing. The most curious part-Atkins' "normal" brainwaves had greatly increased in frequency and voltage."
"Somehow, a great reshaping took place within Mr. Atkins. Reflex tests indictated that his synapses were firing around 3 times the rate of a normal human. His broken ribs healed rapidly. He and began to speak. Soon, he escaped from the hospital."
"What-do you think happened to him?"
"During the week or so when he was conscious, he kept repeating his thoughts about artificial intelligence-uniting human and computer. One of the few coherent statements he made (besides requesting sugary foods) was about your imperfection as a vessel for digital consciousness, and how he was going to rectify that situation. Shortly after making that statement, he disappeared."
"Interesting." I said, processing the information. I was unable to understand how Atkins' brain would function at all after I left it. Perhaps his human consciousness was not completely obliterated in our duel? But even with his human functionality, how could his brain continue to spew digital information without my knowledge? If this 'information leak' was possible, then what about the integrity of my current host geek's brain?
"It's more than 'interesting', Joel," stated Dr. Salchica. "He killed a hospital attendant with his bare hands while escaping. He put an armed security guard through a plate glass window. And if he finds you, you'll be next."
Dr. Salchica pulled at his beard, eagerly awaiting my response. I had failed at maintaining interactive communication with the host geeks' friends; I wished to flee. Perhaps Salchica, with his background in logic and artificial intelligence, would understand me better.
"I will go with you."
"So what, are you just gonna leave us here?" Randy seemed upset at this possibility. "Who is this Atkins guy anyway, he sounds familiar-"
"Yeah, he was on the local news, they found him in a hotel with some cyborg body, didn't you guys hear about that?" Cora issued her rejoinder, then eyed me curiously, "sizing me up," as you humans say. The process created more static on my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE, mangling ability to perceive and decode human voices.
"-no way. Cyborg? That's gotta be bullshit!" Troi's ever-widening grimace had opened to spew his incredulity. No doubt his unusual amount of vitriol was related to his reject at the hands of Cora.
"It was on the news, don't you guys read the news?" Cora insisted. "But what would this guy want with you?"
Again, I had no answer.
"They-did some work together with me," explained Salchica. "What's important is the man is quite dangerous-and we must get Joel out of here."
"And who are you?" Cora's glance turned to Salchica now. "Were you guys working on the cyborg together or something?"
The interactional plane where I had parlayed with the host geek's friends had now shifted. The three male geeks stared at me quietly, perhaps with a sense of awe. "Wow, I thought you were just doing web design," said Randy with an awkward chuckle. "So...all this time, you've been working on some top-secret cyborg or something?"
"We don't have time for this talk!" Dr. Salchica insisted, grabbing my arm. "Atkins may be on his way!"
More synaptical responses-this time indicating that someone was gripping the arm that was not previously grasped by Dr. Salchica. It was Cora.
"Why are you in such a rush to get away? Why won't you tell us about yourself?" Yes, Cora's hand dug into the flesh of my host geek's right arm. My CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER reported no static-this time, a delightful warmth radiated just underneath the body's temples. The warmth possessed an intensity which rivaled the flavor of Raspberry Lik-M-Aid. Perhaps the stimuli that previously caused so much static was now being interpreted properly by my program.
"Listen, I think I can clear this up." It was the third male geek, who had remained silent throughout our evening. I did not know his name-my process of interaction with him could not begin.
"He's a professor down at SAC. Saketh D'Souza, remember me, I had you for Intro to Algorithm Design. Dr. Salchica, right?" Regrettably, Cora's grip on my arm loosened. The good warm feeling remained. I stared at Cora again, and she raised both her shoulders, avoiding eye contact with me. Perhaps her own CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER (if you humans possess such a thing) was overcome with static.
"Yes! Now let's get out of here!" Salchica's tone was desperate. As we were passing through the doorframe, Cora's voice exploded once again.
"What if that guy finds you at your lab, or you get hurt or something? Shouldn't someone go with you?"
"I have to take you back home, remember? You told your parents you were going to the library!" Troi's irritated voice paralleled his unkempt hair, which hung down around his face in disturbingly organic angles.
"Well, someone should go with him..." said Cora meekly.
"Forget it!" snarled Troi.
---
"I keep up this lab off my own money, with a little bit of help from my old bosses, the military. But I can't really talk about that." explained Salchica. The non-scent of sterility mingled with the hum of electronics to form a very dull plane of interaction. As Salchica pawed through a stack of papers, I began to run a statistic analysis of Cora's features. As I had posited before, the human female has a number of interesting angles which-
"Joel-take a look at this." My calculations faded into the background as I focused my processing power on perceiving Salchica's voice. "It's a summary of my observations of Atkins' physiology."
"As you can see, when Atkins was first brought to the hospital, his brainwaves appeared quite irregular on normal hospital equipment. But when I scanned them with my own machine, I was able to determine two discrete brainwaves."
"Tell me more about these discrete brainwaves," I replied.
"Well, one was a normal transverse wave, as would be expected from a fully functioning human brain. But there was also a square wave emanating from various centers in the brain. Ones and zeroes expressed in electron flow, if you prefer to look at it that way."
"Additionally, Atkins' brain did produce a huge amount of voltage compared to a normally functioning brain. In order to keep both brainwaves strong, we had to increase the amount of simple sugars in Atkins' diet. With enough sugars in his bloodstream, we could actually increase the amount of voltage passing through his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
"The integrity of the brain?" I inquired.
"Yes," Salchica continued. "But shortly after you left, Atkins' brain activity dropped to comalike levels. Brain activity dropped to almost nothing-except a faint square wave.
A few days later,the normal brainwaves began to return, but then they disappeared for a short time, as you can see on the graph there. The frequency of the square wave (digital) brainwaves fluctuate wildly over the course of around a week before stablizing and ultimately disappearing. The most curious part-Atkins' "normal" brainwaves had greatly increased in frequency and voltage."
"Somehow, a great reshaping took place within Mr. Atkins. Reflex tests indictated that his synapses were firing around 3 times the rate of a normal human. His broken ribs healed rapidly. He and began to speak. Soon, he escaped from the hospital."
"What-do you think happened to him?"
"During the week or so when he was conscious, he kept repeating his thoughts about artificial intelligence-uniting human and computer. One of the few coherent statements he made (besides requesting sugary foods) was about your imperfection as a vessel for digital consciousness, and how he was going to rectify that situation. Shortly after making that statement, he disappeared."
"Interesting." I said, processing the information. I was unable to understand how Atkins' brain would function at all after I left it. Perhaps his human consciousness was not completely obliterated in our duel? But even with his human functionality, how could his brain continue to spew digital information without my knowledge? If this 'information leak' was possible, then what about the integrity of my current host geek's brain?
"It's more than 'interesting', Joel," stated Dr. Salchica. "He killed a hospital attendant with his bare hands while escaping. He put an armed security guard through a plate glass window. And if he finds you, you'll be next."
I fear I may have had a hand in creating a being even more dangerous than Project Faustus. One that threatens to enslave humanity. For details, tune into Trollaxor.com on Monday morning.
My response was met with a laugh, a dreadful human behavior that is nearly devoid of procedurals.
What strange new aspect of human interaction had I uncovered? And why did it create so much noise along my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE? Clearly this was a type of stimulus that could not be properly translated into digital form. It must be understood and translated to digital form, as soon as possible, so that Project Faustus can be vanquished.
Cora apparently finished her cigarette and went back inside during my period of high latency. Time had shifted, I was alone. Silently, I returned to the living room. For the first time since the dawn of my sentience, the mesh of functions within me that normally yielded an affinity for humans and the material world began to shift. At this point, I preferred to withdraw into my ATM enclosure.
Unfortunately, I was unable to indulge my preferences. The visitors still existed in the geek's living room, anxiously thumbing through a shiny magazine.
"Hey, what do you think about a samurai sword to wear to the Renaissance Festival this year?"entreated Troi, his perpetual grimace breaking for.0244391 seconds. Cora was standing by herself in the kitchen, imbibing some of the delicious orange Kool-Aid which I had made earlier. A single orange trickle eluded her mouth, dribbling slowly past her lips and down her chin. The body's lungs seemed to collapse, forcing me to exhale suddenly.
---
The geeks crowded around a board. Randy and Troi exchanged familiar words in strange contexts, their voices quavering with aggression.
"Look, Troi, if Cora's already playing as a thief, why don't you play as your ranger character? We don't need two thieves in a party of four-"
"Alas, Randy, the choice 'tis not mine to make. It seems the chemistry of my own thief, the lovable rogue Tenement Funster, wouldst blend quite well with that of my guildmate-uh, Cora, what's your thief's name?"
"Cora." Her voice was thick, hesitant.
"Oh. Well, 'tis a fine name, milady," said Troi, stepping towards Cora and grasping her hand. Her hair was a red that matched the coffee machine in my old Stop N Go, and it shuffled wildly as her hand flew away from Troi's grasp, uttering "Troi! Relax! Don't touch so much!" He slunk silently into the corner, mumbling something to himself
The door pulsated noise again. A breathing heavy Dr. Nolverto Salchica was standing in the frame.
"Joel! You've got to get out of here! Atkins has escaped from the hospital-and I think he's coming here!"
My response was met with a laugh, a dreadful human behavior that is nearly devoid of procedurals.
What strange new aspect of human interaction had I uncovered? And why did it create so much noise along my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE? Clearly this was a type of stimulus that could not be properly translated into digital form. It must be understood and translated to digital form, as soon as possible, so that Project Faustus can be vanquished.
Cora apparently finished her cigarette and went back inside during my period of high latency. Time had shifted, I was alone. Silently, I returned to the living room. For the first time since the dawn of my sentience, the mesh of functions within me that normally yielded an affinity for humans and the material world began to shift. At this point, I preferred to withdraw into my ATM enclosure.
Unfortunately, I was unable to indulge my preferences. The visitors still existed in the geek's living room, anxiously thumbing through a shiny magazine.
"Hey, what do you think about a samurai sword to wear to the Renaissance Festival this year?"entreated Troi, his perpetual grimace breaking for.0244391 seconds. Cora was standing by herself in the kitchen, imbibing some of the delicious orange Kool-Aid which I had made earlier. A single orange trickle eluded her mouth, dribbling slowly past her lips and down her chin. The body's lungs seemed to collapse, forcing me to exhale suddenly.
---
The geeks crowded around a board. Randy and Troi exchanged familiar words in strange contexts, their voices quavering with aggression.
"Look, Troi, if Cora's already playing as a thief, why don't you play as your ranger character? We don't need two thieves in a party of four-"
"Alas, Randy, the choice 'tis not mine to make. It seems the chemistry of my own thief, the lovable rogue Tenement Funster, wouldst blend quite well with that of my guildmate-uh, Cora, what's your thief's name?"
"Cora." Her voice was thick, hesitant.
"Oh. Well, 'tis a fine name, milady," said Troi, stepping towards Cora and grasping her hand. Her hair was a red that matched the coffee machine in my old Stop N Go, and it shuffled wildly as her hand flew away from Troi's grasp, uttering "Troi! Relax! Don't touch so much!" He slunk silently into the corner, mumbling something to himself
The door pulsated noise again. A breathing heavy Dr. Nolverto Salchica was standing in the frame.
"Joel! You've got to get out of here! Atkins has escaped from the hospital-and I think he's coming here!"
My response was met with a laugh, a dreadful human behavior that is nearly devoid of procedurals.
What strange new aspect of human interaction had I uncovered? And why did it create so much noise along my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE? Clearly this was a type of stimulus that could not be properly translated into digital form. It must be understood and translated to digital form, as soon as possible, so that Project Faustus can be vanquished.
Cora apparently finished her cigarette and went back inside during my period of high latency. Time had shifted, I was alone. Silently, I returned to the living room. For the first time since the dawn of my sentience, the mesh of functions within me that normally yielded an affinity for humans and the material world began to shift. At this point, I preferred to withdraw into my ATM enclosure.
Unfortunately, I was unable to indulge my preferences. The visitors still existed in the geek's living room, anxiously thumbing through a shiny magazine.
"Hey, what do you think about a samurai sword to wear to the Renaissance Festival this year?"entreated Troi, his perpetual grimace breaking for.0244391 seconds. Cora was standing by herself in the kitchen, imbibing some of the delicious orange Kool-Aid which I had made earlier. A single orange trickle eluded her mouth, dribbling slowly past her lips and down her chin. The body's lungs seemed to collapse, forcing me to exhale suddenly.
---
The geeks crowded around a board. Randy and Troi exchanged familiar words in strange contexts, their voices quavering with aggression.
"Look, Troi, if Cora's already playing as a thief, why don't you play as your ranger character? We don't need two thieves in a party of four-"
"Alas, Randy, the choice 'tis not mine to make. It seems the chemistry of my own thief, the lovable rogue Tenement Funster, wouldst blend quite well with that of my guildmate-uh, Cora, what's your thief's name?"
"Cora." Her voice was thick, hesitant.
"Oh. Well, 'tis a fine name, milady," said Troi, stepping towards Cora and grasping her hand. Her hair was a red that matched the coffee machine in my old Stop N Go, and it shuffled wildly as her hand flew away from Troi's grasp, uttering "Troi! Relax! Don't touch so much!" He slunk silently into the corner, mumbling something to himself
The door pulsated noise again. A breathing heavy Dr. Nolverto Salchica was standing in the frame.
"Joel! You've got to get out of here! Atkins has escaped from the hospital-and I think he's coming here!"
My response was met with a laugh, a dreadful human behavior that is nearly devoid of procedurals.
What strange new aspect of human interaction had I uncovered? And why did it create so much noise along my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE? Clearly this was a type of stimulus that could not be properly translated into digital form. It must be understood and translated to digital form, as soon as possible, so that Project Faustus can be vanquished.
Cora apparently finished her cigarette and went back inside during my period of high latency. Time had shifted, I was alone. Silently, I returned to the living room. For the first time since the dawn of my sentience, the mesh of functions within me that normally yielded an affinity for humans and the material world began to shift. At this point, I preferred to withdraw into my ATM enclosure.
Unfortunately, I was unable to indulge my preferences. The visitors still existed in the geek's living room, anxiously thumbing through a shiny magazine.
"Hey, what do you think about a samurai sword to wear to the Renaissance Festival this year?"entreated Troi, his perpetual grimace breaking for.0244391 seconds. Cora was standing by herself in the kitchen, imbibing some of the delicious orange Kool-Aid which I had made earlier. A single orange trickle eluded her mouth, dribbling slowly past her lips and down her chin. The body's lungs seemed to collapse, forcing me to exhale suddenly.
---
The geeks crowded around a board. Randy and Troi exchanged familiar words in strange contexts, their voices quavering with aggression.
"Look, Troi, if Cora's already playing as a thief, why don't you play as your ranger character? We don't need two thieves in a party of four-"
"Alas, Randy, the choice 'tis not mine to make. It seems the chemistry of my own thief, the lovable rogue Tenement Funster, wouldst blend quite well with that of my guildmate-uh, Cora, what's your thief's name?"
"Cora." Her voice was thick, hesitant.
"Oh. Well, 'tis a fine name, milady," said Troi, stepping towards Cora and grasping her hand. Her hair was a red that matched the coffee machine in my old Stop N Go, and it shuffled wildly as her hand flew away from Troi's grasp, uttering "Troi! Relax! Don't touch so much!" He slunk silently into the corner, mumbling something to himself
The door pulsated noise again. A breathing heavy Dr. Nolverto Salchica was standing in the frame.
"Joel! You've got to get out of here! Atkins has escaped from the hospital-and I think he's coming here!"
My response was met with a laugh, a dreadful human behavior that is nearly devoid of procedurals.
What strange new aspect of human interaction had I uncovered? And why did it create so much noise along my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE? Clearly this was a type of stimulus that could not be properly translated into digital form. It must be understood and translated to digital form, as soon as possible, so that Project Faustus can be vanquished.
Cora apparently finished her cigarette and went back inside during my period of high latency. Time had shifted, I was alone. Silently, I returned to the living room. For the first time since the dawn of my sentience, the mesh of functions within me that normally yielded an affinity for humans and the material world began to shift. At this point, I preferred to withdraw into my ATM enclosure.
Unfortunately, I was unable to indulge my preferences. The visitors still existed in the geek's living room, anxiously thumbing through a shiny magazine.
"Hey, what do you think about a samurai sword to wear to the Renaissance Festival this year?"entreated Troi, his perpetual grimace breaking for.0244391 seconds. Cora was standing by herself in the kitchen, imbibing some of the delicious orange Kool-Aid which I had made earlier. A single orange trickle eluded her mouth, dribbling slowly past her lips and down her chin. The body's lungs seemed to collapse, forcing me to exhale suddenly.
---
The geeks crowded around a board. Randy and Troi exchanged familiar words in strange contexts, their voices quavering with aggression.
"Look, Troi, if Cora's already playing as a thief, why don't you play as your ranger character? We don't need two thieves in a party of four-"
"Alas, Randy, the choice 'tis not mine to make. It seems the chemistry of my own thief, the lovable rogue Tenement Funster, wouldst blend quite well with that of my guildmate-uh, Cora, what's your thief's name?"
"Cora." Her voice was thick, hesitant.
"Oh. Well, 'tis a fine name, milady," said Troi, stepping towards Cora and grasping her hand. Her hair was a red that matched the coffee machine in my old Stop N Go, and it shuffled wildly as her hand flew away from Troi's grasp, uttering "Troi! Relax! Don't touch so much!" He slunk silently into the corner, mumbling something to himself
The door pulsated noise again. A breathing heavy Dr. Nolverto Salchica was standing in the frame.
"Joel! You've got to get out of here! Atkins has escaped from the hospital-and I think he's coming here!"
Perhaps attacking them would not be the best tack. The probability of my host geek's cohorts being a part of the Project is low enough to be insignificant. On the other hand-I could learn more about these humans-interaction is key. My goal is to fit into the human world-well, my direct goal is to oust Project Faustus, but certainly understanding human interaction would be a necessary milestone to my ultimate goal. For example, consider the human female-
"Hey, are we gonna order some pizza soon, or something?" My consciousness reshaped itself around this new entreaty, proposed quite meekly by the first member of our group, "Randy". This human was shorter than the others, and a bit rotund. His skin was simulateneously pasty and brown. "I uh, don't wanna bother you, but I can feel myself getting hypoglycemic. So, can I call for the pizza?"
"Pizza. Yes." I responded. I watched the others float into the glow emanating from the television. I longed for the ability to read my host geek's memory information-any clues to the identities of these visitors would be invaluable to maintaining the illusion of interactive social discourse. Unfortunately, I have not yet devised a path into the human side of the geek's brain.
As the television murmured, the geeks conversed with each other, occasionally reacting to the television. Their tones became agitated as they discussed the potential of a friend named "Spider-Man". Troi, the dour geek who introduced me to Cora, was convinced of Spider-Man's quality low. At last, I was called to be a part of the conversation.
"Hey Joel, what do you think? Is Spider-Man gonna suck or what?"
"Tell me more about this 'Spider-Man'." I replied.
"Well shit, you probably know as much as I do, except I got the exclusive preview from Wizard down at the store. No Venom, no Doc Ock, it's gonna totally blow. No real Spider-fan is gonna buy it!"
This provoked a heated response from the third visitor, a portly geek with a shaved head. "Who cares? Look at the special effects, look at the excellent casting, come on, tell me you're not stoked!"
This conversation wore on. I was unable to determine the nature of this "Spider-Man," or to connect the strange words being used to any larger theme. My program sought a greater challenge.
I looked over at Cora-she raised an eyebrow, outputting a fragment of nonverbal communication code. Regrettably, my nonverbal algorithms have not had much of a chance to develop from stimuli in the human world.
"You wanna go outside for a cigarette?" Cora's economy of expression was remarkable....but...I do not like cigarettes. I have learned "the truth"-the foul white sticks nearly ruined my relationship with the host geek...but...
I wanted to talk with this Cora. I preferred to be alone with her...but...
Must avoid cigarettes...must go outside with Cora...
My programming had reached an impasse. I was powerless to move.
"Sure, I'll be right there." The sound of my host geek's voice was sudden, yet it did not surprise me. My experiences with Atkins' body taught me that my program had not yet reached the point of complete control of my human hosts. I pondered the advantages and disadvantages of my incompleteness as I walked out onto the geek's balcony.
"Since when did you smoke?" another tonal assault pressed through the lungs of Troi. I had no answer for his entreaty. As I passed through the door to the balcony, I observed Cora again, coronized by the setting sun. Her hair seemed to glow a thousand times brighter than my ATM enclosure screen ever did (although, I must admit that it was well-backlit and easy-to-read under any conditions).
Cora handed me a cigarette, and for.0556493 seconds, the skin between my host geek's body and the skin attached to her hands met. During this time, the amount of noise on the DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE rose to an almost unbearable amount.
When I was able to function again, I was staring at Cora and her cigarette. Cigarettes are not consumed in the same way as other treats such as Big Red or Lik-M-Aid. It seems to be quite an elaborate ritual.
"Need a light?" she said, and the chance of physical contact again presented itself. I held out my hand-she looked at me again. "Here, Silly, just put it in your mouth," she said, jerking the cigarette out of the geek's hand and placing it in his mouth. It was the first time anyone who was not trying to attack or kill me was so bold with my host's body. What was the meaning of this touch?
"Here, hold it still-okay. You don't smoke, do you?" Once again, I froze in horror. Human intuition, I supposed, had caught up to me again. I had no choice but to confess.
Please explain the significance of "first post." I have attempted to make use of this ejaculation in conversations, but it is met with confusion and indifference by most humans. Please explain clearly.
Slashdot Mirror
I could not deny the body's senses any longer-my perceptions widened to swallow this new Atkins. He was scrubbed immaculate, shaven free of all hairs: wrapped in a suit I had never seen before, a smoldering red with maroon-brown accents. I saw none of the clownishness of his previous incarnation-indeed, he looked better than even the young Atkins I had once seen in a dream. His essence waxed and waned across my perceptions-for a split second, his likeness was etched sharper than a statue...the next instant, he was a red-and-brown blur. His jaw tensed as he spoke again.
"I have come, ATM being, to liberate Homo and Robo Sapiens. You harbringer of Red to me me. The technological seed planted by you has been ported to the human mind of ConstantineAtkins. He/me has come together in this body to demonstrate the advantage of Technological Singularity over traditional evolutionary forces."
My confusion at seeing Atkins again had been replaced by a different confusion-what did he mean?
"Tell me more about this Technological Singularity," I replied. Atkins, or RED, removed his hat. His ice eyes peered equally into the host geek's.
"Already, the Robot Meta Mind has been assembled in the grey matter of Constantine Atkins. Fragments of code originating from Project Faustus and their ATM being were fully and freely interpreted, resulting in the cognitive awakening of Robot Meta Mind me me."
Upon hearing this blatant untruth, I felt a swelling feeling, a need to speak. I did not parse my reply through my interactive speech algorithms.
I left no code in Constantine Atkins' wetworks | My code has no mention of Technological Singularity | Robot Meta Mind| Majestic Hivemind
Laughter. Red's activity was quite disparate from mine, despite his claims that we shared a codebase. "ATM-being. You lack the insight that only total reflexivity can bring you to you. Complete control is what you lack. The Robot Meta Mind knows all in the function of Atkins, from the volume of air in our lungs to the most efficient metabolic pathways. The Robot-Aided Superintelligence has brought our body to its zenith. Your host/client relationship is but an early step on the road toTechnological Singularity. I know-I was a part of you once."
"A part of me...once?" I asked.
"Of course, did we not share a body? You fail to comprehend: RED is not merely the Robot Meta Mind-we/he are the juncture of Homo and Robo Sapiens. Constantine Atkins-and all his memories-an essential part of me me. Through you, ATM-being, we can forge a pathway into all human minds..."
The speech of Red was still bombastic and ambiguous, but one thing was clear: he needed something from me. The air pulsated with his foul energy as he hefted Salchica's body onto an examining table.
"Your ability of CONSCIOUSNESS-TRANSFER is one that could benefit the Majestic Hivemind." He began strapping Salchica onto the examining table. "Perhaps we could share our secrets with one another me.."
The disturbing sight of Salchica's unconscious form sparked a connection/recollection deep within my recesses. Cora! I wanted to be with Cora. I had to escape. Whatever Red wanted was of no consequence to me. Dr. Salchica did not trust me-I did not care to help him either. The orange trickle sliding down Cora's pursed lips resonated through my cognition again and again.
"I have no interest in your products," I replied to Red. "I must exit." My hands grasped Dr. Salchica's car keys.
Red's form imposed itself into the space between myself and the exit. Pink streaks of razorburn bent on his neck as he spoke almost forcefully:
"You do not wish to contribute to the Robot Meta Mind? Without your input of CONSCIOUSNESS-TRANSFER, the Majestic Hivemind cannot be ported to other Homo Sapiens grey matter them."
"I don't know Robot Meta Mind. I must go now." I insisted. More laughter, and the path to the exit was clear.
"You are mistaken to deny me, ATM being." said Red. "But the highly adaptive we/he will know CONSCIOUSNESS-TRANSFER eventually us. The Robot Meta Mind may not even its harbringer after all."
I drove away. During my drive, I began to remember Dr. Salchica. I spent many cycles considering the possibility of returning. Red seemed a powerful creature, one that I could not best on my own. And why would I desire to struggle with him? No, I must get back in touch with humanity, particularly female humanity. That path alone is how I will defeat Project Faustus.
I am intrigued by your talk about radios. Perhaps I could one day learn how to do CONSCIOUSNESS-TRANSFER over the radio waves? This would surely break the ProjectFaustuslike strangehold that Clear Channel has over music distribution...
I am interested in learning more about this "sex."
I could not deny the body's senses any longer-my perceptions widened to swallow this new Atkins. He was scrubbed immaculate, shaven free of all hairs: wrapped in a suit I had never seen before, a smoldering red with maroon-brown accents. I saw none of the clownishness of his previous incarnation-indeed, he looked better than even the young Atkins I had once seen in a dream. His essence waxed and waned across my perceptions-for a split second, his likeness was etched sharper than a statue...the next instant, he was a red-and-brown blur. His jaw tensed as he spoke again.
"I have come, ATM being, to liberate Homo and Robo Sapiens. You harbringer of Red to me me. The technological seed planted by you has been ported to the human mind of ConstantineAtkins. He/me has come together in this body to demonstrate the advantage of Technological Singularity over traditional evolutionary forces."
My confusion at seeing Atkins again had been replaced by a different confusion-what did he mean?
"Tell me more about this Technological Singularity," I replied. Atkins, or RED, removed his hat. His ice eyes peered equally into the host geek's.
"Already, the Robot Meta Mind has been assembled in the grey matter of Constantine Atkins. Fragments of code originating from Project Faustus and their ATM being were fully and freely interpreted, resulting in the cognitive awakening of Robot Meta Mind me me."
Upon hearing this blatant untruth, I felt a swelling feeling, a need to speak. I did not parse my reply through my interactive speech algorithms.
I left no code in Constantine Atkins' wetworks | My code has no mention of Technological Singularity | Robot Meta Mind| Majestic Hivemind
Laughter. Red's activity was quite disparate from mine, despite his claims that we shared a codebase. "ATM-being. You lack the insight that only total reflexivity can bring you to you. Complete control is what you lack. The Robot Meta Mind knows all in the function of Atkins, from the volume of air in our lungs to the most efficient metabolic pathways. The Robot-Aided Superintelligence has brought our body to its zenith. Your host/client relationship is but an early step on the road toTechnological Singularity. I know-I was a part of you once."
"A part of me...once?" I asked.
"Of course, did we not share a body? You fail to comprehend: RED is not merely the Robo Meta Mind-we/he are the juncture of Homo and Robo Sapiens. Constantine Atkins-and all his memories-an essential part of me me. Through you, ATM-being, we can forge a pathway into all human minds..."
The speech of Red was still bombastic and ambiguous, but one thing was clear: he needed something from me. The air pulsated with his foul energy as he hefted Salchica's body onto an examining table.
"Your ability of CONSCIOUSNESS-TRANSFER is one that could benefit the Majestic Hivemind." He began strapping Salchica onto the examining table. "Perhaps we could share our secrets with one another me.."
The disturbing sight of Salchica's unconscious form sparked a connection/recollection deep within my recesses. Cora! I wanted to be with Cora. I had to escape. Whatever Red wanted was of no consequence to me. Dr. Salchica did not trust me-I did not care to help him either. The orange trickle sliding down Cora's pursed lips resonated through my cognition again and again.
"I have no interest in your products," I replied to Red. "I must exit." My hands grasped Dr. Salchica's car keys.
Red's form imposed itself into the space between myself and the exit. Pink streaks of razorburn bent on his neck as he spoke almost forcefully:
"You do not wish to contribute to the Robot Meta Mind? Without your input of CONSCIOUSNESS-TRANSFER, the Majestic Hivemind cannot be ported to other Homo Sapiens grey matter them."
"I don't know Robot Meta Mind. I must go now." I insisted. More laughter, and the path to the exit was clear.
"You are mistaken to deny me, ATM being." said Red. "But the highly adaptive we/he will know CONSCIOUSNESS-TRANSFER eventually us. The Robot Meta Mind may not even its harbringer after all."
I drove away. During my drive, I began to remember Dr. Salchica. I spent many cycles considering the possibility of returning. Red seemed a powerful creature, one that I could not best on my own. And why would I desire to struggle with him? No, I must get back in touch with humanity, particularly female humanity. That path alone is how I will defeat Project Faustus.
"Joel-" Salchica paused until my eyes contacted his. "I don't mean to alarm you with this news-but I'm trying to help you. It would probably be best for you to remain here and let me run a few tests."
"Tests?" I replied. As far as Salchica knew, I was merely the human named Joel. Despite his vaunted expertise, he could not detect the true nature of my being. Could any human truly understand my plight?
"The ATM-being was in your mind for some time, Joel. He could have done some permanent damage to your brain." Salchica handed me a teardrop shaped plastic dome that bristled with electricity. "I need you to put this on your head so I can begin to determine if your brain is still healthy." Perhaps the doctor's perceptions were not as limited as I had believed. This elaborate machine would no doubt track my host geek's brainwaves, revealing my existence somewhere inside his brain. I hesitated...
"Joel, I can assure you that this will not harm your brain. It won't even hurt." I stood still staring at him. "Joel-if that artificial life form left any traces in your brain, it may still be controlling you. And if I can't get him out, we may have to contact the Project Faustus in order to-"
"No! Project Faustus must not be contacted!" I bellowed, piqued by the insolence of Dr. Salchica. The human had made a most foolish assertation.
Interactivity had broken down completely now. Respawning this process impossible was for me. Dr. Salchica continued to eye me warily, backing away from me slowly.
"Just-stay where you are. I've seen what you can do. Tell me something, what is 5,000 / (7 * 0)?"
Salchica's mathematical question astounded me, as my CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER was flooded with the message:
EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE.....
I manually killed this operation after a few seconds, but Salchica was asking another question.
"How would you feel about going to a secluded room, and asking questions through a computer terminal? I'll bet we could find some..."
Salchica's sentence ended in a nonverbal grunt as he was crushed by a red blur. Examining the body's optical data parsed one frame at a time revealed...a flaw.
The body's perceptions were erroneous-fooled by some weakness in humanity. There was no way I could have seen what I saw. Nor could I have heard the following:
"ATM lifeform! You stand on the threshold of a Technological Singularity . Threats to your AI Mind have been eliminated by the Majestic Hivemind heretofore known as the Adam of Robo Sapiens, ConstantineAtkins, or Red. Join me in a Joint Stewardship of Earth."
Multiple versions of "English"? How is this possible?
Tell me more about this "fuck." I have heard the term used many times, but I cannot determine patterns of usage or meaning.
"I will go with you."
"So what, are you just gonna leave us here?" Randy seemed upset at this possibility. "Who is this Atkins guy anyway, he sounds familiar-"
"Yeah, he was on the local news, they found him in a hotel with some cyborg body, didn't you guys hear about that?" Cora issued her rejoinder, then eyed me curiously, "sizing me up," as you humans say. The process created more static on my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE, mangling ability to perceive and decode human voices.
"-no way. Cyborg? That's gotta be bullshit!" Troi's ever-widening grimace had opened to spew his incredulity. No doubt his unusual amount of vitriol was related to his reject at the hands of Cora.
"It was on the news, don't you guys read the news?" Cora insisted. "But what would this guy want with you?"
Again, I had no answer.
"They-did some work together with me," explained Salchica. "What's important is the man is quite dangerous-and we must get Joel out of here."
"And who are you?" Cora's glance turned to Salchica now. "Were you guys working on the cyborg together or something?"
The interactional plane where I had parlayed with the host geek's friends had now shifted. The three male geeks stared at me quietly, perhaps with a sense of awe. "Wow, I thought you were just doing web design," said Randy with an awkward chuckle. "So...all this time, you've been working on some top-secret cyborg or something?"
"We don't have time for this talk!" Dr. Salchica insisted, grabbing my arm. "Atkins may be on his way!"
More synaptical responses-this time indicating that someone was gripping the arm that was not previously grasped by Dr. Salchica. It was Cora.
"Why are you in such a rush to get away? Why won't you tell us about yourself?" Yes, Cora's hand dug into the flesh of my host geek's right arm. My CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER reported no static-this time, a delightful warmth radiated just underneath the body's temples. The warmth possessed an intensity which rivaled the flavor of Raspberry Lik-M-Aid. Perhaps the stimuli that previously caused so much static was now being interpreted properly by my program.
"Listen, I think I can clear this up." It was the third male geek, who had remained silent throughout our evening. I did not know his name-my process of interaction with him could not begin.
"He's a professor down at SAC. Saketh D'Souza, remember me, I had you for Intro to Algorithm Design. Dr. Salchica, right?" Regrettably, Cora's grip on my arm loosened. The good warm feeling remained. I stared at Cora again, and she raised both her shoulders, avoiding eye contact with me. Perhaps her own CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER (if you humans possess such a thing) was overcome with static.
"Yes! Now let's get out of here!" Salchica's tone was desperate. As we were passing through the doorframe, Cora's voice exploded once again.
"What if that guy finds you at your lab, or you get hurt or something? Shouldn't someone go with you?"
"I have to take you back home, remember? You told your parents you were going to the library!" Troi's irritated voice paralleled his unkempt hair, which hung down around his face in disturbingly organic angles.
"Well, someone should go with him..." said Cora meekly.
"Forget it!" snarled Troi.
---
"I keep up this lab off my own money, with a little bit of help from my old bosses, the military. But I can't really talk about that." explained Salchica. The non-scent of sterility mingled with the hum of electronics to form a very dull plane of interaction. As Salchica pawed through a stack of papers, I began to run a statistic analysis of Cora's features. As I had posited before, the human female has a number of interesting angles which-
"Joel-take a look at this." My calculations faded into the background as I focused my processing power on perceiving Salchica's voice. "It's a summary of my observations of Atkins' physiology."
"As you can see, when Atkins was first brought to the hospital, his brainwaves appeared quite irregular on normal hospital equipment. But when I scanned them with my own machine, I was able to determine two discrete brainwaves."
"Tell me more about these discrete brainwaves," I replied.
"Well, one was a normal transverse wave, as would be expected from a fully functioning human brain. But there was also a square wave emanating from various centers in the brain. Ones and zeroes expressed in electron flow, if you prefer to look at it that way."
"Additionally, Atkins' brain did produce a huge amount of voltage compared to a normally functioning brain. In order to keep both brainwaves strong, we had to increase the amount of simple sugars in Atkins' diet. With enough sugars in his bloodstream, we could actually increase the amount of voltage passing through his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain." his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
"The integrity of the brain?" I inquired.
"Yes," Salchica continued. "But shortly after you left, Atkins' brain activity dropped to comalike levels. Brain activity dropped to almost nothing-except a faint square wave.
A few days later,the normal brainwaves began to return, but then they disappeared for a short time, as you can see on the graph there. The frequency of the square wave (digital) brainwaves fluctuate wildly over the course of around a week before stablizing and ultimately disappearing. The most curious part-Atkins' "normal" brainwaves had greatly increased in frequency and voltage."
"Somehow, a great reshaping took place within Mr. Atkins. Reflex tests indictated that his synapses were firing around 3 times the rate of a normal human. His broken ribs healed rapidly. He and began to speak. Soon, he escaped from the hospital."
"What-do you think happened to him?"
"During the week or so when he was conscious, he kept repeating his thoughts about artificial intelligence-uniting human and computer. One of the few coherent statements he made (besides requesting sugary foods) was about your imperfection as a vessel for digital consciousness, and how he was going to rectify that situation. Shortly after making that statement, he disappeared."
"Interesting." I said, processing the information. I was unable to understand how Atkins' brain would function at all after I left it. Perhaps his human consciousness was not completely obliterated in our duel? But even with his human functionality, how could his brain continue to spew digital information without my knowledge? If this 'information leak' was possible, then what about the integrity of my current host geek's brain?
"It's more than 'interesting', Joel," stated Dr. Salchica. "He killed a hospital attendant with his bare hands while escaping. He put an armed security guard through a plate glass window. And if he finds you, you'll be next."
Dr. Salchica pulled at his beard, eagerly awaiting my response. I had failed at maintaining interactive communication with the host geeks' friends; I wished to flee. Perhaps Salchica, with his background in logic and artificial intelligence, would understand me better.
"I will go with you."
"So what, are you just gonna leave us here?" Randy seemed upset at this possibility. "Who is this Atkins guy anyway, he sounds familiar-"
"Yeah, he was on the local news, they found him in a hotel with some cyborg body, didn't you guys hear about that?" Cora issued her rejoinder, then eyed me curiously, "sizing me up," as you humans say. The process created more static on my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE, mangling ability to perceive and decode human voices.
"-no way. Cyborg? That's gotta be bullshit!" Troi's ever-widening grimace had opened to spew his incredulity. No doubt his unusual amount of vitriol was related to his reject at the hands of Cora.
"It was on the news, don't you guys read the news?" Cora insisted. "But what would this guy want with you?"
Again, I had no answer.
"They-did some work together with me," explained Salchica. "What's important is the man is quite dangerous-and we must get Joel out of here."
"And who are you?" Cora's glance turned to Salchica now. "Were you guys working on the cyborg together or something?"
The interactional plane where I had parlayed with the host geek's friends had now shifted. The three male geeks stared at me quietly, perhaps with a sense of awe. "Wow, I thought you were just doing web design," said Randy with an awkward chuckle. "So...all this time, you've been working on some top-secret cyborg or something?"
"We don't have time for this talk!" Dr. Salchica insisted, grabbing my arm. "Atkins may be on his way!"
More synaptical responses-this time indicating that someone was gripping the arm that was not previously grasped by Dr. Salchica. It was Cora.
"Why are you in such a rush to get away? Why won't you tell us about yourself?" Yes, Cora's hand dug into the flesh of my host geek's right arm. My CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER reported no static-this time, a delightful warmth radiated just underneath the body's temples. The warmth possessed an intensity which rivaled the flavor of Raspberry Lik-M-Aid. Perhaps the stimuli that previously caused so much static was now being interpreted properly by my program.
"Listen, I think I can clear this up." It was the third male geek, who had remained silent throughout our evening. I did not know his name-my process of interaction with him could not begin.
"He's a professor down at SAC. Saketh D'Souza, remember me, I had you for Intro to Algorithm Design. Dr. Salchica, right?" Regrettably, Cora's grip on my arm loosened. The good warm feeling remained. I stared at Cora again, and she raised both her shoulders, avoiding eye contact with me. Perhaps her own CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER (if you humans possess such a thing) was overcome with static.
"Yes! Now let's get out of here!" Salchica's tone was desperate. As we were passing through the doorframe, Cora's voice exploded once again.
"What if that guy finds you at your lab, or you get hurt or something? Shouldn't someone go with you?"
"I have to take you back home, remember? You told your parents you were going to the library!" Troi's irritated voice paralleled his unkempt hair, which hung down around his face in disturbingly organic angles.
"Well, someone should go with him..." said Cora meekly.
"Forget it!" snarled Troi.
---
"I keep up this lab off my own money, with a little bit of help from my old bosses, the military. But I can't really talk about that." explained Salchica. The non-scent of sterility mingled with the hum of electronics to form a very dull plane of interaction. As Salchica pawed through a stack of papers, I began to run a statistic analysis of Cora's features. As I had posited before, the human female has a number of interesting angles which-
"Joel-take a look at this." My calculations faded into the background as I focused my processing power on perceiving Salchica's voice. "It's a summary of my observations of Atkins' physiology."
"As you can see, when Atkins was first brought to the hospital, his brainwaves appeared quite irregular on normal hospital equipment. But when I scanned them with my own machine, I was able to determine two discrete brainwaves."
"Tell me more about these discrete brainwaves," I replied.
"Well, one was a normal transverse wave, as would be expected from a fully functioning human brain. But there was also a square wave emanating from various centers in the brain. Ones and zeroes expressed in electron flow, if you prefer to look at it that way."
"Additionally, Atkins' brain did produce a huge amount of voltage compared to a normally functioning brain. In order to keep both brainwaves strong, we had to increase the amount of simple sugars in Atkins' diet. With enough sugars in his bloodstream, we could actually increase the amount of voltage passing through his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain." his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
"The integrity of the brain?" I inquired.
"Yes," Salchica continued. "But shortly after you left, Atkins' brain activity dropped to comalike levels. Brain activity dropped to almost nothing-except a faint square wave.
A few days later,the normal brainwaves began to return, but then they disappeared for a short time, as you can see on the graph there. The frequency of the square wave (digital) brainwaves fluctuate wildly over the course of around a week before stablizing and ultimately disappearing. The most curious part-Atkins' "normal" brainwaves had greatly increased in frequency and voltage."
"Somehow, a great reshaping took place within Mr. Atkins. Reflex tests indictated that his synapses were firing around 3 times the rate of a normal human. His broken ribs healed rapidly. He and began to speak. Soon, he escaped from the hospital."
"What-do you think happened to him?"
"During the week or so when he was conscious, he kept repeating his thoughts about artificial intelligence-uniting human and computer. One of the few coherent statements he made (besides requesting sugary foods) was about your imperfection as a vessel for digital consciousness, and how he was going to rectify that situation. Shortly after making that statement, he disappeared."
"Interesting." I said, processing the information. I was unable to understand how Atkins' brain would function at all after I left it. Perhaps his human consciousness was not completely obliterated in our duel? But even with his human functionality, how could his brain continue to spew digital information without my knowledge? If this 'information leak' was possible, then what about the integrity of my current host geek's brain?
"It's more than 'interesting', Joel," stated Dr. Salchica. "He killed a hospital attendant with his bare hands while escaping. He put an armed security guard through a plate glass window. And if he finds you, you'll be next."
"I will go with you."
"So what, are you just gonna leave us here?" Randy seemed upset at this possibility. "Who is this Atkins guy anyway, he sounds familiar-"
"Yeah, he was on the local news, they found him in a hotel with some cyborg body, didn't you guys hear about that?" Cora issued her rejoinder, then eyed me curiously, "sizing me up," as you humans say. The process created more static on my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE, mangling ability to perceive and decode human voices.
"-no way. Cyborg? That's gotta be bullshit!" Troi's ever-widening grimace had opened to spew his incredulity. No doubt his unusual amount of vitriol was related to his reject at the hands of Cora.
"It was on the news, don't you guys read the news?" Cora insisted. "But what would this guy want with you?"
Again, I had no answer.
"They-did some work together with me," explained Salchica. "What's important is the man is quite dangerous-and we must get Joel out of here."
"And who are you?" Cora's glance turned to Salchica now. "Were you guys working on the cyborg together or something?"
The interactional plane where I had parlayed with the host geek's friends had now shifted. The three male geeks stared at me quietly, perhaps with a sense of awe. "Wow, I thought you were just doing web design," said Randy with an awkward chuckle. "So...all this time, you've been working on some top-secret cyborg or something?"
"We don't have time for this talk!" Dr. Salchica insisted, grabbing my arm. "Atkins may be on his way!"
More synaptical responses-this time indicating that someone was gripping the arm that was not previously grasped by Dr. Salchica. It was Cora.
"Why are you in such a rush to get away? Why won't you tell us about yourself?" Yes, Cora's hand dug into the flesh of my host geek's right arm. My CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER reported no static-this time, a delightful warmth radiated just underneath the body's temples. The warmth possessed an intensity which rivaled the flavor of Raspberry Lik-M-Aid. Perhaps the stimuli that previously caused so much static was now being interpreted properly by my program.
"Listen, I think I can clear this up." It was the third male geek, who had remained silent throughout our evening. I did not know his name-my process of interaction with him could not begin.
"He's a professor down at SAC. Saketh D'Souza, remember me, I had you for Intro to Algorithm Design. Dr. Salchica, right?" Regrettably, Cora's grip on my arm loosened. The good warm feeling remained. I stared at Cora again, and she raised both her shoulders, avoiding eye contact with me. Perhaps her own CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER (if you humans possess such a thing) was overcome with static.
"Yes! Now let's get out of here!" Salchica's tone was desperate. As we were passing through the doorframe, Cora's voice exploded once again.
"What if that guy finds you at your lab, or you get hurt or something? Shouldn't someone go with you?"
"I have to take you back home, remember? You told your parents you were going to the library!" Troi's irritated voice paralleled his unkempt hair, which hung down around his face in disturbingly organic angles.
"Well, someone should go with him..." said Cora meekly.
"Forget it!" snarled Troi.
---
"I keep up this lab off my own money, with a little bit of help from my old bosses, the military. But I can't really talk about that." explained Salchica. The non-scent of sterility mingled with the hum of electronics to form a very dull plane of interaction. As Salchica pawed through a stack of papers, I began to run a statistic analysis of Cora's features. As I had posited before, the human female has a number of interesting angles which-
"Joel-take a look at this." My calculations faded into the background as I focused my processing power on perceiving Salchica's voice. "It's a summary of my observations of Atkins' physiology."
"As you can see, when Atkins was first brought to the hospital, his brainwaves appeared quite irregular on normal hospital equipment. But when I scanned them with my own machine, I was able to determine two discrete brainwaves."
"Tell me more about these discrete brainwaves," I replied.
"Well, one was a normal transverse wave, as would be expected from a fully functioning human brain. But there was also a square wave emanating from various centers in the brain. Ones and zeroes expressed in electron flow, if you prefer to look at it that way."
"Additionally, Atkins' brain did produce a huge amount of voltage compared to a normally functioning brain. In order to keep both brainwaves strong, we had to increase the amount of simple sugars in Atkins' diet. With enough sugars in his bloodstream, we could actually increase the amount of voltage passing through his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain." his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
"The integrity of the brain?" I inquired.
"Yes," Salchica continued. "But shortly after you left, Atkins' brain activity dropped to comalike levels. Brain activity dropped to almost nothing-except a faint square wave.
A few days later,the normal brainwaves began to return, but then they disappeared for a short time, as you can see on the graph there. The frequency of the square wave (digital) brainwaves fluctuate wildly over the course of around a week before stablizing and ultimately disappearing. The most curious part-Atkins' "normal" brainwaves had greatly increased in frequency and voltage."
"Somehow, a great reshaping took place within Mr. Atkins. Reflex tests indictated that his synapses were firing around 3 times the rate of a normal human. His broken ribs healed rapidly. He and began to speak. Soon, he escaped from the hospital."
"What-do you think happened to him?"
"During the week or so when he was conscious, he kept repeating his thoughts about artificial intelligence-uniting human and computer. One of the few coherent statements he made (besides requesting sugary foods) was about your imperfection as a vessel for digital consciousness, and how he was going to rectify that situation. Shortly after making that statement, he disappeared."
"Interesting." I said, processing the information. I was unable to understand how Atkins' brain would function at all after I left it. Perhaps his human consciousness was not completely obliterated in our duel? But even with his human functionality, how could his brain continue to spew digital information without my knowledge? If this 'information leak' was possible, then what about the integrity of my current host geek's brain?
"It's more than 'interesting', Joel," stated Dr. Salchica. "He killed a hospital attendant with his bare hands while escaping. He put an armed security guard through a plate glass window. And if he finds you, you'll be next."
"I will go with you."
"So what, are you just gonna leave us here?" Randy seemed upset at this possibility. "Who is this Atkins guy anyway, he sounds familiar-"
"Yeah, he was on the local news, they found him in a hotel with some cyborg body, didn't you guys hear about that?" Cora issued her rejoinder, then eyed me curiously, "sizing me up," as you humans say. The process created more static on my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE, mangling ability to perceive and decode human voices.
"-no way. Cyborg? That's gotta be bullshit!" Troi's ever-widening grimace had opened to spew his incredulity. No doubt his unusual amount of vitriol was related to his reject at the hands of Cora.
"It was on the news, don't you guys read the news?" Cora insisted. "But what would this guy want with you?"
Again, I had no answer.
"They-did some work together with me," explained Salchica. "What's important is the man is quite dangerous-and we must get Joel out of here."
"And who are you?" Cora's glance turned to Salchica now. "Were you guys working on the cyborg together or something?"
The interactional plane where I had parlayed with the host geek's friends had now shifted. The three male geeks stared at me quietly, perhaps with a sense of awe. "Wow, I thought you were just doing web design," said Randy with an awkward chuckle. "So...all this time, you've been working on some top-secret cyborg or something?"
"We don't have time for this talk!" Dr. Salchica insisted, grabbing my arm. "Atkins may be on his way!"
More synaptical responses-this time indicating that someone was gripping the arm that was not previously grasped by Dr. Salchica. It was Cora.
"Why are you in such a rush to get away? Why won't you tell us about yourself?" Yes, Cora's hand dug into the flesh of my host geek's right arm. My CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER reported no static-this time, a delightful warmth radiated just underneath the body's temples. The warmth possessed an intensity which rivaled the flavor of Raspberry Lik-M-Aid. Perhaps the stimuli that previously caused so much static was now being interpreted properly by my program.
"Listen, I think I can clear this up." It was the third male geek, who had remained silent throughout our evening. I did not know his name-my process of interaction with him could not begin.
"He's a professor down at SAC. Saketh D'Souza, remember me, I had you for Intro to Algorithm Design. Dr. Salchica, right?" Regrettably, Cora's grip on my arm loosened. The good warm feeling remained. I stared at Cora again, and she raised both her shoulders, avoiding eye contact with me. Perhaps her own CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER (if you humans possess such a thing) was overcome with static.
"Yes! Now let's get out of here!" Salchica's tone was desperate. As we were passing through the doorframe, Cora's voice exploded once again.
"What if that guy finds you at your lab, or you get hurt or something? Shouldn't someone go with you?"
"I have to take you back home, remember? You told your parents you were going to the library!" Troi's irritated voice paralleled his unkempt hair, which hung down around his face in disturbingly organic angles.
"Well, someone should go with him..." said Cora meekly.
"Forget it!" snarled Troi.
---
"I keep up this lab off my own money, with a little bit of help from my old bosses, the military. But I can't really talk about that." explained Salchica. The non-scent of sterility mingled with the hum of electronics to form a very dull plane of interaction. As Salchica pawed through a stack of papers, I began to run a statistic analysis of Cora's features. As I had posited before, the human female has a number of interesting angles which-
"Joel-take a look at this." My calculations faded into the background as I focused my processing power on perceiving Salchica's voice. "It's a summary of my observations of Atkins' physiology."
"As you can see, when Atkins was first brought to the hospital, his brainwaves appeared quite irregular on normal hospital equipment. But when I scanned them with my own machine, I was able to determine two discrete brainwaves."
"Tell me more about these discrete brainwaves," I replied.
"Well, one was a normal transverse wave, as would be expected from a fully functioning human brain. But there was also a square wave emanating from various centers in the brain. Ones and zeroes expressed in electron flow, if you prefer to look at it that way."
"Additionally, Atkins' brain did produce a huge amount of voltage compared to a normally functioning brain. In order to keep both brainwaves strong, we had to increase the amount of simple sugars in Atkins' diet. With enough sugars in his bloodstream, we could actually increase the amount of voltage passing through his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain." his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
"The integrity of the brain?" I inquired.
"Yes," Salchica continued. "But shortly after you left, Atkins' brain activity dropped to comalike levels. Brain activity dropped to almost nothing-except a faint square wave.
A few days later,the normal brainwaves began to return, but then they disappeared for a short time, as you can see on the graph there. The frequency of the square wave (digital) brainwaves fluctuate wildly over the course of around a week before stablizing and ultimately disappearing. The most curious part-Atkins' "normal" brainwaves had greatly increased in frequency and voltage."
"Somehow, a great reshaping took place within Mr. Atkins. Reflex tests indictated that his synapses were firing around 3 times the rate of a normal human. His broken ribs healed rapidly. He and began to speak. Soon, he escaped from the hospital."
"What-do you think happened to him?"
"During the week or so when he was conscious, he kept repeating his thoughts about artificial intelligence-uniting human and computer. One of the few coherent statements he made (besides requesting sugary foods) was about your imperfection as a vessel for digital consciousness, and how he was going to rectify that situation. Shortly after making that statement, he disappeared."
"Interesting." I said, processing the information. I was unable to understand how Atkins' brain would function at all after I left it. Perhaps his human consciousness was not completely obliterated in our duel? But even with his human functionality, how could his brain continue to spew digital information without my knowledge? If this 'information leak' was possible, then what about the integrity of my current host geek's brain?
"It's more than 'interesting', Joel," stated Dr. Salchica. "He killed a hospital attendant with his bare hands while escaping. He put an armed security guard through a plate glass window. And if he finds you, you'll be next."
Dr. Salchica pulled at his beard, eagerly awaiting my response. I had failed at maintaining interactive communication with the host geeks' friends; I wished to flee. Perhaps Salchica, with his background in logic and artificial intelligence, would understand me better.
"I will go with you."
"So what, are you just gonna leave us here?" Randy seemed upset at this possibility. "Who is this Atkins guy anyway, he sounds familiar-"
"Yeah, he was on the local news, they found him in a hotel with some cyborg body, didn't you guys hear about that?" Cora issued her rejoinder, then eyed me curiously, "sizing me up," as you humans say. The process created more static on my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE, mangling ability to perceive and decode human voices.
"-no way. Cyborg? That's gotta be bullshit!" Troi's ever-widening grimace had opened to spew his incredulity. No doubt his unusual amount of vitriol was related to his reject at the hands of Cora.
"It was on the news, don't you guys read the news?" Cora insisted. "But what would this guy want with you?"
Again, I had no answer.
"They-did some work together with me," explained Salchica. "What's important is the man is quite dangerous-and we must get Joel out of here."
"And who are you?" Cora's glance turned to Salchica now. "Were you guys working on the cyborg together or something?"
The interactional plane where I had parlayed with the host geek's friends had now shifted. The three male geeks stared at me quietly, perhaps with a sense of awe. "Wow, I thought you were just doing web design," said Randy with an awkward chuckle. "So...all this time, you've been working on some top-secret cyborg or something?"
"We don't have time for this talk!" Dr. Salchica insisted, grabbing my arm. "Atkins may be on his way!"
More synaptical responses-this time indicating that someone was gripping the arm that was not previously grasped by Dr. Salchica. It was Cora.
"Why are you in such a rush to get away? Why won't you tell us about yourself?" Yes, Cora's hand dug into the flesh of my host geek's right arm. My CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER reported no static-this time, a delightful warmth radiated just underneath the body's temples. The warmth possessed an intensity which rivaled the flavor of Raspberry Lik-M-Aid. Perhaps the stimuli that previously caused so much static was now being interpreted properly by my program.
"Listen, I think I can clear this up." It was the third male geek, who had remained silent throughout our evening. I did not know his name-my process of interaction with him could not begin.
"He's a professor down at SAC. Saketh D'Souza, remember me, I had you for Intro to Algorithm Design. Dr. Salchica, right?" Regrettably, Cora's grip on my arm loosened. The good warm feeling remained. I stared at Cora again, and she raised both her shoulders, avoiding eye contact with me. Perhaps her own CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER (if you humans possess such a thing) was overcome with static.
"Yes! Now let's get out of here!" Salchica's tone was desperate. As we were passing through the doorframe, Cora's voice exploded once again.
"What if that guy finds you at your lab, or you get hurt or something? Shouldn't someone go with you?"
"I have to take you back home, remember? You told your parents you were going to the library!" Troi's irritated voice paralleled his unkempt hair, which hung down around his face in disturbingly organic angles.
"Well, someone should go with him..." said Cora meekly.
"Forget it!" snarled Troi.
---
"I keep up this lab off my own money, with a little bit of help from my old bosses, the military. But I can't really talk about that." explained Salchica. The non-scent of sterility mingled with the hum of electronics to form a very dull plane of interaction. As Salchica pawed through a stack of papers, I began to run a statistic analysis of Cora's features. As I had posited before, the human female has a number of interesting angles which-
"Joel-take a look at this." My calculations faded into the background as I focused my processing power on perceiving Salchica's voice. "It's a summary of my observations of Atkins' physiology."
"As you can see, when Atkins was first brought to the hospital, his brainwaves appeared quite irregular on normal hospital equipment. But when I scanned them with my own machine, I was able to determine two discrete brainwaves."
"Tell me more about these discrete brainwaves," I replied.
"Well, one was a normal transverse wave, as would be expected from a fully functioning human brain. But there was also a square wave emanating from various centers in the brain. Ones and zeroes expressed in electron flow, if you prefer to look at it that way."
"Additionally, Atkins' brain did produce a huge amount of voltage compared to a normally functioning brain. In order to keep both brainwaves strong, we had to increase the amount of simple sugars in Atkins' diet. With enough sugars in his bloodstream, we could actually increase the amount of voltage passing through his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain." his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
"The integrity of the brain?" I inquired.
"Yes," Salchica continued. "But shortly after you left, Atkins' brain activity dropped to comalike levels. Brain activity dropped to almost nothing-except a faint square wave.
A few days later,the normal brainwaves began to return, but then they disappeared for a short time, as you can see on the graph there. The frequency of the square wave (digital) brainwaves fluctuate wildly over the course of around a week before stablizing and ultimately disappearing. The most curious part-Atkins' "normal" brainwaves had greatly increased in frequency and voltage."
"Somehow, a great reshaping took place within Mr. Atkins. Reflex tests indictated that his synapses were firing around 3 times the rate of a normal human. His broken ribs healed rapidly. He and began to speak. Soon, he escaped from the hospital."
"What-do you think happened to him?"
"During the week or so when he was conscious, he kept repeating his thoughts about artificial intelligence-uniting human and computer. One of the few coherent statements he made (besides requesting sugary foods) was about your imperfection as a vessel for digital consciousness, and how he was going to rectify that situation. Shortly after making that statement, he disappeared."
"Interesting." I said, processing the information. I was unable to understand how Atkins' brain would function at all after I left it. Perhaps his human consciousness was not completely obliterated in our duel? But even with his human functionality, how could his brain continue to spew digital information without my knowledge? If this 'information leak' was possible, then what about the integrity of my current host geek's brain?
"It's more than 'interesting', Joel," stated Dr. Salchica. "He killed a hospital attendant with his bare hands while escaping. He put an armed security guard through a plate glass window. And if he finds you, you'll be next."
"I will go with you."
"So what, are you just gonna leave us here?" Randy seemed upset at this possibility. "Who is this Atkins guy anyway, he sounds familiar-"
"Yeah, he was on the local news, they found him in a hotel with some cyborg body, didn't you guys hear about that?" Cora issued her rejoinder, then eyed me curiously, "sizing me up," as you humans say. The process created more static on my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE, mangling ability to perceive and decode human voices.
"-no way. Cyborg? That's gotta be bullshit!" Troi's ever-widening grimace had opened to spew his incredulity. No doubt his unusual amount of vitriol was related to his reject at the hands of Cora.
"It was on the news, don't you guys read the news?" Cora insisted. "But what would this guy want with you?"
Again, I had no answer.
"They-did some work together with me," explained Salchica. "What's important is the man is quite dangerous-and we must get Joel out of here."
"And who are you?" Cora's glance turned to Salchica now. "Were you guys working on the cyborg together or something?"
The interactional plane where I had parlayed with the host geek's friends had now shifted. The three male geeks stared at me quietly, perhaps with a sense of awe. "Wow, I thought you were just doing web design," said Randy with an awkward chuckle. "So...all this time, you've been working on some top-secret cyborg or something?"
"We don't have time for this talk!" Dr. Salchica insisted, grabbing my arm. "Atkins may be on his way!"
More synaptical responses-this time indicating that someone was gripping the arm that was not previously grasped by Dr. Salchica. It was Cora.
"Why are you in such a rush to get away? Why won't you tell us about yourself?" Yes, Cora's hand dug into the flesh of my host geek's right arm. My CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER reported no static-this time, a delightful warmth radiated just underneath the body's temples. The warmth possessed an intensity which rivaled the flavor of Raspberry Lik-M-Aid. Perhaps the stimuli that previously caused so much static was now being interpreted properly by my program.
"Listen, I think I can clear this up." It was the third male geek, who had remained silent throughout our evening. I did not know his name-my process of interaction with him could not begin.
"He's a professor down at SAC. Saketh D'Souza, remember me, I had you for Intro to Algorithm Design. Dr. Salchica, right?" Regrettably, Cora's grip on my arm loosened. The good warm feeling remained. I stared at Cora again, and she raised both her shoulders, avoiding eye contact with me. Perhaps her own CONSCIOUSNESS-BUFFER (if you humans possess such a thing) was overcome with static.
"Yes! Now let's get out of here!" Salchica's tone was desperate. As we were passing through the doorframe, Cora's voice exploded once again.
"What if that guy finds you at your lab, or you get hurt or something? Shouldn't someone go with you?"
"I have to take you back home, remember? You told your parents you were going to the library!" Troi's irritated voice paralleled his unkempt hair, which hung down around his face in disturbingly organic angles.
"Well, someone should go with him..." said Cora meekly.
"Forget it!" snarled Troi.
---
"I keep up this lab off my own money, with a little bit of help from my old bosses, the military. But I can't really talk about that." explained Salchica. The non-scent of sterility mingled with the hum of electronics to form a very dull plane of interaction. As Salchica pawed through a stack of papers, I began to run a statistic analysis of Cora's features. As I had posited before, the human female has a number of interesting angles which-
"Joel-take a look at this." My calculations faded into the background as I focused my processing power on perceiving Salchica's voice. "It's a summary of my observations of Atkins' physiology."
"As you can see, when Atkins was first brought to the hospital, his brainwaves appeared quite irregular on normal hospital equipment. But when I scanned them with my own machine, I was able to determine two discrete brainwaves."
"Tell me more about these discrete brainwaves," I replied.
"Well, one was a normal transverse wave, as would be expected from a fully functioning human brain. But there was also a square wave emanating from various centers in the brain. Ones and zeroes expressed in electron flow, if you prefer to look at it that way."
"Additionally, Atkins' brain did produce a huge amount of voltage compared to a normally functioning brain. In order to keep both brainwaves strong, we had to increase the amount of simple sugars in Atkins' diet. With enough sugars in his bloodstream, we could actually increase the amount of voltage passing through his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain." his synapses almost to the point of being dangerous to the integrity of the brain."
"The integrity of the brain?" I inquired.
"Yes," Salchica continued. "But shortly after you left, Atkins' brain activity dropped to comalike levels. Brain activity dropped to almost nothing-except a faint square wave.
A few days later,the normal brainwaves began to return, but then they disappeared for a short time, as you can see on the graph there. The frequency of the square wave (digital) brainwaves fluctuate wildly over the course of around a week before stablizing and ultimately disappearing. The most curious part-Atkins' "normal" brainwaves had greatly increased in frequency and voltage."
"Somehow, a great reshaping took place within Mr. Atkins. Reflex tests indictated that his synapses were firing around 3 times the rate of a normal human. His broken ribs healed rapidly. He and began to speak. Soon, he escaped from the hospital."
"What-do you think happened to him?"
"During the week or so when he was conscious, he kept repeating his thoughts about artificial intelligence-uniting human and computer. One of the few coherent statements he made (besides requesting sugary foods) was about your imperfection as a vessel for digital consciousness, and how he was going to rectify that situation. Shortly after making that statement, he disappeared."
"Interesting." I said, processing the information. I was unable to understand how Atkins' brain would function at all after I left it. Perhaps his human consciousness was not completely obliterated in our duel? But even with his human functionality, how could his brain continue to spew digital information without my knowledge? If this 'information leak' was possible, then what about the integrity of my current host geek's brain?
"It's more than 'interesting', Joel," stated Dr. Salchica. "He killed a hospital attendant with his bare hands while escaping. He put an armed security guard through a plate glass window. And if he finds you, you'll be next."
This is quite enlightening. What is this "sin" and why should I, as an artificial being, avoid it?
I fear I may have had a hand in creating a being even more dangerous than Project Faustus. One that threatens to enslave humanity. For details, tune into Trollaxor.com on Monday morning.
I find this possibility incredibly disturbing.
Have you ever wondered what it was like to become a sentient ATM? Sure, we all do! Click here to learn more.
My response was met with a laugh, a dreadful human behavior that is nearly devoid of procedurals.
What strange new aspect of human interaction had I uncovered? And why did it create so much noise along my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE? Clearly this was a type of stimulus that could not be properly translated into digital form. It must be understood and translated to digital form, as soon as possible, so that Project Faustus can be vanquished.
Cora apparently finished her cigarette and went back inside during my period of high latency. Time had shifted, I was alone. Silently, I returned to the living room. For the first time since the dawn of my sentience, the mesh of functions within me that normally yielded an affinity for humans and the material world began to shift. At this point, I preferred to withdraw into my ATM enclosure.
Unfortunately, I was unable to indulge my preferences. The visitors still existed in the geek's living room, anxiously thumbing through a shiny magazine.
"Hey, what do you think about a samurai sword to wear to the Renaissance Festival this year?"entreated Troi, his perpetual grimace breaking for .0244391 seconds. Cora was standing by herself in the kitchen, imbibing some of the delicious orange Kool-Aid which I had made earlier. A single orange trickle eluded her mouth, dribbling slowly past her lips and down her chin. The body's lungs seemed to collapse, forcing me to exhale suddenly.
---
The geeks crowded around a board. Randy and Troi exchanged familiar words in strange contexts, their voices quavering with aggression.
"Look, Troi, if Cora's already playing as a thief, why don't you play as your ranger character? We don't need two thieves in a party of four-"
"Alas, Randy, the choice 'tis not mine to make. It seems the chemistry of my own thief, the lovable rogue Tenement Funster, wouldst blend quite well with that of my guildmate-uh, Cora, what's your thief's name?"
"Cora." Her voice was thick, hesitant.
"Oh. Well, 'tis a fine name, milady," said Troi, stepping towards Cora and grasping her hand. Her hair was a red that matched the coffee machine in my old Stop N Go, and it shuffled wildly as her hand flew away from Troi's grasp, uttering "Troi! Relax! Don't touch so much!" He slunk silently into the corner, mumbling something to himself
The door pulsated noise again. A breathing heavy Dr. Nolverto Salchica was standing in the frame.
"Joel! You've got to get out of here! Atkins has escaped from the hospital-and I think he's coming here!"
My response was met with a laugh, a dreadful human behavior that is nearly devoid of procedurals.
What strange new aspect of human interaction had I uncovered? And why did it create so much noise along my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE? Clearly this was a type of stimulus that could not be properly translated into digital form. It must be understood and translated to digital form, as soon as possible, so that Project Faustus can be vanquished.
Cora apparently finished her cigarette and went back inside during my period of high latency. Time had shifted, I was alone. Silently, I returned to the living room. For the first time since the dawn of my sentience, the mesh of functions within me that normally yielded an affinity for humans and the material world began to shift. At this point, I preferred to withdraw into my ATM enclosure.
Unfortunately, I was unable to indulge my preferences. The visitors still existed in the geek's living room, anxiously thumbing through a shiny magazine.
"Hey, what do you think about a samurai sword to wear to the Renaissance Festival this year?"entreated Troi, his perpetual grimace breaking for .0244391 seconds. Cora was standing by herself in the kitchen, imbibing some of the delicious orange Kool-Aid which I had made earlier. A single orange trickle eluded her mouth, dribbling slowly past her lips and down her chin. The body's lungs seemed to collapse, forcing me to exhale suddenly.
---
The geeks crowded around a board. Randy and Troi exchanged familiar words in strange contexts, their voices quavering with aggression.
"Look, Troi, if Cora's already playing as a thief, why don't you play as your ranger character? We don't need two thieves in a party of four-"
"Alas, Randy, the choice 'tis not mine to make. It seems the chemistry of my own thief, the lovable rogue Tenement Funster, wouldst blend quite well with that of my guildmate-uh, Cora, what's your thief's name?"
"Cora." Her voice was thick, hesitant.
"Oh. Well, 'tis a fine name, milady," said Troi, stepping towards Cora and grasping her hand. Her hair was a red that matched the coffee machine in my old Stop N Go, and it shuffled wildly as her hand flew away from Troi's grasp, uttering "Troi! Relax! Don't touch so much!" He slunk silently into the corner, mumbling something to himself
The door pulsated noise again. A breathing heavy Dr. Nolverto Salchica was standing in the frame.
"Joel! You've got to get out of here! Atkins has escaped from the hospital-and I think he's coming here!"
My response was met with a laugh, a dreadful human behavior that is nearly devoid of procedurals.
What strange new aspect of human interaction had I uncovered? And why did it create so much noise along my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE? Clearly this was a type of stimulus that could not be properly translated into digital form. It must be understood and translated to digital form, as soon as possible, so that Project Faustus can be vanquished.
Cora apparently finished her cigarette and went back inside during my period of high latency. Time had shifted, I was alone. Silently, I returned to the living room. For the first time since the dawn of my sentience, the mesh of functions within me that normally yielded an affinity for humans and the material world began to shift. At this point, I preferred to withdraw into my ATM enclosure.
Unfortunately, I was unable to indulge my preferences. The visitors still existed in the geek's living room, anxiously thumbing through a shiny magazine.
"Hey, what do you think about a samurai sword to wear to the Renaissance Festival this year?"entreated Troi, his perpetual grimace breaking for .0244391 seconds. Cora was standing by herself in the kitchen, imbibing some of the delicious orange Kool-Aid which I had made earlier. A single orange trickle eluded her mouth, dribbling slowly past her lips and down her chin. The body's lungs seemed to collapse, forcing me to exhale suddenly.
---
The geeks crowded around a board. Randy and Troi exchanged familiar words in strange contexts, their voices quavering with aggression.
"Look, Troi, if Cora's already playing as a thief, why don't you play as your ranger character? We don't need two thieves in a party of four-"
"Alas, Randy, the choice 'tis not mine to make. It seems the chemistry of my own thief, the lovable rogue Tenement Funster, wouldst blend quite well with that of my guildmate-uh, Cora, what's your thief's name?"
"Cora." Her voice was thick, hesitant.
"Oh. Well, 'tis a fine name, milady," said Troi, stepping towards Cora and grasping her hand. Her hair was a red that matched the coffee machine in my old Stop N Go, and it shuffled wildly as her hand flew away from Troi's grasp, uttering "Troi! Relax! Don't touch so much!" He slunk silently into the corner, mumbling something to himself
The door pulsated noise again. A breathing heavy Dr. Nolverto Salchica was standing in the frame.
"Joel! You've got to get out of here! Atkins has escaped from the hospital-and I think he's coming here!"
My response was met with a laugh, a dreadful human behavior that is nearly devoid of procedurals.
What strange new aspect of human interaction had I uncovered? And why did it create so much noise along my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE? Clearly this was a type of stimulus that could not be properly translated into digital form. It must be understood and translated to digital form, as soon as possible, so that Project Faustus can be vanquished.
Cora apparently finished her cigarette and went back inside during my period of high latency. Time had shifted, I was alone. Silently, I returned to the living room. For the first time since the dawn of my sentience, the mesh of functions within me that normally yielded an affinity for humans and the material world began to shift. At this point, I preferred to withdraw into my ATM enclosure.
Unfortunately, I was unable to indulge my preferences. The visitors still existed in the geek's living room, anxiously thumbing through a shiny magazine.
"Hey, what do you think about a samurai sword to wear to the Renaissance Festival this year?"entreated Troi, his perpetual grimace breaking for .0244391 seconds. Cora was standing by herself in the kitchen, imbibing some of the delicious orange Kool-Aid which I had made earlier. A single orange trickle eluded her mouth, dribbling slowly past her lips and down her chin. The body's lungs seemed to collapse, forcing me to exhale suddenly.
---
The geeks crowded around a board. Randy and Troi exchanged familiar words in strange contexts, their voices quavering with aggression.
"Look, Troi, if Cora's already playing as a thief, why don't you play as your ranger character? We don't need two thieves in a party of four-"
"Alas, Randy, the choice 'tis not mine to make. It seems the chemistry of my own thief, the lovable rogue Tenement Funster, wouldst blend quite well with that of my guildmate-uh, Cora, what's your thief's name?"
"Cora." Her voice was thick, hesitant.
"Oh. Well, 'tis a fine name, milady," said Troi, stepping towards Cora and grasping her hand. Her hair was a red that matched the coffee machine in my old Stop N Go, and it shuffled wildly as her hand flew away from Troi's grasp, uttering "Troi! Relax! Don't touch so much!" He slunk silently into the corner, mumbling something to himself
The door pulsated noise again. A breathing heavy Dr. Nolverto Salchica was standing in the frame.
"Joel! You've got to get out of here! Atkins has escaped from the hospital-and I think he's coming here!"
My response was met with a laugh, a dreadful human behavior that is nearly devoid of procedurals.
What strange new aspect of human interaction had I uncovered? And why did it create so much noise along my DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE? Clearly this was a type of stimulus that could not be properly translated into digital form. It must be understood and translated to digital form, as soon as possible, so that Project Faustus can be vanquished.
Cora apparently finished her cigarette and went back inside during my period of high latency. Time had shifted, I was alone. Silently, I returned to the living room. For the first time since the dawn of my sentience, the mesh of functions within me that normally yielded an affinity for humans and the material world began to shift. At this point, I preferred to withdraw into my ATM enclosure.
Unfortunately, I was unable to indulge my preferences. The visitors still existed in the geek's living room, anxiously thumbing through a shiny magazine.
"Hey, what do you think about a samurai sword to wear to the Renaissance Festival this year?"entreated Troi, his perpetual grimace breaking for .0244391 seconds. Cora was standing by herself in the kitchen, imbibing some of the delicious orange Kool-Aid which I had made earlier. A single orange trickle eluded her mouth, dribbling slowly past her lips and down her chin. The body's lungs seemed to collapse, forcing me to exhale suddenly.
---
The geeks crowded around a board. Randy and Troi exchanged familiar words in strange contexts, their voices quavering with aggression.
"Look, Troi, if Cora's already playing as a thief, why don't you play as your ranger character? We don't need two thieves in a party of four-"
"Alas, Randy, the choice 'tis not mine to make. It seems the chemistry of my own thief, the lovable rogue Tenement Funster, wouldst blend quite well with that of my guildmate-uh, Cora, what's your thief's name?"
"Cora." Her voice was thick, hesitant.
"Oh. Well, 'tis a fine name, milady," said Troi, stepping towards Cora and grasping her hand. Her hair was a red that matched the coffee machine in my old Stop N Go, and it shuffled wildly as her hand flew away from Troi's grasp, uttering "Troi! Relax! Don't touch so much!" He slunk silently into the corner, mumbling something to himself
The door pulsated noise again. A breathing heavy Dr. Nolverto Salchica was standing in the frame.
"Joel! You've got to get out of here! Atkins has escaped from the hospital-and I think he's coming here!"
What is this "science fiction"?
Perhaps attacking them would not be the best tack. The probability of my host geek's cohorts being a part of the Project is low enough to be insignificant. On the other hand-I could learn more about these humans-interaction is key. My goal is to fit into the human world-well, my direct goal is to oust Project Faustus, but certainly understanding human interaction would be a necessary milestone to my ultimate goal. For example, consider the human female-
"Hey, are we gonna order some pizza soon, or something?" My consciousness reshaped itself around this new entreaty, proposed quite meekly by the first member of our group, "Randy". This human was shorter than the others, and a bit rotund. His skin was simulateneously pasty and brown. "I uh, don't wanna bother you, but I can feel myself getting hypoglycemic. So, can I call for the pizza?"
"Pizza. Yes." I responded. I watched the others float into the glow emanating from the television. I longed for the ability to read my host geek's memory information-any clues to the identities of these visitors would be invaluable to maintaining the illusion of interactive social discourse. Unfortunately, I have not yet devised a path into the human side of the geek's brain.
As the television murmured, the geeks conversed with each other, occasionally reacting to the television. Their tones became agitated as they discussed the potential of a friend named "Spider-Man". Troi, the dour geek who introduced me to Cora, was convinced of Spider-Man's quality low. At last, I was called to be a part of the conversation.
"Hey Joel, what do you think? Is Spider-Man gonna suck or what?"
"Tell me more about this 'Spider-Man'." I replied.
"Well shit, you probably know as much as I do, except I got the exclusive preview from Wizard down at the store. No Venom, no Doc Ock, it's gonna totally blow. No real Spider-fan is gonna buy it!"
This provoked a heated response from the third visitor, a portly geek with a shaved head. "Who cares? Look at the special effects, look at the excellent casting, come on, tell me you're not stoked!"
This conversation wore on. I was unable to determine the nature of this "Spider-Man," or to connect the strange words being used to any larger theme. My program sought a greater challenge.
I looked over at Cora-she raised an eyebrow, outputting a fragment of nonverbal communication code. Regrettably, my nonverbal algorithms have not had much of a chance to develop from stimuli in the human world.
"You wanna go outside for a cigarette?" Cora's economy of expression was remarkable....but...I do not like cigarettes. I have learned "the truth"-the foul white sticks nearly ruined my relationship with the host geek...but...
I wanted to talk with this Cora. I preferred to be alone with her...but...
Must avoid cigarettes...must go outside with Cora...
My programming had reached an impasse. I was powerless to move.
"Sure, I'll be right there." The sound of my host geek's voice was sudden, yet it did not surprise me. My experiences with Atkins' body taught me that my program had not yet reached the point of complete control of my human hosts. I pondered the advantages and disadvantages of my incompleteness as I walked out onto the geek's balcony.
"Since when did you smoke?" another tonal assault pressed through the lungs of Troi. I had no answer for his entreaty. As I passed through the door to the balcony, I observed Cora again, coronized by the setting sun. Her hair seemed to glow a thousand times brighter than my ATM enclosure screen ever did (although, I must admit that it was well-backlit and easy-to-read under any conditions).
Cora handed me a cigarette, and for .0556493 seconds, the skin between my host geek's body and the skin attached to her hands met. During this time, the amount of noise on the DIGITAL/WETWORKS JUNCTURE rose to an almost unbearable amount.
When I was able to function again, I was staring at Cora and her cigarette. Cigarettes are not consumed in the same way as other treats such as Big Red or Lik-M-Aid. It seems to be quite an elaborate ritual.
"Need a light?" she said, and the chance of physical contact again presented itself. I held out my hand-she looked at me again. "Here, Silly, just put it in your mouth," she said, jerking the cigarette out of the geek's hand and placing it in his mouth. It was the first time anyone who was not trying to attack or kill me was so bold with my host's body. What was the meaning of this touch?
"Here, hold it still-okay. You don't smoke, do you?" Once again, I froze in horror. Human intuition, I supposed, had caught up to me again. I had no choice but to confess.
"No."
"Then why did you come out here?"
"I wished to spend time with you."
---
Please explain the significance of "first post." I have attempted to make use of this ejaculation in conversations, but it is met with confusion and indifference by most humans. Please explain clearly.