CB's Grim Frequencies IC -- COMPLETE

[Shayuri]

"Mmm," Otter replied, eyes narrowing a little as he snapped the case closed. "You know what surprises me the most? How normal it is inside. It's obviously not normal. What it was doing was physically impossible for anything that has its body. But you pull it apart, and it's so close to an octopus that you can identify the organs from Wikipedia."

"This isn't IT, is it? It's more like...an interface."

 

[gribble]

T-dawg shovels food onto a plate for Klein, and as he brings it over to the table asks, awkwardly and nowhere near as conversationally as it sounded in his head, "So, ah, you here about the alien... monster... thing?"

 

[Forged Fury]

OOC: Will Save = [roll0]

Cyril wasn't sure, but for some reason he was uneasy.

 

[Rubberneck]

J.R. had fallen back asleep to the soothing sounds of Metallica, Iron Maiden, and ACDC. All of which were playing from Pandora on his tablet. This caused him to miss most of the introductions. Now there was the smell of fresh cooked food in the air which caused him to stir. Eventually he rolled over and plucked the ear buds from his ears. He made his way to the kitchen, grabbing a plate and then waited in line for a chance to dish up. He eyed the suit cautiously but didn't address him.

 

[gribble]

T-dawg shovels some lightly spiced vegetarian omelet on to J.R.s plate as well.

 

[Rubberneck]

"Thanks boss."

J.R. replies as he flops into one of the chairs at the table. He continues to eye the new guy.

"Yunz da new baby sitter?"

 

[CanadienneBacon]

Upstairs in the kitchen, Keihn thanked T-dawg for the veggie omelette. "Delicious." He tucked into his food. When J.R. queried whether Keihn was the new babysitter, Keihn looked up, surprised. "No. Just escorting the Professor, J.R." Some seconds later, it occurred to J.R. that no introduction had occurred, yet Keihn knew his first name.

---

Downstairs, the overhead fluorescent lighting flickered. A beat later, there was a fizz and two pops, the first louder than the second. The lights dimmed to brown, then flared brightly before settling into their normal steady light. Bukowski quirked at eyebrow at Cyril for several seconds, but said nothing out loud. [sblock=Cyril]Bukowski's voice sounds loud and clear in Cyril's head, "It's a thrall. They're attracted to telepaths. Like you."[/sblock]

The Professor pushed a metal container of acid into Otter's hands. "Reckon you might could use that sometime. Careful, though. As you've discovered, it eats through damn near anything, including exposed tissue." He paused, sighed, then continued. "It's not "normal," no. At least, it's not an octopus that swims in the sea. But it's not an interface, at least I don't think it's an interface." Bukowski fished out a business card with the Indiana University insignia in the upper left corner. The card bore his name, Charles Bukowski. It also said SETI under his title, which was Professor of Astrobiology.

OOC: I'll say a bit more about the stats for the thrall acid, [MENTION=4936]Shayuri[/MENTION], later today.

 

[Shayuri]

Death Otter glanced at the card distractedly, but didn't take it. Ideas were coming together in her head, accreting like vast vortexes of dust and hydrogen around the behemoth singularity at the center of the galaxy. She couldn't see IT yet, but she could infer the presence of something huge...something she was rocketing towards with reckless abandon.

"SETI...right...but these things can't just be from another planet. I mean, they may be from another planet as well, but that's not the end of it. It can't be. Other planets would still be subject to the same physical laws as Earth. Leverage is wrong, losing mass without releasing energy is wrong. And if it's alien why is it so close to an octopus?" She paced away, no longer really paying attention to Bukowski or anyone else.

"You know what it feels like? Looking at it? Like...if you want to get access to a system, you...you look at it. You snag a few packets, see how the system codes data, and work up a worm or something that works the same way. Sort of the same way. Something that can integrate itself without causing too many errors."

Death Otter dropped to a hunker, getting closer to the remains of the acidpus.

"But that's not THIS," she went on. "This is too big, too obvious. Because what the worm DOES, once it's in, is start generating bits of code for specific purposes. Spiders that look for information and collect it and send it. Or purge data. Or alter it randomly. Or whatever you want to do to mess stuff up. They are sorta kinda camouflaged but not really because they're pretty stupid, and obvious and they are going to make noise. Generate errors. And the system response will find them and destroy them, but it's FINE because the SOURCE is hidden in the deep code...the system registry or root...and it just keeps making more until mission accomplished."

Otter looked at the container the professor had put into her hands. She felt dizzy. Passing the event horizon, stretched by the immense tidal forces...the point of no return. The octopus was small potatoes now, she could see...trivial, really. The important part...the VITAL part was what it implied. Not a fact or a speculation, but a paradigm. A way for her brain to grasp the concepts unfolding in front of her. And the vistas that opened were breathtaking. All she needed was to learn...a new programming language. But it wasn't impossible. She had samples of code right here. But she needed...

"More," Otter said, and looked around at Charles, her eyes wide and suddenly extremely focused. "There's more of these things. You've seen them before. How many? Where?"

 

[Forged Fury]

Cyril froze. He was never at a loss for words, but now he was just that... Staring at Professor Bukowski, the man finally got control of himself. Well, sort of... "Are you f(*&^King sh!%^^ing me? All of this is real?" It wasn't clear if Cyril was asking about the psychic part, the alien part, or just everything.

 

[KirayaTiDrekan]

Feral finally emerged from the back to partake in breakfast, acting as though he had just come in.

"Colder than the arctic out there."