Freelancer North [Dakota] (for_family) wrote in knowhereic, @ 2017-10-01 09:04:00 |
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Having promised George that himself and Theta would help out with her research, North had soon gone to York and explained the situation. Delta was far more suited to be able to help with research than Theta-- true, Theta was an AI, but he wasn’t logic based, Delta was. Delta was made for calculations and science and math and proving theories. And, of course the Golden Soldier had agreed! Georgia had seemed like someone York would like to get to know and he and North certainly could use a few more friends. So why not? The two giants arrived at the designated time at the lab George had commandeered for herself, York heading in first and looking all manner of tall and intimidating at six-foot-four, nearly three hundred pounds (a lot of it was muscle, but a hefty chunk was the metal in his bones), his face scarred over one eye and the offending eye completely white. It was glass, the real eye having been removed a long time ago. His remaining blue seemed warm enough though and focused on her as he smiled. “You must be Georgia. Hey, I’m York.” The would-be thief of her truck.. Except he’d learned it hadn’t been up for grabs and, like any proper soldier, had relinquished it back to her. “This is North.” And as the first blonde moved out of the way, the second beast of a man was revealed fully. Spartans, man, they were giants. *** Theta was an AI, he wasn’t Delta’s logic. He was more emotionally based, the most human of the AIs, prone to distraction and hesitation. North had him for some time now, and he had gotten a lot better with North’s nurturing nature. Theta was stronger, smarter, and more focused, he’d gotten friendlier. North liked testing his skills whenever he could, to encourage Theta and show the AI just how good he was. Because he was good. Of the AIs, he had creativity behind himself, he could do things the others didn’t, he manipulated his own programming to create virtual images of things and had a personality to match it. So of course when Georgia asked North if Theta could help with her project, he’d agreed. He’d also roped York and Delta into the efforts precisely because each of the AIs had different skills. Theta would think outside of Delta’s logic, which would benefit Georgia in the end, because he’d be able to provide alternate ways around problems. A useful team! So when they met Georgia, York was first through the doorway, and the hulking form of the other pale blonde Spartan followed after. At 6’9” and more than two-hundred fifty pounds of solid muscle and metal, North was gigantic. York was short for a Spartan, but North was more appropriate in size. Hell, he made the NBA sized wizard Harry Dresden look small. Theta sat on North’s shoulder, a smallish (how small was he really, when he looked small for a giant Spartan?) magenta and blue holograph, kicking his legs back and forth. He climbed to his feet and waved a little holographic hand. “Hi, Georgia,” Theta said, sounding appropriately like a teenager. “Hello, Georgia,” North said. They’d met before, briefly, when North had newly arrived and Theta was freaking out. She’d been a good initial introduction, calm and logical, which had helped Theta relax. North smiled. *** Georgia glared at the small box on her table, then rubbed her forehead and ran a hand through her blonde hair (Note to self: See if she could acquire hair dye. Though it’d be weird not to have her hair bleached regularly). It wasn’t that the electronics themselves were that hard to understand so much as it was that she had no idea what kind of voodoo the testing kits used to get from ‘contaminated blood’ to ‘failed test’. How did they read the biological information? And of course Buffy and Magdalene weren’t present in this hallucination. Instead, she got hallucinated AIs. ’Because you’re a workaholic who won’t let anything be easy for you, George.’ Her brother’s voice teased in her head. It wasn’t wrong. As a concession to her ‘guests’, Georgia had turned the lights on dimly, and true to her word, she actually answered when they came calling. Being of a normal height, looking either of them in the eyes required her to crane her neck, which in turn caused her to wince as she looked right into the dim light, even wearing her sunglasses. “Okay, so three things.” She held up three fingers, “One, hello, I’m Georgia Mason for you that haven’t met me, thank you for helping me. Two, I’m sorry, but looking you in the eyes is going to give me a migraine, so I’m not going to. Three, were there tests done as to how tall people could be before their physiology or their increased need for oxygen versus lung capacity became an issue?” *** Oh. York liked this girl. The sarcasm was strong with this one and while the golden boy had never been great with dishing out sarcasm, he recognized it and gave credit where credit was due. Bravo for you, Miss Georgia Mason of Zombieland. “Number one,” the shorter of the two giants began, “Lovely to meet you and it’s our pleasure. Number two, that’s okay, we understand that it’s hard to look such handsome and charming men in the eye directly without succumbing to our masculine wiles. And number three, I’m sure there probably were, but it doesn’t matter that much, as we spend about eighty percent of our lives in armor which has oxygen pumped directly into it. We kinda get whatever we need, when we need it, dependent upon battle scenarios and injuries.” Something Delta had explained countless times when York bitched about it. Sometimes Delta drove him crazy. Like now. York, the AI reported inside the Spartan’s head, I have detected several anomalies in this woman and have determined that she is ill in some form. However, it is not an illness that I have experience with and suggest that you take the proper measures when handling her. Do not stand too close. Do not come into direct contact with her blood, sweat, saliva, urine, or feces. I also would not suggest having sexual intercourse with-- “Okay--” York said suddenly, though no one could hear the words in his head but him. The golden Freelancer spoke to himself far more often than North did-- far more often than any other Freelancers, in fact. But they all understood. They’d all met Delta. *** North looked at York when his shorter friend started speaking, a pale blonde eyebrow raising in question and amusement. “How did you get a date with Lieutenant Hawkeye?” He asked, shaking his head. “Sometimes you amaze me.” He stepped past York, nudging him with his elbow on the way, but altered course just slightly so it would take him toward Georgia without directly intervening in her space once he was near. He’d gathered that she didn’t exactly like being close to people and hadn’t wanted to make her uncomfortable with his presence. He’d said as much to York, who of the two of them, was definitely the touchier one. Though they both touched plenty. “Excuse my friend Georgia, he’s a little crazy.” And then York proved it by talking to himself. “... he’s just talking to Delta.” North didn’t blink at York having conversations with himself these days. When he’d first gotten Delta it had been concerning and distracting as hell. Those little jerky eye motions always made North concerned York was about to have a stroke or a heart attack. It was different for North because Theta usually appeared when he wanted to speak, so there was less talking out loud to himself, but Delta? Well. Delta ran all kinds of diagnostics from what York said about him; Delta’s conversations with York were frequent and frequently one sided. North held out his hand, palm upward, and Theta appeared there, like North was carrying him. “You ready to help Georgia today?” “Yeah!” He said enthusiastically, which made North smile. “... Delta is helping, too?” “Yes, it’s important Georgia get all the help she can. Alright?” “Okay,” Theta said. Then North motioned as if setting him down, and the AI hopped off his hand and onto Georgia’s table, stepping closer to her. *** George gave an indelicate snort at York’s comments, “Yes, that’s exactly why I’m not looking at you. Whatever you tell yourself to sleep at night.” Then she considered his comment about the armor and nodded. That’d be efficient, though of course you were still stuck with the physical limits of the weight supportable by bone, etc. Frankly, from what she’d gathered she was surprised they hadn’t just been grafted into/fully integrated with the armor, but even she knew that wasn’t necessarily an appropriate conversational topic. “Now I just want to know what Delta said.” Was her response to York talking ‘to himself’, which she stated with an amused look on her face. George gave a nod of acknowledgement at Theta; the AI’s hologram was small enough that it didn’t cause any of the normal wariness George displayed. If he’d been made of flesh, he would’ve been too small to Amplify. “Okay,” She said in a business like tone, looking over the two (four?) of them. They might actually be the best bet for this, given the AIs clearly had direct neural integrations and were using electronics to process biological data far in excess of a Kellis-Amberlee test unit. “This,” George waved at a small, non-descript box on one of the tables, “is a Kellis-Amberlee testing unit.” The box’s cover had been taken off, and George had connected it to her computer so she could get an idea of the programming running it. “Basically, you stick a finger in, get pricked, and it says if you’re amplifying or not. Catching amplification before someone’s mind goes is the best way, since then we can barricade ourselves and ask for a bullet.” She explained, “This light at the top flashes red or green to let you know, since they needed to be quickly used everywhere by everyone regardless of nationality or literacy level.” “So more of these would be good,” Obviously, “But I can’t figure out how the testing unit is actually analyzing the sample. I get that there’s a sensor, but I have no idea how they programmed the sensor to recognize dormant versus live KA.” “But I was good,” George grinned, “I haven’t thrown it at the wall yet.” *** “Throwing it at the wall would be a counterproductive measure.” Came the sudden, mechanical sounding, precise voice of Delta. His speech pattern was very much like one might expect a computer to be, whereas Theta could speak like a person. The AI that appeared, also unlike Theta, didn’t have an entire body including legs. Nor could he move in a human-like way. In fact, he was simply a suit of MJOLNIR armor, Mark V, in green, holding a weapon that was drawn down, and ending somewhere around the knees, where he just turned into a blur of green light. The extent of his movement seemed to be turning his torso left and right, and bobbing his head. Oh, sure, Delta could also ‘run’, but he was standing still now. Running simply wasn’t required. Yet. “If this is the only Kellis-Amberlee testing unit, destroying it before we had time to analyze it might cause us to be incapable of its accurate reproduction.” York tilted his head some, to where the green AI, who was a solid eighteen inches, was floating somewhere just over his left shoulder. Always his left-- to protect York’s blind side. “Miss Mason, this is Delta. D, that’s Miss Georgia Mason.” “Georgia.” The AI repeated in his mechanical tone. “I have never encountered a human named after one of the states contained inside the former United States of America. I was aware that it happened before the United States fell. I am pleased to make your acquaintance.” Though, even as he said it, somehow it seemed unlikely that the green AI could be pleased about anything. “Furthermore, regarding your earlier query about my internal discussion with Agent New York, I was informing him that I was unable to place the disease you are suffering from in my databanks. I was also instructing him that he should not attempt to make contact with any of your bodily fluids and should exercise extreme caution while standing within your vicinity.” Georgia Mason, meet AI Fragment: Designation Delta. *** In response to the tiny green set of armor, George laughed. Because everything it said was true, and also… “Man, is that what I sound like to Shaun and his people?” She shook her head and nodded at Delta, “Yes, that’s why I didn’t do it. I’m human, though, and humans have these unfortunate chemically modulated emotions which sometimes causes us to do things that are counterproductive.” “Also, I’d prefer to be referred to as Ms.” George clarified to York. Frankly, she’d rather Mr. but people just got weird about that (does that mean you’re trans?! No, it means that she thought the whole marriage-as-determiner-of-title thing was stupid.) Another nod, “Yes, some states are used as names. Georgia, Carolina… my middle name is actually Caroline.” She informed the AI, “Dakota. Not as many male state names, though. Washington, I suppose.” George shrugged, “Yes, Kellis-Amberlee wouldn’t be in your databases as it’s unique to my timeline, but your recommendations are exactly correct, Delta.” *** “Ms, then.” York corrected with an easy smile, leaning back against one of the counters and just watching the interaction between his AI and the woman. “Our presence is making you uncomfortable.” The AI deduced simply. “Your blood pressure is higher than is recommended for a healthy adult female. May I ask what it is that is unsettling you?” It wasn’t that Delta cared, York wasn't sure he had the capacity to care, sometimes, but rather it was because he was collecting data and the fluctuations he was reading off of her were interesting. “You gonna let him have all the fun, Little T?” The golden boy would ask aside to the magenta and blue AI, eyebrows lifting slightly. “Get in there and help. Keep the two of them on track, or nothing will ever get done and they’ll spend all day talking about states.” *** Theta had generated his skateboard while Delta and Georgia spoke. He was currently balancing on it, arms splayed out at his sides and his little armored body in harmony … until York spoke. Startled, he appeared to fall off his skateboard, both hands waving to catch his balance but failing. He pushed himself back to his feet and ran to catch his skateboard, which had rolled away. If Delta was eighteen inches in size, Theta fell somewhere around a foot. If that. He was the smallest but the one with the most personality. He looked up at York, then around at North who nodded his encouragement, before turning to look at Delta and Georgia. “Georgia?” Theta asked, sounding like a shy teen, “May I connect to your computer to see what program you’re running?” North smiled. Theta was learning lessons on being polite in the necessary circumstances. He wouldn’t, of course, ask for permission in a battle zone. The fact Theta could learn the difference probably should have been concerning for outsiders, but North was just pleased. The giant of a man had stepped away, too. As Spartans, they’d been trained in combat, tactics, and given a genuine education in physics, science, and mathematics, among others. But Georgia didn’t want their help, she’d asked for their AIs, so York and North could hang out and let them work together. *** George nodded when she was warned to keep the AIs on track. Not a problem. They couldn’t be worse than her Fictionals. She turned her face towards Delta and responded to his question in a quick, logical tone, “Although I logically know that neither of them,” she nodded to indicate North and York, “have Kellis-Amberlee, I grew up in a world where other people could zombify, and as such I’ve developed certain instinctual responses to being near people in unsecured settings. My brain knows it’s fine, but my endocrine and nervous systems haven’t gotten the memo.” She watched Theta with a raised eyebrow behind her sunglasses. What was the point of the whole skateboard thing? “Do you have tactile perception?” George asked the AIs. “And yes, you can, as long as you don’t laugh at my tech,” She joked. *** Hah. York hadn’t been warning Georgia to keep the AIs on track.. He’d been warning Theta to keep Delta and Georgia on track! But, good that she’d misunderstood. It meant no hard feelings. And it looked like he’d been good to put out the warning, because with George responding that way, Delta would just want to chat. “I think your endocrine and nervous system could easily be bypassed with the help of pharmaceuticals, if you would have an interest in exploring the more unnatural routes of science and the effects of drugs on the body.” Delta supplied helpfully. All the golden boy could do was smirk at North and shake his head a little. They were nerds. Okay, all of them were nerds, but mostly George and Delta. *** “No, they don't have tactile perception. I have no idea where Theta learned that from..” North replied. Or why Theta would fall off his skateboard. Or why it rolled away. Theta stared at Delta while his green brother continued on about drugs and the nervous system. “Delta, stop talking,” he said. He didn't say it very assertively. It wasn't in his nature to be aggressive. He did, however, put his skateboard away and regard Georgia's computer for a brief moment. “Initiating connection,” he told North, who nodded his acknowledgement. North tilted his head a little when the connection was established and Theta flickered a bit. “... these are super old models.” Theta turned and threw out both hands, projecting the binary used in the testing unit. North blinked and stepped forward a little. He'd never seen Theta do that before. Usually his projections were the skateboard and the fireworks. “You must be working really hard when I'm asleep, buddy.” “I am, but don't talk, or I'll lose it.” “.. right,” North said patiently. “Sorry.” Delta, of course, would only need to plug himself into the same system to analyze it. He didn't need the visual, Theta had just been showing off. But the magenta blue AI let the projection fade after a moment. “See? I can be like Delta.” *** “No one’s asking you to be like D, Little T.” York assured him, keeping his place leaned back against the counter. Of course, Delta was now walking forward, stiff as ever, to join Theta and connected with it the same as Theta-- except he didn’t ask permission. “Initiating connection.” He repeated. Then he went very still and York turned his head a bit to the side. Theta was far less intrusive than Delta, by nature of the fact he was more human. Delta was like a wrecking ball in York’s brain, though he had tried to be more delicate in the last few months. It wasn’t always easy. The golden soldier handled it well, though, he had enough patience to deal with it and he needed the help of Delta more than North needed the help of Theta. Without Delta, York would have been decommissioned and that would have been the end of Agent New York. *** It wasn’t a bad idea that the AI gave, but George smiled, “Yes, I’m sure that is possible, but I don’t think it’s a good idea, long term. I hope that I either wake up or return home shortly, and since the instincts are finely tuned to be useful but not debilitating, I need them when I do go home.” Living in a world with Kellis-Amberlee without the ability to instantly size up anything you came across? George wouldn’t recommend it. George watched the smaller AI pull up the program and snorted when he commented on the unit, “Hey, you said you wouldn’t make fun. And it’s good to have the two of you be different,” she said, segueing easily into the next topic, “It means you can brainstorm.” “So basically I get lost in one of the layers between the assembly code and the analysis compilation. I don’t understand how it’s passing the information up the chain, translating the sensed biological information into digital information.” “My tech person isn’t here.” She explained. Her tech person was dead. George shot her. *** Theta paused and looked at Delta, their silent communication going unheard when both AIs connected. Delta was observing. Theta shifted after a moment and turned to look at Georgia. "There is an electrode inside the unit that reacts to enzymes in the blood droplet when it pricks your finger, designed specifically to respond to the viral presence designated Kellis-Amberlee. When the droplet reaches the system, the reaction to the enzyme in the unit generates an electrical signal. Right Delta?" Theta said. “Then the interface causes the flash of lights. The higher the active viral presence the more red there is.” Georgia probably understood that already, but North smiled again at the explanation. Getting Theta to trust himself was always a good thing in the soldier’s mind. So he just encouraged him with another nod. “You should determine which enzyme is reacting to the infection and reproduce that…. If you haven’t yet. If you allowed Delta to analyze the infection in both its active and inactive states, he could tell you where the two meet to produce a signal. He can design the electrode interface, too.” *** “Thank you,” George told each AI, “I still don’t understand how it changes the biochemical information-” The woman stopped mid sentence, looking at Theta’s hologram for several moments. Then she grabbed the testing unit and turned her face towards the screen, scrolling down and scanning over the lines of code, looking for something. Was that... ? She squinted, she wasn’t entirely… maybe it was later… The woman broke out into a grin. She still didn’t get it, but she had an idea of how it might work. She shook her head in response to the suggestion, “The only way to get an active sample is to infect and Amplify something, and I don’t want to die, and I refuse to infect another living thing with Kellis-Amberlee.” Georgia’s voice made it clear that the prospect horrified her. Since she wasn’t a freaking conspiracy nut terrorist. She took a breath, “Okay.” George said, looking at Theta and Delta again, “You can tell me if I’m way off, but is maybe part of the problem that I kept looking for an analysis algorithm - code - when actually the enzyme analysis is done through structure: Using the enzyme’s shapes to activate certain gates and circuits at the assembly level, which then determines what code is run?” *** “You are correct.” Delta confirmed when Theta asked if he was correct. But beyond that, he stood there silently, allowing Theta to read into the data and come to his own conclusions. During those several minutes, Delta looked at York a handful of times. There was clearly some sort of silent communication going on there, as the golden Spartan tilted his head this way or that when regarded by his AI. They’d been together a long time. Though, when George prompted the two AIs about her understanding, the green turned to his younger counterpart. “I believe Miss Mason is asking you a question, Theta.” His simple statement. Theta had started this, he would finish it. Delta was hands (circuits?) off right now. *** Silence continued unabated after Georgia asked her question. Without direct access to a sample, the AIs were working off the limited information provided inside the woman’s unit (Theta had downloaded all the available information there, after all, sorry Georgia) and the testing unit itself. All eyes were on Theta, which made him shrink back a little and look at North in anxiety. “It’s okay, buddy, they’re just asking questions. You know the answer,” North prompted gently. “... okay,” Theta confirmed. He projected the image of the running code again, silent while he analyzed it instead of playing with it like he’d initially done. It took him just a little longer than it did Delta to do the same thing. But after a beat, he looked at Georgia, “Your understanding is correct,” Theta replied. “Though, I’d still advise an analysis of the virus in either state to correctly identify the shapes.” He paused the projected image on a line of code. *** “He’s right,” George reassured that tiny AI, “Even if you didn’t know, I’d just be in the same spot I was before you showed up.” She shrugged a bit to show it wasn’t that big a deal. George wasn’t the type to flip out and yell or throw a fit unless something was seriously wrong, and this wouldn’t count. She watched the code Theta projected silently, her eyes scanning the code herself behind her sunglasses. Part of the issue was that George wasn’t a programmer: She had basic literacy, but she still had to get through the weird syntax to get at the logic underneath. The confirmation made her exhale a sigh of relief. There was that cracked anyway. George nodded at Theta’s advice, “Thank you for the advice, but as the closest thing we have to an expert on Kellis-Amberlee,” which was terrifying, “I’m afraid that’s not feasible.” She said firmly, but without reproach. The woman looked at all four of them, AI and Spartans both, “Thank you for the help.” She said, “It’s appreciated.” *** Theta dropped the image, “You’re welcome, Georgia,” he sounded shy again as he said it. Then he blipped back over to North’s outstretched hand, seeming to stand within his palm. “Good job, Theta, you were great!” The Freelancer encouraged him. He and North shared their customary fist bump before the little AI blinked away to hide. North smiled faintly at nothing, his head tipped a little and his eyes did that strange jerky motion York’s did when Delta was informing him of something. Theta didn’t talk nearly as much though, so North came back to the present briefly after. “York and I aren’t as dumb as he looks,” He jerked a thumb at his one eyed friend. “If we can help, we will. We’ve got a pretty solid background in the sciences.” And while virology wasn’t one of those heavily regarded fields, they were from the future. Plenty of the things they encountered here were primitive, being from a time long before. *** No one and nothing talked as much as Delta. York got very little sleep because of it. Delta was often talking to York while York was talking to someone else, so sometimes he lost his train of thought. Sometimes his train derailed entirely. Sometimes it ended in flames and casualties. As Theta flickered away, so did Delta-- the praise between AI’s kept silent-- and when North insulted York, the way that one blue eye had turned to stare into nowhere, the slightly jerking motion (it was eerie when they both did it) said he really wasn’t listening. He was incredible at pretending he was, though. He heard the words, it was just hard for his brain to process. “Yeah, whatever you need.” He assured with a smile. Damn he was good at that. He’d gotten good out of necessity. “We should probably get out of your hair.” The shorter blonde announced as he lifted his chin a little, Delta still prattling off information into his head. |