etraya | LIVE TEXT.

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LIVE TEXT.

@RK800
We're live.
Hello Etraya, this is Connor. Accelerator and I would like to share our recent findings after exploring the lower floors of the hospital with Yuri and Dimitri. Clint Barton was also involved, but he is no longer here. I apologize if this is new information for you.
Please keep in mind we are strongly advising against investigation.

@Accelerator
There's dangerous shit down there. Everyone had better read this, because it's fucking important.

@RK800
Floors 1-5 are relatively empty. The 8th floor is primarily filled with alien technology, which I believe is a direct correlation to being disconnected from the network from that point onward. You will not be able to reach anyone if you are in danger.

@Acclerator
Once you get to the 8th floor the oxygen levels start to drop. The companion bots will get aggressive and attack you, too. It's like white blood cells attacking foreign entities in someone's body for protection, it's obvious we aren't supposed to be down there.

@RK800
Correct. After the 10th floor, humans were only able to continue with specialized assistance. There are 100 floors that we are aware of. The atmospheric conditions become increasingly unstable, including a change in the planet's gravitational force, with a high concentration of carbon dioxide and helium. The severe change in gravity causes an elevation of heat, and I was compromised. No one can survive it.

@Accelerator
Don't go down there unless you're prepared to deal with being in an environment like the goddamn core of a planet.
I think that's about it. Connor, you sure it's no problem altering the network so all this is public?

@RK800
Since I'm able to access the network after downloading its signature, any adjustments I've made are temporary. No permanent alterations to Etraya's actual network code has been made, so there shouldn't be any issue.

( ooc: responses will be from either/both connor and accelerator! feel free to threadjack, go wild, etc. coding credit to tessisamess )
( edit: i forgot to include this but pretty pls w a cherry on top fill out connor's permissions ♥ but if you don't that's ok, i'll reach out of we get into infomod territory! )

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Hello again. Quite a vague answer for someone advocating for transparency among colleagues and co-victims.

[ He's just hassling him. Congrats, Harold feels comfortable enough to show his sarcasm. ]

However, I do appreciate you guarding the area and ensuring no one endangers themselves. [ Or, presumably, accesses his records, if he's reading this rightly. ] As well as your calculations. Do you have any other astute observations to share about the nature of the planet we reside on?

Add 'hypocrite' to the list of things that make me a shitty person. I'm not happy about it, but it's necessary.

[Wow rude, calling him out!!]

There's a high likelihood the atmosphere outside of the barrier doesn't contain breathable air. That's a theory based on my observations, and I'm pretty fucking confident of it.

On the contrary, applying concepts unilaterally is far more problematic than occasional hypocrisy. Flexibility is a virtue.

[ Doubly calling him out! ]

Is the implication then that Aurora is maintaining our environment purely for species that are human and human-like? There's no reason to assume the full extent of the universe prefers our nitrogen/oxygen mix.

Then is giving you a unilateral 'fuck you' more problematic than just the occasional 'fuck you' when the situation arises?

[He's joking, he's joking.]

Yeah. The atmosphere within the barrier is very similar to the Earth where I'm from. 78.08% nitrogen, 20.95% oxygen, 0.93% argon, 0.04% carbon dioxide, and then some trace gases.

It certainly loses some panache, in my opinion.

[ He's not joking. ]

Given your assurance there are non-humans in residence, I find it interesting what this implies about their selection criteria. If we truly believe the universe is infinite then it seems they would be spoiled for choice. Perhaps the selectors in this case are from a planet with Earth-like atmosphere.

[ He can't help but think of what Riz had said, about worrying that the people deciding would prioritize the beings most similar to them. ]

Wouldn't want to lose any panache.

It's possible. I haven't done any kind of damn survey to ask people about the planets they're from, so I can't say for certain we're all from somewhere with an Earth-like atmosphere.

I assumed the swearing was all for panache, after all. I see. It merely makes me wonder if there are other places like ours, like Etraya, for species with different habitable environments. You did say there was another A.I. like Aurora but stricter than her.

It's a necessity.

[A verbal tic that he uses dramatically, to be specific.]

Eos, she's Aurora's sister. Moorecroft had a similar Earth-like environment to Etraya within its barrier. We haven't been to any other planets, and I'm not sure if there are more out there.

A necessity to be edgy?

[ Sorry he just has to roast him to make up for the insufferable teenager-ness Accelerator inflicted on him when they met. ]

All of the missions have taken place within Etraya apart from Moorecroft? I find that surprising. If they have the capability to bring us here, surely they can send us elsewhere.

Fuck you.

[Yes, yes it is!!! But it isn't cool to admit that, you need to understand this Harold.]

There or up in some space station that might be in another universe. We haven't had many missions overall, so that might be why.

[ Harold actually snorts in humor at reading that fuck you, but does not respond to it. He also has a pang of regret that he missed the space station. He's enough of a sci fi nerd to find that fascinating, but he assumes he'll get similar other opportunities here... ]

Ah. That is a piece of information I was missing. How long has this little experiment been going on, then?

[The space station was indeed cool, but Accelerator is also a bit of a sci-fi nerd.]

About 9 months. I didn't arrive until the second mission, which was in May. Aurora has the first message on her network at the end of March, apologizing for bringing people in early. There's nothing before that, so it wasn't just a matter of people not texting publicly. The first mission would've been in April.

In that case, do you have any significant posts you recommend I review? I was just getting to perusing the archive, but like any forum there's quite a bit of chatter and it's of mixed relevance. You'd be saving me considerable time.

[ This is Harold's polite way of saying he's been on the internet since before it was the internet and he doesn't need to read all your IRC chats. Without a real computer here yet, he can't just run a program to find and pull out the salient bits. Leaving him... forced to read. ]

[Accelerator can commiserate. Despite being the age for it and being so used to it, he isn't the biggest fan of social media. Mostly because of the 'social' aspect, but anyways....]

There's a lot of noise to sift through. Aurora's messages are a good way to start, she tries to provide what information she can and shuts conversations down when people act like idiots, so there's less nonsense to read.

I'll do that, thank you. I find I want to reach out to her myself but I'm at a loss for where to start.

[ He's also feeling a kneejerk aversion to speaking with her because he's afraid she's going to remind him intensely of the Machine, and he has a lot of unresolved feelings there. But Harold isn't about to discuss that with anyone, not even John. ]

It's not hard to come up with a question about how this place works.

[Which is the very practical, professional option.]

Her physical body is also brand new.

[Not that he's saying it out loud because god forbid, but another option is to ask how she's getting along with it..........]

Oh yes, I have altogether far too many.

[ Harold perks up at this implication, because he would absolutely ask how she's getting along with it -- it's a nice, safe, diagnostic series of questions he could run in his sleep if need be. ]

Is that so? How did she come to obtain one?

She was trying to build one. [He still remembers the very sad robo arm trying to get parts it couldn't reach on its own.] We helped her finish it.

[No big deal at all!]

[ Oh, really. Now he has a hundred questions. ]

Are you an expert in robotics? Who is 'we' -- yourself and Connor? And for what reason did she need one in the first place?

[ Giving the Machine a physical body would be hideously limiting for its purpose, and he'd assumed Aurora has a similar type of role if not exactly the same. Perhaps she can inhabit it or not as she wishes? ]

I'd say Connor's an expert, not me, Dimitri or Yuri. I just have a lot packed into my brain.

Haven't asked her why she was building it, but why wouldn't she want one? It must've been limiting being stuck with only a hologram and the network to interact with people. Having a body gives her more freedom than she had before.

[And he's always going to be in favour of that.]

[ He really wants to ask about that comment about having a lot packed into his brain, but one thing at a time. ]

Fortunate that Connor is present, then. It surprises me Aurora would be struggling. Are there not facilities for maintenance of the companion bots? Is that a concern we should have about Aurora's new form and Connor as well?

[ Once an admin, always an admin... ]I should think it would depend on her primary function. Do you think she's gotten... well. Lonely?

[ He can't imagine what else could be motivating it, and he has mixed feelings about the idea. So mixed he couldn't begin to sort them out into separate threads, really. ]

She does have facilities for them, yeah, but they weren't in the best shape at the time. Things should be fine now though, and I know Connor's told me he runs self-diagnostic tests regularly.

[No more Im'mari lurking around means no more infections. Oof, it's rough balancing "don't go down into the hospital basement because Aurora's brain is there" and giving out information.]

Yes. That shouldn't even be a question.

[No mixed feelings here, he thinks it'd be perfectly natural for Aurora, if she wasn't already feeling lonely, to develop those feelings as time went on.]

I see. If I can assist in any way, please let me know.

[ He won't pry further because he knows he risks being overbearing and condescending by doing so. He's new here and shouldn't assume he knows better. And though Harold hasn't been forthcoming about his capabilities, he's not deluded enough to think Accelerator hasn't put a few things about them together by now. He'd just prefer to leave them unspecified for as long as possible, preferably forever. ]

I wouldn't presume to imagine what an A.I. of unknown provenance experiences as emotions.

Yeah, sure. If you look at previous posts, you'll see the one from Aurora that's all messed up binary and hexadecimal code. Any indications from her like that means there's problems.

[It's hard to miss..... If Harold is any good at what he says he does, then he should probably find it interesting. This could also be potentially useful, giving him this information.]

Chances are it's the same as other people. She might just not be that good at expressing or understanding them.
[Just like some other girls he knows.]

[ Harold does go read the whole post and he does find it interesting. And highly alarming. ]

That's what led you all to your hospital investigation?

[ He debates for a long moment whether he's going to give his real opinion here, but ultimately it seems like he should. How A.I. operate is incredibly salient to their continued survival. ]

I wouldn't make that assumption. It's convenient to refer to her as "she" but Aurora is not a human being. Projecting our experiences onto her is doing us all a disservice and could be gravely misleading.

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