Re: The Vivacious Deadlock: S3G6: Round One: Genreshift
06-01-2011, 10:43 PM
Originally posted on MSPA by Akumu.
With a small pop, Dr. Melissa Harmon appeared in the nameless city. She stumbled slightly and her hiking-boot-clad foot splashed into the sickly stream of grayish water flowing down the center of the alleyway she now found herself in. She cursed reflexively and then let out a small laugh, tinged with a bit of mania. Not only was she taken against her will to compete in a battle to the death, but now her boot was wet!
An insistent tone drew her attention to the probe/display unit in her right hand. Before being plucked out of her life by the being calling itself the Spectator, she had been taking measurements of multiversal resonances in the field, and now the digital readout was indignantly displaying “SIGNAL OUT OF RANGE.” Harmon thumbed the sensitivity down an increment, then another. She frowned and rolled the wheel downwards. At a mind-numbingly high input range, the message finally disappeared, to be replaced with a rapidly dancing Fourier spectrum of the local resonances. A whole tangle of alternate worlds were only a hyperdimensional stone's throw away. It was like no spectral distribution she had seen before, the lack of attenuation of signal strength with increased detuning implying a whole manifold of different world-lines equally far from this one but all radically different from each other. Harmon flicked a stylus out of the side of the probe, scribbled “not natural!” on the screen, and saved the trace. In spite of herself, she was beginning to get excited. Battle or no, she had been plunked down in a scientific goldmine.
It was then that she noticed the small signal spike at the lowest extremities of the frequency range. Something that far away should be completely indistinguishable at this low sensitivity, but there it was. Her thumb danced over the keypad, zooming in on and isolating the low-frequency spike. Centered at one hertz, and a phase profile with two spikes ninety degrees apart.
ba-dum
Like a heartbeat...
ba-dum
ba-dum
ba-dum
KRA-KOW
A blinding flash and a crack of thunder made Harmon jump, and she realized she had been staring emptily at the display for some time. Snap out of it, Mel!, she chastised herself. Looking up to the sliver of sky between the buildings looming above her, she saw wisps of dark grey stormclouds moving quickly overhead. A drop of rain splattered against her forehead. She took that as a cue that it was time to get a move on, and slipped the probe into its holster on the side of her backpack.
Crossing a few yards brought Harmon to the end of her alley, which teed into another, slightly larger alley. Apparently city planning had not been high on the priority list when this place was being built. This one at least seemed to have some foot-traffic, clustered around a particular and peculiar hole-in-the-wall establishment. Amongst the concrete and asphalt of the city, the hitching post, trough and saloon doors were definitely out of place, but then again so was Dr. Melissa Harmon. She steeled herself, strode up and pushed her way through the swinging doors.
The reaction was all she could have hoped for. Conversation stopped as the period-dressed inhabitants of the bar noticed her, and there was even a loud discordant squawk as the honest-to-god pianist in a bowler lost concentration on his playing. All eyes followed her as she moved to the bar, plunked down on a stool and called out “Barkeep! A scotch on the rocks, if you'd be so kind.”
The barman studiously kept polishing a glass with his back turned to her, and before she could repeat herself a rough hand fell upon her shoulder.
“Listen, missy. We don't appreciate Matic's scientiflic folks around these parts. And I'm afraid now we're going to have to send him a message.”
With a small pop, Dr. Melissa Harmon appeared in the nameless city. She stumbled slightly and her hiking-boot-clad foot splashed into the sickly stream of grayish water flowing down the center of the alleyway she now found herself in. She cursed reflexively and then let out a small laugh, tinged with a bit of mania. Not only was she taken against her will to compete in a battle to the death, but now her boot was wet!
An insistent tone drew her attention to the probe/display unit in her right hand. Before being plucked out of her life by the being calling itself the Spectator, she had been taking measurements of multiversal resonances in the field, and now the digital readout was indignantly displaying “SIGNAL OUT OF RANGE.” Harmon thumbed the sensitivity down an increment, then another. She frowned and rolled the wheel downwards. At a mind-numbingly high input range, the message finally disappeared, to be replaced with a rapidly dancing Fourier spectrum of the local resonances. A whole tangle of alternate worlds were only a hyperdimensional stone's throw away. It was like no spectral distribution she had seen before, the lack of attenuation of signal strength with increased detuning implying a whole manifold of different world-lines equally far from this one but all radically different from each other. Harmon flicked a stylus out of the side of the probe, scribbled “not natural!” on the screen, and saved the trace. In spite of herself, she was beginning to get excited. Battle or no, she had been plunked down in a scientific goldmine.
It was then that she noticed the small signal spike at the lowest extremities of the frequency range. Something that far away should be completely indistinguishable at this low sensitivity, but there it was. Her thumb danced over the keypad, zooming in on and isolating the low-frequency spike. Centered at one hertz, and a phase profile with two spikes ninety degrees apart.
ba-dum
Like a heartbeat...
ba-dum
ba-dum
ba-dum
KRA-KOW
A blinding flash and a crack of thunder made Harmon jump, and she realized she had been staring emptily at the display for some time. Snap out of it, Mel!, she chastised herself. Looking up to the sliver of sky between the buildings looming above her, she saw wisps of dark grey stormclouds moving quickly overhead. A drop of rain splattered against her forehead. She took that as a cue that it was time to get a move on, and slipped the probe into its holster on the side of her backpack.
Crossing a few yards brought Harmon to the end of her alley, which teed into another, slightly larger alley. Apparently city planning had not been high on the priority list when this place was being built. This one at least seemed to have some foot-traffic, clustered around a particular and peculiar hole-in-the-wall establishment. Amongst the concrete and asphalt of the city, the hitching post, trough and saloon doors were definitely out of place, but then again so was Dr. Melissa Harmon. She steeled herself, strode up and pushed her way through the swinging doors.
The reaction was all she could have hoped for. Conversation stopped as the period-dressed inhabitants of the bar noticed her, and there was even a loud discordant squawk as the honest-to-god pianist in a bowler lost concentration on his playing. All eyes followed her as she moved to the bar, plunked down on a stool and called out “Barkeep! A scotch on the rocks, if you'd be so kind.”
The barman studiously kept polishing a glass with his back turned to her, and before she could repeat herself a rough hand fell upon her shoulder.
“Listen, missy. We don't appreciate Matic's scientiflic folks around these parts. And I'm afraid now we're going to have to send him a message.”