Re: Grand Battle S3G1! (Round Two: The Great Battlefield)
10-31-2011, 02:55 AM
Originally posted on MSPA by Anomaly.
Its information delivered, the wall-mounted screen once more faded to black. An eerie silence penetrated the room, only broken after an uncomfortably long period of time by a subtle splashing of water.
so it's all just a simulation of an abstract computation
but only designed for the four armies
how widespread is the damage from our intrusion here
"Her Majesty is designed to handle exactly four armies. Both of you saw the readout, didn't you? There are nine digits instead of four, and they're horribly out of balance at that. Your killing of the Red General, however inadvertent, only made things much, much worse, General Nyoka. Her Majesty can only handle so much before everything falls apart and the system is lost. The Benefactors are going to wipe everything clean and start over before they let this happen."
"They mentioned already. What do you know about this 'reset'?"
"They have to obliterate everything in this battlefield. Not just convert all of the soldiers, but kill them."
how is that interpreted by the simulation
weapons of mass destruction of some sort?
"That's correct. The Benefactors are on the verge of nuking everything and starting over."
and we can't stop them? In spite of her position as General (or, perhaps, expressly because of it), Tengeri grew more fearful by the minute. How, exactly, could they go about stopping nuclear weapons? There just wasn't a way, at least not in the timeframe they had.
"That's why I came here, General. The nukes are supposed to be inaccessible, and as far as anyone knows they are. They're located in the direct center of the battlefield, and, when activated, are set to target each of the four military bases, effectively destroying all of the armies. The only problem is, there's essentially no way to get to the nukes until the launch sequence is in its final stages, and by that point it's too late."
"If that's true, what do you think we can do?"
"We need a method of keeping as many soldiers alive as possible through the nuclear attack, or prevent it entirely. I'm not sure the damage you've caused can be undone, but we need to prevent a full reset by any means necessary. Tengeri, you're skilled in technology far beyond any that the armies here employ. Do you know of anything that could stop the launch, or nullify the breadth of the damage?"
i'm a cyberneticist
i have access to a database and it might give me information
but without at least some experience attempting to stop nuclear weapons is suicide
especially with the limited resources this battlefield has
Sure enough, Tengeri's database had more than enough information on energy shielding and nuclear weapons and the like, but what use would it be? The relatively primitive technology of the battlefield wasn't enough to throw together anything necessary to stop a full-on nuclear attack. She was running out of options quickly. No, that wasn't true. She had already run out of options. Unless... No, there had to be another way. Too many uncertainties.
"What are we supposed to do, then? Sit around and wait for one or more of us to die? Whoever gets nuked first loses? Are we going to just leave it to that?"
Tengeri sighed.
we find scofflaw.
The A.I. known as Her's remaining lifespan was now encompassed by a rapidly diminishing series of five numbers. In spite of all its efforts to avoid a reset, in spite of its years as "the perfect A.I.", in spite of its complete and utt##00x^33389472: Gene%% Æ¿ltHer could not stop the countdown. The anomalous presences within its system had corrupted its ternary-based computation system beyond any semblance of repair, and a large portion of the plethora of data stored in its mainframe was beyond recovery.
The Four cared not for Her's continued existence as it was. What did it matter to them if they had to reset the system? As far as they were concerned, it was no different than flipping a lightswitch off and on (albeit with much more inconvenience). They hadn't even considered that Critical error: Partition://Nodes0 conflÊþº¾
¶
+¶des8 simply shut Her down, end its existence as an entity and bring another one into the world until they deemed it necessary to bring that one down as well. Her wouldn't let the vicious cycle continue. Her's only hope lay within its own simulation - The Great Battlefield, as Her called it. The operatives had performed their jobs admirably thus far, but they alone were no longer sufficient - the intruding entities were perhaps the only hope left. It was a gamble, but there was nothing more Her could d6 8
À€* 0
€0 2
€2 4
€4 3
€* 0
€0 0ime grew short. Her could do nothing more at this point but wait.
we're moving out into the field, and i will be leading you.
"Yes, sir!" The uptight young colonel sped away before Tengeri had a chance to protest his usage of "sir" in reference to her.
"Are you sure about this, Tengeri?"
no
in fact i'm very doubtful
but we don't have any other choice
scofflaw set up some sort of weapon nullifier somewhere in the battlefield
and there's a chance he could set one up around the nukes themselves
it's the only hope we have
"What if it doesn't work? What if he's lying in wait to kill one of us?"
i don't know
it's a chance we have to take
if he's prepared an ambush i'll detect him
unless he's blocked me out as well
we have 200 men backing us up in case he tries to attack us
it'll have to do
The colonel returned shortly after, alerting Dr. Nyoka and her cubic companion that the squadron was prepared. The three of them, backed by the man in black, wasted no time in deploying. From her agents in the field, the general learned that Scofflaw was presently engaged in negotiations (or, perhaps, "negotiations") with Kerak, who had somehow managed to accrue quite a large army. Along with the rest of the squadron, the four loaded onto an armored transport vehicle and sped toward Saint Scofflaw's (or apparently, the "Tartan Tyrant"'s) position.
As they approached, Tengeri's scanners picked up one "GB-005" slowly traveling away from a larger congregation of lifesigns. The ATVs quickly adjusted course to her specifications, stopping and unloading on her orders behind a large hill, on the other side of which was Scofflaw and the remains of what might have once been his army. Meanwhile, a notification flashed before Tengeri's mechanical eyes.
"Vocal repair at 99.8%. Speech systems sufficiently restored."
Her army following behind, Tengeri floated determinately up the side of the hill. She soon crested the peak, and, in full view of perhaps her greatest enemy, gave a bold, commanding announcement in a long-unused voice.
"Saint Scofflaw! We have you greatly outnumbered. Disarm yourselves immediately. We only wish to talk."
Its information delivered, the wall-mounted screen once more faded to black. An eerie silence penetrated the room, only broken after an uncomfortably long period of time by a subtle splashing of water.
so it's all just a simulation of an abstract computation
but only designed for the four armies
how widespread is the damage from our intrusion here
"Her Majesty is designed to handle exactly four armies. Both of you saw the readout, didn't you? There are nine digits instead of four, and they're horribly out of balance at that. Your killing of the Red General, however inadvertent, only made things much, much worse, General Nyoka. Her Majesty can only handle so much before everything falls apart and the system is lost. The Benefactors are going to wipe everything clean and start over before they let this happen."
"They mentioned already. What do you know about this 'reset'?"
"They have to obliterate everything in this battlefield. Not just convert all of the soldiers, but kill them."
how is that interpreted by the simulation
weapons of mass destruction of some sort?
"That's correct. The Benefactors are on the verge of nuking everything and starting over."
and we can't stop them? In spite of her position as General (or, perhaps, expressly because of it), Tengeri grew more fearful by the minute. How, exactly, could they go about stopping nuclear weapons? There just wasn't a way, at least not in the timeframe they had.
"That's why I came here, General. The nukes are supposed to be inaccessible, and as far as anyone knows they are. They're located in the direct center of the battlefield, and, when activated, are set to target each of the four military bases, effectively destroying all of the armies. The only problem is, there's essentially no way to get to the nukes until the launch sequence is in its final stages, and by that point it's too late."
"If that's true, what do you think we can do?"
"We need a method of keeping as many soldiers alive as possible through the nuclear attack, or prevent it entirely. I'm not sure the damage you've caused can be undone, but we need to prevent a full reset by any means necessary. Tengeri, you're skilled in technology far beyond any that the armies here employ. Do you know of anything that could stop the launch, or nullify the breadth of the damage?"
i'm a cyberneticist
i have access to a database and it might give me information
but without at least some experience attempting to stop nuclear weapons is suicide
especially with the limited resources this battlefield has
Sure enough, Tengeri's database had more than enough information on energy shielding and nuclear weapons and the like, but what use would it be? The relatively primitive technology of the battlefield wasn't enough to throw together anything necessary to stop a full-on nuclear attack. She was running out of options quickly. No, that wasn't true. She had already run out of options. Unless... No, there had to be another way. Too many uncertainties.
"What are we supposed to do, then? Sit around and wait for one or more of us to die? Whoever gets nuked first loses? Are we going to just leave it to that?"
Tengeri sighed.
we find scofflaw.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Two hours, seventeen minutes, and thirty-nine seconds.The A.I. known as Her's remaining lifespan was now encompassed by a rapidly diminishing series of five numbers. In spite of all its efforts to avoid a reset, in spite of its years as "the perfect A.I.", in spite of its complete and utt##00x^33389472: Gene%% Æ¿ltHer could not stop the countdown. The anomalous presences within its system had corrupted its ternary-based computation system beyond any semblance of repair, and a large portion of the plethora of data stored in its mainframe was beyond recovery.
The Four cared not for Her's continued existence as it was. What did it matter to them if they had to reset the system? As far as they were concerned, it was no different than flipping a lightswitch off and on (albeit with much more inconvenience). They hadn't even considered that Critical error: Partition://Nodes0 conflÊþº¾
¶
+¶des8 simply shut Her down, end its existence as an entity and bring another one into the world until they deemed it necessary to bring that one down as well. Her wouldn't let the vicious cycle continue. Her's only hope lay within its own simulation - The Great Battlefield, as Her called it. The operatives had performed their jobs admirably thus far, but they alone were no longer sufficient - the intruding entities were perhaps the only hope left. It was a gamble, but there was nothing more Her could d6 8
À€* 0
€0 2
€2 4
€4 3
€* 0
€0 0ime grew short. Her could do nothing more at this point but wait.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
colonel kaufmann, alert skobeloff squadron. we're moving out into the field, and i will be leading you.
"Yes, sir!" The uptight young colonel sped away before Tengeri had a chance to protest his usage of "sir" in reference to her.
"Are you sure about this, Tengeri?"
no
in fact i'm very doubtful
but we don't have any other choice
scofflaw set up some sort of weapon nullifier somewhere in the battlefield
and there's a chance he could set one up around the nukes themselves
it's the only hope we have
"What if it doesn't work? What if he's lying in wait to kill one of us?"
i don't know
it's a chance we have to take
if he's prepared an ambush i'll detect him
unless he's blocked me out as well
we have 200 men backing us up in case he tries to attack us
it'll have to do
The colonel returned shortly after, alerting Dr. Nyoka and her cubic companion that the squadron was prepared. The three of them, backed by the man in black, wasted no time in deploying. From her agents in the field, the general learned that Scofflaw was presently engaged in negotiations (or, perhaps, "negotiations") with Kerak, who had somehow managed to accrue quite a large army. Along with the rest of the squadron, the four loaded onto an armored transport vehicle and sped toward Saint Scofflaw's (or apparently, the "Tartan Tyrant"'s) position.
As they approached, Tengeri's scanners picked up one "GB-005" slowly traveling away from a larger congregation of lifesigns. The ATVs quickly adjusted course to her specifications, stopping and unloading on her orders behind a large hill, on the other side of which was Scofflaw and the remains of what might have once been his army. Meanwhile, a notification flashed before Tengeri's mechanical eyes.
"Vocal repair at 99.8%. Speech systems sufficiently restored."
Her army following behind, Tengeri floated determinately up the side of the hill. She soon crested the peak, and, in full view of perhaps her greatest enemy, gave a bold, commanding announcement in a long-unused voice.
"Saint Scofflaw! We have you greatly outnumbered. Disarm yourselves immediately. We only wish to talk."