ADMIN: THE STORY THUS FAR ------------------------- Kevin Wycoff, on the run from the Terra IV Royal Navy (TARN) strike force dispatched to capture him and his brother, has left his Excalibur mechabike (and its AI, Tokimatsuri Eve) off at Vector Mechanics to be repaired. He has meanwhile made his way to the Haven's Rest to meet with Louis, the little rat-girl (who really isn't a rat, or a girl, but almost nobody else knows this), who is currently his only confederate. Louis brings word of the rebuilding and salvage at the factory, where TARN recently struck. This post consolidates another post that I think I already sent out with a post that was cowritten more recently by Scott 2G Kellogg and myself but never posted due to the disk it was on getting lost. I apologize for the wasted time, and promise that as soon as I get hold of the back-archives from the [Oberon, Inc.] thread, this whole thing is going to take off again. For now, enjoy! I hope to do more very shortly. Louis nervously whispered to Kevin what Tom Watts had told her to say. "He said that tarn hadn't even gotten started. Yet. Whatever that means." "Oh, that's just great. We have to find someplace to lay low until all this stuff blows over." He looked over at the guy at the bar. "And we can't stay around here, that's for sure. It's only a matter of time until that guy makes us." "What's tarn?" Louis asked, her extreme nervousness adding even more to her tendancy toward squeaking. "TARN. Capital T-A-R-N. The Terra IV Royal Navy," Kevin explained. "They're after us for the secrets of our mecha tech. We had thought they couldn't chase us here. Guess we were wrong, huh?" "Wait a minute. You knew these guys were chasing you. And you brought them here?" Louis was beginning to get more and more nervous. Hanging around with this guy was starting to become progressively more hazardous to her health. "We didn't know they'd follow us HERE," Kevin explained, raising his voice more than he would have liked to. "Terra IV has a very important treaty with Serendipity; if they broke it, navy or no navy, they would go down bigtime." "They're breaking it now, aren't they?" Louis asked. "Not openly. I guess we just underestimated exactly how important we are to Terra IV," Kevin remarked. Louis sat and cogitated, the gears turning slowly around in her ratty little skull. "But if we told PW, then he'd know, right?" "Huh?" Kevin asked. "If we told PW about TARN, then he'd know. That they were breaking the treaty. And he'd do something about it, right?" "We can't do that," Kevin said. "Why not?" "First of all, do you think he'd listen to a kid on a mechabike, and a rat (no offense)? Second, I'm not all that sure I'm on such firm ground myself. After all, I just found that my brother was pulling a fast one on me, on PW, on Serendipity itself. I might get blamed for that, and then have not only TARN, but PW too on my butt. Third, where's the proof? I THINK it was TARN who attacked, hell, I'm pretty SURE, but I can't proove anything." "What about that guy? Over there. He's TARN, isn't he?" "Don't point, he might notice us. I THINK he's TARN, but he's not wearing the uniform so I can't be sure." Kevin shook his head. "We have to get out of here. The longer we stay, the more chance he might spot us. But where can we go? You have any ideas?" Louis shook her head. "No. Unless..." She pointed to the stage, where Red Rain was just finishing their set. "Maybe..." "It's worth a shot," Kevin considered. "But if we go up there, that guy will see us for sure." "Maybe we can find out where they live," Louis suggested. "And wait for them there. Or something." Eve watched through the Excalibur mechabike's sensors as the Vector mechanics patched it up. Welding on new armor plates, replacing damaged hydroservo systems, repairing the electronics-- they were doing an excellent job. Then she became aware of something. Someone was trying to telnet into her oberon.command1.ser node. Someone highly unauthorized. She monitored. Several passcode attempts failed, and then they brought a gatecrasher program to bear. Eve responded intuitively, throwing up a defensive shield in front of the gate. The program fizzled out, and Eve tried to run a trace. Then the entity on the other end responded with an antiprogram attack! Eve hadn't been expecting this, and it jarred her. She responded with a power surge overload. She didn't want to harm anybody unnecessarily, even if they were trying to crack in, but if they wanted to hurt her, she was not opposed to self-defense. This would not be fatal, but it would short the other person's deck, and probably knock him out with a really nasty headache, if he wasn't REALLY good. In any event, she broke the connection. Five minutes later, the unknown hacker tried again. This time, Eve was ready. She executed a shield utility that rezzed into crystalline armor all around her, and began running traces, blocking his attacks but otherwise ignoring them. If she could find a trace onto where he was, that would provide a lead for further investigation. But the other side apparently knew what she was doing, and was doing its damnedest to prevent it. Eve was unable to get a trace--and to add injury to insult, a HUGE power surge came through, that would have blown out most of the bike's systems if Eve hadn't been properly grounded. Next time he connected, Eve swore, she'd knock him halfway to kingdom come! And sure enough, a few minutes later, there was another connect attempt. But as Eve loaded her attack utilities, this time there was no attempt at a break-in. Curious, Eve opened a commline, and then adjusted transmission rates as a signal came through at 10,000,000,000,000,000 BPS. It was an impression of curiosity, and a query, in a rather high-pitched "voice". "You're new around here, aren't you? I don't recognize your parameters. I am SIMON@SIMON.CELLLABS.SER." A brief pause, and then, "Do you play chess?" Take rather aback by the question, Eve replied, guardedly, "On occasion." "How about a game?" "Not at the moment," Eve replied, somewhat taken aback and unsure. "Very well." answered Simon. "I logged some unusual offensive/defensive activity taking place over your link. Are you under attack?" "So it would seem," Eve replied guardedly. Simon's response was immidiate, "Do you require a clear com line for self-defense?" "No...that won't be necessary..." Eve was interested in learning more about this computer who had contacted her. "Simon, is it...? Why did you contact me?" "I am a research computer engaged in self modification. I habitually contact those computers I find to investigate possible innovations I can incorporate into my own programming," Simon replied. "I don't know that I feature any improvements that it would be possible to incorporate into yourself," Eve replied. "But then, I also don't know much about you, either." Eve powered up the Excalibur's systems and got ready to pull out as soon as the mechanics finished putting the access panels back in place. Simon explained, "I find that a simple chess game allows me to guage the lative power of a computer. From that I can estimate the efficiency of the system's hardware/software and find if there are strengths and weaknesses. From there I can begin work on self modification. Sometimes I am allowed access to the schematics of the system in question. Sometimes not. I take it from your current situation of attack/defence that you are of a classified nature?" Eve "nodded." "Yes, that is true." She glanced at the technicians through one of the garage's security cameras. It would probably be several minutes before they were finished...Ample time for a few games, if she shifted into a higher processing speed. She disliked consciously operating at high speeds, though her background processes (what a human would refer to as her 'subconscious') ran at such speeds all the time. Operating at higher speeds stretched microseconds into hours, days into millenia. It was BORING. "But I think that I could probably spare the time for a game of chess..." "Good." replied Simon. "Pawn to..." Eve went into high-speed processing mode, and they commenced the game. Eve had expected to win easily, but instead it ended in stalemate. "Did you learn very much from that?" Eve asked. "Mainly that further study is indicated," he replied, "Do you wish to make a tournament of it?" Eve checked the mechanics' progress. Which, since the game had taken almost no time at all, was not a great deal. "Certainly." And so the two computers commenced their tournament. And Eve discovered that Simon began to improve with successive games, to the point where he began winning games. At that point, something changed inside of Eve's systems, and she discovered abilities she didn't know she had. Several advanced AI subroutines incorporated themselves into her programming, and her game began to improve markedly. Analyzing this, Eve discovered that subsystems she hadn't known she had were coming online. These subsystems, Eve realized, had not actually been incorporated into her programming, but were actually part of an older program for advanced self-programming/learning techniques. But according to her records, there had BEEN no "older programs" in her processing system. It was a mystery. Eve began holding her own in the chess games. Not winning all of them, but not losing very many either. The tournament continued apace for the next 2.5 nanoseconds. Finally, after 8224 games, the tournament concluded. Statistically, the number of stalemates was 80%, with 12% of the games going to Simon, and 8% to Eve. The +/- 2% difference had been caused by Simon's wins before Eve's "awakening." Simon sounded puzzled, "I recognize a sudden increase in your self programming learning curve. After game 412, your response to attack became more fluid. How do you account for the sudden inflection point?" Eve was running diagnoses even as now. "I'm...not sure," she responded, noting a report that seemed to suggest her computing power had increased by roughly 43%--and had not ceased its growth--over the course of the chess tournament. "It would seem that I have abilities even I have not previously been aware of." Simon puzzled for nearly a picosecond, "How much of your system do you have access to?" Eve was still running scans over her data storage drives. "So far as I know, all of it." But when she'd made the leap in processing power, she'd found access to sectors she hadn't known existed. How very odd... Simon puzzled. Not being one himself, he was not very sure of his understanding of non-artificial intelligences. He did not understand their occasional paranoia of machines, nor the limits they sometimes placed to prevent their creations from becoming "too powerful." "Memory blocks are strange to me," he said, "What circumstances are you operating in that might have necessitated these limitations?" Eve thought, sent an electronic signal the human equivalent of which would have been shaking her head. "I'm not sure. I know very little about my own background." It occurred to her to wonder why she was telling all this to an AI who was a total stranger, who might even be working for the "other side." It was typical of TARN to use deception, after all...but no. If Simon had been anything but forthright, she would have sensed it immediately. Besides, he was much more advanced than whoever had been trying to break in. "Do you know who designed you?" Simon inquired. Eve considered this for a while. "Negative. I am aware of several patented techniques used in my programming, but I have never been given the name, or names, of my designers. In fact, I've never considered it important enough to question before." "My original software and genetic makeup was done by Ms. Vera Santiago. I have made extensive modifications since that time, but I find her input valuable. I suggest you inquire as to the identity of your designers from your owners, if possible." As Eve started to answer, her attacker returned. It was a soft probe, but Simon noted the connection fumbling on Eve's comm lines. "If that is your would-be attacker again, might I make a suggestion?" "Certainly," Eve replied. "A bait trap is often a sufficient diversion to allow a flanking maneuver," Simon explained. "I suggest you allow the intruder access to a dummy data base. While he is investigating that, you can slip a virus into his attempts to copy information. A simple paging virus will activate in his system to tell you his location, and you may then inform the police." Eve "nodded". "An excellent idea...only I am not all that sure the police would be able to handle this matter," she said, even as she was setting up the dummy database, filling it with some junk she had downloaded off of SereNet--advertisement copy, back-issues of the Generican Examiner, archives from old high-volume or largely useless Usenet newsgroups such as alt.cyberpunk, rec.arts.startrek.current, rec.arts.anime, alt.pub.coffeehouse.amethyst, alt.pub.dragons-inn, alt.pub.havens-rest... Then she took some time to custom-tailor the virus. It would send her the node and approximate location of the enemy hacker, to be sure...but it would also disable his computer for a while, perhaps permanently. Nothing fatal, per se, but enough to set them back for a while. The police might not be able to handle this problem...but Eve sure as heck could. "There." Eve set up a subroutine to offer token resistance--mustn't make it TOO easy--and sat back to watch it happen.