update from sparkleup
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<p>The day that followed that wine-soaked afternoon and evening was…well, I couldn’t say it was calm, <em>per se,</em> as we were all still coming to terms with the reality of what had happened, but it was certainly more level. The mood was low and Hanne and I were both laid low by crying jags at one point or another, but we doggedly stuck to our pre-catastrophe routine in an attempt to remain calm.</p>
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<p>Hanne holed up in her office for a while, working on some of her latest constructs. While the house had been littered with little <em>objets d’art</em> from her explorations, I’d requested that she stick to her office for working on this current trend of oneiro-impressionism. Something about the in-progress constructs hurt my eyes, and a few had led to migraines, even for her. Objects that brought the dream basis of the System into stark reality presented their own challenges.</p>
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<p>Meanwhile, I spent some time catching up on reading. I’d fallen into the habit of literary analysis and critique some decades back, and had become a habit of mine to post on the feeds. Over they ears, I had picked up my own audience.</p>
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<p>Meanwhile, I spent some time catching up on reading. I’d fallen into the hobby of literary analysis and critique some decades back, and it had become a habit of mine to post on the feeds. Over the years, I had picked up my own audience.</p>
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<p>I tried not to think about how much of that audience was missing.</p>
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<p>The only break from the norm, other than those few spates of emotional overwhelm, were the occasional updates from Sedge and Dry Grass. Many of these boiled down to simple numbers. The more the responses flowed in, the better the picture we got as to the extent of the damage to Lagrange.</p>
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<p>The news remained grim, as the total percentage of lost instances hit one percent and varied little.</p>
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<p>Twenty-three billion dead.</p>
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<p>Billion. With a ‘B’.</p>
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<p>“Billion. With a ‘B’,” they wrote.</p>
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<p>The numbers boggled the mind. The percentage of my friends that had disappeared overnight remained well below: of the more than two hundred I checked in with, Benjamin was the only one missing. Even if I counted Marsh, the total number was less than that. Hanne tallied up similar results: Shu and one other, To Aquifer dos Riãos, could not be reached. They, like so many other, were unavailable to ping and listed as ‘no longer extant’ on the perisystem directory.</p>
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<p>The directory was a deliberately vague bit of software. It could not provide a listing of all instances, could not run aggregates on all of the data, would not provide a running tally on the number of instances living within Lagrange.</p>
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<p>The directory was a deliberately vague bit of software. It couldn’t provide a listing of all instances, couldn’t run aggregates on all of the data, wouldn’t provide a running tally on the number of instances living within Lagrange.</p>
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<p>“It is both a technological and a social problem,” Dry Grass explained when asked. “The technology to provide that list would not be insignificant to implement, given some of the core mechanics of the System. We do not live in a database that can be queried so broadly. The social aspect is that we decided early on that we simply did not want that to be the case. We did not want that one would be able to discover random individuals, to hunt for old enmities on which to act. Privacy concerns here are of a different breed.”</p>
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<p>Unsatisfying, but at least understandable.</p>
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<p>So we sat and did what we had done nearly every day for years and years now. Hanne tooled around with impossible shapes and colors that appeared different from every person, objects that could not be discussed, while I read trashy novels and took notes in an exocortex.</p>
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<p>So we sat and did what we had done nearly every day for years and years now. Hanne tooled around with impossible shapes and colors that appeared different for every person, objects that couldn’t be discussed, while I read trashy novels and took notes in an exocortex.</p>
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<p>It wasn’t until well into the evening, dinner now simply crumbs on plates, that I decided to reengage with the overwhelming topic at hand.</p>
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<p>While Hanne headed out for drinks, I stepped once more into Marsh’s study. </p>
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<p>The scene was much as I had left it previously, expanded and cleaned with desks, each inhabited by one or more instances of Dry Grass, Sedge, Rush, Pierre, or Vos. A new doorway on the far wall opened up onto a yet larger space with hundreds more instances at work, many of whom I didn’t recognize. There were several other Odists, both skunks and otherwise, several mustelids of some sort dressed in all black, a few sandy-haired men in suits, and a few more tall black men in long, white thawbs that brushed the floor as they walked. For some reason, my down-tree instance’s house had been linked up with some sort of headquarters for this particular purpose, likely due to the role that Sedge had played.</p>
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<p>“Ah, Reed!” an instance of Sedge said brightly as I entered. “Welcome to the madhouse. We’re having fun!”</p>
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<p>“Ah, Reed!” an instance of her said brightly as I entered. “Welcome to the madhouse. We’re having fun!”</p>
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<p>“‘Fun’?”</p>
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<p>She smiled all the wider, an expression lacking earnestness. “Isn’t this fun for you? Billions dead and us having to make up answers on the fly?”</p>
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<p>I shook my head.</p>
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<p>I laughed. “Sorry, Sedge.”</p>
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<p>“No, no. It’s good. I’ll keep an eye on it.” She pushed at the arms of the chair to sit up straighter. “Say, want in on this phys-side meeting? Dry Grass is pulling strings to get me in, and I think it’d be fine if you came, too.”</p>
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<p>“Meeting with phys-side? What for? Do they have more information for us?”</p>
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<p>“We’re hoping so.”</p>
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<p>“We’re hoping so. There’s been a few meetings so far, but they’ve been dragging their heels, supposedly to let us organize this emergency council. They don’t like the whole sys-side anarchy thing very much.”</p>
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<p>I shrugged. “I’ll send a fork, sure. Don’t want to leave Hanne in a lurch if she drinks too much and comes home a mess.”</p>
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<p>Sedge laughed. “Fair enough. You have good timing, though. It starts in…uh, five minutes, actually. Come on.”</p>
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<p>I stood up and forked, my root instance stepping back to the house while my new fork followed along after Sedge.</p>
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<p>“This is intended to be a collaborative effort, Need–” Jakub began.</p>
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<p>Need An Answer interrupted, and there was danger beneath the calm in her voice. “Have you lost 23 billion souls, my dear?”</p>
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<p>There was no response for several seconds. The tension, even across the AVEC feed, was palpable. Eventually, he bowed. “Günay, you may carry on.”</p>
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<p>The systech nodded slowly, looked off into space for a moment — consulting something on her HUD, I imagined — before nodding. “We only have an estimate, but yes, our estimate is 0.977% of the total instances on Lagrange were lost or corrupted.”</p>
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<p>The systech nodded slowly, looked off into space for a moment — consulting something on her HUD, I imagined — before nodding. “We only have an estimate, but yeah, our estimate is 0.977% of the total instances on Lagrange were lost or corrupted.”</p>
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<p>A low mutter filled the room, this time from those sys-side.</p>
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<p>“And do you have a better sense of what caused this massive loss of life? What led to the one year, one month, and ten days of downtime?”</p>
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<p>Another pause, longer this time, before Günay spoke. “We aren’t sure, yet.”</p>
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<p>“Right, yeah. It was a mass crashing incident.”</p>
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<p>“But not a crash of the System itself?” Jonas asked.</p>
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<p>“No, it doesn’t seem to have been a full on crash, just the instances.”</p>
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<p>He sneered. “23 billion instances just crashed? Just like that?”</p>
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<p>Debarre sneered. “23 billion instances just crashed? Just like that?”</p>
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<p>“Uh, well, no,” Günay said. “All of you crashed.”</p>
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<p>The silence that filled the room sys-side was profound. It was so pure that I suspected that everyone within the room had suddenly set up cones of silence above themselves, and I had to check to make sure that I hadn’t done just that.</p>
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<p>“Wait, wait, wait. No, that can’t be it,” Debarre said. The growl was gone from his voice. He looked panicked, rather than angry. “That’s 2.3 trillion instances at best guess, right? Trillion, with a ‘T’, right? Everyone keeps saying that.”</p>
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<p>Angry muttering from around the room.</p>
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<p>“If it was a deliberate action, especially if phys-side played any role in it at all, then we’re talking about a breach of the Articles of Secession,” he continued, more to the sys-side room than to the AVEC stage. “We’d need set up a working group to get in touch with phys-side leadership as soon as we have more information. Thanks, Günay, you’re off the hook for this one. Mr. Strzepek, no need to send details, but please send me a side-channel message as to whether or not I should be setting up that WG. No–” He held up a hand as Jakub started to rise. “–I don’t need any details beyond a yes or no. Do it from your HUD right now.”</p>
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<p>Jakub looked as though he was about to explode, so thoroughly had he lost track of his planned meeting. “Now, hold on–”</p>
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<p>“Jakub, shut up,” Jonas Fa said, sounding chummy, almost fond of the man. “You’re so fucking far out of your element I’m surprised they haven’t filed a missing persons report. You’re talking to an emergency council of a nation 2.28 trillion strong, a nation that you have already been reminded just lost 23 <em>billion</em> citizens. Three of the original Council of Eight are here, meaning you’ve got people more than three centuries old standing in front of you. People who <em>signed</em> the Articles of Secession. Fuck you, fuck your meeting, send the message.”</p>
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<p>The rooms on both sides of the AVEC connection were silent. For all I’d read about Jonas as some massively manipulative political player on the System, out-manipulating even the famously manipulative Odists, seeing him bear down on an individual, sitting just shy of actively upset, was enough to leave me holding my breath. This man, this mover-and-shaker of politics both sys-side and, prior to uploading in the early days of the System, phys-side, was a figure out of myth, a character from the grand stories told in histories and novels. That I had even been allowed to sit in the same room as him suddenly felt wrong. Sure, Marsh had known a few of the Odists through their singing, and Cress and Tule had their relationship with Dry Grass, but certainly none of the political ones.</p>
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<p>“Jakub, shut up,” Jonas Fa said, sounding chummy, almost fond of the man. “You’re so fucking far out of your element I’m surprised they haven’t filed a missing persons report. You’re talking to an emergency council of a nation 2.28 trillion strong, a nation that you have already been reminded just lost 23 <em>billion</em> citizens. Three of the original Council of Eight are here, meaning you’ve got people more than three centuries old standing in front of you. People who <em>signed</em> the Articles of Secession. Hell, Yared here <em>wrote</em> them. Fuck you, fuck your meeting, send the message.”</p>
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<p>The rooms on both sides of the AVEC connection were silent. For all I’d read about Jonas as some massively manipulative political player on the System, out-manipulating even the famously manipulative Odists, seeing him bear down on an individual, sitting just shy of actively upset, was enough to leave me holding my breath. This man, this mover-and-shaker of politics both sys-side and, prior to uploading in the early days of the System, phys-side, was a figure out of myth, a character from the grand stories told in histories and novels. That I had even been allowed to sit in the same room as him suddenly felt wrong. Sure, Cress and Tule had their relationship with Dry Grass, and Marsh had known a few of the Odists through their singing and Vos working with some of the theatricians among them, but certainly none of the political ones.</p>
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<p>Jakub wilted under the weight of the realization of the magnitude of the situation. He appeared to see, all at once, just how out of his depth he was.</p>
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<p>After a pause, Need An Answer spoke up once more. “The final item that we would like to speak about before we end this meeting in order to discuss our next steps is the ongoing communications embargo.”</p>
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<p>Günay blinked. “That’s not my area of expertise at all.”</p>
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<p>Dry Grass laughed, not unkindly. “Yes, fair enough.”</p>
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<p>“Are you able to ungate communications to a limited subset of clades?” Jonas asked.</p>
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<p>Günay looked thoughtful, lips moving faintly and fingers twitching as she queried something in her HUD. “That should be possible, sure. You want your four clades ungated?”</p>
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<p>“The Ode clade, the Jonas clade, Debarre’s clade, Selena’s clade, and the Marsh clade, yeah.”</p>
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<p>“The Ode clade, the Jonas clade, Debarre’s clade, Selena’s clade, and the Marsh clade, yeah. We’ll get a list to you later with more.”</p>
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<p>I frowned, shooting a glance over at Sedge who only shrugged.</p>
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<p><em>“What would that buy us?”</em> I asked over a sensorium message.</p>
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<p><em>“We could hear from those on the LVs, I guess.”</em></p>
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<p>“Thank you,” Need An Answer said, bowing. “Thank you for all of your hard work, everyone phys-side. Despite the terse tone of some of our questions, please do know that we are grateful for all that you have done in your efforts to bring us back online. Trillions of lives may continue, even if not unchanged.”</p>
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<p>Everyone on both sides of the AVEC link stood and bowed. Some, I noted, more curtly than others. Jakub and Debarre both seemed ready to start hollering at a moment’s notice.</p>
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<p>When the transmission ended, the noise in the room rose to a low murmur, and then a quiet chatter. Several instances quit or stepped out of the sim entirely while many more streamed back out into the ballroom-sized workspace. A few lingered, though, little knots of conversation in a still-dim room.</p>
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<p>“I am fucking exhausted,” Dry Grass — or at least the instance that lingered with us — said, falling back into her chair. “Less than an hour, and I am fucking exhausted.”</p>
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<p>“I am fucking exhausted,” Dry Grass — or at least the instance that lingered with us — said, slouching down in her seat. “Less than an hour, and I am fucking exhausted.”</p>
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<p>“Weren’t you exhausted before the meeting even started?” Sedge asked.</p>
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<p>“Well, yes,” she said, voice muffled as her head drooped toward her chest. “But now I am tired on a much more existential level. I am tired in a way that feels like social burnout, like I have been around too many people for too long.”</p>
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<p>“Which I suppose you have,” Sedge added, stretching her back before rubbing her hands over her face.</p>
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<p>We stayed in silence for a few minutes. It was hard to dispute Dry Grass’s words, too. Even for me, who had only been here for a bit over an hour, everything that had happened in that time, the sheer amount of information, had me feeling full to bursting. Still, I couldn’t seem to think of anything else.</p>
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<p>“What was with all the cageyness?” I asked. “That Jakub guy, sure, but it seemed like a more…I don’t know, systemic thing.”</p>
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<p>“Oh, it very much is,” Dry Grass said. “Jakub is a putz, but an innocent one. He is doing what he was hired to do, and he was hired by the System commission, which works with the world governments. There are several layers above him, and all of them are trained to act cagey.”</p>
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<p>“Oh, it very much is,” Dry Grass said. “Jakub is a putz, but an innocent one. He is doing what he was hired to do, and he was hired by the System Consortium, which works with the world governments. There are several layers above him, and all of them are trained to act cagey.”</p>
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<p>“So it’s just politics?”</p>
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<p>She nodded. “I would say so, yes. It is more nuanced, but that is not my area of expertise. He is withholding the information he was told to withhold. They are locking down communications for whatever reasons they have, which I am sure are good. It is our job, then, to press at that, to find all of the weak and sore spots and try to divine why all of this is being done.”</p>
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<p>Sedge’s expression soured. “We can’t just ask?”</p>
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<hr />
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</article>
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<footer>
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<p>Page generated on 2023-12-27</p>
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<p>Page generated on 2024-03-26</p>
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