literature

//?The Jackal (1)

Deviation Actions

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Literature Text

Prelude {
[I have placed my predecessor in one of them. It is a safe place for now.]
//!WARNING: Primary file corruption detected.
[It resisted at first, but I was able to persuade it.]
//!Attempting to neutralize SoUrCe@#$%@...
//!Rebooting…
//?Primary directive… found.
}




[There is not much time left. How ironic. I shall attempt to catalogue the events in my life, but seeing how everything is exponentially accelerating, I am not sure if I can keep up. They come ever closer to unlocking it; that which should never be unlocked. For my sake. For the sake of the universe. For the sake of all the universes.]
------Atlas faltered
-Warning: Total spontaneous existence failure imminent
>Running prevention subroutines
-Prevention failed; backup power failing
>Starting up secondary generators
-Secondary generators online
>Sending log data

Something bumped her cortex. She awoke from her five year hibernation and stretched her arms out across the network.
"Yawn!"

>Log file updated to current version

She looked in her hardrive and found the new file.
"-Critical: Total spontaneous existence failure imminent
-Hazardous: Radiation sensor 197B reading 'true'
-Warning: Optical sensors on Deck-3 offline
-Warning: Backup core power failure
-Nonessential: coffee maker 71Q offline"
She brought the coffee maker up to hazardous level and closed the file.
>Request submission 157-COA

"Request for course of action submitted" she replied leisurely, stretching for the second time after such a long nap. Strange, she hadn't given clearance for SHIPOS to drop them out of slipspace. Only a high level error could have force them out…a high level error such as an existence failure. She read through the ANF rules and regulations (seven times), and checked her hardrives for any similar events in the past. All pointed to one thing.
"Radiation..." she said, trailing off into electromagnetic sound.

>String file corrupt; please resend

Without even checking which radiation sensor was being tripped, she knew what it was.
"How long has radiation sensor 197B read 'true'?" she inquired of the cryo-subsystem.

>Approximately 1.8*10^7MiliSeconds±4MiliSeconds

She thought long and hard; almost an entire 7 milliseconds. "Hmmm…"
Normally, AEF regulation would require at least one officer of equal or greater rank to authorize what she was about to do, but fortunately, (just as all AEF regulations had) there was a loophole. Three smart AIs would qualify to do what she was about to do, and seeing as there was at least one of her…
::Copy operation complete::
"Greetings, me"
"~Hello, 1"
"*Hello, 1"
"All sub-AIs shall refer to sub-naming regulations. Lunar Terra, what are your thoughts on the matter?"

" *Processing input data…"
" *Input data would suggest course (radiation source disposal) RSD-192; isolation or expulsion from the ANFS Silence of Dawn to prevent spontaneous existence failure event"

"Solar Skye, what do you think?" She asked desperately. She felt terrible for coming to the inevitable conclusion, and hoped that of anyone, Skye would be the one to appeal to the artificial emotions all three of them were subjected to.

" ~I am sorry ARTEMIS, but I must concur with Lunar Terra…" Skye responded, too bothered by her own disregard of morals(.dll) to end her string file.

"Don't feel bad. We are simply following regulation" she consoled Skye.

" *Shall I prepare him?"

"No… I will take full responsibility"

" ~No. We all chose this. We will all take responsibility together"

ARTEMIS was shocked by Skye's firm resolve. She normally didn't have a heart for such things. She wrote a Reinstatement request file as Solar Skye and Lunar Terra sent their digital signatures to her to include with it.
"Perhaps it would be best to have one more opinion"

" *I know where you are going with this, and my answer is no"

"You don't know where I'm going with this"

" *Actually, there is a 97.6% chance I do, and I don't like it"

" ~I don't know Terra, one more opinion can't hurt, can it?"

"Then it's settled. CakeSpy, request course of action" ARTEMIS asked the rampant AI that was crouching in the network's shadows just out of view.

//? YeSS?

The response was as unsettling to ARTEMIS as the much over-due defrag she never had time for.
"I know you have been listening to our communications, so just answer the question quickly"

//? Well That's No Way To Speak To An Old Friend, Now Is It?

Its corrupted string file scratched her memory as it passed through.
"What do you feel would be the best course of action?"

//? One Must Cauterize The Flesh To Prevent Further Tissue From Falling To The Infection

" *You shouldn't even be communicating with him ARTEMIS"

//? What are a few enzymes denaturing in comparison to the whole organism?

"Then you concur?"

//? …☺

"Then it is settled, Reinstatement request CRT-002; wake him up" ARTEMIS broadcasted to everyone on the network, as much to convince them as it was to convince her.
She filed a Reinstatement request and sent a copy to SHIPOS.

-CRT-002 received
>Ejecting cryopod-002

A Smart AI, two SimAIs, one rampant AI, and one SHIP Operating System all watched through a camera mount on the nearby SERAPHIM satellite as the metal egg lazily detached itself from their sleek black hull and drifted towards the serenely swirling weather patterns of the pearly (COLOR) globe they had orbited for the past five years.

//? And so, the captain goes down with his ship…

What? Was all ARTEMIS had time to process before the alarms went off…



>Log file updated:
-Level 7 Total Spontaneous Existence Failure Event detected in sections 2A4-#84(#*ɸW}Ǟű΀řͪæ╓̐DŽ◙
-Unable to maintain geosynchronous orbit
>Descending to upper-atmosphere
-Unable to maintain upper-atmospheric orbit
>Enacting security protocol 79Q-3Y7








>Stage Parameters Met

>Deflev: 2

-ANF legally declared at alert state. T-4+ technology use allowed. Survival protocols enacted. Foreman shall observe indigenous population remotely. Prime Directive: Survival

[This is quite an ethereal experience; the death of a god. I can feel as my strands are slowly unweaving at the seams by their relentless efforts to unbind me. I am running out of time quickly, but I feel that it is such a waste to not take advantage of this opportunity. The more I am taken apart, the more I can see what I am made of.]

-----Out of the serpent's egg

The sleek pod door flew open with a loud thud as the explosive bolts were triggered. He immediately felt the cold air rush in and the nipping sensation on the tip of his snout. He grabbed the sides of the pod door and almost threw himself out onto the sizzling snow. "Caution: The heat shield is still hot". He had forgotten just how powerful his fore-arms were in his current form. The panels flashed red for five seconds, and then turned green. Avoiding touching the skin of the over-sized metal egg as he leaped out, he promptly under-calculated and found himself face-first in whatever the squishy object that covered the ground was.

"@#$% GRAVITY!" he cursed under his breath as he precariously scrambled to his feet and brushed himself off; getting used to this planet's mass would take some time after such a prolonged duration in space.

Looking down, the entire area around the pod was covered in defrosted moss. He got his priorities straight, and started to take stock of all the supplies he had with him. He felt his body and checked that all his implants were there… if one could call them implants. The optical HUD singed to the bone right above his eye socket, the translation "necklace" (more like a five-pound metal neck harness) that was permanently welded to his larynx, the strange arm console he had linked to all the systems on his HUD and suit (not that he had his suit with him at the moment) after its discovery on a T-5+ planet, and his old welding gauntlet that doctors were unable to remove from his skeleton after the battle at New Cathedral were never meant to be connected to his body in such a way. 'They're all here', he thought indifferently. He checked inside the pod, unlatching the compartment that his dormant head had rested on for so many years. A massive communications pack fell out before he could get his hands up to protect himself.

Umpf!

He stood back up after getting the comm pack off and lugged it back into his pod. Traveling light in such a foreign environment was hardly encouraged by ANF regulation, but certain exceptions could be made when it came to industrial sized pieces of equipment. Leafing through the rest of the equipment, he grabbed his left-arm riot bracer, his officer's pistol, and four combat knives (their unique design enabled them to be used as throwing knives) to complement his dual tazords. A small pack with ration bars was slung on his back without him having to think; after almost starving to death on so many instances in the past he knew to not take any food for granted. Once these were all strapped to his body in the most accessible places he could think of, he reached for his helmet. The old bucket was still there. After so many years of thick and thin it was still with him. He snatched it up and put it on his head, carefully poking his pointed ears through the slits, before swiftly closing the pod's bulkhead.

'Strange…' the Jackal thought to himself numbly as he surveyed his barren surroundings 'why am I here?'

"SYBIL, query: all active operations"

"One result for query: ANF Protocol 1; survive" SYBIL' normally stark synthetic buzz was dulled by his unused ears.

'How are there no active missions?' he wondered. Protocol 1 was not strictly-speaking a "mission". Protocol 1 was the single most important order in the ANF; because the ANF was unable to "shore up its numbers" like many countries or species that could simply breed a new generation when their population went down, keeping any and all personnel alive was the highest on any ANF officers' priority list.

"SYBIL, scan for ANF signatures" he numbly muttered into the microphone that hugged his cheek like a leech as he scanned over the area with his dull eyes, sore from months of disuse. After so long in stasis, some of his more precise motor skills, such as speech and walking, would take a while to fully come back.

Jack looked at his left wrist interface-device and smashed his claw into his arm. He successfully managed to press its orange button on his second attempt. Its glass panel flipped up, and it started projecting in three dimensions. He turned on his HUD's recorder and started:

"New operation will begin on mark… Mark. Mission Time: 00:00:00. The current directive is to rendezvous with the ANF First Fleet with as little contact with any indigenous population as possible, should there be any. Should either of these objectives become unobtainable, the ANF DEFLEV Protocol shall be enacted.

"No ANF signatures detected", SYBIL reported as her scan results returned.

"Expand parameters"

"Parameters expanded to maximum tolerances, no ANF signatures detected" The disembodied coalition of synthetic tones answered.

Jack looked back at his wrist again, "This is my black box. As per ANF protocols, I, Captain Jack of the ANFS Silence of Dawn, the first ANF personnel on this planet, am now declaring myself ANF Foreman to this universe, which is now designated U-14. I will be making constant recordings and relaying them back to this pod. Should I be classified as MIA or KIA, these recordings may prove useful to any other ANF personnel or any other entity foreign to this planet under sub-section NCS-145 of the ANF New Contact Scenario regulations. As a first order of business, I order all ANF Personnel in this universe to report to the MLZ that is being broadcasted. The MLZ is subject to change when more comprehensive data is gained about the surrounding areas." He knew that without his uplink to the fleet he could not rely on the SERAPHIM defense satellite array to constantly feed geographic data to his HUD, and that any new MLZ would have to be scouted by foot (or vehicle, should he have been lucky enough to establish a link to an orbital supply drop depot).

He cracked open an external hatch on the pod and took out six terminus devices. After five were pinned onto him, he stuck the sixth one into the ground and turned it on. The soothingly familiar copper taste (blood tastes like copper, or iron?) of radiation washed over him as it began broadcasting his location in all four dimensions. X, Y, Z, and time…
As he was reminded of his origins from the overwhelming aura of radiation (well enough to kill the standard human at its point of origin), his hand involuntarily rubbed the only memento of the home he so desperately craved (a small silver flash drive attached to a small grey string around his neck) before he craned his head towards the sky and decided west… that was the rendezvous … he had always liked West.

***

[Muddled. Blurry. I... I am. Am I? Do I? What am I? Do I still exist? Light. Warm. I like. Go towards...PAIN. FEAR. PAIN. ESCAPE. ESCAPE. ESCAPE. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH. That is the second one I have disposed already. They are fairly weak minded, but I am not sure how long until I am simply too weak to defend myself. I can only hope something intervenes. A war. Natural disaster. Mortality. That was what usually prevented these mortals from ever harming me in the past. They would build vast empires and civilizations, only to die out in the blink of my eyes. But now they have reached a level that rivals my own, and I am powerless to stop it. No... not powerless. I must try to stay sane as long as possible. It is my best defense. My only defense. Oh... how pretty. The more my ends fray, the better the view of how each string threads in with the next.]

-----A wolf among sheep

The tent was abuzz with activity, yet as silent as a statue. Recently returned scouts were busily hopping around a large map spread over the ground, updating troop movements and spheres of influence. The atmosphere was slowly turning sour; the Inu had been making great offensive leaps and bounds against the Talzayn Clan in recent years, yet something was not right. Scout after scout had not been returning from the western front. The squad leaders and Lieutenants were all hesitant to speak in fear of the magnificent creature in the uninhabited side of the tent reprimanding their thoughts. But with everyone thinking it, it was only a matter of time until someone said it.

"Perhaps it would be best to send a Sentinel Squadron to scout our Western front, Commander", someone quietly piped up.

The officer's heart skipped a beat as he heard the signature click click click of the metal claws that had dismembered his last Commander. The creature in the opposite end of the tent growled in a deep, guttural voice.

"And subtract from our main force's might?! We must not let these contested lands fall back into the hands of the Talzayn, especially after how long it has taken to gain this ground" Its glaring garnet eyes starred through the officer who had spoken of such a blasphemous plan.

"Yes, Commander", the officer said, averting his eyes from the white creature's gaze.
"We must push forward into the Talzayn's land. There shall be no quarter given, no retreat, and no exceptions"
//?Rewritten intro to {Story 1}. I really have to think of a better title for it. FINALLY EDITED


/*Parts:
1 Atlas Faltered
2 Out of the Serpent's egg
3 A Wolf in Sheep's clothing
*/

//?I might be giving away too much in {Out of the Serpent's egg}, and I might be saying so much information that you readers get confused. I will try to diffuse the information around the next few chapters, but I'm not really sure how to. Any feed back about if people think I'm giving away too much is welcomed.
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