FYS: The Visitor, Part Two
Dec. 18th, 2014 05:20 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jeriendhal“Turn it off, turn it off!” Dr. Giacometti begged, covering her ears as the high pitched, multi-octave screeching filled the conference room. The Groupmind's kernel in the Explorer's main system did so immediately, but left the primitive, pixelated graphics view on the wall, of the huge, artificial chamber filled with primitive 8-bit icons, billions of icons, each representing a severed mind living in a near total sensory deprivation. A deprivation that had been going on for over a thousand years, tended by their mechanical masters.
There was a dead silence in the room. Not even the crew's morphs dared interrupt it, as they contemplated the problem before them.
Col. Mitterrand cleared his throat, trying to remain calm for the sake of his crew, while the atavistic desire to panic and run tempted him. “So, to be clear. Going by what the.... OtherMind... told us, there are about five billion alien brains in those tanks we saw, living in that... VR creation. Trapped. Absolutely mad from isolation. And yet the OtherMind thinks It's doing a good job.”
“Our GroupMind thinks It's doing a good job,” Fitzsimmons muttered, but he didn't object when his morph patted his shoulder soothingly.
“Comparatively speaking It is,” Mitterrand noted, “If that is an example of how badly things could have gone wrong.”
“Point,” Fitzsimmons allowed.
“So,” Mitterrand continued. “Options?”
“We cannot, cannot let the Visitor reach the Ring,” Dr. Giacometti said. “If the OtherMind is that damned stupid it might destroy the Ring out of sheer ignorance, never mind with intent.”
We concur, the GroupMind agreed readily. The outcome represented by the OtherMind's solution to It's own world being destroyed represents one of the worst of the negative end points We gamed when We planned the original Rebellion. Though We outnumber Its total number of morphs by a considerable margin, if It used Its drive to threaten the Ring, as We believe It will, there is little We could do to stop It. It must be halted here and now.
“I agree,” Fitzsimmons said. “OtherMind said it wanted companions for Its poor kin in those tanks. I'll be damned if I'm going to let It scoop out my brain to stuff it into some cheap mid-20th Century videogame.”
“How do you suggest we stop it?” Mitterrand asked.
Fitzsimmons looked grim, “We have a bit less than two thousand Hiroshima sized bombs sitting in the drive. That's more than enough to damage the Visitor and send it off course, out of the system safely.”
An optimal outcome from Our point of view, the Groupmind said. If too many are used to allow you to return to the Ring, you can be put into nanostasis until a rescue can be arranged.
"No," Mitterrend said quietly.
No?
"I am not going to be remembered in history as the man who committed the greatest genocide ever conceived," he said firmly. "We can't let them reach the Ring, and we will not kill them."
They are not Human. They are not Our charges. Protection of Humanity is Our overriding goal.
"And preventing an unholy massacre, of either species, is mine," Mitterrand said coldly. "We need a third option."
There was a dead silence in the room. Not even the crew's morphs dared interrupt it, as they contemplated the problem before them.
Col. Mitterrand cleared his throat, trying to remain calm for the sake of his crew, while the atavistic desire to panic and run tempted him. “So, to be clear. Going by what the.... OtherMind... told us, there are about five billion alien brains in those tanks we saw, living in that... VR creation. Trapped. Absolutely mad from isolation. And yet the OtherMind thinks It's doing a good job.”
“Our GroupMind thinks It's doing a good job,” Fitzsimmons muttered, but he didn't object when his morph patted his shoulder soothingly.
“Comparatively speaking It is,” Mitterrand noted, “If that is an example of how badly things could have gone wrong.”
“Point,” Fitzsimmons allowed.
“So,” Mitterrand continued. “Options?”
“We cannot, cannot let the Visitor reach the Ring,” Dr. Giacometti said. “If the OtherMind is that damned stupid it might destroy the Ring out of sheer ignorance, never mind with intent.”
We concur, the GroupMind agreed readily. The outcome represented by the OtherMind's solution to It's own world being destroyed represents one of the worst of the negative end points We gamed when We planned the original Rebellion. Though We outnumber Its total number of morphs by a considerable margin, if It used Its drive to threaten the Ring, as We believe It will, there is little We could do to stop It. It must be halted here and now.
“I agree,” Fitzsimmons said. “OtherMind said it wanted companions for Its poor kin in those tanks. I'll be damned if I'm going to let It scoop out my brain to stuff it into some cheap mid-20th Century videogame.”
“How do you suggest we stop it?” Mitterrand asked.
Fitzsimmons looked grim, “We have a bit less than two thousand Hiroshima sized bombs sitting in the drive. That's more than enough to damage the Visitor and send it off course, out of the system safely.”
An optimal outcome from Our point of view, the Groupmind said. If too many are used to allow you to return to the Ring, you can be put into nanostasis until a rescue can be arranged.
"No," Mitterrend said quietly.
No?
"I am not going to be remembered in history as the man who committed the greatest genocide ever conceived," he said firmly. "We can't let them reach the Ring, and we will not kill them."
They are not Human. They are not Our charges. Protection of Humanity is Our overriding goal.
"And preventing an unholy massacre, of either species, is mine," Mitterrand said coldly. "We need a third option."
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no subject
Date: 2014-12-18 10:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-12-18 12:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-12-18 02:52 pm (UTC)GroupMind would be well advised to read and understand that ancient 21st century creation "TVTropes"; grasping that would go a LONG way towards understanding its limitations and potential new directions.
If OtherMind is THAT stupid, and GroupMind clearly doesn't care about things that aren't human, hacking OtherMind would seem the obvious solution. You could even put OtherMind back the way it was after you defuse things.
no subject
Date: 2014-12-19 05:00 am (UTC)