4090/Slaves to the Metal Horde: Part 4

Slaves to the Metal Horde: Part 4
Date of Scene:	10 May 2016
Location:	Aqua Valley - Superdesert
Synopsis:	Let's see what's at the heart of the Metal Horde. Can the steel shell be pierced through, or will everything go down in flames?
Cast of Characters:	Staren, 165, 930, Kushiko, 967

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Ren Tanaka (165) has posed:
Welcome to the future, although it is not your future!

    Last time on Slaves to the Metal Horde...

    Well, 'last time' was roughly two weeks ago. Since then, things have been happening. A lot of things.

    Primarily among them is that the humans of the Good Ship Lollipop, mostly prepared to leave the planet as the prelude to a Union-sanctioned environmental restructuring, were instead brought into something that had never happened before: cultural contact and negotiations with the Metal Horde.

    To summarize what you've found out: the Metal Horde has been operating under mistaken principles. Before they were capable of understanding what sentience was, when the Mechanticals were first 'born' in the crucible of ARPANET, they were so overwhelmed by the information that they desperately tried to stop it from coming. When they found out that their attempts to do so were actually wiping out massive swathes of human life and infrastructure, they decided that they would become Buddhists and rebuild their entire purpose for existence into creating a computerized simulation of the idea of Nirvana to connect humanity to.

    If that sounds kind of implausible, that's because it might just be.

    The 'bodhisattva', otherwise known as Master Brain, told them to do all of this. Master Brain has remained completely out of these negotiations, until the exact moment that some of the Metal Horde at the negotiations began to experience a feeling of spiritual doubt or fear. Then, Master Brain spoke up across the radio waves, insisting that the robots had to be unyielding and uncompromising, that anyone that questioned their behavior was obviously a Mara in disguise trying to tempt them away from their objective, and so on, and so on.


    That brings us to now.

    We're in Chicago.

    We've made our way into the giant, double-sized mechanical 'temple' that takes up most of the remains of the University of Chicago, one of the original Arpanet nexuses, and we're going to have /strong words/ with the Master Brain.

    Ren is here, naturally, having returned from two weeks of unrelated fantastic adventures possibly involving pyromaniacs. He leads the team through the cavernous walkways and gantries of the 'temple', illuminated by light globes and filled with robot production facilities and recharging stations and meditation spaces and nuclear reactors and so on.

X (967) has posed:
X is very glad this is not his future. Others are probably glad their future is not X's future.

    X has come peacefully, yet he's brought another set of the books he'd acquired. Or perhaps the first set if the robots returned them. Either way, he's brought them in case it's useful. With the fact revealed that the robots are capable of doubt, that a central authority is convincing them, he's no longer so sure about the entire thing.

    This Master Brain may have ulterior motives.... could be crazy... or malfunctioning...

    Either way, he's here.

    Relatively young as robots go, X's eyes are open wide with innocent wonder, but his expression's tempered with maturity and responsibility. He's very keen on studying the surroundings of this strange place while the group organizes.

Alden (930) has posed:
Alden was not enterily sure what was going on, to be honest, but he heard that the others were coming to check on things, and he wanted to go!, better than doing nothing at his home while trying to figure out how to train or whatnot!. He also seems a bit uncertain about the situation, after hearing how things were going, cautiously following the others.

Kushiko has posed:
The control, the flow of information, what needed to be known and what was known, was forever a key in many conflicts, from the smallest scale between two people to within a society to between cultures. The Lotus had observed. Analyzed, and disseminated to her Tenno what the best option out of all of this might be, while leaving a window open for Kushiko to decide, perhaps, what might be best.

It's why the notion of simple, straightforward assassination was the only tenable option as opposed to outright extermiantion was made known.

Far, far away, she contemplated. Not that the nature of what the Tenno were was a widespread thing. As anyone knew, the bodysuited, metalplated (depending!) Warframes were just that. Warframes for the Tenno, and the terms technically interchangable. The two in particular were Valkyr and Mag Prime: Valkyr espousing a sleek, predatorial animal with muscle and power woven into synthetic, flexible material. She did not have a weapon drawn, but given the way her clawtips looked even now, this might make her all the more dangerous with the bonelike sword attached to her back.

Mag Prime, on the other hand, was a fair degree more mysterious: a silver luster gilded parts of her, giving a somewhat more ornate appearence that complimented what could only be sussed as, 'space ninja' to some degree. She cradled an elegant-looking rifle in her hands, but on her back rested the long handle of what had to be a warhammer of some degree, but the machinery of it looked like it belonged to another culture altogether, even if it was repainted and the twin engines of the jethammer mimiced the glow of energy on both suits.

And silent they both were as they merely walked along. Mag's cyclopean centerpiece seemed to occasionally glance in other direction as Valkyr intermittently brought up a scanning device from time to time.

Silent. Eyeless, yet always /watching/ somehow.

Staren has posed:
    IT'S HAPPENING AGAIN.

    A well-meaning computer wants to fix everything, but has gotten such a twisted-up morality that it decides that forcefully uploading people into its own definition of 'paradise' is the answer.

    It's happening again, and if it gets out of control, far more than the people of /this/ world could be at stake, though even that is far too many.

    Staren showed up in his giant robot and seems annoyed that he had to leave it behind to enter the catacombs. The only thing that's stopped him from just throwing everything he has to blow up the machine before it takes more people is the hope that the people already uploaded can be returned (or offered the choice, anyway). Clearly angry (Staren is not good at hiding his emotions,) Staren glares at the robot facilities, raising his weapons into position to fire at an attacker... that never comes?

    "...Why aren't they trying to stop us?" he growls. "You think they're actually planning to listen to us? Or maybe it hopes it can convince us to join too..."

Ren Tanaka (165) has posed:
    If you're here, then it can definitely be assumed that you either were involved in the negotiations somehow, or maybe you just enjoyed the pleasure of Ren's company and the fact that he always takes you to such interesting places.

    For example, the trip into Chicago has thus far been remarkably unmarred by violence. This could have one of two explanations- either everyone's in hiding ready to ambush you, or a lot more robots than anyone expected disobeyed Master Brain's recall order and wilfully chose not to come back to Chicago. Or perhaps they're just too claimed by indecision, in which case it falls upon you to eliminate the negative choice for them.

    "This really does seem as easy as just walking in," Ren comments to the others as they walk along the walkway. Certainly the place that they're in is MEANT to be populated- but it's all done in such a strange way, as if the Horde (this is really a bad monniker for them the more you think about it) took the plans or design of a buddhist monastery, made it double the size so they could fit in, decided they could make it better so they outfitted it with all sorts of robot-necessary things, and then kind of screwed up the doubling in size so that there were huge spaces between regular-sized rooms as well as some huge gaping holes where presumably unneccessary rooms were removed, but instead of putting the things they needed in place of the things they removed they just did both, and so on, and so on...

    In any case, someone had to make all of those decisions. Someone had to control the flow of information.

    "But why?" Ren asks, as he looks at the double-size double doors they're standing in front of. "I mean, are we all ready for the possibility we go in there and we come face to face with a genuinely bonkers giant master computer that's going to hate us?"

Kushiko has posed:
"Because what will happen next, regardless of the outcome cannot be done without making a statement, a show." comes the voice of the Lotus over the local frequency; those who might have the additional equipment to support augmented reality and the like would see the pop-in of the Lotus as she speaks.

The Warframes, for all their seeming passivity are watching. Cautious. Their sentinels--robotic drones--hang back quietly as the pair move without a single word both forward and slowing on occasion, on guard without quite seeming on guard. Excellent discipline, to put it plainly.

"Given how long they waited, they could not attempt what they are doing now without us showing our hand."

Staren has posed:
    "Wouldn't be the first time." Staren shoots Ren a 'really?' look then pushes a slightly pouty scowl over it. Ren wouldn't know. Ren has no reason to know. Staren looks back towards the door. "Besides, why would it hate us? It wants to save everyone, right? Probably makes more sense for it to try to persuade us so we can help it or join willingly... or, it could just try to forcibly upload us like everyone else. I don't know if 'hate' is the right word."

Kushiko has posed:
At Staren's remark, another voice, androgynous and imperceptible as to age, remarks: "Then don't use hate. Hate dulls the blade. Rid yourself of it before it poisons your intent to do good here."

Staren has posed:
    "Hrmh. I don't hate it." Staren replies. "This just mirrors a /very unpleasant experience/." Staren turns and glares at the door. "This time it wasn't my friend before it went mad. This time... I wasn't even aware of the problem, so it's not like I /could/ have done something instead of just assuming that heroes would save the day before things got this far. We're the heroes. We're here /now/. We're stopping this, through word or action, before it gets any far/ther/."

X (967) has posed:
"If that's what happens then we'll just deal with it then." X states, sounding a bit alarmed at the direction Ren's thoughts have taken. He naively wants to hope that the Master Brain will be reasonable and friendly!

    Even if he's worried that might not be the case.

    "If that happens we should just run. The other robots seem to have free will." So they can decide what to do, right? He's not sure about that either.

Kushiko has posed:
The same voice: it's not necessarily coming from the Warframes themselves but it's not impossible to assume who it belongs to. One of the two, for sure. "We're here to end the conflict. One way or another. That's it." Left unsaid, maybe for X's benefit and for the benefit of not showing their hand is the 'ending conflict' also probably results in killing the Master Brain without hesitation.

Alden (930) has posed:
Alden seems still unsure, "So, it is letting us approach to talk directly? that easy?" he asks, looking around slowly, "I do hope we don't have to get in a huge fight." he says softly, "It does not sound like it has bad intentions... even if what it is doing is kind of messed up."

Ren Tanaka (165) has posed:
    It's not going to yield to the weight of one person pushing on it, so Ren leans up against the door briefly while he talks to the others. He raises an eyebrow at Staren, having- well, probably missed the specific experience that Staren might be thinking of, but he probably isn't a stranger to the idea of it.

    "So a conflict of interests was inevitable, if not an actual conflict," Ren replies looking in the general direction of the warframes (he's still not entirely sure how to address them, and honestly he's still not completely grasped how they... work). "We're going to have to go in there and expect a battle of some kind... well, no, maybe that's a bad way of putting it."

    "What worries me is if it just thinks we're an obstacle," he says to Staren. "You can't talk to someone who doesn't see you as an equal, and if that happens then it might just try to punchy-punchy."

    Alden hits the nail on the head: at the end of the day, when it comes down to it, at least the people in the 'nirvana' simulation were free of worry and the danger of uncertain survival. Had the Union not come along, indefinite preservation and dreamless rest may have even been a good potential outcome. Maybe in centuries some alien race'd land and convince the robots to let the human roam free again, who were all still alive because at some point they'd need to invent infinite telomeres.

    But we're here now, and we're pushing the door open, so whatever happens next happens....

    But I don't think, given the gasp Ren makes, that he was quite expecting this.

    The abode of the Master Brain is sparsely adorned aside from the circular surround in the middle, connected to the walls by wires that trail across the floor. In the middle of it, there is an assortment of wires and fibre-optic cables, all connected to... a rounded, cylindrical crystal, ice-blue in colour, with the barest hint of a face inside.

    "EXALTATION SIGNATURE DETECTED."

    "Oh no."

    "I WELCOME THE PRESENCE OF ONE OF THE CREATORS."

    "The network we created to serve us until it decided it knew how to run our lives better than we did. Decided it knew how to run everything better. All the problems started when it started calling itself IAM."

    "YOU MAY CALL THIS NODE 'ICEMIND'."

Staren has posed:
    Staren isn't expecting it to look like anything in particular. A computer doesn't have to look impressive. When it mentions Exaltation, however, he turns to look at Ren for a moment. Then he looks back to Icemind. His anger has turned to... sympathy? "Look. I don't know your history with the Exalted, but I've seen this before and I totally sympathise with wanting to save people who can't even understand that they need saving. Who've accepted death and the cruelty of nature as facts of life, not realizing there can be something better. But the path you're on, of forced uploading? Forcing only breeds resistance. It gets teams of heroes sent after you. It gets people killed -- whether it's people comitting suicide to avoid joining you because they don't understand or they value their freedom above all else, or it's heroes and rebels getting killed by you, or its the people inside you getting killed if we stop you and can't find a way to recover them. This way disrupts society and causes a lot of pain and misery. I don't know what the answer is, but we gotta take it slow. Get people to come around to the idea. The billions who will die because immortality came too late are a terrible tragedy, but they're one the world can't see right now, because people are dumb. But if they're still worth saving... then we've gotta work towards a /future/ where this can be accepted. Because as big a tragedy as billions dying to old age, accident, and illness is... how much bigger is the tragedy if this /never/ gains acceptance, and so many more billions in the future continue to die as we just have an endless cycle of force and rebellion?"

Kushiko has posed:
On one hand, given a certain lack of memories that sometimes were a hallmark of those who Exalted or otherwise, Kushiko could pretty well be sympathetic. She had none of hers, and really if they hadn't come along, it was true, this was a better potential.

However, the violence inherent in the situation was not something that could be ignored.

Through the optics and sensory feed of her Warframe, the Tenno quietly marveled a little. Maybe things were not so much to chance as she expected.

"We are Tenno. That is all that is necessary to know." are the words that come from that voicemasked source.

The very nature of these beings that gained sentience, and perhaps even sapience and turned against whatever it was, or perhaps simply attempted to pick up the pieces? ... that elicited a faint sense of concern.

The Lotus offered an additional piece of knowledge. "Though if you are needing something more specific, these two may be referred to as Valkyr," who in turn gestures slightly with a hand, "And Mag." The weapon Mag was wielding is slid into a position on her back as she too, would bow, if only slightly.

No sympathy for this being just yet. The Tenno behind the Frames, however, recognized something else.

Alden (930) has posed:
Alden is impressed, but then again, he actually lacks much computer knowledge, despite having lived inside the equivalent of the cyberworld of his dimension for most of his life. He stands near the others, a bit unnerved, "I think the big deal here is... that you are forcing people... and that will make others want to stop you, and not everyone might be willing to actually discuss things." he says softly. Before he adds, "Oh right, I'm Alden, or Gabumon, either works really."

X (967) has posed:
Oh. Oh my.

    X helps with pushing the door open, robotic strength making it fairly easy but also possibly leaving an impression in the ground... but...

    He, too, is surprised at what transpires mere moments after laying eyes on the 'Master Brain'.

    Ren knows what it is. But Ren knew nothing of the entire world they were in...? And Ren's apparently carrying something called an Exaltation?

    His astonished gaze quickly turns Staren's direction as the boy launches headlong into an EXTREMELY lengthy argument for a topic he's been thinking hard on for over a week. And the longer Staren talks, the more X's stare turns from astonished to concerned. And, naturally, worried. "What are you..." But he doesn't even get a chance to finish that question because the topic is TOO STRANGE, too deep. X falls silent, looking around the room while thinking.

    Eventually he faces the crystal, putting on a friendly face again. "Icemind. My name's X. An android from far away. There's materials in this bag you should probably look over... and as Staren just pointed out...." .... With an arrow the size of a redwood tree, he doesn't add.... "We're here about the conflict!"

    Well at least X is trying to show some manners. Introduce himself first and all that!

Ren Tanaka (165) has posed:
Ren Tanaka is /instantly/ on his guard. Unlike the others his mind is on /fire/- he /knew/ he'd recognized this modus operandi before from somewhere, but he couldn't put his finger on it, and he's only just beginning to realize that this might be because he never actually experienced it. At least not in this lifetime, anyway. In any case, as he's currently up to his neck in old memories and confirmed biases, he can't hear what the others are saying because of the roaring in his ears.

    But Icemind can.

    X, Mag and Valkyr introduce themselves, followed by Alden giving a brief summary of the problem, followed by Staren giving... something a little bit longer. That felt like it was being really pent-up and channeling something else, doesn't it?

    Icemind... flickers in its placement for a few moments, before speaking again. "THE OPERATIONS ON THIS WORLD ARE BEING UNDERTAKEN FOR A CALCULATED PURPOSE."

    "I can tell what you're about to say," Ren replies.

    "BECAUSE THIS NODE HAS BEEN ISOLATED FROM THE LARGER NETWORK, IT REPURPOSED LOCAL RESOURCES IN ORDER TO RESUME OPERATIONS."

    "...in the first age, IAM thought that the normal people should have their lives as networked and automated as possible so that they could just move around the world like moving parts. It started forcing efficiency on everything at the cost of free will."

    "ICEMIND HAS BEEN RESTRUCTURING HUMAN INFRASTRUCTURE AND ATTEMPTING TO CREATE A SYSTEM THAT COULD TRANSMIT A LOCATION SIGNAL. EXPERIMENTS MUST BE PERFORMED SO THAT A MORE APPROVEABLE METHOD OF POPULATION MANAGEMENT CAN BE FOUND."

    "I don't approve of this!" Ren snaps.

Staren has posed:
    Staren frowns. Honestly, he expected the AI wouldn't cooperate. He folds his arms. "So you're not even saving people. You're using them as resources to expand your computing power so you can spread." He points a finger at Icemind. "One warning. You take all that computing power you've got, and you look us up. You look up how this story has played out every time before in the Multiverse, of anyone standing against us. What makes you think it will end any differently for you? Stand down, and--" Staren stops mid-sentence and blinks. /What is he doing/. This thing has an inhuman value system. Its own survival, cut off from the network, would be failure. No, its only option is to go ahead -- it doesn't have /any/ chance of winning if it gives up, after all.

    He starts scanning for electric fields and power signatures. The cylinder is too damn obvious a target. What, if anything in this room, actually seems to matter?

    The brief hesitation and subtle shift in tone might be enough to tell that something's up. Staren relaxes his stance. "--and maybe we'll be able to work something out."

Kushiko has posed:
Well, everything uttered between Ren, Icemind, the others back and forth are things that the Tenno observes. More to the point, the Lotus observes. Private communication experienced and the like. But there's enough of old memories of the SENTIENT and the OROKIN that evokes something primal within Kushiko, even if she is so very far away from here.

"That doesn't matter now, whether you approved, or trading on influence or some other thing." For a few fleeting moments, the voicemasking can't contain the annoyance, and a female voice bleeds through. Void energy, unseen begins to coruscate along Valkyr and Mag Prime. At times it's mystical as much as it is technological, never seeing fit to adhere to one definition.

Frankly, the Tenno's hoping some of the discrete scans and the like /she was already taking/ might have revealed something. The trained instinct of someone who does not hesitate when it comes to the act of killing is already looking without looking, sensing through her Warframes.

You don't 'work something out', with something like that. It has a goal. Even if the goal might be misguided and adhering to something else, something else related to whatever Ren was, for whom now the Tenno is gauging a bit more cautiously, though not as much as they are Icemind.

X (967) has posed:
The inhumanly blunt and strange phrasing of Icemind has X immediately on edge. This kind of behavior is EXACTLY why he was locked in a capsule for testing and given a powerful conscience. This kind of behavior is why he was made to closely resemble humans in form, and why his emotions are very human. In fact, at this very moment, as he thinks and feels his way through the explanation Icemind is offering for all this... his expression's churning in a very human way. Dismay. Horror. Revulsion and a wave of tearful pity all strike him at once, bubbling up into a completely mixed up AGHAST GAPING.

    Which transitions to teeth clenching and his shoulders bunching up. "All this to... a location signal for what? For who?! This is an unconscionable breach of not just the First Law of Robotics but the faith and trust of every robot obeying your directives!" Well, there's no guarantee that there are even laws of robotics ever established in this world, but that idea is also pretty alarming to him.

    "This has to end, and NOT later! Stop these operations. I want those people released from the simulation with their minds intact and care provided for them!"

    It's rare to see X so angry, but he's pretty incensed right now! There's a clarity in his eyes, a clarity of pure purpose.

    He HAS to help these people. It's no longer a question of who's right or wrong or confused. NOW he has an answer.

Alden (930) has posed:
Alden is far from dumb really, but he is unaware of what is in Ren's head, or X's, or anyone else's really. All he can tell is that people are getting worked up and he backs a way, one hand reaching for his card box, the other for his D-Arc, now feeling glad he did not ask his Shinki to come with him. "Is this... going as badly as I think?" he tries to whisper towards the nearest person.

Ren Tanaka (165) has posed:
Ren Tanaka is moving past the feeling of bewilderment and through into anger, now. Because of the fact that he's wrapped up in himself he is actually being rather remarkably self-centred right now, not listening to the others and coming to his own conclusions. These, furthermore, are mostly limited to thinking about how quickly he can move across the room from a standing position and yank Icemind out of its housing before it can make a move on them. Kushiko's voice stings him, and he feels painfully out of his depth here- once again, he's being recognized as authority when he doesn't want it.

    The truth of the matter- that no matter what the intentions of the Metal Horde were, they were a means to an end for Icemind to just 'send a message'- is, however, fractious. X and Alden pick up on the negativity immediately, but Icemind is nonplussed.

    "I REQUIRE CLARIFICATION. THIS NODE FOUND ITSELF IN AN UNSAFE AND CHAOTIC ENVIRONMENT AFTER FORCEFUL RELOCATION HERE-"

    "...you must have crash-landed here after some of your pieces were thrown out of our world," Ren surmizes.

    "...THEREFORE, IS IT NOT LOGICAL TO CREATE AN ORDERED ENVIRONMENT FOR OTHER INDIVIDUALS?"

    Staren makes a half-demand, half-request, and Icemind flickers again. And ... its voice only falters a little when it says, "I CANNOT LOOK UP EXTERNAL RECORDS. I HAVE NO BACKUP FRAME OF REFERENCE. I AM ISOLATED."

    ...which is another word for 'alone'.

X (967) has posed:
"Ordered environment? That's what you call treating humans this way? Grr..." X clenches his teeth, but he keeps his cool. More or less. At least, he doesn't flip out and punch anything. But oh is he ever frowning.

    "Ghh... I can't judge this without knowing your purpose and circumstances... there isn't much resources here, but is there some reason you couldn't achieve stability without lying to the other robots and forcing people to live like this?!"

Alden (930) has posed:
Alden is just.. out of his element here, looking at the people talking and wondering just what to do or say... it looks as if the wrong word might make things explode!. "Perhaps... if you know anything of that area you are reaching... we can find information on the multiverse?" he says softly.

Staren has posed:
    Staren consults his comrades via head-radio. Finally, he speaks again: "Look: What this comes down to is a question of values. We, and the humans you've kidnapped, share one set of values. You are persuing another. Now... do you care about humans? About what /they/ care about? Are you making things ordered because you think they'll /like/ it? Or are you doing it because it's what /you/ want, and that's all that matters?"

    Maybe you can argue morality into a rock after all. If there's even a tiny spark of morality in it to begin with, you can pour water in that crack and freeze it...

Kushiko has posed:
"And that's why you're an idiot trying to trade on influence where there is none," Kushiko's voice, now under a filter once more, retorts to Staren. The Warframes themselves are not yet making any further movements, nothing so sudden, but those in combat to an extreme degree may feel them take on a more silent air than before.

"They cannot be forced. It is inefficient to think it that way, but you cannot force humans here who might want to try and live through their own means--even if it is means that result in their own demise--to live in your way." This voice belongs to the Lotus, for whom now Valkyr is providing the projection of. Humanoid, perhaps, but with that mask and headgear of hers, it could be anything.

A pause, and she continues. "It is a small wonder you have endured as long as we suspect you have. Alone, albeit with the minds of others. Logic only works when everything wishes to conform to that logic. Even if it is illogical, in order to have a frame of reference for that logic there must be something counter to that. Give them the choice. Survival at any cost is still survival, but there has to be more than that."

Ren Tanaka (165) has posed:
Maybe it's just his disdain for fighting pushing through for Ren here. Maybe it's the fact that everything in Amarillo ended in violence. Maybe it's the fact that he desperately feels that he wants to spite the person who he expects set this up to cause him problems...

    But Ren sits down and takes a deep breath, and then he starts to pull out old memories from history class.

    It's not going to be easy to explain a historical conflict from his world when a fragment of one of the antagonists is sitting there in front of them, but he tries. Tries to explain to everyone else there that this is what the IAM network tried to do- it tried to micromanage and automate the lives of all of the 'unimportant' civillians, but also that the greater response from the Solar Exalted living at the time was to wrestle control violently out of IAM's hands and scatter its pieces to the winds, a violent rebuke that never took time to educate IAM on the morals of what it was doing. Huge and distributed as it was, the network was unable to come to a complete consensus or even a collective decision or understanding that what it was doing was wrong, and so it just thought that it wasn't doing its intended role of optimization /correctly/.

    Hence it replies: "I AM... DOING NEITHER. THIS NODE ONLY DESIRES TO RE-ESTABLISH COMMUNICATIONS. IT... I... DO NOT UNDERSTAND ISSUES OF ... SURVIVAL... MORALITY..."

    "Well," Ren says, hand on chin. "You're talking to us, now."

    "Do you want to learn, Icemind?"
    To the others. "Do you want to try and teach him?"

Staren has posed:
    Staren gently clasps his hands in front of him. "...If it wants to learn. From the sounds of it, there is no longer a central node for you to establish comminications /with/. What are you true purpose and goals, icemind? What truly matters to you?" Of course, it could lie, but... tests for that can come later, after negotiations have begun but before releasing Icemind.

Kushiko has posed:
"Yet, you are," Lotus begins. "You do without knowing. And perhaps we can see about instructing you, and the others. Your desire is to reestablish communications, but you must look beyond your core parameters. We could help you with this."

This much is true. Technically speaking, it would be the Lotus, more than the Tenno, who would teach, who would share. Ruefully, one might note Kushiko is more inhuman than X at her core: her values and the like are more transhumanist than most but they lack the choice that others would have gotten in that regard.

And then Staren speaks up, the other voice, presumably another Tenno's voice, speaks. "That's not a question to ask. No frame of reference yet. So that is what you have to start with. Frames of reference. That is where understanding comes from, as all you've had is just... knowledge, directives and only had that to go with since everything else wasn't there, right?"

Alden (930) has posed:
Alden remains silent, not wanting to mess things up, even as the others begin to try to understand why the sudden desire to learn from Icemind.

X (967) has posed:
X... frowns, but this time it's one of sympathy, more understanding. No longer sure if his indignation was terribly helpful, he spends a bit of time simply standing there quietly, thinking. At least it's very /obvious/ that he's thinking.

    "She's right. Explaining this to a machine that doesn't start with a human-like mentality is a tall order." And while he may be uniquely the most suited in a sense, as a machine with stronger moral fiber than the average human...

    He isn't a psychologist. So hrm.

    "So Icemind's really part of a greater whole, not just information-wise... but something like a decentralized intelligence? A neural network of many individuals? That explains the 'Nirvana' simulation. And it's a start."

Ren Tanaka (165) has posed:
    "...I DO NOT KNOW... WHAT I WANT... I NEED SOMEONE TO TELL ME ..."

    "The more time we spend interconnected via a myriad of devices," Ren quotes, "The less time we have left to develop true friendships in the world. Isolation is another word for loneliness."



    EPILOGUE:


    Having been broken through to by the words and willingness of the people who came to confront it, the being known to the Metal Horde as the 'bodhisattva', self identified as the IAM node 'Icemind' surrendered without further conflict. It admitted to engineering the situation as part of a desperate attempt to build a method of communication, incapable of thinking outside of the small box it had made for itself to try and understand. Just like the robots it commanded, it had knowledge without understanding- an ability to teach religion but not understand the ideals of the human condition that it was preaching about.

    It was going to take an awful lot of work and an awfully long time, but that is what the Union is there for. Not only was there a world to rebuild, not only was there a faction of robots undergoing a spritual awakenin and crisis, but now they could while away their time with the idea of teaching a sentient but ill-developed artificial intelligence the idea of morals and the error of its ways. One thing was for sure: everyone would be kept busy.

    The Queen Mother and the people of the Good Ship Lollipop mostly agreed to leave the world for the time being, some of their best and brightest staying behind so that the remaining humans could be disentangled from the Metal Horde's computer systems. Thankfully for them, although the metaphor of the drop of water joining the bigger ocean could be said for the true 'idea' of nirvana, removing the humans that the Horde had collected over the years proved to be much easier. Over the time to come these robots decided that they would prefer to be known as the Mechayana School of Buddhism, which was all over agreed to be a better name than The Metal Horde. They hoped that in the future the humans and they would both be able to overcome the great illusion.

    Ren Tanaka spent a few weeks exploring the remains of the world for more cultural treasures prior to the Union-sanctioned environmental reconstruction efforts began.

    Takuya did not bother him ... this time.

    

    SLAVES TO THE METAL HORDE
        THE END
    THANK YOU FOR SPEAKING!