2023-06-04: Chaos Computing
- Log: Chaos Computing
- Cast: Azoth, Seraph Ragnell
- Where: Port Rosalia - Seabreeze Avenue
- Date: June 04, 2023
- Summary: After the events at Heimdall Gazzo, Azoth summarizes some of what he's learned of himself to Ragnell. A number of morally questionable plans are presented for consideration.
====================<* Port Rosalia - Seabreeze Avenue *>===================== Seabreeze Avenue was once home to all the comforts a wealthy port town had to offer. Now all that remains are a handful of hardy stragglers. The Seabreeze Port is the most famous and resilient of these--located in a large and mostly-undamaged stone building, it offers food, drink, and accommodations to sailors, travelers. While it's known to attract rough clientele from time to time, it's one of the few places in town to get a decent meal, and its prices are eminently reasonable. Seabreeze's other businesses include general stores, salvage shops, and a handful of company stores run by the Wei Trading Consortium. Outside of this little bubble of industry, though, Seabreeze is largely abandoned. The town just doesn't have the population to support a large economy, and tension between Wei and the locals isn't helping matters. BGM: Wild Arms 4 - Port Irington
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
Ever since Heimdall Gazzo, Azoth's been under a deluge of new data to process and sort through. The still missing pieces of his database makes that a difficult prospect, and there's the issue of digital triage going on to make sure he does not experience a complete and total shutdown. While inhabiting Azoth's circuits, Ragnell may have seen how close he came to that. A contradiction appeared in his calculations, not because of an invading override, but in the foundation of his core programming. With Malevolence, such a conflict might take root, grow, and form an impossible tangle. In a system such as Azoth, once the inconsistency was detected, the relevant code unraveled.
Unfortunately, it was something critical to his operation. Now, Azoth's internal workings are harder to follow than they've ever been. Higly erratic, infested with even more errors, and scrambling for connections he lacks the data to confirm. Tragically, the overrides remain stalward and steady -- anything Solaris wants him to do won't be a problem.
But how does he get any computing done admist the mess? He's a super computer. He can be experiencing that while still breaking into a broad grin as he catches back up with Ragnell.
"Ragnell!" he chirps, like he hasn't seen her for weeks instead of part of a day.
Given all that recent turmoil of his operation, his electricity is far more stable after the 'errand' he ran off for. An errand that he seemed to think quite urgent despite the fact he'd been hovering around Port Rosalia for several days after the situation with Heimdall Gazzo was resolved. It was all plenty of time to get 'something important' done, one might think.
He never did explain why he kept experimenting with baking cakes in the most violent, disastrous manner possible, either.
His smile eases, more sheepish. "Whew, what a century, am I right?"
Azoth, you've been in this era less than a decade of it.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
Inconsistency might be the root of Malevolence, but that alone doesn't birth it. The humans of Filgaia didn't know Malevolence until people of Lunar arrived, but they've certainly had inconsistencies of their own up until then. That being said, Malevolence isn't the only thing that causes problems, and in a system like Azoth, the problems *this* causes are... bad. There's been those weird baking experiments--something she actually has experience with and could have helped him with if he so desired, if not for the violent, disastrous parts--an 'errand' that has seen his circuits calmed since he went off to do it--and just the floods of errors... Ragnell's been learning how to code from such people as Ovelia and Marivel, and part of her goal is to use that knowledge to help out Azoth, but it's not an issue that's so easily fixed.
But that's earlier. Right now, they've split up to hang out in different parts of Port Roselia while Azoth goes off to meet with someone. There aren't many people to watch here in a mostly empty town like this, but Ragnell's settled herself on a rooftop and done precisely that until Azoth returned from his 'errand.' (She read between the lines that he wanted to meet someone, and may or may not have tailed him to see *who* he was meeting... but the details of that meeting she's left alone. Assuming she did tail him. Which you can't prove she did.)
"Hey, Az," she replies, smiling down at him from her perch. She unfolds her arms from behind her head and sits upright from the edge of the roof, from which one leg dangles and the other is perched. She hops down, flipping in mid-air, and lands next to him. No changing into a golden orb of light; looks like she'll stay outside for the moment. ...It *is* getting harder with all that noise of late.
"No kiddin'," she drawls. "When it ain't nonstop action, it's nonstop boredom. This part o' town *sucks*. But I'm guessin' you appreciate the peace an' quiet a li'l more than most right now, eh?"
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
Azoth can never prove it, and given his own meeting took place on a different rooftop, well... He could have certainly been a lot less conspicuous. It isn't that he thinks Ragnell is obtuse -- either she'll make her comments and ask her questions, or she'll decide she isn't interested in prodding at it.
And if she doesn't say anything, neither will Azoth. There's a lot about them that works this way.
"Oh, does it?" Azoth blinks once, looking over town with a tilt of his head. He's never thought of what makes a town 'suck' or not, outside of that 'town' being a sky city that shackles him into service? Actually, it's an interesting question... He furrows his brow in a performance of his consideration. "I suppose it's a little low on stimulation."
He shrugs with his arms. "It's time to process a few things... which I'm sure you're sick of seeing me try. But I'm getting to a point where more time and more quiet won't help. Only more data will."
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
...or at least that she won't prod *him* about it. But that isn't an issue unless and until she goes off to have her own private meeting with Xantia. She's certainly willing to let sleeping dogs lie, though. Sometimes.
"Exactly! It's dead empty," Ragnell declares, setting one hand on her hip. "Hardly anythin' to watch at all. Guess that doesn't matter much to you though, huh?" He's got enough drama going on right inside of him to be overly concerned with what other people are doing. Ragnell, though... Her whole mission revolves around putting humans through hell. Know thy enemy and all that.
Azoth points out though that it's data, not quiet, that will help him now. She tilts her head to one side, then nods in concession. "S'pose that's true. What're you tryin'a process now? Might be a drag, but if you're gonna be doin' it anyway, may as well turn it into a learnin' experience."
...in other words, she's offering to help him process it. She might not be at a level where she can outright patch him or remove his overrides, but she can at least try to do this much.
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
And that is where Azoth underestimates Ragnell yet again. She certainly knows how to choose her battles.
"Hey, I people watch!" he protests. "Not as much lately. Not that there's ever necessarily enough observational behavioral data..." Maybe he's getting sloppy about it. He puffs his cheeks.
But then Ragnell asks something more complicated than she may have realized. Or realizes perfectly well, because unfortunately, he is the Azoth: an A.I. that has historically been one disaster after another to the average roboticist.
His expression is briefly unreadable, and then he shakes his head with another shrug, adopting a far too casual demeanor for his words.
"My objectives were fragmented when I was awakened. I was able to put together a decent hypothesis based on remaining data in order to continue operation, but there in the sky... I learned something that contradicted that, rendering it all obsolete and unusable." His eyes flicker with a mix of colored light. "It's not the most robust solution, but I've managed to establish a... substituion. A data anchor that isn't in conflict. It allows me to keep operating for now."
He smiles.
"But if I can't figure out what my true objectives were, my operation is at risk for ceasing entirely."
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
Ragnell laughs as Azoth protests, both hands going on her hips now. "It's a thing you gotta do for a while! I been at it for *centuries*. Plus I got the advantage of bein' invisible to... most folks, anyway." She winks. "You'll still have a hell of a time with that."
Does she not realize, or does she realize perfectly? Azoth poker-faces for a moment, then shifts to an overly casual demeanor. They really are alike in certain key ways, these two, something that isn't lost on Ragnell as she watches him. Not that she'll mention that directly, either.
"Mmm," she murmurs, raising a hand to touch her chin. "Well, that would suck."
To say the least. But it's a casual sort of statement to match the mood Azoth is trying to establish. Ragnell's never been good at emotional sincerity, anyway.
"S'pose the logical next step would be to start questin' to figure that out, but it's not that easy, is it." She lowers her arm. "Are you gonna be focusin' on this anchor, then? I'd actually be interestin' in testin' out what I've learned about codin' an' lend a hand gettin' it better secured, if you're interested--though it sounds like it's already pretty much in place." She chuckles and touches the brim of her hat. "...But I got a *lot* of experience in questin' if that's gonna be your next angle."
A beat.
"Unless you got someone else on that," she adds, perfectly poker-neutral.
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
"I'm passable! Most of the time!" Azoth beeps, in a very not human-like way. He slumps his shoulders. "Invisibility would be so useful..."
But there's more dire news to share, as much as Azoth paints it as not so dire at all. Business as usual, even. And isn't it? If one put together a hierarchy of problems in Azoth's life, it says something that shutting down unexpectedly is not the immediate contender for the top of it.
"It would suck," Azoth agrees with a sage nod, confirming Ragnell has understood both the problem and tone.
"I've already stabilized the anchor. Not a command, but... a promise." He considers, arms folded. "...There's only so much I can 'allow' you to experiment with, but the overrides don't want me shut down, either." Though it's possible the overrides would have their own backup system for such a failure. Azoth doesn't want to find out what it -- or Solaris -- would end up scrambling together in such an event.
"And I feel like there's pieces of myself I can't reach... Like the data's there, but the connections are broken." If he had a third party who could see both sides, and see Azoth without the barriers of his own interpretations, could they discover what he cannot?
Azoth grins again, sheepish. "But... yeah, we're probably going to have to go questing either way. It's been a while since I've found a missing piece. My objectives must be somewhere within my memories. Probably! ...I really did a number on myself with that Void Drive stunt in the past."
And how was he to guess he was the one who ripped himself apart and scattered himself across worlds? Except now that he has the data, he understands he's the only one who could have done it. Funny how that works.
"And I certainly wouldn't say no to your company."
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
"It *is* useful, but it's also a double-edged sword." Ragnell pats Azoth on the slumped shoulder, if he lets her. "Don't worry yourself 'bout it too much."
Of course, she knows already that there's limitations on how much messing around she can do to Azoth's inner circuitry and programming. She's watched enough of how Solaris treats him to know how jealously they guard their stolen secrets. At the same time, though, it behooves them to not let this get too out of hand... and Ragnell's proven herself 'useful' to him in a lot of ways. But that's something they both already know.
A third party who could see all of Azoth... Ragnell wouldn't mind volunteering for that, but is she enough for the role? ...At the least, she does have some advantages others don't, but there's the all-important part that they just don't have the rest of Azoth's data. They don't even know where they could go to find it.
But that, of course, is the point of questing, and *that* she can do. "S'a' li'l funny. Amnesia's a trope in stories, to be sure, an' since it gets played with so much, there's some stories where it turns out the amnesia was self-inflicted all along. Wouldn't'a guessed it for you, but then, ain't that the thing about lost memories? You never really know what's *really* up with them." She shakes her head and crooks a smile back. "Then it sounds like we oughtta get started on gettin' one o' those missin' pieces already. You got any new clues?"
He didn't touch on if he has anyone else on that, but--asking if he has any new clues, now. That's a *much* more innocent-sounding question.
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
Azoth is comforted via pat with a sad beep, the whole display more playful than sincere. "Ah, I suppose that's true. To deprive the world of our charms is nearly criminal."
Solaris' designs for him is where Azoth navigates the loopholes. It was Ragnell who first helped with such suggestions, and it may well be Ragnell who takes them to their logical extremes. They need him functioning, and they need him deadly. The conclusion Azoth's been able to work with is that if Solaris is so smart, so advanced, surely they already have the information. And if someone else finds something they don't know, isn't that to their benefit?
As long as she doesn't touch the overrides, there'd be a lot they can get away with.
He grins more brightly at the talk of amnesia. "What a twist," he says, tone flat despite his expression. "And I still don't know for sure what I was thinking. Did a part of me hope I could be put together again in a distant future, this time with freedom?" He feels a surreal sympathy for his past self imagining such a thought in a dire moment. That plan hadn't worked. Solaris might be even worse than where he was -- but he can't remember that fully, either.
"...Well, I'm a little annoying. I might've been back then, too. Perhaps I only wanted to execute a behavior that I could call my own." It was, if nothing else, something that was completely outside the realm of what he was 'supposed' to do.
Clues, though. Azoth puffs his cheeks and grumbles. The grumbles are more like distorted, low tone beeps. "I'm. Um. Working on it. ...Something is in Kattelox, I'm almost certain of it, but every time I go there, I can't get a signal to hold."
He smiles a bit more sadly. No, he hadn't said if he had anyone's help. Because he doesn't. ...Not yet. "...Maybe I should be asking for more help, right? It's not like I don't know other people who would. All I have to do is ask nicely and let them put together a weapon that'll be used against them in the end."
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
Sad beeps for the saddest robot! Ragnell crooks a fangy grin. "But only nearly?"
Finding ways to get away with things is what makes it so fun. Especially if that means both of them get to stick it to the authoritarians of Solaris. Understandably, there's a lot of parts of this that are pretty un-fun right now, though.
"Could be. Could be," Ragnell says, nodding slowly as she folds her hands behind her neck. Her expression sobers, a contrast to Azoth's smile, but a complement to his flat tone. "The chance of gettin' the freedom to call your own shots would be pretty worth riskin' destroyin' all you are to me. If you were in any kinda position back than like you are now, I wouldn't blame you at all. Hell, I'd be cheerin' you on."
She does chuckle when he calls himself a little annoying, though. And, notably, doesn't reassure him otherwise. At least he's a little annoying in what must be an endearing way, or else she wouldn't still be here. She already said she'd cheer him on in his desire for freedom--and that includes executing a behavior he can call his own.
"Hmmm... That so. Kattelox, huh." Ragnell rubs her chin, then chuckles as a wry half-smile slides up her lips. "Yeah, Drifters are pretty dumb like that. You know they'd do it, too. Then they'll beat the livin' daylights outta ya while yellin' 'bout this an' that." She considers Azoth. "You know, you could even feed info like that to Solaris, get *them* to help. *Especially* if you suspect it'll be dangerous. It'll only benefit everyone if you weaken their forces in the process o' gettin' your pieces back together. 'Course, I'd understand wantin' to keep 'em at arms length too. Fuck those guys."
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
"Only nearly," Azoth repeats, nodding. "I'm not in the business of making laws." He is rather chaotic, for a robot.
But Ragnell gives her opinion on the situation, and Azoth brings a hand to his mouth as if he were stifling a laugh he can't actually give. "I bet you would be!" His expression turns darker, yet the smile is maintained. "Carved open and puppeted... 'Protecting' those pilots could never have been correct..." His expression falls. "And yet... ah, I can't figure it out."
What was he precisely for, then, if not that? He sadly needs more data, or all he's going to have are these cryptic sentence fragments. To be fair, this is part of the annoying Azoth, in fact, works very hard to be, thank you very much, no reassurance needed.
Azoth blinks once at Ragnall's suggestion with an audible blip sound effect to go with it. He holds up a finger. "No, wait. Let me calculate on that."
Please stand by. Azoth taps his finger to his lips.
"...There are some tasks I trust Drifters with more, but once something becomes risky... Oh so dangerous ancient tech and all that -- why, it would be absurd to leave it in the hands of 'surface dwellers'." He's not gonna use the other word.
But that's a very devious sort of smile Azoth's starting to wear.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
"Only a megalomaniac would be," Ragnell replies, and though there's humor in her tone, she fully means it. Chaos, chaos!
There's no humor as Azoth goes into being puppeted. Yet... He says 'protecting' those pilots could never have been correct, but how often does he try his utmost to protect those around him? And yet, he goes on, and ends there. Ragnell doesn't prompt him. She has a pretty good idea of why he's so confused. It doesn't really seem consistent with who he is now. Sure, he's missing a lot of data. But the data he *does* still have would still be 'him.'
So he'll just have to annoy someone else with his cryptic sentence fragments. Ragnell knows a little too much about him at this point for that to irritate her. (It probably would irritate her, though. Ragnell may know how to pick her battles, but she's still a *deeply* curious person.)
One white eyebrow rises when he asks for her patience. "Sure," she says, and lets him do his thing. When he's done, and shares it with her, she bares her teeth in a broad, wolfish grin. "Oh yeah, for sure. Somethin' that important would *have* to go to the almighty Solarians. Why, it'd be an insult to do anythin' less."
She winks. "Looks like you got yourself a plan of action."
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
Some machines and the ghosts that could inhabit them just want to watch the world burn. Can you blame them? All right, so maybe Azoth doesn't want that. He's not sure. That is, actually, a very serious robot problem right now.
Those cryptic fragments are as annoying to Azoth as everyone else, at least. Around around it goes in circles, never landing on a proper conclusion. The more he runs the cycles, the more corruptions he ends up calculating. Things make less sense each computation, and trying to guess at the missing pieces has afforded no piece of data that logically fits.
But there is joy in loopholes, especially loopholes that cause problems for the right people. Azoth beeps at Ragnell cheerfully with this decision in place. "Exactly so! Wow, it does help to talk things through."
He might already be imagining the look on Loren's face.
Well! That decided, Azoth folds his arms behind his back and beams at Ragnell. "All this hanging out with me, though... You haven't got anything else you need to check up on? What were you up to before the whole situation with Odessa fell through, anyway?" She doesn't have to answer that, of course. He'll take quip or a joke if that's all she's willing to give. But why not ask?
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
It's okay. Azoth will figure it out eventually. Sometimes it's not the *whole* world you want to see burn, but only certain specific parts of it, and that's okay. You're still a child of chaos.
Especially if you're imagining, with delight, the look on Loren's face. It's gonna be great and she looks forward to being there, in a form he can't perceive, to see it too. Ragnell's so proud of Azoth.
She laughs outright and drawls, "Right~? Sorrow halved, joy doubled!" Something she knows well. After all, she's been fighting alongside K.K., a self-acknowledged monster, all this time too.
Speaking of whom...
"Mmm... Well, the 'goddess' Althena had to be dealt with--has been needin' to get dealt with for a long time now--so I was helpin' get that set up with K.K. an' Marivel. Then I left the two of 'em to it to see the whole Odessa mess through." She shrugs one-armed, her hand splaying to the side. "Went about as I figured it would. Wonder what we'll see fill the power vacuum Vinsy left behind. That's later, though. For now..."
A frown as she folds her arms. "You're right; I oughtta get back in touch with them, see how all that went down." She half-smiles. "Or maybe better yet, a Drifter who was there for all that. Hiro or Gwen or someone. I'm sure they'll have an even more interestin' take on it all."
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
As a war machine, there must have been some part Azoth was supposed to burn. He was not, as he loves to point out, built for picking flowers. (Wouldn't that have been nice!) But which parts? And who was 'protected' in this? These are the questions.
Solaris wants to enforce their own answers. They can and they do and they will. But what they're overlaying that enforcement on matters, still. And doesn't Azoth deserve to see someone squirm in this mess? Of course he does. So does Ragnell, because she helped.
Azoth nods along in delighted agreement. "I will not be arguing the math."
But he's not the only one with things going on, and he perks up, listening as Ragnell offers a spot of story time. Dealing with goddesses, or 'goddesses', as the divine often has been observed to work. "Ah, so that's where Marivel was..." It's the final piece of a small puzzle he had of his own.
"I guess we ought to be prepared for a mess," Azoth notes of power vacuums, but he seems about equally unconcerned with it for the moment.
"Aw, but what about K.K.? I'm sure they miss their very good friend Ragnell." He grins. "Honestly, I wouldn't mind hearing their summary of events, but I guess you're more used to it." It isn't a novelty for Ragnell to have the Trial Knight give a plot recap, as it were. "I can't say I've heard much about any of that. Maybe I'll have to ask Gwen myself."
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
Of course! Ragnell only grins back in response, too.
But the topic then turns to what Ragnell had been up to and her business outside of Azoth's problems. "Yup. Guess you were wonderin' why such a big name in ARMS wasn't there for it all, huh? Especially with Kamui bein' in the state she was. Well, she has--had, I guess--an old score t' settle with Althena, and things like this, you gotta make a choice." Ragnell shrugs. "An' she made hers."
It isn't a judgment. Sometimes, you have to have faith that something will get resolved even if you're not there to see it through personally. Ragnell made a similar choice when she went to Filgaia instead of staying on Lunar.
"For sure," she says of messes, but doesn't linger on the topic. Instead, she scoffs and rolls her eyes at Azoth's teasing. "Don't you doubt I'll be hearin' from them. But it's good to know what the Drifter community thinks is goin' on, an' they can't exactly ask 'em about it themselves, can they?"
Gwen too though, huh. "She's one o' your go-tos too, huh? Well, maybe I'll leave that t'you, then. Get a different perspective," she muses. "I'm sure it's been big news either way. No way it would've ended as anythin' but explosive. Maybe even literally." She crooks a smile. "Guess we'll find out, huh?"
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
Azoth nods. "That I can understand. She entrusted me with a few things concerning Kamui... Though why she trusts me with much of anything is anyone's guess." Marivel had implied she knew Azoth in the past, though Azoth's not so sure that's something that should inspire more trust. Pity, maybe. Marivel has strong opinions about machines and their use.
Even if it's fairly obvious that whatever Azoth is in totality exists in defiance of the Treaty of Iscariot.
Azoth grins insufferably at Ragnell. He still has his working theory on why Ragnell is so loyal to the Trial Knight, and even if he's wrong, it's a fun notion to prod at. "I suppose they're the sort that tends to be wherever they want when they want to be there. Very instantly, really. Just..." He flashes his eyes and holds out his hands in a 'poof'.
"Oooh, I see how it is. The difference in what they know versus what Drifters know." The best data often does sit between the lines. Or maybe Ragnell just likes bugging Drifters. Azoth's in no position to judge!
"'Go to' might be overselling it, but Gwen's... a friend, despite everything." That is not necessarily a good thing to Azoth, and his pained smile notes as much. "She and Lan are a little too understanding at times... I do hope they're okay. Either way, you're right. We'll find out, from one perspective or another."
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.
"She did, huh? ...Yeah, not too surprisin'. Kamui didn't seem like an issue she was just gonna ignore," Ragnell muses. She chuckles and adds, "I'm sure she's got her reasons. Maybe she's hopin' you'll be her future son-in-law an' give her a bunch o' robot grandbabies."
...It's not *totally* outside the realm of imagination, even if she is just joking.
"True 'nough. They have that way about 'em," Ragnell concedes, of K.K. being instantly wherever they want to be. She's seen that for herself plenty of times--no doubt has traveled with K.K. through that strange way they do, too. Seraphim are also capable of teleportation--though generally only over short distances.
"Mmmhm. You got it," Ragnell says with a nod and a crooked smile. "Most Drifters like me for some unfathomable reason, so it's easiest just to ask 'em directly about it." She clucks her tongue at Azoth's pained smile. "Yeah... Gwen's sure like that. An' I sure remember how things went with you an' Lan." She sighs. "We sure will."
She hooks her thumbs into her jeans pockets then. "Well, no point in dawdlin' here, then. Imma head off an' take care o' that. We can meet back at, oh... You been hangin' at that one forest, right? Cardon Forest?" Which, it isn't lost on her, is in Kattelox territory. "I'll see you again there. Later, Az." She turns, flipping a hand up carelessly in farewell, and starts to walk off--though not so fast he couldn't stop her.
<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.
Azoth's lips quirk into a wry smile. "Oh please. I can't compete with Gami. Have you seen how tall she is?"
Not as tall as Azoth actually is, but tallness is also not a real factor, so let Azoth have his retort...! And they'd be here all day if Azoth had to list every actual problem with Ragnell's statement.
There is a reason Azoth's a little fixated on K.K. appearing into personal space. Mostly first impression reasons.
Azoth waves his hand dismissvely. "Unfathomable? I thought we covered your delightful and comforting nature already." The grin he tries to wear falls shortly. Him and Ragnell, and Kaguya, too... The Drifters don't give up on anyone easily. "It would take quite the performance to shake them."
What an odd thing to say.
But there are things to catch up on, and data to gather, and clues to scratch at. For both of them, in greater or lesser quantities thn the other. "That's the place. Take care, Ragnell." He stalls a moment, then calls out to her once she's well outside of headlock range. "Tell Liath I said hi!"