Plotty bits...and pundits.
Character-wise I'm getting much better insight into this songvirus. What it is and wants to do.
The RP for that just...degenerated into late-night silliness. Which, as we all know, perfectly justifies being up so late. *grin*
Puzzle Park
Squizzle nods. "Yes, well... in order to achieve one's goals, one must occasionally make sacrifices..."
Coalesce sidles in, somewhat soberly.
Squizzle says, "Hello, Coalesce."
You say, "Good evening. "
Phoenix waves at Coalesce. "Hey, Coalesce...how goes?"
You say, "It goes...well. "
Squizzle says, "You sound uncertain. Is something bothering you?"
Squizzle says, "... Other than what's bothering everyone else, that is?"
You say, "Ah, was just having some conversation with Chastity about...the song. "
You say, "Which, as far as I know, isn't actually bothering anyone else right now. "
Coalesce smiles slightly.
Phoenix cants his head. "It isn't bothering me, really. Which song?"
You say, "THE song. The only one...for me at least. Oh, I mean, the songvirus. "
Squizzle looks about, idly, humming a tune.
Phoenix cants his head, and peers over at Squizzle, then back at Coalesce. "Is it a -good- song?"
Coalesce shrugs. "Chastity went through a lot to get rid of it. Since he can't just delete it like a computer or Twin could.
Coalesce looks Phoenix in the eyes. "It is the most beautiful song I have ever heard."
Phoenix blinks back at Coalesce, arching an eyeridge. "Really?" He ponders. "Let me guess, that's the problem?"
Squizzle pauses and looks up. "Something the matter?" It goes back to humming "Uh Oh". De dip doo dah dah dah dah-dah, dah-dip da-dip da-dip-dip, de-ya de-de-ya...
Coalesce nods to Phoenix. "The problem is that it WANTS to spread. It is more complex a song as well, it's almost fractal in complexity. Can contain itself in a simple melody that catches...or expand in concert with instruments and fill the space between...
You whisper, "I forget...were you around for the 'first' concert? Or have been exposed to it before?" to Squizzle.
Squizzle whispers, "Part of the one before Ake collapsed. Right now I'm just making Coalesce jittery. ;)" to you.
You whisper, "It was only making him jittery when he was worried about being reinfected. Which he is, now. :-P" to Squizzle.
Squizzle whispers, "Is reinfected, you mean?" to you.
Coalesce eyes Squizzle cautiously. "Oh...you remember it too?"
You whisper, "Yeah. He recaught it from the cube tree, and the last concert when Twin helped Ake...oh yeah, you walked in on it. That didn't get rid of it." to Squizzle.
Phoenix rumbles softly. "A -scalable- songvirus. Clever." He ponders, and then earperks, dangerously, to Squizzle's humming, squinting a little and furrowing his brow.
Coalesce sighs, clapping his hand over his face. "I forgot about Squizzle! Gah. Everyone else I remember from that concert here has already erased or finally forgotten the song."
Squizzle blinks. "Hm? I'm pretty sure this isn't the same song." It hums a few bars.
Coalesce looks relieved.
You say, "I'm just...well, I've got the song still. It won't let me delete it like last time. And...it wants to infect again. But...it seems innocent enough! Like Strange's supposed innocence. "
Phoenix arches an eyeridge. "I'll let the Bonobians know about this...song, if they hear it. It's tempting, after all, if it's as lovely as you say. What's the actual -problem- with it? Does it cause damage?"
You say, "The best I can do might be to create an antivirus...something that will counteract it. Then....set it free, see if what I think will happen is true. "
Squizzle hums a different tune. You might recognise it as "I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing".
You say, "It doesn't damage...I don't think. But it wills who catches it to sing, perform, or otherwise transmit it to others."
Squizzle says, "I don't know about that, Coalesce. The 'cure' might turn out to be worse than the disease."
Phoenix ohs. "That's not too good.." He rumbles, thoughtfully.
Squizzle winces. "I know *that* much from experience."
You say, "Everyone's so against it, thinking that after it is loose, it's the only song that anyone will want to sing..."
Coalesce frowns to Squizzle. "I think I know what you mean." He continues. "It's...more complicated than that, though. I understand it because I've had it longer...and I think it's got much more space inside me to take up. Trillions on trillions of neurons, compared to millions..."
You say, "The song doesn't want to stop at just infecting enough...I think it's more like...it needs them. Like...like reflectors. Everyone singing it at once...phased-coherent music..."
Phoenix arches his eyeridges with mixed skepticism and apprehension.
Coalesce waves his hands around in vague loops and circles. "I...don't know if I can explain it any better. It's just what I was feeling the last time I...let it free. When more than just me was singing it."
Phoenix aahs and nods slowly. "Well. I'm heading to bed myself. I'm still trying to figure out some things; Mod puzzles me the most, now."
You say, "I do know one thing. Twin opened that hole for Ake, remember, Squizzle? Before Ake collapsed, I felt something on the brink of what Twin's hole felt like. "
Squizzle says, "Good night, Phoenix..."
Coalesce smiles a little. "Dream well, Phoenix. We could use some of that around here lately."
Phoenix rumbles and nods. "Aye, no kidding. And people wonder why the Bonobians are getting a little paranoid." He smirks, and slips into the nexus.
Phoenix disappears down the hole at the base of the cube tree.
Phoenix has left.
Squizzle thinks back. "You felt like... you were about to lose yourself?"
You say, "Not...quite. I felt something...emergent. "
You say, "It was like there wasn't enough energy. Maybe the song is really an incantation. Magic. I don't know any shamans to ask, though. That's why...that's why I want to let it go. Maybe it will let me go. "Squizzle says, "As though all the merging songs were forming into something... bigger than themselves?"
Coalesce nods slowly. "It's...already doing something like that, inside me."
You say, "It might be...preparing me for something."
Coalesce shrugs, and sits down. "That's why I spend so much time in the Forge...at least a distraction for the music that's often louder than I can think. Or IS my thoughts."
Coalesce weaves sideways in some internal rhythm.
Squizzle sits up on its haunches beside you, whistling a tune.
Coalesce smiles. "Other songs don't distract me anymore. Unfortunately.
You say, "But...there might be a way to use destructive interference. Engineer an exact opposite canceling peice of music..."
Mel climbs out from the hole at the base of the cube tree.
Mel has arrived.
Squizzle says, "That would more likely generate dissonance than a cure. Hello, Mel."
You say, "Greetings, Mel. "
[OOC] Coalesce side notes, ye gods the muck is empty tonight.
[OOC] Mel noticed.
[OOC] Mel thinks we should do something breath-taking so everyone will feel sorry they missed it.
[Here commenced something so totally amazing that I had to edit it out, just so I could say you had to be there]
[Later, after the silliness plot-shattering revelations of the nature of life, the universe, and everything...]
Argent climbs out from the hole at the base of the cube tree.
Argent has arrived.
Squizzle says, "Hello, Argent."
Coalesce nods to the multiotters.
Argent bob heads in sequence, "Mawn."
Coalesce walks around several of Argent's members, curious.
Argent watch the plastic patchwork ... whatever ... curiously.
Coalesce prods at one of the otterforms. "Are you all...together?"
Squizzle goes over and stands beside Mel, gets out a notebook and a pencil, and laboriously jots things down in it, watching the exchange carefully.
Mel is inscrutable.
Squizzle turns around and watches Coalesce and Argent, instead.
[OOC] Coalesce instantiates a large metallic spiralling rod with a flat top, and hides inside the hollow inside.
[OOC] Coalesce is in-screw-table.
[OOC] Mel says, "Oh man, that was almost a Squizzle level pun."
[And that's when it started...]
Argent's Ran, "I'm Argent. Uh... not toys nor pets. Don't make amusing noises when poked."
Squizzle looks over the jottings in its notebook, knitting its brow. Hmmmm. It looks up at Coalesce and Argent again.
You say, "Oh...sorry. "
Coalesce grins and steps back.
[OOC] Coalesce says, "I used to be quite a punster as well. That was trying to see if I hadn't lost my touch. :-P "
Argent flomp in an untidy sleepish scatter.
Coalesce sits nearby. Notices Squizzle. "What are you writing?"
Squizzle shakes its head. "Hm. There're just no two ways about it..."
Argent's Lin bounces over and peer at squirrel and notebook.
Squizzle turns the notebook around and shows all the jotted-down games. "Whenever I play Tic-Tac-Toe against myself, I always come out in a tie."
Squizzle says, "Which is a pity, because the tie clashes with the uniform."
You say, "Hmmm. That's quite a bind. "
Squizzle unties it, folds it up, and stuffs it in a pocket. "So how are you and the Volk getting along?"
You say, "I think I've got the Volk separated from the Vites. "
Squizzle says, "So the Volk aren't viting? That sounds vine."
Argent's Lin, "I'm thinking of building some kind of vehicle to get around in. Nothing special."
Argent says, "There's a six-legged bioform design that's popular back home. The Volk's Beetle-wagon."
[OOC] Mel hates you all. :)
You say, "Are you implying that it'd be a grape mistake, Squizzle? I mean, if you want to get the girl with the orgasmic fireworks vibromotor involved in a winery, that'd just be D's vine. "
Argent have six poker faces.
Coalesce has four suits. But Squizzle has the only tie.
Squizzle says, "Careful, Coalesce. I think Argent are about to start poking us."
Coalesce figures Argent playing poker with self would be interesting.
Argent says, "Need a tie-breaker so we can share."
You say, "Argent playing cards with himself would always win or always lose. One or the otter. "
You say, "That was a very cutting remark, Argent. "
You say, "It was knot appropriate. "
Argent flomp again.
Coalesce is only trying to even the squirrlore.
Squizzle gets the necktie out again, cuts it into six more-or-less equal pieces, and distributes one to each Volk. "Honestly, you shouldn't make those puns dragon."
Coalesce eyes the scissors carefully. "I bow to your sharp wit."
Coalesce instatiates a bow. "I'm just playing second fiddle." Violin music.
Squizzle topples over backward, smoke rising off it. "You win!"
Coalesce oddly feels like Mod.
Argent accept the scraps. Ran looks up and emits a stream of static. Puzzlebox converts the scraps into snooze-masks for Volk, and the pack put them on. Sur's has My Little Ponies on it.
Argent Zzzzzzzzz.
You say, "The squirrel eats his words...and gets incombustion."
Argent's Lin, "Diddn't think Squizzle was into steamy stuff."
Coalesce helpfully sharpens Argent's saw, makes the log-cutting easier.
Coalesce feels the hate from Mel, so should probably stop while he's ahead. No, he's not moving to Otissa.
Mel VmVmVmVmVms hate.
You say, "Otissans only know how to stop AFTER they're a head. "
Coalesce, cut down in the prime of his life by anti-pun hate beams. Alas.
You say, "There's no love. None at all. "
(I'll note here that I'm extremely paranoid all of a sudden...I was up at 3 AM this morning editing this log and posting it. I even edited one or two words AFTER posting. Only to come in today and find...gone. Entirely. No idea where it went, but I'm sure it was there before! Oh well, here goes again...)
The RP for that just...degenerated into late-night silliness. Which, as we all know, perfectly justifies being up so late. *grin*
Puzzle Park
Squizzle nods. "Yes, well... in order to achieve one's goals, one must occasionally make sacrifices..."
Coalesce sidles in, somewhat soberly.
Squizzle says, "Hello, Coalesce."
You say, "Good evening. "
Phoenix waves at Coalesce. "Hey, Coalesce...how goes?"
You say, "It goes...well. "
Squizzle says, "You sound uncertain. Is something bothering you?"
Squizzle says, "... Other than what's bothering everyone else, that is?"
You say, "Ah, was just having some conversation with Chastity about...the song. "
You say, "Which, as far as I know, isn't actually bothering anyone else right now. "
Coalesce smiles slightly.
Phoenix cants his head. "It isn't bothering me, really. Which song?"
You say, "THE song. The only one...for me at least. Oh, I mean, the songvirus. "
Squizzle looks about, idly, humming a tune.
Phoenix cants his head, and peers over at Squizzle, then back at Coalesce. "Is it a -good- song?"
Coalesce shrugs. "Chastity went through a lot to get rid of it. Since he can't just delete it like a computer or Twin could.
Coalesce looks Phoenix in the eyes. "It is the most beautiful song I have ever heard."
Phoenix blinks back at Coalesce, arching an eyeridge. "Really?" He ponders. "Let me guess, that's the problem?"
Squizzle pauses and looks up. "Something the matter?" It goes back to humming "Uh Oh". De dip doo dah dah dah dah-dah, dah-dip da-dip da-dip-dip, de-ya de-de-ya...
Coalesce nods to Phoenix. "The problem is that it WANTS to spread. It is more complex a song as well, it's almost fractal in complexity. Can contain itself in a simple melody that catches...or expand in concert with instruments and fill the space between...
You whisper, "I forget...were you around for the 'first' concert? Or have been exposed to it before?" to Squizzle.
Squizzle whispers, "Part of the one before Ake collapsed. Right now I'm just making Coalesce jittery. ;)" to you.
You whisper, "It was only making him jittery when he was worried about being reinfected. Which he is, now. :-P" to Squizzle.
Squizzle whispers, "Is reinfected, you mean?" to you.
Coalesce eyes Squizzle cautiously. "Oh...you remember it too?"
You whisper, "Yeah. He recaught it from the cube tree, and the last concert when Twin helped Ake...oh yeah, you walked in on it. That didn't get rid of it." to Squizzle.
Phoenix rumbles softly. "A -scalable- songvirus. Clever." He ponders, and then earperks, dangerously, to Squizzle's humming, squinting a little and furrowing his brow.
Coalesce sighs, clapping his hand over his face. "I forgot about Squizzle! Gah. Everyone else I remember from that concert here has already erased or finally forgotten the song."
Squizzle blinks. "Hm? I'm pretty sure this isn't the same song." It hums a few bars.
Coalesce looks relieved.
You say, "I'm just...well, I've got the song still. It won't let me delete it like last time. And...it wants to infect again. But...it seems innocent enough! Like Strange's supposed innocence. "
Phoenix arches an eyeridge. "I'll let the Bonobians know about this...song, if they hear it. It's tempting, after all, if it's as lovely as you say. What's the actual -problem- with it? Does it cause damage?"
You say, "The best I can do might be to create an antivirus...something that will counteract it. Then....set it free, see if what I think will happen is true. "
Squizzle hums a different tune. You might recognise it as "I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing".
You say, "It doesn't damage...I don't think. But it wills who catches it to sing, perform, or otherwise transmit it to others."
Squizzle says, "I don't know about that, Coalesce. The 'cure' might turn out to be worse than the disease."
Phoenix ohs. "That's not too good.." He rumbles, thoughtfully.
Squizzle winces. "I know *that* much from experience."
You say, "Everyone's so against it, thinking that after it is loose, it's the only song that anyone will want to sing..."
Coalesce frowns to Squizzle. "I think I know what you mean." He continues. "It's...more complicated than that, though. I understand it because I've had it longer...and I think it's got much more space inside me to take up. Trillions on trillions of neurons, compared to millions..."
You say, "The song doesn't want to stop at just infecting enough...I think it's more like...it needs them. Like...like reflectors. Everyone singing it at once...phased-coherent music..."
Phoenix arches his eyeridges with mixed skepticism and apprehension.
Coalesce waves his hands around in vague loops and circles. "I...don't know if I can explain it any better. It's just what I was feeling the last time I...let it free. When more than just me was singing it."
Phoenix aahs and nods slowly. "Well. I'm heading to bed myself. I'm still trying to figure out some things; Mod puzzles me the most, now."
You say, "I do know one thing. Twin opened that hole for Ake, remember, Squizzle? Before Ake collapsed, I felt something on the brink of what Twin's hole felt like. "
Squizzle says, "Good night, Phoenix..."
Coalesce smiles a little. "Dream well, Phoenix. We could use some of that around here lately."
Phoenix rumbles and nods. "Aye, no kidding. And people wonder why the Bonobians are getting a little paranoid." He smirks, and slips into the nexus.
Phoenix disappears down the hole at the base of the cube tree.
Phoenix has left.
Squizzle thinks back. "You felt like... you were about to lose yourself?"
You say, "Not...quite. I felt something...emergent. "
You say, "It was like there wasn't enough energy. Maybe the song is really an incantation. Magic. I don't know any shamans to ask, though. That's why...that's why I want to let it go. Maybe it will let me go. "Squizzle says, "As though all the merging songs were forming into something... bigger than themselves?"
Coalesce nods slowly. "It's...already doing something like that, inside me."
You say, "It might be...preparing me for something."
Coalesce shrugs, and sits down. "That's why I spend so much time in the Forge...at least a distraction for the music that's often louder than I can think. Or IS my thoughts."
Coalesce weaves sideways in some internal rhythm.
Squizzle sits up on its haunches beside you, whistling a tune.
Coalesce smiles. "Other songs don't distract me anymore. Unfortunately.
You say, "But...there might be a way to use destructive interference. Engineer an exact opposite canceling peice of music..."
Mel climbs out from the hole at the base of the cube tree.
Mel has arrived.
Squizzle says, "That would more likely generate dissonance than a cure. Hello, Mel."
You say, "Greetings, Mel. "
[OOC] Coalesce side notes, ye gods the muck is empty tonight.
[OOC] Mel noticed.
[OOC] Mel thinks we should do something breath-taking so everyone will feel sorry they missed it.
[Here commenced something so totally amazing that I had to edit it out, just so I could say you had to be there]
[Later, after the silliness plot-shattering revelations of the nature of life, the universe, and everything...]
Argent climbs out from the hole at the base of the cube tree.
Argent has arrived.
Squizzle says, "Hello, Argent."
Coalesce nods to the multiotters.
Argent bob heads in sequence, "Mawn."
Coalesce walks around several of Argent's members, curious.
Argent watch the plastic patchwork ... whatever ... curiously.
Coalesce prods at one of the otterforms. "Are you all...together?"
Squizzle goes over and stands beside Mel, gets out a notebook and a pencil, and laboriously jots things down in it, watching the exchange carefully.
Mel is inscrutable.
Squizzle turns around and watches Coalesce and Argent, instead.
[OOC] Coalesce instantiates a large metallic spiralling rod with a flat top, and hides inside the hollow inside.
[OOC] Coalesce is in-screw-table.
[OOC] Mel says, "Oh man, that was almost a Squizzle level pun."
[And that's when it started...]
Argent's Ran, "I'm Argent. Uh... not toys nor pets. Don't make amusing noises when poked."
Squizzle looks over the jottings in its notebook, knitting its brow. Hmmmm. It looks up at Coalesce and Argent again.
You say, "Oh...sorry. "
Coalesce grins and steps back.
[OOC] Coalesce says, "I used to be quite a punster as well. That was trying to see if I hadn't lost my touch. :-P "
Argent flomp in an untidy sleepish scatter.
Coalesce sits nearby. Notices Squizzle. "What are you writing?"
Squizzle shakes its head. "Hm. There're just no two ways about it..."
Argent's Lin bounces over and peer at squirrel and notebook.
Squizzle turns the notebook around and shows all the jotted-down games. "Whenever I play Tic-Tac-Toe against myself, I always come out in a tie."
Squizzle says, "Which is a pity, because the tie clashes with the uniform."
You say, "Hmmm. That's quite a bind. "
Squizzle unties it, folds it up, and stuffs it in a pocket. "So how are you and the Volk getting along?"
You say, "I think I've got the Volk separated from the Vites. "
Squizzle says, "So the Volk aren't viting? That sounds vine."
Argent's Lin, "I'm thinking of building some kind of vehicle to get around in. Nothing special."
Argent says, "There's a six-legged bioform design that's popular back home. The Volk's Beetle-wagon."
[OOC] Mel hates you all. :)
You say, "Are you implying that it'd be a grape mistake, Squizzle? I mean, if you want to get the girl with the orgasmic fireworks vibromotor involved in a winery, that'd just be D's vine. "
Argent have six poker faces.
Coalesce has four suits. But Squizzle has the only tie.
Squizzle says, "Careful, Coalesce. I think Argent are about to start poking us."
Coalesce figures Argent playing poker with self would be interesting.
Argent says, "Need a tie-breaker so we can share."
You say, "Argent playing cards with himself would always win or always lose. One or the otter. "
You say, "That was a very cutting remark, Argent. "
You say, "It was knot appropriate. "
Argent flomp again.
Coalesce is only trying to even the squirrlore.
Squizzle gets the necktie out again, cuts it into six more-or-less equal pieces, and distributes one to each Volk. "Honestly, you shouldn't make those puns dragon."
Coalesce eyes the scissors carefully. "I bow to your sharp wit."
Coalesce instatiates a bow. "I'm just playing second fiddle." Violin music.
Squizzle topples over backward, smoke rising off it. "You win!"
Coalesce oddly feels like Mod.
Argent accept the scraps. Ran looks up and emits a stream of static. Puzzlebox converts the scraps into snooze-masks for Volk, and the pack put them on. Sur's has My Little Ponies on it.
Argent Zzzzzzzzz.
You say, "The squirrel eats his words...and gets incombustion."
Argent's Lin, "Diddn't think Squizzle was into steamy stuff."
Coalesce helpfully sharpens Argent's saw, makes the log-cutting easier.
Coalesce feels the hate from Mel, so should probably stop while he's ahead. No, he's not moving to Otissa.
Mel VmVmVmVmVms hate.
You say, "Otissans only know how to stop AFTER they're a head. "
Coalesce, cut down in the prime of his life by anti-pun hate beams. Alas.
You say, "There's no love. None at all. "
(I'll note here that I'm extremely paranoid all of a sudden...I was up at 3 AM this morning editing this log and posting it. I even edited one or two words AFTER posting. Only to come in today and find...gone. Entirely. No idea where it went, but I'm sure it was there before! Oh well, here goes again...)