What is Love? [Valentine's Date Event]

[fabricaketions]

It's shaping up to be another average day on the Transmigration 9. Crew members are going about their business as usual and all is (to most appearances, at least) about as "well" as things ever are on the ship.

Some crew members are going to be stopped out of the blue by impact with a force field.

"Attention Crewmen: You have been chosen to participate in an experiment!" GLaDOS's voice informs. They're not alone, someone else that was nearby is also caught within the same narrow radius. "Participation is mandatory. Please try to relax and enjoy the experience, as this will improve the quality of the test results."

Clearly this is going to be a wonderful day for science.

"You and your new scientific partner are now on a date," GLaDOS goes on. "As it would be detrimental to our study of the date experience if you were to be separated, you must remain close to your partner for the duration of the experiment. This will be enforced with the Transmigration 9 Crewman Containment Field. Prolonged exposure to the Transmigration 9 Crewman Containment Field may have unexpected side-effects. While any side-effects encountered will be documented and your desire to offer yourself to science is commendable, it is not a necessary part of this experiment."

"You will be informed when the test has been completed. We would like to thank you in advance for your full cooperation in the experiment and failure to attempt to foil it in any way."

"The experiment has begun, so you may begin dating."

[OOC: The exact details of your characters' confinement are up to players' discretion. Being trapped in a sensorium or other stationary place is a possibility, as is being stuck in a sort of roving invisible force field hamster ball that only affects the two of you. How far partners can move apart is probably subject to whatever's fun but they ideally shouldn't be able to sit on opposite sides of a room ignoring one another the whole time.

ICly the "test" lasts for a few hours and you are free to godmode GLaDOS telling them the experiment is finished.

If you would like a few tags from GLaDOS herself in your thread, ping me on this account or plurk or AIM or whatever is most convenient for you. :)]

Comments

[first_of_steel]

Roger's mouth quirked a bit at that. "Those were standard issue in my unit," he said. "I was in the army, about twenty years before I got taken onto this ship. Most soldiers used regular guns or other weapons, but I was stationed at a research facility where they were developing things like that laser rifle, so they made sure each of us got them to use instead."

"Can't say I ever encountered anybody who struck me as seeming like a wizard before, though. Even on this ship, you're the first."

[grimbiker]

"Ah, well then it's good you started with me. You've met the best wizard here. And the most conceited." Sirius laughed and shook his head. "My best friend is here, so is my godson and a friend of his. They're all brilliant- just don't tell them I said so."

[first_of_steel]

"I'll keep that in mind," said Roger. "I seem to recall you mentioning some names when Marco did that shape-changing trick of his. Was that them?"

[grimbiker]

"Ah," Sirius thought back. "I believe Marco asked if I was from Harry's world, which I am. He's my godson. Great boy- man now." That was something he still had to process. But there Sirius was about to go on bragging about him again.

"If I mentioned anyone it was probably them. I don't know very many people here yet, except for the people who went on the modeling mission."

[first_of_steel]

Roger nodded. "Haven't met too many people here myself, at least partly thanks to getting shunted into that part of the ship just after being let out of the pods," he said. "Two from my world, but... they're from two hundred years after my time, the both of them. Don't know how that works. Not sure I want to know."

[grimbiker]

Sirius let out a low whistle. "I thought I was behind when everyone from my world is at least twelve years ahead of me but two hundred years. Now that's a real difference."

[first_of_steel]

One side of Roger's mouth twitched. "Turns out they're both members of an organization I founded, too," he says. "Which just makes things weirder all around. We're going to need to sit down and have a very long talk very soon- sometime after this so-called 'date' is over, obviously."

[grimbiker]

"You should order them around some. Tell them to grab you a beer or two. All in good fun." Sirius winked. "Speaking of, we might as well have a good time ourselves. Do you think GLaDOS will let us go anywhere?"

[first_of_steel]

"Don't know. When the AIs back home went off their rockers they usually just wound up repeating things to themselves," said Roger. "Then again, this one doesn't seem completely insane, just... really, really wrong. Maybe if we asked."

[grimbiker]

"One way to find out. What about it, GLaDOS? I can have this make for one interesting experiment."

[fabricaketions]

"The Containment Field is portable," she chimed in after several seconds of delay.

"It is currently only programmed to prevent separation."

[first_of_steel]

"Huh," said Roger. "Is there anywhere around here that has actual beer, or would we have to go to the Sensoriums and have the place fake it up?"

[grimbiker]

"There's the Drunken Dragon. I haven't been there yet. But there's also a beer tree in hydroponics. Actual beer inside a can." He would pause there and let that information sink in.

[first_of_steel]

Silence.

More silence.

Then: "What level of genetic engineering did they have to do in order to induce a tree to produce pods like that?"

And, after a little bit more: "Is it any good?"

[grimbiker]

"I prefer firewhiskey and it's not butterbeer but it gets the job done." Sirius shrugged. Then he paused but curiosity got the better of him. "What's genetic engineering?"

[first_of_steel]

"I'm from Wisconsin. I haven't had proper beer in a really long time."

He glanced up for a moment, trying to work out how to explain the concept. Eventually he said, "I don't know how much science you know, necessarily. I assume you're familiar with breeding animals or plants for desired traits, though. Genetic engineering is a scientific way of planting the part of an animal or plant's makeup that causes it to have a certain trait into a different animal or plant, so that the next generation carries that trait. Or to simply alter the thing's genetic material directly so that the result is new traits, or the eradication of old ones. Upping milk yield on cattle, adding disease resistance to wheat, that kind of thing- that's the mild end of the scale. They'd have to do a hell of a lot more than that to get a tree with beer in its sap or fruit or whatever the can pods would be."

[grimbiker]

Sirius nodded. He knew the concept very well. As he should, considering he was the product of a misguided attempt at it.

"Makes sense." Except when it didn't at all but that wasn't what the man was talking about. "So how about I show you the beer tree?"

[first_of_steel]

"Fine by me. Beats sitting around here waiting for that machine to get its processor back on track."

[grimbiker]

"Let's go then. It's not far from him." Sirius lead the way, careful not to walk too far although from time to time he walked too fast and smacked against the force field.

"What kind of machines do they have on your world? That are like GLaDOS, I mean. I have to admit, this is outside my area of expertise."

Give him a motorcycle and he could tell you everything about it in detail. Give him a rifle, especially a laser rifle and he would mess around with it and probably accidentally shoot himself. Have an AI talk to him and tell him to run mazes he was going to assume it was some highly advanced magic until told otherwise.

[first_of_steel]

Roger was used to force fields, more or less; they weren't all that common any more, but there'd been a few in deployment around Mariposa, before the end. Mobile ones weren't really part of his experience, though. He kept a careful pace or two behind Sirius to be safe.

"Oh- that depends. We've had machine intelligences for a while now," he said. "We used to build them for research purposes, mostly. Advanced calculations and simulations and stuff like that. Easier than harnessing large numbers of humans to do that much math, that's for sure. We used to give them personalities and identities so they were easier to interact with. The ones we had in my world didn't usually take this much initiative- we were pretty careful about keeping them under control. You don't want your creations getting to the point where they could turn on you."

He plinked a finger against the force field by way of demonstration.

[grimbiker]

Sirius nodded. In some ways, it wasn't that different from the Marauders' Map. They had even included some elements of their own personalities inside of it, enough to mimic their responses.

"Can they think on their own?"

[first_of_steel]

"Some of them, yeah," said Roger. "The big mainframes, mostly- machines that take up whole rooms, that's how much space we need for all the parts to handle that kind of processing power. Robots usually can't- they're smaller machines, people-sized more or less, and mobile. They might use 'I' in conversation and they might have personalities, but most robots don't have the ability to do much outside of a set of rules and preprogrammed reactions. Takes a whole lot of expensive hardware and really sophisticated programming to bring a robot into the same league as a self-aware ZAX, at least from what I know of them."

[grimbiker]

Sirius was just going to pretend he knew what some of those words were.

"That must take a lot of hard work and ingenuity. Magic can't create objects that think on their own like that, only come close." He was impressed. "Still, I think I prefer motorcycles."

[first_of_steel]

If it was any comfort at all, Roger would be in approximately the same position if he ever asked someone from a more conventional line of technological development what these 'micro-chip' things were. Muggle technology developed a little oddly on his world, even by the standards of Muggles.

"Tell you the truth, it's not really my line of specialization. There were Scribes in the Brotherhood who could've explained it all to you better. I'm about able to keep your average robot operational and tuned up, but if I need a new one or a major change in a machine's behavior, I have to find a specialist." His mouth twitched. "Whereas the only thing I know about magic at all is what I saw you doing in that room with the snake. Where I come from, 'magic' just means illusions and tricks done for entertainment."

"My son found a motorcycle in the desert south of Lost Hills years ago. Got it working, too, but it ran out of fuel. You work on your own at all?"

[grimbiker]

"You know how to use a laser rifle and that's enough for me."

Ah, but motorcycles, now that was something that he could really get animated about.

"You could say that. I put some standard enchantments on it. Its seat expands to fit your size, mostly in case James is join-" He stopped abruptly, not just talking but walking as well. With effort, he forced himself to continue. "And I enchanted it to fly." It wasn't like the Ministry was here to fine him for it.