David Carrian can't help but be attached to his amazing, very expensive computer. As such, when a virus sneaks onto his system without his knowing, he puts all of his focus and knowledge into removing the threat that is screwing with his memory and CPU.
But he hears something coming from his headphones. A quiet, almost unnoticeable voice cries out from behind the computer screen. On one hand, knowing that the virus is playing such sickening sound effects drives him harder to fix the problem. On the other however, he stops to think after he finally makes out the words said to him...
"...Help me..."
This tale follows heavily on the Slice-of-Life and drama side of things, but sways towards adventure halfway through the story. As of Chapter 13 (treehouse.exe V1.31), we have not reached that point yet.
Episodes beyond season three episode two are ignored.
Click here to listen to a reading of the first chapter by Griffin Productions!
You have my curiosity.
6033968 same here.
''twas very interesting. thumbs up :)
....... Iiiiiiinteresting, you've gotten my curiosity and interest by bait, hook and line, can't wait to see how this will proced.
Translation: sweet story bro. I'll be watching!
this is really good
I think I'll add it to my story tracker
This one of the only times I read a story without the comedy tag and was intrigued to read the whole first chapter. The concept was intriguing , it's executed well so far and I absolutely love the way your describing everything. I look forward to the next chapter.
So far, I'm with this.
Basically an AI running on a laptop and consuming few gigabytes of RAM? I guess the answer is magic? Interesting, I'll be tracking it
This story have potential, continue please
Looks interesting.... I'ma followin'
It has potential, at the very least. Not a fave just yet, but worth tracking.
You've amused me and thus evoked my interest.
I shall withold any praises for this story for now... I shall wait for things to unravel before I give any more than this comment.
You have, my attention. *steeples fingers*
Hello, i'm Anemptyshell,
Let the world of cyberspace begin.
Well, well, well. What have we here.
You have... an interesting record. I'm quite enjoying this so far so I'm going to out of my regular routine and give you an upvote, let's see if we can get some attention to this.
If he's in doubt, why doesn't he just shut down his internet connection or locate the file or whatever instead of assuming that anyone has the patience to make such a ridiculously elaborate prank/virus ( speech recognition being something we still can't get quite right ) ?
6036260 Indeed. The first thing you do in a situation like this is to throw yourself at the router, unplugging it.
6036390 Dear god, no. That would involve me getting up from my chair.
But if I saw a strange program I never heard of before that may or may not allow a complete stranger access to my computer, then I would go to the network and sharing center and kill my internet connection.
And if I didn't know how to do that, then yes, I'd get up and pull the plug, that seems better than just passively wondering about the situation.
And seriously, the protagonist is still somewhat thinking that this is some sort of prank: if they don't have access to your computer, they can't prank you.
Though I guess not everyone studied Computer Science, so maybe my years of having friends that enjoy testing what they learned from class taught me uncommon reflexes.
6036390 Nice I just spent 10 Minutes writing a message and realised "hold on, I don't think he's being sarcastic" so disregard my comment.
Long day...
6036467
The limit of David's knowledge is the limit of my knowledge.
but a part of me thinks that it makes it more realistic
6036475 Bah, any way he reacts can be explained, maybe he panicked a bit and didn't even think he could do that (a weird situation like that, of course you'll be taken off guard), maybe he doesn't know much about computer (more common than many think), maybe he's confident nothing bad'll happen, maybe he's bored and wants to see what happens...
Go as you wish, all of that was just me saying that your character overlooked something that might have helped him, and this is your choice as a author of the story. Nothing wrong with a protagonist that makes mistakes, quite the opposite in fact.
6036467 Hehe, Sorry.
No, but from a layman's perspective it's usually to unplug things manually, especially if you've got multiple devices running from the same access point.
I'd love to see what Twilight can do should she figure out how to do things to the computer. She is an .exe file, after all.
What I would do:
Turn off internet Connection
UnPLUG internet connection (ethernet cable or router) to double-check.
If pony.exe still works and I can still communicate, freak the FUCK out. It's a goddamn Artificial intelligence, or at least a program with some damn good voice recognition that I suspect can pass the Turing test.
(Of course, just because it doesn't work doesn't mean Twilight isn't actually there. It's entirely possible she's on another computer somewhere, and has managed to randomly access my computer. Not that I'd be able to tell the difference between that and a prank without extensive testing that I wouldn't be bothered to do.)
6036475
Basing your character's knowledge on your knowledge might seem like a good idea, but the world around him is also based on your knowledge, right? So if YOU can't tell what's right or wrong, and your CHARACTER can't tell what's right or wrong, the end result is that reality has little to this fic.
To clarify/make an example, if your character does something that defies the laws of physics and he doesn't know that and you don't know that, then what he's doing is perfectly acceptable in his world. This is (generally) a bad thing, because we've been lead to believe that this world is based upon the real world, and suddenly showing us that it's not is very jarring. Same goes for computers.
Depending on how much the reader knows about computers (it doesn't even need to be that much), it might just fuck up Suspension of Disbelief.
6036790
Yeah, I see what you're saying.
I'm gonna try and keep myself away from the inner, INNER technicalities of computers, because, well, I don't know enough to go that far. However, what I do know I will apply and if there's something sketchy I will research it. I allowed David's lack of knowledge pass because honestly it could happen. You could have an expensive computer and still not know what to do with it a lot of the time.
This is the problem I had with choosing Twilight as the feature pony. She's smart, but I think she might be too smart for me to write in her current environment.
6036790 Freak the FUCK out. Yeah, good plan. I like that plan. Good plan.
6036889 Eh, inner technicalities aren't really necessary for fiction. If you're doing a plot-arc based on something computer related, a simple google search should do the trick.
That said, I love the concept. So many possible plot-arcs that can be explored.
I wonder how Twilight would deal with David's microphone breaking. If they'd be able to communicate anyway.
6036977
How would you react to realizing that someone has coded a sapient being into existence and placed it into your computer?
Or at least something that can reasonably simulate one?
... Actually, maybe I could copy the exe and sell it to some senior CS major that's stuck on his thesis and needs to cheat. Make a quick buck.
6033968 mine too... I don't think I have seen something like this.
Color me interested.
You have my attention.
This is good so far. Can't wait for more!
Smacking the Follow Button now!
Twilight trapped in a computer? And she only takes up a gig of memory and a chunk of the cpu? Well that is magic then.
Also, $800 being an expensive computer?
. In an expensive computer, I'd spend more on the graphics card! An expensive Pc is between $2,000 and $10,000 with about $5000 being the sweet spot I would aim for if I had crap tons of cash. For $5000 I could get 32 gigs of ram, an i7, a custom liquid loop, two Titan X Gpu's in Sli, and maybe a Pci-e SSD if I had the space left over after the two Titans.
Great story! Keep it up!!!
6037021 CS major? Patent that shit, copy it and sell it to AAA companies. (Or would that technically be slavery? Sapient beings and all that.)
6037122
I based that number off of my friend's PC, where he would brag to me that all it cost was around 800$ because he bought all the parts separate and put it together himself. I would never hear the end of it because of how I bought a mac at the time and that his PC was "the best gaming PC ever"
...Unless I forgot the exact numbers. It was a little bit above 800, I think, and that was about four years ago.
Alt-F4
just kidding. tracking this story.
I had a feeling this story would get featured
6037275 I can see how you could brag about that, $800 is really cheap for a good PC. The best I've ever seen anyone do was $200 for something equivalent to what companies like Alienware charge $3000 for.
(octo-core i7, 8 gigs ram, terabyte hard drive, liquid cooled, and a Radeon r9290x)
6037275 Hehe. 800 is fairly standard for a "workable" system that will last about a year until it's getting too dated. Double that and you'll end up with a system that will be able to hang in a few years without suffering too much from the expected graphics development.
Personally, I believe that 1200-1700 is a reasonable price for the computer itself, then you'll add a few hundred more for mouse, keyboard, screen(s). Of course, with this you will still get somewhat "dated" equipment, but it'll be quality stuff that should last you a while
Looks like I found me my next favourite read.
Maybe Hackerman can hack her out of the computer by altering the space-time continuum !
Anyways , let's see how it goes from here.
6036475 AI TWILIGHT! YES!
6037217 That's the issue, isn't it. If Dwarf Fortress ever fills out its scope of simulating quantum mechanics, then I'd advocate having the developer and any continued players put to death for mass murder.
There's potential in this premise. Curious to see where you go with it. I do have some concern that if you're not careful this might go...nowhere.
As someone who is familiar with computers, personally if I was in David's situation shutting it off wouldn't be my first inclination. I mean, it's obviously not "just" a virus. If I didn't recognize the name Twilight, I'd assume that it probably was a prank, but a very clever one, and that pony.exe was connecting me to a live speaker. Voice chat, basically. And if somebody went to all the trouble to make a "virus" just to talk with a stranger, and make a pretty story...hey,I'd totally talk to them. That's interesting.
Of course in this case, through the normal course of conversation things would start coming that were obviously "not right." And that would make me suspicious. So assuming that it was engaging me in chat with somebody, when I was ready to test it, I'd simply unplug the network cable from my computer.
And if that didn't cut off the conversation...at that point, pony.exe becomes a very interesting thing.What we've seen from Twilight so far is already better than a chatbot is likely to be able to do.
It looks promising. Looking forward to the next chapters.
6036629 Heh. My dad's an IT Tech and unplugging the router is still our go-to strategy for dealing with network problems.
6037945
You watched too much "Kong Fury".
This was not quite what I was expecting, but I'll follow along for now.
6036790 To confuse a computer program in the Turning test, ask it what its favorite things are, then ask it why it favors those, and then ask it how each thing makes it feel.
Then do the same for things it doesn't like, and then follow that up by asking why it decided not to like those things while liking the others.
Inevitably, it's going to become stumped and generate an irrational response because it'll run out of pre-programmed responses or it simply cannot self-generate an appropriate-sounding response to the increasingly complex level of psychological abstractions.
This story is good. Keep writing.