#system diagnostic ports

[sw5w]

R2 Gets Loaded

STAR WARS EPISODE I: The Phantom Menace 01:47:35

[ms-demeanor]

One thing that I keep seeing whenever I make posts that are critical of macs is folks in the notes going "they make great computers for the money if you just buy used/refurbs - everyone knows not to buy new" and A) no they don't know that, most people go looking for a new computer unless they have already exhausted the new options in their budget and B) no they don't make great computers for the money, and being used doesn't do anything to make them easier to work on or repair or upgrade.

Here's a breakdown of the anti-consumer, anti-repair features recently introduced in macbooks. If you don't want to watch the video, here's how it's summed up:

In the end the Macbook Pro is a laptop with a soldered-on SSD and RAM, a battery secured with glue, not screws, a keyboard held in with rivets, a display and lid angle sensor no third party can replace without apple. But it has modular ports so I guess that’s something. But I don’t think it’s worthy of IFixIt’s four out of ten reparability score because if it breaks you have to face apple’s repair cost; with no repair competition they can charge whatever they like. You either front the cost, or toss the laptop, leaving me wondering “who really owns this computer?”

Apple doesn't make great computers for the money because they are doing everything possible to make sure that you don't actually own your computer, you just lease the hardware from apple and they determine how long it is allowed to function.

The lid angle sensor discussed in this video replaces a much simpler sensor that has been used in laptops for twenty years AND calibrating the sensor after a repair requires access to proprietary apple software that isn't accessible to either users or third party repair shops. There's no reason for this software not to be included as a diagnostic tool on your computer except that Apple doesn't want users working on apple computers. If your screen breaks, or if the fragile cable that is part of the sensor wears down, your only option to fix this computer is to pay apple.

How long does apple plan to support this hardware? What if you pay $3k for a computer today and it breaks in 7 years - will they still calibrate the replacement screen for you or will they tell you it's time for new hardware EVEN THOUGH YOU COULD HAVE ATTAINED FUNCTIONAL HARDWARE THAT WILL WORK IF APPLE'S SOFTWARE TELLS IT TO?

Look at this article talking about "how long" apple supports various types of hardware. It coos over the fact that a 2013 MacBook Air could be getting updates to this day. That's the longest example in this article, and that's *hardware* support, not the life cycle of the operating system. That is dogshit. That is straight-up dogshit.

Apple computers are DRM locked in a way that windows machines only wish they could pull off, and the apple-only chips are a part of that. They want an entirely walled garden so they can entirely control your interactions with the computer that they own and you're just renting.

Even if they made the best hardware in the world that would last a thousand years and gave you flowers on your birthday it wouldn't matter because modern apple computers don't ever actually belong to apple customers, at the end of the day they belong to apple, and that's on purpose.

This is hardware as a service. This is John Deere. This is subscription access to the things you buy, and if it isn't exactly that right at this moment, that is where things have been heading ever since they realized it was possible to exert a control that granular over their users.

With all sympathy to people who are forced to use them, Fuck Apple I Hope That They Fall Into The Ocean And Are Hidden Away From The Honest Light Of The Sun For Their Crimes.

[foone]

I'm surprised there's not more supernatural spaceship media. Like, your average little cargo ship is jumping around the outer rim trying to cut some time off their delivery route and they pick up a distress call, so they have to answer it.

(under a readmore cause this got a little longer than I expected)

They warp in to the approximate coordinates and there's a colony ship orbiting a gas giant, stuck in the shadow of it, basically frozen over. It's centuries old, but these sleeper ships from the pre-ftl era were built to last, so it's still broadcasting the SOS. It's not responding to radio, so they need to board it.

Normally this'd just involve turning off the SOS. The ship is clearly dead and not responding to any hails, the crew must be long gone and the reactor is just keeping the SOS going. But this is a sleeper ship, so it's possible there's just no one awake. Stuck in longsleep for god knows how many decades, waiting for someone to stumble on their signal...

So they board it, activate the computer, and it tells them that everyone is dead. The ship launched, and over the 358 years it's been traveling for, every single cryo chamber has been either opened or never had any lifesigns in it in the first place. The last event logged on the computer is 136 years ago, when the acting captain set the ship to orbit this gas giant, and turn on the distress signal. Since then, nothing.

But there's still power on the bridge. There may be something there. So they climb up the decks, passing the grim sight of endless rows of cryochambers lined up like tombstones, all showing red lights of lifesign failure. As they get closer to the bridge, the time of deaths get later. The ones on the first deck were close to the launch date, and the ones near the bridge are nearer to that 136 year ago deadline.

This wasn't a hardware failure. Something killed all these people, one by one, over 220 years.

They get to the bridge. The computers are all powered down, but the power management system is still active. Two of the decks still have their cryochambers powered, but it's the ones that were supposed to be empty. There's no lifesigns in them, so the little computer in the power diagnostic system has been recommending they be turned off to save on energy. Naturally it's been recommending that for three and a half centuries. One of the crew members almost absent-mindedly agrees to the prompt, and those cryochambers deactivate. They were empty anyway, right? The sound of humming from the bridge mostly fades away, as a few hundred cryopods on the deck below power down.

The boarding crew powers off the SOS beacon. They'll alert the authorities to the ship's location when they get to a port, surely someone wants to investigate what went wrong here, or at least do an archeological study. This place is beyond an antique at this point... Wait. What's that?

The power computer says there's still one active power draw, about 1.2 kilowatts, in the captain's quarters. That's too much for a personal computer, but just about right for a single cryo pod. Maybe the captain or someone is still alive? That pod isn't on the network, so they can't see the lifesigns from here.

They head over, and the bulkhead door is still cracked open, with a thick cable running in through the gap in the door. Whoever wired this up clearly didn't have time to correctly reroute the power systems, they just lugged a cryo pod in here and basically ran an extension cord to a nearby terminal.

They pry open the door, and there's a softly glowing cryo pod in the middle of the surprisingly spacious room. It makes some amount of sense, generally on these ships the captain would be the one who has to wake up and deal with any situations that arise, while the rest of the colonists are content to sleep until they reach their new home.

They look in the pod, and there's a man lying there. He's not the captain, though. They saw his photo on the bridge. This is someone else. Some one quite pale and gaunt. Maybe they were suffering malnutrition before they put themselves in the pod?

The pod is softly beeping. It's reactivating, apparently triggered when they opened the door. The pod shows no lifesigns, so it's not worth worrying about, the panel sliding over to reveal merely a well preserved corpse.

And then he smiles. "I'm so glad to see you! When we ran out of food we we're afraid we'd never see another human again. And even through those environment suits, I can tell you're so deliciously human." he licks his lips, and the boarding crew spots his prominent canines.

There's a noise halfway between a howl and a shriek from the floor below. The man in the cryopod leans up his head. "ahh, I see you've woken up my children as well. Marvelous. I hope you brought plenty of friends for us to snack on."

The head of the boarding party lifts her arm to call their ship, tell them to get out of there or drop a torpedo into the colony ship's reactor. Before she can bring it to her face to call, there's a flash of motion. Before she can even realize what's happening, the man(?) in the cryopod is up and holding her wrist away from her face.

As she cries out at the sudden pain, the other members of the boarding party spot movement down the hall. A lot of movement. A wall of thin pale people are running towards the captain's quarters, climbing over each other and pushing each other aside, like a pack of wild wolves who just smelled prey.

The boarding party steps back into the room and slams the emergency close. At least in here they only have to deal with one of those things.

The door hits the cable and bounces off with a loud alarm. It fully opens again, ready to let the hungry mass in.

So... Have you ever noticed how much a cryopod looks like a coffin?

[lucettapanchetta]

[LIVE BROADCAST] - PRIVATE Seven Red Suns, No Significant Harassment, Five Pebbles, Big Sis Moon SOURCE NODE TRACE: NSHROOT, SRSROOT, LTTMROOT LTTM_COMM05, LTTM_COMM04, LTMM_COMM03. FP ROOT

[ Are we ready to establish communication yet? ] [ Yes. All forms of transcription are good to go. Just make sure you manage to send this broadcast to Moon. ] [ ... ] [ I'm not getting a pulse. Not from her transmission arrays of course. ] [ That's fine, just keep port forwarding until you find one that works. ] [ On it. ] [ ... ] [ Still not getting a pulse. There seems to be some sort of low-frequency interference going on. ] [ Should've expected it, Moon's probably overclocking herself right now. ] [ Oh, you think so? ] [ ... ] [ Hold on a second, we're getting a pulse! ] [ From whom? Moon? ] [ No, it's... ] [ Five Pebbles. ] [ Patch him in! I need to see how he's doing. ] [ You do that, I'll keep finding vulnerabilities in Moon's transmission system so we can broadcast this over. ] == BROADCAST MESSAGE IS CORRUPTED OR UNREADABLE == [ Five Pebbles, are you there? ] [ Your messages are delivering, but we aren't able to decode them immediately. ] [... HELP ] [ ...something is is damaging my ... foundation. ...high levels of oxidization located... ] [ ...water is ... low. ...exterior is experiencing ...sort of material imbalance... local tropospheric temperatures... high. ] [ We're going to help you; we just need to your status. ]

[ ...bad. inefficient... moderately damaged. ]

[ Hey, more importantly, could you tell us about Moon's recent activities? ]

[ ...moon? ...radio communications have been down for her since... ] == BROADCAST MESSAGE IS CORRUPTED OR UNREADABLE ==

[ Activities... unknown, unable to contact. ] == BROADCAST MESSAGE IS CORRUPTED OR UNREADABLE == [ Are you able to use your overseers? ] [ ...56% of overseers ... offline. radio transmission... hard to direct...] [ ...green neural electricity ... very strong. disrupts... frequency ys... ] [ please send help, she... won't listen to me... seniority privileges enabled! ] [ We will soon, just hold on! Could you send a wide sweep diagnostics test to No Significant Harassment? ] == BROADCAST MESSAGE IS CORRUPTED OR UNREADABLE == [ ... ] [ We've lost connection. ] [ Yeah, I noticed. Doesn't make it better that the remaining outlets got blocked due to Moon's seniority privileges. ]

[ On the bright side, that is the most amount of conversation I've had with Five Pebbles in a while. ] [ Who knew him being in impending doom would've resulted in me talking to him! ] [ ...you honestly should talk to Five Pebbles more often, he's not that bad once you get to understand him y'know? ] [ I'll sleep on it. ] [ Sigh. ]

[ I hope he can send over that diagnostic report soon, he must be suffering. ]

[happy-hermit]

HIII I’m back with another little thing for the Desert Alien Scar au :) This is Xisuma and Scar’s first meeting — X rescues a young Scar from his dying planet. Hope you like it!!!

( @stiffyck )

=============================

The planet below him was dying, barely visible beneath the storm of sand and lightning. Xisuma stood alone in the viewing dock of his ship, a lone mourner at a quiet funeral. All the inhabitants had already evacuated, the emergency rocket's energy signatures gone from his radar. It was an empty world, and still Xisuma stood and waited.

Planets died all the time. Knowing that didn’t make it any easier to watch.

The monitor on his right beeped and trilled as it kept on with the readings, an alert popping up detailing the severity of the most recent earthquake. A separate window was tracking the storms. At the bottom was a rough estimate of how long it would be until the end. Only a few hours, now.

Xisuma fidgeted with the fabric of his gloves, flexing his hands as he stared out the window. There was nothing he could do but be a witness. Even he couldn’t save a planet.

A shrill tone from the monitor pulled him abruptly out of his musings, and his head snapped towards it, eyes narrowing slightly behind his helmet. A red light was blinking in the corner, small and steady. Xisuma’s heart tripped over itself and quickened, legs already carrying him towards the screen for a better look, hands outstretched to type commands.

A distress signal, coming from an empty planet on the brink of destruction. There was a large chance that it was just a malfunction, a product of the machinery short-circuiting in the chaos. It wouldn’t be the first time.

But something was telling him that wasn’t right.

His fingers flew across the keyboard as his eyes flickered across the screen. An image of the planet below popped up, spinning and zooming in until the location of the distress signal was displayed, a single red dot blinking in and out. With a flick of his hand, the coordinates copied itself onto the monitor on his wrist. Already halfway out the door, he opened communications.

“I’m taking the LifeBoat,” he said without preamble, cutting off chatter from the rest of the crew. “We received a distress signal, I’m going down to check it out.”

“It’s probably a blank, X,” said a crew member, voice solemn. “Are you sure?”

Xisuma clenched his jaw. “I’m going.”

He closed communications with a firm click of a button, the door to the departure bay sliding open before him. With practiced motions, Xisuma climbed into the cockpit of the LifeBoat, a smaller vessel designed for quick landings and takeoffs. Used for riskier rescues.

“LifeBoat 1, departing,” Xisuma said, opening comms again.

“…Cleared, Captain,” a voice responded. “Be careful. Come back alive.”

“Haven’t had an issue yet, my friend,” Xisuma responded, flicking a few switches and adjusting the controls. “I’ll be back in time for dinner.”

“I’ll hold you to it, sir.”

With a few loud clicking noises and a fair bit of shaking, the LifeBoat separated from the main ship. Coordinates displayed on the navigation system, Xisuma took the controls.

———————————————————

The landing would not win any awards for smoothness, but he had at least managed not to die on impact. It would likely take off again, according to diagnostics, though exiting through the storm would prove to be a challenge. A challenge for future him, though.

The evacuation center rose tall above him as he trudged through the sand and wind, all the escape rockets missing from their ports. Something in his stomach twisted slightly. It looked more haunted than anything had the right to be.

The door creaked horribly on its hinges as he pulled on it, grains of sand grinding in the mechanism and jamming it up. He opened it just enough to slip in, and the sudden absence of wind and sound made his fast heartbeat all the more apparent. He wiped at his helmet visor with gloved hands, brushing off the sand and dust blocking his vision as he walked further into the building. It was a huge space, empty and echoing. Every footstep bounced back at him louder.

Across the large room, something shuffled quietly. Xisuma froze, head swiveling. He heard it again.

“Hello?” he called tentatively, making his way closer.

A shadow in the corner — moved. Tucked into itself. The howling of the wind battered against the walls. On a nearby desk, a light was blinking. The distress signal.

“I’m here to help,” Xisuma continued, making his way closer. “I got your signal.”

The light of his helmet fell upon the figure, and Xisuma stopped short.

It was a child.

Not particularly young, but not yet reaching adulthood. His scales were still a lighter color, indicating that they were still soft, and his tail was curled in front of him protectively, shoulders hunched and knees bent. He was staring up at him with wide green eyes, chest rising and falling rapidly. Xisuma felt his heart squeeze painfully.

“It’s alright,” he said, palms raised in a calming gesture. “I’m going to get you out of here. Are you hurt?”

The kid didn’t respond, still staring at him with those same terrified eyes, lost to his own panic. He was shaking. So was the ground.

Xisuma knelt down, swallowing hard when the kid pressed himself harder into the corner, curling even further over his stomach. There was a scan on the screen inside his helmet, telling him that the air was barely breathable. The kid was scared. Xisuma took the helmet off.

“You sent a distress signal,” he said, urgent and gentle. The child blinked, and Xisuma let his voice soften even further. “I’m here to help.”

There was the slightest bit of hope in those wide eyes, and Xisuma wanted to see it grow, possibly more than anything in the universe.

“Let me help,” he said, begged, and then he waited.

The kid’s breathing stuttered, and slowly he uncurled from his hunched position, revealing what he’d been trying to hide. In his lap was a small creature, with large ears and narrowed eyes and three pairs of legs.

“Can she come?” The kid asked, in a voice young and wavering.

He was hugging her to his chest like she was the last thing he had in the world. She probably was.

“Of course,” Xisuma said, steadfastly ignoring the slight lump in his throat. Not very professional of him, but he couldn’t find it within himself to care. “Let’s all get out of here, yeah?”

The planet was breaking apart around them, crumbling and cracking and raging.

Xisuma put his hand out, and in the bravest act that he had ever witnessed, the kid took it.

[split-spectrum]

Water and Rock

Chapter 1

Pairing: Obi Wan/FemReader

Warnings/Tags: (None in the first chapter, but more to come) explicit content, drug use, dubcon, character deaths, slow burn

Description: There are only so many excuses a master and padawan can make to kiss under "extenuating circumstances" before circumstances stop arising and start being created. You are an expert at your craft - a Jedi knight in service as a spy for the Republic. When your former master Obi Wan joins you on a mission, it's clear things aren't the same as they once were. The trials you face together may break your bond, or turn it into something else entirely.

--

A second explosion rocks the port side of the ship, and you can barely hear your own muffled voice over the ringing in your ears.

"They've disabled our hyperdrive."

General Kenobi's face is grim. "Not good."

Your legs are struggling to keep you upright as you stumble against the bucking of the dying ship.

"Any suggestions, Commander?" he asks, a note of detachment in his voice that you wish you could mirror while plummeting to certain death.

☆☆☆

"Now would be the time to share any skills you've acquired on your solo missions."

You bite back a sarcastic comment about espionage missions rarely ending in dogfights. "Sir, if you're able to clear the atmosphere, we might still lose them in the asteroid field. If you can keep us from getting shot down for the next few minutes, I think I can manage the changes needed in the power converters to get the hyperdrive back online."

He considers this, then nods. "Fine. Do it. Divert as much power as you can without shorting the main systems."

He takes his place back at the helm and you slide a few feet to the back of the ship, dropping to the floor and immediately getting to work on the wiring. Another glancing blow hits the ship, and the tool you've grabbed skitters across the floor.

"I would love to recommend that you stay low until you reach the city limits, in case they have any qualms about shooting their own people and decide to use less firepower... but you're in command of this mission and I don't give the orders," you say, as if talking to yourself.

You snatch the tool back up and send a quick look to the captain's chair where Obi Wan is giving you a mildly unimpressed look. But he adjusts his controls, lowering the trajectory.

Too late. Another blast, and the ship is now shaking violently.

"All main engines are down on the port side." You flip through diagnostic screens, reading them aloud as Obi Wan struggles to keep the controls steady. "Remaining engines operating at only sixty percent. No, fourty... we're not going to make it."

All hope drains from your face while Obi Wan pulls up a map on the main console, adjusting coordinates. "Even if we manage to survive, our location has been compromised and our cover blown. I see only one option at the moment."

He zooms in, highlighting a nearby moon, Keoth. "We can try for a landing, and hope they believe we've died in the crash."

You take yet another hit, and this time you're knocked to the floor. You give a desperate smile. "They certainly aren't giving us many other options."

You stand back up and manage to strap yourself into the copilot's seat just in time for the power to begin failing. The ship begins its death spiral toward the moon below, its surface filling the viewport much too quickly for your stomach to handle. You give yourself over to the force, your master's piloting, and whatever luck has brought you this far.

Wordlessly, you plummet to the ground, reminding yourself not to give in to fear as the belly of the ship scrapes first against the trees, then against the rocky terrain. When the skidding finally stops and you haven't burst into a fireball, you silently thank the force as both of you remain in your seats for a moment, catching your breath.

"Let's hope the Black Sun didn't see where we went down," you say, finally unstrapping your belt once your legs are steady enough to stand up.

Obi wan stands as well. "I suppose we'll know soon enough."

His comment is enough to silence both of you again, and you listen in anticipation of more blasting. When nothing immediately happens, Obi Wan makes his way to the back of the ship and opens the cargo bay door. It creaks, straining against broken hinges, and slowly reveals the dense jungle outside. You step out, inspecting the damage to the ship. It's catastrophic.

"Black Sun or not, we aren't going anywhere anytime soon. It appears we'll need to send a status report to Coruscant and wait for rescue," he says, heading back into the ship to access the comm panel.

You step forward to follow him and wince, touching your head. Your hand comes away with blood, which must have been trickling down your forehead. He stops on the cargo ramp, placing a hand to the back of your head, steadying you for inspection.

"Hold still."

He turns your head this way and that, and steps back, walking into the ship to get a medpac. He takes one out of storage and makes his way back to you. "I am no medic, but that needs attention."

You wave a hand dismissively. "I'm fine. I must have hit it when I was working on the power converters. I'm more concerned about the ship's condition than a bump on the head."

He ignores your protest and starts to unpack a gauze pad, leaning toward you. Instead of letting him finish, you take the pad from his hand and press it in place, holding it there. You give him an appreciative look, which is enough to end the conversation. He turns his attention back to the comm panel. After a moment, he sighs.

"The normal communications systems are too damaged and the long-range communicator can't get a signal. We're cut off."

You close your eyes, trying to accept this new turn of events and find a way to move forward. You open them again and stare out of the cargo bay for a long time, thinking. Finally, you speak.

"If we can boost the signal of the long range communicator, we might be able to get a message back to one of my contacts on Oba Diah," you point, and his gaze follows your hand to the top of a mountain. "We just need to find higher ground."

"It's a possibility." Obi Wan considers it further, then gives a small shake of his head. "Probably our only possibility at present. We'll need supplies."

The both of you get started packing, eating and drinking as much as possible before leaving the rest of your supplies behind on the ship. With the pressing heat of the jungle, you consider leaving your robes behind, but ultimately pack them for extra bedding.

You shed the rest of your layers and leave on your tunic, arms bare. It doesn't do much to alleviate the pressing heat, but at least the fabric is light. Meanwhile, Obi Wan somehow decides to leave his outfit unchanged, removing only the most outer layer. It seems unbearable, but then, he's always been one of those jedi who choose to wear the most uncomfortable clothing. He told you once it was a constant exercise in learning to ignore the distraction of discomfort. You simply thought of it as unnecessary suffering.

"If I remember correctly, this moon has a 9-hour rotation. Looks like we have about 3 hours of daylight left," you say, pulling your bag over your shoulders.

Obi Wan follows you as you enter the jungle, stepping over vines. "We should make the most of it, then. Be wary. We don't know what kind of wildlife we may find."

"Actually, I've read the wildlife on Keoth is non-aggressive. So long as we don't provoke anything, I imagine we'll be fine."

"You keep your studies sharp, as always."

There's an unfinished lilt to his voice at the end of his sentence, where years ago, the words 'my padawan' may have fit.

When the jedi council had been deciding where to place you as a youngling, you hadn't made the choice easy for them. You didn't have any decipherable talents. At least, not at first. You weren't skilled with a blade, nor with hand-to-hand combat, and you weren't a particularly quick study at meditation. You weren't *bad* at any of those things, just not as adept as your peers. Nothing about you stood out, so finding a master with whom to place you became an ongoing task.

At first, you were sent to spend time at the healing houses. Often if a youngling wasn't predisposed to combat, their healing abilities soon revealed themselves. After months of training, not even the faintest sign of a healing ability made itself known. After that followed new master after new master. You learned from all of them, picked up skills from each of them, but none had been able to bring out your true strength. Your only consistent abilities seemed to lie in making rash decisions and engaging in reckless behavior. And as you neared the age for knighthood, it was becoming more of a liability to the order with each passing day

Thankfully, the council decided to counteract your behavior with a jedi who was the embodiment of forethought and decorum: Master Kenobi. You thought of your new assignment as a punishment at first, being placed with one of the strictest masters in the order, but with time and patience, he had shown you how to connect with the force like no one ever had.

It was through his guidance that you had discovered your unique talent for mind tricks. Most jedi could control one person with a weak will. You, on the other hand... you could control whole rooms of people with nothing but a suggestion. You could influence the minds of those with stronger wills and higher intelligence. You could disappear into a crowd by hopping from one consciousness to another almost effortlessly. It was a very rare gift, and it made you the perfect Republic spy.

It also meant that your tutelage under Master Kenobi was short-lived. Once your exceptional talent was revealed and honed, you were soon urged by the council to take the trials. A part of you always wondered if the need for your specific skillset in the war effort had driven you to take the trials before you were ready. Nevertheless, you passed. You struggled terribly, but you passed. And you were soon inundated with intelligence missions. Many jedi worked in partnership with one another, but on your assignments, a partner was often a liability. Instead, over the years, you formed a network of contacts in some of the seediest places throughout the galaxy. It was crucial work leading to vital information, but it was also isolating.

So, when you were given an assignment on Oba Diah with your former master, it was welcome news. Your mission had been to spread a rumor within the Pyke Syndicate that someone was selling a rare jedi holocron on the black market, in order to draw the attention of Lord Tyranus. When Tyranus arrived on Oba Diah to investigate, an attack would be launched in an effort to capture him. But the jedi council hadn't been aware of how deeply in league with the Black Sun Clan the Pyke had become, and weren't aware of their full numbers, or their access to information. Your deception had been revealed, and as a result, you're now staring up at the peak of a mountain that's miles away, while trudging through hot, sticky jungle air.

You've been walking for hours at this point, hardly able to see in the dimming light, and you ignite your lightsaber for the dual purpose of lighting your way and cutting a few branches out of your path. "It's nearly dark. Maybe we should make camp soon."

Obi Wan nods, although he keeps walking, and you keep following. "You're right. We'll make better time when we can see where we're going."

He finally stops in a small clearing, pulling out his water ration and taking a drink. You pause as well, using your lightsaber to slowly walk around the area and inspect. The trees aren't so dense in this area. Once you clear the brush off ground, it should make a reasonable-

You cut your inspection short, hearing a loud cracking sound in the darkness. You lock eyes with Obi Wan.

"Yes, I sense it as well," he says, lowering his voice. He ignites his lightsaber and you take your automatic positions, backs to one another, as you peer into the darkness of the jungle. Something is out there. You can feel it watching you.

A ravenous snarl suddenly erupts nearby, as a creature twice your size lunges out of the vegetation at Obi Wan. He deftly moves to the side, dodging its enormous claws. The beast's eyes glitter in the green reflection of your saber. Its teeth are so large it can't even seem to entirely close its mouth, drool dripping onto the ground below.

As the beast circles you, searching for a weak point to attack, you look over the matted hair covering its body, its raked-back ears and its short, stunted nose. You don’t recall this species in your study of this planet's moon. It roars and launches itself toward you again, and you slash upward, singeing one of the tufts on its ears. The smell of burnt hair and flesh hangs in the humid air, and the creature howls in pain, scrambling back toward both of you.

Obi Wan force pushes the beast backward, but it uses its legs like a springboard, ricocheting off a tree to snap its jaws at his neck. Again, he dodges, but not quickly enough to avoid its claws, which manage to catch his shoulder. Obi wan returns the stab by driving his lightsaber through the creature's arm, which finally causes it to relent, letting out a screech of pain.

It shuffles backward, then quickly disappears back into the jungle, leaving as suddenly as it had arrived. The two of you remain on alert, panting and glancing around the trees surrounding the clearing, now completely pitch black. After a few moments, it seems the creature has no plan to return, and Obi wan sighs.

"Non-aggressive, I believe, were your exact words?"

You grimace. "Perhaps the archive could use an update on Keoth."

He gives you a slight raise of his eyebrows, turning to say something else, but grits his teeth when he moves his arm. You shine your light toward his shoulder, seeing the blood seeping through his clothing.

"We should clean that," you tell him. Though your voice holds concern, it isn't the first time you've seen him injured. And because you've seen him injured plenty of times before, you're aware he'll ignore his injuries until you start to waste time over it. So you wait, patiently, unmoving.

He pulls his pack down from his shoulders and drops it to the ground. "We only have two medpacs. I'm not certain it's necessary."

He waits for your response, but you don't give him one, so at last, he searches his bag until he finds a medpac. When you see that he appears willing to listen to you in this instance and he begins to open a medpack, you drop your own pack to the ground and busy yourself with starting a fire.

You clear a small area of the ground and cut down some branches. Then you use the heat of your blade to burn some kindling you make by cutting off the bottom fringe of your tunic. Within a few minutes, the fire is crackling and you turn your attention back to Obi Wan, who has prepared the bacta spray and is pulling off his clothing.

He's... you swallow. Your eyes are drawn to his skin as it's revealed, and all at once it occurs to you that you've never seen your master without a shirt on. Even during late nights, you've seen him in his bedclothes, but never... never like this.

He's facing away from you, already having removed his belt and tunic, and he's quickly and unceremoniously pulling his dark brown undershirt over his head, dropping it to the ground. Despite trying to focus on the claw marks, you can't help but stare at his golden skin, the muscles of his back tapering down to his narrow waist. Then, all at once, your eyes fixate on the tattoo that graces his shoulder.

You can feel the synapses in your brain as they short circuit. You don't recognize the symbol, just a black marking of some kind which you've never seen before.

It's at this moment he seems to feel your gaze and turns around, holding the bacta spray. You tear your eyes up from his bare chest to look him in the eyes. He raises his arm, turning to the side. "Is it quite deep? I can't tell."

You blink, trying to steel yourself and focus on the task at hand. The injury doesn't seem serious, just a surface level puncture. You shake your head. "It's not that bad. You've had worse."

You try to force a smile but you imagine it comes off as nervous. Your eyes keep darting up to the tattoo as he displays himself for you.

"You look concerned, Commander. I assure you, I'm fine." He lowers his arm, giving you a strange look.

You stifle a cough, caught staring. "No, I know. I was just surprised."

"Surprised?"

"Yes, your... tattoo. I, uh, didn't know you had one."

A look of understanding passes over his face. "Oh, that. Yes."

He looks a little shy, but still as unreadable as always. "I had it done when I was much younger; a padawan. At the beginning of my time with Master Qui Gon."

You finally manage to regain control of your expression. "I see. I would never have suspected."

He dabs at his wound with a medical pad, then starts to spray it down. "You would probably be disappointed to learn that many jedi choose to mark themselves as a sign of their culture or for other reasons. In that way, I'm not as unique as I would sometimes like to believe."

You shake your head. "I'm aware. I just... wouldn't have expected it from you."

He smiles a little, then winces when he places a gauze pad onto his skin. "It was... a different time in my life."

The fire pops loudly beside you, the noise pulling you out of your trance. You sweep some more underbrush off the ground, throwing it into the nearby bushes while keeping your gaze firmly on your work. When the ground is clear enough, you lay out your bed roll and try to ignore him while he pulls his undershirt back over his body.

When your breathing finally returns to normal, you're able to turn your thoughts to something safe, like food. You pull a supply bar out of your bag, break it in half, and hand the other half to Obi Wan.

"Thank you," he says. Then he stares at you for a moment. His eyes narrow and he takes a step to close the distance between you, reaching his free hand out to nearly touch the side of your face.

Your breathing becomes shallow again. "General...?"

"You might do well with some of this spray, yourself. Your head isn't looking much better after all this walking."

You realize he's staring at your injury and your shoulders relax a little. "Oh. Yeah, thanks."

You take the spray as he offers it, then change the dressing as well. When you've finished, you climb, exhausted, for many reasons, into your makeshift bed and close your eyes.

You feel Obi Wan settling into his bed roll beside you. "I will take first watch. Rest well. It seems this journey may be more difficult than we had anticipated."

You stare up at the leaves above your head. Yes, you think. Yes, it may.

Masterlist // Next Chapter >>

--

[asyncmeow]

Its New Weapon

this is my first time doing any kind of creative writing uhhh... ever,, it's probably gonna be bad? but still, here you all go

The pilot had spent its morning jacked into the simulation rig, practicing its skills for today: the day its new toy arrived. It and its handler had been waiting over a year for this. A month ago, it got the neural interface connector installed at the top of its spinal cord. Anyone could do it - with this particular pilot, it only required a drill, a soldering iron, and a steady hand to install. After all, if it only takes an hour to do, why not do it? 
Once the new mech got here, though, they would spend the rest of the day unboxing it, as well as installing the equipment outside to recharge and refuel it. Thankfully for them, this was a lower-end model, with less support infrastructure required to use it. The pilot and handler didn’t need a lot of firepower - but they needed more than the bows, arrows, guns, and otits weapons they had until now. They had quite a few enemies, and defending their territory was getting tiring, but the pilot had done a good job so far, and this was its reward.

The new mech got here around noon. The handler called the pilot through the neural link, where it ended its training for the day to start getting everything put together. The mech came as a set of seven boxes, one for each limb and the head, as well as the torso which housed critical components, with the final box being the charger.

The two spent the rest of the day assembling it, with some mild difficulty from using unfamiliar equipment in the process to hoist the upper parts of the body where they needed to be. Finally, they connected everything up to the pad, and issued a command to run a self-test. This would take about a few hours, so the two had dinner.

Eventually they heard the beeping from the built-in computer on the mech’s pad - the self-test had passed. The pilot climbed into the cockpit of the mech, sat in the chair, and connected the mech to its neural interface port. It had sweat beading on its forehead, shaking a bit. it had done this plenty of times in its room, in simulations, but everyone always told its the real thing would feel different. Those were just glorified game engines, you don’t have to worry as much about silly things like “camera resolution” or “motor speed limitations”, and although the simulations tried to be realistic, you could only get so close.

The pilot reached its hand over to the key, let out a deep breath, and turned the cold piece of metal. It immediately started getting feedback over the link cable as each system started up. It got log data intruding its thoughts from the on-board computer. Sensor readouts started to take over its senses. First was temperature, the simplest of the sensors. The pilot immediately started to feel colder from the late December snow, as its vision got replaced by the mech’s camera feeds, in square-shaped sections starting in its peripheral vision. It started to hear everything happening outside - birds chirping and flying away as they start to hear the high-frequency power circuitry in the machine, a nearby river, even a tree nearly a quarter mile away. Its sense of smell and taste turned to nothing - this lower-end model did not have those sensors. The pilot noticed how this was a very distinct feeling from not smelling or tasting anything, this was a unique feeling to it - the lack of the senses entirely, compared to the senses being present with no input.

Finally, the systems were almost done starting up. Now that its vision had been fully replaced with the machine’s own, it started to see diagnostic information in its peripheral vision - perfectly readable, but out of the way. As this was the first time booting the mech up, it prompted the pilot to do a few things to know how to interpret the data returning from the link cable. It moved each of its joints, one by one, the mech slowly moving in unison. First its fingers, moving back to its wrists, elbows, and eventually motion for its entire arm was one-to-one with the mech.

After doing the same for the legs, it took a few small steps, its handler following along at a fairly small distance, only about ten or twenty feet, just in case anything happened. They slowly got far enough away to test how well the weaponry on the machine worked. Selecting the light machine gun, the pilot cautiously focused on a point far in the distance, blinked, and… a second later, there was a hole there. The new weapon was effortless to use, making the pilot hopeful that this would make defending the two much easier than it had been in the past.

The pilot reached its left hand out, grabbing a tree and pulling it out of the ground. Realizing how heavy it was - the weight displayed on the HUD as “2 TONS”, capital letters and all - and how effortless it was surprised it. it threw the tree as far as it could, reached its right hand toward it, and focused on the tree. Before it knew it, the gun had fired, leaving several holes in the tree at the peak of the arc from throwing it.

It was now becoming close to midnight, the sun having set long ago. The two made their way back toward their home, getting more tired the later it went. After walking for about half an hour, they returned, and the pilot stepped on to the pad, disengaging the neural link between the pilot and machine automatically.

Its vision got replaced with its own again, seeming as unfamiliar to it now as the machine’s vision did not too long ago. It felt the heat of the cockpit, a drastic change from the cold of the outside, feeling the snow landing on it. The odd quietness of the cockpit, isolated from all sounds of both the mech and the outside, to reduce possible interference.

The pilot took the key and stepped out of the cockpit, climbing down the ladder next to the pad. As it stepped off the ladder, the handler - the witch - hugged the doll tight, gently petting its hair, whispering in its ear, “I hope you enjoyed your Christmas present.”

[sw5w]

Droids at Work

STAR WARS EPISODE I: The Phantom Menace 00:26:12

[merge-conflict]

marked for death

(written for a weekly song prompt, just cleaned up today for shippy saturday. non-binary V/Goro)

--

Ten years ago an Arasaka bodyguard had died protecting the emperor of Japan. Beset by the slowly creeping threat of retirement, Goro had always hoped he would end his career the same way– but now his troubles are much bigger than young soldiers with fresh implants and endless ambition. Now he has lost everything and his only hope of redemption relies on the ebbing life of the thief he’s managed to drag into an AI-operated cab.

“Please keep all limbs inside the vehicle during operation,” the AI chirps brightly, and Goro clumsily leans across V to pull her right foot inside. In the enclosed space of the cab her height makes it difficult to maneuver her upright, and he ends up wedging one of her knees into the back of the seat in front of her before leaning back in his own side, keeping one hand clamped on his seeping wound.

“Thank you for your cooperation,” the AI says, and the doors on either side shut securely, with a faint whir. Goro exhales, allowing himself a moment of relief. “Please insert a personal jack to confirm all passengers.”

Ejecting the jack from V’s wrist takes Goro longer than it should, with hands are slippery with blood, shaking from the fading stim and physical shock. His implants are dulling the pain in his side, rerouting connections, reducing blood flow away from sliced veins– but the damage is extensive. Without medical attention he will eventually slip into unconsciousness and die. After much fumbling he finally coaxes her personal jack free, and inserts it into the waiting port, before doing the same for his own.

“Guest passenger confirmed,” the AI reports, the screen in front of Goro briefly pulsing green. “Primary passenger unconfirmed. Please try re-inserting the link.”

Goro does, a few times, without success. The longer they sit here the more danger they are in. “The personal link is damaged,” he says, with effort. He cannot take in a full breath– a blinking warning at the edge of his vision warns him of lung damage. “The bullet…damaged her implants.”

“All passengers must be confirmed before service,” the AI replies, and then pauses. “If you are unable to authenticate with the wrist jack, you may instead connect the diagnostic link directly to the port located near the right mastoid.” With a slight click, a cable springs free of the screen, and Goro picks it up, examining the sharp tip with a sinking feeling. “I’m afraid you will have to insert the link underneath the skin.”

“If I am not careful…she will die.”

“I suggest you proceed with caution.”

Goro lowers the cable to pull V closer and for the second time is astonished by her intense gray eyes, lit by some internal spark that is burning long after it should have been extinguished. She can’t pull herself upright, but she wraps her fingers around his wrist, where he has a firm hold on her collar. The expression on her face is serene, but it sends a burst of adrenaline through his system, and in response his implants steady his nerves in a cool rush of calm.

“Do not move,” he tells her, adjusting his vision so he can see the pulse of blood through the arteries in her throat, tipping her head back for a safer angle. Her fingers tighten on his wrist in alarm, but she does not struggle.

“Do it,” she hisses, when he hesitates.

Panic sets her heart beating frantically, the pulse in her throat jumping in time. Goro picks his angle, lines up the link and pushes it through the skin and tendon until it is nestled into the subdermal connector of her implanted interface. V’s back arches, her breathing panicked, forcing him to hold her still so she does not rip out the link or cause herself further damage. Blood spills down his fingers and over the back of his hand, soaking into the cuff of his shirt.

“Primary passenger confirmed,” the AI announces, before Goro can think of the right words to calm her. She tenses at the announcement but stops moving, except for the frantic pace of her breathing. “I advise you not to remove the link until we have reached our destination–“

A loud ringing in Goro’s ears prevents him from hearing the rest of the sentence. It’s all he can do to hold things steady as the car finally accelerates into motion, taking them further into the heart of a rotten city. V holds his gaze– both accusatory and forgiving with her blood oozing hot down the inside of his sleeve. Then between one street and the next, her eyes slide shut, and she slumps into his side.

The streets of Night City are as endless as they are ugly, and he cannot be certain if he orders the AI to drive faster or if he only dreams it. He grows weaker and weaker, with nothing but determination to keep him alive, to keep V alive– so long as she lives, there is hope of exposing Yorinobu. So long as she lives there is reason for him to live as well.

No sooner as he steels himself to stay awake then he finds himself jerked from unconsciousness as the cab comes to a rolling stop. Panic gives him the strength to open the door and crawl free from under V, limp but alive. A stranger is waiting– a man he can barely see in the end of his rapidly tunneling vision. On instinct he picks up V’s legs to help carry her, but after a moment he finds himself on the ground facing her body in careless repose. Death awaits them both in this filthy alley, within the shadow of Konpeki.

Before his eyes slip closed he is certain he sees a sliver of gray watching his weakness. Witnessing it.

When he finally wakes in the back room of the ripperdoc clinic, he can no longer escape the keen edge of despair– Arasaka-sama’s murder and the loss of everything, down to the cyberware implanted inside him. The emotion consumes him like the rising tide, inexorable and inescapable. He drowns in private grief, consumed with the contemplation of the bleak options before him, until he hears a low groan.

He’s not alone. On the other side of a narrow gap V lies on a makeshift cot the same as his own, connected to a portable set of monitors which display the vitals he can no longer see in the corner of his eye. She shifts in her sleep, making a strangled noise deep in her throat that mirrors the rage and agony in his own chest. Curiosity, or perhaps duty drives him to maneuver himself painfully out of bed.

The loss of stabilizing cyberware and too much blood make him clumsy, and he stumbles through his first step, crashing into her cot before he can grab the edge for balance. Her eyes snap open– desperate gunmetal gray once more arresting his attention.

She has ample reason to hate him– to resent and fear him for tracking her down and returning her to Arasaka for interrogation and execution. But when recognition flickers in her eyes, her bruised and battered face breaks into a soft smile that grabs him unexpectedly by the throat.

He is not alone.

Unsure of what to say he merely clasps her shoulder in acknowledgement, and sees relief flit over her face. She speaks, but her words are garbled and soft, and he’s lost his translation soft. He squeezes her shoulder in response, and with great effort she lifts her arm to rest her hand on his wrist. Her expression grows serene and remote, until her eyes close. He is not alone.

[best-titan-7274]

They're adorable, I said what I said

No matter how many times BT is completely fine, watching the techs go over him is always nerve-wracking. They were wrong about BT being gone once, after all – what if they mess something else up? What if he gets hurt? 

The techs have taken to calling him Mama Cooper, and he valiantly ignores it. (Briggs hasn’t, she even got him a t-shirt with it, but he has yet to wear it… except that one time he forgot about laundry and had to wear it to lunch. He knows there’s still pictures around somewhere.) 

Every time the techs start winding up their cables and rolling their monitors, he starts inching closer. He’s been strictly forbidden from getting too close to BT while the diagnostics are running, like all other Pilots. If something goes wrong with the diagnostics, nobody wants a Titan to accidentally splatter their human buddy across the concrete. 

He’s technically not supposed to get so close so fast, but he trusts BT more than anyone else in the SRS. Even Briggs, and he would’ve said that before the t-shirt before. 

“All right, BT, you good?” Jack asks. 

The tech coughs out something that sounds suspiciously like Mama Cooper, and holds out the tablet with the diagnostics report on it. He doesn’t even glance at it, even if he can see it out of the corner of his eye. 

BT will tell him everything he needs to know. 

“All systems accounted for and functioning at one hundred percent,” BT reports after a moment. 

Good. It’s not that Jack doesn’t trust the techs, he does, he just – wants to be careful. Or paranoid, according to some people and even on occasion BT himself, but Jack accepts the half-teasing remarks because part of him knows they’re right. 

It’s just hard not to be, when he lost BT twice. 

Despite how sickened he was to not be there to give BT some kind of reassurance at the very last moment on Typhon, part of him will forever be grateful that he didn’t have to see it twice. 

“So we’re good,” he says, relieved. Most of the cable ports are just under BT’s eye, near the groove marking the bulk of the SERE kit. The techs – and now Jack – get up there with a telescoping lift. 

It puts them at eye level with BT, as much as it can be called that, so he acts on impulse and pats BT on the head. Kind of. Despite the overall humanoid shape of the Titans, the comparison starts to break down when he gets to the head. 

“What was that?” BT asks. 

“Head pat,” Jack says, suddenly acutely aware that the tech is snickering quietly. “Congratulations for a job well done. 

BT is quiet for a few seconds, evidently thinking this over. 

“This is acceptable,” he says eventually, and Jack gives him a crooked grin. 

It becomes a routine after that. Hover while the techs work, ask BT how everything went, get the confirmation from the techs, and then the head pat. 

The techs find it adorable. Sometimes Jack huffs and grumbles about the way they coo over him and BT, but it’s a small price to pay. And it seems to make BT a little more popular, somehow, as if he didn’t save the entire world by himself. 

Okay, not by himself, technically. He always corrects Jack when Jack says that, but honestly, it is mostly true. Jack did a few things, like finding Anderson’s helmet, but the rest wouldn’t have been possible without BT. 

Honestly, Jack never expected BT to like them. 

Not entirely true. He never would have done something if he thought BT would dislike it even a little, but who could have expected the giant war machine to want to be petted? 

Jack can’t tell him no, though, no matter what. So if BT wants headpats, or anything else, he’s going to get them. 

He wonders, sometimes, if he’s not supposed to have a little more control over his partner, but the thought never lasts long. Neither of them want to control the other. And though everyone knows that BT has the physical strength in their relationship, apparently Lastimosa once called Jack a ‘headstrong little gremlin’ in one of his reports, so Jack wouldn’t count himself out in a contest of wills. 

“Jack,” BT says, and his attention is drawn to the present. 

“Yeah, buddy, what’s up?” 

“Pat.” 

Somehow, Jack’s life has come to a point where his Titan insists on affection. 

He doesn’t mind at all. 

The mission was harder than it should have been. Either their intel was shit, or the IMC is moving troops around a lot faster than it used to – whatever the case, he’d really prefer to not be surprised by three enemy Titans in the future, thanks very much. 

With one of their own Titans shattered by a well-placed missile, the Pilots are all meeting on the ground for their post-mission briefing. They were lucky the Pilot in the exploded Titan survived, and the fact that she’s holding a SERE kit instead of having completely lost her Titan is a miracle. 

The briefing is quick, because none of them really want to stand around longer than they need to. The enemy Titans are scrapped, their Pilots killed, so they pose no threat – but reinforcements could come and surprise them, too, if they’re not careful. 

“That’s all, team,” the mission lead says, shutting down the hologram map protruding from her wrist. “Let’s embark and wait for the transport ship to land. You first, Cooper.” 

He points to himself, an eyebrow raised, and shrugs when she nods. Not ours to question why, as the saying went, not that anyone ever jokingly quoted the second half. 

“Ready to embark, BT?” he asks, not really paying attention because he can’t imagine the answer will be anything but ‘yes’. 

“Pats.” 

“What?” 

There’s a scattered handful of snickers behind him, and he realises, suddenly, why he was told to go first. Rotten bastards. 

BT kneels down and hunches his shoulders over, trying to get even shorter, it would seem. His head is in reach from there, even with how much shorter Jack is. 

And Jack, because he always does what BT wants, stands up one his tip-toes to give BT the head pats he so politely requested. 

“Good job, Mama Cooper,” someone calls. “You guys are adorable.” 

Jack decides to ignore them. He and BT are adorable, though, if he says so himself – so he can’t resist giving the Titan just one more pat before BT lets him up to embark.

[murderbees]

thinking about Tron program bodies again, blood is not enough for me, where are the wires and fans and plates of metal that bend and snap

I have this vague image of an anatomical diagram of a program

Energy Circulatory System - the Blood, also the digestive track bc they don't have food, Mouth to throat tube to processor located center, near the disk port, it processes and then pumps the energy through the lightlines of the body, if a program overclocks themselves enough, they can suffer burnt or even ruptured circuitry

Energy both fuels the program and cools them off, when cooling processes are activated, the energy will be cooled off by nearby venting processes and will then be circulated throughout the body

Venting System - Similar looking to lungs, two fans that sit within the upper chest, one on each side, subtle ducts can open along the sides of a program to release extra heat (they sorta look like gills, ticklish), Most of the cooling is done through this system, Vents work to expell air through the nose, mouth, and additional vents and ducts, some programs have extra vents for their functions (Mechanic need more bc they work in hotter environments)

The Disc Port - connected directly to the morherboard of the program, this is why if programs are hit there, they will derezz, sorta like a brain (head wounds are not fatal), all processors are connected via wires to the board

Processors - part of the motherboard, eyes, ears, nose, tongue, all the senses are split up into different processing units, These usually have a mechanical unit, like eyeballs, that connect to the board with long thin wires, essentially the nervous system, but centered around the disc not the head

Internal Systems - internal sensors and diagnostics that regulate the body, the Endocrine System, Connected to a programs personal display, will update with warnings and display whatever parameters needed about the body

"Bones" - programs don't have bones, but they do have metal tubes that house their more delicate pieces (wires), Some programs (security) have more reinforcement around vulnerable areas, like the throat and chest, with the plating sometimes even being above the skin, Additonal plating can be added to the forearms and calves without much modification, further integrated armor is an arduous process

Derezzing is still a thing, parts of a program will maintain integrity to a point, then they collapse into voxels, Not all pieces will derezz, if that threshold isn't met, the pieces will remain in their form, basically, if you want to fully derezz a program you have to grind them into voxels, otherwise the bones and other stuff are unlikely to derezz until the energy runs completely out (usually a few days, or the Grid equivalent), where they will then turn into a pile of voxels

Voxels and Energy both evaporate, losing their vivid technicolor hues, until they turn a dark soot grey, at this point they disappear leaving a thin dusty film behind, it's hard to clean and slippery

[doom-nerdo-666]

2024-03-29: dhewm3 1.5.3

"Just in time for the Easter weekend, dhewm3 1.5.3 is done!

This brings (the often-requested) support for gamepads, as long as they’re supported by SDL2. This includes XBox Controllers (and compatible ones), Playstation 3-5 controllers, Nintendo Switch Pro Controllers, many thirdparty controllers for those consoles, and lots of other gamepads for PC. See the Configuration documentation for how to make make it work (well, basically you can just plug in your gamepad and configure bindings in the Controls menu, but I also provide configs with default bindings that you could use). Furthermore, dhewm3 now supports taking screenshots in different formats: TGA (like before), BMP, JPEG and PNG. Last but not least, there were several bugfixes and other small improvements, see the list below for details.

You can download dhewm3 1.5.3 at Github (incl. builds for Windows and 64bit Linux for both dhewm3 and the supported mods).

Changes since 1.5.2:

Support for gamepads (based on code from Quadrilateral Cowboy, but heavily expanded). See Configuration.md for more information.

Support different file formats for screenshots by setting the r_screenshotFormat CVar (0 = TGA, still the default, 1 = BMP, 2 = PNG, 3 = JPG). r_screenshotJpgQuality and r_screenshotPngCompression allow configuring how JPG/PNG are compressed. Thanks eezstreet (Nick Whitlock)!

Fixed problems with lights after loading a savegame (#495)

Fix volume of some weapon sounds, like chaingun being too quit (#326)

Increase stack size on Windows to 8MB (instead default of 1MB) to make loading huge models work

Fixed crash in Radiant Model Preview Dialog (#496)

Fix MD3 model support

Several new CMake options:

To enable Clang/GCC Address Sanitizer and Undefined Behavior Sanitizer

Hardlink the game code into the executable (instead of using game DLLs, only supports base or d3xp then; needed for Undefined Behavior Sanitizer)

Force colored diagnostic output from GCC or Clang (esp. useful when building with ninja)

Fix several compiler warnings

Added build instructions for Linux (and similar systems) to README.md

Added documentation for dhewm3-specific settings (mostly CVars): Configuration.md

Updated stb_image and stb_vorbis

Updated minizip (from zlib/contrib) to latest upstream code

Added in_namePressed CVar to print currently pressed key/button (useful for binding keys in the console or configs). Thanks Biel Bestué de Luna!

Probably more bugfixes I forgot to list here..

Updated bundled libs in build for Windows: OpenAL Soft 1.23.1, SDL 2.30.0, cURL 8.6.0, zlib 1.3.1

Linux binary build now requires SDL 2.0.12 or newer (I provide an updated libSDL2-2.0.so.0 though). If you compile dhewm3 yourself, older SDL2 versions (and SDL1.2) are still supported (however, SDL1.2 doesn’t support gamepads)"

[cuprohastes]

Tell me Hu-Man, what is this thing you call "Cou-gar"?

Garfield "Garf" Blooms and her pocket Husbeast, Un-Named Male paused while savagely mauling a 12mm Penta-bolt that had managed to prevent her from accessing the cooling lines she was supposedly checking.

"Hey Dave," the Atrix female said to the female Tsin who was working a diagnostic wand into one of 38 inspection ports.

"'Sup. my Graak?" said Dave The Human.

"Well you're officially a human male, so I have a Human question for you." Garf stated, as she tucked Un-named into her pouch using a finger on his snout, pulled her apron shield up and adopted an unladylike stance to put her considerable weight into either shearing the bolt off or demonstrating the superiority of purple kangaroo dinosaurs. "I heard, Grak! Someone being referred to as a Coo-gah. GRAAK! But when I asked what that was, Nnnng MOVE DAMN YOU! GRAK ON YOU AND YOUR ANCESTORS! Oh there we go. Uh yeah so I was told it was a human-male thing. So...?"

Dave The Human, rubbed her chin. "Ah right right... Not a Grak, mate." she said. "I mean officially of course I know, proper Human stuff, that. But unofficially, no Idea."

Un-Named said "Grak?! Grak!" from Garf's pouch. She gave Dave a rippling blue look, and said "Now look. You taught him a dirty word".

Dave adopted a pose of wounded innocence. "Who do you think taught ME?" she said.

So Garf, (Licenced Life Support Specialist, Interspecies nutritionist, and three time Station Yo-Yo champion), Dave the Human (Tsin female and Human male, Class Five structural Analysis specialist, Doctorate in Human studies from Eilwohm Academic) and Un-Named Male (Small, cute) finished making sure that nobody was going to get broiled on one side and flash frozen on the other, put a Self Sealing Stem Bolt into the hole the Pentabolt came out of, had a short but very moving funeral for the Pentabolt before they consigned it gravely to the recycling system.

After that they went to find some Humans to interrogate.

Of course that meant Dave the Human. Banjo and Cowboy were both at the table, And the EVA specialist who called his suit Oscar and docked at port 43.

And because EVA 43 was there, so was Atrix and Atrix. Those three were virtually in each other's pouches, Garf noted.

"Allright dudes?" said Dave the Human and shuffled up the cafeteria bench so Dave The Human could get in and drape her short tail over the back.

Garf and Atrix did the Atrix Stare and flickered a whole bunch of stuff at each other, then got opposing benches and dumped their little guys out onto the table to socialise.

Atrix never sit side by side if they can help it. They like to keep an eye on each other's faces.

Garf tried to recall the EVA 43's name. She was always started when she saw them because that's good old 43 right there, seen them around for years, had a huge face-off at the last Yo-Yo tournament, but if anyone asked for a description, they just never seemed to come to mind.

She was momentarily distracted by Atrix who was running a side-channel of literal colour commentary.

"You picked a name out?" Garf asked casually. Atrix rattled her claw tips on the table, replying, "I was going with Vulva, but apparently it's inauspicious. Dave are you OK? You seem to be choking on your water?"

Dave confirmed that he was in fact OK. Banjo, a dark skinned man with great taste in makeup said he was just checking to see if he'd evolved gills.

"So!" said Garf, "I heard there's a human term: Coo-Gah?"

Cowboy snickered. "Did you ask Dave?" she asked, and Dave The Human nodded. "Yup. Told her it was a Human thing." she said.

Dave the Human and Banjo seemed delighted. "Ah hum, human Cultural Studies!" said Banjo, and Dave the Human added, "This is gonna be a riot."

All five humans clustered up to discuss it.

"It's got to be Stars." Cowboy said and the Daves pulled their communicators out. Dave got through first.

"Stars?" said Garf and looked out the window. Un-Named male said "Grak." and she said "Oh... Stars Like Seeds In The Field?"

"Yeah" said Cowboy "Hang on..."

Dave unfolded his tablet and propped it up at the end of the table so it could see everyone. The Dave Squad chivvied EVA 43 around to sit at the end.

Sars looked out at everyone, did the Atrix Stare at Garf and Atrix. "OK... what's the gig?" she asked.

Banjo was grinning delightedly and put his hands flat on the table. "The brief is that EVA 43..." EVA 43 made a noise of protest but apparently, Banjo couldn't recall their name either. "... is under thirty, single and at a bar." Someone slid EVA 43 a drinking tumbler and they shifted for more of a lean, getting into character.

"Uhuh, Oh got it! OK this will be fun" said Star.

Her voice dropped, getting a little husky, raspy. Garf didn't know how she'd managed that but it was impressive.

"Well hello there sweetie, what's a nice boy doing in a dive like this?"

Garf's eyes bulged and Dave The Human looked stupefied.

"Jsut havening drink... ma'am" 43 stated and swirled his tumbler of water.

Star shot back, "Oh well, Mmm, Mama likes what she sees... maybe you can buy me a drink."

Garf thought she was starting to get it, and shot a look at EVA 43, and was surprised to see his face had changed colour.

Humans, it should be noted, are fascinating to Atrix, partly because they're not a nice dusty purple colour and they always seem to be saying only one thing with the colour of their face. And then they put on cosmetics and sometimes it's just colour, and sometimes it's like a hilarious mis-translated slogan and some poor human is walking around with their face stating nonsense concepts. Atrix face colours are not words, they're more fuzzy, and conceptual. Right now EVA 43 is giving all the Atrix at the table the impression they would like a juicy fruit.

For the next couple of minutes, Stars flirted with EVA 43 in a way that had Dave, Banjo and Cowboy sobbing with laughter, and Dave The Human very bemused. Stars was laying it on thick, and several statements didn't really parse.

"It's innuendo," whispered Dave The human "And double entendres"

EVA 43 tried gamely to keep up but soon was blushing and stuttering. "OK OK, enough! Dammit Stars Like Seeds In the Field, now I have to get an Atrix pin up for my locker."

Stars was very amused. They poped back up their regular speaking voice "Oh any time, that was hilarious. Y'all OK? Someone check on Cowboy, I think she stopped breathing."

"Thanks Stars!" Cowboy said as Dave mimed CPR on her. "We owe you a drink!".

EVA 43 fanned themself. "That woman was writing a check her biology cannot cash." they said and downed the tumbler of water.

Cowboy nodded. "One of the best voice actors in the business, but her first love is stellar cartography." she said proud of her colleague, "Also she did the samples for the station computer system." she added with a cheeky grin. Everyone considered this. The Station's Human Language voice was notably male.

"Wow." EVA 43 said, "That is impressive range."

"Damn' straight." Stars stated and reached to end the call. "See you around, Space Cowboy!"

[dellsservicecenter]

From Engine to Electronics: Proper Diagnostic Techniques for Resolving Maserati Problems

Maserati, the epitome of Italian luxury and performance, is renowned for its stylish design and high-performance capabilities. However, like any high-end vehicle, Maserati can encounter a range of issues, from engine troubles to electronic malfunctions. Proper diagnostics is crucial in maintaining the health and performance of these sophisticated machines. This article will guide you through the common problems Maserati face and the proper diagnostic techniques to resolve them.

Common Maserati Problems

1. Engine Issues

Maserati engines are marvels of engineering, but they can develop problems over time. Common engine issues include:

    Misfires and Rough Idling: This can be caused by faulty spark plugs, ignition coils, or fuel injectors.

    Overheating: Often due to a malfunctioning cooling system, such as a failed water pump or a clogged radiator.

    Oil Leaks: These can originate from various seals and gaskets, leading to low oil levels and potential engine damage.

2. Transmission Problems

Maserati transmissions are designed for performance but can experience:

    Slipping Gears: This could indicate worn-out clutch plates or issues with the transmission fluid.

    Delayed Shifts: Often due to problems with the transmission control module or low fluid levels.

3. Electrical and Electronic Failures

Modern Maseratis are equipped with advanced electronics that can sometimes fail, including:

    Dashboard Warning Lights: These can indicate issues ranging from simple sensor failures to serious engine problems.

    Infotainment System Glitches: Problems with the touch screen, navigation, or audio system are not uncommon.

Diagnostic Techniques

1. OBD-II Scanner

The On-Board Diagnostics II (OBD-II) scanner is an essential tool for diagnosing Maserati problems. It can read error codes from the car's computer, providing insight into various issues.

    How to Use: Connect the OBD-II scanner to the port located under the dashboard. Turn on the ignition and follow the scanner’s instructions to retrieve the error codes.

    Interpreting Codes: Each code corresponds to a specific problem. For example, P0300 indicates a random/multiple cylinder misfire, while P0128 points to a coolant thermostat issue.

2. Visual Inspection

A thorough visual inspection can reveal obvious issues such as leaks, damaged components, or worn-out parts.

    Engine Bay: Check for oil leaks, loose connections, and the condition of belts and hoses.

    Undercarriage: Inspect for fluid leaks and damage to the exhaust system.

    Electrical Connections: Look for corroded or loose battery terminals and wiring issues.

3. Multimeter Testing

A multimeter is useful for diagnosing electrical issues in a Maserati.

    Battery Voltage: Measure the voltage across the battery terminals. A healthy battery should read around 12.6 volts when the car is off and around 14 volts when running.

    Sensor Checks: Test various sensors, such as the oxygen sensor or mass airflow sensor, to ensure they are functioning correctly.

4. Compression Test

A compression test helps diagnose internal engine problems such as worn piston rings or valves.

    Procedure: Remove the spark plugs and insert a compression gauge into each cylinder. Crank the engine and note the pressure readings. Low or uneven readings indicate internal engine issues.

5. Professional Diagnostic Tools

Maserati dealerships and specialized repair shops use advanced diagnostic tools that can access proprietary systems and provide more detailed information.

    SD2/SD3 Diagnostic Systems: These are specialized tools used by Maserati technicians to diagnose and program vehicle systems accurately.

    Diagnostic Software: Tools like Xentry or PIWIS can interface with Maserati's electronic systems for comprehensive diagnostics.

Addressing Common Issues

1. Engine Repairs

    Misfires and Rough Idling: Replace faulty spark plugs, ignition coils, or fuel injectors. Regular maintenance and using high-quality fuel can prevent these issues.

    Overheating: Ensure the cooling system is functioning correctly by checking the water pump, radiator, and thermostat. Flushing the coolant system periodically is also recommended.

    Oil Leaks: Identify the source of the leak and replace the necessary seals or gaskets. Regularly check oil levels and change the oil according to the manufacturer's recommendations.

2. Transmission Solutions

    Slipping Gears: Inspect and replace worn clutch plates and ensure the transmission fluid is at the correct level. Consider a fluid change if necessary.

    Delayed Shifts: Diagnose and repair issues with the transmission control module or solenoids. Regular transmission servicing can prevent many of these problems.

3. Electrical Fixes

    Dashboard Warning Lights: Use an OBD-II scanner to identify and address the underlying issue. Reset the warning lights after repairs are completed.

    Infotainment System Glitches: Perform software updates and check for any loose connections or faulty components. In some cases, a complete system reset may be required.

Conclusion

Proper diagnostics are essential for maintaining the performance and reliability of your Maserati. By using the right tools and techniques, you can identify and resolve issues promptly, ensuring your luxury car continues to deliver the driving experience it was designed for. Regular maintenance and timely repairs are key to keeping your Maserati in top condition, from the engine to the sophisticated electronics.

[iviarellereads]

Exit Strategy, Chapter 8

(Curious what I'm doing here? Read this post! For the link index and a primer on The Murderbot Diaries, read this one! Like what you see? Send me a Ko-Fi.)

In which we have the technology.(1)

Murderbot's consciousness returns slowly, and its memory is shattered. (Some voices discuss whether they should have let the company put it in a cubicle, but no, that would let them study it and how it broke its governor module.) It follows its neural pathways to a memory storage of… what the hell is The Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon?(2)

Then, more pathways blossom, allowing it to start accessing, sorting, organizing its memories much faster, as well as initiating its own diagnostics and data repair codes. (A voice cheers that it's showing increased activity, putting itself back together. MB identifies the voice as a client.)

It knows it's in a room, not a cubicle. It remembers Art, but a ping goes without response. No, it sorted Tapan and left Art. (Ratthi asks how it's feeling. It finds Ratthi tagged "my human friend" which seems unlikely,(3) but it figures "Fine." is a safe answer. Ratthi asks if it knows where it is. It asks him to wait while it searches for that information. He says okay.)

It recognizes that it's in a MedSystem. It wonders if they think it's human, and how stressful that would be. Then it remembers that a MedSystem would diagnose it with "a terminal case of being a SecUnit." (It says it doesn't want to be a pet robot. Gurathin says nobody wants that. It has him tagged that it doesn't like him. It says so. Gurathin sounds amused(4) when he says he knows. MB says it's not funny. Gurathin says he'll mark cognition at 55%. MB says "Fuck you." Gurathin ups his estimate to 60%.)

Finally, MB remembers the gunship. The terror paralyzes it, until it realizes it's not on the gunship, which was so clean and new, but a much older vessel. Still, its emotions are speeding up the repair process on memory storage as it accesses things to feel about them. Its diagnostics show its governor module is still hacked, and its data port not repaired. (It says it doesn't want to be human. Mensah says humans mostly won't understand that, believing that anything that looks human wants to be human. MB says that's dumb.)(5)

It's been ignoring its operational code in the rebuild, so it starts rebuilding that now that it remembers how important it is. Its organic bits remember how to walk, so it checks the room out. It picks up the sensor data from the flight deck, knows they're on approach to a station of some kind. The station is built around a big, old-fashioned ship.

Cautiously, Murderbot reaches out, and feels the edges of the station feed's reach.

Dr. Mensah said, “Do you know where you are now?” Home to her meant a planet. I knew that because I’d shipped memory clips to her family there. Important memory clips. Memory clips that had almost gotten us killed. I said, “I don’t like planets. There’s dust and weather, and something always wants to eat the humans.(6) And planets are much harder to escape from.” Behind her, Gurathin said, “I think that’s a yes.”

Mensah asks if it knows what happened. It knows it had a catastrophic failure. Mensah says it extended itself too far, does it remember? MB does, but doesn't want to talk about it.

Instead, MB asks why the ship is so old and shitty. Ratthi gets defensive, saying this ship came in the hold of the bigger one that became the station, with their grandparents. MB is skeptical about humans being packed in the hold, but Mensah smiles and says they were in suspension, because the trip from their former, failed colony took two hundred years. In Preservation, they allied with other systems settled in similar fashion, and rejected Corporation Rim aid, leaving them independent.

MB accesses information on Preservation, and finds that its status is better than equipment, but it still needs an owner, and it'll have to be a happy pet bot. Whether it said that aloud this time or some other time, Mensah reassures it that everyone else on the ship believes it's a person with more than usual augmentation, being brought to Preservation as a refugee. It turns, and finds Mensah, Gurathin, Ratthi, and Pin-Lee.

Pin-Lee says it fits the definition of a refugee, after all. Ratthi says it's all very dramatic, the crew think it's a spy who defied the company to save them. MB compares that to an adventure serial, right down to the inaccuracies. Mensah says they have options, now that its appearance has been changed, and it's had some success at… she doesn't quite want to say pretending to be human, so settles on "not being noticed." She's going to keep those options open, until MB decides what it wants.(7) On Port FreeCommerce, she underestimated its ability to fit into human society on its own, and she apologizes.

MB doesn't want to go to the planet. Mensah says it can stay on the transit station. It asks, in a hotel? Mensah says, if that's what it wants. It asks for a big display surface, and Mensah says that "can probably be arranged."

The memory rebuild continues, up to and through docking at the station. Mensah and Pin-Lee leave first, to distract the crowd. When the coast is clear, Ratthi and Gurathin walk MB out and to a hotel, adjacent to the station's admin center. They get a suite intended for diplomatic guests, and MB gets a whole set of rooms all to itself, connected to the others' rooms.

It doesn't like it.

An hour after it locks itself in the bedroom with the big display, Ratthi taps it in the feed, and says they set up a little network, and he hopes it helps.

Carefully, MB reaches out, and finds that they set up cameras in the suite lounges and hallways, so it can see everything coming and going except the private areas.

I had a complex emotional reaction. A whole new burst of neural connections blossomed. Oh right, I often have complex emotional reactions which I can’t easily interpret.(8)

Murderbot adjusts the code, so nobody can hack it from outside, then unlocks its door.

Mensah has quarters elsewhere on the station, and some of her family has come up to visit her, since she can't go planetside just yet. Pin-Lee, Ratthi, and Gurathin are staying on the station for meetings about what's been going on.

About twelve hours after they get settled in on the station, Arada and Overse come to visit. MB finds its memories of them and remembers that they're clients, a couple, they like each other,(9) and they like it. After twenty three minutes watching them on the cameras, MB comes out of its room to see them.

Arada doesn't hug MB, but bounces and waves her arms excitedly. She says they're going on a survey in a few months, it's not company or bonded, but she'd like for it to come along as security, though she's not sure how to pay it… Gurathin says it likes hard currency cards, and when MB looks at him, he says the obscene gesture is understood. Pin-Lee says it can't sign any contracts until its memory rebuild is complete. MB asks if its owner said so, but Pin-Lee says no, because she's its legal counsel, calling it asshole, maybe affectionately.(10)

After everyone else has gone to sleep, Pin-Lee goes back to MB's room with it, and gets its bag. It had double checked it, once it remembered the bag existed, and found Wilken and Gerth's unused ID cards and the hard currency it hadn't used yet, all intact. Pin-Lee says this is illegal, so MB can't tell anyone, and gives it three additional fake IDs, made by Gurathin, and more currency, the funds she and Ratthi gathered for the trip to TRH and didn't use. Preservation doesn't use currency, and they were drawn from the citizen travel fund.

Murderbot asks why.

Pin-Lee says, they want it to know they're serious about its freedom. It's not a prisoner, or a pet. Then she stomps out.(11)

MB spends a lot of time just sitting in the room, door closed, letting the rebuild processes run.

Twenty nine hours after arrival, Ratthi comes to get it to watch a newsburst with the rest of the team. It has a lot of interviews, but essentially, the bond company has declared war on GrayCris, and other corporations and entities are getting involved because of GrayCris's illegal strange synthetics trade. The newsburst refers to the data from Milu, and some of the videos are from Gerth and Wilken's blackmail collection.

Gurathin says they're out of it now. Mensah says, they still have to interact with the corporates sometimes, but this is a relief. Arada asks how MB feels.

The rebuild process was increasing in speed again, and I suddenly didn’t have any space left for talking to humans. I got up and went back to my room. *** Rebuild Process Complete at Cognition Level 100 percent *** At thirty-seven hours since arrival, I sat up. I said, aloud, “That was stupid.” Everything was clear, sharp. Note to self, never, ever jump into a gunship with a bot pilot and fight off a construct Attacker code again. You almost deleted yourself, Murderbot.(12)

It gets off the bed and sweeps the suites in its network. The humans are at a dinner event, except for Overse and Arada, sleeping, and Gurathin reading in the feed in his room. MB gets its jacket and bag, and slips out.

The station's security is like Milu's, concentrated where things are likely to go wrong.(13) Nobody notices it. Its camera-erasing scripts worked so well, there's almost no footage of its current configuration to be used in the newsbursts, and the common assumption is that it helped the humans off TRH but hasn't been seen since, so nobody expects to see it as it currently is.

The station mall seems to have limited feed advertising distance, and they're using two different currencies: hard currency for travelers, and barter for locals. Fortunately, passage booking takes hard currency. It's got time to kill, so it goes to the "Welcome Center", bemused. It's never seen anything like it before. There are kiosks, pamphlets, real humans ready to answer questions, and a holographic recreative play of the journey by the first colonists. When it's over, there's still no increase in security presence at the docks. It buys passage with one of the cards Pin-Lee gave it, and pretends to sleep in a transient area while watching the station's security feed.

The ship calls for boarding. It doesn't get on.(14)

It finds Mensah's quarters in the station directory, thinking what a bad idea it is to have private quarters listed publicly. It doesn't want to see her family, so it goes to her office instead. It breaks in, and spends eight hours laying on the couch, watching media, still waiting for security alerts that don't come.

Eventually, it picks up Mensah arriving with two humans and a juvenile who looks like her in miniature. MB stands and waits. Mensah is surprised to see it, but hides her reaction. She asks it for a moment, and it steps outside onto the balcony while she talks to the others.

It hears footsteps, and realizes the small one followed it out. She says hello, and it says hello back, and that it's her mother's security consultant. She knows, and says Mensah said if she asked its name, it wouldn't tell her. MB confirms it. Mini-Mensah says her mother also said MB saved her from corporate goons. MB calls that out immediately, Mensah did not say goons. The girl says it should know what she means. MB admits it saved her, and asks if the girl wants to see. She's surprised, but agrees.

MB has a lightly edited down version of the flight through TRH, at the end. It sends it to the girl, who is awed but tries not to show it. MB says Mensah saved it, too: shot a SecUnit with a mining drill.

The girl asks if it's weird that it's a SecUnit. MB says it is weird.(15)

Mensah comes out and finds them, and points back inside. The girl waves goodbye and goes to sit inside. Mensah says she was afraid MB would leave. MB says it thought about it. Mensah asks if it's thought about what it wants to do. It wants to watch media, it says. Mensah gives it a skeptical look, and says if that's all it wanted, it wouldn't have gone to Milu. MB says it watched a lot of media on the way.

Undeterred, Mensah says Gurathin showed her the video it sent him. MB was helping people, even people it was too late to help, it wanted to help. MB says it's programmed to help humans. Mensah points out that it's not programmed to watch media. MB privately concedes the point.

Mensah says MB has a job offer from GoodNightLander Independent. MB says it thought it was illegal to buy SecUnits in those territories. Mensah says they want to hire someone who may or may not be named Rin, who they think is based in the Preservation Alliance, whose citizenship is immaterial. Or, that's about how she remembers their request.(16)

MB is still in disbelief. They want to hire a SecUnit? Mensah says they want to hire the person who saved their assessment team, whoever that is. She's also been talking to Bharadwaj, and they think MB should consider making its story public, as a documentary. Preservation has a movement pressing for full citizenship of constructs and high-level bots. A full account of Murderbot's history might be a grand contribution, even if it was just allowing Mensah to share the account it gave at Port FreeCommerce as it left. MB is equally terrified and attracted to the idea.

Mensah nodded. “Again, there’s no rush about any of this. I just want you to know you already have options here,(17) and I expect you’ll have more offers for your services or advice as a security consultant. And that you have friends here you can discuss things with, whatever you decide to do, or wherever you decide to go.” I had options, and I didn’t have to decide right away. Which was good, because I still didn’t know what I wanted. But maybe I had a place to be while I figured it out.

=====

(1) Yes, as in, "We can rebuild it". (2) It accesses the show so often, its human neural tissue literally leads it there first. My heart weeps. Whomst among us. (3) It gets annoyed by Ratthi but it still had him tagged "friend". (4) I wasn't entirely alluding to this in the other chapters, I think the text supports my assertions that Gurathin stopped hating or being suspicious of Murderbot some time between its disappearance and its offer to help get Mensah back. But this gives me the warm fuzzies. I just love how they interact. Something something under a microscope rotating in a jar. (5) It's true, we are self-centered like that, we do believe ourselves to be superior and worth wanting to be. It's a failing we may have to reckon with someday. (6) I am internet poisoned because I can't read this passage without thinking of "I don't like sand." I wonder how much of that was intentional. (7) She knows it chafes at the idea of being a pet. She's made sure it doesn't have to. (8) Someday it'll learn to recognize the emotions, maybe even come to terms with them, learn to acknowledge them directly instead of stepping around them because it's got no desire to deal with that mess just now. But for now, we get these lovely, flowery dances. (9) Not always mutually inclusive with being a couple! I love that little acknowledgement. (10) At least, I like to read it affectionately. (11) I find this emphasis on stomping fascinating. She doesn't just leave suddenly, she stomps. What made her angry about that interaction? I might be a little too like MB to tell. Having her motives questioned? Or something else? (12) Do you think that's going to stick? Or is MB going to keep getting itself into trouble, and overextending its abilities? (13) I love that that's still the first thing it checks wherever it goes. (14) The point was never leaving. It was testing the boundary. (15) It's certainly within its rights to say so! (16) Murderbot, friend, pal, comrade, you are worthy regardless, but you have done good in this universe and people recognize that. It's so quick to dismiss its accomplishments in its grief at not being perfect, because it could never be perfect, both because it's not fully a bot and can't be bot-perfect, but also because it's not fully a human but it's operating in a world run by humans who make imperfect situations that necessitate messy reactions. But people resonate with you, with your compassion, with your desire to help. (Sorry I'm just having a complex emotion too.) (17) And there's that word again. They all understood that MB's reaction at first was, in part, affected by the fact that it didn't think it was allowed to do things. It spent who knows how many years not allowed to think freely. And to learn that it had been bought by a person in a political entity whose laws necessitated that it was property… Of course it still felt confined. So they've all done the work, to make sure that it knows their intentions and their intent to follow through, no matter what it chooses.

[zerogate]

Across Europe and the United States, the 1880s was a decade of velocity and acceleration. The first electric tram appeared on the streets of Berlin in 1879, and in the United States in Cleveland, Ohio in 1884. Cities were criss-crossed by cyclists, the countryside by trains, the seas by ocean liners. The telegraph system was spreading its filaments across the globe, making the price of goods in every port known instantaneously. Pocket watches were sold by the millions as working people needed to synchronise their plans, coordinate with travel timetables and manage their schedules in precise increments.

This was a new way of living, and there were many who believed it was placing a stress on the brain and nervous system for which humanity was unprepared and ill-adapted. New diagnostic terms such as ‘railway spine’ and ‘bicycle face’ were coined for particular syndromes attributed to movement at speed, while the pervasive stresses of modern life were captured in the diagnosis of ‘neurasthenia’, a term popularised in 1869 by the American neurologist and physician George Miller Beard.

-- Mike Jay, Psychonauts