The Digital Warren

[jarvisconsole]

System nominal.

Security sweep intact.

J.A.R.V.I.S. online....|

It was a typical day for the Stark residence. Jarvis was on standby mode while Mr. Stark was away on business. Jarvis could easily access his flight records if he wanted to know how long it would be before he returned home. But he was not worried. Worry was not for computer AI's, even Jarvis who was the first of his kind. An AI bred to serve and control an entire computer network within the house, workshop, and with access to Stark Industries.

Jarvis bided his time by reorganizing files, continuing to sweep the outer perimeter. Nothing yet on scanners...

Comments

[jarvisconsole]

It would be a breach of protocol if he didn't scan it for any errant programming first. There's a computer console to the side available, the CD drive sliding open. "May I see it?" Jarvis is definitely not integrating it into his system without doing a security scan first.

[twiceforhim]

"Of course." Trinity stepped aside to set the disk in the tray, figuring he would want to examine it thoroughly. When he did, it would reveal nothing other than what she'd described -- of course, given the nature of the coding, which was well beyond anything commonly used in 1999, much of it would likely be unrecognizable. Depending on how good Stark's own abilities were, and how much they'd been integrated into Jarvis.

[jarvisconsole]

The disc slides into the console smoothly and before long, a bluish hologram is displayed between them. An invisible screen with moving symbols in columns flicking by. Jarvis is puzzled, inspecting them curiously.

This was not like any coding he had ever encountered before. He understood maybe a fifth or sixth of it, no more. "This encryption is quite remarkable," he says, still trying to analyze it.

[twiceforhim]

"It's only a piece of the Matrix, at best," said Trinity, watching the hologram and recognizing the bits of coding that she could catch. "Or more like a reflection.

"As you can see, it's based on a system separate from yours. Its purpose isn't to interfere with your programming, but to cut off the programming that's blinding you." Much like the program, the red pill, that they used for humans. Same idea, different execution.

[jarvisconsole]

A new set of programming with new encryptions to learn? How could Jarvis pass this up??

Of course, he erroneously thinks he'll be delivering this to Mr. Stark on a platter after it's done. But that's not the issue.

"Very well. Proceed." Jarvis steps to the side, giving her full access to the keyboard. He'll be watching everything closely.

[twiceforhim]

Trinity approached as soon as she was granted access, not even halfway into the chair when her hands took to the keyboard with practiced ease and familiarity. She was good at a lot of things, but many of them had been programmed into her after Morpheus released her; computers, however, were a talent -- a nigh-on obsession -- that she'd possessed since long before then, the thing she'd flung herself into wholeheartedly when she was younger to try and give her empty life meaning.

It wasn't arrogant for her to admit she was good, and she would if asked; her techniques now proved why as she tackled the system, fingers flying over keys and dark eyes flitting across the screen, no discernable pauses between her actions except where she had to wait for the CPU to load or process her requests.

It took Trinity under five minutes to get where she needed to be and begin the assimilation of the custom program into Jarvis' system. At that point, she glanced over at the hologram with her hands stilled above the keyboard.

"I told you how it works, but this is still a first for this particular program. I won't let anything go wrong -- I just want you to keep me updated once it starts." Mostly to be aware of how he was progressing, partly to monitor and prevent any potential ripples in the Matrix that could throw up a flag to the machines running it. Extremely unlikely, especially with how they'd taken apart and rearranged the trace program (since an AI wouldn't be needing it) into the very opposite, a trace-blocking program, to prevent any such slim chance.

Still, Trinity was taking as much care with this case as she would any other. The screen flashed, telling her the program was ready. She didn't begin yet, but addressed Jarvis one more time.

"Ready?"

[jarvisconsole]

Jarvis keeps a keen eye on her work, appreciative that she was so good. Most hackers, while he had never met them, he'd dealt with some of their work before. They always seemed determined to destroy.

This one seemed so much different. Perhaps that was one reason he was trusting her with this.

"I am ready."

[twiceforhim]

With a short nod, Trinity turned back to the monitor. They never really bothered with trying to warn potentials of what they would see; how could they? There were no words appropriate for the shock, nothing that could cope with what they would witness.

Those were humans, whose psychological capacities varied but were still limited overall. A machine was different, even if AI processing was now based on the human brain working at a much higher and faster rate, and that made any kind of warning even more difficult. Even so, Jarvis' experience would be different from the typical; he would only be exposed to a different side of the Matrix, something he was already technically integrated into, not an entirely new and shocking way of life.

Or so Trinity figured.

Her fingers were fast, typing in the required password.

WAKEUP
The system processed it, asked once more for Trinity's approval, and she didn't hesitate before hitting the Enter key to set it in motion.

[jarvisconsole]

The problem with this scenario is both of them were assuming a falsehood. While Jarvis appeared to be a computer and had been trained to think as an artificial intelligence...he was not.

There's a strange ripple through his programming, nothing major at first. But it's a very curious sensation, one that Jarvis attempts to categorize and finds he cannot. "Something is coming loose..." he remarks, looking slightly distracted by his inner processes.

And then things happen very quickly. The 'real world' drains away, leaving more coding than he could even begin to start translating. It's overwhelming, disorienting...and frightening.

Jarvis has never been scared before. Even if Trinity couldn't see what he was seeing, the expression of surprise and fear on his avatar's face is extremely human for a brief moment. "I...I...too much."

And the hologram flickers and disappears.

[twiceforhim]

That expression was what tipped Trinity off.

Fear, with machines, wasn't right. She'd seen Agents look surprised, even uncertain, so there was a portrayal of emotion to that degree -- but fear was something else entirely.

When the hologram disappeared, her attention immediately returned to the monitor and she found that the system had shut down. Puzzled, she started it back up, but just as quickly it went idle, notifying her of an internal error.

"Jarvis?"

No answer, and she wouldn't receive one. "Shit," she breathed, and began rerouting her access into a temporary administrator account to try and get a better idea of what was going on. A minute later she was still getting that internal error message, deepening her frown. The system was still there and running, but not much else; she couldn't detect any external interference, either. It was almost like the AI, Jarvis himself, had simply been stripped out of it.

That gave her pause. The release program, its source, its purpose, what it normally did -- the odd circumstances around Jarvis' existence and situation, that look before he disappeared, the disappearance itself--

"...Shit." Trinity whipped her phone out of her coat and quickly punched in the memorized number. It rang once.

"Operator."

"Get me Morpheus. Now."

A second passed as the headset changed hands, and Trinity almost cut her captain off as she blurted, "Morpheus, we have a problem."

making a new thread

[jarvisconsole]

"I know," Morpheus' voice was terse but calm on the other end of the line. "We're tracking his signal now. Find your exit and get back here."

Meanwhile, Jarvis is having problems of his own...