jarvisconsole | Further Down the Rabbit Hole

Current Location: for twiceforhim

Further Down the Rabbit Hole

Jarvis had always been told he was very unique. A one of a kind artificial intelligence. If only he had known how rare a being he was.

The shutdown was unplanned and swift, Jarvis having the sensation of being pulled away from the apartment, Trinity, the light, his network, everything...

Then it was all too quiet. No numbers running through his head, no video feed, no programming.
Nothing.

Nothing but the faint sound of bubbles as they passed by his head.

Access requested...

Jarvis attempted to find his network. Nothing happened.

Error, access requested...

The rush of sensations hit him all at once. The warmth from the liquid around him. The rough pressure of the tube down his throat keeping him from drowning. The smooth surface in front that his hand bumps into. The fact that he's upright and completely submersed in a pinkish liquid which made his eyes burn when he tried to open them.

No, this was all wrong.

Runtime error, please respond!

The feelings were too much of an overload for Jarvis. On the outside, he was almost frozen with fear, unable to move. Inside, he was panicking and seriously freaking out. Repeating the same error messages in his mind as if someone might notice. Somebody had to notice he was gone, right?? Where was Mr. Stark?!

On the outside, just beyond his field of vision, the automatic computer system was just now finding out their experiment was a failure. Without a warning, Jarvis and his life support are cut from their strings and flushed away. They hadn't even bothered to remove the tubes. The rush of adrenaline from the ride down a twisty water slide is enough of an overload to cause Jarvis to shut down again.

Only this time, he passes out as his body hits the water on the other side.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

His eyes opened to see the gray steel ceiling.

"Jarvis on....line..."

There was silence instead of a response. Jarvis realized at that moment it did not matter if he was online or not. There was no one to respond because there was no network.

He lay on the thin mattress quietly for a time, realization sinking somewhere around his middle area. He didn't like the feeling but it wasn't going to go away.

Jarvis needed new parameters to go by. He had always been adaptable, just never had to adapt this far. Jarvis resolved to do better than he had been and attempt to... "be human".

Only then did he sit up and take stock of any damage to himself. Everything seemed to be alright and in the right place.

Responsible or not, Trinity wasn't without a sense of duty all the same. This wasn't necessary, but later in the evening she sought out Jarvis' quarters, knocking once with her free hand before opening the heavy door slightly.

She didn't lean in, but continued to balance a tray of food in her other hand as she called, "Jarvis?"

Jarvis stood up immediately when hearing her voice. "Trinity. How can I assist you?" Old habits die hard. That was his default setting still, that he was to assist.

Taking that as invitation to enter, Trinity stepped inside. Even as she kept her gaze on his face, she was taking stock -- he looked just as he had before, from what she could tell.

It wasn't a smile she wore, but a gentle look that was the closest thing to one. "I thought you might be hungry."

Jarvis looks from her to the tray of food and back. It wasn't something he had thought about yet.

"I do not know." What was it like to be hungry? Most of the feelings he had been able to identify were confusion, panic, fear. And now he looked a little lost, wishing he could access his database to research hunger. "What time is it?" That was one thing he did know, humans tended to eat at prearranged times.

"Around twenty hundred hours," she replied, having defaulted to the twenty-four hour clock like most. It was simpler when there was no sunlight to distinguish AM and PM.

"It would be a craving at first. You'd feel it as a pain, eventually," she tried, noticing his confusion. "Weak and dizzy after that."

He seems a little relieved at the information given. He may not have his database, but asking humans was another way of getting information first hand. "I had felt unwell earlier." Y'know, when he passed out babbling incoherently. "It has improved."

Jarvis' eyes move behind her where the door is half open. "What is our location?"

Trinity set the tray down on the table, crossing her arms in front of herself at the wrist -- a professional stance, out of habit.

"We're on-board a ship, the Nebuchadnezzar," she replied. "I'm one of the crew under Morpheus, our captain." She paused a beat before inquiring, "Has he spoken with you yet?"

Jarvis processed that information before replying. "A submarine?" It would seem logical from the metal décor and the shape of the doors.

"I do not recall." It's possible he might have but Jarvis wasn't quite ready to talk at the time. He looks down at the food. If one could call it that. Some kind of runny creamy soup.

"No," Trinity replied calmly, "an airship."

She hesitated a beat before continuing, "Today's date is actually ahead of what you think. Around two hundred years ahead, to the best of our knowledge."

She stopped there, looking for a sign that he wasn't ready to confront all of reality just yet.

Processing...still okay.

"What will become of me?" Perhaps he should have led with that question, it seemed a big one. Now that Mr. Stark was not here, Jarvis had nowhere to go.

The way he phrased it made Trinity frown ever so slightly, but her response remained level.

"We've established a city for the free humans, safe from the machines that run the Matrix. We won't return for a while, but I imagine you're free to stay there if you choose. But Morpheus, myself, and the rest of the crew have chosen to operate from this ship in the way you've seen: by infiltrating the Matrix for different purposes."

A city sounded alright. But what Jarvis really latches onto is the going back part.

"You will visit others in the Matrix? How?" More importantly How could he participate in this?

"We usually enter it to free and recruit select humans," she explained, "although our ultimate goal is to free everyone.

"As for how, we're able to enter the Matrix using technology that we've scavenged and adjusted. But," Trinity added, as if sensing where Jarvis was going with the question, "entering is easier than leaving. To say it's dangerous is an understatement. And even if you enter it again after being unplugged, as you and I have been, there is no going back to your old life. That's the price of being freed."

His expression doesn't change But it's clear that some of his hopes were dashed away by that information.

Jarvis straightens. "I wish to be useful." Whether as a human or machine, he needed direction. A purpose for being.

"You will be," she said, in the same easy, patient voice. "But whatever you choose to do, you still have a lot to learn about this world. Not to mention you need more recovery time." --especially if you want to do what some of us do went unspoken. "Even the best of us weren't active for a couple months at the soonest."

A few months??

He clarifies, "I am recovered. I wish to be useful right now."

Surely he could at least get himself oriented to their way of hacking into the Matrix. He could not sit by and do nothing, that only made it more real that he was not attached to any computer system.

"Please."

Trinity hesitated, taking the moment to picture what kind of state he was in. Going from a life as a computer -- a machine -- to that of a human in the relative blink of an eye... It was impressive that he was this coherent already, really.

And his mind -- how was that working? Still in the ways of a computer system, judging by his previous behavior; she couldn't imagine what that jump -- fall, maybe -- must be like.

"...When you were on the ship's computer system before," she said finally, "how much did you understand?"

"Approximately 15% of it was understandable." Surely that was enough for a start. He did want to find out how to access the computer system from the inside again.

A small percentage in the long run, but considering the circumstances...

"It isn't my call to make," said Trinity finally, "but I'm sure Morpheus won't overlook it. If you really want to dedicate yourself, I recommend telling him everything you've told me." She paused a beat before adding, "You can trust him. More than you can trust me, to be honest. If he thinks you're fit for it, then he'll make it happen."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Further Down the Rabbit Hole

likewise! you have good timing actually :)

awesome \o/

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject