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[jpublic]

My response to Melissa...

[krystyn]

We totally don't have to choose sides, imo. Melissa can't see the Princess, no matter how hard she looks. She can't even see the flea! There is mirroring going on here, and lots of the players have speculated here that the Princess is the portion of Yasmine that needs to be kept under lock and key so that the A.I. can function properly.

Trouble is, how do we communicate this effectively to Melissa, without hurting her? The flea still appears to be a problem, even though the Princess has been quite adept at using him, and not letting him use her.

I got the e-mail as well (my special commendation comes from the vinyl record/chatter analog), and I don't think (I am pretty sure) it's a bad thing to have brought it to the forums - I'd love for us to come up with a compendium of evidence (sort of like the list atdt came up with above), and present it to Melissa in some sort of unique, compelling way.

I find it incredibly bothersome that she can't see the flea stepping all over her stuff on the website. I can understand her not seeing the Princess, because of the mirror/reflection thing, but not seeing the flea? Even though he's right there? Not good.

What we need is Kamal. He will be able to verify the Princess as truly being 'of Yasmine,' and use that to convince Melissa. He will know things about Yasmine that, if our spec is true, only the Princess will know.

Gah, but he's trying to be offline. And Durga's so distracted that she has to expend more effort than usual just to keep track of him, while her left hand is off telling us to cheer at payphones ...

[missphinx]

Here is mine, taken from my hotmail account using firefox. Note that there are several question marks that were not in atdt's message. This is most likely a hotmail vs. firefox fluke or something similar and is probably of no consequence, but I thought I'd post it anyway. I received it because my 2004/2552 image got in the special commendation category - this is the first time I've heard from Melissa and until now wasn't an official crew member.

In any case, I am also recruiting your help. I consider all my colleagues here to be loyal to the cause of discovering the truth and fighting the true enemy, the Covenant.

[weephun]

So from this we learn that.

Q - Why is Melissa so intent on removing/trapping the Sleeping Princess?
A - Melissa believes the Sleeping Princess to be a virus due to her sneakiness and ability to conceal herself.

Q - How is the Sleeping Princess able to conceal herself?
A - With the help of the Pious Flea.

[SPEC]
Q - Who is truly the virus, the SP or the PF
A - The PF

End goal to make everybody happy: Remove the PF and convince the SP to come out of hiding.

Why? Melissa will then recognize the PF as the virus and not the SP and will no longer want to terminate the SP.

How? Melissa is apparently unable to remove or even see the PF so we need someone else who knows about the PF, has access to the server, and a desire to help both Melissa and the Sleeping Princess. And what do you know, we just happen to have somebody like that at our disposal (conveniently made available this week) ... DANA!

[krystyn]

[atdt1991]

That's an impressive point, Krystyn.

[weephun]

[missphinx]

I'm with you krystyn.

I also wonder if we need the PF to get the pieces back together or to assist in transmitting between Durga/Melissa.

But perhaps if Melissa becomes able see the PF, she herself will figure out what it is and does.

[C_Brennan]

I've already contacted Dana with what we know and suggested overlooking the server for the Flea and possibly attempting a crude virus sweep. I'll see what I can get back from it.

[WILD SPEC] You ever wonder if Melissa's coming back in time wasn't just a fluke/accident? Our technology, as shown by this latest exercise, isn't the greatest. And our virus technology sucks. Maybe it was the Covenant's intent to corrupt Operator and then fling her back in time. This would accomplish 3 things:

1. Disorient the AI so it had no clue what it was doing and would be unable to use its built in defenses to protect its data.

2. Have us wondering what the heck this AI was, because "We're to dumb to understand artificial intelligence."

3. Even if we did understand what it was, we may not have the means of cleaning the virus off of its system.

Also, I've always heard that the more complex the virus, the more chance it has of not working. Our Flea here is a very simple thing, even using programming language as a way to communicate, seeing it can't formerally speak. This could be an insanely simple virus, but it would seem very complex to us because we've never seen anything like an AI or a virus of this type before. And the simpler it is, the slower it will take to infect, but the chances of having it work are higher.

If Operator was left infected in her own time, chances are she could be repaired and cleaned very easily. In our time, with our "hardware difficulties" and "problematic network", she may not be able to survive for very long. That would make this job alot easier.

I would say we should be careful, just incase if Flea has a built in mechanism to transmit to the future or get himself back to his own time.[/WILD SPEC]

[vector]

I recived one of the Melissa email's and responded by recomending that she capture and interrogate her SPDR program and to offer peace to Princess. we will see.

[Phaedra]

No email for me.

[thunderclap8]

I was in the special commendation for the rum/intoxication pills one, and amazingly all 6 others I made got put in honorable mention.


So anyway. DeltinaWildfire I like that spec, it has a certain amount of sense to it.

My personal simplistic analysis/spec of the situation:

the flea is obviously the covie virus. It wants to use the SP against Melissa, perhaps mine the SP for data. Obviously we can't allow this to happen, the flea must be stopped. Melissa can't see the SP or the flea, which leaves us with these options:

1. Kill the SP, forcing the flea to attack melissa directly and be dealt with
2. Restrain the SP (or get her on our side pretending to be restrained), hopefully luring the flea out of hiding
3. Somehow lure the flea into a trap itself as happened to SP before
4. As an absolute last resort, destroy Melissa and the SP, as well as the flea if possible.

Obviously I don't like options 1 or 4 any better than the rest of you. But if necessary, they might be the last resort(s). Option 2 seems the most likely to me, though I can't help but wonder if the PMs plan on ending the game in some variation of option 4.

And as much as I don't like it, I would support the elimination of the SP if it would help neutralize the flea. She's a fun personality, but she's not really Yasmine and Earth takes precedence.

[krystyn]

I don't think we can destroy or restrain the SP without causing the other two entities to fall apart.

Here:

Why doesn't the Sleeping Princess like Melissa? Because Melissa is the Queen, is very bossy, and wants the Princess to stay in her casket. The SP is simplistic in this regard - she is a child-like thing, and although she may know oodles more than she will ever tell us, it's pretty easy to see that she simply will not be controlled - she knows Melissa's weaknesses, because she is a part of those weaknesses! (say my name when she breaks down!)

Durga and Melissa are both very similar to each other - just broken in slightly different ways based on circumstance and environment. They both have reflection issues, and yet Melissa is quite aware of Durga's existence, and even tells us that she has a fragile connection to her through time.

I don't think any deleting can occur, nor destruction of any one of the three. It seems like a non-answer to an ever-growing threat (in the future.)

[C_Brennan]

Maybe they're leading us to the "Golden Rule". "The AI of a ship is never to be captured. If about to fall into the hands of the enemy, the AI is to be destroyed immediately."

I hate to say it as well... but maybe if we can't do anything else, we're gonna have to shut down ILB, destroy the server, and hope that the Flea didn't escape.

NOTE: This plan, as always, is the LAST RESORT.

[krystyn]

The game seems to be leading us to Dana, since she's back stateside and has come to some agreement with Melissa. But man, I cannot kick this idea that we need Kamal. He is an eyewitness to details that only a brother would know. Stuff he hasn't related to Sophia or anyone else in range of chatters. He is human proof of the connection, and with Dana, perhaps they can locate this virus and trick it or obliterate it for good.

Then there's that pesky artifact, magnetically ticking away.