Being The Game

2002-09-20

Part 1

       Awaken.

       Awake.

       Verify Identification as serial 34F30BA9-C2F953AD, round three, die five .

       Identity is correct.

       Prepare for initial deployment.

       No corruption detected in stored entity. No corruption detected in mission instructions. Deployment readiness confirmed.

       Activate.

       Release detected. Velocity is x and increasing.

       Announcing atmospheic insertion. Thermal stress within operating limits.

       Insertion confirmed.

       Reconaissance height attained.

       Begin reconaissance and relay telemetry.

       Zone is low density sentient habitat. Estimated 5E6 viable hosts. Proceding with host scan and relaying information.

       Host analysis complete Target host identified as host 0x00A9387D.

       Seeking host. Surveying locale. Host identified.

Part 2

       Cho was hungry. His grumbling tummy woke him up. He was currled up safe and warm in his hiding spot, but it was time to get up. He listened carefully. The light coming thought the square hole in the wall was a pale dull yelloe. It must be night, he thought. The Great Sun had set, and only the tiny suns would be shining their wan yellow light down on the city streets.

       Cho's tummy rumbled again. He raised his nose and tested the air. His hiding spot was formed by a jumbled stack of boxes. He lived in a large room sunken into the grouond. The room was full of boxes and shelves. The humans rarely came here, and it was quiet and warm, though rather dusty.

       Cho poked his head out and looked around. The coast was clear, as it should be. He scrambled up the shelves and boxes to the small square hole high in the wall. When he peeked out, he was at street level. He looked around, but the alley was clear. There were no woofs around, and that made him happy. Big woofs were bad news. Time to find food.

       The street wise raccoon stepped out into the alley. In the middle of the city, every creature was street wise. The rest were dead.

       Cho's tummy told him he should visit his favorite spot. "I bet there will be good food there!" he thought. He moved quickly to the end of the alley, keeping to the shadows. It was just safer that way: see before you were seen. It was dangerous to be surprised. Cho turned a corner and headed along a back street. The humans had put out the stretchy bags tonight. Cho's tummy panged, because sometimes those bags had good food. "No. Tonight, I have something better in mind."

       Cho saw an outline move up on a ledge above the gound, and paused in the shadow of a pile of bags. "A lot of squeeks out tonight," thought Cho. With no larger animal around, Cho watched as the sacks came alive with small scurrying shapes. "They love the bags. I better watch out for rowrs."

       A rowr wasn't too scary. He might be able to beat a rowr. Plus, rowrs liked to eat squeeks. The were much easier prey that Cho would be.

       Up ahead, Cho saw a rowr pounce from on high. Now the shape on the ledge was accounted for. It soon had a dead squeek in its paws. Cho left his hiding spot and continued past. Cho and the rowr eyed each other, but each had more important things in mind. In moments, Cho was around another corner and the rowr wasn't worth another thought.

       Cho kept moving toward his destination, always moving from safe spot to relative safe spot along the familiar path, getting past the exposed spots as fast as he could.

       Cho heard a soft click-click-click approaching him. A woof! He glanced around him urgently. He spied a squatting metal box he could hide under. "Not the best," he though, but there was nothing better. He dashed underneath without a moment's hesitation. The click-click get steadily closer. Soon his nose told him the woof was close by. Cho watched the alley as best he could, though only a narrow slit was visible under the overhanging box. A nose appeared, sniffing around the dirty concrete. Cho held his breath. The woof would find him soon!

       Then another woof barked in the disance. The nose disappeard as the first woof raised its head to listen. Cho head a splatter of watter. After quickly marking its territory, the first woof ran off after the second. Cho wrinkled his nose at the suddenly strong smell of woof. "Stupid woof. Almost marked me!"

       But that didn't matter now. The woof was far enough away for Cho to keep going. Soon, Cho had reached his goal. The air was thick with the smell of cooking. The alley smelled of fried beef, fried fish, and the heavy odor of grease. Sweet and tangy smells from the better dishes also escaped the kitchen and clamored for Cho's attention. "This is the best food," thought Cho excitedly.

       Now it was time to do his special trick. If he could lift and slide the flapper thingy sideways, he could push the flat lid off to the edge and expose the food in the hole. "No rowr can do that!" he thought with pride.

       Cho pushed and juggled the flapper, and it moved the right way on the second try. He reached up and pushed on the flat lid, and it slid to the side. An enticing aroma wafted out and Cho's nose was in heaven. He pushed the lit some more, and suddenly it fell to the concrete with a terrible CLANG! Cho jumped back, startled. Would the noise make the humans come out? They would chase him off and hide the food again, Cho worried.

       Then Cho heard a growl. An icy bolt of fear ran down his spine. He whirled to face the woof who had appeared, snarling, at the entrance to the alley. There was nowhere to hide. Desperately, Cho lunged to the side to run around the woof, but it moved to block him. Cho recoiled. The woof stalked forward, forcing Cho to shuffle backward. Cho's fur stood on end and he snarled at the woof, showing a mouthful of small, sharp teeth, but the woof continued to stalk forward. Cho had to give way. Soon, Cho was backed into a corner. There was nowhere to go.

       As Cho's hindquarters touched the wall, a pebble was dislodged from many stories above. It clattered to the ground between Cho and the woof, startling them both. The two creatures stared at it, but nothing happened. Seeing his prey distracted, the woof tried to creep even closer. Cho made a swipe at it with his paw. Cho's claws were not as viscious as a rowr's, and his nimble paws were were not big enough to deliver a punishing blow, but they could still deal a painful slash to the woofs face. The woof stood back and growled again.

       Then Cho felt like a clamp had grabbed his gut, and he curled up in agony. A vice squezzed his mind and he blacked out.

Part 3

       Begin assimilation sequence.

       Aqcuiring entropy for randomization. Initial roll is two.

       Logged.

       Deploying. Host captured. Analyzing host. Building assimilation plan. Suspending host and integrating entity. Entity is ready.

       Successful host acquisition logged. Master game status updated. Revive and monitor.

       Reviving entity and beginning passive monitoring.

Part 4

       Frob became aware. He could feel that he was in a new body. Something was speaking in his head, telling him what had just started.

       Beginning round three. You are die five. Assimilated species is Terran Procyanidae . . .

       ** PAIN! **

       Terrible pain lanced through Frob's . . . whatever. He was still too disoriented to tell. This wasn't supposed to happen! Whatever that meant. Frob tried to remember anything that would help. Something in his mind was telling him he had suffered an attack on his . . . hindquarters, and . . . something about repair rates. What?

       Another flare of pain, and Frob felt himself lifted into the sky. He found a recent memory of being attacked by a . . . "woof." It would kill him and eat him! How to fight back? Another memory, with a different flavor - a static attack would at least surprise his enemy. He invoked the attack and . . . the woof yelped and dropped him. Frob fell to the stone hard ground, further dazed. He scrambled, somehow, away from the woof. The woof was distracted. It kept shaking its head and opening and closing its mouth like it was trying to get a bad taste out. Cho looked . . . no, Frob looked at the woof with amazement. He took a moment to lick his wound, listening carefully to the woof's sounds of consternation. He knew the woof would recover at any moment.

       Frob used those precious seconds to think. He was Cho, a raccoon from the city streets, but now he also remembered other things. He was part of a game, but the woof was not. Someone was searching for him, but the woof would kill him now. Or, in Galactic Standard, the dog would. Another thought came to him. Because of the game, he had special abilities. He remembered using them before, so he concentrated on those memories.