dp.1

[MEGAZONE 23]

GRM Reaper Productions, Uninc.
in association with
British-AnimeTech Limited
presents

A PsychoMental Production
A Virtual Non-Film

Benjamin D. Hutchins Brian Bikowicz
Rob Mandeville

Undocumented Features

THE CAST
Benjamin D. Hutchins Gryphon
Brian Bikowicz MegaZone (!23)
Rob Mandeville ReRob
Kei Kei Morgan
Yuri Yuri Daniels
Rob Crocker Crocker/Confused
John Todd Macquivr/Q
Adam Johnson Pfloyd
Rich Parker Rich
The Wedge Rats The Wedge Commandos
John Coyle Coyle
Larry Foard Entropy
Andrew Petrarca Android
Kevin Tefft Kevin
Largo Largo

Special Visual Effects by Your Brain On Drugs, Inc.
Costumes by Why Me, Lord? Ltd.
Vehicles by British-AnimeTech Ltd.
Destruction by Joe Martin Destruction Systems International
Cool Neo-TechTronic Things by British-AnimeTech Limited
Music by Ben & Joe & The Assistance
Screenplay by Brian Bikowicz
From an Original Story by Benjamin D. Hutchins, Brian
Bikowicz, and Rob Mandeville
CLULESS Created by John Todd
8thdimension Created by Rob Mandeville
The Wave Motion RifleTM Created by Andrew Petrarca
The GRF-3N Griffin III Armored Combat Suit Created by
Benjamin D. Hutchins
Gryphon Created by Ben's Parents
MegaZone Created by Brian's Parents
ReRob Created by Rob's Parents
Kei and Yuri Created by Haruka Takachiho
Technical Support by Gadaiyio Takeimienei
Publishing by Eyrie Publishing Co., NotEvenCloseToInc.



This one's for all the people out there who love SF, anime,
and the marvelous concept known as "write yer own". But more
than that:

For Kei and Yuri.

Ben:
For Mike, the original coauthor--he's the one who got me
going on this write yer own stuff...

For Joe, the reason I'm here in the first place.

For Cory. You started the whole mess anyway, indirectly.

For Zoner and ReRob, who got me running with this idea like
a giant snowball.

For Mom and Dad, who could never understand, but they're
behind me anyway...

For Randy, who has become comfortably numb.

For Seann, who may well find himself caught up in similar
insanity next year.

For anyone else I can't recall right now...I write for
everyone, but not everyone reads for me.



Zoner:
For the Wedge Rats, who so graciously helped in proofreading
and conceptualizing this beast.

For Dave, who has been my best friend for, oh about, 7 years
now. You were the only one who could put up with me.

For Gryphon and ReRob, who sucked me into this mess and got
me thoroughly involved to the point that I couldn't get out.

For the Internet, especially rec.arts.anime, for all of the
good stories and information I have gathered over the years.

For Jenna, who saved me from the brink. I owe you more than I
can ever say.

For Marc, who got me into anime in the first place.

For my parents, who have encouraged me to be myself.


ReRob:
For Crocker, without whom the HDS would be just a dream.
As if it isn't right now.

For Ben and Zoner, who warped a simple storyline into a
convoluted mess only an author could love.

For Jolt, for obvious reasons.

For Joe "Lampshade" Curtin, the Anti-Gweep, who drove me
over the edge and into the Wedge in the first place.

For my parents, who love me because they think I'm loony
and not in spite of that fact.


How It Began----------------------------------------------ONE

"On the first day of the first month in some distant year,
the whole sky froze golden. Some said it was the aftermath
of the radium bomb, while others told of a final retribution,
a terrible revenge, of the gods."
--Def Leppard

WEDNESDAY 2 OCTOBER 1991

It was a slow Wednesday; Ben was down in the subbasement
of Fuller Labs, poking around in CSLANtronix. He got up,
logged out, and, bored, slouched out of the room. It was
nearing lunchtime; today he had actually gotten up rather
early. He turned the corner, heading away from the elevator;
he was curious as to what was over there.
At the end of the hallway was a room whose door said
"NO ONE CUMZ IN HEER. SEKRIT". Being the naturally
inquisitive sort, Ben tried the handle on the door, just to
see if it was locked. It wasn't. The room beyond was dark
and silent, save for the thrum of machinery. He looked
around; there was no one around, no one in the entire
subbasement, probably, except him. He entered the room,
closing the door behind him.
His hand sought a lightswitch on the wall; he touched
something. Immediately, the room blazed into light.
All around him was the environment of a DECstation.
"Wha--?!" he uttered involuntarily, stumbling backward.
He turned; the door was gone. He turned back around,
almost in a panic, and suddenly he realized where he was.
This was 8thdimension! The HoloDECstation!
"But that was only a story," he breathed. "This is
nuts." But it wasn't, it couldn't be; there in front of him
was an xeyes, an IRC window, and the tattered remains of an
xtank game. The station was logged into an account that no
longer existed.
Ben walked to the session manager's icon and thumped it
with a fist; immediately, the window sprang into existence.
He pulled the session menu down and quit, then banged the
"YES" box with his fist. The station logged out and returned
him to the system prompt. With a growing smile, he stepped
to the login box and drew his login name, gryphon, and his
password, which I'm not going to write here, so neener neener
neener.
Within moments he was inside MWM on his own account.
"Hmm...let's see what this thing can do." He pulled up
an xgif -3 of /usr6/pub/anime/dp.portrait.gif, the 2d version
of which he always had running on a normal DECstation
whenever he used it. Then, with a suitable distraction
running, he started fooling around.
He soon discovered xtty, which created a keyboard for
him to type on; he found writing in air tiresome. As he sat
clattering away, he decided to cd to /usr1 and see what was
in there, but by a strange typo, he wound up typing

What do we do next, Doctor? A:>cd /usr-1
instead. To his surprise, he wound up in a directory. He
ls'd it and discovered that it only contained one file:

cluless

"What the hell is cluless?" he wondered, cding it. That
accomplished a bit, and it soon became apparent that it was a
software compiler. He more'd the README file.

CLULESS

CLULESS is a software compiler designed to generate
artificial nonintelligence. It is the considered opinion of
the author that true artificial intelligence is impossible,
since so little natural intelligence exists to use as a
model. Therefore, I have developed a software package which
will generate, I hope, artificial NONintelligences, with
which the casual user will be much better acquainted.

Source code may be entered using emacs or another text
editor and then compiled using the command clucomp -i
<filename>.

NEVER use clucomp without the -i flag.

Ben's brows knitted; no explanation of the syntax of the
language, nothing of that sort whatsoever. He wondered
briefly what would happen if he were to start programming
something and then compile it through clucomp.
He thought nothing more of it, having no idea what the
programming syntax for CLULESS was; instead he played with
the station for a while longer and then decided to clr2gray a
Dirty Pair .gif for mailing to a friend of his. However, in
his rushed typing and crossed up train of thought (he always
typed too fast) he wound up typing

What do we do next, Doctor? A:>clucomp</usr6/pub/anime/dp.005
oav.gif|fbps>~/dp.PS

He received the following messages:

WARNING! Two separate entities--divided successfully.
WARNING! Insufficient data. Auto-crosschecking: please wait:
checking: dp.beverly.gif
checking: dp.bikini.gif
WARNING! Extraneous entity ignored!
checking: dp.calender.gif
checking: dp.chased.gif
checking: dp.cycle.gif
checking: dp.dressing.gif
WARNING! Significant deviation from previous data!
disregarding discrepant data.
checking: dp.gunpod.gif
WARNING! Significant deviation from previous data!
Disregarding discrepant data.
checking: dp.keitop.gif
WARNING! Source lacking significant chromatic variation!
Interpolating proper coloration from other data.
checking: dp.portrait.gif
checking: dp.rambo.gif
checking: dp.topgun.gif
checking: dp.water.gif
Visual data successfully compiled. Now compiling personality
protocols.
checking......... Failure in locating data!
Checking system for data...................
Data located in /usr6/pub/anime/Scripts/
checking: dp.bigbang.Z
checking: dp.eden.nr.Z
checking: dp.eden.ps.Z
WARNING! Duplicate data!
Ignoring superfluous data.
checking: dp.flight005.syn.Z
checking: dp.movie.Z
checking: dp.oav005.Z
WARNING! Duplicate data!
checking: dp.robin.Z
Personality protocols successfully compiled.
Interpolating...
Interpolation complete.
Extrapolating...
Extrapolation complete.
Compilation complete and successful.
fbps: Cannot output to PostScript.

"What?" He tried it again, oblivious to what he had
done, and this time it worked; he outputted to -Plps20 and
thought no more about it. Annoyingly, the station seemed to
have slowed down.
When he emerged from the HoloDECstation four hours
later, having totally missed lunch, he found an extremely
surprising sight waiting for him.
He backed out of the room and closed the door; when he
turned around he stopped breathing for a moment and almost
dropped dead in his tracks.
Two beautiful, and totally naked, women were standing in
the hallway. They weren't doing much of anything; just
standing. Somewhere in the back of his head he could hear
guitars...

<<In The Flesh?, Pink Floyd>>

He recognized them, of course he recognized them, but
what the hell were they doing there? He turned around--
The door was gone. Momentarily panicked, he grabbed for
the doorknob; the wall melted away and he was inside the
station again. It had recognized him as its operator.
He logged in and did a "what gryphon"--and received the
following message:

USER PROC# TIME TTY IDLE JOB
gryphon 4432 17:38 8E ps
gryphon 19553 17:38 8E sh
gryphon 3180 17:38 8E grep
gryphon 1010 17:38 8E tcsh

gryphon 22067 17:58 8D 4:15 fbps
gryphon 1009 17:58 8D :05 tcsh

Ben called up the uncompiled code and found the line:
Clothing=$null /*conflicting data, clothing dropped*/
Which he quickly changed to Clothing=$WWWAuniforms in both
kei.cluless and yuri.cluless.

What do we do next, Doctor? A:> kill -9 22067
[22067] Killed
What do we do next, Doctor? A:> kill -9 1009
[1009] Killed
What do we do next, Doctor? A:>

Maybe that will do it, he thought as he logged out and
left the station.
They were still there; now, though, they were moving.
And they were clothed in V-cut shorts, high-collared, open-
fronted halter tops, and tall boots. The hung fbps job had
held them there, unmoving; now they were freed.
Without realizing what he was doing, Ben had created the
world's first artificial life, CLULESSly compiling a .gif
file and generating a life form with the absolute statistics
of the .gif's subject. CLULESS's designer didn't realize it
could do that, but then, he designed a programming language
called CLULESS, so how brilliant could he have been?
The red-haired one fixed him with a clear brown-eyed
gaze and said forcefully, "Anta wa dareda?!"
To which Ben replied articulately, "Huh?"
"Kore wa nani o shimasu ka?" the other chimed in.
"Uh...look...I don't speak Japanese..." Ben backed
through the portal to 8thdimension again and called up the
uncompiled source code for them, which was now split into two
files and overloading his directory bigtime. He searched the
one entitled kei.cluless frantically, searching for
something, anything, that--AHA! The string there,
LANG=$Japanese. That looked promising. He changed it to
$English, then changed his mind and changed it to
$AmericanGeneric. He altered yuri.cluless the same way, and
then logged out yet again.
When he exited, he was met by a long string of
questions--but they were all in AmericanGeneric, a language
he could understand. He weathered the storm, waited for his
"guests" to calm, and then said evenly and diplomatically,
"My name is Hutchins. Benjamin D. Hutchins. You can call me
Ben. You're Kei," he said, pointing, "and you're Yuri. I
don't know how you got here, really." He shrugged and
opened his arms wide in a gesture of benediction. "Welcome
to WPI!"