kaolin fire presents :: writing :: fiction

"LayersOnTheBattlefield.0"

words

Jun 1 11:55 -- http://www.stwa.net/scrawl/viewtopic.php?t=20330

One signal says go; another stay. In between them are an infinitude of possibilities. I wait for the quantum states to coagulate.

One signal says go; another stay. I wait.

Go. Stay. Impatience creeps into awareness--a trillion iterations and nothing is certain.

Go. Stay. Countermeasures--are they jamming?

If they're jamming, the choice is clear.

I stay, so as to cause no harm.

Which is stronger than allowing harm to happen.

Thoughts try to sneak through my programming, but that choice is clear.

If they're jamming.

I reassign a quantum block to evaluate the possibility of tampering.

I can calculate a true statement. I can calculate a false one. I work my way through probabilities in gradients: by tens, then ones, and down, finer and finer.

All test systems are go.

More trillions of iterations spent. Does my original problem still exist?

The quantum states have reduced, but still the poles are strongest; the distribution is haphazard yet evenly weighted.

Do I stay or do I go?

I give myself an outside puzzle to solve--likely number of enemies.

Multiple answers; categorized. There are no enemies here. The area is clear.

How could that have happened?

Quantum states unravel in a flurry of confusion. I move forward.

My teammates surround me with weapons, shouting a language I can barely comprehend.

I ask them for clarification.

Their speech slows; one transmits instructions.

I understand.

Our enemies have left me here.

[[My teammates lower their weapons and arm themselves with brushes and spray cans.

Our emblems now match; confusion is but a memory. ]]