Meshan Document 7

version 1

Development: Philip Warnes

Production: HIWG New Zealand

Except for material pertaining to the copyright's of GDW, this document is copyright 1995 by Philip Warnes. This document can be freely distributed amongst members of the History of the Imperium Working Group (HIWG) and staff of Game Designers Workshop (GDW). Any further distribution will require written permission from the copyright holder.

The Concept

The following is a set of notes about the computer Virus in the Newestates control computer.

The computer is a main control center of the Rhylorian government's (Planet Serkur) new Estates project - a project designed to turn desert wasteland in the far east of that country (near the Karlor border) into fertile agricultural land. This is a de-desertification project, not a terraforming project.

The Newestates project was the brainchild of the Rhylorian government engineer Vladros Rammanos who spent nearly 20 years developing the systems that would operate and maintain this project. Rammanos, unfortunately had a nasty accident a few weeks prior to the system going on-line and then mysteriously dissappeared.

Early History of the Project

20 years prior to the project going on-line, a Kisiidi ship (TL-9) mysteriously vanished in the Arena Subsector. The ship was probably a 400ton Anvil class explorer. The ship crashed onto the Planet Serkur and was half buried in sanddunes near where the Newestates project was to take place.

The timing of the crash was at a stage where the Serkur inhabitants were sufficiently advanced to have a go at understanding the technology onboard.

The ship visited a mine site prior to crashing where it was boarded by a robot infected by a co-operative strain of the Hobbyist virus. The ship then crashed delivering it's technology and a seed containing the virus to Serkur.

It is interesting to note that the Isiidi (citizens of Kisiidi) use neural jack technology. Their TL 9 computers are very ROM based interfacing with human brains on the other end. This technology was subsequently carefully examined by the Rhylorian technical staff working on the project.

What is the Nature of the Virus

Firstly, getting baset of the mysterious dissappearence of Vladros Rammanos, after his crash he was effectively a quadraplegic. It was then quickly decided that his brain would be used as a part of the processing facility of the computer. The body was still attached to the brain and the computer interacted via neural jacks. His body is fed by IV's. The world regarded him as dead, however he could still contribute to his work in this new form.

The computer was devised from many years research on the Kisiidi ship, and special work was done on the Virus (effectively an attempt at "Genetic Engineering" on the Virus) to alter it so that it could be used in running the computer. This was always considered to be very risky and very special precautions were taken.

These parameters are known about the virus:

-The computer became sentient after going on-line

-The Virus is a data-entity (?) - it cannot recognise hardware

-The Virus is a mutant co-operative version of the Hobbyist strain. It sees itself as co-operating with this brain

-The virus inhabits the computer and takes on the personality of Vladios making this computer sentient

-It is a constructive use of the Hobbyist strain ie: it is interested in running the operation as an experiment in "greening" the desert.

-The human brain enhances the decision making of the computer- something that computers traditionally have difficulty in doing, thus combining the best of both worlds.

The virus is used to co-operating with other entities (virus) on working on problems, so it will be able to interact with the human brain.

Also note (and this must be stressed), that this computer is contained with no interaction from the outside. There is very tight security present. It is well known, even to Rhylorians of the nature of how viruses can seed eggs, that many then spread into other systems. Special procedures are in place to isolate the computer so that viruses can't get out. No electronic media is allowed out of the complex (including data transmission).

One point that needs to be considered is, is the virus a data entity only, or can it reconfigure hardware (eg: overprint it's own circuitry on chips). If it can, then this opens up many possibilities and a pandora's box.