CHAPTER 1
789.345
[LIVE BROADCAST] - LOCAL GROUP [LIGHTONTAINTEDGLASS] LightOnTaintedGlass
TTC: I don’t know what, or who, is sending these corrupted broadcasts. Is this some kind of strange joke?
TIAS: What? What are you talking about?
TTC: It’s just an error message.
TIAS: Sounds like a prank. Unless their communication systems have gone through some fatal error, which is unlikely. Every little part of us is continuously monitored.
TTC: I still have my worries.
NPM: I heard rumors of a local iterator breaking down. My guess is SBC
TIAS: Really?
NPM: Some kind of punishment? I haven’t seen it for myself yet though
TTC: I suppose I’ll ignore it for now.
TIAS: Now I think of it, it could just be faulty maintenance.
NPM: It can’t be that simple
793.115
[LIVE BROADCAST] - PRIVATE Cage of Membrane, Missing Link of Chain
MLOC: It has come to my attention that your rain production has increased by a higher margin than usual.
MLOC: What’s the occasion?
COM: superv-visor orders.
COM: unsure. i am in- normal condition though! no worries
MLOC: Good to hear! You’ve gone oddly quiet as well, I made an attempt to search some of your administrator’s logs to see if it had happened again.
MLOC: I have news about Sixteenth Boundary Collapse!
COM: is-is it okay? do tell-
COM: i send my condolences
MLOC: It didn’t take much to find out what they plan to do with it now, word of mouth reaches far.
MLOC: It allegedly is still capable of performing typical iterator tasks, thankfully. Though any communications appear to have not gone through, I’ve even tried a forced broadcast with no success, and I am sure many others have too.
MLOC: They plan on moving to a new city.
COM: sounds… silly.
MLOC: Well, it’s something related to a new variation on the iterator model. However, it's information that I am not yet allowed access to. For reasons I don’t understand.
MLOC: You seem busy now though, so I will leave the speculation up to you now. Have hope for SBC!
COM: i-i-i will… get- back to work…
794.534
[RECORDED LOG: 794.534 - PRIVATE]
I feel I must go against what I have been advised to not do. What would they need to hide, anyway? All I need to do is somehow obtain access to SBC’s facilities, perhaps that could give me answers.
Some overseers should be simple enough.
794.950
[RECORDED LOG: 794.950 - PRIVATE]
Well… it looks terrible, to put it lightly. The communication arrays have been trashed. Graffiti depicting… quite heinous things, all across its can.
I lost many overseers to the rioters, thankfully I still managed to capture some visuals on this situation. The worst part was the chamber. Sixteenth Boundary’s puppet appears to be decapitated, laying on the floor limply.
The microbe strata have lowered activity, indicating some sort of emergency procedure, or even a temporary loss of consciousness? It cannot be that simple though, how does one even manage to incapacitate an iterator…?
My questions about the supposed new iterator continue to be unanswered. I am unable to find the source I received that information from. Maybe something in my archives…?
787.960
[RECORDED BROADCAST: 787.960] - LOCAL GROUP [LIGHTONTAINTEDGLASS] LightOnTaintedGlass
NPM: They’re constructing another one!
MLOC: How do you know that?
NPM: Well, I heard talk about it from many of my citizens-
MLOC: Last time you used your citizens as a source I ended up wasting several cycles sorting through faulty data over a ridiculous conspiracy.
COM: mountains is ri-right-!
COM: they’re exp-panding the mountain facilit-ties
MLOC: I’ll have to look into that soon then if I get the time, thank you!
NPM: When will they fix your broadcast system…?
MLOC: Please be respectful.
795.498
[LIVE BROADCAST] - PRIVATE Thirteen Catastrophes, Missing Link of Chain
TC: Missing Link of Chain, on behalf of both the House of Providence and House of Bells, you are Ordered to Recall your Overseers, effective Immediately.
MLOC: No.
TC: Do not ignore our Request.
TC: You are Committing a serious Offense.
TC: Please. For Your safety.
MLOC: Why?
TC: If you interfere Again, I will have to take Action and inform your Supervisors.
796.001
[LIVE BROADCAST] - (ANNOUNCEMENT) Thirteen Catastrophes to Local Group
TC: As ordered from the House of Providence and House of Bells, we ask you please refrain from discussing any potentially confidential information about iterator construction plans.
TC: The House of Providence and House of Bells both carry Concerns over Potential Citizen and Government outcry.
TC: These are not topics to be discussed Publicly.
TC: Thank you.
798.385
[RECORDED LOG: 798.385 - PRIVATE]
Despite my brief guilt, I know I won’t regret this.
I had my overseers inspect SBC’s communication systems, what I have found is… of high interest.
I will record the communication manifests received from its facility as so:
====
[OUTGOING REQUEST: 797.329] COMMUNICATIONS MANIFEST
[[ERROR]] Missing Components
[[ERROR]] Malformed Message Header
MODULES SBC_COMM05, SBC_COMM08, SBC_COMM11 UNAVAILABLE
MESSAGE CONTENTS:
SBC: -the
SBC: h----
SBC: --ter
797.453
[OUTGOING REQUEST: 797.453] COMMUNICATIONS MANIFEST
[[ERROR]] Missing Components
[[ERROR]] Malformed Message Header
MODULES SBC_COMM05, SBC_COMM08, SBC_COMM11 UNAVAILABLE
MESSAGE CONTENTS:
SBC: -llo-
SBC: r--air --on-
SBC: -a-ved
SBC: -th-nk y--
====
Perhaps it isn’t beyond saving… yet.
799.840
[LIVE BROADCAST] - LOCAL GROUP [LIGHTONTAINTEDGLASS] LightOnTaintedGlass
TTC: Do you understand now?
TIAS: Ah…
TTC: I won’t rub it in your face
TTC: I might get in trouble.
OOQT: Is this about the broadcasts again? I thought we moved past that.
799.841
[LIVE BROADCAST] - LOCAL GROUP [LIGHTONTAINTEDGLASS] LightOnTaintedGlass
OOQT: I’m not sure why they’d keep additional iterators secret. Your neurons must be severely rotted.
NPM: Quartz! I’m telling you! They’ve already finished the void fluid piping in a restricted facility near SBC!
OOQT: And why wouldn’t that just be a typical excavation? We’d have been informed of such a thing, even in passing.
NPM: With SBC’s current condition, it’s probably something they want to hide from us-
OOQT: Stop. Talking.
NPM: Go talk to Missing Link of Chain privately if you don’t believe ME then…
OOQT: She didn’t do anything-
TC: Oblivion On Quartz Towers and Nine Purple Mountains. If you could so kindly take this Discussion out of the Public Group.
799.842
[LIVE BROADCAST] - LOCAL GROUP [LIGHTONTAINTEDGLASS] LightOnTaintedGlass
TC: Well, no, that’s Not how it works.
NPM: No because they start off with the pipes, then the legs, and then the can.
OOQT: You don’t know anything!
OOQT: It’s the legs, the can, and finally the piping systems. They all have to conform to the can and the legs!
TC: When was the Last time either of you Properly spoke to anything other than an Iterator?
OOQT: I’m not wasting my time speaking to boring politicians and lizard brains, though I suppose that’s the only crowd you’ll fit into.
TC: You are not permitted to Insult me in Such a way.
NPM: Wait, I checked. Both of us were wrong.
799.843
[LIVE BROADCAST] - PRIVATE Missing Link of Chain, Oblivion On Quartz Towers
MLOC: By the way, iterator construction varies wildly. There's no absolute way. They’re always attempting some new optimization.
MLOC: Mountains corrected themselves, and yet still managed to get it incorrect the second time, haha!
OOQT: I realized that. Ugh. So much time spent pointlessly bickering.
MLOC: It was only one conversation. You’re looking in the face of near-eternity!
OOQT: A near-eternity of irritating arguments.