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 Posted: Wed Dec 16, 2015 5:46 pm
  
"It wasn't really specific he just said that everyone in the resistance should be there when Sybil fell." Will responded as he set his sawed off on the table next to a metal chair. Metal and glass may have shown off wealth but they never showed comfort. They were cold and hard, like some people in the resistance. Still will took a seat in the chair and crossed one leg over another in an attempt to find a more comfortable sitting position to wait. "For such a remarkable machine Sybil has always been fooled when Adrian tried to fool it. Don't worry, too much. Within five hours we'll be free or we'll be dead. Either way, the conflict, the fighting, it will be over."
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Posted: Thu Dec 17, 2015 8:34 pm
Amelia Cross  “I find that rather hard to believe.” She looked at will with a raised eye brow. Adrian had never included her as part of the resistance. Amelia smiled faintly at Will’s attempt to get comfortable, but she didn’t sit down herself. She was feeling much too anxious to sit down. She looked around helplessly for a moment before finally asking, “How is your shoulder? There should be some medical supplies around here. And an entertain room upstairs with more comfortable chairs.” Though this wasn’t her house, houses were often built with identical layouts, with only the furnishing up to the owners. People under Sybil’s rule didn’t own their houses so much as were assigned to them based on their role in the city. It made things much more efficient.
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Posted: Thu Dec 17, 2015 9:09 pm
"We live in a world where a tyrannical A.I. tells everyone what to do and when to do it but you find it hard to believe that one of the free minds in society wants everyone there to see the fall of the machines?" Will questioned as he shrugged his injured shoulder a little. It didn't hurt too much, there was a red burn mark where the taser had hit him but most of the pain had turned to numbness and so nothing felt off about it. "My shoulder will be fine."
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Posted: Sat Dec 19, 2015 8:24 pm
Amelia Cross “I don’t think I rank much higher than the machines.” Amelia commented quietly, and then sat down in a chair across from Will. “I designed most of them you know? Virtually all of the newer models. I started out making helpful machines, making people’s lives better. First it was mundane things like improving the efficiency of the agriculture bots, but I didn’t stay there long. I was transferred to the medical department, where I spent a few years surrounded by doctors building the machine that would replace them all. Precision surgery. It was tedious balancing all of the hydraulics just so, and hours of medical research, but when it was done it was my crowning glory. It still is I suppose. I didn’t want to move to Peace Keeping at first. I was promised I’d be saving lives by keeping the public safe and for the first while I only created non-lethal bots like the one that attacked us. I remember my first lethal bot as well. Taser and sleeping gas weren’t enough to keep the people safe. Criminals had counter measures for those and sometimes it was necessary to kill them to eliminate the threat. All of Sybil’s controls and it still couldn’t breed out of humans those who wanted hurt others for the fun of it. Anyway, I actually did enjoy making them. It was so much more interesting than the Ag bots and so much less tedious than the medical bots. And poor Glenn, this is his house. He used to be head of the Peace Keeping department before I joined. He couldn’t stand it that this twenty something could improve upon all of his designs. Eventually he had a break down and was sent to a ‘Relaxation Centre’.” People rarely returned from these relaxation centres. It generally involved giving sedatives to the people in there all day instead of dealing with whatever issues they had. Still Sybil didn’t reassign the houses until the patient was dead, since it couldn’t admit these people would be never coming back. “I want to help people, but I seem to only cause destruction wherever I go.”
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Posted: Sat Dec 19, 2015 9:51 pm
"Well you're not wrong." Will mumbled, undermining any emotional core in her little speech. He didn't care for serious moments like this, high tension times where all they could do was wait. He wanted to be out there helping retake the hangar but he couldn't. The distant sound of explosions suggested the attack on the Hangar had begun. "But it's fine now, Sybil will be destroyed soon an anything you have done to hurt us you have made up for by helping finish the virus. Amelia, it is all going to be over soon, we can go back and live normal lives free of machine control. " By focusing on the positives Will missed something Adrian would not have. He missed the reason that Adrian's father sent Adrian after Amelia, the key to everything. But it didn't matter, the events had been set in motion.
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Posted: Sun Dec 20, 2015 9:22 pm
A thousand minds buzzed as the collective ran different possibilities. They had successfully gotten a hold of the program before the rebel could warn the others, though unfortunately Amelia was missing again. They had scarcely started uploading the program to about a quarter of those guarding the Hanger when the first attack came. Now it ran millions of calculations based on probabilities to decide the best course of action. It all took less than a second for the collective to agree. They turned several of the machines to their offline mode, choosing to focus on completing the upload where it had already been started. Being offline during an attack wasn’t desirable since the individual machines would follow their programming instead of working as a collective, but once the upload was complete they could connect so many more and focus on the battle. The first uploads finished and within seconds they lost the connection with those machines. Shock echoed throughout the collective. Such a thing wasn’t possible. They scrambled to cancel the uploads that had been started, but not completed. Unfortunately the choice to boost the upload speed was now working against them. All in all 278 machines had gone dark by the time they had managed to stop the upload. Not an insignificant loss, but they could still protect the Hanger with their remaining forces. Once it was over they would take the time to examine the code in depth and figure out how to get those machines back or scrap them. Instead to focused on bringing the remaining machines in the area back online so they could better co-ordinate their defense. Of course the collective assumed the virus had only knocked the machines offline. They didn’t know someone else had assumed control.
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Posted: Sun Dec 20, 2015 9:24 pm
Amelia Cross Somehow Will’s words did make her feel a bit better about the whole thing, but then maybe that was why she had decided to tell him in the first place. Why she felt comfortable enough around him to show her softer side instead of constantly being on the attack like she was with Adrian. He was always so relaxed and nonchalant about these things. “I’m not so sure others would agree with you…” She commented quietly. Who knew how many people her designs had killed? It was a large part of why she had avoided not telling Adrian what she was capable of, scared he would dig into what exactly her job was at the Tower. Again that choice to be afraid Will had talked to her about. “You should be with them. Instead you are stuck with me again. I can wait for Adrian by myself if you want to go.”
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Posted: Sun Dec 20, 2015 9:52 pm
"The idea of me being here was an order, not an option. Well not true, I did volunteer once Adrian made it clear you needed protection so it was sorta an option." Will explained as he shifted slightly in his seat. "Besides, you think I wanna be out there in the fight? I want to live to see the new world, these covert assignments are the best and worst way to achieve that goal." Will could hear the gunfire now, it was so clear yet so far off. The battle had begun. Humanities last stand shook the ground beneath them and they sat in some room talking like so many others who lived unaware of the freedom they would soon have again.
  
While Will and Amelia were speaking Adrian sat in the command center of the battle. A tent, on a hill, overlooking the Hangar. He had a table device displaying an overhead view of the battle. The moment the rebels took control of the 278, the attack had begun. The resistance had 100 men and women charging the Hangar room each side, now supported by 10 machines per side. They had a limited supply of Sybil's creations but that was not why he was using them sparingly. They would be the first line of assault on to Tower, now was simply the time to show Sybil it had lost them, the time to make the machine fear the total cost of what it had done. That fear could always be used, that was the goal of retaking the Hangar, make the machine's fear mankind again.
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Posted: Tue Dec 22, 2015 8:12 pm
Amelia Cross “You wouldn’t rather be out fighting with your fellow rebels, kicking mechanical a** like a hero from a fairy-tale?” Amelia asked, though she largely accepted his answer. Of course Sybil had destroyed any stories where machines were the antagonist. Not that it kept the free thinkers of secreting such contraband away. Her eyes traveled towards the sounds of the gun fire in the distance. Did that mean it worked, or was Sybil slaughtering them in the streets? It was impossible to tell from gunfire alone and the strange communication remained silent. Not that that was exactly a surprise. What would the two of them do if Sybil was killing them all anyway? “So what is that thing anyway?” She asked finally, indicating to the old world radio. Shock rippled out through the collective as some of those they had lost connection with started firing at their own forces. It wasn’t supposed to be possible and hadn’t even been considered in the calculations for possible outcomes. It was only a fraction of what they had lost and they could still defend their position. New calculations showed a 52% probability of success with heavy losses provided more of their machines didn’t start firing on them. There was a moment of debate, a rare thing for the collective, before they came to a consensus on a new battle strategy. The machines on the battel field took up a defensive position, seeking to limit damage and hold their ground rather than eliminating the rebel forces attacking them.
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Posted: Tue Dec 22, 2015 8:46 pm
"You only need to kick metal once to know it just breaks your toes." Will responded simplistically. He did harbor some small desire to be there in the fighting but he had orders and knew it was his duty to follow them. "Besides, this way I'm almost guaranteed to survive the end of the rebellion. I only have to make it through one battle, everyone else has to make it through two." Will paused and looked down at the radio on the table. "Not entirely sure. All I know is that I have to let go of the button on the side in order to hear Adrian and I have to press it for him to hear me. So oldschool but also free of an A.I.'s control so it must be a good thing."
Adrian received a report reflecting the new strategy. He had anticipated that Sybil make take the defensive and was prepared to counter. The resistance had roughly 2,278 fighters, including the machines they stole from Sybil, 440 were currently attacking the Hangar directly. Adrian wanted Sybil to receive a false count of the Resistances full power. Fortunately that also meant he had people he could expend to do other things. While everyone here was attacking the warehouse entrance, Adrian issued orders for a small unit of 20 men and woman to infiltrate the Hangar through the vehicle entrance roughly five miles northeast of the warehouse. It was closer to the city but it was also less likely Sybil had found that entrance. From the outside it appeared to be normal ground, and even if you managed to get in the Hangar you wouldn't be able to see it until you retracted the wall so the vehicles could move out and you couldn't move the wall without Adrian's hand print. Then again if Sybil had gotten into the Hangar it could have blown the wall open so it was a calculated risk. Still the order had been issued. While the battle at the warehouse remained in a standstill, Adrian sent the small group to enter the hangar and reclaim their tanks and weapons. If it worked, and they managed to reclaim the vehicles and weapons inside, Adrian would use them to reinforce the assault on the warehouse. Adrian wanted the Hangar back, the attack on the tower would be managed better if they could reclaim their technology.
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Posted: Wed Dec 23, 2015 10:21 pm
Amelia Cross Amelia smiled slightly. “I’ve done that on more than one occasion.” Her workshop in the Tower was often a mess, with various machines parts and tools scattered about. More than once she had stubbed her toes on a piece of equipment and had managed to break a few toes that way. “I imagine you’ll be spending the second battle keeping me out of the way as well.” Or at least she sort of hoped he was. The other likely option was being with Adrian wherever he would be commanding their forces from. It still seemed odd to her that he was wasting resources protecting her now that her part had been completed. “I suppose he’d be upset if I took it apart to see how it works. Could you imagine though? We could build an army of machines that use that technology to communicate instead and Sybil wouldn’t be able to hack it.” Of course that’d only be useful if they failed today. To do such a thing would take a lot longer than days Adrian had left. “Did the medics say if he could survive another surgery? If say, there was another heart available?” The vehicle entrance appeared to be undiscovered, though they would be wise to assume Sybil knew where it was now if it hadn’t before. With the entire city on lock down and the streets empty any movement was fairly easy to track. After several minutes of the battle coming to a near standstill it became clear Sybil had been stalling as much as Adrian had. Those that had been guarding the hanger had been the standard enforcement bots. Lethal, but not overly so and designed to detain or kill criminals in one versus one situations. War machines were a thing of the passed in the golden age of Sybils peace. It seemed however that Sybil was prepared for war. The ground rumbled as three heavily armoured behemoths rolled down the street on tank treads. As soon as they cleared the last buildings the sound of the miniguns spinning up begin fire could be heard seconds before they began to spray the rebels position from behind.
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Posted: Fri Jan 01, 2016 7:34 pm
"Not sure about the attack on the Tower. We are supposed to be picked up on the way to the attack so we'll probably be expected to fight or at least I'll be expected to fight." Will responded. He did expect that he would be fighting it only made sense to him though. The attack on the tower would be the end of it, everyone who could fight, would. "And as far as building the army of machines, I feel like that is what began the problem with Sybil. To reliant on machines to do the jobs we could have been doing. If Sybil were to take control of the army we built things would only be worse. Still it would save some lives." Will added. Unlike Adrian he tried to point out the positive sides of peoples ideas while also keeping hem grounded in reality. Then came her question about Adrian, one Will knew the answer too. He had been there the whole time. He was there when Adrian's body was recovered and he was there every for every report the medical; staff gave. He knew the answer and even now didn't want to admit it. "There are no hearts available. Even if there were, Adrian's body can't withstand another surgery. That machine on his heart is all that's keeping him going and it is going to die as well. We can't save him." As soon as he had finished speaking Adrian's voice boomed out of the walkie talkie.
"Will, bring her to the Hangar now. There's been a change of plans."
"Pull out the ground forced and wait. Let Sybil think it's won, we'll hit it again before it can reach the vehicle entrance." Adrian gave out the orders quickly and then began to wait/s he sat waiting men and women were called int full retreat. Sybil's war machine was impressive but it was only fodder, the rebels still had the EMP in the Hangar and if Sybil hadn't uncovered the vehicle entrance then it could not have gotten in meaning all the weapons inside were untouched. Adrian sent the orders through to the infiltration unit that had been sent into the Hangar. The were to reduce the EMP blast to the area surrounding the warehouse entrance and then set it off. By reducing the range it would increase the power and should disable the war machines and ground units Sybil had deployed. That was when the idea dawned on Adrian. They had tanks, sure they had tanks, but they could take Sybil's war machines too. The EMP would put them offline and then he could have Amelia reprogram them while they were down. However that meant that he needed to bring her to the field. So he picked up his walkie talkie and sent the message. "Will, bring her to the Hangar now. There's been a change of plans."
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Posted: Sat Jan 02, 2016 1:39 pm
Amelia Cross “Give me a wrench and I’ll throw it at them.” Amelia commented, making light of her complete lack of combat experience. Sure she had interment knowledge of the machines and could disable most of them with a carefully placed blow. The problem lay in getting close enough to do so without said machines killing her first. Besides she had passed most of the schematics onto the rebellion anyway. “Machines are only as good or as bad as the people who made them. The question is who made Sybil? I suppose after today it won’t really matter though.” The Sybil System had been around for a long time, but until recently they all thought a human was over seeing it. How long had Sybil been self-governing? How had it taken over without anyone noticing? Amelia opened her mouth to respond about Adrian when the man’s voice crackled from the strange device just like Will said it would. What she would give to take it apart. “Is that a good thing or a bad thing?” She asked, standing up and swinging the bag she brought from her house onto her back. The behemoth war machines were slow due to their weight and it wasn’t difficult before the rebels to out distance them, though not before the miniguns had a chance to cut a number of them down, the rapid fire bullets slicing through most nearby cover. The slow moving war machines were left to guard the warehouse entrance, while a good chunk of the more nimble enforcer bots were sent after the retreating rebels and the vehicle entrance. The enforcer bots that stayed behind weren’t idle though as they began to cannibalize the machines Adrian had taken over.
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Posted: Sat Jan 02, 2016 2:23 pm
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Eloquent Conversationalist
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Posted: Sat Jan 02, 2016 8:25 pm
Amelia Cross “Sure, you just get the machines to stand still while I use the knife to pry open the access panel.” Amelia offered for a battle strategy. At least with a wrench she could put some nice dents in them. A knife would probably be worthless in her hands. She was hot on Will heels out the door, pausing a moment to try and close the broken door before remembering it didn’t much matter. It wasn’t like they were coming back, so she gave up on the door and caught up to Will on the street. As promised, every machine in the area shut down. The war machines stopped their movement, the miniguns pointing towards the ground instead of slowly sweeping the area looking for movement. The enforcement bots stopped chasing the rebels to the vehicle entrance, some slamming into buildings and cars as their momentum carried them forward. Even most of the air drones fell from the sky. The war machines would be difficult to move given their weight and the clock was counting down until Sybils machines would be able to reboot themselves.
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