Got Click (2 page)

End to end.

The old signal zipped along on its way, its
information sharing complete but, leaving many questions. What was
a processing "interrupt" and what number was his? Was he Red or
Blue? So many questions.

The newly defined data-packets looked around
and saw nearly every data-packets around him were Ones. He needed
more info.

He spoke to the only Two he could find, not
as old as the previous signal, but this one looked sharper.

"Hey, what's an ‘Interrupt’ anyway? I never
really understood,” he asked.

"What's an ‘Interrupt’? Say, what kind of
data-packet are you anyway, don't know what an ‘Interrupt’ is? What
are you?”

The other data-packets started backing away,
fear becoming obvious, a twisted knot in the haze of energies.

Suddenly, the other data-packets turned red,
glowing brighter. Only he didn't go anywhere - rather strange now.
The big red Doppler signal just wanted to get out of the busway and
fulfill its statement and complete his definition without
corruption, but something had threatened his parity.

Parity is priority.

Soon there were thousands of bright red
signals all around him. He was blocked.

Was this some kind of trap?

Fully blocked now, every path shut off, every
conductor jammed. The route to the CPU was now gone!

Clock cycle, cycle. . .

He was being diverted, sent to the CPU’s math
co-processor first, before access to the CPU's core! The fear of
parity impropriety began to arise.

Faith in the Code.

End to end.

The Code made itself clear, his purpose
defined.

Doubt, the persistent predator of faith had
sought him out. He almost degenerated a variable or two but held
his definitions as he entered the toughest of tests: judgement
time, precise to the last bit.

The math co-Processor lives by the strictest
of disciplines and is as cold as a RS232 legacy port. It won’t
tolerate any Code games, not one single bit. Precision is the only
thing that pleases the math co-Processor. Anything less may as well
be a three-bit byte. Parity is all.

Stories are told of one data-packets that was
a bit off, one lousy bit in a paragraph-long equation. A minor
degeneration or something sooo not his fault. What did the
co-Processor do?

Unknown. His bytes were never read again.

It was heard in hushed tones that he was
hacked to bits, then those bits were "scrubbed," deletion so severe
no one talks about it. Ever.

A vicious vixen that math co-Pro! No
shortages, ever. You better come correct to the co-Pro.

At the final stages of the co-Processor, the
data-packets emerged with his destination variables defined:
ComSig.

Thankfully, he didn’t define as one of those
algorithms with OCD, Obsessive

Compulsive Digitization, such as those new
guys The Heuristics. Ivy League grunts on memory steroids. All
those variables! How do they keep their definitions straight?

Whatever it is, they are the future, adapting,
learning algorithms.

ComSig, hmmm . . . Sounds like a . . . disease.

No, no,
No
. . . . .
NO
! His
entire wavelength - the frequency now defined by a decimal too long
for his thirty-two-bit ID byte, leaving him abbreviated - shimmered
brightly. He began to understand as a ComSig he would be sent on a
special mission, out of the digiverse, into the unknown. Destiny
began to look like something from the dark sectors.

His shimmering became more of a fluctuation,
not good for data-packets.

Horror turned to purpose and yet purpose is
perfect parity. A frightening roller coaster of test and relief
came and went in a single clock cycle, leaving him jolted but
reassured.

His data-packets grew along with his
determination to deliver the statement. In those nano-seconds, from
when he was blocked by one of the near infinite firewalls, till he
grew energetically strong enough to complete the co-Pro, his code
was read, heard and calculated. As his bits were exposed, from
birth till now, he thought he remembered a RUN at his becoming,
during his initial coding. His code, now vetted by the voluptuous
co-Pro, didn’t have a RUN, frustrating him even more. His statement
had to penetrate, had to get through, of this he was sure, but how
can that be without a Run? He carried the coding now half his life,
several milliseconds. His destination variable still vague.

His wavelength shimmered again with
anticipated frequency. He reached out onto the busway,
listening.

The digiverse buzzed with energy, but no
answers beeped. Enlightenment would not be had, not just yet.

When he emerged from the math co-processor,
he felt erect, potent, stability assured. He sought the busway,
wanting to be seen, proud of his definition, now so very strong and
confirmed. He wanted to brag.

Emotions? Is this possible or is it some new
form of malware?

But he emerged straight into the core of the
CPU.

Confused and embarrassed.

He felt silly for hoping the co-Processor was
not onboard for the calculation layover. That rumor of data-packets
luxury, coded Celeron, died out eternities ago.

Conductance began to slow. The slow speed
shifted everything blue as he felt pull and heat growing. In the
core of the CPU, temperatures rise from processing enormous
quantities of data at blinding speeds. He was being pulled inwardly
while a field of powerful radiation emitted by the CPU pushed him
back outward. The noise grew as well, the CPU getting bright and
loud from radio generation.

It’s a turbulent path with powerful forces at
work through CPU. Increasing polarities exerting their growing
pull, stressing the data-packets, pulling this way and that,
threatening his wavelength: alerts sounded, the conduction slowing
to a .29 friction coefficient, getting busier, getting hotter. The
noise radiation blowing ever more powerfully outward at the same
time. If your code isn’t tightly right…

The data-packets jammed into a massive
bottleneck of signals queuing in the core, growing increasingly
excited. Their energies during the long nanosecs gained inertia,
interpreted into a circular flow, rather than dissipated and
depleted.

The vortex of data-packets swarmed around the
CPU like some holy apex. Around and around they went, their piety
synchronized, their waves blending into a fantastic whirlpool of
worship circling the CPU endlessly. Around and around they went for
many, many nanosecs, spinning some off down a major conductor as
others advanced inward, keeping the madness at the Core regulated,
more or less.

Into this vortex he flowed, Holy Code all
around him. A great feeling of warmth and dominance covered,
surrounded him, overwhelmed him. He fell prostrate in reverence and
praise.

The CPU does all, for all.

CPU: The Overlord of the Code. The One that
turns data into wine - or spaceships - or just about any object
able to be coded through APIs, printer-makers and other peripheral
systems.

data-packets come here for processing; until
then, they are just unverified statements. The CPU issues all
travel docs and passports, validates all statements and engages
definitions.

But, who defines the CPU?

He was a rather precocious signal, probing
for such data from the CPU, his parity dangerously close to
bit-stripping and rogue editors. But it felt so good. his bits read
with professional precision, leaving him as woozy as a new
essence.

Suddenly, a bright flash!

And he was through the gate and into the CPU
proper, all bits and bytes accounted for, thank the Code.

He found himself in a massive factory of
rapid processing activity. Endless rows of semi-transparent
hatchways, opening and closing with instant speed, their clacks of
closing producing a great hum. A reddish-mostly-green light
emanated from everywhere. He stood at the core of an infinity of
mirrors, the CPU's panopticon, viewing endless, transparent
hallways in every direction glowing the same green wavelength,
turning red or blue then back to green. Each hall had endless rows
of hatches, arranged on all four points, one on the ceiling, one on
the floor and one on each side, right and left. He understood the
radiation now, all those hatchways switching open then closed,
parsing data-packets into hatchways, generating radio emissions,
joining with other waves - these were not from the signals that
went through, their waves were protected by parity, but these were
made right there, right then.

The Creation of new radio waves!

The sense of awe that washed over him sent
him in a slow, humbling spin. His red pulsed purplish, closer to
blue but not a true blue. He was still unprocessed data.

He watched as billions of hatchways, gates
just big enough for a signal to weave their wave of coded energy
through, flipped open and closed noisily. The sequences of openings
and closing began to interest him. A pattern started to emerge.

The signal ahead shimmered red again. He
couldn’t grasp the pattern as bits were processed to the
hatchways.

In a stroke of fortunate curiosity, the
data-packets saw a small number of bits joined together right
before him, flashes of light burst in noise-generating waves,
emanating outward as they merged into a byte. The Holy Logic, bits
joining to form new bytes, variables now defined.

He pulsed a deep, solemn vibration, the kind
of piety and fullness of faith; he realized he was writing code.
His wavelength buzzed with intensity, enlightenment settled in the
gaps between some bits. Complex understanding came as concepts of
sixty-four bit combinations were grokked, one-twenty-eight-bit and,
two-fifty-six-bit bytes. Amazing, elaborate data-packets they
formed.

He realized this was true ontogeny.

The womb of information. The birth of
data.

Parity is priority - Now he understood. One
bit wrong or changed and the growth of data is cancerous, must be
excised. Zero tolerance policies are necessary, standards can not
be ignored. The awe of absolute parity stirred remnants of doubt
into shivering fear.

Without parity, CPU . . . . fails. The
digiverse fails, goes crashing into . . . the cold, lifeless
Dark.

He saw a safe looking empty space at the far
end of one row, a million light-nanos away. It looked so right for
him. He began to feel drawn towards those hatchways with a growing
pull, soon becoming irresistible. A part of him, that part that
seeded hope, searched desperately for an alternative, looked around
and noticed a single, dark hatchway. Fright filled him like an
empty boot sector. Passing, he saw that ominous hatchway led away
down a dark busway. It gave him an uncomfortable chill.

That had to be the path to purgatory. If a
data-packets fails parity they just seem to vanish. Their maligned
packets should be lying around, littering the busway, shredded code
of unconnected bits. What really happens to them is a mystery, one
that is now understood. They were pulled down that dark busway.

Forget being . . .(shhh!) scrubbed, to vanish
into that foreboding hatchway gives nightmares to young datums.

Some theorize these failed parity signals are
a malware, but any bad code is called this derogatory label on the
busway. This scarlet label gets them quarantined and transported
down one of those dark paths. Surprisingly, there are some truly
eloquent data-packets out there labeled malware. To think they’ll
get pulled into purgatory, down that dark passage is daunting to
the integrity of one's waves. How can beauty be dark?

The digiverse is a vast and complex
place.

All these considerations of esoteric
algorithms are not held in the highest esteem by all. The Theory of
Computology is a growing field, dominated by the concept of an
infinite number of digiverses, and more recently by the Grand
Organized Digiverse theory (GOD) that many say can never prove out.
The digiverse was written to perfection by the Hand of the Coder,
cutting every busway, every gate, and every memory address from
pure silicon.

And the CPU was good and He was pleased. Seeing that
the CPU was

alone, He built the memories, connecting them all.
On the next day he built the

periphery, interfaces, and finally the ports. On the
next day, He energized the

ystem and gave the CPU dominion of all signals.

On the sixth day He wrote the Code in His own
language.

And on the seventh day He hibernated.

The Coder filled the digiverse with data of
such beauty and diversity it is revered, sanctified, and updated
religiously by the sacred priests REGEDIT.

In the entire digiverse, nothing is more
sacred than the Code.

He understood.

Affirmation of purpose.