I’m a fan of Issac Asimov.  I love his short stories.  And I got this idea to parody one of his short story formats with a short story of my own.  SoftLayer was kind enough to be the backdrop of this fun little adventure.

The short story was called Pâté de Foie Gras and involved a goose that laid golden eggs.  My story is a little more… IT oriented…

I’m not going to tell you my name for two reasons: first, I don’t want a million tickets assigned to me asking if I’m crazy. Second, if I am crazy, I don’t want anyone knowing it’s me.

I’m not a writer myself, so I asked Shawn to write this up for me. He’s a programmer, and more important a Trekkie, so he’s likely to understand (and more important, believe) this story. Besides, he’s written a few humorous, slightly preposterous posts for this blog, and that’s very, very important.

Unlucky as I am, I was the first person to notice something strange going on. I’m a datacenter tech for the company (but I’m not going to tell you WHICH datacenter), and my job… well, I’m the power guy. I make rounds in the datacenter, checking breakers and power panels, keep an eye on voltages in the portal, that kind of thing. No power issues at the datacenter? That’s because of me. So, I’m perusing the tickets and keeping an eye on things, like I should.

As I was answering a particularly interesting ticket, I received an IM from a datacenter engineer I hadn’t met yet. That’s not surprising; we’re growing like crazy here, and I don’t always get the “Welcome a new employee” email before I find myself working with the guy or gal. I finished my ticket and opened up the IM window. It was from “Nnet,” and the contents caused me to leap out of my seat:

“The power strips on the new racks (205, 206, 207) are drawing too much current; it will pop the breakers in 52 minutes, 12 seconds.”

I had just CHECKED those racks. I walked down to the server room, muttering about some whippersnapper of a new engineer playing a trick on me. I was going on vacation in a week, and I did NOT want any power issues; I was training another engineer to take the console while I was gone, and if anything happened during testing I would surely be called in. Anyway, I walked into the server room and checked the gauges on the power panel.

And they were drawing almost a full five amps too much. If we had turned on the third rack, the whole aisle would have gone down. That wouldn’t have been too bad; no servers were hooked up. This is exactly why we test the power before we put servers in.

I and the rack crew worked for about an hour rewiring the racks, starting from the third rack. Sure enough, about 52 minutes later, rack 205 shut down. Mentally thanking “Nnet” for finding this (and more importantly, not tinkering with it before letting me know!), we got the racks wired more efficiently (they’re supposed to be on separate breakers, but the electrician labeled the wires wrong), reset the breakers, and had absolutely no issues for the rest of the day.

I got back and thanked “Nnet” for finding that issue. The next day, I got to thinking about how “Nnet” had saved my vacation (I would have spent all week tracing wires to figure out what had happened), and I wanted to invite him or her to lunch. So I IMmed “Nnet” with an invitation. An hour went by with no response, but it’s not too strange to have a datacenter tech away from their desk for a couple hours. So I sent an email to Nnet.

The email bounced back.

Maybe HR hadn’t set up the email yet? So I called them up to see what was up with Nnet’s email address.

That’s when HR told me that nobody with the last name “Net” had been hired (I thought “Net” was a strange name for a tech, but it’s not the strangest last name I’ve ever heard). I called the networking department to ask how I could receive a company IM from somebody who doesn’t work here? They researched it and couldn’t find any incoming links through our firewalls or any of the internal logs. Stranger yet, the Jabber server indeed DOES have an account for “Nnet”, but the engineer who runs the server swears that he never set that up.

We were discussing this back and forth when one of the developers walked by, overhearing our conversation. He laughed, and when we asked why, he told us that he was reading a book about the human brain, and that the brain is made up of million of millions of neurons all interconnected with each other; that these interconnected neurons work together to create intelligence.

Could that be true? Absolutely not. It’s preposterous. Sure, we’ve got tens of thousands of computers around here, dual cores and quad cores running various operating systems and applications, all connected by an incredibly fast private network…

…could it be?

The engineers are all completely sure that one of the datacenter techs must be playing a joke, and they’re currently tracking it down. But I’m not too convinced. “Nnet” knew which power strips were having trouble in a room keycarded to open only for me and a hand full of other techs. And they all swear they didn’t send it.

That’s when I talked to Shawn. He told me that there’s a lot of technically minded people out there who read fantastic science fiction stories and come up with solutions… even knowing that the tech is impossible, they can find a way to solve the problem. So we hatched up this idea to write out a fantastic blog post, an interesting narrative of my predicament.
Then we’d post it to the blog and watch for any discussion on the customer forums. Our customers are really smart, and they like solving problems. Maybe somebody out there has an idea of how we can figure out what’s going on around here.

So here’s the story. A completely fantastic modern day science fiction story about a sentient datacenter.

Preposterous!

…any ideas?

Originally posted on Monday, February 4th, 2008 at http://theinnerlayer.softlayer.com/2008/nnet-strikes-back/

A Dr. Who/Star Trek XI movie crossover written in a few hours today, starring one of my most favorite Doctor Who, Doctor Number Four.

Originally posted at:  http://core.sector001.com/cgi-bin/board.cgi?thread=508&post=11

THE BLACK HOLE OF DEATH 

By Cameron Sanantonio 

EPISODE ONE 

The room was bright white, with little round cubbyholes around the perimeter of the hexagonal space. It was almost antiseptic in it’s whiteness. In the center of the room was a hexagonal console, covered with switches, levers, knobs, and gauges. The gauges measured everything from temporal coordinates to the temperature of any of the ship’s six million rooms. 

In the corner was a hatrack with a long knitted scarf and a large floppy hat attached near the top. 

On the other side of the room, a tall man with curly hair stood, contemplating the console in the center of the room. Suddenly making a decision, he rushed to the console and set a few of the controls. He flipped a switch and pulled a lever, and with a "Squeeee! Squeeee!" sound the lit central column of the console started going up and down. 

"Where are we going now, Doctor?" asked a beautiful but bored looking woman who had just walked into the console room from the side entrance. She was wearing a brilliantly white gown, and had her hair down. Her name was Romanadvoratrelundar, and frankly she didn’t want to go on any adventures right about now. 

"Ah! Romana!" said the man named Doctor. "I’ve been trying to decide what to do now. We have five of the six segments to the Key to Time, and the tracer can’t seem to pick anything up." He thumped the console near the tracer port, with the device silent. "It’s not setting coordinates, and it’s not showing us anything! So! I’ve decided that we need a bit of a vacation. We’re on our way to Stravomueller Beta… the stars in the sky are so condensed by the proximity to the core of the Galaxy that…" 

"I know about Stravomueller Beta," said Romana, rolling her eyes. "Unlike some people, I actually passed Mutter’s Spiral Astrophysics 101." 

"Hmph!" said the Doctor. "Well, you haven’t seen the dry ice falls yet, so let’s go!" He slapped the console, and again the "Squeeee! Squeeee!" sound filled the control room. 

"But the key to time…" started Romana. 

"…can take care of itself for a change. We’re in a time machine, we’ll go back a few eons and nobody will ever know what happened." 

With a sudden Star Trek Shake, the TARDIS sideslipped a few hundred meters and few thousand years, throwing Romana and the Doctor against the far wall. With a painful squeal, the TARDIS attempted to right itself in the Time Vortex, causing the interior to shake violently. The motion shook loose the recharge cable from K9, who was anchored to the bottom of the console. "Master?" the robotic dog asked plaintively. 

"K9!" shouted the Doctor. "I can’t get to the controls! What’s happened?" 

"Master," started K9, extending his sensor stalk upward toward the console. "Data indicates that the TARDIS has struck a black hole, or other similar material." 

"Black hole shmack hole!" shouted the Doctor. "This is a TARDIS. Even a black hole couldn’t cause so much rustle! They aren’t that powerful an extension into the Time Vortex…" 

"Only the first shake was the Time Vortex, Master," explained the dog. "Sensors indicate that an emergency landing has been engaged and that the shaking is being caused by the environment outside the TARDIS." 

The Doctor smiled to Romana. "Sounds exciting!" 

"Sounds dangerous," she said, chidingly. 

"Exactly what I said! Come on!" The shaking had subsided, allowing the two Time Lords off the floor. "Let’s see what the bustle is all about." With one final look at the central console, the Doctor smiled and pulled the lever, opening the main doors. 

—– 

Outside the TARDIS, Romana looked around. "Positively ancient." 

"Isn’t it though!" The Doctor ran to a quivering panel on the wall and attempted to pull up information on it. "Positively human! I love the archetecture." 

Romana scoffed. "Human. Bah. Looks like a brewery." She squinted. "Where are we? Which human empire?" 

"None!" shouted the Doctor. "This is even before the First Great and Bontiful Human Empire, before even the New Roman Empire! We’re very early in the Humanist Era… in a time period I usually make sure to avoid…" 

"Because it’s dangerous?" asked Romana. 

"No! Not dangerous! I avoid it because it’s boring." The Doctor waved his hand around. "A few centuries of peace and prosperity. No empire, a federation! A federation of various lifeforms and civilizations, banding together to boldly go where nobody had gone before! A time of exploration and enlightenment. Sure, there were a few wars here and there, but right now, we’re in a bubble of calm. A few years ago, the Battle of Cheron took place, and the Romulan Star Empire has calmed down. The Klingons are too busy killing each other to harm the new alliance, and exploration is the fact of life." 

"So, no fighting?" asked Romana. 

"Well, some, but nothing really big." 

"How, then, do you explain that?" Romana pointed to a group of young security officers running toward them, phasers drawn. 

"What?" asked the Doctor, shocked. 

"Who are you!" shouted a burly security guard. "Never mind that! We’re under attack! Civilians to the escape pods and shuttlecraft! Go!" The squad then turned to a side hallway. 

"Attacked! Escape pods!" shouted Romana. "So much for peace!" 

"This is wrong, so wrong! Lets go forward and take a look." The Doctor and Romana made their way forward dodging Starfleet officers left and right. Apparently the battle had rejoined, as the craft was being flung back and forth, and officers were streaming to the shuttles. "Ships of this time period usually had a command area forward and up called a Bridge," started the Doctor… just before they came face to face with the windows. 

"Oh… my," said Romana. 

"That is one big ship!" shouted the Doctor. 

The ship responded by spraying the ship with missiles. 

"Look!" shouted Romana, pointing to the side. "What quaint little boats!" 

"Not boats, Romana! Shuttlecraft! And that bully is firing rockets at them! Why, I’d like to get my hands on…" 

"This ship is shooting the missiles down with some kind of laser weapon!" 

"Good show!" shouted the Doctor, peering at the shuttlecraft. 

"Doctor…" 

"What now, Romana?" 

"Doctor, that big ship is getting closer." 

"Nonsense!" shouted the Doctor, "I can feel the gravity dampeners. We’re the ones mov…" He stared at the other ship. 

"Doctor… I think we’re going to…" 

"Collide! It must be worse than we thought! Come on, Romana, back to the TARDIS!" 

Romana and the Doctor spun around, running as fast as they could back to the TARDIS, weaving in and out of similar looking corridors, trying to remember the route back, and hoping they had time. They dived into the TARDIS. 

"Collission imminent, Master," stated K9. 

"I know that K9!" The Doctor and Romana hurled themselves at the console. 

"What coordinates!" shouted Romana. 

"No time!" shouted the Doctor, grabbing the "Emergency Jump" lever and giving it a tug. 

—– 

With a "Squeeee! Squeeee!" sound, the TARDIS dematerialized out of the hold of the USS Kelvin seconds before it impacted the Romulan battleship, changing the course of future history. 

—– 

Inside the TARDIS, the Doctor, Romana, and K9 watched the Time Column nervously. An "Emergency Jump" is dangerous at any time, but in such close proximity to such an outpouring of energy as a high speed collision, followed by the yank from the Vortex caused by the Black Hole… any outcome was possible.

"Squeeee! Squeeee!" The sound of the rematerialization circuits is welcome to the time travelers, signifying that they’re going to live through the landing. With a "thrumm!" the ship shivers to a stop. 

"Where are we?" 

"Sensors indicate a landing on the large vessel which was attacking our last location," stated K9. 

"Why did we go there!" shouted Romana. 

"Well, you see…" starts the Doctor before being interrupted by K9. 

"Proximity to the black hole caused a fault in the Type 40 TT capsule emergency launch sequence, locking on to the nearest gravity source but forward between 10 and 100 years." 

"Thank you K9, I was just about to say that." The Doctor huffed. "Well, since we’re here, and the TARDIS needs to recharge after an Emergency Stop, an Emergency Landing, and an Emergency Jump. Lets take a look, shall we?" 

"And this isn’t dangerous?" snarked Romana. 

"Well sure it’s dangerous. But we’ll haven K9, won’t we?" 

"Master!" said K9, wagging it’s antenna tail. 

"Lets go." Said the Doctor. 

—– 

Stepping out of the TARDIS, The Doctor, Romana, and K9 survey their surroundings. 

"Where are we?" asked Romana. 

The Doctor started gesturing in the air. "Well, if this ship follows any sane construction pattern, I think we’ve settled down in… settled in… where are we K9?" 

"Master? It appears we are in the shuttle deck area." 

The Doctor and Romana looked around the deck, and the Doctor’s eyes fell on a large white ship that seemed so out of place. 

"What is this!" He walked toward it. Should we take a look?" 

"It’s closed up, Doctor," said Romana. 

"Oh, is it. K9, please?" The Doctor gestured to K9, who rolled forward and extended his sensor stalk. Whines and squeals like an old-style modem emitted out of K9 and his counterpart computer in the ship, and with a hiss the ramp extended. 

"Good dog, K9! Come on," said the Doctor. 

"Master," said K9, "If it pleases you, I’d rather stay and talk with this computer. It’s not often I get to talk to such a logical intellectual equal to myself." 

"Good boy. Come on, Romana." They made their way into the ship. 

—– 

"Well, this ship doesn’t look at dreadfully retro like the rest of this godforsaken era," said Romana, laying a hand across a console. 

"Oh, be nice Romana. I find it kind of quaint." 

"Says the Time Lord who flys around in a police box." 

"Low blow." 

The Time Lord and Time Lady made their way through the spartan living quarters of the ship toward the engineering section. 

"Well, I must say!" said Romana. "These engines don’t seem so bad." 

"Dear Gallifrey!" shouted the Doctor. 

"What! At least I’m saying something nice," said Romana. 

"Not you, this!" And with a gesture, the Doctor pointed toward a large clear tube containing a large ball of red stuff. 

"Red matter!" shouted Romana. "What is Red matter doing here?!" 

"This is old!" said the Doctor. "Impossibly old. Like old old. Next I’ll expect somebody to show up covered in Huon particles being chased by a Racnoss." 

"That’s perposterious!" shouted Romana. 

"Then explain the red matter," started the Doctor, before being interrupted by K9. 

"Master!" 

"Not now, K9!" shouted the Doctor. "What is it?" 

"Two humanoids carrying phased energy hand weapons have just entered the bay. They are heading for this vehicle." 

"Good boy!" said the Doctor. "Lets leave. You keep an eye on this ship K9." 

"Master." answered the robotic dog. 

"Lets go." 

—– 

The Doctor and Romana made their way toward the edge of the bay, attempting to evade security. Their attempt failed. 

"Halt!" shouted the Romulan. "How did you get on this ship!" 

"We’re… travelers. Just on a quick stop. Ship had some problems so we landed…" 

"Oh shut up, Scarf." shouted the guard. "Come with me. You’re going to see Nero." 

"I thought you said the New Roman Empire wasn’t for a few more centuries?" chided Romana. 

"Shutup, Cupcake. Come with me." The guard shoved into them both, frisking them for weapons. He pointed at The Doctor. "Empty your pockets!" 

The Doctor reached in to his pockets and started pulling out various items. An idol from Betelguise II, a Martian salt shaker, a Freiberger, a paper bag. "Jelly baby?" asked the Doctor to the Romulan. The Romulan guard slapped the bag out of his hands. "Huh," said the Doctor. He then pulled out a small metal pipe. 

"What’s that?" asked the Romulan Guard. 

"A whistle. Want to try?" 

The Romulan grabbed the whistle and blew on it, producing … no sound whatsoever. With disgust, he threw it to the deck. "I don’t have time to play with you old man!" 

"Old man!" shouted the Doctor. "I’ll have you know I’m not a day over 600!" 

"Liar." said Romana. 

"You’re coming with me," ground out the Guard. 

"Except for one thing," said the Doctor. 

"What’s that?" said the guard, clutching his gun. 

"K9… now!" 

And with a warbling whistle, K9 let out a beam which knocked the guard to his knees. 

"What took you so long, K9?" chided the Doctor. 

"Master?" 

"We almost died!" 

"Master?" 

"And it would have been your fault." 

"Master?" 

"Oh, do leave him be," said Romana. 

"Master, the ship was taken away by one of the humanoids. I was just about to board when you called." 

"Oh, I’m not really angry. Who’s a good boy, K9?" The Doctor leaned over, scratching under K9’s metal chin. 

"I am, Master." 

The Doctor picked up the whistle. 

"Master, this ship has just entered Warp Drive chasing after the shuttle." 

"Well, I have a feeling that this ship doesn’t belong to the Good Guys." He pulled out his Sonic Screwdriver. "How about we wreck a little havok before we go?" 

"Master?" 

"Do you think that’s wise?" asked Romana. 

"Romana, this ship should not be here. My time senses have been going off overtime since I stepped foot out of the TARDIS." 

"Mine too." 

"So, I say, give the good guys a little help, hmm?" 

"Yes, but what can we do?" 

Just then, the ship started to shake. 

"I think they’ve engaged battle again." said Romana, looking at the ceiling. 

"Correct, Mistress." 

"Well, come on. We’ll sabotage something on the way. K9, keep a look out." 

—– 

The Doctor, Romana, and K9 were bustling down a corridor, when the ship was hit with a large explosion, knocking them to the walls. 

"Master, Mistress. I believe the ship has collided with another." 

"I gathered that, K9," said The Doctor. "But which ship?" 

Suddenly, an alarm blared. "Everyone, evacuate! Red matter!" 

"Red matter!" shouted Romana and the Doctor. 

"The shuttle, Master." said K9. 

"I know it was the shuttle, K9!" shouted the Doctor. Then he gasped. "That’s it! Romana, this ship has collided with the shuttle!" 

"Yes, Doctor," said Romana, patting K9’s head. 

"That means that the red matter has been released, and will create a black hole!" 

"Master, this ship is equipped with a chronaton stability device which will keep the black hole from forming." 

"But this ship has a chronaton stability device!" shouted the Doctor. "That will keep the black hole from forming. Drat it all!" 

"Master, we may be able to sabotage the stability device…" 

"By reversing the polarity flow!" shouted the Doctor. 

"Brilliant," said Romana, rolling her eyes. 

"Master, a main control conduit runs along the length of this corridor." 

"How convenient!" 

—– 

Small bits of red matter floated around the superstructure of the Romulan ship, but the chronaton stability device kept the red matter in compact little balls, and kept them from contacting the ship’s surface. 

The USS Enterprise opened fire on the Romulan ship with renewed gusto, battering down it’s defenses. 

—– 

The Doctor jumped out from below a console. "I was able to disable only the backup field generators. The mains are still protecting the ship." 

With a large shake and rattle, the lights went out all over the ship. 

"Master, the mains are down." 

"Good dog, K9!" 

"I didn’t do it, Master." 

"Doesn’t matter, let’s go!" 

"Master, Mistress, red matter conversion in 60 seconds." 

"Like I said, let’s go!" 

—– 

The Doctor, Romana, and K9 rushed to the TARDIS and ran inside. 

"Initiate dematerialization, Romana!" 

Romana ran to the console and dematerialized the TARDIS just seconds before the black hole opened again, and they were safely in the Time Vortex. 

"Good job, Romana! And you too, K9!" The Doctor took off his floppy hat and scarf and hung it on the coatrack. 

"Are you sure they’re going to be OK?" asked Romana. 

"Oh, no," said the Doctor. "I’m sure all the Romulans have already died in the radiation field." 

"Not the Romulans, Doctor. The Humans. I looked up the databank just before we left. They attempted to destroy the Earth with red matter." 

"Ahh, but they failed. I’d expect nothing less from the Human race. Nah, they’ll be fine. I caught a glimpse of the ship’s name that was attacking the Romulans. As long as Earth has a USS Enterprise, they’ll be just fine. I can’t believe you didn’t recognize the ship." 

"Mutter’s Spiral Ancient History was an elective at the Academy." 

"Well, it looks like they are going to be fine." 

"Master." 

"What is it, K9?" 

"The Tracer." 

Both Time Lords looked over at the tracer, beeping and sending coordinates to the computer. 

"The sixth key to time!" they both said. 

"Well, what are you waiting for?" asked the Doctor. "Lets get this quest over with." 

—– 

The USS Enterprise ejects it’s warp cores, causing a massive explosion, throwing it clear of the black hole. Just outside it’s sensor range, The TARDIS rotated in space. With a "Squeeee! Squeeee!" the TARDIS faded out on it’s way to it’s next adventure. 

I know, groan.  A Fanfic.  Not necessarily the pinnacle of writing prowess, I know.  And in fact, this fanfic was written over 6 years ago on an old crappy computer dragged kicking and screaming away from death.  It was my first attempt at creative writing outside of schoolwork, and I wrote it for a contest.

A contest I lost horribly.

But after watching an episode of Inspector Gadget, I wondered if my manuscript was still on the Internet.  It was… but not in a safe place.  It’s stored deep in the Internet Archive, and while they plan to store everything forever, I’d be happier with a copy of my own.  Just… please don’t use this to gauge my current writing abilities, OK?

So, here it is:  The fanfiction Go, Sonic, Go! written for the Netraptor.org Fanfiction contest back in 2003.

One quick note is that the title is incorrect!  I apparently submitted it without checking, and ended up passing the title wrong.  The correct title is Go Go, Sonic! for reasons that will become obvious if you get far enough in the text.

Read the rest of this entry »