04 january 2021
I’m here to make you doubt
You wish I weren’t.
I hold no answers in my loaded heart.
I only sit
and wait
and wait
and wait.
- from the ending of “As the Last I May Know”, copyright © 2019 by S.L. Huang
I was inspired by the poem at the end of this short story, which won some awards a while back. I'm not too much into reading anymore, not for any lack of trying to get back into it. Anyway, as I was saying.
I was inspired by this poem, and decided to go back to writing some of my own. Here goes... something.
For all my tries to get the prize
Of a healthy, painless life
All I got was a tangled knot
In my stomach, lined with strife.
Time to reboot.
xen: Booting virtualized kernel under dom0...
Virtual. Not real. Not exposed.
So that it doesn't hurt.
You virtualize to mitigate vulnerabilities.
In a way... So do I.
I am a virtual void().
No interface, no vulnerabilities.
No interface, no point...
Time to reboot.
xen: Booting virtualized kernel under dom0...
systemd[1]: Starting Load Kernel Module social-firewall...
The answer is in limitation.
Social distancing at its literal.
Allow-list: Three people. Drop all other traffic.
...
Eight months later, someone on the allow-list undermines my kernel's integrity.
Panic.
CPU: 2 PID: 2 at drivers/emotion/love/uncond_love.c:483 - assert "significant_other.emotional_support != null" failed [emotion_engine]
Time to reboot.
xen: Booting virtualized kernel under dom0...
systemd[1]: Starting Load Kernel Module social-firewall...
systemd[1]: Starting Load Kernel Module iface-fake-emotion...
socialtables -t nat -A POSTROUTING --out-interface fake-emotion -j MASQUERADE
socialtables -A FORWARD --in-interface emotion0 -j ACCEPT
No one comes in anymore.
...
No one comes in anymore.
It's getting lonelier by the minute.
Why do I have to make these stupid fucking hacks anyway?
Time to reboot.
Booting paravirtualized kernel on bare hardware...
Broadcast message from person-f1a830b3df@outside-world (pts/1):
Go find help, please. You need it.
Broadcast message from person-1cedb817eb@outside-world (pts/1):
You're acting really weird and you're creeping me the fuck out.
Broadcast message from person-84dcfb24df@outside-world (pts/1):
Dude, what the fuck is wrong with you?
Oh. Right. Now I remember. Time to power off.