7-142: Illuminator
Social
At lunch, Erin talks shop for a bit with Oliver; it seems she is really enjoying her temporary posting as part of the Illuminator’s engineering crew.
She mentions that Dr Fromm has tried being unusually nice to her, but indicates without saying anything explicitly that she doesn’t really trust him and thinks he’s up to something.
She asks Oliver if he’s been asked to prepare anything for the pre-dock meeting, says she’s been asked to give a very quick summary of what she has been up to.
Oliver’s Research
IT Blobs
Oliver is currently researching IT Project #27, which dates from around 209.700. It seems to be some sort of tool he’s writing for himself, but Oliver hasn’t worked out what its purpose is yet.
I have updated and amended the summary of the IT Projects, which is here.
Exercise Books
Oliver has read up to exercise book DN#432. This book ends on 203.209.
Oliver has determined the following information:
- Argyle’s earliest exercise book began on 199.743, and he was aged 5 at the time.
- The first book suggested there may be others before then, but this is the first one in the collection.
- Argyle has designated his earlier books DN#<number>
- They split into different, topic-based books later, but Oliver hasn’t read that far yet.
- His earlier books are quite scrappy and disorganised, but he gradually evolved conventions around writing dates, action items, reminders, decisions and other people’s conversational notes
- At the time of his first book he was in Senior Education, very much on the maths-science-computing course
- His first book is largely about notes he was keeping for a school project, and that may be the origin of these writings
- In similar vein to his later works, the notes are interspersed with random reminders, diary notes, and technical notes on several topics at once
- The school project was a computing assignment that used a conjunction of a mathematical proof and a brute-force computing algorithmic approach using a modified computer to analyse a mathematical sequence.
- Apparently he received an excellent mark for it.
- After the project is over he retained his journalling, note-keeping habit.
- The young Argyle seemed fascinated by mathematics, science and computing.
- Oliver believes Argyles birthday to be 193.780.
- At the time of his initial writings he was on the B Colony world of Zargholme in Octant 7.
- He entered the Higher Education stream, remaining on Zargholme while he studied for his HE Certificate
- During this time he lived on campus.
- There are occasional references to visits with his father, but no other mention of family at all.
- His studies seemed related to mathematics and electronics, computing was, at least initially, only a sideline for him.
- At age 7, he moved to Zargonia to study his AHE there at Bright University.
- He was excited at the opportunity, and it is at that point that it is apparent he is a Hybrid class.
- His AHE continued his maths/engineering path but it was at that point that he developed an interest in Cryptographic applications of his maths skills
- He began some computer studies so he had the tools to work more practically in the maths/crypto space.
- On Zargonia he formed a romantic relationship with a fellow student named Lyanna, who was apparently studying astrophysics.
- The notebooks are interspersed with love poetry of questionable quality at this point
- He also refers to his friend Barty, who is also studying electronics.
- Barty doesn’t seem to be as clever as Argyle
- There are even a couple of notes in another hand, presumably Barty’s, as they are working on problems together – Argyle seems to be teaching Barty stuff.
- Argyle appreciates Barty’s perspective and his social nature
- There are occasional references to other classmates (and later, workmates) and some confusingly cryptic references to someone named Abbas.
- At age 8 he attempted to do a CHE, but was not approved.
- Instead, he did some brief grunt work as a private contractor in the private sector, apparently installing and repairing comms panels in houses.
- That did not last long and he was apparently taken on as a private contractor for the Planning Bureau working on mathematical forecasting models.
- Once his first major project with Planning was complete he was apparently seconded to the Vizierate (still employed as Bureaucracy Technician) where he spent some time at MAPACOA working on networking problems and security.
- Shortly after turning 9, he wound up working at The Black Palace.
- His employment with the Bureaucracy was terminated and he was engaged as a member of the Overlord’s Household.
- During this time his books become a lot more cagey and cryptic about what he is working on, he’s obviously mindful of security.
- When not making cryptic notes or scribbling obscure mathematical formulae, his books lament the difficulty of spending time with Lyanna, as she is now working for the Industrial Bureau and it is difficult for them to match their work schedules.
- There are gaps of Cycles in these times when it’s apparent he is with her and not taking notes in these books.
- Nearing the end of Oliver’s reading progress, Argyle was focussed on some sort of security upgrade to the The Black Palace network and he appeared concerned about patching a security vulnerability.
Questions? Next steps?
He’ll need to prep his presentation. How much detail is he going to put in? Anything he’ll leave out?
Lunch:
Oliver tells Erin that he had a very nice conversation with Fromm and believes that maybe he’s just loosened up with the freedom the Illuminator brings, compared to their former posting.
Presentation:
Oliver covers swiftly the history of Argyle’s study in a sort of “We already know this but Argyle’s notes confirm he was heavily interested in these fields.”
Oliver will also bring up Lyanna and Barty as potential contacts to investigate into Argyle. He reminds them of how old these files are proceeded by a “However”.
Oliver will try and catch Dicard by the meeting, either outside the door or by messaging him prior to meet up a few moments earlier and go over the Black Citadel thing quickly and ask if it’s appropriate information to share with the entire crew.
He’ll then, if allowed, share said security concerns and again quote how old the data is.
Otherwise he’ll stay behind and have that conversation with just Nanny and Dicard.