From: dvandom@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (David VanDomelen)
Subject: LNH - the Cyberspace Wars
Organization: The Ohio State University
Distribution: na
Date: Thu, 10 Sep 1992 18:42:14 GMT

Acton Lord was happily looking over his GIF files when suddenly he noticed some
small discrepancies, as if retconning had been done sloppily.  With a concerned
look, he recompiled the GIF and saw that the picture had several errors in it!
Not just on one file either, but on multiple files!  Muttering "Once is 
happenstance, twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action," Acton Lord 
inserted the suppositrode and entered the cyberspace of the GIF files.
     All around him were flashing streams of data and orbs of lambent light, 
special effects that would cost a lot of money if this weren't a text 
adventure.  Grabbing a data stream, Acton Lord sped toward Netlurker's account,
where the GIF master copy lay.
     When he arrived, he was startled to see none other than Sig Lad mucking 
about with the code!  Acton Lord grabbed a thread from rac.xbooks and used it 
to hose down Sig Lad, hoping to drive him from the file.
     "Here's a trick I learned from Killfile!" shouted Sig Lad as he pressed 
the 'k' key.  Instantly the thread began to vanish.
     Acton Lord, however, knew the limits of Sig Lad's machine, and that it 
took forever to do the first kill of the day, so he quickly grabbed a Sandman 
thread and aimed it at Sig Lad.  Sig Lad, too busy killing the xbooks thread, 
was caught flatfooted and inundated with the new thread!
     "Argh!  Noooooooo!  I don't care who Dream's lover is!  I don't read 
Sandman!  Help!"  cried Sig Lad as Acton Lord grynned and poured on the racm 
threads.
     Soon the screaming stopped, and Acton Lord let off on the pressure.  
Funny, where was that hissing sound coming from?  Then he noticed that antennae
had formed on Sig Lad's helmet...horrified Acton Lord looked in his hands to 
see what thread he had been last using.  It was a Cerebus thread!  This could 
only mean one thing!
     "Hsss...Unorthodox electronic revenge!" hissed Sigroach as he hurled huge 
granite sig files at Acton Lord.
     Acton Lord had forgotten about Sig Lad's inherently unstable genetic 
structure, a structure that made him so easy to mutate for purposes of plot 
twists, and now had to find a way out of the mess he had trapped himself in.  
Dodging those sigs that he could and blasting the rest into powder, Acton Lord 
furiously tried to remember 'Roach's weakness..."Aha!  Frostonite!"  Slowly 
making his way to the cyberspace analogue of his cheapo needs-to-be-defrosted- 
every-week fridge, Acton Lord scraped some virtual ice from it, used his power 
to make it into Absolute Ice, and hurled it at Sigroach, crying "This'll put 
your gazpacho at the proper temperature!"
     Sigroach gasped as the deadly Frostonite sped his way, and yelped in pain 
as it impacted, sapping him of his powers even as Acton Lord knew it would.
     "HA!" shouted Acton Lord.  "Now that you're helpless, I can now repair the
damage you did to my GIFs!"  And with that, Acton Lord caught the 3:15 data 
stream back to .cis.
     Sigroach shivered in dejected pain.  What would his main babe Astoria say 
if she saw him like this?  How could he get out without his now-depleted 
powers?  Would he be trapped in this cyberspace forever?
               Of course not.
     For just that moment, the ever-vigilant Netiquette Lad and his hoary host 
arrived.  "Hey, what is this cyberpunk stuff doing here?  Get over to 
alt.cyberpunk.chatsubo!" yelled Netiquette Lad, flaming Sigroach into 
aforementioned group.
     The flames had melted the deadly Frostonite, but now Sigroach was trapped 
in alt.cyberpunk.chatsubo!  How would he get out?  The only person he knew that
posted here was Netlurker, who was firmly in Acton Lord's employ!  What would 
he do?  What *would* he do?
     Dave Van Domelen, promises to stop stealing from Sim by the end of the 
week.  Maybe.