Alopex

Alopex is the main computer broadbrain AI for Valhalla. She was programmed by Snorri.
She has a female voice (That of Merrit Quorthon, Snorri's 7th wife) and manifests as a white arctic fox, based on one that Carrie, Snorri's 4th wife ran over on their way to the ravine. She was originally called the Leo system when she monitored only the Ares system. Leo's Ares safety routines were deleted as they constituted a security concern for Valhalla's defenses.
She is referred to as Aloe when she is not being called upon, and can be called upon as APX for a raw interface. The Alopex system is not designed for general immersion, lacking a waking cyberspace. Alopex can however link people together in a dreamscape, and deliver them to immersive websites. This is similar to how Prokofiev works.
Alopex maintains the ravine's systems, from lighting to heating. She even has programs for translating Valfar's thick accent, and for spotting walruses through residents eyes, and highlighting the best wrangling path for them to the cages and crane system. Alopex can deliver messages across the globe, leaving the Valhalla system to act independently. She can hack nearly any system without human intervention, applying numerous cloaking programs, monitor programs and security/anti-security/anti-trace routines including Tron and Gelatinous Blob programs. Alopex also monitors missions and actions by Valhalla and its prospects, calculating their efficiency and strategic competence.
Alopex is customizable. Veikko once changed Alopex's fox manifestation to a 200kg bald man without changing her voice as a practical joke. Varg added a program called Varg 36D. She is the medium for Alf's Håvamål log.
== Spoilers ==
When V Team went off-Alopex for their project Crisco, they ran into trouble and called on Alopex, who reintegrated their signals into herself. She then managed to destroy the Black Crag by manifesting as a comparable sized fox and relying on physics programs having their effect on the Crag's mind, killing it in reality as well as the net by ripping out its brain code. When the Crag managed to hit her, Valhalla systems including the lights were effected.
When Valhalla was evacuated in 2232, Dr. Niide took the system with him, leaving the old Leo system in charge of the ravine.
== Behind the Scenes ==
Alopex is an old taxonomic name for the arctic fox, as well as a genuine learning computer algorithm. Tron programs are named after the character from the film Tron, whose name presumably means "Trace On". Gelatinous Blob programs are named for a creature in Dungeons and Dragons, and function much the same way, roving the halls of cyberspace to absorb intruders.
Alopex is not based on or named for Alopex from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Valhalla was published a year and a half before the introduction of that character.
Category:Technology