#yea i have no reason why finely-tuned line aint talking to his local group Ɛ>

[finely-tuned-line]

RP:

Log 216

FTL: I can finally confirm that FTLR-3 appears to be coalescing in an area near the centre of the containment chamber. If I were to hazard a guess, I’d say that it appears to be taking the shape of the lizard it originated from. This is extremely unusual, but everything about FTLR-3 appears to be as such.

FTL: Now why would it be doing such a thing? My primary hypothesis is that its an efficiency-based behaviour. Doing so would provide a source of transport, whilst not having its expansion abilities restricted by the host body. A moving Stationary Rot that preserves its original Expanding Rot-like features. Incredibly curious.

FTL: I would like to make a quick sidenote here to say that the Ancients’ naming schemes for this were dreadful. In my opinion, there should be three types of Rot: Expanding, Stationary, and Moving. But I suppose that the similarity between Stationary and its Moving subtype is that they regenerate their quickly-degrading cells, unlike the quick self-replication (to its own detriment) of Expanding types.

FTL : And yet, Stationary and Moving types may have their similarities in the nature of the self-replication of their cells, but the way they act is vastly different. Moving types control the body of the host, growing tendrils out of it in order to move around, the host body providing energy for the movement, disintegrating as time wears on. Then they move onto the next available host. A parasite.

FTL: Meanwhile, Stationary types remain in one spot, hence the title of Stationary. They feed off of the environment and any prey that falls within its reaches. The host body melts into its general structure, leaving just the tendrils bound to where the body died.

FTL: It just makes no sense. Why group Stationary and Moving in together, what with the vast differences in their lifestyles? If they wished to group them in together, why not make them sub-groups of another group? Something like.. Regenerators. Expanding types can also become a general sub-group, despite being the only type of self-replicating Rot. Just for the equilibrium. Replicators. Regenerator Rots and Replicator Rots, with their three sub-groups. It just makes more sense, there’s even alliteration in there.

FTL: …Why am I even complying to the Ancients’ naming practices? They’re long-gone, I have no reason to conform to their set of practices. This information isn’t that important in the end, it isn’t going to matter at all in the longterm.

FTL: I have come to the conclusion that this will be my new categorisation system for the Rot. Regenerator Rots, with its sub-groups of Moving and Stationary, and Replicator Rots, with its sub-group of Expanding (in reality, Replicator Rots and Expanding Rots are one and the same, so the titles are interchangeable).

FTL: Back to FTLR-3. I do believe that it is somehow a combination of all three sub-groups. Majorly Moving and Expanding. It displays the self-replication of Expanding Rots, I suspect it will soon display the autonomy of Moving Rots (though it will probably be done in a fashion that clearly displays its Expanding tendencies), and the passive feeding methods of Stationary Rots.

FTL: The cyan lizard that was FTLR-3’s host has long since melded into its general structure, the energy surely long since utilised. The only thing I can conclude is that it’s drawing energy from elsewhere, most likely the air or, dreadfully so, the chamber itself. I will run a self-cleaning protocol, that will hopefully remove anything that can be used as a source of nutrients for FTLR-3. Or it could backfire horribly. Or it could finally outright kill the thing. We’ll see what happens.

FTL: In the end, this thing may be what kills me, but it is truly fascinating. Rots aren’t even my main area of study, it’s just information I had to know, but it remains an incredible occurrence, one that I am eager to study in the meantime of my attempts to eradicate it. I may accept my potential death to it, but I will not die having not studied it to the heights of my potential.

FTL: As for the mentioned eradication attempts, I still have not made any proper attempts. I’m still unable to find a genetics-based counter to its out-of-control self-replication, although that has thankfully slowed down. I am becoming more and more keen to use alternative methods.

FTL: One of said alternative methods is one suggested by an anonymous transmission I recieved, suggesting bleach. Of course, that is inaccessible to me, but it did grant me the idea of using a corrosive substance of some sort, hopefully a liquid.

FTL: I’ll have to synthesise one, something I have no experience with (…if my logs are going to be broadcasted against my will, I’ll use it to my advantage. I ask whoever hears this to lend me any ideas or formulae you have for corrosive substances that are not Void fluid.). It shouldn’t be too difficult, I hope.

FTL: Beyond the realm of my unfortunate (yet fascinating) dealings with the Rot, Echoes of a Paradox is still spamming my transmissions. They have relented in their pace about midway through this past cycle, instead turning to sending me poems that I can only assume they wrote during my absence.

FTL: I still haven’t been replying to them. How does one reply to something like that? I have nothing to say, in all honesty. Perhaps they’ll acknowledge my silence and move on.

FTL: Doubt’s Dichotomy contacted me as well. I cannot tell what her motivations in doing so were, but she just asked me yet another question about the culture of the Ancients that formerly lived upon my Can. I do not understand sols fascination with them and their ways. I didn’t reply to it either.

FTL: Maybe one day I’ll get the courage to face them once more. Although I do not truly know why I avoid them in the first place. It just seems right to do so.