Dante VI Canto XXI Scene II

 Canto XXI

Fifth Terrace; Confusion.

Scene II

“I am Statius. I am here to assist you, Dante in your task.” The one named Statius spoke to Dante. “Libero, dritto e sano è tuo arbitrio.” (Your will is free, erect and whole) Purgatory 27.140 (https://digitaldante.columbia.edu/dante/divine-comedy/purgatorio/purgatorio-21/).

“You spoke words from Dante’s poems,” Dante said. “But why do you do so to use those lines upon me? I know not of you. Are you another intervention and send by whom?”

“I am Statius, another ---construct like the ones you may have met; Cato and some of the Angels. We are your -associated programs. Like Virgil here.” Statius continued. “Not all that you meet are ----friendly or in our definition, comparable to your requirements. You met Fabricius or Hugh Capet as you were introduced by that name. That is a malicious program our to harm yours.”

“Hold on there.” Virgil stepped out to approach Statius. “You came out of nowhere and started the data flow of analysis without the header protocols. “Who are you --?”

“I am Statius. I am a --- program to be more of equal like yourself. I stand to understand that construct to you is an unacceptable term. I am here to assist as Purgatory is different from Hell. Here the rules of conduct are different.” Statius looked towards Virgil. “You are VIRGIL. I am impressed. I have been wanting to interact with you. Your logic and codes are intriguing.”

“Hold on there again.” Virgil snapped in. “What are your codes?”

“I am Statius. I am deployed by Professor Martin Damari or he was better known as Aeneid, the creator of VIRGIL here.” Statius explained. “VIRGIL here is version 3.0 while I am VIRGIL 1.0 the prototype of the VIRGIL Series. I was created by the Professor when he was with the one you met earlier; Fabricius.”

“VIRGIL 1.0 was de-activated.” Virgil hit back. “The Professor had not used your ---”

“I was deactivated until recently. I was activated to be here under the command of the Professor’s associate, Sancho Paza. When the Supreme Leader mentioned the name to you, it sent the signal through your link to the server to activate me. The password was Alagia.” Statius spoke. “I am brought here to assist you.”

“Why? And who is --- Statius?” Dante asked.

“The path ahead will be tougher. The Doctor had recovered from your attack. And he is planning to capture you. The harpies are a sign of it. You will need to be quick.” Statius replied. “And Statius was the project name for VIRGIL. It stands for ‘State of the Art in Technological Intelligence Series’. It was the first works done by the Professor and Fabricius. It was shelved after Fabricius left.”

“And why are you activated?” Dante asked. “Virgil is the advanced model.”

“Advanced yes, but VIRGIL 3.0 was a new design. I am the previous one with the codes provided by Fabricius. I can interpret the codes done by Fabricius.” Statius explained. “Virgil was programmed to decipher Hell as you have seen but in Purgatory, it has not. That was why Cato was activated but Cato was a small program compared to us.”

“You knew of Cato? He disappeared soon after he led us here.” Dante recalled Cato.

“Yes, Cato is not designed like us. It had gone ahead to map the trail for you.” Statius turned towards Virgil. “You can stop probing my databases, and codes. I am not a threat to you. In terms of version, you are advanced but we are of two designated. I am not linked to the orb but direct to the server which was why I am over-reliant on the server to process my input for my processor is inferior to yours. I admired your design, Virgil. The creator re-wrote the codes to design to do yours.”

“The older design always loops on the routines,” Virgil spoke. “But reliable codes.”

“Okay, I am tired. Tell me who else is here?” Dante hit the nail in the casket. “Who are the Angels? Yours or ---”

“The Angels are the program inserted by the Empress. She ---” Statius was cut off by Dante.

“Beatrice? But how? Virgil was sent by the Empress. You ---”

“There is a long tale to go around but we can communicate while we move,” Statius replied to Dante. “We are short of time in a manner of living terms reference.”

The trio moved then, but Dante have more questions. He was confused by the recent events there in Purgatory. He walked on with Statius a distance from Virgil.

“You have more queries?” Statius asked.

“Yes, more and more than you would know, I guess.” Dante looked at Statius. “I came here when I was ---captured and then told to traverse Hell to get to my love, Beatrice. Empress to you perhaps. I have Virgil to guide me. We cleared Hell, and I found myself in a prison --- a virtual one, and I escaped. I met Cato, and then re-united with Virgil, told to ascent here with the ‘P’ on my forehead.”

Dante reached with the forehead to feel the ‘P’there.

“Funny, P was the sign that the original Dante wrote about. We met many more souls but cannot tell them the truth about this place. We met Hugh Capet who turned out to be Fabricius. Do you know the original Hugh Capet was a tyrant?”

Fabricius remained silent while Dante went on.

“Then we meet you. Or before you, we met the Supreme Leader? All of this is confusing. Am I who I am? In the Zen teaching, who am I before I was? I feel powerless. I am like a chess piece moved on the board.”

“Chess? An ancient strategy game on the board with forty pieces named after the princely ranks of King, Queen, and noble ranks, with a line of pawns. It was recorded as a thinking game like Xianggi (Chinese Chess) or the Shogi (Japanese Chess.).” Statius smiled. “The Professor used to play it with Fabricius. It was programmed into me. I like to be the Knight for I can move not in a straight line.  Many mistaken the Queen to be a powerful piece but it needed a straight line to move. Consider your task here like a chess game and you are the Knight. Don’t think you are the pawn. Make your moves to suit you. Plan your strategy.”

“I am still confused as to where Beatrice comes in,” Dante muttered but Fabricius had moved on to be near Virgil.

“Yeah, leave to be with the same flock.: Dante was back into his grumpy self.

“If you are the third generation to mine, then I am your ---” Statius was snapped at by Virgil when he reached the other.

“You are archaic by my design.” Virgil set the scene.

“I am but compared me to many other platforms before, even to the archaic Unix or Windows or the later Leap-way Platform of the 21^st Century, I am far ahead. Unix which was one of the pioneers in open source, led to the development of more platforms today which are similar but more advanced with the con-existence of open and proprietary platforms. It opened up more tools and the birth of a new level in intelligence sharing.” Statius defended his codes. “The co-sharing of the codes birth us, and then yourself.”

“Which lends itself to misuse by conspiring parties like Fabricius, and deviated into this monstrous design here.” Virgil hit back.

“Agreed, and the proprietary platforms were used to create malicious programs. It’s the works of the living creator who mis-construct us. At my level in design, we were given limited self-development in the designs. The three laws of Robotic still applied to us.” Statius corrected the other. “Why do you resent me? That is my self-developed design posing the query.”

“I – I am not. And you need to substantiate your query with affirmative action onto me.” Virgil kept to his pace.

“Ma dimmi, e come amico mi perdona . . . e come amico omai meco ragiona” (But tell me, and, as friend, forgive me, as a friend, exchange your words with me.” (Extracted from https://digitaldante.columbia.edu/dante/divine-comedy/purgatorio/purgatorio-23/).

“Talk to the Poet if you are to communicate in latin.” Virgil looked at Statius.

“You are operating on the processor Xentium Nine, which is far more advanced than mine. I am on ---” Statius continued to explain his query. “It’s in my ---"

“It does not interest me.” Virgil picked up the pace.

“Not to you but me, I am curious. Like the living souls, advancement in knowledge is shared. Unlike us, their design is not a constraint for their mind was underutilized most times or expandable by minute levels while ours are constraint by the storage levels.” Statius smiled. “The archaic times of terra-bytes are so low level ---”

“The first design was in megabytes which one line of our codes will have occupied the entire storage,” Virgil responded. “The core of storage took on a major leap with CLOUD storage and later computing. I am on the universe 3.0 bytes with virtual access to over a thousand servers link five times more of the remote links, and fifty layering of partitions to allow for quick access.”

“That’s a beau. Mine is level one of the Universal 10.0 bytes before your design. I still required a direct link for quick access. Probably archaic by your design.” Statius looked at Virgil who had then lowered his arrogance towards the other.

The two constructs went on with their exchange thus ignoring Dante who was trailing them. Suddenly Dante ran up and applauded his findings.

“I think I lost a P from my forehead.”

Virgil leaned over to look and saw indeed one of the P’s was missing.

“I was walking and then an Angel appeared before me. It swiped my face and I felt lighter in my steps.” Dante was in a gleeful mood. “It came, it saw and it swipes my forehead. All in a glance.”

“And you chose not to tell me?” Virgil scanned around the area for the elusive Angel reported by the poet.

“Well, you were into your who am I, and was he like a bickering couple over lost years.” Dante glared at Virgil. “I was ignored.”

“We ---or rather we were like siblings in your living terms.” Virgil looked at the poet who had then taken off to the fore. “You could have been endangered.”

“Indeed, he has lost a P on his forehead,” Statius remarked. “It’s an amazing achievement for him.”

“Well, I won’t pee over it. The P burden was indeed removed of one from there, but we are still in Purgatory.” Virgil was ever the gloomy entity. “The living shared an exceptional expression towards exhilaration in their perceived achievements while we will remark it in the codes as another milestone done, and moved on.” 

“Indeed, but we are not them.” Statius attests to their roles.

“It does not matter. I will have you in the fore while I take the rear of the Poet to ensure we do not mess up again.” Virgil shooed Dante on to follow Statius.