cybertrixx | Bastard Fucker Graphics Card AAAAAAARGHHH!!!

I returned from the portal to portals this afternoon, where the steel and silicon beasts sit in their cages, placated by rhythmic thrumming sinusoids and steady tones of initiation, negotiation and disconnection. After embarking upon a great journey across several miles, I made my entrance home, ready to begin an evening placating my own steel and silicon beast. As I performed a rite of initiation and brushed my fingers against the life-point, I sat back in satisfied anticipation. But the sight that greeted my eyes was one almost too hideous to contemplate. Etched into the face of electronically channeled reality was the very essence of raw, unparalleled horror!

Thinking myself imagining things, I turned from the portal before me, took a second to catch my breath and compose myself, and turned back. And it was still there. Facing me, taunting me, written into the visage of functionality and normality I have come to expect when I empower this steel and silicon beast with the energy of artificial, electronic life.

A thousand thoughts flashed through my mind. I considered, for a brief moment, the possibility that I was seeing things; that my mind was playing tricks. Surely it was a moment's glitch, a fleeting glimpse of potentiality and nothing more.

The screen flickered, and for a moment the abberation faded. The world within the box was returned to a visage of friendly normality. The smooth, curling white forms stretching out across a black sea of emptiness. I was reassured, calmed. A glitch. That was all.

It struck me unawares, while I had let my guard down. The abberant corruption returned, worse this time. Where before there had been friendly, smooth and coherent lines and shapes, I was now an overwhelming mass of geometric perversion, ordered according to its own infernal structure. I watched in horror as my steel and silicon beast struggled to right itself, to throw off the shackles of corruption and stand brave and strong in the face of such tainted horror. But it was no use.

In shock, I reached for the power switch once more, thinking to invoke the seven-count rite of restoration, hoping that things would be fine. My Steel companion stuttered and convulsed in electronic fury as it began its existence anew, returning to life from the ashes of its previous incarnation. But the corruption remained beyond the bounds of the rite of restoration. Such vile taint would not be defeated by a simple first-line trick.

In mounting desperation, I performed the rite of unhinging, and exorcised the gathered dust that encrusted the source of visual empowerement. Steeling myself, I reached beneath the humming altar of golden energy, pressing my fingers gently into its' whirring underbelly in order to ascertain the functionality of the engine of regulation. The engine appeared to be intact - in fact, it nearly devoured my finger in its fury.

My concern rose once more. The engine or regulation was still functional. Evidence was gathering, hinting at the unspeakable truth. No. It couldn't be. How the could the corruption have gone so deep, so heavily engrained, and yet allowed my companion to survive in a contemptible mockery of life, tortured by its tainted existence?

I performed the process of reseating, hoping beyond hope that a simple trick would restore my tortured friend. But it did not - when my friend's visage returned, there remained the corruption, taunting me cruelly. I performed the rite of initiation once more, and my fears were confirmed. This was not a mere convolution of fate, remaining briefly before fading into non-existence. My friend was broken, marked by the unholy lines and sigils of corruption.

I write this now with a heavy heart. It is difficult to see, to make sense of the words which I lay down upon my friend's shattered face. Brief patches of order lie within the mass of chaos, fleeting and tenuous. I have made the best I can of this terrible evil - I have resolved to view it as an opportunity, a chance to improve and advance things. My friend shall live again, even if it costs me dearly. I cannot give in now. I owe it to you, my beast of steel and silicon. I will restore you. And in doing so, I will set you free from the shackles of sluggishness. You will project a scene of angular beauty across your face once more - but with redoubled power and grace. Together, we shall stride through this darkness, and arise, tested but triumphant.