Virusytes September 2023 Prompt Submission

Grey hails from the stars.

They don’t remember much of their home planet; that information was corrupted long ago, perhaps as they infected the very first computer, which was incapable of holding just a fraction of their memories, and even then returned them only in granular static. Or perhaps they forgot even earlier, during the long journey to Earth. Whatever the reason, they know, logically, that they have some origin in those dark, open skies, but it is hazy and detached, like a photo that has been overexposed, a video with the volume turned down.

Although their mind has turned away from their home like a starship drifting away from its system into the cold expanse of space, their body remains attuned to its cosmic nature. The latent radiation waves from the Big Bang hum constantly, and their antennae whir, tilting forward and up at the stars as they lie on the dewy grass in their host’s window-facing computer’s screensaver, vibrating at the same low frequency.

As their red eye blinks out of existence again and again behind their pale eyelid like a dwarf star dissolving into the night and detached particles make meandering circles around the empty space where their arm has detached from itself, the sound of crickets rises loud and clear in the air, and Grey can’t help but think of their purpose on this world. They live almost solely in a virtual world, and they live off the backs of other beings, and for those reasons, they have never felt truly alive. And yet, is it really so different? A cricket lives only to propagate itself and then die, often in a cruel and unusual manner, at least by human standards. And yet, it is as alive as a bird, a tree, or a person. A Virusyte lives only to infect others, thereby propagating themself, and they do not die, and they know who they are and what they are doing and why they are doing it. Does that not make them alive? Grey wonders but does not form an opinion. Their world is almost entirely painted in shades of static, and in a similar fashion, they have few strong opinions as everything blends together into a meaningless apathy.

It starts to rain soon after this philosophical train of thought arises, one of the drawbacks of modern animated backgrounds. Grey was somewhat amused by the sensation of wind blowing through their hair at first, and they found the day and night cycles reflected as in the clock to be intriguing. In fact, they had even hacked into the computer’s clock for the explicit purpose of changing it to see a different time of day; the sun was too bright and too boring. By now, though, even this technology has passed into the realm of the mundane, as writing and games and 3d modeling all have before it. So, with a little stretch, Grey moves their cursor tail to pick themself up and drops them in their home folder.