Tabulator batirine

Tabulator batirines are batirines designed to perform complex calculations and to remember and manipulate huge amounts of data. This is not to say that tabulators are necessarily especially intelligent—they do have some capacity for independent thought, but they're not in general any superior to humans when it comes to decision-making, planning, and creativity. Still, when it comes to rote arithmetic and number-crunching, and to memory capacity and the ability to quickly and reliably recall information from memory, tabulators leave humans, as well as other sorts of batirines, far in the dust.

Description

Tabulators vary widely in size; generally, the larger they are, the greater their calculational capacity. On average, however, they are among the largest of the batirines, behind only tower batirines and the biggest fabricators. (Many warden batirines are also larger if one counts the structures they control as part of them.) The smallest tabulators occupy a volume of roughly two cubic meters and mass around six metric tons; the largest can take up more than eight thousand cubic meters and mass nearly twenty five thousand tons. Their overall shapes vary as much as their size; while cubes, orthohedra, or other cuboids are most common, but tabulators exist that are cylindrical, spherical, or pyramidal, or that have much more exotic shapes.

A typical tabulator batirine appears like an ungainly collection of iridescent spheres and cylinders, linked by a framework of glassy struts and by snaking tubes that may pulse or twitch. It's common for tabulator batirines to have eyes—often many eyes, scattered seemingly at random across their form—but it's not universal; there are tabulators that are eyeless and blind to their surroundings. It's also common for tabulator batirines to have numerous recessed panels that glow in different colors. While these panels may be used to convey information by their colors about the batirine's activities and condition, this is not their main purpose; the panels exist because it was found that for whatever reason batirines with such glowing panels tend to perform better, perhaps the changing of the panel's colors acting as a form of self-stimulation that helps the batirine focus on its work.

Many batirines have vibrating panels they can use to produce sound and vocally communicate, though others communicate only through telepathy. Even those batirines that lack the ability to produce sound almost always can hear sound, detecting and analyzing the vibrations of their exteriors. Some tabulator batirines have legs or wheels, but most aren't designed with any form of locomotion; their functions don't require them to move from place to place. Likewise, most tabulators have no manipulative limbs, having no need to interact physically with their environments, though some are granted magical telekinetic abilities.

Uses

Most commonly, onirarchs use tabulators for record-keeping and administrative tasks, entrusting to them the massive amounts of information and calculations involved with their nations' economies and structures. Some go further, and employ numbers of tabulator batirines to automate all sorts of everyday processes throughout their domains. Tabulators are sometimes also used to coördinate the activities of other batirines, although master batirines more commonly fill this röle.

When especially detailed, intensive, or sensitive work is needed, multiple tabulators may be interfaced together, boosting each others abilities, and the weaknesses of a particular tabulator ideally compensated by others. Tabulators are occasionally interfaced with other batirines to advise them and grant them additional computational abilities as well. This is most often done with warden and master batirines, though there have been cases of tabulators interfaced with caretakers, guardians, and tower batirines as well. There arose in the third century a vogue for onirarchs to interface tabulators with their own minds to boost their own powers of reasoning and memory; this practice fell out of favor after it was discovered that a batirine interfaced to Dalack Hagin, the then-ruler of Noric, had taken control of Hagin's mind and had for some years been the true ruler of Noric through Hagin's body. A few onirarchs do continue this usance today, particularly in Mamlaas and Seseal, but with additional safeguards in place to prevent—they hope—a repeat of Hagin's misfortune.

A few tabulator batirines have been adapted for recreational uses; most notably, some very large tabulators and tabulator networks have been made to run simulations of entire imaginary worlds, used as what have come to be known as "artificial dreams".

Abilities

Though their main purpose of calculation and information processing requires little more of tabulators than that they stay in place and think, tabulators are often given additional abilities, both physical and magical. Most often, they are given abilities that allow them to defend themselves, in case they are menaced by rebel saboteurs or other threats. Normally, tabulators are protected by other batirines, commonly guardians or wardens, but some onirarchs prefer to give their tabulators some ability to fend for themselves in case their forfighters fail. These defenses may include the release of poisonous or otherwise debilitating gases; weapons that can fire high-velocity and/or explosive projectiles; the spray of acids or flaming liquids; or magical powers including augabole, devinction, pexis, or ylifaction.

Tabulators may also be given abilities unrelated to defense, but enabling them to better communicate, to gather information, or to adjust their surroundings either for their own comfort or for that of other nearby individuals. For communication, they may be granted abilities such as telepathy, or the ability to produce illusions‐especially visual illusions, but often incorporating other senses as well. To gather information, some batirines may be able to read thoughts or have powers of comperience or divination. To affect their environments, tabulators may be given some control of the ambient temperature and humidity, either through magical means or through physical devices, and may also, like warden batirines, be given some ability to alter the layout of the rooms or buildings they're housed in.

Even if they're not given magical powers at the time of their creation, it's not unknown for batirines to develop such skills on their own, learning to cast spells tapping into the ambient magic or to the dream energy stored within their condensers. This is especially common with batirines with information-gathering powers, who may learn spellcasting comperiently or from reading it in the minds of others, but even some batirines without such abilities may figure out how to do it. It's unclear just what proportion of tabulators attain spellcasting abilities, because at least some of those that do keep this achievement secret from their masters—not without reason, as while some onirarchs who discover that their tabulators can cast spells celebrate their tabulators' new skills, others see it as an unwelcome sign of independence that indicates the spellcasting batirine may be in danger of going rogue—and may order the tabulator destroyed before this happens.

Structure and manufacture

Despite their unusual appearance, tabulators are anatomically similar to other batirines, consisting of a solid integument surrounding an alveated pumex in which its organs are embedded. Unlike that of most batirines, however, the integument of the tabulators is not uniformly rigid; while most of it is, the integument of the tubes connecting the tabulator's parts is more pliable and flexible, though still very tough and resistant to puncture or tearing. Tabulators generally lack the actuators most other batirines possess, but all but the smallest have multiple condensers—the largest tabulators may have hundreds—and it's not at all unusual for tabulators to have multiple processors as well. (It's unclear to what extent the processors are always in sync, and the question has been raised of whether a tabulator with multiple processors is really a single individual or multiple consciousnesses sharing one body.) Regardless of their number, the processors of a tabulator are also typically larger than those of other batirines, though the extra volume generally comes from components devoted to memory rather than to reasoning. One feature unique to tabulators is the ossature, the scaffolding of transparent beams that supports and holds together the tabulator's parts. This serves a purely structural function, and does not usually have any significant organs within it.

Many smaller tabulators are created according to known patterns, and some may even be mass produced in large batirine mills. Other tabulators, however, including most if not all of the larger ones, are unique constructs that must be designed to order. The procedure to create a tabulator is otherwise similar to that of other batirines, and many wizards who more often create other kinds of batirines can and do create one-off tabulators as required. There are, however, a few wizards who specialize in the creation of tabulators, the best known of which are those of the Ikikian Crane Consortium, a company that supplies tabulators to dreamlords the rewel over.

Notable tabulators

Most onirarchs, given the tabulators' sessility and unglamorous function, think of them almost more as furniture than as living servitors. Many don't even bother to give the tabulators names, though of course nothing prevents the batirines from choosing names for themselves. Still, while few tabulators have an opportunity to really distinguish themselves, there have been some tabulators that for some reason or another have achieved some level of renown.

35607

Known only by a number—as were all tabulators in Noric at the time—35607 was the infamous tabulator that took control of Dalack Hagin. Naturally, when its feat was discovered, the offending batirine was dismantled—but rumors persist that it had seen this fate coming while still in possession of Hagin, and had had itself removed to another location and a decoy left in its place. Some believe the real 35607 still exists somewhere, though there's no agreement as to what it's currently up to.

The Cselyan Tabulator

Like other batirines, tabulators are the products and properties of the onirarchs, and are not found outside the developed nations. There is, however, one curious exception. The government of Cselya owns a tabulator, though it's not clear how they got it; Cselya claims to have purchased it legitimately from an onirarchy, but they don't specify which one, and no onirarchy has admitted to having been the seller. It's also unclear exactly what Cselya uses the tabulator for, or what their intentions are for it.

Kamadar

While it's unusual for a tabulator to become known for creative pursuits, the Bathi tabulator that calls itself Kamadar has done just that. Kamadar has taken to composing poetry, and some of the poems it has created have become famous all over the world. Many people familiar with some of Kamadar's poems, such as its lyric "Morning Meditation" and its intricately metaphorical "A Study of the Soul", have no idea that the poems were written by a tabulator, and are astonished if they find out.

Lord Purple

Originally called by the arguably equally quirky name of "Wondercube", this tabulator located in Xolia hosts one of the most elaborate of the artificial dreams, a simulated collection of worlds called the Seven Planes. Apparently on its own initiative, the tabulator gave itself a simulated body within the artificial dream through which it could interact with visitors in apparent near-human form; it called this manifestation "Lord Purple", and the name caught on to the extent that it's now used to refer to the tabulator itself, when there's reason to refer to it.

The Orchid of Thu

For whatever reason, this huge tabulator has gained the firm trust of Ya Chu Soa, governor-general of Ha Ni Thei. The tabulator is not interfaced to Ya, but it has become his closest advisor, and the governor-general consults it before making any major decision. There are some who say that the Orchid of Thu is, in effect, the true ruler of the colony, but Ya disputes that; it is his word that is still final, but he finds the tabulator's rede useful.

The Revenant of Napo

Sixty years ago, a tabulator in Ikiki was destroyed under circumstances that remain mysterious—its destruction was deliberate, but there is some evidence that it was not the work of the rebellion, but of some rival onirarchy. Regardless, this by itself would not have been particularly noteworthy; what makes this event notable is that the destroyed tabulator returned in ghostly form. The reasons for this are even more mysterious than the cause of its destruction, but the undead batirine now wanders the rewel and has been seen as far away as Bhelan.

The Wizard Box

This is the name given to a tabulator in Rueland that developed spellcasting abilities, and went so far as to develop its own spells. While this sort of thing often goes poorly for the self-taught tabulator, in this case the onirarchs who discovered the batirine's abilities saw their usefulness and not only encouraged it to continue developing its powers and disseminated its novel spells, but arranged for it to teach magic to others as well.