Fiddly Bits [Orion & Alastor]

In the most sardonic voice he could muster through his laughter, Alastor looked up at Orion and asked, trying to hold back his mirth, "Was that supposed to be scary? 'What if I hit the power button'... AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH." Beating his fist on the desk for a second, he wiped his eyes with one hand, and then, stifling the laughter, hit the power button himself. Nothing happened. ,"I disconnect stuff like that as a precaution. Even if I didn't, you're looking at the monitor. This is just projecting what's in the computer tower beneath the desk." Smiling a Cheshire cat grin, the demon asked patronizingly "Do we need to get the "How Computers Work" book from the K-6 Section?"

Chuckling, but calming down a bit, he shrugged. "Go ahead, press it. I'm honestly a little insulted you think I hadn't thought of something like that." Gesturing down at the computer tower, he waggled a finger. "The data's down there, not actually in the monitor. If that gets unplugged, I just burn a bit of energy to power it long enough to get out. Computers don't wipe their data every time they turn off." Shrugging, he gave a grin. "Sure, you could emp pulse an area while I'm in a computer, or something like that, but suffice to say I generally take precautions for those methods. There's a few other aspects of what I can do that help keep me from getting erased."

Pulling himself back into the screen, he proceeded to emerge, like a genie from a bottle, out of the USB port on the tower. The computer whirred slightly, and went back to it's regular functioning. Crossing his arms, an act that was much more impressive given the number, Alastor stared down, his tail whisking about his feet. "So, I'm curious. I suspect you're not human, but if you're researching magic, the way you said it implies a lack of it on your part." Tapping his chin, the clawed finger lightly dimpling the flesh, he raised an eyebrow. "Hmm. I'm going to go with Extra-terrestrial or Extra-Dimensional on this one." It was a bit of a gamble, but as far as the demon could tell, a fairly safe one. The other player in this little info-war looked human, but didn't appear to have magic or something similar. That left some sort of alien as the most likely choice.

Tapping his chin, the demon cocked his head. "Well, yes. I'm feeling the twinge of curiosity. I'm ALWAYS feeling that." Reaching over, he fully emerged from the computer, and caught the laptop before it hit the chair. Spinning it around, he dropped it into his messenger bag. Spreading his hands, he shrugged for a moment, before tapping the side of his head. "Y'see, I'm rather connected to the Internet. Quite literally, but there's a metaphorical bit to it as well. I mentioned the elementals and such, yes?"

Turning around, he tapped the keyboard on the school computer, and opened up the web browser. His fingers danced across the keyboard as he spoke, opening up tabs and pages, entering URLs and search terms. As the taskbar filled up with page after page, covering literally hundreds of topics, areas of interest, chatrooms, scientific studies, social networks, and more, he narrated. "Data is information. Information can change depending on how it's used, wouldn't you agree?" Opening two windows side by side, Alastor brought up a news story about a man using a backdoor in an email system to locate his abducted son, and another about the same backdoor being used to steal hundreds of personal emails. "I was born from the massive, sprawling hive of dataways that run through society in this new age."

Pausing, he raised a finger. "That was metaphorical, to clarify. I was not actually birthed from a server in some bizarre techno-pregnancy." Going back to what he was doing, the keystrokes opened one final window, before he turned around, and tapped the monitor. With a wink, windows began to close one by one, flashing for a second onto each of the different sites. "I claimed the internet as my place of power. I certainly don't control it, mind. I doubt anyone can really control the crazy, creative, destructive chaos that is the Hivemind. Hell, nobody's been able to deal with the fallout from 4chan's regulars."

Putting his hands in his pockets, in a move that didn't entirely make sense given how many of them there were, he smiled. Unlike the previous ones, it didn't seem like he was up to something. He looked genuinely happy. "So yes, to summarize. I'm curious. I'm literally always trying to learn, to add to the collective knowledge that I draw from. TL;DR," he stood up fully, and with a shivering motion, shrunk down to his human form again. " I'm influenced a bit by the internet. Thankfully I can filter it. God knows what would happen if I had to deal with all that porn. XD" It was somewhat bizarre, but he managed to actually say the emoticon. Not the letters X and D, but a literal noise that evoked the mental image of the emoticon.