Lauren Ipsum: A Story About Computer Science and Other Improbable Things by Carlos Bueno Read Free Book Online

around
them a few times, then zipped off into the weeds, still screaming. “ Furfnoodle!
Furfnoodle! ”

    “What on Earth was that?!” Laurie said.
    “That,” said Xor, “was a baby Jargon.”
    “Where did it come from? It just blooped out of the air.”
    “You made it with . . . that word.”
    “I made it?”
    “I tried to warn you,” Xor said. “Where did you think Jargon came
from?”
    “What’s so special about Furf—that word?”
    “It’s a name that only means something to you. That’s what a Jargon is ,” Xor said. “You made it. It’s yours.”
    “But why?”
    “No one knows,” he said. “It’s one of those Axiom things. You have to
be careful with names. They have a power all their own.”

Chapter 10. A Well-Timed Entrance

    Probability was a little town on the edge of the sea. It was surrounded only by a rough wooden
fence, nothing like the high stone walls of Symbol, and the main entrance seemed to be unguarded.
Laurie was walking through the gates, when—
    “Excuse me, dear! Hello, on your left.” An elderly lady was sitting in the shade
just inside. She held a large book on her lap. Her name tag read Jane Hecate, Border
Security .
    “Oh! I didn’t see you there,” said Laurie.
    “That’s all right, dear. But before you come in I have to make sure you are on the
List.”
    Laurie had played this game before. “My name is Eponymous Bach, and my password
is—”
    “Hold on, dear, hold on! One thing at a time. First let’s look up your
name.” She opened the heavy book and started to scan the pages with her finger, letter by
letter.
    “E . . . E . . . Ah, E! Here we go.”
    It was painfully slow.
    “P . . . P . . . E-P! . . . E-P-O . . . E-P-O . . . no.”
    Jane closed the book with a thump.
    “Sorry, not on the List.”
    “What?”
    “You’re not on the List, dear. There are Es, and E-Ps, but there are no names that
start with E-P-O. If the start of your name isn’t on the List,
there’s no reason to keep looking for the rest of it, now is there?
It’s only logical.”
    “But her— my name must be on the List! She’s a
great—I mean, I am—” Laurie sputtered.
    “Are you a foreigner? I bet your name is spelled differently where you come from. That
can happen, especially with foreigners. Why don’t we try again?”
    Maybe she did have an account after all. “Is it under ‘Laurie
Ipsum’?”
    “Let me see.” Fllliiiip! “L . . . L . . . L! A . . . U
. . . R . . . I . . . Nope. Not here, but I’m sure we’ll find it.”
    “It could be spelled Laur en Ipsum.”
    “L . . . A . . . U . . . R . . . E . . . No, not that way either.” “Uh, Hugh
. . . Rustic?”
    “H . . . H . . . H! H-U-G-H R-U-S-T-I-C. Ah, there you
are.”
    “Great!”
    “I’m so glad we could find you!” Jane said. “Your name is spelled
quite a few different ways, isn’t it?”
    “Yeah, I guess it is. Thanks!” Laurie turned to go inside.
    Jane held her back with a surprisingly strong grip.
    “Your password , dear?”
    “Oh! Is it ‘Rustic’?”
    “No.”
    “Turtle?”
    “No.”
    “Algorithm?”
    “A . . . L . . . No.”
    “Good Enough?”
    “No.”
    Laurie was stumped. “Now what?” she whispered to Xor. “She doesn’t
care if I try every word in the dictionary. But we’ll be here all month!”
    “I have an idea,” Xor whispered back. “Try
‘Abstraction.’”
    “What is that? I don’t even—”
    “My third cousin is a Thesaurus. Trust me!”
    “Is it Ab-stract-tion?” Laurie asked Jane.
    “A . . . B . . . S . . . No, dear.”
    “‘Trust me,’ huh?” Laurie said to Xor.
    “Come to think of it, I never liked that cousin.”
    “Hey . . . did you notice something?”
    “Is it dinner time already?” Xor asked hopefully.
    “No! When I said ‘Turtle,’ she said no right away,” Laurie
said.
    “So? It’s not the password,” Xor said.
    “But when I said ‘Algorithm,’ she took longer to say no. And with
Abstraction, she took a little