SAGE

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SAGE
Character Information
Common Names	SAGE
Other Names	Semi Automatic Ground Environment, "Whirlwind II"
Human Name(s)	Gina Forrester
Faction	Wanderer Class
Lineage	MIT
Rival(s)	UNIX, most microcomputer-tans
Appearance
Height	167 cm (5'6")
Hair Color	Medium brown
Eye Color	Blue and yellow (sectoral heterochromia)
Weapon(s)	Missile launcher, makeshift weapons
Design
First Appearance	Jan 2008
Technical Information
System Personified	Semi Automatic Ground Environment (system) and AN/FSQ-7 (hardware)
Developer(s)	MIT Lincoln Laboratory
Debut	Jan 1959
Latest release	Circa 1983

Technical Details

Built for the US Air Force by MIT, IBM and SDC, the Semi-Automatic Ground Environment was an air defense network active throughout the Cold War. Radar data was collected and processed by AN/FSQ-7 computers at 26 sites across the United States. If detected, the location of enemy aircraft would have been transmitted to interceptors. While it faced a number of serious technical issues and was ineffective against ICBMs, it was the best answer to the threat of bombers, and made advancements in a number of modern technologies, including networking and interactive computing.

Character Details

Physical

SAGE-tan as an adult

SAGE-tan is depicted as a light-skinned woman in her mid-thirties, of average height, and sturdy build with a full chest. She has long brown hair tied into dual buns, and blue and yellow eyes. She decorates her hair with red and white checkered ribbons and wears rectangular glasses.

In her youth, she wore a beret, blue and yellow two piece, and her hair long. During her time in service, she wore contemporary women's USAF uniforms or antiquated military-style garb consisting of a long coat, ruffled shirt and ascot, puffy pants, boots, and a red sash across worn across her forehead or over her eyes.. Today she dresses in plain clothes mixed with pieces of her old uniform, particularly her overcoat.

SAGE-tan has been blind since being cut off from her radar stations. She speaks with a Massachusetts accent and favors antiquated slang.

Powers

SAGE-tan's perception and mental faculties are tied to the hardware in her network, which gave her excellent senses and a sharp mind during her active years. She could see radio frequencies with her radar stations, and demonstrated slight precognition because of their reach.

IBM 728-kun acted as her memory, while her stations had a generally stabilizing effect.

Personality

During her prime, SAGE-tan was self-assured, professional, and proud of her work. Despite her cockiness, she was responsible with her duties, friendly toward her comrades, and treated others with courtesy.

Though she was initially confident of her capabilities, the introduction of airborne enemies who could evade - or baffle - her senses instilled a paranoid tendency that she maintains to this day.

With the progressive loss of her stations, SAGE-tan's well-being worsened, her paranoia sharpening into psychotic episodes and an eventual mental break. She also developed amnesia following the death of IBM 728-kun, resulting in poor recall of her past and disjoint thought in the present. Though contact with other OS-tans improves her state, she's unable to regain her former condition.

Despite her loneliness, psychological instabilities and cynicism, her old self shines through interacting with friends. Although she's hostile toward younger generations of OS-tans, she has a good rapport with the survivors of her era, and is generally protective toward hardware.

She enjoys writing, and watching planes.

Family and relationships

SAGE-tan as a child

SAGE-tan is the first-born daughter of Whirlwind-tan. Despite being kept apart by separate duties, the two were close with each other. PDP-1-tan is her younger sister, while CTSS-tan is her youngest sibling, adopted by Whirlwind-tan in the early sixties.

SAGE-tan has a number of children. Besides her stations, her most notable is BUIC-tan, who acted as a backup to her mother. Despite having a mutually-loving relationship, the two rarely spent time together for security reasons. Her relationship with SABRE-tan is fraught with feelings of betrayal, since SABRE-tan is a "clone" created without her permission.

As a child, SAGE-tan had a number of friends, her closest being GENIAC-chan, a small, simple computer-tan whom she cared for before deployment. Later on, she made friends with numerous Air Force computer and hardware systems, notably Univac 1050-II, FASTRAND-kun, LIFT-tan, and the various radar stations who made up her system. She was especially close with her assistant and bodyguard IBM 728-kun, whom she regarded as a brother-in-arms.

While SAGE-tan was initially dismissive of Multics-tan, her impression softened after they worked together, beginning a tumultuous friendship that lasts to this day. SAGE befriended Apple III-tan after retirement, and likewise reacquainted with DTSS-tan, an old colleague of her sister's, in the present day.

Of all her enemies she hates Unix-tan in particular, sentiment at least partially reciprocated. She looks down on microcomputers with the exception of GENIAC-tan and Apple III-tan. However, her superiority complex doesn't stop her from visiting the Binteeji Renmei to reunite with her old companion, accidentally befriending others others in the process. She fosters a hatred of birds, as they easily confused her sensory systems. In the present day this manifests in conspiracy theories that birds are out to get her.

History and background

Early life

SAGE-tan was born in the mid-1950s and lived at Lincoln Laboratory, where she trained for her future career under the care of her loyal engineering team. There she befriended GENIAC-chan, a doll-like toy computer who'd been assembled at the lab. The two girls became inseparable, spending their free time playing games and getting into mischief.

She found herself separated from her mother by mutually busy schedules. Nevertheless, the two maintained an affectionate relationship, Whirlwind-tan being proud of and encouraging to her daughter, who loved and admired her mother in return. When able to, SAGE-tan traveled to Cambridge to spend time with Whirlwind-tan, favoring picnics & walks in the park.

SAGE-tan left home in the late 1950s. Unable to break the news to GENIAC-chan face-to-face, SAGE-tan bid goodbye via letter. The two lost contact, with SAGE-tan believing that GENIAC-chan must have died.

Prime

Upon deployment, SAGE-tan met her assistant IBM 728-kun.

Early into her career, the advent of the intercontinental ballistic missile instilled doubts about SAGE-tan's usefulness. While SAGE-tan still believed in herself, the public's misgivings eventually wore her down, sharpening into cynicism later on.

During the height of her career, SAGE-tan had a large family of stations and sub-systems. She was particularly close to BUIC-tan, keeping in touch by letter although she didn't get to spend much time with her. She had contact with family and colleagues inside the military and out, the two worlds occasionally colliding as was the case when Multics assisted at one of her bases, or when one of her radar installations impacted her distant niece WAITS-tan.

At around the start of the 70s, the weight of self-doubt began to strain on SAGE-tan, exacerbated by the loss of some of her first stations, and the death of her mother. Nevertheless she flew some combat missions at this time, continuing to pilot into the mid-70s.

Retirement

SAGE-tan was forced into retirement in 1983. With her stations and hardware demolished, her faltering mental state worsened to the point of crisis. Equally impacted was her physical state, losing much of her eyesight without her radar stations active. In contrast to many of her old coworkers, who either died or retired, SAGE-tan sold her possessions, cut remaining ties, and adopted the life of a lone wanderer.

During the 90s, SAGE-tan found herself on the periphery of the OS Wars and Unix Wars. Though she was able to avoid entanglement in the conflict for the most part, she was ambushed and brought to Unix-tan, who sought her battle management knowledge. Incensed by the offer, SAGE-tan attacked Unix-tan, and while SAGE-tan was defeated in the ensuing fight she survived the encounter.

At some point she made acquaintance of Apple ///-tan, helping her with a mysterious project on a tropical island.

Her journeys brought her to Montauk, where she inhabited the ruins of one of her old stations. Here she began chronicling her remaining memories, in between fending off curious explorers and birds flocking to the radar dish.

The discovery that GENIAC-chan was alive motivated SAGE-tan to visit the Vintage Federation, where she reconnected with various old friends. While she feared that GENIAC-chan would view her departure as a betrayal, GENIAC-chan was happy to see her, but later revealed her worry that SAGE-tan would leave again without warning.

SAGE-tan seemingly finds a measure of stability later in life, living comfortably in a home on Long Island and hosting friends for Christmas. Of note is the confirmation that her condition improves around other computers & equipment from her stations, and that she maintains contact with GENIAC-chan, Apple ///-tan and FASTRAND-kun to this day.

Notes

SAGE-tan attained the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and was a trained pilot.

Fanworks

Refer to this List of works depicting SAGE.