Chapter Seven

Shouts and screams came from the ship and Macro readied his laser as he dashed into the cockpit. He released it back into its holster and shook his head at the two pokemon rolling on the floor.

"Please release me," Download Database said, rather too calmly. "I must shut down and wipe my short term memory."

"No!" Matrix half-growled. "It's too creepy!"

"What are you two doing?" Macro leant against the door frame and folded his arms.

Both pokemon looked up at him and Matrix sat back, revealing that the pachirisu had her arms bound to her sides with the jack lead she'd been boxed with.

"I'm stopping her shutting down again," Matrix explained. "It weirds me out seeing a living pokemon like that."

"Correction," said Download Database. "I'm a living computer. Shutting down is a necessity to conserve power and organise data."

Macro looked down at her. "So you admit you're not a living pokemon? You have, in fact, been killed?"

"No, the pokemon I used to be has not been killed. I am merely borrowing her body."

"It's still savage."

"I'm afraid I do not understand." She wriggled until she was sat upright and fixed him with emotionless, brown eyes. "Please release me. I must shut down and wipe as much memory as possible. I will sadly remain with... forty six minutes of useless data. This unfortunately cannot be rectified without the right command."

"Too late for you then, isn't it?" Macro stifled a laugh. "No. You can stay tied up. There's no point in shutting you down."

"But I must clear my memory as Socket absolutely must be the first pokemon I see."

"Again, it's too late." He frowned. "Why must she be the first one? Can you tell me that, at least?"

"It's an imprint function. The first pokemon I see is the pokemon I serve and have devoted loyalty to. At the moment, that pokemon is you."

"Oh!" His eyes widened and he rubbed at his chin. "So I could tell you to do anything then? Absolutely anything?"

"Yes, and I would have to obey."

"That's convenient." He paused and a smirk tugged at his lips. "Stay switched on."

She blinked. Twice. Then gave a polite nod.

"And stop this Socket nonsense," he added. "Because there's no way I'm taking you to her."

"You're not?"

"No. With the amount she increased my price by, she's clearly up to something. You're no mere toy to her." He frowned at her blank expression. "Understood? You cut it out, and I'll untie you."

She nodded again and stared at the floor.

Macro moved over to her and tugged the cable free. She flexed her arms and rose to her feet while Matrix watched warily from the navigation desk.

"So she's not gonna shut down?" he asked.

"No," said Macro. "Not if she's true to her word."

"I am programmed to obey," she said.

Macro looked up at Matrix then stood. "There you go. She won't freak you out any more. Happy?"

Matrix nodded slowly and twirled one of his antenna in his paw.

"I do, however, require sleep," she said. "But that is a different thing entirely. Something this living body requires."

"Wait a minute... Does that mean we have to feed you, too?" Macro asked.

"Yes."

"Huh." He scratched at his ear and tutted. "I should have thought of that before I ordered that sundae."

"Did someone say sundae?!" Cookie trotted into the cockpit and licked his lips.

"Good timing." Macro nodded over his shoulder at the pachirisu. "One more mouth to feed. Think you can handle that?"

"Ooh!" Cookie eyed her curiously. "I might have to triple my recipes."

"For one more pokemon?" Macro raised an eyebrow. "She's not even that big!"

"Yeh." Cookie rubbed the back of his head. "Hmm... double then?"

Macro waved a paw in dismissal. "You work it out. I'm gonna have a little nap." He rubbed at his chest as he strode from the cockpit. "I'm starting to get some epic heart burn."

"Story of my life." Cookie trotted back into the kitchen, grabbing his apron from the door as he passed.

Macro continued down the corridor past the washroom until he reached the sleeping quarters. Three doors spanned it on either side, and the end one on the left was his, right by the loot room. He eyed the other rooms reminding himself that two of them were free. He'd have to assign one to Download Database, unless she was happy enough sleeping in a wooden crate.

He pushed his room open and threw himself onto his back on his bed. The sheets were still bunched up from the previous night and pressed into his lower spine. He shuffled until he'd managed to move them from underneath him and kicked them right to the end of the bed. He then slipped his belt off and placed it carefully on his night stand. One day, he'd end up forgetting to put one of his lasers back into safety and blow a nice hole in his mattress...

He reached into his pouch and pulled out his pocket computer, staring at the clock ticking seconds by on its flat screen. It hadn't taken long for Surge to pull his number out of him. She had needed it, after all. He wondered how long it would take her to get the information he needed, then he'd block all her future calls if need be. He let his arm flop over the edge of the bed, keeping a firm hold on the computer. Within seconds he was staring at it again, pawing through the various useless apps he'd installed over the years.

A soft knock at the door snapped him out of his daze and he raised his head to look at it.

"Who is it?" he asked.

"Download Database." She pushed the door open before he could tell her to go away. "Matrix has made something clear to me. You owe me an apology."

His brow knit together and he pushed himself up so he was sitting. "For what?"

"For offending me," she explained. "He informed me that is what I was feeling after you called me an 'emotionless, empty, pathetic husk' and 'stupid computer'."

His jaw fell open and hung there. All he could do was stare at her. Was she serious?

"Well?" She inclined her head on one side. "Are you going to apologise?"

Looking into her emotionless, empty eyes unnerved him. No. He wasn't sorry. Everything he'd said was true. There was nothing... nothing... inside this pachirisu except empty data and an ability to speak. She could do the exact same thing as a computer tablet's voice command and helper feature. The only difference here was it was using the body of a living being.

He flopped back onto his bed and went back to scrolling through his computer apps. "I've got nothing to apologise for. I meant every word."

"So I'm pathetic and stupid?"

He grimaced. Maybe not every word.

"I understand." She turned from the door then faltered. "By the way. You said you were going to have a nap. You lied."

He turned his head slightly to look at her. Her back was turned but she had one eye fixed on him over her shoulder.

"You're rude and a liar," she said.

He snorted and blankly thumbed over his tablet screen. "And you're programmed to obey me."

"Yes. I am programmed to obey. Nevertheless, Matrix told me to make my feelings known. I've done that. Have a nice nap."

The door clicked shut, rather too politely. He rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling. 'Weird' didn't even begin to describe it. He could totally understand where Matrix was coming from. Everything about that 'pachirisu' was wrong. Was there anything he could do to train this computer to behave like an actual pokemon? Or was he stuck with data strolling around his ship inside some hapless pachirisu's body? It wasn't like she'd asked to be put inside there. It wasn't her fault the pokemon had had her identity stripped away. He closed his eyes and took in a deep breath. His chest still hurt. Maybe he was ice cream intolerant? He rolled onto his left, facing the wall, and let his computer drop to his pillow. Maybe a good nap would clear his head?

...

Singing. Who was singing?

Macro rubbed his eyes and pushed himself up onto his elbow, trying to work out where on earth that music was coming from. His pillow was lit up like a torch. He reached down to block it out, but instead his paw found his computer tablet and he snatched it back, noting the name on the screen.

Surge.

It all came barreling back down on him. Breakfast. Socket. Download Database.

He grabbed his phone and croaked a 'Hello' into it.

"Wow, you sound wonderful," came Surge's voice, rather too heavy on the sarcasm.

He cleared his throat and adjusted his pillow so he could sit back against the wall.

"You just woke me," he said.

"It's one in the afternoon."

If he'd thought to switch it to camera mode, she'd have seen him shrug.

"Anyway," she said. "I got the information you need."

"That was fast," he said.

"I take pride in my work. I don't leave my clients waiting around for too long." He thought he heard her smile. "Unless they've wriggled into my bad books."

"I guess I should count myself as one of the lucky ones?" He paused and rubbed at his scar. He couldn't deny he was rather nervous. "So what have you got for me?"

"It turns out you were right," she said. "Socket is up to something, and stealing that living computer may have been the best thing for System as a whole."

"What?" He laughed. "You trying to tell me I've saved the world?"

"No. Not yet." There was a small pause and he heard her take in a sharp breath. "Download Database, as the computer is called, is part of a larger network called BackDoor."

"Huh. Is that being sent over the city antennas?"

"No. BackDoor is not entirely different from the living computer, except it has a personality. Of sorts, anyway. It's completely artificial. Download Database isn't the only computer linked to the network, either. It's filled with creatures that aren't biological. She's the only biological component, designed merely to fit in with pokemon kind without drawing attention to Socket."

"So what is this BackDoor doing exactly?"

"It's looking for dimensional gateways."

In the silence that followed, Macro found himself wondering if he was actually still asleep and the conversation wasn't even happening. He glanced around at his room. Everything felt strange, dreamlike. No... eerie. Like something was very wrong and he was about to wake up at any moment after a rather unpleasant nightmare.

"Macro?"

Surge's voice snapped him back to his computer and he took in a shaky breath.

"Are you all right?" she asked. "You went quiet."

"I... I'm not sure."

"I know this is hard to take in. I've read over this information three times to make sure I'm reading it right. You know how murder is illegal in System?"

"Yes, I'm quite clear on that."

"Well, they've skirted around it with Download Database. Every single scrap of her personality and memories, everything that makes her who she is from her likes and dislikes to her fears and dreams, has been downloaded from her brain and stored on a disk. But after she fell into your paws, they've been broken up and placed onto five different disks and scattered throughout System to make it harder for whoever ends up with her to obtain them."

"So her personality is retrievable?"

"It is, but you're gonna have a hard time getting them. Each one is in a different government facility and those are heavily guarded. If you try to get them back then you clearly have a death wish."

"Does it say where they are?"

"I have a list. I'll send it to you along with the list of commands you wanted."

"You... you said something about dimensions?" His voice wavered again. Part of him was deeply uncertain he'd even heard her right.

"Yes, I did. What I told you about the living computer and murder law-dodging is completely relevant to that. She's a prototype." She paused and he heard her scratch her head, or ear, or face. "Macro, you've heard of humans?"

"I have. They're fictitious. Make up part of System's mythology."

"Well, Socket believes they exist." She paused again. "That's what BackDoor is trying to find. They're scouting out dimensional gates and opening them. Not just to other worlds, but to other time lines, and it looks like they've had some success. They managed to open a gate that showed them the same room they stood in thirty minutes prior to the test."

He actually pinched himself. It hurt. Could you feel pain in dreams? He really wanted to wake up.

"Macro, this is huge! If they're doing this, then you're already in too deep. I feel I've made a massive mistake in telling you all this."

"No... no, you've not." His voice really wavered.

"You don't sound well."

"It's just heart burn." It wasn't heart burn at all. He felt faint and the room was beginning to spin. "Look... send me the locations for her memories."

"You're still going after them?"

"I have an empty husk of a pachirisu walking around my ship, Surge. Every ounce of her personality has been stolen from her and I'm going to do everything I can to steal them back."

She sighed audibly. "All right. But promise me that's all you'll do."

He bit his lip so hard it hurt. Did she honestly think he was going to interfere in whatever Socket was doing? It was bonkers. It couldn't be real. Humans didn't exist. They never had, there was no proof of that. Zero proof. Allegedly they had, but then they'd all miraculously gone back home from the same dimensional tear they'd been dragged through. It was absolute tauros poop.

"Macro?"

"Did you find out exactly why she wants to find humans?" he asked.

"I didn't delve that deeply," said Surge. "To be honest, I got scared. All I know is she wants to turn them into computers like the pachirisu, but what purpose they serve is a mystery to me. I don't think I even want to know. The passwords for Download Database should allow you to find all that out if you're desperate to know. She's got a computer in her brain, after all."

Macro ran a paw over his face and let out a long sigh. What was Socket up to? One thing was for certain. There was no way she was getting her paws on Download Database.

"I'm getting her memories back," he said. "Then I'm done with this nonsense. Humans do not, and have not ever, existed in System. If what you've told me is even remotely true, Socket is clearly insane. You've seen what she's done to this pachirisu, or read it at least. You have to agree?"

She made a 'hmm' and rapped her claws on what sounded like a desk or table. "I can't say I disagree with you. Anyway. Now I've done all this, can we make another date?"

"Send me the information first, then we'll talk." He hung up and sank down against the wall.

His chest felt strange, like someone had fastened an elastic band around it. If he'd still been wearing his belt he would have torn it off in hopes it would alleviate it. Anxiety? Fear? Whatever it was, he didn't like it. Usually a bit of a shock gave him a buzz to keep fighting.

His computer chirruped at him and he stared down at Surge's name again. This time it was an email. He opened the attachment with a growing sense of dread.

It wasn't a dream. The whole bonkers, convoluted, dangerous and deadly plan was one hundred percent real. And he had been dragged right into the thick of it.