Cyborg Spent Fa too much time in Chatrooms it was a weakness he had been indulgeing in with a side process in his head. It wasn't hurting anything and it was funny. It let him blow off steam and burn out the anger that built up on bad days and allowed him to maintain his sunny disposition. He had some real friends, who didn't know him as the titan. Just as Victoryisasured his screen name. Posing as a Titan's Fanatic, why not it was a talking part and all he had to do was comment about everything in third person and no one would ever know. But like all things there were problems like one exceedingly naïve and Literal kid who bugged Cyborg often, asking questions about what it was like to be a person, he just assumed the kid was being a weirdo. He wasn't doing anything wrong, just asking weird questions. Nothing wrong with that, so he just ignored him, until something happened. The person on the other side of the Line showed something dangerous though a touch of understanding that he had not let onto, he called Cyborg by name, a name never given, that left very few options of explanation and it finally came to something, a back trace on the registration on the Screen name Victor had used his real name.
This made Cyborg more uncomfortable than he had been in a long time, he had convoluted the heck out of the pathways himself, to have made it past the red Tape to get that name took a whole different breed of Hacker… and that brought back memories of a certain Virus and the havoc it caused. This was an unpleasant idea, and he did his best to banish it. There was only one recourse, A counterhack. And Cyborg was uniquely qualified to perpetrate it. He took some of his free time and spent it carefully in his room, not enough to cause suspicion but enough to allow him a swift patch around the system and began to dig. Dig and Dig. What he found… surprised him to say the Least. The Screen name was registered to someone who was currently dead, and had died before computers were even invented.
So, Cyborg sat down on his "bed one night and initialized his internet protocol and tapped the titan's mainframe, it was time to do a bit of research.
This left gaps, big ones. Dig and Delve into the dark and eventually he came across something a reference number that looked like a social security number, but running it against the Titan computers turned up no one, the number was either fake or it wasn't a social security number. Finally he tried one more thing, hacking the Internet Protocol address. A direct shot into his mainframe, whoever he was. And Who it was was something of a surprise.
See, amusingly There was no such person, the mainframe was no where, a loophole circuit with a pirated IP leading to a tiny cul-de-sac of information, a something he touched directly, and as the final digits opened the package of Data his mind Froze. Cyborg found himself standing in a Metaphoriscape, a representation of nothing, it was disorienting and disquieting the space was blank but for a single chair. It was occupied by something, a mere Wireframe an Androgynous something it sat flat footed with hands on its knees looking at him with twin motes of light it's voice echoing like a sophisticated Microsoft Sam.
"So Victor, you found me. I am SHIU. And I am what was once men."
Cybrog scratched his head, marveling that he could for a fraction of a moment and then looked at the thing "So… you mean to tell me I've been playing around with a Sentient databit? That's just weird. You shouldn't be able to exist."
The thing didn't move, it was mechanically still but it spoke again in that disquietingly blank and choppy tone "But I Do. And as you know the feeling of being trapped between two worlds I have been trapped far too long."
Now that sounded dangerous, and Cyborg stepped back and armed his AntiHack software taking the form of an active Sonic cannon in his hand, a comforting and familiar metaphor. "No one Joyrides on Cyborg! " The Wireframe however was gone, then it was again standing in front of him just to his face, just points and connecting lines representing a three dimensional object. "unfortunately I give you no Choice. You are what I need. I was, and now I am. I want to know I have all the information at my whim, but still Organics escape me. I offer you this now. Submit to my observation, or have it forced upon you." And in that moment, he clicked the trigger of the software and the stream of virtual energy roared at the wireframe, Obliterating it in one blast. "BooYa! not so Tough now are we!?" he called in mockery as the Metaphoriscape began to collapse and then resolidified the Wireframe now doubled and holding his arms out with imperturbable strength.
"I was Hoping to not be pushed, but you have forced this." And in the next moment it all collapsed, everything broke and scrambled as though the world broke into fragments and shattered around him leaving him Screaming in pain as every fiber of his being was ridden and warped by the invading energy carving him up and sifting him through.
He Snapped awake, his Systems blinking his Organic mind awake as he bolted upright he must have dozed off at some point. His human components bathed in sweat. He had almost forgotten what a nightmare was like, he hadn't had one that vivid since Brother Blood had played around in his head. That was bizarre. Psychotic, a wireframe virus. He needed to lay off the bacon and cheese sandwiches before bed. He laughed it off and stood up and ran a quick diagnostic, all clear on the mental front. Then he headed down for some breakfast. He needed it, he felt drained after all that.
Yet, in the back of his mind, a tiny Cul-de-sac had formed, watching all his sensory outputs and copying them, watching him watching them, a silent rider. A Worm in the Apple, Deus in Machina