(II)
Wing woke up again, He sat up, and began to examine himself. He was dressed in a dark tank top and a pair of black pants. Glancing at the IV plugged into his forearm, he pulled it out, and stared at the grafted outlet. Frowning faintly, he ran a hand over his head, and noticed that he had no hair, he dismissed this as unimportant. He ran his fingers down to the back of his neck and explored the large outlet that was in base of his skull. 'What the hell..' he thought to himself scowling now. Looking up, he saw Dragon standing inside the door. He watched him and then realized something, the man standing in front of him was older than the person he had met in the motel. "Dragon, what is going on? Where the hell am I?"
"More important than what is when?" Dragon said coming inside the room sitting down across from him
"When?" he asked.
"You believe the year is AC 197 when in fact it is much closer to AC 697. I can't say for certain what year it is because we honestly do not know." Dragon said, crossing his arms in front of his chest.
"That's not possible." Wing said, his eyes widening slightly as he watched the older Chinese man.
"I promised you the truth, Wing, and the truth is that the world you were living in was a lie."
"How?" he asked, getting to his feet.
Dragon stood and walked back to the door. "I'll show you." he said as he walked out of the room.
Wing followed him noting that everything was colored in hues of dark gray and black. He looked up at the older man as he spoke again. "This is my ship, the Nataku. It's a hovercraft. Small like a submarine. It's dark, cramped and cold. But it's home." Dragon said with a trace of soft amusement. They came to a ladder and he followed Dragon as he climbed up. As he straightened up, he scanned the area and saw several people standing around that he didn't recognize. "This is the main deck. You know most of my crew." Dragon said turning to look at him and gesture at the people standing behind him. He then saw a tall blonde man step forwards and smile at him softly, nodding faintly.
"The ones you don't know." Dragon continued, walking to stand beside a young man with a surprisingly long braid. "This is Shinigami," he said laying a hand on the young man's shoulder. "No end.." he gestured to a woman with violet eyes who smiled at him. "Nanashi and Mau'dieb.." the hand waved over two men sitting next to each other, the taller one's face was half-hidden by his hair. He then turned as he heard someone walk up behind him. "And that is Po, she is our doctor. She helped me put you back into shape." The woman looked him over once and then nodded once in approval it seemed, before walking over to wrap an arm around No end.
Dragon walked over to a swamp of electronic equipment. Vines of coaxial hang and snake to and from huge monolithic battery slabs, a black portable satellite dish and banks of little systems and computer monitors. "And this, this is the Base. This is where we broadcast our rebel signal and hack into OZ." Dragon said walking over the center of the web of technology. Wing walked over, following him and glanced at the seven exoskeleton chairs that had been fitted with suspension harnesses. He looked over past the circle of chairs, to study the control console and operator's station where the network looked to be monitored.
" It is time you met the last of our crew, help him Wolf." Dragon ordered standing beside the chairs still.
Wing glanced at Wolf silently and let the taller man help him into one of the chairs. He glanced over at Dragon as he moved to stand by his chair.
"Do you remember when I asked you about an apparatus that could turn a virtual reality into reality?" Dragon asked.
Wing nodded.
Dragon touched Wing's head. "It's right here." he said. He then moved his hand and touched the jack in the base of his head. "And it's accessed here." he said, as he guided a coaxial line into the jack. "This will feel a little weird." he said quietly as he snapped it in. Wing winced, his muscles stiffening for a moment and then they relaxed. Then everything went white.
"This is the Construct." a voice said behind him suddenly. Wing spun around and found the younger Dragon now standing behind him. "It is our loading program. We can load anything from clothes, to weapons, to training simulations. Anything we need." the Chinese youth continued.
Dragon then walked past Wing, and he turned and frowned faintly as he watched Dragon embrace another man that had been sitting in a leather chair that sat in front of a large-screen television. The other turned then to glance at him and stood up. The ginger haired man studied him and then glanced down again at the man beside him.
// He is the *one*? //
Dragon nodded.
Wing shook his head, and blinked. The older man's voice had sounded very strange. He then heard Dragon laugh softly and he looked up.
Dragon was smiling at him and then wrapped an arm around the other man. "You'll get used to his voice Wing. Just give it time."
Wing walked over frowning faintly still, and studied the man. There was something about him he couldn't place his finger on, but he dismissed it as Dragon moved away from the man to show that two more chairs had appeared.
"Sit down, please." Dragon said sitting in the chair next to the other man.
Wing stood behind the chair watching them. "Right now, we're inside a computer program?" he asked.
Dragon grinned at him. "Wild, isn't it?" he said and then took the other man's hand in his own. "Before I forget to, this is T.K. or Khush, he is the last member in our crew. He'll be giving you the answers you wanted."
Wing's ran his hands over the cracked leather and then looked at them. "This isn't real?"
The older man looked away from Dragon and studied Wing silently for a moment before he spoke.
// What is real? How do you define real? If you're talking about your senses, what you feel, taste, smell, or see, then all you're
talking about are electrical signals interpreted by your brain. //
He picked up a remote control off the side of the chair and turned on the television.
// This is the Japan you know. Japan as it was at the end of the time of AC 196. This Japan exists only as part of a neural-interactive simulation that is called OZ. //
He clicked a button and changed the channel.
// You have been living inside someone's vision, inside the map, not the territory. This is Japan as it exists today. //
The sky was an endless sea of black and green fury. The earth was scorched and split like burnt flesh.
// *The desert of the real.* //
In the distance, Wing saw the ruins of Japan jutting out from the wasteland like blackened ribs of a long-dead corpse.
// We are, right now, miles below the earth's surface. The only place humans can survive outside OZ is underground, or in Space if one could find a way to get there. //
Wing turned away from looking at the ruins and discovered that now only he and the man called Khush were there. The chairs were now sitting in the middle of the black desert. Wing held onto the chair and watched the ginger haired man who brought out a pair of mirrored sunglasses like Dragon had wore during their first meeting. He put them on, covering his sapphire eyes and looked up at him. "What happened?" Wing asked him.
// It started after the colonies had been built, in the year AC 199. There was a small battle between two nations that grew to suck in more nations. It became a war. Some people fled Earth to the colonies. The war continued though until it engulfed the Earth in complete chaos and conflict. After year AC 299, the war was all the people who were still on the Earth knew of. Peace had been completely forgotten, it was a foreign concept, known only to the people who lived in space. The Colonies had been cut off by the conflict that tore Earth apart, so the war never touched them. //
// Finally, when I became a General in one of the opposing armies, in the year AC 315. I grew tired of the meaningless fighting. I constructed a plan and then used my weight within the army to have it carried out. Someone under me designed a system that was to help the plan be carried out. It worked, to a degree.//
Khush's lips drew into a faint frown as he leaned his elbows on the arms of the chair and clasped his hands together in front of him.
// The machines I created brought peace to war-torn Earth, things began to heal. Soon though things shifted as the system that the man under me created gave birth to artificial intelligence, a singular consciousness that began to make its own decisions. I tried to warn them. They called me a liar, threw me out of the government that had been created to watch over Earth. //
Wing watched T.K as he rested his chin on his hands, in his sunglasses, he watched storm clouds gather.
// I decided to try a different way of stopping what I saw was about to come to pass. In the end I was too late and not powerful enough to prevent it though. The system which had been dubbed *ZERO* by its creator had taken over the government, killing those that had once ruled it and began to take over the people of the Earth. I managed to get an army of free humans behind me and we tried to stop the machines. //
Wing watched the circular mirrors of the glasses, watching as explosions lit up a bloody battle field.
// I don't know really who struck the first true harming blow. Us or them. But sometime at the end of AC 397, the battle was joined, each of us striking hard back as we could back and forth.//
Wing flinched slightly as the war seemed to leave the glasses Khush wore and surrounded them.
//The war raged for generations and turned the face of the planet from green and blue to black and red.//
Wing heard screams and spun around to see machines; killing machines that were at once terrifying and beautiful. Some looked insect-like, other's mimicked the human's they killed. Rainbow shades of color covered their armor, and they hunted the soldiers retreating from the battle field. One caught a soldier and cracked open the body armor of a soldier, and fried the man within it.
// The war scorched and burned the sky. Some foolishly thought that we had won, because without the sun the Gundam's were without a power source. But I knew better, the Gundam's sought out a new energy source to survive. //
The Gundam in front of Wing locked up, as heat lightning, black as ink burst against the sky, spreading into a permanent cloud of ebony stain.
// They discovered a new form of fusion. All that was required to initiate the reaction was a small electric charge. Throughout human history we have been dependent on machines to survive. Fate, it seems, is not without a sense of twisted irony. //
Wing watched the scenery change into the power plant that he had escaped from, he saw human beings inside the cocoons, with almost blissful looks on their faces.
// The human body generates more bio-electricity than a 120-volt battery and over 25,000 B.T.U. of body heat. //
The scene changed once again, Wing took in the area spreading around the power plant. Beneath a breathing greenhouse, there were huge fields.
// Humans are, as an energy source, easily renewable and completely recyclable, the dead liquefied and fed intravenously to the living. Sounds like a bad horror flick, eh? //
Wing watched as huge farm-like reapers began to enter the fields.
// All they needed to control this new battery was something to occupy the human mind. If one cannot remember the enemy, one cannot fight it. //
The scene in front of Wing changed again and he watched as it closed in on a clear tubular husk. Inside it floating in viscous fluid, there was a human fetus; its soft skull already growing around the brain-jack.
// And so they built a prison out of our past, wired it to the human brain and turned the humans on Earth into slaves. //
Wing turned away from the images to face Khush. He blinked and shook his head as the surroundings became white once more and he glanced at the television to see the image of the fetus on the screen. Wing backed away from the chair staring slightly wide-eyed at the ginger haired man. "No! I don't believe it! It's not possible!" he cried.
// Dragon didn't say that it would be easy, Wing. He just said that it would be the truth. // Khush said standing up watching him from behind the mirrored glasses.
Wing backed away from him and then stumbled as the room began to spin around him. He wrapped his arms around his head. "Stop! Let me out! I want out!" he screamed closing his eyes.
Inside the Nataku, Wing's eyes snapped open and he thrashed against the chair, trying to rip the cable from the back of his neck. "Get this thing out of me!" he screamed.
Wolf took his hands away from the cable. "Easy, Wing. Easy." he said as Mau'dieb walked over to help him. Mau'dieb held him while Wolf stepped behind him and unlocked the cable, sliding it out.
Once he felt it leave, he tore away from both of them, falling as he tripped free of the harness on the chair. Wolf stepped around the chair to help him to his feet. Wing flinched back away from him. "Don't touch me! Get away from me!" he screamed at them. He moved to rest on his hands and knees, closing his eyes as the world spun around him again. Sweat poured off him as a pressure built inside his skull, feeling as if his brain had been put into a centrifuge.
"He's going to pop!" Queen screeched as she watched him from where she sat by the monitors. Wing pitched forward suddenly and blacked out.
*
Wing blinked, regaining consciousness, the room was dark. He glanced around and found himself back in the bed he had woken up in earlier. He felt the older man sitting in his room watching him. "I can't go back, can I?" he asked quietly.
Dragon leaned back sitting like a shadow in a chair in the far corner of the room. "No. But if you could, would you really want to?" he asked softly watching Wing. Wing wasn't sure of his answer, so he remained silent. Dragon continued quietly. "I feel that I owe you an apology. There is a rule that T.K had made before.." he shook his head and sighed before continuing. "We do not free a mind once it reaches a certain age. It is dangerous. They have trouble letting go.. Their mind turns against them. I've seen it happen. I broke the rule because I had to." Dragon turned and stared off into the darkness of the room, confessing as much to himself as Wing.
"When OZ first came into being as the thing it is now, there was a person that was able to make OZ behave as he saw fit. It was this person that freed the first of us and taught us the secret of the war; control the OZ and you control the future." Dragon paused. "When he was killed by OZ, the Oracle of Sanc prophesied one that could help his mind return and envisioned an end to the war and freedom for our people. That is why there are those of us that have spent our entire lives searching the OZ, looking for him." Dragon looked back at Wing. "I did what I did, because I believe we have been brought here for a reason, Wing. You are here to serve a purpose, just as I am here to serve mine." He finished watching him.
Wing scowled slightly and crossed his arms over his chest, still lying down on the bed. "I told you I don't believe in fate."
Dragon smiled, and leaned towards him. "But I do, Wing. I do." he said softly. He stood up and then looked down at Wing. "Get some rest. You're going to need it." he said walking to the door.
"For what?" Wing asked him.
Dragon glanced back and smiled. "Your training." he said as he shut the door.
*
Wing was awake in his bed, staring up at the lights, when the door opened and Nanashi stepped inside. "Morning. Did you sleep?" the tall man asked, watching Wing through his one visible green eye.
"No." Wing answered simply, sitting up on the bed.
Nanashi gave him a nod.. "You will tonight. I guarantee it. I'm Nanashi. I'll be your operator." he said offering his hand.
Wing shook it, then noticed that Nanashi didn't have any jacks. "You don't have.." he began.
"Any holes? Nope. Me and my lover, Mau'dieb, we are 100 percent pure human. Born free. Right here in the real world. Genuine child of Sanc." Nanashi said.
Wing stood up. "Sanc?" he asked.
"Sanc is the place. You'll see it one day. Last human city. Only thing we have left." Nanashi said smiling faintly. He turned and walked to stand in the doorway. "Let's go we have a lot of work to do today." Wing nodded and followed him out and up to the main deck.
Nanashi plugged Wing in, and then walked over to the Base, turning once to give him another faint smile. "We're supposed to load all these operations programs first, but this is some major boring shit. Why don't we start something a little fun?" He sat down in his operator's chair and began flipping through a tall carousel loaded with micro-discs. "How about sore combat training?" he said holding up one of the discs.
Wing read the label on the disc "Jujitsu? I'm going to learn jujitsu?" Nanashi slid the disk into Wing's supplement drive. "No way." he said, watching the long banged man sitting in the chair. Smiling faintly, Nanashi punched the "load" code. Wing's body jumped against the harness as his eyes clamped shut. The monitors kick wildly as his heart pounded, and adrenaline surged. An instant later his eyes snapped open. "Holy shit!" he said, catching his breath.
Nanashi snickered softly at his reaction. "Hey, Mikey, he likes it! Ready for more?" he asked Wing.
Wing looked over at him and smiled slightly. "Hell yes!"
On the monitor of Nanashi's computer, gray pixels slowly filled a small, half-empty box. It's a meter displaying how much download time is left. The title bar read: *Combat Series 10 of 12,* file categories flashing beneath it: *Jujitsu, Ken Po, Drunken Boxing.. *
Dragon walked in, glancing at Wing then to Nanashi. "How is he?"
Nanashi looked at his watch. "Ten hours straight. He's a machine."
Wing's body shook and then relaxed as his eyes opened, breath hissing from his lips. He looked at Dragon. "This is incredible. I know Kung Fu." he said, with a small smile.
Dragon sat in the chair next to him. He nodded to Nanashi. "Show me." he told Wing closing his eyes.
They stand in a very sparse Japanese-style dojo. "This is a sparring program, similar to the programmed reality of the OZ. Consider this your first lesson." Dragon said, as he assumed a fighting stance. "Attack me."
Wing assumes a similar stance, cautiously circling until he gave a short cry and launched a furious attack. Fists and feet striking from every angle, Wing pressed his attack. But each and every blow is blocked by Dragon with effortless speed.
While their minds battled in the programmed reality, the two bodies appeared quite serene, suspended in the chairs. Nanashi monitored their life systems noticing that Wing was wildly and chaotically lit up as opposed to the slow and steady rhythm of Dragon.
Inside the mess hall of the ship, dinner is up. Everyone, besides the three in the Base, is eating bowls of single-cell protein, which has an oatmeal consistency. Shinigami bursts in the room, braid flying behind him. "Dragon is fighting Wing!" he shouted as he spun and then dashed back out. All at once they bolted for the door running towards the Base.
Back inside the dojo, Wing's face is knotted, teeth clenched, as he hurled himself at Dragon.
"Good. Adaptation. Improvisation. But your weakness isn't your technique." Dragon said as he evaded Wing again. He attacked Wing, feet and fists flying everywhere taking Wing apart. For every blow Wing blocked, five more hit their marks until - Wing fell.
Panting, on his hands and knees, Wing's blood dripped from his mouth speckling the white floor of the Dojo. "How did I beat you?" Dragon asked him still standing over him, watching him through mirrored glasses once more.
"You - You're too fast." Wing said.
"Do you think my being faster, stronger has anything to do with my muscles in this place?" Dragon said, raising an eyebrow above the rim of the glasses. Wing was getting frustrated, still unable to catch his breath. "Do you believe that's air you are breathing now?" Dragon asked him.
Wing looked up squinting at him.
"If you can free your mind, the body will follow." the Chinese man said.
Wing stood, nodding.
"Again." Dragon said, stepping back and going back into position. They begin again, their fists flying with unbelievable speed.
Everyone is gathered behind Nanashi, watching the fight, like watching a television show. "Allah! That boy is fast!" Mau'dieb said as he leaned over Nanashi.
"Have you ever seen anyone that fast that soon, Nanashi?" Shinigami said, as he watched the pair fight.
Nanashi leaned back in his seat and shook his head. "Never."
Kat stared at the monitor. "Dragon is right. He's got to be the one."
Back inside the dojo, the speed of the blows rose impossibly high. Wing's face shed its mask of calm with a scream. He wanted to beat Dragon, he wanted to beat him now. Finally a single blow caught Dragon on the side of the head, knocking his glasses off.
Back in Base, there were several gasps. "I don't believe it!" Shinigami cried as he watched the glasses fall.
Dragon rubbed the side of his face. "You are angry with me." he stated.
Wing panted getting his wind back. ".. maybe." he said, looking into Dragon's black eyes.
Dragon nodded. "It's all right. It's natural." he said, lowering his hand from his face.
"I feel better." Wing admitted.
Dragon nodded again, watching him. "Good. Anger is a gift, Wing, but it's a heavy one." Dragon smiled. "Nanashi, load the jump program." he ordered.
Wing straightened as the dojo dissolved away like a curtain lifting, leaving them now standing on a building rooftop in a city skyline.
"You have to learn to let go of that anger. You must let go of everything." Dragon said, as the wind howled around them, whipping Dragon's long coat to one side. "You must empty yourself to free your mind." he said. He spun, running hard towards the edge of the rooftop, and jumped. He sailed through the air, his coat billowing out behind him like a cape, somersaults once and lands on the rooftop across the street.
Wing stared at him. "Shit." he said, watching as Dragon stood and looked back at him, waiting. He looked down at the street twenty floors below, then at Dragon an impossible fifty feet away. "Okay." he said, taking a deep breath. "Yeah. Free my mind. Right. No problem." he said quietly to himself. He concentrated, and ran.
Inside Base, they are transfixed. "He's going to make it." Mau'dieb said quietly.
Kat shook her head faintly, not taking her eyes off the screen. "No way. Not possible." she said.
"No one's ever made their first jump." Shinigami said, leaning on Kat's shoulder watching Wing on the monitor.
"What if he does?" No end asked.
Kat shook her head again slightly. "He won't." she answered.
"It's never been done." Nanashi said, his single eye fixed on the screen.
Wolf stared at the screen, his fists clenching. "Come on." he whispered.
Back on the rooftop, Wing summoned every ounce of strength in his legs, and launched himself into the air with a single maniacal shriek - but comes up drastically short. His eyes widened slightly as he fell. Stories flew by, the ground rushed up at him, but when he hit - the ground gave way, stretching like a trapeze net. Wing bounced and flipped, slowly he came to a rest, flat on his back. He laughed softly, a bit unsure, and wiped the wind-blown tears from his face.
Dragon walked out of the building and helped him to his feet. "Everyone falls the first time." he said quietly to Wing.
Wing nodded quietly, he understood what he meant.
"If you never know failure, how can you know success?" Dragon finished, taking his glasses out of his coat and placing them back on his face.
Back inside Base, the suspense over, the group broke up going their separate ways. "What does it mean?" Shinigami asked, glancing at the monitor and then at the others.
"It doesn't mean anything." Mau'dieb said, as he sat down in the chair Nanashi had been sitting in.
Queen grinned and then looked back towards where Wolf had been. "Everyone falls, right, Wolf?" But Wolf had left the room.
Wing's eyes opened as Nanashi eased the plug out. He tried to move and groaned, cradling his ribs. While Nanashi helped Dragon, Wing spit blood into his hand. "I thought it wasn't real." he asked Dragon. He stared at the blood, and a new thought came to him. "If you are killed in the OZ, you die here?" he asked him, looking up at him.
Dragon nodded and slid off the chair. "The body cannot live without the mind." he said.
Later, Wolf walked into Wing's room, carrying a tray of food. "Wing, I saved you some dinner.." he said softly. He glanced at him passed out on the bed. He set the tray down on a table and pulled the blanket over him. Pausing, with his face close to Wing's, he inhaled lightly, breathing in the scent of him, before slowly pulling away. He glanced back at him once more and then shut the door, walking to his room.
*
The ship is quiet and dark. Almost everyone is asleep. The Base glowed with monitor light. Queen was in the operator's chair as Wing came up behind her. "Whoa! Shit, Wing, you scared the hell out of me."
"What are you doing?" Wing asked.
"Midnight Watch." Queen answered.
Wing's eyes lit up as he stepped closer to the screens that seemed to be alive with a constant flow of data. "Is that... ?" he began.
"OZ? Yeah." Queen said taking a small drink from a cup. The monitors were packed with bizarre codes and equations. "You want a drink?" she asked lifting a plastic jug. Not waiting for an answer, she poured Wing a cup of it and held it out for him. He took it and held it in one hand still watching the screens. "I'll tell you, I feel for you, Wing. I really do. Most of us were still young, just punks, when Dragon jacked us. But you, you had a real life."
Wing took a sip from the cup and started coughing hard. Queen pounded on his back. "Good shit, huh? Shinigami makes it. It's good for two things: degreasing engines and killing brain cells." she said, and then sat back down with a small laugh.
Red-faced, Wing finally stopped coughing.
"Did he tell you why he did it?" she asked him.
Wing nodded.
"I'll be the didn't tell you that this wasn't the first time he thought he found the *One*." Queen said. Wing shook his head as Queen filled his cup and laughed again. "Let me give you a piece of advice. Between you and me, if Dragon says you can fly, I wouldn't go jumping out any windows to find out if he's right. Understand?" Queen raised her drink and grinned at him. Queen laughed again turning back to the monitors. "Welcome to the real world!" she said, taking another drink.
*
Inside OZ, two people were having a meal. The two woman were sitting at a table next to the window overlooking the skyline. The blonde cut into the steak on her plate. "The real world. Ha, what a joke." she said with a small laugh. "You know what real is? I'll tell you what real is." she continued as she raised her fork with a piece of the steak on it. "Real is just another four-letter word." Queen said as she ate the steak.
Sitting across from Queen, was Agent Une.
"Do we have a deal, Miss Peacecraft?" Une said, watching her coldly. She watched Queen place another piece of meat into her mouth.
"You know, I know that this steak doesn't exist. I know when I put it in my mouth, OZ is telling my brain that it is juicy and delicious. After nine years, do you know what I've realized?" Pausing, she examined the meat skewered on her fork. She placed it in her mouth, savoring the taste. "Ignorance is bliss."
"Then we have a deal?" Agent Une asked.
"I don't want to remember nothing. Nothing! You understand? And I want to be rich. Someone important. Like an actor. You can do that, right?" Queen asked.
Une nodded. "Whatever you want, Miss Peacecraft."
Queen took a deep drink of wine. "All right. You get my body back in a power plant, reinsert me into OZ and I'll get you what you want." she said.
"Access codes to Sanc." Une said icily.
Queen set the wine glass down. "I told you, I don't know them. But I can give you the man who does." she said.
Agent Une's eyes narrowed. "Dragon." she said coldly.
*
Wing snapped out of the construct coma. " Hn.. I was wondering about that." he said quietly.
"What?" Nanashi asked, looking over at him.
"Why I was bald here but not in OZ." he said sitting up in the chair.
"R.S.I." Nanashi replied.
"Residual self image."
Nanashi nodded. "Good. Now what's this?" he asked, pointing to a monitor beside Wing.
"Life systems monitor, glucose levels." Wing answered.
Nanashi nodded. "What's that?" he said, pointing in a different direction.
"Main power supply to the Base."
Wing stood and followed Nanashi to the operator's station where he pointed to a red key-switch.
"How about this?" he asked, watching him.
". . . E.M.P?"
Nanashi nodded again, crossing his arms over his chest. "Electromagnetic pulse. Our best weapon against the machines. The problem is if someone is still in OZ when that thing goes off, they're not coming back." he said seriously.
Wing nodded in understanding, then glanced back at the sound of footsteps to see Dragon walking up behind them.
"How's he doing?" the Chinese man asked Nanashi.
"We just finished the operation programs and he's showing great retention." Nanashi reported.
"Good. I want everyone alerted to 12-hour stand-by. We're going in. Wing, it's time for you to know why you're here." Dragon said as he walked away.
Wing glanced over at the long-banged man. "What's he talking about?" he asked.
"He's taking you into OZ to see her." Nanashi replied.
Wing frowned faintly. "See who?" he asked.
"The Oracle."
*
The room was empty, heavy curtains covered windows. It looked as if it hadn't been touched in years. In the bedroom with the cracked oval mirror, an old black phone begins to ring. The room filled with equipment and the team.
Dragon answered the phone.[We're in.] he said and then hung up the phone. Dragon turned to the rest and then nodded once before walking towards the door. "Kat hold the exit. Let's go." he said as he walked out.
Wing followed the others as they filed down the stairwell that wound around an antique elevator shaft. They crossed the old lobby. No end and Shinigami stopped at the doors of the old hotel. Dragon turned to look at them through his glasses. "We should be back in an hour." he said quietly. They nodded and then began watched the area.
Wing squinted into the sun that seemed unnaturally bright. He noticed then that he was the only one without sunglasses.
Dragon walked up beside him. "Do you now understand what it means when we say, if you're not one of us, you're one of them?" he asked him.
Wing nodded silently then spoke quietly. "The agents. They're sentient programs. They can commandeer any software hardwired to the mainframe." he answered.
Dragon nodded. "Anyone that is still in a power plant. That is why we try to be invisible in OZ." he said.
"The best hacking is always traceless." Wing said as they walked towards the black Lincoln Continental that had pulled up in front of the hotel.
As Queen passed a garbage can, she surreptitiously dropped a cellular phone inside it. They then climbed inside the car and it pulled away.
Inside the car, Wing looked over at Wolf, who was staring out the side window. "Did you have to do this?" he asked him.
Wolf nodded continuing to watch the scenery rolling past.
"What did she tell you?" Wing asked.
"Lots of things." he answered.
"Any of them true?" Wing asked curious.
Wolf looked over at him, then looked back out the window. "Some of them." he said, a faint trace of fear and hurt in his voice.
"Were they good or bad?" Wing asked quietly.
Wolf shook his head not looking at him. "There's no point in worrying. Whatever is going to happen is going to happen." he said.
The Lincoln pulled up to another hotel, Dragon climbed out and gestured for Wing to follow him. Wolf and Queen stayed inside the car as he slid out and followed Dragon inside the hotel. They walked over to an elevator and rode up to the thirteenth floor. Walking out of the elevator, Dragon led him to a door marked 1305. Dragon opened the door and he walked inside.
The walls and floors were polished marble. Wing followed, his mouth agape. "What - what is this place?" he asked.
Dragon looked back at him. "This is the temple. It is a part of Sanc's mainframe. It's hidden inside OZ so that we can access it."
Two priestesses were waiting in the antechamber. "Hello, Dragon. We've been expecting you." one of them said, bowing her head in respect towards him.
Dragon returned the gesture and then looked at Wing. "You're on your own. Go with them." he said sitting down on the bench that sat inside the room.
One of them took Wing by the arm, and led him down a hall into another room. "Wait here. Among the other Potentials." one of the women said. They then left him. Wing walked into the room and finally understood the attention given to his age. The Potentials are all little children. The room felt like a Buddhist temple and a kindergarten class. Some were playing, others meditating or practicing their gift. He watched a little boy levitate wooden alphabet blocks. A small girl held a spoon which swayed like a blade of grass as she bent it with her mind.
Wing walked over to her, and sat down in front of her. The girl smiled as Wing picked up a spoon and tried to imitate her actions. Despite his best efforts, Wing couldn't repeat them.
The girl brushed her reddish hair out of her face and smiled at him. "Your spoon does not bend because it is just that, a spoon. Mine bends because there is no spoon, just my mind." she said, glancing at him with deep blue eyes once, before looking back at the spoon she held. Wing watched as it curled into a knot. "Link yourself to the spoon. Become the spoon and bend yourself." she told him.
Wing nodded, holding up his spoon again. "There is no spoon. Right." he said softly, he concentrated. The spoon began to bend just as one of the women returned and touched his shoulder.
"The Oracle will see you now." she said standing behind him. The little girl smiled at him as he stood up setting the spoon back down on the floor.
Wing walked into the room the woman led him to and glanced down at the floor as he walked inside. Beneath his feet was a path of the zodiac, he followed it with his eyes and saw that it led to marbled stairs that rose up to a dais, which was empty. Frowning faintly he called out. "Hello?"
A voice called back to him and he followed it up the stairs. At the top of the dais, he smelled something cooking. Following the scent, he moved behind the pillars where he found an open door. "Just come on in." the voice said to him as he stood in front of it.
He walked through a vestibule and saw a second door, he walked inside and blinked.
It looked like a suburban tract house. There was a lot of cozy furniture, a dining room hutch filled with china, shelves and tables crowded with doilies, and knick-knacks. Wing followed a plastic carpet runner into the kitchen. He walked into the kitchen, and noticed a woman with long brown hair. She stood in front of an oven, peering inside through the cracked door.
"Hello?" he asked quietly, watching her.
"I know. You're Wing. Be right with you." she said, not looking away from the oven.
"You're the Oracle?" Wing asked, as he stood in the doorway.
"Yes. I have to say I love seeing non-believers. It's really a relief at times. Almost done. Smell good, don't they?" she said, her tone carrying amusement.
"Yes."
"I'd ask you to sit down, but you're not going to anyway. And don't worry about the vase." she said turning, to glance at him with warm brown eyes.
"What vase?" Wing asked, turning around to look. As he turned, his elbow knocked the vase in question from a table next to the door. It broke against the linoleum floor.
"That vase." she said.
"Shit, I'm sorry." he said, and stepped further into the room away from the table.
She pulled out a tray of chocolate chip cookies and turned setting them on the cooling rack that sat on a counter next to the oven. "I said don't worry about it. I'll get one of my kids to fix it." she assured him.
"How did you know...?" he began.
"What's really going to get you later on is, would you still have broken it if I hadn't said anything." she said, as she laughed softly. "You're cuter than I thought. I see why he likes you." she said watching him.
"Who?" Wing asked, slightly confused at what she was talking about.
"Not too bright, though." she teased, giving him a wink, she then sobered up looking at him seriously. "You know why Dragon brought you to see me?" she asked him.
"I think so." Wing answered.
"So? What do you think? You think you're the one?" she asked, watching him.
"I don't know." he answered her honestly.
She gestured to a wooden plaque above Wing's head, over the doorway. "You know what that means? It's Latin. Means, *Know thyself.*" Leaving the counter, she walked towards him. "Well, let's have a look at you." She looked at his eyes, checked his ears, and felt the glands in his neck. "Open your mouth. Say, *ah.*" he did and she nodded and turned her attention to his palms. "Hmmm. You have the gift, but it's tricky. I'd say the bad news is, you're not the one. You still have a lot to learn. Maybe next life."
"What's the good news?" he asked her frowning faintly again
She smiled again at him. "Same as the bad news, you're not the one." she said.
"Is that it, then?" he asked crossing his arms across his chest.
She shook her head. "No. Here." she said, picking up the tray and holding it out towards him. "Take a cookie. You have a long day ahead of you." He eyed her, then took one of the cookies. He then left her and walked out eating the cookie. She set the tray down and smiled at the doorway. "Make a believer out of you yet." she said softly.
*
Dragon rose from the bench as a Priestess escorted Wing out. After she left them, Dragon placed his hand on Wing's shoulder. "No one will ever ask you what she told you, because it is a gift from her. It is for you and you alone." he said quietly. Wing finished the cookie, and nodded following him as he left.
Storm clouds have begun to gather outside. Queen nervously glanced down the surrounding streets from inside the car. She silently noticed several unmarked white vans. She glanced back at him when she heard him speak. "Here they come." he said quietly.
In the hovercraft, Nanashi is typing rapidly at the keyboard. "Strange. This area never has this much activity." he said quietly as his fingers flew over the keys.
Back in OZ, Dragon and the rest are back at the old hotel, Shinigami opened the side door and they walked inside.
Inside room 1313, Kat's cellular phone rang. She flipped it open. [ Kat here..] she said.
[They're on their way.] Nanashi told her.
[Right.] Kat answered, flipping the phone shut as she jumped up to her feet.
Light filtered down the center of the building through a caged skylight at the top of the open elevator shaft. Four figures glided up the dark stairs that wound around the antique elevator. Wing noticed a black cat, a green golden-eyed shadow that slinked past them and padded quickly down the stairs. A moment later, Wing saw another black cat that looked and moved identically to the first one. "Whoa. Deja'vu." he said. Those words stopped the others dead in their tracks.
Inside Base, the monitors suddenly glitch as if OZ had an electronic seizure. "Oh, shit! Oh, shit!" Nanashi swore as his fingers once again flew over the keys.
Inside OZ, back on the staircase Wolf turned around, his face tight. "What did you just say?" he asked softly.
Wing looked up at him. "Nothing. Just had a little deja'vu." he said.
Wolf watched him intently. "What happened? What did you see?" he asked.
"A black cat went past us and then I saw another that looked just like it." Wing answered.
"How much like it? Was it the same cat?" Wolf asked, a faint trace of fear coloring his tone.
"It might have been. I'm not sure." he answered.
Wolf looked at Dragon, who listened quietly to the rasping breath of the old building.
"What is it?" Wing asked watching the two of them.
"A deja'vu is usually a glitch in OZ. It happens when they change something." Wolf answered, his voice growing wary as he listened to the sudden sound of helicopter blades growing ominously louder as they near the hotel.
Back inside Base, Nanashi spotted what was changed. "It's a trap!" he cried out as he placed another call to Kat's phone.
Inside OZ, Dragon looked up the stairs as a helicopter's shadow passes over the clouded glass of the skylight. "Come on!" he shouted as he ran up the stairs.
Down in the basement of the hotel , heavy bolt-cutters snap through the main phone cable.
Inside room 1313, Kat answers her phone. [What's going on?] she asked.
[They cut the hard-line! It's a trap! Get out!] Nanashi cried. Kat walked over and yanked open the curtain.
[Oh, no.] she whispered.
The windows were bricked up. The door to the roof exploded inward as heavily-armed men rushed toward room 1313.
Inside Base, Nanashi watched helplessly. "No.." he whispered.
Back inside OZ, the door to room 1313 slammed open and the police force poured in, dozens of assault rifles surrounding Kat who was armed with only a handgun. "Dragon! It's a trap.." she screamed.
On the stairway, Dragon stopped as the scream was drowned out by the report of the machine guns that filled the building with terrible fury.
Wolf's eyes widened. "Oh, God." he whispered.
Inside Base, Kat's body thrashes against its harness as -
Bullets drive her back against the blood-splattered brick window, inside OZ. Gun smoke thickened inside room 1313, Kat blasting and moving until, the hammer clicked empty. She screamed as the guns opened fire, and ripped her apart.
Blood flowed from Kat's mouth, her body convulsing, and then laying perfectly still. The flat-line alarm softly cries out from the life monitor of the dead woman.
Inside OZ, more police cars arrive as cops break open the lobby doors, pouring into the hotel.
Wing woke up again, He sat up, and began to examine himself. He was dressed in a dark tank top and a pair of black pants. Glancing at the IV plugged into his forearm, he pulled it out, and stared at the grafted outlet. Frowning faintly, he ran a hand over his head, and noticed that he had no hair, he dismissed this as unimportant. He ran his fingers down to the back of his neck and explored the large outlet that was in base of his skull. 'What the hell..' he thought to himself scowling now. Looking up, he saw Dragon standing inside the door. He watched him and then realized something, the man standing in front of him was older than the person he had met in the motel. "Dragon, what is going on? Where the hell am I?"
"More important than what is when?" Dragon said coming inside the room sitting down across from him
"When?" he asked.
"You believe the year is AC 197 when in fact it is much closer to AC 697. I can't say for certain what year it is because we honestly do not know." Dragon said, crossing his arms in front of his chest.
"That's not possible." Wing said, his eyes widening slightly as he watched the older Chinese man.
"I promised you the truth, Wing, and the truth is that the world you were living in was a lie."
"How?" he asked, getting to his feet.
Dragon stood and walked back to the door. "I'll show you." he said as he walked out of the room.
Wing followed him noting that everything was colored in hues of dark gray and black. He looked up at the older man as he spoke again. "This is my ship, the Nataku. It's a hovercraft. Small like a submarine. It's dark, cramped and cold. But it's home." Dragon said with a trace of soft amusement. They came to a ladder and he followed Dragon as he climbed up. As he straightened up, he scanned the area and saw several people standing around that he didn't recognize. "This is the main deck. You know most of my crew." Dragon said turning to look at him and gesture at the people standing behind him. He then saw a tall blonde man step forwards and smile at him softly, nodding faintly.
"The ones you don't know." Dragon continued, walking to stand beside a young man with a surprisingly long braid. "This is Shinigami," he said laying a hand on the young man's shoulder. "No end.." he gestured to a woman with violet eyes who smiled at him. "Nanashi and Mau'dieb.." the hand waved over two men sitting next to each other, the taller one's face was half-hidden by his hair. He then turned as he heard someone walk up behind him. "And that is Po, she is our doctor. She helped me put you back into shape." The woman looked him over once and then nodded once in approval it seemed, before walking over to wrap an arm around No end.
Dragon walked over to a swamp of electronic equipment. Vines of coaxial hang and snake to and from huge monolithic battery slabs, a black portable satellite dish and banks of little systems and computer monitors. "And this, this is the Base. This is where we broadcast our rebel signal and hack into OZ." Dragon said walking over the center of the web of technology. Wing walked over, following him and glanced at the seven exoskeleton chairs that had been fitted with suspension harnesses. He looked over past the circle of chairs, to study the control console and operator's station where the network looked to be monitored.
" It is time you met the last of our crew, help him Wolf." Dragon ordered standing beside the chairs still.
Wing glanced at Wolf silently and let the taller man help him into one of the chairs. He glanced over at Dragon as he moved to stand by his chair.
"Do you remember when I asked you about an apparatus that could turn a virtual reality into reality?" Dragon asked.
Wing nodded.
Dragon touched Wing's head. "It's right here." he said. He then moved his hand and touched the jack in the base of his head. "And it's accessed here." he said, as he guided a coaxial line into the jack. "This will feel a little weird." he said quietly as he snapped it in. Wing winced, his muscles stiffening for a moment and then they relaxed. Then everything went white.
"This is the Construct." a voice said behind him suddenly. Wing spun around and found the younger Dragon now standing behind him. "It is our loading program. We can load anything from clothes, to weapons, to training simulations. Anything we need." the Chinese youth continued.
Dragon then walked past Wing, and he turned and frowned faintly as he watched Dragon embrace another man that had been sitting in a leather chair that sat in front of a large-screen television. The other turned then to glance at him and stood up. The ginger haired man studied him and then glanced down again at the man beside him.
// He is the *one*? //
Dragon nodded.
Wing shook his head, and blinked. The older man's voice had sounded very strange. He then heard Dragon laugh softly and he looked up.
Dragon was smiling at him and then wrapped an arm around the other man. "You'll get used to his voice Wing. Just give it time."
Wing walked over frowning faintly still, and studied the man. There was something about him he couldn't place his finger on, but he dismissed it as Dragon moved away from the man to show that two more chairs had appeared.
"Sit down, please." Dragon said sitting in the chair next to the other man.
Wing stood behind the chair watching them. "Right now, we're inside a computer program?" he asked.
Dragon grinned at him. "Wild, isn't it?" he said and then took the other man's hand in his own. "Before I forget to, this is T.K. or Khush, he is the last member in our crew. He'll be giving you the answers you wanted."
Wing's ran his hands over the cracked leather and then looked at them. "This isn't real?"
The older man looked away from Dragon and studied Wing silently for a moment before he spoke.
// What is real? How do you define real? If you're talking about your senses, what you feel, taste, smell, or see, then all you're
talking about are electrical signals interpreted by your brain. //
He picked up a remote control off the side of the chair and turned on the television.
// This is the Japan you know. Japan as it was at the end of the time of AC 196. This Japan exists only as part of a neural-interactive simulation that is called OZ. //
He clicked a button and changed the channel.
// You have been living inside someone's vision, inside the map, not the territory. This is Japan as it exists today. //
The sky was an endless sea of black and green fury. The earth was scorched and split like burnt flesh.
// *The desert of the real.* //
In the distance, Wing saw the ruins of Japan jutting out from the wasteland like blackened ribs of a long-dead corpse.
// We are, right now, miles below the earth's surface. The only place humans can survive outside OZ is underground, or in Space if one could find a way to get there. //
Wing turned away from looking at the ruins and discovered that now only he and the man called Khush were there. The chairs were now sitting in the middle of the black desert. Wing held onto the chair and watched the ginger haired man who brought out a pair of mirrored sunglasses like Dragon had wore during their first meeting. He put them on, covering his sapphire eyes and looked up at him. "What happened?" Wing asked him.
// It started after the colonies had been built, in the year AC 199. There was a small battle between two nations that grew to suck in more nations. It became a war. Some people fled Earth to the colonies. The war continued though until it engulfed the Earth in complete chaos and conflict. After year AC 299, the war was all the people who were still on the Earth knew of. Peace had been completely forgotten, it was a foreign concept, known only to the people who lived in space. The Colonies had been cut off by the conflict that tore Earth apart, so the war never touched them. //
// Finally, when I became a General in one of the opposing armies, in the year AC 315. I grew tired of the meaningless fighting. I constructed a plan and then used my weight within the army to have it carried out. Someone under me designed a system that was to help the plan be carried out. It worked, to a degree.//
Khush's lips drew into a faint frown as he leaned his elbows on the arms of the chair and clasped his hands together in front of him.
// The machines I created brought peace to war-torn Earth, things began to heal. Soon though things shifted as the system that the man under me created gave birth to artificial intelligence, a singular consciousness that began to make its own decisions. I tried to warn them. They called me a liar, threw me out of the government that had been created to watch over Earth. //
Wing watched T.K as he rested his chin on his hands, in his sunglasses, he watched storm clouds gather.
// I decided to try a different way of stopping what I saw was about to come to pass. In the end I was too late and not powerful enough to prevent it though. The system which had been dubbed *ZERO* by its creator had taken over the government, killing those that had once ruled it and began to take over the people of the Earth. I managed to get an army of free humans behind me and we tried to stop the machines. //
Wing watched the circular mirrors of the glasses, watching as explosions lit up a bloody battle field.
// I don't know really who struck the first true harming blow. Us or them. But sometime at the end of AC 397, the battle was joined, each of us striking hard back as we could back and forth.//
Wing flinched slightly as the war seemed to leave the glasses Khush wore and surrounded them.
//The war raged for generations and turned the face of the planet from green and blue to black and red.//
Wing heard screams and spun around to see machines; killing machines that were at once terrifying and beautiful. Some looked insect-like, other's mimicked the human's they killed. Rainbow shades of color covered their armor, and they hunted the soldiers retreating from the battle field. One caught a soldier and cracked open the body armor of a soldier, and fried the man within it.
// The war scorched and burned the sky. Some foolishly thought that we had won, because without the sun the Gundam's were without a power source. But I knew better, the Gundam's sought out a new energy source to survive. //
The Gundam in front of Wing locked up, as heat lightning, black as ink burst against the sky, spreading into a permanent cloud of ebony stain.
// They discovered a new form of fusion. All that was required to initiate the reaction was a small electric charge. Throughout human history we have been dependent on machines to survive. Fate, it seems, is not without a sense of twisted irony. //
Wing watched the scenery change into the power plant that he had escaped from, he saw human beings inside the cocoons, with almost blissful looks on their faces.
// The human body generates more bio-electricity than a 120-volt battery and over 25,000 B.T.U. of body heat. //
The scene changed once again, Wing took in the area spreading around the power plant. Beneath a breathing greenhouse, there were huge fields.
// Humans are, as an energy source, easily renewable and completely recyclable, the dead liquefied and fed intravenously to the living. Sounds like a bad horror flick, eh? //
Wing watched as huge farm-like reapers began to enter the fields.
// All they needed to control this new battery was something to occupy the human mind. If one cannot remember the enemy, one cannot fight it. //
The scene in front of Wing changed again and he watched as it closed in on a clear tubular husk. Inside it floating in viscous fluid, there was a human fetus; its soft skull already growing around the brain-jack.
// And so they built a prison out of our past, wired it to the human brain and turned the humans on Earth into slaves. //
Wing turned away from the images to face Khush. He blinked and shook his head as the surroundings became white once more and he glanced at the television to see the image of the fetus on the screen. Wing backed away from the chair staring slightly wide-eyed at the ginger haired man. "No! I don't believe it! It's not possible!" he cried.
// Dragon didn't say that it would be easy, Wing. He just said that it would be the truth. // Khush said standing up watching him from behind the mirrored glasses.
Wing backed away from him and then stumbled as the room began to spin around him. He wrapped his arms around his head. "Stop! Let me out! I want out!" he screamed closing his eyes.
Inside the Nataku, Wing's eyes snapped open and he thrashed against the chair, trying to rip the cable from the back of his neck. "Get this thing out of me!" he screamed.
Wolf took his hands away from the cable. "Easy, Wing. Easy." he said as Mau'dieb walked over to help him. Mau'dieb held him while Wolf stepped behind him and unlocked the cable, sliding it out.
Once he felt it leave, he tore away from both of them, falling as he tripped free of the harness on the chair. Wolf stepped around the chair to help him to his feet. Wing flinched back away from him. "Don't touch me! Get away from me!" he screamed at them. He moved to rest on his hands and knees, closing his eyes as the world spun around him again. Sweat poured off him as a pressure built inside his skull, feeling as if his brain had been put into a centrifuge.
"He's going to pop!" Queen screeched as she watched him from where she sat by the monitors. Wing pitched forward suddenly and blacked out.
*
Wing blinked, regaining consciousness, the room was dark. He glanced around and found himself back in the bed he had woken up in earlier. He felt the older man sitting in his room watching him. "I can't go back, can I?" he asked quietly.
Dragon leaned back sitting like a shadow in a chair in the far corner of the room. "No. But if you could, would you really want to?" he asked softly watching Wing. Wing wasn't sure of his answer, so he remained silent. Dragon continued quietly. "I feel that I owe you an apology. There is a rule that T.K had made before.." he shook his head and sighed before continuing. "We do not free a mind once it reaches a certain age. It is dangerous. They have trouble letting go.. Their mind turns against them. I've seen it happen. I broke the rule because I had to." Dragon turned and stared off into the darkness of the room, confessing as much to himself as Wing.
"When OZ first came into being as the thing it is now, there was a person that was able to make OZ behave as he saw fit. It was this person that freed the first of us and taught us the secret of the war; control the OZ and you control the future." Dragon paused. "When he was killed by OZ, the Oracle of Sanc prophesied one that could help his mind return and envisioned an end to the war and freedom for our people. That is why there are those of us that have spent our entire lives searching the OZ, looking for him." Dragon looked back at Wing. "I did what I did, because I believe we have been brought here for a reason, Wing. You are here to serve a purpose, just as I am here to serve mine." He finished watching him.
Wing scowled slightly and crossed his arms over his chest, still lying down on the bed. "I told you I don't believe in fate."
Dragon smiled, and leaned towards him. "But I do, Wing. I do." he said softly. He stood up and then looked down at Wing. "Get some rest. You're going to need it." he said walking to the door.
"For what?" Wing asked him.
Dragon glanced back and smiled. "Your training." he said as he shut the door.
*
Wing was awake in his bed, staring up at the lights, when the door opened and Nanashi stepped inside. "Morning. Did you sleep?" the tall man asked, watching Wing through his one visible green eye.
"No." Wing answered simply, sitting up on the bed.
Nanashi gave him a nod.. "You will tonight. I guarantee it. I'm Nanashi. I'll be your operator." he said offering his hand.
Wing shook it, then noticed that Nanashi didn't have any jacks. "You don't have.." he began.
"Any holes? Nope. Me and my lover, Mau'dieb, we are 100 percent pure human. Born free. Right here in the real world. Genuine child of Sanc." Nanashi said.
Wing stood up. "Sanc?" he asked.
"Sanc is the place. You'll see it one day. Last human city. Only thing we have left." Nanashi said smiling faintly. He turned and walked to stand in the doorway. "Let's go we have a lot of work to do today." Wing nodded and followed him out and up to the main deck.
Nanashi plugged Wing in, and then walked over to the Base, turning once to give him another faint smile. "We're supposed to load all these operations programs first, but this is some major boring shit. Why don't we start something a little fun?" He sat down in his operator's chair and began flipping through a tall carousel loaded with micro-discs. "How about sore combat training?" he said holding up one of the discs.
Wing read the label on the disc "Jujitsu? I'm going to learn jujitsu?" Nanashi slid the disk into Wing's supplement drive. "No way." he said, watching the long banged man sitting in the chair. Smiling faintly, Nanashi punched the "load" code. Wing's body jumped against the harness as his eyes clamped shut. The monitors kick wildly as his heart pounded, and adrenaline surged. An instant later his eyes snapped open. "Holy shit!" he said, catching his breath.
Nanashi snickered softly at his reaction. "Hey, Mikey, he likes it! Ready for more?" he asked Wing.
Wing looked over at him and smiled slightly. "Hell yes!"
On the monitor of Nanashi's computer, gray pixels slowly filled a small, half-empty box. It's a meter displaying how much download time is left. The title bar read: *Combat Series 10 of 12,* file categories flashing beneath it: *Jujitsu, Ken Po, Drunken Boxing.. *
Dragon walked in, glancing at Wing then to Nanashi. "How is he?"
Nanashi looked at his watch. "Ten hours straight. He's a machine."
Wing's body shook and then relaxed as his eyes opened, breath hissing from his lips. He looked at Dragon. "This is incredible. I know Kung Fu." he said, with a small smile.
Dragon sat in the chair next to him. He nodded to Nanashi. "Show me." he told Wing closing his eyes.
They stand in a very sparse Japanese-style dojo. "This is a sparring program, similar to the programmed reality of the OZ. Consider this your first lesson." Dragon said, as he assumed a fighting stance. "Attack me."
Wing assumes a similar stance, cautiously circling until he gave a short cry and launched a furious attack. Fists and feet striking from every angle, Wing pressed his attack. But each and every blow is blocked by Dragon with effortless speed.
While their minds battled in the programmed reality, the two bodies appeared quite serene, suspended in the chairs. Nanashi monitored their life systems noticing that Wing was wildly and chaotically lit up as opposed to the slow and steady rhythm of Dragon.
Inside the mess hall of the ship, dinner is up. Everyone, besides the three in the Base, is eating bowls of single-cell protein, which has an oatmeal consistency. Shinigami bursts in the room, braid flying behind him. "Dragon is fighting Wing!" he shouted as he spun and then dashed back out. All at once they bolted for the door running towards the Base.
Back inside the dojo, Wing's face is knotted, teeth clenched, as he hurled himself at Dragon.
"Good. Adaptation. Improvisation. But your weakness isn't your technique." Dragon said as he evaded Wing again. He attacked Wing, feet and fists flying everywhere taking Wing apart. For every blow Wing blocked, five more hit their marks until - Wing fell.
Panting, on his hands and knees, Wing's blood dripped from his mouth speckling the white floor of the Dojo. "How did I beat you?" Dragon asked him still standing over him, watching him through mirrored glasses once more.
"You - You're too fast." Wing said.
"Do you think my being faster, stronger has anything to do with my muscles in this place?" Dragon said, raising an eyebrow above the rim of the glasses. Wing was getting frustrated, still unable to catch his breath. "Do you believe that's air you are breathing now?" Dragon asked him.
Wing looked up squinting at him.
"If you can free your mind, the body will follow." the Chinese man said.
Wing stood, nodding.
"Again." Dragon said, stepping back and going back into position. They begin again, their fists flying with unbelievable speed.
Everyone is gathered behind Nanashi, watching the fight, like watching a television show. "Allah! That boy is fast!" Mau'dieb said as he leaned over Nanashi.
"Have you ever seen anyone that fast that soon, Nanashi?" Shinigami said, as he watched the pair fight.
Nanashi leaned back in his seat and shook his head. "Never."
Kat stared at the monitor. "Dragon is right. He's got to be the one."
Back inside the dojo, the speed of the blows rose impossibly high. Wing's face shed its mask of calm with a scream. He wanted to beat Dragon, he wanted to beat him now. Finally a single blow caught Dragon on the side of the head, knocking his glasses off.
Back in Base, there were several gasps. "I don't believe it!" Shinigami cried as he watched the glasses fall.
Dragon rubbed the side of his face. "You are angry with me." he stated.
Wing panted getting his wind back. ".. maybe." he said, looking into Dragon's black eyes.
Dragon nodded. "It's all right. It's natural." he said, lowering his hand from his face.
"I feel better." Wing admitted.
Dragon nodded again, watching him. "Good. Anger is a gift, Wing, but it's a heavy one." Dragon smiled. "Nanashi, load the jump program." he ordered.
Wing straightened as the dojo dissolved away like a curtain lifting, leaving them now standing on a building rooftop in a city skyline.
"You have to learn to let go of that anger. You must let go of everything." Dragon said, as the wind howled around them, whipping Dragon's long coat to one side. "You must empty yourself to free your mind." he said. He spun, running hard towards the edge of the rooftop, and jumped. He sailed through the air, his coat billowing out behind him like a cape, somersaults once and lands on the rooftop across the street.
Wing stared at him. "Shit." he said, watching as Dragon stood and looked back at him, waiting. He looked down at the street twenty floors below, then at Dragon an impossible fifty feet away. "Okay." he said, taking a deep breath. "Yeah. Free my mind. Right. No problem." he said quietly to himself. He concentrated, and ran.
Inside Base, they are transfixed. "He's going to make it." Mau'dieb said quietly.
Kat shook her head faintly, not taking her eyes off the screen. "No way. Not possible." she said.
"No one's ever made their first jump." Shinigami said, leaning on Kat's shoulder watching Wing on the monitor.
"What if he does?" No end asked.
Kat shook her head again slightly. "He won't." she answered.
"It's never been done." Nanashi said, his single eye fixed on the screen.
Wolf stared at the screen, his fists clenching. "Come on." he whispered.
Back on the rooftop, Wing summoned every ounce of strength in his legs, and launched himself into the air with a single maniacal shriek - but comes up drastically short. His eyes widened slightly as he fell. Stories flew by, the ground rushed up at him, but when he hit - the ground gave way, stretching like a trapeze net. Wing bounced and flipped, slowly he came to a rest, flat on his back. He laughed softly, a bit unsure, and wiped the wind-blown tears from his face.
Dragon walked out of the building and helped him to his feet. "Everyone falls the first time." he said quietly to Wing.
Wing nodded quietly, he understood what he meant.
"If you never know failure, how can you know success?" Dragon finished, taking his glasses out of his coat and placing them back on his face.
Back inside Base, the suspense over, the group broke up going their separate ways. "What does it mean?" Shinigami asked, glancing at the monitor and then at the others.
"It doesn't mean anything." Mau'dieb said, as he sat down in the chair Nanashi had been sitting in.
Queen grinned and then looked back towards where Wolf had been. "Everyone falls, right, Wolf?" But Wolf had left the room.
Wing's eyes opened as Nanashi eased the plug out. He tried to move and groaned, cradling his ribs. While Nanashi helped Dragon, Wing spit blood into his hand. "I thought it wasn't real." he asked Dragon. He stared at the blood, and a new thought came to him. "If you are killed in the OZ, you die here?" he asked him, looking up at him.
Dragon nodded and slid off the chair. "The body cannot live without the mind." he said.
Later, Wolf walked into Wing's room, carrying a tray of food. "Wing, I saved you some dinner.." he said softly. He glanced at him passed out on the bed. He set the tray down on a table and pulled the blanket over him. Pausing, with his face close to Wing's, he inhaled lightly, breathing in the scent of him, before slowly pulling away. He glanced back at him once more and then shut the door, walking to his room.
*
The ship is quiet and dark. Almost everyone is asleep. The Base glowed with monitor light. Queen was in the operator's chair as Wing came up behind her. "Whoa! Shit, Wing, you scared the hell out of me."
"What are you doing?" Wing asked.
"Midnight Watch." Queen answered.
Wing's eyes lit up as he stepped closer to the screens that seemed to be alive with a constant flow of data. "Is that... ?" he began.
"OZ? Yeah." Queen said taking a small drink from a cup. The monitors were packed with bizarre codes and equations. "You want a drink?" she asked lifting a plastic jug. Not waiting for an answer, she poured Wing a cup of it and held it out for him. He took it and held it in one hand still watching the screens. "I'll tell you, I feel for you, Wing. I really do. Most of us were still young, just punks, when Dragon jacked us. But you, you had a real life."
Wing took a sip from the cup and started coughing hard. Queen pounded on his back. "Good shit, huh? Shinigami makes it. It's good for two things: degreasing engines and killing brain cells." she said, and then sat back down with a small laugh.
Red-faced, Wing finally stopped coughing.
"Did he tell you why he did it?" she asked him.
Wing nodded.
"I'll be the didn't tell you that this wasn't the first time he thought he found the *One*." Queen said. Wing shook his head as Queen filled his cup and laughed again. "Let me give you a piece of advice. Between you and me, if Dragon says you can fly, I wouldn't go jumping out any windows to find out if he's right. Understand?" Queen raised her drink and grinned at him. Queen laughed again turning back to the monitors. "Welcome to the real world!" she said, taking another drink.
*
Inside OZ, two people were having a meal. The two woman were sitting at a table next to the window overlooking the skyline. The blonde cut into the steak on her plate. "The real world. Ha, what a joke." she said with a small laugh. "You know what real is? I'll tell you what real is." she continued as she raised her fork with a piece of the steak on it. "Real is just another four-letter word." Queen said as she ate the steak.
Sitting across from Queen, was Agent Une.
"Do we have a deal, Miss Peacecraft?" Une said, watching her coldly. She watched Queen place another piece of meat into her mouth.
"You know, I know that this steak doesn't exist. I know when I put it in my mouth, OZ is telling my brain that it is juicy and delicious. After nine years, do you know what I've realized?" Pausing, she examined the meat skewered on her fork. She placed it in her mouth, savoring the taste. "Ignorance is bliss."
"Then we have a deal?" Agent Une asked.
"I don't want to remember nothing. Nothing! You understand? And I want to be rich. Someone important. Like an actor. You can do that, right?" Queen asked.
Une nodded. "Whatever you want, Miss Peacecraft."
Queen took a deep drink of wine. "All right. You get my body back in a power plant, reinsert me into OZ and I'll get you what you want." she said.
"Access codes to Sanc." Une said icily.
Queen set the wine glass down. "I told you, I don't know them. But I can give you the man who does." she said.
Agent Une's eyes narrowed. "Dragon." she said coldly.
*
Wing snapped out of the construct coma. " Hn.. I was wondering about that." he said quietly.
"What?" Nanashi asked, looking over at him.
"Why I was bald here but not in OZ." he said sitting up in the chair.
"R.S.I." Nanashi replied.
"Residual self image."
Nanashi nodded. "Good. Now what's this?" he asked, pointing to a monitor beside Wing.
"Life systems monitor, glucose levels." Wing answered.
Nanashi nodded. "What's that?" he said, pointing in a different direction.
"Main power supply to the Base."
Wing stood and followed Nanashi to the operator's station where he pointed to a red key-switch.
"How about this?" he asked, watching him.
". . . E.M.P?"
Nanashi nodded again, crossing his arms over his chest. "Electromagnetic pulse. Our best weapon against the machines. The problem is if someone is still in OZ when that thing goes off, they're not coming back." he said seriously.
Wing nodded in understanding, then glanced back at the sound of footsteps to see Dragon walking up behind them.
"How's he doing?" the Chinese man asked Nanashi.
"We just finished the operation programs and he's showing great retention." Nanashi reported.
"Good. I want everyone alerted to 12-hour stand-by. We're going in. Wing, it's time for you to know why you're here." Dragon said as he walked away.
Wing glanced over at the long-banged man. "What's he talking about?" he asked.
"He's taking you into OZ to see her." Nanashi replied.
Wing frowned faintly. "See who?" he asked.
"The Oracle."
*
The room was empty, heavy curtains covered windows. It looked as if it hadn't been touched in years. In the bedroom with the cracked oval mirror, an old black phone begins to ring. The room filled with equipment and the team.
Dragon answered the phone.[We're in.] he said and then hung up the phone. Dragon turned to the rest and then nodded once before walking towards the door. "Kat hold the exit. Let's go." he said as he walked out.
Wing followed the others as they filed down the stairwell that wound around an antique elevator shaft. They crossed the old lobby. No end and Shinigami stopped at the doors of the old hotel. Dragon turned to look at them through his glasses. "We should be back in an hour." he said quietly. They nodded and then began watched the area.
Wing squinted into the sun that seemed unnaturally bright. He noticed then that he was the only one without sunglasses.
Dragon walked up beside him. "Do you now understand what it means when we say, if you're not one of us, you're one of them?" he asked him.
Wing nodded silently then spoke quietly. "The agents. They're sentient programs. They can commandeer any software hardwired to the mainframe." he answered.
Dragon nodded. "Anyone that is still in a power plant. That is why we try to be invisible in OZ." he said.
"The best hacking is always traceless." Wing said as they walked towards the black Lincoln Continental that had pulled up in front of the hotel.
As Queen passed a garbage can, she surreptitiously dropped a cellular phone inside it. They then climbed inside the car and it pulled away.
Inside the car, Wing looked over at Wolf, who was staring out the side window. "Did you have to do this?" he asked him.
Wolf nodded continuing to watch the scenery rolling past.
"What did she tell you?" Wing asked.
"Lots of things." he answered.
"Any of them true?" Wing asked curious.
Wolf looked over at him, then looked back out the window. "Some of them." he said, a faint trace of fear and hurt in his voice.
"Were they good or bad?" Wing asked quietly.
Wolf shook his head not looking at him. "There's no point in worrying. Whatever is going to happen is going to happen." he said.
The Lincoln pulled up to another hotel, Dragon climbed out and gestured for Wing to follow him. Wolf and Queen stayed inside the car as he slid out and followed Dragon inside the hotel. They walked over to an elevator and rode up to the thirteenth floor. Walking out of the elevator, Dragon led him to a door marked 1305. Dragon opened the door and he walked inside.
The walls and floors were polished marble. Wing followed, his mouth agape. "What - what is this place?" he asked.
Dragon looked back at him. "This is the temple. It is a part of Sanc's mainframe. It's hidden inside OZ so that we can access it."
Two priestesses were waiting in the antechamber. "Hello, Dragon. We've been expecting you." one of them said, bowing her head in respect towards him.
Dragon returned the gesture and then looked at Wing. "You're on your own. Go with them." he said sitting down on the bench that sat inside the room.
One of them took Wing by the arm, and led him down a hall into another room. "Wait here. Among the other Potentials." one of the women said. They then left him. Wing walked into the room and finally understood the attention given to his age. The Potentials are all little children. The room felt like a Buddhist temple and a kindergarten class. Some were playing, others meditating or practicing their gift. He watched a little boy levitate wooden alphabet blocks. A small girl held a spoon which swayed like a blade of grass as she bent it with her mind.
Wing walked over to her, and sat down in front of her. The girl smiled as Wing picked up a spoon and tried to imitate her actions. Despite his best efforts, Wing couldn't repeat them.
The girl brushed her reddish hair out of her face and smiled at him. "Your spoon does not bend because it is just that, a spoon. Mine bends because there is no spoon, just my mind." she said, glancing at him with deep blue eyes once, before looking back at the spoon she held. Wing watched as it curled into a knot. "Link yourself to the spoon. Become the spoon and bend yourself." she told him.
Wing nodded, holding up his spoon again. "There is no spoon. Right." he said softly, he concentrated. The spoon began to bend just as one of the women returned and touched his shoulder.
"The Oracle will see you now." she said standing behind him. The little girl smiled at him as he stood up setting the spoon back down on the floor.
Wing walked into the room the woman led him to and glanced down at the floor as he walked inside. Beneath his feet was a path of the zodiac, he followed it with his eyes and saw that it led to marbled stairs that rose up to a dais, which was empty. Frowning faintly he called out. "Hello?"
A voice called back to him and he followed it up the stairs. At the top of the dais, he smelled something cooking. Following the scent, he moved behind the pillars where he found an open door. "Just come on in." the voice said to him as he stood in front of it.
He walked through a vestibule and saw a second door, he walked inside and blinked.
It looked like a suburban tract house. There was a lot of cozy furniture, a dining room hutch filled with china, shelves and tables crowded with doilies, and knick-knacks. Wing followed a plastic carpet runner into the kitchen. He walked into the kitchen, and noticed a woman with long brown hair. She stood in front of an oven, peering inside through the cracked door.
"Hello?" he asked quietly, watching her.
"I know. You're Wing. Be right with you." she said, not looking away from the oven.
"You're the Oracle?" Wing asked, as he stood in the doorway.
"Yes. I have to say I love seeing non-believers. It's really a relief at times. Almost done. Smell good, don't they?" she said, her tone carrying amusement.
"Yes."
"I'd ask you to sit down, but you're not going to anyway. And don't worry about the vase." she said turning, to glance at him with warm brown eyes.
"What vase?" Wing asked, turning around to look. As he turned, his elbow knocked the vase in question from a table next to the door. It broke against the linoleum floor.
"That vase." she said.
"Shit, I'm sorry." he said, and stepped further into the room away from the table.
She pulled out a tray of chocolate chip cookies and turned setting them on the cooling rack that sat on a counter next to the oven. "I said don't worry about it. I'll get one of my kids to fix it." she assured him.
"How did you know...?" he began.
"What's really going to get you later on is, would you still have broken it if I hadn't said anything." she said, as she laughed softly. "You're cuter than I thought. I see why he likes you." she said watching him.
"Who?" Wing asked, slightly confused at what she was talking about.
"Not too bright, though." she teased, giving him a wink, she then sobered up looking at him seriously. "You know why Dragon brought you to see me?" she asked him.
"I think so." Wing answered.
"So? What do you think? You think you're the one?" she asked, watching him.
"I don't know." he answered her honestly.
She gestured to a wooden plaque above Wing's head, over the doorway. "You know what that means? It's Latin. Means, *Know thyself.*" Leaving the counter, she walked towards him. "Well, let's have a look at you." She looked at his eyes, checked his ears, and felt the glands in his neck. "Open your mouth. Say, *ah.*" he did and she nodded and turned her attention to his palms. "Hmmm. You have the gift, but it's tricky. I'd say the bad news is, you're not the one. You still have a lot to learn. Maybe next life."
"What's the good news?" he asked her frowning faintly again
She smiled again at him. "Same as the bad news, you're not the one." she said.
"Is that it, then?" he asked crossing his arms across his chest.
She shook her head. "No. Here." she said, picking up the tray and holding it out towards him. "Take a cookie. You have a long day ahead of you." He eyed her, then took one of the cookies. He then left her and walked out eating the cookie. She set the tray down and smiled at the doorway. "Make a believer out of you yet." she said softly.
*
Dragon rose from the bench as a Priestess escorted Wing out. After she left them, Dragon placed his hand on Wing's shoulder. "No one will ever ask you what she told you, because it is a gift from her. It is for you and you alone." he said quietly. Wing finished the cookie, and nodded following him as he left.
Storm clouds have begun to gather outside. Queen nervously glanced down the surrounding streets from inside the car. She silently noticed several unmarked white vans. She glanced back at him when she heard him speak. "Here they come." he said quietly.
In the hovercraft, Nanashi is typing rapidly at the keyboard. "Strange. This area never has this much activity." he said quietly as his fingers flew over the keys.
Back in OZ, Dragon and the rest are back at the old hotel, Shinigami opened the side door and they walked inside.
Inside room 1313, Kat's cellular phone rang. She flipped it open. [ Kat here..] she said.
[They're on their way.] Nanashi told her.
[Right.] Kat answered, flipping the phone shut as she jumped up to her feet.
Light filtered down the center of the building through a caged skylight at the top of the open elevator shaft. Four figures glided up the dark stairs that wound around the antique elevator. Wing noticed a black cat, a green golden-eyed shadow that slinked past them and padded quickly down the stairs. A moment later, Wing saw another black cat that looked and moved identically to the first one. "Whoa. Deja'vu." he said. Those words stopped the others dead in their tracks.
Inside Base, the monitors suddenly glitch as if OZ had an electronic seizure. "Oh, shit! Oh, shit!" Nanashi swore as his fingers once again flew over the keys.
Inside OZ, back on the staircase Wolf turned around, his face tight. "What did you just say?" he asked softly.
Wing looked up at him. "Nothing. Just had a little deja'vu." he said.
Wolf watched him intently. "What happened? What did you see?" he asked.
"A black cat went past us and then I saw another that looked just like it." Wing answered.
"How much like it? Was it the same cat?" Wolf asked, a faint trace of fear coloring his tone.
"It might have been. I'm not sure." he answered.
Wolf looked at Dragon, who listened quietly to the rasping breath of the old building.
"What is it?" Wing asked watching the two of them.
"A deja'vu is usually a glitch in OZ. It happens when they change something." Wolf answered, his voice growing wary as he listened to the sudden sound of helicopter blades growing ominously louder as they near the hotel.
Back inside Base, Nanashi spotted what was changed. "It's a trap!" he cried out as he placed another call to Kat's phone.
Inside OZ, Dragon looked up the stairs as a helicopter's shadow passes over the clouded glass of the skylight. "Come on!" he shouted as he ran up the stairs.
Down in the basement of the hotel , heavy bolt-cutters snap through the main phone cable.
Inside room 1313, Kat answers her phone. [What's going on?] she asked.
[They cut the hard-line! It's a trap! Get out!] Nanashi cried. Kat walked over and yanked open the curtain.
[Oh, no.] she whispered.
The windows were bricked up. The door to the roof exploded inward as heavily-armed men rushed toward room 1313.
Inside Base, Nanashi watched helplessly. "No.." he whispered.
Back inside OZ, the door to room 1313 slammed open and the police force poured in, dozens of assault rifles surrounding Kat who was armed with only a handgun. "Dragon! It's a trap.." she screamed.
On the stairway, Dragon stopped as the scream was drowned out by the report of the machine guns that filled the building with terrible fury.
Wolf's eyes widened. "Oh, God." he whispered.
Inside Base, Kat's body thrashes against its harness as -
Bullets drive her back against the blood-splattered brick window, inside OZ. Gun smoke thickened inside room 1313, Kat blasting and moving until, the hammer clicked empty. She screamed as the guns opened fire, and ripped her apart.
Blood flowed from Kat's mouth, her body convulsing, and then laying perfectly still. The flat-line alarm softly cries out from the life monitor of the dead woman.
Inside OZ, more police cars arrive as cops break open the lobby doors, pouring into the hotel.