questions and answers

There was no doubt about it – Chitanda electrocuted herself. Her body wasn't moving; except her palms which twitched. With every twitch, another whiff of smoke rose from her mouth and nose. Oreki panicked, trying to hold himself up, but he couldn't. Running to his iPhone, he called Satoshi but there wasn't any answer. Then he tried with Junko.

"Oreki-ya… I was just sleeping…" audible yawn followed.

"Junko, you got to help me! Chitanda has electrocuted herself!"

"She WHAT?! Oreki, how could you let her do that?!" Junko loudly screamed.

"There's no time for that! We have to do something!"

Quite contrary to his belief, Junko simply yawned again. He heard a thump, like her head fell on the pillow. Then the sigh followed.

"Na'ah. I'm too sleepy to come right now. Sorry, Oreki. Ya'll have to take care of your robot girl yourself."

"What the hell, Junko! You can't-"

*click*

She simply dropped the call. He felt betrayed. No, betrayal wasn't enough to describe it. Oreki was absolutely hopeless. He wasn't messing around, nor was he absolutely responsible for this. To think that he's going to have her die because of his mistake, again, though! Anxiety, maybe. No, it was worse than anxiety, that feeling which crippled him.

Just as he was ready to give on the hope, somebody knocked on the door.

Oreki tottered to the door, opening them only to be faced with the man in his twenties, with a small goatee and red eyes. He wore simple, dark glasses, dark sweatshirt, dark pants and similarly dark All-star tennis shoes.

"Who… are you?" Oreki confusingly asked.

"My name is Baba Ryu. I suppose you're Hotaro Oreki, owner of the Persocom number 2765?" his voice was strong and manly. He had a stern face, which wasn't showing any visible emotions.

"Yes…how the hell do you know that?"

"I'm a designer and main technician behind this very model. Just an hour ago I got a distress call, prompting me to come here. You see, this model is having advanced software which sends out a distress call to her creator, whenever something bad happens."

Not even waiting for his answer, man walked inside, kneeling on the side of the burned out persocom. His face finally showed a semblance of emotion in a shape of the frown on his nose and eyebrows.

"This is why amateurs should never have such wonderful persocoms handed out to them. Belisae, come." he called, making Oreki even more confused as another persocom walked in. And she was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen. Her hair was glistening, white as a pale snow covering the tops of the misty mountains. Two golden ears protruded from her head. Her azure blue eyes were like two opals on the ceramic plate. Oreki was absolutely flabbergasted, watching as she walked close, wearing only white overalls.

"Can… you fix her, Mr. Baba?" Oreki carefully asked, just as the persocom named Belisae handed a long wire from her golden ear things. Man stood up as Belisae worked on inspecting the persocom. In the end, white haired girl stood up, too.

"Inspection over. Problem code – 001002. I recommend caution, Master Ryu."

As soon as he heard the code, man looked even more nervous than before.

"At last you're showing some semblance of respect. Look, I don't know what kind of sick things you were doing with your persocom, or what kind of fetish you're having, but this particular unit suffered not only physical damage, but also a corruption of the data inside of her emotion progressing software. To explain it in plebeian terms, you've made your pretty girl suffer and she killed herself."

Oreki wanted to scream, but he still tried to be patient.

"But can't she be repaired?"

"Lucky for you that she can. You probably don't know this, but persocoms are made with an internal life-saving system. In case of the major trauma, this system takes on the damage to minimize the damages on the more vital parts."

"What about her software?" Oreki asked.

Ryu looked kind of annoyed for a moment, but he tried being professional. Tipping the border of his eyeglasses, he looked at him with the sharp stare.

"Some of her data is corrupted. As she's a persocom, she'll automatically erase this data to prevent the further corruption. Belisae, hand me the ILSS unit." Ryu ordered something to his persocom. White haired girl produced a small chip, handing it out to the guy. He embraced Chitanda's body, gently but firmly.

"Everything's going to be fine, my daughter." Ryu whispered, grabbing her ears. They clicked, and the whole face opened up, like a closet. Oreki let a disgusted shrill.

"She's a persocom." Belisae explained his question.

"I think I might go out, for a while…" Oreki whimpered.

As he got up, Ryu had finished changing the destroyed life-saving chip. Chitanda looked normal again. She sat on the edge of the bed and her eyes flashed in medium intervals, as she checked her data for the further corruption. At the same time, Belisae plugged her own wire inside, checking the rest of the system for hidden damages.

"No other damages found." Belisae checked.

"At least on the hardware." man called Ryu answered. They've continued waiting for the persocom to end the data checking.

It was a stressful feeling, waiting for this mess to resolve. Oreki felt like somebody drill-punched him in the stomach, as he stood by the wall, watching the ordeal unfolding before his eyes. Technician, also, looked nervous as Chitanda went over her database, checking for the corrupt files and errors. In the end, she finally stopped and her eyes went to the usual color.

"Checking database – over! Corrupt files found – one! Corrupt file – deleted!"

Oreki, of course, panicked. Taking her palms she looked her in the eyes.

"Chitanda, do you remember me?!" he shrilled. Ryu rolled his eyes.

"Master Oreki!" she embraced him, and Oreki felt absolutely relieved. She looked fine, she wasn't damaged, and he was sure that this one meager file wasn't anything important.

"If you need my assistance with her, simply call me. I live here, in Kamiyama." Ryu gave him a paper, with a telephone number and the address.

"Thanks." Oreki muttered.

Later, Persocom Chitanda sat at the bathroom tub. It was a quiet, quaint place: sand colored tiles, little window, and it always had a fresh scent. She was already naked, brushing her body with a soft, squishy sponge. As she turned around to take the lavender shampoo, her hands suddenly felt weak and she dropped it.

"Eh..?" she uttered, trying to raise it up, and it worked. Attributing it to her weariness, she brushed the worries off, going to the bed. Finding Oreki already sleeping, she quietly snuck up in the bed, embracing him around the waist. It was enough to know that he was here.

It was enough.