AN: This chapter comes a bit early this week because I need to focus on my studies this coming week. In the meantime, thank you all for your continued support, and I hope you enjoy this chapter.

Pagliacci-11

Chapter 32

It was a beautiful day as the sun rose. The air was sweet and fresh, and it was a very fulfilling time of day. It wasn't cold, but it was just the right amount of low temperature to make one relish days like today. Jeremy was in the back yard, dozing slightly in a comfortable chair that overlooked his mother's garden. He had gotten used to the medicinal dosage; he was no longer drowsy anymore. However, much to his shock, Jeremy found that his thoughts were even more uniform in structure than they had been previously. It was as if he had stepped out of the clambering halls of parliament. Now the issues were met on a case by case basis, and in many ways, this was perfect.

The screen door creaked and his mother, Emily came out and sat beside him. "How are you feeling?" she asked.

"I'm better." Jeremy replied, "Oddly enough, what Dr. Watts gave me seemed to be just what I needed."

"There's no shame in having a stellar intellect, Jeremy. But sometimes it's helpful to know when to turn some select features off from time to time."

"I understand that now. Oddly enough, I don't think it ever registered that possibly overwork or overthought was the problem. But I do feel better."

"That's good. Would you like something to drink?"

"No, not right now, anyway. Thank you, though."

Inside the telephone rang and Michael was heard to answer it. He talked for a brief period and then came outside, "Jeremy," he said, "Aelita and Yumi are coming to see you in a couple of hours. They said that they had some things that they needed to talk to you about."

"Are you sure that's wise, dear?" Emily asked, "I mean, given everything that's transpired?"

"It's fine." Jeremy replied, "It's very likely about a project that we have coming up next year. It's one of those notoriously difficult ones that live on in academia like a creature from folklore."

"Really? Kadic has assignments of that caliber?" Emily asked.

"Well, it is a private institution, dear." Michael replied, "I'm sure every school has at least one element like that."

"Ms. Hertz is a great teacher, and it's kinda' natural for her to want to test the leaving class." Jeremy said, "Think of it as an intellectual census. It helps her to organize her lesson plan for the coming year."

Emily nodded, "Well, if that's how it is, I have no issue with you working ahead, just don't work too hard. Remember, work smarter, not harder."

Jeremy nodded and replied, "Of course. Oh, since their coming over, could we make them a nice lunch?"

Emily nodded, "Sure, I don't see why not. It's not that often you have company, so sure, have fun with it."

"Alright, let's go to the market." Michael replied, "Rumor has it that James has a new supplier of produce and dairy, and I want to see what it's like."

Emily laughed slightly, "Michael, sweetheart, a mushroom and gouda is a mushroom and gouda no matter where you go."

"Not true, not at all. It depends how the mushrooms were grown, where they were grown, how the cheese was aged, there's a whole bunch of factors to consider."

Emily laughed a bit louder, "Oh, alright, then, go ahead to the market."

"I'm just saying if Jeremy is to have friends over, I want this to be done properly." Michael replied, "Come on, Jeremy, let's go see James."

As they headed to the car, Jeremy asked, "How are Aelita and Yumi?"

"They said they're doing okay. They've just had some developments that they wanted to talk to you about. It's not terribly urgent they said, but they couldn't reach you on your phone, so they decided to come here."

"Okay. It's not a problem, is it?"

"No, not at all. We don't have that many guests, even in the general sense. Your friends coming will be just fine."

Jeremy and Michael soon arrived at Haupt's Natural Foods. It was a store owned by James Meyer, a boyhood friend of Michael's The store had been in the area since before the second world war, and Michael knew, if there was anything that could be gotten here, it was quality food and quality food in abundance. As they entered the store, Michael went along the isles and soon spotted James.

"James, how are you?" he asked.

James went to Michael and embraced him, saying, "I'm well. it's been a little while since I've seen you."
"Yeah, well, business keeps you busy. But then I don't need to tell you that. You told me you'd have the new product in."

"Oh, yes. I'm glad you came when you did. I put some aside just for you. Apart from that, I can't keep the stuff on my shelves long enough. Come with me."

Michael and Jeremy followed James through to the back, and James gave Michael two large paper bags.

"Here it is. Gouda, fresh mushrooms, pumpernickel loaf, Beluga Caviar, and the rest of it. Here, go ahead, sample some."

Michael sampled the mushrooms first, and James could immediately tell he was satisfied.

"Oh, James, where did you get this?" Michael said, "Here, Jeremy, try some."

Jeremy had one and was very pleasantly surprised. He usually wasn't that great a fan of mushrooms, but these were different. Savory, an earthy bite, and sweet.

"These came from a new source called Garb of Spring. It's a large specialized natural foods company. They came to the country a few months ago, and their product is so good, I literally can't keep it on my shelves. It's proved a massive boon to me. I felt you should enjoy some of it."

"Oh, it's delicious, James. Do you know where they're headquartered out of?"

"I think out of Russia somewhere. But don't quote me on that. It's is good stuff, and I endeavor to keep it as a business partner."

"With this quality of just mushrooms, I think it'd be more than prudent." Michael said with a smile, "When's your next shipment in from them?"

"Next week. Be here by Thursday at eight o'clock. That way, you can beat most of the mob who comes in shortly after." James looked at Jeremy, "How have you been, Jeremy? It's been some time since I've seen you last."

Jeremy nodded, "I'm okay. Just taking the summer off from studies, and I'm good overall just been busy."

James smiled, "Well, that's good. Keeping out of trouble?"

"For now, in a manner of speaking, yes."

Michael said, "He's doing just fine, James. He just got a bit overworked, and so we brought him home."

James nodded, "Well, study, that's a good thing. Just don't overdo it."

Jeremy nodded, and Micheal said, "Well, thank you, James, and this is covered by my credit from last time, no?"

"Of course, Michael. You'll always be covered here. Is there anything else I can help you with?"

"Nothing I can think of. But thank you."

As Michael and Jeremy left the store, Jeremy was deep in thought as to what had transpired, and he loved that his father had the freedom to perform these kinds of transactions, not only here but across town. Michael had deals at the editing office, he had deals at the store, he even had sales and lines of credit at the hardware store and the veterinarian. Sitting down in his seat, Jeremy thought to ask the question that was looming in his mind. There was no gentle way to ask it he knew, but in light of what he had seen his father and without doubt, others capable of doing, he had to get it out.

"Dad," he said, "I have a question for you."

"And I have an answer. Buckle up and ask."

Jeremy fastened his seatbelt and said, "Capitalism versus Socialism. In your opinion, which is better?"

"It's an age-old argument, Jeremy. Each side has its benefits and its drawbacks. In some ways, you can't have one without the other. There are limits as to how altruistic someone can be. However, generally, most don't consider one over the other. If they did, they would largely take themselves into the overall equation when arguing their point, arguing themselves oftentimes the producer of a situation. However, if put under a microscope, even the best provider takes advantage of aspects that socialism promises."

Jeremy nodded, "Uh-huh. See, the reason I ask is you have amazing relations with people all over town. You have people extending your lines of credit in their facilities, and they don't mind doing so. Why isn't it more that way than not?"

"Well, Jeremy, you have to consider these things as one being the benefit of the town where we live. Everyone knows everyone which can be good or bad. However, because of the insular nature of our town, we have a mutual understanding of each other and each other's respective places in it. I have many lines of credit because I grew up with many of the people here who are business owners here. I am also very punctual about paying any debts that I owe, and even then, I only allow so much debt to be accrued at a time. It's the principle of being a constant payer of debts; also, it helps to build a natural relationship over time of goodwill from others because of your punctuality with debt payment. In many ways, you are seeing a blend of socialism and capitalism going hand in hand."

"Yeah, and so let me ask, what is the danger of a purely capitalist system and a purely social one?"

"You're going to have significant problems if you went to either extreme without a place of the other. Capitalism, in the rawest sense without socialistic allowance, is tyranny by the wealthy if you will. A perfect example is that slavery and even the caste system. You have those designated to their positions, and those positioned are locked. Wealth is accumulated, sure. But it is seldom put to the good of the people. If the people get portions of that finance, it is literal crumbs from the masters' table.

Purely social lifestyles, on the other hand, must have funds from which to run any and all programs and, even then, would lead to a deficit of inactive people versus active people within it. The more significant problem being that none wishes to honestly give a portion of their own hard-earned money to the social machine. Because they don't believe in financing a sedentary life. For in their minds, "Why should the lay-about get what I get? It's not fair." Leaders such as Stalin saw this deficiency, and whenever you hear the term, undesirables, Jeremy, that is when you most need to be afraid. Because it is such a handy word. It can mean anything. From the man who doesn't dress how you like to someone who may owe you money."

Jeremy thought as his father drove back to their house, and then he said, "So, as we see in our town, we have an exchange of capitalism and socialism, the two in one. You have a line of credit, but because you pay your debts, your credit is extended, and if you must pay later, under a set of circumstances that is allowed. But in paying your debt, you give money to the establishment who can buy their wares to replenish their stores as well as pay their workers. Is that right?"

"That's exactly right. Now, it's not this way all over the world, not even all over the country. But this is needed. Because it gives the human element of compassion and sympathy to an otherwise cold and hard system of purely supply, demand, and payment for the supply. Without the exercise of compassion and other humane elements, your society is doomed to die. That said, you cannot allow people to trample all over you because of your kindness. That is why we have courts to settle such things called a small-claims court."

Jeremy then paused, "I feel I know the answer, but I'm going to ask anyway. Why is it so hard to apply this general principle of both systems across a larger populace of people?"

Michael pulled up to the road that led to their house, "Answer what is on your mind as what you think is the answer, and we'll see how on the mark you are."

Jeremy replied, "I believe the reason it wouldn't work is that as someone pointed out to me, people and their own reasons for not wanting to do either one."

"And your friend is largely correct. In this world, Jeremy, you will find that people fall into one of two categories, leaders and doers or followers and supporters. Both are what shape our society, and just like you have the tug of war between ideals, you will have a battleground made of these two groups. I assure you, Jeremy, there is no shortage of self-regard among people no matter where you go."

"But why would some people content themselves to be just supporters and followers? Where's the challenge in that?"

"The answer to your question is within your own question. It is far better to be a follower because much of the legwork and the actual thinking is done for you. At that point, you are taking orders to live the best life you can. And sad to say, a lot of people have no problem being the follower. It allows them to better utilize their energies for their passions."

Jeremy then asked, "So they follow because it allows them the freedom to live the lives they want, but at the same time organization to fulfill their day?"

"More or less. Passions are not wrong, nor are they evil but is often the hope of the follower that the leaders will take notice of their skill in their passion and elevate them to a leader's position based on their skill and merit."

"Are there what some would call gatekeepers?" Jeremy asked.

"Define gatekeepers," Michael asked as they pulled into the driveway.

"What I mean is, people who keep others from their full potential due to an element of nepotism or favoritism?"

Michael took the groceries and said, "There's nepotism in some regards in a lot of the world. Typically, you have nepotism if it's something like a small family business. Heck, not even small but often family business in general. It is not at all uncommon for families to want to keep the real reigns of power in-house as much as possible. Now, that doesn't mean you can't advance due to your skill or loyalty working with them, but you'll never be the head owner or co-owner, for example. It just doesn't work that way because well—it's that family's fortune and their right to do with it as they will."

Jeremy thought a moment, "So, let me ask, is there ever an instance of such families working within the law to get that same effect?"

Michael sighed as they headed into the house and laid out the food, "It's like this, Jeremy. Yes, there are instances of that happening. But it's not like you would perceive it to be. Now, are there those who want to give their family the best shot if they can? Sure. Because on some level they see it as helping their family as best they can. It's throwing a bone as it were. However, such decisions are usually revealed to be either successes or failures in due time. Why all these precise questions, hmm? What have you been listening to?"

Jeremy sat down at the kitchen counter and said, "It's complicated. It's a theoretical concept I was thinking about earlier in the week. The concept is if you make a system designed to help the people and keep them cared for, can it be viably possible with minimal physical interference without oppressing them?"

"It honestly sounds like a society with very light applications of law and order." Michael replied as he began to chop the mushrooms, "You may wish the best and hope the best for mankind. But the real issue is that inevitably the boundaries will be pushed to see how lenient the law is. If push comes to shove, the state has every reason and right to enforce its code of ethics and standards upon the people. If the people refuse to comply, then the proper legal action must be taken against them to maintain peace."

"It kinda' feeds into what I was talking to with an acquaintance. Do you genuinely think that to give an occupation centered around one's passions and to have it applied to a whole society is viable?"

"That's more of a eutopia kind of thinking and honestly? I don't have a solid answer for you. A society where your passions are your work, while it sounds admirable, what of all necessary jobs? Sanitation, policing, what of those jobs, and others like them? Very few love to police the people unless they have a power complex of some kind. Even fewer like to be sewage workers and exterminators. So, how does your acquaintance anticipate remedying such jobs?"

Jeremy leaned back slightly in his chair, "All valid points."

Michael seeing the slight distress on his son's face, said, "Jeremy, it is best if you let this mental quandary go. I have explained what is needed regarding the two systems, a balance. However, when it comes to a much grander scale, it will take a lot of hard work and dedication to that work to strike any form of balance. There is no such thing as a perfect government because there are no such things as perfect people. What needs to happen to maintain society, is to open a dialogue between those who wield power and those who follow that power; that is the only way to ensure things are done properly." He checked his watch, "Give me a hand and start chopping up the parsley in the fridge. We're going to make your friends cream of mushroom soup."

Jeremy nodded and went to the fridge to retrieve the parsley.

Back at North-Gate headquarters, Terrance was sitting alone watching the hibernating central core of the program. He knew very well what he had to do. It was no different than standard maintenance on the program. He sighed as he got up and plugged in a USB jump drive into the maintenance panel. He set up his computer and began looking into the brain of the core. As he looked carefully file by file into the logs and subroutines that were in place, he saw what he more or less expected to find. The program had portioned itself out among its active drones in the world, and because of that, the central decision-making components were under-performing. In addition to that, regular daily maintenance and oversight had been skimped on in his absence. As much as Terry knew what North-Gate wanted to achieve with the three external nodes, the facts were facts. Thee endeavor was proving too high a strain on the system's stability. As Terrance looked at North-Gate's action in the last forty-eight hours, he knew this, in addition to lack of system checks, was forming a gradual snowball effect. Considering the radical shift that was beginning to emerge in North's Gate's logged actions, it made perfect sense to discontinue the active drones outside. But more than that, a hard reset would assuredly be the best move. It was not sound, not sound at all, to be at the command of something that was slowly being driven mad.

Terrance took out his pager and sent a fax to Yolanda at Kadic's infirmary. Yolanda received the fax as she was, and she read the following message, "Found the issue during maintenance. I need you here. Call in Beck. We're going to do a manual reset of the host into the program." Yolanda seeing this, immediately picked up the phone and called Jude, and once he was on his way to Kadic, she went to her car.

Terrance took his clearance chip and had it scanned by the central core's sensor. There was a moment before a keyboard came out of the central terminal. Terrance typed in his credentials, and the keyboard retracted. A deep tone reverberated throughout the chamber, and soon a hatch beside Terrance opened, and a large cylinder came up out of the ground.

Terrance took a walkie-talkie and said, "Bring me a robe and a gurney to the central node, double time."

Maria came with a robe, and Emilio came quickly behind her with a gurney, and Terrance said, "Stand by."

Terrance went up to the cylinder and opened a small window at the top. He reached his hand out to a white button and pressed it. At that moment, two vents opened, and jets of steam began to shoot forth from the top left and right ends and from the base. Terrance motioned for Maria, and he took the robe from her. The door of the cylinder gradually opened; the steam cleared to reveal a young girl about sixteen years old. Atop her head was a highly specialized interface in the form of a neuronal headset. Terrance took her in his arms and guided her arms into the sleeves, easing her down into a sitting position. Terrance pressed another button on the outside of the cylinder, and the neuronal headset detached. Terrance used his sleeve to wipe some of the gently pooled blood from atop her head and then gently lay her on the gurney.

Emilio looked at the young girl before him, and he smiled a bit, "She hasn't aged a day."

Terrance was silent as soon he heard running approaching the chamber. Yolanda had arrived just in time. He backed up as Yolanda immediately went to work.

Terrance was silent as Yolanda checked the girl's vitals one by one. Once done, Yolanda looked at Terrance. He mouthed the words to her, "Hard reset into the CPU."

Yolanda nodded, and she spoke to Emilio and Maria, "She's okay. Get her to the intensive unit and have the traditional massages over her entire body. One massage every hour on the dot. We can't risk too much dystrophy. Have the reserve keep a constant and fresh supply of hot towels. I want her to be as comfortable as possible. Also, ease her into a temporary diet of liquids gradually graduating to semi-solids and then solids."

Emilio nodded and quickly took the girl to the infirmary while Maria remained at Terrance's request.

"It's a good thing you kept constantly automated and manual log overviews." Terrance told Yolanda, "You leave for just a few days, and it all goes to shit. Maria, why didn't you check anything? It's basic operational protocol."

Maria replied, "It was only a couple of days. I honestly didn't think much would happen to compromise the mission in just two days."

Terrance sighed, "Look, you do a maintenance and wellbeing check every day. Without that, it's a very slippery slope to where we're dealing with what we are now. The system is unstable due to the stress of the three external nodes. The system can handle one active physical node, not three. It's much like XANADU; you can have one major clone out there, even have a polymorphic. But make more than that, and you compromise mission integrity. But I didn't know this was a problem until I had a chance to go home and look over some older notes."

"I understand. What would you have me do with the units we have active?" Maria asked.

Terrance replied, "We have to repurpose two of them. Which of the units have made a formal introduction?"

"Only one the rest have been on basic subroutines with minimal use on the outside," Maria replied.

"Alright. Go to those other two and bring them into the assembly. We'll doctor them to meet the standard and repurpose them with a semi-active protocol with override ability. The first unit, we will keep on-field and use it as the proper conduit once the factory reset has been established. We have to make sure that we can have a proper reset on that unit while we do the hard reset on the processing core."

Yolanda spoke, "I can do that. It's not at all a problem, and it's minimal work."

"Good," Terrance replied, "Maria, you will go to the holding station and the safe house, and you will attain the second and third units and bring them into the assembly. If you need help, have Frank go with you. I will set about making sure their integration into the ranks is as smooth as possible, but for right now, we have to focus on the reset of North-Gate."

Maria nodded, "I'll be back in half an hour." She departed, leaving Terry and Yolanda alone.

Yolanda asked, "Well, now we know why some portions of the program went into violent fluctuational use."

"Yeah. Honestly, this helps sort out a lot of things. We can also use this to slightly alter the directives. However, too much alteration could set off warning bells. Leave that to me. I want you to focus on stabilizing the primary node also to keep Sylvia comfortable until it's time for her to go back in."

"A question I have meant to ask you, you saw on the logs where they activated the Implant Initiative, right?"

"I did, and I was very unnerved by it. I want you to keep an eye on Sylvia tonight once you get off. You and I need to assess her mental state after being in so long. It should be okay but with some of these fluctuations—I'm not sure. I think personally, once we sever and then rework the link to the second and third node, it should restore stability. That and the factory reset admittedly may put us a bit behind, but it's not so bad that it's detrimental."

"What are you going to do about the Implant Initiative?" Yolanda asked.

"I'm going to do the smart thing, disable it. It's too much of a risk to use right now. We're going to go back to our basic methods. Amy showed the holes in the system that could be exploited, and as for the last use, it's too much of a risk as it stands, and there's potential damage that may not be able to be undone. It needs to be disabled, analyzed, and possibly restructured. Until such time, we're going to use our field kits as necessary and only as necessary."

Yolanda nodded, "Very well. I'll be back tonight, and I'll take care of our primary node. It's straightforward to do, which is a good thing. Will you need some help with the reset?"

"No. I have all my necessary components, and it just takes a few scans, objective evaluations, physical uninstall, reinstall, and confirmation of sorts. At most, it will take two hours."

"Alright. And I had time to look over the pamphlet. It's not a bad read. It's not perfect as a system goes, but it's definitely worth considering."

"I'm going to implement just one or two small things with the reset, which should help us along. Considering what has happened since I've been gone, I'm debating how much of a rewrite is necessary. I'll know more once I do my diagnostics of the system and evaluations with Sylvia."

"Alright, then. Well, I'll get back to Kadic, and I'll see you tonight." Yolanda replied.

Terrance nodded, "See you tonight."

Back at Jeremy's house, Yumi, Aelita, and Jeremy were having a spectacular lunch of cream of mushroom soup and tuna-fish sandwiches. As they ate on the deck out back, Jeremy listened to all that had happened with Aelita and her dream. Once Aelita had finished explaining, Jeremy sat back in his chair and processed the event.

"So, you had a dream. North-Gate or Sylvia, as she calls herself, stabs you to get your blood for an integration. She gave you a hyperbolic expose on the evils of capitalism, told you that you were too loud, and she shoved you back, and you say you had a pepper-shaker from the dream in your hand when you woke up?"

Essentially, yes." Aelita said, "I even have the shaker here with me." She gave Jeremy the shaker.

Jeremy looked at it carefully and smiled a bit. Then his face returned to normal, "Aelita, this is one of the pepper shakers that Kadic uses every Christmas when they want to showcase elegance towards the families of the students. Surely you remember. it's one of the odd things about Christmas that they have those shakers in addition to better cutlery."

"Huh?" Aelita asked as she looked at the shaker closely, "But how? It was so very real!"

Jeremy then said, "You said she stabbed you and you felt immense pain. It was in your chest. Were there any cuts or anything on your chest when you woke?"

"No, nothing. I checked my chest, but there were no marks or anything of the kind."

Jeremy snapped his fingers, "I think I have an idea of what happened. Aelita, do you remember you said to me that feelings of touch and smell were being amplified in North-Gate's manipulations of Lyoko?"

"Yes, why?"

"Okay, get ready. Yumi, do you remember when XANA made a full-scale virtual replica not only of Kadic but of the city, and none of us knew it was a trick until later?"

"How could I forget? It reminded me of a twisted version of computerized version of Inception."

"Exactly. What I think North-Gate or Sylvia did was to copy the original formula XANA used, then she localized it in the context of a dream. We know that she has all kinds of methods of communicating with us, usually through technology. From her bracelets to something as innocent as a phone."

In all reality, there is very likely a chance that the house you saw was genuine. You described it well enough for me to draw that conclusion. However, the crux is that such a house was used only for her illustrative narrative purpose. Apart from that, it has no function.

North-Gate also said that it had someone looking out for us that we didn't die. Okay, so, let's use logic. How would you consider that one of our celebratory kind of peppershakers gets into your dream? Much as XANA did, make a model of it. However, because of the feeling itself, it had to scan the pepper shaker into its databank. It's easy enough to swipe a pepper shaker out from anyone's nose if there are many of them. How did it get into your hand? Very likely, that same person put it into your hand as a kind of bridge between your dream and reality. You didn't go anywhere. I guarantee you it's all an elaborate ruse to make you think you had been somewhere."

Yumi looked at Jeremy, her eyes wide, "Wow. That's smart. I mean, very smart."

"The scary part is, it's a very logical conclusion. Especially when you consider the pieces we know she has in play." Jeremy replied.

Aelita sighed, "Thank god. For a moment, I thought I was going crazy."

"The thing is—" Jeremy hesitated a moment.

Aelita looked at him, "What is it, Jeremy? Is something wrong?"

Jeremy took a breath and spoke his mind, "Insanity is her best weapon which she can use against us. Look at what she has done to me already. I am on medication for the treatment of seizures. Seizures that she started. In the hands of our current positions as teenagers and in the hands of potentially nervous parents— what better way to isolate us if we prove troublesome?"

The two were silent as they thought about Jeremy's words. In many ways, they knew he was right. Aelita, for her part, knew better than to utter the thought that was on her mind. That North-Gate never needed them as soldiers or even as advisors to help it. On the contrary, to use such pretense to better know you to put you on lockdown, that was far more likely.

Yumi then asked, "What about your parents? They seem pretty normal, and easy-going is there any way to convince them you don't need your medication?"

"My dad isn't a problem. My mother is. The only way to get her off my back is to take a back seat from all activities that would be perceived as overly stressful. Tell her I have a situation like this, and suddenly a lot of things are limited. My use of computers is restricted to an hour to maybe an hour and a half if I'm lucky. Again, which is why I say a nervous parent. Long story short, I'm going to be on a form of monitoring for the better part of summer until classes resume."

Yumi paused, "But Jeremy, you're a great student who shines in computers, robotics, math, and so on. But to tell me you're now being limited because of seizures? A bit harsh, don't you think?"

"Not in the eyes of my mother. It's as she would say, 'a necessary hiatus to ensure the quality of life.'"

Aelita arched an eyebrow, "It's a seizure, not a terminal illness."

"That's what I said." Jeremy said with a laugh, "But again, nervous mother, what can you do? Hopefully, the shit doesn't hit the fan until we're back in session."

Yumi looked at Jeremy, "Jeremy, it's North-Gate. If she's anything like XANA, when is a break ever our reality?"

"A guy can dream, can't he?" Jeremy asked, "At any rate. We'll see. Oh, Aelita, how's your new roommate, Amelia or Milly II as I call her."

"I moved in with her this morning. She's a nice person. A bit withdrawn, but I think she's just shy. I tell you, as far as roommates go, I think she has the most books of anyone I've ever seen."

"Oh? What kind?" Jeremy asked.

"A whole bunch of satirical books and plays. The rest of her books are diverse from Jung's Red Book to Da Vinci's drawings on the human body and all kinds of stuff in between." Literally, her whole book collection takes up three shelves on her side of the wall."

"Huh, so she's well-read. That's good. It should make nightly discussions lively." Jeremy replied with a smile, "How's her music tastes?"

"If her CD collection is anything to go by, believe me when I say all over the place. You have classical, boy-bands, folk music, classic rock, punk, opera, symphonic techno, rap, soundtracks, it's insane."

"If your roommate is that diverse, I can't wait to see how ordinary Jeremy's is," Yumi said with a laugh.

"Ordinary? What makes you think he's ordinary?" Jeremy said.

"I'm a huge believer in Murphy's Law, that's why and balance. If Aelita gets this much variety out of Milly II, I wonder, just how nature will balance you out."

Jeremy groaned, "I tremble at the thought. Isn't it enough that I have a sportsman sharing my room? is that not extreme enough?"

"Sure, in the most basic sense of balance," Yumi said.

"I mean, think about it." Aelita said, "The way Delmas lined all this up, we have our opposites to help us grow as individuals if you choose to look at it that way."

"That's not particularly helpful," Jeremy replied.

"Hey, if I can handle the rainbow for a roommate, you can handle Gaston."

"Charming," Jeremy said with a sigh.

At that moment, Emily came out and said, "Excuse me, ladies, your ride back home is here."

Yumi looked surprised as she checked her watch, "Huh, a bit early."

Jeremy said under his breath, "See what I mean? Get a nervous mother, and visits are cut short."

Yumi nodded, "I get it. Trust me, you have my pity. If this is how it is now, what was it like for you growing up as a baby?"

"I could ask you the same question," Jeremy said as they headed inside.

"Before Hiroki came along, it was nice." Yumi said, "Imagine having all that attention to yourself."

Aelita laughed, "What do you mean, imagine? Jeremy always had that attention."

As the girls left, Jeremy hugged both, and once in the car, Akiko asked, "Well, girls, how was it?"

Aelita replied, "It was interesting. He spent most of the time licking the glass and making obscene gestures with his hands."

Akiko looked back, "What?!"

The girls burst out laughing as Akiko sighed, "You have got to be kidding me."

"Oh, I never kid, Mrs. Ishiyama." Aelita replied, "Sure, I tell cool jokes and stuff, but never kid."

As the car left the driveway, Akiko said, "Ms. Stones, your capacity for wordplay astounds me."

"Stick around, it gets better," Yumi said with a laugh.

"Of that—I have no doubt."