Disclaimer: As always, Shirow Masamune, not Twiknham. I just enjoy making them dance to my tune. So, the tune is mine, the dancers are SM's. Enjoy.

Chapter 7: Kusanagi Memories

"Talking"
Thinking
(Cyberspeaking)
(Figure it out)

Kusanagi and I were both police officers with Tokyo Public Safety Section 5. Part of the paperwork we'd signed stated that if we were to ever obtain life-threatening injuries, we were to be given whatever was available to sustain our lives, including experimental procedures. That's how I initially ended up in bed with a fake torso and legs.

Within three weeks of the accident, they'd had to replace most of my body with cyborg components. My eyes had sustained major injuries when shrapnel had flown into them, and the shock blast had destroyed the bone structure in three of my four extremities. These parts were replaced immediately. My chest was a mixture of real bone and fake ribs and once they realized my body had started necrosis on the remaining parts, they finished the replacement job; keeping my right arm as a gift for the loss of the rest of my body.

When I woke up from the second set of surgeries, I was no longer alone in my room. It had been a big empty room, now it was a big room that held another pseudo-corpse. After several days of looking at people pass through the curtains drawn around the bed next to mine, I finally learned that another officer, in another division, had been in the explosion. I also learned that the total count of fatalities was 83 and two officers had been killed. One in the line of duty, and one out on a date with his girlfriend. That meant I was a dead man, with no history to go back to. Since Nizuki had been killed instantly when a piece of the trunk sliced through her skull, my past was exactly that, the past.

Kusanagi hadn't been as fortunate as myself. The bomb had been in the trunk of the car and she had been walking up to it when it exploded. The glass that took out my eyes missed her completely. However, when they found her, the frame of the car was sitting on her abdomen. The doctors later stated that the wreckage had worked as a tourniquet, cutting off the blood loss and keeping her alive.

Since the emergency workers couldn't remove her from the wreckage without killing her, a specialist was called to consult. He said it was a risky maneuver, but there was a small window of opportunity if they could remove the car at the instant they pulled her body out and then immediately seal the wounds by cauterizing them. That was only to get her to the hospital, where she could die under sedation.

He didn't tell the emergency volunteers that his team had been waiting for a fatally wounded victim from the military sector to try a new procedure on. The team he headed had developed a method of removing the brain and part of the spinal column and transplanting it into a containment unit that would then act as a translation device between the brain and a cyborg body. This unit would later become known as a 'brain box.' Since her signature was an implied consent, and her chance of survival outside of this procedure was zero, it was decided to attempt the surgery.

There had been many unsuccessful surgeries before then, the first one had occurred almost five years earlier. The brain had rejected the materials used in the making of the box and had lived almost two minutes after it had been implanted. Each time a failure happened, the doctors analyzed the causes and improved the system. The last time the procedure had been performed, the new shell opened its eyes and spoke. The doctors all gathered around, astonished that their procedure was a success. Two days later, the cyborg told them to let him die, and quit breathing. An autopsy revealed his brain had hardened due to an imbalance in the chemicals it was being provided.

The man who performed that ghost-box operation was named Dr. Logan Honshuu. He spent months researching the correct chemical makeup and was sure the next surgery would be a success, if the person was willing to accept the body. He would later win professional notoriety for the first successful brain/cyborg transplant. Only a handful of people knew that his 'groundbreaking' surgery had actually been his third success. The first two had been top-secret military operations; but he couldn't advertise the fact he'd brought two dead people back to life when they didn't exist.

When he heard that there was another candidate, he called Megatech and got a release for the latest shell. When the candidate arrived, he called Megatech and changed the gender. I wouldn't know all of this, but I had a LOT of time in the hospital to ask questions of this brain trust. Since I was also a cyborg, they didn't mind telling me. Kusanagi never asked for the details. She was more interested in her future than her past.

ssssss

My first memory of seeing Kusanagi is blurry at best. I'd just come out of my second surgery, having finally undergone the brain box transformation myself. There was a lithe naked body lying on the bed next to mine, and I was sure angels had come to claim my soul. I was actually a little relieved to know I was going that direction, surely Satan wouldn't waste someone so lovely on my sorry ass. I blinked and when I came to, there was a white curtain and more of the same…nothing.

Drugs do strange things to the time/space continuum. Just as I was beginning to believe I'd suddenly become trapped on a mobius strip, time hiccup'd and I found myself sharing the same clock as the rest of the world. Days passed as days, and minutes because as truly finite as before. One night I was sleeping heavily, having spent the day being tortured by surgeons, when I heard the voice.

"Hello? Am I alone?" (hello?)

I didn't realize until days later that the woman beside me had automatically linked.

"No, you're not alone."

"Where are you?"

"I'm trapped in this damned bed on the other side of the curtain."

A shaking hand peeked through the curtain and a very mechanical movement later, the curtain was thrust aside and we were looking at each other. "Hello."

"Hi, I had begun to wonder if they were keeping the curtain closed just to tease me into insanity." She smiled, not big, but a smile. It was nice to see a friendly face. "I'm Batou."

"I'm not sure who I am right now." She started to fade out.

"That's okay. I'll be here when you figure it out."

When the nurse came in, she started to close the curtain; but I reached out a hand and stopped her. "The lady opened it, she said she'd like to see another human. I know I'm not a lot to look at, but you have to admit I'm better than a white curtain." She smiled and left the curtain cracked.

"Okay, but I'm not giving you a peep show. You keep your eyes on her face, the rest of her body is her business."

If that nurse had only known Kusanagi. She didn't care who saw her business...

I was asleep the next time she surfaced. (Wake up.) I blinked, focusing on her purple eyes.

"Morning." She moved a hand up to rest beside her head, it shook as if she had a bad case of palsy. "Mine did the same thing until they got the servo units sync'd with my body."

"Good, I was beginning to think I was the lead in the next Katharine Hepburn story."

I chuckled, a rusty sound. I hadn't had much to laugh about since I came here. "I'm Batou, if you don't remember."

"I remember. I just don't remember my name yet."

"That's normal. You will though." The voice startled both of us, and we looked at the white suit standing between the beds. "I need to talk to you both for a few…hold on, let me get a chair."

My ears worked fine, and the sound of metal feet scraping on tile was not pleasant. The lady beside me obviously felt the same way, although she hadn't quite figured out how to control her features. There was a tear running down one cheek and half of her face had squinched while the other side did not.

"I'm Dr. Honshuu, it's a pleasure to talk to both of you. As you probably already know, you were victims of the explosion in Odaiba. Batou lost his eyes and several body parts. However, he did manage to escape with no damage to his brain and spinal column." The girl beside me rolled her eyes, it was a panicked motion. The doctor lightly touched the exposed hand, gaining her attention. "In some ways, you're in better shape than Batou. We couldn't save your body, but we saved your brain and the top three vertebrae of your spine. You have been transplanted into a new body. In fact," we could tell he was excited by his tone of voice. "You are the first full cyborg to exist!"

He later told me that she wasn't technically the first cyborg to exist, the guy who was alive for 3 days was the first one. However, she'd been the first successful one and he didn't want to do anything to make her question her existence. Little did he understand that being alive and having an existence are not related, and one has to wonder if the quality of existence is not more important than the quantity of the same.

Dr. Honshuu made a habit of stopping by and talking with us every evening before he left. The entire first night he spent explaining the procedure used to turn us into cyborgs. He started with an explanation of how our brains were turned into miniature computers, than he went on to explain how motion was controlled by synaptic energy from the brain that went through electrical centers in the body and was turned into commands used to start subroutines in the body.

He explained that we would have to train our bodies to perform to the level demanded of us, that they would start out jerky and slow; and he put clear emphasis on making sure we understood that if we became frustrated with our lack of motor functions, it would slow down our progress.

Later we would tease each other with that statement every time we were unable to perform even the simplest task. I never understood how complicated it was to button a shirt, or tie a shoe. Something that a toddler can learn became excruciating for the adults. Years later I learned that the techniques used to teach us were the same techniques used to teach stroke victims how to learn these skills. Later generations of cyborgs were programmed using the commands we'd developed, eliminating the need for rehab; so we really got to experience it from the ground up.

When we weren't in rehab, learning how to use our bodies, we were in training to learn how to use our minds. Kusanagi had never been cyberized, so she had a steeper learning curve. Unfortunately, I suspect that my prior cyberization is the reason why she was always much more adept at cyber-diving and doing the more sophisticated things she did. Because I already had a set idea about how the mind worked, I subconsciously put self-imposed limits on my abilities. I had heard that this couldn't be done, or that wasn't possible; so I basically caused a self-realized prophecy condition. Because I had heard the future, I actually made it come true.

Kusanagi had no such barriers in her mind. She was the first full cyborg; therefore, she had no preconceived ideas on what could be done. The first week I kicked her butt, ran through all the mental mazes they provided, and let pride get the best of me on more than one occasion. The second week started out the same, but I could tell she was getting angry. Not at herself for her limitations, but at me for my attitude. She told me later that if she'd known how to do a round-house, she'd have taken my head off before lunch on Tuesday. However, the only way to beat me was to shut me out.

We were both working in a dummy net, a fake internet set up to allow us to dive without being infected by hackers or tagged by protection programs. Since we were both basically infants, we did not know the tricks to stay safe. We were both maneuvering through chat rooms, with several windows open in our minds. Physically I was rattling on about how easy it was for me to get through the gates. I was actually bragging about how I'd purposely decided to take a more difficult route just to slow me down, and I'd still beaten her. She was talking too; but it wasn't much, and she wasn't looking at me.

Suddenly she rolled her eyes over to glare at me. (Shut the fuck up already!)

Kusanagi rarely used the F word. It startled me a little, but I continued to talk. I'll admit that sometimes I'm not to most intelligent person in the room.

(If you don't shut up, I'll shut you up.)

That time I realized her mouth wasn't moving. "How did you…"

Suddenly the room was dead silent. I was staring into those piercing eyes, my mouth opening but no sound coming out. My voice controls were no longer working.

(That's much better. Now, if you are done, how about you come back in here and help me figure out how to reroute the system to shut out the techs.)

(Uh..oh, okay) To this day I'll never know if she gave me the power to link back, or if I automatically learned it as a result of knowing she could do it. I don't mind being the first into a room, guns blazing; but Kusanagi has ALWAYS led any advancements we made as cyborgs. I look at an option and balk because it's never been done. She looks at an option and does it because its never been done. Then she finds a way to taunt me. It's been years of 'you may have gone the more difficult route to show me up ONCE, but here's ANOTHER freebie for you…'

Two minutes later, she gave me my voice back, and on the other side of the window three techs were locked out of their controls. Gotta give the girl credit, she always did get things done.

A/N: Just like Batou, I've made up a history on Motoko. I've not read the manga, so it may be completely wrong. Hope you're enjoying this, and I will bug you again next week. -TK