Disclaimer: As always. Not Mine. Shirow Masamune's. I gain nothing from this financially. I write so that my muse will let me sleep; and occasionally I get reviews, which light my day.

Chapter 9: The Chief

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

The first time I met Aramaki, Kusanagi and I were working on crouch and run maneuvers. The basic, crouch behind a stationary object, then run to the next object and crouch behind it. Sounds like an easy task, but it makes tying shoes and buttoning shirts what they are...children's tasks. Getting an 1100kg body to behave reflexively is something that takes practice. The first day Kusanagi mastered the squat, but I beat her in the running. She's always been more agile than myself, and I'm sure this was no exception.

It was day two of C&R hell, and Kusanagi had mastered it. However, she was demanding I do it until I got it right. I'd spent most of the first day on my hands and knees, having mastered the 'crouch and fall onto hands' technique. She had figured out the precise point her center of gravity needed to be in order to crouch against the wall, and while I was still crawling around the corners, she was doing something out of an old special ops manual. I was green with envy.

The moment I laid eyes on our new Captain, I was trying to catch Kusanagi to strangle her. She was lightly jogging backwards, occasionally punctuating the statement by doing a backhand flip. When the hell she had time to learn that, I don't know; but it was an entire statement as to her abilities that she'd done so without instruction. I was reaching for her arm, as it was outstretched in preparation for another flip, and my vision caught a glint of light off of something shiny and silver. I turned and promptly fell on my face, taking in the strange view of an older man falling in the opposite direction as I headed down.

Of course he wasn't falling, it was my perception that was changing. Aramaki was standing stone still, hands in the pockets of a black felt jacket. He'd apparently been standing there for a while because he was shifting his weight to the opposite hip, something military personnel don't normally do unless they are motionless for extensive periods of time.

Kusanagi stopped as soon as I fell and walked over to help me up. "If you continue to reach for a mirage, you will never achieve your goal." I accepted her hand and as she pulled me up, she also noticed our visitor.

Dr. Honshuu called us over. "This is Daisuke Aramaki. He would like to talk with the both of you for a few moments." He bowed politely and left us to talk.

"May we sit?" He pointed at a table and three chairs and we all sat down. "Over the last six months, we have seen a rise in the numbers of cyber-related crimes. These crimes are not the garden variety crimes you used to deal with in Section 5."

At my raised eyebrow, he continued. "Oh yes, I know your backgrounds." He nodded at us. "You are Batou and you are Motoko Kusanagi. Although you both worked for Section 5, Batou worked with cyber intelligence and Kusanagi worked with counter-terrorism. I was actually talking with the majors of your departments about recruiting you before the explosion at Odaiba two months ago."

(We've been here for two months?) She never looked away from Aramaki.

(I didn't think it'd been that long. I guess a couple of surgeries really kills time for you.) I didn't either.

That was the first time I ever saw Aramaki smile. We both blinked. Although he's short even to Japanese standards, Aramaki commands the respect usually reserved for much taller men. I've seen people look past him and introduce themselves to the taller official thinking he was Aramaki. One of the reasons I think he garners such trust and respect is that he does not joke lightly. His sense of humor is very intricate and rarely requires a response. I've often thought that maybe he learned early that babies cried when he smiled, and so he never did. It makes his eyes crinkle up and his face look more skeletal than normal. As we both watched in carefully managed horror, he opened his mouth.

"You are both exceptionally advanced in your cyber-linking capabilities." He schooled his features and we went back to feeling comfortable with the man. "According to the papers, you're ghosts. You both died as a result of injuries sustained at Odaiba. Neither of you have families or loved ones who will miss you." He looked at me. "I was sorry to hear about your friend, I was told that the two of you were close."

Kusanagi did cut her eyes over to me at that, but then went back to minding her own business. Her tact is one of the many reasons I have allowed her into my soul.

"Section 9 will be an intricate part of stopping terrorism before it has a chance to impact officers at the level you yourself were at two months ago." He steepled his fingers, looking at us over the top of them. "I had already offered the lead job to Motoko Kusanagi before her untimely death." He looked over at her. "You may not remember, but I have signed documentation here if you would like to examine them." He pulled a file over that had been sitting to the side.

Kusanagi did not move to take the file. "There are pieces missing from my memories, but I do remember meeting you once before."

"Are you willing to honor your previous commitment? I will understand if you do not feel right doing so, considering all that has happened since."

"I will honor any commitment that I have made with you. I have memories of Security meetings in which I was a guard. At these meetings I heard about you and the forming Section 9. I am not sure that a young officer such as myself is the best person to lead this group of individuals, but I am willing to do my best."

"As the new leader of Section 9, you will need to put together a team."

"How long do I have?"

"As long as you need."

The two of them suddenly quit talking, or at least I couldn't hear them. An infinity of silence later, she started to speak again.

"I want Batou on my team. Our cyborg bodies make us much more impervious to damage. Knowing what I know about mine, I believe any member of our team that wasn't a cyborg could become a liability."

That was it. Over the next two years, the woman who had just become Major Motoko Kusanagi handpicked four more cyborgs. Two months later, she rescinded her initial statement and added a human to keep us from have a fatal weakness in our strengths. Cyborgs tend to think and react like machines in high pressure situations, true humans do not. Although Togusa is mostly sheltered from fire-fights, he has come through with sheer pluckiness, and that one trait that we can never again emulate…humanness.

ssssss

So now I stand in front of Captain Aramaki's door. It's currently closed, and I have no idea how to say what I want to say. I do not feel I am able to give the team what it deserves right now. I raise my hand to knock, but end up just lowering it. I am finding huge gaps in my memories that weren't there a couple of days ago and I'm worried I've become a liability. Again, my hand freezes just before knocking. I need to take a couple of days completely away from everyone to find out why my ghost keeps whispering to me.

Suddenly I find myself banging the door with my fist. I guess my body got tired of waiting on my mind.

"Come in Batou." I opened the door. Aramaki was standing and looking out over the city, his hands clasped behind his back. "I could hear you breathing outside my door. I felt like the principle waiting on the pupil to come in for our talk."

I stood there, ten thoughts running through my mind simultaneously. "What do you see when you look out that window?" That was not one of them.

"The forest."

I looked over at the giant painting of a forest beside his desk. "Like in that picture?"

He turned and looked. "No. That is only a picture of a tree." He pulled out his chair and sat down, waving me over to sit. "That picture reminds me that in order to protect the safety of the forest…" He waved at the window behind him, "I must never forget to examine every tree." We both sat in silence for a moment.
"The hardest moments in my life have been ones in which I've had to make tough decisions in order to protect those most affected by them." He leaned forward, spearing me with his eyes. "Like the time I had to risk the lives of my team in order to protect them. However, they are not the toughest moments in my life. The toughest moments in my life are when I sit down across from an individual that is dealing with a crisis."
"Six years ago, I sat across the table from two individuals who were facing a crisis. They were the only ones of their kind, and their kind required extensive maintenance and replacement on a regular basis. They were also facing an extinction of another kind. The kind of extinction that happens when we no longer have a purpose for existing. I sat there sweating under my coat, hoping they would make the correct decision. They didn't disappoint me then, and I do not worry about being disappointed now.
I wanted to pace, but Aramaki was as cool as ice. "I want to know what is going on. I am of the hope that you still trust me enough to tell me what thoughts are running through your mind."

We sat in silence. Aramaki waited with a patience I've never seen in another human. I ran phrases through my mind looking for the right wording.

"Ever since you had that chip put in my head, my head hasn't been right. My ghost has found a voice and there are moments that I wonder if I'm not turning into Kusanagi. She seems to be everywhere I turn." I stood and paced, frustrated that what I was saying was the truth, but not a very polished version. "I worry that with all of these off-links that I'll end up putting my team in danger, and I worry that I'm becoming senile." I sighed and sat back down, putting my head in my hands. "I need some time off."

Aramaki continued to sit there, no sound coming from him. Worried I'd given him a heart attack, I looked up to find him drawing very small patterns on his desk. When he noticed my interest, he looked up for an instant than went back to drawing. "When I was a little boy, I had a problem with attention span. They put me on medicines, but I was not able to improve. My grades slipped, and my family worried about my future. One day my father took me to Kyoto and we walked through the sacred rock garden at Mimurodoji. I stopped at the edge and used a small stick to draw patterns. It was the first time I had been able to focus all of my attention on one thing."

"You want me to go to Mimurodoji and play in the rock garden?"

He chuckled. "No. I find that drawing patterns on my desk helps me to focus when my thoughts are scattered. Your thoughts are very scattered right now. You may have time to focus and put your thoughts together. I need a complete team, not one that is disjointed. Find the cause of your problems. Until you do that, you will be unable to solve them." He pushed away from his desk and stood. "You have two weeks. There is trouble brewing in the security sector, the PM incident was a precursor. I will do my best to keep my word. Two weeks may not be possible."

"Thank you." He dismissed me with a wave of his hand, and I started towards the door.

"Just come back. We can't afford to lose you too."

AN: Hope everyone had a great week! -TK