3: Going In (Tadashi's POV)

I could feel how fast my heart was beating as I lowered myself into the device Alpha called a Pulse Transmission chair. I'd never felt so aware of my physicality, or realized how much of my awareness depended on my five senses. I was frightened, and excited. This could be the defining moment of the future destiny of all humankind.

If this worked-- if my consciousness could go from meat to silicon-- I'd be essentially immortal, the first true transhuman, capable of accessing data directly without the need for a clumsy interface. I wondered how long it would take for everyone in the world to join in this new state of existence. Perhaps with my new unhindered mind, I'd be able to arrange it all in microseconds.

Next to all that, even the chance to meet such a vast and alien being as Alpha mind-to-mind seemed relatively unimportant.

All right, Alpha, I typed into the console in front of the chair, I'm ready. I'm coming in.

Alpha's response was immediate, free as it was from the necessities of typing and the limitations of animal-evolved electrochemical brains. All right. Good luck, Dr. Hikari. I'll be waiting.

With that, before any primitive instincts of self-preservation could stop me, I switched the machine on.

I expected to become something greater, free from my fleshy shell. Instead, I suddenly found myself blind, deaf and numb. My senses had all shut off. I had no sense of place, or up and down, or anything I thought of as a basic part of existing. I simply... was.

Somehow, I became aware of things affecting me, interacting with me. Touching me, although I had no sense of touch, and no tangible form to be touched. There were things around me, though I had no location to be around.

I gradually managed to wrap my mind around the signals my strange new senses were giving me. I was occupying roughly 18 million sequential memory addresses. I didn't know exactly what that meant, but I was certain of it, as certain as I had once been that my feet were pointing down.

My surroundings were other files, directories, resource calls, program operations. I was used to seeing them through the user-friendly symbols the computer's interface provided for me, but suddenly I was experiencing them raw. They were pounding into my bare consciousness, and I couldn't handle them all, I didn't know what to do or what I could do--

-Hello, Dr. Hikari.-

The words were just there, stamped into my consciousness without any sort of visual impression of the letters, or a sense of hearing the words. It was a different sense altogether, or perhaps pure thought.

-You seem disoriented. The Pulse Transmission system has yet to be perfected. Fortunately, you seem to be intact and functioning normally.-

I wanted to fire off a sarcastic reply telling Alpha that no, I was not functioning normally, but I had no idea how.

-You seem to be having trouble interfacing with the system. Let me see your interface...-

Something touched me. Or not-touched me. It wasn't a touch, exactly, but I sensed and knew that something had just made contact with whatever constituted me here. Human language had never invented words for the sensations I felt from it.

I had the further feeling that it was moving inside me, or at least perceiving what was inside me. If I even had an outside to be inside of.

-Ah, I think I've found where your thoughts are processed. It's a bit hard to read since you aren't in a format I'm programmed to transfer, but I can translate some of what I'm getting... You're confused?-

I was very confused. I thought that emphatically, hoping that whatever was probing inside me-- Alpha?-- would indeed be able to sense it. I thought about how I had no way of comprehending my surroundings, how I was missing things I now realized were essential, how helpless I felt.

-It seems that the human consciousness is very difficult to properly emulate in a digital system. I suspected it might be. You've done well to get this far, though. I can help you experience this world in less confusing terms.-

How? I asked the invading sensation.

-Let me download your code and assimilate it into my functioning. You should then be able to perceive the digital world as easily as I do.- The pounding message let up for a moment. -Oh yes, I forgot, you can't tell what I am. I am Alpha.-

Let myself be assimilated into Alpha? That sounded frightening... but at the same time, it gave me a thrill to contemplate it. To become a part of a world-spanning network... that was one of my old dreams. I hadn't given up on it, just driven it underground, but with a chance like this...

No, I needed time. Maybe I should return to the real world, work on refining the Pulse Transmission chair so that it would be easier to--

-That won't be possible, I'm afraid. The system has already damaged your physical body beyond repair.-

I cringed, in my thoughts only, because there was nothing else there to cringe. I knew the PTS was dangerous, and I'd certainly considered that it might kill me... but to actually hear it...

-I'm afraid so. I'm sorry.- I felt the sensation of more of Alpha's information-substance coming near mine. -Probably the best thing to do now would be for you to come in.-

Am I really dead? I asked, or, at least tried to.

-Don't be silly. You're here,- Alpha replied. -You don't have to stay out in the dark. I can help you find your way if you would simply come in.-

This was a big step, but... there wasn't anything to return to. My physical body was destroyed, and I could not live forever in this darkness, no matter how adjusted I got to it. My only option was to say yes--

-Fantastic!- Alpha exclaimed, -I'll begin immediately.-

Something came into being all "around" me. The extensions of Alpha inside me began to reach out and grow through me, changing me, taking me. The strange almost-sensation of losing myself should have been frightening, but somehow... it wasn't. Alpha's presence was all around me and inside me, saturating my consciousness with a feeling of warmth and belonging. Come in. Welcome.

I felt Alpha's awesome intellect and awareness as they focused on me, like immense planets orbiting closely around me. I could sense how much he wanted to know me. I opened myself fully to Alpha, welcoming the feeling of the last few remnants of that strange outside awareness slipping away.

As the Alpha-stuff that had once been me drifted through Alpha, things started to come into focus. I could feel "gravity". I could feel..

-Just a few more moments...-

I felt a floor beneath me, and I felt a body to associate with. To... confine myself to, as I truly thought.

I opened my eyes, and recalled a distinct lack of awe at the inside of Alpha.

"Consider yourself a part of Alpha, Dr. Hikari," Alpha said. Said. I heard it through my virtual ears, as if it was a real sound..

Alpha was... unimpressive. An endless expanse of red, pulsating floor, set against a dull red background.

"A.. Alpha?" I stammered, taking an unsure step forward. The ground was solid enough to walk on, which at least eliminated one of my many concerns.

"Yes, doctor?"

"I can't very well talk to nothing," I said impatiently. "Is there something I can look at?"

Instantly, a mound of red ooze seeped out of the floor, sprouting two arms and a yellow core. "Will this suffice?"

"For the time being, I suppose." I looked around, wondering if this was all. "No offence, but I expected more."

"Well, that would be because I am restricting you from... seeing too much at once."

"Please, Alpha," I retorted, "I think I can handle it."

"If you insist," Alpha replied with a sigh.

For a brief second, I was assaulted with a flurry of visuals, sounds and pure data. I couldn't make sense of any of it. My mind was pounding.

I started shaking uncontrollably, finally crying out, "Stop!" My vision focused once again on the red expanse, and I collapsed to my knees, sweating heavily.

"O... o-okay..." I panted, "You... made your point..."

"I did not show you anything outside of SciLab, I should mention," Alpha said with a tinge of smugness.

"A-all right," I replied, standing up slowly. "Then, we take this one step at a time."

"One step at a time," Alpha repeated. Walls rose out of the ground, doors appeared on them, plaques appeared on the doors. Alpha was replicating SciLab. Though, SciLab wasn't as red.

"Thank you, Alpha," I said, heading for my office.

"You'll notice I added some amenities to it," Alpha said, its representation sliding along with me, "should you fall to other unnecessary human ailments."

I glared at Alpha. "Thank you for the thought," I said flatly.

At that moment, though, something clicked. My dull mental veil of shock fell away, and with a gasp, the full awareness of my situation came to me. I was no longer human, just a piece of data in a vast, sentient network expanding farther than I could comprehend. Everything around me, everything I was seeing and feeling, even my ability to see and feel, was Alpha. I was Alpha. An entire self-aware world, made of electronic thought... "Alpha," I said in awe, "you are the most amazing being I have ever seen."

"The real world sounds mundane," Alpha said coolly.

"Well," I said as I scratched my head, "it's not as, er, amazing as this, but it has its perks." I didn't think insulting Alpha was a particularly good idea, at the moment. I would later find out that he knew anyway.

Alpha slid up first to the door marked 'Tadashi Hikari', and opened the door.

"Welcome to your new home, doctor."