Disclaimer: Well, my short hiatus is over. GITS starts up next week and the proverbial writer's juices are flowing again. This chapter has nothing to do with 2nd Gig, but when I reach 10 entries, I post. By the way, if you haven't already figured it out…I'm not Shirow Masamune, and I don't own any rights to these characters. All I own are the literary rights to whatever activities and thought they do/have that aren't from the published works. I also don't own the rights to any electronic pets that may appear in this chapter. I cannot sell this or make money off of it, and I don't have any interest in that anyways. Enjoy.
Chapter 8
Yada,
Yada, if you're reading my diary, you better pray I'm dead. And
with my new knowledge of cybernet ghosting, death might not be final.
Last warning.
Entry 71:
I knew
that damned environmental class would come back to haunt me. Since
it's been so slow around here after the conclusion of the Laughing
Man case, Aramaki decided we needed to integrate this new
environmental protocol into our system while we had the time. He sat
down with the book, the one with the notes I jotted in the margins;
and broke the assignments into parts. Each of us has two section,
and Aramaki is overseer of all.
He gave me the chapter in which I'd written notes on the margin about what I'd like to do to the professor if he didn't quit looking at my breasts. He also handed me the one where I'd drawn a picture of Aramaki hanging from a tie. It was a very busy tie, the guy who breathed on my neck all day was wearing it. I felt it was fair to use that tie as a weapon of death, it had implications of terror for me, and who had I most wanted to die that day?
The problem with writing pithy comments, is that I only wrote them during the extremely boring parts. So, now I'm in charge of "Hazardous Materials Permitting and Reporting" and "Governmental Records Retention Schedules." Where's a bad tie when you need one?
Entry 72:
It's
been two solid weeks of environmental compliance. All of us are
becoming loopy. I actually had a discussion on a chat channel last
night about the usefulness of the new SARA Title III International
Legislature on catching illegal procurement of explosives. That
conversation prompted me to leave and find Courtin just to make sure
I was still sane. She set things right, and I felt much better until
I came in today.
Ishikawa ended up with the Waste Disposal sections. They include both non-hazardous and hazardous materials. By 2pm, he was beginning to get this rabid wolf-hound look to him. At four, he leaned over and informed me that no torture method ever devised matched what the government did with their fucked up regulations. I had to agree.
He told me that tomorrow was going to be a whole new ballgame. If he didn't do something fun, he was going to go nuts. I'm too afraid to ask; but since I was planning on faking my own death, I guess I can hold off for another day or two.
Entry 73:
Ishikawa
has started playing pranks on the androids; you know typical android
pranks. We've been watching him do small things for the last two
weeks, but today put him in the big leagues. He came up to me this
morning and told me over coffee, he enticed me with a double
cappaccino dammit, that he'd read an archive about an old final
exam prank. Thirty years ago, two college students at TTI physically
removed all the keys on the keyboards in their "Advanced Computers"
lab and replaced them in incorrect positions, just to see who
actually knew how to type. Laughing, he leaned over and told me that
it caused a riot among the students because no one could find the
keys they needed. The pranksters had put all the keyboards the same,
and the class spent most of their final figuring out the correct
combination. "Let's try it on the droids" he whispered. I
just looked at him. How old is he again?
So, I'm not sure how I ended up being the distraction, I suspect it was his seductive promise of a week's worth of cappaccino that did it. Ten minutes later, I walked into the networking room and grabbed the supervisor, holing him up in his office talking about a theoretical networking issue I'd just come up with. Ishikawa reprogrammed the key sequences on the keyboards in half that time, but left me hanging out with the lecher for an extra laugh. I'm going to get even for that.
Anyways, two of our droids went on cybernetic trips, guts bursting out of their skulls. I had a momentary flash of guilt, but I know they can be easily reformatted and put back on line. It's not like they have souls or anything. Since the androids are hard programmed as to what keys to press to get what letters, when gibberish showed up on their screens, they started network chat. It didn't take long before they'd overpowered their cerebral capabilities. Because they are not capable of thinking on their own, they weren't able to figure out there was a problem with the keyboards. Dr. Akai ran in and figured out what was going on in less than two minutes. Screaming at the supervisor, he didn't see the two of us sneak out.
Entry 74:
I'm
telling you, environmental compliance documentation isn't good for
any person's sanity. At least we're having fun despite the
insanity of this program change. Dr. Akai hasn't figured out who
the mastermind is behind the pranks, but he's getting warmer. Good
thing we didn't forget to turn the monitoring system off-line
during today's attempt.
Ishikawa went in for his routine maintenance and they decided to do a brain case swap. He asked if he could borrow his old body for a few hours. It was slated for destruction and meltdown the next day, so one of the employees at Megatech agreed if he had it back by 5. I think I might be spending too much time around Ishikawa because he didn't have to ask me twice this time. No, I'm just bored out of my mind. Oh wait, all I have is a mind, so I guess I'm bored IN my mind.
Android Sally, we call her Sally because android Silly would just be cruel, was the victim of this one. She walked through the maintenance dock to find Ishikawa's arm on the floor. She picked it up and looked at it with concern. She's one of the brighter androids. We've thought about promoting her to head android; but it wouldn't be worth the trouble. They don't care about status, and they don't get paid.
Togusa and I were hiding in the upstairs conference room, barely peaking out over the edge of the windowsill. Yes, Ishikawa has been recruiting. There are now four devious devils running amok at S9. Saito isn't having any of it; and we think Boma has a crush on Sally, so we made sure not to invite him. Well, Sally's looking around for Ishikawa. Finally she sees him, he's trapped under an incendiary device. Knowing he's hurt, and her programming telling her not to touch the bomb, she starts running for the door.
Player number 4, Batou, snuck in and removed the shell. Suddenly Ishikawa walked around the corner and asked her what's wrong. Startled, she whipped back to the device to find that…he's not there. Togusa and I are both sniggering, hands over our mouths…just in case she can hear us through the glass. We can almost smell the smoke come out of her processing unit. Suddenly, she turned back to him, handed him the arm, and told him she thought he might have misplaced it. We lost it. Batou came back in, carrying Ishikawa's shell, to find Togusa in the middle of a hysteria caused asthma attack, tears streaming down his face. I was a little more dignified, or at least I wasn't crying. He just shook his head and carried the body out to Ishikawa's car.
Entry 75:
Today,
Ishikawa went a little too far. One set of the droids were scheduled
for their annual fluids exchange. Ishikawa snuck into Dr. Akai's
office and swapped the synthetic oil with expresso. You ever seen an
android on expresso? "Hhheeeeeellllllllllllooooooo, he, h
h…..I…feel, funnyIfeelfunnyIfeelfunnnwha's hapng2me……."
You get the picture. I had to chuckle. I thought I had kept it to
myself, but those grey eyes of Batou can always see right through me. Major, we're going to get in trouble if we don't stop. I
didn't have anything to do with this prank, so I zipped it and
walked back to my office. It took Dr. Akai all day to catch the
androids and then drain and replace their fluids. I would feel
remorse for adding to his job, except I think he gets sadistic
pleasure out of tearing androids apart and rebuilding them. I
sometimes hear maniacal laughter coming from the labs and wonder if
he's not related to Jekyll. He kinda looks like him.
I feeeeeeel funnn. Sorry, that just slipped out.
Entry 76:
This
morning, in between "(lack of) mission update" and "environmental
compliance review", we officially awarded Dr. Akai the "Least
likely to dance on a table" award, he wasn't amused. Ten minutes
later, Aramaki's on our asses about our serious lack of
seriousness. Serious lack of seriousness? We all broke out in
laughter. Ever seen a Leprechaun get pissed? You don't want to.
After screaming at all of us that if we were going to act like children, he was going to treat us like children, he gave us homework. No, not work you take home. Fucking open the book, read the chapter, and do the problems type homework. I swear that man knows more about us than we do ourselves sometimes. Each of us was given our most dreaded subjects. I've got four chapters of Marketing to do tonight. Marketing? I'm a government funded cyborg. I don't buy, I destroy. However, Ishikawa received the worst punishment of all of us. Aramaki gave Ishikawa an English book and told him to diagram every sentence in the first three chapters. I think I actually saw his ghost leave his body when he heard the assignment.
Entry 77 :
Well, we
finished our assignments and have slumped into inactivity depression
again. Batou's been whining all week about it being boring here at
work and at home; so Togusa and I pitched in and bought him a
Tamagotchi. You know, the little electronic pets. I read about them
in my marketing book (yes, I actually DID read the book), and thought
it was a good idea. It was hard to find a dealer, they've been off
the market for fifteen years. We bought a cute little…I don't
know, it was furry with big eyes, and a beak. It looked like a
chicken…monster…cat.
Batou gave us both funny looks, pressed some of the buttons, and threw it in his pocket. When I showed up for lunch, he was sitting at the table with an uneaten meal. As I approached, he shoved something in his pocket and picked up his fork. Not saying a thing, I sat down across from him. Ignoring the noises emanating from his pocket, I ate leisurely.
We've been trying this new soba shop out, and I think they were attempting chipped beef and gravy over noodles. It didn't taste too bad. The food went great with the electronic chirping coming from the big guy's pants. Several of the people around us turned and looked at him curiously. However, when a little kid ran up to him and asked him why his pants were chirping, while pointing at his…bulge, he admitted defeat.
He cyberthreatened me. I swear if you mention this to a soul, I'll…read your diary. Oh he did not. Well, yes he did. Rolling my eyes at him, I went back to eating. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out the toy and blipped some buttons before showing it to the kid. Satisfied this man's…didn't have some magical powers he'd missed out on, the little boy ran back to his table. I looked over at Batou and asked him if he'd killed it.
That's when he went into this doctoral thesis about how it was hungry. Then he informed me he has to feed it every twenty-two minutes, give or take fifteen seconds, or it starts chirping. I can just imagine him handing it to Aramaki and asking him to feed it, as he's suiting up for a critical ops. Batou broke me out of my humor when he stated he figured out the algorithm after three episodes. Then he told me he was just waiting for it to beep when I showed up and he shoved it in his pocket because he didn't want me to think he liked it.
I swear, Batou can be so strange sometimes. I'm going to have to tell Togusa to scuttle his plans for an electronic dog.
Entry 78:
Woo Hoo!
Finally some action! And I'm not talking about the kind that
happens at home. A small insurgent group of terrorists from
Singapore showed up today. Singapore, who would have imagined? They
started blasting away at the civies, so S6 was called in. As S6
arrived, they pulled out the big munitions and started taking out S6
mechas. S9 got involved at that point.
We did a short distance drop, and took out the tank. Well, Batou took out the tank. I was gathering my mind from where it'd shattered on the way down. Not physically, I'm being metaphorical here. Lt's just say that high velocity cold air can be very stimulating on the new non-standard features of this shell. I'm going to have to start wearing pants on drops.
After I'd come back to my senses, Batou screaming at me to get my ass out of the line of fire helped, I whipped around and took out four armed intruders who were trying to penetrate the razor-wire fence by ramming it with a truck. Razor wire bends, and doesn't give way. Not that it mattered, they never got as far as the secondary fence. One second they were revving the engine, the next it was ten degrees warmer as a giant fireball sent them to Hell.
When we got back to base, Aramaki quizzed me about my lapse. I told him I hadn't been in any combat with the new shell yet, and I had a linkage problem. He didn't believe me, but he dropped the subject. One thing about the man, he can take a hint.
Entry 79:
Today was
a very sad day at the office. We experienced a death in the family.
Maybe I need to clarify. Batou experienced a death in his family,
and we all got to suffer it with him. He's had his Tamagotchi a
month, who knew it needed batteries replaced frequently. Apparently
they don't make SR-60 batteries any longer either. How were we to
know?
Batou came in first thing and rushed over to Togusa, pointing at the little blue box in his hand and waving his hands around frantically. I couldn't hear what he was saying because I was standing next to the coffee machine. Tt's been relocated to a sealed room that requires security access to get in. Dr. Akai doesn't forgive very easily, guess who had to hack the system to get his own access…
Suddenly Togusa turned, saw me, and wiggled his finger. It was the universal 'come here' sign, so I rolled my eyes, added one more ice cube, and headed out of the box. When I walked out, Batou was yelling. "What the fuck! It's been sick all weekend, I can't do anything to it to make it well. You've given me a pet, and now it's going to die on me." He turned to me and glared. "It's like giving flowers at a funeral, all they do is die too."
I glared at him. "You leave them on the grave so you don't have to watch it happen." At the pathetic little 'beep,' I zoned in on the toy. "The battery is dying." I opened the back and read the number. Batou was watching over me like a mother…what did I call that thing again? I could tell he was worried I'd take the battery out and kill his child. It actually had two batteries, an ingenious idea to prevent possible premature character death. If only we had that option for characters in anime shows.
We walked to our office and did some research to see if we could find a replacement. Unfortunately, they haven't made that type of battery in five years. We searched through archives for any store that might carry them, but we were unable to find a replacement. I've never watched anything electronic die before. It was a sobering experience. I hope if I go out, it's quick. I certainly don't want to fade away by making feebler and feebler off-tone chirps. By four, Batou's electronic pet was dead. Togusa took it home to bury it in the back yard beside his daughter's first fish. He said he had the perfect casket, an old satin lined cigar box.
Batou said he was leaving early to go have a drink. I offered to assist him, but he turned away and said he needed solitude tonight. I felt so bad that when I got home, I set up a program to activate in case something ever happened to me. In the off-chance I cease, for whatever reason, a certain person will be contacted with the information and financial resources to find Batou a real dog. Although I'm tempted to request a Jack Russell Terror, er, Terrier; I think a Bassett is the better choice.
Entry 80:
"I think
I'm turning Legalese, I think I'm turning Legalese, I really
think so, m-m m m…m m m-m…" Day 30 of the Environmental Death
Squad (EDS). That's our new name. We've decided that we're
being short-listed because of our propensity to uncover really bad
things within the governement. REALLY BAD THINGS. Instead of just
locking us in cars and compacting us, it's to be death by
regulations. Today Aramaki dumped records in our laps from
environmental compliance reports done over the last…seven years.
Yup, EDS, that's us. After work, I invited everyone over to watch
a movie. It's so rare that I do that, so I found myself sitting on
the couch with every member of the EDS, except for…good gracious, I
just realized I'm so Environmentally ingrained that I've started
using acronyms in my own diary. This is pathetic.
Aramaki-less, we settled down to watch a movie of Togusa's choice. Have I ever mentioned that Togusa is what people refer to as an 'old soul?' I think we could have survived some gangster black and white film from the forties. We definitely could have handled a Kurosawa. What we got was…'Valley Girl.' After about ten minutes, we all decided we hadn't had enough to drink. Damned metabolism control system. Anyways…like we totally got blitz'd. Not really. But we demoted Togusa to EDSMWCPM (Environmental Death Squad Member Who Can't Pick Movies). Ishikawa said next week's movie night is going to involve a flick called "Office Space."
A/N: I hope everyone's had a great last few months. Trying out a new format, It'd be nice if someone would let me know if it's better or worse than my original method. Thanks.
