Elsa paced back and forth in her room, muttering "no, no, no, no, no" over and over to herself. Apparently something had snapped in Anna yesterday, back during their The Magic session. Data corruption or something, and Anna was beyond recuperation. At least, that's what the doctor had said.

Earlier this morning her mother had gone into Anna's room to wake her up. The loud shriek had woken Elsa and she and her father reached the doorway to her room at the same time. And there lay Anna, her comatose body suggesting sleep, but the open, waxy eyes betraying a more serious underlying issue.

A knock came from the door and Elsa made the gesture to show the camera feed for right outside her room. She saw her father standing at the door, his face already gaunt with worry.

"Elsa, honey, are you in there?" He knocked again.

"Go away," Elsa said. She sat down on her bed, leaned against the wall, and grabbed her knees.

Her father turned away from the door, took an indecisive step, the returned to the door. He knocked again.

"Come on, hon," he said. Elsa relented with a sigh. She released the electric lock and he entered, shutting the door behind him. He approached and sat on the bed beside her.

"You're mother's doing the same thing," he said, "But hiding and moping isn't going to bring Anna back. One of my partners says there's a group of heavily augmented people in one of the lower levels on the outskirts of town. I figure it's a good of a place to start as any."

Elsa sniffed in response.

"I'll do some digging tomorrow after work, but time is most certainly of the essence," he continued. "In the meantime, I need you to be strong. Can you do that for me?"

Elsa nodded, but bit her lip.

"Thank you," said her father as he stood up. He walked to the door, stopped, and turned around, just looking at her. Then, without a word, he left, closing the door behind him.

After he was gone, Elsa had an idea to look over the code for The Magic, see if anything stood out as potentially harmful for second-party viewers. It was possible, after all, that even if Elsa herself wouldn't be affected by side effects of any bugs, a bad line of code could hurt any additional people. Anna in particular would be at the most risk, as being so new to her augments could have amplified any of those effects.

As she processed through her code she didn't find anything harmful, but that didn't mean a lot; most of what she'd written was the gesture control. Originally the program started with a "temple tap," but Elsa had wanted something a little more elegant and spent weeks working on the current gesture. The actual visual portion came from an open source project on the net. She scrolled through that code too, but didn't understand it enough to see if anything could cause issues.

By the time Elsa was finished her father had come home from work. Her mother stayed in her room as she and her father made dinner. Quiet sobs drifted into the dining room as the two sat and quietly ate their food.

"I learned some more about the auggies," her father said, glancing towards the source of the weeping. "They may actually be able to help." He set his fork down and looked straight at Elsa. "Would you like to come with me?"

She nodded, not sure what to say.

"Then let's go tonight," he said. He picked up his fork and finished the last little bit on his plate before standing up and heading towards Anna's room. He emerged, carrying Anna in both arms. Another pang of guilt hit Elsa in the stomach at the sight of her sister, but she helped her dad put her sister in the car, before climbing in herself.

They set off, following the dark, twisting driveway to the highway that led to the city. Elsa watched her father, whose usually upbeat demeanor was replaced with solemn and worry. Elsa looked at her comatose sister before turning back towards the city. She heard her father mumble something and looked towards him, but he shook his head when he realized he'd gotten her attention.

They arrived at the city and took the exit for the lower levels. Elsa was both excited and terrified; everyone knew the lower levels were dangerous. And with her dad having a good job, they would be targets for robbery or worse. No, she thought. I mustn't think like that. They were here for Anna. To help her. To fix something. It was going to be alright. Elsa mustered up her courage and looked at where they were.

Her father pulled into a dark alley that was littered with beer cans and used tech. Ancient keyboards lay strewn about and small circuit boards of varying colors looked like leaves just ready to be raked up. The area was dimly lit by a visual puke of various neon colors: orange, red, green, blue the most prominent.

Her father got out of the car, disgusted at the trash that also lounged around the area-including right outside his door it seemed-and got Anna out of the back seat. Elsa got out and followed him into a small building that said "Pabbs'" right above the doorway in a faded orange.

The cocktail smell of cigarette smoke and beer hit Elsa like a hammer made of bricks and she coughed and covered her nose to try to filter the smell. Her father had a visible grimace but was able to bear it, continuing to walk further into the building. The contents were people, all sitting in chairs with varying pieces of tech on them, zoned out and looking at the picture their implants were showing them. One person stood out, standing beside a door at the far end.

Elsa's father walked up to him. "Where's Pabbs?" He asked quietly, as if not to disturb the others.

"Who wants to know?" The man spoke fairly loudly and his voice echoed slightly in the otherwise quiet room.

"I do," said her father. He gestured towards Anna with his head. "I want to see if he can fix her."

The man squinted a little, then tilted his head slightly to the side. After a second he nodded. "Alright, go on in," he said, opening the door. Elsa and her father stepped inside.