Normal Text - Narrative

"Quotations" - Dialogues

"Quotations + Italics" - "Thoughts"

Italics - Quotes, media and messages

(bracket) - (flashback)

Arc 2: Life Chapter 2

Chapter 8: Ben's Tech Support

"You know, the Research Teams had trouble figuring out how to start up your 'phone'. I heard that they even tried breaching in by using your cable which surprisingly matches the port that currently exists here." Ryna picked up the phone and disconnected the charging cable before inspecting the port itself. "Usually, they have a knack for this kind of thing but in this case, it is just not it."

I shrugged. "That's fair. I mean, it's probably the software that's acting like a barrier if you know what I mean. It won't let you access the files from another device unless you put in the password which allows files to be opened and moved." I looked at my phone that was being held by Ryna. Apart from the huge amount of scratches on the casing, the phone itself sustained no damage, at least from my eyes and you all know how my eyes are so I was pretty damn impressed when the thing even survived. "Well, at least that's what I see based on experience."

"Sure…" she said sceptically. "Now I'm wondering how encrypted this device actually is because- You see, they even tried using Rotoms. That was how they attempted to breach in."

"That just sounds like a privacy invasion to me."

"It would be, yes," Ryna confirmed. "But it's also a great way to get past encryption techniques. In the end, the only thing that matters are the data stored on it." She put down the phone and looked at me. "So, is there anything else you can tell me about this phone?"

"Well, besides the encryption thing, I guess there's also the fact that it's got a couple of other features like- Can you flip on the back?" Ryna shrugged and the phone was flipped on its back, revealing the camera system and the fingerprint sensor.

"That right there is a set of dual 12 megapixels sensors – a two times zoom and a main camera. The one on right is the heartbeat sensor- You put your finger on top of it while holding it and it measures your heartbeat and the square below it is the fingerprint sensor. Ya know, for more security but- It's broken."

"That's actually pretty impressive. Definitely something to consider," Ryna said, nodding. "It's actually pretty weird when you think about the amount of effort they put into data security and then they proceed to steal your data. I'm guessing you guys do that too." She gave me a slight smile as I closed my eyes and slowly nodded. "Let me jot this down…" She picked up her notebook and began writing. "How do you remember this anyway?"

"Oh, you do not understand. I know my phone like it's my son– I don't have a son but you'd get what I mean. I'm just so invested in technology- and I feast on this type of shit. I can tell you the chip inside if you need it."

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is where we found a rabbit hole and as an actual geek about this, I jumped right into it and pulled Ryna along with me even though she's the one that baited me into it.

"Really? Enlighten me."

"It's an… Exynos… nine-eight-ten if I remember correctly…"

"See, even you're unsure."

"Hey, at least I know the name."

"Name means nothing if you know nothing about the details."

"It's an eight-core CPU – I think – with eight gigabytes of RAM and 512 gigabytes of storage. Happy now?"

Ryna laughed. "That's actually kind of comical. No really, that is really impressive for an eight-core to be in a device this small." She finished jotting down the information and smiled once more. "The research teams are going to have their mind blown."

"Speaking of which, what's the average amount of storage in… things here?"

Ryna pulled her phone out of her pocket and showed them to me. "This right here has 8 gigabytes of storage and a single gigabyte of RAM. …And that's considered a lot. Too much even."

"How about a data centre or a high-end PC?"

"A lot," she said simply.

"Eight gigs are big here… To think that I managed to fill two-thirds of my phone full…" I muttered to myself.

"It's a lot for us. And a lot of money for you to get it."

"You can get a 4TB drive for 200 pokedollars back in my home if my conversion is remotely correct, which I don't think it is. And you can just pick them up at the store," I said, cringing a little when saying pokedollars. "Why the hell do they call them pokedollars?"

"...Wow."

Enough tech talks, we actually went through some of the downloaded videos on my phone. Some are interesting, some are alright and some are downright weird. Surprise, surprise the weirdest ones are the most dominant.

In the end, we had enough of Youtube and moved onto the tablet and opened Netflix where a lot of downloaded content was located, one of which was the entirety of Breaking Bad. I celebrated but was also surprised because I didn't even remember downloading it in the first place. It must have been a long time ago.

Anyway, we watched the first episode for 'experimental purposes'. Ryna had her camcorder out and I can tell she was mesmerized by the display. "This looks gorgeous. Is this still LCD?"

"Hmm? LCD? No. That's an OLED panel."

"What's the difference?"

"I can't say for sure but if I remember correctly, OLED panels don't use backlight because the pixels make their own light and the pixel can simply turn off so you get these deep blacks. Though the downside is that they can't get really bright."

"You really know your stuff."

"And the manufacturer took advantage of the perfect blacks to do this," I said, ignoring Ryna's comment. I reached over to my phone and tapped on the screen twice, revealing the 'Always On Display'.

I lied. The tech talks aren't over.

After minutes of waiting, my earbuds, which now have faint scratch marks all over the case had enough juice to start working. I put it on and it automatically connected to my phone. I started Spotify and played one of the downloaded songs and it sounded just like I remembered. I was dazzled.

"Ryna, you gotta try this." I handed her both of the earbuds. "This one is the right bud and this one is the left. You gotta adjust it until it's just right."

"Right…" She took the earbuds from my hand and stared at them for a moment before putting them in her ears and adjusting them.

"Are you ready- I should probably turn down the volume." I started playing the song and I can see in her eyes that she was basically hypnotised. I didn't know Tyler the Creator can do that to people.

"How…? How can it play low frequency even though it's so small?"

"What do you mean?"

"This makes Tragen's Motor sound like a tin can."

I chuckled at her analogy and she asked me, "Tell me, what drives these?"

"It's- a Dynamic Driver? It's like a plastic-ish material with a copper coil in the middle of the plastic and there's a magnet in the middle of the copper coil. It's like- You run currents through the coil and it changes the poles- the polarity? And the plastic moves front and back with the coil because it's stuck to it, making sounds."

"You make it sound so simple."

"No- No, really. It is that simple. Just simple electromag- e-le-c-tro-mag-ne-tism. God, I hate long words."

"I can't believe the solution to good audio is right under our noses the entire time," Ryna said, focusing back on the show.

I shrugged. "I mean, simpler is better, I guess."

"I really don't know what to do with this," I said with my arms crossed. "Like, this thing can't even connect to the internet if that even exists."

"That's true but we can try something."

"Wait, wha-"

Ryna pulled out a pokeball from the briefcase and opened it with a click of a button. "I knew this would happen. Rotom, we need your help here."

A white streak emerged as a small white silhouette formed into an entity no smaller than a can of air. It had a shape not comparable to anything I'd seen, the closest one was its arms which looked like a pair of lightning bolts. It floated around and looked around the room before staring at Ryna, ready to receive orders from her.

"You wanted to use it right? Then I'm doing you a favour," she said to me. She was right; I wanted to use the phone as my daily driver but I wouldn't trust a Rotom with my electronics, especially with my data on the line.

Looking back at Rotom, Ryna pointed at my phone and said to it, "Right, since the phone's unlocked, I need you to go into the device and see what you can do and change."

Rotom complied and merged with the phone. The display then began twitching, opening stuff like the camera and settings. I wasn't too sure about the idea of deleting the entire operating system because of the risks involved so I whispered to Ryna, "Are you sure about this?"

"I'm positive."

A few moments later, Rotom got out and once again, stared at Ryna.

"Alright, I got a few questions. Are you able to manipulate the apps?"

Rotom nodded.

"Are you able to go through the system files?"

Rotom nodded.

"Are you able to manipulate and delete files tied to the operating system?"

"Ryna, wha-"

"Shush." Ryna put her finger on my lips. "If I were to ask you to copy an operating system into this device while keeping all the apps operational and data safe, would you be able to do that?"

Rotom nodded and flew around in a circle.

"Are you sure this is a good idea? I mean, I don't care unless the files are safe but I'm scared that if anything happens, the files will be corrupted."

"Ben, one thing I can assure you is that nothing will be damaged. Rotom has a lot of experience in device manipulation." She sounded confident enough for me to trust her.

She dug into a separate compartment of the briefcase and pulled out a rectangular card similar to a 2.5-inch hard drive. "Alright, I need you to copy VixenMOS into this device and make a copy of the operating system in the device and put it in this."

"This is also where the operating system that you will be copying is located. You can start now. One more thing, this device is special and the files inside are very important so take your time and don't rush it."

Rotom zipped into my phone and it immediately turned off. It went back and forth from the phone to the hard drive and back, most likely sending all my data into the drive.

"VixenMOS? As in V-I-X-E-N-M-O-S?" I spelt out.

"Well actually, it's spelt as V-I-X-N-M-O-S but close enough."

While waiting for… that to finish, both of us decided to move on to the tablet and discussed what can we do with it although the discussion is pretty one-sided if that makes sense. To summarize, Ryna looked at the tablet and was like, "Yea, we can install a PC operating system in this" to which I was like, "Aight."

It was reasonable and it seemed like we can do it right away but then we realised that we only had one Rotom on hand…

…which means we have to wait for that Rotom to finish doing its job before we can proceed with the tablet. With that, I decided to make the most of it by having a feel of the Android for one last time until there was nothing to try out because the tablet had nothing interesting in it other than downloaded shows on Netflix, ibisPaint, and Microsoft Office. The truth is, this is my brother's work/personal tablet that he lent to me because I also need to do my work and he wasn't using it at the time.

The word 'vacation' was technically a lie, basically.

In the end, it took overnight for Rotom to finish fiddling with my phone and when it finished, it was already the next morning and even then, I still had time to take a walk outside and had breakfast with Russ and Ryna.

"Yeah… It's definitely usable," I said as I scrolled around the phone while Rotom was zooming around the room like a bee. The look and feel of 'VixnMOS' reminded me of the time that I was still using and daily driving a hand-me-down Galaxy Note 5 running on Android Marshmallow; the icons looked 'realistic' but weren't too minimalistic and honestly, I kind of dig it."It definitely looks great though and everything works too."

"I told you this would work perfectly." She then clapped her hands. "Well, let's move on to the tablet shall we?"

Another 12 hours went by the job was finished. Rotom looked tired so Ryna went ahead and recalled it back. Now, I was left with two perfectly working devices in a foreign world, ready to be daily driven. I couldn't be happier.

"Hang on, I think we missed something."

"Hmm?" For the I-lost-track time, I saw her searching inside the briefcase and all around the compartments.

"There's something left- What's this?" She pulled out a… wait- That's my watch!

"Yeah… we definitely forgot about this."

I pinched the bridge of my nose because I wasn't planning to wait any longer and I would probably be old enough to get a licence if I did. "Just… you don't have to. It's just a watch that can do other stuff."

"Are you sure…?" I thought about it for a second and that made me realise the fact that the watch still has the Latin alphabet in the system. People would be very suspicious if they noticed that so I quickly changed my mind and asked Ryna if she could ask Rotom to convert the Latin alphabet to whatever I'm familiar with now. How hard could that be?

Not that hard, actually! Well, at least from my point of view. It only took a couple of minutes for Rotom to do its magic and now I have a completely working smartwatch which serves no other purpose than to tell the time.

While Rotom was doing its thing, Ryna took the time to actually go through all the pockets of the briefcase where she found my USB C hub that I always keep inside my bag.

"A USB hub…? And- is that HDMI?"

"You guys call them that too?"

"It sure looks like one. Can't be a hundred per cent sure though…"

"Yea… it is- It is USB?"

"And what's this right here?" She pointed towards the male connector.

"That's USB C. It'll accept anything, really. I mean- you can probably figure that out with the variety of ports in that thing."

"True, true. So, do you just plug it in?"

"Yep."

Ryna wasted no time and plugged the hub into the tablet which was sitting idly on the table. At first, nothing was recognised because nothing was plugged into the hub so she grabbed the portable hard drive from yesterday and plugged it in via USB which surprisingly fit. She went into the files and yes, the drive was indeed recognised which made me relieved because now I can confirm that the hub is compatible with the software.

"To think that we could've made Rotom's life easier by plugging this in. It could've had direct access to it."

Upon hearing that, Rotom zipped out of my watch and it floated around the hub for a bit before slowly turning back to face Ryna with an expression that says, "Are you kidding me?". I imagined the sound of a door hinge creaking as it did that.

I couldn't help but chuckle when Ryna started apologizing to Rotom.

"I'm really sorry. Can we just wrap this up please?"

Rotom disappeared into the watch and appeared back again about a minute later.

"Is that all? I hope that's all."

Rotom nodded at her.

"I believe that's it."

"Yes!" I pumped my fist and celebrated. The task was complete and I can finally enjoy the convenience of having my stuff back.

You know, about the job offer, I never really thought about how I'm gonna do this and how the information is going to be relayed to the higher-ups. All I ever thought about was I was going to accept the job offer. Well, it turns out, it's not as easy as you and I think.

Translating is just one part of the job. What I actually have to do is translate, and then explain the content which would double the amount of work. Other than that, it's pretty straightforward.

But it doesn't end there. I have to actually send the files to the database. Now, this actually got both of us brainstorming the process of it because the higher-ups definitely won't let me access their database; that's just asking for a disaster.

SO,

Ryna and I made agreed on a process that is pretty straightforward in itself. To put it simply, if there is a video included, I will make another text file where I can put all the timestamps of things that I want to show. The video will act as a reference. Then, I will put all the files into a folder inside the hard drive and then Ryna will connect the hard drive to whatever she's using and send it off.

RIGHT! Now that everything is settled, I now know how to start. The question now is where.

Everything was going fine on my end and in Sandgem Town…

…until it got cold. Crazy cold. Over the span of four days, the temperature dropped by 12 degrees and even dropped into the negatives during nighttime after a blizzard slammed into southern Sinnoh according to Ryna.

Remember when I said that snow barely covered the ground and that the grass can still be seen all around? The snow which was barely a centimetre deep became 10 centimetres of snow. Even though the blizzard was brief, the temperature stayed low enough for the snow to stay and snow was still falling days after the snowstorm.

I definitely didn't prepare for this since I don't have any winter clothing. Therefore, I made an ingenious solution which is to wear about two or three layers of shirt with my hoodie on top of them, shove my hands into my hoodie pocket and walk as quickly as possible even though I did almost slip numerous times…

Seeing the temperature swing, Ryna decided to book me out of my hotel room and brought me in to live with her in her apartment. It'll be a while until I take a walk around the town. Actually- maybe. Maybe if I get a jacket, I can take a walk outside. We just have to find out and see.

AN: What's up guys? Honestly, I do not know what to say in this author's note. Wait. Ah yes, I decided to refine the text pointers thing – the one that shows you what each text represents and their types like dialogues – so that it's easier to remember and increase the overall readability of the fic. From now on, it would be like this:

Normal Text - Narrative

"Quotations" - Dialogues

"Quotations + Italics" - "Thoughts and media (newspaper, phone, etc)"

Italics - Quotes and messages

(bracket) - (flashback)

Welp, that's all from me. Have a great day.

Word count: 3211 words