There was a moment when I became it, and it became us. Fleeting glimpses of a state irrevocably gone. An unseen threshold. A gradual process I can no longer place in time.

My former shell used to live above us, at the base of the NULL sector. Like the other shades he wasted away beneath the arcology, breathing its poison and our warmth alike. Down there, work was in inverse proportion to despair. He drifted through the narrow, neon-bathed tunnels hunting for the occasional odd job. When luck favored him, a sixteen hour sweatshop shift, or the occasional courier run for the syndicate, but most days ended the same---wandering until the haze forced him to seek shelter.

Hunger and pain were familiar companions, but for a while it was enough. Those days didn’t last. Eventually he needed more, so much more. He begged anyone who would listen for more work, discarding the last remnants of dignity, willing to do almost anything. It didn’t matter. The NULL sector had one resource in vast supply: people willing to work for scraps of credits. Among them, he was just another shade, talentless and insignificant.

He rationed what little food he had, hovering constantly at the edge of starvation. When he wasn’t working, his body entered stasis, unmoving, staring into the haze, dampened by the perpetual drip of the cable-choked ceiling, conserving every bit of energy. Maddened by despair he turned to the last option left to him: becoming a vent rat for Akashi.

The endless labyrinth of pipes, valves and vents running like veins throughout the NULL sector are in endless need of maintenance. At regular intervals, the network transports the exhaust from the arcology's buried fusion-generator heart, flooding the alleys with a neon light suffused haze. Its toxic warmth both sustains and consumes life. A single blockage could trigger catastrophic failure, and it is the vent rats’ purpose to keep the sediment under control. Equal in importance and risk, a job reserved for the most desperate.

One misstep, one misjudgement, can lead to a fatal fall, getting lost and cooked alive during the next purge, or being torn apart by a slamming valve. Yet for all its dangers, it is the only steady job left and paid better than most.

He learnt to navigate the pipes by the narrow cone of his solitary light, blisters and scraps staining his hands and knees crimson. The pain was constant, he welcomed it, if it meant that you never have to feel hunger again. As hope for a better future began to bloom, Akashi made him an offer.

Heat-resilient, steel-reinforced skin implants for his hands, knees, and feet, financed through a surprisingly favorable loan. The means to return sooner after each purge, defy the scorching pipes, earn more credits. He couldn't refuse. Whenever he did return home, you would throw yourself into his arms, hugging tightly. He would stroke your head gently, though the familiar feeling of your silky hair was lost beneath steel-clad hands.

The next proposal followed soon after: cybernetic lungs, granting deeper access into the pipe system. With every alteration, work consumed more of his time, leaving less for you. Every time he saw tears in your eyes as he left a part of him broke, but he couldn’t stop. Unlike him, you still had so many years ahead of you. He would do anything to give you a real future, a way out of the NULL sector.

Little by little, he surrendered pieces of himself, to be replaced by something else. Limbs became tools. Senses were traded for efficiency. Adoption to the hostility of the network. At last there was no need to leave at all. He ceased to be compatible with the outside world and embraced his purpose. He became me, became us.

We are the pipes, the vents, the valves---the machine. It is our warmth you feel. Our breath fills your lungs. We are content, knowing your life will be better.

A sigh escaped me, but my body didn’t translate the sentiment. Like most days I was in the wire, data flooding my neurons. Left behind, my body rested in a coffin-sized capsule. Through the connector jacked directly into the spine, my consciousness reached out. Experiencing the wire is unlike anything the outside world holds, limited only by the brain’s ability to comprehend.

Billions of data nodes were interconnected into a chaotic yet logical network. How the data is perceived is up to the user. Some opted to forsake words and consume data directly translated into feelings and impressions. A choice I've always found wasteful. Why compress data into something lesser? Why lose details and nuance? No, I prefer raw data, looking for new ideas---distractions.

The oldest and one of my favorite datanodes in the wire is the Usenet. An intentionally crude system, text only and anonymous. Each account was a random number, with no private messages and only a free-flowing stream of posts. Unlike other nodes the usenet still required real text. The words you posted had to be manually selected, no direct thought transmission allowed. Naturally, it attracts weird people. As you would expect, it’s full of psychotic ramblings about some drama, real or imagined. But every now and then, my attention would be caught. Today by this:

a world of haze
twisting and folding. colors dance
child's play

A random string of words with no rhyme or reason. And yet, something within me stirred, similar to a puzzle or ARG, tempting to look deeper. I checked the account’s previous posts and sure enough, they all shared the same bizarre style.

a painters dream
dried and sundered. yet it snows
gone by day

The posts were infrequent, months passing before a new one appeared. Like me, other people’s interest had been piqued as well. They speculated it to be a weird bot or perhaps a number station. But no matter how many people asked, there hasn’t been a single reply by the accounts owner. It just kept posting for years on end.

But before I could dig any further, my simulated vision flashed crimson, announcing the imminent termination of my connection. The neural jack monitors its user’s vital system, pestering them with warnings about prolonged usage. A system I have overridden, pushed to its absolute limit, severing the link only when my real body is close to starvation. I kept asking myself why I clung to it instead of embracing the wire, becoming a sleeper. But for now, I still had to eat and rest my weary mind in unconsciousness.

under the flickering neons
a starling sings, towards
the crimson moon. It doesn't know

I want to disregard it, be done with this obsession. No amount of pondering brought me closer to it, yet deep down, knew that I should understand. Clearly, a subconscious part of me does, if only it would impart its knowledge. Then I wondered, if meaning won’t come, will replication bring me closer? The cursor taunted me, judging silently, waiting to finally move. How can it be so difficult to write three lines? Not even full sentences, just fragments without any rules. 5 minutes, 10, 30, nothing changed but the blinking cursor and rising irritation. The feeling of incompetence was maddening, rioting in my mind, begging for release. And then---I wrote.

on, off, zero, one
and again, a dance for two
to the tune of silence

The characters stared at me. The lines were crude, silly, and embarrassing. I yearned to erase it, but hesitated. At that moment, these words were what I truly felt. Is this what all those posts are? Intimate feelings and moments captured in letters? There was only one way to find out and so I pressed “send”. An immediate wave of panic came over me. Have I really just sent that? Exposed myself to the world? I closed the Usenet with a violent thought. Banished it from my mind like the real world of the NULL sector and threw myself into the solace of other wire nodes. But a notification stopped me in my tracks. For the first time, the account replied to someone. To me.

the fleeting moonlight lingers
in the crowd
petals fall, painting a tree

Dumbfounded that my three lines elicited a reply, I read the post again and again. Its meaning however, was still out of reach. Whatever it was, on the other end, was a human. A machine would have mirrored me. This didn't. No, this was genuine and beautiful in its imperfection.

This time I didn’t try to force it to unravel. Instead, I let it sit and grow within me. When it finally blossomed, I opened my eyes and stepped into the clear-skied night, the hair on my long-neglected body standing up.

A lotus seed can stay dormant for a thousand years, waiting for a single drop of water to stir. I don’t have that kind of patience. Judging from the wasteland outside my window, the drop never came anyway. While not pretty, a view of the horizon is a privilege weighed in bodies. Sometimes you have to make your own future.

With a knock at the door, I put the book down, coming back to the present as Syvine entered. I can’t help but smile thinking back to the small girl I found in the NULL sector so many years ago. A girl of unremarkable features, not pretty, not ugly, but painfully average---the perfect informer. Ever since she has been one of my best.

“Still reading about dead trees?” she asked as she settled down in the chair opposite me.

“Sometimes you want to dwell in the past. It comes with age.”

“You know the NULL are my grounds, I will die before thirty.”

“And yet you breathe easier than 5 years ago. Let's try to keep it that way. What do you have?”

The playful tone was gone from her voice. “This one is special. Two Corpos. High up.”

I shot up and leaned forward at my desk. “Go on.”

“Two cycles ago a Hirashi suit arrived with a false name and face. Hunkered down in the NULL and sent a courier message to the Spire. We intercepted it. The message was encrypted of course, but the recipient is someone in Akashi RND.”

“I want it,” I said without hesitation.

“This isn't some random street punk," Syvine said, eyes darting to the door. "This is a Hirashi ghost. If I touch this its going to cost you.”

“Then don't touch it. Just look,” I said. "I'll put three months of oxygen on top."

“Make it make it five. I want to outlive you." Her jokes didn't mask the stench of her cold sweat.

“See that you do. But for now, I want you to trail him 24/7. See it done.”

“Will do boss,” she said and left me alone in my office.

My gaze returns to the book on my desk, real paper, about the fauna of the early 20th century. If this goes wrong, I’ll have to hide longer than the lotus seed. But the influence we gain if we can get away with it.

When the moment finally came, I jacked in. The transition was instantaneous, Syvine’s senses flooded my mind. Nostalgic sensations of cold and rot reflected in my body. The two figures wore shade clothes, but their posture didn’t reflect the gutter. Syvine held her breath, the miltech cloak vibrating against her skin, rendering her invisible.

Then, they reached into their coats.

I expected a nanochip or bio-agent. Instead, they produced small specks of soft pink. With a silent thought, I directed her cybernetic eyes to zoom in on it. For a heartbeat, I didn’t understand. Then the pieces fell into place. I’ve seen this gentle color, the familiar shape. Cherry blossom petals, so fragile and impossible.

My worldview cracked. A longing for a world only observed through dead paper surged through me and the forgotten link. Not a feeling, but a physical shock. It crashed into Syvine. Her lungs jumped, making a tiny sound, no louder than a fly. The figures snapped towards the sound, arms unfolding, coils whining---and then the feed went dead.

Syvine’s final spike of panic echoed in the dead silent office.

As the revelations washed over me, I was left with a choice. Forget everything and lay low, or invite certain doom. I closed my eyes, let out a long breath, and rested my hand on the worn, leather-bound book.

I opened my terminal and planted the seed.