Ryan had no idea on what just happened. The only thing he knew was that he had been running away from a hijacked Compressor set to self-destruct inside the Lecturer’s Office room. And that Professor Edward was by his side when the walls against them cracked into thousands and dispersed into their way. He remembered it clearly, even the fact that he pushed the Professor aside in order to save him, and took a full hit of the blast. Ryan thought that was the end of everything. A trade of life, his, to save the Professor’s.

In spite of that, things were not as what he expected.

“What… is this… place,” Ryan mumbled to himself.

His vision was distorted, and he could see nothing beyond his own eyes. Pain soared throughout his body, as if he was being ripped apart from every direction. His heart pulsed in a very abnormal rate, and it seemed as if he had no blood circulation system in his body, the blood itself rushing outward from the centre into his very limbs. Every few brief moments, Ryan’s body would act like it was zapped by electricity, trembling at a very considerable speed.

But, at the same time, Ryan could feel like his body was absorbing something. He didn’t know what exactly it was, but it was easing his torment, and that it gave him the energy to not pass out from the pain alone. He noticed, that if he was to focus on absorbing these mysterious things, perhaps he could regain his senses, and even completely block out all the abnormal things happening to him. There was simply no logic reasoning behind it, but Ryan decided to not nit-pick on the little things, for he was devoid of even the state to do so.

And so, few minutes passed since he decided to just put his mind on absorbing the mysterious energy around him. There was something that appeared to do something to him, as if trying to remove him forcefully from his current position, but Ryan couldn’t ascertain what it was. On the other hand, whilst that ‘something’ had continued to stay around him, he noticed his energy absorbing rate seemed to spike up all of a sudden. Perhaps I’m feeding off it, he thought.

But it didn’t last until the thing suddenly stopped bothering him, and then the amount of energy Ryan was absorbing dropped down again.

Ryan finally regained the ability to think properly, and he began pondering on what exactly was happening to him. Was he perhaps inside some sort of advanced healing chamber that accelerated his physical healing? If so, where was Professor Edward? Was he safe? Ryan didn’t know. There was simply no source of information he could rely on, not with his senses being mysteriously blocked. Panicking was one thing he didn’t want to do, but since he woke up feeling extremely exhausted, Ryan had no energy to even panic to begin with.

However, his peaceful self-restoration was suddenly interrupted by someone, probably the first he heard after waking up in this state.

“Hey! Aren’t you an User? What are you doing in my computer?” a voice shouted. It seemed like a girl’s voice, but he couldn’t confirm, not with his sights still extremely blurry. However, there was something else that he took notice of.

“…Com…puter?” replied Ryan, in a low voice. He didn’t know why, but simply speaking slowly drained the energy he had been absorbing, and right now, it was the sole thing that was keeping him from feeling all those pain he had experienced. Even then, gaining information took priority, and he had a lot of things to ask about. Ryan didn’t know how much words he could speak before his body could take the pain, but it was a risk he needed to take. Not to mention, it bothered Ryan on how the voice said that this place, was its computer.

“You… you don’t look good. What happened?” the voice asked.

First things first. An introduction was needed. Ryan couldn’t possibly keep conversing with the voice, without knowing its name, or something of the similar.

“…Name… Ryan. You…?” he asked.

“Emily. It’s Emily,” answered the voice, Emily.

“Emily… tell. Is… this… a cyberspace… your… computer…?”

“Yes, it is. What happened to you?”

A cyberspace? Ryan thought. By his memory, it was impossible that he could suddenly end up being in a cyberspace, because clearly he was running away from an explosion. It was also unheard of to be able to suddenly traverse within the cyberspace without the will of the user itself, since the CCL could only be activated if the user was willing to perform a ‘Conscious Access’. It was set to be as a security countermeasure against any accidental or unwilling events of a human suddenly entering the cyberspace of an electronic without their own consents.

Ryan was about to speak of another sentence, but before he could do so, he felt a sharp pain soaring throughout his body. This time, it was much worse, and he could literally feel like he was losing sense of his limbs. It was there previously, but as time passed by in this condition, it felt like they were disintegrating away, like smoke blown away by the wind. Ryan couldn’t focus himself, his mind as if being pulled away from his own body.

“Hey, what’s going on? Hey! Don’t lose me now!” said Emily.

“…Weakened,” was the final word Ryan could say, before he lost completely of his ability to hear.

Ryan’s five senses stopped responding. He couldn’t hear, he couldn’t feel, he couldn’t see, he couldn’t taste, and he couldn’t smell. What could he do in this situation? Nothing. If anything, he was grateful that the pain he had suffered since just now stopped coiling around his body, and that if death was the only solution, then be it. He wanted to do something, but if he continued to become stuck in this suspension state, then it’s only a dream.

“I’m not letting someone die in front of me.”

Suddenly, Ryan felt like he received a burst of energy. It cleared away all the darkness that surrounded him, and he could actually notice that his senses were returning to him, much clearer than ever. There was no longer pain, only the feeling of warmth that wrapped his body. His mind became clear, and he was no longer experiencing mental distortion. Sense of relief surged inside Ryan, as he never thought that he would be ever be rescued, not in this kind of space.

As his eyes reformed their sights, Ryan could finally see. His environment around him, that he was hovering in mid-air, and even the small figure that stood below him. It was Emily, the little girl—whom was oddly enough wearing a pyjama inside a cyberspace—who had pulled Ryan out of his death. Behind her was two stationary objects, one that appeared like a light purple sphere, and the other was a green diamond that spun in place constantly.

Ryan recognized them immediately. An anti-virus and data.

“So… I am really inside a cyberspace,” said Ryan. He looked down on his body, which was noticeably transparent like that of a spirit, something that was not supposed to happen to an User. Wait a minute… this state…, thought Ryan.

“Are you okay now? Can you like… uh, you know, come down or something?” said Emily whilst looking at Ryan with her head up.

“Ah yes, of course,” replied Ryan.

Hovering in mid-air within a cyberspace was definitely not a normal feat for an User, but he was personally taught by his mother on how to do it. Usually, it would need a strong mind and focus to be done, so Ryan was perplexed as to how it occurred. Even then, it was all in the past, and a gratitude came first for the person who pulled him out of certain end.

Ryan relaxed his legs and imagined as if he grabbed hold of the cyberspace’s dimension itself. He tugged on it softly, and just like that, he went down, little by little. He continued to do so, until his feet touched the solid ground, which, he had just noticed, was considerably dark in colour. It was a definite sign that this area was already ‘dead’, or in a better term, corrupted. Just what had happened? Ryan didn’t know.

Before him, stood Emily that was shorter than him, probably younger as well by his predictions. Even then, she was his saviour, and he should properly express his gratitude.

“Emily, was it? Thank you so much for saving me. If I may ask, what exactly did you do?” asked Ryan.

“I literally fed you data.”

“What? Wait a minute, that’s not possible.”

“Yeah, I thought so as well, until I saw how you kept draining this area’s data of integrity, and also shrunk the data behind me, like, half of its original size.”

“Huh? This… corrupted area, and that data, I did that?”

“Exactly. I’m even starting to question if you’re actually an User, or an advanced Trojan horse that seem like an User. You even sort of destroyed my Anti-virus.”

Ryan took a peek behind Emily, and just like she said, the purple sphere which was the Anti-virus, was not responding at all.

“Uh… my bad. I really don’t know what’s happening to me,” Ryan apologized.

“It’s fine. Just, log out now, ‘kay? I’m really not a fond of some random guy being inside my computer and all,” said the girl.

“To be honest… if I could do that, I would have done it long ago.”

“What? Of course you can, right?”

“You see… I think my CCL chip is destroyed.”

“Huh?”

Just like Ryan said, the probability of his chip being destroyed was considerably high. He had—after all—stood against the blast of the explosion head on, so it wouldn’t be odd that if it would become damaged afterward. Not to mention, there was another concrete evidence that his chip had indeed been destroyed. His current form of his body.

“What do you see right now?” asked Ryan.

“Your body? Uh, transparent?” she answered.

“Exactly. This is what you call Desynchronization state. Basically, I can’t ‘recall’ back my consciousness to my body, because the link that allowed me to do that is severed now,” Ryan explained.

“Seriously? Isn’t that bad?” Emily questioned.

“Yeah, it’s quite bad. However, if I can somehow come in contact with my physical body, I can then try to perform a reverse ‘Conscious Access’, from the cyberspace, into my CCL. I’m also guessing that I’m absorbing data in order to stabilize my existence inside the cyberspace, much like a cyberspace that needs an operating system to stay alive,” continued Ryan.

“But, isn’t it bad for you to stay out of the body for long?”

“Yeah. To be honest, I have 2 days before I… never mind.”

“What? What is it?”

“Well… 2 days before I lose control as a human, and turn into a virus. A virus that could think and evolve like a human.”

“That is just…”

Ryan noticed how the girl had a concerned face on her, but he shouldn’t burden her any longer. Emily gave him enough help, and that should be it. If anything, he should leave this place, and in the future if possible, repay the girl for all she had done to help him, however simple it was.

“Hahaha… it’s fine. I’ll leave now. I’ll find a way somehow. Thanks for the help still,” said Ryan.

However, before Ryan could turn and leave, Emily tugged on his back.

“Wait a minute. You need data to survive, don’t you? How are you going to survive out there if so?”

“Oh… yeah, there was that. Uh, I’ll make do?”

“That’s not going to happen! You do realize there’ll be defensive systems that will try to delete you for absorbing data, don’t you? Inside here, nothing’s happening because I’m the admin here, and I made sure nothing could touch you. Or… at least before I realized it was an User,” said Emily, lowering her voice at the end of it.

“Wait. Did you… tried to delete me?”

“Of course I tried, okay? And I’m sorry for it! Anyway, how about this. I’ll let you live inside here for now, but not on my computer, cause god knows just how much more you’re going to eat.”

“Really? Didn’t you try to chase me away just now?”

“Gosh! Have anyone told you that you’re so nit-picky about everything? Just accept it!”

“Uh… okay.”

For now, Ryan had found a temporary shelter for him to live in. It was indeed abrupt, even the fact that his CCL was destroyed. Even then, he couldn’t afford to be so fixated on it, because he had a time limit before things go awry for himself. For now, his first task was to affirm himself of his current situation, and to gather enough information on where his current physical body was located at.

And perhaps, even for just a little bit, he felt sort of excited for the little adventure he was about to have.

“I just hope I don’t need to take a poop in this space,” Ryan said.

“DON’T YOU DARE!” shouted Emily.