The Real World (IC)

[Electra]

"I've never been to Tronik," Gina told him, "and I've never seen the machine it runs on personally. I'm going from detailed reports made by another scientist. He says that the program has been experiencing lossage and glitches periodically for several years now, but the server is robust enough to keep the simulation running. I have a strong suspicion that in order to keep Tronik running indefinitely, something is going to have to be done to increase the memory space and shore up the weak areas in the programming. Doing that might require alerting the citizens to the nature of their reality. But as I'm sure you understand, it's not an easy piece of information to absorb."

[Avenger Assembled]

"It wouldn't be," said Sharl warily, still not ready to fully accept the reality she was giving him. "I don't know if it would be worse or better if people believed you or not." He sighed heavily, running his hands through his hair. "This wasn't supposed to be like this!" he suddenly yelled. "I was...I was just supposed to find out if aliens were real, and inspire people so they could know we weren't alone anymore. Not find out that nothing's real, and we're talking about my whole world like it's just a badly-built computer. You said the Centurion saved us. Who did this in the first place? Who would do something like this?"

[Electra]

"It's not that it isn't real," Gina pointed out, folding one leg over the other and lacing her hands together over one knee. "It's just that it's real in a different way than you thought. Your thoughts aren't any less real than mine because mine originate in an organic blob of squishy pink meat, and yours originate in a circuit board. Your perceptions aren't less valid because your eyes perceive signals made of computer code instead of light particles. You're still real. And the person who did it... well, he was misguided, but I think he had good intentions. He wanted to save something of your world, so he digitized your city before it could be destroyed by the Cataclysm."

[Avenger Assembled]

"So that was real, at least," he said, letting out a sigh. "I wondered if it was all a fiction, if all our memories are just lies programmed into us by whoever made us. But if the city was real once..." He walked over and laid his hand on the wall, closing his eyes as he felt the wood beneath, rougher than the metal furnishings he'd known most of his life. "Don't tell people," he finally agreed. "Not until you have something more to show them than this. I can accept what you're telling me," he finally admitted. "Because of everything you've shown me, and because of everything I've been through in getting here. But most people wouldn't. Not even close." He turned back to Gina and took a breath, dismissing the irrational urge to hold his breath and see what happened. After all, he didn't really have lungs. "What do you need me to do?" he asked her. "How can I help you? With me, or with...with anything else? I owe you my life."

[Electra]

"Keep doing what you're doing," Gina told him, brusquely but not unkindly. "You're going to have to stay calm, and be brave, and not let yourself get overwhelmed by what's probably going to seem very strange to you. You've got a flexible mind, which is probably what got you into trouble in the first place and saved you from insanity in the second place. I'm going to keep working on decoding your program, and when I can, I'll see if I can set up a holoemitter so you can at least look around in my house and lab. It won't be much, but it'll give you a look at the organic world. For now, though, you're going to have to sit tight."

[Avenger Assembled]

"Okay, I guess I'll do that," said Sharl, who hadn't really expected anything better. "I mean..." He gestured to the room all around them, rooms now that Gina had added so much, "this is much more than I could ever have expected. I'll keep studying, I guess, and trying to think of what I'm going to tell my parents when I get home." His shoulders settled, but he didn't look defeated so much as he looked tired. "Are you a superhero?" he asked her. "Like the other people I saw on TV with powers."

[Electra]

"I am," she told him with neither pride nor modestly. "You won't see me on the television though. My hero name is Cyberknife, and the work I do is in cyberspace, the word we give to the internet and the worlds inside computers. I was working when I chased you down, because you were causing so much damage. I thought you were a malicious program and dropped you into this partition, but obviously you're nothing like what I was expecting. You can learn a lot from watching the heroes of Freedom City, though. They're a rare lot, they do a great many wonderful things without much reward for it. Good people."

[Avenger Assembled]

Sharl spent the next few hours watching television, flipping from channel to channel as he tried to take in all he could about the strange new world around him. He'd get online and search the local version of the 'Net later, he was smart enough to know he couldn't do research without knowing what to look for. _This is it,_ he thought with a low whistle as he watched Jack of all Blades rip through the Crime League, watched Lady Liberty punch through a Communist robot's face, saw a thousand other acts of heroism big and small. _This is what I've been looking for all my life. Beings of great power and great character, who want to use their great powers to make a better life for everyone else._ He hadn't expected to fall asleep, but he did anyway, dozing off in his chair to guilty thoughts of his worried family. But when those passed, and he was alone, the computerized reflection of a man dreamed of flying.