The afternoon slipped away in a haze of code reviews and system checks. Giri's fingers flew across the keyboard, diving deep into function calls and database optimizations. The office buzz faded into white noise as he lost himself in the rhythm of debugging.
Shadows lengthened across the office floor. One by one, his coworkers packed up and left, their cheerful goodbyes barely registering through his concentration.
A satisfied sigh broke through his focus. Hane stretched at her desk, her smile reflecting the glow of her monitor.
"You still here?" she asked, a slight frown creasing her brow. "Everyone's gone home."
Giri blinked, finally noticing the empty office around them.
"Yeah, just… finishing up a few things."
Hane shrugged, giving him a small, knowing smile as she submitted her merge request.
"Alright. Have a nice weekend."
With a final wave, she turned and left.
The pod should be ready for testing now, Giri thought. His fingers brushed against the keycard in his pocket. If he wanted to test it, this was his chance.
The walk to the elevator felt longer in the empty office. His footsteps echoed through the silence, each sound amplified in the deserted space. The emptiness made his stomach twist - he'd never stayed this late alone. Usually, he either worked overtime with the team or took his work home.
The equipment elevator stood before him, its doors marked with scratches and dents. Unlike the sleek passenger elevators, this one showed its age. Paint chipped away at the corners, and hairline cracks spider-webbed across its surface, testament to years of moving heavy machinery.
Giri pulled out the keycard, its smooth surface catching the dim light. Following Yuki's instructions, he swiped it through the reader and pressed B1, holding it down. The button's usual blue glow shifted to purple, a change he'd never seen before.
The elevator groaned to life, but something felt off. Instead of the usual downward motion, the car moved at an angle. Giri's stomach lurched as the compartment descended diagonally, like a rollercoaster taking an unexpected turn. He braced himself against the wall, metal cool against his palm.
The doors opened with a soft hiss. Giri squinted as bright fluorescent light flooded the elevator car, a sharp contrast to the dim lighting he'd left behind. His eyes adjusted to reveal a vast space that stretched far beyond what he'd expected for a basement level.
White panels lined the walls and ceiling, their pristine surfaces reflecting the overhead lights. This wasn't the cluttered equipment storage he'd visited before - the space had the sterile, organized feel of a high-tech laboratory.
To his left, mysterious machines stood as tall as he did. Their sleek metal casings hummed with quiet energy, status lights blinking in steady patterns.
What caught his eye most was the impeccable organization of the cables. Each bundle was perfectly routed, color-coded, and labeled. Not a single wire out of place.
"Now that's how you manage a complex system," Giri whispered, admiring the meticulous attention to detail. As a programmer, he appreciated clean architecture, whether in code or hardware.
A long corridor stretched out on the far right, breaking the monotony of the white panels. Steel doors lined both sides, each marked with illuminated labels that cast a soft blue glow against the walls. The letters seemed to float in the air, reminding Giri of holographic displays from sci-fi movies.
His footsteps echoed as he walked down the corridor, reading each label. 'A.I.R', 'N.E.O', 'P.H.I' - acronyms that meant nothing to him passed by until he spotted it. 'S.I.P' glowed above the third door on the right, its metal surface unmarked and pristine compared to the others.
The silence pressed against his ears. No hum of machines reached this far, no whisper of air conditioning, not even the usual creaks and groans of a building settling. Just dead silence that made every breath sound too loud.
Giri stood before the S.I.P door, his heart thumping against his ribs. The keycard felt heavy in his hand.
"Well, let's hope this wasn't designed by Weyland-Yutani. I'm not in the mood for jump scares."
Giri pushed against the heavy door, its mechanism releasing with a pneumatic hiss. A blast of frigid air hit him, making him shiver. The temperature difference was dramatic - like stepping into a walk-in freezer.
"Geez, who set the thermostat to Antarctica?" He rubbed his arms, watching his breath mist in front of him.
The room hummed with the sound of industrial cooling units. Their massive vents lined the ceiling, pushing waves of chilled air downward. The cold made sense - high-end hardware needed serious temperature management.
The testing pod dominated the right side of the room. Its sleek white surface gleamed under the harsh lighting, reminding Giri of a high-tech coffin. Cables snaked from its base to a nearby computer station, their paths perfectly organized in labeled bundles. The neural headset rested on a mount above the pod, its sensors already wired in.
Giri pulled his jacket tighter and approached the computer desk. A thick manual sat beside the keyboard, positioned with deliberate precision. Someone had prepared everything, expecting his arrival.
He flipped through the pages, scanning the section headers:
Awakened Expansion: SIP Testing Protocol v3.2Subject CalibrationSensory Input SynchronizationNeural Interface Protocol
The technical diagrams and dense procedures made his head spin. He set the manual aside and moved the mouse, waking the computer from sleep mode. A simple command prompt greeted him, its cursor blinking against the black screen.
"Really? LineOS and no interface?" Giri shook his head. "Talk about old school."
Following the manual's instructions, his fingers found the keyboard. He typed:
System -diag
After a few seconds, the results appeared:
System Diagnostics Report:
Power Supply: Checked
Sensory Input: Checked
Neural Interface: Checked
Cortex Visualization: Checked
Olfactory Simulation: Checked
Auditory Simulation: Checked
Tactile Feedback: Checked
Vestibular System Check: Checked
Over Voltage and Surge Protection: ...
The system paused for a fraction of a second, the cursor blinking rapidly. Then, finally:
Over Voltage and Surge Protection: Checked
Calibration: Checked
All Systems Nominal.
Giri tossed the manual aside, its pages fluttering as it landed on a nearby desk. The cold air nipped at his fingers as he positioned them over the keyboard.
"Time to see what you can do."
He typed the command with practiced precision:
Run Aeona --VR --SIP
The pod hummed to life. Lights flickered along its surface as internal systems activated. The computer screen filled with scrolling text, each line appearing faster than he could read.
[19:57:22] Initializing Aeona VR Environment...
The cooling units ramped up, their pitch rising to match the increasing power draw.
[19:57:22] Loading Sensory Input Modules...
Giri's heart raced. This was it - months of work coming together.
[19:57:23] Establishing Neural Interface Connection...
The neural headset's indicators blinked in sequence, running through their startup routine.
[19:57:23] Checking System Dependencies...
His breath caught as the text stopped scrolling. A single line appeared:
Standing by for S.I.P...
A series of lights blinked to life on the box beside the pod, pulsing in a mesmerizing sequence. The rhythm matched Giri's heartbeat, each flash drawing him closer to the moment of truth.
"Well, here goes nothing."
Giri slipped off his shoes, the cold floor sending a shiver through his feet. He climbed into the pod, surprised by the warmth that greeted him. The padding cradled his body, molding to his form with just the right amount of give. Despite its clinical appearance, the interior felt more like a luxury recliner than medical equipment.
His hand traced the contours of the neural headset. The surface felt impossibly smooth under his fingers, almost liquid to the touch. This piece of technology represented countless hours of work, dreams, and determination - not just his, but his entire team's vision made real.
This was it.
With steady hands, he lifted the headset and settled it over his head. The world shifted, his vision filling with text that seemed to float in space. No eye strain, no sense of looking at a screen - the images projected directly onto his retinas, as natural as opening his eyes in the morning.
[Headgear Pairing with S.I.P. and Aeonalus System...]
A progress bar materialized below the message, its edge crawling steadily rightward. Giri watched the percentage tick up, each increment bringing him closer to the unknown.
The bar filled.
System Ready.
A single button appeared, pulsing with an otherworldly blue glow. The color seemed alive, drawing him in with hypnotic intensity.
[LAUNCH]
Everything—years of coding, designing, rewriting, believing—had led to this moment.
His breath hitched as he focused on the LAUNCH button, his finger hovering just above it.
The soft hum of the machine, the whisper of cooling fans, the pulsing blue light.
No more hesitation.
Giri's finger dropped.
LAUNCH.
A jolt.
Not the smooth, seamless transition he expected—but a violent lurch.
The pod whined sharply, the hum twisting into an ear-splitting shriek—a scream of circuits straining beyond their limit.
Then—agony.
Searing, electric agony.
A thousand white-hot needles plunged into his nerves, lighting up every cell in his body. His muscles locked. Spasmed. Convulsed.
Electric! I'm being shocked!
The thought barely surfaced before it was drowned in unbearable pain. His heartbeat slammed erratically against his ribs, his vision blurring with blinding flashes behind his eyes.
Need to stop it.
His breath came in ragged gasps. He try threw himself forward out of the chair.
The headgear remained locked in place, as if the machine had grown sentient and refused to release him.
A spark.
Unseen by Giri, a thin arc of electricity leapt from the headgear's connection to the console, the sickly scent of burning metal filling the air.
His body jerked violently, fingers clawing at empty space.
He screamed—but the sound never left his throat.
His lungs collapsed inward, a pressure so intense it felt like his chest was imploding.
Then—his heart stopped.
The pain vanished.
The buzzing in his ears faded to silence.
Everything stopped.
No breath. No heartbeat. No sensation.
Nothing.
To an observer, Giri lay still.
His headgear remained attached, a thin wisp of smoke curling from the connection point. The console's lights flickered violently—erratic, desperate—before finally dying, plunging the room into near darkness.
The only sound left was the faint, eerie crackling of dissipating electricity.
Then—footsteps.
Rushed. Urgent.
Growing closer.
The moment faded to black.