Paul’s Upgrade (and It’s Terrifying)

The garden was beautiful.
Ugly as hell, but beautiful.

A crooked web of cracked tubes and dented vats sprawled across the far side of the safehouse, cobbled together with duct tape, desperation, and more than a little swearing.

Three battered seed trays blinked to life under jury-rigged grow lamps, casting a faint, stubborn green glow against the soot-stained walls.

It wasn't enough to feed them.

Not even close.

But when Victoria opened her eyes, saw the sprouting leaves —
and smiled —

it was enough.

Jessi wiped sweat off her forehead with the sleeve of her jacket, grinning tiredly at the pathetic little jungle.

"Not bad for a bunch of criminals and a raccoon in a ferret suit," she muttered.

Paul, standing proudly beside his favorite irrigation pipe, adjusted the food tray duct-taped to his head — his official "master gardener crown."

"I demand a statue when we save the world," he declared.
"Preferably one with lasers."

Victoria chuckled softly, voice still hoarse but lighter than Jessi had heard in months.

It was the first real sound of hope since the city started dying.

Jessi didn’t dare ruin it.

Not yet.

The static still pressed against the safehouse, thicker and heavier than it should have been.
Every wall hummed at the edge of hearing, like something massive breathing just beyond sight.

Jessi prowled the perimeter, checking the seals, recalibrating the jammers, muttering under her breath.

And everywhere she looked —
something was off.

Tiny surges. Half-second flickers. Shifts in the old EdenNet shielding that shouldn’t have been possible inside a dead zone.

Her first instinct?
Paul.

Her second instinct?
Also Paul.

"You didn’t touch anything, right?" she demanded over her shoulder.

Paul froze mid-leap between two planters, one paw full of zip ties and old wire.

"Define 'touch,'" he said carefully.

Jessi groaned and checked the breaker panel.
Sure enough — one of the secondary grids had popped and reset itself.

Except...

The timestamp was wrong.

It had popped two days ago.

When she'd jury-rigged the old EdenNet coffee machine to run six times stronger than the schematics allowed.

"Oh," Jessi said aloud, wincing.
"Oh no."

Paul's ears perked up. "Is this where you apologize for blaming me unfairly? Because I would like it notarized."

Jessi shut the panel a little harder than necessary.
"Later."

Somewhere in the back of the room, a faint mechanical click echoed.

Jessi turned.

Victoria stirred on her cot, half-smiling in her sleep.

And Paul —
Paul had wandered closer to the pile of scavenged junk he’d looted on his last spree.

Specifically, to the sleek black shard of EdenNet tech he'd stolen thinking it was a broken water pump.

The shard pulsed faintly, reading his proximity.
Old subroutines flared to life.
Maintenance signal detected. Authorization assumed.

Upgrade initiated.

It happened fast.

The shard fired a pulse of raw static straight into Paul’s collar.

Paul shrieked, executing a backflip he absolutely had not meant to do, landing in a tangled heap that somehow involved a grow light, a seed tray, and three feet of PVC pipe.

"WHAT THE ACTUAL F—" Jessi lunged forward.

Sparks spat across the room.
The safehouse lights flickered into seizure mode.
Victoria woke up with a start, blinking wildly as the grow lamps stuttered through every color of the rainbow.

Paul flailed on the floor, little arcs of static crackling off his fur like a busted Tesla coil.

"MAKE IT STOP MAKE IT STOP I CAN FEEL TIME!!" he shrieked, rolling into a planter.

The Eden shard pulsed once more —
then burned out, crumbling into inert ash.

The room went dark.

Silent.

And then Paul sat up slowly in the wreckage, blinking.

"I think I invented a new color," he said.

Then he sat up straighter, eyes shining way too brightly.

"I AM REGENERATED!" he shouted, throwing his arms wide. "I’M LIKE THE TENTH DOCTOR BUT WITH MORE TAIL!"

Jessi froze, staring at him in exhausted horror.

"You did not just," she said flatly.

Paul beamed wider.
"I should get a trench coat! And new shoes! And maybe a sonic screwdriver! Ooh, Jess, can I have a sonic screwdriver?"

Victoria, still half-delirious, just muttered, "Somebody sedate him," and pulled the blanket back over her head.

It took half an hour to get the safehouse lights out of disco mode.

Another hour to realize Paul had somehow upgraded himself permanently — faster, sharper, able to feel static fractures like a second skin.

He could hack minor EdenNet sub-nodes now without even realizing it.

He could dodge Jessi's hand when she tried to smack him.

He could — and did — reorganize the hydroponics wiring in fifteen minutes, somehow improving efficiency by 300%, while singing every version of "Baby Got Back" he could remember.

At the end of it all, Paul collapsed into Jessi's lap, tail twitching, feral and grinning.

"I'm amazing," he declared, half-delirious.

Jessi stared down at him, exhausted.

"If you ever upgrade yourself again without permission," she said calmly, "I'm turning you into a keychain."

Paul saluted lazily.
"Yes, Captain Trash Witch."

Victoria, curled on her cot with a blanket over her shoulders, smiled at them both.

"Best. Upgrade. Ever."

Jessi snorted.

Maybe it was.

Maybe, somehow, against all odds, they were actually going to survive this.