Common Dilemma

"A bio-machine would almost be considered a human if it wasn’t for the metal and electronic circuits that made up the core of the being. Apart from the brain and power source a bio-machine is made of organic parts. The organic parts of the machine however all conduct electric signals similar to that of circuits and wires allowing for transference of data and connecting to terminals. While the organs are strengthened and altered for the machine's physiology they remain tissue. All is living tissues from the skin that wraps around them to the muscles attached to the bones and even the blood in their veins.”

Herbert Stein, Machine Historian -

The days had passed for Satoru quickly. He had watched Asami being worked on hoping that he would find some answer from staring at her. In all the endless hours all he found was tired eyes and empty returns. He felt like he was going to explode. Each day that passed made the stress that was building up in him worse. It had all been in him before, but there was never the sense that he was being forced to make a decision until now. They were waiting for him and he kept walking around the subject.

Satoru couldn’t stand being in the room anymore and had left. He had finally begun to figure out the system that the underground was laid out in. Though he looked like he was wandering there was purpose to where he was heading. When the door opened it revealed a green park complete with a blue sky and chirping birds in the distance. It was a false room built to give the illusion of being on the surface for those that stayed away too long. An illusion felt good to him in the moment where everything was being revealed to him in ugly truths. He didn’t want to see anymore. A dream was a welcome peace.

The small park circled around itself leading to some stairs up to a balcony. Another entrance to the park was attached to the balcony, but Satoru had come for the view. It gave him a better perspective of the dream that he stood in. Unfortunately, it was just a dream and his reality was coming back to him. He was no closer to a decision than he was three days ago. "Asami…what should I do? I don't just know what I'm supposed to do any more. I don't have anyone left."

"I guess he is right," a voice from behind him said out of nowhere. The voice soon became a shadowed figure and then Natsuko. She stood in the middle of the entrance staring out at Satoru.

"Huh? Natsuko?" Satoru leaned back against the railing of the balcony, a little surprised to find that she was listening to him talking to himself. "How long have you been there?"

She walked out of the entrance from the hallway taking up a position next to him. Even though she was leaning on the railing next to Satoru she didn’t look at him. "Long enough. You need to quit hiding behind people and stand on your own." She was feeling like Yuu suddenly the way that she was talking to Satoru. So often when they talk she was protecting him or trying to be comforting rather than putting him back together. It was a strange feeling for her.

"That's easier said than done." Satoru turned back looking out at the park with Natsuko. He did not have to see her face to know what she was saying. "Nothing makes any sense anymore. The woman that I thought I loved is a machine and my best friend betrayed me. The company I worked for goes against everything that I believed in. There are machines out there trying to kill us and those that want to make peace with us. I just don't know who is who anymore."

Natsuko watched the birds fly around the park in the background. She didn’t have anything rehearsed for Satoru. It wasn’t really even her plan to be here, she just happened to be walking by when she saw Satoru go into the park. Since she had seen him she hoped to be able to talk to him, but ended up playing the role of bothersome friend. "In the end does it really matter who we are? Doesn't it matter who you are?"

Satoru couldn’t understand how Natsuko could say something like that. It was more important to know who the people around him were so that he knew what he was getting into. He needed to know them so he knew whom he could trust and whom he needed to watch out for when his back was turned. Unfortunately, there seemed to be no one in the world anymore that he could leave his back unguarded against. "But how can I trust anyone that I know. How can I trust you or the president? Everyone's betrayed and lied to me!"

Hearing Satoru tell her that he couldn’t trust her pained her to hear, but she understood what he was going through. He was filled with so much betrayal and lies that it was difficult to want to trust anyone now. She wished that she could simply wash it away so that he wouldn’t have to suffer anymore. "Satoru…it's human nature. What about yourself, can you trust yourself?"

"Myself?" It felt like everyone was telling him the same thing. He didn’t want to believe them. Everything that was happening was because of what he had become involved in. If he continued down the path he was afraid that he would even up making a mistake that would destroy what little piece he had left of himself. He had to avoid the abyss that constantly threatened to take him whole. All there was to protect him from himself was the fragile will that he was left in him. He couldn’t give that up and risk everything.

"You need to trust your feelings," Natsuko said, knowing that she was going to sound like she was repeating herself. She wasn’t sure if Satoru hadn’t thought about it or just didn’t want to consider the thought. Natsuko believed it to be closer to the latter seeing the way that he was reacting. However, that made her job more difficult if he was just pushing it aside or ignoring it. It would mean that she had to convince him to change his mind and she knew that it was difficult to do that with Satoru. When he was dead set on something he wasn’t going to change.

He left the company when they changed their policy and work without so much as a regret or second thought. Even after all of the efforts to get him back it was only because he came after Asami that he did return. It had nothing to do with the company and wanting to work. If he only knew what was really happening she knew that he would change his mind. Yet she wasn’t allowed to talk to him about it. "If you can't trust anyone else in the world, all that leaves is yourself. Trust yourself."

"But what if what I'm doing is wrong?" Satoru couldn’t so easily accept what he was doing was right. It wasn’t as though he didn’t want to accept it. If he could actually accept it his life would be much easier on him. However, it was the vying thoughts that he was going against what the public and everyone thinks to be right and following his heart. Following his heart could mean betraying everyone in the world and becoming its enemy. He wondered sometimes why he had such trouble with betraying everyone since he was already betrayed countless times. But it continually fell to him trying to see himself as an enemy of the world. "What sort of justification is that?"

"Does it really matter if you got the world against you if you know you've followed your heart?" She knew what he was thinking about it well enough. It was a thought that she had everyday. Even now she wondered if she was doing the right thing knowing that if they failed or things changed dramatically history would see them as betrayers, traitors of humanity. The idea sat like lead in her stomach turning everything sour. All she could do was believe and know it was right even if the world didn’t agree.

Satoru wanted to stare at Natsuko to try to see the expression on her face to read what she was saying, but he kept looking forward. It was a silent agreement between them that they weren’t going to face each other. He wasn’t even sure why he had agreed. The reason didn’t matter at this point. All he needed was someone to speak to hoping that it would bring him to a clear resolution or even just remove some of the conflict. The advice was all too familiar for him. "How can you make it sound so easy?"

Natsuko closed her eyes for a moment, having an image come to her in her mind. It made her smile warmly thinking about it. "Because I'm following what my heart says right now. It may make me the enemy of many people, but I'm doing what I believe to be the right path. You know what path you should follow. I believe that. You just have to allow yourself to take that step and no longer be afraid of the choices."

There was a strange subtext to what she had said that Satoru wasn’t sure that he was interpreting correctly. "Natsuko…" he said, turning to look at her hoping to see her face to get an idea of what it was that he was supposed to have heard. However, she walked away from the balcony exiting from the park and disappeared into the hall. Satoru stood with his back against the balcony trying to understand what he had just heard. It felt as though she was saying one thing and meaning something completely different while still meaning what she was saying. The paradox left him confused and allowed him to escape from his troubles for a moment.

"Following your heart, Natsuko? You sure you want him to do that?" There was a figure in the shadows of the hallway that had been eavesdropping on their conversation for at least the last part. When Natsuko passed by the figure stopping with her back turned the light in the hall slowly faded on. It was Yuu leaning against the wall looking surprisingly serious for the moment.

"He's already made his choice a long time ago," she said looking down with her head pressing against her shoulders. It was the sad truth that she had faced already. She knew that there was nothing that she could do, but push him in the direction that he was already going. There was no pulling away. "I know that, but I'll stand at his side knowing that my feelings will never be returned. He deserves to be happy. We all do, right?"

"Yes, we do," he said, answering quickly. It was a simple answer, but even in this world of despair and violence it still was something everyone should have. Yuu looked down the hallway at the entrance to the park. "Perhaps he will be the one to show us to that future."

"I believe in him…"

Uncertainty had been the chef's special for Satoru and he was growing tired of the taste. He wasn’t sure if he should really be looking for advice from Yuu, but the man also had answers to other questions. If for nothing else it might make the picture clearer for him. The thought of something clearer right now seemed like a fantasy, but he could hope. "Excuse me. I wanted to ask you something."

Yuu looked up from his desk looking as though he was working when he in fact had seen Satoru coming down the hall. He leaned back in his chair having a pretty good idea what he was here to talk about. "If you're here for advice about what you should do then you don't need to waste your breath. I'm not going to say that you probably haven't heard anyway from people you know better."

'Figures…I guess I'll move on.' Satoru walked into the office even though it looked like Yuu wanted him to leave. The man had screwed with him enough that he didn’t care what he wanted. Satoru wanted some answers. "Fine, but there is still one other thing I want to know about. What's going on here?"

"What do you mean?" Yuu said leaning further back in his chair pretending like he didn’t know what Satoru was getting at. It wasn’t something that he wanted to address until a decision had been made.

Satoru sat down in the chair that he had originally woken up in. "You know what I mean, don't play dumb with me." He gave Yuu some time to respond on his own while he adjusted into the chair. The long awkward delay unfortunately didn’t do what he had hoped, leaving it up to Satoru to press the vague into the obvious. "This faction stuff. I remember hearing something about a President Faction. There is some internal company fighting or something. What happened since I've been away?"

The chair rolled around facing Yuu towards the monitors along the wall. On the screens were placed images and videos of what appeared to be fighting between two groups of people in an unknown location. It took Satoru a moment to realize that it was in the Qintech building and that they were employees. What he saw looked like some war zone out of a movie. "These are images and recordings from cameras in the building. Some of these are actually happening right now, though thankfully most are old."

"Why is there fighting in the company and why hasn't the government done anything to stop it?" Satoru wanted to stand up, but he chose to lean forward trying to keep his composure. This sort of violence would never have gone ignored by the government and police. They would have stepped in quickly; it should have been on the news. 'But I guess I haven't watched the news in a while…'

"That's because the government is involved. They are part of the reason this is happening."

"What!? You can't be serious. The government would never do something like this on its own citizens!" He couldn’t sit down anymore and listen to Yuu. Satoru marched over to Yuu, staring at him trying to see more of what he was saying.

Yuu changed the monitors to a single view showing a room where there was a mass of people grouped together shouting about something. Satoru couldn’t tell what it was about without audio, but it is certain that they were angry or protesting something. "A week ago employees became fed up with what they were working on. Between the long hours that they were being forced to work and the distaste for the work itself they protested. A large percentage of the employees gathered in the main meeting hall and locked themselves in on protest.

"It was then that the divide began and those that agreed with the work took up one side and those that disagreed, the other. Most of the people being technicians, programmers, researchers and engineers they didn’t really do much more than debate and argue. But since the military was invested in the project being completed quickly sent an ultimatum. Return to work or be so under force. That was enough to sway the weaker that opposed, but many still disagreed. I have you to thank for that." Yuu pulled up videos of Natsuko rallying people together in the room of those that remained. Satoru could see others in his team nearby with her trying to keep people from collapsing under the pressure.

"Well the military had had it and wasn’t going to negotiate considering this a war time situation and military project. They stormed the building two days ago with the help of many of the employees that sided with them. The primary figure was Kiyoshi, your friend. He took charge of those that were on their side and ended up killing many of those that opposed. Natsuko and those that resisted barricaded themselves in the meeting room. Being skilled with computers they were able to hold off the military for while by locking them out."

Satoru couldn’t stand listening to him so casually go through what happened. He had to interject before he blew up. "And where were you in all this?" It was obvious from what he had seen that Natsuko made it out and was working with the President, thus the President Faction name. But how could he have let this all happen to begin with?

"I was unfortunately not in the office for the last month on business. When I heard what was going on I rushed back. I found out that in my absence someone had taken advantage of me not being in direct control and made certain changes. Namely, the canceling of all projects and the activation of the dead Adam Project. All that information was held privately. Someone hacked my computer and obtained the information no doubt with the military's help. I still haven't figured out who was behind it. I was late in arriving, but I was able to take control of the building's systems and rescue Natsuko and her group before the military was able to kill them. Since then they have hid in here running small hit-and-run strikes on facilities in the building that the military has been trying to use."

"I can't believe it. Has everyone gone mad?" Satoru couldn’t stand watching the monitors anymore, turning away. He had seen enough to see what was happening. It was disturbing to know that the military would be so obsessed with getting the project finished that they would kill civilians that were peacefully protesting. 'The world really has gone insane now…'