My room was set opposite James’ room, and the two doors that led to both our rooms were actually set to one side off from a circular spot on the maintenance deck of the ship.

In the middle of that spot, as I walked by, it looked like a kind of supercomputer sat there. One gigantic mass of cables and wires flowed all around the walkway surrounding it, while the tower itself looked to mostly be one solid core of metal. Its monitor was enormous, and seemed to be running any number of programs in various windows. I could see the edges of panels around its core, some of them flung open with all the wiring and such running to them.

James arrived at the same time I did, though he didn’t say much to me as he walked by. He just nodded at me, gave a curt, “Goodnight,” and then disappeared into his room. I gave the computer one more look before quietly slipping into my own new home.

It didn’t look to have much in the way of comfortable furnishings. I didn’t even see a bed when I first walked in. Piles of discs and cards were strewn about, though for the life of me, I couldn’t see anything around that might use them. I casually glanced at a few as I stepped in, seemed to mostly be installation software for all kinds of programs.

I scratched my head, looking around. There was nowhere to sit, nowhere to lie down, no shelves to put anything on, it was basically just an empty room except for the mess that had been left behind.

“Um… Hello?” I tried.

“Good evening, Tilana.” It was the same voice that had interrupted me back in the video room. I still couldn’t figure out its source, but I thought it was decidedly male. As soon as it greeted me, a large panel in the floor pulled away and a padded chair set on a platform rose from the resulting hole. It had a grey helmet attached to a cord resting on top of it, but otherwise looked like a more comfortable version of those exam chairs at a doctor or dentist’s office. “Please, have a seat.”

I slowly walked over to the chair, a little apprehensive of it.

“Don’t worry, no harm will come to you by sitting in it. This is where you plug in.”

I folded my arms lightly. “Well, I don’t know who or where you are, though.”

“Of course. Look above the door.”

I turned around and did as I was asked, noticing a small black dome, a security camera. “OK…?”

“That’s me.”

I unfolded my arms, glancing over my shoulder at the chair again. “You have a name?”

“My creators gave me the designation of JAR8311CN42. You may call me Jerry, if you wish.”

I figured it was an AI of some kind, I guess I wasn’t terribly surprised. I took a seat in the chair, leaning back and settling in. “Nice to meet you, Jerry.”

His voice wasn’t completely monotone like most artificial programs, but it certainly lacked any kind of enthusiasm. It reminded me of the manner James talked in, if perhaps a little more at ease. “Nice to meet you, Tilana. If you would please plug in now.”

I looked over the chair again. “Uh…?”

“Please remove your clothes.”

I raised my eyebrows, looking back to the security camera. “Excuse me?”

“In order to properly plug in and to prevent any damage to your person, it is required for all engineers to remove their clothing before plugging in.”

At the sister facility, this wouldn’t normally be a big deal – people were stripped down to nothing all the time. But I had sort of expected those requirements to be gone after getting on board this ship. Still, I couldn’t really see the point of arguing with a computer – it’s not like it was going to give in.

I stood up out of the chair and unzipped the sides of my boots and slipped out of them, slipping my jacket off and unbuttoning my shirt. I let them both pool on the floor, then undid my bra, dropping it beside the growing pile of clothes. After unbuttoning my pants and slipping them off, my panties soon followed. I actually felt comfortably warm in the room – I hadn’t noticed the temperature control as I entered, I guess it had been taken into account for just that reason. “Now what?”

“Please sit back down and plug in.”

I returned to my seat. “How?”

“The helmet. Please put it on.”

I reached up and took hold of the helmet, looking around the inside of it. It seemed pretty smooth, not like there was anything to plug into me or vice versa. It looked like it was supposed to completely encapsulate the top half of my head, with little headphones where my ears would go, and a flip-down visor. As I started to slip it on, I glanced up at the security camera above the door. “So why do you call it plugging in?”

No sooner had I finished my question and put the helmet on, I suddenly felt a strange, prickling and tingling sensation cover every part of my body that was touching the chair, and the visor on the helmet fell down into place, obscuring my vision. I was about to start, when I realized I couldn’t move my body, though my head was still able to move around. “What’s going on?”

“Relax, Tilana.”

I was a little agitated at being kept in secrecy. “No, I mean it, what exactly am I doing in here that I have to do every night?”

“This is your time to recharge, Tilana, as well as my time to provide you with any data you’ll need to know for tomorrow. Goodnight.”

I blinked. “What do you mean goodnight?”

I soon found out, as the sensation quickly spread to the rest of my body, completely numbing it. I found even my head was no longer able to move, I couldn’t talk at all, and a very heavy drowsiness overtook my senses. I tried to fight against it, to somehow do… Well, something. Anything. It was futile, though, whatever Jerry did to “plug me in,” he was apparently very good at it. Darkness overtook me before I could give it much more thought than that.

8:55 AM found me leaving my room, not entirely sure when I had woken up or when I had put my clothes back on. I felt a little out of it as I almost bumped into James when we met outside our rooms. He reached out and settled his hands on my shoulders, steadying me as he looked at me from behind his sunglasses. “Don’t worry, you’ll get used to it.”

I nodded some, more limply bobbing my head than anything else, as my hair fell in front of my face. I couldn’t quite get my thoughts together. “I… Uh…”

He lets his hands away from me, turning and walking down the tunnel away from the supercomputer. I wasn’t really sure, but I had the feeling I was probably supposed to be going the same place he was headed.

As it turns out, we ended up at a mess hall of sorts. I say that because I didn’t actually see anyone else there besides the two of us. No crew, no passengers, nothing. Hell, there was really only one table, upon which rested a couple bowls of something I can best describe as slop. I wasn’t even really sure how I recognized it as a mess hall at first until James said, “0900 hours. Breakfast.”

I rubbed my head softly, nodding as the two of us went and took our seats, opposite each other at the table. He picked up a spoon lying next to his bowl and proceeded to eat his slop. I kind of just sat there, hands resting against the chair limply, staring idly at my slop. Really, the stuff looked terrible.

James seemed to feel otherwise, though I figured it was more that he had built up a tolerance to it. He paused briefly, looking at me from behind his sunglasses. “Eat.”

I managed to form a coherent thought and the very first thing I could think of to say was, “This looks like it might try and eat me.”

He shrugged. “Has everything you need to keep you healthy, and it doesn’t have much of a taste, so I don’t think there’s anything you can really complain about.” He then returned to silently eating his breakfast.

I begrudgingly picked up my spoon and dipped it into the bowl, bringing it back up to my lips. It didn’t have a smell to it, and when I ate it, it really didn’t taste like anything. It was kind of a strange sensation. To be honest, I disliked it. Everything natural you eat is supposed to taste like something. “What is it?”

“Breakfast.”

I narrowed my eyes up at him. I was tired of the answers I was getting to most of my questions. “Smartass.”

He stared back at me for a moment before answering. “I don’t know what’s in it. It ensures I don’t die or otherwise become unhealthy due to poor eating habits.”

I sighed softly, taking a few more bites. As James finished his bowl, however, he simply set the spoon in the empty bowl, rewarded with that clinking sound dishes make, then stood up. “Breakfast is over.”

I blinked, looking up at him. “I’m not done.”

He started walking to the exit of the mess hall. I looked back at my slop, realizing I would probably be hungry if I didn’t finish, but I had the feeling I might get in trouble if I didn’t follow him. I wasn’t sure why, it just seemed like a good idea to keep his schedule for my first full day. I dropped my spoon in the goop, and got up, going to catch up with James. “Hang on a second, I can’t run too well yet.”

Without looking back at me, he just said, “You’ll get used to it.”

As we got back to the supercomputer that stood between our rooms, I was finally starting to feel a little more normal. Normal enough, anyhow, that I remembered I had some questions for James.

“James?”

“Tilana.”

“What exactly happens when we plug in?”

He touched a button on the monitor and a panel opened to reveal a small microphone. “Hardware engineer.”

The computer screen shifted its windows around for awhile, then scrolled a lot of text off, none of which I was able to actually read. James just sort of stared at it for a little while as it flew by. When it finished, the monitor returned to its regular display of windows. James looked at me, expectantly.

I blinked, looking between him and the monitor. The microphone seemed to be waiting for me, as well. I stepped up to it, leaning in slightly, “Um… Soft…ware engineer…?”

A flood of information started rushing through my brain, so fast I wasn’t even sure exactly what it was. I could see a lot of text scrolling by on the screen, just like it had with James, and while I wasn’t consciously aware of what it said, I knew I was somehow reading it and storing it away. Then, all at once, it stopped. I stumbled back, feeling like someone had just punched me through my face into the back of my head.

I heard Jerry’s voice. “A little present for you, Tilana.”

“God… Damnit!” I rubbed my head at the pain, then realized what Jerry had said, so I looked up to see a small panel had opened up next to the microphone, a tiny case being extended at the end of a metal rod. My head throbbed again. “Ugh…”

James simply said, “You’ll get used to it.”

I cast a sidelong glance at him. I was tempted to tell him to fuck off, or something to that extent, but I ended up biting my tongue and taking the offered case. It was like something you might keep a ring in, though smaller. I opened it up to see half a pill sitting inside it, with a little Z stamped on it.

As soon as I opened the case and James saw what it was, he turned back to the supercomputer. “Jerry, no.”

Jerry came back, calm and peacefully, “What’s wrong, James?”

His jaw was hard-set, and he had that same tone of voice from when he warned me not to take the drug. “She doesn’t want your present.”

I shook my head, picking up the little half-pill. “What is it?”

“While you were plugged in, I sensed that you had a lot of curiosity about how ZX7 feels. I thought you might like to try it before lunch, you have a light workload today,” Jerry said.

James turned to me, his gaze set and unblinking. I guess – I still hadn’t seen his eyes, so I guess it always felt like he was always staring. “Don’t you dare.”

I furrowed my brow, putting the drug back in its case before pocketing it, then setting my hands on my hips. “You know, you never even told me what was so bad about it, it seemed like a pretty good thing from what I was watching.”

“It is not worth it, I-“

Jerry chimed in, silencing James. “You have work to get to, James.”

He immediately stopped, though his jaw remained clenched tight. He stared at me for another moment, then shook his head, turning and walking off. I scratched my head, glancing at the monitor. “Do you really think it’ll be OK if I take this, Jerry?”

“Of course, Tilana. Enjoy.”

I somehow felt the urge to go back to the video monitoring room, like instinctively I knew there was something I was supposed to do there. I had the feeling it was all the information that had been shoved into my mind a few moments before speaking to me at a subconscious level. “Um… Thanks, Jerry, I guess.”

“You’re welcome, Tilana.”