Chapter 9: 9. Tin-can

My stupid mirror was adamant; the one who looked back at me was a girl. Without the pointy ears and with a dirty blonde color of hair, but otherwise the same as Charlie, the game character. But that’s it, right? Game character. How?

As I crashed onto my poor sofa, my mind raced to get the answers. Something happened and my body changed; well, I lacked something down there! Wait! The world seemed to be a little off, perhaps larger?

Darting off, I was stomping ground, almost crashing into my wardrobe. Why was I running so fast the dust flew all over my place? Easy, I was searching for the measuring tape, and after I rummaged in the drawer for a while and found it, and quickly controlled my height. Damn, only 5 feet, 5 inches. To ventilate my anger, I kicked an innocent cabinet, injuring myself, and sat on the sofa again.

“If I may, Miss Charlie,” a computer-generated voice surprised me. I hadn't heard so distorted voice since they developed the natural tts.

“Who the hell are you?!” I yelled at the voice and the emotions swirled inside me. Anger, fear, excitement, pain, sadness.

“I don’t have a name; my designated identification number is MK3-85. I am a computer core in your capsule.”

Bang, I hadn’t expected to hear that. Suddenly almost forgotten memories of news surfaced in my brain. Mark-3, Nathan’s experiment. Because people lived in stupid capsules, the company needed to amend the need for exercises; it ended badly. At least none died, as far as I know. Although, what about that girl who received a third arm? Or the dude who had two… something I didn’t have anymore. Damit! Naturally, I punched my stupid capsule.

“What the hell happened?”

“When you entered the system, the discrepancies between your body scan and actual body were more than my factory limit. In my factory, they programmed me to call the police. However, by my calculation and observation, there was over 98,74% chance that you would prefer to synchronize your body.”

I shook my head and punched a wall. This time a few drops of blood tricked down, but my weak attempt failed to make a dent. Whatever. “Like that would be possible…”

“Miss Charlie, I succeeded. Although I shortened your telomeres, and you will die twelve years earlier, by my estimation. The embryonic stem cell capacity wasn’t sufficient to alter the complete body DNA, so I had to order additional four containers, and your company’s AI agreed to a generous loan.”

What? I froze and stared at the capsule with my mouth open. How? Did robots get me again? After my inner contemplation, I said, “Geez, this is even better. Why not kill me right away? How much?”

“One canister has a market value of one million, but the company offered a deal, 800’000 credits per canister, so the cost was three and a half million credits. As your weekly salary is 2 thousands credits, the company will deduct 1 and half thousands over the next forty-five years.”

Look at that, Lucas wasn’t the only debtor. Just as he said that, my weak will failed me and I stumbled down to the ground, pulled knees to my chest and crashed my head on them. So that’s it? The stupid tin can… Tin-can altered my body? Yeah, I heard about creating bodies of athletes, well if people were rich enough. Growing artificial organs, replacing heart or parts of brain, but this? “How am I even alive?”

“The process was challenging, but your vital signs are in the norm.”

“It’s better to jump off the tall building, or consume ten liters of whiskey?”

“Miss Charlie?”

“Shut up, Tin-can!”

“Miss Charlie, your emotions may be unstable for a while. This procedure was unprecedented; I reco-”

I threw my old shirt at him. “Shut up!” I screamed and let tears out. A lot of them. I might be sexist, but now I am a girl for real, so crying is an option, right? Despite all my tears, I gazed up at my mirror again. No, you aren’t me.

Lucas finished his shower and checked the clock; he still had time to dive into the game and meet his friend. While he was pondering about it, he tried to do a simple call to John and to his surprise; the call got through. He wasn’t playing?

“What do you want?!” a trembling, melodic voice of Charlie with a clear anger in her voice invaded his ears. His mind refused to believe it, but his eyes confirmed it, because on his screen was a familiar girl, sitting on a ground in a pitiful position, wearing… almost nothing.

The shock of seeing her caused him to stagger, and he grasped a wall to prevent falling. “What’s going on? How did you change in reality?”

“What do you think, master hacker?! The AIs finally got me, it’s over. Sorry, I need to die.”

“Charlie, please don’t rush the decision. I will be there shortly.” Even though it wasn’t her, it was her. His mind tried to find answers, but he came up with nothing. To hell with that! “I will bring you clothes, do you know your new size?”

“Five-five, small as a dwarf. The rest dunno, don’t care.”

While was I thinking about how much whiskey it would take to kill me, my new capsule said, “Miss Charlie?”

“What the hell you want, you stupid piece of junk?”

“I would like to offer you an apology.”

“An apology? Right now, I need answers! How do I turn my body back?” I said and strode to the mirror again. There were no words to specify what I felt when I looked at the girl.

It stung so much, and I couldn’t bear it, so I threw yet another punch, this time at the mirror, and destroyed her. A little shiny pieces of mirror flew in all directions as I gave up on life and let the gravity take me down.

“That is nearly impossible. They archive your body scan at the government offline facility. Even if you manage to get your old body scan back, you would need at minimum thirteen canisters, because the body mass is bigger than yours. Your telomeres will shorten by approximately ten to twenty years.”

“So there is a way,” I said, as I examined my never cleaned ceiling and focused on that one good thing. There was a way. Yes, there had to be a way.

My bell rang, but I didn’t have any energy to answer it, so I gave the stupid trash Tin-can permissions to operate my smart home. What else could he do? Besides, there was a way, and the only one who could revert me back was Tin-can. Even though my emotional brain was hating it, I had to get his trust, if that stupid junk was capable of something like that.

Lucas raced in, almost jumping. What a funny guy, I flashed him a weak smile as he fell to one knee next to me. “John? No, Charlie, what the hell happened?”

“Oh, this?” I laughed, albeit it sounded more like a whimper, and pointed at the broken pieces. “I disagreed with a mirror; the mirror lost.” Showing him my fist, I finally noticed my bleeding hand. The pain was so mild, at least compared to the virtual reality, that I hadn’t known about it until now. What a hilarious situation. One punch of a virtual Boss was more painful than a cut open fist. I laughed madly and couldn’t stop.

Lucas stared at me in disbelief and examined my hand. After he somehow bandaged my wound, he offered me a hand; I rose. So what I was a girl; so what I felt like a Boss after a gang-bang of a full party. I would get my body back, even if I had to go to hell and back!

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“I need to break into a government offline facility.” I said in a confident, girly voice. Fine, that was the new normal.

“If you said Fort Knox, it would have been easier,” he tried to joke, but that only made me more sad and I weakly punched him to his chest. His surprised expression was uncomfortable, so I glanced away from him, but then he offered me a hug. As I hugged him, a warm feeling spread through my body, and my tears went down on their own, again. I couldn’t stop them, even if I wanted to. Which I didn’t.

“We will get thought this.”

Using sleeves to I wipe my tears, I studied his eyes. “No, we won’t. I know things, a lot of things I shouldn’t have. Who is important enough to save? What is important? I ignored it, but the pressure got me now. If I could choose, I would get drunk and forget.”

Without a word, he smiled at me and led me to a large bag he left behind. Oh yeah, he said something about clothes, right? Quickly pulling out, he gave me a long white sleeveless dress with a flower pattern, a white bra, panties and a pretty pedant - heart with a red gem and a silvery high heels shoes.

Not knowing any better, I dressed up on the spot. The underwear first, then the dress; it fitted perfectly. How could he know the exact size? Good job, Lucas.

After I saw my new shoes, I tensed up. That damn fool. Yes, the high heels were beautiful, but how was I supposed to walk in them? Did he forget about the game fiasco? I furiously walked towards him, barefoot.

His face reddened with an embarrassment, he backpedaled and shook his head. “I swear! I didn’t!”

“What?!” I snapped at him, but then took a deep breath. He was kind to come here, John, for the love of god, don’t antagonize your only ally. I glanced at the shoes again and yelled, “You idiot! I can’t walk in high heels!”

Tin-can interjected into our conversation, “I can offer you an instructional video.” Lucas’ ears perked up, and he glanced around my room with furrowed brows.

“Who the hell are you?” I giggled, because he stood in front of me as if to protect me. Silly Lucas.

Ignoring him, I slipped into the high heels, and it was a perfect fit for me, good job! Because he persistently looked around, I had to say, “Tin-can? He is the stupid computer core who changed me.”

“Special core mark-3, edition seven, nice to meet you.”

Lucas frowned, glanced at me with concern, as his voice was trembling, “The core where they tried to upload people’s brains, but failed?”

“You are correct; I used to be a human, but they couldn’t transfer my memories to the quantum core, so I lost them.”

“Charlie, take his chip and put in into the microwave. Now, before it’s too late. He can’t copy himself, so it will destroy him.” Really, Lucas? I gazed into his eyes to confirm it. Yes, he wanted to destroy Tin-can, despite that we needed him.

How could I say to him they were harmless? I read about it, but in the future. They usually only wanted to help, except the broken serial killer, but he was mad because they forced him to do something horrible I forget. Tin-can was the only one who could turn me back, and he wanted to kill him? That got me riled up, so I slapped him.

Lucas held a hand to his face with surprise in his eyes and glared at me. “What was that for? I want to help you!”

“Don’t be silly, I only grazed you with my nails. Now let’s go. Drinking will solve our every problem.”

The familiar sight of bar calmed me down, more so as the sixty-year-old barman grinned at us. I welcomed the atmosphere and went to my usual place. As I skimmed through the crowd, my emotions had subdued, like the time when my step-mother covered me with a blanked and gave me a warm milk. This pleasant feeling inside me found its way out as a smile.

Afterwards, another very unfamiliar feeling surfaced. Looks of people at the bar were uncomfortable, and the normal not-so-concerned stares changed as if I was for sale. What the hell? Maybe it was because I didn’t have any make-up? Or perhaps because of my messy hair? No way girls feel like this, right?

I shook my head and tried to ignore it, so I ordered my favorite drink, “Hey old man, can you make Old Thyme Sour?”

“Yes, young lady, but only after you look right in here,” Patrick nodded towards a retina scanner. Right, I wasn’t John. I complied with a sigh, and the stupid thing confirmed my age. Drinking age.

“That will take a while, right, old man? Then please one regular whiskey on ice.”

After avoiding three young punks playing billiard at the back, Lucas finally caught up to me and sat down next to me. “Go slower tonight, Charlie. You don’t know your limit yet, okay?” I only nodded and tasted my whiskey. Nothing was more delicious than an Irish whiskey at an Irish bar.

“Want to talk about it now?” He tried to lean towards the bar, but his hand slipped and he almost went down, so he rested his elbow instead. To his awkward display, and his genuine concern, I responded by shaking my head and enjoyed the sweet alcohol. No serious talk, please.

Because I wasn’t responding, Lucas shifted in his seat, opened his mouth, close it, then opened again. Only after I drank a third of my bottle, which took me ten seconds, he said, “Have you heard about the hero? I read heroes are ‘the players that will play a major role in the upcoming events!’”

“Yup,” I said as I finished my first drink. “I am the hero, alright. The skills are amazing, so I can carry us now.” Patrick handed me another drink just as I raised my hand. Another smile escaped my lips; that was it - robots couldn’t replace a good barman, especially him.

He laughed, “You are joking, aren’t you.” I didn’t answer him, instead I focused on that he was only half-way through his first beer. Lucas, you need to drink. I wanted to say, but only grinned and looked at Patrick.

He placed two sprigs of Rhyme and Chartreuse into an old glass and stirred. Then he took a shaker, added with two sprigs of Thyme, liquors, egg whites, syrup… It always amazed me how perfectly he could make drinks. No robot could ever reproduce that.

“Charlie? Please answer me! Are you joking? If you-” I ignored Lucas’ ramblings and couldn’t avert my eyes from the old man’s preparation. Why? Because of his skills, he lighted the glass on fire for a few seconds!

He noticed my stunned gaze and explained, with a wide grin, “How else I would add ‘smoky’ ingredient to the drink?” I nodded as it would be only logical, ignored Lucas once more, and picked up the glass with a nervous gulp. So perfect. In the next few priceless moments, I savored the yellow drink, as the sour taste melted in my mouth.

Lucas was fuming from all the ignoring, but he deserved it. Failed hacker. Naturally, I tasted the drink once more. Oh, how much I missed this! “The most delicious drink I have ever had!” I commented and averted my focus to the door, because Ian arrived.

After avoiding the crowd near the door, he noticed Lucas and walked toward us. My usual panic filled my heart, and before I could think of something, he stopped beside me and introduced himself.

“Charlie,” I said at least something. Why? Tell me why, you stupid panic thing! We had been friends since forever! As always, he ordered his dark beer, sat next to me and chatted with Lucas. Topic of their conversation I couldn’t hear, because my heart was too loud, and my head spun quickly.

This wasn’t something I could change without the aid of an alcohol. With a forced smile, I quickly finished the regular whiskey and ordered another one. Why? All stupid feelings, despite that Ian was an average man.

Female hormones? No way.

Hell, If I ever had to say who was the most average person in the universe, Ian would come among the top. That wouldn’t be fair though; he was good at smoking weed. As I hated smoking weed, I rated it as a flaw.

Maybe because he was working at the company, he always wore a gray shirt and blue jeans. Unremarkable face without something to point out, average voice. His dreaded hair was the only unusual thing about him, and I was stretching my definition of an unusual thing.

When a third whiskey disappeared in me, a warm feeling inside slowly spread and calmed my heart. Finally, I grinned and tune in to their conversation.

“… crazy! The runes, I mean. Like, who thought of that? I want to reset, but no, you don’t allow it.” Ah, Lucas rambled about his spells. To get his attention, I rose from my seat, hit him to his shoulder and grinned, before hugging him from behind.

Ian glanced at me with raised eyebrows, but I just continued grinning. After Lucas finished his rambling, I placed my chin on his shoulder, and said, “I bet Ian can’t talk about any specifics, am I right?”

“That’s right,” Ian nodded and hesitated. “But despite that I know little outside of my scope, I am a debugger - that means I fix the bugs that AI missed.” He glanced around for any spies. Poor Ian, why was he so scared of getting fired? I let go of Lucas and beamed before I hugged Ian around his shoulders and pressed at him. Why? Because why not?

“Did you like my bug report?” I whispered in his ear, almost screaming. Oops, sorry! “About the Goolems? Lucas told me your number!”

“That was you? You are the Princess, the hero?!” His eyes widened, and he smacked his mouth, but it was too late. My secret about being a hero was out. “Cha-charlie, I am sorry, I shouldn’t have, that is only internal information…”

Giggling at his innocence, I said, “That’s fine, my new buddy! Let’s drink to that!” Still clutching his shoulder, I leaned for my glass and raised it. “Let’s drink to the new beginnings, to the heroic moments that will come tomorrow! Will you play with us?”

Both of them hesitantly raised their glasses, but I didn’t have any of that and almost spilled my drink as I gesticulated to drink it. “Sure,” he said after thinking a while. “My name is Wian.”

Wian. Holding my laugh in, I buried my face into his shoulder. Why? Again, no reason. On other hand, it was a mistake, because now I reeked with weed as well. “Ugh, weed!” I complained. “Wian? You are even more unoriginal than Charlie’s Princess!”

Lucas finally finished his beer. First beer, what an amateur. As before, he shifted in his seat, and said with an uncertainty in his voice, “How come you can play? John can’t because he is a tester.”

“Our boss persuaded the higher-ups. Like the best debugging is on live servers, or something like that. We think that is because she sleeps with her boss and it would be weird if only she could play. So every department can issue something to let people play, but you have to sign NDA.”

“Crazy!” I laughed and finished my whiskey, and because the world spun really fast, I clutched Ian’s shoulder with one hand, while I gesticulated with the other, and said, “Haha! Sleeping with someone? My Boss would love to do that the other way around with Lucy!” With my free hand, I ordered more drinks.

“Charlie, don’t you think you had enough?” said the always serious Lucas, as he tried to spoil the mood.

What? Nonsense, I winked at him and grinned as I hugged his arm tightly and rested my face on his shoulder. “Silly Lucas, I never have enough.”