Enzo Fenton-Matrix

Danny followed Mouse, and as soon as they were out of earshot of the waiting room, asked, "This wouldn't happen to be a scan of the excruciatingly painful variety, right? If it is, and it has to be done, I'll do it, for her. But I'd at least like some warning."

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"Naw, sugar, it's not the kind you gotta get poked for," Mouse assures him. "It is the kind you gotta be undressed for, though." She waves over at the scanner bed, then turns and heads for the control panel. "I'll just daintily avert m'eyes an' all that."

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His cheeks went dark purple.

"Geez. The only thing that makes this suck less is that while it won't the first time I'll have been wearing less than I wanted to in front of people I'd rather be clothed in front of, is that at least this is the first time the naked will have happened while in a lab," Danny said, fussing with his clothes. Skin. Whatever it was.

"That would have been so super creepy the last few times, considering."

Hnn.

"...Okay, how do I take my clothes off here? They, uh--they don't have hems."

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"With yer icon," Mouse says. "Since you only got the one set o'clothes, double-clickin' should do it. Lie down on th'scanner an' wait fer me an' Oracle t'get set up b'fore ya try." That will minimize any injuries to Danny's dignity.

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Oracle has already busied herself looking over the scanner controls. "This is your equipment," she says looking over at Mouse, "So this will probably go faster if you don't have me mucking about with your settings."

She's bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet very slightly.

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"Just watch th'displays on th'left," Mouse says. "Runnin' the scan won't take more'n th'press of a button, 'less somethin' funny happens. I mostly want ya here t'help me look over th'results from th'scan." Mouse figures that Oracle might catch something she'd miss, whether during or after the scan of Danny.

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"Okay then," Oracle nods and opens a series of vid-windows streaming data about code structure and instabilities. "Whenever you're ready."

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"Just to let you know, um, Vlad--my evil arch-nemesis, who created Dani?--seemed to think he needed a DNA sample from me mid-transformation to stabilize his other clone--which means Dani would need it. So you might need to scan me when I'm transforming, which'll be a little hard with how fast it happens, but I think I could hold it out."

He was likely right. Each form would scan fine, but the transformation from one to the other was a complicated bit of interchange with the metaphysical and matter, when he was human. As a sprite it'd be a very complicated change in code.

Now for naked time. Argh.

Danny tapped his icon and squeezed his eyes shut, his cheeks a dark, dark purple. Not only was he naked--and teenage boy naked at that--but he had to be in front of two older chicks while he was. And all purple at that.

Apparently, all purple everywhere.

It was a testament to how much he wanted Dani healthy that he was willing to undergo such a blow to his awkward teenage boy modesty.

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"Okay, sugar," Mouse says. "We're gonna do a scan o'you in each format. Since th'scan takes 'bout a nanosecond - that's a minute to you - so doin' a mid-switch scan is gonna be tricky. How long can ya keep switchin' back an' forth?"

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"Geez, it takes about two seconds--that's, you know, user seconds. Teeny tiny amount of time to me. But I think I can hold it out a minute. I've done it before."

Under extreme duress, when he was trying to resist the change being forced, so he had a little experience with it.

"Tell me when to do it." When the first scan was done.

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"Just do a straight switch t'yer other format," Mouse instructs him. "Then we'll try a mid-switch scan." If Danny can't stay in mid-change during the scan, she'll have to figure a workaround, but they can burn that bridge when they come to it.

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Danny went ghost, so she could scan that.

"Tell me when." To do the hard part.

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When Mouse is finished with the second scan, she speaks to Danny with uncharacteristic gravity. "We're gonna try the mid-switch scan now. I don't want ya t'hurt yerself, so if y'can't stay suspended, then don't. We'll figure out a workaround."

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"No, I can do it. I can. Just tell me exactly when to start."

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"Okay," Mouse says. She starts the scanner, letting it go about three-quarters of the way through its usual warmup cycle before saying "Now."

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Fwash.

The rings of light started at his middle and started to spread up and down his body, revealing purple skin again (the suit always always came automatically when he went ghost, but that was imprinted in from the accident, and part of his ghost form).

He stopped the rings, and from the way his face contorted, it was probably readily apparent that it was quite a strain to do it and that he possibly lied about it not being painful.

A workaround might have been difficult though. The code that came streaming in was horribly complex, because it was reflecting a very complex change. They were seeing the digital equivalent of someone's DNA reverting matter into another type of matter mixed with a sort of energy.

It was also probably pretty easy to see how the actual transformation itself, and the use of the powers, triggered Dani's instability.

In fact, it was pretty much a miracle that the accident hadn't just vaporized Danny--and Vlad--or left them puddles of steaming human goo, and even more of a miracle that Dani, being cloned from him, was even as stable as she was.

The laws of chance worked in funny ways sometime.

Keeping the rings inching along would have had beads of sweat rolling down his face at this point, if he could sweat, and his hands were balled into fists. It was like holding your breath for too long, or trying to lift something too heavy. Some things your body just wasn't meant to do.

"How--much--" Longer. How much longer? was what he was trying to ask.

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"Ten picoseconds." Mouse has been working on the fly, trying to get the system to match extrapolated data from the previous scans with this one so there won't be any redundancy and the process will go faster. "Hang in there..."

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Oracle watches the numbers flash by, her mind extrapolating differences in the scan data and attempting to identify transportation patterns. Under Mouse's guidance, the scan finishes slightly more quickly than it might have otherwise and Oracle calls out, "Got it!"

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OH, sweet relief.

Danny let go with a gasp, and the rings finished traveling up in down, and it seemed they almost did it faster, as if to make up for being slowed down.

He was left naked, still slightly embarrassed for being naked, and slightly exhausted, in a vague, unfamiliar sort of way, on the exam bed.

"Do--do you need to scan it going the other way?" he asked tiredly. "Or is that enough? If you need it, I-I can do it the other way."

Heck, he'd go through what Vlad put him through again if it meant Dani could be fixed.

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After a moment to look over the data scrolling past, Oracle shakes her head, "The transform sequence is a pretty complex piece of code, but it looks like we got everything we need to go both ways from that one scan." She turns to Mouse to make sure that there's nothing else they need.

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"It's all good," Mouse says. "Go ahead, put yer stuff back on an' head out to the waitin' room when yer ready. Ask yer cuz t'come in." Mouse hopes they won't have to do a mid-shift scan with Dani, because she may not be able to hold out that long. "An' thanks, darlin. You're pretty crashin' tough, when it comes right down t'it." Maybe that ego-boost will compensate for the ego-bust of having to be naked in a scanner.

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"Heh. Compared to the last time, this was cake," Danny said, sitting up and beeping his clothes back on.

"Hello clothes."

Whoo. Much better.

He hopped off the bed and headed out, but stopped at the door. "Um, I know you're going to do your best, but--she'll be okay, right? This will work?"

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"It'll work," Oracle looks up from the open windows in front of her. "We've done this before, after all, and it worked that time too." She smiles, "The sooner you get Dani in here, the sooner we can get this over with and you can stop worrying."

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