The Return of the Beloved Son

Connection

"It's simple, we have your little girlfriend turn it on for us." Okabe smiled, pinching his chin to give himself a cool look.

Subaru was flabbergasted, his mouth hung open, but no sound came out, until he managed to stammer, "Ho-How do you know about Rem?"

Okabe looked up to the ceiling with a thoughtful look, "So that was her name, weird. With her blue hair I would have thought she was a..." Okabe looked at Subaru, removing his hand from his chin and holding it palm up, "...a Taylor? What do you think?"

Subaru walked up to Okabe and grabbed his lab coat's collar again, "I'm thinking you're crazy and you should tell me how you know who she is!"

"Hey, hands off the coat," Tugging the collar from Subaru's grasp, Okabe began to fix it's positioning, "My lab coat is a symbol of my dedication to science! I will not let you defile it's perfect structure!"

Subaru didn't care about the coat, he wanted answers. "Well, I'm so-rry if I messed up your oh-so perfect giant white rag, but I'm kinda tensing up right now because you have information I reeeally need to know."

Okabe walked around Subaru, Subaru met his eyes, and didn't drop his gaze, watching Okabe like a hawk. Okabe grabbed a phone that was charging on a metal table, "Wouldn't the whole world like to know." Removing the cable from the phone, Okabe turned around to present it to Subaru, the tail of his coat flowing. "Behold! The Metia Communication System, Mark 2, Version 1!"

Subaru said nothing, only staring in wonder at the phone, causing Okabe to speak his thoughts out loud, "Weird, I expected applause." Subaru reached out to the phone, Okabe placed it in his hands. It was a normal flip phone, complete with a screen and a number pad.

"It-It can call Rem?" Subaru look up at Okabe, hopeful.

"Yes and no. You see, the version I am holding has the same operating system as the one you have in your very pocket. Go ahead try calling yourself."

Subaru directed the phone to the contacts list. In it he found only one contact: Natsuki Subaru. There was no number to go with it.

Pressing the call button, the screen showed that it had found Subaru's metia and was connecting.

Bzzz Bzzz Bzzz Bzzz

Taking his metia out, Subaru saw that the there was no caller ID. It worked. Subaru handed the makeshift metia back to Okabe, "But this still doesn't explain how you know what Rem looks like."

"Another great example of my incredible self!" Okabe clicked a few buttons on the metia and showed the screen to Subaru, "Every metia is able to be copied onto another to switch over one's information onto a new metia during a purchase. This would include photos and contacts, but in this case I was only able to retrieve your photos and contact." On the screen was the photo gallery, showing dozens upon dozens of photos of Rem.

Blushing madly, Subaru said, "Dele-Delete those right n-now! Those are supposed to be private!"

Okabe had a smug look, "I didn't have much to work with when I came back to Japan, but I made do with what I had. I recreated my original metia hoping it would work, but there was just one problem, I had nothing to test it with. So, I created something capable of detecting the signal that comes from each metia." Okabe rushed to a collection of shelves that held all kinds of tools and weird gadgets.

"I had put it somewhere," Okabe began to shift through the objects. "I'm pretty sure I had left it right here, hmmmm how strange." Okabe scratched his head then shrugged his shoulders, "I must have put it somewhere else, I guess." Okabe froze, "No, unless..."