Ninjago - One-shots and short Stories

In His Head // Zane and P.I.X.A.L.

P.I.X.A.L.
Today is Thursday, it is 1:37:42 am. It has been 19 days, 15 hours, 26 minutes and 11.4 seconds since Zane installed my module in his system.
One could say that we are still getting used to each other at the moment. Just as Zane is adapting to his new – upgraded – titanium body.

We share many functions, for instance I have access to his main power source and the external sensors on his – our – body, but we each have our own disk space as well. Zane has provided me with me my own partition on his hard drive and I do not have access to some of his private data, like his memories from the time before we met. And although I would have the skills to decode his disk encryption algorithm, my own programming does not allow me to do so. So I have to wait until he is willing to share them with me, hopefully, in the future.

My application runs from my own separate processing unit with a rechargeable battery. I can therefore remain active when Zane shuts down his system or performs maintenance operations, just as he is doing right now.

I never 'sleep' for my operating system was developed to function 24/7, without interruptions.

But every night, when his human brothers (although not related to him at all) are asleep, Zane reboots his system to clear his RAM. Afterwards he runs a defragmentation of his hard drive as well as a full virus scan. His new, upgraded hardware would allow him to perform all these tasks during normal operation without a restart, but he still insists on doing it during the night while shutting down all non-essential functions. He told me that he is used to doing it that way and that it makes him feel more normal – and more like what he calls 'before'.

Afterwards he usually remains in energy saving mode, meaning that all his motoric functions are on stand-by, and we talk. Just like ordinary people do. Due to our connected processors, we could exchange data a lot faster, but we both enjoy this form of communication, although we have to set the output volume to minimum level in order not to wake up his – our – teammates.

Over the past weeks, we have already learned a lot about each other. But I know there is something else, something Zane does not tell me – or anyone. I have kept record of the time he needs to run his maintenance operations after the restart. And it always takes a lot longer than it should, based on the amount of new data he has acquired and calculations he has performed during the day. And Zane has never mentioned any problems with his hard- or software that could have caused this discrepancy between the calculated and actual duration.

I am starting to consider the possibility of my AIE-ES (Artifical Intelligence Enhancer – Emotion Suppressor) chip being defective, for not only can I find no rational explanation for my observation, but also... I have started to miss Zane whenever he is offline...

Incoming call for P.I.X.A.L. from TheRealSkyWalker.

My 'thoughts' are suddenly interrupted and my Personal Assistant mode immediately takes over, before I even get to start wondering who could be the one contacting me – and at this unusual time. "Good morning. My name is P.I.X.A.L., the Primary Interactive X-ternal Assistant Life Form. How can I be of your assistance?"

And... who are you and how were you able to contact me? I want to add, but these questions are not part of my standard greeting.

"Hi P.I.X.A.L. This is Jay."

The analysis of his voice confirms the blue ninja's identity and I can detect that he is both tired and nervous. Jay still acts rather uncomfortably around me. While Zane may be one of his closest and most trusted friends, he still has not forgiven me for revealing - and repeatedly confirming - Cole's identity as Nya's Perfect Match. But he is merely shooting the messenger, for numbers never lie.