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"Haven't seen that color on you in a while," Alyx noted as she saw Barney's suit. He had just finished switching it to a soft pale gray, and at least for now, his circuits were back to blue.
"Yeah, well..." Barney shifted back and forth nervously. "I didn't wanna freak him out when he wakes up." Alyx gave him a nod. They both knew how fragile Gordon's state was right now; the User had outright told them that his code was the most unstable he'd ever seen when he opened Gordon's disc.
"I thought, maybe, if I had somethin' a little more neutral, it wouldn't scare him. And maybe the old uniform would jog his memory." Truth be told, though, it could just as easily make him a target, since the pale suit wasn't exactly inconspicuous.
But there was no time to second guess himself now; Gordon's User opened the door and gave Barney that unnerving stare of his. "Our friend is... nearly finished, with his reboot," he told them both. "I will stay in the room, just, in case of an emergency."
Barney nodded and took a step forward. Alyx grabbed his hand, and gave it a reassuring squeeze, for which he was grateful but too jittery to return. If he let himself pause here he might not start moving again. Gordon needed better than that.
He had just finished his boot cycle when Barney saw him. His eyes snapped open and immediately locked on the security program, which made Barney stop and bring his hands up in a peaceful gesture. "S'okay, I'm not gonna hurt you," Barney told him. He scrambled for something to say next. "Just wanted to... make sure you're okay." Gordon narrowed his eyes a tad, and Barney couldn't blame him, since that was just about the lamest reason he could have given. True or not, it was a laughable thing to say given the situation.
Gordon looked a lot different than the last time they'd seen each other so closely. His hair was much longer. His eyes were a sort of sickly yellow green, instead of the healthy orange they should have been, and curving over his right cheek was a thick scar of blackened voxels, branched like a strike of lightning.
Barney swallowed. He remembered the way the virus had crawled over Gordon's shell, how the harsh acidic code twisted and curled as it looked for another host to infect.
He took a step forward, and Gordon flinched away, despite the gap of several feet between them. This was going to be much more delicate than he first thought... time for a new idea.
Maybe...
"Okay, you gotta promise to not try to derezz me for this," Barney mumbled. He reached into his old memory files and dusted off an address he'd long since cataloged as inactive. Then, cautiously, he sent a ping through.
hello
Gordon jumped like he had heard a siren. It made sense, since the old hex code hadn't been in common use since the system reformatted. Barney rarely used it himself anymore, even with Kleiner and Eli. Gordon probably hadn't felt it since the Cascade… Users, he might not have received any pings at all since then. Barney had no idea what Breen had done to him over the last thousand cycles.
Slowly, after a few nanos, Gordon relaxed a little bit. His hands twitched like he wasn't sure what to do with them, but thankfully they stayed away from his disc. If there was one thing that Barney knew about him though, it was that Gordon couldn't resist his curiosity, and sure enough, his eyes flashed as he sent a nervous reply.
hello
The familiar signature was as invigorating as it was a punch to his gut. Barney took a breath.
do you remember me
Gordon squinted. He didn't have his glasses- where were they?- but he seemed to be doing his best to analyze Barney.
data fractured… image name “b#rn#y”
That made him chuckle. “Almost got it,” he said before he sent a reply.
good to see you
He tried to push as many warm feelings through the message as he could. He didn't want to overwhelm Gordon, but he couldn't just pretend that he wasn't happy to have him back. It really was good to see him again.
where am i
There was no easy way to answer that, but Barney gave it his best shot.
safe