The sleek terminal pods gleam under the expo lights, and I shift my weight as the first wave of curious attendees approaches. A middle-aged woman in a sharp business suit stops in front of our booth, her eyes narrowing at the white pods like they're some kind of alien artifact.
"Excuse me," she says, adjusting her glasses. "Is this some kind of meditation equipment? Digital detox chambers?"
I force a smile, the kind that doesn't quite reach my eyes. "Not exactly. These are EDEN terminals. You don't just view information—you enter it."
"Enter it?" She blinks. "Like virtual reality?"
"VR hasn't been invented yet," I say carefully. "Think of it like... stepping into data itself. The network becomes a place you can walk through, touch, experience."
She stares at me like I've grown a second head. "That sounds impossible."
"Everything did, once."
A teenager in gaming merch saunters over, probably seventeen or eighteen, wearing a faded Zelda t-shirt. He's got that look—like he thinks he knows everything about technology because he's beaten Dark Souls.
"Yo, is this some new arcade setup? VR headset thing?" He gestures at the pods. "My rig at home could probably run circles around whatever this is."
"It's not a game," I say, keeping my tone even. "It's a network where you become part of the digital space. You're not controlling an avatar—you are the avatar."
"Dude, that's deep." He squints at the pods. "But like, how does it work? Motion sensors? Haptic feedback?"
"Better," I tell him. "Direct neural interface through quantum entanglement. Your consciousness translates into digital form."
An older gentleman in a tweed jacket approaches, his cane tapping against the concrete. He looks like he walked straight out of a 1950s science textbook.
"Cognitive therapy applications?" he asks, peering at the terminals. "My nephew suffers from severe anxiety. Would this help with mental health treatment?"
I pause, surprised by the question. "Actually, yes. EDEN could revolutionize therapy. Safe spaces for patients to confront trauma, controlled environments for treatment."
"That's remarkable," he says, pulling out a small notebook. "What's the success rate?"
"We're still in beta testing."
The skepticism is thick enough to cut with a knife, but I catch genuine curiosity in their expressions. They don't understand what they're looking at, but they want to. That's something.
A businessman in a crisp suit approaches, his tablet clutched like a shield. "What's the market potential here? Are you taking investors?"
I glance at the pods, then back at him. "The potential is unlimited. We're not just changing how people access information—we're changing what it means to be connected."
"Connected to what, exactly?" The teenager crosses his arms. "Sounds like expensive daydreaming to me."
I meet his gaze. "To each other. To possibility. To a future where distance doesn't matter anymore."
The skeptical crowd gradually thinned as people actually tried the pods. No harm in trying, right? That's what I kept telling myself as I watched them step inside, one by one, like they were boarding some kind of carnival ride.
"Everything going okay with the systems?" I asked Gwen and Peter, who were hunched over their tablets checking readouts.
"Everything is working fine," Peter said without looking up.
"Perfect," Gwen added, her fingers flying across the screen. "Just monitoring the neural sync rates."
Jessica leaned against the booth wall, munching on chips from a bag. She was chatting with someone through her Digivice—probably Impmon, given how animated her expressions got. I couldn't hear the conversation, but she kept laughing at whatever that little troublemaker was saying.
Gatomon and BlackGatomon materialized beside me, stretching like cats after a long nap. Two cooped up inside the Digivice, they said, and now they were making up for lost time.
"Act like cats in public," I reminded them. "Not like you're trying to summon lightning or whatever."
"We're being perfectly dignified," Gatomon said, though her tail twitched with obvious feline satisfaction.
"Yeah, real dignified," BlackGatomon purred, arching her back in a stretch that would make any house cat jealous. "Nothing says dignified like showing off those claws."
"Hey, at least we're not the ones who tried to eat the diagnostic equipment last week," Gatomon shot back.
"That was one time."
"One time too many, if you ask me."
I watched Jessica take another chip from the bag, her shoulders relaxing as she listened to whatever Impmon was telling her. Good to see her smiling again after everything with Killgrave. The kid had been through hell, and here she was, just hanging out at a tech expo like normal.
"Neural sync is stable," Gwen announced. "Everyone's reporting clear sensations."
"Clear sensations?" Peter looked up. "What kind of sensations?"
"Like they're actually walking through data streams," Gwen said. "One guy described it as 'swimming through light.'"
"Swimming through light," I repeated. "That's either profound or he's having a stroke."
"Probably both," BlackGatomon said, settling into a crouch that put her at eye level with me. "So when do we get to try this swimming thing?"
"After we make sure nobody's having an actual stroke," I told her. "Patience, furball."
The first wave of users starts trickling out of the pods, and I straighten up from where I've been leaning against the booth wall. Their faces are lit up like they just stepped off a roller coaster.
"That was incredible," a woman in a business suit tells Gwen, her hands still trembling slightly. "I was actually walking through data streams. It felt like flying."
Gwen's already scribbling notes on her tablet, probably documenting every word. I can see the satisfaction in how she holds herself—shoulders back, that little smile she gets when her code actually works.
A teenager who tried the movie house earlier comes bounding over, his eyes wide. "Dude, I watched three movies at once! The detail was insane—I could smell the popcorn."
Peter's grinning like an idiot behind his own tablet. "That's the sensory integration layer. We mapped taste and smell receptors to match visual input."
"That's actually terrifying," BlackGatomon says from where she's perched on the booth counter. "What if someone tries to eat the data?"
"Then they learn an important lesson about not eating digital food," I reply, earning a snort from Gatomon.
The clothing store must have been popular—people are walking around in outfits that definitely weren't there when they entered. A guy in a full tuxedo strolls past a woman wearing what looks like medieval armor, both of them laughing about something.
"Load capacity is holding steady," Gwen says without looking up from her screen. "We've got forty-seven concurrent users and the system's barely breaking a sweat."
"Forty-seven," I repeat, watching a little kid run past in what I swear is a superhero cape. "And not one of them's complained about motion sickness or headaches."
"That's because we're not idiots," Peter says, but he's smiling. "Unlike someone I could mention."
I flip him off without looking. The playground area must be working too—kids are shouting about flying and racing cars that exist only in code. Their parents are watching with this weird mix of amazement and confusion, like they're seeing magic for the first time.
"They actually built a racetrack," a dad tells his wife, pointing at their daughter who's somehow convinced a digital sports car to do donuts. "She's eight years old and she's driving better than I do."
This is it. This is what we've been working toward. Not just the tech, not just the Digimon battles or the SHIELD headaches or any of that chaos. This—this moment where people step into something we made and it changes how they see the world.
Gatomon nudges my shoulder with her head. "They like it," she says simply.
"Yeah," I say, watching another group emerge from the pods, all of them talking over each other about what they saw. "Yeah, they really do."
***
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