I go by many names. Tech Support, Help Desk, Geek Squad, Super Nerd… This was even before I started my job, and they weren’t all terms of endearment.

But there are those who depend on me, see me as a hero. There are others who fear me, because I am the essence of their nightmares, the one being who can end their existence.

To them, I’m The Technician.

It started in high school. I was, once again, the new kid. Dad was the stay-at-home sort, and Mom’s job moved us around a lot. I hadn’t had a stable friend group since the fifth grade, and had stopped even trying since the seventh. Here I was, a junior, and my only friends were some gamers I had met online. Of course, since this was high school, other kids were quick to notice I was always on a device and didn’t socialize unless I was forced to.

“Tech Support” first popped up in gym class, one of those forced socialization situations. We were picking teams for dodgeball, and the jocks chosen as captains were arguing over me.

This wasn’t because I was bad. I was usually picked quickly for gym class, because I was nimble and could catch well. Throwing wasn’t my strong suit, but I was good enough at catching and dodging to be a valuable player. I rarely got out in dodgeball unless I wasn’t paying attention.

“Come on, man, you got Tech Support last time! Take Cody instead.” That was Tyler, a varsity basketball player. He was, as expected, tall, with dark hair and tan skin. Apparently, his parents had saved up and taken the family for a trip to Hawaii over summer break, and he remained outside a lot after they got home as well.

“No way, bro. Cody’s good, but he’s never touched her. If you get her, I get Noah. He’s the only one that can get Tech Support out. You can’t have both,” August, a track superstar for the school, countered. He was also tall, and wiry, with pale skin and red hair. I assumed he wore some strong sunscreen when he competed.

Cody and Noah were both football players, and cousins. Cody played defense, and Noah was the quarterback. Honestly, looking at them, they could’ve been twins. Cody had bleached his hair, for some unknown reason. At least be told apart, for now. Otherwise, they had the same dark complexion and eyes.

“Ugh… Fine, but if you get Noah, we get Cody too,” Tyler sighed.

“Deal, we get Noah,” August agreed.

“Cool. Cody, Tech Support- uh, sorry, Andy. You guys are with me.”

That was when I clued in that I was “Tech Support.” There must’ve been a look on my face, because a couple girls started snickering.

“Wait, I’m ‘Tech Support’? What the hell kinda dumb nickname is that?”

“Come on, Andy, it’s all in good fun. Better than mine,” August assured me. “I’ve been ‘Crash’ since I was ten. It’s just because no one knows you well enough for something better.”

“… Yeah, sure,” I replied with a shrug, moving to join Tyler’s team. He had a point. I’d only been there a couple weeks and hadn’t gone out of my way to make friends.

From that day, I was ‘Tech Support’ to this group, and a few others. To their credit, these boys didn’t let people harass me over it. I found out after another couple weeks that Cody was actually into computers, and hoping to be a programmer after college. Noah wanted to go pro in football, but he planned on going through college first so he could be a teacher if his football career fell through. Tyler and August each had their own dreams as well. Slowly, these four and I grew to be friends, and any bullies had to find a new nickname for me.

It was actually Cody who got me my first job, when my mom confirmed we would be staying until after I graduated high school.

“Yo- Tech Support, you got plans for part-time work?” He asked one day as he joined our group for lunch. A couple other girls had joined our little group too, Bethany and Sabrina. “My old man’s looking for a part timer. He has a computer repair shop.”

“Isn’t that a little too on-brand?” August joked. “Tech Support working in tech support?”

“I could use some income…” I admitted thoughtfully. “You sure he’d want some kid with no work experience?”

“He actually asked if you’d want the job,” Noah admitted. “I was over when they were talking about it. Uncle’s heard us talk about how good you are with computers. He said, if you want to work in the field when you grow up, it could be good experience. Even if not, customer service is a good field to get experience in.”

“Oh… Well, sure. I don’t know what I want to do with my life yet, but computer repair is always a needed field. Could be a good fall-back if nothing else,” I answered. “I just gotta make sure my folks are cool with it. I’ll give you a call later?”

“Sounds good, I’ll let him know,” Cody grinned. “I help out at the shop too, so we’ll get to work together. Well, when I’m not at practice.”

“I’ll disown him if he skips practice,” Noah agreed solemnly. Tyler and August just chuckled.

“Hey, you start making some money, we could take you out to the best shops sometime,” Bethany offered.

“Yeah, the mall has some places I think you’ll love,” Sabrina agreed. “Could be a fun girl’s day.”

“Sure, sounds great,” I agreed.

It didn’t take much to convince my parents about getting a job. Dad thought it would teach me responsibility, and Mom said she’d help me start learning about finances when I started making money. She said school never really prepared anyone for that part of life and, admittedly, she was right.

When I called Cody later, he put his dad on the phone. “This is Joseph, how can I help you?”

“Hello, sir, this is Andrea Jones. Cody mentioned you might have a part-time job I could apply for?” I’m pretty sure I sounded nervous, because I was, but Joseph sounded really calm and cool.

“Oh, Andy! Yes, of course. You have your parent’s permission?”

“Yes sir, they think it’ll be good for me,” I assured him.

“Perfect. Now, I’ll have you on a couple nights a week and on Saturday’s. I’m closed on Sundays, so you’ll have that off. It’ll be hard work, make you think a lot, but I’ll pay $15 an hour starting out.”

“Wow, that’s more than I expected. Sounds perfect. I’m not afraid of a little hard work.”

“Then swing by my shop with your folks on Saturday and we’ll go over paperwork and everything. I want your parents there in case they have any questions for me, or concerns.”

“Yes sir, thank you! We’ll see you Saturday.” With that, I had a job lined up that, unbeknownst to me, was going to radically change several lives.

The job went well for a few weeks, until a lady brought in a machine on a Monday night that had a virus. Joseph called me over and smiled. “I’ve gotta step out for a few, but this looks like it should be pretty easy for you to handle. Just do like I’ve been showing you, shouldn’t take but an hour or two I think.”

“No problem, Joe. Shouldn’t be too bad,” I promised. He smiled and left, leaving me in charge for the first time. I took the machine to the back and set it up, getting to work on it. As it booted up the first time, though, something odd happened. I saw a little pink character peek out from the corner of the screen at me.

“That… has got to be the oddest thing I’ve ever seen on a computer,” I muttered to myself, leaning closer to the little figure to try to decide what it was. I slipped a little and caught myself by grabbing onto the old CRT monitor Joe had set up for testing purposes… And my hand went right through the screen.

Not in a “broken beyond reason” way, but in a “portal to another world” way. As I stared at my hand, or where my hand should be, the pink figure moved over to where my hand had gone through. I felt a tug, and suddenly I was being pulled into the computer screen. I was falling into a dark void with no idea what was happening. Pretty sure I screamed, but my ego says I didn’t. I landed pretty hard on my back on what looked like a grassy plain.

“Oooh, that didn’t look like it felt good,” Someone commented. I tilted my head up to look and see the pink character standing there. “Well, sucks for you. Guess you can’t get rid of me now, if you’re stuck in here with me.”

“Excuse me?” I couldn’t believe my eyes. This character looked like a woman’s bathroom symbol, but with a face. It wasn’t a super detailed face, but it was there. “What the hell kind of contact high did I get from that computer?”

“You didn’t. At least, I don’t think so. You’re a Linker. You can enter our world, and interact with it as if it was yours,” Bathroom Sign Lady smirked at me. “But since you’re just a little girl and you don’t know what you’re doing, you’re gonna be stuck here unless another Linker finds you and pulls you out. And now there’s nothing you can do to me.”

“Wait so… like… you’re real? I mean… you pulled me in here, so you and I can touch each other?” I asked, confused but plotting. I wasn’t exactly fighter material, but either I was high and about to shadow box myself, or this was real and I could punch the thing annoying me most right now without anyone getting mad at me.

“Uh, yeah. That’s how you got here, duh,” BSL retorted, clearly thinking I was dumb.

“Oh, good.” I stood, wincing a little. I didn’t feel anything broken, but I was definitely sore. “Then I can do this,” and I gave her my best right hook. At least I think it was a right hook. I’d never thrown a punch a day in my life.

She didn’t dodge it, though. I don’t think she thought I would be with it enough to do so. But my fist hit her face, and she shrieked. Then, she shattered into small pieces and disappeared.

“You did it! You stopped the virus!” A small voice cheered behind me. I turned and spotted a little cat that walked over, sitting at my feet and licking its paw to wash its face. “Not that she was a very strong virus, but she would’ve done a lot of damage to the local area.”

“Uh… Are you… a talking cat?” I asked, confused.

“Yes. I’m a program out in cyberspace. The owner of this system has me installed, so I have a home nearby that I visit when she needs me.” The cat stopped washing and looked up at me. “So, you’re a new linker just learning your powers. What are you called, Linker?”

“Uh… I uh… I’m not sure what a ‘linker’ is, I’m just a technician…”

“Technician! I like it, it has a nice ring to it. Alright, Technician… So I suppose you don’t know how to get out, do you?”

“Uh… No?” It felt odd, being judged by this cat. I mean, cats judge everyone all the time, but this was a talking, virtual cat apparently. So it felt a little more odd than usual.

“Well… I can see who I can talk to. Or you might get lucky and have a linker swing by,” The cat chuckled. “You might be stuck here a while while I look for someone who knows something, though. I could ask an old program, but… The only one I think would know is Staple Mable, and she’s kinda annoying, so… I’d rather ask anyone else first.”

“Staple Mable? Like… The old Macroverse assistant? The one that would pop up and talk to you when you opened one of their products?” I only barely even remembered the little stapler that would pop up in older versions of Macroverse products.

“That’d be the one. She’s older, but she’s been around long enough to know things. And you know some of it was picked up in the course of her duties. I’m Jabber John, by the way. A talking companion.”

“Oh… I’ve heard of Jabber John. Also popular for a while…” I blinked. “Uh… Sorry if that was… Insensitive…”

“Oh, no, not at all. Such is the life of a program,” John laughed. “Well, let me see-” He looked up. “Nevermind, looks like you won’t need my help after all.”

I looked up to see what he was talking about. A strange tool was above our heads and lowering towards me. “Wha-” Before I could react, the tool latched on to my arm and pulled. Now I was flying up toward where I’d fallen from, then out and into Joe’s arms.

“Easy there, kid- I’ve got ya,” Joe told me as he steadied me and made sure I got my feet under me. “Well, I had suspected you might be a linker, but… Wasn’t expecting to get back and find you in an old machine!” He chuckled.

“What?” I straightened quickly and met his eyes, baffled. “You can do that? Go into machines?”

“Computers, phones, video game consoles… Yep. Haven’t tried car systems yet, but… I’d imagine we could go in those too,” Joe answered, moving to grab one of our desk chairs and sit. “Take a seat, Andy, and let’s talk a minute. I already closed the shop for the night. We’ll need the quiet.” I obeyed, taking another chair and sitting. Well, at least I knew I wasn’t high.

“So… Linkers… Are a thing. And I just punched a real computer virus,” I stated, clarifying what had just happened and admittedly not fully believing it.

“Oh, you did take care of the virus? Perfect, that will make the night easier!” Joe said cheerfully. “Yes. I’m not sure where the term came from, but linkers have a… Superpower, I guess you could call it. We can enter technology, fight viruses from within and even travel that way if we know what we’re doing,” He explained. “We can even interact with regular people, if they’re at the computer. They’ll assume we’re a program, of course, but what can you do?” He smiled. “I’ll start teaching you how to use this power. After you’ve had time to process this, that is.”

Over the next couple years, I slowly grew into my abilities and learned all I could from Joe. When I went to college, Joe pointed me to another linker he knew in the local area and got me a job at her tech shop. College was where my adventures really began, and my life started to change.