The scan was taking a lot longer than you though, which lead to you and Near talking about all kind of things while you waited. You learnt more about him, you knew he was adopted and his parents worked during the day which is why you didn't see them often. But you didn't know that it was actually their idea for Near to get into persacoms. He was already so good with technology they figured it would be a good way for him to create that sibling bond he'd always wanted with someone he made especially to fit into the family.
It definitely worked out well, because aside from the chobits Nears persacoms were some of the most complex and human like you'd ever seen. And they way they all interacted definitely reminded you of a sibling bond. Near finally had a family he'd always wanted, it was rather sweet.
You also found out his interest for technology started when he was younger and collected robot toys, he'd take them apart to see how they worked and put them back together again but even better. That was his way of 'playing' with them as a kid. Even though he was so young, he was absolutely one of the smartest people you'd ever met.
Your long conversation about random topics finally came to a halt when you heard the sounds of all the persacoms coming out of scan mode and waking up again.
"Scan complete" Matt announced.
You and Near immediately jumped up and rushed over.
"Did you find anything?" You asked.
"We've concluded the password is voice activated. Even if we said the right word without the right voice it won't open" Matt explained.
"That's annoying, but did you get the password itself?" Near asked.
"Chobits"
That was it? It was chobits the whole time? Why didn't you think of that? He was a chobit after all. It seemed so obvious and yet you totally missed it. Then again, you weren't sure if L was a chobit at first, this confirmed without a shadow of a doubt that he was one.
"Could you get anything else?" Near asked.
"There's still something locked behind the voice activated password, we can't access it without the right voice. But we extracted all the data we can" Mello added.
"Perfect, send it to my computer"
Mello plugged himself into the computer set up, and transferred everything they'd extracted onto it. Near sat at the computer and you looked over his shoulder at the screen, L leaning on your shoulder to look as well. Near scrolled though the code, a lot of it was gibberish to you but he seemed to understand it all.
"Interesting... the earliest recorded date of use is five whole years ago. That must be when he was made and first turned on..." Near muttered.
"Woah, you're older than I thought L" you commented.
L looked and acted like an adult, but had only been operational for five years. Although there was no telling how long he'd been in production, he could be 30 years old for all you knew. All that mattered was he was physically and mentally a young adult, maybe 20 or so. Which helped put together some clues.
"And here it says he has internal parts that are the same used in super computers. That'd be why he's so powerful he can surge the power of other persacoms. Whoever made him must have been rich to be able to afford all this..." Near said.
The more you found out about him, the more amazed you were. L was truly impressive.
As you all read over the code, L wrapped his arms around you and rested his head on your shoulder. Needing to be close to you as usual, he was rather clingy. You wrapped an arm around him in return, keeping him close as you both read the code and tried to spot anything significant.
"Woah, that's weird..." Near muttered.
He highlighted a block of code with the mouse and took another look at it.
"This doesn't line up with the date of all the other code. Like it was placed in there at a later date. It's a memory, maybe something of B's that was saved onto L?"
You didn't know how all this high tech stuff worked, so when Near opened up a new program and dropped the code into it, you were baffled when a video file showed up. He clicked it, opening it up into a new window.
"This must have been recorded on B, then backed up to L" Near commented.
He pressed play, and you watched through the eyes of B looking up at L.
L wore all white, a frilly top and loose pants, with a lolita style headband holding the hair from his eyes. He seemed to be in the same area where the pictures of B were taken, with chords surrounding him and computer screens behind him.
"Are you sure B? What if this causes us to loose some data?" L asked.
"It's all we can do. I'm going to be shut down for good, the only way part of me can survive is if we back it up onto you" B replied.
B had a slight different voice to L, a deeper and more monotone sounding one.
"There must be some way dad can fix you?" L said.
"There's none. Our AI makes us human and you can't fix a human that was born different. If it were any other problem we could learn to live with it... but I'm too dangerous" B replied.
B reached out a hand, L took it and gave it a worried squeeze.
"I'm sorry Lawliet... I don't know why my AI went down this path. Just... don't make my mistake ok? Take some of my data and keep living, a small part of me can be alive in you. The good parts, not that dangerous ones" B said.
L gave him a saddled look, but nodded in agreement and pulled the chord from his ear ports to plug into B and collect some of his data.
"And L..." B added.
"Hm?"
"Love someone. That's what we were built for, make someone happy. Do what couldn't"
"I will... I'll find the one just for me" L agreed.
With that, L plugged his chord into B and the video cut off as B went into scan mode.
You weren't sure what to make of it, it was proof that L and B were together in the same place before whatever happened, happened. And that location was the same one as in the pictures. Something happened that caused B to be permanently shut down, and to L it was like losing a brother. Of course now, he didn't remember it after having been reset. But the data taken off B was still there, stored in L's hard drive.
"What happened...? It seemed like everything was going so well for L and B up until that point" you pondered.
"It sounds like B's AI malfunctioned and caused a dangerous situation. So it was safer for him to be shut down" Near explained.
"L... doesn't remember that" L muttered.
"Your side of the memory must have been wiped when you were reset. But B's memory is still backed up on you somewhere deep in your files. You'd not remember them because it's not your memory, you're just storing it"
It seemed the files that B backed up onto L, L himself couldn't access unless they were ripped from his system like you'd just done. But the existence of them in him meant B could still talk to him, although very weakly.
"Here... there's also a picture file" Near added, opening it up.
Dated at four years ago, and having come off B's hard drive, the photo showed the two almost identical persacom sitting together. They wrote opposite matching outfits. Same style, but B's in black and L's in white. They sat in front of a draped background as if it was a set intentionally for a photoshoot.
"Can you get data on where the picture was taken?" You asked.
"I'll try, hang on" Near replied.
He put the picture into another program and ripped the data from it.
"It was taken four years ago on a canon camera at... hang on. Isn't that the address of your apartment complex?"
You took a closer look, and sure enough... it was the address you lived at. Not your exact apartment, but the address of the building.
"What the... there's no room like that- unless someone make a makeshift photo set four years ago. If it's at the apartment then... Watari MUST know about it" you said.
"Mr Watari must know me and B before I was reset... which means he might have known who made me..." L pondered.
That settles it, Watari knew. You had to talk to him.