This episode starts in a hospital, there is a little girl recovering in bed and drawing a picture as a nurse looks on. Kusanagi comes up from behind the nurse and puts her hand on her shoulder. The nurse is startled, but then realizes it is Motoko, and is glad to see her (this nurse is the same woman from the fifth episode who was trying to to spend more time with Motoko.) Kusanagi asks why the nurse wanted to see her. The nurse talks about the little girl; the girl had a heart transplant a month ago, it was taken from a little boy, who was getting cyborg body parts, and no longer needed his organic heart. However, the parents of the boy, said they didn't give consent for a heart transplant. The parents had the police investigate, but the police officer involved was in an accident and so the case was interrupted. The nurse continues, saying how worried she is about this. If the girl had not received the heart, they were considering giving her a complete cyborg body, which would be very expensive, a huge strain on a young child, and require a lot of maintenance. The nurse stops talking as she notices Kusanagi's sad, distant look. Kusanagi asks how old the girl is. The nurse answers - just six years. Kusanagi looks on.
In the parking lot of the hospital, Togusa is waiting in the car as Kusanagi arrives. She enters and tells him that she didn't get much information. She contacts Aramaki, asking what she should do. He tells her to head to the Meditic Corporation, as they were the ones who coordinated the girl's heart, while Borma and Ishikawa look for the money transfer. It seems Section 9 is investigating this incident, seeing if there is a connection to a foreign mafia which has been known to kidnap people in the country and then sell their body parts. Ishikawa mentions this could be an international trading route, so he wants it investigated.
Kusanagi and Togusa arrive at Meditic and are greeted by a man and a small Jameson type robot. The man says they were waiting, and welcomes them. Togusa goes up to shake the man's hand, but the man corrects him. The man is actually a secretary android, and it's the little Jameson robot that is Iwasaki, the director of Meditic. Togusa is surprised, but Iwasaki just laughs. He says everyone makes the mistake, and how even his wife and kids don't understand why he chose a Jameson type body (which is little more than a box with some limbs.) He says it's something only guys can understands and lets out a long laugh. He asks what it is he can help Section 9 with, and so Togusa shows him an organ delivery statement. Iwasaki gives it a quick look over, he says it definitely looks like one of their delivery statement, but it's strange, as their office doesn't coordinate that type of thing. He tells Togusa and Kusanagi that if they want to investigate something, they're more than welcome to. Togusa is still visibly feeling a little strange talking to the director in the little robot body.
Kusanagi and Togusa take an elevator up to a floor where Meditic's records are kept, they're escorted by Iwasaki and his Secretary. Kusanagi asks Iwasaki about Meditic and some of the things it does, like about making spare organs from deposited genes. Iwaskai explains the process, he says they take some of a person's genes and give them to a pig, which will then produce compatible organs, if the person is ever needs some organs, they can then be taken from the pig. Iwasaki quickly goes into salesman mode, saying he can get Kusanagi a special price. She smiles and tells him he should be offering it to a human, looking Togusa's way. Togusa is taken aback, and doesn't have time for a response before Iwaskai continues explaining the process; if you don't want the pig anymore, you can sell it to a transplant coordinator who can then sell the organs to someone else.
When they reach the floor, Iwasaki takes them to a records office, the secretary tells Kusanagi and Togusa to contact him if they need anything, and the two leave. Togusa immediately starts talking about Iwasaki, joking that he has the personality of a country boy who never changed. Kusanagi laughs at the stereotype, and how it fits with his western dialect. The two talk about how a Jameson type cyborg body is best for someone who deals in organ trading, saying maybe he traded his own organs and that is why he's now in that box. Borma and Ishikawa interrupt them, saying they're here to take over the searching. Ishikawa talks about how the investigation of the money transfer went. He says that the Accident Relief Society paid for the heart, but there's no record of that here at Meditic, plus the contact and amount paid don't match the receipt. Kusanagi asks if it could be hacking, and Ishikawa says he believes it is, companies like Meditic don't do a good job protecting their data. Kusanagi calls Togusa and says they should go visit the injured Police Officer in the hospital (the one who was originally following the case) and they leave.
Togusa is at the hospital now, talking to a doctor. The doctor says the officer was admitted when he collapsed on duty, after running some tests, it was discovered he had been taking drugs. As they approach the officer's room, two young men with a medical unit exit the room, the doctor knows right away that these two aren't supposed to be there. The two stop pushing the medical unit, and take off running. Togusa takes off after them, taking a quick look into the hospital bed to ask if the Police Officer is ok. The Officer is simply sitting up in bed, drooling, and doesn't respond, something had been done to him. Outside, the two criminals are picked up at the front of the hospital by a driver in a white car, the driver says he was worried because the two were late. Togusa follows, stops, then pulls out his revolver. He puts a special tracking bullet into his gun, and then fires at the car. The device sticks onto the car. Kusanagi pulls up in her car, and tells Togusa to hurry up and get in. They take off in pursuit of the fugitives.
In the white car, the three men think they have escaped. They bicker a little bit, but say everything is going to be ok, as they erased the memory of the police officer. The shortest fugitive wonders who Togusa was, and the other (he seems to be the leader) guesses it was probably a co-worker. In Kusanagi's car, Kusanagi contacts a Tachikoma, who is following along the side of the freeway, jumping from rooftop to rooftop, she tells it to try and get to the white car and get it's plate number. She then orders Togusa to set up a long range radio signal, while she gets ready to send out a "checking virus." Togusa reminds her, that this is against transmission rules, but she says it's an emergency. Togusa says they can broadcast when they exit the tunnel. Kusanagi puts the car on auto pilot. When they exit the tunnel, she transmits the virus. Every car on the freeway comes to a stand still (except their own,) and alarms go off. The virus does it's work though, and they are able to find the fugitive car, and they check it's owner. He's a medical student. Kusanagi says that they must be planning to hide in a warehouse down by the harbor (which they are just now approaching) and decides to contact Batou. She stops the car, gets out, and tells Togusa to continue following the target, while she uses the Tachikoma to catch up to Batou.
Down at the harbor, the three fugitives are still driving. The car is full of body organs in glass jars. The short fugitive starts saying how they've gone too far and should just dump the organs. The owner of the car, the leader of the group, says that all they're doing is giving low priced organs to people who can't afford a cyborg body, and says he's not worried because his father will fix it if they get caught by the police. He says they should just hide the car in the warehouse for now, with the organs still inside. No one would notice a single car in a warehouse full of junk. The short fugitive is starting to panic, he is worried about Togusa, thinking he must be a member of the Mafia who kidnap people and steal their organs. He fears that they've intruded on their turf, and will be killed. The leader just tells him to shut up, and tries to make a call on his cell phone... only to find out he has no service on it. Everyone in the car starts to get a little more worried.
Kusanagi watches the car drive past, as she hides in her tachikoma under thermoptic camo. She contacts Batou, who is hanging out with his Tachikoma on a crane nearby. He says he can see them too. She says she wants to lure the suspects to a specific location, and so Batou can scare them, just not scare them to death. Batou laughs, asking if she's sure they're allowed to have that much fun. She says it's ok, so Batou calls his Tachikoma, and the two of them freefall down from the crane, onto a warehouse roof. The two jump rooftops until they get close enough to the car. Batou tells the Tachikoma not to hit any of the humans. The Tachikoma targets its guns on the car's back tire and fires. The car spins out of control, and hits a building at low speed. The suspects pile out of the car quickly. Batou removes the grenade launcher cap off the Tachikoma. It fires at the now empty car, the blast knocks the suspects off their feet and onto the ground. Batou turns to Kusanagi in her tachikoma, which has just arrived, and lets her know he's left some work for her. Togusa pulls up to the smoking car and asks himself if this isn't a little much.
The three Section 9 members go to the stunned suspects. Togusa checks the identification of the driver, and confirms that they're med students. Batou remarks that it's sad to think that they could have been working on their bodies in the future. A Tachikoma pulls out an organ in a glass jar, and shows it to everyone. Togusa concludes that they were selling the organs by relabeling them after operations. Kusanagi notices that there is still one suspect missing, the leader and owner of the car, they've only caught two. Batou says he'll go get him, but Kusanagi insists she deal with it. She says they've gone too far, and she needs to teach him a lesson. She gets in a Tachikoma, and takes off, taking the bottled organ with her. Batou laughs, amused by the situation. The short medical student tries to crawl away, but Batou pulls a gun on him. The suspect screams and begs for Batou not to steal his organs. Batou is taken aback. Togusa laughs, saying that everyone who sees Batou's face thinks he's part of the Mafia. He looks down at the other suspect who's cowering in fear, and is shocked to realize that they think he's Mafia too. Batou laughs.
The leader of the suspects is still on the loose, hiding in a narrow alley. Just then, he notices the wall of the alley start to deform and bend outwards while sparks fly, as if something too big was trying to get in and is pushing the wall back. It is Kusanagi piloting a tachikoma, but it's camouflaged, so he's unaware of this. He finds a door to one of the warehouses, and gets inside before the tachikoma reaches him. The wall and door bend in just as he makes it inside. He stops and pants, his back to the wall. Everything is quiet. Just then, he hears footsteps, panicking, he tries to get back out the door, but it won't budge now that it's been bent in. He starts running through the warehouse. He comes to a window, opens it, but finds that it's bared. He hears the footsteps approach behind him. Kusanagi approaches him holding the organ... and a knife. She pretends to be part of the Mafia, and starts talking about how she could earn a fortune on him because he's 100% human. The man tries to bargain, saying how they can work together, but Kusanagi says she has no reason to, she can kill him, and take his organs to hide the evidence – two birds with one stone. She gets closer and closer. The man pleads some more, saying his father will pay money. Kusanagi raises her knife as he backs into a corner and cowers on the ground. He screams for forgiveness as Kusanagi readies the knife. She raises it, while the man screams, and strikes with the knife... right into a pipe above the man's head. It sprays sewage all over him, but he has passed out from the shock.
Outside, later on, the police have rounded up all the medical students, and they sit in the back of a police car. Kusanagi walks up and tells them that people from the underworld don't listen to reason, and they should think about that. She tells them that they have money, knowledge, and their health, and then she leaves them. She walks over to the Tachikoma, who is complaining about how it's still stuck in the warehouse alley. She just tells it to wait until after she's done taking the suspects to the police. It happily agrees.
Back at Section 9 HQ, in the Tachikoma bay, Togusa is playing Go with a Tachikoma while some Techs work on it. Batou enters with his exercise equipment, and the Tachikoma greets him. Togusa asks Batou if he thought Kusanagi was acting unusual today. Batou explains; Kusanagi had her entire body converted to a cyborg when she was the same age as the little girl in the hospital, so he reckons she had her own personal feelings on the whole case. Togusa continues, he talks about the case, talking about how on one hand it had a girl who needed a new heart because of an accident, and on the other hand had a company president who gave all his organs away and became a cyborg. Batou says how the organ trade places a premium on original organs, and the economy allows for people to become wealthy... and so those who don't worry about money or religious reasons can have a high quality cyborg body... like Section 9. Batou teases Togusa, asking if that hurts his feelings. Togusa says that's not what he meant. he just wonders which side Kusanagi is on... is she a cyborg only because she had to be? or did she want to become one? The Tachikoma calls check mate. Togusa, is surprised, and informs the Tachikoma that is a totally different game.
Just then, Kusanagi walks in. She walks up to Batou and asks what he's doing, and if he bought more workout equipment. She says it's his business what he buys with his salary, but she doesn't admire it. Batou snaps back, saying Kusanagi is in a weak woman body, and how she should exchange it for a manly one, it would give her more power. Kusanagi smirks, removes her watch, and motions for Batou. Batou is incredibly amused at Kusanagi wanting to fight, as are Togusa, the Tachikomas, and the technicians in the area. Batou stands up, and gets ready. Kusanagi closes her eyes, and smiles. Batou looks confused, and then promptly notices his arm moving... it swings, gives him a swift uppercut under the chin, and he falls right over. Kusanagi walks up to the dazed Batou on the floor. She tells him that if she uses her opponent's power against them, then there is no disadvantage to a female cyborg body. She tells him to write up a report on it with his muscular brain, and walks out of the room. Togusa calls over, asking if Batou is ok. He raises his arm, and says it doesn't hurt... but the fact he's flat out on the ground suggests otherwise.
In the hall, Kusanagi put her watch back on and looks at it... she moves her fingers rigidly into a fist, perhaps reminding herself that she is a cyborg, thinks about it, and walks on.
Trivia/Did You Notice?:
The design of the organ donating pigs is taken directly from the Ghost in the Shell Man Machine Interface manga.
The design of Iwasaki's robot body is taken directly from the first Ghost in the Shell manga.
Togusa firing a tracking device onto a car with his revolver is the same trick he used in the Ghost in the Shell movie.
Getting Batou to punch himself is also from the Ghost in the Shell manga. She has access to his cyberbrain because she is his commanding officer.
