"Please stay where you are and remain calm," Dr. McKenna says amidst shouts and cries.
The lab is in utter darkness. I can't see my hand in front of my face, but I can feel the brain cap and other electrodes that I'm hooked up to. By the time the emergency lights turn on, I'm free from all wiring. And feeling better than I've felt in weeks.
"That was crazy," I say, joining G and Zahir. "Did you see that?"
PCs recount their version of what happened all at once. Everything from uncontrolled zombie robots to a glitch in the supercomputer. But not one version is true. Because I know what happened. I can't explain how or why. But I saw the robot's binary code; billions of zeros and ones. And I instantly understood how to control them—how to perfect their performance. At least until the power went out.
I see Dr. McKenna watching me in the rowdy chatter. The slight squint in her eyes. The downward pull of her arched eyebrows. And then she claps her hands together. "Ok. That was exciting. Certainly. Works every time," she says.
"What?" Luke asks. "Are you saying—"
"Yes." The doctor pauses and then smiles. "All part of the show. Bonus 10 XP to Liam for getting closest to the truth. But not a glitch in the supercomputer. A sophisticated program to show you what's possible and our potential for controlling inanimate objects."
Her assistants stare at her. They seem just as surprised as the rest of the PCs.
"But the power—what happened!" Anila exclaims. She runs her hands over her head and through her black hair. Her cheeks have a burgundy hue from all the excitement. "I felt this crazy surge of energy through my brain cap and all the electrodes." She hugs her arms to her chest and shivers. "My skin tingled everywhere."
"Me too!" Luke agrees. "I thought my brain was going to get fried!"
"Yeah—that was insane," I say, joining in. And I'm telling the truth as I press my hand against my heart. "The last thing I need is to be shocked again."
Laughter and confusion spike a new round of babble and theories. But I'm more frustrated than ever. Why did no one see what I saw? How perfectly magical my performance was. Only it wasn't magic. But I don't dare say a thing. Not with all the craziness already plaguing me.
Dr. McKenna claps her hands. "Ok," she says. "Let's reign this in. Clearly we are having some electrical issues, but I can assure you, the robots performed as programmed. Now you can return to your busses to continue the debate or we can finish your tour with the X-chip."
She has our undivided attention. This is what I had been most excited about before coming. Before the X-Lab Neuron Challenge.
Before I felt like a wizard.
Edric Landry announced the generational chip at the annual BrainTech Event last month. An event I missed due to my late start at Code-X Academy. Rumors about the next-gen-neuro chip have been circulating media outlets for several years, but no one outside of BrainTech has seen the chip or what it can really do.
The doctor confirms with facility engineers that the electrical surge was limited to the X-Lab Demo room. Then we follow her through a set of doors in the back and down a long hallway before we enter a staging room where everyone changes into white cleanroom suits, shoes, and gloves. Only our faces are exposed. And per instructions prior to leaving for this trip, no one is wearing fingernail polish or makeup or perfume.
We are ready.
When we enter the pressurized bay to the X-Lab Cleanroom, the doors close; a loud rush of air blows up from the grated floor toward the ceiling vents, which are sucking up any stray particulate we might have on us from getting dressed. After a few seconds the flow of air stops, and a second set of doors opens. The cleanroom is large enough to be a gymnasium and has floor-to-ceiling manufacturing equipment with a long, wide aisle down the middle.
"This is where the magic happens," Dr. McKenna says, holding her arms out. "Our research facility has everything we need: dicing and probing machines, polish grinders and more, to build nano chips and semiconductors at a micro scale." She stops our group in front of a large media screen and points to an enlarged image. "The X-chip is the smallest computer chip ever developed."
"Look at the circuitry," G says, "There's billions of transistors on that one chip." A graphic next to the enlarged image shows a blown-up spec of dust and the X-chip next to it; the X-chip can barely be seen in comparison.
"To put the X-chip in perspective," Dr. McKenna says, "a single human blood cell is 7,000 nanometers. And the X-chip is only 5 nanometers."
"Shì,"Xia says, "But what does the X-chip do?" She points to the sophisticated machinery around us. "I've seen a manufacturing plant before. I want to know what you're doing with the X-chip. And if you have started testing."
Dr. McKenna smiles, her hands behind her back. "Much of that information is classified. But imagine the ability to control the robots you saw today without the need for brain caps and electrodes all over your body. What if all the sensors were inside your body? And instead of hundreds what if there were millions? Maybe even billions." She holds up her index finger. "And what if surgery wasn't needed to achieve such a feat?"
"Madre de Dios," Isa says. "Is that what the X-chip is—all of that?"
Dr. McKenna pulls a small metal box from her lab coat pocket. We gather tight around her as she opens the lid. There is a small vial filled with liquid. "Yes," she says. "Billions of that."
As I squeeze in closer for a look at the quantum marvel, I feel the hair on my arms stand up. And not just because I'm excited. The electric haze in my head is frizzling into a static charge. The fuzzy brain kind that leads to zaps and flashes of light. The same electrical storm that has plagued me over the past several weeks.
I look at the small vial in wonder. The glass tube lies horizontal in the box, snuggly pressed into black, styrofoam padding. The clear liquid could be nothing more than water. No one would know the difference, and Luke even says as much out loud. But somehow my body knows the doctor is telling the truth. The muscles in my legs and arms are twitching. My head is pounding. And I feel unstable. The entropic charge within my physiology accelerates as I inch closer and closer to the vial.
When I look up at Dr. McKenna, she's studying me again. And the feintest of smiles creases her tight cheeks. I don't understand why until I look back down again. The liquid in the vial is swirling with a yellowish glow.
Like a honeypot trap.
When I look up at her again the corner of her mouth twitches—an excited smile her cold façade holds hostage. I know I'm right because the eyes show everything—my dad taught me that—and as our eyes lock, Dr. McKenna's small, black pupils dilate in delight.
She knows!!
The robots...the electrical storms...something else—but how?
YOU ARE READING
Merlin's Curse
Science Fiction[8X FEATURED] Merlin is the greatest-eleven-year-old nerd the world doesn't know because his name has cursed him--he's all parts nerd and zero parts magic and all he wants is to be cool. When Merlin hacks a new encryption code designed to protect on...
