Cybernetics

CHAPTER ONE: Ambrosia

Ambrosia Stephens stumbled for a moment as she walked down the hall of her school. She glanced down at the loose bolt that was just about to fall from the side of her foot. She sighed and limped cautiously over to the side of the hall where she then bent down and tightened the pesky bolt. The threading on it was nearly gone, she'd have to beg for money to get a new one. Or maybe Mr. Olym would be feeling generous and turn a blind eye to her taking one from the shop once she got to work.

She straightened up and her retinal display told her she had less than a minute to make it to her next class, half way across campus. It laid out the fastest route over her regular vision and she hurried to follow the glowing line. Ambrosia made it to class with seconds to spare, huffing as she scurried to her seat. She pulled her glasslet out of her shoulder bag and set it down on the desk's top. A glasslet was just what it sounded like, a piece of reinforced glass that wouldn't shatter if it was dropped and had a smart screen that connected to the Net as soon as it booted up.

The teacher holo flickered to life a few moments later, just after the bell rang and began a rather boring lesson, at least to Ambrosia, about cybernetics. Ambrosia knew all about cybernetics, had known since she woke up nearly ten years ago after the crash. She linked into the science feeds on her ret-screen and tuned out the holo at the front of the room, a pre-recorded lesson and an advanced AI ran the holo in the teacher's absence.

Her ret-screen displayed the names of the students called on in the corner and the question asked. Ambrosia had spent weeks programming the central processor to do that over the summer of sixth grade. When she was called on, the name would flash red and the feeds would cut out. They wouldn't link back up until she'd attempted to answer the question.

Halfway through the block, her feeds cut out and she read the question quickly: What are the things that run cyber-bionics?

"The central processor, a pre-frontal cortex nerve simulator, and pseudo electrical signals that transmit down the nerve sim to the bionic limb or limbs," Ambrosia answered in a bored tone.

"Very good, Miss Stephens," the holo replied surprised. "And what is it that makes up the central processor?"

"A small hard drive, although size and location of the drive varies depending on the cyborg ratio, and a micro-motherboard," Ambrosia said, again bored at the questions about what she had been studying for years.

Of course, no one knew she studied cybernetics in her free time, in fact, Ambrosia could count the number of people on one hand. As a cyborg herself, Ambrosia researched cybernetics so she could update her systems and learn new programming for her processor, as well as keep up her maintenance. There was that one time after she first got her bionics that someone had tried to put a bug in her systems that would make her do the chicken dance. She crushed that bug as soon as she got home from school that night. It wasn't even hard.

At only seventeen years old, she had to be one of the most knowledgeable people about cybernetics. It was why Mr. Olym had hired her for his repair shop. Eventually, Ambrosia's plan was to open her own think tank, just like her idol, Lance Strong, had. Lance Strong was a total recluse, and that's what she loved about him. He stayed out of the spotlight enough that no one knew who he was.

Often enough, his personal representative, Lucas Sickle, gave speeches and announcements on his behalf. Lucas was only eighteen, and no one knows why he is the one who represents Lance. Ambrosia called up the science feeds again, her class program booted up automatically, and she ran a search for any new news about Lance Strong or LS Thinks, Lance's company.

A new article published only an hour ago announced the release of a new cybernetics processor Lance had designed. All citizens with cyberbionics were eligible to enter to win a free one with the submission of a personal essay. Amrosia's eyes widened minutely before the program warned her of unlikely behavior. Her program was smart, she relaxed her muscles and continued reading the article.