tumbldown stories

Nodejacked

(originally published April 2017)

I don't know how the fuck I missed the guy. I'm usually pretty good about these things, especially walking around in the Port after midnight, but it was like he came out of nowhere – the first thing I heard was just the one footfall, real loud right behind me, and then there was red lightning shooting out the back of my skull, out through my face, as the fist smashed me right between the spine and my right ear.

I guess I might have blacked out for a second, because I was on the ground, not hearing too good, seeing stars and green phosphors instead of the fire hydrant, the roaring stink of blood all over the place like I bit my tongue, and I was trying to move, push myself up, but my hands and feet weren't cooperating. The guy who hit me was on top of me, kneeling on my back – and – maybe? – my pockets were getting turned inside out. I flailed around, and my ears must have rebooted because I could make out the slap of soles on concrete, running away.

There was something on the sidewalk in front of me; I blinked a couple times to try to focus, and picked it up. Leather, clunky: wallet – mine. I opened it up: cards still there, license there, billfold empty. It was less bad than it could've been. I shoved it back in my pocket and put my hand in the other one to check my keys, get out my phone to call the police and call a ride home from here. No phone. Duh. Of course. Goddamnit.

Ten hours later I had skipped my morning class and was still sore from where I'd gotten hit in the back of the head, worse sore because T-com was giving me the runaround about turning the goddamn phone off. I decided to bail on the afternoon one too and see if I could steal some food from the bagel stand in the engineering hall, or off Riley's lab. The world had fucked me out of a nearly-new smartphone and thirty-two bucks plus a Dunkins coupon, and I had to get my own back somehow.

There were still freshmen from the Gluino Research Society manning the bagel stand, so instead of just stealing stuff I had to slug the can; seven cents makes about the same sound as twenty-five in loose change, but I was flat broke and doing a nickel-and-dime runaround to afford a stale bagel was really not helping my mood. No grad-student guest lectures, no pizza crusts to garbage-dive for; there better be something lying around that applied-physics lab.

When I got there, though, there was anything but: Riley was standing around some kind of bit of machinery with Carolína and Yuping, looking at it like it was going to blow up. "Yo," I said coming in, because if you don't let the applied physics lab know you're there, nobody's going to stop you before you point at something that's going to arc you into bacon bits. "Hey. What's up? Can I borrow four bits off someone to go get coffee? I got robbed last night and I'm dead broke."

"Experiment," Yuping said. "Please stay still." I stood still.

"In three – two – one – discharge!" There was a shake through the floor as Carolína came to that point. "Diverging – when you see the reference frame shift, grab it!"

"Power's holding," Riley said, nervous but excited. There was a really weird feeling in the pit of my stomach. "Holding – estimate branch merge in thirty seconds – if you get the shot take it, in position now!" Yuping leaned over the chunk of technology, hand poised – and suddenly, no warning, stabbed into the box, yanking out almost as soon as he was in. "Cut! Cutting! Metrics?"

"Steady – steady –" Carolína's voice was rising, and she was trying to keep focused on whatever readout she was looking at instead of the Lions mug in Yuping's hand. "Cut! Cut! Clear! Clear! Do you have it?"

"Have!" Yuping shouted. "Clear?"

"It's clear – and it's still in there! We did it!"

"Yes!" Riley jumped up in the air, punching at the ceiling. "We did it! We're going to win the Nobel Prize! We're going to be famous!"