Field Investigations

Chapter 35:

It was a while before they worked out the entire course. I sat silently the whole time, just watching. I didn't feel like they wanted my input, and anyway, I didn't have much to say about the project. When they finished, Matthew handed the Field Interface to me, rolling the spherical Transporter across the circle to where I sat.

"You've got to go on the course too," he reminded me. "After the race."

Oh. He wanted me to work out the coordinates myself.

"Yeah," I said.

He stood up, walking over to the gear wall on the other side of the room. Gavin and Sasha followed, each of them pulling on a harness, preparing to run the course.

I picked up the Field Interface, tossing it between my hands for a minute. I squinted at the clock on the wall behind me. Twenty minutes or so before the race would start. That left me with about thirty minutes to prepare to run the course myself.

I wondered what would happen with Quinn and Carrie. Would they be running the course afterwards too? It would only be fair. If so, we'd probably be running it as a group anyway. I guess I kind of switched teams for nothing.

My scrap paper was covered in numbers already, calculations to figure out the safest course through the Field dimensions. It was getting hard to find spaces to write.

I stood up, walking to the front of the room to grab another piece of paper. As I passed Ms. Rainer, our eyes met for a second. I think she could tell that I was disappointed about our conversation earlier.

At this point, Quinn, Carrie, Ms. Rainer and I were the only people in the room who weren't putting on harnesses. Quinn and Carrie were back in the corner, still talking in hushed voices. Shouldn't Ms. Rainer have gone over to tell them to start getting ready to run the course? They didn't even have a Field Interface with them.

It didn't matter. I had enough to worry about with my own impending trip into the Field. It took a few minutes, but I managed to find a path through the Field that seemed pretty safe in terms of temperature. Plugging the coordinates into the Transporter, I heard its dials fall into place with a satisfying click. I had improved at all of this, even if I wasn't good enough for the advanced classes yet.

All that was left was telling the Transporter who I wanted to send into the Field. In this case, myself. That might sound like a simple thing to do, but telling the Transporter who to transport is the hardest part of planning a trip into the Field. You have to write it all in with this code so that the Transporter can understand it, and you need to be very specific. I mean, you practically have to account for each individual strand of hair on your head.

After a few minutes, though, I finished.

Brushing off my shirt (for no good reason, really, as it wasn't like I'd been sitting in the grass or anything), I stood, walking over to join the rest of the class by the gear rack.

Spotting the same baby-blue harness I wore the time before, I pulled it off of its hook. I didn't put it on yet. The harness wasn't all that comfortable, and I figured I still had a few minutes. After all, I wouldn't be going until after the relay race, and that would probably take at least ten minutes.

Ms. Rainer stepped over to where we all stood. I noticed a silver stopwatch clutched in her right hand. "If all of you are ready, it's time for the race."

"We're ready," Matthew said. Everyone nodded.

"Okay, then. Everyone, get to your starting platforms." She turned to me. "Isabel -"

"Isa," I corrected.

"Isa, Ethan is on the platform you'll be starting on already, so you can't go up there yet. The second he goes, though, you'll have to head up there. We don't have too much time left in class, and I want you to get a chance on the course."

"What about Quinn and Carrie?" I asked.

"They're opting out," she said.

"What do you mean? That's allowed?"

"It doesn't matter to me if they ever finish this class," Ms. Rainer said. "It's up to them if they're interested or not."

"That's not fair, though," I pointed out.

"How? It seems fair enough to me. The students who want to move through faster do, and the students who don't do the work don't move forward. You don't have to run the course if you don't want to, but you were just telling me how you want to get through this class quickly. If you meant that, then I don't see why you'd choose not to attempt the course."

"I guess you're right," I said slowly. Ms. Rainer nodded before she walked over to the center of the room. She peeked at her Field Interface for a second, checking to make sure everyone was on their platforms before she pulled a small microphone out of her pocket.

She shouted into it, "Starting in three... two... one!"

There were five people on the course, but I could only see one of them, Peter. Everyone else was in the Field. And a few seconds later, Peter disappeared, too. Ms. Rainer was tracking their progress on her Field Interface, so she knew exactly where they all were. She called out commentary on the race like it was a professional soccer game.

"And Derrick J. takes the lead," she shouted. "Oh, wait - Matthew H. pulls ahead only a few hundred feet from the second platform. He rounds the corner and... oh, he's slowing down as he approaches this next obstacle. He's got to get out of the Field to step on it; timing is everything here. And meanwhile, as he waits, Maggie K. pulls ahead from last place, only ten feet away from the platform and... team three is onto the second stage of the course!"

It wasn't all that interesting to watch. From the ground, I was pretty much just looking at a couple of scattered platforms. I mean, some of them looked like they were floating in the air (they were suspended by hybrid poles that couldn't be seen), but that kind of thing was starting to lose its novelty to me. Anyway, I guess knowing that there were invisible people running along those platforms was kind of cool, but from where I stood, I wasn't seeing anything happening. Ms. Rainer's commentary definitely made it more exciting, though.

Once all the teams had made it onto the second stage of the course, I stepped into my harness, pulling it up and tightening it around my waist. It was good timing, too, because only a second later, Ms. Rainer tapped my shoulder.

"Time to head onto the course," she told me. I started towards the ladder ahead of me, the main entrance to the course, but she stopped me.

"Go the other way," she said, pointing me towards a different ladder in the center of the room with bright red rungs. "That leads straight to your platform. You won't have to worry about bumping into anyone on the course."

I twisted my hair around my finger, my legs shaking as I walked to clip into the safety rope. My hands felt sweaty on the slippery rungs as I climbed, and I got shakier with each step higher I climbed.

Finally, I got to the top. This platform was in the Field, so I would have to wait for the timer I'd set on my Transporter to go off. I hated this part, because you just started falling and had to hope you could catch yourself. I mean, worst case scenario there was the rope. Even so, it was scary for me.

I didn't have to wait long. After a second, my hands went transparent. I fell for only a fraction of a second before my hands caught the rough surface of the platform. This time, I didn't have too much trouble climbing on.

The rest of the course was easy to run through. This time, I'd programmed the timing much better, and I switched in and out of the Field right on schedule. When I climbed down the ladder at the end of the course, I kept my expression neutral although I was grinning inside.

"Nice," Kenna said.

"Thanks," I replied.

I had nothing to be proud of, really. Most of the other people finished their courses even faster than I did, even with having to reprogram the Transporter in the air. But I was proud, at least because I'd done better than the time before.

Not that that was a very high bar.