"So, what're you looking for? You need me to shed a little . . . light on things? Hoo hoo, I came up with that one myself."
8 tightened the screws around Light Switch's 2 frame and tapped it twice to make sure it was in place. She gasped at him.
"Did you just spank my covering? I don't even know your name! You . . . you . . . ooohhhh, I don't have a word in my personality data for someone like you, but whatever the word would be, it isn't a pretty one! Tapping my case like that!"
"Maybe if you didn't wear it so loose," Switch 1 called out from the other room, "You wouldn't have to get routine adjustment on it so often. She does it for the attention, Doctor."
Switch 2 made a growling noise.
"Don't pay her any mind. She never gets her case tapped. She's always circuit protected, she says, but I just know she wishes she could go natural like me. Ooh, a little more tweaking on the upper right one, could you? Just a little twist?"
8 applied his driver to it and cranked it in a little further.
"That's a good screwing," she giggled, "Now I'm even all over. Ooh! Is Mobius around? I just have to tell him about all of the time we got to spend with that guest of his! He loved my light show demo. It got him so stimulated he started drooling all over the couch!"
"That's because he fell asleep in the middle of it," Switch 1 said.
"You put him to sleep by asking him all those questions about his job. A man doesn't want to talk shop when he's on vacation. He wants some company. A little mentat, a little salient green and soda and the right atmosphere. No wonder he fell asleep if all she wanted to do was discuss old lizard bones with him."
"At least I can discuss anything at all with our guests besides just suggesting various alcoholic beverages and tittering at their bad jokes like a Vegas floozy."
8 sat down on the bed and put his tools away in a folding storage knap. He took out his Knobulator, now properly hooked up to a pair of fusion batteries, and began tuning in to the Sink's diagnostic output streams.
"Okay, you're online the both of you. Excellent. You can send and receive from my Knobulater here, right? I'm pinging you both now."
Both switches yelped.
"Naughty!" Switch 2 squealed, "You've got full subsystem access."
"I'm not entirely comfortable with this," Switch 1 said, "Can't we at least get to know each other first? We haven't even been on a proper date!"
"Time is short," 8 replied, "If I have to log and review an entire luminescent output data dump with a remote sensor we're going to be here through the nuclear winter. Tell me truthfully, because I can find out for myself if necessary: does Mobius have remote access to your systems from X-42?"
" . . . noooo," Switch 2 said.
"I'll have to run invasive diagnostics to make sure, then?"
"No! I mean, no. No, believe you me, we're all alone in here. Mobius doesn't keep a watchful eye on us at all! I mean, why would he? We're his loyal switches!"
"Quit embarassing yourself," Switch 1 sighed, "Yes, Mobius has a constant datastream incoming and outgoing from the Sink. I believe he routes it through the Central Intelligence, as loathe as I am to admit that we all share the same circuits. I assume you're not interested in him knowing that you're fondling our internals like this?"
"Not presently. I'll just . . . fix that," 8 said.
"Hey! Stop it! I'm not even on my defragmentation cycle!" Switch 2 protested.
"This is so demeaning."
"Okay, you're both plugged up and isolated from the rest of the Sink. I'll go fix that annoyingly informative routing issue with the SCI and be right back."
In the main room of the Sink the Central Intelligence glowed its quietly superior glow. On its holographic display grid a map of the facility showed the general status of every building and important installation. Doctor Zero's lab was an emergency red. The Dome had a large yellow cone on the roof, the VAC, which was labelled "under construction."
"Good evening sir," the Intelligence said as 8 crouched in front of it, "I must say, it feels quite remarkable to finally be online. Time spent stored in holotape form is remarkably lacking. If only Sir hadn't decided to activate all of these other 'intelligences' along with mine I would have gone so far as to say my coming into being was quite timely and gratifying. Can I assist Sir with anything, anything at all? Beverages? Sundries? An Atomic evening mixer, perhaps?"
"I just need you to tell me what sort of input is most compatible with your runtimes: wireless, direct-input?"
"Either or. I'm not particularly fussy about it, Sir. However, I would advise Sir not to attempt to remotely access any of the Sink's confidentially concealed or forbidden systems. Mobius was most prudent to ensure security from outside threats in an attempt to make sure the experiment parameters were properly controlled. It may not go well for Sir if Sir tries to worm Sir's way through the firewalls."
8 twisted dials until he'd syched up with the Central Intelligence's core firmware and began navagating his way through various layers of protections. Mobius had sheltered external access to the Sink firmly underneath a dogpile of obfuscating systems, most of which appeared redundant and possibly adding to the Central Intelligence's eccentricities. Several security measures were rabbit holes leading to dead ends. One was even a trivia quiz about Mobius' daily drug habits, something that 8 had to navigate almost completely by guesswork. Once he'd finished he found nothing approaching root access but instead layer upon layer of ideas for recipes involving the use of salient green.
"If Sir is going to be performing invasive surgery upon this unit, might I request that Sir clean up the file structure when Sir is finished? It would be nothing short of basic courtesy."
Past multitudes of false leads 8 was able to find a particularly complicated and abstract layer of coding logic that wound up with him stuck in a loop. Trying to undo transfer protocol protections in root access led right back to the surface layer of the root. It wasn't until after twenty or so attempts that 8 figured out that the packet transfer system was an isolated piece of hardware that needed to be physically switched on or off. So, he called up Zero.
"Don't mind if it complains. Somewhere in there there's a switch that needs to be flipped so I can trick Mobius into thinking that the Sink isn't being accessed even though it is."
Zero scratched his head and stared at the Central Intelligence, which seemed about as nervous as a machine can seem.
"It's not exactly a robot. I'm not sure I can take it apart without it ending up in incompatably-shaped pieces."
"It should just screw off . . . somehow. I don't know hardware like you do."
"Well," Zero said, "I'll do my best."
"Sir, might I suggest Sir and Sir, er, avoid dismantling me at all cost? I believe Mobius has this unit rigged to alert him if any of the intelligence cores are tampered with physically."
"Eh?" Zero looked at 8.
"Just try to take it apart without ripping any wires."
"Er, I'll do my best. Wires don't always behave like that, though. Collateral damage is part of my occupational description."
After about fifteen minutes Zero had the whole top of the SCI removed. He hunted around for something that looked like a switch.
"Melting mentats everywhere," Zero grimaced, "Maybe this is it? There's a box with a sticky note on it here. It says . . . uh, 'Don't flip this if you don't want to know the Sink is being sabotaged.' Sounds about right."
8 nodded.
"Wait, there's more . . . 'And if you're someone who isn't me and planning on sabotaging the Sink, I, Doctor Mobius, formally declare my feelings to be very hurt by your rude behaviour.'"
"Flip it."
"The note's making me feel all guilty!"
"Just do it!"
Zero flipped it. 8 ran a diagnostic and found himself in full control of input and output of data.
"Can you put it back together?" 8 asked.
"I, uh," Zero scanned the clutter of parts littering the room, "I can make it . . . talk again. Maybe. I mean, there's a first time for everything."
Once Zero had the voice module reconstructed, wires trailing from its voice output into the electronic entrails of its open guts, 8 tapped into the data stream and began rigging every device to send false feedback data to Mobius.
"This is ever so humiliating," sighed the Central Intelligence.
"Once we've figure out of Mobius has been brainwashed or not, I'm sure he'll put you back together right," Zero said, trying to reassure the machine, "If not, well, I'll just build you a new exterior! You should have seen the fish tank I built today."
"An imitation of life spent filtering the fecal matter of aquatic fauna is about equal in terms of enduring misery to having all of my insides exposed to the open air while unauthorized technicians peruse my most delicate workings."
"Technician!" Zero scoffed, "Scientists, excuse me! 8 definitely isn't a technician! I'm just about the opposite of a technician!"
"All the more worrysome."
"Looks clean," 8 nodded, "Okay, the Sink is now invisible for the time being. Zero, can you keep an eye on these readings here? If any of them starts to fluxuate, I need you to tweak the corresponding dial in the direction that makes the needles here quiver and shake less. Like a game of hot or cold. They make minor adjustments to the information admission capacity of the various cores. I'm pretty sure Mobius wired them all to mislead saboteurs interested in certain information, such as how to use the technology against Mobius himself. I can't force them to be completely honest on short notice but I think we can steer them in the right direction with just a few questions. You make sure my machine can adjust their ability to hide information."
"I think I can do that. But, wait, what if they all start shaking at the same time? I'm only human and there's, like, six shaking needles on this thing."
"Then we'll have our answer. Try to be quick. Personality modules can work around this kind of electronic suggestion tweaking if you're not fast enough."
8 sat down on the couch again across from Light Switch 1 and clasped his fingers together.
"We, his trusted colleagues, think Mobius is sick. Sick in the head, to be exact. He's operating against us without his knowledge."
"Ooh! Like one of those spy films!" Switch 2 gushed, "Mobius taught me all about spies. Evil, jealous, fun-hating men from the Orient trying to crash our party!"
"The adults are talking now, sweetie," Switch 1 cooed at her.
"Phooey on you! I'm trying to help!"
Zero watched the needles. Nothing had moved yet.
"Spies? Yes. We think a spy has corrupted Mobius' good honest American ways. I know he spent a lot of time dealing with the both of you when it came to the workings of the human mind in terms of comfort, complacency, increasing the flow of information across neurons, improving human contact. Well, we need to improve contact with Mobius. We need him to trust us again."
"Well, I'd start with a discussion of Molière's contributions to the refinement of mimesis. You so-called 'colleauges' of his just need to get to know him better! Do you even talk outside of work? We talked with him all the time about the most illuminating subjects."
Two needles began clicking and clacking back and forth. Zero fiddled around with the controls until they'd stabilized.
"Activity on two and three," Zero called out, "But I got it covered."
"I mean," Switch 1 stumbled over her words for a moment, "That's not to say . . . we . . . didn't discuss more . . . practical things. Like . . . waves. Particles."
"Mood-a-delic soothwaves!" Switch 2 sang, "My favourite!"
"Shh!" Switch 1 hissed at her, "We don't kiss and tell!"
"Lightwaves? Well, that's appropriate. What specifically were you studying in regards to that? I assume something having to do with influencing the human mind with light?"
"Why of course," Switch 1 said, "That's quite clearly our function: we provide an illuminating atmosphere for conducive thought."
"Don't forget me!" Switch 2 pouted, "I make the room look good, along with anyone in it! You just make the place look like a stuffy software library."
"Is this a purely aesthetic form of illumination?" 8 asked.
"Not entirely. With the right touch of light I'm capable of stimulating the release of glucose and epinephrine from the liver and medulla respectively, along with other controlled endochrinal releases and adjustments to make sure anyone I'm lighting up stays bright as a bulb, if you don't mind my repartee."
"And her?"
"Oh, nothing much."
"You . . . you cold-hearted witch! Ohh, wait until Mobius hears about this. She's a liar! I'm amazing, to put it mildly. My adjustments to the room's ambience . . . how does it go again? Introduce . . . entroduce . . . boost . . ."
Switch 1 snorted, "The word you're looking for is induce, but don't force a memory leak."
"Humph! I was just about to say that, thank you! Yes, I . . . 'induce' a release of dremamine-"
"Dopamine," sighed 1.
"Phooey! Do-pa-mine and sarah-toe-nin. Yeah! That's probably it!"
"So," 8 sat back in his seat, "If you can alter chemical output using lightwaves, surely you can do more to the human mind than just simulate the effects of basic chems."
"No, sadly that's about it," Switch 1 lamented, "We're fairly limited in our ability to influence brains on our own."
"Anything, Zero?"
"Nope. All's quiet."
8 frowned, "Not on your own, then. But surely you've got background data on the various effects that light waves have on human beings? Enough to repurpose the various findings into some other desired effect? Create anger, sadness, things of that nature?"
"Why would you want to do that?" Switch 2 asked, "That's no fun at all!"
"Sadly, no. We only have the information necessary to carry out our previously described functions, nothing more."
Four our of six needles began waving frantically back and forth as Zero struggled to get them all in order.
"I . . . I mean . . . we . . . don't . . . can't . . . backup data is . . . pretty . . . complicated . . ."
"Hurry up, Zero! Before she finds a way to work around it!"
"Trying! Trying!"
The more Zero turned knobs, the more they seemed to wiggle and jimmy back and forth. Eventually he got almost all of them to quiet down.
"Don't . . . want to . . . get into it but . . . yes . . . of course . . . we've got backup data. It's not very useful, but . . ."
"Quickly, Zero!"
Tongue sticking out from between his lips, Zero rapidly spun the knob in circles trying to find the sweet spot.
"," Switch 2 began warbling.
"Zero! You're going to fry her logic! Find it or stop!"
Zero stopped. The needle was rattling slowly back and forth like a metronome. He turned it a hair counterclockwise and it narrowed in arc until it was just a thin quiver.
"ZzzorororororororffhhfhfwhatI'mtrying to say is that, well, the data might be of use to someone interested in exploring other uses of lighting but without Mobius around to provide input I, well, I just don't think anyone else could manage!"
"Oh, why did you make her stop?" Switch 2 complained, "She looked like she'd finally found a way to loosen up."
8 sighed with relief.
"If I were to investigate this data, what would I find?"
"Just a lot of little notes about this or that. Nothing too important. This colour influences that part of the cerebral cortext, yadda yadda. There's some flourescence and bioluminescence pattern data. Something about rearranging, um, certain . . . priorities with . . . well, I don't think you'd understand really."
Zero tweaked needles one and six to stillness.
"Or maybe you would! I mean, who knows? Maybe you're even remotely as smart as Mobius. Nobody could possibly hope to be, but in the off-chance that you had the mental capacity to understand his findings about how lighting can affect a person's prioritization of choice then I guess there might be a footnote or two of interest."
"Prioritization? As in, changing how humans behave with lighting?"
"Maybe a little here and there. Nothing big on the topic."
"Enough to, say, change the lighting in X-42 Mobius think he's got some very important business outside in the crater, so important that he rushes out of his lab forgetting to lock the door behind him?"
"Of course not! That's outlandish! There's absolutely nothing in my research banks about anything so hideously unconscientious!"
Zero found it absolutely impossible to balance all of the flipping needles. They were hammering back and forth so hard that the Knobulator was jumping in his hands.
"8, I'm sorry but . . . this is impossible. There's no way I can-"
"It's fine. Leave it alone. She's told us all we need to know."
8 rose and joined Zero next to the Central Intelligence, leaving Light Switch 1 doing her best to glare icily at him whilst lacking eyes or a face.
"He played you like blues on Blind Diode, honey," Switch 2 smirked, "I'm so going to remember this next time you say that 'knowing things' makes you better than me."
