Chapter 2: Amazing Technology
The next morning, Keri woke up to the sound of her annoying alarm clock chirping in her ear. She slapped the 'snooze' button angrily, not wanting to be awake now. Slowly, but surely, she did waken, though. She staggered to the bathroom, still rubbing the sleep from her eyes. Turning on the shower and grabbing a washcloth, Keri stepped into the bathtub and an invigorating stream of hot water.
As she was washing, she couldn't help but think about the strange car now sitting in her dilapidated garage.
I wonder where it came from? she thought. Even though it's 2015, cars are still not THAT advanced.
Most of the governments declared over 10 years ago, that money that used to be put towards making newer and better cars would be diverted to other more important funds, like education and that Foundation.
What was that place called again? she thought. The Foundation of Law or Government? Yeah, something like that. But she had never seen such a decked-out car before. One that jumps at the push of a button? I wonder who made it and why? And why did they leave it in the city junk yard for anyone to get a hold of? Her head was teeming with questions, but, unfortunately, no one could answer her.
She shut off the water, toweled herself dry, and put clean clothes on. She went downstairs and began to prepare breakfast. Although Keri was in her mid-twenties, she lived alone in a large, old-fashioned house, the kind you might have seen in the 1950's.
She loved old things. Every time she saw something from before the turn of the century, she had to have it. And with the job she had, restoring old junk and selling it at outrageous prices, she could afford to have the old place. Keri could fix anything with wires or gears, and as long as people loved old junk and bought it no matter what the price was, it would only fuel her ambition to go out and get more. The junk yard was the perfect place to find the old things she loved. But now that she found this strange old car, she considered taking a vacation to restore it. The more she thought about it, the better she liked it.
"I'll do it," she said aloud, stuffing her face with syrupy pancakes, "I'll take a vacation and fix that old car."
After finishing off the pancakes and washing the dishes, she picked up her dirty gray working jacket and put it on. She opened the front door and made her way to the garage and the car.
"Okay, car, let's see what's under your hood, and then see if I can fix it." She popped the hood and took a look inside. "A turbine engine? No wonder this thing packed a punch!" she said, remembering the evening before when she first started the machine up.
"Wow, look at this! A computer CPU! I'll bet this is what controls all those buttons in the cab." She reached inside and pulled some wires away from the CPU and then wrenched it loose from its platform.
"Some of these chips are for memory. Hmm... they're moldy and chewed through," said Keri taking a closer look. "But I'll bet I can download these memory chips into new ones and then replace them on the motherboard."
She set to work on the chips, and in less than twenty minutes, had the new chips loaded with the old software installed successfully on the motherboard.
"Hmm... everything else looks fine to me," she said. She placed the component back into its platform and began to secure it and place the wires back into it. An extra wire and an extra socket in the component was left over. Shrugging, Keri placed the wire into its socket and was rewarded by a shower of sparks and a jolt. "Whoa! Everything in this car packs a punch!"
She scanned the powerful engine again and spotted a rather large rat's nest located near the fan belt. "You're gone." She grabbed her shop vac, plugged it in, and began to suck out the dust, debris, and especially that rat's nest from the engine.
She did not hear it, but under the loud noise of the shop vac the car spoke to her!
"Hello? Is anyone there? Michael?" The car spoke with a very noticeable, male Boston accent, and seemed a bit confused. However, Keri could not hear a word it said. "Switching to internal voice mode," the car stated under the vacuum. Perhaps it would be best if this human did not know that he could talk quite yet.
Turning off the vacuum, Keri noticed that a wire was loose from the light contraption that protruded from the slot in the hood. She reached in and pushed it into place. She heard a slight humming noise as if power had been fully restored to the light, and a red glow glided back and forth along the track. Inside the car, the monitor on the curved dash suddenly sizzled with snow, then came to life. On the screen was a blurry form, which soon came into focus. It was the bottom half of Keri's body jammed uncomfortably close in the monitor.
"Oh great," the car muttered inside the cab, so as not to attract attention, "It figures. As soon as I get my eyes back in focus, the first thing is see is a crotch." Just then, Keri bent down and stared the scanner right in the eye... so to speak. "Wow... I guess that's not Michael. She's a lot prettier than he is. I should ask her where I am, but I'm not sure she can be trusted yet."
This car had a habit of talking to himself.
Satisfied, for the time being, that the light was just a light, Keri stood up and slammed the hood shut. There was nothing else to fix under there. Now, she had to check out the inside of the car. Just as she was about to open the door, the monitor shut itself off. She pulled up the latch, opened the door, and sat down on the grimy seat. Glancing below the dash, she noticed there were no protruding wires or circuits. She bent down and took a closer look. There were two black panels, held on by screws, on the driver and passenger sides. Apparently, they were holding all the wires back. Keri scrounged around for a screwdriver and removed the panel on the driver's side, one screw at a time. When the panel fell away, so did hundreds of thin multi-colored wires and connectors.
"Oh man! How am I going to make heads or tails out of this mess?" she complained. Actually, all the wires were where they were supposed to be, except for a few that were chewed off or broken. She noticed the damaged wires and told herself that's all she'd touch. She grabbed some electrical tape and began to patch together the broken wires. Occasionally, sparks flew but that was all. As she was patching up, she noticed that a few indicator lights on the dash that had not been lit up before had now come to life.
At least, I'm actually fixing it, she thought. When she was done with the wires, she replaced the black panel and then moved over to the passenger side. She went through the same procedure and fixed a few wires.
When she finally stood up, Keri realized she was rather hungry. Looking at the dash again, she saw that nearly all the indicator lights were now lit up and blinking with life.
"Well, I guess that's it. I'm going to get something to eat, and then I'll come back to see if there's anything I missed. I think I got everything, though," she told the car. She left the garage and returned to the house.
The lonely, dusty black car sat in the middle of the garage. "I do hope she returns soon. After being alone for who knows how long, you tend to want company. I have to thank her for repairing my systems too. Perhaps she can help me find Michael."
A half hour later, Keri returned to the garage still wearing the grimy gray work jacket. She leaned against the car staring at the counter that held an assortment of objects. Her eyes fell upon a device that she had put together several months earlier. A holographic projector. She walked over and picked it up. The device began to hum when she pressed a button on it. Then, five feet away a form appeared and stood before her.
"Chris..." she whispered in a sad small voice. She deactivated the hologram and looked at the car. Why not? she thought. This thing has just about everything else. Why not one more thing?
Keri popped the hood once again and began to install the projector. Hours ticked slowly away as she tried and retried to install the tangled pile of metal and wires. As nightfall came, she totally forgot about sleep. She was getting tired, but refused to stop until she successfully installed the unit.
Finally, at five P.M. the next day, Keri connected the last wire to the car's CPU. The projector came alive with a slight hum and lights blinked from within. A slight smile hovered on her tired face as she collapsed onto the cold, concrete floor.
"Oh dear!" the car said, worried. "Are you all right? ... Hello? ... Young lady?" The car tried over and over to wake the fallen girl, but failed. He even resorted to honking the horn, but that didn't work either. "What is that device she installed into me, anyway?" said the car, hoping it would be something that could help. He accessed the device and activated it.
Opening his eyes, the man looked around the room. "What a strange sensation," he said. He turned around and looked at the black car in front of him. "Incredible! Talk about an out of body experience!" the man exclaimed. He was actually the car in a holographic form!
He enjoyed being human for a while, walking, running, jumping, skipping, rolling in the grass; all the things he had never been able to do. And he could actually feel it! He felt the grass under his feet, and when he rolled in it, he smelled the dirt under his nose and felt the spray of water from the sprinkling system in the side yard. His joy was soon over, though, when he returned to the garage and saw that Keri was still lying unconscious on the floor.
"The poor woman. I've got to help her. She exhausted herself giving me this wonderful experience!" The man knelt beside her and brushed her long, golden hair away from her eyes.
She is pretty, he thought. I wonder... He reached down and placed his arms under her back and behind her knees. It worked. Apparently, not only was he now a hologram of a human being, but he was a solid hologram; not one of those run-of-the-mill light projections only.
Carefully, he picked her up and moved toward the driver's side of his original body. Amazingly he was still in control of it, because when he thought of opening the door, it opened. He placed Keri's still form into the driver's seat and tried to make her as comfortable as possible. He found an old torn blanket in the corner of the garage and draped it over her, since it was a little chilly out. The man deduced it was in the early fall of the year. Although of what year he didn't know.
"She'll be hungry when she wakes up. I'll go prepare something for her to eat." The man walked toward the house, but the farther away from the garage he walked, the more unstable he became. His form began to flicker and waver as if he was the screen of a television that was having bad reception.
"The projector must have a limited range of twenty-five to thirty feet. I guess if I'm going to go into the house, I've got to get the projector a little closer." the man/car reasoned.
Without moving, the man looked at his former form, and its engine started and revved up. The car backed slowly out of the garage and pulled up beside the front porch. The hologram walked up the stairs, opened the door, and, eventually, found the kitchen. He made a sandwich that looked relatively good and brought it out to Keri. She was still asleep on the seat, exhausted from installing the projector.
"I guess she doesn't want this right now," the handsome blonde haired, blue eyed hologram said. He placed the sandwich in the passenger side of the car. "Well, I don't need to stand around and wait for her to wake up. I'll deactivate the hologram until she does." The man's form flickered and wavered, then vanished completely. The car's engine started again, and he returned to the garage. Inside, the car parked, shut off its engine, and patiently waited for Keri to wake up.