I hope all of my reviewers had a happy holiday. On to the new chapter!
Tucker's eye twitched violently. He had actually been pretty lucky to find the manual for the computer. It even had notes by the creator. The problem was that the computer was complex to a new definition of the word.
From what he could gather it was a biological-artificial fusion processor. There were tanks inside the main body of the computer. Those five tanks had a kind of polymer resin which insulated five artificial brains. Masses of gila and neurons fused with silicon transistors and some of the weirdest integrated circuits that the techno-geek had ever seen.
Other than that, Tucker had been able to determine that it was a supercomputer and might even be faster than what was out today. The brains were kept alive by a life support system. An electrical heart, lungs, and just about anything else the body could provide, only using electricity as energy instead of food.
Although, the memory was the most complex thing imaginable. It operated on one of the few things common to all animals…DNA.
Selections of specific combinations of amino acids made up a kind of microscopic biological memory that was years ahead of anything Tucker had seen. Even the display screen was above-top-of-the-line. What he had originally thought to be a screen was actually a box of translucent fluid membrane. Using lasers, it could provide an image of just about anything, in 3D.
Then he had noticed that there were cords, other than the power cord, leading away from the computer. Following them, Tucker thought he might find what necessitated all of this processing power. There had to be something down here that was out-of-the-ordinary.
And he found it. Tucker wasn't sure what it was that he had found, but it was pretty big and on the same level of tech as the computer. After that, the techno-geek had searched around, revealing that…
The basement was really big.
And there was a lot of stuff in it.
The first wasn't surprising. The second included dozens of gadgets that he couldn't possibly hope to figure out right now. The rest of the basement was full of stuff similar to what he thought should be in a museum, instead of tech that would make a supercomputer look slow.
There were a few Egyptian mummies and their golden coffins, he couldn't really remember what they were called right now. Then there were a lot of books that he couldn't read because he didn't know whatever language they were in.
There were statues…paintings…a few scrolls, more scrolls…some other piece of tech that he couldn't figure out. Lets see…what was this? Tucker bent down and looked into another dark stairwell. Looking between the computer and the stairwell, he decided that the computer was much better suited to the continuation of his current state of mental health.
"When does it end?" Sam asked herself softly. She had been walking down one row for the last ten minutes and it hadn't ended yet. Currently, she was reading the book she had picked out, but then something caught her eye.
It was a pedestal. Like the one would put a large volume on to read from to a class or something. On it was one of the biggest books she had ever seen. Sam groaned inwardly. Why did things always have to be big with this house?
Walking over to it, the first thing she noticed was that it wasn't in any language she had ever seen. Looking from one side to the other conspiratorially, Sam whispered a memorized spell under her breath. It was a translation spell. Only…it didn't work.
The relatively simple scratch-like writing didn't change. That meant the book had to either be enchanted, or…
Sam stifled a gasp as she realized what this could very possibly be. The writing, now that she took a closer look, didn't look like scratches. It looked like the soft footprints of birds.
She was looking at the language of the birds. The language that God himself had wiped from the face of the earth after toppling the tower of Babel.
Jazz was having a much easier time than the others, by comparison. Reference was easily a large part of her life. All this was, was referencing product and inventory lists by number. She would have to check that they did have these things later, but for now, a well composed list would have to do.
"Danny? You there?" Jazz asked, it wouldn't hurt to check in.
"Yeah, right here," Danny said tiredly.
"What's wrong?" Jazz asked.
"It never ends," Danny groaned. "I mean, how many floors did you say this place had?"
"Five," Jazz said with relative certainty. "Six at the most."
"Well," Danny contradicted. "By my count, I'm on the eight floor."
"Danny," Jazz warned.
"Honest!" Danny swore. "No joke. I looked around on the second floor for a little while, but then decided to see about the top floor, since that one would be most effected by the ghost zone portal."
"And," Jazz prompted.
"And I'm on the eight floor. Wait…no, I'm on the second?" Danny said with obvious confusion in his voice.
"Huh?" Jazz asked, now thoroughly confused herself.
"Jazz, look. When I get this figured out, I'll explain it to you." Danny said and signed off.