~Chapter Twenty-Four~
"Marbles! I think that's enough straightening up for one day lad!" Archimedes exclaimed as his roommate reorganized his bookshelf. Lately Marbles was becoming obsessed with everything being in perfect order.
"I can't help it Archimedes," Marbles said, "I just have this sudden urge to make sure everything is upgraded to perfection."
"That can never happen though Marbles."
"Not so Archimedes," the sixteen-year-old boy argued, "Look."
Marbles walked over to his desk drawer and pulled out a blueprint he had made.
"What's this?" Archimedes asked, "Some sort of advanced vacuum cleaner in the works?"
"Not quite," Marbles answered, "Its the blueprint to an invention I'm working on. A few weeks ago I was thinking back to a math lesson from middle school about symmetry. And it came to me, what if I could design a machine that would automatically make symmetrical products?"
"Well I fail to see how that will help you with your bookshelf lad," Archimedes replied.
"Look at my bookshelf Archimedes," Marbles said pointing at it, "You can just vaguely see that one side is longer than the other. That's mainly why I'm having difficulty with it. It will never look quite right."
"I think you're being a bit obsessive lad," Archimedes laughed, "But all the same, your idea would probably help out a lot of manufacturing companies."
"Precisely Archimedes," Marbles said, "I want to open my own factory with it where everything is built perfectly symmetrical. And after showing Mr. Williams my upgraded version of the Skwak Pad, he's vowed to help me bring my next product into the spotlight. Oh Archimedes I can see it now! This machine will change the future of cyberdustrial manufacturing forever!"
"What are you gonna call it lad?"
"The symmetrizer of course," Marbles answered.
Archimedes smiled. "Very original Marbles... Well I'm off to Poddleville now." He paused. "Don't you have a date with Ada tonight?"
Marbles gasped. He had completely forgotten.
"He lent you his coat?! Oh how romantic!" Ada said over the phone.
It was 6:00 PM and Melissa had called Ada to tell her all about her encounter with Antoine.
"I was so ecstatic I thought I was going to faint!" Melissa said, "Oh Ada! He's so romantic..."
"Oh Melissa I believe you've been bit by the love bug," Ada teased.
Melissa sighed. "Do you think I'm being immature about this whole thing?"
"Even if you are, who cares?!" Ada exclaimed, "We're young. We can be a little immature if we want to be."
Just then Ada heard a knock at her door and immediately knew who it was.
"I have to go now Melissa," Ada said into the phone, "Marbles is here for our date."
"Alright have fun you two," Melissa said on her end of the line, "And be safe."
"Goodbye."
"Goodbye," Melissa said before Ada hung up on her end of the line.
Melissa went over to her study desk and pulled out a small compact computer she'd designed over the summer. If anyone whom had just met her saw it, they'd think she was ridiculous. What could anybody want with a computer small enough to fit in the palm of one's hand? That's what cyberphones with cybernet connection are for. But she had plans for this tiny device. She didn't have the money now, but whenever she did, Melissa planned to run experiments on consciousness transfers.
"There has to be some way that someone can have their consciousness taken back out of the computer and back into their bodies," she always argued.
But every time, nobody could see a way her idea could work.
"What body dear?" Margaret Lovelace had told her years ago, "The consciousness transfer is done because the cyborg's body is either dead or near dead without hope of being fixed."
"It took this long for them to find a way to transfer someone's consciousness from a body to a computer," Melissa's high school teacher said, "By the time they figure out how to reverse the process, the end of the cyber-world will probably be the next day."
"If we expect to have that happen Melissa," her Advanced Software Systems professor had said, "We'll to have to completely reformat the cyborg body first."
Melissa clenched her fists in frustration as she remembered all the mockery she'd received for her theory. Only her brother and her mother had ever agreed with her on the possibility of a reversed consciousness transfer.
"I'll show them," Melissa said to herself as she analyzed her miniature replica of the Pompadorian king's mainframe, "I'll even do more than that. I'll enhance the abilities of living computers too. I will find a way to program them to teleport onto any surface just by thinking it. I'll make it so they can..."
Melissa's cyberphone rang and she got up from her chair to answer it.
"Hello?"
"Hello?" said a masculine voice on the other end of the phone, "Is this Miss Melissa Benson?"
"Yes," Melissa answered, "Who is this?"
"This is Antoine Klemmons."
"Oh hello Antoine how are you?" Melissa asked politely, her electrical pulse racing.
"I'm very well," Antoine answered, "And you?"
"Quite well thank you."
"That's good," Antoine said nervously, "Um, I was wondering Melissa. Are you doing anything this weekend?"
Melissa had planned on doing more research on conciousness transfer, but that could always wait. "No, not so far."
"I was wondering if maybe you wanted to hang out tomorrow afternoon?"
"Sure," Melissa said, knees shaking in excitement.
"Okay," Antoine said also shaking with excitement on the other end of the line, "What time and where should we meet?"
"How about 12:00 at the school newsstand?" Melissa suggested, "That way we can decide what we want to do."
"Sounds swell," Antoine said, "I'll see you then. Good night."
"Good night Antoine."
Melissa heard the phone line click and she knew he'd hung up. Putting the phone back on her nightstand, she jumped onto her bed and screamed into her pillow.
Marbles and Ada were on their way to the Cyber Museum of Science and Mathematics, the most famous museum in all of Cyberspace. A new exhibit had come out two weeks ago, and now that the crowds had died down, the couple saw this as a perfect opportunity to relax and possibly get some ideas for new inventions. However for the past hour they had been aimlessly driving in circles around Cyberspace.
"Marbles are you positive we are going the right way?" Ada asked her boyfriend for the hundredth time.
"Affirmative Ada," Marbles answered, his dialogue having more technical vocabulary since starting college, "My upgraded version of the Skwak Pads has an extra advanced GPS."
"But its saying there's no satellite connection here," Ada said pointing to the Skwak.
"Impossible!" Marbles exclaimed, "I-"
CRASH!
Their cyber-coupe suddenly collided with someone else's. It wasn't enough of a collision to damage either one permanently, but it was enough to send Marbles' cyber-coupe out of control. The two screamed as Marbles tried desperately to regain control of the cyber-craft before it landed somewhere very unfamiliar. The couple groaned in pain and looked around.
"Where are we?" Ada asked.
"I'm not sure Ada" Marbles answered, "But look! There's a sign over there!"
Ada looked in the direction her boyfriend was pointing. "Well isn't that convenient?"
The couple got out of the cyber coupe and walked toward the sign.
"You have landed in Mizz Arky's cyber triangle of doom," Marbles read from the sign, "Only Mizz Arky can open the lock. Enjoy rusting here. Hahaha."
"Mizz Arky?" Ada asked Marbles, "Who is that?"
"I'm assuming its that Ann Arky girl from the news, " Marbles said, "She's a mischievous teenager who has been uploading chaos everywhere. She even attacked Control Central. Half of the main control room was wiped out and they had to completely remodel eighty percent of the facility. All from this fifteen year old girl."
"You mean she's younger than us and has managed to trap us in some sort of geometrical prison?!"
"Afraid so my lady," Marbles sighed.
"Arky... Arky..." Ada repeated to herself, sure that she remembered the name, "Arky... MARBLES!"
"Yes Ada?"
"Arky was Francesca's last name!" Ada exclaimed, "And I remember she had a younger sister!"
"You don't suppose-"
"YES Marbles! Ann Arky is Francesca's younger sister," Ada concluded, "It makes perfect sense. She probably got her inspiration from Francesca."
"Well my lady," Marbles said, "It doesn't really matter right now where she downloaded her behavior from. What matters is how we are going to upgrade out of this place."
"Do you have your cy-phone with you?" Ada asked.
"Yes," Marbles answered as he pulled his cyberphone out and dialed Melissa. But...
"Signal negative," Marbles sighed.
"Well try Archimedes then," Ada suggested, "He said he was going to spend the weekend with his family didn't he?"
"Yes but I don't know where we are right now. Poddleville could be even further away than the university."
"Just try," Ada pleaded, obviously beginning to stress.
Marbles nodded and dialed Archimedes' number. Still no signal.
"Now what?!" Ada exclaimed throwing her hands up in the air and pacing in a circle around her lover, "What are we going to Marbles? We can't stay here forever! There has to be a way out! THERE JUST HAS TO!"
"ADA!" Marbles shouted, "Calm down. Everything is going to be fine... We'll just have to think our way out of this..."
Location: Cyber University:
Melissa closed her diary and put it on top of her nightstand. It was 7:30 P.M and she desperately wanted to call Ada and tell her about Antoine calling her. But she knew that Ada and Marbles were probably still on their own date and didn't want to disturb them. She looked over at her work desk. For once, she simply didn't want to work on experiments or do research on anything. She wanted to just hang out with friends, but there was nobody to hang out with tonight. Ada and Marbles were on a date, Archimedes had gone home to Poddleville to celebrate his father's birthday and she had no really close friends on the Junior semi-campus. She sighed.
"There must be somebody I can talk to!"
It was then that Melissa remembered her portal software. She grabbed her purse and ran over to her laptop and typed in a few commands. Within seconds a portal appeared behind her and sent her off to The Forest.
Location: The Forest:
Melissa fell out of the portal and landed in a perfect relevé next to the stump of the tree where Bill lived. After two years of experimenting with portals, she was able to get them more and more precise in its location.
"Hey Melissa," the cybird greeted, having heard the gust of air and come down from his nest, "Nice landing there!"
"Thank you Bill," Melissa laughed.
"You usually come on Saturdays. What's the special occasion?"
"Oh I hope I'm not intruding on anything!" Melissa said.
"Not at all," said Bill, "I've been bored stiff today. How are things?"
"Things are wonderful Bill! Remember how I texted you about the boy I danced with at the masked ball?"
Bill nodded.
"Well he wants to hang out with me tomorrow!" Melissa exclaimed and jumped up slightly.
"Well that's great Melissa! Congratulations!" Bill exclaimed. He paused then said, "Wait does that mean that we can't hang out tomorrow?"
Melissa's smile faded. "Oh. I don't suppose we can. But I don't know if we're going to be hanging out the whole day."
"Well," Bill suggested, "Just in case. Lets have as much fun as we can tonight. Did I ever tell you that there's a firefly show every night?"
"No you didn't," Melissa answered as her eyes lit up with excitement, "What do they do?"
"They fly really high up in the sky and make pictures with their lights. Its really cool. They should be starting soon so we better hurry."
"We can use my portals!" Melissa suggested.
Bill's color suddenly drained from his face. He had never been in a portal before. "Um... well... I don't know..."
"Don't be afraid Bill. I'll be right there with you."
"Afraid?! I'm not afraid!"
Melissa shot him a knowing look.
''Well... Maybe a little bit..." he admitted.
"Just hold my hand the whole time."
Bill took a deep breath. "Okay."
Melissa grabbed her portal remote from her purse and pressed the button for a portal to appear for them. Melissa and Bill stood back as it formed, to avoid being sucked in before they were ready. After Melissa had put the remote back in her purse, she held out a hand for Bill to hold. He took it and they jumped in.
Location: Ann Arky's "Triangle of Doom":
"Oh Marbles its been an hour and a half now! We'll never get out of here!" Ada exclaimed as they felt around the perimeter of the triangle for some sort of hidden door, "Goodness! How did we even end up in here?!"
"My hypothesis is that the cyber-coupe was pulled in by some sort of magnetic force within the area of the triangle which also would explain why we can't get it off the ground," Marbles answered, "And message error Ada we will exit this program!"
Ada sighed. "Well I can't think of anything right now. I can't even see where the cyber-coupe fell from."
"Ann must have..." Marbles tried to come up with an answer but couldn't, "Ann must be a very intelligent cyborg."
"Well its not like there are any torture chambers in here," Ada sighed, "We might as well just sit in the cyber-coupe and think of a way out tomorrow."
"Alright," Marbles said also sighing, "At least there's a television in the back seat. I rented TRON a few days ago."
"Oh Marbles that's the most ridiculous movie ever made!" Ada exclaimed as they took the long walk back to their cyber-coupe.
"You really think so?" Marbles asked, "I'd conclude its my favorite work of cinema."
Ada rolled her eyes. How could he like a movie that was so inaccurate? Suddenly she tripped over something. She looked down to see the rusting corpse of a dead cyborg. She screamed and clung to her boyfriend tightly.
"Ada what are you screaming about?!" Marbles yelled. His girlfriend pointed down at the body. He turned paled at the sight.
"It would appear this prison of hers has been here a while," Marbles said, his voice trembling in fear.
"We must upgrade out of here tomorrow!" Ada exclaimed, "We simply must!"