by Anh Do
First published by Allen & Unwin in 2020
Text copyright © Anh Do, 2020
Illustrations by Chris Wahl, 2020
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. The Australian Copyright Act 1968 (the Act) allows a maximum of one chapter or ten per cent of this book, whichever is the greater, to be photocopied by any educational institution for its educational purposes provided that the educational institution (or body that administers it) has given a remuneration notice to the Copyright Agency (Australia) under the Act.
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Australia
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ISBN 978 1 76087 752 1
eISBN 978 1 76087 359 2
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Cover design by Jo Hunt and Chris Wahl
Text design by Jo Hunt
Set by Midland Typesetters
CONTENTS
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
I hate me! Ethan thought to himself.
I hate this stupid body, I hate this hospital, I hate everything!!!
Ethan’s angry thoughts swirled around his head as he lay on the operating table in nothing but his underwear.
He considered running out of the room, but he knew he didn’t look great in those tight white undies. That was enough to keep him lying there, awaiting his fourteenth operation in eighteen months.
The storm raging outside didn’t help his mood. Lightning flashed through the windows, glinting off the medical machines around him.
Ethan tried to calm himself … You should be used to hospitals by now, he thought. You’ve spent enough time in them.
Throughout his childhood he had been plagued with health problems – heart, bone and muscle issues – but, after years of treatments, he thought he’d finally beaten them all.
In his mid-teens Ethan had, for the first time in his life, found himself relatively strong, and able to be … normal. He’d made friends, played sport, and to everyone’s surprise, including his own, he got a girlfriend.
He’d also been able to concentrate on his true calling, computer coding, and his brilliant marks had allowed him to graduate school early and take up a scholarship to a top computing course at Titan University.
Then the terrible headaches began, followed by the devastating diagnosis of an inoperable brain tumour.
‘This looks worse than anyone predicted,’ a nurse muttered. Ethan worried she was talking about him, then realised she meant the storm.
‘How you holding up there, Ethan?’
Doctor Penny Cook appeared beside him. Her presence was calming, transforming his fear into mere awkwardness.
He felt embarrassed as he lay there, near-naked. He was thin and gangly, and half his hair was shaved off. He didn’t exactly feel handsome.
He knew it was silly to get a crush on an older woman – especially his doctor – but he couldn’t help it.
Doctor Cook had chestnut hair and deep brown eyes, and her smooth skin was pale from years spent under fluorescent lights in laboratories.
I might die within the hour, he thought. I can have a crush on whoever I like.
When Ethan’s tumour had been diagnosed, his parents consulted the best doctors in the world. They all said it was impossible to cure him. Then Penny had appeared, like an angel in a shining white lab coat.
She was a prodigy, a leading global expert in neuroscience and artificial intelligence at just twenty-six years of age. She had heard about Ethan’s condition and approached his parents to ask if he was willing to try a highly experimental procedure involving a medical android she’d created.
Given his only other option was to die, Ethan had agreed. Now he found himself in a state-of-the-art government medical facility. He’d had to sign dozens of secrecy agreements and go through all kinds of security checks to get inside. So had his parents, who were waiting outside the operating room.
‘Ethan?’ Penny said. ‘You lost in thought?’
‘Kinda.’
‘It’s perfectly natural to be anxious,’ said Penny, putting a hand on his arm, ‘but we’ll get you through this.’
Ethan smiled weakly. She couldn’t possibly be as certain as she sounded. Not when this was the first time this procedure had ever been attempted.
‘Now,’ said Penny, ‘I believe you’ve met Gemini.’
The medical android stepped into Ethan’s view.
He looks so … perfect, thought Ethan.
With short blond hair, angular features and lithe frame, Gemini was almost indistinguishable from a man in his mid-twenties. What gave him away were his chrome eyes, and the power cable reaching from his back into a control panel.
Gemini was a groundbreaking creation, unknown to the public, and one of the reasons Ethan had to sign all those stay-quiet forms. Penny hoped Gemini would revolutionise the medical industry.
‘Hello, Ethan.’ Gemini’s mouth curved upwards in what was supposed to be a reassuring smile, but actually looked a bit creepy. ‘Good to see you again. Are you ready to begin?’
‘Do you think it will work?’ asked Ethan.
‘I have a one hundred per cent surgical success rate,’ Gemini said. ‘However, this procedure is untested. I calculate a probability of—’
‘That’s enough, Gemini,’ Penny interrupted. She shot Ethan an apologetic look. ‘His bedside manner needs a little tweaking.’
‘Just give me the anaesthetic already,’ Ethan said bluntly, and immediately regretted his tone.
‘All right, Ethan.’ Penny reached for the IV attached to his arm and twisted the valve.
As his eyes grew heavier, Ethan wondered if he would ever open them again.
‘Just give me the anaesthetic already,’ weren’t exactly great last words. He needed to say something better before his tongue went numb.
‘Don’t screw this up, guys,’ he mumbled to Penny and Gemini. Not a whole lot better!
The thunder outside sounded like the sky ripping itself apart.
‘Subject is unconscious,’ said Gemini. ‘Permission to commence procedure?’
As Penny sat behind a semicircle of monitors, she wondered if the assurances she’d given Ethan were for him or her. She reminded herself that Ethan had no chance at all without her and Gemini.
Via the monitors, Penny watched as Gemini raised his right hand and tiny panels opened on the tips of his fingers, each revealing a laser scalpel. With five scalpels working together, Gemini could make multiple incisions simultaneously and with inhuman precision.
‘Proceed,’ she said.
Gemini positioned his fingers over Ethan’s scalp, and bright blue, incredibly thin lasers sprang out. Gemini started to cut.
Penny tried not to think about Ethan’s parents, waiting outside, as Gemini worked quickly and methodically. More surgical equipment emerged from his fingers, including forceps, pincers and a tiny mirror.
Panels slid open on the finge
rtips of his left hand now, and tiny silver rods extended. At the end of these rods were nano-tools, allowing Gemini to work at a microscopic level no human surgeon could ever achieve.
The aim was to remove Ethan’s advanced tumour then reconnect severed synapses, something previously untried in medical science.
‘Status update?’ said Penny.
‘Proceeding to excise the tumour.’
Gemini worked quickly. As instruments popped in and out of him, he could cut, stem bleeding and perform dozens of tiny operations simultaneously.
As Penny watched him, her confidence returned. Gemini was working around the tumour easily. However, the trickiest part was yet to come.
A peal of thunder startled Penny as Gemini dropped the tumour into a jar.
‘Tumour excised,’ he said. ‘Permission to commence reconnecting synaptic pathways?’
Gemini was effectively about to rewire Ethan’s brain.
‘Proceed,’ Penny said, trying to keep her voice steady.
Gemini began reconnecting the millions of neural pathways in Ethan’s brain.
Penny scanned Ethan’s brain on the monitor. In the sections that Gemini had repaired, Ethan’s brain was firing as normal.
Two hours later, Ethan’s heart was beating normally and the damage to his brain was almost reversed.
‘One per cent connections remaining,’ said Gemini.
The windows lit up as lightning cracked. Then came a great zapping noise from above.
The nurses glanced at each other. ‘What was that?’ Penny asked them urgently.
‘I think the building’s been struck!’ said one of the nurses.
Penny’s monitors flickered and she pulled back her fingers in alarm as her keyboard sparked.
The lights in the ceiling exploded, raining down shards of glass. Bands of pure energy rippled along Gemini’s cord from the control panel.
‘No!’ shouted Penny.
Electricity surged into Gemini. His back arched as white-hot bands travelled down his arms and passed directly into Ethan! Ethan convulsed, his muscles contracting as the power coursed through him.
For a moment, everything fell silent, save the rain battering the windows.
Then the machinery whirred back to life, illuminating the room in a blinking, haphazard way. Gemini was slumped over the table, Ethan still beneath him.
Penny’s heart sank – surely no one could survive an electrical shock directly to the brain.
Suddenly Gemini lurched back into action. He straightened, then hastily started stitching up Ethan’s scalp.
‘Is he alive?’ said Penny.
‘Unknown,’ said Gemini.
Penny ran to Ethan’s side and put two fingers on his wrist.
There was a pulse!
‘Ethan?’
The first thing Ethan was aware of was Penny’s face above his. His eyes shot open so fast he made her startle.
‘I’m alive?’
‘Seems so,’ Penny said, smiling with relief.
Ethan was lying in a bed that was a lot more comfortable than the one in the operating theatre. There was a slight throbbing in his head.
‘How do you feel?’ asked Penny.
Ethan sat up. He felt alert, awake … good! He could hardly believe it.
‘Did you remove the tumour?’ he asked.
‘Yes … but there was a complication.’ Penny gently eased him back down.
‘Complication? That’s never good,’ Ethan said.
‘It was a freak occurrence. The top of the building was hit by lightning, which caused a power surge. Gemini was electrocuted while he was operating. And so were you.’
‘Whoa,’ Ethan said. ‘My brain was fried?’
‘Actually … no,’ said Penny. ‘I’ve been running scans all night and … well, it seems that you suffered no damage from the electrocution. You’re cured!’
‘Best complication ever!’ Ethan said. ‘Have you told my parents? They must be worried sick.’ ‘I’ve told them you’re alive. Now that I can see you’re … still you … I’ll let them in.’
As Penny made a call, Ethan gazed at the heart monitor. The line spiked in sync with his heartbeat, beeping each time. Ethan found the beep annoying, so he reached out, hoping to find the volume button.
But as soon his hand touched the machine his eyes glazed over and he drifted into what felt like a waking dream. The heart monitor was full of electrical pathways governed by a CPU … all he had to do was perform a quick tweak to its algorithms …
‘Ethan?!’ Penny rushed back to the bedside, alarmed.
‘What is it?’ he asked.
‘The monitor stopped beeping … but you’re okay. Hmm. Maybe the storm damaged the equipment.’
Ethan looked at the heart monitor in confusion. The line still spiked, but the machine wasn’t beeping anymore. He couldn’t have done that, could he? Maybe imagining things was a side effect of the operation?
The door burst open and his mum and dad rushed in. Tracy and Paul Forrester wore expressions of relief.
‘Oh, my boy!’ His mum threw her arms around him. ‘I was so worried.’
‘Careful, Tracy,’ said his father, holding back. ‘The kid’s just had major brain surgery.’
Ethan could see that his dad wanted to hug him too, so he smiled. ‘It’s fine, Dad. I actually feel pretty great.’
He managed to pull an arm free of his mother and held it out to his father, who didn’t need any more encouragement. Carefully, Paul wrapped his arms around his wife and son.
Soon everyone was crying. Ethan had so many tears on his face, he wasn’t sure which were his and which were his parents’.
‘It’s okay, guys,’ he told them. ‘I’m okay.’
Penny waved goodbye as Paul and Tracy got into the elevator with Ethan. She would rather keep him in for observation, but all his vitals were excellent. So Penny had settled for a promise that Ethan would call her daily, and come back for a check-up soon.
As the doors closed, Ethan caught her gaze through the tangle of parental affection.
‘Thank you,’ he mouthed.
Penny smiled warmly, then walked back to her lab. She would have to run diagnostics on all her devices, including Gemini, before they could be used again.
When Penny arrived, she was irritated to find a man in a suit waiting for her. A man she didn’t like.
‘Agent Ferris,’ she said.
Agent Ferris was middle-aged, with oversized square glasses and closely cropped black hair. His suit bore no government insignia, but she knew he was a People’s Service Agent assigned to watch over her.
‘Doctor Cook, I hear the Gemini model was successful again … even after having a thousand volts shot through him!’
Penny hoped if she kept her answers brief this would be over soon. ‘He was.’
Ferris moved over to Gemini, who was powered down. ‘Very impressive. And no damage to our favourite android?’
‘I don’t think so,’ said Penny. ‘I want to run some tests.’
‘My superiors are very eager to see the robot tested in the field,’ said Ferris. ‘The situation in Sharo is worsening every day, and our troops would benefit greatly from such a highly skilled surgeon. In your last update you mentioned you’d been working on a new battery to make him more mobile. How’s that coming along?’
‘A day or two more, and I’ll have it installed.’
Agent Ferris flashed a row of straight white teeth that made him look like a bespectacled shark. ‘Excellent,’ he said. ‘Make it your top priority. I want to ship Gemini out by Tuesday.’
‘Tuesday?’ said Penny. ‘But there’s still much to be tested. His software, his core personality …’ ‘I can tell you that wounded soldiers won’t care a jot about his personality,’ said Ferris. ‘So long as he gets them back on their feet.’
‘That’s not what I meant—’ said Penny.
‘I shouldn’t have to remind you that the government has paid for everything here. N
ow they want results. Tuesday, Doctor Cook.’
Ferris strode out the door without waiting for her reply.
Penny chewed her lip. Was Gemini ready for the outside world? She wasn’t sure … but it didn’t seem like she had any say in it.
Ethan could not believe his speedy recovery. Just a day after surgery, he was back in one of his favourite places: the computer lab at Titan University. Sitting beside him were his old schoolfriends, Stevie J and Rose. They were boyfriend and girlfriend – Stevie was short and quiet with long brown hair, and Rose was tall and loud, with dyed hair.
‘Yo,’ said Rose, tapping on her keyboard. ‘He just turned off Gardeners Road.’
‘Man,’ said Stevie J with a grin, ‘that’s going to put him in the middle of nowhere.’
They were practising their hacking skills. They never did anything really dangerous or scammed anyone. For Ethan, the sheer thrill of cracking in was the reward, but a little mischief didn’t go astray.
To celebrate Ethan’s return, the trio had decided to mess around with a bully they went to school with. Brad Larson had given them a really hard time for being geeks. Now he had a job driving a van for Hyperspeed Couriers.
They had hacked into the Hyperspeed network and sent Brad to a strange address to pick up a package that didn’t exist.
Ethan watched the blip on a GPS map: Brad driving through a barren industrial zone.
‘I think I can access some security cams in there,’ he said.
Stevie J and Rose looked worried. The city’s camera network was tightly controlled by the government.
‘You sure that’s a good idea?’ said Rose.
Ethan’s fingers danced across the keyboard. He didn’t know why, but since the surgery, hacking had become a whole lot easier. It was like the code spoke to him.
‘Yeah, it’s fine,’ he said, as he typed commands that would hide his IP address. ‘Besides, we’re just having a look. Check it out!’