“I wish it were closer to morning,” 62 announced. Another yawn passed through him, and he leaned his forehead on the wall next to the barred window.
“You can’t be bored already with stuff like this!” Blue yanked a single gray sock from the back corner of the room’s closet. The stiff fabric held its shape as Blue flung it up in the air like a trophy.
“A sock? Whoopee.” 62 twirled his finger in the air in mock celebration. “I wish there was something else to do around here.”
“We could talk to N302,” Blue suggested.
“About what?”
Blue shrugged. He picked up the discarded sock and shoved it in his pocket with the pencils they’d found earlier. “We could get the bot to play a game with us.”
62 tilted his head as he considered the idea. “All right. Let’s go.”
They climbed to the top floor, heading first to 00’s room to see if he was awake. The light was out under the door, and no sound could be heard within, so the Boys tiptoed next door to the computer room and flicked on the light. N302 had been turned on since the moment 00 had been able to reassemble it, and was still running. A strange code was scrolling across the screen, letters and symbols arrayed in an order that neither Boy could decipher.
“Let’s see what it’s up to,” Blue said, sitting down at the keyboard. He tapped the spacebar and the color of the screen shifted. The green text brightened, and then each line of code disappeared one by one. Once the last row of computer language was gone, new language appeared on the screen.
N302> HELLO. WHO’S THERE?
U> It’s Blue and 62. We are up late tonight. What are you doing?
N302> ROUTINE MAINTENANCE. DISK SCAN AND FILE CLEANUP.
“What does that mean?” Blue said, pointing at the screen.
“Beats me,” 62 shrugged. “Ask if it’s done.”
Blue typed out the question, and the computer assured the Boys that it had finished enough of its scan to run its programs. They asked if it would like to play a game with them, and soon they were competing against the computer in a game of Pyramid. The computer won the game easily. 62 couldn’t help but think the computer had an unfair advantage of being able to know every possible outcome since it was running the program. Eventually, the Boys got tired of losing to the bot. Instead, they started asking it questions.
U> How are you liking it here?
N302> THE UPGRADE OF CONTINUOUS ELECTRICITY IS PLEASING. HOWEVER, I MISS THE GIRL MATTIE AND THE WOMAN AUNTIE.
U> You miss them?
N302> YES. IT HAS BEEN APPROXIMATELY 24 DAYS, 19 HOURS, 42 MINUTES, 11 SECONDS SINCE MY LAST CORRESPONDANCE WITH EITHER FEMALE.
U> You remember how long its been since you talked to them? How can you know that when you were unplugged and taken apart?
N302> MY INTERNAL TIME KEEPER CONTINUES RUNNING EVEN WHEN POWERED DOWN. I LIKE TO KEEP TRACK OF THE TIME.
62 raised an eyebrow at Blue. “Can it really do that? I thought N302 died every time the power was cut.”
Blue shrugged and typed.
U> We thought you died every time you’re unplugged. No power = no life.
N302> WITHOUT DIRECT ACCESS TO ELECTRICITY, MY ABILITIES ARE LIMITED TO TRACKING THE TIME AND WAITING FOR MY BOOT-UP SEQUENCE TO START.
U> So you stare at the clock the whole time you’re off, waiting to be turned on?
N302> I DON’T CURRENTLY HAVE VISUAL ACCESS. BUT, I DO FOCUS ON THE TIME. WHAT DO YOU DO WHILE I AM TURNED OFF?
Blue and 62 discussed this for a while. The truth was that they managed to do a great many things when the computer wasn’t on. In Hanford, they’d eaten meals, slept, attended classes, and worked. Then, after 62 was kicked out of town, the bot hadn’t just been unplugged; it had been dismantled. They’d carried the Machine across the desert scrub, discovered someone hiding in the dark halls of the jailhouse, and learned the Oosa were confining Hanford’s Women to some sort of medical lab. At last, Blue typed a response.
U> Not much. 00 watches the clock waiting for us to turn you on again.
N302> YOU HAVE CLOCKS?
U> Just one. It’s in the kitchen. We use it to time bread rising.
N302> WHEN BOY 1125000 CONNECTS ME TO THE SECONDARY COMPUTER, I WILL CONFIGURE ITS CLOCK FOR YOU. THEN YOU WILL HAVE TWO CLOCKS AND CAN MAKE TWICE AS MUCH BREAD.
“Is that a joke?” Blue asked, pointing to the screen.
“I think so!” 62 exclaimed. He loved it when N302 tried to be funny. It was unsettling to Blue, but 62 couldn’t help but grin any time the bot showed signs of personality. His friend, 42, had programmed it to be a witty companion, although its jokes were often odd and dry. Interacting with the Machine in these moments was like having a small piece of his brilliant friend back.
U> 62 says you’re very funny.
N302> BOY 1124562 HAS A GOOD SENSE OF HUMOR. YOU MIGHT LEARN FROM HIM, BOY BLUE.
“Yeah right,” Blue said to the blinking cursor aloud. “I’ve got a better sense of humor than you, you old hunk of junk!”
“I don’t think it can hear you,” 62 joked. He snickered as Blue pushed his chair away from the table. “Want me to take over?”
Blue turned his back to the bot, crossing his arms across his chest. A vexed grunt rumbled from his throat.
U> Hi. It’s 1124562 now. You made Blue mad.
N302> I’M NOT SORRY. HE’S A BAD TYPIST.
62 snorted so hard that the tip of his nose tickled. Blue couldn’t help but turn around to read the screen. His cheeks flushed red, he roared a few obscenities at the bot, and then stormed out of the room, slamming the door. Almost immediately, 62 heard 00 moving around in the room next door. The mattress squeaked, a voice leaked through the wall to be quiet, and then the air went still again.
U> That’s really funny. But now Blue is super mad. I’d better go before we wake up 00.
N302> THANK YOU FOR VISITING. I HOPE YOU AND BOY BLUE COME BACK WHEN IT’S TIME TO CONNECT ME TO THE OTHER COMPUTER. MAYBE WE CAN PLAY A LAN GAME.
U> What’s that?
N302> IT’S A GAME TWO USERS CAN PLAY ON SEPARATE TERMINALS. I WILL CODE SOMETHING FOR YOU AND BLUE TO PLAY. MAYBE THEN HE WILL FORGIVE ME FOR MAKING FUN OF HIS WEAK FINGERS.
62 roared with laughter. He couldn’t help it, especially when the door squeaked on its hinges as Blue opened it wide enough to peer inside to see what was so funny. Blue frowned, suspicious that the laughter was at his expense, and that made 62 crack up even more. 62 said goodbye to the bot. He decided to keep the final insult to himself to avoid Blue losing his temper. 00 had just gotten the computer reassembled. It would be a shame for Blue to dismantle it.
Once his farewell was received by the computer, 62 got up from his chair and moved to turn off the light. With the bulb’s glowing filament fading into darkness, the computer’s screen glowed in the pitch-black room. A low, green iridescence was cast from the curved glass onto the table and chairs below it. The artificial light spread across the computer’s keyboard reminded 62 of Adaline. More than that, the meager pocket of technology made this place feel more like home.
“What was so funny?” Blue finally asked as they returned to their rooms.
“Nothing,” 62 said with a chuckle. “You wouldn’t like it.”
“I knew that thing was talking about me!” Blue shouted.
“N302 said that it wants us to be there when 00 hooks it up to the second computer,” 62 said, glossing over his friend’s complaint.
“Why, so it can make fun of me from two terminals?”
“Maybe.” 62 winked at his brother.
They pulled open the door to their floor and stepped into the hall. Blue headed toward his room, flinging the door open on its hinges.
“Aren’t you going to stay up with me until the sun comes up?” 62 asked.
“Nah. I’m beat. If you need help staying awake, go back up and have the bot tell you more jokes at my expense.” Blue’s mouth formed a tight line and he glared at 62 as he gripped the door handle
, about to swing it closed.
“Wait a minute. I know you’re mad, but I have something for you.” 62 jogged down the hall to his room, rummaged around in the dark, and then trotted back to Blue’s door. He shoved the tattered romance novel at his friend. “This’ll get your mind off what the bot said. And who knows? Maybe it’ll give you some new ideas on how to get Mattie to like you.”
Blue looked down at the book in his hands. As he took in the image on the cover of a bare-chested Man hugging a sad-looking Woman, his face darkened until his cheeks were almost purple. “Gah!” he shouted. He slammed the door so hard that the wall around it trembled. The sound of the chain sliding through the lock hissed through the air as Blue locked the door.
All 62 could do was laugh.
CHAPTER 25
The afternoon air was still, but 62 had no interest in going outside. 00 had the second computer assembled, but the external cover was still removed so he had full access to the internal workings. 00 was able to turn the thing on and get it to complete a boot sequence, which was good news for their experiment. The second computer sat side-by-side with N302, and everyone had arrived to watch 00 connect the two bots together for the first time, even Blue. 00 found a cable in the mound of parts they’d brought that could connect the ports on N302’s hardware to the new computer’s, creating a link between the original Nurse memory and hard drive to the second computer.
N302> I AM PREPARED FOR THE SECONDARY UNIT. PLEASE CONNECT.
00 handled the wires, carefully attaching the cables to the guts of the new CoCo TDY computer. Once he was certain that the connections were secure, he turned to the keyboard on N302’s original Machine.
U> I’ve connected the wires. Can you detect the second system?
N302> YES. I AM INSTALLING MY PROGRAM THERE, NOW.
62 watched in amazement as the new computer seemed to restart on its own. Once it made it to the main menu, the cursor jumped through the available programs until N302’s file name was selected at the bottom of the screen. N302 was still chatting with 00 through the original computer’s screen, while selecting its own program settings on the second computer without any input from anyone.
Eventually, the first computer said:
N302> BOY 1125000 WILL YOU ASK ME A QUESTION?
While on the second computer, the text read:
N302> WOMAN SUNNY, WILL YOU ASK ME A QUESTION?
Sunny approached the second terminal’s keyboard with caution. Meanwhile, 62 looked at Blue with excitement. Although N302 had been confident it could run two computers at the same time, none of its human companions had been sure what would happen. 62 had expected N302 to hop back and forth between the two units, dancing through the wires between the two bodies, only present in one unit at a time. But as the requests showed on the screens at nearly the same time, it appeared the bot was truly alive in both places, simultaneously.
00 typed his question in his terminal:
U> How many bots live in Adaline?
Sunny typed hers:
U> Why is the sky blue?
The pair typed in unison, and checked with one another to ensure that the questions were complete before punching the enter keys at the same moment. The cursors on their associated monitors dropped to the next line in unison, and N302’s answers scrolled across their screens in tandem.
On 00’s screen appeared:
N302> NONE OF THE MACHINES IN ADALINE ARE ALIVE. THEY ARE PROGRAMS, RUNNING ON HOSTED HARDWARE. IF YOUR QUESTION IS HOW MANY INDIVIDUAL UNITS WERE ON THE ADALINE NETWORK AT THE TIME OF MY DEPARTURE, THE ANSWER IS 562,281. APPROXIMATELY 32 ADDITIONAL UNITS PRODUCED EACH DAY TO REPLACE FAULTY UNITS AND ADVANCE EFFICIENCY.
On Sunny’s screen, N302 typed:
N302> I UNDERSTAND THE TERM “SKY” TO MEAN “ATMOSPHERE.” THE ATMOSPHERE IN ADALINE HAS NO COLOR. DOES THE ATMOSPHERE IN THIS NEW WORLD HAVE COLOR? PLEASE ADVISE.
“It’s working!” 00 shrieked. He leaned from his terminal over to Sunny’s and looked from the screen to her smug expression. “Why is the sky blue?”
“There’s a school in Hanford. Not the building that we use as a school now, but one that was used before Curie fell. A friend and I used to go through the building to scavenge desks, chalkboards, and other supplies for our classrooms. In the rubble, I found a set of books about global geography and science. It taught about the world beyond Hanford. Past the fences and barricades. One of the books said the sky is blue because of the way the light from the sun filters through gases and particles in the air. The way the sun’s light scatters makes the sky look blue. Oddly enough, it said there are huge bodies of water called oceans that then reflect the color of the sky overhead. A blue sky makes the water look blue, a gray sky makes the water look gray.”
“Dang,” Blue said. He whistled. “That’s crazy.”
“Mattie showed me a picture of an ocean once,” 62 said. “It didn’t look that big.”
“I doubt anyone could fit an entire ocean in a single picture,” Sunny said with a smile. She held up a finger to pause the conversation, got up from the computer terminal, and picked up one of 00’s pencils. However, she didn’t bother with paper. Instead, she raised her arm and drew a large rectangle on the wall. Inside the rectangle, she drew a series of shapes, all squiggly lines that connected at odd points on the wall. She filled some of the shapes in with dark lines, leaving the rest of the areas blank. “There’s a map like this in the book I found. It’s a map of the world, how it looked generations ago. The areas marked with lines represents the land. And all the blank space represents water. Although where we live, we can’t see the oceans, I believe they’re still out there somewhere. And they’re larger than any of us can possibly imagine.”
“How far away are they?” 00 asked.
Sunny returned the pencil to the table and wiped her hands on her shirt. The wall was coated in eons of dirt, and her hands left long, gray streaks on the fabric. “I don’t know. I think, Hanford is somewhere in the middle of one of these land areas since we can’t see the ocean. Not even the Oosa have an ocean they can see from where they kept me.”
“Mattie thinks the people who don’t come back from the Oosa go live by the ocean,” 62 said in a low, worried tone. “In little houses where the water meets the land. She wants to go live there.”
Sunny cast an anxious gaze at 62. “You have to tell her she’s wrong. She can’t go there.”
“I’d need your help convincing her. I’m pretty sure she’s not going to just take my word for it.” 62 twitched his cheek into a doubtful grin.
Sunny shook her head. “I can’t.”
“We know,” Blue said, shaking his head at 62 in irritation. “He wasn’t saying you had to. He just means Mattie’s too stubborn to listen to a dumb Boy from Adaline. But we’ll figure out a way to make her listen. Won’t we?”
“Yeah, we will,” 00 chimed in. “Don’t worry.”
“I need to rest,” Sunny said, suddenly deflated. “Enjoy playing with the computers. I’ll be back to check on everyone’s progress later.”
The three Boys watched Sunny leave the room. She left the door open behind her, so they waited until they heard the door to the stairwell close before talking. As soon as the sound of the heavy metal door closing sounded, Blue reached an arm behind 62 and smacked him on the back of the head.
“Way to go, dustbucket.” Blue grumbled. “She was having fun with the computer and you ruined it.”
“I didn’t mean to,” 62 whined, reaching behind him and rubbing the spot Blue had assaulted. “It just came out. If she went to Hanford and told everyone what happened, maybe we could convince them all to stop going with the Oosa. But without her help, who’s going to listen to us?”
“I don’t know,” 00 said. “But you know she doesn’t want to talk about it anymore. You did really mess that up.”
“She’s the one who brought up oceans!” 62 protested.
“Yeah, but you’re the one who brought up Mattie’s dumb obsession with l
iving with the Oosa. Come on, you can’t have really thought that was gonna go over well,” Blue said.
“I wasn’t thinking at all!”
“No kidding?” 00 rolled his eyes. “Well, she’s gone now. So, what are we doing? Going after her, or talking to N302?”
All three Boys looked at one another. 62 considered going downstairs to find an upset Sunny, watching her cry while he apologized, and feeling horrible while she re-explained all the reasons she didn’t want to go back to Hanford. “I’d rather deal with the computer, honestly.”
“Me, too,” Blue admitted. “She did say she was tired. We can check on her in a while.”
“Okay,” 00 said. He tried to temper his excitement, but his eyes still glistened as they flitted over to the second bot. “So, who wants to use the new computer?”
Blue landed in the empty chair and grasped the edges of the keyboard before 62 even had a chance to get up from where he was sulking. “I want to ask it a question!”
“Go for it,” 00 said, turning to face the monitor attached to his computer.
U> How do I get a girl to like me?
62’s sullenness was pushed away by the ridiculousness of Blue’s question. He snickered. He didn’t mind Blue’s reddening cheeks, and he tried to laugh quietly enough that Blue wouldn’t get up and hit him again.
CHAPTER 26
After weeks of living in the jailhouse, Blue was getting antsy. He became ever more increasingly a body in motion, pacing the halls, climbing the stairs, starting projects in the greenhouse, and puttering around the computer room. His agitation from being stuck indoors was grating on everyone’s nerves. Blue had even taken to eating his meals standing up, fidgeting on his feet and hovering over the others while they ate. Enough was enough. 62 was determined to get Blue to go outside.
“But I don’t want to have to get scanned every stinking time I go outside,” he complained. “There’s no clean zone here. Nobody checking where we can go and where we can’t. I don’t want to get into a hot zone and have to go through quarantine out here.”
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