Cyborgia

by D. M. Darroch

  As soon as AC finished his first hot dog, he grabbed another. He coated this one in baked beans before devouring it and roasting a third. Mrs. Clark wasn’t sure who would eat more, Angus or his father. She had known that at some point in his teen years, her son would out-eat his father, but she was not prepared for his tremendous appetite to begin this weekend. She hadn’t packed that much food.

  Halfway through his third hot dog, AC began to slow down. Mrs. Clark said, “I’ll clean this up. Why don’t you two boys explore the beach?”

  “Are you sure? Don’t you want help?” asked Mr. Clark.

  Mrs. Clark looked at the pile of plates and utensils coated with bean residue, and then she looked at the tiny plastic bucket of lukewarm water she would be washing them in.

  She sighed and said, “You’d better get out of here before I change my mind.”

  AC grabbed Mr. Clark’s arm tightly. He’d never seen such vast openness. The white sky stretched forever without a break until it met the steel gray water miles away. Angry waves crashed on the rocky beach with a reminder that the clouds might be resting for the moment, but the rain would return.

  AC had seen the sky this color in his world. He’d seen rain in his world. But that had been from indoors, looking through safe polymer windows. In this wild setting and with only a piece of canvas to shelter him, he felt afraid.

  “Can you feel the power of the ocean?” asked Mr. Clark, glee painted across his face with broad strokes. He closed his eyes and tipped his head back, catching the wind as the two elderly women had done on the ferry. AC looked at the man standing beside him and slowly released his arm. He closed his eyes and focused on the nip of the fresh, brisk sea air on his cheeks and nose. He breathed in the salt and let the moisture settle on his forehead and eyelids.

  When he opened his eyes, Mr. Clark was no longer there. The familiar anxiety returned, but only for a moment as AC realized that Mr. Clark had walked down the beach and was merely a short distance away. AC followed behind him at the water’s edge.

  The boulders and logs stacked farther up the beach looked interesting, though dangerous. If AC fell he would require an ankle or a wrist implant, maybe even need to have his skull mended. However, he couldn’t help looking at them and wondering what it would be like to climb on them. They beckoned to him, luring him to touch them, sit on them, and walk on them. He was being pulled to them as if by an invisible force.

  The rocks and logs whispered and tempted until AC could resist no more. Heedless of the possible injury to his person, AC clambered over their tops, leaping from log to boulder and back again.

  Mr. Clark turned around and saw him. “Angus!”

  Just as AC was beginning to enjoy this world, of course his alter’s father would have to warn him about dangers. Exactly the same as his own father, even if he didn’t have body part implants.

  But Mr. Clark only said, “Remember when we used to build forts on the beach? I know exactly what you’re thinking. Let’s build one now!”

  Mr. Clark pointed to two boulders not far from where Angus was standing. They rested side by side with a two-foot space between them.

  “We can use those stones to support a roof.”

  Mr. Clark selected a piece of driftwood and dragged it across the beach. AC briefly wondered how this old father was moving that large log without bicep or back implants.

  “Help me lift it,” Mr. Clark said. AC grabbed one end and helped Mr. Clark hoist the log to rest on top of the boulders.

  “It seems a little precarious to me,” said AC. “Dangerous, even. I believe we should construct walls first to buttress the roof.”

  “Great thinking, Angus. Shorter logs for that. Then we’ll build the roof.”

  By nightfall, AC and Angus’s father had completed two sides of the fort.

  “We should be getting back to camp. Your mother will be worried about us,” said Mr. Clark.

  They felt the wind picking up as they walked back across the beach to the campground. Mr. Clark switched on the flashlight as the entered the dark shelter of the trees.

  AC felt the strength of the arm around his shoulder, even though it had no bicep implants.

  20

  Antidote

  “He did this? AC did this!” Ivy had just finished reading AC’s lab reports. “You jerk!”

  She punched Angus.

  “Why are you hitting me? I’m not responsible!” Angus protested.

  “If AC were here, I’d punch him, but he’s not, so you’ll have to do. And you look exactly like him.”

  “She does have a point,” said Billy. “Punch him for me, too—since I can’t do it myself. You know. No fists. ‘Cause I’m a bug now.”

  Angus held up his hands to ward off any further blows.

  “Guys, guys. Violence won’t solve anything. We have to figure this out.”

  “I can’t believe he kept running the experiment after he saw what had happened to the first group of kids. I mean, our entire class is in the hospital. So, AC turned everyone into body jumpers?”

  Angus nodded.

  “Well, where are they all?” she asked.

  “Duh. In the hospital,” said Billy.

  “Yeah, thanks for that, Captain Obvious,” said Ivy. “I know their bodies are in the hospital, but where are they?”

  She glanced at the laboratory shelves and saw what was on them for the first time.

  “Are you kidding me?” Her voice went high and screechy as she read the names on the jars. “Dylan, Skylar, Beth ... Ooh, yuck! Look at Mark. Jerk!”

  She punched Angus again.

  “Cut it out,” said Angus grabbing his arm. “At least he’s got them all in one place. So if we figure out an antidote, we can give it to all of them.”

  “What do you mean if?” asked Billy. “You better mean when. No way am I spending the rest of my life as a cockroach!”

  “Well, you can be any animal you want,” said Angus. “Ask Ivy. She’s been a wolf, a lion, a crab, even a mastodon!”

  “Really? Cool! How do I do that, Ivy?”

  “Angus,” Ivy scolded and indicated with a jerk of her head that Angus should follow her to the corner of the room away from the cockroach.

  She whispered into his ear, “The last thing we need is Billy bouncing around this world and every parallel world he can find. It took me nine months to find my way back. We need to protect him from himself.”

  “Got it,” said Angus. He walked nonchalantly back to the desk, whistling and staring at the ceiling. “So ... Billy,” he began and then clapped his hand quickly over the cockroach. He scooped his hands together and felt Billy’s crunchy legs scrabbling on his palms. Little snippets of invective could be heard through the spaces between his fingers.

  “Sorry, buddy. This is for your own good. Ivy, can you get me Billy’s jar?”

  Ivy brought the glass jar labeled Billy within reach of Angus’s clasped hands.

  “Thanks. Oh, and the lid.” He opened his hands and Billy scrambled along his arm. “Oh no, you don’t,” said Angus grabbing the insect around its abdomen and popping it quickly into the jar.

  “Ow! Careful with my thorax!” yelled Billy.

  Angus screwed on the jar lid.

  “What’s that?” Ivy asked, pointing at the miniature circuit board attached to the lid. Before Angus could prevent her, she nudged the joystick with her fingertip. Billy crashed into the side of the jar.

  “Don’t,” Angus said grabbing her hand and moving it away. “That’s another one of AC’s creepy experiments.”

  She looked into his face. “It does something to Billy, doesn’t it?” she asked.

  Angus nodded. “It doesn’t hurt him, but it’s unpleasant.”

  Ivy sat on the edge of the bed. “That’s the problem with AC. I mean, he’s really smart. He thinks about things that don’t occur to other people. He figures stuff out. He tries all of his crazy ideas and doesn’t give up if they don’t work the first time. But he doesn’t always
think about people when he’s coming up with his ideas. What will happen to them, you know? Sometimes I think he understands that robot he built better than he understands me or Billy.”

  Angus looked at CATT rumbling by the door in a weird imitation of a nap.

  “That’s because he built CATT. It’s a part of him. Humans are much more difficult to understand than machines.” He looked at Ivy. “You never know what they’re thinking. Whether they like you or not.”

  He began to blush and quickly looked away.

  “You can build machines to do what you want. To work the way you expect.”

  “Yeah, without all the messy feelings and disagreements. That’s what you meant, right?”

  She peeked at Angus. He still wouldn’t look at her. She hadn’t noticed before how his hair kind of fell over one eye. It looked good messy. A streak of indigo dye would make it look even better and highlight his eyes. She felt a light fluttering in her stomach.

  She continued, “Don’t get me wrong. AC is a nice guy. He doesn’t mean to hurt people. Sometimes he needs someone to talk to. Someone who looks at things a little differently than he does. Who isn’t afraid of people.”

  “AC’s afraid of people?” asked Angus. Fear of cannons and swords, freezing to death in water or snow—those were things to be afraid of—not people. Unless those people were pirates or gangsters.

  “Well, a little bit I think,” answered Ivy. “He doesn’t entirely relate to them. It’s like he belongs to a different species sometimes. I think he’s afraid of what he doesn’t understand. That’s why he’s always doing experiments—so he can understand everything. But people don’t work that way. You can’t understand them by doing experiments on them—not the things that really matter, anyhow. And I think that’s what makes him afraid.”

  “So is that what you do for him? Help him understand people?”

  “Maybe.” Ivy chewed on her lip and thought about the question. “Actually, I think I help him be okay with not understanding. I mean, people are complicated. You can’t understand everything about even one person. How can you expect to understand everyone? Even with your best friend, when you think you’ve figured everything out, they go and change on you.”

  Angus glanced at Ivy quickly and tried to smile.

  “Well, especially if your best friend is a body jumper. One day she’s a cat, the next day she’s a girl ...”

  He blushed furiously. She pretended not to notice.

  He cleared his throat. “So what do we do now? I make inventions. I don’t know where to begin with antidotes. You’re the potions expert, and it was your concoction that started all of this.”

  “If only I knew how I got my body back. At first, I thought maybe the potion had worn off, but if that’s the case, we can’t do anything to help the others.”

  “Why not?”

  “Everyone’s metabolism would process the potion differently. Like how your body processes aspirin.”

  “You mean how my dad takes three aspirin for a headache, but I only take one?”

  “Yeah, something like that. But also, some people take aspirin for headaches. Some take acetaminophen because aspirin doesn’t help. And you know how the instructions say you can take a second dose between four and six hours later? That’s because some people need a second dose after four hours, while for others the first dose doesn’t wear off for five or even six hours.”

  “So the potion wore off in you after about nine months, but it could last longer or shorter in others?” asked Angus.

  “Yeah, that’s what I’m saying.”

  “Well, then there’s nothing we can do to help the others except sit around and wait.”

  “And in the meantime, the adults make us wear white biohazard suits everywhere. If they ever let us leave the house, that is. And with me? They might put me back in the hospital and keep testing me. I refuse to wait for the potion to wear off, if it even does,” said Ivy.

  “Or wear white,” Angus joked.

  Ivy elbowed Angus jovially.

  “Totally. Would a little purple dye or zebra stripe on one of those suits hurt anyone? But seriously. I’ve been giving this a lot of thought. When your medication wears off, it doesn’t stop working all of a sudden. You can feel the effects wearing off gradually. If I woke up because the potion wore off, wouldn’t I have felt it gradually?”

  “I don’t know. What would that have felt like?”

  “I’m not sure. When I was in your cat, I was totally in control of its body. If the potion was wearing off, wouldn’t your cat gradually have taken over more control of the body? Eventually, I would only be watching—like a bystander inside your cat.”

  Angus began to pace the room as he thought about what Ivy was saying.

  “That would make sense. So if the potion didn’t wear off all of a sudden, something happened to counteract its effects. Something you ate or drank, maybe?”

  Ivy thought about this. “Well, I drank water. I ate diet cat food.”

  “And all the food I dropped on to the floor.”

  Now it was Ivy’s turn to blush. “I only ate off the floor because I was a cat. I can’t help what I want to eat when I’m in an animal. I keep my mind, but I get all of the animal’s instincts and cravings.”

  “Hey, you’ll get no criticism from me.” Angus smiled gently. “I’m the slob who dropped all the food, remember?”

  Ivy wasn’t used to this Angus. He was teasing himself rather than her. She was so confused that she said, “I thought it was nice. You were watching out for me. You always watch out for me.”

  A high chirping voice sang out from the bug jars, “Angus and Ivy sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G.”

  “Shut up, Billy!” Angus and Ivy both yelled. They looked at each other and blushed.

  “Would the two of you please hurry up and figure out how to fix us?” said the cockroach.

  “Okay. Ivy, exactly what did you eat when you were in Sir Schnortle’s body,” said Angus.

  Ivy counted the food items on her fingers. “Water, cat food, a chicken drumstick, rice, a few cornflakes, a piece of broccoli—”

  “Wait, you ate broccoli?”

  Ivy ignored him and continued, “Vanilla wafers with your dad, a few licks of lip balm, a stink bug—I didn’t eat it, it squirted at me, but I did lick it.”

  “Ooh. That’s gross.”

  “I found an old spaghetti noodle under the cupboard. And your dad gave me some salmon-flavored cat treats.”

  “Sir Schnortle ate all that?” asked Angus. “No wonder he keeps gaining weight. I can’t imagine any of those things would counteract your potion. Those are all basic foods. Except for the stink bug.”

  “I didn’t eat that. I licked it. It would be something I chewed or swallowed, don’t you think?”

  “And you didn’t put anything else in your mouth? Nothing at all?”

  Ivy tapped her forehead as she considered everything she’d eaten. “Do toys count? There was a foam dart that I simply couldn’t resist ... no, nothing else.”

  “Remember when I was trying to figure out how the World Jumper worked?” asked Angus. “You told me to go through everything that happened right before it zapped me on to the Fearless Flea.”

  “Well, I jumped on to the workbench in your garage, I mean your lab. I spilled the milk. That hideous girl slapped me. I bit her.”

  “That’s right! You did! You bit her!” Angus grinned.

  Ivy laughed. “Yeah. That was fun. She totally deserved it.”

  “Yeah, she did. But think about it: My first jump into a parallel world happened by accident. I think that’s how you ended your body jumping adventure—by accident.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You said you jumped worlds before by focusing your thoughts on the body of yourself. This time, you focused your body on the body of yourself. You caused the physical body of Sir Schnortle that you were inhabiting to interact with the physical human body of your alter. You bit her! O
r maybe the act of her physically hitting you did it.

  “Whichever of you caused it, I suspect that the collision of bodies forced your consciousness back into a human body. But her body was already inhabited by a human mind, so you were forced to a world where your body was devoid of a human mind. This world. Your world.”

  “So you’re saying I found my way back home by biting myself?”

  Angus grinned at her.

  “You think the antidote to the potion is not a drink, but for the person affected to physically bite herself.”

  “Yes. Or to hit herself. Maybe even to kiss herself. Some kind of physical collision,” said Angus.

  Ivy stared at him. “That’s both simple and creepy.”

  A voice chirped from the jar, “Ooh, creepy. I like creepy. Let’s do this thing!”

  21

  Polymer

  “You might be right, Angus. But even if we could convince all the insects in these jars to bite themselves, how would we ever get them into the hospital?” asked Ivy. “I can imagine you wheeling in AC’s jar collection. ‘Hi! I’m Angus Clark. Don’t mind me. I’m going to visit all your patients in the quarantine ward with my insect zoo. Won’t be but a minute.’ How do you think that will go?”

  Angus ignored her sarcasm. “How did you get out of the hospital?”

  “I melted the window and repelled down the side of the building with bedsheets,” she said.

  “You did what? Billy?” asked an astounded Angus.

  “Yup. Truth,” said the cockroach.

  “So what do you propose?” asked Ivy. “I could try to climb back up the way I came down.”

  Angus shook his head. “No. We don’t have to go up.” He pointed at the rows of jars. “They do. Tell me about this material.” Angus touched the gray wall in his bedroom. “And the windows. What are they made of?”