Reaching the bottom, I noticed a nice decorated area: nice wooden floor, black leather couches and a home theater.
Pretty neat.
Then I glanced ahead, seeing an opened door to a large stockroom. I headed forward as Jeffrey pulled a large device out of a cardboard box and placed it onto a desk. Entering the room, the shelves were filled with many sorts of devices. Some old as others more recent. There were also several large boxes, containing all sorts of wires, adapters and other electronic components.
The room was lit by a light bulb hung from the ceiling and a lamp clamped to the desk.
“Boy! You got a lot of stuff in here!” I said.
“I keep collecting,” he replied. “If you ever need anything for your computers, you can take whatever you need.”
“So this is your project?” I pointed out.
“Yup. Just try not to mention it to lots of people. Our girlfriends it’s okay. Jennifer already knows, being quite impressed with it.”
“Well … it’s not like we have many other friends to tell, do we?”
We both laughed.
I surveyed Jeffrey’s homemade device with various wires hanging out from the sides. A small keyboard and mouse connected to a black metal box: rectangle shape, practically wide in size compared to its small height. At the top appeared to be a thick sheet of glass, revealing nothing more than blackness. Perhaps for the moment.
“So, you’ve made a computer with a screen pointing upwards?” I asked.
Jeffrey smiled. “Well, sort of … not exactly.”
He switched it on, hearing the power surge from within the black box. The glass glowed softly, tiny lights beamed from inside the frame.
Soon after, I was expecting to see the system graphically booting from within the glass. But that was not what happened.
Instead, I was astonished to see a holographic display emerging vertically from the glass – a start menu.
“Whoa! That’s pretty cool!”
“Thanks, buddy,” Jeffrey said proudly. “Obviously, it’s programmed to use with the mouse and keyboard. But what I’ve been really working on is to actually navigate through the operating system, using your fingers.” Jeffrey hit a button from the menu, now accessing the system’s main files. “Come on, give it a try!”
The graphics were clear and proceeded accurately with the move of my finger.
“This is quite amazing, Jeff! You’ve done it,” I said.
“Yeah, but I’m far from being finished,” he said. “That’s why I need your help to improve it.”
“Well, what’s to improve?”
“The operating system is very basic and I know you’re better at programming and configuring. Now that I’ve succeeded to make it work, I need to work intensively on the hardware.”
“How long have you been working on this?” I asked.
“Close to a month. I’ve been surfing the web before getting my nose into books.”
“You kept this a secret …”
“Because it’s a big project and I was afraid that people would take me for a lunatic.”
“A lunatic? Are you kidding me, Jeff? I would never thing that of you, buddy,” I assured.
“I have the dream of making this device smaller. In fact much smaller.”
“How small?” I frowned.
“Maybe in a few years I’ll be able to make it into the size of a tablet or a phone … I don’t know yet.”
One day, it will be the size of a watch, Jeffrey.
CHAPTER 57
“Wow! Are you kidding me?” Samantha said, lifting her eyes from her schedule, sitting on the comfortable couch.
“Jeffrey’s been keeping it secret until now. And he asked me to join his project to help improve the hardware and operating system.”
I walked over, handing Samantha a diet cola. Then I sat down next to her, taking a sip of my drink.
“But that’s great! Sounds pretty exiting.”
“Indeed, it is.”
Left from the living room, I glanced at my little brother Thomas, sitting in the dining room, doing his homework. He seemed to concentrate hard, his nose sunk into his book, holding his head in one hand and fiddling with his pencil with the other.
“Is everything all right, Thomas?” I asked him.
He shrugged, keeping his eyes into his books.
“Thomas, you need a hand, sweetie?” Samantha offered.
He turned to us, showing a faint grin. “No, I’m fine. I’m trying to find as many combination probabilities with the numbers: two, five, seven and nine.”
“Okay. If you ever need help, don’t be shy to ask. All right?” she said.
Thomas nodded with a smile.
“You’re good with kids!” I told her in a low voice.
“I love kids,” she said. “It’s the main reason why I like babysitting.”
We both smiled at each other.
“Hey, Samantha!” Thomas called. “Will you be staying for dinner, tonight?”
“That’s very nice of you to ask, Thomas, but I have to go babysit, tonight,” she replied. “Perhaps some other time?”
“Sure, why not?” Thomas smiled.
“My little brother definitely likes you,” I stated.
“He’s just adorable. How can you not like a boy like him?” she whispered. Then she dimmed her eyes, keeping her smile. “You were having an eye on the substitute teacher, today, weren’t you?”
“Jeffrey had more an eye on her than I did. I just thought she looked familiar, that’s all.”
“How familiar?” she asked, gently poking my belly.
“Not that familiar,” I assured.
She leaned forward, smacking me a kiss. “I’m not the jealous type, Derek.”
“There’s no need to be the jealous type when you’re the most beautiful,” I told her softly.
We gave each other another quick kiss as my brother suddenly cleared his throat.
Samantha glanced at her watch. “Well, I better get going. Babysitting night.”
“Are you gonna take the time to eat something?” I asked her.
“Actually, I’ll be cooking for the kids, while the parents will be out for the evening,” she alleged.
“They’re quite lucky to have someone like you!” I told her. “No time to prepare anything for their own children before they leave … just saying.”
“They’re the rich kind. Big house and expensive cars, and constantly on the run,” she said.
“Oh! So, you should be payed the big bucks, then.”
Samantha rolled her eyes. “Yeah, we’ll see about that.”
CHAPTER 58
Shortly after Samantha had left for her babysitting night, I wandered up to my room to turn on my computer. Having the will to proceed with our project, I began working on several scripts – programming and adapting many graphical elements on top of an open source kernel.
Sometime later, I grabbed my cell phone from my desk, and called Jeffrey to come over.
Then in a matter of minutes, he came knocking at my front door. He stepped in, with a cardboard box tucked under his arm.
“Hey, buddy!” he said.
“Cool! You brought the box,” I muttered.
“The homemade computer,” he whispered.
I nodded.
“You boys are working on something?” my father asked, on his way to the kitchen, probably for an after-supper snack.
“Just a school project,” I replied.
“That sounds kind of cool!” my dad exclaimed. “You know, if you ever need help or suggestions …”
“I think the boys are good enough for handling it on their own, Daniel,” my mother told my dad, while reading a book in the living room.
From my bedroom, I managed to transfer all the work to the computer in the basement, using our home network. The basement had the appropriate space for tweaking, wiring and program whatever we needed.
“So, Samantha is babysitting at a luxurious house?”
Jeffrey grinned.
“Yeah,” I said.
“Jennifer told me. She also said that she’ll be popping in for a little visit after the owners leave for the evening. Apparently, the owners have the reputations of having quite pesky kids.”
“Really?” I said.
Jeffrey nodded.
“I hope Samantha won’t have too much trouble watching them. At least, she won’t be alone the whole time.”
“Jennifer will surely give a hand if Samantha needs it,” he alleged.
I kept my eyes at the computer screen, accessing the files I had recently transferred.
“There it is,” I said, activating my homemade operating system through a simulation software.
“Looks pretty awesome!” Jeffrey exclaimed.
“Still very incomplete, though,” I said.
“Doesn’t matter,” Jeffrey replied. “You actually seem to have gone off on the right foot!”
I laughed from Jeffrey’s reply, staring at the main menu, linked to various folders from within the operating system.
“I knew you’d be better than me for that part,” Jeffrey added. “Eventually, we’ll fill it up with a whole collection of applications. Truly gonna be awesome.”
“Absolutely,” I said. “But first, we need make this system work properly on our hardware.”
“That’s what I’m talking about,” Jeffrey crooned, cracking his knuckles and slipping his holographic computer out of the box.
We’d spent the few remaining hours before bedtime, working on our project.
Obviously, we couldn’t proceed further into our hard work without encountering many bugs and crashes, in attempt of installing and configuring the new operating system onto our homemade hardware. But we just went on and on – reformatting and reinstalling. Taking every mistake as a learning opportunity.
Our goal was to create a light, but a more complex operating system from what Jeffrey first created.
After hours of tweaking and tinkering, we finally got the system to work on the holographic computer.
“Eureka!” Jeffrey breathed, rubbing his eyes.
“Then we’ll be running the system’s diagnostics, for its performance,” I said.
“Not tonight, buddy,” Jeffrey begged.
“No, I was thinking eventually,” I said, glancing down at my watch, showing a quarter to midnight.
“Time flew by like crazy!” Jeffrey exclaimed.
“I know, tell me about it,” I said.
“But we’re getting there,” Jeffrey muttered mirthfully. “We’re getting close.”
CHAPTER 59
The following morning at school, I stepped out of the washroom as Jennifer walked by, heading to her locker.
“Hey, Derek!” she called worryingly.
Frowning, I headed toward her as she began fiddling her combination.
“Hi Jennifer. Is everything all right?” I asked.
“Samantha’s looking for you. I think she’s still at her locker. She doesn’t look to well.”
“Did something go wrong, last night?”
“No, she seemed fine. I gave her a little hand with the kids and everything went well.”
“All right, thanks,” I said, walking away to find Samantha.
I made a left turn, passing the next few rows of lockers. Then I saw Samantha grab a pile of books before closing back her locker door.
I drew closer to her, looking into her incredibly exhausted eyes. Her face was slightly whiter than her natural pale complexion.
“I just ran into Jennifer. Is everything all right, Samantha?” I asked. “Did you have a rough night?”
She brought a hand to her mouth, yawning. “The parents arrived close to eleven-thirty, last night. Jennifer had left just a few minutes before. She helped me put the kids to bed.” She showed a faint grin. “Very energetic kids! But also very adorable. No mean hearts whatsoever.” She sighed. “Caroline is twelve, Jonathan is ten, and little Angelina is two years old. All of them blond with blue eyes, like their mother. Instead, the father has dark hair with green eyes.”
“So, they’re not really little monsters, from what I understand?” I said.
She shook her head. “The babysitting night wasn’t the problem. I woke up at two-thirty in the morning and couldn’t go back to sleep,” she pleaded.
“Nightmares? Worries?”
“I had the strangest dream, Derek,” she uttered frightfully. Then she seemed to search her words. “I’m not even sure whether it was just a dream.”
“Samantha, what do you mean?” I demanded.
“It felt so real! I’m having a hard time describing it!”
“What do you remember about your dream? Any specific details?” I urged.
She closed her eyes a brief moment, taking a deep breath. Then slowly opening her eyes at me, she began to explain.
“I opened my eyes to a blue-lit ceiling … a very high ceiling,” she said. “I felt the frigid cold floor from my bare feet. I began walking down a steel-walled hallway that seemed to stretch to infinity.”
I almost felt sweat break out of my face from hearing her story.
Samantha, what the hell?
“I was feeling alone and lost, taking various directions, turning into other hallways … and then I …”
“Did you find a door?” I asked.
“What?”
“Did you ever get to a door, Samantha?”
“Yes, in the end I did get to a door. A very huge and bulky one.”
“A big red door with Transit Terminal, written on it. Right?”
She gently shook her head. “No, not at all. It was a big blue door with Lab 58, written in white.” Her eyes widened dreadfully. “This wasn’t just a dream, now was it?”
“Tell me what happened next,” I said softly. “The door, did you manage to open it?”
“Being afraid of opening it, I figured it was probably a way out. But then I heard a strange noise, like heavy footsteps getting closer from another hallway. I just wanted to get back home, thinking about my bed. I only had the time to see the beginning of a huge shadow, like a giant machine, before a sudden blue flash of light came to me. Then I fell right onto my bed, not knowing whether I’d awaken from a bad dream.” She sighed. “I’m telling you, Derek. It felt so real.”
Although I told Samantha everything about myself, I had never described my first traveling experiences with such specific details.
The bell rang.
“Is it the first time this ever happened?” I asked her.
“First time, last time … Whatever. I just don’t want to be part of any of this, Derek.”
I stared into her gloomy eyes.
“Better get to class,” she added, walking past me.
She hurried toward the hallway past the cafeteria, to our math class. Then I caught a glimpse of Marianne Whitmore, the substitute teacher, following a few steps behind. I noticed her glancing at me, then at Samantha, on her way toward the same hallway.
CHAPTER 60
My worries increased, after what Samantha told me. Coming to know that she was now able to transmit herself, unfortunately beyond her control. I had to keep an extreme vigilant eye on her.
The bell rang for lunchtime.
The public area was immediately flooded with students, stumbling vibrantly from all directions.
I headed for my locker and fiddled the combination. I swung the door open, dumping my books at the top shelf. Closing back the door, I decided to walk to Samantha’s locker.
But she wasn’t there.
Leaning my back against her locker, I looked both ways, hoping that she would soon arrive, unless I had already missed her.
The crowd of student decreased quickly, most of them heading to the cafeteria.
I guess she’s already there.
My watch suddenly chirped as I strolled away from the locker. There was a message: Go to classroom A-1004.
Time Leap: A Teen Superheroes Saga Page 13