Chapter 56

James was in the chair once again. Apparently, its purpose was not only to grant access to the workshop proper, but also to manage features of the workshop that needed extra security. What James was currently seeing was the standard workshop. The various forms and figures he saw were all projects in various states of completion, but none of them were actually ‘completed.’ Those, his father had told him, were kept in another secure room. One that was only accessible by having the proper… hardware, to use the chair properly.

“Alright, I’m in the chair.” James said aloud as he got himself comfortable. It was hard to trust the chair fully, considering the last time he’d sat in it, it had trapped him in its clutches and taken him down to this secret laboratory. “Now what?”

“The system should do a scan to activate your nanites.” As his dad spoke, James felt the warm sensation on the back of his neck. Once again, the monitor came to life. Though, he now knew, that was all an illusion. If his dad was to be taken seriously, what James was seeing was actually being projected within his mind.

Welcome James, the prompt once again said. Followed immediately by, Would you like to leave the Workshop?

James mentally thought no. The words flickered.

Standing by for intent

“It says standing by for intent.” James read to his dad. “Now what? Do I just think about your finished projects?”

“Nah. That won’t work. This is a special room. It requires a specific phrase be given. Request access to,” his dad cleared his throat, “Mommy and Daddy’s special toy closet.”

“What?” James asked immediately.

“Please don’t make me say it again.” His dad said, a bit of embarrassment in his voice. “It was a bad joke between your mother and I. When we were setting up the security, we wanted to make sure it was something ridiculous that no one could accidently stumble upon. And when it comes to passphrase cracking, silly and embarrassing things are usually some of the last things to be thought of. Probably unnecessary, considering only those with nanites can even access the chair, but you know, security is important. And…” his dad trailed off, almost to a whisper, “we may have been a tad inebriated when we put it in place. Plus, in a perfect world, the only one ever using the passphrase would have been your mother and I, at which point, it wasn’t, ya know, awkward.”

“A tad inebriated,” James muttered, “I’m sure just a tad, huh? And yeah, this is something no kid should have to think of.” He shook his head best he could while secure in the chair and thought the passphrase, trying extremely hard not to let his mind wander. Some things parents should just never say around their kids. And some images kids just never needed of their parents.

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

Special Access Granted

The message pulled his mind, thankfully, from the route his imagination was taking. There was the sound of heavy pressure releasing, and then clanking gears and grating metal. James pulled himself free of the chair and looked in the direction of the noise. An entire part of the wall of the laboratory, which had been covered with blinking monitors, had slide inwards. The monitors served as lights to tease at what lay within. It was a large room, though not as spacious as the massive workshop he was currently in. And from where he stood, he couldn’t fully make out the details inside.

His excitement wouldn’t let him wait. “It’s open,” James said quickly to Dagger, as he quickly walked towards the open room. The dog trotted just behind him, its glowing eyes still providing the video feed of everything that was happening to his father, who was, somehow, receiving all of this in his head through his nanites. How exactly was he doing that, James wondered. Was it a function of his father’s parrot robot? An image of the robot sitting on his dad’s shoulder, perhaps leaning its head against his neck, flashed through his mind. What was the range on these nanites that his parents had inserted knowingly in themselves, and unknowingly within James. What could trigger them. What else could they do?

His musings were short lived, as he reached the secret workshop, which he refused to acknowledge as his parents’ special toy closet.

The room was the size of a small gymnasium, and it was much more organized than the lab itself. Whereas the lab had bits and pieces all strewn about, with robots moving too and fro, computers beeping and screens blinking, the special room was lit by a steady white light, showing a completely sterile white space, with metal floors and ceilings. It was like a vault, and as James walked past the heavy door, he could see it was also reinforced by a few inches of thick gleaming metal, with massive pistons and stakes on the inside that seemed to have retracted from slots in the floor. No one was getting through that door without either extreme brute force, or the proper password. And that required, first and foremost, that the person knew where to look.

Within the vault, which he felt he should consider it, were six robots, two on each wall of the room, with the wall with the door being completely empty. They were held upright by massive mechanical braces, which reminded him of how video games and anime usually showed mechanized suits being secured. Technically, there was room for 15 robots total, judging by the three empty sets of braces on each wall. James wondered if there had been robots in them before, or if they were there simply for future projects.

Besides each of the robots was a terminal, from which wires ran into the braces, and then the back of the heads of the robots. As James got further into the room, heading to the nearest robot on his left, he realized each and every one of them, while humanoid, was distinctly different.

“Welcome,” James’s dad said from behind him, “to our Government Goes Batshit contingency.” James looked down at Dagger, and then back at the first robot. His dad hadn’t been lying. They had been busy. And he wondered when they’d had the time to make these six.

“Impressive,” James said as he reached the first terminal. “Are you going to tell me what they are called, and what they do?”

“And ruin the surprise?” His dad said with a chuckle. “Heavens no.”

“Then, at least tell me how to fire up the terminal?” James asked, looking down at the piece of technology. There was a handprint scanner on the face of it. There was also a set of goggles, which he figured was either a portable retina scanner, or would serve as the display for the terminal’s information. And then, last but not least, a keypad.

“That, I can definitely do.”