And then there were five of us rolling down the Brooklyn Bridge into Manhattan.

"Who is next on the list?" Sara asked.

"I've been thinking about that. Our original list had a spot for a hunter, linguist, medic, musician, thief and weapons engineer."

Sara twirled her fingers in a gesture I now recognized as impatience, "Yeah, so?"

"When I saw how Noah had chemistry as a skill, it made me wonder if we've been thinking the wrong way. I'll admit I'm a bit biased by my time playing games as a kid, so maybe skills like Music aren't really that important. We aren't going to stay alive with a Bard."

Sara nodded, "Or Linguist. It feels like some skills we can just trade for. What ideas do you have?"

"I'm thinking about more fundamental thinkers. Chemistry, Biology, Physics, things like that. I think we are going to need to completely rework our code the way I did with this computer. Only I'm guessing I was damn lucky it worked. Next time I want to go at it in a scientific manner."

Sara nodded again, "So you don't end up with a joystick for a dick."

"Not what I was thinking at all, but yes, so I don't end up with a joystick for a dick."

I reran the algorithm to account for skills that might have a more scientific orientation. I excluded Mathematics, I could handle that area. I left out Chemistry for now. Noa certainly wouldn't be the strongest candidate in that area, but we had her and so we should prioritize other areas first.

Two job board postings came up that I liked.

Posted By: Wen Zheng

Job: Construct a magnetic containment field.

Location: Columbia University

Price: Physics +20

Posted By: Amari Olowe

Job: DNA Sample

Location: NYU

Price: Biology +12

While they were advertising general skills, I figured we could voir dire them in person and then make the call to recruit or move on. They weren't in the same school but NYU and Columbia were both in Manhattan. I sent them over to Sara.

"OK, let's start with Amari first." Sara said.

"Why?" I didn't really care, but I liked to know why people expressed an opinion.

"Because unless you have a magnetic containment field handy, giving someone a DNA sample sure seems easier."

"Fair enough."

We parked in a red zone on Waverly Place, directly in front of the NYU Genomics center.

Everyone wanted to get out and stretch their legs.

"Someone should probably stay with the truck." I suggested.

"Why?" Eyal asked.

I still struggled with Eyal's brusk manner. I know he wasn't being mean, but it put me on the defensive. "So that it doesn't get towed?"

Charlie laughed, "Nothing is towing Little Jefe. They don't even make tire boots large enough for my little guy." He rubbed the metal of the truck like it was a puppy.

"Ok then, let's go donate some DNA!" I shouted. But Sara had already started her way in and the others were following her, making me the last one in the group.

Things seemed a lot more normal in Manhattan. There weren't as many people on the streets as I'm guessing should have been out at this time, but it felt like many people had decided to come into work and pretend Elon Musk and Douglas Adams hadn't just wiped out their entire understanding of the world.

Sara asked the receptionist, "Amari Olowe?"

The receptionist looked like a student volunteer, "Room 213. And he goes by O."

Sara hustled up the stairs. Eyal and Noa kept pace with her while Charlie and I huffed slowly behind them.

When we all made our way into room 213 we found it empty of people. It was a rather modern lab that appeared capable of supporting at least 20 people.

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

Charlie gravitated to a bizarre contraption that looked like a centrifuge and an electron microscope had conceived a baby.

"Oh, don't touch that," a bald man in his thirties wearing gold rimmed glasses hustled towards them.

"Mr. Olowe?" I asked.

"Call me O. How can I help you?" O had a soothing voice, although he kept throwing distrustful glances back at Charlie. Probably a good idea, Charlie likely would have snatched his machine into inventory if O hadn't appeared when he did.

I continued, "We are here about the job posting. You wanted DNA samples?"

It took him a moment, but he smiled widely, "Yes I did. Excellent. I wasn't sure that job board would work. "

Then he caught sight of my arm. He grabbed it and turned this way and that way. "How did this happen?" he blurted.

"I made the modification. I'm guessing it wasn't too different from how you made that machine over there."

He smiled again, "Yes, it's an entirely new way to look at DNA." He walked over to the machine and put his hand on it. "I have a theory that we might be able to translate our DNA into snippets of code. I can't wait to get your DNA, I have a feeling the changes you made will really speed up my search."

"About that." Sara pushed forward.

Ah, never tell a negotiator what you most want. Well, his pain will be our gain.

"You can have any of our DNA. But his DNA is really special. We are going to need something else for that."

He looked weary, "What do you mean?"

"Well, it turns out that we have the same goal as you do. We want to understand how it all works. We are putting a team together..."

O waved his hand, "I am not interested. I just want to work here in my lab."

Sara, always cool under pressure, "I understand. Well, do you mind if we connect over the network? You can still have the rest of our DNA. If you change your mind, just send us a chat."

O relaxed. "Sure, no problem. Who is first?"

Twenty minutes later we were headed out of the building.

"Do you expect him to contact us?" I asked Sara.

"Yeah, he'll contact us. That arm of yours is going to eat him up inside. He couldn't stop looking at it. Let's go get Wen and hopefully by then our friend O will be ready to join up."

We headed back to Little Jefe and noticed a tow truck parked in front of her. The driver scratched his head while staring at our monster truck.

"Not going to happen," Charlie said with a smile.

"No shit," the tow truck driver responded.

Charlie drove. We made our way to the upper west side and parked a block away. This time we split up, most of the team went out for supplies while Sara and I headed to the lab.

And then I heard my name, "James! James!" I froze. I knew that nasally voice. I stopped, turned, and forced a smile.

"John Farber," I replied.

I guess I shouldn't have been surprised. John worked at Columbia and we had just parked at the math building.

"Wow, I'm feeling pretty luck today. This revelation just keeps opening door after door for me," John kept smiling.

It was then that I noticed the red stains on his shirt front and sleeve. My heart quickened.

I sent a message to Sara over chat, "This guy has blood on him."

"I see. I'm sending a message to Eyal. Keep him talking."

I smiled, "What doors are those?"

John leaned in to whisper, "I've already added hundreds of new skills to my programming."

"Oh yeah? How's that?" I wanted to look for Eyal but I kept my gaze firm on John. If he was going to try something, I wanted to see it coming.

"People just need a little motivation. Hell, I bet my math skills are higher than yours now too. I've already visited Professors Salvatorri, Wilkenson and Sato. It's opened up my eyes to so much James." His eyes clouded over and he stopped talking. "Hey, come on into the building and we can swap notes. I'm dying to find out how that arm of yours works. You can bring your friend if you want."

"I'm afraid he already has an appointment with me." I hadn't notice Eyal approach us, the sneaky bastard.

John looked over at Eyal in surprise and frowned. He caught himself and smiled again. "Too bad. Well, I'm sure we'll be seeing each other around real soon. It's a whole new world."

John didn't move. I began walking away with Sara and Eyal followed a few steps behind us. When I got to the corner of the street and turned to walk right, I could see that John hadn't moved. He continued to stare at us as we walked out of sight.

"That guy is dangerous." Eyal said.

I shook my head, "He seems to have gone a bit crazy, but he's not exactly a prize fighter."

Eyal disagreed, "He might be a prize fighter now. He stood in a very specific fighting stance, and when I arrived he pivoted and started to move his arms into a defensive position."

I hadn't noticed any of that. "Maybe I should have networked with him so we could see what skills he picked up."

Sara jumped in, "And let him see your skills and track you? Nah-uh." She stopped, "We are here."

We entered Pupin Hall, the home of the Physics department for Columbia. The building, while less than 10 stories tall, presented an awesome face. A big park leading up to the red brick face put a building like this more at home in New England than Manhattan.

We entered to find the front desk deserted. Fortunately we found a directory pointing us to Wen's office. We walked up three flights of stairs and opened what looked like a normal office door.

This was not a normal office.

We entered a cavern that must have reached 5 stories high. A large bulbous machine occupied the center of the room. Parts were strewn across the floor. A man wearing a disshelved suit moved frantically from part to part, making them disappear into what I assumed was his inventory.

"Mr. Zheng?" Sara asked. Her voice sounded small. The cavern ate sound. The man turned and ran up to us. "Hello, I need your help. Do you know how to put things into your inventory?"

"Yes, why?" Sara asked.

"Some nut job tried to attack me on my way to work today. It isn't safe here any longer. We need to take my machine and find a safe place."

I looked at the machine, it was huge.

Sara remained pure business, "Mr. Zheng, we can help you. Let me call in some friends and we'll get you out of here ASAP."

I grabbed Sara's arm. "Where exactly are we going to bring this... thing?"

Sara's eyes twinkled. "I have an idea."