Dr Angus

Angus had managed to get home from the lab unscathed. On the way, he had certainly noticed some people acting strangely. He saw a homeless man making a meal of a pigeon, and a few accountants pecking in some shrubbery like chickens. He even saw a man in a Saville Row suit running about on all fours trying to climb a lamp post. But even these occurrences, to him, weren’t entirely out of the ordinary for South London. Maybe a little more strange than usual, perhaps. In any case, Angus was too depressed about the no-show investor meeting that day to have really cared much about anything.

No, surprisingly, the moment when Angus finally began to suspect that something was truly wrong was when he noticed his elderly neighbour, Edwina Higgins, swinging like a chimpanzee from one of the very top branches of an Elm tree in his backyard. He watched in wonder as she quite happily stripped pieces of bark off the tree trunk and licked up the ants she found there with relish. He wondered how a woman of eighty was able to do something so athletic, particularly since he knew that she suffered from crippling arthritis.

It was at this point that the beginnings of a realisation started to pour into Angus’s head. And because Angus is a scientist, he tends to think in hypotheses. The hypothesis that he was noodling with at this particular junction went something like this:

Edwina Higgins = acting like monkey

(this = strange)

‘Mrs Higgins,’ he said. ‘Are you really quite alright?’

Mrs Higgins turned and inspected Angus, quickly deciding that he wasn’t of interest. She then made an aggressive hissing noise and continued on with her business of eating ants and holding onto branches.

‘Do you want me to call Derek? It’s just that you’re awfully high up in that tree there, and I don’t think it’s safe, especially at your age.’

Derek is Mrs Higgins’ son (the Doctor). Mrs Higgins now paid a bit more attention to Angus, this time beating her chest and hooting at him. Angus immediately regretted his remark about her age.

‘I think I’ll call Derek. Not to worry, help is on the way.’

Angus started dialling Derek’s number into his phone while fixing himself a nice cup of tea. Then his mind began to wander. His thoughts went something like this:

My computer experiment = mind transfer

(This = not exactly dissimilar to Mrs Higgins’ behaviour {at first glance})

The phone rang out. Angus left a polite voicemail, while peering out the window at Mrs Higgins, who had now taken to licking her cardigan with great enthusiasm. Angus then noted concerningly that her eyes looked a bit…purple?

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The mind cogs whirred again, this time with a soupçon of anxiety creeping into Angus’s subconscious. The manner of the whirring of the cogs went again something like this:

My supercomputer = success on rat

Perhaps

Supercomputer = also success on Mrs Higgins(?)

He shook off that thought. What a terrible thought indeed. It couldn’t be seriously considered – the math was solid. It had done what it was supposed to do. Rat mind + computer = immortal rat.

But what if he was off in his calculations?

Angus hesitantly picked up a yellow marker he had been using to mark use-by dates on portions of Shepherd’s Pie he was freezing, and began to slowly write out – on the window – the mathematical equation by which his computer performed the processes that made the thingies go boop and zing in his machine. As Angus kept one wary eye on Mrs Higgins outside, who was now swinging lithely from one branch to the next (particularly commendable for a woman of 89), his writing became more furious, and more desperate. His thinking went a bit like this:

My supercomputer = mind transfer

Mrs Higgins’ mind = monkey(?)

Therefore,

Withstanding other plausible explanations,

My supercomputer = responsible?

Eventually, the entire window was filled with a long, overly complex mathematical equation, and at the very end, Angus encircled a single number 1 above a zeta symbol, which was on top of a theta symbol, divided by ‘m’ minus ‘c’. In a moment of catastrophic realisation, Angus rubbed out the number one, and moved it to the other side of the zeta-theta/m-c bit, then frowned deeply and miserably.

Had he forgotten to carry the 1? Surely not, his mathematicians had been through every line of code over a thousand times. The stakes couldn’t be higher if something were to go wrong, so this sort of attention to detail was baked into Dr. Angus’ operation from the start.

But what if someone had gone rogue, and was operating the supercomputer independently? Surely not. But where was everybody today?

Had someone gone rogue? It was a terrifying thought. Because this technology was immeasurably powerful, and could be catastrophically dangerous if misused. It would be a bit like like playing footsie with an atom bomb.

The mind cogs whirred again.

Let’s play devil’s advocate here.

If (and it’s a big ‘if’) someone had taken control of the device and bungled up the code, a mistake as simple as forgetting to carry the 1 would (cogs whirring again) instead of concentrating their Trademarked Gamma-Theta Ray computer add-on bit at a simple rat, instead cause it to travel back into the electricity source, and then out along electrical lines, which of course would link up with telephone lines, which then link up with the cellphone towers, which would then transmit brain swapping rays out indiscriminately, all across mainland Britain.

Had they transferred the mind of a rat to the whole of Britain? He couldn’t be certain of that fact - since rats aren’t known to have quite such manual dexterity as Mrs. Higgins was currently displaying.

But it was a horrifying thought all the same.

Angus hoped briefly that the problem was only limited to his own backyard, though when he went do do a quick check of what was going on in the street outside his home, He witnessed Abe Tillerman, a mild-mannered accountant, chasing his shrieking wife around their front garden on all fours while growling like a honey badger.

Immensely crestfallen by this point, Angus walked back into his kitchenette and plonked himself onto a stool.

If someone were to get into the machine and try to use it, he thought - who would it be? Who would be stupid enough to try? Only Angus knew the intricacies of the system in its’ entirety.

Angus checked his phone. On it, he saw some very ominous words:

Keenan Fritz: Missed call: Voice message left.

Oh Keenan. You bloody idiot.