When the interloper first crossed the bridge, Jaye was not in an optimum position to observe. A lockdown was triggered immediately preventing any communication from the observation area and the bridge zone. After she had crossed the barrier, the interloper froze almost immediately, as the drone drove off to the maintenance area. The interloper slowly and deliberately removed their outer garment careful not to alarm the armed troops who were pointing weapons at her. She dropped it on the floor and raised her hands in the air.

Iris descended into the scene and this was when the great stare-down occurred. Both participants were unmoving statues. Iris appeared to be ready to decapitate the interloper. The interloper ready to avoid any incoming strikes. It was unclear, despite Iris’s perceived superiority, who would come out of such a showdown.

Very little happened in the next fifteen minutes, as Iris continued to tower nearly three times the height of the interloper. Kimiko, wearing an air-filter mask, joined them at the nine-minute mark. Jaye was unable to read anything off the interloper due to a lack of previous data. Time spent with Kimiko made her disciplined apprehension clear.

The stalemate broke when Kimiko appeared to fight off a feint. It was subtle. Jaye checked Chekhov to see if she had noticed. A general concern was dominant, but no signs she saw the incident. The interloper did however. Her eyes flicked to Kimiko and back to Iris quickly. That was when Iris changed. She retracted her blades. Her face changed to a safe green, and she lowered herself to eye-level with the interloper. Kimiko still appeared apprehensive. There was a change, and she wasn't hiding it as well.

Iris and the interloper started talking. The interloper turned her head away from the observation area so her lips couldn't be read. Kimiko was sent away, and finally, the observation blinds were closed. Chekhov left, and Jaye was alone in the room.

It was twenty minutes later when Iris appeared before her. Jaye was troubled by how difficult it was to determine if this was the real Iris or an AR projection. Iris applied a filter, making the transmission appear cell shaded.

“Can magic exist beyond the bridge?” Iris asked.

"It's a matter of definitions. Magic, by our definition, is supernatural. Anything that exists, by the mere aspect of existing, is natural. Therefore, magic does not exist. However, something Dr. Rosenberg does not seem to understand, is that there is no guarantee that the laws of physics are consistent across universes. Taking that into consideration, there can phenomena that could be referred to as magic, either by us or by the inhabitants of the place across the bridge.”

“With the assumption that magic is real, can it work here?”

“We don’t enough data to formulate a hypothesis.”

“I am going to task you with answering the questions. We have some items to examine as a starting point. You are in charge of this, not Dr. Rosenberg.”

“He won’t like that.”

“That’s not your problem. Prepare for information transfer.”

Jaye accepted the download. The information poured into her head like a memory. She gained some information from the data. The interloper's name is Pierce. She comes from a realm where magic is "real." There were basic details on how magic works. Items belonging to the interloper are being moved to the lab. A book, and two vials full of black liquid, had a lot of magic attached before crossing the bridge. The blackened liquid concerned the interloper, saying it could be "cursed", however, the interloper was unsure if the curse could be passed onto non-organic life forms such as Jaye. The file also included directions to be relayed to Alan.

The items were placed in quarantine although they had been checked and rechecked for any known dangers. They weren't radioactive. They didn't contain pathogens. They didn't create any odd physics anomalies such as excessive gravity. The items were everything they appeared to be. A random assortment of tools that someone who was in the habit of being where they don't belong might carry.

Jaye focused her attention on the two vials of unknown liquid. Other than their black color, nothing else could be isolated other than water. She started several threads on how to work the problem and her thinking was having an appreciable effect on the environment.

Jaye was often bemused at some of Alan's old movies and TV shows that featured some 'superior AI' being defeated by a logical paradox. Paradoxes were easy to defeat, as soon as one was detected, it was labeled a paradox and kicked aside. Jaye, who's work involved inter-dimensional travel and possibly time-travel, was excessively skilled at finding solutions to counter-intuitive problems. If you wanted to hang up an AI you would have to give them a problem resembling a busy beaver algorithm. A busy beaver program looks at a tape and follows instructions. The goal is to find the longest one that stops. Each new ruleset complicates the matter significantly. The only way to know the answer is to run the machine. Sometimes these machines would run forever before halting or looping on themselves. Figuring out where to start in an unknown phenomenon that may not comply with any known laws of physics is a busy beaver problem.

Alan designed her chassis to use a method similar to respiration to control her temperature. Small vents around her face expelled hot air out and pulled cold air in with each breath. The lab's typically cooler temperature helped Jaye maintain peak performance for longer than usual. However, the temperature of the room had gained by three degrees Celsius, and Jaye would have to terminate several threads soon or risk permanent damage to her components.

Jaye put herself into sleep-mode so that she could cool off. She cached her best ideas so far and would go deeper into them after the break. She was awoken by the sound of Chekhov's voice. "The upgrade was supposed to help you, instead it seems worse."

As expected, Kimiko's voice was next. "I'm fine, Stitches gave me a clean bill of health. Besides upgrades always come with an acclimation period."

“In addition to the dizzy spells, you are having nightmares. I can hear you crying in your sleep. Stitches is good with wet-ware. Have Alan go over your hardware.”

“This conversation is getting too personal,” Kimiko stated. “I think we should continue this later.”

It struck Jaye that it was out of character for Kimiko to ignore a possible security risk. She considered intervening on behalf of Chekhov. It didn’t take very many cycles for her to determine that most of these would result in increased animosity between Chekhov and Kimiko. Kimiko would become defensive and would be less inclined to seek the attention she needed. Counterintuitively, Chekhov would also be hostile toward intervention from Jaye. Once her thread was complete, she decided that she would approach Chekhov, encouraging her to apply pressure on Kimiko. She would also mention her observation to Alan. Alan would hopefully wait till he noticed something and intervene. If she was available at that time, she would throw her support behind Alan. Avoiding the entire conflict with Chekhov, and circumventing most excuses that would be put forth by Kimiko.

“This isn’t over, if you want me to drop it now, you have to promise to pick it up later,” Chekhov said.

“Promise,” Kimiko responded.

“Patented?”

Kimiko let out a drawn-out breath. “Patented.”

A following moment of silence was interrupted with Chekhov noting, "It's a little warmer than usual in here. Jaye, what's going on?"

Jaye noted the painting of a snowflake, the painting Chekhov made for her. She returned her attention to the array of things taken from the interloper. “I have been given the task of determining if magic is real. As it stands, I am having difficulty determining a starting point for experimentation.”

“What’s your hypotheses?” Chekhov asked. Kimiko walked over to the items in the case and started studying them.

“Magic is real,” Jaye said.

“That seems a bit broad,” Chekhov responded. “No wonder you are having trouble.”

“How about, Pierce is a thief?” Kimiko put forth. “She has a lock-picking set. This weapon,” she gestured toward the slingshot, “mild amount of defense. Not something I would rely on in a scrape. However, if I wanted to put lights out, or distract someone. This would be my go-to weapon of choice.”

“Observation. Hypotheses. How would you go about testing this?” Jaye asked.

“Ask her,” Chekhov responded.

“Not far from the truth. We’d have to do an interrogation. I’d consider setting up a honey pot. See if she goes for the bait.”

“If you assume she is a thief,” Jaye remarked, “you will bias your interpretation of the evidence.”

“It’s not my job to do science. It’s my job to identify threats. Is she willing to steal? Is she willing to kill? Those are the types of questions I have to answer.”

“We can’t know if she is willing to kill until she kills something,” Chekhov put forth, “assuming she is not honest when questioned, that is.”

“Put her in a room with one other person and a knife. Leave her in there with no other food source. If she kills the person and eats them, she is capable of killing, if she starves to death or is killed by the other person, then she is not a killer,” Jaye proposed.

“Wouldn’t that make us killers?” Chekhov asked. Kimiko gave her a slightly uncomfortable look. “In fairness, she warned us about the potential dangers of her stuff. We just don’t know how to test it.”

There is a trick that agents can do when they encounter a dead thread like the ones she was faced with before. Running the thread in the background and allowing irrelevant information to influence the parameters, she can narrow down on a course of action, even if it isn't the best one. "The experiment would be highly unethical, however, it's principals aren't." She turned toward Chekhov. "I need four white roses and two vases. Let's give this stuff the opportunity to kill."

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

Chekhov nodded and left the room. Kimiko continued looking at the items. “There is something that is off about these items. I can’t quite place it.”

“It’s probably the anachronisms,” Jaye said.

“What?”

“This paper is old, in the sense that it doesn’t use any manufacturing techniques more advanced than the first piece of paper. These tools, on the other hand, were built using mass production techniques... some of them anyway. And then there are these goggles. These aren’t much different than the AR glasses that Alan is fond of.”

“This book appears to be made using modern standards.”

“The book isn’t from Pierce’s world. It’s from the library in between worlds.”

Chekhov returned carrying the four roses in the two vases. She also had a guest. Right behind her came Dr. Rosenberg. “It looks like you guys are in here doing science without me,” he said. “Why wasn’t I notified?”

“I hadn’t reached a point where your input was required,” Jaye said.

“I should be consulted on all science matters,” he said sharply.

Jaye took the roses from Chekhov. She placed one in a vase outside the quarantine. Everything else was placed into an entry chamber. “This is my project. Iris assigned this to me.”

"She doesn't have that kind of authority. I am the lead at this place." He looked at the roses that Jaye was now placing in the two vials of black liquid. A third was placed in its vase inside isolation. "What are you doing? Some kind of high school science experiment?"

“I am testing for lethal properties.”

“We’ve got all these scanners, all these tests, have you bothered to run them?”

Jaye picked up a tablet and handed it to him. "Feel free to browse the results. If you see anything I haven't done, I'd be more than happy to do it for you."

Rosenberg snatched the tablet up. He flicked through the different data; an annoyed look came across his face. "None of this is remarkable in any way," He said.

Jaye shook her head and pointed at the black liquid. “Anything in there tell you why it’s black?”

He flicked back a few results. “The spectrum indicates that it reflects no light. That’s why it’s black.”

Chekhov started fighting back laughter. Jaye, on the other hand, was not as amused. "That's just another way of saying it's black," she said. "All the other tests, however, indicate there is nothing there but water."

Rosenberg shook his head and handed the pad to Chekhov. She began looking through the results just as the doctor had done before her. “The temperature seems a bit low,” she said. "It doesn't seem to track with the room. No gain while the room warmed."

Chekhov handed the tablet back to Jaye. She observed the relatively flat line and compared it to the increase caused by her processor. “Good catch.”

They heard the elevator arrive. When the doors opened, Alan was standing there with the interloper. He was laughing. “Jaye,” he said as they exited the elevator, “we have a few questions for you.”

“Not a problem,” she responded. She looked at Pierce. “I have more than a few questions for the interloper.”

“Hey! Interloper?” Pierce said indignantly. “An unwelcome guest! That’s....fitting I suppose.” Alan grabbed a chair and placed it amongst the growing group of people. Pierce promptly scaled the seat so she could be level with everybody else.

“Jaye,” Alan said, “what would happen if an object made of emtonium crossed the bridge?”

“As it crossed the event horizon,” Rosenberg responded, “It would merge temporarily with energetic material.” Chekhov rolled her eyes in his direction.

Pierce looked at Alan. “Is this the guy?” she asked. Alan nodded. “Mr. Mustache--”

“Dr. Musta—Rosenberg,” He responded dryly.

“Dr. Rosenberg? Is your first name Jaye?”

“No, it is Wade.”

“So, what prompted you to answer just now?” Pierce had adopted a tone not that much different than a pre-school teacher lecturing a student on the importance of sharing.

“I knew the answer.” Wade started cleaning his glasses.

"Does Jaye know the answer?" With each question, Pierce leaned a little closer to Dr. Rosenberg.

“I would assume she does.”

“So, if Jaye was asked a question that she knows the answer to, don’t you think it would be appropriate to allow her to answer?”

“Well...um?”

“Do you know the...what did you call it, Alan?”

“Pythagorean theorem,” he said.

“Yeah, that? Do you know that?” There was a direct correlation between Pierce’s smile and Dr. Rosenberg’s discomfort.

“Of course, I know that! The square of the hypotenuse of a right triangle is equal to the sum of the square of the remaining sides!”

“What if I told you it wasn’t always true?”

“Don’t be preposterous. Math is math. A triangle is a triangle.”

Jaye started analyzing Pierce’s cryptic line of questioning. In a short time, it appeared that Pierce and Alan had created a rapport. Rosenberg was upset with the readings from the explorer while it was on the other side of the bridge and blamed Alan. More to the point, the navigation seemed wrong. Distances were off. Rosenberg sent a message strongly insinuating that Alan was incompetent. Jaye knew Alan had done his due diligence on the software and hardware of the equipment. While reading errors was an avenue worth pursuing, it was not the only option.

When is a triangle not a triangle? If you drew a triangle large enough on the surface of the earth, at some point, it would cease to be a triangle. Despite what the people on Alan’s forums may say, the earth is not flat. A triangle on a curved surface is not a triangle. “The library only appeared flat,” she said, “It’s curved like a bowl.” She started doing internal calculations and the math started to make sense.

“What are you talking about?” Rosenberg said.

“Like a bowl?” Pierce asked. She cocked her head to one side. “I can see that.” She turned her attention back to Rosenberg. Without leaving her perch, she managed to intrude on the Doctor’s personal space. “Even if the spider cart was broke, doesn’t mean it was my friend’s fault. You could use a little... understanding of others.”

“Empathy,” Chekhov said, “I think the word you are looking for is empathy.”

Rosenberg’s face reddened. “I have better things to do than be lectured by a sprite,” he grumbled. Pierce’s smile faded. He paced quickly through the room, ignoring the positions of everybody, and left the room.

“What’s his purpose?” Pierce asked.

"He is technically head of research," Jaye said, “He devised the necessary structure to create emtonium, and hypothesized the bridge. He is knowledgeable, but he has a hard time challenging his assumptions.”

“And emtonium is? The...MacGuffin... was made of the stuff.”

“MacGuffin? That sounds like an Alan word. Emtonium is a dense material. Under the correct circumstances, it allows quantum effects to operate on a macro scale. For example, creating an inter-verse bridge.”

“So,” Alan said, “back to where we were before the diversion. What happened to the MacGuffin?”

"As Rosenberg said, it would become excited as it crossed the bridge, temporarily fusing with it." Jaye paused to run some probability models. "When the bridge powered down, it would return to its previous state. Eighty-three percent chance it's on this side of the bridge. Fourteen percent that it is still in the library. Three percent that it fell into the unknown, or failed to un-fuse with the bridge."

Kimiko had her hand on her temple. “I need to go,” she said. “I’ve got business to attend to.”

She started walking toward the door. “Didn’t you have questions for the interloper?” Jaye asked at the same time Alan asked, “are you okay?” There was a look of concern on Chekhov’s face. Pierce was staring intently, seeing something the others did not see.

“I’m fine. Stitches cleared me.”

“Still,” Alan said, “It can’t hurt to do a once over on your cybernetics.”

“I’m not in the mood to be poked and prodded. And as for the thief, I will interrogate her later.” Kimiko, much like Rosenberg before her, left the room.

Jaye once again noted that Kimiko’s response was out of character. A long silence was broken by Pierce. “Thief? I’m … Interloper! Thief is... accurate... it’s a respectable profession.” She turned toward Chekhov. “Was she walking funny?”

Chekhov, fighting back tears, “I’m not sure what you are talking about.” Jaye noted that Chekhov appeared to be obscuring information, perhaps covering for Kimiko.

“It’s not like her to ignore a security risk,” Alan said.

“Sure, I can gauge from your responses that nothing about that interaction was normal. But that walk though?”

Jaye replayed Kimiko's departure through her head. She traced her movement and compared it to previous observations. The start was awkward at first but smoothed out. However, there was a distinctive difference in her walk. “Analisis shows that the walk was indeed funny. What are you getting at?”

“Memories of a recent out of body experience. Probably nothing.”

Chekhov turned away from everyone. Alan approached her. “Hey,” he said. He held his arms open. She turned toward him and leaned into the hug.

When they separated, Chekhov wiped underneath her eye. “I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what is wrong. It’s been going on since her last upgrade. She gets hostile anytime I bring it up.”

“I know I am new here,” Pierce said, “but it seems odd that your medical machines can’t fix human machines.”

“It wasn’t a priority for their designers,” Alan said dryly. He walked off to the corner of the room and to make a call.

An intercom speaker featuring the voice of Dr. Rosenberg abruptly broke in. “Is my badge in the lab?”

Jaye scanned the surroundings looking for signs of the badge, taking special note of the reaction of the interloper. The badge was absent from view, and the interloper showed no signs of deception. She replayed the interaction from earlier. He appeared to have the badge on when he left.

“I do not believe your badge is here,” Jaye said.

“Did you even look?” his voice boomed. “Is Kimiko in there? She isn’t answering her coms.”

“She left moments ago.” Chekhov’s voice cracked a little as she said this, followed by an audible sniff.

“My memory indicates that you had it on your person when you left,” Jaye said. “You should retrace your steps since you left the room.”

“I can’t. I am being held at a checkpoint.” The next thing he said grumbled with frustration. “I think I am going to have to replace it. Thank you!” His tone indicated that “Thanks for nothing,” was more in line with his mood.

Alan finished his call and returned to the group. “Iris says to stay aware but to respect her privacy.” There was a collective nod from everyone. He looked at Jaye. “The changes you requested are ready. We can install them tomorrow if you are ready for surgery.”

Jaye nodded. An oversight in her design allowed AR to fed into her audio/visual input signal without her permission or knowledge. The dangers of this became apparent when she received a call after finishing a charge cycle. She spent fifteen minutes talking to Alan, unaware he wasn’t really in the room. Upon investigation, this vulnerability was exploited previously. Something Iris experienced firsthand when her squad was infected by rogues. Alan had devised a way to force highlight AR objects so they stand out from real items. This required a hardware change to decouple the AR pipeline from the standard visual feed. “Thank you.”

Alan smiled at her. “After that project, I need your help with my next one. Stitches is going to get an upgrade. Full agent status.”

“Why are you doing that?” Chekhov asked. Her voice had calmed significantly.

“We need an on-sight doctor who can take care of all our needs, both organic and cyber components. An agent can be quickly brought current with all that and would provide valuable future-proofing. We need a doctor that can think, not just one that can execute. Should have been done sooner. I’ve been dragging my feet on this one.” Alan looked down for a moment and showed a face he hides often. He shook his head, and his smile returned. “Fortunately, we have a soul chip on hand.”

“That’s a result,” Chekhov said, any previous distress completely forgotten. She was looking at the isolation chamber. Jaye turned to look and see what she was talking about. The two control roses were the same as they were before. The roses in the potentially magical potions had changed. One was red, almost like Chekhov’s hair. It had nearly doubled in size with an unusually thick extra thorny stem. The other one had turned yellow. It was smaller than it was before. It had taken on a wispy look to it. The formerly black water was now completely clear.

“That is a result,” Jaye echoed.

While Chekhov and Alan looked at the roses with fascination, Pierce looked closely with disappointment and worry. “The magic is used,” she said. “These roses will be dead tomorrow.” The next day, the roses were dead.