Chapter Forty-One

CLEFF and Viktoriya’s training had ended faster than either of them expected that day. And perhaps it was the moderated codes inserted in CLEFF, or he had seemly become more human. Still, he had carefully deciphered that something was quietly different with Viktoriya that very day.

“Is everything okay, Vik?” he had asked.

“Yes. Well, no. My arm is still taking some time to react,” she responded without casting a second glance at him. She continued the routine crunches, her breath fluctuating, seizing when she sat up and rapidly falling when she lay back.

“I’m acting funny, and I don’t know why,” she said.

“I see. You are awfully quiet today, and from the way you are working out, I can tell that something is bothering you, so it is your arm? Is there something additional?” CLEFF said.

Despite his question, she continued without glancing at him.

She shut her eyes, still pulling through each crunch, even though her abdomen burned from the pain she was now churning against.

“Don’t you have confidence in me enough to share it with me?” CLEFF asked again, a sign of worry detected in his voice.

She pulled herself from his grip then walked toward the red punching bag, saying, “I know you’re trying to analyze me, CLEFF. It’s not always about having confidence in sharing,” she said, then exhaled. He had done nothing to her, and she knew she acted awful toward him.

She turned to face him. There was always a certain change in the atmosphere when he became concerned, and even though she understood he was merely a compilation of lines of codes, she could not help but wonder if perhaps he actually felt the same emotions.

After all, emotions are merely biological codes, and CLEFF’s system was a computer system of, well—codes.

“Sometimes, it’s about the person. Not trust or confidence. It’s like—” she paused, trying to find the words to say while he remained patient, gleaming at her with those green eyes.

“It’s like not knowing how to make sense of what you are thinking or perhaps being misunderstood. Like a line of a program that you cannot execute,” she tried to explain.

Over the months, she had grown fond of him, and although he was not human and could barely express emotions of his own, he had played the role of a good friend.

Most of the time, her mood had been clear and even contagious to him. Whenever she was sad, he would be too, and whenever she was laughing or happy, so would he.

All he wanted was to make her safe and happy. Protect her. All the things no human could do for her. At one point, she had even called him her guardian angel. The one who watched over her.

“You can tell me. Maybe I can help you. Do you know there are over an average of five hundred thousand search results on IntSearch for any topic on the Collective?” CLEFF was saying when she burst into laughter.

Every time he spoke about the search results, it always seemed he was bragging about his vast knowledge.

“I know, CLEFF. You said it like a thousand times already now,” she replied, half laughing. But then she paused. Maybe he could help. Perhaps he could explain the numbers she had seen in her visions.

She rushed toward her room, retrieving a notepad and a pen. She began to artistically write out the scrawling numbers onto the pages, at least the parts she could remember. CLEFF stood behind her, waiting for her to finish.

She handed him the scribbled notes, and as his eyes scanned it, he took a couple of seconds, then raised his head and spoke.

“I understand some of what this is. This line is readable. The rest is your terrible scribbling and makes no sense whatsoever.”

“You do, what do you understand?” she asked, excited.

“This, but I cannot fully translate it. I am prohibited from executing low-level, non-conformant code. It is not secure. Some of this doesn’t appear to be AI or human-generated,” CLEFF said, lowering his head to look into her eyes.

“Aw… Don’t be sad. I am sure I can figure it out, then I will tell you and help you know what it means,” she said, tapping the metallic arm.

“Really?” he replied, and his gloomy eyes brightened up.

“Yes,” she responded with a smile.

She chuckled. “You will always be my friend, and I’ll always share what I learn with you, CLEFF,” she said, with a big grin that CLEFF could not help but brighten his eyes in return.

“Ah, okay. So, this one line is easy! But unfortunately, it is also the only line that I can interpret. It is the formula to calculate the total magnetic quantum number,” CLEFF said confidently.

“An azimuthal quantum number is a number representative of an atomic orbital that produces its orbital angular momentum,” he explained, and he paused.

“The total magnetic quantum number is defined as the number which divides the subshell into individual orbitals which hold the electrons, is calculated using the magnetic quantum number. Sorry, my protocol will not let me proceed further.”

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

“Okay. So, all I have to do is find my father’s old computer. Then, we can access the Halikkon Collective archives and find out more,” she replied.

“Your father’s computer? Is that not in the lab?”

“Yes,” she answered as she unwrapped the boxing gloves. She made her way out of the room, followed by CLEFF, who walked faster, trying to catch up with her.

“Your father would be mad. He said you should never go there alone.”

“It’s the only thing I can get my hands on that won’t have restricted safe-searches on it. And, it also has all of his nuclear projects and databases, along with his electron splicing models. And besides, he won’t even know we were there. We would barely touch anything,” she said, pushing the door to the lab open, but he stood there, refusing to go in with her.

She turned to him, but even with his eyes partially dimmed and slanted, she could understand him almost as she would herself. And he understood her well, most of the time.

“Okay, you can wait here. I will be back in ten minutes, but you must promise me you won’t tell Dad,” she said.

CLEFF replied, “Unfortunately, I must follow you for the security protocol, Viktori-Ya.”

They made their way down the flight of stairs until they were inside the bright laboratory, with the florescent lights illuminating the wholeness of the lab.

She evaluated the room from the looping simulation on the screen to the packed up clear, glass freezer with stones from who knows where stored within it.

It was easy to lose one’s self in there, especially when there were so many systems, control panels, and cores, as well as the odor of stale coffee that seemed permanently saturated into the very air itself.

The lab was like a vast warehouse. The smell of hydraulic oil, smoke, and waste chemicals lined up in another row of transparent capsules as they passed several lab tables.

“Is it here? Is this it?” he asked.

She heard him, but was too immersed in searching for the computer to respond. Finally, she stumbled across a chair, then her hand pressed against the transparent table, causing a hologram to spin up.

She stood there, watching as what seemed to be a space ark assemble in front of her in space and took off in a split second.

She made her way to the computer at the other end of the room, typing the text ‘magnetic quantum number’ into it.

She read everything about it, finding a translator of quantum formulas to standardized equations.

She typed the formula part she could recall, and after a few seconds, the words popped up a link to a big dark font.

“Quantum Magnetic Plasma Travel.”

She stared at the phrase, wondering if perhaps her subconscious had embedded the thought into her head after a series of fictional movies where she could see humans bend reality.

The Spectrum Web.

It had to be. What other reason could there be for her to see endless, glowing spiderweb-like structures throughout the universe?

As she continued to stare at the screen, trying to make sense of the message, she recalled the ark that had launched into space on the hologram, then the quick flash of a memory.

She remembered when she had been in the rear end of her parent’s car, and they were fighting over the best type of nuclear propulsion for the journey.

“Was that it?” she thought. Was that what she had to do? Did she need to tell her parents that their plan would not work, and that there was perhaps a better method of propulsion? A better way to travel than nuclear drives?

But what way?

The Quantum Magnetic Plasma?

What was that, actually?

She didn’t have a clue.

The ground trembled just then, a minor shake of the lab, but it was enough to disrupt their search. Over the months, the planet’s natural disasters had risen rapidly, an average of over three earthquakes in a week, and although the big ones were rarer, they were just the same.

“Viktori-Ya!” CLEFF called. “We have to leave now,” he said, touching her shoulder.

She had fallen against the table, a slight buzz slowly ringing in her head. Her vision had blurred with the hit, and her balance was affected.

An aftershock caused another slight tremor and then subsided. The Kuzlands had built their home and labs to withstand earthquakes, although the repetition took its toll, and the home had started to take damage.

She struggled to gain composure again and a clearer view of her surroundings. However, she could still see the blurry figures on the screen and the thought of the last few seconds before the quake rumbled in.

CLEFF had waited long enough for Viktoriya to obey his order to leave. He grabbed her, lifted her to his chest, and rushed to the stairs back up to the hallway leading into their home, the sound of his metal steps echoing back to them.

Another aftershock came, this time more resounding than the last. But in the presence of this one, she considered the previous one a mere teaser.

The whole lab trembled under the quivering of the ground, and they heard glasses shattering against the floor everywhere.

CLEFF reached the top of the stairs just in time, shielding her from a frame that plummeted off the wall. The frame glanced from his arm and then landed just beyond them.

Viktoriya had gone pale, her skin appearing more white than usual. Her whole body was in disunity. She could barely bring herself to stay still.

“I have you, Viktoriya. You are safe,” he said, carrying her out of the lab.

She was still in a blur when the door slid open and her parents ran in. They had rushed back home right after the first wave.

She lay on the couch while CLEFF applied first aid to her head injury.

“Oh my God!” her mom called out as she rushed toward her girl. She lifted Viktoriya into her arms.

CLEFF remained quiet. His program prevented him from lying, but it said nothing about not responding to a yet unasked question.

“Mom.”

“Save your breath, hun. We are here. You are okay,” her mom said, her hands roaming her daughter’s body, searching for any other injuries.

“Mom, listen,” she spoke again, but her mom was so lost in the moment that she had failed to notice her desire to inform her of something else.

“Mom, it won’t work,” she finally said, knowing it was the only way to get her mother’s attention.

“What?” she asked. Her mom’s attention had finally been drawn.

“The ark,” she muttered.

Her parents both gazed at her now. Her dad had taken a seat beside her, letting her mother take the lead.

“It won’t work. It will take forever to get there. There is another way. I found it on Dad’s system. The ark will degrade and fall to pieces over the centuries unless we go faster, and…”

“Vik, don’t try to change the subject, hun. We told you not to go into the labs whenever we are not with you. Vik, some of that stuff is very dangerous.”

“I know, Mom. I only wanted to learn something important.”

“What was that?”

She turned to CLEFF. “It was… it was nothing. I am sorry.”

She needed to tell them.

She wanted to talk about all her visions, but she knew they would not understand.

Instead, she thought they might force her to see one of those mental-health doctors she had read about on the psychology blogs. The ones she found when she got side-tracked onto so often when searching the Collective for information on her autism. Doctors for people who cannot connect with reality and are unstable.

For now, she remained quiet about it. But she would find out what it meant and then prove it to her parents.

Once she had figured out how to show them their mistake and told them how to fix it, they finally would believe her.

She just needed to do more research on what she had discovered, and then they would listen to her.

They would finally listen.