Read Online The Flicker Men by Ted Kosmatka - Free Book Online Page B

visuals.”
    â€œWaves to images.”
    â€œYeah.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œFor me, it was the challenge. To see if it could be done. For the others, there were more practical reasons.”
    â€œLike?”
    â€œPushing past the system’s polygon budget. It was a way to render 3D space efficiently. Stuart was into hardware improvements. Modeling design. Starting his own company. Things that were actually useful.”
    â€œDid it work?”
    â€œThe company? Yeah, it’s still based in Indiana.”
    â€œNo, the computer.”
    â€œOh that. Kind of. We reached a sixteen-coherence state and then used nuclear resonance to decode it.
    â€œWhy only kind of? So then it didn’t work?”
    â€œNo, it worked; it definitely worked,” I said. “Even when it was turned off.”
    *   *   *
    It took Satvik two days to rig up the light while I built the box.
    Point Machine brought the frogs in on a Saturday. We separated the healthy from the sick, the healthy from the monsters.
    â€œWhat is wrong with them?” Satvik asked.
    â€œPollutants.”
    One frog was spiderlike—a phalanx of pale and twisted legs sprouting from its rear quarter. The legs twitched when Satvik picked it up. Another leg flexed and straightened.
    â€œPollutants do this?”
    â€œTo amphibians, yes. The more complex a system, the more ways it can go wrong. Amphibians are very complex.”
    â€œPoor bastards,” Satvik said. He dropped the frog into the other aquarium with a loud plop.
    Joy was next door, working in her lab. She heard our voices and stepped into the hall.
    â€œYou working weekends?” Satvik asked her when she appeared in our doorway.
    â€œIt’s quieter,” Joy said. “I do my more sensitive tests when there’s nobody here. What about you? So you’re all partners now?”
    â€œEric has the big hands on this project,” Satvik said. “My hands are small.”
    â€œAh, so you have Eric to blame for your lost day off?” She followed Satvik’s voice deeper into the lab, fingers trailing the wall.
    â€œSo it would appear,” I said. I hammered the last nail into the corner of the box. It was a flimsy thing of plywood two feet square, into which a small light had been wired—the bulb scavenged from a small chandelier at Satvik’s house.
    â€œI’d heard you were going to be leaving here.” The statement was pointed at me.
    There was an awkward moment. Point Machine glanced up from his aquariums.
    â€œNot quite yet,” I said.
    â€œThen what are you working on?” she asked.
    Satvik shot me a look, and I nodded.
    So Satvik explained it the way only Satvik could. It took five full minutes, as he went over every detail, and she never interrupted him.
    â€œOh,” she said, finally. She blinked her empty eyes. She stayed.
    We used Point Machine as a control. “We’re going to do this in real time,” I told him. “No record at the detectors, just the indicator light inside the box. When I tell you, stand there and watch for the light. If the light comes on, it means the detectors picked up the electron. Understand?”
    â€œYeah, I get it,” Point Machine said.
    Satvik hit the button, firing a stream of electrons. I watched the phosphorescent capture screen while an interference pattern materialized before my eyes—a now-familiar pattern of light and dark.
    â€œOkay,” I told Point Machine. “Now look in the box. Tell me if you see the light.”
    Point Machine looked in the box. Before he even spoke, the interference pattern disappeared. “Yeah,” he said. “I see it.”
    I smiled. Felt that fine edge between known and unknown. Caressed it.
    I nodded at Satvik, and he hit the switch to kill power to the gun. I turned to Point Machine. “You collapsed the probability wave by observing the light, so we’ve established proof