UnEarthed by Rebecca Bloomer

Author:Rebecca Bloomer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Odyssey Books
Published: 2012-07-02T00:00:00+00:00

Silver Service

The school doors slid open upon recognition of Astrid’s fingertips as she pushed them out of her way. Back in her role as ‘girl on a mission’, she strode toward the computer room, with Jodi almost running along behind her.

Lights glowed brighter as they entered the room. Motion sensors. Jodi registered the fact distantly as she settled herself in front of the wallscreen. Astrid tapped into action. She plugged Jodi’s drive into the unit built into the desktop and clicked the prompts to set it running.

Jodi waited patiently until her code appeared on the screen.

“So I saved your program to a different stick in case you didn’t like my work. Then I tried to figure out what you needed. Something to scrape and clean arteries, right?”

Astrid nodded, her eyes scanning the lines of script on the screen.

“I figure you’ve basically created a tiny, weeny, cleaner bot right? So I pretty much cloned the instructions for Anphobosite cleaner bots.”

Astrid’s mouth fell open and she transferred her full attention to Jodi.

“I know!” She raised her hands to fend off Astrid’s words. “It may be a simplistic approach, but we can change it and refine it according to what you need. We just have a really good base to work from now.”

Large hazel eyes blinked slowly closed. Astrid drew a deep breath through her nostrils before she started speaking in a slow, exaggerated fashion. “You got cleaner bot programming?”

“Ye-es … but I …”

The eyes opened again. “How did you get that?”

“Oh … well … yes … that. It wasn’t that hard. I figured it’s only cleaner bot programming. I’m not like, stealing state secrets or anything. And I did warn you that I was being a bit evil … sort of.” She gulped and rushed on. “But if we change it enough, nobody will recognise it. Well, it’s highly unlikely they will, especially if they’re just physics teachers and not, ummm, council programmers or something.”

Astrid’s perfectly formed mouth spread ever so slowly, to become a giant smile. “You’ve been here less than a month …”

“Less than a fortnight, actually …”

A finger waved her quiet. “Let me finish. You’ve been here less than a month, and you’ve hacked city programming work and cloned cleaner bot programs to help me with a physics project?”

Jodi grinned. “And I get more than five minutes of hot water per shower!”

“HA!” Astrid started laughing and clapping her hands. “Oh,” she sniffled and delicately wiped her eyes. “That’s too perfect!”

“Well, not exactly perfect. It could be better. I was thinking we could actually merge bits of bot programs. Give your little machine some super powers.” She shrugged. “But it’s your bot, so only if you want.”

When she’d gathered her wits and found some words, Astrid blinked at Jodi, for all the world a playful kitten who’d just found a vat of cream. “Teach me.”

Other than her near-death-almost-space-crash, there were not many moments in Jodi’s life she considered mind bending. Certainly none that she thought she might like to keep forever.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.