Chapter Two - The Lab
By Xigeous
Cyberbeast silently followed the Admiral down a long hallway and
into a brightly mirrored room marked "Officers Only." There, the
three paid the rent on their coffee and then proceeded to the lab in
another building.
After a brisk walk across the parking lot and into another large
building, the two took an elevator down, down, down, far into the
Earth. The elevator delivered the two into the lab itself. It was a
huge room, with the standard twinkling computers, bubbling beakers,
and half assembled experiments lining the walls. Little clicking and
beeping sounds emanated from all directions.
On entering, Cyberbeast was so disgusted by whom he saw that his
mechanical eye went PING as it dilated. It was the foul Dr. Xigeous,
the man that saved Cyberbeast's life and cursed it in one operation.
Sure, Cyber owed his existance to the man but Dr. Xigeous had a
dehumanizing bedside manner. He treated Cyber as if he was really a
mechanical man with a few unfortunate vestigial organs.
Dr. Xigeous was brilliant yet short-sighted, imaginative yet
shallow, hard-working yet unethical, sarcastic yet humorless,
determined yet cowardly. The universe and everyone in it were his
playthings. What was good for his ego was good for mankind. And what
was good for mankind was good-enough for any one man on whom he
experimented.
Cyberbeast made believe he didn't see him. He turned to the Admiral
saying "Did someone leave an ham sandwich in a drawer somewhere?
Something stinks in here."
Xigeous did a sad swagger as he approached, "Cyberbeast, I see you
have not yet learned to appreciate what I've done for you."
"What you've done for ME?" stage whispered Cyberbeast, "Yes, you
saved my life. You rebuild me. But you made my life a traveling freak
show with no light at the end of the tunnel."
"Ouch!" interrupted Xigeous, "That was one sorry mixed metaphor
there."
The Admiral knew both Cyberbeast and Xigeous were essential to the
success of the mission and said, "Gentleman, time is wasting. Please
put aside your personal differences and work together. Doctor, show
us what you've done."
Xigeous motioned that they should follow him to one of the lab
tables. He picked up a sword-like ray gun.
"This is a Xiphoid Intrusive Grape-shot Gun. I call it the XIG-
Gun."
Cyberbeast groaned as he remembered Xigeous' preoccupation with
naming inventions after himself. He was grateful there was a limited
supply of words that began with "X." The Doctor continued.
"It fires continual balls of anti-cohesion energy. Concrete and
steel will melt before your eyes."
Xigeous fired a few blasts at a monolithic-sized block of metal
hanging a few yards away. The gun made amusing POOP POOP POOP sounds
as little balls of light made their way through the metal. The block
was cut in half. The lower part quickly fell towards the three, who
screamed like women and ran backwards. Xigeous, once again, lived up
to his reputation of being brilliant yet short-sighted.
After a insincere apology, the Doctor took a heavy metallic
watch out of a glass case. The watch appeared to have little jewels
freely circling its face.
"This watch is filled with twenty Xylene Ignited Glass Beads. I
call them XIG-Beads! You flip the top, take out a bead, throw it
and..."
The room was suddenly filled with non-toxic gas. No one was
able to see except Cyberbeast with his mechanical eye. The cover only
lasted a minute but the harmless explosion could instantaneously
cover several blocks.
After sixty seconds of waiting for the clouds to clear (and a
lot of "So how's the wife?" "Catch the game last night?" "Seen any
good movies lately?) Xigeous looked to Cyberbeast to see if he was
impressed. All Cyber did was merrily quip "Okay. And now we have
nineteen beads."
Xigeous mumbled something about "a tough audience" and
produced some clothing that looked somewhere in-between a jumpsuit
and a spacesuit. He cried "Xanthene Integrated Gravity Suits! I call
them XIG-Suits! They can alter your body weight from zero to double
your weight. They also produce a force field helmet that pumps
oxygen."
"Okay, okay, that one's almost impressive," interjected
Cyberbeast, "But none of this is going to get us to an unapproachable
island."
"True," answered the Doctor, "Let's jump to the big finale."
He pushed a button on a consol. The floor opened up in a
carelessly designed way that had previously cost many unsuspected
janitor's their lives. Cyberbeast and the Admiral jumped back just
in time. Immediately after, a small submarine like vehicle was
brought up with the new floor. It looked like a giant white shoe-tree
with windows.
The Admiral and Cyberbeast were again startled by the Doctor's cry
of "The XIG-Mobile!"
The three walked up to the shuttle and Xigeous continued.
"It's propelled by X-axis Inertia Generation. Inertia generation is
irresistible. If I throw an IG force field around an object, it
carries that object where-ever the field is programmed to go. I've
installed it in this small self-contained air shuttle. No barrier nor
gravitational pull in the universe can stop it."
Cyberbeast found this impossible to believe and said
so "Impossible!"
"Not so" answered Xigeous who began a stream of unfathomable techno-
babble.
"You see everything in the universe rests on countless miniature
gravitational pockets that reside in sub-space energy matrices. All
matter is ultimately controlled by this energy-defiant space grid. I
found a way to reach this grid and manipulate its independent kinetic
orientation. An object, such as the shuttle, can have its hyper-
dimensional place-marker altered. It will respond as if it's been
acted upon by an outside stimulus when it has not. I merely plot a
point in the computer's x-axis Cartesian plane, increase the inertia
reading in sub space to what ever energy level the grid needs, and
the shuttle, at all cost, will go to that point."
Cyberbeast didn't understand a word but quipped never-the-
less, "What a coincidence. That's just what my buddies were was
telling me last night and I thought it was just the alcohol
talking."
Nobody laughed. Cyber asked the Doctor, "Have you actually flown
this shuttle?"
"I've had many successful test flights. There *were* a couple of
careless manuevers that got me a few extra points on my driver's
license but all the other tests were extemporary. I conducted them
myself. I'm the only one that knows how to fly the shuttle."
Cyberbeast was almost impressed, "I see. And I'm willing to bet
this shuttle actually *could* get us to the island. But Admiral,
there *is* one more problem you've failed to consider. This man
offends me so greatly that I refuse to work with him on any mission."
*
