Project Alpha

by D. J. MacHale

  Niko opened one eye.

  “If you’re scared, you are in the wrong place,” Gabriel said.

  Dash took out a framed photo of himself, his mom, and his little sister. All three wore big, happy smiles. He gently placed it on a shelf above his bed.

  “I’m not scared about the mission,” Dash said. “What scares me is a world without power. Money won’t matter much if we all get sent back to the Stone Age.”

  Gabriel had no comeback.

  “I say we make a pact,” Ravi said, jumping out of his bunk. “The four of us guys should be the ones to go on this mission. We don’t need girls out there. Especially that Anna. She’s wound a little too tight. We gotta do everything we can to make sure we’re the final four. What d’ya say?”

  Dash and Gabriel hesitated, not sure how to answer. Dash opened his mouth to speak and…

  “Excellent! You are making yourself at home!” came a tinny, cheerful boy’s voice through a speaker.

  Everyone looked around for the speaker, but instead saw a visitor.

  It wasn’t a boy.

  It was a robot.

  “Well, this is different,” Gabriel said, stunned.

  The robot stood three feet tall and had two arms, two legs, and a wide head with two lenses that looked like eyes. Its plastic-cased body was mostly white, while all the joints were a mix of black and metal, lit up by glowing blue lights that emanated from within. Its tiny hands were fully functional, complete with opposable thumbs. And though it had rather substantial feet, it almost seemed to glide like a hovercraft when it moved from place to place. It walked toward the boys with a fluid motion. There was nothing robotic or stilted about its movement.

  “Welcome to you,” the robot said warmly. “I am STEAM 6000. Call me STEAM. Yes sir!”

  Niko and Dash climbed down from their bunks. None of them could take their eyes off the little machine.

  “You’re a—you’re a…robot,” Niko said numbly.

  “He probably knows that,” Ravi said.

  “Maybe it’s a she,” Dash said.

  “I am neither,” STEAM said. “Shawn gave me a boy voice, so you might as well refer to me as ‘he.’ ”

  “Shawn?” Niko asked.

  “Commander Phillips,” STEAM replied.

  “He made you?” Dash asked.

  “Yes sir,” STEAM replied. “I will assist you through the selection process and training. I will try to answer your questions and help make the experience as easy as possible.”

  The four boys stared at the little robot in wonder.

  “Man, this day just keeps on getting stranger,” Ravi said.

  STEAM walked back for the door. “Put on your uniforms and meet outside. Time for dinner. I will alert the girls.”

  STEAM pushed open the door and left.

  The four guys stood there with their mouths hanging open.

  Finally Ravi called out, “Okay, bye!”

  “That really happened, right?” Niko said, dumbfounded.

  “Who is this Phillips guy?” Gabriel asked. “He’s running this whole show and still has time to invent talking robots?”

  “He must be a genius,” Niko replied. “It’s not going to be easy to impress somebody like that.”

  The four boys looked at one another, remembering that they were in a competition.

  “Remember,” Ravi said. “The guys gotta stick together. Everything we do has to be about bouncing the girls. Just keep it on the down low. Right?”

  “Let’s go eat,” Dash said, ducking the question.

  The boys got changed and walked down the stairs that led to the first-floor common area. Waiting for them were Siena, Carly, and Piper. All three were dressed in their orange-and-blue uniforms.

  “Look at us!” Ravi announced. “If we don’t make the team, we can always get jobs at Jiffy Burger.”

  “I think they’re cool,” Piper said.

  An elevator door slid open to reveal

  Anna and STEAM. Anna hurried out of the elevator, looking irritated.

  “Back off!” she shouted, pointing a finger at the robot.

  She went right up to the others and stood behind Piper’s wheelchair for protection.

  “What’s the matter?” Piper asked.

  “That talking Lego is freaking me out,” Anna said, clearly upset. “I didn’t bust my butt to get here just to have some plastic WALL-E Pillow Pet telling me what to do.”

  “I do not mean to upset you, Anna,” STEAM said. “I want to make things as easy as possible for you. Yes sir!”

  “Yeah, well, no sir!” Anna shot back. “If you really want to make it easier on me, waddle yourself on out of here.”

  “I will do my best to stay out of your way,” STEAM said. “Everyone please follow me to the dining hall.”

  STEAM hurried out of the building with quick short strides. Everyone followed except Anna. Dash saw that she wasn’t coming and went back to her.

  “You okay?” he asked.

  “I’m fine,” she said sharply. “I just didn’t expect to have some mechanical Munchkin knocking on my door.”

  “It kind of threw me too. Maybe you should sleep in the dorm with the other girls. Being alone is only gonna make it tougher to—”

  “Whoa, stop,” Anna barked. “I earned that room and you want me to give it up?”

  “No! We’re all in this together and I thought it might be easier—”

  “We are not in this together,” Anna snapped. “When the final four get picked, I’ll care about the other three but until then we are in an eight-way fight. So back off.”

  Anna stormed off after the others, leaving Dash with his mouth hanging open.

  Up until that moment, he had only thought of the competition as being about proving himself. It was him against the various tests and challenges. He hadn’t thought much about having to compete against others. Now, between Ravi trying to create a secret alliance and Anna throwing down the gauntlet, he was faced with another reality. He not only had to prove himself, he had to worry about seven others who were in a desperate fight to win.

  And he had only been there for three hours.

  “I love this place!” Ravi exclaimed as he went back for his third piece of key lime pie.

  The meal was extraordinary, with every candidate getting plenty of their favorite food. There was pizza, BBQ, roast turkey, burgers, hot dogs, and even spicy chicken fingers. Five different kinds of salads were available along with baked, mashed, French fried, and sweet potatoes. They even served plantains, cheese fondue, and sushi. The desserts were impossibly good with cakes, pies, eight different flavors of ice cream, and heaping bowls of fresh fruit.

  The chefs had outdone themselves because they knew what everyone loved based on their profiles. The kids ate by themselves in a small dining room. Nobody talked much. It had been a long, tiring day and this feast was exactly what they needed.

  Finally, after an hour of feasting, the last dirty fork clattered down.

  “Who wants seconds?” STEAM announced as he strode into the room.

  He was met with a chorus of groans.

  STEAM said, “It is good you enjoyed the food. It was a special meal to make you feel at home.”

  “Home?” Gabriel called out. “I don’t eat like this at home.”

  “So what’s next, little guy?” Ravi asked.

  “Bedtime,” STEAM said. “Tomorrow the competition continues.”

  “Bed?” Anna exclaimed. “It’s only like…nine o’clock.”

  “Twenty fifty-nine,” STEAM countered. “The evening meal will not always go this late. Lights go out at twenty-one hundred hours.”

  “Why so strict on the time?” Dash asked.

  Suddenly, the room turned dead-black. Everyone fell silent.

  “Whoa,” Carly said. “You weren’t kidding about lights-out.”

  “It is the blackout,” STEAM said. “Every night. Power will return at zero five hundred tomorrow.”

  It was a
sober reminder as to why they were there. Yes, they were vying to take part in the adventure of a lifetime and a ten-million-dollar prize, but the purpose was to save the world from going dark. Forever.

  “Wow,” Dash said. “Even the government gets blacked out.”

  “How do we get back?” Piper asked nervously. “I can’t see a thing.”

  Two beams of light shot from STEAM’s “eyes.” “I will guide you, yes sir!”

  STEAM walked for the door. Everyone scrambled to get up and follow while trying not to trip over their chairs. Soon they were walking two by two across the quiet sandy road that cut through the desert base.

  Night had come to the desert. Not a single light shone from the buildings, but the sky was alive with the twinkling lights from an uncountable number of stars.

  Dash stopped and stared up at the brilliant umbrella.

  “I wonder which one we’re going to?” he asked nobody in particular.

  Piper stopped next to him and looked skyward.

  “I try not to think about it,” she said. “I don’t want to get my hopes up and then be disappointed if I don’t make the team.”

  “Too late for me,” Dash said. “I want this really bad.”

  “Me too,” Piper said. “I know I’m good enough; I just hope Commander Phillips thinks so.”

  “I wouldn’t stress if I were you,” Dash said. “The way you saved Niko today? That was awesome.”

  “It was a team effort,” Piper said with a humble shrug.

  “I guess,” Dash said. “If you ever want to team up again, let me know.”

  Piper smiled and said, “Same here.”

  She held out her hand to shake and Dash took it.

  “Hey!” Gabriel called. “Catch up!”

  The two took off, hurrying after the others.

  Dash was happy to have made a friend in Piper, but as they approached the group, he realized his dilemma had just deepened. Ravi was expecting him to be in an alliance of boys, yet he had just made an agreement to team up with a girl. Either way, somebody was going to be angry with him. Dash couldn’t be sure if he was making friends or lining up enemies.

  Fifteen minutes later, everyone was in their bunks, ready for sleep.

  “Power is back at zero five hundred,” STEAM announced to the boys. “Be showered, dressed, and ready for breakfast by zero six hundred. Understood?”

  All the guys grunted an exhausted “yes.”

  “Perfect,” STEAM said. “I am going to make like a tree and get out of here. Good night.”

  With that, the little robot left and closed the door.

  “What did he say?” Gabriel asked. “That made no sense.”

  “Maybe the blackout scrambled his circuits,” Ravi said.

  “I don’t think I can sleep,” Niko said.

  They were the last words anybody heard before they all fell asleep.

  The only one who didn’t nod off was Gabriel. He lay in his bunk with his eyes wide open. The wheels in his mechanically adept brain were grinding away. Something didn’t feel right to him. Gabriel prided himself on being able to figure out how things worked, whether it was a complex machine or a string of computer code. He could see twenty moves ahead in a chess game and predict the exact outcome or listen to a car engine and know which cylinder was sticking.

  He didn’t know exactly what was bothering him except that something felt off. He also knew that his brain wouldn’t let him sleep until he figured out what it was. He had no choice but to get up and go for a walk. Carefully, quietly, he slipped out of his bunk, put on his uniform, and tiptoed for the door. With one last look to make sure he hadn’t disturbed the others, he left the boys’ dorm.

  His plan was to go outside, take a few laps around the building to clear his head, and then try to sleep. The plan changed when he got halfway down the stairs to the lobby and saw the shadow of someone sitting on the bottom step. He froze.

  “I heard you,” a voice said from the step.

  Busted. Gabriel gave up trying to be sneaky and walked down the stairs.

  Sitting at the bottom, still dressed in her uniform, was Carly.

  “You can’t sleep either?” Gabriel asked.

  “How can anybody sleep knowing what we’re going to face tomorrow?” she asked.

  “We’ll do fine,” Gabriel said. “We wouldn’t be here if they didn’t think we could handle it.”

  “I know,” Carly said. “But what’s getting to me is the unknown. What kind of tests are they going to give us? That freezing-fog thing was crazy.”

  “I know, right?” Gabriel said with a laugh. “Abominable snow dude? Didn’t see that one coming.”

  “Exactly!” Carly exclaimed. “These aren’t tests you can study for. I’m a studier. I like to be prepared.”

  “I think that’s the point. They want to see how we’ll do when we don’t see what’s coming.”

  Carly nodded thoughtfully. “I guess, but that’s not how I operate.”

  “Don’t tell anybody,” Gabriel said. “If they think you’re nervous, they’ll be all over you like sharks in bloody water. There’s already a plan to—”

  Gabriel stopped talking. He had said too much.

  “Plan to what?” Carly asked.

  Gabriel thought fast but couldn’t come up with anything.

  “All right,” he said. “Some of the guys are talking about working together to make sure we win.”

  “You mean to make sure the girls lose,” Carly said.

  “I didn’t buy it,” Gabriel said quickly. “I don’t think Dash did either. But it was Ravi’s idea and Niko is probably meditating about it right now.”

  “Meditating?”

  “Don’t ask. Just watch your back, okay?”

  Carly gave Gabriel a smile and said, “Thanks. Why can’t you sleep?”

  Gabriel’s eyes narrowed down. That’s what he did when he was working on a problem.

  “It’s this blackout. We’re on a military base. They wouldn’t black out an entire military base. Especially not one that’s trying to solve the world’s energy problem.”

  “Maybe they don’t have a choice,” Carly offered. “We really are running out of energy.”

  “Maybe,” Gabriel said, still squinting. “But there’s something else. I can hear it. This base isn’t dead. Something’s got power.”

  “You can hear that?” Carly asked.

  Gabriel shrugged. “What can I say? I’m fine-tuned.”

  Carly thought for a second, then stood up.

  “So let’s go find it,” she declared.

  “Wait, what?” Gabriel asked nervously. “We can’t go poking around this place.”

  “Why not? Now you’ve got me interested.” She walked for the door, turned back to Gabriel, and said, “Coming?”

  Gabriel hesitated. As curious as he was, he didn’t want to do anything that would hurt his chances of making the team.

  But his curiosity won. It always did.

  When they stepped outside of the dorm, Gabriel stood still and listened.

  Carly listened too. “All I hear is the wind—”

  “Shh!” he said, holding up his hand. “There’s a steady hum. The frequency means it’s definitely man-made.”

  He walked off quickly, following his ears and his instinct. Carly was right on his heels. They moved through the dark base, hugging the buildings for fear of getting caught. There weren’t many people around. They passed a few soldiers who hurried along with their heads down but that was it.

  Suddenly, Gabriel grabbed Carly and pulled her into a doorway.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked nervously.

  A second later, a jeep flew by without its headlights on.

  “I heard that coming a while ago,” Gabriel said.

  “Wow, you’re like a cat.”

  Gabriel walked quickly, like a bloodhound closing on its quarry. Carly had to jog to keep pace. They rounded the corner of a hangar and found themselves in front of a vast on
e-story building that looked large enough to encompass an entire city block.

  “Whatever the sound is, it’s coming from in there,” Gabriel said. “Still want to see?”

  Carly nodded enthusiastically.

  They jogged across the road and up to a door. Gabriel grabbed the handle, hesitated a moment for fear it would be locked, and pulled.

  It opened.

  “I can feel the vibration through my feet,” Gabriel said.

  “You’re kind of odd, you know that?” Carly said.

  They entered a long, dark corridor. Gabriel put his hand on the wall, feeling the vibration. Slowly, he walked to his right while running his hand along the wall.

  “It’s getting more intense,” he said.

  They continued for several yards until they came upon a door on the inside wall.

  Carly put her hand on it.

  “Whatever it is, it’s stronger in there,” she said.

  A ribbon of light shone from beneath the door.

  “Either they’re burning torches in there, or they’ve got power,” Gabriel said.

  He grabbed the door handle, pressed it down, and pushed the door open.

  The steady hum they had been following grew louder. Cautiously, they poked their heads through the doorway.

  “Oh man,” Gabriel said.

  Carly’s eyes went wide. “What is this?”

  “Some kind of control room,” Gabriel said in awe.

  On the far side of the large room was a series of touch-screen monitors on a long counter. All showed rapidly changing data. Beyond the monitors, separated by a glass wall, were three giant steel-encased devices. They were lying side by side, each the size of an eighteen-wheeler truck.

  Carly and Gabriel drifted closer.

  “They’re turbines,” Gabriel answered with authority.

  “So they’re generating power after all,” Carly said.

  On the far side of the room, a door opened.

  Carly and Gabriel quickly hid behind a bank of hard drives.

  Two women in blue coveralls came in and stood at the control board to read the monitors.

  “Let’s keep number two online at fifty percent,” one woman said. “Bring one and three down to five percent. We’ll bring them both back up at four forty-five tomorrow.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” the second woman said.

  The first woman left and the second ran her fingers over the center console, sliding down two of the controls. Instantly, the tone of the generators changed as two of the machines powered down. Satisfied that all was well, she left the way she came in.