Death Trap

by Sigmund Brouwer

  But here I was, beginning to consider what had made me cry all last night. I told myself to focus on the operation that crippled me instead.

  In a way, I felt more sorry for Mom than I did for myself. She’s the one who feels guilty over what happened because of the operation, although it isn’t her fault. She didn’t have much of a choice: Either she had to send me off to certain death on the spaceship or allow me to stay and become part of an experimental procedure. She’d only had a short time to make the decision—and all when my dad was out of communication range, so she had to make the choice on her own.

  Maybe I should be mad at Director Steven, who forced Mom to make the choice. But he didn’t plan on the operation going wrong. It did explain, though, why he always seemed to dislike me. Now I knew I reminded him of his terrible mistake in forcing me to be an experiment without any choice. At least that’s what Rawling says.

  It wouldn’t do much good to get mad at Director Steven anyway, since it wouldn’t change my situation. And I knew Director Steven had plenty of other problems now.

  I stopped juggling and went back to writing.

  Late the night I’d found out the real truth about my legs, one of the scientists went to Rawling with the committee’s decisions—the committee Rawling had refused to join.

  They call themselves the Life Group. They have 75 people, too many for security to arrest or fight. So they now have enough power to rule the dome. They say that unless Director Steven agrees to help them, they will do it themselves. They are trying to force him to make sure that 20 people die early so the other 180 will live. If Director Steven doesn’t help them, they’ll find a way to pick those 20 people themselves.

  Then yesterday morning, Director Steven called another meeting for everyone under the dome. He said he didn’t agree with the Life Group but was afraid a war would start if he didn’t try to do something.

  Director Steven said we had three days to figure out what was wrong with the generators. After that there would only be enough oxygen left for 180 people to survive until the ship arrived. He said at this point he felt he should see if any volunteers would give up their lives to help save the others if the generators did not get fixed.

  It was very quiet when he asked for those volunteers.

  I felt tears begin to roll down my cheeks again.

  I mean, what would you do in the same situation? If you were going to die anyway when the oxygen was gone, would you volunteer to die early so you could save others? Or would you hope that others volunteered to die early so you could be saved?

  I wish I could tell you what I decided about volunteering. But I wasn’t given a chance. So I’ll never know for sure, no matter what I tell myself.

  Director Steven said some people wouldn’t be allowed to be volunteers because of what they contributed to the long-term project. I was one of those people. He had learned through Rawling that I’d said yes to the experiment where the nerves of my spinal column would be attached to a robot’s computer drive.

  I forced myself to write in my journal what happened next.

  Altogether, there were about a hundred people who would be allowed to volunteer to save the others. When he asked again for 20, nobody looked at anybody.

  Then I heard a movement as some people stepped out of the back of the group.

  Director Steven had asked for 20 volunteers, and 3 decided to give up their lives if the generator wasn’t fixed in time.

  I cried all last night. I haven’t cried in years. But I couldn’t help myself.

  One of those volunteers was my mom.

  CHAPTER 14

  “Tyce, you know I believe God created humans with a body, a mind, and a soul. I know you can’t prove the existence of a soul. You tell me that all the time. But you can’t prove it doesn’t exist.” Mom stood beside my wheelchair in the part of the dome that overlooked the ferns and trees planted in straight rows. She had a hand on my shoulder.

  “You’re correct. No scientific instrument will measure or prove the existence of God or the soul,” she continued. “But no scientific instrument can prove the existence of love or loneliness, either. Love exists. So does loneliness. You can feel it. And I believe your soul will be filled with one or the other.”

  “Please,” I begged, “please change your mind about being one of the 20.” I fought hard not to cry in front of her. It was bad enough when I did it alone.

  “I know we’ve had these talks before,” she stated, “but listen to me again. If we have souls, then there is more to this life than what we see with our human eyes. And there is someone beyond, waiting: God, who created us and this universe.”

  “Mom …” I couldn’t help it. I began to cry.

  She squatted beside me and stared into my face. She smoothed my hair as she spoke. “I love you. I love you so much it breaks my heart to think of leaving you behind. But my faith would be worth nothing if I could not face death bravely because of it. Our human lives are just a blink in eternity compared to God’s promise of where my soul will fly after it leaves my body.”

  “No …,” I blubbered. “You can’t. I don’t want you to leave me behind.”

  Mom spoke very quietly. “I can’t make you believe what I believe. I just hope that when you see how strongly I believe in God—even accepting death because of it—that my faith might lead you to believe in God too. If my sacrifice brings you home to God, then it’ll be worth it. And I’ve already asked Rawling to take care of you when your father isn’t here.”

  “All right,” I said, tasting the salt of my tears. “I’ll believe. I’ll believe. If that’s what it takes to save you, I’ll believe anything. Just tell Director Steven you’ve changed your mind.”

  She stood again and looked out at the plants. “You know I can’t do that. But don’t give up so fast. We still have two days to find a way to fix the generators.”

  CHAPTER 15

  “Your upper back giving you much pain?” Rawling asked.

  “No,” I said. “Can’t feel a thing.”

  We were in the computer lab room. I was on my back on a narrow medical bed in the computer laboratory. I wore a snug, navy blue jumpsuit. My head was propped on a large pillow so the plug at the bottom of my neck didn’t press on the bed. This plug was wired to an antenna that was sewn into the jumpsuit. Across the room was a receiver that would transmit signals between the body suit antenna and the computer drive of the robot. It worked just like the remote control of a television set, with two differences. Television remotes used infrared and were limited in distance. This receiver used X-ray waves and had a 100-mile range.

  A half hour earlier, Rawling had frozen the area of skin below my neck with a needle injection. It had taken him less than five minutes to find the rod in my spine and attach a computer plug to the end of it. With the plug sticking out, Rawling had stitched the small opening of my skin around the plug with careful, tight loops, explaining that if we weren’t so short on time, we’d have waited a week for the skin to heal.

  I didn’t care about a few stitches that I couldn’t feel anyway. I wanted to get started as soon as possible to see if this would work. My wheelchair was empty in the corner, and I hoped to keep the wheelchair empty for as long as possible. I’d dreamed my whole life about walking, and if it took my brain and a robot’s body to do it, I was ready.

  “I’ve got to go over this one more time,” Rawling said. “I can’t tell you enough how important it is.”

  “No problem. I’m ready,” I said.

  “Tyce …,” he warned.

  “Um, ready to listen just one more time,” I quickly finished.

  “Good.” Rawling began pulling straps tight across my legs to hold me snugly to the bed. “First, it won’t be good if you move and break the connection. I doubt it will happen, since only your brain will be responding, and your brain, of course, cannot move. But this will be the first time anyone has ever done this, and I’d rather be safe than sorry.”

  He tightened
the straps across my stomach and chest. “Second, don’t allow the robot to have contact with any electrical sources. Ever. Your spinal nerves are attached to the plug. Any electrical current going into or through the robot will scramble the X-ray waves so badly that the signals reaching your brain may do serious damage.”

  Rawling placed a blindfold over my eyes and strapped my head in position. Immediately, it began to itch under my chin.

  “Lastly,” he directed, “disengage instantly at the first warning of any damage to the robot’s computer drive. Your brain circuits are working so closely with the computer circuits that any harm to the computer may spill over to harm your brain.”

  “Understood, understood, and understood,” I said. I wanted to scratch myself under my chin. “I’m ready.”

  “No, you’re not,” Rawling answered. “Tell me how you’re going to control the movements of the robot for me.”

  I spoke directly to the ceiling. My eyes were shut beneath the blindfold. “From all my years of training in a computer simulation program, my mind knows all the muscle moves I make to handle the virtual-reality controls. This is no different, except instead of actually moving my muscles, I imagine I’m moving the muscles. My brain will send the proper nerve impulses to the robot. It will move the way I made the robot move in the virtual-reality computer program.”

  “Correct,” he said, sounding pleased. “It may feel strange at first, sending brain impulses in this way. Don’t panic if it takes you some time to figure this out. Now, tell me when and how you disengage your mind from the robot controls.”

  My chin was driving me crazy. “If I see any object about to strike the robot’s computer drive or if I feel the robot begin to fall or otherwise get close to danger, in my mind I shout Stop! The combination of throat and neck muscle movement from my brain impulses, plus the sound of that one single word, triggers the computer drive to disengage me instantly, and my brain awareness returns to my body here on the bed.”

  “Excellent,” Rawling said. “Remember, this afternoon is just a test run back and forth in this laboratory. Nothing fancy or dangerous. Right?”

  “Right.”

  “You know the blindfold is here to protect your real eyes from visual distractions. I also need to make sure your real ears can’t hear anything. Any questions before I put the headphones on?”

  “Just one,” I said.

  “Yes?”

  “Could you please, please scratch under my chin?”

  CHAPTER 16

  In motionless darkness and silence, I had no sense of time. I knew Rawling would need to download the virtual-reality program into the robot’s computer drive. But I couldn’t guess exactly when this might happen.

  As I waited, I pictured the robot. Its lower body was much like my wheelchair. Instead of a pair of legs, an axle connected two wheels. Just like a wheelchair, it turned by moving one wheel forward while the other remained motionless or moved backward. I knew I could handle direction changes easily. After all, in my real body, the use of spinning wheels was the only way I’d ever moved through the dome.

  The robot’s upper body was a short, thick hollow pole that stuck through the axle, with a heavy weight to counterbalance the arms and head. Within this weight was the battery that powered the robot, with wires running up inside the hollow pole.

  At the upper end of the pole was a crosspiece to which arms were attached. They were able to swing freely without hitting the wheels. Like the rest of the robot, the arms and hands were made of titanium and jointed like human arms, with one difference. All the joints swiveled. The hands, elbows, and shoulder joints of the robot could rotate in a full circle as well as move up and down. The hands, too, were like human hands, but with only three fingers and a thumb instead of four fingers and a thumb.

  Four video lenses at the top of the pole served as eyes. One faced forward, one backward, and one to each side.

  Three tiny microphones, attached to the underside of the video lenses, played the role of ears, taking sound in. A speaker on the underside of the video lens that faced forward produced sound. This was the speaker that would allow me to make my voice heard.

  The computer drive of the robot was well protected within the hollow titanium pole that served as the robot’s upper body. Since it was mounted on shock absorbers, the robot could fall 10 feet without shaking the computer drive. It had a short antenna plug-in at the back of the pole to give and take X-ray signals.

  I felt my heart beating fast in suspense. When was it going to happen? When was the computer drive going to be ready? What would it be like? Would it work?

  It seemed I waited forever in the darkness and silence of the blindfold and soundproof headphones.

  I was just about to open my mouth and ask Rawling if there was a problem.

  Then it happened. I began to fall off a high, invisible cliff into a deep, invisible hole. I kept falling and falling and falling. …

  CHAPTER 17

  “Tyce! Tyce! Tyce!”

  In the blackness, my name echoed weirdly around me, as if I were trapped in a metal barrel.

  “Tyce! Tyce! Tyce!” My name was so loud, it hurt.

  I lifted my hands to my head to cover my ears. That movement seemed to rip the darkness off my eyes. I saw three blurry pairs of titanium hands waving wildly.

  “Not so loud,” I complained. Except my words came out slow and deep and warbly.

  The three pairs of hands still waved wildly.

  Then I realized I saw three pairs because I was using three eyes—the video lenses on each side and the forward lens.

  I blinked a few times and concentrated straight ahead. Much better. Now it was only one pair of wildly waving hands.

  “Tyce!”

  “Not so loud,” I complained again in my robot voice.

  I stared at my hands. Oops. My video lens zoomed in too close. A giant titanium knuckle filled my view.

  I zoomed back. I saw the wall and bed and my body strapped on the bed. Weird!

  My hands still waved. Finally I managed to get the focus right. Then I asked myself why I was doing something dumb like watching my hands work. Was I a little baby who had never seen fingers move before?

  I thought about dropping my hands to my side and letting them rest there. Instantly, they moved where I wanted. This was great!

  “Tyce!” It was Rawling. He had moved directly in front of me. My front lens saw his stomach.

  Up, I mentally commanded myself.

  The video lens tilted up.

  I saw his face looking down on me. Blinking a few times to focus better, I saw his nose hairs. Too close. I backed out a bit. Then it was just right.

  “You’re too loud!” I said.

  “It’s not me,” he said. “I’m whispering. You must be trying to hear too hard. Those speakers can pick up the sound of a feather landing on a floor. I’m turning them down.”

  I thought of listening less hard. The volume of his voice dropped. This was really fun.

  “Rawling,” I said, focusing on speaking properly. My voice became more normal. “How are you?”

  “This is unbelievable,” he said excitedly. “It’s you in there!”

  I blocked out my front view and switched to a side lens. It showed my body on the bed again. I zoomed in close. My chest rose and fell as the body breathed.

  “Yes,” I said, “it’s me in here.”

  I kept watching the bed. It was very strange. That was my body on the bed, but it wasn’t my body. My brain was working, controlling a robot’s body. Very, very strange.

  I switched to the rear video lens, then the other side, and then the front again. In a blur, it showed the back wall, the side wall, and Rawling’s face.

  Big mistake. Going in a circle that fast made me dizzy. I wouldn’t do that again.

  “Can you move?” Rawling asked.

  In my mind, I pictured shoving back in my wheelchair.

  Both robot wheels responded instantly. In a flash, I was going
backward. Too fast!

  Without thinking, I switched to the rear video lens.

  The back wall was approaching too quickly.

  Stop, I commanded the wheels. Stop!

  In that instant, I fell into blackness again. Off that high, invisible cliff into that deep, invisible hole.

  Just like that, I was back in my body. I felt the straps against my stomach and chest. I felt my itchy chin. And I heard a loud crash.

  “Tyce!” Rawling shouted. “Are you all right?”

  “Yeah,” I said from the bed. I’d forgotten the stop command would disengage me from the computer drive. “But how’s our robot?”

  CHAPTER 18

  Hello again, journal. I feel like a person in a cave who has just found enough gold to make him rich for the rest of his life, then watches as the cave entrance gets covered by a landslide. What good is the gold going to do then?

  For me, the experiment with the robot was the best thing that ever happened to me. I had freedom for the first time in my life.

  Rawling spent the rest of the afternoon with me. The robot wasn’t damaged from smashing into the back wall, so we put it through dozens of trial runs. Each time I got a little better at using it. All the years in virtual-reality training have paid off for us.

  I rested my fingers, thinking about what I’d write next.

  The robot is amazing. It has heat sensors that detect infrared, so I can see in total darkness. The video lenses’ telescoping is so powerful that I can recognize a person’s face from five miles away. I can also zoom in close on something nearby and look at it as if using a microscope.

  I can amplify hearing and pick up sounds at higher and lower levels than human hearing. The titanium has fibers wired into it that let me feel dust falling on it, if I want to concentrate on that miniscule of a level. It lets me speak easily, just as if I were using a microphone.