Coral Gables
Copyright © 2020 by Mick Liubinskas.
Published by Mango Publishing Group, a division of Mango Media Inc.
Cover Design: Kim Balacuit
Illustrations: Kim Balacuit
Layout & Design: Kim Balacuit
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She’s Building a Robot: A STEM Novel
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication number: 2020940957
ISBN: (print) 978-1-64250-341-8
BISAC: JUV014000—JUVENILE FICTION/ Girls & Women
Printed in the United States of America
T-Minus Twenty-One
The first time I was expelled, it wasn’t my fault. Not entirely. It was caused by a hundred seemingly small moments. Any one of them could have gone differently. But they didn’t.
The moment that started it all off was an increasingly noisy Friday afternoon in Computer Science.
“Ok, fine, books away, let’s do a challenge,” said Mrs. D’Silva. “Here’s a logic puzzle. If anyone can solve it, the lesson is over.”
“Well, you mere mortals just leave it to the genius,” said Dalk.
I looked at Dalk and my mouth dried up. I’d known Dalk for years now and had never once directly spoken to him. He was popular, smart, and he seemed to be able to do whatever he wanted. It’s unfair. I shook the thought away and turned back to the board.
I like puzzles. I always have. The thrill and the frustration. That was “Home AZ,” though, not “School AZ.” They were two very different people and I took great care to keep them separate. School AZ didn’t win challenges like this.
Mrs. D’Silva wrote on the board:
Three identical robots are sitting in a row. Ayanna Howard, a roboticist, wanted to work out which robot was which. What she knows is that ENIAC always tells the truth, Bender always lies, and R2D2 sometimes tells the truth and sometimes lies.
Ayanna asked the first robot, “Which robot is in the middle of you three?”
The answer she received was, “That is ENIAC.”
Ayanna then asked the robot in the middle, “What is your name?”
The response given was, “I’m R2D2.”
Ayanna turned to the robot on the right, then asked, “Who is that in the middle?”
The robot replied, “That is Bender.”
Ayanna asked the same question three times and received three different answers.
Who was who?
I started to write down a few ideas. I could work this out. But I couldn’t win. People like Dalk win. It was unfair, but that’s just the way things were. This was just one challenge.
Over my stomach sliding and my mind flipping, a thought surfaced. As I turned to the board to look at the puzzle, I thought of my mother who loves puzzles. Her voice floated into my head saying, “AZ, what is the whole puzzle about? Don’t just start. Start right.”
Read the puzzle. Think. Read the puzzle. Think. Read the puzzle.
“Don’t fret, my people,” said Dalk. “Everyone will be cheering my name. Just like every time I win our robot-building competition.”
A few of my classmates were looking out the windows. I leaned into the paper on my desk. Thoughts bounced against questions and suddenly I had the answer. But, as usual, I wasn’t going to say anything. I was going to keep it to myself.
Then, from some far-flung corner of the universe, a new sensation entered my stomach and made itself at home. It was bold and felt good, but also scary. I straightened my back and lifted my head.
“First is R2D2, second is Bender, third is ENIAC,” I said loudly and clearly.
Silence. Then someone gasped.
What just happened? Did I really just do that?
“What? No way,” Dalk said. “I don’t think that’s—”
“She’s right,” interrupted Mrs. D’Silva, smiling.
“Oh, come on. Aye Zed beat me? I’ve never lost a challenge. Did you give her the answers or something?” Dalk said.
Mrs. D’Silva stopped smiling as she walked down the aisle to Dalk. “I beg your pardon? Watch how you speak to me, young man. I don’t care whose son you are. I certainly did not give her the answer. And it’s pronounced Aye Zee, not Aye Zed,” She looked down at Dalk’s work. “She got it right before you and that’s all there is to it.”
Dalk scowled at Mrs. D’Silva and me in turn.
I looked around and saw people’s expressions shifting between smiling at her and sneaking a worried peek at Dalk.
With his face turning red, Dalk knocked his chair over and walked out the room.
“I was wondering when you were going to turn up,” said Mrs. D’Silva, smiling at me again.
Looking around the room and feeling the sweat roll down my forehead, I wondered whether I’d just slapped a “social pie” into my own face.
T-Minus Twenty
Just one hour later, I was in the school principal’s office facing the consequences.
Jax, the billionaire CEO of Jax Robotics, benefactor of 99 percent of our school’s fundraising, and the father of Dalk, was pacing the very small room in very small steps.
“I want her expelled! I want her fired! I want you to give a public apology to my son. I want it today!” yelled Jax, spittle flying.
What had I done?
“Ok. Ok. Ok. Please calm down,” said Principal Tajek. His hands attempted to smooth over the tension of this strange group, squeezed into his beige office. Around the room was Mrs. D’Silva, Jax, Dalk, and my dad, wishing he were somewhere else. The room smelled like everyone had their shoes off while eating super-strong mints.
“Impossible. I cannot ‘calm down.’ My son’s honor, my family’s honor, my honor has been torn to shreds by some unqualified hack and a clear cheater,” Jax yelled, slamming both fists on the table three times, knocking over a plastic cup full of chewed pens.
“Your son made an unfounded accusation and his behavior was completely inappropriate,” Mrs. D’Silva said, arms folded. “And quite frankly, it’s about the one-hundredth time and if he wasn’t…”
“Impossible. My son would never act like that unless provoked. You, you, you…must’ve provoked him! And to think that this little girl could have actually beaten my son at anything remotely intellectual is impossible,” Jax said. He held up three fingers and counted them off while pointing, “I want this teacher fired, this girl expelled, and an apology from everyone involved.”
“Ok, I’m sure we can work this out. AZ, why don’t we start with you apologizing to Dalk?” Principal Tajek pleaded.
I opened my mouth to apologize and at the last possible moment, after the first sound escaped my mouth and the churning began in my stomach, I
stopped. Why should I apologize?
I looked at my dad and could tell by the tortured look on his face that he wasn’t going to be leaping to my defense anytime soon. My mother worked at Jax Robotics and Jax was her boss’s boss’s boss. Dad knew Jax fired people for looking at him the wrong way. As the family breadwinner, we couldn’t afford her to lose her job. She was probably lucky that he didn’t care about employees, so he didn’t recognize our last name.
Instead, Mrs. D’Silva stepped up. “Apologize for what? For beating him? Do you know what he does when he gets first place on a test or wins an award? He struts. He actually struts up and down and tells everyone within shouting distance that he’s the best. But this time he lost. AZ beat him. Fair and square. He lost and she should not apologize for beating him.”
For the second time that day, I felt a moment in my life about to flash by. I’m not doing what I’m supposed to be doing. I pictured my mother when she was being determined and slowly folded my arms. Part of me had had enough. I’ve hidden my feelings and thoughts for too long. I’ve put up with this kind of abuse, smiled, and stayed out of trouble.
I don’t want to live like this anymore.
Another part of me was also petrified. In this world, if you stick your neck out, it gets kicked. If you try and fail, you’re a loser. You can put all the positive-attitude messages on cute pillows you like, but it doesn’t change a thing.
I surveyed the room.
•Principal Tajek: Just wants all this to go away but needs Jax to be happy. Would prefer if Mrs. D’Silva resigned and I moved away.
•Mrs. D’Silva: Won’t back down but doesn’t want to lose her job. Wants me to stand up for myself.
•Dad: Doesn’t want his wife fired. Wants me to make peace but doesn’t want me to lie. Wants everyone to be happy and to be meditating.
•Jax: Wants to win. Wants his son to win. Wants everyone else to get out of the way.
•Dalk: Wants his dad to know he’s still the best and to stop yelling at him. Wants me to be wrong and to beat me.
What about me? What do I want?
I want it to go away. I want no stress. But I also don’t want to be bullied all the time. I’d like to be able to stand up for myself. Maybe…I’d like to win?
I remembered my mother’s advice and thought about it like a puzzle:
1.I say I didn’t cheat and Dalk has to live with it. No one happy. Jax pulls his school funding. Mrs. D’Silva may be fired. My life becomes hell. No.
2.I say sorry, I cheated. Jax, Dalk, and principal happy. Mrs. D’Silva and Dad disappointed. Me humiliated. No.
I have to keep my self-respect and let Dalk keep his. But how?
I got it. Option 3. Another way.
Everyone was speaking at once.
“Excuse me. Excuse me! EXCUSE ME!” I yelled. The room went quiet and every eye was on me. I normally avoided public speaking.
Am I doing the right thing?
“I will enter the robot competition this year,” I said to the stillness.
“HAA HAAA HAAAAAA!” Dalk and Jax burst into an avalanche of laughter.
“You are going to enter the robot competition? You? Build a real robot?” Dalk asked. His eyes looked shocked, but his smirk made him seem happy.
“If Dalk is smarter than me, then he’ll win and I’ll lose. If I win…”
“If you win? Impossible! Dalk has won the last three years; he will win again,” Jax said. “But fine, fine, enter, and when Dalk’s robot crushes you, we will all see you for what you really are. Come, Dalk.”
Jax and Dalk strode from the room as if they were wearing capes. I could faintly hear Jax lecturing Dalk, “You must be careful. You must win. You know what’s at stake…”
“Ok. Great. All sorted then,” said Principal Tajek, a relieved but anxious look on his face.
“Well done, AZ. That’s a good outcome,” said Dad. He patted my back and walked out of the room and back to his serenity.
“This is good. I like this version of AZ. I’d like to see more of her,” said Mrs. D’Silva, unable to hide her pleasure as we both walked from the room. “And I will help you make sure you do your best.”
I felt each step. Each time my foot hit the ground I felt connected to the earth.
Can this be me now? Can I do this? Well, I’m in it now.
“No, I’m not going to do my best,” I said, forcing one of Mrs. D’Silva’s trademark, whole-head recoils. “I’m going to win.”
T-Minus Nineteen
When I got home, my mother greeted me with a hug and a soldering iron.
Definition: Solder—A low-melting alloy, especially one based on lead and tin or (for higher temperatures) on brass or silver, used for joining less fusible metals. Used in electronics and robot building.
“I’m excited. This competition is a great idea. I’ve set up the workbench in the garage and sent you some links for reading,” my mother said. Then she kissed my head, picked up her phone, and whooshed away, tapping ferociously.
I was born into a world of technology with my mother working for a robotics company. She always tries to get me to think like an engineer and tells me about new innovations, but I’m not sure how much has sunk in. I was lucky enough to have done some computer programming, building hardware and robotic principles at school. But actually making my own fully functioning robot was going to need much more than that.
With Mrs. D’Silva’s guidance, I started with an off-the-shelf robot that I would customize. It would be basic, but it’d be easier. After a few weeks of daily work, I realized it wasn’t going to be that easy.
The robot I’d picked was the YuTu 900. It was very short, and its exterior was mostly white with black sensors, nuts, and bolts. I’d seen it posted on a blog by a girl in my school named 10, who came in second place at last year’s robot competition. It had:
•Three ball wheels for motion—top speed of ten miles per hour
•Nine sensors for guidance, collision detection, and facial recognition
•Voice recognition module
-Basic speech—five thousand words
-Basic instructions of where to go
Today I was in my garage adding the voice recognition module. I held the soldering iron with grim determination, trying hard not to let the hot metal touch my fingers as I held the tiny wire in place.
ZZZAP!
“Yowee!”
ZZAP!
I paused, sighed and looked at the soldering iron, and my now-red wrist, wondering how I ended up here.
Oh yeah. It was my idea. I’m here because of me. I got myself into this and I need to get through this. This is harder than I thought and maybe I won’t win but quitting now would be way worse.
An hour later, the voice recognition module was in place and the robot lay on my worktable. I imagined I was Victor Frankenstein, about to bring my monster to life.
“Mwuu haaa haaaa haaaa,” I said to the roof, quickly stopping and peering around to make sure no one had heard me. “Well, no putting it off any longer.”
I needed a safe place with a flat surface to try it out. Minimal embarrassment and minimal danger. I chose an empty parking lot and the end of a rarely-used lane. It was a Wednesday afternoon and it would be empty, and its surrounding walls should contain my first experiment.
The robot was about the size of a two-year-old kid but with wheels instead of legs. I placed it down in the very middle of the rough asphalt. There was a small driveway back to the main road, a dumpster, and about five hundred disgusting cigarette butts. A few windows overlooked the scene, but no one was watching. Eyeing the dumpster, I seriously thought about picking up this clunky chunk of rubbish in front of me, throwing it in the bin, and just quitting.
I shrugged and said to my robot, “Well, what is the worst thing that can happen?”
Breat
he. Breathe. Breathe.
I switched YuTu on and stood back. For a second, nothing happened. Then the little machine lit up, started whirring, and vibrated.
“It’s aliiiiive!”
I really have to stop saying that.
“Command not recognized,” came YuTu’s reply in a flat, stop-start voice.
I raised my eyebrows and lowered myself to its height. “Hello.”
“Hello,” YuTu replied.
“How are you?”
“I am ready.”
I thought this was a bit odd and not really what a person would say, but maybe that was a good thing. I’d thought it unlikely that anything would happen at all, so I hadn’t really thought of what to do from here. “Move forward,” I suggested.
The little robot made a low ZZZ, ZZZ, ZZZ sound and started coming forward…and kept going.
“Stop, stop, stop,” I said, and the robot jerked to a stop.
“Move forward and then stop.”
YuTu moved forward and then stopped.
“Spin around.”
YuTu started spinning. And spinning. And kept right on spinning.
“Stop, stop, stop,” I said, realizing the robot was going to take everything quite literally. I looked around the carpark, trying to think of more tests.
“I am ready,” YuTu said.
“Ok, just hold on. We’re going to start small. I don’t want you running away from me at high speed.”
“Run away at high speed,” YuTu said and took off, straight down the driveway.
“Nooooooo, come back, stoppppp!” I yelled, chasing after it with my arms flapping in panic.
I reached the driveway just in time to see YuTu turn the corner onto Main Street. Then I started sprinting.
So, this is actually the worst thing that could happen.
The bustle of the street overwhelmed my senses. People, cars, shops, restaurants. My legs were burning but I was actually gaining on YuTu.
If I can just catch it…
She's Building a Robot Page 1
