I Found A Knife
A Story site from EldonHughes
Willie & Frank--
Shakespeare?
In Nano-Time
The Ball Returns
(Chapter 6)
One thing you won't usually find at the Pin Up Bowl after the family hour is a serious bowler. This is the social hour. Games can take forever. Half the time the first game isn't finished before the rental hour is up. Anybody keeping score that time of night isn't talking about the pin count.
And yet, three drinks later, the lane rental was almost up, and I still hadn't done anything more than wave across the scoring table at Jenny, um, Jennifer. She was hanging out at a table with some friends. For some reason I was happy to see that none of them were from the research team. I guess I figured that, if she was seeing anybody from work OUTSIDE of work, it had to be a real relationship. I didn't want to get my hopes crushed before I'd had the chance to build them up high enough for the fall to be really painful. We hadn't even managed to meet up at the ball return yet. (Hey, there goes that thought again.)
“She doesn't seem to be here with anyone.”
"Dammit, Shaun. Don't sneak up on me like that.”
“What sneak? I was standing right here.”
“Well stand louder, or something...”
“You got it, rat boy,” he said. “It's your turn to bowl. Hey, look. It's Jennifer's turn, too. Time to get to work.”
I started for the ball return with him calling after me. “Remember, slow, smooth approach. Keep yourself out of the gutter.”
I was going to say something clever back. Really I was. But then it was too late. I was standing facing Jennifer.
“Your nose looks OK,” she smiled. “Doesn't look broken, or anything.”
“Oh, no, I'm good. I mean, it's good. It had a soft place to land. Your, um.., hair doesn't look, um.. damaged.”
She reached up and twisted a curl with her right hand. “No, it's good. Nothing some deep treatment with a conditioner couldn't fix.”
“Oh man, I'm sorry,” I said. “Is there something I should pay for, or.. something.”
She laughed. “No, silly, I'm kidding. It's all good.” She grabbed a ball and started to bowl.
“It sure is,” I breathed. I don't think she heard me... maybe.
I bowled after she did and we met back at the ball return.
“So, how are the subjects?” she asked.
"Willie and Frank? They're OK. I left them watching football.”
“Willie and Frank?”
“Yeah, they let me name them. A one seven B and F six twelve sounded too much like the next couple to mate on THX or something.”
“Or the next two red shirts to die on Star Trek.”
I smiled. “Yeah, exactly. Anyway, Willie and Frank sounds more promising for future writers, don't you think?”
“As long as they don't wind up arguing over who gets the credit.”
Holy crap, I'm thinking to myself. She gets it. All of it. I love this girl!
“blah blah blah...football?”
Red Alert. Get your head back in the conversation. I took a split second to run playback in my head. Something about why are they watching football.... oh, OK. Yeah.
“Well,” I said, “That little television only gets four channels. It was football, news, Lawrence Welk or Jerry Springer.”
“OK, football does seem like the most educational of the lot. I don't know though. I might have gone with Lawrence Welk.”
“They'd already seen it.”
After we'd thrown our second balls (hey look, I stayed out of the
gutter), I offered to buy her a drink to make up for knocking
her down.
“No, thanks,” she said. “I have to get up early tomorrow, and I have to be awake and alert. The hallways can be dangerous, you know.”
Free fall. Crushing free fall. Not a net in sight. At least it was a short fall. “Oh, OK..” I started to turn back to where I could see Shaun and Jamie watching us.
“But hey,” she said. “I switch to the late shift day after tomorrow, so you could maybe buy me one then?”
“How about dinner, too?”
“Hmm,” she said. “Tell you what. Throw in dessert and I might even
let you try to run me over again.”
All I could say was, “Cool.” Then she was gone, back to her friends, and I was turning back to the guys.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
I was waiting in the hall the next morning when she came around the corner.
“What do you think?” I said.
"Umm. Good morning.” She looked puzzled. “What do I think about
what?”
“Oh, you didn't notice it. Well, it is kind of small. But it was the biggest one I could find overnight.” I pointed up to where the wall met the ceiling, in the middle of the hallway intersection. I had stayed up late the night before and mounted a small mirror, only about six inches across, on the wall. It was angled such that you could see who was coming around the corner before you got there. I'd even scrounged around and found an old motion detector and a proximity switch, so that a red LED light would blink as who ever was approaching reached the intersection.
“You really are a geek, aren't you?” Jennifer said.
“What, the cell phone – PDA – all-in-one laser array on my utility belt wasn't clue enough?” I answered. “Too weird, huh?”
She nodded slowly, but she was smiling. “Maybe a little. But, it's kind of sweet to.”
“In a weird way.” I said.
“Yeah.”
'OK, I can live with that,” I said. I pointed a thumb over my shoulder. “The guys are waiting for you. I've got to get upstairs.”
Later, after lunch, I saw Jennifer in the hallway. She wasn't nearly as friendly somehow. She stopped in front of me and gave me this cool glare. Her tone was even cooler, and really quiet.
“Just so you know, I'm not sure how much I care yet? But even so, you better realize, if they think you're screwing around with this experiment, they'll kick you out of the building. You won't get paid, and they might even kick you out of school.”
And then she was gone down the hallway. 'Um, thanks?” I said to her retreating form.
That night I ran over to my apartment just to visit my stuff, and to do some laundry. I didn't know what was up with Jennifer. But, just in case dinner was still on, I decided I ought to have something clean to wear. While my clothes danced the cycle away I did homework. I didn't get back to the dungeon until late.
The next morning I awoke to Igor dragging a chair across the floor to the mouse cage. Igor was one of the other research assistants. He was maybe four foot ten. He needed the chair to stand on to reach the mice, to give them their shots and to change their food and stuff. I don't think I'd ever heard his name. He might have been a nice guy, a fun guy to hang out with. But, he was an hour earlier than any of the others had been, and he woke me. “Igor” would do. I didn't say hello to him, and he never so much as looked at me. I should have known something was up.
Just after ten Doctor Wizell came by my office. Wizell is one of the younger doctors on the research team. He's a first year professor. He acted like he owned the campus, even if he couldn't find his way around it yet.
“Jake, we need you in Conference Room B.”
“Sure thing. Be right there.”
In the conference room, along with Doctor Wizell and Doctor Kyle, the senior researcher for the project, was Doctor Marten, the lab administrator. In other words, my boss.
“What's up?” I asked. “Is something wrong?”
I was asking Doctor Marten, but it was pretty clear he wasn't going to be doing the talking.
“We don't know, Jake,” Doctor Kyle said. “Right now what we have are some concerns.. some, questions.”
“OK,” I said. “Are they some that I can answer? Something to do with the network or the cage set up? It was functioning normally this morning when I left for work.”
“Oh, no. The touch pad system seems to be functioning fine, as is the keyboard and mouse. What we want to find out is which one is feeding us the data we're seeing on the screen and printouts.”
“What do you mean? Are you not getting words anymore?”
“Oh, we're getting words.” Wizell said. “Lots and lots of words....”
“But...?” I asked.
“Not a but,” said Kyle, “an and. As in, and some of them are starting to make sense.”
“Jennifer said you are letting the mice watch football?” Wizell said.
Kyle looked at Wizell, silencing him without a word. “Jake, were you watching football, er.. with them?”
“Not really. I don't much care about football this year.”
“The Rams suck?” Kyle said.
“Yeah, they do,” I nodded. “But the television down there isn't much. It only gets four channels. And, usually the only one that comes in clean is ESPN. So, they've been watching a lot of football.”
Suddenly, the words on the computer screen from the other night came back to me. “Somebody else on the research team must think they suck, too. I saw on the screen the other night where someone had typed in that the Rams suck. I was going to try and find out who it was. Figured they were just screwing with me.” Danger Will Robinson, my brain shouted. What if it was Jennifer that typed in those lines? What if I just got her in trouble? Aw crap....
Doctor Wizell looked at a note on the tablet in front of him. He kept clicking his pen rapidly. He had this custom made blue pen that he always carried, and was always clicking. It had a little clear window on the side. When he clicked it you could read his name inside it. Click Click, “Peter Wizell”. Click, click “Doctor”. Click, click. Over and over again. He told everybody it was a gift from his mother, but we all knew that it was a come on from one of those sleazy pharmaceutical reps that show up every few weeks.
Click, Click. “Jake, you know we have key loggers and monitoring on all of the machines in the labs, right?”
“Sure, I put them on. I figured I could check the monitor logs and compare them to the account log ons. That would tell me who typed in the weird lines. I just haven't done it yet.”
“We have,” he went on. “The text we're looking at didn't come from any of the lab or office machines. None of it did.”
“None of it? You mean there's more than just that one time?”
“Yes, several more.”
“We figured they had to be input on the keyboard by the cage.”
“There's a key logger on that one, too,” I said. “It would give us the same evidence. You think someone has been in my room while I was out or....” This little light of mine.. I'm gonna let it shine. “You think that I did it.”
Doctor Kyle chimed back in again. “Yes, we did think that, Jake. But, let me ask you something. Is there a way around the key loggers on these systems?”
“Normally I'd say yes, sir.” I answered immediately. “But in this case, even a bypass would leave tracks. Unlike the rest of the school, we don't have content filtering in this lab. So, accountability was of high importance. Those were your directives. Yours and Doctor Marten. I installed this stuff myself. There isn't anything out there, short of maybe some top secret thing that DARPA may be hoarding, that will bypass the key logger invisibly, even if I do it. Everything gets logged.”
“That's what I thought,” Kyle said.
“Have a seat,” Doctor Wizell said. He passed over some printouts. “Take a look at these.”
LARGE WHEN WORD SUCK LAND HOW HERE SAID MUST AN BIG EACH HIGH SHE SUCH WHICH FOLLOW DO ACT THEIR WHY TIME ASK IF MEN WILL CHANGE WOMEN WAY TOWARD TABLE EAST I DO NOT KNOW WHAT DEEP DISH CHEESE PIZZA IS, BUT WE GOTTA TRY IT. CHILDREN WAR TRAVEL WEIGHT BEGIN LAY LESS LANGUAGE GOT AGAIN MORN YEAH, IT LOOKS GOOD EVEN IN BLACK AND WHITE. PATTERN SLOW EASE CENTER PAPER LOVE OFTEN PERSON ALWAYS MONEY
- - - - - - - -
WENT ABOUT MANY KIND THEN OFF NEED WOULD HOUSE PICTURE WRITE LIKE TRY WOMEN SO US THESE AGAIN HER ANIMAL ONE POINT MAKE MOTHER THING WORLD SEE NEAR BROTHER BUILD HIM TWO SELF EARTH LOOK HEAD MORE SISTER SHOULD PAGE GO COULD OWN STAND DID COUNTRY MY FOUND SOUND ANSWER SCHOOL NO MOST GROW STUDY WHO STILL LEARN OVER KNOW PLANT WATER COVER THAN TREE CITY WORK PART CROSS GET HARD PLACE START TOP FARM COMMON BOAT CROSS GOLD WHOLE MIGHT MADE LIVE STORY KING POSSIBLE WHERE SAW SIZE LOOK OUT HERE COMES THE SMELLY GUY WITH THE COLD HANDS. PLANE AFTER FAR HEARD AGE BACK SEA BEST DRY LITTLE DRAW HOUR WONDER ONLY LEFT
- - - - - - - - -
BETTER LAUGH ROUND LATE TRUE THOUSAND MAN RUN DURING AGO YEAR DON'T HUNDRED RAN CAME WHILE AM CHECK SHOW PRESS REMEMBER GAME EVERY CLOSE STEP SHAPE GOOD NIGHT EARLY YES ME REAL HOLD HOT GIVE LIFE WEST MISS OUR FEW GROUND BROUGHT THEY MAKE DANCING LOOK SO EASY.UNDER STOP INTEREST HEAT REACH THEY OUGHT TO TRY IT WITH FOUR FEET. SNOW WORD FAST BED OPEN TEN FIVE BRING SEEM SIMPLE SING SIT TOGETHER SEVERAL LISTEN PERHAPS NEXT
- - - - - - - - -
VOWEL SIX FILL EED FOR BEFORE WOULD HOUSE ON TURN WRITE PICTURE ARE CAUSE LIKE TRY WITH SAME SO US ASS AS MEAN THESE AGAIN I DIFFER HER MAN THAT GUY CAN SNORE ANIMAL HIS MOVE LONG POINT THEY RIGHT MAKE MOUNT WAIT NORTH PLAN ONCE FIGURE BASE STAR HEAR BOX HORSE NOUN CUT FIELD SURE REST WATCH CORRECT COLOR ABLE FACE POUND WOOD DONW MAIN BEAUTY ENOUGH DRIVE PLAIN STOOD GIRL CONTAIN MOUNTAIN USUAL FRONT YOUNG I WISH HE WOULD KNOCK THAT OFF. I AM TRYING TO SLEEP. TEACH READY WEEK ABOVE FINAL EVER GAVE RED GREEN LIST OH THOUGH QUICK FEEL DEVELOP TALK SLEEP WAR BIRD SOON FREE BODY MINUTE DIRECT
I noticed that the date and time stamps were gone from the sheets. These must have been cut and pasted together to pass around.
“Excuse me, when was this last one?”
“About three a.m., night before last.”
“Hmpf, must be talking about me. I mean, I do snore. But how would they know this?”
“How would who know?”
“The mice,” I said. “It sounds weird, but... if it has to be coming from the cage, it has to be coming from Willie and Frank.”
“That hardly seems likely,” Wizell said.
“What do you mean? I thought that's what you guys were trying to do?”
Doctor Kyle interrupted “Jake, you said 'How would they know this?' This what?”
“
Uhm, nothing. Never mind.”
“The section you were looking at was from yesterday morning, around feeding time,” Doctor Wizell offered.
“Yeah, I figured. That's how you can tell it wasn't me. I, um... I wasn't alone with them when these words happened.”
PRESS REMEMBER GAME EVERY CLOSE STEP SHAPE GOOD NIGHT EARLY YES ME REAL HOLD HOT GIVE LIFE HE LIKES HER. WEST MISS OUR FEW GROUND BROUGHT UNDER STOP INTEREST HEAT REACH SNOW WORD FAST BED OPEN TEN FIVE BRING SEEM SIMPLE SING SIT TOGETHER SEVERAL LISTEN I DO TOO, SHE SMELLS NICE WHOLE GOLD KING POSSIBLE SIZE PLAN HEARD AGE DRY BEST HOUR WONDER BETTER LAUGH THAT OTHER GUY SMELLS NICE, TOO TRUE THOUSAND DURING AGO HUNDRED RAN AM CHECK REMEMBER GAME STEP SHAPE EARLY YES HOLD HOT WEST MISS GROUND BROUGHT INTEREST HEAT REACH SNOW FAST BED FIVE BRING SING SIT LISTEN PERHAPS SIX FILL TABLE EAST TRAVEL WEIGH LESS LANGUAGE HE SMELLS LIKE OLD CHEESE. STOP INTEREST HEAT REACH SNOW WORD FAST LAUGH ROUND LATE TRUE THOUSAND MAN RUN DURING AGO YEAR DON'T HUNDRED RAN CAME WHILE AM CHECK SHOW PRESS REMEMBER GAME EVERY CLOSE STEP SHAPE GOOD NIGHT EARLY YES SEE? NICE. RIGHT MAKE MOTHER BE BOY THING WORLD AT OLD SEE NEAR ONE TOO HIM BUILD HAVE
“That last section is talking about Igor.. um... the short research assistant,” I said.
“You mean Brad?” Doctor Wizell asked.
“Yeah. I didn't know his name. They must be talking about him.”
“You think Brad smells like cheese?” Doctor Wizell asked.
“Well, not me, I mean, that is...”
“But he does,” said Doctor Marten.
Doctor Kyle nodded. “It would appear that the subjects are responding to some of the stimulus they are encountering... commenting on what happens around them.”
“Well, yeah. See this? This must be from late the other night, after the football game. Willie and Frank were watching PBS when I went to bed.”
BOAT CROSS GOLD WHOLE MAYBE THE RAMS COULD BEAT LAWRENCE WELK. MIGHT MADE LIVE STORY KING POSSIBLE WHERE SAW SIZE
Doctor Wizell checked his notes. “Yes, it would seem so.”
Doctor Kyle cleared his throat. “If it is, in fact, the subjects...”
“Willie and Frank."
“Er, yes, Willie and Frank. If it is Willie and Frank, perhaps we can prove this by changing the stimulus we are providing them.” Doctor Kyle said.
“What 's wrong with Lawrence Welk?” Doctor Marten asked. I didn't have an answer. The other two just looked at him.
“The television in the room is too ancient to be used to feed images to them," I said. "It doesn't even have a VCR connection. But the monitor could be configured to switch back and forth, showing what they type and then showing whatever other input it might get, say our keyboard entries, or images, even video.”
“That should do it,” Doctor Kyle said. "Along the way perhaps we can expand their vocabulary, in order to help our understanding of what they are writing."
“Yes,” said Doctor Wizell, holding up another printout. “Then maybe we can find out what junk like this is supposed to mean.” He laid the page, face up on the table, for them to see.
THIS GO SUCKS THIS GO SUCKS THIS GO SUCKS THIS GO SUCKS THIS GO SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS SUCKS THIS GO SUCKS
It took a moment, but then I couldn't stop laughing. I tried to stop, to explain, but it was difficult. The others just had to wait for it, or figure it out for themselves.
Finally, I was able to get out, “Would this be from night before last? Say around seven, eight o'clock?”
Wizell checked his notes. “Yes. why? You know what it means?”
“It means they don't like my brother's taste in music any more than I do. It's not 'this go'. It's 'Disco'. Remember, the floor pad has the four hundred most common words used in books, plus the letters of the alphabet. 'Disco' isn't one of them. I guess they didn't know how to spell it, but they figured out a way to say it anyway. That's what they were talking about. Contrary to what Shaun may think, Willie and Frank think disco sucks.”
“Well, there's no accounting for taste,” Doctor Marten said, drawing curious looks from all of them.
Doctor Kyle cleared his throat. “We need to do some experimenting to determine how far this interaction, if indeed that is what it is, can go.”
“Perhaps we could put some images up on the computer monitor. Some strong, identifiable images, and get their response,” Doctor Wizell said.
“Will they know what they are?” I asked. “I mean, if you put up things they've never seen anything like, it might be like speaking a foreign language to an infant. Even if they answered you wouldn't know what it meant.”
“Perhaps, but we would still have the fact of their reactions,” Doctor Kyle said. “Just because you can't understand baby talk, you still know when the baby is upset, or happy.”
“What if we put words up with the images?” Doctor Wizell said. “Words that identify what the images are, in steady increments, starting from a Kindergarten environment, and see how far up they can comprehend?”
“First you are going to have to prove you can measure comprehension.” Doctor Marten. "You'd better get started."
Wizell lead the way and we headed down the hallway, going back to the labs. Behind me, Doctor Marten was talking to Doctor Kyle.
“You know, forty years ago, if we were going to experiment with drugs, we'd just drop a couple of tabs in the punch.”
“What's your point?” Doctor Kyle asked.
“Nothing really. Just wondering how much our willingness to experiment on ourselves has informed our willingness to experiment on the rest of the food chain.”
“Hmpf,” Kyle grunted. “The food chain is where the real danger is. We're still experimenting on each other. We just do it by adding chemicals to what we eat.”
“Isn't that just another way of saying we are what we eat?” I asked. When Kyle nodded I added, “I was just wondering, with all the preservatives we eat, where are our grandkids going to put all of us when our bodies stop decomposing... or we just stop dying?”
I opened the lab door and held it for the others to enter. “I mean, I guess they can just stack us in the hall closet or the basement.... drag us out when family Christmas time or birthdays roll around.”
I went back to work and left them to their new plans. Afterward I had a lab class that ran long. So, I didn't get back to the dungeon until late... again. I tossed my stuff on the bed and went to check out Willie and Frank. I watched the screen for a bit, the usual gibberish was on the screen. But the guys were sitting out on the ledge of the cage. It looked like they were resting. I must have just missed feeding time, which meant I missed Jennifer,.... again.
OK, THAT IS JUST DUMB.
The change in the screen brought my attention back to the mice again. Willie was out on the floor, moving from word to word.
I looked back at the screen. There was a picture of a pizza. A large double cheese to be exact. Oh, wait. It was the one from the ad on television. Next to the picture was the word PIZZA, just as it appeared on the touch pad floor. So, they'd really done their homework on this. Willie was moving again.
WE ALREADY KNOW WHAT A PIZZA LOOKS LIKE. WHAT WE WANT TO KNOW IS WHAT ONE TASTES LIKE.
“Hmmm,” I said out loud. “I'm not sure that the folks upstairs would care too much for the idea of me introducing you to delivery grease and garlic, guys.”
“Screw 'em. Do it anyway. A mouse deserves a good time as much as we do.”
I jumped and turned around. Shaun was in the doorway. “Dammit! Stop that,” I shouted.
Shaun laughed and closed the door behind him. “So, you're still talking to the experiments I see.”
I felt a little sheepish. I wasn't sure what I could say about the experiment now. “They're no worse than some room mates I've had. They don't eat my last meals.”
“Point taken,” he nodded. “So, is this your plan for the evening? Long, soulful conversations with the resident rodentia?”
“That and some studying. If I don't get past this new lab exercise I'm never going to pass.”
“Well, you have fun with that.” Shaun came over to the cage, to where he could see the screen. “So, have your room mates had anything interesting to say lately?”
I think my eyes bugged for a second. I turned on Shaun and moved up into his face. “Shaun? Is there something you should be telling me about Willie and Frank?”
“Umm, no?”
“Are you sure?” I moved in even closer. He took a step back. “You haven't been tapping odd little messages on the touchpad have you?”
“Not me, dude. Just 'cuz I think it's nuts, doesn't mean I'm gonna jack with the grand experiment.”
“I got the third degree from the research team this morning because they thought someone was messing with things. They thought it was me. Some strange messages are showing up on the screens, and they think the mice might be doing them. That, or somebody with a weird sense of humor is messing around.”
“Messing around by what, inserting odd sentences and stuff?”
“Yeah.”
“Like that one?”
LOOK. A GUY WITH A BIRD ON HIS HEAD
“What the...” I looked at the screen. There was a picture of Lawrence Olivier, with a large Shakespearean hat on his head, complete with large, flowing feather.
“It does look kind of like a bird,” Shaun said. “Even so, 'A GUY'? You'd think that who ever is upstairs would know who Olivier is.”
“They don't know who Olivier is,” I said.
“Really.”
“Really. They've never seen him before. Never even seen a movie. This television doesn't pick up any channels with movies on them.”
“Wait, you mean that's not coming from some one upstairs?”
“Nope, there isn't anybody in the building. And the internet to the building is down for some phone company maintenance. It won't be up until after midnight.”
“So, umm,” Shaun looked a little pale. “So this is actually coming from them? From the mice.”
I hesitated, then nodded. Suddenly, his face brightened, and he grinned.
“That's so cool!”
IT IS NOT A BIRD. IT IS JUST A FEATHER. LOOK FUNNY THOUGH. WONDER WHY HE IS WEARING IT.
Frank was on the keyboard with Willie, moving from word to word. He had just finished and was looking back and forth between me and Willie.
“OK.... OK..,” Shaun said. “Hey, what about this?” He sat down in front of the keyboard and started to type.
IT'S A HAT. IT IS PART OF A COSTUME. FOR A PLAY.
Frank looked at the screen for a minute and then hopped across the keys.
WHAT IS A PLAY
“Holy shit!” Shaun started to reach for the keyboard again.
“Wait!” I shouted and caught his arm.
“What? I was just going to answer him.”
“I know, I know... Just, wait a minute. I have to think...”
“Think about what? This is amazing! They're actually talking to us. We have to answer them!”
“Well, yeah, we do,” I said. “But anything we type here, shows up, up there. I gotta think. I'm not sure we want them knowing about this yet.”
“How are they going to know?”
“Well, for one thing the mice don't have the ability to do contractions.”
“Oh... so we have to be careful about that.”
“Not just that. I figure that they're going to notice if there are complete conversations actually on the screen. Hey, wait a sec.”
I went over to the corner and got my laptop.
“If I set the font big enough, they should be able to read this screen too. I'll hook a separate keyboard up to it so we can set the laptop up right next to the cage.”
“OK,” Shaun said. “We type there, and they type here, and we can have a conversation. But, I think we're still going to have to be careful. It won't take too many lines to figure out that they are answering somebody.”
“Yeah, you're right.” I thought for a moment or two. “I'll be right back.”
It took some digging around, but I found what I was looking for in a box in my office. I held up the keyboard splitter and an extender cable as I came back through the door to the dungeon.
“I can't do anything about stopping what's keyed in to that PC from being seen upstairs. But I can redirect the touch pad” I plugged the extension cable into the touch pad and ran the other end to the splitter. Then plugged my keyboard into the splitter. Finally, I ran the splitter output over and plugged it into my laptop.
“OK, now we, and they, can enter stuff and it will show up on the laptop.”
“Cool!” Shaun said, and sat down in front of the keyboard.
“Hang on, one second.” I said. “Just in case, start a new Document file. We might want to save whatever we wind up, ummm talking about.”
“Good point,” Shaun said, and opened the word pad “Now, can we get started, Professor?”
I thought for a second or two. “Um... yeah. But, what are you going to tell them?”
“Tell them? Nothing. Right now, I've just got questions.”
CAN U READ THIS?
On the touch pad Frank started moving around.
BETTER THAN YOU CAN TYPE IT IT SEEMS.
“This is so cool!” Shaun said.
SORRY. CAN YOU READ THIS?
WE JUST ANSWERED THAT I THINK.
CAN YOU?
“Who knew something so small could be such a big smart ass?” Shaun asked.
I reached for the keyboard. “OK, my turn.”
HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN ABLE TO UNDERSTAND THESE WORDS?
This time it was Willie who moved around the touch pad
BEATS ME AWHILE NOW WE HAVE BEEN TRYING TO GET YOUR ATTENTION FOR A FEW DAYS
SORRY I WASN'T PAYING ATTENTION. IT WON'T HAPPEN AGAIN.
“Yeah,” Shaun said, “That's what you need. Something else to run your life.”
“Hey, we're talking with mice here, for crying out loud, and we've probably just wrecked a multi-million research project. You got anything more important in your life to do?”
“You got me there, Jakey.” Shaun admitted. “So, now what?”
“Well, now we...... umm, I, .... I have no idea.”
SO ABOUT THAT PIZZA
I looked at Shaun. He looked at me. Willie and Frank looked at both of us.
"Oh, yeah... In for a penny, in for a pizza, I guess.”
Up Next: Jennifer's In
Available Tales
--"Willie & Frank"
~~~~