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Brooks didn’t go down easily that night. Totally wired, he jumped on his bed singing the Choo-Choo song loud enough to drown out the sirens that still screamed way past midnight. I closed us both up in his room and sank into the corner. Through half-closed eyes I struggled to follow the brown curly blur back and forth from the toddler bed to the bean bag chair in the middle of the floor.
Even in my haze I smiled, remembering the day my little brother threw one of his famous Bit-Fits to get the ugly thing. His high-pitched squeal coursed through my chip and bore a hole directly into my brain. He’d only had his own chip a couple days but he was a natural. I knew recycled chips were dangerous and my parents had fought over whether to let the then two-year-old Brooks get one. In the end, Dad won out by telling Mom they’d only get a ‘clean’ chip from Sector A since those were harvested from only verified natural peaceful deaths.
Some underground peddlers tried to say theirs were pure, only from infants and children who’d rejected their implants for whatever reason. “Yeah and they only drove them to the grocery store and back once a week, too,” Mom had said, scrunching her nose the same way I sometimes do. I hadn’t understood what she meant, but I knew that tone all too well.
And so it was that two days after implanting his new chip, Brooks had mastered thought transfers. His first order of business? That nasty bean bag chair.
Dad had just smiled at his boy and pulled the tattered old thing out of the neighbor’s “FREE” pile of junk by the roadside trash, saying, “You know Mommy’s gonna have my butt for this.”
Now, the rhythmic squeak-thump of Brooks jumping from bed to bean bag lulled me into a fitful sleep. I rubbed my burning eyes and pushed myself up the wall to a somewhat standing position. “Don’t move. I’ll be right back.”
Although my parents’ bedroom was never off limits per se, we still never ventured in there unless it was absolutely necessary. After recent events, I was even more hesitant, worried about disturbing the items that would now become a shrine to my poor dad. And maybe Mom, too, I caught myself thinking.
The enormity and eeriness of the day made me expect the Boogeyman himself lurking around every corner. I couldn’t turn lights on fast enough to kill the long shadows growing up the walls. Thoroughly creeped out, I snatched my dad’s old radio off the end table and ran back to Brooks’s room. All the while chanting //Howie// into my chip with no response.
Brooks showed no sign of slowing, the Choo-Choo song more annoying than ever. I set up the radio and breathed a sigh of relief as the smooth deep voice of The Fox filled the room. The Fox was Dad’s favorite radio guy. Brooks and I always groaned when he turned on the radio because The Fox only talked. He talked and talked and talked and never played any music. Boring. Plus it was only radio. No hologram, no 4D haptic feedback. Just his voice. Extra boring.
Now, however, his baritone soothed the frayed edges of my nerves. Even Brooks seemed to calm, jumping back and forth a tiny bit slower and thank Stone, forgetting the Choo-Choo song.
“Until we know more,” The Fox said, a little too upbeat for my liking, “I’m going to refrain from giving you listeners casualty numbers. I think that would be highly irresponsible of me. For those of you who can still get online, my comments section is open and will remain so as long as possible. Feel free to conspiracy theory yourselves out in there. You’re going to anyway. But I won’t put any of it over the air until we have confirmation. Remember, these are real people — friends, neighbors, humans — that we lost today. Keep it civil.”
Also, a bit of housekeeping. We only have two moderators right now. Go easy on them or I’ll sic the bots on you and nothing will fly.”
Brooks had stopped jumping and started snuggling with Andy Panda on the bean bag. Any minute now. I knew I should put him on the bed but wouldn’t dare move him and risk breaking the spell of The Fox’s deep monotone.
The Fox continued, “All I can confirm at this time is basically what we’ve all heard from President Sturn. The EC421 chips aborted mid-patch. I read the fine print myself regarding this patch and nothing jumps out at me. It’s pretty standard Geo-locating and routine maintenance stuff. The reason for the abort in, what we know so far, only the EC421 is unknown.”
I could feel myself fading and snuck a peek at Brooks. His mouth did that sucking thing, a telltale sign that he was down for the count. I knew I should use that time to get some sleep. My whole body begged me to, but I couldn’t give in until Howie answered. My constant mayday transmitted to him in the background while The Fox kept his show going.
“I have a holo call here with Dr. Abend. Doctor, do I have your permission to broadcast?”
“Yes, I give permission,” a scratchy female voice broke in.
“Dr. Abend, we’ve been hearing multiple reports that the chips, these EC421s, were purposely targeted with the new patch. Now, I’m not feeding into any conspiracies. I already told my audience to keep that stuff in the comments sections.”
“However... these rumblings seem to come from reputable sources, one of which is a high-level officer with Global Defense. One, why would Galactic Security even be involved in a routine patch, and two, is it even possible to target one model of chip specifically?”
“I won’t speculate as to GSA’s involvement, as I’m not privy to any of their communications. However, as to your second point, yes. It’s entirely possible to specifically sync... I won’t say target... but sync to individual models. More likely a scenario is that the code for the EC421 wasn’t clean.”
“Each generation of chips will have its own code, own parameters. That’s only logical as technology evolves. The issue we’ve faced for years now is that new scientist coming out of school aren’t familiar with the outdated technology of older chips like the 421. This entire tragedy could be because of the gap between old tech and new minds.”
“Wow,” Fox interrupted. “It’s hard to imagine something so trivial being the cause of all this suffering.”
“I know. So sad and so preventable. Remember the Council issued the removal order for all chips just five years ago. If more people followed the initiative, this wouldn’t have been as wide scale as I fear it will turn out to be.”
“Yeah, but come on. We all know that billions of people still have chips. I still have mine. I’ll admit it.”
The doctor butted in. “I’m not saying it’s the public’s fault. I still have my chip as well. Had it since I was an infant. Can’t seem to bring myself to remove it.” She sighed, wistfully. “And I count myself extra lucky that I wasn’t affected. Nor anyone in my immediate family.”
“So true. We’re among the lucky few.” The Fox agreed. “But Dr. Abend, how would the chip fail in such a ‘catastrophic’ way, to quote President Sturn?”
“My best guess, albeit educated as it is, would be that they simply froze. The same basic principle behind your holopad freezing. Only problem with chips, especially older generations, is no reboot capabilities. The patch didn’t download properly and the chips just kept trying until the froze.”