Chapter Seven

Parts and Pieces with Friends

Temple woke up startled in the middle of the night. His mind fixated on the explosion. After ten minutes of anxiously tossing and turning, he gave up on sleep and got out of bed. The clock on his communicator read 3:42 AM.

Moving around the room, Temple stepped carefully not to disturb his fellow trainees who were fast asleep. One foot at a time he made it out of hearing range, then sprinted to the storage room that he'd seen a maintenance man rolling carts of trudger parts into. It would hopefully contain everything he needed for his plan.

Inside the room Temple found assorted trudger parts scattered on shelves and heaps of legs arms and heads stacked next to trash bins. Temple rummaged through the parts until he found enough to build a trudger of his very own. Laying different colored beat up pieces on the floor inside the storage room, he immediately went to work in the dim light. It didn’t take him long to assemble his makeshift trudger, then lugged it over to one of the old control booths plugins.

Nervous but hopeful, he plugged in a headset and slid it down over his head. Nauseous and dizzy at first, everything seemed to be functioning. The trudger then began to walk around. At that point, he began his efforts to make the trudger explode. He tried various approaches––running it into walls, burning it, and even sent it to leap off a building––but nothing resulted in an explosion. So he ran.

The harder he pushed in his mind, the faster the trudger ran. Once he’d reached the maximum speed, he linked his mind unknowingly with the trudger. Then oddly he experienced everything the trudger did and felt. He could feel its various part and pieces as if they were his body muscles and skin. He took in a deep breath and willed with all his might for it to explode.

Ka-boom! An explosion so powerful disintegrated the trudger into mere ash and probably woke up everyone in the building.

“Holy shit!” he exclaimed aloud, unable to contain his excitement. “That was so cool!” Realizing he ought to keep his voice down, he covered his mouth with his hand and started to try and figure out what had just happened in his head by scratching it with the other.

“How did I do that? Was it because of me? No, it couldn’t have been. It had to of been faulty hardware. But the same thing happened earlier during the walkthrough. No way 's it a coincidence! It’s me. It has to be me,” Temple fought with himself mentally coming to the realization that he was the one who had made the explosions occur, his excitement suddenly dampened when something else came to mind.

“That's what I did to my mom.”

He removeed his headset, and realized the cord to the headset had been unplugged.

“How did I?” he muttered aloud, staring in confusion at the unplugged wire in his hand. “This meant that I connected it.”

He decided to test his thinking. After quickly manufacturing another trudger from the old parts in the storage unit, he held his breath. He concentrated hard and attempted to connect to it without being hooked up to any wires or dots at all. With his eyes blinked oped he quickly saw himself through the trudgers eyes. Then his mind came back to him. He waived his hand, the trudger did as well. Temple’s eyes widened.

“No way!”

So he figured he might as well have some fun with it, and started dancing around, laughing as the trudger mimicked his every move.

0600 hrs. Too much time had passed since he’d begun experimenting with the trudgers, and he figured his fellow trainees would be awake by now, so he decided to send the trudger on a spy mission to see if he could safely return. Temple knew he had to be extra careful doing this; sending the Trudger out on its own and into the sleeping area required extreme precautions and if he got caught he would get in a lot of trouble.

First, he sent the trudger outside and up the side of the building until it came to the air vents to the sleeping quarters. He lowered the trudger down carefully to hover above the vents, where he listened in to the trainees talk, making sure to remain quiet as a mouse.

“No, Sir, I don't know where he is.”

“There's no place to go the buildings shut down.”

“There's something scary about that guy. I mean, who blows up a trudger? I don't know if he's right for our team,” he heard one of the other contestants say.

“Okay, and how about you Larry? What are your thoughts on the explosion from yesterday?” Temple recognized the second voice instantly asMaster Brock.

“I think it was a stunt, he must have planted a bomb or something,” Larry answered.

"Of course, it was," someone else agreed.

“How else could it of happened? Of course, it was a bomb.”

“We’ve been trying to blow up trudgers forever, and we've never had one explode. That's one of their features as you know, Sir.”

As the other trainees all went on, continuing to badmouth Temple, he realized he had no friends there. He couldn’t trust a single one of them.

Temple had heard enough. Hiding the trudger carefully under a pile of broken parts on a shelf, he then cleaned up the ashes from the trudger that had exploded.

He slipped into his workroom unnoticed. For the rest of the day, Temple worked diligently on preparing for the competition; fueled by a new motivation to prove everyone wrong.

It was dark out when Temple finally took a break from his work. Temple realized that he was starving. He went over to the mess hall, hoping to have a late bite to eat, but to his dismay, it was already closed. With his stomach still growling, he went to his sleeping unit––it looked like he’d be going to bed hungry.

When he got back to the sleeping area, he saw that his bunkmate Jack was still awake in his bed. Jack always had food. His parents continued to send him care packages no matter how old or fat he became, so he's continuously stocked with candy, cookies, and a variety of other snacks. Thinking back to what everyone had said as the trudger eavesdropped on the trainees earlier, Temple recalled that Jack hadn’t badmouthed him like all the others. So perhaps he did have one friend there after all.

Jack and Temple had liked each other right away, and that had made being bunk buddies much easier for both of them.

“What are you doing up?” Temple asked when he approached the bunk.

“Can't sleep, the meatball sub I had earlier doesn't agree with me. We are having quite the argument right now in fact!” Jack replied, patting his belly. “What about you?”

“I went to the mess hall to eat, but they were closed!”

“I have some red bear bars,”

“Can you please spare me two?” Temple asked Jack. “I’m starving!”

Jack made no objection to Temple’s request. Temple thanked him and then climbed into bed. As he devoured the bars, he thought about the newfound powers he’d discovered. Temple knew he couldn’t tell anyone about them, no matter what. The power to destroy, he vowed to keep to himself.

“Hey, Jack you know how to levitate right? Have you ever blown up a ball or anything like that?

“If I could, I wouldn’t be here. I'd be an electric warrior. That's the kind of stuff they live for. I've always wanted to ride a Spark staff. Probably need to stop eating bear bars, though.”

Temple heard the slaps of his hand on his plump belly.

“Did you blow up your baseball too?” Jack asked.

“A long, long time ago. I haven't tried since. But, I have a feeling I'll get it right the next time I see one.” Temple smiled to himself with his new secret.

“My mother told me stories about a kid who blew up his baseball a long time ago. I wonder how he did it. Maybe he's like you.”

Temple did not respond. The thought of his mother being hauled away in the ship stuck in his mind.

In the morning Temple was ordered straight to the sergeant's office. The sergeant immediately stood up and saluted when Temple entered the room. Temple shook his hand, noting how hot and clammy it was.

“Temple, On behalf of the C.A.C. Technology Program and the World Alliance it's been an honor to have you here with us. I know your father, and you certainly come from an esteemed family. I wish things could have turned out differently,” the sergeant said, shaking his head. “Here are your orders straight from the top. Sorry Temple,” he handed Temple a small, round, metal disk and sighed.

“I don't want to leave sir, the competition is tomorrow,” Temple pleaded, reluctantly accepting the disk.

“Not my decision kid. Like I said, it's straight from the top,” the sergeant answered matter-of-factly.

“I can't leave today sir. I’ve worked so hard it’s critical that I win so I can see my father. I haven't seen him in years.” Temple insisted and was beginning to get upset.

“They told me to have you ready in 15 minutes son. Now hurry up and grab your stuff,” the sergeant said gruffly.

“What will I do?” Temple asked tearfully. They must have found the remains of the Trudger I blew up, he thought to himself.

"Let's go" Refusing to answer any more of Temple’s questions, the sergeant began to escort Temple to collect his belongings then walked him over to the transport ship. The entire time, Temple continued to try and reason with the sergeant.

“Why am I being reassigned?” Temple asked, frustrated when they reached the ship.

“Listen carefully" The sergeant stopped, turned to Temple, then backed him up against the wall. He looked Temple square in the eyes then looked over his shoulder to make sure they were alone, then back at Temple.

“Not everything is as it seems. Be brave and be true.”

Then he relaxed and pulled Temple to the landing platform.

"The ship will pick you up here, do not leave this location for any reason." The sergeant saluted goodbye and left Temple standing in front of the transport ship pick up area.