Chapter 13
Neural Connections
A knock on the bedroom door woke Jared from a dreamless sleep.
Ferran peeked in. “Time to get up. Get ready and meet downstairs for breakfast.”
Jared heard Ferran repeat the same message at Danielle’s door.
After Paul and Jared had gotten ready and gone downstairs, Ferran asked, “Have either of you seen Danielle yet this morning?”
“No,” Paul said. “Her bedroom door was closed.”
Jared shrugged. “Maybe she went back to sleep.”
“Let’s go check on her.” Ferran headed for the stairs.
“I’m hungry,” Paul said. “Can’t it wait until after we eat?”
Ferran kept walking. “No. We need to see if she’s okay.”
Jared kind of thought Ferran was overreacting. Danielle was probably just tired and wanted to sleep in.
Once they had gathered at her door, Ferran knocked lightly.
There was no response, so he opened the door. “Danielle?”
Jared peeked around Ferran. Danielle was sitting on her bed, still in her pajamas. Her arms were wrapped under her thighs. She was hugging her legs to her chest. Her head was resting on a pillow that she had placed on her knees, and she was looking at the wall, away from Jared, Ferran, and Paul. She didn’t turn her head to look at them or even stir when they entered her room.
Ferran approached Danielle, “It’s time for breakfast,” and then put his hand on her shoulder.
She buried her face in the pillow and started to sob.
Jared felt uncomfortable watching Danielle cry and wanted to leave.
“Danielle.” Ferran was firm yet gentle, and for some reason, the tone in his voice kept Jared from leaving. “I want you to listen to me. Sit up, please.”
He took away her pillow and helped her sit up on the edge of the bed. Ferran squatted down to Danielle’s eye level, but she didn’t look up. He was about an arm’s distance away from her.
She remained slumped over, looking down, as she wiped the tears away from her eyes with the back of her hand. She sniffed and rubbed her nose.
Jared started to feel more at ease with the situation once Danielle had stopped crying, but it was still a little awkward.
Ferran spoke quietly to her with a nurturing but decisive tone. “Danielle. It’s okay to feel this way about your parents, but don’t let your feelings consume you.”
“My parents betrayed everyone who loved them.” Danielle’s jaw quivered.
Ferran kept his voice bold yet soft. “Danielle, there was nothing you could’ve done about your parents’ decision to follow Dreggan. But, what you can do is learn from their mistakes.
“You have the advantage of seeing what they did wrong, so you won’t fall into the same traps. Leave what happened in the past, in the past. Don’t forget it, though. Learn from it, then do the right thing.”
Danielle sat up a little straighter, and her eyes started to lift. She seemed to be accepting what Ferran was saying.
Ferran continued. “Look deep inside yourself. Search your feelings. You wanted to know where you fit in. You’ve always known you could achieve something great, but you didn’t know what that something was. Now you do.”
Ferran stood up. “You can be trained to restore Teruvisa to its former greatness. On top of that, you, Jared, and Paul will be key components in taking Teruvisa to even greater heights.”
Jared felt his spirits begin to lift and wondered how Ferran’s words were affecting Danielle. However, her expression was unreadable, and she didn’t say anything.
“Please,” Ferran pleaded with her, “don’t give up on us like your parents gave up on Teruvisa.”
To Jared’s surprise, Paul stepped around him and approached Danielle. “Dreggan wants you to give up. Don’t give up.”
Danielle looked up at Paul briefly and wiped the tears from her eyes.
Jared couldn’t think of anything to say, so he just agreed with what Paul said by nodding.
Ferran said, “That’s right. Dreggan wants you to be afraid. He doesn’t want you to realize your potential. Don’t give him any power over you. You three are better and more powerful than he’ll ever be.”
Jared wondered how he could be more powerful than a man that defeated an entire civilization. Sure, he felt he had an important job to do. But, am I really more powerful than Dreggan?
Ferran must have sensed Jared’s doubt and seen the same look of disbelief on Danielle’s face that Jared saw. “It’s true. Don’t doubt it for a second. You want to know why the three of you were chosen for the MSI implantation?”
Jared had assumed he was chosen because his parents were heads of security and was just a convenient subject for his parents to experiment on. There’s another reason?
Ferran looked at Jared, Paul, and Danielle, “Not only are you descended directly from the Founding Masters, but you have possessed, since birth, a remarkable energy—one that can be felt. We knew you three would be our best hope for success with the microchips.”
Jared got goose bumps. I had no idea.
“By just deciding to begin training, you three have brought hope to those of us who’ve been lost.” Ferran smiled, and it looked like he was getting teary-eyed. “We’ve been working hard to prepare for this time, not knowing if we would succeed.”
Ferran looked at Danielle with a piercing gaze. “Danielle, you chose to start this journey. Now, let’s finish it together.”
Jared found himself stepping forward. He didn’t know exactly why. He just felt the need to help her. He nudged Paul, and they both took a step closer to Danielle.
Jared said, “Come on, Danielle. I know we can do it.” He had hoped his words would be powerful, but, after he said them, he thought they seemed feeble.
Instinctively, Jared held his fist to his chest. He was startled when he felt his kevanshu in his hand. He didn’t intend for it to appear, but there it was.
He unclenched his fingers and looked at the glowing stone. The light on the surface of the stone began swirling in an irregular pattern.
Jared elbowed Paul in the arm, not knowing if his friend had seen what the light on the stone was doing. A few seconds later, Paul held his kevanshu out next to Jared’s. The light from the two stones swirled around faster and became brighter.
Jared wondered, What’s going on?
The boys looked at each other and then at Danielle, who had put her fist to her chest.
She paused, lowered her hand, and then, standing up, slowly uncurled her fingers, revealing her glowing kevanshu. With a look of uncertainty on her face, she held her stone out next to the boys’.
The three kevanshus began to shine even brighter. The light quickly became very intense, and Jared looked away, shielding his eyes with his other hand.
Along with the increase in light, a force pulled Jared forward. The instant he felt his hand make contact with the hands of Danielle and Paul, a blast of warm, soothing energy shot through him. He lowered his arm from his eyes.
Jared looked at his hand. His kevanshu was gone; so were Danielle’s and Paul’s. They were completely surrounded by a soft, white light.
Jared looked down at the ground around him. “Where are they?”
Before anyone answered, a low hum began filling the room. Jared looked around, trying to figure out what was making the noise.
Paul asked, “What’s that noise?”
The hum got louder, and then a sharp pain pierced Jared’s head. He put both hands up to the sides of his head and squeezed. His skull felt like it was going to explode. He closed his eyes and fell to his knees.
A second later, a blast of heat shot down from his head to his toes and out of his body, taking the pain with it. He opened his eyes. He was lying on his back, looking up at Ferran.
“What happened?” Jared asked.
Ferran helped Danielle to her feet and looked at Jared. “I was just about to ask you the same thing.”
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nbsp; Paul stood up. “The three of us were surrounded by a white light. There was this humming. My head felt like it was about to burst. Then, suddenly, I felt hot. After that, the humming and the pain just went away, and I woke up.” He looked stunned—exactly how Jared felt.
Danielle said, “Same with me.”
Jared got up. “Me too.”
“I wonder...” Ferran looked off into space, tapping his puckered lips with one finger.
“What is it?” Jared asked.
Ferran held up his finger. “Well, I saw the three of you surrounded by light. Soon after that, you were drawn closer together.” He brought his palms together. “Then, when your hands touched, the kevanshus flew into the air and were absorbed into your heads.” He pointed to his head.
“What does it mean?” Danielle asked.
A light seemed to go on inside of Ferran (Jared could see it in his eyes). He started nodding slowly. “Yes. I suppose it could be possible.” He seemed to have not heard Danielle’s question.
“What’s possible?” Jared asked.
Ferran looked at the youths and raised his eyebrows. “Let’s get you hooked up to the neurointerfacer and find out.”
What’s he talking about? Jared asked, “What’s a neurointerfacer?”
“I can use it to connect to your MSIs to do a status probe.” Ferran tapped the side of his head with a finger.
The MSIs? Jared furrowed his brow. “So, you think what happened has something to do with our brain chips?”
“I can’t be sure, yet.” Ferran nodded. “But, that’s a definite possibility.”
Jared noticed some excitement in Ferran’s voice.
Paul asked, “Where is the neurointerfacer?”
“In the library. Let’s go.” Ferran turned to leave.
Danielle asked, “So, what is it that you think has happened?”
Ferran turned back around and looked like he was about to explain but then said, “It’ll be better if you see for yourselves.” He smiled apologetically. “Sorry.” Ferran ushered Jared, Paul, and Danielle out of the bedroom.
Once they were in the underground library, Ferran indicated the shelves of books with a sweeping motion of his hand. “Yesterday, I didn’t thoroughly explain to you that these books are really cartridges containing data. They cumulatively comprise the system files of Teruvisa. They are all connected by a network to a central processor.”
Ferran walked over to one of the shelves. “In fact, one of these runs the neurointerfacer program.” He ran his finger along the spines of the book-cartridges. “Ah—ha.” He pulled one off the shelf.
The edge of the book had a rectangular, metal strip on it where the pages would’ve been if it were a real book. Ferran walked over to a nearby computer terminal and put the cartridge in a slotted box next to the computer.
He started typing on the keyboard and using the mouse touch pad attached to it. “I’m now accessing the neurointerfacer program contained on this particular data cartridge. Give me just a minute to set up the scan.”
When he finished, Ferran looked at Paul. “Okay, Paul, you go first. Put your thumb on the touch pad, and hold it there until I tell you to move it.”
Paul placed his thumb on the touch pad. On the black background of the window on the computer screen, white letters appeared that read,
Scanning for Parameters...
Please wait.
Soon, the message changed to,
Host Identified..........Paul Harmon
Neural Connections......Active
Power Status............Off
Security Status.........Access Denied
“Yes!” Ferran punched his fists in the air.
Paul asked, “If the chips aren’t on, why are you so excited?”
Jared wondered the same thing.
“Why am I so excited? I’ll tell you why I’m excited. The neural connections are active!” Ferran pointed to the second line of the display. “We’re one step—one significant step—closer.”
Ferran typed on the keyboard. “Okay, Paul, you can take your thumb off the pad now.” He turned to Danielle. “Now, it’s your turn.”
A similar message appeared on the screen when Danielle placed her thumb on the pad.
Jared immediately stepped forward to take his turn when Danielle removed her thumb from the pad. His name and the same status messages appeared on the screen.
Danielle asked, “So, Ferran, did you know that all we had to do was put our kevanshus together to activate the neural connections?”
“We did know, or rather we hypothesized, that, when the kevanshus were held close together, you would be able to access your MSIs, with the right amount of mental focus.” Ferran smiled. “But, we thought that you would need at least some training in Diestro to do it.
“It’s amazing that you’ve been able to activate the neural connections already. You three are definitely gifted. You’ve demonstrated a real aptitude for our technology.”
Jared was puzzled. “But, I don’t get it. How can the chips not be turned on if our brains are connecting to them?”
“Well, think of it this way. Your MSIs are like lamps. Just because you plug a lamp into an outlet, doesn’t mean it’s going to give off light.” Ferran removed the book cartridge and put it back on the shelf. “A lamp has electricity running to it, which is like your MSIs receiving signals from your brains, but you’re missing two things—a switch and a light bulb.
“With training, you’ll be able to learn how to turn on the MSIs—like flipping a switch. After that, you’ll need to get the final element to unlock the MSIs, just like the bulb is the last thing you need for a lamp to give light. After all, even if you can turn on a lamp, if it doesn’t have a bulb, you still don’t have light.” Ferran paused. “And, that last piece is...”
Jared leaned forward slightly onto his toes, waiting to hear what he needed to unlock his MSI.
Ferran looked at each of the youths as if he was making sure he had their attention, “A password. When you give the proper password at the proper time, the MSIs will be unlocked, the microchips will interface with Teruvisa through the decoder, Teruvisa’s old systems will go offline, and the new systems will be enabled.”
So, we turn them on and then say a password. Jared asked, “But, how do we get the passwords?”
Ferran held his hands up at chest level with his palms facing outward. “Hold on. Don’t be too anxious. Although you’ve already exceeded our expectations, you still have much to learn about our technology.” Ferran stepped closer to Jared and patted his shoulder. “But, before we get started with today’s lesson, how about if we go back upstairs and get some breakfast?” He looked around at the youth. “You can’t learn on an empty stomach.”
At that moment, Jared’s stomach grumbled. He nodded. “I could eat.”
“Okay. Good.” Ferran led Jared, Danielle, and Paul back into the elevator.