chapter 3

A few days later, downtown Sacramento

"Hey Angie, remember that really weird, drunk guy last weekend at the bar?" Colleen asked.

"Yeah, of course. Can't remember last time I saw such a freak there. I'm glad he hasn't shown up after that."

"That's the thing, he did, last night. He was drunk again, but not as drunk as on Friday. He kept mumbling something about a gadget he had lost and that his dad would kill him if he didn't find it."

Angie fell silent and sipped at her decaf coffee. She remembered the device, but didn't want to tell Colleen about it. She'd just get weird and ask questions she had no answers for. She turned a page on her exam book on European history.

"Lets get back to studying, I have enough problems without some weirdos losing their stuff."


Later that evening while Angie was reading more history books on her bed, she realized she couldn't concentrate on the reading. She couldn't get the strange device out of her mind and kept thinking what it was and who was the guy who had dropped it. She slid open the drawer where she had stored it and took it out, holding it on her palm.

Silence.

Angie sighed. Her mother had always told her she was too curious for her own good. She was probably right.

"Hello. Umm, you can talk now." she said uncertainly.

"Hello user, thank you for allowing me to communicate again." the soothing voice said in Angie's head.

She couldn't help but to giggle a bit. She had done that whenever she was nervous ever since early childhood.

"What are you?" she asked.

"I'm Matter Transport Application, version..." the device started.

"Yeah yeah, you said that earlier and I don't understand any of that. What are you used for?" she interrupted.

"I am used to teleport minor amounts of matter from one place to another. My speciality is in doing very complex calculations and modifications on the teleported matter to make it adjust and fit in the receiving environment."

"This has to be a joke. Where is the hidden camera? I'm not so stupid that I'd really believe something like that would be possible in year 2012."

The device fell silent for a moment while its neural networks adapted to the new information.

"I see. It would seem that I have been transferred backwards in time. The date my neural network was activated is June 15th 2124. That would imply that in 2012 technology for teleporting matter hasn't been invented yet."

"So the guy that dropped you was...from the future?" Angie gasped, having forgotten her suspicion of a practical joke for a moment.

"It would seem so, but I'm not allowed to give you information about him or any of my creators."

"Ok if you want me to believe this is not a sick practical joke that's going on national television next month, show me what you can do!"" Angie demanded.

"I can't do anything without a user's help. And I need to have mapped the space-time structure of both ends of the transfer before I can do it. If you can hold me and take me to the next room and then back, I can transfer anything that weighs less than 4 pounds." the device said smugly.

"Were you just being smug?" Angie asked while trotting to the living room of her small apartment.

"Yes my neural networks are quite sufficient for such a primitive human emotion."

"And was that...irony? No, it was sarcasm! You little..." Angie started but fell silent realizing how ridiculous she was talking alone with a gray gadget on her hand.

Angie walked around the living room and then headed back to the bedroom.

"Ok, transfer something now." she told the apparatus.

"I can't do it alone. You need to think of an object from the living room and then where to place it here. I am not authorized to initiate transfers on my own."
Angie closed her eyes and thought of her living room. She remembered there was another history book there she'd need to read later. She imagined the book appearing on her bed. Then she carefully opened her eyes, fully expecting there to be no book. But there was. It had been open in the living room, but it was closed now. But it was the same book.

"***!" Angie cried.

She carefully touched the book and found it intact. Then she walked to the living room and saw there was no book there.

The device back in hand she could hear chuckling inside her head. "Of for ***s sake, don't tell me you know how to chuckle annoyingly as well?"

"Oh indeed. You'd think a device that can transfer complex molecular structures through space can also do something as simple as chuckling? Knowing when and how to chuckle consumes roughly 0.0002 percent of my processing power."

"Good thing that gadget isn't a real person. I'd probably hit him soon for being such a pompous ***" Angie thought to herself.

"I might mention at this point that I can also very easily read your mind, Angie." the device mused.

Angie sighed and threw the gadget on her bed. She really didn't need all this complexity in her life. She ran her fingers through her long, dark brown wavy hair as she always did when she was anxious.