Episode 2: iJennifer and the Technological Uprising

Episode 2

iJennifer and the Technological Uprising

"Advancements in technology are a threat to all of mankind," Jennifer says with a serious tone and the end of the world in mind, as she leans against the row of lockers, next to Tessa.

"I think it's kind of neat," Tessa says while slurping up the last of her iced coffee, as Mr Nibbs, the school Janitor, comes riding past on his Segway. Cleaning supplies strapped onto the front of the contraption and an old rag slung over his shoulder. Apparently, the school's let him bring his robot overlord to school because of his difficulty walking... Jennifer's only question is that if he can't walk properly, then how can he still clean?

Mr Nibbs has had the Segway for about two years now and has used it daily since. At first, the town was abuzz about it and what an interesting sight it is to see grey, old, Mr Nibbs picking up a few things from the farmer's market each Saturday or taking his little dog, Snogger, for a stroll, but now it's become rather normal. Normal enough to start allowing the thing in Mecha Fall's historic school.

"You still haven't told me what happened between you and Angus last week..." Tessa says and flutters her long lashes.

"He's gonna run someone over one of these days, Tess..."

"You've been in a bad mood ever since!" Tessa says.

"You've got to tell me! You used to tell me everything," she says with fake sadness in her voice.

"We didn't actually talk, Tessa..." Jennifer starts to say, when...

"You're in front of my locker," Ronita Timpelton, the black-haired-hacker-girl, says and crosses her arms over her chest. Tessa just holds up her hand, silencing the short, feisty girl and continues to talk to Jennifer.

"Well, what's wrong then?" Tessa asks fiercely.

"He was talking to someone," Jennifer says and bites her lip.

"Seriously guys, I have to get to class," Ronita says, only half irritated, also listening to the new gossip.

"Who?" Tessa asks.

"I don't know! He was on the phone. He was smiling that stupid smile of his and... smiling all stupidly," Jennifer says and waves her hand dismissively. This is stupid, she's just being stupid. She's not like this, like other girls, but something here feels off and she's not really sure what.

"Smiling stupidly, you say," Tessa smiles and lets out a little laugh, her hunger for gossip satisfied. 

"Did he see you?"

"No."

Mr Nibbs rides past again, this time only narrowly missing the tiny Ronita Timpelton.

"See! I told you! It's a safety hazard! Technology must die!" Jennifer declares.

"Stop changing the subject!" Tessa yells.

"I'm not changing the subject. We've got more pressing matters to deal with here; the safety of all the students at Offset High is at stake!" Jennifer says and Tessa storms off without another word. Jennifer frowns, Tessa's never done that before.

"Technology isn't all bad," Ronita says to Jennifer while opening her locker. "If you like, I can find out who Angus talked to last Friday, for a price."

"It's fine," Jennifer says and looks past her, down the hallway, to where Tessa disappeared to. "Thanks, Ronita."

Ronita shrugs and slams her locker shut. "The offer still stands. A few keystrokes and I can have you his entire digital profile." She walks off without another word.

***

Jennifer dials Tessa's number and wedges the phone between her shoulder and ear. But, again, the phone doesn't even start ringing before it cuts off. Jennifer takes her books out of her locker and slams the door shut, only to drop her phone in the process. Jennifer leans her head against Tessa's locker, in front of her.

"Tessa and I've been friends for the past ten years. We've had our disagreements, as all girls do. Lately, Tessa's thirst for gossip has stirred up a few problems, but this is something else entirely. Maybe I've taken her for granted? We haven't spent as much time together as we used to."

The first period started a few minutes ago and Jennifer still hasn't made her way to class. She's never been particularly interested in school and she's not going anywhere without Tessa.

Jennifer picks up her phone and inspects it in the palm of her hand. The old hand-me-down that can do nothing other than call, overheat and cause problems because of a silent mode that vibrates louder than the actual ring tone, might be slightly hated, but dearly cherished none the less.

"What if we adored people half as much as we adore our phones? What if we held our loved ones as much? Talked to them as much? Paid attention to them as much? Don't you think we'd have better relationships?" And with that thought, an alarm starts blaring.

***

Gripping her knees, Jennifer tries to calm her breathing. She's hiding in the bathroom, in one of the stalls. The alarm bounces off the inside of her skull as she tries to identify the alarm. She wishes that she'd paid attention when the safety inspector explained the different types of alarms used to signal different emergencies.

This could either be a fire alarm, flood alarm or an emergency alarm. With fire and flood, everyone evacuates, but with an emergency alarm, the entire school goes into lockdown. Jennifer didn't listen for people evacuating, so she's not sure what to do.

What if there's someone out there?

"I may be fictional, but the fear I feel is real. I don't want to die." The bathroom door is yanked open so hard that it bangs against the outside wall. Jennifer's heart stops, she pulls her feet up onto the toilet and holds her breath as tears start streaming down her face.

"Anyone here!" An angry, male voice booms. Suddenly her phone loudly vibrates in her pocket. A cold fear flashes through her every nerve as she fumbles around to silence it. None of the buttons she presses works so she opts for switching it off entirely.

She can hear the door swinging shut as she bites down on her bottom lip – in an attempt to silence her loud breathing.

"Deep down I'm terrified for what my writer has in store for me. I'm not brave. I'm not strong. I'm not fast." Her pulse quickens and she starts to feel faint. "I'm not a hero. I don't have some epic driving force. My writer made me perfectly average. Special, in absolutely no way..."

Suddenly the alarm goes off, pulling Jennifer out of her soliloquies completely. She listens intently, but not a sound can be heard. Jennifer climbs on top of the toilet and peers over the top of the stall. The bathroom is completely empty.

Having calmed down a bit, she hops off and slowly opens the stall door. Looking around one last time, she decides to leave and find some way out of Offset High.

As she moves toward the door, something moving catches her attention. There's someone else there! She quickly spins around, only to come face to face with her own reflection in the bathroom mirror.

"For all that is good and green, Penelope!" She says without thinking and catches her breath again. She looks at her reflection for a second and tucks a strand of hazel hair behind ear before stepping out into the hallway.

"There's nothing creepier than an empty school..."

Suddenly all the lights go out. Jennifer freezes in her stride and decides to make her way back to the bathroom.

"Way to jinx it, Hudstone."

Not a second after having turned around, footsteps start echoing off the stone floor. Jennifer ducks into the first open room she can find and quickly shuts the door behind her. She peers through the tiny window at the top, to see who's coming, but before anyone can even manage to enter into her field of vision something beeps behind her.

She jumps out of her skin at the sound and jolts around, only to find that she's in the computer lab. All the computers are silent, dead without their life-sustaining electricity. So, what had made the beep?

She flattens herself against the wall, next to the doorway, feeling more unsafe than in the hallway. It's happening, technology is taking over...

Jennifer scans the room. It's completely dark. The room was built like a small auditorium, row upon row of tables and computers descend all the way to the bottom, with a large projector screen in the front. Not a single blinking light is visible to Jennifer, but, then again, she can't see very well in the complete darkness either.

Jennifer starts to turn back to the tiny window, to check if it's safe to leave, but as she does so a little red dot catches her attention. As she turns toward the dark room, red dots appear on every screen – the computers are starting up! Jennifer can feel herself getting dizzy once again. What's happening? Technological uprising? Where is everyone? Is Tessa okay?

This can't be the end. She needs to see Patrick – her baby brother – give Shaun a run for his money on the soccer field. She needs to see the world. She needs to do so many things, this can't be... suddenly the lights above her head start glowing and then flickering. She needs to run. She needs to get out.

She grabs the door handle and falls against it with her entire body weight. It swings open and she's back in the hallway. She stumbles from the force of her shove and regains her balance just in time to see a dark shape approach. It's tall and inhuman and has two bright yellow lights blinding Jennifer completely. Fear radiates through her. It starts to speed up and charges toward her. Jennifer bolts down the hall. She reaches the staircase, glances over her shoulder to see how far behind the monster is and, in the process, loses her balance, falling down the stairs.

She's vaguely aware of gravity shifting and then it all goes dark.

***

Someone's talking... "Her parents have been contacted," She frowns at the sound of the voice. Their words are a complete jumble of nonsense. Her head hurts. Why does her head hurt? Jennifer wrenches her eyes open, she's laying on her back, in the stairwell.

"Looks like a concussion," The voice says, but none of the words make sense.

She props herself up on her elbows, but the movement makes the world spin for barely a second before turning completely black once again."...take her home," is the last thing she hears.

***

"So... I woke up at home," Jennifer can't seem to make sense of anything that she remembers. Was it all a dream? Tessa walking off would certainly never happen in real life; it must have been a dream.

"But if it were all a dream, Dear reader, why am I in bed at noon?"

"Hey! Sleeping Beauty finally woke up!" Someone suddenly yells and Jennifer flinches away from the loud noise, turning on her side. Her head is throbbing.

"For all that is good and green, Penelope!" Jennifer suddenly turns around, that's Tessa. Jennifer turns around fast enough to see Tessa flying-leap onto her bed. Her entire unstable mattress vibrates at Tessa's impact.

Jennifer props herself up against the headboard and manages a smile, "What happened?"

"Everyone was looking for you, you weren't there, there was a fire drill..." Tessa suddenly says, without taking a breath.

"Fire drill?" Jennifer asks. "Start over, what happened?"

"You weren't in homeroom," Tessa says and points her finger at Jennifer angrily.

"They told us about a fire drill they wanted to run before school started. So, they did... I thought I'd find you at the assembly point, but you weren't there and you didn't answer your phone and the next thing I heard, Mr Nibbs found you at the bottom of the stairs," Tessa's barely holding her tears back. "It was rather funny, he had flashlights strapped to his Segway..." she hiccups.

Jennifer hugs her tightly. "I'm fine. My author still has a lot more in store for me."

Tessa pulls out of the hug. "Tess? Why did the power go out?" Jennifer asks, all the pieces are starting to fall into place.

"You know how jumbled the circuits are at school. The fire alarm didn't want to switch off, so Mr Glaspy decided to just shut everything down... you know, reboot. After Nibbs found you, he called an ambulance. They checked you out, you may have a minor concussion and should stay in bed... they called your parents and brought you home."

Jennifer lets out a sigh of relief as all the worry is lifted off her shoulders.

"What were you doing anyway?" Tessa asks and Jennifer smiles sheepishly, before telling Tessa her side of the story.