The Teleporter. (3 page)

The team do not argue, even though they all object to this as further research is required.
“… but, how can we be sure that this initial weight loss is not detrimental to the subject?” John asks.
The other 3 cringe and you can tell that they would never question Mikes authority or decision. 
“Excuse me, did you not just hear what I said? We will proceed with the human, if you don’t like it- there is the door!” Mike says aggressively.
“BUT how can we be sure!? We absolutely cannot send a human being into that machine without identifying the source of the wei….”
                                    “… You haven’t been in the company long have you, lad?” Mike snaps at John.
“No, not very long” John replies
“Well if you want it to be much longer I suggest you be quiet and do as you are told” as Mike walks off.
“Fucking asshole” John mutters just as Mike is out of sight
“Dick” Alex mutters whilst shaking her head
“Wow I can’t believe you just stood up to him John!” Cat adds
“John, we have all been there, and we have all failed, and we have all learnt what you just have learnt. Chin up, lets carry on” Paul reassures John.

A Couple of days later, the first human test subject arrives at exactly the correct moment, as the machine is spooling and ready to go. This time, there are no cameras being set up, or anything like that. Two armed police officers then enter the lab followed by a Male, approximately 35 years old, Caucasian with brown hair and in shackles with two more armed guards behind him. One begins to question if this is all above board and completely legal but not a word is said. It seems like they have just plucked a prisoner off of death row to test the teleporter, maybe with nothing but a promise of being let off death row if they go through with it. Regardless, this man is about to go down in history. 

Or not as the case may be.
“So, what’s your name pal?” Asks John as he is taking a blood sample
“Dave” the prisoner replies
“Sooo, why were you in prison, if you don’t mind me asking?”
Dave looks at one of the guards, then looks down and replies with a simple “Dunno”.

John at this stage realises he isn’t going to get more than a one word answer every time so he decides just to get on with it and no speak to him.

“It’s time” Says Paul
Paul and John then direct him where to stand and give him a count down from 10.

“10…9…8…7…6…5…4…3…2…1… Now
” Paul says.
*Whoosh*

‘Dave’ vanishes in a more of a ‘pop’ sound this time, as opposed to the dramatic sounds and light that was previous.
He then instantly appears on the receiver pad. He is conscious but loses his balance a little, but regains it and manages to stand upright.

“Give us a wave, Dave” Cat Yells
Dave then instantly waves and leaves the receiver pad, to sit on the nearest chair in his normal negative manner.

“That went well, didn’t it?” John states.
“Yeah, a little too well. I personally was expecting more of a show…” Alex adds
“So Dave, where are you from?” Paul asks him
“Dunno”
“Ha! He’s fine!” John says, then he turns to Paul and continues “He’s not the talkative type”
“John, check the weight again” Paul orders as Dave is escorted out of the lab quite roughly.

A few minutes later;
“I don’t believe it, exactly 21 grams again!” John shouts in confusion. Alex and John look at each other and again, dismiss the irrational hypothesis that they are both about to communicate.
“We can’t focus on this John, you know this, you heard Mike” Paul explains
“Fuck Mike” John curses
“You can if you want, but believe me, you will be ‘fucked’ afterwards” Mike calmly replies “Good work team, I’ll be in tomorrow at 09:00 to collect the full reports from each of you. We have 12 more test subjects, all from different walks of life to test and I want them all done this Friday, Live on Television”
“Again Mike, we need to test fully before we can…”
                                                                                    “… Look if you want to fuck with me one more time go right ahead, John, as it will be your last. You can either do as I say or get the fuck out. We clear?” Mike interrupts and shouts whilst pointing directly at John.
“…Crystal clear, Thanks Michael” John backs down for the best whilst the team look on in agony because they are desperate for someone to overpower the tyrant.
“09:00 tomorrow people. Do not disappoint me” Mike shouts as he strides out of the lab door.

“You know, it’s physically and technically impossible for that man to be any more of an asshole that what he already is” Alex vents. 

“Paul, this is bullshit, we are prevented by Mike at every turn to try to prove the safety of this machine, we need to properly analyse where this 21 grams of weight is coming from. We absolutely cannot proceed without identifying the source… it could be something important you know!” John says to Paul.
Paul then replies “John, I don’t know how many times I have to tell you, Mike is in control, what he says is ultimately what we do. I have tried and cannot do anything about him… its useless to battle him”.
“… What about getting a third party involved, you know, making it actually impossible for us to continue unless we go through different processes?” John is now clutching at straws.
“Look, we have tried everything John, I know it’s frustrating but seriously, just ignore it” Alex reassured John.

“Okay Fine. But know that I don’t agree with sending these 12 human beings through on Friday…”

Friday, 09:30

Today is the big day. 12 human ‘volunteers’
are sitting outside the lab. Their samples and checks are completed prior to entering, but this time is different. There are news cameras outside interviewing them. They seem to be quite high- profile volunteers. John then goes back in the lab and has a look at their files. Some of the job titles include Singer/ Songwriter, Commercial Pilot, best-selling author and even an Army Captain. John is impressed and immediately walks over to Alex. “Look, Airline pilot, Military Captain… These volunteers aren’t exactly off death row this time are they?”.
“Haha, no babe they’re not, they all seem to be famous, rich or both.” Alex replies.

The day goes without a hitch.
Throughout the success of the day, teleportation after teleportation, and the whole thing being recorded from seemingly every angle, the team are sitting there compiling the results, again.
“So that went well” Paul breaks the silence. “Good work team”.
“Paul, its Friday afternoon, its 23 minutes past 8… I should be drunk right now” John says for a laugh.
The team then laugh and Alex and Cat then agree. “Ok, since we’ve all worked so hard today, we can all go. The first round is on me!” Paul says, which is very out of character as the team believed that he actually didn’t drink as he was so ‘square’.

As they are followed by their bodyguards to their local pub, they then bump into that Mike fellow just leaving the pub. “Oh for fuck sake, look at who’s coming out” John says in a melancholy tone.
“Oh hi, if it isn’t my favourite bunch of people! You guys have out done yourselves” Mike says. The team then politely agree as they shuffle past him into the pub. “But you…” Mike stops John “… Look, I like you, you have balls, but if you have a problem with me, then tell me now. We’re not at work so I…”
John then interrupts “You  are  nothing  but  a tyrant. You listen to nobody as you think you know it all, but really you are just blinded by the money and the greed. We needed, we were required by every bone in our bodies to make fully sure that the missing weight wasn’t life threatening but YOU…” John realises that he is getting more and more angry and calms down “… YOU have a nice evening. We’ll have a drink for you”. The team look confused, not to mention Mike. Briefly, His gaze was widening as John was bringing reality home to him like a ton of bricks, and you could almost see the cracks beginning to show as nobody had ever stood up to him like that before. What happened was John lightened up the subject as he realised that the same man he was about to bring to his knees, was the same man that gave him the job at FTR. Mike then smiles and says “I like you” As he shakes Johns hand and retires at a quick pace back to his car, which is chauffer driven.

Alex is waiting by the door and sees it all unfold “That  was  so  hot” Alex whispers to John, which puts the biggest smile on his face.
“Let’s get pissed!”

Yet another Monday morning eventually comes after an amazing weekend that John and Alex have just had together. However together, they have achieved no work whatsoever which prompts an early start for them. Alex and John are in at 6:30am compiling the results, when at that point, they notice something very strange and exciting. Paul and Cat arrive together just after they settle in, and to their surprise they are holding hands as they walk in the lab door! Obviously it is very, very unusual for someone to be in the lab this early so Paul and Cat are very shocked to be caught out like this.
“Hey, yeah, guys! How are you doing? Wh… why are you in so early?” Paul stutters.
Cat does not know where to look so she just says “Hi” and walks straight to her workstation, with a lot of added colour in her face. 
“Hi guys! What are you doing her so early?” John says in a happy and upbeat tone.
“We didn’t get any sleep, um sorry I meant
work
done over the weekend so we thought… so I thought that we…. So we individually thought separately that we should get an early start” Paul at this point has completely and utterly verbally guffed that he had been up all weekend with Cat.
Things at this point are very awkward. Alex gets up, grabs Cat and says “GIRL CHAT” whilst dragging her into the en suite lab cloakroom. Meanwhile John replies to Paul “It’s ok, I understand, I did Exactly the same. Me and Alex didn’t get much sleep either, if you know what I mean” as he winks at him. “Oh so it’s true! So you.. and Her… ahhhhhhh…. It was obvious though” Paul mutters. “Haha! Not as obvious as you’ve just made it mate!” John points out!
At this point there is a lot of bonding going on. Paul and John are in the lab, having a very manly conversation about what they did ‘exactly’ on the weekend. And where. And how many times. Alex and Cat are having a very girly chat in the cloakroom, asking and telling how sweet the guys have been, and where they have taken them, and the new stuff they purchased whilst with their men and so on.
The elite 4 could not be any closer. That is, unless they started swinging of course.

After all of that was cleared up, they get back to work
in a very excited mood.

‘
We interrupt this program to bring you some breaking news’ the reporter on the TV near Johns desk says, which captures Johns full attention. ‘At approximately 23:50 last night there was a series of brutal murders in the City of London.’

John then calls the tea
m over and turns up the volume ‘38 people have been confirmed dead with 50+ injured or hospitalised before police marksmen shot and killed the murderer. The murders span from Soho to Oxford Street and through to Regents Street. Eye witnesses say that they each saw one Caucasian male with Brown hair, wearing what looked like an orange prisoners overalls ‘shooting innocent people at random’ and some at ‘point blank’ range for no reason. One eye witness said ‘I tried to calm him down, I asked him what his name was and he said his name was Dave but he wasn’t that responsive… he was armed to the teeth, and then started shooting randomly and indiscriminately. He even shot at me but somehow he missed and I’m still alive!’. Police are yet to make a statement and have currently sealed off all areas with diversions, so the recommendation is to use public transport as much as possible to minimise the traffic’
“That’s horrible. I can’t believe he was here only a few days ago” says Alex
“Yeah! I know. Scary!” Cat says as she walks back to her workstation
John is silent, as is Paul. Paul then gets on the phone to Mike to discuss how they can get a full report on ‘Dave’.
Alex and John look at each other, and whisper “are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Alex says.
“Yes, I think so. 21 Grams?” asks John
“Yeah, I need to prove this theory wrong, just for my mentality that is” Alex adds.
“Alex, in the film, and after Googling it A LOT, the whole weight loss thing is when a human passes away, the soul then leaves the body hence the 21 grams weight difference.  This guy is 21 Grams lighter but he is still alive. We have to remember he was in prison… on death row… he must have done something bad before… he’s probably just a bad person…? I’ll check the 12 that went on Friday and see if they’re the same” John explains.
“Yeah, I can see you logic. We were being a bit paranoid there weren’t we” she said after realising the irrationality of the theory. 

Half hour later John throws down some paper on Paul’s desk.
“Each and every one of the Twelve that were teleported on Friday has lost exactly 21 grams each. “ John says loudly so Alex and Cat can hear.
There is a moment of silence as they’re all thinking what it could be.
“Water weight, it has to be water. It can’t be anything else the people are just fine.” Paul adds.
Cat then goes on to say “The water could be coming from the bladder, or even somewhere else that we can’t really measure. The fact that it’s always 21 grams suggests that it is a constant, something everyone has”.
“Agreed, but what if that ‘something that everybody has’ is actually something very important, like…” John struggles to think of a socially acceptable example.
Paul then interjects “… like 21 grams of plasma? Of blood? People can lose pints of blood and survive; or even if it is water, that can be replenished. Seriously John I think you’re focusing too much on this… I agree that it needs to be looked at but if you look at the evidence of the 13 people walking, talking, breathing and being medically tested to be fine afterwards, these 21 grams just isn’t that big a deal”. “But if it puts your mind at rest, you and Alex do a report on ‘Dave’. Try to rule out the fact that the teleportation, and the 21 grams, didn’t cause him to go ‘mad’. I’ll then submit it to the board as soon as you’re finished”

John backs down “O
k, ok. I’ll get that other report to you by Wednesday.” John feels a little defeated at this moment in time, but he accepts the fact that his strong hypothesis was wrong and carries on.