Jeff senior talked to the female scientist, grimacing a little. "What do you mean he quit?"
"He wasn't a real scientist anyway," Said Tesla. She was actually a little annoyed at the whole thing. She was, a 'real' scientist, and had a proper degree. She worked her entire life uncovering the secrets of the universe, physics, chemistry, biology... and some 'child' who happened to gain an amazing IQ suddenly thought he knew 'better' then her? Just because of the sunlight?
Jeff Snr. shook his head. "... Maybe not. But his insights were amazing." The scanner technology- called the sider-scan alone... which they paid a great deal for, was able to probe and then allow them to replicate each aspect of the 'creature' better then an X-ray. It gave them an idea of everything in motion. It worked well and they brought him in to have a closer look and even let him know exactly what they were trying to do...
...but then he reacted so... so poorly. He held the strangest notions for a scientist. A soul? Humans were biological machines, nothing more. This was the translation of that machine into a difference engine. Jeff Snr. thought a 'mad scientist' would understand...
Tesla looked over the schematics. "I don't really understand how his technology works... but it has been useful. Even if we don't understand 'how' it works, we can certainly copy it. Give me a few weeks, I'll uncover the scanner's secrets"
Jeff Senior nodded but was dismissive. "I don't care too much about the scanner, I am more interested in what it picked up and gleamed from 'it.'" He said gesturing to a drawing of the insides of Jeff Junior. It was a life sized drawing, every gear was inspected for how quickly it turned and its probable role in the greater whole. Everything was measured... everything. Size, shape, torque, motion... everything.
... it was what his son became. No longer his son really... not any more. He was seeing not just what he could make from the situation, he was seeing the failure of biology at work. His attempt at procreation... a dismal failure. Of many years nurturing, thrown into the gutter. A failure that could not even be a human, let alone a man. All he could do now, was try to make a new son. There was nothing left to fix of the old.
Tesla nodded pointing to the torso. "We've duplicated the design of Jeff almost perfectly. But... The Sider Scanner does not work on one part of her-"
"It."
"Ah- yes sir. It..." Tesla looked a bit guilty at that slip. Obviously the creature had no real gender. Only what they themselves attributed due to the shape. The creature they were making from scratch was obviously designed to be 'male', even if it was made from a clockwork that appeared female. Such was Jeff senior's desire, that he wanted to make sure it had... male equipment, in as much of an appearance as possible. "Where was I... oh yes. The scanner does not seem to work on this area. The signal gets bounced off or something."
"A limitation of the Sider scanner?"
"I don't know. Sider was implicit that it should scan 'everything' about a person. Maybe he didn't know how well his own technology works either. Frankly, he didn't even 'care' that his machine seemed to be failing." It annoyed her a great deal. "Anyway... scanning around the anomalous area, we have picked up some kind of 'lock' just about here. That should mean the area is accessible externally. But we can't figure out any means to work out how its done. It might be incased in some kind of element like lead to X-rays." Obviously it 'wasn't' that, but she was at a loss. The Sider Scan always drew a blank on this region.
"Is this area important?" asked Jeff annoyed.
"No idea," said Tesla.
"Alright... I am going to try something. Maybe I can work out how to get a few pictures of what theses 'special gears' are...
"Assuming it is a gear in there," thought Tesla. Who knows what really ran Jeff, though she was trying hard not to imagine it was probably a mouse on a wheel.
Jeff thought she handled the interview quite well. She spoke softly, saying how she kind of missed being human... she missed her friends, but she drew a blank on the specifics of who she missed. She wished Ricky and Belle were here, but her father said that they likely 'hated' her...
"Why would they hate me?" asked Jeff.
"Don't blame yourself," said her father. "You turned into a giant version of them. In a way you are a mockery of their own existence... you make them 'difficult' to be normal."
"I.. do?" Yes, that did make a sad kind of sense. It was little wonder that she didn't get any message from them, or anything. It happened whenever she invited someone to her house. Whenever she got close... bad things happened. They just... used her? But now they hated her.
"Now Jeff... this is going to sound a little difficult, but I want you to completely power yourself down. As much as possible."
"Completely?" asked Jeff hesitantly. "I dunno how." she moved her large eyes to the side with a gentle ticking noise.
"Just try sleeping, and let your consciousness drift away. We need to take a closer look at some of your parts when they are not moving."
"A-alright dad..." Jeff complied, closing her eyes, letting her gears slow down. She wasn't sure how she was doing it really. Time just... seemed to stretch out before her, with everything slowing down. Until finally the universe itself, blinked out of existence...
...she didn't like this strange void. It reminded her of... of something. But she had to do as her father asked, so in the end tuned even this void out of her mind, until she was at the zen state of non-existence.
Jeff stared at the giant clockwork girl as she slept. A sleeping giant, that could cause so much harm... With a remote on his hand, he moved the platform that he stood upon, to get close to her back. He held the giant key in his other hand, holding it like it was some kind of magic staff. Would this work? It seemed unlikely but... nothing else did. "... I command this 'door'... to open"
Jeff's skin seemed to split suddenly, at her back. it creased over, as something inside moved in no way that any human should move. Locks turned into an unlock positions, rotating with the strangest sound of a whirling metallic bit piece. The command from her Key Holder was fulfilled, with a sound of many strange clicks and camshafts moving. Jeff didn't react to the sensation, being unconscious- but if she was wake, she would have felt her skin move strangely, as her strange gears were exposed to the outside world to the eyes of her father.
Jeff stared at the opening of the hatch, mesmerised as if he was looking at the door of an alien spacecraft. He almost stumbled, but fortunately the hatch opened up into a platform on a hinge of some kind. He gingerly stepped onto it, to see that it supported his weight. This was.. unbelievable. Somewhere inside was a gear or.. area that they needed to take a picture of. He quickly took a few photos with a very high resolution camera. It recorded everything in split second motions...
... he inched himself closer, to get a better idea of lay inside...
