Sci-Fi Shorts

Sci-Fi Smackdown Round 1.1 - Bad Medicine

A/N 1: The prompt for this story was to utilise three quotes from a selected list - the quotes I chose are in bold.  1000 words.

A/N 2: For all the science purists out there, I'm aware I've fractured/bent/made up/ignored a few laws of physics. Oh well.

"Are you sure we're allowed in here?" asked Alex, anxiously looking around the radiology clinic.

"They gave me a key, didn't they?" James' muffled voice emerged from deep inside the body of one of the machines positioned around the room.

"Yeah, but you're a janitor. You're supposed to wipe stuff, not rewire it. What if somebody busts us?"

"Relax. Nobody comes in here at night."

Alex persisted. "What if it doesn't work? What if you break something? This stuff looks expensive."

"Trust me, it'll work."

"Yeah, that's what you said when you connected my guitar amp to the lawn mower."

"That worked, didn't it?"

"For about five minutes. Then the garage caught on fire."

James withdrew his head and grinned. "But how awesome did it sound for those five minutes?"

Alex considered this. "Fair point. And this will sound good?"

James' grin became slightly manic. "Good? Good doesn't come close. With this sick beat we'll become the best Bon Jovi tribute band ever. Plus, we'll be closer to completing our crusade. To recreate the entire New Jersey album, but even better than the original."

"New Jersey? That doesn't sound like much of a crusade. I still think we should do Slippery When Wet."

James' face grew serious. "Hey, let's not get sacrilegious. We walk before we fly."

Alex looked abashed. "I know. I just like to dream." His face brightened. "Anyway, tell me how this works."

"It's simple. The cyclotron makes fluorine-18, which is used for positron emission scanning. I've juiced it up to make us a nice big batch. With me so far?"

"No."

"Which part don't you get?"

"Everything after "simple.""

James sighed. "Look. This thing" -he pointed to the cyclotron- "makes stuff that emits anti-matter. When anti-matter meets matter, it creates lots of energy. Which is what we need for the next bit."

"Which is?"

"Feeding truckloads of energy into the MRI scanner."

Alex looked at the enormous tunnel-like contraption. "What the hell for?"

"It's all about magnets, dude. This baby has 3 Teslas of magnetic goodness. Normally it runs off 20kW of power, but with the anti-matter setup, I'm boosting it to 100kW."

Alex looked impressed. "Wow, awesome. Um, why?"

James closed the access panel of the machine he'd been working on. "Why? When I crank this baby up, the whole room will become the biggest sub-woofer in the history of rock. Three hundred times more bass than our pathetic everyday speakers. We're using bad medicine to rock Bad Medicine, dude."

Now Alex was grinning. "Well, what are we waiting for? Let's crank it up."

James flicked a few switches and plugged in his phone. "OK, first I'll play the original as a test run." He turned a dial on the MRI to maximum. An ominous humming filled the room. He hit play.

The opening chords of Bad Medicine played, mostly through the phone's tinny internal speaker, as the frequencies were too high for the throbbing monstrosity James had constructed. Then the first drum beat hit.

An enormous boom sounded, accompanied by an intense flash. And where moments before there had been an MRI scanner, there was now a whirling sphere of intense, otherworldly light.

"Ah, crap," said James.

Alex backed away, eyes bulging. "W-w-w-what is that thing?"

James sighed. "It's a fusion reactor. We've created a min-sun. Bugger."

"Bugger?"

"Yeah, the Wikipedia article said that might happen. Amazing bit of physics. But useless for rocking out. Better shut it down, I guess." He flicked the switches again. Nothing happened. "Hmm."

"What the hell is "hmm?"" yelled Alex.

James frowned. "Looks like this baby has become self-sustaining. The magnetic field of the MRI is containing it for now, but it'll get too big for that before too long."

Alex had backed up against a wall. "And then it will shut down?"

James scratched his head. "The article didn't really say. It might shut down."

"Or?"

"Or maybe it'll keep growing and consume the planet."

"What? What the hell are we going to do?" demanded Alex.

James thought for a moment, then pointed to a control panel mounted on the wall. "That connects to the PA system. Let's get everyone out." He picked up the mic and hit the on switch. "Um. Hi everyone. Look, really sorry about this, but we've kind of created a mini-sun that might be going to eat the world. So, if you could all leave, that'd be great. This is not a drill. I repeat: this is not a drill. This is the apocalypse. Please exit the hospital in an orderly fashion."

Alex had taken out his phone and was texting feverishly. He looked up. "I've told the rest of the band to be here in a few minutes with all our gear."

"Huh? What for?" asked James.

Alex smiled, grimly. "If we can't turn this sucker off, we're going to have to drain its power. We'll plug the whole band in and Bon Jovi it to death."

James shook his head. "You know you can't win this. It's suicide." He smiled back. "But what a way to go."

Ten minutes later the band was set up on the steps of the hospital, extension leads snaking back into the radiology clinic. Staff and patients streamed past them, making their way to the temporary safety of the car park.

The band began to play. They played like there was no tomorrow, because if they didn't there wouldn't be. They belted out song after song and gradually the fleeing crowds slowed and turned to watch. Lighters and phones were held up.

Finally, as the dawn broke in the east, the music stopped. The power had been drained and the world had been saved. Exhausted, James dropped his guitar and collapsed, only to hear his phone ringing. Mustering the last of his energy, he answered it.

"Who is it?" asked Alex, who was slumped in exhaustion over the drums.

"Bon Jovi's record company. They want to talk royalties."