43 THE OPERATION

CHAPTER 43 THE OPERATION Midnight, and the children were wide-awake in their beds. Jaya and Jad were waiting for their father to fall asleep. Once he was snoring deeply, they tiptoed past his bedroom, down the stairs, and out the back door. They crept across the farm to a cluster of trees, and there was the old barn, looming above the undergrowth like a mountain. Its door was open a crack, and a wedge of light spilled outside. The children closed the door behind them, and walked past wooden railings and stairways and up a ramp to a platform in the back corner of the barn. Lanterns hung from the walls and cast their soft light upon a large table. Standing behind the table was the robot. "Hello, children," said Roz. "How do you like our operating room?" "It's a little dark," said Jaya. "But it'll work." Jad pulled his computer from his pocket. As he brought up the diagram of Roz's body, his face

tightened with worry. "We've never done anything like this before." "Just do your best," said Roz, patting him on the back. "That is all I can ask of you." The robot unfastened her tool belt and draped it over a railing. Then she lay flat on the table. It was time to begin. Jaya looked down at Roz. "All set?" Roz looked up at Jaya. "All set." The girl felt under the robot's head, found the button with her fingers, and pressed it. Click. Roz's body relaxed. Her quiet whirring slowly stopped. Her eyes faded to black. Jad took a deep breath. Then he grasped the robot's head in his hands and twisted until—thwip—it popped off. In the smooth socket where the head had just been was another button. Jaya pressed it and the robot's chest opened up. They peered into the hollow chest cavity and saw a tangle of tubes connected to a grid of boxes: these were the robot's electronic organs. "That's the Transmitter," said Jad, pointing. The

children reached into the robot's chest, carefully removed a box and a tube, and set them on the table. "That was easy!" said Jaya, smiling. "Actually, I think this is the Transmitter over here," said Jad, and he removed another box. Then Jaya removed another tube. The boy checked his computer and said, "I might have this backward." A bead of sweat rolled down his forehead as he removed another box. "Wait, I think we should start over." Jaya nudged her brother out of the way and started plugging parts back into the robot's chest. "You're doing it wrong." Jad nudged his sister out of the way and started removing parts again. I don't know about you, reader, but I'm a little confused. So were the children. Pretty soon Roz's internal parts were strewn across the table, and nobody knew where anything was supposed to go.

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"Why did you remove so many boxes?" yelled Jaya. "Why did you remove so many tubes?" yelled Jad. The siblings argued for a while. Then they sat quietly for a while. The children were tired and cranky and afraid that they'd never get Roz working again. Jaya slumped against the table and looked up at the ceiling. Then her eyes drifted to the lanterns dimly glowing above. And then she had an idea. She climbed onto a wooden railing, grabbed one of the lanterns from its hook, and climbed back down. When she held the lantern close to Roz's body, Jad noticed that there were different numbers lightly etched onto each of the internal parts. Now things were starting to make sense. The children quickly removed the correct box and tube, they put the robot back together, and they turned her on. Click. Roz's body tensed. Her quiet whirring slowly started. Her eyes began to glow. But she didn't say a word. "Are you okay?" said Jad.

Roz pointed to her mouth. "Can you speak?" said Jaya. Roz shook her head. "She can't speak!" cried the boy. "We must have put something back in the wrong place!" Click. The children opened up Roz's body, rearranged some of her internal parts, and put her back together again. Click. Roz powered up and said, "Children, I can now speak, but I cannot move." Click. After hours of trial and error, and with morning light seeping into the barn, the operation was a success. Roz stood up, scanned her internal parts, and said, "Children, you did it! You removed my Transmitter! Thank you so much for your help." "You're very welcome," said Jaya, yawning. Jad checked his computer. "I can still see your signal on the map," he said. "Your Transmitter is still working, so keep it close until you leave the farm." And then he stuffed the little electronic device into the robot's tool belt.