A future Halloween’s tale

Chapter 3
Trick or Treat?

Chapter Description: Technology plays a little trick on the unsuspecting couple.

The sending transporter was supposed to make a quantum copy of their component atoms, have the receiving unit create a duplicate of them at the other end, and then destroy the original. As it was doing what had been done thousands of times before, a stray Cosmic Ray came from outer space and hit a pico-sized transistor right in the logic gate. This caused a large cascading array of electrical discharges to spread throughout the machine and change an important parameter of Alice and Henry’s makeup.

At the receiving end, the transporter there was completing its check of the quantum construction of Alice and Henry when the sending transporter sent new information about them. The receiving transporter made its corrections to its parameters, modified Alice and Henry, and produced them. As they appeared on the receiving unit’s grid, their originals were destroyed.

As Henry stepped off the platform, he nearly stepped out of his baby slippers. The adult-size diaper that fit him snugly back at the apartment was now several sizes too large and started to slip off his narrowed waist and fall his legs as he walked which caused him to stumble.

As Alice stepped off the transport grid, she felt that the room was somehow larger than it was supposed to be. For her, the transporter adjusted her clothing to fit her now 10-year-old body. She looked to Henry and found that he’d become an 11-year-old boy.

At first, she didn’t think it was Henry, but she recognized the Sesame Street characters on his diaper, put two and two together, and said in a subdued tone “Transporter Malfunction”.