‘How exactly is this supposed to help us again?’ my assistant piped up from the other end of my lab. I suppressed a sigh, the rubber of my gloves creaking as my fingers ground themselves into my palm.
‘It will help us,’ I hissed through gritted teeth, ‘by advancing the cause of humanity.’
‘Oh,’ he said, still visibly confused. ‘I see. Got it.’
‘You have no idea, do you?’
‘None whatsoever.’ He shook his head.
I sighed – you had to respect the honesty of the complete imbecile.
‘This,’ I pointed to the large electrical apparatus positioned above the makeshift operating table, ‘is the conduit for the electricity that will travel from that machine, into the… patient. Harnessing the power of the next lightning storm, my creation will shred the very bounds of Creation itself, bringing an end to the natural order and establishing a new, human order. We will be our own masters!’ I clapped my hands together, elated.
‘Ah,’ my assistant nodded, eyes squinting. ‘I see. What does that bit do?’
He pointed at a tangle of cables attached to the side of the machine.
‘That bit?’ I frowned. ‘Nothing. It’s just a fuse, I think, a trifling part that was, uh… donated to me by the local hardware store in Sandringham.’
I cackled, not un-manically.
‘I see,’ the boy said again. ‘So it isn’t a differential converter, then?’
‘A what-now?’ I frowned.
‘Just because of where it’s positioned, all that copper directly in line with the direct-current conversion, wouldn’t it serve to differentially transform the voltage and negatively inbound the resulting charge?’
‘Uh…’ I choked out running the calculations through my head. ‘Uh, I suppose, if it were to be…’
‘And wouldn’t that make the machine explode, destroying this lab, your castle and wipe out most of the electrical supplies around the Cheltenham area?’
I gaped at him, suddenly aware of how close I’d come to flipping the lever.
‘Sorry,’ he shook his head. ‘I’m sure I made a mistake.’
‘Yes, yes,’ I agreed, distantly. ‘A mistake. But, uh, just in case…’
‘Yes?’
‘Fix that for me. Please.’