Unwired
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Chapter 5:- Politics
Hailey stared at the article in the news reader and tried to make sense of the details one more time in her notes on her Gadget. The current events homework was a pain, but at least it gave her something to do other than listen to Max drone on about how bored he was without his Warcraft game or Vid screen.
She read her notes out loud to her dad. "Radical elements in China's northern territory have seized control of two major power grids and are threatening to plunge the country into chaos if their demands are not met. What can they really do, Dad, just turn out some of China's lights for a while?"
"Depends. Power grids could mean most anything with the way the state controls the press over there. If it simply is a couple of power grids and the "radicals" just shut them off, obviously all power those grids service would be shut off until dispatchers could reroute around them. No lights. No electric heat. Nothing. The area those radicals are in is pretty rural, but it still would be a hardship for the people without power - for however long it lasted," her dad said. "It'd be pretty quiet though."
"How long would it take to reroute the power?" Hailey asked, thinking she would n't like to be without electricity longer than it took for her Gadget to need to be recharged.
"Hard to say. That would depend on if they just turned it off, or damaged it - like blew up a substation - to shut it down."
Hailey added another thought to her notes and hit the save button. That was enough school work for a Friday afternoon. She tapped page turn button on the news reader, advancing the screen to the entertainment section. Malibu stared back at her in full color. An interactive "play this video" button blinked on the image, so Hailey grabbed her wireless earpiece from its slot on her Gadget, touched it to the screen to sync it, and then hit the play button. Malibu mentioned her appearance on an upcoming late night talk show and then introduced her latest video - for the second time that day Hailey was enthralled by the new song - Deanne was so right - it was totally uncharted.
Hailey stared at the article in the news reader and tried to make sense of the details one more time in her notes on her Gadget. The current events homework was a pain, but at least it gave her something to do other than listen to Max drone on about how bored he was without his Warcraft game or Vid screen.
She read her notes out loud to her dad. "Radical elements in China's northern territory have seized control of two major power grids and are threatening to plunge the country into chaos if their demands are not met. What can they really do, Dad, just turn out some of China's lights for a while?"
"Depends. Power grids could mean most anything with the way the state controls the press over there. If it simply is a couple of power grids and the "radicals" just shut them off, obviously all power those grids service would be shut off until dispatchers could reroute around them. No lights. No electric heat. Nothing. The area those radicals are in is pretty rural, but it still would be a hardship for the people without power - for however long it lasted," her dad said. "It'd be pretty quiet though."
"How long would it take to reroute the power?" Hailey asked, thinking she would n't like to be without electricity longer than it took for her Gadget to need to be recharged.
"Hard to say. That would depend on if they just turned it off, or damaged it - like blew up a substation - to shut it down."
Hailey added another thought to her notes and hit the save button. That was enough school work for a Friday afternoon. She tapped page turn button on the news reader, advancing the screen to the entertainment section. Malibu stared back at her in full color. An interactive "play this video" button blinked on the image, so Hailey grabbed her wireless earpiece from its slot on her Gadget, touched it to the screen to sync it, and then hit the play button. Malibu mentioned her appearance on an upcoming late night talk show and then introduced her latest video - for the second time that day Hailey was enthralled by the new song - Deanne was so right - it was totally uncharted.
