Quinn walked downstairs as the first light of the day filtered through the curtains. Priya had breakfast ready.

“Pree, you don’t need to make breakfast for us every day.”

“I know Dad, but I like doing it. I made a quiche this morning while I studied some chess moves for the tournament today.”

Quinn shook his head in amazement.

“I’ll admit, this smells wonderful.”

“Sit down, here’s some veggie juice I made. Here’s some for you too Sanj.”

“Thanks, Pree,” Sanjay said as he glanced at Quinn. “I like the new and improved Priya.”

“I’m the same as always, don’t be silly,” Priya said. “Oh, it’s seven. I already ate. The coach should be picking us up any minute to go to the tournament. I gotta go.”

“We’ll see you there,” Quinn said.

Anatoly picked up Priya, Sophie, Amy, and some of the rest of the team. Soon they arrived at the tournament in a large gymnasium, where hundreds of players and parents walked around inspecting the boards and checking out the other people.

“Okay guys, this is a Swiss style tournament,” Anatoly said. “You’ll each be paired with someone who has a similar rating. Jose, you’ll be up against the second rated player since you have the top rating. If you win, you’ll be paired with the highest rated winner for the next game. You’ll play at least five games whether you win or lose. Afterwards, we’ll know where everyone is currently ranked. Don’t be upset if you lose. Go on to the next game.”

Anatoly walked over to Priya who watched a highly rated participant play a practice game.

“Priya, you were assigned to another player with a 1750 rating like yours. Sophie, you’ll play someone with a 1600 rating like yours, you should win at that level. Amy, you play a tough opponent with a 2000 score like yours. Always play your best game, okay?”

“We will,” they said in unison as the coach did a double-take.

They started their games. Within 14 moves, Priya’s opponent withdrew. She watched Sophie and Amy play. They easily won their matches. Jose and his number two ranked opponent played to a draw in 60 moves.

Quinn and Sanjay arrived as the second round began. The difficulty level increased. Priya and Sophie still won easily but Amy took 55 moves to beat her opponent. Jose played the third ranked player in the tournament and won easily.

Priya and Sophie breezed through the third round. Amy lost to the number two ranked player and Jose beat the number four ranked player.

In the fourth round Priya and Sophie won easily again against much higher rated players. Amy lost to Jose.

In the fifth round, Sophie played a tough game against Jose and managed to force him to withdraw after 30 moves. He wiped the chess board clean, sending the pieces flying. Priya played the second ranked player who earlier played Jose to a draw. She checkmated him in 25 moves.

Sophie and Priya played the final, tournament-deciding game. The restless audience watched the progress in their Eyepieces and on the big board in the front of the auditorium.

A woman in the audience shouted into the hushed silence, “This tournament isn’t for mutants, it’s for humans.”

Priya looked up at Sophie and thought to her, “I’m gonna go and kick her—”

“Pree, calm down,” Sophie thought back. “Keep your head down. Play the game and ignore her. We need to show a good example for the others who were abducted.”

The audience became disturbed. People whispered.

Someone else shouted out, “Yeah, they’re cheating mutants. Disqualify them.”

Another person said, “Mutants…mutants…mutants…”

Soon some in the crowd joined in.

Priya glanced at the audience and back at Sophie and thought to her, “The parents are acting worse than the children.”

“Yeah, they’re immature. Don’t say a word.”

Within a few seconds, a judge stepped in front of Priya and Sophie and said, “Calm down everyone, the judges are reviewing the situation now. Please stay calm.”

He walked away. The crowd continued talk in hushed tones.

Priya and Sophie sat at the table and thought silently with each other for 10 minutes. They didn’t make a move in the game. A judge came out and the crowd quieted down.

“We contacted the US Chess Federation and they advised us to temporarily restrict genetically modified humans from all official US tournaments until a final decision is made at the summit to be held next month. We offer our sincere apologies to our finalists Priya and Sophie, who played world class chess here today. Let’s give them a round of applause.”

Some audience members clapped amidst the hushed boos.

Priya and Sophie looked up into the audience, which included Quinn and Sanjay.

Priya thought to Sophie, “Are they clapping for us or are they clapping because we’ve been eliminated?”

“I’m not sure,” Sophie thought back. “Are they booing because they disagree with the decision? Or are they booing at us?”

Priya gazed into the audience again and thought to Sophie, “I don’t know whether I should like the clappers or the people booing, but I sense a lot of animosity out there. Let’s get outta here.”

They stood up from the table and walked over to Anatoly, who argued with the judges.

“Thanks coach,” Priya said. “Don’t bother arguing with them. There’s too much fear in the room and this is neither the time nor the place to fight this.”

“The right time and place will happen at some point in the future.” Sophie said.

“You’re right,” Priya said. “Okay coach, we’re going to go home with my dad now. Thank you so much. I’ll be at practice next Friday. Ouch.”

“Pree, are you okay?” Amy said.

“I’m not sure what happened but—”

She spotted something spinning on the ground.

“Oh, how nice. Someone threw a queen at me.”

They glanced up into the crowd, but everyone turned the other way. They quickly left the auditorium and Quinn took them home.

“I’m sorry this happened guys,” Quinn said. “There’s no excuse for this behavior. It’s like racism.”

“It is racism Daddy,” Priya said. “Or speciesism. They think we’re mutants, which can sometimes be regarded as another race or species. Maybe they’re right. We are mutants.”

Quinn ordered the autopilot to pull over to the side of the road.

“Don’t say that Pree. You’re every bit as human as you were before.”

“Am I Daddy? I easily beat the two best players in the Western US. I didn’t practice. No human wants to touch me. Even Amy had a tough time grabbing my hand at first. Maybe we are a new species.”

“Now you’re being crazy,” Quinn said as he ordered the autopilot to continue. “As far as I can tell, you’re no less human than before. You had a little tune-up, like the old gasoline cars. A car may run a little better after a tune-up but it’s still the same car.”

“Dad, let me restate your old car analogy. I’ve had a new engine installed. Only now it’s an interplanetary ion-fusion drive. And the wheels were replaced by magnetic levitation. If you still want to call that a car, go right ahead.”

Quinn rolled his eyes but smiled.

“I guess I’ll never win another argument with you.”

“Dad, according to you I’ll still lose sometimes. I’m still human remember. Humans are fallible.”

“Ugh,” Quinn said smiling back at Priya. “I can’t win a single point.”

“I love you Daddy,” Priya said.

She smiled at him with admiration. Quinn smiled back at her.

“I know you do Pree. Me too.”

They arrived home exhausted and ate lunch, debating the definition of what it is to be human.

Priya put on her eyepiece.

“I need to contact Mom.”

Soon they were talking.

“What’s happening with Bok and Yoova?”

“I’ve heard nothing from either of them today. Bok must still be having problems with his parents and Yoova is at her concert. Do you know what happened at the concert?”

“No.”

“30,000 people showed up and they paid $30 each. So, they raised $900,000. They’re selling human and Yooti food and pencil drawn portraits too. Yoova wants to put on a series of concerts so they can buy land. They’re thinking about buying land up in Humboldt County. The deep and dark redwood forests remind them of home, though the redwoods and other trees are taller because the gravity on Earth is weaker.”

“Awesome,” Priya said. “Now, another problem has surfaced.”

“What’s wrong Pree?”

“Sophie and I won the chess tournament, and they threw us out. The federation banned us from playing anymore and they took away our victory. The crowd hated us. Well, some in the crowd hated us and some supported us.”

“I’m sorry Pree. I noticed that too. I’ve been talking with the modified kids who returned home, and they’re encountering similar problems. I think you guys need to stick together through this. I think your situation will get worse before it gets better. Did you contact the others? You need to form a social network of some kind.”

“Good idea Mom. I’ll start a social network right away. I have no support. Our neural network is still embryonic. We get no help from the Omanji, but we can modify it.”

Priya glanced around the table.

“Well, you, and Daddy, and Sanjay, and Amy support me, but in society I’m unsupported and rejected.”

“Do you want me to post something to my followers?” Nisha said. “I’m up to a billion now.”

“No thanks,” Priya said. “I want to hide for a while.”

“Me too,” Sophie said.

“I need to go. I just wanted to hear your voice.”

“I’m glad I heard yours, Pree.”

They signed off.

“I think we need to create a non-Omanji social network only for the abductees,” Priya said.

“Great idea,” Sophie said.

“Let’s do one now,” Amy said. “I took a social network programming class in ninth grade. I could get the basics up and running in a few hours. I didn’t think I’d ever put my knowledge to practical use. After seeing what happened at the chess tournament, I want to help. You guys are going to need all the support you can get.”

By 10pm, they had the solid skeleton of a social network up and running.

“This looks good,” Priya said.

“Thanks,” Amy said. “And it has full 1024-bit encryption throughout. Nobody will be able to break in without our permission. Well, the Omanji could, I’m not sure.”

“Yeah, they can do everything,” Sophie said. “But I doubt they care about us. Let’s get some people on here.”

Priya dropped into silence. She thought, ‘root/connect’ and immediately she heard hundreds or thousands of voices. She told everyone about the new social network. This would serve as a place to meet, plan, and make friends. She interacted with as many people as possible. She dropped out by thinking ‘disconnect/root/end.’

“Hey look,” Amy said. “Our first member has joined.”

“Besides us,” Sophie said.

“And there’s our second,” Priya said. “I hope we can get everybody to sign up. 25,000 isn’t a lot for a social network so we don’t need expensive servers or anything. Amy, you’ll be our only honorary non-abducted member.”

“It’s an honor.”

Priya, Sophie, and Amy interacted on the network, welcoming new members until 2am. Quinn woke up, walked into Priya’s room, and told them to go to sleep. They fell asleep at 3am.