The Rest Will Soon Follow (chapter)

The fourth chapter of the Hours audiobook. Construction of the miracle machine has been going on for over a month. Seth realizes Pete is part of shimmerings. At the end, the machine is finally completed and turned on for the first time, and the students experience the waving world.

Description
Seth and his classmates have been working hard for the past month on the miracle machine. His hands have caloused from the work. He notices Pete didn't sleep in his bed, meaning he has been chosen for the mysterious Shimmerings.

Seth also notices that Pete left some diagrams out for the machine. He slams the door shut and hears a rattle, leading him to find a bottle of pills he deduces are part of shimmerings.

On his way to the medium he spots Pete being reprimanded by Birdie. He later deduces this was about the lost bottle of pills.

As he observes the medium, Seth is retrospective about the construction of the miracle machine and all the work everyone put into it. He dispatches Kevin to check the duct work and Pepper to turn on the breaker.

The miracle machine is an incredibly complex machine. It uses a bizzare form of electromagnetism to pull blood away from the brain, almost killing someone. Alexis built the digital controller box. It creates a gateway for the power. Seth remarks on how his classmates understood that Seth is a vessel for the design of the machine, not the author.

When activated, the machine makes a smooth warbling sound, compared to heat waves, if they were audible. Seth has one last stab of concern for how Pete's body will handle the impact, but Pete doesn't share the worry.

A few minutes later, at the center of the gym, the students begin to feel the effects. First a dizziness. Then a fragment of invisible space before their eyes. A ringing in their ears. A cold sweat and a dry mouth. A few shooting pains in their chest and side. Finally a heart palpitation. Each sensation passes to make way for the next, until a feeling of a solid wall beneath their feet arrives, holding them up just barely above death.

Everyone's faces are white and their lips purple. Olive remarks on blueberries and suddenly Seth can taste it, deliceious, like it was really there.

Olive leaps up and is able to fly. The rest soon followed. Anyone watching would have seen them flying around, would have seen time go slow for them, and would have seen their super strength as they begun to dig a hole. Things worked differently in the waving world.

Seth remarks at the end that this is the start to everything changing, "because when we dug the hole, we dug too deep."

Quotes
"Looks like we've all been eating... blueberries." - Olive

"The rest soon followed." - Seth

"Everything eventually changed because when we dug the hole, we dug too deep." - Seth