The Machine stood in the center of the small, dark, dank, room. It was as tall as a man and twice as wide, round and tubular, and made of a dark black steel, with a translucent domed covering that served as a ‘ceiling’ to the Machine. Lining the inside of the Machine, tall, transparent pipes ran from the dome to the steel floor, containing a semi-translucent green fluid, veined with streams of bubbles rising upwards through the ceiling. Large bundles of wires emanated from several ports on the sides of the Machine, and were plugged into various machines and other objects scattered about the room, generating the impression of a large spiderweb.

Amidst all of this, a man, his wife, and his daughter sat in the only area still free from the army of tools and equipment. The man–the father–stood up, and faced his wife and daughter, his cheeks flushed and ruddy with excitement.

“What is this, Harold?” asked his wife before Harold could begin. The father’s voice caught, he took a breath, took another one, and then began again in a rush of words.

“In the center of this room, you see the next step. A time machine into the future, only it cannot travel through time. I have been working on it for forty years! Forty years! And at last, it is complete!” The daughter piped up.

“What does it do, Daddy?” Harold scooped up the girl and put her on his shoulder. He turned to face the Machine.

“This, my dear Abigail, is the world’s first ever built transmutation device!” Abigail’s eyes were wide with unconcealed awe. “It can turn any material, that is any material, into pure and solid gold.” Harold bent over and picked up a small and previously unnoticed object lying next to the sawmill. He held it up for all to see.

It was a small, two-inch long screw. It was round, and rusty. The head of the screw had a large cross gouged into it, and into that cross was placed a large plug of the same shape, of a rather desaturated red color. From this plug, emanated many wires, some plugging back into the body of the screw and others spilling onto the floor, running along it and connecting to a large box on the side of the tube, which had the word BATTERY written on it. The father placed his hand on the side of the tube.

“This here Machine’ll make us known all over the world! With gold, pure gold, we could move out of our house, and live in the country! In a nice, large villa, somewhere. Maybe in England. Who knows! Who knows!” The mother raised her hand hesitantly.

“How does…it…work?” she ventured.

“Aha! Glad you asked! You see the solid metal base that it stands on, yes? And the same base, mirrored onto the dome?” Both, mother and child, nodded their heads. “You see, those are electromagnets, very powerful electromagnets. They use exactly 2.53497 gigawatt-hours of electricity to create a magnetic field capable of atomically displacing the particles of mercury, which is a poisonous metal, floating in the tubes of green oil, and in doing so, settle onto the object to be transmuted. They then transfer the energy from themselves and into the material, regenerating the same atomic displacement effect in the material and thus changing the atomic structure of that material to pure, solid, gold! It is foolproof!” He held up the screw.

“What’s that for, Daddy?” Abigail asked, still on her father’s shoulder.

“Aha,” said the father, lifting Abigail off his shoulder and placing her in her mother’s lap. “That is my test subject. The wires are a failsafe, in case of the machine malfunctioning and sending a lightning bolt’s worth of energy through the screw, melting it and setting an electrical fire to everything that you see around you! Unfortunately, the wires are incapable of connecting to the circuits, and so I must be the bridge. Now, it is time to demonstrate the Machine!”

Harold stepped cautiously yet confidently into the Machine, holding the screw studded with wires. His wife placed a hand on his shoulder.

“Harold, are you sure about this? Have you tested it before? Is it safe?” Harold held her hand in his.

“Matilda. If I do not come out of that door again, then something must’ve gone terribly wrong. But if I do, we can all leave the lab and go down to that little restaurant at the corner of the block.”

“But–”

“Don’t worry. I’ve already made reservations, and in case I don’t come out again, that’ll be a cut in my bank account, and I won’t be wanting that, now will I?” The mother smiled. Harold placed his hand on her shoulder and kissed her softly. Then he stepped back into the Machine and the steel door closed behind him. The lock clicked shut with the same solemness of a church bell ringing over the cemetery out the back. 

“Alright now,” came his cheery voice from inside the Machine. “Abigail, d’you see that lever on the side?” Abigail nodded. “I want you to pull it as soon as I say go. If all goes well, we’ll all walk out of here as happy as humans can be! Ready, go!” Abigail pulled the lever. At first, nothing happened. 

Then the green liquid began to froth inside of the tubes lining the walls of the Machine, and a valve opened to let out excess steam from inside the machine. A sharp, piercing screech came from the whistle at the summit of the domed roof of the tube, and then all was quiet, save for the constant sound of the liquid boiling.

“Now, pull back the lever!” cried the professor from inside the tube. 

“I can’t! Mommy, it’s stuck!” Matilda came over and she and Abigail both pushed it until it slid slowly into position. There was a sharp click from the mechanism as it slid into place. The green liquid started to turn a dull red as, the way Daddy explained in long scientific words, the electrical field generated by the electromagnet in the base forced the electrons from their default shells and up the pipe, hitting the atoms above with such force that the energy released sparked an atomic reaction which then changed the element structure entirely, thus “transmuting” the metal. A green light activated on the side of the tube and both Mommy and Abigail pulled back the lever. The door opened, and out rolled a golden bust of the professor. Alongside him laid his wig, and the screw that he had been holding, all studded with wires, and solid gold. Matilda stood up. 

“Wait, don’t panic! Didn’t he say, ‘All materials?’” She turned to the tube, her mind in a whirl. “Didn’t he?” Abigail jumped to her feet, her face streaked with tears.

“Daddy!”