Nexus of Time

by Mark Riverstone

  "Are you saying he becomes impervious to harm?"

  "No. Harm and death are still very real. And will still have his anaphylaxis. What this does is make it so his body can counter the effects and therefore heal faster than the allergens can damage. The question is whether living tissue can continue to grow after going through this unification process. This apple had been picked well before I used it, and may be on its way toward decomposition. The only other living thing to go through this was a Grey aboard the Roswell craft, and it too was dead by the time the military recovered it. There is no proof that a Grey could sustain life after having unified with inorganic material."

  "Did the crash or did this process kill the Grey?"

  "Don't know. Those Greys also passed through time. As Walter has explained, when something goes back in time, it leaves its matter behind in our time, and is created anew from particles when exiting the rift. It may have been the matter reconstruction that caused them to die, and not the unification or the crash."

  "What does this mean for Ying?"

  "If I can perfectly combine organic flesh with an inorganic compound within a rift, yet return it to the present, retaining the original matter it was created from, it might take on these traits. His lesions could close, his regenerative abilities could rebuild the damaged cells and organs, and his body could compensate for the petroleum and petroleum extracts on this ship. But his surviving the procedure might come down to hope and prayer, because there is no scientific evidence that life can survive dimensional integration."

  "But there is a chance ..."

  "Captain, I can't even say that. This sample here doesn't mean it will work on a complex organism. And if it could work, we have to generate a rift big enough to use on Ying. Right now, I have an apple combined with a tennis ball, and a theory."

  "I'll talk to Walter. Tell him to build you something."

  "No. This is what I was talking about, Captain. This is my problem. Telling Walter to build something will take him away from what he is working on, and he may not complete his research. If I distract Walter, saving Ying might still mean the death of us all."

  "But how are you going to create a dimensional rift?"

  "Let me do my tests, and when I collect the information I need, I'll try to design something as best I can. You must give up control and let me and Walter do what we do. Separately."

  "You want me to step aside and do nothing?"

  "I want you to take care of the crew and this ship. Make sure Walter and I have what we need. It's what you do. What you have always done. Keep doing that until we succeed, or die. Can you do that?

  Nemolopolus is taken back by her words. So much, it causes him to relax as his eyes become distant. After a moment of silence, he speaks.

  "This time mumbo jumbo has become overwhelming, confusing. I'm living in a moment that has happened watching Walter get messages from a future that will be. No science has ever affected me. But Walter, his ideas were always more than science. They encompass everything. This future-past stuff makes me feel out of control, as if I am no longer a captain, but a passenger. My urges inside are telling me to stop taking a back seat and reclaim control of everything, be the one to carve out the future again. But you both tell me, instead of controlling the future, I am waiting for my destiny."

  "You are leading us into a new future. We are here making this future because you allowed us to be here. This moment never happened before. Hopefully our last future, a successful one. Future isn't control, it is confronting that which stands before us. If we each do that, together, we may get it right this time."

  "Now I understand why Mr. Nix never wanted to give you up. I knew it had to be more that your scientific brilliance. Don't be offended, but I thought he was attracted to you or secretly in love with you. Now, I understand you were not only his brains, but his conscience. I'll leave you to your work. Contact me when you need."

  "I will."

  Captain nods and leaves. Dr. Black turns to the core extractor, removes the contents, uses a scalpel to slice thin cross-sections, and then places them on microscope slides.

  Holding Tight

  Chapter 39

  Theoretical Laboratory, Barge.

  The room is crammed with computer monitors, multiple computers and virtual marker boards covered with equations and theories. Walter sits at a desk looking over holographic blueprints and dimensional diagrams on 3D projectors, while referring to documents on display screens. While pondering what is before him, he sips at a glass of ice water.

  Captain Nemolopolus enters without knocking, "Sorry I'm late."

  "No problem. I remind myself you run an entire ship."

  "The transmitter has been mounted on the sea floor adjacent to the receiver. At this moment, they should have completed sending the initial radiation mark I found...I will find. I hate this time loop jargon. I'll appreciate it when I just have a past, present and future again. The transmitter is powered off until you are ready to send the next transmission. What are you working on?"

  "This." Walter points at a 3D blueprint of an integrated wall that shows four arced tube channels going into the wall hold four arced massive solid rods with tips that narrow to a point and touch. They extend beyond the wall horizontally with two on top touching and two on bottom touching.

  Captain Nemolopolus explains, "Those are the Barge's salvage clamps, or docking clamps, what I call the 'pincers'. They are the second reason countries hire the Barge. You would be surprised how much secret technology is on ships and submarines, that by accident or design, end up sunken on the bottom of the ocean. The countries who own those ships can't let word out they lost submerged secret tech and have no way to recover it. It's why this vessel has the name 'the Barge.' Those clamps are two-foot diameter iridium titanium alloy rods that retract into the ship, and when extended, clamp together as you see in that image representation. They are capable of enough pressure to grasp and puncture a battleship, sub or aircraft carrier. And this vessel has enough power to pull a ship from the deepest ocean onto a shore. We could lift it into the air if necessary."

  "You do salvage for hire?"

  "And for necessity. Vast amounts of common and precious metals are on sunken marine vessels. Expansion sections of this ship were built from recycled materials we salvaged from wreckage," says Captain Nemolopolus with pride.

  "Can't you just buy the raw materials?"

  "Yes, we can. But the Barge must maintain secrecy regarding its needs and physical makeup. What keeps this ship strong and safe is that no one in the world knows what resources we need to operate or repair this vessel. If a country we were getting materials from knew those materials were to make this ship bigger or better, or to fuel this ship, they might withhold it or make acquisition difficult unless we did favors in exchange for those resources. I can't let any world power control us, or pressure us that way. It's why we collect our uranium from seawater."

  "Don't have that worry anymore. Any remaining functioning governments are too busy crumbling. Back to this blueprint, are you telling me those salvage clamps are operational?"

  "Yes. And contained in the tactical information I was reviewing from the future transmission, I used those clamps in our last loop's attack against the Greys as docking clamps to board their ship. The plan looked good, except I don't know how it was done. Those clamps aren't sufficient to do what I saw in the tactical report, which is penetrate the Grey ship hull."

  "It will be. Apparently, I came up with a way to turn them into an interdimensional docking clamp."

  "What is an interdimensional docking clamp?"

  "Grey ships are composed of super high-tensile hulls and powerful shields surrounding them. The Barge clamps require tremendous pressure to collapse Grey shielding and isn't capable of the pressure to puncture the Grey ship hull. The Greys could easily break free of the clamp's grasp, preventing our ability to dock. What I did was wrap the clamps with tesseract coils when they were extended and closed; the same coi
ls I used for unifying gravity and electromagnetism to create dimensional rifts. It causes the clamps at the front section of the barge," Walter points on the blueprints, "...from here to here...to be inside the rift bubble when the coils are activated. The tips of the clamps will be in the fifth dimension."

  "How does that help us dock?" asks Captain Nemolopolus.

  "Well, what we deduced in the future was it works as a ram meld."

  "That tells me nothing."

  "Have a seat."

  Captain Nemolopolus sits, ready to listen.

  Water explains, "The notes included here tell me how we came to this. I gather you are sending out scanner drones to see what is going on with the Greys and humans on the mainland."

  "I have been doing that. The only Grey activity or presence I see on land are these..."

  "...Fabricator ships," interrupts Walter.

  "...I haven't named them yet, but that's a good description. Fits what I was thinking."

  "You named them according to this document. It doesn't say what those ships are. It is written as if we should know."

  Captain Nemolopolus informs, "From what the drones observed, these Fabricator ships create massive land terraforming machines that you said deconstruct human construction. They hover over the ground, and below them they fabricate terraforming machines from thin air, although the process resembles 3D printing, without the printer."

  "It doesn't come out of thin air."

  "I know. I find your comment unusually condescending for you, Walter."

  "Sorry. Getting this information on things I built and didn't invent yet makes me feel like I'm cheating, like I'm doing nothing. But I did it. These time loops mess with my emotions. Making discoveries gives me an adrenaline high; I experience a sense of achievement. With these transmissions, I see the failed successes of inventions I haven't created yet, and experience none of the rush. Great ideas that work but don't."

  "What do you mean, work but don't? Are you saying nothing works?"

  "No, no. Everything here works, just that...there's a term I came up with. A temporal loop has an elliptical nexus I labeled the 'nexus of time'. It is the point on a temporal loop where a loop ends, connecting the last transmission from the future to the beginning of the loop in the past, and then splits free continuing on to create a new history from the loop's events, resulting in a different outcome. You understand, the whole point of creating temporal loops is that each time we go through a loop we benefit from the discoveries made in the last loop instead of discovering research from scratch each time. The next loop will build on the research and inventions of the last loop, getting us closer to a nexus that produces an outcome we want."

  "I get that. That is why this...stuff...," Captain points at the information and images on the multiple monitors. "...was sent back."

  "Correct. And that loop had a nexus of time. Those versions of us, once they hit the nexus, had to play out whatever future came from those discoveries."

  "When is our nexus moment? Can you predict it?"

  Walter takes a moment to sip from his glass of ice water before responding, "I can explain what is it, but not when it happens. It is at the moment of the last transmission from the future into the past. That is the end of that loop where the connection from the future to past becomes severed. The videos Dr. Black and I got were from the nexus. The future 'us' decided that connecting the videos from the first transmission gives us time to change the outcome."

  "What happens after the nexus? To us in the future after future 'you' send the videos?"

  Walter pauses before answering, "We fail. All this research, as far as we take it, we fail. And die. Everyone. Keep in mind, there is a possibility that victory is not possible."

  "Isn't the whole point of these loops to give us victory?"

  "It is to give us a chance for a victory. This is our fifth loop. If we don't get it right this time, I will send a message back from our nexus point, our point of failure, to warn the next loop not to make the same mistake."

  "The whole point of this loop might be nothing more than to warn the next loop?"

  "Yes. And you must not tell anyone."

  "Of course not. The Barge has faced death many times, but I always tell my crew we are facing victory. We cannot win if our goal is to not lose. I understand now why you are so tense. But let us get back to thinking victory."

  "Okay. The loop before last, we failed because we didn't act fast enough and the Greys came and got us. Last time, you selected a target to attack, one of these Fabricator ships. It was successful to a point."

  "What point?"

  "The point that you picked a good target. It was my technology that came up short. One thing I got from a document included with the video is it took us too long to board the Grey ship once we docked with it. We successfully attached to their ship, but the Greys on the ship were able to recoup and fight back before we could take advantage of being docked. I need to figure out a way to speed up penetration, so we can board the ship faster and keep the Greys from recovering during the attack."

  "Explain how this interdimensional clamp setup is supposed to work. Maybe I can come up with an idea."

  Walter smiles at him, "I'm hoping you can. This clamp rift creates a dimensional bubble in the front of our ship instead of solid clamps. We then ram the Grey craft with this frontal rift point. Even though their ship has a shield and a high-density hull, neither can block out a dimensional rift. The rift penetrates their shield and the hull, and a section of their hull enters the fifth dimension when it touches the rift. This puts both our clamp and their hull in the rift at the same moment, and two objects occupying the same space inside the rift at the same time will combine if they exit the rift at the same moment. Closing the tesseract coil rift while our ship's clamps are intermeshed with the Grey's hull causes the two ships to become inseparable at that spot, melding together, or docking. Thus, our clamps penetrate their hull without having to puncture it."

  "Something doesn't make sense, Walter. You said if the rift is moving, matter entering the rift will go into the past or the future, and not stay in the present. So why doesn't the part of the clamp in the rift disappear into another time when the rift is closed?"

  "For a moment, it will. Yet, because it's physically attached to our time and dimension by the rest of the clamp, the clamp tip is pulled back into the present."

  Captain Nemolopolus strums his fingers while staring at nothing, "That answers that. Now, if I imagine a scenario where the Barge connects to the Grey Fabricator ship, I see the Greys wanting to attack the Barge. But their weapons are too powerful, meant to destroy a ship with a single shot. Attacking our ship with those weapons while their ship is connected to ours would destroy their ship as well. The Greys are not suicidal, and with their population being in the thousands, they won't sacrifice their ship or people just to destroy us. Their ship shielding can't block us out, since the shielding lacks the ability to differentiate where their ship ends and ours starts at the point of integration. Penetrating their hull, we can get on their ship. If this tactical approach worked for the Barge last loop, why couldn't we take the ship? Where did it go wrong?"

  "Time, ironically, was not on our side. The plans I see here used high-intensity plasma torches to cut through the Grey hull, but from this document sent with the videos, it took over twenty minutes for four plasma torches to cut an opening large enough to pass through. In that time, Greys on their side of the ship gathered at the location. The moment we breached the hull, a firefight took place right there at the opening between us and the Greys."

  "So, the issue was the Grey hull integrity. Their alloy is too hard. Shame we can't combine it with a giant apple like in Dr. Black's experiment. Maybe we could then cut through it as easily as she cut through that apple-tennis ball," jokes Captain Nemolopolus.

  "I...that is actually a good idea!"

  "Don't be sarcastic, Walter, I was just joking."

  "No, I'm not. An apple is eig
hty-five percent water. That is why Dr. Black sliced through it without effort. When we put both their hull and our iridium titanium alloy clamps in the rift together, we are combining two hard materials, which once combined either keeps them as strong as the weakest or might even make the hull harder. But if we integrate their hull with an apple, the result is a soft material composed primarily of water, which a plasma torch could cut, melt or vaporize with ease!"

  "I appreciate your excitement, Walter, but giant apples don't exist. And we don't have many apples left on this ship. We barely have enough to fill a bucket."

  Walter drinks the last of his ice water, taking a cube into his mouth and chewing it. Nemo looks over the holographic schematics of the Barge, pondering the problem. Suddenly, Walter spits the ice that was in his mouth onto his hand. This action catches Nemo's attention.

  "You ok, Walter?"

  "Yeah, I'm...fine. Better than fine. We are in the Arctic. Lots of ice in the arctic."

  "Yes. That is the Arctic. Land of ice," states Captain Nemolopolus.

  "Ice is solid, easy to handle, easy to melt, and shrinks ten percent in space when it returns to liquid form. That's it. We add ice! If we can combine their ship's hull with ice, we should be able to melt a hole very fast. The ice will shrink causing the hull to weaken as it liquefies, preventing the hull from being able to maintain integrity. And with plasma torches, we can make an opening as big as the ice block we use in a minute or two. We'll be able to board their ship almost as quick as we can link to it."

  "But didn't Dr. Black's apple-tennis ball reseal itself, reconnect where cut, because of molecule alignment or something?"

  "Yes, however, her cut did not remove much matter, and the whole object had aligned molecules. In this case, only the spot at the clamp location will have aligned molecules and we will remove or melt most of them away. The rest of the ship will be normal, and the hull hole will remain open."