The Null Prophecy

by Michael Guillen

  The very same physics explained a Chladni plate. If applied properly, vibrations of just the correct frequency made the surface warp resonantly into a distinctive pattern of high spots and low spots, which was easily made visible with sand. The grains hopped up and down on the resonating plate, sliding off the peaks and settling into the valleys—the end result looking like a work of art.

  A similar resonance phenomenon was being instigated by Hero. She was sure of it. Tiny, rogue quantum perturbations from innumerable point sources within the Q-thruster’s vacuum chamber interfered with one another, as they radiated outward—ultimately inducing a resonance pattern in the magnetosphere. In her opinion, the physics was inescapable.

  Calder remained stone-faced. “Of course. But—”

  “No, hold on. Given certain reasonable assumptions—about the size and shape of Hero’s vacuum chamber; about the frequency and amplitude of the quantum ripples; about the size and shape of the earth’s magnetosphere—given those reasonable assumptions, my calculations show an interference pattern with six valleys.”

  She paused, twisting her hair.

  Dios, I hope I have this right. I’m so tired.

  “Yeah,” he said, “go on.”

  “And their locations match exactly the latitude and longitude of the six magnetic holes.”

  He began to protest.

  “Oh, c’mon, Calder!” She grabbed the Brody map and waved it in front of him. “This is no coincidence and you know it.”

  “No, I don’t. No, I don’t.”

  “Yes, you do! The calculations don’t lie: Hero’s operation is distorting the quantum vacuum for hundreds of thousands of miles all around her. She’s turning an entire spherical region, including the magnetosphere, into a three-dimensional Chladni plate.”

  “Oh, please—listen to yourself!”

  “No, you listen to yourself, Calder. My calculations clearly show unintended quantum vibrations from Hero’s chamber are radiating outward, interfering, and causing the magnetic field lines in space to dance around like sand grains on a Chladni plate. The vibrations are creating a gigantic, 3-D interference pattern that has six bowl-shaped valleys, six low spots, six holes.”

  “Rubbish! I told you, the ancillary ripples from Hero’s vacuum chamber can’t possibly be significant that far away. You don’t know what you’re talking about. Besides, the whale strandings began before the rescue mission. They and the magnetic holes have nothing to do with Hero!”

  “Calder!” Her insides were a nauseous miasma. “We’ve been through this a million times already. You’ve been testing Hero for how long now? Weeks, right? Well before our mission. You know that’s right.”

  He jumped up from the floor and began stomping around, saying nothing.

  Her eyes followed him. “Look, I know this is far-out. But it fits the data.” She lowered her voice. “And it doesn’t take away from what you’ve accomplished.”

  He stopped dead and snorted. “Oh, really? OH, REALLY?! Imagine what Bradstreet will say if this turns out to be true. It’ll be the end of my work, my whole life’s work. So please, stop with the patronizing.”

  “Calder, you’ve spent your life devoted to science, to the truth. I know this is a hard pill to swallow. But you have to have faith that—”

  “Oh, please, don’t start that again!” He was shouting now. “I told you, I don’t have faith in anything but my bad luck. It’s the one thing that’s never failed me.”

  She gaped at him wide-eyed.

  She could never live with this man.

  Oh, stop.

  You’re just tired.

  She took a deep breath. “Calder, my proposal has nothing to do with my belief in God or your belief in luck. Show me where my calculations are wrong and I’ll take back everything I’ve said. I’ll leave you alone and you won’t have to deal with me or my beliefs ever again.”

  Roughly, irritably, he ran a hand across his face. After some hesitation he held out that same hand to her. “Let me see them again.”

  She sprang to her feet and handed him the pages scrawled with her computations. Then she fell down heavily onto the couch.

  What if I’ve made a mistake?

  What then, Miss Brainiac?

  There was knocking at the door.

  “You get it,” Calder mumbled, pacing, his face buried in the pages.

  She went to the door and opened it.

  “Finally!” Eva exclaimed, pushing her way inside. “My god, Allie. The world’s falling apart and you’re nowhere to be found.”

  “What? What’s the matter?”

  “What’s not the matter? Let’s start with the fact that at this very minute the G-20 is being relocated here to the base.”

  CHAPTER 34

  ON BOARD

  SUNDAY, APRIL 30 (12:35 P.M. PACIFIC DAYLIGHT TIME)

  NAVAL BASE POINT LOMA; SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA

  ESTIMATED TIME TO IMPACT: 38 HOURS 13 MINUTES

  She had no choice but to follow Eva out the door, leaving Calder and their unsettled business behind. Her attention was immediately drawn to the sun’s orangish halo. It was larger and brighter than before—as expected.

  God help us, we’re running out of time.

  She lowered her gaze and saw Agent Aragon standing next to his black sedan.

  “I see you brought the troops with you,” she said, waving to Aragon. They hurried into Eva’s car, which was parked behind the sedan.

  “Just to warn you,” Eva said, “Stu’s having a cow.”

  Allie buckled herself in with an irate flourish. “Yeah, well, let him. I’m only one person and none of this’ll matter if we all get fried to death.”

  Eva pulled away from the curb and sped off, following the agent’s car. “Hush! Just listen. You’re about to go on the air and there are things you need to know.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “The x-ray storms are intensifying. They’ve grounded air travel, even Air Force One. The radiation above thirty-three thousand feet is now way too dangerous; satellite communications are going south—including TV satellites. Stu says they’re taking a beating and lots of them are biting the dust. The network’s having to go back to the old days: UHF and VHF broadcast towers.”

  Allie touched her forehead and shook her head. “Lord! I remember Dad telling us how they used to use rabbit ears to get good reception.”

  Her thoughts froze.

  Apá . . . the church basement.

  It might not be strong en—

  Then an idea came to her.

  She’d get Aragon on it right away.

  “ . . . that bad yet,” Eva was saying, “but Stu says to keep broadcasting anyway and not worry about it. The other thing is people here are starting to lose it. The strandings, the holes, now the x-ray storms and the CME—they want out. They’re jamming the streets to escape.”

  “But where do they think they’re going?”

  “Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada—anywhere to get out from under the magnetic hole. Some people are actually leaving on foot, the traffic is so bad. It’s total mishegoss.”

  Allie stared at her in disbelief. “But the streets were fine this morning. Why all of a sudden?”

  “It’s the morning shows. They got people all hyped up with horror stories about past CMEs and how the magnetic holes are getting worse. The last straw was the G-20 deciding to evacuate here to the base. That’s why Stu made me come after you. I’ve been trying to get you on the—”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know.”

  “Anyway, we’ll be there in just a few minutes. You’d better start . . .”

  As Eva yacked on, their car quickly passing one military building after another, Allie’s thoughts returned to Calder. She wondered what he was making of her calculations.

  More than ever now, everything was on the line.

  SUNDAY, APRIL 30 (12:47 P.M. PACIFIC DAYLIGHT TIME)

  ESTIMATED TIME TO IMPACT: 38 HOURS 1 MINUTE

  Calder, alone in the living roo
m, let Allie’s papers flutter to the floor. He could no longer deny the truth. He felt dizzy and nearly lost his balance. He quickly made for the couch and spilled across it like a drunken sailor.

  I knew it was too good to be true.

  He flashed to one of his all-time favorite black-and-white movies: Carl Laemmle’s Frankenstein, starring Boris Karloff and Colin Clive. He loved the scene where Clive stands up to the small-minded, naysaying scientist Dr. Waldman right after achieving the supposedly impossible and dangerous aim of bringing the dead back to life.

  He’d long ago memorized the soliloquy’s exact words.

  Dangerous! Poor old Waldman. Have you never wanted to do anything that was dangerous? Where should we be if nobody tried to find out what lies beyond? Have you never wanted to look beyond the clouds and the stars or to know what causes the trees to bud and what changes the darkness into light? But if you talk like that, people call you crazy.

  But if I could discover just one of these things, what eternity is, for example, I wouldn’t care if they did think I was crazy!

  He squeezed his eyes tightly. It turned his stomach to think of Hero in the role of the infamous monster.

  Yet math didn’t lie; Allie’s computations were irrefutable.

  My destiny, my great purpose. Right.

  Just more bad luck.

  He recalled a quote he’d once read or heard. Something like: “Whom the gods would destroy, they first drive crazy.”

  Not gods, God.

  Allie’s supposed God.

  What a crock.

  For a long while he didn’t move. Deep down he’d known something was amiss ever since Cádiz, the second time he and Allie were told the whale stranding had disappeared spontaneously—on the very night they—

  Hold on!

  He sat bolt upright.

  Yes, it just might work!

  Rolling off the couch, he grabbed his car keys and raced out the door.

  SUNDAY, APRIL 30 (1:03 P.M. PACIFIC DAYLIGHT TIME)

  ESTIMATED TIME TO IMPACT: 37 HOURS 45 MINUTES

  Pitsy set up the live shot just outside the base’s northernmost entrance, through which the dignitaries were expected to be passing shortly. Allie, standing on her mark, gazed up at the sky. The air high up was blushing red and green. Out of habit her hand went straight for her hair.

  “Don’t even think about it, girlfriend!” Eva shouted through the IFB.

  Allie’s hand instantly retreated.

  “They’re less than a minute away. Stand by.”

  Seconds later she was on the air: “I’m standing at the north entrance to Naval Base Point Loma—and as you can see behind me, the motorcades are beginning to arrive. The president’s press secretary announced late this morning that, out of an abundance of caution, the G-20 leaders are being brought here to complete their meetings.”

  A video clip showed the press secretary urging the public to stay calm and to follow the instructions of local officials. He said the president would be making an important announcement later in the day.

  “Just minutes ago,” Allie continued, “at one o’clock Pacific Time, the governor declared Southern California to be in a state of emergency. He vowed to impose martial law if necessary.”

  She tossed to a video clip of the governor looking glum. Sternly, he warned that the extra police and military backups already here for the G-20 would be used whenever and wherever it became necessary to maintain civil order. He singled out San Diego and Los Angeles, where the first and worst signs of mass hysteria were breaking out. He said people were free to evacuate, but curfews would be strictly enforced and lawless behavior would not be tolerated.

  Allie continued, “Streets leading out of San Diego and Los Angeles are backed up for tens of miles. Reports of rioting and looting have been minimal but we’re told a run is beginning on emergency supplies. For the latest, we go now to our reporter in downtown San Diego, Heidi Shore.”

  The cutaway showed a female reporter standing at a street corner surrounded by bumper-to-bumper traffic and sidewalks crowded with people pushing and shoving their way forward. On their backs, in their arms, in hand-powered carriages of one sort or another, they were hauling personal belongings and goods of every description.

  “Heidi, tell us what’s going on.”

  “Allie, it’s pandemonium here as people are trying either to get out of the city or to hoard essentials. I’ve covered lots of disasters but never anything like this.” She paused to button-hole a young man passing in front of her. “Excuse me, sir. Can I ask you what you’re doing down here?”

  The teenager mugged for the camera. “This is like totally cray, dude! My buddies and I are getting some camping gear and heading out to a cave in the desert.”

  A middle-aged, well-dressed woman said, “I came down here this morning to do some regular shopping, but now I’m not sure what to do. This is very scary.”

  An excited UPS delivery man said, “It’s like the end of the world or something. I’m calling it a day and beating it home. I’ve been trying to reach my wife and kids but I can’t get through. All the phone lines are either jammed or not working.”

  Heidi turned to camera. “Allie, it all started just about an hour ago. The streets went from being normal to this.” She gestured to the stalled traffic. “It began right after the Space Weather Prediction Center announced the magnetic holes are getting worse and the White House press secretary reported the G-20 Summit was moving out of downtown to the Navy base. We’ll certainly keep an eye on the situation. But for now, reporting live from downtown San Diego, I’m Heidi Shore. Back to you.”

  CHAPTER 35

  LOST SOULS

  SUNDAY, APRIL 30 (2:16 P.M. PACIFIC DAYLIGHT TIME)

  NAVAL BASE POINT LOMA; SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA

  ESTIMATED TIME TO IMPACT: 36 HOURS 32 MINUTES

  For an uninterrupted hour Allie reported live from outside the Command Administration building, where the G-20 leaders were gathered. Finally, the network cut away to a brief commercial break.

  “Chica, I need to get back to Calder,” she said to Eva via the IFB. “Someone else can do this.”

  “I know, I know. Hold on.”

  Allie waited—and waited.

  “Chica, what’s going on. Hello?”

  Eva came back into her ear. “Okay, okay, I just spoke to Stu. He says just one more report and you can go.”

  “No! That’s what he keeps saying. I really need to—”

  “Stand by. In ten. . . .”

  Allie growled.

  “Go!” Eva said.

  On the TV screen was a woman standing in a tidal marsh located fifty miles north of the Golden Gate Bridge.

  AA: “As if the mass strandings aren’t enough, now this: birders from all over the world are spotting species where they aren’t supposed to be. With me now is Gillian Woods. She’s chief science officer at Point Blue, a conservation group based in Petaluma, California. Gillian, tell us what’s happening.”

  GW: “Well, as you said, bird watchers are seeing vagrant species everywhere. We expected something like this, but not so widespread. Migrating birds are like whales—they use Earth’s magnetic field to navigate. It’s clear they’re having to fly blind because of what’s going on. Let me show you what I mean.”

  On the screen appeared video of a warbler. Its small blue body was set off by black and white highlights and a bright yellow chest.

  GW: “This is a Northern Parula. Normally these little guys migrate along the Mississippi and Atlantic flyways. But now we’re seeing them here on the Pacific coast. One hundred sightings so far in the Bay Area alone.”

  Allie instinctively looked around her, half expecting to see some strange bird flying by. Moments later, after finishing the interview with Gillian, she quickly segued to the second part of the report.

  AA: “Joining us now is Kyle Post, winner of this year’s World Series of Birding. It’s a competition held annually at the start of every spring in New Jersey
. Hello, Mr. Post, can you hear me okay?”

  On the screen appeared the image of a balding, middle-aged man wearing combat fatigues, a pair of expensive-looking binoculars hanging from his neck. He was standing in a vast meadow beneath a gray, overcast sky.

  KP: “Yes, Allie, I can hear you fine. I watch you all the time. It’s great to be talking with you.”

  The man spoke with a thick New Jersey accent.

  AA: “Great, thanks. First of all, tell us quickly: what exactly is the World Series of Birding?”

  KP: “Sure. It’s a bunch of teams that compete all over the state to see who spots the most bird species in a twenty-four-hour period. My daughters and I—the Marshketeers—that’s what we call ourselves—we’ve been competing for more than ten years and what happened today is something totally new, totally far-out.”

  AA: “Tell us about it.”

  KP: “Well, early this morning we were tromping into this meadow here, Cape May Meadows.”

  The man jerked his hand to indicate the grasslands surrounding him.

  KP: “The girls and me were pretty sleepy because we’d been up all night. But then I hear this call and I perk up. I can’t believe it. I tell myself I’m more sleepy than I thought. You know, I’m hearing things.”

  AA: “Yes, go ahead.”

  KP: “Well, I stand there and I hear it again, clear as a bell: Fee-reet! Fee-reet! I tell the girls and they go, ‘We didn’t hear anything.’ And when I insist, they say, ‘C’mon, Dad, stop pulling our legs.’ Except now I know I’m not hearing things. It’s for real.”

  AA: “And what was it, sir? What kind of bird did you hear?”