The Null Prophecy
Page 29
DO: “First, whatever you do, stay indoors. That goes for your pets too. Don’t try to evacuate, it’s too late for that. What you want are as many layers of solid protection between you and the sky as possible. If you have a basement, then by all means stock it with supplies and plan to hole up until the CME has blown over. Just to be extra cautious, I’d say plan for about two days.
“Second, unplug all electrical appliances. Power might be down right now, but when the CME hits it’ll cause electrical surges in the wiring that’ll fry anything plugged into the grid.
“Third, stay away from plumbing. Surges will go through metal pipes as well.
“Fourth, wet down your house if possible. In case of an electrical fire, it’ll be less likely to burn down.
“And finally, if you have any electrical equipment containing important information that could be erased by surges—a hard drive, for example—put them into cardboard boxes and wrap the outside of the boxes with aluminum foil. It sounds crazy but it works. And people with pacemakers should do something similar. I’d recommend wrapping yourself in one of those aluminized Mylar space blankets.”
AA: “Homemade Faraday Cages—I like that, very clever. Good advice.”
DO: “Allie, one last thing. These precautions, which I urge everyone to take, are still no guarantee against the CME. People would need to hide in bomb shelters at least three feet underground in order to be truly safe. And for people living under a magnetic hole, the danger of being hit by an unfiltered CME is very real. Expect explosive fires and radiation poisoning to be everywhere throughout a hole site. But again, staying indoors the way I explained is about all any of us can do at this point. There’s no other way to protect ourselves from this thing that’s about to rain down on us.”
Allie, mindful it was getting close to launch time, thanked Dallan and asked him to stand by for further updates.
DO: “You bet. Thank you, Allie. Stay safe.”
Allie tossed to Bill Marks, a reporter standing by at the Staples Center in downtown Los Angeles.
“Thanks, Allie. Rioting and looting here are now completely out of control . . .”
She took the brief opportunity to gulp down some water and communicate with Eva via the IFB. In mid-swallow she heard her name being called. She turned and saw Calder coming toward her, somber-faced and suited up.
“Excuse me, Allie,” he said upon reaching her. “But if you’re coming with me, you’d better get dressed, pronto.”
She wasn’t amused and said so.
“I’m serious,” he said, holding up a flight suit. “You win.”
She stepped out of the camera lights. “Calder, I don’t want this to be a test of wills with a winner and a loser. Unless you really want me to go, I won’t.”
He looked her in the eyes. “Okay, I really want you to come with me.”
She searched his face for signs of irony and found none. “What changed your mind?”
“Not what, who. You.” He thrust the flight suit at her. Then gently taking her by the forearms, he murmured, “I want us to be together—no matter what happens.”
“Allie!”
The familiar, bossy voice was shouting into her ear through the IFB, but it seemed to be coming from a long, long way away.
Allie, still staring into Calder’s eyes, leaned in and pressed her lips to his.
“Where are you?!” the voice shouted. “Allie, Allie, you’re on!”
CHAPTER 44
SHOWTIME
MONDAY, MAY 1 (9:15 A.M. PACIFIC DAYLIGHT TIME)
NAVAL BASE POINT LOMA; SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA
ESTIMATED TIME TO IMPACT: 17 HOURS 33 MINUTES
As Calder neared the pier, he was taken aback by the large number of Navy people around Hero shouting orders as if they were in charge. Under different circumstances he would’ve stormed down there and chased them all away. For that matter, he would’ve asked the president on the phone a few minutes ago why in his speech yesterday he’d connected Calder with the Navy.
He let it slide. There was too much to be completed before launch. Like the final stages of evacuating the vacuum chamber and freezing it to nearly absolute zero. There was also the complication of freezing the supersonic booster as well.
Allie, all suited up, rushed up to him. “Okay, put me to work.”
He smiled weakly. “Just go ahead and get aboard. Make sure all your cameras are in place and tested.” He lifted a forefinger. “And no interviews this time until we’ve pulled away. We’re cutting things really close.”
Nearly a half hour later, with every task in the pre-launch sequence completed, he inspected the vehicle one last time. He finished by lifting the vehicle’s rear cover and scrutinizing the collision avoidance system. It was the part of Hero he was most concerned about; it had never been tested at supersonic speeds.
“All set, everyone,” he said at last, in a voice loud enough for everyone standing nearby to hear.
Allie stood up in her seat. “Calder, just a minute. Can we pray?”
He vacillated, but took note of the nodding heads all around him.
“Sure.” Then in a low voice added, “Make it quick, please.”
She thanked her God for the gifts of life, love, and light . . . beseeched him for mercy . . . and asked for his will to be done, through Calder.
At the end of the prayer, everyone—but not he—said a loud amen.
“Thanks,” he said in low voice, despite himself.
In the distance he heard the beating of helicopter blades.
The media circus begins.
Quickly donning his Kevlar helmet, he stepped into the cockpit and studiously worked through the preflight checklist. When he reached the point of booting up the computer, he held his breath and pushed the green button.
C’mon, baby—do your thing.
His heart sank when the nav screen faltered and began fluttering. A moment later, the display settled down and he heaved a huge sigh of relief.
Immediately, he thrust a fist high into the air and the crowd erupted with loud, raucous cheering. Then he pulled the domed windshield shut.
Allie watched the ensigns untying the ropes. When that was done, she heard the telltale whine of Hero’s ignition system. She said to her viewers, assuming there were any, “With all systems go, it sounds like the engine has ignited. For the next few minutes I’m going to keep my commentary to a minimum so Dr. Sinclair can concentrate. I’ll let the natural sights and sounds speak for themselves.”
She pictured the laser and electron beams revving up and colliding—the subzero quantum vacuum shivering in response—sneezing up a spray of innumerable electron-positron pairs. Pictured them being channeled by a magnetic lens into the combustion chamber, like an incendiary river. Imagined them coming together inside the chamber, annihilating one another in brilliant explosions of gamma radiation. According to Calder, Hero generated a thrust equivalent to six hundred thousand pounds of TNT per ounce of matter-antimatter fuel—enough energy to power the average American home for 60,000 years.
The sudden forward momentum pressed Allie against the seat. She fought to catch her breath, could sense Hero’s souped-up propulsion system champing at the bit, like a strapping racehorse eager for the sting of the jockey’s crop.
“Joshua One, this is Point Loma. Please confirm your parrot is on. Over.”
A subtle but noticeable change in the audio level of her IFB gave Allie the distinct impression she’d lost the connection to the production truck.
“Eva, can you hear me?”
Nothing.
She’d worried about this. The Emergency Alert System had access to the finest, most storm-hardened communications pathways known to science, but it was far from foolproof.
“Hello? Hello? This is Allie. Can you hear me?”
Nothing.
Then scratchiness.
“Ye—we ca—ar you.”
“You’re breaking up,” Allie said. “Try again.”
Af
ter a few more minutes of futility, she opted to give it a rest.
“Problems?” Calder asked.
She saw he’d already steered Hero well clear of the bay and was now headed toward open ocean. “What else? Anyway, once you give me the all-clear I’ll ask you some questions as though we were live, okay? They can broadcast it later. We do it all the time—it’s called live-to-tape.”
“Let’s do it now, but fast. I’m about to give the ol’ girl her rein.”
For the viewers’ sake, as always, she’d pretend not to know the answers to her questions.
AA: “Dr. Sinclair, we’ve just left Naval Base Point Loma. Tell me, what’s your plan for fixing the magnetic holes?”
CS: “Sure. There are six holes all together, but I don’t have time to fix each one separately.”
AA: “So what are you going to do?”
CS: “I’ll try to make this simple, but help me out, okay? For starters, there’s something called the Riemannian centroid. It’s a fancy way of saying that if you have lots of points on the surface of a sphere, like the Earth, there’s one unique location that’s equally distant from them all. I’m oversimplifying things but that’s the gist.
“When I did the calculation, I discovered the Riemannian centroid of the six magnetic holes is located in the Middle East. Specifically, Amman, Jordan.”
AA: “But you’re talking about an inland city. Hero’s a ship. How can you possibly get to the centroid?”
CS: “Well, the short answer is that I can’t. But I’m going to get as close as possible.”
AA: “What’s the plan when you get there?”
CS: “We believe the magnetic holes can be disrupted—snapped back to normal—by hitting them with quantum waves of just the right frequency.”
Last night Calder and she agreed not to tell people Hero almost certainly created the magnetic holes in the first place. They felt it would only add to their fears. There would be plenty of time afterward to come clean. Assuming the mission was a success.
AA: “Okay. But how exactly do you do that?”
CS: “Basically, I’ve come up with a makeshift frequency modulator. It lets me change the frequency of quantum waves naturally radiating from Hero’s vacuum chamber. Think of it as a jamming device, like what the military uses to block enemy radio signals. I’ve calculated a very particular jamming frequency that should disrupt and destroy the magnetic holes. And people should know you helped me with this, Allie, so thank you.”
AA: “You’re welcome, but please go on.”
CS: “When I get to the centroid, my job will be to turn on the jamming device and hope it does the trick—that it jams whatever mechanism is causing the magnetic holes. If it works, then the magnetic field should snap back to normal right away, instantaneously.”
AA: “Amazing. And by the way, before I continue, I want to make sure viewers understand something. Dr. Sinclair can’t make the CME itself go away. All he’s trying to do, which is plenty, is close the doors on it, right?”
CS: “Yes—although I wish I could make the CME disappear.”
AA: “How long will it take you to get to Amman? It’s pretty far.”
CS: “Yeah. It’s about fourteen thousand nautical miles by way of the Pacific and Atlantic, around Cape Horn. At five hundred knots it would take us more than a day to get there. But we’re going to be traveling faster than the speed of sound. And Allie—I’m sorry, but the interview’s over. We’ve gotta get going.”
“Allie! Can you hear me? Over.” It was Eva’s voice, clear as day.
“Eva, not now, I’ll call you back. Over and out.”
“But I—”
Allie threw the kill switch. “Sorry, Cald—”
Without warning, Allie was squashed against the chair so brutally she nearly passed out.
“Awright, here we go!” Calder cried out, “Beam me up, Scotty!”
Calder activated the supersonic booster and felt a slight jolt. An instant later Hero accelerated precipitously, as if suddenly unshackled, throwing him back in his seat.
He beamed. It was just as the Haisch theory predicted! Hero’s supersonic booster was manipulating the quantum fields—whittling down her inertia, lessening her resistance to motion—causing her speed to surge.
Calder’s body was now pressed so hard against the seat he was virtually paralyzed. With all his might, he forced his left hand to keep nudging the throttle forward.
With her mounting speed, he could feel Hero straining to hold together.
Please, baby, please.
The anxious seconds ticked away and all continued to go well. No glitches. No alarms.
Still pinned in his seat by the brutal, unremitting G-forces, his gaze flickered drunkenly over the dashboard and landed on the digital speed log. But its cycling numerals were an indistinct blur.
He dragged his gaze over to the navigation panel; the grid lines were whizzing across the screen indecipherably. With great effort he turned his head to the right and left, looking outside for any clues as to Hero’s speed. But the passing scenery—what little he could see of it—was no less of a blur.
A few moments later Hero stopped accelerating. He stared at the speed log until its indistinct numerals settled down. He blinked at the final reading: 1,446 knots. Mach 1.9! Nearly two times the speed of sound—way past his expectations.
Before he was able to tell Allie the great news, he became aware of a strange, disorienting sensation. His limbs moved more freely than normal—even though he felt as heavy (his bum was sunk deeply into his seat) as ever.
He puzzled over the paradoxical sensation—and then it dawned on him. He was experiencing a side effect you’d expect from the Haisch theory. Usually, inertia, our resistance to movement, was inextricably tied to weight, our feeling of heaviness. It was as though inertia and weight were Siamese Twins. But now they’d become detached. His inertia had plummeted significantly—explaining his newfound freedom of movement—but his weight was still the same.
Holy cow!
The discovery would surely win him the Nobel Prize.
But then pessimism, his familiar nemesis, whispered into his ear.
Wait to see what happens.
Wait to see if you even survive.
CHAPTER 45
WEIGHTY MATTERS
MONDAY, MAY 1 (6:05 P.M. CHILE SUMMER TIME)
TIERRA DEL FUEGO, CHILE
ESTIMATED TIME TO IMPACT: 12 HOURS 43 MINUTES
Their pit stop at Cape Horn was as brief as its Chilean Navy station was small. The only year-round residents were a military family who maintained the station’s lighthouse, chapel, and memorial sculpture. The monument—a thick metal plate whose center was cut out in the shape of a flying albatross—honored the countless sailors who over the centuries lost their lives trying to round the Horn.
The family helped secure Hero to the station’s narrow floating pier, remarkable for its bright, tropical-blue color. Then they all rushed up the wooden staircase built into the cove’s scrub-covered hillside to a modest, weather-beaten dwelling at the top. There, he and Allie hit the restroom and then wolfed down some cazuela, an earthy stew of rice, potato, corn, and meat.
As they hurried back down again, Calder eyed the dark, fast-moving thunderheads shrouding the lowering sun. Powerful winds out of the west were whipping up a heavy chop, tossing Hero fiercely about.
When they reached the pier’s pitching surface, he shouted to Allie over the wind’s blustery voice, “Hold on!”
For many seconds, struggling to keep his balance, he waited for a lull in the choppiness that would make it safe to board Hero.
Then it happened.
“Now!” he yelled. “Now!” He bounded for Hero, unlocked the windshield, and lifted it.
Reacting quickly, Allie made for a handhold near the cockpit, grabbed it, and pulled herself aboard.
Jumping in right afterward, Calder shut the windshield and immediately began running through the preflight checklist.
By the time he finished, Hero was pitching every which way, like a maddened rodeo bull.
“Allie, if you feel yourself getting seasick, I have—”
“Don’t worry about me, I’m fine. Just get us out of here. I don’t like the looks of those clouds.”
He was even more concerned about the icebergs in these waters. Hero’s collision avoidance system had worked perfectly so far; but floating mountains of ice were a hazard she’d never faced.
Just as he went to ignite the engine, the dark, pregnant clouds ruptured with fury. Powerful gusts hurled thick, horizontal strands of drenching rain hard against the windshield. The sea all around—where the Pacific and Atlantic oceans collided—rose up and became a white-capped maelstrom.
Hero’s engine came to life.
“Fasten your seatbelt, Allie, it’s going to be a bumpy night.”
“Ha, ha, very funny.” Her voice was tight.
Carefully, he steered Hero away from the rocky cove and pointed her east. The plan was to head up the coast of South America, steadily angling toward the Straits of Gibraltar, and then directly into the Mediterranean.
Inching the throttle forward, he was comforted by the vacuum-powered engine’s ferocious roar.
“Yahoo!” Allie cried out. “Let ‘er ri—ayyyy!”
Hero sprang forward like a cheetah charging an impala.
Calder—his hand still advancing the throttle—struggled to keep breathing; his torso was being crushed against the seat. He glanced at the speed log.
627 knots.
A few moments later they hit the speed of sound—and, still, Hero kept accelerating. Soon her speed leveled off at 1,074 knots—Mach 1.4. Not as fast as before.
He pressed on the throttle to make certain it was fully open. It was.
Why in the . . .?
With no time to figure out why the supersonic booster was under-performing, he forced himself to be happy with going forty percent faster than the speed of sound.