Cyborg 03 - High Crystal

by Martin Caidin

  Mueller spoke up. “They could just try to starve us out, Steve.”

  “Sure, but I doubt it. They can’t wait us out too long. They want what we’ve found. This temple, these massive stone blocks, this construction . . . its message of a power beyond anything we know today about controlled energy . . . Something that could change the face of our whole civilization. No, I don’t think they’ll sit and wait for us to give up. Those people out there,” Steve said slowly, “are going to do whatever they feel necessary to get their hands on this”—he indicated the crystal—“or to keep us from getting back to our respective governments with this information. If they can’t get it, they’ll try to destroy it. And us.”

  The huge crystal was balanced on a series of thin, metallike rods in the form of push-pull arms so that it might be tilted at different angles. It was the only place they had seen metal in the temple except for some of the bas-relief plates. The push-pull arms were set in a circle of stone so that the entire device could be rotated about its axis, like a stone ring within a groove. It appeared it would move with no more energy required than could be delivered by one man. Steve elected not to try that movement yet, until he better understood this incredible apparatus. In the “front” of the crystal, directly below its centerline, he saw a circular indentation about eleven inches in diameter. It was obviously a lens within the much greater “lens capacity” of the crystal itself. Now that he had this clearly in his mind, Steve searched for and discovered smaller circular lenses on each side of the crystal—he counted four in all; the main lens, and the smaller ones, no more than an inch in diameter. He felt sure that whatever energy was fed into the crystal could be channeled through any one of the four lenses. He had worked with all kinds of complicated, exquisite equipment. He had solid background for this judgment.

  The arrangement of the crystal facets, the main lens and three smaller lenses, and the push-pull arms suggested that by moving the arms, and rotating the crystal on its ring, you could effectively aim or direct the energy that had to come from the lens—in this case the largest circle. None of them had any idea what the material was that made up the crystal. They only had suggestions, supported by hard knowledge. Not even Phil Wayne who had lived and worked with crystals as a mechanic, as a mechanic would work with tools and an engine, would hazard a guess.

  The energy, they were convinced, was solar. Yavari translated the strange glyphs on the walls. The ancient schematics and diagrams, which was what they turned out to be, indicated only solar light as the source of energy for the crystal. If there had been some other energy involved, then it was no longer here. There’d be argument on that point later on when engineers got their hands on this extraordinary package, because the temple could never have been assembled by manpower alone. Other energies had been used here. Right now, though, the crystal was everything.

  The slots cut so neatly into the outer walls of the temple dome . . . At a certain time of day the sun would strike directly in a beam channeled through a slot to the crystal. There, something inexplicable happened to that gentle beam of sunlight. Its intensity was somehow magnified thousands of millions of times within the matrix of the crsytal, and what emerged through the aiming lens had to be an energy beam of unspeakable violence. Steve wondered about the “lightning” that had assaulted Major Ryland’s plane . . .

  Carla discovered the dome itself could be moved. It would slide back, Steve reckoned, so that at high noon, with the sun at its fiercest, the solar energy would fall full onto the crystal from directly overhead. That would be the most intense of all energy levels, and what the beam would or could do under that power was staggering to contemplate. Wayne had talked of a super laser beam, as far advanced over what they did with rubies and crystals in their lasers as a laser was advanced over an ordinary flashlight beam. If this were so, then the Caya—or whoever had taught the Caya—knew how to utilize the energy in a solar beam so they could control coherent light without the necessary pumping systems of lasers.

  If the Caya could build or could get their hands on a crystal of this size there was every chance they worked with crystals of smaller dimension and or lesser energy. And that would explain the manner in which these stones had been cut so perfectly, how one stone went atop the other so smoothly they seemed to have been extruded. It was super-laser welding of a sort that would handle stone or metal or any substance one might imagine. And, Steve reflected, if you could control this sort of energy down to an nth level, then you could transmit energy. Like a microwave system, but so advanced the microwave pulse system would seem like a tugboat whistle.

  And that would help explain something of the strange jeweled model in that lower chamber . . . why bother with wheels if you could have power transmission of that level? The model had a kind of antenna, or receiving dish, and if this picked up beamed energy, it could translate that energy into a repulsion system. (Could there be something buried beneath that glazed surface of the highway?) The principle wasn’t so extraordinary. Magnetic repulsors had been tested for years for superfast trains. And beaming energy, even massive bolts of plasma with the fury of a nuclear fireball, was the kind of program into which the United States and the Soviet Union, in their competitive efforts to develop a system for knocking out the warheads of incoming missies, had been pouring billions of dollars for years.

  So this crystal could be . . . Steve felt the chill move slowly through him. In this most ancient room could be the quantum jump into the future of energy control. It could revolutionize industry. It could make enormous levels of power available to the smallest hamlet anywhere in the world. The energy crisis would be a near-overnight bad memory only. It represented a colossal economic force. It was—

  A weapon. Unlike any other. Coupled with the latest laser systems for pumping vast energy pulses through . . . Steve shook his head. A quantum jump in destructive power. That also was in this room.

  And outside, a group of men who needed to kill them to grasp this reach into the future of unparalleled energy control. He looked at the crystal and knew it was another extension of that moment when the atom climbed from mystery into men’s daily affairs.

  If possible, he would bring the secret of the crystal home. In any event, he would do whatever he could to prevent the secret from falling into the hands of the people Fossengen worked for. He had to smile to himself. Steve Austin, military adventurer. When they’d gone to the moon to explore the distant past they hadn’t needed so much as a popgun. Weapons were hardly relevant against the far more dangerous adversary of cold and the weightless state in space where gravity didn’t exist, where—

  Gravity. Where it didn’t exist. It came to him with a shock that perhaps this was behind the secret of the crystal, of the special energy that literally had moved mountains. The crystal . . . what, indeed, if it didn’t originate with the Caya? What if there was some truth to the old legends . . . The Chariots of the Gods . . . What if the crystal had been brought here . . . Perhaps, then, the crystal from gravityless space was somehow linked to an anti-grav force . . .

  Anti-gravity . . . It was a matter of degree. An airplane was an anti-gravity machine of sorts. So was the Saturn V that had boosted a hundred thousand pounds to the moon on Steve’s own mission. But these were basically inefficient. They fought gravity; they didn’t eliminate it. This crystal was obviously a means of power transmission. Not a new idea. Scientists had been experimenting with microwave transmission for a long time, without much luck. These ancients were far advanced over them with their power systems and lasers. But what if the crystal was also a means of transmitting enormous quantities of energy? He visualized a huge ship receiving an energy beam transmitted through the crystal, the energy channeled into repulsors.

  That wouldn’t be crude anti-gravity. It would be null-g, null-gravity! A smooth, complete blanking out of gravitational force. The nudge of a finger, so to speak, would be enough to ease a ship away from a planet. Or raise a heavy stone to great heights. The possibilitie
s were nearly beyond belief. If there was substance to his notion, then the crystal could potentially open up the entire solar system to men’s exploration . . .

  A fine dream, but now the reality was more urgent. He looked about him. Wayne and Rudy were wrapping up their photography and taping work. Fatigue was closing the eyes of Dr. Yavari, and his daughter was arranging a makeshift bed from their packs. Mueller was in the stairwell, listening for any sign of movement. It was going to be a long night. In the morning, Steve decided they would test the crystal.

  CHAPTER 19

  “Dr. Yavari and Carla haye been plotting the sun angles. I’ve looked at it from a different point of view, but we check out,” Rudy Wells said, tapping a sketch of the dome. “At just about ten o’clock this morning, a few minutes from now, slot number three, that’s over there, will drop a shaft of sunlight directly into the crystal. We’ll have to work those push-pull gimmicks to bring the crystal down a bit. Now directly in front of the main lens—you can see the outline on the wall—there’s about a four-foot section of stone. The way Dr. Yavari reads the inscription, the whole section slides to the side. The crystal beams through there.”

  Steve studied the sketches. It seemed to fit as Rudy explained it. He told Mueller to take up his position in the stairwell again. Once they started working with this thing they’d be wrapped up so tight in it they wouldn’t hear an elephant tripping over his own legs.

  He wondered about Fossengen. Nothing had been heard the night through. They’d taken turns at guard, but outside of animal and bird sounds, and the constant wind, they seemed to be in a deserted world.

  “Stay back from the open spaces when we move the stones,” he warned the others. “Fossengen and his people will be watching for anything. We may be high up but we’re a target for a sniper with a scope.” He looked around. “Everyone ready? Okay, Rudy, the stone.”

  The doctor went to the western side of the dome, pressed against a circular space in the carved inscription. Something scraped and complained with a loud squealing sound, and then the four-foot block of stone slid along a groove to the right.

  “Back from there,” Steve snapped at Rudy, who stepped away from the yawning space in the dome wall. Light flooded the room, bringing new life to the crystal. It glowed from a thousand different places and, as they studied it, searched within the bottomless twisting of light, the points of reflection and glow shifted and took up fractions of an inch away. It seemed to warp vision. Dust blew about them, the wind leaping through the open space, blowing away time and indecision. This was what it was like then, to the Caya priests and their men of knowledge. This was how they felt perhaps seventeen thousand years ago . . .

  “Phil, the stone behind you. Number three slot. When you remove it, put it on the floor and then come here next to me. I want you to be the one to lower the crystal.”

  Wayne nodded. He worked the shaped stone free from the wall slot, brought it to the floor. A beam of sunlight stood frozen, almost material, in the dust swirling about them. But it did not reach the crystal. Not yet, for it was still high over its mount on the push-pull arms.

  Wayne joined Steve, grasped the control rods, really no more than simple levers. He turned to Steve, waiting.

  “It’s time,” Steve said.

  Wayne moved the levers. The crystal came down slowly and steadily. Wayne felt a slight click, and the crystal was in place. The sunlight from the open slot flowed into and was lost within the crystal.

  Light shifted before their eyes. They still looked at the crystal, couldn’t focus. Light shimmered and danced before them. A vibration filled the room. It could almost be heard but it wasn’t sonic. Something disturbed the air.

  It happened.

  A beam of light, pale blue, white also, snapped into existence. A single unbelievably intense flash, real and unreal, impossible and overwhelming in its reality, just . . . existed. The ghostly radiance flashed away, visible for thousands of feet, and flickered out of sight.

  “Phil, lift it up!” Steve directed. Wayne moved the control levers, raised the crystal from its resting place.

  Steve studied his watch. “Four seconds. The beam was there for just four seconds, and then it vanished. Why?”

  Wayne was still shaken, but he took hold of himself. “The pulse,” he said. “Whatever happens inside that crystal, it seems to rearrange light. From random to coherent, like a laser. But . . . I don’t know what happens in there, Steve, only that it works. You saw it. We all did. The crystal does something with direct solar radiation. God knows what. When it, well, when it builds up what we call a charge, it pulses it out. Four seconds. Then the charge is gone. It starts all over again.”

  “How long between pulses?”

  “Your guess is as good as mine.”

  “Let’s find out. That last one just went out into thin air. Did you notice anything special about it?”

  “Sure,” Wayne said at once. “Ionization effect in the air. Also some electrostatic fielding. Did you hear that slight rumble?”

  Steve wasn’t sure and said so. “Well, on a small scale, you were hearing thunder. The beam burns through the air. You’ve got heating and expansion. Shock wave.”

  “And I thought you weren’t paying attention,” Steve said. “Look, that hill over there,” he said, pointing. “How far?”

  “Thousand yards, maybe a little less,” Wayne replied.

  “Think the beam can reach it?”

  “It went three times that distance, Steve. I’m sure there’s a range control somewhere, but I haven’t—

  “Later for that. Okay, Phil. Before you bring it down again, can you aim at the top of that hill?”

  He did, angling the position of the large center lens. Then he lowered the crystal again. They waited. It took ten seconds before the ghostly blue beam flicked into existence.

  A thousand yards away the summit of the hill boiled. No other word for it. Flame speared upward as the beam slashed through trees, earth and rocks. The foliage burst into flame. The heat had to go somewhere. Within a second, faster than their eyes could follow what was happening, rocks ran molten, spattering blazing globules in all directions. A screaming sound drifted toward them.

  The beam snapped out.

  They were stunned. They stared at the tight circle of carnage in the distance. Smoke spumed before the wind.

  “Rudy, relieve Mueller on the stairs. I want our State Department to see what kind of tiger we’ve got by the tail.”

  Mueller came into the domed chamber. Steve pointed. “When Phil brings the crystal into position, we get a pale blue beam,” he said. “And that’s what happens.” Mueller looked at the blackened earth, the flames barely seen on the slope, the smoke pouring before the wind. “I want you to see it for yourself,” Steve continued. Then, to Wayne: “Phil, when you bring it down this time, as soon as we get the beam, move it slightly from left to right. A sawing motion. Okay, let’s have it again.”

  Wayne brought the crystal down, waited. Ten seconds.

  Snap.

  The ghostly radiance leaped into being. From the crystal to the far hill, instantly.

  Wayne moved it from side to side.

  The top of the hill exploded.

  Not a blast. A continuing, ripping explosion occurring everywhere the beam touched. The crystal trembled beneath Wayne’s own shaking hands. The tremble was magnified by distance to a slight up-and-down motion along with the sawing effect. The side of the hill was torn to pieces. Flames everywhere. Cracking blasts, overlaid by a shattering roar.

  Snap.

  The beam was gone. The top of the hill was gone. Below, molten rock tumbled and splashed. The line of trees and brush blazed. Wayne raised the crystal.

  Mueller stared. He went to the open space, his hands resting on the stone, still staring.

  “Aaron! Get back from that—”

  Steve didn’t finish the warning. Mueller turned from the open space, one hand raised, his mouth open. He tried to speak but the bl
ood spilled from his mouth and down over his clothes. A black hole showed in his chest, immediately below the neck. He collapsed to the floor.

  “Down! Everybody down!”

  The sniper’s second bullet ricocheted off stone. Rudy scrabbled forward on the floor, reached up to bang his hand against the control. Stone rumbled back into place. Wayne slammed the other form-fitting stone into the window slot.

  Someone groped for a flashlight. When it came on they heard her cry out. Carla.

  “Oh, my God,” Rudy said, rushing to her side. The second bullet, ricocheting off the wall, had struck Dr. Yavari in the head. Fatally.

  CHAPTER 20

  Phil wayne said it calmly, almost like casual conversation, as he attended to his cameras. “We’re trapped.”

  Steve nodded, sat on the floor of the domed chamber, his back against a wall, resting his forearms on his knees. Carla still suffered from shock, but she’d refused any sedatives from Rudy Wells. A good sign. The girl was strong. She would rally. She would have to.