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Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Acknowledgements
Preface
PROLOGUE
BREAKOUT
SPECIAL PROJECTS
SCHIZOPHRENIC
MYSTERY
THE ONE DREAM
TEAM
MARGI
MELEE
BULLETIN
SOLUTION
ANITA
THE DREAM
RALPH
PICKUP
HOSPITAL
KIDNAPPED
FOUNDATION
DALY
PLEA
RAINBOW
LINKED
INSERTION
INTO THE DREAM
POT OF GOLD
FACES
SKIRMISH
EXPERIMENT
LEADS
DIRECTION
NORFOLK
JOURNEY
MOTEL
PROFESSOR
DOORWAYS
INTEGRATION
SOURCE
BARRIER
CONCERN
BATTLE
EVANS
DISSOLVED
EXIT
DISCHARGED
CAVE
GUIDE
PHONE CALL
INFORMER
INTERCEPT
CARLSBAD
THE LOST
HOMECOMING
DOOR
VANISHED
ELIZABETH’S LINK
CAPTURED
RETURN TO THE NORFOLK
NIMITZ
GENERATORS
TRIAL
ACID BOMB
CONFRONTATION
MELT DOWN
ESCAPE
COLLAPSE
SITE VISIT
ALERT
NORFOLK’S SCREAM
BYSTANDERS
RALPH’S LEAD
ENDGAME
CRUSHED
TRAPPED
LAST CHANCE
WRECKAGE
ERUPTION
PILE UP
LAST CALL
AWAKENING
EPILOGUE
Dramatis Personae
Also by
Copyright Page
Thanks to my editor, Bob Gleason, and my agent, Carol McCleary, for their continued enthusiasm for my projects. I appreciate their suggestions and encouragement.
Gale and Abby, thanks for reading and re-reading my manuscript. Is it really true the story gets better every time you read it? Katie, you’re next in line to be your dad’s reader, and then, Bethany, it’s your turn.
This book is for the readers of Fragments who weren’t ready to say goodbye to Ralph.
Preface
The Philadelphia Experiment
On July 22, 1943, scientists working for the U.S. Navy conducted an experiment that had remarkable and far reaching results, and which continues to generate controversy to this day. The goal of the original experiment was to develop electronic camouflage that would render U.S. warships invisible to enemy radar and even invisible to the human eye. Scientists recruited for the project included some of the world’s finest, including Albert Einstein and Nikola Tesla. Based on extrapolations from Einstein’s unified field theory, these researchers believed that by pulsing magnetic-field generators at certain frequencies, they could cause the fields to resonate, thus generating a magnetic field so intense that it would bend light and radar around a ship, making it invisible. Code-named “Project Rainbow,” the electronic camouflage project succeeded far beyond expectations, and according to witnesses, the Navy released a force they couldn’t control.
The destroyer DE 173, USS Eldridge and its crew were selected for the experiment and the ship was fitted with two large 75KVA degaussers (magnetic-field generators) which had been modified for the experiment. These were mounted in place of the forward gun turrets. In addition there were four large magnetic coils and three thousand 6L6 power amplifier tubes. The various pieces of equipment were connected with circuits designed for synchronizing and modulating the magnetic fields. The goal was to adjust the modulations (pulses) until the two magnetic fields resonated, thus exponentially magnifying the combined power of the two fields.
At 0900 hours on July 22, 1943, in the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard, the equipment aboard the USS Eldridge was powered up and the experiment began. At first nothing appeared to be happening, but slowly those on the ship began to feel the build-up of electric charge. The crew had been issued rubber boots and sou’westers to insulate them against severe electric shock. Slowly a green mist formed and the sky darkened. From the outside the ship appeared to be enveloped in a greenish fog spreading one hundred yards in all directions. Then the fog and the ship disappeared. A few seconds later the ship was back, and the experiment ended.
The Navy had succeeded in rendering the DE 173 invisible, but there were deleterious effects on the crew. Many of the men acted as if they were drunk, speaking with slurred speech and staggering. Some were extremely giddy, others were disoriented, and some complained of double vision. Most were nauseous and a few lost consciousness. Despite the effects on the crew, the Navy was excited by the first test of the equipment and ordered continuation of the research.
The second experiment took place on October 28, 1943, at 0715 hours. The equipment aboard the USS Eldridge had been modified to increase its power and adjustments made in the frequency of the modulation. When the equipment was powered up there was again the gradual build-up of an electric charge, and again the ship was slowly enveloped in a green fog which spread out around it. This time, though, just as the ship became invisible, there was a blue flash. Simultaneously, witnesses aboard the SS Andrew Fusureth, which was anchored in the Norfolk, Virginia harbor, reported seeing the USS Eldridge suddenly appear. The Eldridge, which displaced more than 1500 tons, had been instantly teleported from one state to another. Then, just as suddenly, the ship was back in the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard.
This time the effects on the crew were even more powerful. Some members were insane, many were unconscious or violently sick, some were dead, and some were missing. Most horrifying of all was the fact that some of the crew had fused with the metal of the ship, and arms and legs protruded from decks and bulkheads. There appeared to be delayed effects from the experiment, too; one Philadelphia newspaper carried accounts of a bar brawl in which some of the seamen from the USS Eldridge became transparent while others walked through walls and vanished.
Surviving members of the USS Eldridge’s crew reported that during the experiment, time seemed to slow down, or for some, come to a standstill, and that while they were inside the green fog they felt sluggish. Their movements were labored and they felt like they were pushing their way through molasses. After the experiment the crew continued to experience time distortions, and would occasionally “freeze,” or become stuck in time. (During a freeze the frozen person doesn’t experience the passage of time and remains motionless like a statue, letting time flow around him.) Men who were frozen like this were unresponsive and seemingly unaware of their surroundings. Then, just as suddenly as the freeze had gripped them, the frozen m
en would thaw and rejoin the time flow, continuing as if nothing had happened.
While the U.S. Government admits that research was conducted at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard in the 1940s, it denies that any ships were rendered invisible or that any crew members suffered from the experiments. Curiously, the Navy does confirm that there were experiments using high-frequency generators and that these experiments did create coronas, thus confirming parts of the story. Despite the government’s denials, or perhaps because of them, many people believe that the Philadelphia Experiment did take place and, like the Roswell, New Mexico UFO crash and the CIA’s MK-Ultra mind-control experiments, has been covered up by the U.S. Government. Because each of these events has been mythologized in its own complex way, separating fact from fiction is difficult. However, each of these legends seems to be built on the foundation of real events.
While the core of the Philadelphia Experiment story remains the same in most accounts, details of the experiment vary depending on the source. Some sources claim that there was only one experiment in the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard, which took place in July, with the October experiment taking place at sea. There are reports claiming that the ship wasn’t teleported to Norfolk, but instead to another dimension where the crew encountered aliens. Another variation has the ship appearing in Norfolk three years after it disappeared from Philadelphia, and not instantly.
While not all parts of the story can be confirmed, some of the details can. There was a destroyer escort commissioned the Eldridge, and the DE 173 is listed in Jane’s Fighting Ships and other ship registries. The Eldridge survived World War II and was sold to Greece in 1951 and renamed the Léon (there is a web page devoted to the ship). Albert Einstein was indeed a consultant to the Bureau of Ordnance between May 31, 1943, and June 30, 1944, the period during which the experiments supposedly took place. There are eyewitnesses who say they saw a ship disappear at sea, including the ship’s master of the SS Andrew Fusureth, and there are newspaper accounts of the bar brawl that supposedly included crew members of the USS Eldridge.
For the purposes of my novel I assumed that two experiments took place, and that the second experiment never really ended. I have the first experiment taking place on the Eldridge and the other on the cruiser Norfolk. The CA 137, Norfolk, was designed to be a Baltimore class cruiser and was to be built at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard at about the time of the experiment. Records show that construction of the CA 137 was cancelled in December 1945. I moved the second Philadelphia Experiment to the cruiser Norfolk in order to get more space for the action, and because I was struck by the coincidence between the ship’s name and the location to which the Eldridge was supposedly transported. I admit to wondering briefly whether the details from the eyewitnesses might have become confused over the years; perhaps, in fact, the Eldridge wasn’t transported to Norfolk, Virginia, but rather the cruiser Norfolk was transported somewhere in space and time. Could it be that construction of the Norfolk had proceeded in Philadelphia and that the experimental electronic camouflage equipment was moved to this larger ship for sea trials? The existence of two experimental ships might help explain why there is confusion over the number of experiments conducted and their location. It could be that the Eldridge was the ship that disappeared from the Philadelphia Shipyard, and the Norfolk the ship that eyewitnesses saw disappear in a green fog from the middle of the ocean. Certainly, listing construction of the Norfolk as “cancelled” would be the simplest way to cover up the loss of the ship. Then again, perhaps this is just the kind of speculation that gets passed around and confused for fact, and ends up as part of an urban legend.
If you would like more information about the Philadelphia Experiment there are books, web pages, and a movie devoted to it. Perhaps the easiest way to begin your search is to access an Internet search engine and type in the key words “Philadelphia Experiment.”
PROLOGUE
Dr. Lee huddled in the belly of the plane, hands deep in the pockets of his parka, his briefcase at his feet. His wire-rimmed glasses needed straightening, but when he pulled his hand from his pocket it shook so badly he feared he would knock his glasses from his face.
“Want some coffee?” a crewman shouted over the roar of the twin jet engines.
Dr. Lee shook his head, refusing the coffee, knowing he could never hold it steady enough to drink until he was safe on the ground again. With preparation, meditation, and willpower, Dr. Lee could tolerate commercial airlines, but just barely. The flight in the Grumman C2-A was nothing like the comfortable Boeing 767 that had taken him to Philadelphia. The C2-A was known as the Carrier Onboard Delivery jet, or C.O.D. Capable of landing and taking off on carrier decks, the C.O.D. shuttled cargo. Dr. Lee was part of today’s cargo, along with a jet engine, toilet paper, and cases of fruit cocktail.
The loud whine of the engines wore on Dr. Lee’s nerves, and the vibrations resonated through his bones. The C.O.D.’s interior was spartan, with little to cushion his small frame. The two-hour flight to the Nimitz was an eternity to Dr. Lee; he was checking his watch for the hundredth time when a crewman approached, leaning close to his ear.
“We’re almost there. The captain wants you to come forward.”
Dr. Lee nodded, fumbling to work the latch on his harness and failing, the crewman finally reaching over and deftly releasing it. Using one handhold after another Dr. Lee worked his way to the flight deck, where a set of earphones was placed on his head and a microphone pulled in front of his lips. Stepping forward, he leaned between the seats. The pilot spoke from the left seat, pointing through the windscreen.
“The Nimitz is dead ahead.”
There were two ships visible, but the aircraft carrier Nimitz dwarfed its companion. Nearly four times the size of the other ship, the Nimitz was nearly beyond his comprehension. Even from this distance Dr. Lee could see dozens of aircraft parked on the ship’s vast, flat surface, the only vertical structure being the flight control tower on the starboard side. At the forward end of the deck, “68” was painted in giant numbers. Flanking the Nimitz was a cruiser that would have been impressive in its own right, but like the pretty friend of the beautiful homecoming queen, it paled in comparison. Despite working for Navy intelligence, Dr. Lee knew little about aircraft carriers, but he knew the Nimitz and its cruiser were at the center of a battle group that would include another cruiser, destroyers, and frigates, and somewhere hidden in the deep, miles ahead of the flotilla, two hunter-killer submarines.
Proud of his ship, the pilot fished for compliments.
“Ever seen anything like her?”
“Nothing in the water,” Dr. Lee admitted.
“Nothing like her on land either,” the pilot said.
The pilot was distressingly young, lacking Dr. Lee’s gray hair. Dr. Lee thought he looked about twenty-five, but he preferred to imagine him as a young-looking thirty.
“That deck’s nearly five acres, and that makes her as big as a shopping mall,” the pilot continued. “She carries ninety aircraft, counting our C.O.D., and about 6000 crew. That’s about the same as the town I grew up in—Gillette, Wyoming; ever been there?”
“No,” Dr. Lee said.
“Didn’t think so,” the pilot said. “Someday I’ll find someone who has.”
“No you won’t,” Dr. Lee heard over the earphones.
The copilot turned and smiled, and Dr. Lee saw he was younger than the pilot. Dr. Lee gripped the back of the pilot’s seat to steady himself Once composed, he studied the Nimitz, not seeing her as the most powerful war machine on the planet, but as a mass of conducting metal.
“How much steel?” Dr. Lee asked.
“Fully loaded the Nimitz displaces more than ninety thousand tons. I’d guess eighty percent of that is steel,” the pilot said, looking at Dr. Lee. “That’s a funny kind of question. I’ve shuttled a lot of visitors to the Nimitz before—congressmen, senators, reporters—and I’ve been asked a lot of questions, but never that one. Does what happened have something
to do with her steel? She’s been sailing since ’71 so you’d think any problem would have turned up before now.”
Dr. Lee wasn’t good at lying. Now he chose his words carefully so he wouldn’t raise further suspicions.
“I was just curious. Were you on board when it happened?” he asked.
“Yeah,” the pilot said. “I was having coffee in the mess with some of the MIDRATS—that’s the midnight watch—when someone came in saying there was something strange up on deck. We’d been at sea for three months and anything that breaks the monotony is a godsend. It was night so we got a good look at it. There was a green glow just off the bow and a couple of hundred feet in the air. Someone said it was the northern lights, but I’ve seen the northern lights and they look nothing like this. It was the strangest damn thing I’ve ever seen. A kind of green mist hanging in the air—looked a lot like the fog on a radar screen.”
“Tell him about your hair,” the copilot urged.
“Yeah, that was something. I was due for a cut, so my hair was pushing regulation. It stood straight on end in all directions. I was charged with static like I’d never been. I knew better than to touch anything metal, but some of the others didn’t. I saw a three-inch blue spark shoot between one man’s hand and the hatch. I’ll tell you we stayed the hell away from metal after that!”
“Did the Nimitz sail into the green light?” Dr. Lee asked.
“No. The air around us was crackling like green wood in a hot fire, but just when we were about to pass under it the light disappeared.”
“Were there problems with communication?” Dr. Lee asked, smiling and straightening his glasses again.
Both the smile and the work with his glasses were nervous habits. He was calmer now, the hand tremors controllable. Working on the problem was distracting him from the fact that he was a thousand feet in the air in a fragile craft, piloted by children.
“Some communication problems?” the pilot said. “We had broad band disruption running from infrared through radar. At first we thought someone had triggered the jamming array on one of the Prowlers. The F-14 pilots flying patrol weren’t affected, except for loss of contact with flight control for a few minutes.”
Ship of the Damned Page 1
