“What’s going to happen?” Wes asked.
“Dr. Kellum said those machines pulled the Nimitz through the force field to this place. One machine can’t keep it here, so the Nimitz should go back to where it came from.”
“Then shouldn’t we be on it?” Wes asked.
“Coming through that electric field the first time killed most of the crew. Even if we survived the trip back, the electric charge will blow the fuel tanks on the planes and detonate the munitions. The ship will be an inferno.”
“What about the nuclear weapons?” Wes asked.
“The ones we passed in the hangar were intact and safe, but they’ve got one on the Norfolk they claim to have fired. If Dr. Kellum is right about the effect of this place, then it could go critical if it ever gets back home.”
Now there was a loud hum. The machine was coming apart from the inside, vibrating violently, threatening to tear loose from its mounting. The hum stopped abruptly, followed by a grinding noise and a sudden violent spasm. Then the machine was still. The Crazies watched, faces frozen, unable to believe what had happened.
“Look!” Jett said.
Following the direction his finger pointed past the stern of the Nimitz, Wes could see that the opaque force field was moving toward the Nimitz’s stern. It hit the stern with a flash and a deafening crackle. The Crazies on the Nimitz stampeded, rushing for the rope bridge, fighting each other at the entrance, piling up, creating a human dam. Those on the bridge ran for the Norfolk, but their out-of-step running caused the bridge to vibrate and sway; they stumbled and fell, struggled to their feet, and fell again.
The field swept the length of the carrier with a circle of light. Around the circumference the field was clear, and Wes could see ocean and blue skies. It was a way home that no one could survive. The field caught up with the Crazies piled up at the entrance to the footbridge, electrocuting them. When the field hit the cables holding the bridge, the electric charge was conducted through the cable supports, knocking Crazies off their feet. Two fell from the bridge, dropping silently to the desert, stunned by the electric charge. The field kept coming, swallowing pieces of the bridge. Wes and the others backed away, not sure if the field would stop. With another flash of light, the field finished reshaping, and when it did, the cables connecting the bridge with the Nimitz were severed, the bridge collapsing and dumping unconscious bodies into the desert. Just before the last of the field regained its opaqueness, Wes glimpsed the Nimitz back in the Atlantic, its decks on fire, its planes exploding.
COLLAPSE
Evans ducked behind the generator as soon as he had pulled the last plate free from the acid bomb. Retrieving his gun, he hunkered down behind the generator, ignoring the barrage of bullets, bolts, and spears. It was done. They would die now. Knowing that, some of the hate left him, taking his energy with it. He felt his wounds throbbing now. He was ready to die, but with his mission accomplished he found he wanted more. He wanted to watch them die.
Reaching over the generator, Evans fired a few rounds and then retreated back down the narrow space between the racks of pipe. Aware of movement to the left, he flicked his wrist, firing across his body into the pipes. There was movement to the right; he fired again, driving a Crazy with a spear back under cover. Then a woman stepped in front of him. She was dressed in blue slacks and a blue blouse, her hair neatly combed and curled. Then, as if he had been swatted by a giant hand, he was knocked to the deck. She was psychokinetic and powerful.
Evans came up with a psi strike of his own, but she countered and blocked his blow. Evans concentrated, using every trick he’d learned to maximize his power, but he couldn’t break her. She was half his weight at best, and in a normal fight he would have broken her neck in a few seconds. Physical mass didn’t matter now. It was her power against his, but she had the advantage of time. He had to kill her fast.
Summoning every bit of his psychokinetic strength, he put it into one last all-or-nothing burst of power. It wasn’t enough. She recoiled with shock but quickly recovered. She was stronger. With a blow of her own, she knocked him to the deck. His head felt as if it had imploded, and his vision was blurred. Blood ran from his nose across his lips. Then there were hands on him, holding him. The woman who had beaten him came, wiping a drop of blood from her own nose.
He tried summoning his power again, but got nothing but pain in response and more blood from his nose.
“Should we bag him, Gertie?” one of the men holding him asked.
“No. I broke him,” she said.
Evans knew it was true. Something had burst in his brain. His power was gone. Would this place restore his power? He wouldn’t live long enough to find out.
They stripped him of his weapon and tied his hands, taking him to Prophet. Ordered to sit, hands tied behind his back, Evans watched from the deck as Prophet tried to pry the bomb from the generator. It had a soft seal designed to conform to the curved surface of the generator and space-age glue that made a joint stronger than a weld; Prophet had no chance of removing the bomb. After several minutes of work he threw his crowbar to the deck in frustration.
“Use the gun,” he said to Compton. “Blow it off of there.”
Compton fired round after useless round into the bomb casing. Dr. Lee’s guns didn’t have the power to pierce the metal. Dr. Lee had also added a soft outer coating made up of layered Kevlar. Frustrated, Prophet jerked the gun from Compton’s hands, stretching it to the length of its cable and then firing another six rounds into the bomb casing. Accomplishing nothing, Prophet screamed for someone to bring him an axe. Three men ran from the room.
Two axes were brought. Prophet took one, swinging with all his might. The casing dented, but the soft outer layer absorbed much of the blow. With three more swings Prophet shredded the outer layer, reaching the metal case. But after a half dozen blows the casing was merely dented. Then a sailor pushed through the crowd with a hacksaw. Wisely, Prophet stepped aside and let the machinist’s mate go to work. The mate sawed feverishly. When exhaustion slowed him, Prophet ordered another to take his place. Lee’s alloy was hard, but the hacksaw had created a noticeable groove. Evans worried that they might find a way to save the generator.
There was a commotion in the back, and a sailor pushed through the crowd, hurrying to Prophet.
“The Nimitz is gone, sir. The heretics escaped and destroyed the desert generators.”
Prophet launched into a swearing fit, frightening his followers, who backed away defensively. Evans smiled at Prophet’s rage. When Prophet regained his composure, he shoved the sailor with the hacksaw away and took a turn, sawing frantically. A man in shorts and a tie-dyed tee-shirt knelt, watching the blade.
“We’re almost through,” the man said suddenly.
Prophet picked up the pace. He sawed recklessly, repeatedly losing his place in the groove and resetting it. Suddenly, a brown cloud spouted from the bomb. The man in the tie-dyed shirt caught a facefull, sucking the brown gas into his lungs. Coughing, he clutched at his throat and collapsed. Prophet was coughing, too, as were others near the bomb. As the cloud expanded, it touched Evans, and he felt the vapor react with his good skin, burning him lightly. The mob backed away, dragging with them those doubled up in coughing fits, and leaving Evans behind. Only when Prophet had recovered and the gas had dissipated did they return, approaching the bomb cautiously.
Suddenly there was a change in the sound of the generator. The mob froze, all eyes on the generator, all ears listening to the machine. The generator began to vibrate, and emitted a hum which varied in pitch from high to low. The vibrations increased, the generator moving in its heavy steel mounting. Then, with the sound of grinding metal, the generator seized up and went silent, leaving only the hum of its twin. Suddenly, Evans’s skin prickled and his hair stood on end. His back crackled as the static discharged into the pipe that he was leaning against. For a long minute no one moved or spoke. Eternal life had just been snatched away from the Crazies.
&nbs
p; Evans enjoyed the moment—Prophet’s fantasy destroyed by Evans’s acid bomb.
“It’s over, Prophet,” Evans said. “Your little kingdom is doomed.”
Face blood-stained, hands tied, his power gone, Evans still felt victorious.
Prophet still had his Special ability, but he was as broken as Evans. The kingdom he dominated was doomed. Then Prophet’s head came up, his eyes bright.
“Dr. Kellum can repair the generator,” he said.
The mob murmured agreement.
“We can still fulfill God’s plan and build a new Israel,” Prophet declared.
“Ralph found a way out before,” Compton said. “If he does it again, Kellum could get away.”
“Spread out. Search every level. Kill the rest of the heretics, but bring Dr. Kellum to me alive.”
As the mob rushed for the exists, Rust stepped forward.
“Do you want me to finish the purification?” Rust said.
Evans recognized the leisure suit and the neatly trimmed beard of Rust. He was the Special who had set him on fire the first time Evans had entered Pot of Gold.
“There’s no time,” Prophet said.
Evans felt a twinge of hope. If they left him behind to go chasing after Kellum, he might escape. Then, through blurry eyes, he saw Prophet pick up the axe. He closed his eyes, regretting that he wouldn’t see the last act of the play, but knowing how it would end. The last thing he heard was the whoosh of the axe blade as it cut through the air.
SITE VISIT
Dr. Lee waited nervously in his office for Woolman’s arrival. The director of the Office of Special Projects seldom visited Rainbow, and then only for routine inspections. Today’s visit was different. Woolman’s phone call demanding Dr. Lee’s presence at Rainbow had been curt and hostile. Dr. Lee didn’t know what to expect.
They had detected another escape from Pot of Gold and notified Woolman according to routine. Finding the Special was not Dr. Lee’s responsibility, so Woolman couldn’t blame him if that had gone wrong. The other possible reason for Woolman’s visit was the recent reconfiguration of Pot of Gold’s field, but the change had happened after Woolman’s phone call and the director couldn’t know about it yet. While Dr. Lee waited, he studied the data spread on his desk. Something remarkable was happening to Pot of Gold.
The phone rang. It was a guard announcing Woolman’s arrival. Too nervous to sit, Dr. Lee stood, fidgeting until his boss appeared. Woolman’s normally pudgy face was tightened rock hard, and his bald head was shiny with perspiration. Woolman came into Dr. Lee’s tiny office, slammed the door with a flick of his hand, and glared at Dr. Lee across the desk. Dr. Lee decided to take the offensive.
“I was going to call you,” he said. “We’ve had an unexpected event. Pot of Gold has reshaped itself.”
Dr. Lee’s words came out in a rush of nearly incoherent babbling, but Woolman understood. His face softened slightly and he looked puzzled. Dr. Lee had knocked him off guard.
“What does that mean?”
“As you remember, the field configuration fluctuated in the months before the Nimitz disappeared and then assumed the ovoid shape at the same time that the ship vanished. I assumed that was because the inhabitants of Pot of Gold had found a way to alter the field and pull the Nimitz inside. However, since we have received a negative signal from Jett’s team, and nothing else, it suggests that the Nimitz isn’t inside Pot of Gold as we feared. The reversion of the field to its original shape suggests that the ovoid shape was a temporary aberration, perhaps caused by an external force—sunspots for example.”
Dr. Lee ended with a nervous smile.
“The Nimitz is inside,” Woolman said flatly. “That escape you detected wasn’t a Special, it was a nuclear warhead from the Nimitz’s arsenal, and the warhead was armed. A note came with it from Prophet. He’s ordering us to shut down our containment field or the next bomb he sends out will detonate.”
Dr. Lee lost his smile.
“We must send in troops,” Dr. Lee said.
“If we do, they’ll send out a ten-megaton thermonuclear warhead.”
“But we sealed that gap when we detected the escape,” Dr. Lee said.
“If they got one through, they can do it again,” Woolman said. “The CIA is breathing down my neck over this. They want to know how my agents could miss something as large as a supercarrier in a place as small as Pot of Gold, and why anything or anyone is ever allowed to get out. They want to know why there wasn’t a permanent solution to Pot of Gold before the Specials inside became a nuclear power.”
All of the CIA’s questions were unreasonable, but Dr. Lee wasn’t foolish enough to argue. There had been no permanent solution to Pot of Gold because there was no way to eliminate that little pocket in the fabric of the universe as long as its field was intact. They had tried crushing it with Rainbow’s field, but without knowing the resonant frequencies that had created Pot of Gold in the first place, they couldn’t duplicate the power; and the only two people who knew those frequencies were Albert Einstein, who took the secret to his grave, and Walter Kellum, who was trapped inside.
“They’re making me the fall guy, and I’m not going down alone. You’re responsible for keeping Pot of Gold locked up tight, not me. I’ve never yet failed to catch one of those bastards you let escape, and I’ve lost many good agents doing it. Now they’ve got nuclear weapons and it’s a new ball game. I want to know what you’re going to do about it.”
“What can I do that I haven’t done?”
“You can seal it up once and for all. Forget the Nimitz. She can stay where she is as long as her nuclear weapons stay with her.”
Dr. Lee wanted to protest: teams of scientists had tried and failed for twenty years to find a way to permanently seal Pot of Gold; but nothing rational would satisfy Woolman today.
Then the alarms went off.
Alert beepers sounded all over the lab, giving Dr. Lee an excuse to escape from his office. Hurrying to a monitoring station, he scanned the consoles, looking to see if the field had reconfigured again. He knew from the commotion that something catastrophic had occurred. Technicians jabbered excitedly, pointing at monitors. Dr. Lee recognized what had happened immediately. Pot of Gold’s field had collapsed.
“Call up the field topography,” he ordered.
“What’s going on?” Woolman demanded.
Ignoring Woolman, Dr. Lee studied the three-dimensional picture that normally represented Pot of Gold’s energy field; but now the only field on the screen was Rainbow’s. As he watched, the bubble displayed on the screen was redrawn, the scrolling readout at the bottom indicating a one-percent decrease in size.
“Give me a projection of how long until zero field.” Dr. Lee said.
Algorithms based on every conceivable contingency were programmed into the computer, but it took the technician a few tries to access the unfamiliar program. Once displayed, it took Dr. Lee only a few seconds to soak in the data.
“Your agents succeeded,” Dr. Lee said. “Pot of Gold has lost its field and it is collapsing.”
“How long?” Woolman said crisply.
“It will be gone by morning.”
Woolman thought through the implications. Collapsing Pot of Gold had long been the goal, since it would exterminate the threat of the Specials once and for all. But with the Nimitz inside, it was a riskier proposition.
“There’s no way to stop it now?” Woolman asked.
“No.”
“Can you speed it up?”
“Increasing the power of our field has never had any effect, except to seal exits,” Dr. Lee said patiently.
Dr. Lee had explained this many times to Woolman. Certain resonant frequencies were needed to create a dimensional rift, but once it existed, it sustained itself. Neither Dr. Lee nor his predecessors had been able to discover the frequencies of the original Philadelphia Experiment. The field they created around Pot of Gold’s field wasn’t self-sustaining, and wasn’t capable of creat
ing dimensional rifts. It could only seal exits.
“Imagine opening a window,” Dr. Lee explained. “Once the window is open, you can place a stick in the sill, and the stick will keep the window open. It doesn’t have to be a very large stick to hold the window up—a dowel the size of a pencil will do. While you could replace the dowel with a two-by-four, the extra thickness isn’t necessary.”
“Don’t patronize me,” Woolman said gruffly. “So, if the stick has been removed, why won’t the window close?”
“The window is closing, but slowly, and we have no way to push it closed. It’s all happening according to physical laws we don’t understand. We are monitoring the collapse and should gather a great deal of data.”
“I’ll put our agents on alert,” Woolman said, heading toward Dr. Lee’s office.
Dr. Lee was relieved to have Woolman out of his hair so that he could concentrate on what was happening to Pot of Gold. The supercomputer at Rainbow had run thousands of simulations of what would happen to time and space when the field collapsed. Many of them projected the creation of multiple new exits as time and space curved through the corridors of the ship. What wasn’t clear from the modelling was where those exits would lead.
After an hour of refining the time projections on field collapse, Dr. Lee took his new estimates to Woolman. The director was sitting in Dr. Lee’s desk chair, fingers drumming on the desk top. Dr. Lee sat in the visitor’s chair and presented his time table. Woolman was indifferent, distracted.
“If there is an escape during the collapse, is there any way to remotely determine whether the escapees are Specials or from the team we sent in?” Woolman asked.
Dr. Lee understood Woolman’s concern. Jett and his team were more dangerous than Specials.
“There’s no way to tell them apart except by visual inspection.”
“It’s going to be a long night,” Woolman said.
“But the last one,” Dr. Lee responded.
Ship of the Damned Page 35
