by John Ringo
“I guess,” Weaver said. “The thing is we can determine where the bosons are going, now, and when they’ll arrive at various points on their travels. And I think I can determine, based on what limited data we have, where they’ll stop.”
“You’re kidding, right?” Garcia asked, sliding his chair over.
“No,” Weaver said. “Look at this track, A-4, generated about an hour after you got the instruments up; thanks by the way.”
“No problem,” Garcia replied.
“Zig, zag, zag, seventeen degree skew turn, zag, increase in size of moment by a fraction and repeat. Run that through the equation, superimpose and, voila, passes perfectly through Eustis, Florida, after going in a vaguely circular direction past Sanford and Daytona Beach. Doesn’t quite match up with Jules Court but damned close, close enough for these instruments and this map.”
“What about the rest of them?” Garcia asked.
“I’m mostly backtracking at this point,” Weaver said. “I think the Boca Raton boson was B-14. And am I imagining things or are they increasing in mass?”
“They’re increasing in mass,” Garcia said. “Or charge, not sure which at the moment.”
“Charge,” Weaver said. “Now it’s starting to make sense.” He brought up the computer again and started plugging in numbers, pulling them up from the data from the instruments. “I need to do a field experiment. Go find somebody with a Humvee.”
“Now?”
“Now,” Weaver said, not even looking up. “We’re going to Disney World.”
* * *
The staff duty officer had been reluctant to part with a Humvee and driver but when Weaver pointed out that he was going to be a making a report to the President in the morning, not to mention looking for where the Titcher might break through next, things got remarkably easier. The yawning driver took them down the almost deserted Greenway until it connected to Interstate 4 then turned south to County Road 535. More turns led to a guard-shack manned by a young guard in a blue uniform and a nylon jacket sporting an embroidered mouse that was world famous.
“Can I help you?” the guard said, looking at the driver of the Humvee. The only one available at that time of night was a recon Humvee that still had a 40mm grenade launcher mounted.
“Yes,” Weaver said, leaning over the driver. “Could you direct me to Bear Island Road?”
“Sir, this is a restricted area,” the guard said. “I understand that you think you need to enter here but we’re considered a top target of terrorism. Nobody gets in without a pass that has to be preapproved by the security office. I don’t see a pass. No pass, no entry.”
“Too bad,” Weaver said with a smile. “My orders from the national security advisor and the gun on the top of this thing, not to mention the very pissed off and sleepy SEAL in the back means I can go anywhere. Now, could you direct me to Bear Island Road?”
Chief Miller had just laid his head down for the first time in two days when he’d felt somebody kicking his boot.
“Come on, Miller, the game’s afoot,” Weaver had said, tossing him his M-4.
“What now?” Miller said, standing up. He was almost instantly awake but that didn’t mean he was rested. He looked at his watch and groaned. “Jesus, I just got off the horn to SOCOM an hour ago!”
“You’re a SEAL? You’re complaining about a little sleep? Besides, how long were you out in Shands?”
“What?” Miller asked. “UNCONSCIOUSNESS does not COUNT.”
“Whatever, come on…”
So he was in no mood to be held up by some rent-a-cop. And he’d been waiting most of his adult life for a moment like this.
“Son,” he said, popping his head up through the gunner’s hatch and training the MK-19 until it was pointed vaguely at the guard. “We’re in no mood for Mickey Mouse. Get out of the road.”
* * *
“Where are we and why are we here?” Miller asked as the Hummer pulled to a stop on a stretch of deserted road. There was something that looked like a small factory just down the road and he could see lights and what looked like the top of Cinderella’s castle off to the left. To the right was a drainage ditch half filled with water and then dense forest.
“I think I know where another boson settled,” Weaver said, climbing out of the back of the Hummer and opening the hatch. “I need to get some readings. Help me with this.”
“This” was a box about a meter square and a half meter high. There were also two car batteries to be lugged.
“We need more people,” Miller said, lifting one end of the box. It wasn’t all that heavy but it was bulky as hell. “Where are we going with it?”
“That way,” Weaver answered, looking at a hand-held GPS and pointing into the woods. As he did a car made a screeching turn at the end of the road and came barreling down, yellow lights flashing. It slammed to a stop and two more security guards got out, one of them fingering his side arm.
“If you put your hand on that again, I’ll feed it to you,” Miller growled, flipping the M-4 up to a hip-shot position.
“What’s going on here?” the driver said, coming around the car. When he saw the SEAL pointing an M-4 in his general direction he stopped and raised his hands. “Sir?”
“I think there’s a boson over in those woods,” Weaver answered. “Thanks for showing up. We needed some more help.”
With the two security guards carrying the box and Weaver and the national guardsman carrying the batteries and Chief Miller following along, his rifle in no way pointed at the two guards, they managed to get the material across the drainage ditch and into the woods.
“About seventy-five yards that way and we’ll take our first reading,” Weaver said, pointing slightly to the right.
The woods were pine with palmetto undergrowth and hard going. The only light was the tac-light Miller had attached to his M-4 and it was great for illuminating about a one-meter patch but otherwise useless. The guards continually stumbled over the low, spiky, palmettos, occasionally letting out a yelp as one of the fronds pierced their pants.
“Can I ask a question?” the driver said, gasping. The box was a bitch to carry though a swamp and over palmettos.
“Sure,” Weaver answered. He looked at his GPS again and stopped. “This’ll do. Try to find a flat spot.”
The palmettos were close growing but there were occasional open spots and the guards gratefully lowered the box onto one of them, wincing and grabbing at their hands that had been cut by the thin handles.
“What in the hell is a boson?” the driver said, sniffing. “Do you smell something?”
“It’s what’s causing the gates,” Weaver replied. There were levelers on the bottom of the box and he was busy trying to get it level. “This is a muon detector. They should be emitting muons and we should be able to detect them within about a hundred meters.”
“Doc,” the SEAL said.
“There are two coated plastic plates inside. When the muons hit the plates they cause Cherenkov radiation, which emits a flash of light. Light sensors record the flash and with the two plates we can get a reading on which direction they’re coming from. That way we can figure out which way the boson is and move it around until we find it. The particle itself will probably be invisible to the naked eye…”
“Doc,” Miller repeated, hoarsely.
“But we’ll know where the boson settled. And from that we can extrapolate where more gates might open…”
“Doc!”
“What?” Weaver said, looking up as he realized nobody was listening.
No more than twenty feet away a large, round mirror was reflecting the lights from Cinderella’s castle.
* * *
“The planet on the far side has a reducing atmosphere and what looks like an F class sun.”
The military responded even faster now that there was an SOP for such things. In no more than two hours secure communications and a string of tents and trailers were set up along Bear Island Road and the nationa
l security advisor, rubbing sleep from her eyes, was shaking her head at the physicist’s latest report.
“No signs of life at all; it might as well be the primordial Earth. Very low oxygen levels, high levels of ammonia, chlorine, methane and carbon dioxide. Rocky ground, very dry. Slight overpressure so we’re getting a fair amount of their atmosphere leaking through.”
“No signs of the Titcher?” the NSA asked.
“No,” Weaver said. “From what Nyarowlll told me the planet would be of little interest to the Titcher. But what I don’t understand is why a gate opened at all. I’ve come up with a list of GPS sites and the list is going out to local police for investigation. But if this gate is open, it means most, or at least many, of them are going to be open. This explains the magma pile in Georgia, at least.”
“Do you think it’s the same planet?” the Homeland Security Director asked. “I’ve seen stuff about the early Earth, lots of lava…”
“Those shows are… slightly overdramatized,” Weaver said, carefully. “At the point of advancement of the planet on the far side crustal formation seems to be complete and we’d expect similar tectonic activity to earth or significantly reduced. This is going to be a good opportunity to find out which.”
“But it’s not a threat?” the NSA said.
“Other than atmospheric leakage, not so far,” the physicist answered.
“How many of these things can we expect?” the Homeland Security director asked.
“Well, the UCF anomaly is producing about thirty bosons per day,” Weaver said.
“Oh, my God…” the NSA muttered.
“If every one opens we’re in for a world of hurt,” Weaver said with a shrug.
“Even if they don’t…” the NSA said. “How are these things… spreading?”
“They seem to be following, by and large, certain fractal course tracks,” Weaver answered. “They zig zag around in an apparently random manner and when they reach a certain point, based upon their energy level, they stop. The energy level is increasing, though, so each one is going farther.”
“And they’re spreading across the world,” the NSA said. “If they’re up to Georgia then they’re down to Cuba.”
“Yes.”
“Opening up in open ocean.”
“Presumably.”
The NSA put her head in her hands and shook it. “Sailboats cruising along and suddenly landing in other planets.”
“Well, they’d have to be quite small sailboats,” Weaver pointed out. “Otherwise they’d sort of… crash.”
“Freighters,” the Homeland Security director said. “Cruise ships! We need to get a hazard warning out for mariners!”
“That… would be advisable,” the physicist said.
“We need to get that… anomaly turned off,” the NSA said. “Soon. How many of these gates can the Titcher access?”
“Unknown,” Weaver admitted. “We only have one emergence so far. If we have a couple more it will give me some data. In the meantime I’m as in the dark as you are.”
“How do we turn the anomaly off?” she asked.
“Errr…” Weaver shook his head. “You remember how I mentioned the great big steel ball?”
“That will turn it off?” the NSA asked. “A billion dollars will be pocket change compared to this stuff.”
“I also remember how he mentioned ten years,” the Homeland Security director said, sourly.
“And it won’t turn it off,” the physicist pointed out. “What I might be able to do is steer the bosons somewhere controllable. Maybe. Nyarowlll admitted that their gate openings, the controlled openings, are on small islands with heavy guard facilities. Maybe steer them all to atolls or, I don’t know, Area 51 seems appropriate.”
“I’ll pass that on to the President,” the NSA said, dryly. “In the meantime, try to figure out how to turn off the anomaly and shut at least some of these gates.”
“I’ll put some of my people on the job of monitoring them once they’re found and we’re going to need a whole bunch of people suitable for surveying the far sides,” the Homeland Security director said, sighing. “I’ll put FEMA in charge of finding those people. They know every environmental specialty company in the U.S. This is going to start costing real money pretty soon.”
“Look on the bright side,” Weaver said.
“There’s a bright side?” the Homeland Security director said with a grim laugh.
“Sure, besides the advances that this is going to make in science, we’re looking at multiple worlds that are available for colonization. Sure, so far there haven’t been many that have been worth much and the U.S. isn’t really interested in getting rid of surplus population. But if we can figure out how to steer some of these things to India and China…”
“That’s a point,” the NSA said. “One bright point.”
“So far we’ve encountered two civilizations,” Weaver said. “One of them hostile and one friendly. That, I think, is pretty good odds.”
“Three,” the NSA pointed out. “If you add the Boca Raton anomaly. And I don’t know if it’s hostile or just so impossible to understand it will always be an anomaly.”
“But the point is that we’re encountering friendly ones,” Weaver said. “It’s not all doom and gloom. It’s just very odd. But the U.S. is a master of handling oddities. We take cellular phones and the internet for granted. In time I bet that we absorb gates just as we’ve absorbed every other change. And, for that matter, make money off of them,” he added with a chuckle.
“Okay,” the NSA said, smiling. “I’ll point that out to the President, too. Just as soon as he wakes up. I’m sure we’ll be talking again, Doctor.”
“Yes, ma’am,” the physicist said as the transmission terminated.
He got up and stretched his back, then undogged the door to the communications center and stepped into the other room of the trailer. Miller was sitting at a short range-radio with his feet up on the ledge in front of it, his eyes closed.
“I thought that SEALs never needed to sleep?” Weaver said.
“I was just resting my eyes,” Miller answered instantly and opened them. “I was talking to the director of security for the parks. I’m much more impressed with this outfit than I was just dealing with their rent-a-cops. They’ve got better environment suits than FEMA, a bigger environmental response team than most major cities and a ‘county’ SWAT team that is dedicated for the park and looks pretty damned sharp. The security director, who’s an ex-Green Beanie, and I took a little stroll on the other side. Not exactly a garden spot, but you know Disney. He’d already talked to the director of parks and they’re planning on turning it into an ‘interplanetary adventure’ at very high rates. Suit people up in environment suits and take them for a stroll on ‘the primordial Earth.’ ”
“I just told the NSA that somebody would find a way to make money off of these things,” Weaver said, sitting down. “You know, she wants me to either shut down the anomaly or figure out a way to move the gates. It occurs to me that the people to put on that would be Disney’s Imagineers. They’re some of the best engineers in the world, certainly the highest paid.”
“We’ll talk to them later,” Miller said, standing up and taking the physicist by the arm. “We’re headed back to base. Then you’re going to bed. And you’re going to sleep even if I have to hit you over the head with a blackjack. And I’m going to sleep, too. And I’m not getting up until tomorrow. By then there will be more news, more gates, more data and more emergencies. But until then, we’re getting some sleep. Understood?”
“Understood,” Weaver said, grinning. “If anything comes up, I’ll tell them you’re on another emergency somewhere.”
“Yeah,” Miller said. “In fact, I think I’m just going to check into a hotel. Maybe the powers that be won’t find me there.”
What they ended up doing was talking to the security director who, whether he was appreciative of them responding so fast to a potential threat on Dis
ney property or happy that the SEAL hadn’t killed his guard, arranged for rooms in the Grand Floridian. It was broad daylight when they made it up to their rooms but neither of the two cared. Weaver undressed, took out his cell phone, turned it off, plugged it into the charger he was carrying and hit the bed with his whole body. He never even pulled the covers down, he just fell asleep.
* * *
Shane Gries was sitting on the back of his M-2 Bradley Fighting Vehicle eating a hamburger from Burger King when he heard the distinctive WHAM-WHAM-WHAM of a 25mm chain gun. He dropped the hamburger just as the driver that was manning his own vehicle’s gun opened fire and the first Abrams fired with an enormous slam of sound. He had his vehicle helmet on in seconds and plugged in to the intervehicular communications system before he popped his head out of the commander’s hatch. What met his eyes was nightmare.
Something like a giant green worm was extruding through the gate, filling it from side to side. As he watched a ball of lightning jumped out from a horn on the side of one segment and impacted on an Abrams, which exploded in a ball of fire. He saw 25mm rounds bouncing off the armor on the thing and just as he wondered about Abrams rounds a “silver bullet” went downrange with a sound like ripping cloth, impacted on the armor of the thing and then, incredibly, bounced off, the depleted uranium arrow breaking into pieces and sparking fire.
“Holy shit,” he muttered, keying the Forward Air Control frequency.
“Alpha Seven this is Romeo Two-Eight!”
“Romeo Two-Eight, this is Alpha Seven. Before you ask I’ve already called for JDAMs. Impact in forty-five seconds. Danger very God damned close!”
Shane switched frequency to the company net and shouted: “JDAM! JDAM! JDAM!”
A B-52 or B-1 bomber had been on continuous loiter since an hour after his company arrived, their Joint Directed Attack Munitions programmed to the location of the gate. Because of the danger of the gate the weapons they were carrying were M-82 two-thousand-pound bombs. In the event of their use the only thing the infantry could do was hunker down and hope like hell that the bomb hit the target and didn’t hit them. If it came anywhere near the line it would probably kill half the company.
