by Joe Nobody
The Olympus Device: Book One
By
Joe Nobody
Copyright © 2013-2014
Kemah Bay Marketing, LLC
All rights reserved.
Edited by:
E. T. Ivester
Contributors:
D. Allen
www.holdingyourground.com
This is a work of fiction. Characters and events are products of the author’s imagination, and no relationship to any living person is implied. The locations, facilities, and geographical references are set in a fictional environment.
Other Books by Joe Nobody:
- Holding Your Ground: Preparing for Defense if it All Falls Apart
- The TEOTWAWKI Tuxedo: Formal Survival Attire
- Without Rule of Law: Advanced Skills to Help You Survive
- Holding Their Own: A Story of Survival
- Holding Their Own II: The Independents
- Holding Their Own III: Pedestals of Ash
- Holding Their Own IV: The Ascent
- Holding Their Own V: The Alpha Chronicles
- The Home Schooled Shootist: Training to Fight with a Carbine
- Apocalypse Drift
A few disclosures…
The physics behind the rail gun are being explored by the United States Navy as of this writing.
Technically, the weapon described in this tome is a coil gun. For readability’s sake, I used with the more commonly used description of “rail gun” in depicting technology that moves a projectile via magnetic fields. Both categories of devices do exist.
It should also be noted that I took fictional liberties with the known laws of physics, or perhaps I should state the “unknown laws of physics.” No one really yet understands what would happen if the situations described in this book did occur. Perhaps the story is closer to reality than a work of pure fiction.
While super-hero devices, like Iron Man’s suit or Batman’s cave of wonders are great entertainment, the real story is how a man copes with such power. How would you react if you held the Olympus Device?
Joe Nobody
Contents
A few disclosures…
Day 1
Day 2
Day 3 - Morning
Day 3 - Afternoon
Day 3 – Late Afternoon
Day 3 - Night
Day 4
Day 5
Day 6
Day 7
Day 8
Day 9
Day 11
Day 13
Day 15
Day 16
Day 18
Day 18 - Night
Day 19
Day 20
The Final Day
Epilogue
Day 1
The green LED glowed brightly for a moment, then faded back to powerless oblivion. Dusty raised his hand to give the uncooperative connection a good thump, but reconsidered at the last moment. It must be the weld, he thought. There’s nothing else it could be.
Lowering the welding mask over his face, he peered through the narrow rectangle of dark green glass, making minute adjustments to the mixture of gases fueling his torch. Content with the size, color, and shape of the flame, he shifted his weight, positioning just perfectly for the delicate operation.
“I thought I’d find you out here,” sounded a greeting. “Have you finished the choke on my shot…? What the hell is that, Dusty?”
Sighing, Dusty closed the valve, extinguishing the flame. Lifting the welder’s shield, he turned to face the visitor. “Hey, Hank. How’s it going?”
“I’m doing well, thanks for asking,” replied the always cheery man. “Dusty, what is that… that thing?”
“It’s a little experiment I’ve been working on for about a year. It’s called a rail gun. I read about the US Navy experimenting with larger ones in Popular Science a while back, and I thought I’d try to build a miniature. So far, I’ve failed miserably.”
Hank couldn’t seem to pull his eyes away from the contraption, stepping around Dusty while staring like a boy in a bicycle store. “What’s it supposed to do?”
“It fires a projectile just like a regular gun, but it uses magnetic fields to propel the bullet rather than gunpowder.”
Finally pulling his gaze away, Hank shrugged his shoulders and replied, “So? What good would that do?”
“In theory, you can propel an object much faster with magnets than you can with a chemical reaction, like burning smokeless powder. So far, that theory isn’t working out so well.”
Turning his attention back to the device secured in the workbench vise, Hank pointed and said, “How’s it work?”
“The barrel is actually formed by rare earth magnets from China. I shaped them like doughnuts. The projectile is pushed and pulled down the tube - kind of like a shish kabob through doughnut holes. Magnets become stronger if you surge electrical current through them, so if you time the jolt of power just right, each ring pulls the steel bullet through the barrel while the previous one pushes… hopefully faster and faster as the projectile moves from one magnet’s influence to the next.”
Hank scratched his head, obviously in deep study of the rifle-like invention. “What’s this right here?”
“That’s a cordless drill battery I had laying around - the drill broke last year.”
“You expect to shoot a bullet using a drill battery?”
Dusty grinned at his friend’s skepticism. “Yes, but not how you would think. I ordered a Taser off the web, and I’m using some of the electronics from it. They use an ultracapacitor to store up a lot of juice, so I used that to power the magnets, just like the Taser generates all its power from a small battery.”
Hank knew his neighbor would eventually grow frustrated with his questions, but couldn’t keep his curiosity in check. “So what do you think is wrong with it?”
“I’ve got a bad weld on one of the coils… at least that’s what I think it is.”
“Well, what are you waiting on? Let’s fix it, and let’s see if it works.”
Shaking his head at the innocent contradiction, Dusty handed his guest a spare mask from the bench. After making sure Hank’s eyes were protected, he set about re-welding the problematic connection. After a few touches with the super-hot flame, the procedure was completed.
Without lifting the shield, Dusty moved to the computer keyboard and pushed a key with his gloved finger. The display on the laptop flashed once and then refreshed. The green LED on the weapon’s stock glowed brightly – and remained illuminated.
Lifting his mask, Dusty turned and smiled at his friend. “I think that was it. The computer says all systems are go.”
“Let’s shoot the damn thing, Dusty. I’ve gotta see this.”
The gunsmith scratched his chin, eventually shrugging his shoulders and declaring, “Why not?”
Motioning for Hank to follow, Dusty moved to the back wall of his workshop where the two men began stacking hay. “I normally test a good deer rifle with bales stacked two deep. Today, just to be safe, let’s stack three.”
“Three! Now, Dusty… you don’t think that contraption of yours is really more powerful than a good ole’ 30-06, do ya?”
“Better safe than sorry.”
Nodding his agreement, Hank pitched in and helped finish constructing the organic bullet stop. Dusty then pulled a tri-pod from a corner and set about mounting a small movie camera on top of the stand. Noticing his friend’s inquisitive expression, he said, “If it works, I want to send a video to my brother.”
“Sounds like a little sibling rivalry still lurks. How’s the professor doing by the way?”
“He seems happy enough at A&M. I
don’t know how he stands living in the big city like that, but he claims to be enjoying his research.”
Hank grunted, “College Station is hardly the big city, Dusty. You need to get out more.”
Ignoring the jab, Dusty pulled another piece of equipment from a nearby shelf. “I want to set up the chronograph so we can get a velocity measurement. The software I’m burning into a chip is the key to the whole system, and knowing how fast the projectile is moving will help me with fine tuning.”
The gunsmith reached into a glass jar next to his invention and pulled out a single, shiny, steel ball bearing. Holding up the marble-sized metal, he declared, “Our missile.”
Dusty flicked a switch on the gun’s stock, and the magnets started spinning. He dropped the projectile into the breach of the weapon.
Always the perfectionist, he examined the unit closely, taking a small penlight from his shirt pocket and shining the beam on the ball bearing. Motioning Hank to come take a closer look, he pointed and said, “See how it floats in the chamber? It should stay levitated the entire trip down the barrel… never touching anything. That way there’s no resistance – no friction.”
“That looks like a magician’s trick. How did you get it to float in mid-air like that?”
“The magnetic poles are pushing equally on all sides of the ball bearing. It took me three weeks of machining to mill them down to just the right shape. After that, I had to order bearings from eight different companies before I found a supplier who manufactured product to extreme tolerances. These are from Russia.”
“What are the bearings normally used for?”
“Jet engines… military jet engines.”
Hank grunted, “Don’t you just love the internet?”
Moving back to the rail gun, Dusty adjusted the power setting, the red LED numbers showing 02. “I’m going to give it two percent for the first shot. I just want to see if the ball bearing will move at all. We’ll turn up the power if this works.”
After one last check to make sure everything was in order, Dusty motioned for Hank to lower his mask for eye protection – just in case. Once he was sure his visitor was protected, he hovered a finger over the keyboard, inhaled, and pressed down.
It was difficult for Dusty to tell exactly what happened, the welding mask restricting both his view and hearing. His first thought was that the weapon had exploded. He pivoted, finding Hank lying on the ground, slowly raising himself to an elbow and surrounded by what looked like smoke.
Rushing to his friend’s side, Dusty bent and shouted, “Hank! Are you okay?”
Hank seemed not to hear the question or was unable to respond. Dusty started visually inspecting the man’s torso, looking for any sort of wound. He couldn’t see any bleeding or physical damage.
Slowly, the prone man raised a shaky hand and lifted his protective mask. Staring with a look of terror in his eyes, Hank’s mouth started moving, but no words came out. He pointed a trembling finger.
Dusty turned his head, his gaze naturally following his friend’s gesture.
Dusty inhaled sharply and dropped his mask on the floor. Both men remained silent for several moments, staring at what had been the back wall of the workshop just a few seconds before.
The three-thick bales had been completely cut in half. Behind them, a hole almost four feet in diameter had been punched through the cinderblock, the back wall of Dusty’s shop now equipped with a new opening into his backyard. It wasn’t smoke he’d seen a moment before. It was dust – a small cloud of pulverized cinder block now settling around the shop.
It was what they saw through the new hole that was truly shocking. Fifty yards behind the building, a truck-sized boulder had been split through the middle, each half lying on the ground like a ripe melon split with a cleaver.
Hank finally managed to speak. “Look at what you did to Pilgrim Rock.”
Dusty couldn’t believe his eyes. He and his brother had played on that rock since they were old enough to toddle. It had been their fort, castle, and outpost during countless afternoons of childhood adventure. Now it sat in two pieces, wisps of vapor rising into the air.
After helping his friend to his feet, Dusty walked to the blackened ends of hay, carefully touching the tips as if expecting them to be hot. Glancing back at Hank, he announced, “They’re ice cold.” He then moved to scoop up a handful of the crumbled cinder block. “This feels like it has been in a freezer.”
Going back to the only eyewitness, Dusty grabbed the shocked man by the shoulders. “Hank – what happened? What did you see?”
“I… I don’t know. It was like a streak of black lightening or something.”
Remembering the video camera, the gunsmith removed the small device from the stand and hit the rewind button. Focusing on the small, fold-out screen, he watched, frustrated as one frame showed the pre-shot room intact, the next displaying the destroyed bales.
His next stop was the chronograph. With his mouth dropped open, Dusty stared blankly at the screen. He finally managed to stutter, “That’s impossible,” as he looked at a message on the device’s readout – a display that indicated an error. Turning back to Hank, he declared, “That device is rated to measure speeds up to 9,999 feet per second. There’s no way. That’s impossible.”
Both men stood staring at the rail gun for several moments, trying to reconcile what had just happened.
“What are you going to do?” Hank finally managed.
Dusty’s voice was low and calm. “I’m going to take your advice, my old friend. I’m going to get out more… I’m going to visit Mitch.”
Hank shook his head, “I think I’m going to visit a bottle – I need a drink.”
Day 2
The day wasn’t old enough to be hot. Driving with the windows down provided more than enough comfort despite the slow speed required to navigate the narrow lane. The driveway wasn’t really anything more than a gap in the fence with a mailbox, the grass thinned from the passing of the occasional tire. More from habit than need, Dusty pulled the pickup under the drooping branches of an ancient cypress, the wisps of foliage brushing harmlessly over the windshield as he rolled under the umbrella of shade.
After exiting the truck, he parted the low hanging growth and approached a broad, shady porch. A slightly arthritic, red tick hound dog guarded the area, barely raising its head to acknowledge the newcomer.
“Hello, Roscoe,” Dusty greeted. The only response was a single thump of the animal’s tail on the wooden floor. Taking a knee and scratching behind one of hound’s droopy ears, Dusty softly instructed, “Now, Roscoe, don’t get all excited.”
The sarcasm was clearly lost on Roscoe, who managed two half-hearted wags of his tail in response. Switching ears, Dusty took a moment to scan the homestead.
The old Barlow place was just over 200 acres, and in Dusty’s opinion, some of the best land in the Fort Davis area. A modest, single-story home dominated the grassy floor of a valley, the flatland bordered on three sides by steep, black faced walls of volcanic rock. A large barn and smaller outbuilding stood toward the back of the cut, their rough, aged gray façades evidence that the property was once a working ranch.
Blooming beds of seasonal fauna now surrounded the home, a sure sign of a woman’s touch. Hanging baskets, dripping with ivy, framed the porch, a small fountain of tumbling water adding to the relaxed atmosphere of the retreat. Dusty smiled, approving of both the color and the obvious pride of ownership indicative of the landscaping. This land hadn’t always benefited from such considerations.
Old man Barlow wouldn’t have bothered with such trivial pursuits. He had earned a reputation as a man more concerned with counting his money than wasteful investments in frivolous gardening or home décor. He’d passed away some five years ago, wealthy and alone. Dusty would have never used the word “happy” in describing the old gruff, terms like sourpuss or codger more in tune with the value of his life.
The sound of the nearby screen door interrupted hi
s sequence of memories, as well as the manipulation of Roscoe’s ear.
“I thought I heard someone out here. What brings you over this way, Mr. Durham Weathers?”
Dusty removed his hat and shyly looked down. “I’m sorry to drop by unannounced, Miss Grace, but I’m going to be taking a trip tomorrow and wanted to check on my Last Will and Testament.”
Grace’s tone became gentler. “Durham, you know you’re always welcome here, announced or not. Come on in.”
The lady of the house held the door open for Dusty to pass, the narrow entrance bringing their bodies physically close. She smelled of vanilla and softness, the shine of her blond hair drawing his eye. If she noticed he hesitated too long in the doorway, she didn’t let it show.
Dusty entered the living room and paused. He began to justify his visit. “I’m taking the plane to College Station early tomorrow. I’ve not seen Mitch or his family in quite a while. That’s a long flight for me, and, well, I reasoned it best to have my affairs in order before I left. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be bothering you.”
Grace, placing her hand on hip, threw Dusty a look of “Stop being silly,” but didn’t say anything. “Can I offer you a glass of iced tea or coffee? I just made a fresh pot.”
“A cup of java sounds great, if it wouldn’t be a…,” Dusty started, but Grace waved him off and turned toward the kitchen before he could finish.
He didn’t feel like sitting, instead deciding to mentally dissect the montage of pictures hanging on a nearby wall. The first frame held a college degree from the University of Texas School of Law, the ornate document proclaiming one Grace Amber Kennedy as having been awarded a Juris Doctorate. The next cluster of images held countless awards and honors issued by the State of Texas and numerous legal associations. Finally, his gaze settled on a small group of personal photographs.
Dusty struggled with the words to describe Grace Kennedy. Beautiful seemed like an understatement - attractive sounded almost insulting. Any woman equipped with such a disarming smile, petite frame, and healthy skin was desirable, and surely Miss Grace was all of that. Adding proven intelligence and an extensive track record of professional success to the mix elevated her well beyond mere physical descriptions. Silly words like stunning and gorgeous began entering the male mind. He dismissed the labels as shallow, overused, and cliché.
