by Bob Blanton
“You were taking a lot of license with your position,” General Wilson said.
“I know, but it was a minor cost, and I was worried he had help with the sonar, possibly foreign help.”
“Okay, so that explains how you know what he was doing, but explain about ‘just cruising’ a little better.”
“Dr. McCormack, his brother, Blake McCormack, his daughter, Catie, and two ex-Marines went to the Caribbean and cruised around for two weeks. They did quite a bit of diving during this time but never in the same area. They then flew to the Azores on a private jet that Dr. McCormack had leased. While in the Azores, they lounged around the island, went to the beach, essentially waiting until their yacht, the Mea Huli, arrived. When it arrived, they moved aboard it and started cruising around the islands. They went out for two days; they came back to the hotel for one; then they went out for three days. When they came back, they sailed the Mea Huli to Lisbon. Dr. McCormack, his daughter, and former Marine Captain Elizabeth Farmer met with the Portuguese Minister of Antiquities, where we presume, they discussed the Chagas. During this time, the commander and former Marine Staff Sergeant Kalani Kealoha met with a chemical company where they specified and ordered a foam compound, which was a completely new formulation with properties that had never been engineered before. This foam was used to help raise the Chagas. Any questions?”
Everyone shook their head, “Go on.”
“While Dr. McCormack, his daughter, and Captain Farmer stayed in Portugal to negotiate with the government, the commander and Sergeant Kealoha sailed the Mea Huli to Casablanca.”
“Wait, they sailed to Casablanca?” Director Lassiter asked. “Around the eighteenth of August?”
“Yes sir.”
“Why is that date important?” Secretary Barrows asked.
“That was when Omar Harrak, a notorious arms dealer and smuggler, went missing.”
“Yes, and his nephew, Muzah Harrak, who happened to work for the Portuguese Minister of Antiquities, also disappeared about that time,” Admiral Michaels added.
“A coincidence?” General Wilson asked.
“I generally don’t believe in coincidences,” Director Lassiter said. “Please, continue.”
“After spending two days around Casablanca, the Mea Huli sailed back to the Azores, while Dr. McCormack and the other two finalized their agreement with the Portuguese. They then flew back to the Azores. While there, the crew from the jet they were leasing joined the rest of them on the Mea Huli. Again, they seemed to just sail around the islands, staying out for five or six days at a time. Like before, the yacht was never in the same place for more than a few hours. On the fourteenth of September they met up with a small flotilla from the Portuguese Navy; they then set sail to a set of coordinates about three hundred miles southeast of where they met the flotilla. When they arrived, the five Americans went diving. They stayed down for several hours, then they and the Chagas surfaced.”
“Unbelievable,” Director Lassiter said.
“I would agree, except that it happened,” Admiral Michaels said.
“Keep going, we’re still not to the jets.”
“At this time, things got quiet. They received two-point-six billion dollars for the Chagas, their company was registered in the Caymans, undoubtedly for tax purposes. They eventually shipped the Mea Huli to Rarotonga in the Cook Islands. While there they enlisted the help of a top international lawyer, Samantha Newman, who negotiated an agreement with the government to give them a fifty-year lease on Manuae, an uninhabited island within the Cook Island system. In exchange, they agree to pay the government fifty million dollars per year over the term of the lease and to invest another one billion dollars in the economy, setting up local industries and also setting up a high-end medical facility for research and treatment of chronic diseases. Cook Islanders are to receive free treatment.”
“Magnanimous of them.”
“Yes. On the sixteenth of November, Dr. McCormack brought his daughter’s great grandparents to the islands, accompanied by his ex-wife. Also accompanying them were Dr. Leo Zelbar and his wife Nikola, both of them are specialists in material science; Dr. Tanaka, a nuclear physicist, and his daughter; and Dr. Nakahara, another nuclear physicist. All of the doctors, except Mrs. Zelbar, were reported to be suffering from Alzheimer’s.”
“And you’re going to tell us that Dr. McCormack was able to treat them,” Director Lassiter said.
“Dr. McCormack’s ex-wife is a medical doctor, a brain surgeon actually, but the treating physician was a Dr. Metra Kumar according to our source. After three weeks, the McCormacks and the grandparents returned to the U.S. The others stayed behind. According to discreet inquiries, the grandparents are both extremely healthy and leading a completely normal lifestyle.”
“Are they treating others?” Secretary Barrows asked.
“They are offering to treat others. It has been very discreet; our sources say they are charging five hundred thousand dollars for treatment; they have also brought in a few more old codgers from various scientific fields who were treated and are continuing to stay with them,” the admiral continued.
“Five hundred thousand dollars, my god, that’s a fortune.”
“It costs upwards of fifty thousand dollars a year to take care of an Alzheimer’s patient,” Admiral Michaels said. “And the people who are getting the treatment are the wealthiest of the wealthy. We’ve had trouble verifying the success since there is so much secrecy around them. But they’re treating over twenty-five people a month. It should go up as the new clinic comes online. Right now, they’re using a hospital ship they’ve leased.”
“That’s over twelve million dollars a month!” Secretary Barrows said.
“Yes, it’s a nice chunk of change,” the admiral said.
“The jets,” General Wilson interrupted.
“Yes sir, the jets, getting there now,” Admiral Michaels said. “In February, our asset noticed that China and Russia both had spies in place on Rarotonga. He indicated that they didn’t seem to be having any more luck gathering intel than he was. On March ninth, our asset reported there was a huge stir. Dr. McCormack, his daughter, his brother, Sergeant Kealoha and Captain Farmer boarded the Mea Huli and left Rarotonga. They were gone for two days, came back for two weeks, then everyone except Dr. McCormack disappeared again for a week. The Chinese incident occurred in the middle of that last week.”
“Finally, the jets,” General Wilson said.
“Yes, the jets,” Admiral Michaels said. “The communications we intercepted show the Chinese pilots reporting that they were being attacked by one jet. They said it was almost impossible to get a radar lock on, and that at times, it was flying at over Mach five. They said it actually outran their missiles. Two Chinese jets were shot down in a matter of minutes. The Chinese launched two more jets, after which a second unknown jet joined the fight. It shot down the second pair of Chinese jets while the first jet apparently attacked the carrier. The carrier Liaoning returned to port with its flight deck severely damaged.”
“Also, during this time, several ex-Marines and ex-Special Forces soldiers have been recruited to join the team in the Cook Islands. Most of the Marines and Special Forces guys are amputees.”
“That’s a strange recruiting pool,” General Wilson said.
“I agree,” Admiral Michaels said. “Most of them have been isolated on Manuae since they arrived. Now somewhat mundane but significant, McKenzie Discoveries just introduced a revolutionary battery into the market. They are now providing all the batteries for Tesla Motors, and they have signed an exclusive deal with Apple to provide batteries for their laptops and phones. These batteries reportedly never age, recharge four times faster than lithium-ion, and hold over five times the charge. They have purchased Johansson Motors and started production of electric motorcycles with them. They are apparently negotiating with Honda Motors to purchase the rights to produce an all-electric version of the Honda CRV.”
“These people
are really ambitious,” Secretary Barrows said.
“Oh, it gets better.” Admiral Michaels turned to the big screen in the room, which was now displaying the pictures of Delphi City.
“How does it get better? And what is that thing?” asked Director Lassiter.
“Our engineers assure us that this is impossible to build without it collapsing in on itself. The platform is eight hundred fifty meters by eight hundred fifty meters; it is floating on pontoons and columns. The columns are impossibly small, the span between columns is two hundred meters, and based on information from our asset, they plan on expanding it to sixteen hundred fifty meters by sixteen hundred fifty meters. They’re duplicating their production of the polysteel from the island of Manuae on the platform, and moving their battery production there,” Admiral Michaels explained.
“Okay, we need to know a lot more,” Secretary Barrows said. “I’ll give the president a brief synopsis, but he’s not going to be happy. We need to get real intelligence on whatever they’re doing,” he said while looking at Director Lassiter.
“I’ll get my best people there immediately. Admiral, I’ll need the info on your assets.”
“I’ll send it over right away.”
“Good work, Admiral,” Secretary Barrows offered his hand.
Everyone shook hands and left. Admiral Michaels turned to Captain Johnson, “Well, we’ve lit the match. I hope we don’t get burned.”
“Yes sir. So do I.”
Chapter 2
Design
Catie walked into Marc’s office and gave her father a cautious look. “Daddy, I have a question.” She sat down in front of Marc’s desk.
“Sure, what’s up?”
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but why rotate the station for gravity? Wouldn’t using artificial gravity work better?”
“Have you read up on the theory?”
“No, but the Sakira uses it.”
“Only when in deep space,” Marc said. “If you use it around a gravity well, then it starts fighting the gravity there. It starts acting like a gravity drive and creates acceleration. Hard to maintain an orbit while your accelerating; and if you want to maintain a fixed position, you have to balance the forces, so you wind up sitting in place with guess what?”
“No gravity,” Catie answered.
“Right. Besides, it takes an enormous amount of energy; the Sakira only uses it at one-tenth G except for a short time each day when it’s set it to full gravity for the crew’s health.”
“Oh, I guess it would only make sense for a deep-space station then.”
“Right, maybe someone will figure out how to get around the problems,” Marc said. “But until then, we have to live with it. Do you have everything you need to design the Oryx?” Marc asked.
“ADI does, she’s doing most of the work; I’m just figuring out what parts we can buy from other manufacturers and convert them instead of having to print them all,” Catie said.
“I hope you’re working on the engineering too.”
“I’m only thirteen,” Catie said.
“Funny, I don’t recall you mentioning that when you called dibs.”
“Okay,” Catie sighed. “I am working on it as much as I can, but I can only learn so fast, and I don’t want to slow things down. I’ve got the lift on the wings figured out, but I don’t have the math to figure out how to avoid the sonic shockwave. I’m just trusting ADI on that.”
“I don’t have the math for that either,” Marc said. “We’re going to need to get a real theoretical mathematician somewhere.”
“Oh! I know just the guy,” Catie said.
Marc shook his head in surprise, “You do?”
“Yeah, I came across him when I was reading up on gravity theory for a class,” Catie said. “Einstein’s model, the one that works for orbits and such.”
“I’m aware of it.”
“Anyway, he has a PhD. in mathematics and was working on a second PhD. in astrophysics. He submitted a dissertation on gravimetric waves, and it got rejected,” Catie explained. “He was only eighteen, and he’s been arguing his case since. He’s teaching at some junior college in Ohio now. ADI says his theory is mostly right.”
“So why should we hire him?”
“He’s super smart; he’ can’t get a decent job because he’s being shunned by the scientific community; he seems to know something about the gravimetric waves that the gravity drives use; he’s a bit isolated so he should be easy to get. And, he’s young enough that he’ll probably be willing to wait to publish and get his revenge until you’re ready.”
“Good points. Send me his info, and I’ll look into it.”
“Okay. Bye Daddy.”
“Bye Sweetie.”
◆ ◆ ◆
Samantha knocked gently on the door jamb, as she stuck her head into Marc’s office. “Marc, gotta minute?”
“For you, I’ve got all the time in the world.”
“I’ll remind you of that when you’re saying uh-huh to everything I say while you’re buried in that HUD of yours.”
Marc removed his HUD, and turned to face Samantha, “I’m sure you will. What’s up?”
“I’m looking at our investment numbers. We’re overcommitted. Where is all the cash going to come from?”
Marc grimaced, “Oops.”
“You forgot to tell me something else. What another spaceship, a new alien species, you can turn lead into gold?”
“Sorry,” Marc said while looking as apologetic as he could. “ADI takes care of the shortfall.”
“How?”
“We opened a few trading accounts; seeded them with twenty-five million each. She’s built them up to about one hundred million each, and now she returns about one hundred million a month.”
Samantha leaned forward in her chair, looking very worried. “How does she do that?” she asked.
“It appears that ADI can sift through all the economic data faster than anybody else, and she predicts the market movements, both stock and futures.”
Samantha bit her lip, “Aren’t you cheating?”
“Everybody uses computers to predict the markets, ours is just faster. Besides, her trades have the side benefit of stabilizing the markets.”
“Stabilizing the markets?”
“Sure, she buys big and early when it looks like the market is undervalued. It forces the price up, keeps it from undershooting too much; same thing when it’s overvalued.”
“But you siphon off a big chunk.”
“Of course, think of it as a stability tax.”
“So, when I tell you that Johansson wants five hundred million to close that deal with Honda to license the CRV design, you’re going to be fine with it?”
“ADI?”
“Yes, Captain. I have one-point-two billion in the accounts.”
“Thank you, ADI,” Marc said. “Seems, we’re good.”
Samantha reached across the desk and slapped Marc on the arm, “I want a raise.”
◆ ◆ ◆
“Hey Liz,” Catie said as she walked up and gave her father a hug. “How’s it going?” Catie synced her comm up to theirs so she could watch the three-D image of the project they were working on in her HUD as well.
“We’ve figured out how to form the pieces to make the hub,” Liz said.
“You’re going to build it in pieces,” Catie said, clearly she didn’t think that was a good idea.
Liz raised her eyebrows and looked at Marc, “Sure, what else would we do?”
Catie ducked her head a little and shrugged her shoulders, “Oh, I don’t know.”
“Go ahead, Catie,” Marc said. “We want this done right more than we want to be right.”
“Well, I assumed you would extrude it,” Catie said.
“How would we do that?” Liz asked.
“At first, I thought you’d form a foam base and spray it on, but that seemed a little unwieldy. Then I realized you should just extrude it like Uncle Blake makes t
he columns and beams. He’s modified the form. Now, it has little wheels that push the beam out of the form as it’s being made.”
“How does that help us?”
“You make the form and fit it with a plasma torch to deposit the polysteel. Put it all on the end of an arm that you can rotate around the center. Some big mass attached to the center to keep everything stable, a magnetic bearing to let the arm rotate. Plumb the mix and power out to the plasma torch,” Catie said.
Liz and Marc nodded their heads as they followed along.
“Then you start rotating it, the speed sets your extrusion rate, then you start pushing the shell down.”
“Wow, that might work,” Marc said. “You just keep pushing it until you’re done.”
“That’s what I thought.”
“What about the rings?”
“You should extrude those too,” Catie said. “Set it up just like you do the hub, but rotate the whole thing around the hub. You probably should do it in quarter sections; otherwise, you’ll be extruding it for months.”
“What happens when you reach the start of the last section?”
“Put a taper on the inside form, put all the hardware on the outside form, then just let the inside form go into the other quarter section. You’ll have to cut the inside form into pieces to get it out of the ring, but that won’t take all that long.”
“That wouldn’t be so bad,” Liz said. “You can cut it with a laser so you can reassemble it for the next ring.”
“What about the holes for the elevator spokes?”
“You slide a foam plug into the form when you want a hole. It’ll get pulled in by the wheels, and then the plasma gun won’t deposit there. Support it on the inside of the form. You can pop it out later when you’re ready to add the spoke. You might want to go back and put a thin coat on the outside, so you’re airtight until you want to add the spoke to the next ring.”
“This should really speed up the project,” Marc said. “I was really frustrated at how long it was going to take.”
