Kaem grinned, “Touché. But remember I don’t really know how it works either. Let’s keep stazing stuff for now. Then you can take me out to dinner and I’ll answer questions about what we do know.”
Gunnar said, “You want me to set up a strip of Mylar for us to use to try welding things together?”
“Great idea!” Kaem said. Gunnar promptly set to work on it.
Lee opened another moderately large box and pulled out a bivalved mold for the interior of a rocket engine. It had the bulb of the chamber over the bell of the exhaust. There were horns coming up off of it that would form the interiors of the fuel and oxidizer inflow pipes coming together in a fuel injector/mixer. They stazed a temporary stade inside of it, then assembled the engine mold around it. This mold had the outer shells of the inflow pipes and injector built into it. Once a long term stade had been stazed in that mold they opened the shell and admired their gleaming new rocket engine.
They checked the cryotank and—the inner, temporary stade having vanished—it was now hollow. They had to wait another twenty minutes before the stade inside the chamber and bell of the engine disappeared to make their rocket engine functional.
They stazed fuel feed lines and parts for valves and regulators to adjust the fuel’s flow.
The lines were set up to be conventionally bolted together over indium washers but they stazed an extra set. Gunnar wrapped those with his Mylar tape. Kaem stazed the space beneath the Mylar. It worked, giving them a weld, but it was incomplete, stade not having formed in places where the Mylar’d pulled tight and left a gap less than one millimeter.
Pleased to see Kaem looking daunted, Gunnar said, as if it were obvious, “This isn’t a problem.” He wrapped the junction again, this time with waffle cloth first, then a gentle overwrap of Mylar. They stazed it again. This time it not only had a rigid junction, it had one that was airtight as well.
Kaem said, “Gunnar! Amazing idea! Way to go.”
Gunnar waved off the compliment, gruffly saying, “Would’ve been obvious to anyone with half a brain.” Secretly though, he found that getting an attaboy from the little genius felt immensely flattering.
They stazed small LOX (Liquid Oxygen) chambers that would be valve connected to the liquid hydrogen cryotank. Opening the valve, then igniting the mixture would pressurize the tank.
They stazed vanes that would go into the exhaust plume from the rocket’s engine, controlling flight.
When they were done, Kaem turned to Arya and said, “You’ve been keeping track of the volume of stade we made for them haven’t you?”
Surprise on her face she asked, “What?”
“Remember? We’re charging the price of gold by volume for the stade they make while they’re figuring out how to design their tanks and engines.”
“I don’t know the volume.”
“Hmm,” Kaem said, looking at the tank. “About five inches, or 12.5 cm in diameter by about a meter long and I’m figuring a 1.3-millimeter wall thickness. That’d be five hundred and forty-two cubic centimeters.”
Gunnar thought, The kid’s amazing at math but he couldn’t have just guesstimated that correctly, could he?
Kaem continued, “Gold’s worth about fifty dollars a gram, times 19.2 grams per cc would make it nine hundred sixty dollars per cc, or about $520,320 for the tank.” He looked at Lee, “Did you guys figure the volume from your CAD?”
She nodded slowly, “Your estimate on the volume of the tank was pretty close. We had it at five hundred and sixty-three ccs. Plus, another hundred and twenty-eight ccs for the engine.”
Kaem nodded, “Call it $663,360?”
Gunnar thought, Damn! I knew we were charging a lot for this stuff, but… wow!
“Actually,” Lee said, “the price of gold is $50.08”
Kaem waved airily. “Tell Marks we gave him a deal.” He turned to Arya, “You can send Space-Gen an invoice?”
Arya nodded. “What about all the little parts we stazed for them?”
“We weren’t going to charge for things we were interested in, like knowing how bolts and nuts would work and whether we could make valve parts, etcetera.”
Lee looked uncomfortable. “When I told them how much it was going to cost, Mr. Marks asked me to see if it’d be possible to renegotiate the prices of test objects. He points out Space-Gen’s having to pay more than twenty-five percent the price of a full-sized engine for just these samples.” She looked hesitant, “And, you once told me that if Space-Gen inked a deal with you that you’d charge less for test versions.”
“Hah, it seems unfair to put you between us when you work for both of us.”
“I told him that. He asked, ‘Who better than someone with a foot in both camps?’”
“Tell him we sympathize, but we also don’t want to be inundated with test objects. We’ll lower the price to a hundred-dollars a cc, about a tenth the cost of gold.”
“So,” she asked slowly, “you’re lowering the price on this stuff?” She waved at the engine and cryotank.
“No. They agreed to pay that price. I suspect they didn’t figure out how much it’d cost them ahead of time. Shame on them. This new deal, you can tell them you negotiated, is for test objects going forward.” Kaem turned to Arya again, “Can you attach the new price to the invoice, specifying that it’s going forward?”
“Sure.”
Lee frowned, “You don’t have to approve these changes with your Mr. X?”
Kaem tapped his earbud. “He’s got a great AI. It listens in and tells him when he needs to give me direction.” He looked at his watch. “Hey, it’s dinnertime.” He looked back up at Lee, “Are you flying back to LA with this stuff?”
She nodded, “Tomorrow. I’ll be back to start work here later this week.”
“We’ll help you pack it up then.”
Arya said, “I need to have her sign her contract with us before she takes off. How about if you pack up her stuff for her while I go over the contract?”
Kaem looked askance at her, “Sounds like you just want to get out of the packing.”
She smiled, “I didn’t get this job for being stupid.”
Kaem grinned, “Did you just make a joke?”
Arya shook her head and rolled her eyes. She turned to Lee with a sigh, “How about if you and I go out to the anteroom?”
~~~
As Arya and Lee moved toward the anteroom, Kaem asked, “Lee, are you wanting your molds too, or just the stades?”
“As many of the molds as you can get back in the boxes with the stades. They’re wanting to compare the sizes of the molds to the sizes of the finished stades to estimate tolerances for the future.”
Gunnar and Kaem finished up their packing about the same time Lee and Arya finished going over the contract and signing it.
To Gunnar’s surprise, Arya intended to go out to dinner with Kaem and Lee. Is she jealous? he wondered. They invited Gunnar along, but he didn’t want to sit through another explanation of how stazing worked.
~~~
The dinner was pleasant. Arya took them to a restaurant called Simple Fare. Since it was a nice restaurant, Kaem hadn’t ever been there before. However, he thought the food was great. I could get used to eating in places off the University’s food plan, he decided.
Later he would look back on the evening as one of the best of his life. Out with two bright, nice-looking women. Eating some of the best food he’d ever had. Staze seeming to be on solid footing. Treatment was set up for his dad—which might not work, but Kaem had a good feeling about it. He’d worried that Arya and Lee wouldn’t get along, but they acted like good friends.
He laughed at himself. As if they could be jealous of each other over me!
Epilogue
A few weeks had passed. Final exams were over and Arya’s family had come down for her graduation. After the ceremony, she took her parents and her younger brother out for lunch at Bistro Valentin. Having placed their orders, Arya braced herself for the impending interrogation.
>
Her father leaned back in his chair, “We brought the SUV. Do you think we’ll be able to get all your stuff in it? Or are we going to have to hire a trailer?”
“I extended the lease on my apartment. I’m going to stay here for a while.” Probably forever, she thought, but knew better than to say it.
Her father’s eyebrows went up. “How are you going to afford that?”
Arya read the subtext that her father wasn’t going to pay for it. “I’ve started a business with some friends.”
Her father shook his head, “Even if it’s based on a great premise, it won’t do well at first. Startups always lose money to begin with. This is not the—”
Arya interrupted, “It’s already making money.”
Looking dubious, her father asked, “Enough to live on?”
She nodded. “More than enough.” Part of her wanted to tell her parents how much, but she’d always despised braggarts.
He frowned, “What kind of business is it?”
“One of our group came up with an invention. Two more have been developing it. I’m running the business end of things.”
“An invention?” When Arya only nodded, he pushed, “What kind?”
“It’s… a new industrial material.”
Though Arya expected to be quizzed further by her father, the next question came from her mother. “What kind of people are they?”
Arya knew what her mother wanted to know—she didn’t trust people who weren’t of Indian descent—Arya intentionally made it hard by saying, “They’re very nice.”
Her mother looked frustrated by the evasion, but was interrupted by a commotion to Arya’s right. Arya saw her mother’s eyes go there and widen, just before she turned to see what was happening herself.
Kaem!
He dragged up a chair and sat down beside her. “Hi, Arya! Congratulations on your graduation! Is this your family?”
Arya nodded, her mind racing. What’s he doing here?! I told him what’d happen if he met my mother! I’ve got to get him away from us before everything goes to hell? Arya said, “Um—”
Kaem interrupted her by leaning forward, sticking his hand out to her father. He said, “Hi Mr. Vaii. I’m a friend of Arya’s from school, Kaem Seba.”
Her father glanced at Arya, then stiffly shook Kaem’s hand.
Kaem promptly turned to her mother, bobbing his head and saying, “Ms. Vaii. In your society, I don’t believe it’s proper to shake hands with a lady?”
Arya thought, My God, he’s been reading up on us!
Her mother, still wide-eyed, now because she had a fear of African-American men, shook her head. She asked timidly, “How do you know Arya?”
“We’re both Curtis Scholars. She helped me get oriented when I started here and we’ve been friends ever since. Then, this year, we worked together to start a new business.”
Arya’s dad gave her a sharp glance at this.
Oblivious, Kaem continued. “Your daughter’s amazing. She knows so much about the ins and outs of business. Not just the stuff she learned in business school, but the practical stuff she learned from you guys. And she’s so good with people. She sets me straight every time I mishandle someone. When my dad got sick and I couldn’t get him a doctor’s appointment, she set one up in just a few minutes! She’s turned our business into a thriving concern…” He sighed as if in admiration. “I’m sure you guys aren’t surprised to hear everyone around here just loves her.” He glanced at Arya, apparently oblivious to the warning she was trying to project, “I’m so grateful to have met her and to be able to call her my friend.” He shook his head, “You must be very proud.”
“Well!” Arya’s mother said.
Arya thought, Here it comes. She can tell he’s trying to butter them up and she’s going to be pissed.
Arya was not at all prepared to hear her mother say, “It’s delightful to hear someone sing Arya’s praises.” Astonished, Arya turned to stare at the impostor inhabiting her mother’s body. Her mother continued blithely, “Are you here alone Kaem? We’d love to hear more about the new business you and Arya have started. Perhaps you’d have lunch with us?”
No! No, no, no, no! Arya thought turning to stare at Kaem and project her wishes with all her power. Say you can’t sit with us!
Kaem smiled broadly, “I’d be delighted. Arya, is this your brother?”
Arya thought, I should have SAID something. I ought to know by now that Kaem can’t pick up on social cues! She produced a weak smile and said, “Yes, this is my brother, Rhoall. He’s just finishing his first year at the University of Maryland.”
“Oh, great!” Kaem said, turning to Rhoall, “What’re you going to major in?”
When the waitress came over, he slipped her a fifty-dollar tip and talked her into letting him sit at their table, though—the waitress said—it was against policy.
As Arya sat, appalled, Kaem continued charming her parents through the entire meal. Her brother liked him too.
When her father asked about the “new industrial material” their business was founded on, Kaem almost made it sound as if it were Arya’s idea. According to Kaem, he’d had an ivory tower theory that a Mr. X had developed and Arya had turned into a practical business. When quizzed about it, he said things were still supposed to be confidential, but it was a very strong substance that should find lots of uses.
Then, at the end of the meal, though Arya didn’t see him do it, he managed to pay the check. Her dad protested, but weakly, obviously impressed.
After Kaem left, her mother turned to her and said, “What a nice young man!”
What’s happened to my mother? Arya wondered.
Her mother glanced after Kaem again, then astonished Arya by saying, “I was going to complain about how hard it would be for us to arrange a marriage for you, with us up in Hagerstown and you down here. But, maybe you don’t need our help, eh?”
When she got control of her voice, Arya jumped onto this path to freedom, “No, you’re right, I decided I’d rather not have an arranged marriage. I’d rather follow the American tradition of choosing badly by myself.” Choosing Kaem?! she wondered. No! That’d be… crazy.
***
With classes done, Kaem went in to Staze early in the morning. His new stazer circuit boards had come in and he wanted to install a set of components on one before anyone was around. He was getting sick and tired of opening the breadboard version’s case and scrambling the electronics each time they were finished stazing for the day, then opening it again to put them back when they needed to do some stazing again. He kept wanting to just rely on the fact that no one would be able to get past the security on his laptop to command the integrated chip in the temporary stazer. Then he’d remind himself that he couldn’t afford to have them learn the physical setup of the electronics, whether or not they could control the chip and actually make stade.
To his dismay, Lee was already there, working on her laptop. He couldn’t very well keep up the secret of Mr. X if he built a stazer while she was watching.
I’m going to have to build this damn thing back in the dorm, he thought. Which reminded him that he needed to get an apartment now that he could afford one. There he’d have some privacy. As he let the door close behind him, he said, “Hi, Lee. What’re you working on?”
She looked up, “Oh. Hi.” She smiled happily and it sent a shiver through him. “I’ve got video for you to watch.”
Eagerly, he said, “They tested the stade rocket?”
She nodded, “Finally.”
He grinned, “Wouldn’t have taken this long if you were in charge out there, right?’
She grinned back, “Damn right it wouldn’t! Here, have a look.” She turned her laptop toward him, displaying the glossy surfaces of the small rocket engine with flame leaping out the back of it. The audio sounded like muted thunder.
“Why’s the sound pitched so low?” Kaem asked, “When I’ve heard rockets that size before they’ve sounded… higher.�
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Lee’d stopped the video at his question. She shrugged, “To my understanding, they think it has something to do with the resonant frequency of the space between the adjacent walls. But I can’t help thinking stade’s so rigid that everything in the motor, feeds, valves, and tankage vibrates as one large unit that has a lower resonant frequency. Regular rockets must have lots of small surfaces flexing within them, each with its own higher-pitched resonance.” Her face scrunched, “Not sure about the sound from the combustion though. It’s probably producing a lot more acoustic energy than the rocket itself. If so, the resonant frequency of the space between the walls might be the best explanation for it.” She shrugged, “Depends on how much of the sound comes from combustion and how much from the vibration of the motor, etcetera. Is it important?”
Kaem closed his eyes to ponder, then decided it probably wasn’t. He’d think about it later. “I guess not,” he said. “How’d the cryotank perform?” he asked.
“Oh, they’re in awe. They filled it with liquid hydrogen and then just let it sit for a couple of days. Confirming what a great insulator stade is, the pressure didn’t go up appreciably after the first thirty minutes. Then, though it made them extremely nervous, they tried your idea of forcing some oxygen into the tank and igniting it. That shot the pressure way up. The stade pressure regulator they built out of the parts we stazed for them is what’s bringing the pressure down to what they wanted for the engine.” She waggled a hand, “It’s working pretty well, but they’re hard at work designing a better regulator. But that rocket,” she pointed at the video she’d paused, “is running off the cryotank we stazed, combusted to crazy pressures, that’re being stepped down close enough to what’s needed by the regulator.”
She touched a key and the video continued. She said, “Here they start doing crazy things with the fuel flows to see if they can blow up our engine. First, they’re running too much fuel.” Kaem saw the exhaust brighten and extend, expanding outward from the nozzle, indicating that combustion was continuing even beyond the end of the nozzle. Then it started chugging. Lee said, “Here they’re inducing oscillations in the combustion, something that tends to blow up motors.” She looked at Kaem, “Essentially, they’re doing everything they can to demolish our engine and failing. Teri tells me, everyone, on every design team at Space-Gen, has been reassigned. They’ve all been moved from whatever they were working on and instead they’re brainstorming designs that’ll take advantage of stade’s properties.”
The Thunder of Engines Page 26
