Twisted Spaces: 1 / Destination Mars

by E. N. Abel

  ''Are you OK again?'' Alex asked cautiously, and, when she nodded, released her. She shook her hair like an angry bird its feathers, but stayed sitting on his lap. Mike pushed a champagne glass into her hand.

  ''Damn you! You two bastards owe me an explanation. And it better be a good one,'' she growled from her friend's lap.

  ''Chan,'' Mike began, ''to say sorry we dumped you into that pit would be ...''

  ''An understatement?''

  ''No, a lie.''

  ''What?''

  ''See, we were desperate. We thought the equation to be mathematically correct, but it's so fucking huge. So impractical. Heim himself had made a comment in one of his lectures that a derivation of this monster existed, one of thirteen dimensions only. That smaller equation should - for all practical reasons - perform the same duty as the big one. But he never published it. And we, Alex, Claus Smith and I, were not able to derive it. Also the other one needed to be reviewed - independently.''

  ''Only problem,'' Alex added, ''Nobody was smart enough.''

  ''Then I came.''

  ''Yes. A once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.'' Mike nodded.

  Xao had said that, too. ''So you decided to exploit me.''

  ''Take a sip, Mai-Lin darling,'' Alex suggested, padding her arm. ''It will cool you down.''

  That earned him another punch, this time a playful one. But, trusting him, she did as he had suggested and received another revelation: ''My, this is great!''

  ''Yes, but regrettably my last one,'' Mike remarked dryly. ''From the Legion's chateau.''

  They sat a moment in silence, savouring the excellent champagne.

  ''See,'' Mike picked up the trail, ''we could have used the twenty-seven dimensional one - the software is ready. But it's so fucking complex that it gets a bit slow, also it uses a huge amount of energy - and we suspect it wastes most of it. You know we are talking pico-second intervals and I wanted the best solution possible. Now, with your discovery, we can replace that part of the software, which contains the monster equation with a shorter one. Our two IT chaps are waiting and eager to do exactly that: please send it directly to them.''

  ''I find your way of handling this disgusting,'' Chan growled while typing on her pad, transferring her results to the IT guys. ''You could have just asked me ...''

  ''No, we couldn't,'' Mike answered quietly and very serious.

  Chan took a minute, then she nodded. ''No, you are right. You really couldn't. It would have been different. Wrong focus.''

  ''Yes, that's it exactly,'' Mike replied. ''But, Chan, your thirteen dimensional equation ... does it describe the passing through the wormhole in the fold in terms of a continuous number space? In the mathematical sense?''

  Chan considered the question, then took a sip. ''No, I think it's based on a discreet space. Why?''

  ''What happens during the penetration to the other side?''

  ''You get a gap, a lag ... you mean you don't know?''

  ''Nobody knows.''

  Now Chan needed a little longer to contemplate what she had heard. ''If I understand correctly, you do know how to create a space fold, enter it on one side, drill a hole through its walls to the other side, then slip through and appear on the other side.''

  ''Yes. A wormhole through the fabric of space. Also we can close it again - behind us.''

  ''But you don't know what happens the moment - a picosecond or less - of the transfer, the passing-through?''

  ''No.''

  ''So what do you fear?''

  ''That something stays behind.''

  ''On the entry side?''

  ''Yes.''

  ''What could stay behind? Part of the ship?''

  ''We simply don't know.''

  ''What do you fear it to be?''

  ''Worst case? Some energy. From us humans.''

  ''You mean ... life energy ... your souls?''

  ''Yes.''

  Chan's initial fury was gone now; Mike's revelations totally blew her out of the water. As a communist she did not believe in a God or a soul, but of course she knew that plenty other humans, probably most, did. And that such a fear had to be taken very seriously. This was the moment when she really understood why there had been no warning when she had been dropped onto Heim's equations. The review had to be real, hard, with every effort she could muster. Their fear was a raw and basic one.

  ''So what are you going to do?''

  ''One of us has to do it. To go through,'' Mike replied toneless. ''And return. No matter how.''

  ''To tell the tale?''

  ''To be living proof.''

  ''And who is the lucky guy?'' Chan requested, ironically.

  ''Me.'' Mike emptied his glass, threw it against the wall, shattering it, finishing off the Russian way. Alex followed up, smashed his glass, too.

  Meanwhile Chan had heard one or the other story about Mike's gang, the A-Shaitan. They had the reputation of being absolutely fearless, tough and devastating in battle. Like warriors from another, darker age. Now the most feared of its members was sitting here in front of her, telling her that he was afraid of losing his soul.

  Chapter 95

  Cape Canaveral

  Monday, 05.12.2016

  Again one of those fruitless sessions with a dozen or so science-pukes bashing each other's heads in. The issue had to be a serious one, guessing by the fuss they made. Probably arguing about whether to allow an ashtray on board or not.

  Damn, he needed a smoke. Lieutenant Colonel Warrington stared at the ceiling, trying to decide if that fucking smoke detector up there would jerk off on a cigarette, but with all these anti-smoke sissies here it probably wouldn't matter anyway. Damn this place, damn his boss. Ordering him here as liaison officer: C'mon, Rick, a few days in the sun getting your ass roasted on the beach, watching girlies with big tits in tiny bikinis ... sure, watching girlies ... well, fuck you, General! Agitated he got up, opened the window, sat on the sill and lit a cigarillo. A few deep drags calmed him down a bit. Damn, there was something, a thought he couldn't quite grab. It had been nagging him ever since he had talked to Mike on that landing pad. He was missing something ... something very important. But what? He took another drag, blew the smoke out of the window.

  Sure enough, some white lab coat came marching up to him and started a rebuke: ''Sir, smoking is prohi ...'' but an icy stare from the Colonel made the rest of the sentence stick in the idiot's throat. Immediately the sheep hurried back to its flock.

  Warrington sighed, let his gaze wander over the assembled crowd of scientists, watched them concentrate on the task to re-engineer that space balloon. Bickering about details, arguing just to prove they were right.

  What is wrong in this picture, the Colonel marvelled. That there was something wrong, of that he was sure. It literally reeked of wrongness. But, damn, what?

  A memory from the past dropped in on him, uninvited: a few US soldiers sitting in a ground depression in dune country, obscured by some bushes, smoking and talking quietly. A dozen Taliban crawling closer from two sides, positioning themselves to pop the stupid grunts. They closed the trap very, very neatly, got ready ... then the sky dropped on them: Mike and his devils, buried in the sand behind them, broke free and just wasted the whole bunch in a blink of an eye. It's a fucking ambush, Warrington thought. An ambush Shaitan style! He scratched his forehead. Naah, not an ambush. Nothing to gain by killing here. It's more like ... like a diversion. He stared at the conversing scientists, watching them intently: But what should they be diverted from? C'mon Rick, don't think like a fucking ground hog. Look close: what are they doing?

  The Colonel finished off his cigarillo, and, out of old habit not to leave traces, put the butt in his shirt pocket. His focus was elsewhere. They are arguing, quarrelling over details. Construction details of ... of Mike's spacecraft design... He walked back to his place, sat down, wondering. Why the hell would he want them to concentrate on that balloon?

  Finally Warrington turned to his right. Nora Coleman was sitting there,
flushed with eagerness, fighting it out with a colleague. He touched her arm slightly to get her attention.

  A little irritated she faced him, still stuck in her dispute. ''Colonel?''

  ''Ma'am, what makes that spaceship so special?''

  She looked at him as if he was a Martian: ''Are you serious?''

  ''Yes, Nora.'' After three days of sitting side by side with her, this was the first time he had called her by her first name, and it had the intended effect: Dr Coleman turned her full attention on him, took a breath and started to explain.

  ''Well, for one thing it's a super-compact vessel with a highly efficient allocation of space - so much we could deduct from the parts lists and a few hand drawn sketches your colleagues found in Germany.''

  ''Hand drawn sketches.''

  ''Yes, we think the ship's designers used them to clarify certain details for the builders.''

  ''Were there no detailed construction plans?''

  ''No, they must have been in the computers.''

  ''So? Couldn't you use them?''

  ''All hard drives have been destroyed.''

  ''Unrecoverably deleted?''

  ''I was told they had a self-destruction device attached. It melted down half of the computer with a pyrotechnical charge. Thermite, if I remember correctly.''

  ''Oh, OK. That stuff would do it.'' Suicide packs - on all essential machinery: a long-standing Special Forces custom. ''No backups?''

  ''We found none. Maybe there are some on the Internet, but not even the NSA could trace their movements there.''

  No computer data - but paper drawings ... if they had access to Thermite, they could have burned the whole fucking hangar down in a heartbeat - they surely had the expertise to do that: peanuts for a man of Sergeant Muller's calibre.

  Hmm, another oddity. He furrowed his forehead, then asked: ''Those sketches: how detailed were they?''

  ''Well, not perfect, but enough to give us some good hints.''

  That smell of a trap again. ''Would you have found out the ship's design without them?''

  ''In the end - probably. Well, more like yes. With a lot of extra time and not at this level of detail. This way we'll stay far closer to the original plans.''

  Another Special Forces technique: dangle bait, but not an easy one. Make the target stretch for it, desire it, then lure it gently onto a pre-set path. The Shaitan had used this method, time and again. Always with an unhappy end for the prey.

  ''What else is so interesting about that ship?'' Warrington pressed on.

  ''Many things,'' Coleman replied, ''For example it consists completely of open-market parts. DIY materials, bargain-offer computers, diving equipment. Their oxygen exchanger has been modelled after the one the Apollo-13 crew improvised, when they had that mid-flight emergency. Our friends just re-engineered it a bit. Quite cleverly though, I must admit.'' She laughed shortly. ''Anyway. Can you imagine, they even bought the space suits on eBay?'' She pointed at a paper slip in front of her, telling him something he already knew from the intelligence report. ''There is the receipt: Russian surplus, type-7's, stone age stuff. One thousand dollars a piece.''

  ''Do they still work?''

  ''Yeah, probably. But that's like using a horse cart instead of a Mercedes.''

  In spite of the snide remark: somehow Warrington was sure that those suits were intact and usable. Old, but absolutely fit for purpose. And a horse cart would take you there, too, wouldn't it? Sometimes even through terrain the Mercedes will get stuck in. The superiority complex of your enemy - here: the NASA people - used to lure him off-track. Right out of the book again. But lure where to? Or away from what?

  Picking up another sheet and showing it to him, Nora continued: ''Here is a sketch of deck four, the machine deck. Someone even scribbled a crude metric in it. We can rebuild it off this drawing!'' She moved a finger over a rectangle in the drawing: ''This is the space for the AM reactor. It fits exactly to the plans you got us.''

  Dr Coleman fired a brilliant smile at him: ''With all this we can build an interplanetary shuttle within days after we have the secret of the gravitation manipulating device.''

  Warrington understood: the bait had attracted a fish, and the fish had swallowed it - complete with the hook. Swallowed it deep, too.

  ''Listen, Ma'am, how about we go for a walk. Let these characters fight it out?''

  ''A walk? Now?''

  ''Sure. It's nearly noon, the sun is shining and we could use some fresh air. Maybe have lunch together, at your mess hall.''

  Nora Coleman considered his offer a moment, then nodded. ''OK, let's go. After lunch they will be less argumentative anyway.'' They got up and left the room. Walking down the stairwell she asked: ''May I call you Richard? I mean, since you call me Nora already?''

  The Colonel laughed. ''Rick. My friends call me Rick.'' He offered his arm, and after a second of hesitation in the face of this archaic gesture, Nora linked in with him, beaming.

  Leaving the building she steered him to the left, and after a few yards they walked on a well groomed path between the buildings.

  ''So why did you kidnap me?'' Nora asked curiously. ''I'm old enough to know that this isn't a date ...''

  ''Well, I need some privacy to squeeze a bit more from you.''

  ''More of what?''

  ''Why are you all so excited about that little balloon?''

  She stared at him, big-eyed. ''That balloon, as you call it, can reach the speed of light!''

  ''So what? Would still take years to reach the nearest star,'' Warrington grumbled. ''Nobody can live that long in such a ball.''

  ''Sure, but all our planets come within reach: in five minutes to Mars, in five hours to Pluto! With such crafts we can actually explore our solar system.''

  ''And exploit it.''

  ''Yes, search the asteroid field for uranium, heavy metals, iron ore and rare earth elements.''

  ''How long will it take?''

  ''What?''

  ''The conquering of our star system.''

  She laughed. ''Centuries, Rick, centuries.''

  Warrington's heart just stopped. Without missing a step he kept walking, but his mind made a quantum leap. That was it, the diversion! Mike simply wanted to keep the humans away from the stars, for a few centuries at least! He did have a contingency plan! The star drive! That must be it! His last secret! It must be far more important than NASA realises!

  With its help Mike could essentially escape the madness of Earth, even search for a new home world. Leave the human race behind, caged in their solar system. Unable to crack the secret of faster-than-light travel, because they were lured onto the wrong track. But Mike also knew about the biggest problem of humanity, the problem above and beyond violence and war: overpopulation. So maybe he would find a way to offer inhabitable worlds to humanity and still keep them out of the rest of the galaxy. Colonel Warrington turned to the woman on his arm. ''You know,'' he said, ''Why not build an extra spacecraft and give it as a present to that group. It's not such a costly thing.'' When she looked at him, astonished, he went on: ''For one: exploring space must be outrageously dangerous, even more so if you travel alone. A little less dangerous if you have a friend close by. And second: they will reply in kind.''

  Tilting her head some, she gave him a glance of appraisal, then a brilliant smile. ''You are a very smart man, Colonel, far more considerate than I expected. And you are right: there is no harm in being on good footing with them. I will arrange it.''

  Warrington smiled back: ''Can you pull that off?''

  ''Pah, I'll simply let them build five crafts instead of four. Nobody will notice - not at that price tag. We could hide those costs under a postage stamp.''

  That made him laugh. ''Good. How about lunch now?''

  ''Are you married?'' she asked flatly, obviously interested.

  Warrington shook his head: ''Divorced. Long time ago.''

  ''Then how about dinner?''

  The Colonel checked his watch: ''How about both?''
r />   That drew a laugh ... and a nod. She took his arm again and pointed him towards the cafeteria.

  Chapter 96

  Florida

  Monday, 06.12.2016,05.12.2016

  Nora pulled herself up, leaned on his chest, her naked breasts dangling freely and tickling him. ''Not bad for a jar head, not bad at all,'' she teased. ''Get a lot of practice laying women, don't you?''

  Rick did not answer immediately, so she went on ironically: ''All those sweet girls in all those countries you visited ...''

  ''You remember I told you I am divorced?'' He somehow sounded strange.

  ''Yes,'' she replied, cautious now.

  ''That's not true.''

  Nora froze on his chest.

  ''It's what I usually tell anyone asking, but it's not true. I lost my wife. In one of those no-one's fault car accidents, twenty years ago. Took our two children with her,'' Richard added quietly. ''Ever since, I have had no honest woman in my arms again. A whore now and then, to take care of my needs, but no real woman. You are the first in many, many years.''

  This unexpected confession left her without words. For a long moment she remained motionless, then slipped down into his arms for a long and very passionate kiss.

  Chapter 97

  Florida

  Monday, 06.12.2016

  ''You know,'' Nora said later, past midnight, ''I can build your friends another sphere, even including the antimatter reactor - we have those plans now. But I don't have the motor, as you would say. The gravitational device is missing and we can't build it until we have the schematics from CERN ... and even then it will take some time.''

  ''Long time?''

  ''Normally NASA needs years for that. While we are building a spacecraft, we also develop test plans for each component and another, highly complex one for the final assembled system. We test everything over and over, then perform something we call a 'flight acceptance test' in the end. Only if the craft passes all of these, it's considered fit for purpose and gets released to Operations.''