Chapter 9

TWT on Earth-Alpha1 got a little better organized to handle the emergency and sent contact crews to the islands in the Atlantic Ocean and to Europe and Asia. The southern hemisphere was ignored for now, since the worst of the dust cloud would not reach there for a few months.

The usual reaction to the contact missions was skepticism and distrust. Each contacted group was sure it was somehow a plot of the evil USA government to take over their country. Even after a careful explanation of who TWT was and why they were there, most governments refused to cooperate. Only UK, Scandinavia, Germany, Poland, Italy, Israel, and Japan could be convinced to cooperate officially with TWT. These people were moved quickly and efficiently to their corresponding place on Earth-Alpha2.

The other peoples were contacted unofficially, in relatively small groups, and invited to join in the migration to Earth-Alpha2. Only about 50% of the population of the northern hemisphere agreed to move; the rest stubbornly refused to face the facts. TWT was finally forced to throw up its hands and say, "We can't help you any further, you are going to die! So be it!"

Attention was now moved to the southern hemisphere, where only governments of Australia and New Zealand were willing to listen. They moved, but most other governments refused to cooperate. Again, about 50% of the people were moved, but the rest had to be abandoned.

The effort by TWT was now concentrated on easing the transition to living on Earth-Alpha2. A number of trans-coms had been allocated to a special section of TWT personnel to be used in searching alternate universes to see if there was other technology which could be used to help on Earth-Alpha2. Several invaluable technologies were found.

Four universes were found to have replicator technology. They worked with varying degrees of efficiency, but they all worked. George contacted the manufacturers of the replicators on the four worlds and they agreed to work together to improve the units by having an engineering group form to combine the best features of each device. In less than a month they had a design which combined all of the best features of each original replicator. All four companies tooled up to manufacture the standard replicator and had the first units flowing to Earth-Alpha2 within six more weeks.

Initially, the units produced basic food, staples of the diet of the various ethnic groups. Once the emergency was over, the replicators would be programmed to reproduce any food ordered, with any organic source as raw material. TWT paid for the food replicators with gold taken from Earth-Alpha2. Ultimately, these food replicators were sold all over the multitude of galaxies in the multitude of parallel universes, but that was far in the future.

The search through the parallel Earths found two who had small fusion power generators which, though not as powerful as the ones made by hand by the ETs, could be mass produced at a low cost. George was active in the negotiations which resulted in these being used to power the standard food replicator. Again, TWT paid for the units which went to Earth-Alpha2.

The personal fliers from Earth-Alpha1 and Beta were adapted to use the fusion power and these went to Earth-Alpha2. Earth-Alpha1 supplied the material which went into building the foamed-in-place structures used for emergency housing. The Irzons supplied the trans-coms; everybody on Earth-Alpha2 had access to one. And so it went; TWT's resources were stretched to the limit, but they came through with everything necessary for survival on Earth-Alpha2, and, eventually, comfort and luxury.

This emergency forced a level of cooperation unprecedented in human history and resulted in the formation of an interuniverse/interstellar emergency help organization called "The Multidisc," for its logo of a disc covered with a multi-colored ring pattern.

The emergency also resulted in a vast growth in the standard of living on every planet involved in helping with the recovery effort. The communication and resulting trade among the planets was to everybody's benefit, despite the grumbling by the professional naysayers, complaining of "cultural contamination."

One day, Jim said to Susan, "I'm sick of being stuck in the lab or office all day! I want to go adventuring! Want to join me?"

"I wondered how much longer you were going to be able to stall off cabin fever. I've got it too! Where do you want to go?"

"Let's take our personal fliers and the stun rifles and go to one of the primitive parallel universes without humans. In fact, let's visit the dinosaurs!"

"That's a great idea. I'll put on my jeans and tee-shirt while you find the best universe to visit for dinosaur watching. I'll be ready in 15 minutes."

Jim thought to himself, "Ha! Only 15 minutes to change clothes? I'll bet!" But he did have the good sense not to say it aloud!

Fourteen minutes later, Susan was back, ready to leave. "Did you find a place?"

"Yeah, I did. Let's pick up our fliers and weapons and get going."

They had Esther transport them and they were off on their first jaunt, purely for pleasure, in over two years. The were wearing headsets linked to their trans-coms, so they were able to converse comfortably, even when they were separated. The automatic tracking device recently added to the trans-com design made this possible.

They were skimming along a rolling plain with no particular destination in mind when Susan screamed, "JIM, LOOK OUT!"

The scream wasn't necessary with the trans-com hookup, but it helped to get Jim to duck as a large winged body swooped by only inches overhead. "What was that?" Jim asked as he swung his eyes around, trying to find his assailant.

"I didn't get a good look at it, but it had to be some kind of giant pterodactyl. Look! There it is! My God, it must have a 30-foot wingspan!"

"That looks like a whole flock of them over there a couple of miles. They're circling like buzzards. What do you suppose could attract that many of the things to one place?"

"I don't know, but I sure would like to look. Let's go see."

"OK, but watch out for another attack."

(a few minutes later)

"My God, Susan, what a smell! Whatever attracted them must be huge to smell that strong!"

"Look, its not one thing, it's a lot of things. It looks to me like dead dinosaurs all over the place. And look, they've all been skinned!"

"Yeah, it's as if a bunch of buffalo hunters had gotten displaced in time. Esther, can you see what we see?"

"Yes, I can. It's horrible. Do you want me to pull you home?"

"No, get us a team, in spacesuits because of the stench, to see if they can tell what killed these animals. Susan and I will mount guard."

"OK, it should only take a few minutes. I'll send the planet survey team that's currently on duty."

Within five minutes, six spacesuited figures appeared among the dead animals. Jim and Susan climbed to about 100-foot altitude and circled as the people examined the corpses.

Esther spoke to Jim and Susan, "The animals were definitely not killed by the usual predators; there are no bite or claw marks to be seen. The skin appears to have been removed by a very sharp knife in what looks like a single swipe. I've never heard of a tool able to do that, have you?"

Jim and Susan responded negatively and Esther continued, "The animals have no obvious wounds. Maybe they were shot by stun guns like you are carrying, but with a fatal control setting. The investigators report 43 bodies, probably all adult herbivores. It definitely looks like the animals were killed for their skins. If that's all you want, I'll pull the investigators out, now. There's a planet they need to look at."