Chapter 18: The Gadget

We finished our coffee just as Ohmu finished her direct information interface with Truffles and rejoined us.

“I hope he was worth it. Let me know if it starts hurting when you pee,” I joked to the android.

She retorted almost instantly, “It never did after I started having my way with your shell while you were away in virtual, John. I suspect Truffles is much safer.”

Uxe barked out a laugh at my expression. I joined her when Truffles added, “I am!” to the conversation.

Ohmu became serious and turned to Uxe. “I am most impressed and must congratulate you Uxe. You have likely increased humanity’s chances for long-term survival by an order of magnitude or more.”

What the hell had Uxe done here!? I knew she usually studied advanced propulsion technologies. Maybe there had been a breakthrough. But why so much secrecy?

“There is still a lot of work to do, Ohmu,” Uxe replied. “And a few impossible-seeming problems to solve.”

“Have you created warp drive or something?” I asked Uxe.

“Not quite. Shall we go see?”

Instead of answering, I extracted myself from the low G cradle and stood. Uxe stood with me and pushed herself towards a solid-looking door near her work console. It opened and Ohmu and I followed her through. Beyond was another narrow tunnel. More tunnels! This one was metal and seemed to lead upwards from the work area. The door sealed behind us as we passed.

We pulled ourselves along the tunnel until we came to another heavy door at its far end. I estimated we had come forty or fifty meters while ascending about twenty. The door opened into an airlock but the far door was already standing open. There were also a pair of pressure suits hanging in the lock and I could tell that one was Uxe’s from its size and coloration.

Uxe explained that experiments in the past had been done in a full vacuum but today, our demonstration area would have a breathable atmosphere, so no suits were needed. She did give me a radiation badge to clip onto my shirt though. Apparently, she had done early work on Gambado’s new engines and they had bombarded the area with neutrons. She reassured me that the levels from today’s demonstration would be far lower.

The room beyond the airlock was a long rectangle. On the left was a series of heavy windows with work consoles and small airlock pass-throughs below the glass. There were four of these stations located about eight meters apart. The right side of the room was dominated by a single larger and heavily armored window. Each of its thick crystalline panes was set in a robust-looking metal framework. There were metal shutters on the outside of the glass which currently were closed, blocking any view of what lay beyond.

Uxe directed us to the first of the smaller windows on the left. Lights came on in the five-meter-cubical chamber beyond. I spotted a large extendable manipulator arm mounted just inside the chamber next to the observation window but otherwise, the chamber was empty.

“Note the empty experiment chamber, John,” Uxe said.

Her statement made me look again. This time I gave the chamber a more thorough inspection. I could see that there were scorch marks here and there on the floor, walls, and ceiling. It was also clear that the floor had been repaired many times with overlapping patches. The patches were concentrated near the chamber’s far end. I noticed similar patches on the walls and ceiling. The chamber had seen some hard use. Had she been testing explosives or volatile compounds here?

“Okay?” I replied, drawing the word out questioningly.

She then led Ohmu and me to the single console centered in front of the large, armored window on the room’s opposite side. There was a series of hand and foot loops around the console so I locked my feet in place. This workstation also had an airlock pass through below the glazing. I noted the console displays were showing various statuses and energy levels for ... something. It was all way over my head.

Uxe stood at the console and placed an interface cap over her head making sure that the cap’s cranial transducer pads were aligned with those embedded in her skull. The cabling looked like a heavy braid as it dropped behind her and entered the console. Yes, I was freaked out a bit.

“How are we doing, Truffles?” Uxe asked out loud, most likely for my benefit.

“Energy levels are at ninety-six percent. Matter streams are charged and in a stable suspension pattern. Confinement lasers are cooled to operating temperatures. No space vessels are currently operating within the minimum radius from this location, Uxe,” Truffles said.

“Open the blast shutters please,” Uxe said. She then turned towards me. “Hold on to your hat, John.

We watched the panels slowly slide down, uncovering the large window. The gigantic test chamber which was now exposed made me gasp. It had to be well over two hundred meters in diameter and sixty meters tall. The circular walls were the roughhewn rock of the asteroid. Were we looking at a crater on Vesta’s surface? I looked up and instead of the blackness of space, there was a perfectly smooth, white-colored cover over the entire area.

Uxe was watching me and explained that the circular space was open to the vacuum of space but that there was a thin membrane forming a roof. The membrane was radio and visually opaque to hide the experiments from outside view but was also thin enough so as to not contain any explosions if there were a catastrophe. At first, I just nodded at her explanation.

“Wait ... what?” I finally sputtered out. “Catastrophe?”

She smiled, “Relax. We’ve moved past those kinds of events ... mostly.”

This time she laughed at my expression. “I’m kidding! Today’s demonstration is perfectly safe. We’ve done it many times without incident.”

My attention was drawn back to the giant experiment chamber when additional bright lights mounted around the perimeter were switched on. Most were focused on the center of the space but a few were illuminating the underside of the membrane. The bright chamber now revealed what was likely the reason I had been brought here. My mouth dropped open again as I took in the device. It was a complex-looking donut of gadgetry which must have been almost a hundred meters in diameter.

The torus of technical wizardry was itself forty meters in diameter, with almost a third of that recessed below the perforated floor of the chamber. I estimated the void or hole in the middle of the torus had a diameter of around twenty meters. Attached to the exterior of the torus was a maze of conduits, piping, and huge superconductor cables. This was clearly where all that stored energy from the ESU chamber ended up.

I continued to survey the chamber. The big central torus was not alone. Elsewhere around the large chamber were other, smaller tori. Some were intact but many were partially disassembled. I realized they might be new experiments under construction but I had no way of knowing for sure. Were they the remains of earlier or failed experiments or the next evolution of the current one?

I then spotted evidence of melted components and other damage. Ah, they were failed experiments. One of the objects had been an even larger torus than the current one centered in the chamber. Dozens of mobile units were busy around these remains continuing to remove pieces from the wreckage.

I returned my attention back to the central torus as there was new activity. Some of the pipes connected to the torus had tiny streams of vapor leaking from them. Coolant or fuel? Uxe remained unconcerned. What was this thing? Some kind of huge electric xenon thruster? Or was it some sort of fusion engine? I had not spotted any fuel tankage as of yet but I imagined they could be off on the surface somewhere remote.

“Uxe, did you build a new type of thruster? Or is this some sort of magnetic or reactionless drive?” I asked. I had guessed at the last. A neutrino drive would explain the lack of fuel piping. Or, maybe it was a gravity drive I thought with some excitement.

She just smiled and shook her head. “I guess with my research history I can’t blame you for thinking along those lines. No, this is something completely different. Something unexpected.”

She then turned and retrieved a small metal cylinder from the console. She looked at the cylinder and then studied me for a moment before handing it to me. “Here, you do it. That way you won’t think this is a trick of some sort. Open the cylinder please.”

I twisted the top and saw that the cylinder was hollow. I also saw that the threaded joint on its cap had a set of rubberized gaskets indicating the cylinder was probably air-tight.

“Now, remove your genealogy amulet and place it in the cylinder please.”

I frowned but did as she asked. I folded the necklace carefully and dropped the amulet in the cylinder. The amulet had enough wear marks on it that I would easily be able to recognize it as being mine. I guessed what was coming and resealed the top to the cylinder without being prompted. Uxe nodded and activated a button on the console. Below the window, the hatch leading to the small airlock pass-through opened.

“Please place the cylinder containing your amulet into the pass-through, John,” Uxe directed.

I did so and the airlock sealed. I watched through its small viewport and saw that the hatch on the far side of the pass-through cycled open. The cylinder was now exposed to the vacuum of the chamber beyond. A small manipulator arm reached into the airlock and retrieved the cylinder. It then passed the cylinder to the manipulator of a thruster-powered space drone.

Through the larger window, we watched the drone take off under rapid-firing jets of compressed gas. It puffed its way silently to the middle of the large chamber and hovered ten meters directly above the center of the huge torus. I cranked up my iris’s zoom a bit and could clearly make out the cylinder with my amulet still held in the drone’s grip. Additional bright spotlights switched on and illuminated both the drone and the center of the torus.

I turned to Uxe. “You’re going to torch my amulet?”

She just shook her head and laughed. “Truffles, start the demonstration please.”

The console displays became even more active and I felt a physical vibration pass through the floor of the chamber. Uxe saw my look and explained that it was just the main energy relays cycling. They were apparently physical relays due to the high power levels. I returned to watching the view through the thick windows. The drone was still hovering where it had been before but now there were other things happening in the large chamber.

Electrical discharges were now crawling around some of the conduits and superconductors where they met the sides of the torus. The center of the torus was looking ... strange. The reflections of the spotlights were becoming distorted and the white light shining on the area was becoming blue-tinted.

There was a waviness which reminded me of heat shimmers. Something was getting very hot at the center of the torus. I suddenly realized that with the outer chamber in a full vacuum a visible heat shimmer was impossible! What the hell was causing the same effect? A beep came from the radiation tag on my shirt and I gave it a glance.

“It’s okay, John. There is a brief spike in high energy particles as the hole is punched but the overall levels remain safe.”

In the torus center, the distortions continued to oscillate back and forth until suddenly, they expanded almost instantly almost to the inner edges of the torus. At the same moment, a shimmering chrome disc appeared in the center of the open space. I rocked back feeling suddenly dizzy. Uxe reached over to steady me. When I recovered I saw that the chrome disc had stabilized. If I had to guess I would say it was about half a meter in diameter.

“Look in the small chamber behind us, John,” Uxe said.

I turned and saw that the smaller chamber to the left of our workspace now had a matching chrome disc floating near its far wall. It appeared to be the same size as the disc in the center of the torus. While I stared at this new disc, the manipulator arm which was mounted in the smaller room reached out and hovered, waiting with its open grapple just below the disc.

I turned back to the large chamber just as Uxe said, “Dropping in three, two, one, drop.”

The hovering drone released the cylinder containing my amulet and it fell slowly towards the chrome disc. When it hit, it vanished as if sucked inside. I spun around quickly enough to just catch the manipulator arm grabbing the still-falling cylinder below the disc floating in the smaller chamber. What the hell!

Uxe laughed as she reached over to physically close my opened mouth. “What do you think? Pretty neat trick, huh?”

I was unable to speak. Ohmu was not as tongue-tied as I was and commented that the demonstration was remarkable.

We watched the arm retrieve the cylinder and place it in the small chamber’s pass-through. As it did, the chrome disc disappeared. The instant wave of dizziness passed through me a second time. I turned to see that its counterpart in the large chamber was also now gone along with the surrounding distortion waves and the electrical discharges.

Uxe removed her cranial interface cap and led me over to the left side of the room while the pass-through cycled. The airlock hatch opened. “Can I touch it?” I asked.

“Yes, it’s nearly the same temperature as when you deposited it in the other airlock.”

I reached in and felt the cylinder. She was right! It felt the same temperature as it had been. I realized that the vacuum it had been in would have helped the cylinder hold its temperature much like a thermos bottle. I opened the top and retrieved my amulet. The casing appeared to have the same wear marks and nicks. I pressed the amulet’s activation stud and the amulet began projecting my family data like normal. Everything survived.

“So, did you invent a transporter or something?” I asked.

“Not exactly, John. What you just saw was what you probably might refer to as a wormhole. Or, maybe you might know of it as a bridge through space, as in Einstein-Rosen bridge. There was no conversion of matter to energy and back to matter. The cylinder with your amulet simply started falling in the large chamber and ended its fall in the smaller.”

She had said ‘simply.’ Even I was smart enough to realize that there was nothing simple about what I had just seen. I was still having trouble processing what I had just witnessed, much less speaking intelligently about it.

“Come. I have enough energy remaining for one more demonstration,” Uxe said.

We returned to the big window and Uxe again put on the interface cap.

“Note that the space micro drone is now retrieving a camera probe. The view from the camera is projected on this screen,” Uxe said.

I acknowledged the screen she was pointing at and watched the hovering drone pick up the small camera. It was attached to a one-meter-long rod which the drone picked up from the end opposite the camera. Again, it jetted off towards the center of the large chamber where it hovered, waiting.

The camera was hanging directly below the drone, and I could still see the view it was transmitting in the small display. Its view swiveled around until I was watching myself through the window. Ohmu waved. The camera view rotated again until it was directed down towards the center of the torus.

“I am now establishing a second wormhole,” Uxe said.

Once again there was a tremor as the power relays closed below us and the electrical discharges began crawling across many of the conduits. The distortion waves again appeared in the center of the torus. I felt that same uneasy feeling I had during the first test. After a few seconds during which the waves oscillate back and forth, the chrome disc snapped into existence. I spun around but did not see a matching disk in the smaller chamber.

Uxe noted my confused look. “This time the other end of the spatial bridge formed at a location out in space a few hundred kilometers above Vesta. Please note the display as I lower the camera into the wormhole,”

I watched the display which showed the view from the camera. From the top, the disc looked different. Instead of the chrome disc, there was now a black disk full of stars. I couldn’t resist and exclaimed. “My God, it’s full of stars!”

Uxe either ignored the reference or was unfamiliar with it. “Yes. The current camera view is perpendicular to the surface of the wormhole so it can see through the hole in space to the other side. Previously, our viewpoints of the wormholes through the windows were nearly edge-on. At that angle, what we saw was in effect a perfect mirror as it was impossible to perceive the ‘sides’ of the rip through spacetime.”

She continued after a short pause to see if I was following. “Only if our viewpoint is within a few degrees of perpendicular, as the camera is showing now, can you see through the wormhole. I am not sure but I suspect that there is a funneling or lensing effect caused by the local gravimetric distortions. Regardless, if your view is from roughly above, you can see through the hole in space.”

The drone was lowering the camera into the wormhole. Out the window, I saw the moment the camera dropped through the chrome disc and disappeared. In the display, I saw the view of the starfield expand as it did so. Now on the other side, the camera swiveled around, and the starfield shifted. An object appeared which was moving against the starfield.

It looked like an approaching spaceship! Moments later I recognized the ship. It was Prancer! Uxe had sent the camera out to a location near the parking orbit of the torch ship. This time I was able to emit an audible, “Wow!”

The camera had to rotate quickly to track the spaceship. In seconds it had grown large and now was beginning to recede from view. A new alarm sounded at the console and I saw the space drone start to rise in the chamber, pulling the rod and camera out of the wormhole. The chrome disc winked out suddenly and the camera view cut off. Again, I felt momentarily dizzy.