Pulsar

by Ethan Stand

  “Yes. Yes, I am, and I hate it. I truly believe that scientists have an obligation to share.”

  “What if I tell dad? He has no conflict of interest and can decide who I share it with.”

  BB considered that for a moment then said, “That is a good compromise. He has a night lecture so he won’t be home until after boxing. You discuss it with him, and then we’ll let him decide. Agreed?”

  “Agreed.”

  Happy to finally have some closure, BB headed back downstairs while Zen just stared at her screens, thoughts whirling around in her head. Finally, Zen had dinner and then headed out to the gym. She didn’t fight in tournaments anymore but liked to spar because it kept her skills up and was a great workout. Her coach stopped the session after she’d been knocked down for the third time. He said, “Zen, no more sparring tonight. Your focus is all over the place and you’ll get hurt. What are you doing? Have you got a boyfriend or something? What’s the problem?”

  As he unlaced her gloves, she said, “No. No boyfriend. Just school, I suppose. I’m sorry. I’ll have my head back in the right place by next week.”

  He nodded and asked Zen to work with some of the younger kids after she’d cooled down. Zen helped train some of the younger fighters, and this paid for her own time, so she agreed. When the time was up, and after she’d helped pack everything up, Zen rode home. She dreaded talking with her father but knew she had no choice.

  When she got home, her dad was already there. He was in the lounge reading, obviously waiting. When Zen entered, he said, “Mum was exhausted and has gone to bed. She told me of your deal. Sit down and talk to me.”

  Zen shook her head and said, “Let me get a drink, then can you come to my room? All the data is there.”

  Ed nodded, and after slipping a bookmark into the novel, he headed up to Zen’s room. Half closing the door to keep the noise down, he dragged her second chair over to her desk. She got up and closed the door. Ed said, “You know the rules Zen, two people in the room and the door stays open.”

  “Yeah, I know. It’s just that with the door closed the Faraday cage covers the whole room.”

  “Faraday cage?”

  “Yeah. I built it in grade eight. Science experiment.”

  “My phone’s working.”

  “Yeah, let me fix that for you.”

  Zen unplugged her router and the various connections to the antennas she’d added to the eaves outside her window. She then disconnected the ethernet cable from her computer. When everything was disconnected, Zen said, “We are cut off from the world but just to be sure, let me turn on some white noise.”

  Ed looked up from his phone which now had no signal, and said, “Paranoid much?”

  “It was an academic exercise in case of solar flares. More of a personal statement to the idea of privacy than anything else. One of the many phases I went through, which remain undetected by both the world and my loving parents.”

  “OK. Let’s skip the lecture on our parenting practices. Now that everything is private, what is your hypothesis?”

  Zen started talking, and the two of them were still looking through data when BB woke the next morning. She knocked on the door and opened it, but before she could say anything Ed had got to his feet and putting his hand on the door, said, “Give us some more time. Can you please ring work and say I’m sick? Do the same for Zen and her school. I’ll explain later.”

  He bent over and kissed her head before gently pushing her out of the room and closing the door. BB decided they would all stay home and was getting anxious. She was scared when neither Zen or Ed had appeared by eight and was about to head up and demand answers at about half-past when she heard Zen’s door open. Ed and Zen walked down, and both looked exhausted. There was a tension in them, though, that ruled out sleep.

  Ed said, “BB, I think it best if Zen says nothing to you at this time.”

  “What! How can you say that? I can keep a secret. Forget the NDA. My family comes first.”

  “I know. Believe it or not but Zen freaked me out last night with all the secrecy, but now I’m convinced.”

  “So when will you talk to me?”

  “Soon, I hope. But first, could you ring your friend, Phil, from Harvard days, and ask if we could have lunch?”

  “Phil, ring Phil?”

  “Yeah, the one in Canberra.”

  “Canberra! Lunch? When for?”

  “Today if possible. Otherwise dinner. While you talk to him, I’ll book us some flights.”

  As Ed walked off, BB turned to look at Zen, only to see her heading back upstairs to pack.

  4

  BB was better at networking than Ed and had hundreds of contacts. Some were people she’d only met once or twice, but she kept up with their public presence and even browsed their social media. She’d met Phil Bateman at Harvard where he’d been working on his PhD in cybersecurity. They’d connected at a mutual friend’s home who’d been trying to get them interested in religion. BB had enjoyed the evening but knew she’d need more evidence and time before committing to anything and didn’t go back to the second meeting. She had kept Phil’s number, and they’d caught up once or twice, but then Ed was on the scene, and they drifted apart.

  When she’d first moved to Australia, she’d contacted him because he was one of the only Australians she knew. It turned out he now worked in a government office and was newly married. They reconnected once more when Zen was about six or so, and the three went skiing for the first time. When the family had flown into Canberra before heading to Perisher, they stopped to meet Phil and his wife, Diane. Phil and Diane had three children by then, and the meeting had lasted for less than an hour. It was these small things that BB used to network, and she’d found the contacts helpful over the years. This was another of those times.

  When Phil’s phone rang, BB said, “Hey Phil, it’s Bīngqīng. How are you?”

  “Hey Bīngqīng, I’m well. I thought you went by BB now?”

  “True, Ed’s called me that for years, but I wasn’t sure you’d remember.”

  “How could I forget. What’s it been? Eight, nine years?”

  “Almost ten. How are the kids? I was sorry to hear about you and Diane.”

  “Yeah, well, it happens. We’re still friends, and we share custody. The kids are well. John’s seventeen this year and in the last year of school. Julie is fifteen and just come out the other side of the hormonal years. Lizzie, or Elisabeth as she prefers, is thirteen and right in the middle of them, and Kyle is eight. How’s Zen?”

  “She’s well, she’s a year younger than John and really coming into her own this year. We had another one, a boy, his name is Thales, but Zen insists we call him Hal. He’s almost three.”

  “Good. Good. Now, to what do I owe the pleasure? Are you guys coming through Canberra again?”

  “Um, well, we hadn’t planned to. Everything is pretty busy, and we both have lectures to teach. Zen has school but Ed just up and asked me to see if you were free for lunch today. He’s booking tickets as we speak.”

  There was silence for a moment. Then, “Today?”

  “That’s what he said. If not, then how about dinner?”

  “Do you know what it’s about?”

  “Not really, Phil, not really. Well, that’s not exactly true, but I think he’d be annoyed if I said anything over the phone.”

  “Can you hold for a second?”

  “Sure.”

  In the end, it was five minutes before Phil returned, “BB, sorry that took so long. Um, I can do lunch. Where were you thinking?”

  “I wasn’t, but I imagine Ed would like somewhere secluded so we can talk in private. Wait, here he is. I’ll let you ask him.”

  BB had seen Ed walking past and said, “Phil wants to know where to meet for lunch. I said you’d tell him.”

  Ed took the phone and said, “Hi Phil, sorry about this, but something’s come up I’d like to chat about. It doesn’t have to be for lunch if you’re busy.”r />
  “No. No, lunch is good. Why don’t I have you picked up and by then I’ll have found a nice restaurant?”

  “Somewhere we can talk without being disturbed would be nice.”

  “OK, I’ll arrange that. It’ll just be the three of us.”

  “Actually Phil, we’re all coming. The whole family.”

  “Oh, OK. Table for five.”

  “That’d be great. We’re booked on the Qantas flight arriving at eleven oh five.”

  “I’ll have someone meet you. See you then. Bye.”

  When Ed hung up, he handed the phone back to BB and said, “Sorry about the secrecy, but Zen’s hypothesis is sound. It seemed farfetched at first, but she’s done the legwork, and it’s sound.”

  “You’re scaring me.”

  “Then join the club.”

  Ten minutes later, all four were in the car and headed for the airport. They only had hand luggage, so it was shortly after eleven fifteen when Ed waved to a man holding a small sign saying ‘Drako Family’, then followed him to a black SUV. They were surprised to find Phil waiting in the back. He said, “Sorry for the surprise but I’m in a bit of a quandary. If this is a general chit chat, then we can go to this lovely Italian place near here. If, and as I suspect it is, this is more serious then we have other options. So, Ed, why do you want to talk with me?”

  “Because I have some idea who you work for and how high up you are.”

  “OK. Please understand that if you are right, then we will need to discuss how you know that. Who do you think I work for?”

  “I’m pretty sure you work for ASIO.”

  BB looked sharply at Ed, then at Phil. Phil nodded and said, “So far, so good. What do you mean high up?”

  “You are one of the decision-makers. Top five is my guess.”

  Phil nodded then looked at BB, then at Zen, and then Hal, he said, “It’s too late to keep it from the family, so tell me why you think that.”

  “I actually can’t tell you without authorisation. I have an NDA in place. They were my private observations and sharing them with you was at your request, so I haven’t broken the NDA. Explaining them does, sorry.”

  “OK. Fair enough. My fault for asking. How secret do you want this meeting to be?”

  “Zen and I discussed this last night sitting in a Faraday cage and isolated from the Internet. She played white noise in the background all night, and I’m not sure that her precautions were safe enough. So, if you have it, I’d like a room that would satisfy people who wear tinfoil hats.”

  Phil looked hard at Ed to see if he was joking, then said, “OK, we have a room like that. Anything else you need?”

  Ed looked at Zen, who said, “A computer with the lot and someone who understands astrophysics well enough to have a conversation with my parents if you don’t.”

  “OK, well I might be able to understand most of it, but I also know someone who is almost at their level. Anything else?”

  Zen just shook her head, and Phil got on the phone to set things in motion. BB just looked at Ed, who shrugged and mouthed an apology. Twenty minutes later, the SUV pulled into an underground garage. The family was ushered into a lift with Phil, where it went down several levels instead of up. Soon after that, they were seated in a small conference room with a trolley with sandwiches and drinks against one wall. The table had a console with various slots for data, and three large monitors were on the far wall. A man in his mid-thirties was already waiting.

  Phil said, “Ed, BB, Zen and Hal, please meet our resident whizz on all things scientific, Dr Drayson, or Ted.”

  Ted nodded hello as did BB, Ed and Zen. Phil said, “OK, Ed, over to you.”

  Ed shook his head and said, “Not really. Zen is the one who wanted to be sure the people we talked to were the right people.”

  Instead of talking, Zen started plugging her drives in and working out how the monitors were configured. In the silence, Hal said, “I’m hungry.”

  Everyone chuckled, and Phil said, “We have a child care facility in the building. Would you like to put him there?”

  BB agreed, and Phil walked BB up to drop Hal off. By the time they returned, Zen was ready. She took a deep breath and said, “Almost three years ago I discovered what I thought was, at the time, an undiscovered pulsar. It is in the northern sky and in the constellation Draconis, which should help explain why I was looking at that part of the sky. It was what is called a millisecond-pulsar, and its period-of-rotation was constant enough that I built a pulsar clock. The clock has been projected onto my wall since then.”

  Phil stopped to make sure his understanding of pulsars was correct, then Zen continued. “At the time, I noted several factors that I thought might warrant investigation, but none of them was actioned. I couldn’t justify looking into them full-time until I finish school. There was no evidence of a nova event, and the pulsar was too close to the star Edasich to get an accurate distance, but I couldn’t imagine it being behind the star, or the signal would have deteriorated more than it had.”

  Paul stopped for more clarifications, then Zen said, “Three months ago the period-of-rotation, which had been constant, began to decrease. Two-and-a-half months ago the pulsar gave a final burst of radiation, then disappeared. Yesterday it reappeared with a period-of-rotation near the limit when it disappeared. Already the period has begun to increase. As far as I know, only my parents and I were interested in what was happening. I’ve always considered it to be my pulsar and no one except me spent time researching what was happening. Now, I said before I couldn’t investigate it full-time, but I was still able to arrange what I call sky-time every month, and then every week.”

  Ted said, “What is sky-time?”

  “Control of where the telescope is focussed and what it looks for.”

  “That’s pretty expensive. How’d you pay for it?”

  “Odd jobs.”

  “I’m not convinced.”

  “I can charge between two hundred and a thousand for an hour’s work doing translation and editing. Check my taxes, it’s all legit.”

  Ted raised his hands in defeat, then said, “OK, sorry. My bad.”

  Zen took a breath then continued, “Yesterday, after it reappeared, I managed to arrange three hours sky-time, and I found some more anomalies which I’ll go through in a minute. OK, that is the context. Now for what has freaked dad and me out, my hypothesis. Edasich is approximately one-hundred-and-two light-years from earth. What if what I’ve called a pulsar is really the byproduct of something else? What if the radio waves aren’t the result of charged particles from a rapidly spinning neutron star, but instead are charged particles being expelled by other forces? I suggest they are the byproduct of strong, focussed, gravitational waves that have been purposefully formed to exploit their relativistic effects to allow an object to exceed the light-speed barrier. It took two and a half years to reach the threshold and two weeks to transverse the distances. I suspect it will take two-and-a-half years or less to slow the object from near light.”

  Both BB and Ted started talking together, but Ed put up his hands and speaking loudly said, “Wait, wait. Don’t be dismissive until you hear the evidence. I’ve spent eight hours trying to tear a hole in the hypothesis and I can’t. It may be wrong, but the data is there, and the hypothesis is the only explanation I can come up with. Even then, I needed Zen to put the pieces together. Zen has data on red-shift, on signal strength. She can explain how we have the data now when the waves are being generated a hundred light-years away. She even has an idea, with supporting data, on how many digits are on their limbs for crying out loud. Just listen.”

  Ted and BB had gone quiet, but Phil said, “I’m sorry. I’m not sure what you mean. Ted, what has you so upset? Whose limbs are we talking about?”

  Ted looked down then said, “I need to see the data, but if I’m taking Zen’s words at face value, and Dr Drakos is saying I should, then what Zen has is proof that we’re about to be visited by aliens.”


  5

  Phil’s eyes opened wide. “Aliens, like little green men?”

  Zen said, “I’m not sure of their colour, but I’m tentatively suggesting they’re heptadactyl.”

  “Heptadactyl?”

  “Yes, seven fingers or maybe seven limbs. There is a base seven bias to the variations that isn’t necessitated as far as I can tell by the physics.”

  Phil said, “No joke?”

  Ed shook his head and said, “No joke. We didn’t even tell BB because we needed advice on when and where to share this. Zen didn’t trust the people who BB consults for, but she needed some data to double-check her findings, and BB is one of the world’s best at gravitation. I reviewed her thoughts on relativity, and while it’s hypothetical, it meshes with the work I’m doing. It even takes account of Einstein and the light-speed limit. If Zen publishes she’ll get the Nobel. BB trusts you, and she’s usually a good judge of character. I knew you had connections here, so here we are. No joke.”

  “If I stay, will I understand the explanation?”

  Zen nodded and said, “I think so, although it’ll take longer than when I went through it with Dad.”

  Phil looked at Ed, who nodded. “It’s not complicated if you take Zen’s words as accurate reflections of the theory. You’ll find it hard to understand the data, but Ted will be able to tell if she’s flubbing it.”

  Phil looked at Ted and said, “Anyone else in your department able to verify this?”

  He shook his head and said, “Depends on how secure you want this. Lisa would be capable, but her security isn’t high enough.”

  Phil glanced at Zen and BB, then said, “Who else knows?”

  Ed said, “Just us.”

  Phil looked at Zen and said, “How and why does a sixteen-year-old girl know to keep this quiet?”

  “I’ve seen people in panic mode. I remember corona and the craziness. This will be worse, much worse. I don’t so much want to keep it secret as to make sure it is managed properly. I think we have a few years, but I could be wrong. To be honest, I need some data from LIGO, but if what I think is the process is correct, we’ll start seeing evidence that points to this in the wider scientific community within weeks.”