Thomas Aquinas, Explorer of the galaxy (Thomas Aquinas series)

by Rico, J. Luis

  Sister Jones has been working to finish her doctoral thesis under the tutelage of Brother Lewis, Brother Sebastian, and Hakham Katz for six months now. For their final experiments, they will need a minimal gravity environment, that is, an environment with no undue influence. In the inner system, the gravity well is dominated by the Sun. In the outer system, the gravity well is dominated by Jupiter. The L4 in the area of Jupiter’s influence is the perfect choice. The influence of the Sun and Jupiter cancel each other out. To find a better location she would have to nearly exit the system and travel to the Sol Alpha Centauri Lagrange point where the two systems cancel each other’s gravity wells out.

  For six years now, Catholics all over the known systems have been busy building FTL drive colony ships using the improvements of Brother Lewis’ design to more economically and much quicker transit into side space and travel between the stars. Forty such ships are under construction. Six are being built in the other large Lagrangian point of Jupiter and the Sun, L5. Half kilometers long iron nickel asteroids are being consumed by Nano bots and constructed into rigid high mass shapes by intelligent Nano devices. The work is continuing at a rapid pace. If Sister Jones experiments work out as she and Brother Lewis hope, Catholics galaxy wide will make another economy of scale improvement in FTL travel and the spread of Catholic humanity into the void with increase yet again.

  Her discovery builds upon the prior discoveries of Brother Lewis in harmonics. He perfected the ability to control black holes with high order harmonics of Hawking radiation, which made the control fields and their large glass bowls much smaller and more efficient. Ten times smaller and over a hundred times more efficient. Kilometers long FTL ships could be constructed much smaller and had tremendously lower energy requirements. His discoveries boosted the efficiency of inter stellar exploration by magnitudes of efficiency.

  Her discovery is not in the harmonics of the Hawking radiation, used for containment and control of black holes. But in the harmonics of the space time ripple they create. Where the Hawking fields and their harmonics were previously used to overlap one another, and force a black hole to be contained in a very tight and very specific location. This would be used to create the ripple in space time when it interacted with antimatter bullets at relativistic speeds. She believes she can use these same Hawking radiation fields to control the movement of two or more black holes and force them to interact with each other relativistically without traveling at all ourselves. And further magnify their apparent speed by using the second, third, or fourth order harmonics of the space time ripple.

  Imagine this thought experiment. You have two black holes and are able to hold them a meter apart. You place antimatter or exotic matter in between them. They are repulsed by the exotic matter they cannot digest into their event horizons. They push away. You force them towards the exotic matter with other Hawking radiation containment fields from the top and the bottom. You time it so that the two are slightly out of sync. It has to be carefully orchestrated. The fields of Hawking radiation containment are of necessity ultra-fine and ultra-accurate. They prevent the black holes from escaping but allow them to move up and down in relation to each other and the antimatter between them.

  You keep the exotic matter and black hole dance going and increase speed slowly. The two black holes establish a rhythm. Before long, you can get them to move at great speeds using they're own built in mathematical repulsion from the exotic matter between them and the exotic matter you control on top and bottom of them. You accelerate the rhythm.

  At .1C, a measurable and useful ripple in space is created. It is mathematically accessible for manipulation. Getting the black holes to dance with each other at .1C while holding them a meter apart is going to be tricky, but not impossible.

  It is not the .1C ripple created in space and time that is what Sister Jones wants to manipulate, however. It is the ripples and the way they interact with the other black hole ripples. They should create a higher order harmonic at an effective and much more useful .2C first order harmonic ripple. The second order harmonic is at .4C and nearly enough or a ripple to be used to enter side space. If they can maintain a .8C ripple, however, it will create a hole in space time large enough to step through at leisure. A ripple at a greater than relativistic 1.6C will create a ripple in space big enough to drop a kilometer sized asteroid through. All without accelerating a kilometer-long ship. All without years of acceleration for the crew. All without hundreds of meters of non-reusable glass bowls mounted on fusion fired generating plants.

  Research Asteroid Thomas the Magnificent

  Sister Jones supervises the last of the equipment calibrations. Crews finish the last of the glass bowl polishing as well, and everyone is ordered aboard the asteroid habitat on the Thomas the Magnificent or the sister research asteroid Lady Macbeth. The long-awaited countdown begins and is mirrored on the other asteroid lab habitats monitors. Brother Lewis is looking at a mirror image display on the Lady Macbeth that is as precise as quantum entanglement can make it, which is to say it is perfectly accurate.

  The digits on the display show less than a minute. Sister Jones and Brother Lewis begin to energize their Hawking radiation fields and their higher order harmonics to firmly entrap the two small black holes they are working with. The glass bowls on the asteroids begin to warm up as they bleed not only Hawking radiation in overlapping fields but physical heat energy as well. As the large bowls heat, they change colors in visible light. This is a design attribute of Sister Jones design from her Master’s thesis. Adding a layer of color ablative shielding in the right layer of glass allows the color changing metal to provide for better control for the operator of the Hawking radiation fields. The operator can visually see an indication of temperature and when it is changing on the bowl. This is a vast improvement of the previous placement of sensors and the operator viewing a series of tables on a digital read out.

  The bowls are magenta now and near their highest heat rating. The invisible fields of Hawking radiation and its higher order harmonics are invisible to visible light, they may only be seen indirectly through their action on the black hole they have captured and are manipulating.

  “Sister Jones, I have the ball and am introducing the exotic matter, it is between the black holes now.” Brother Sebastian smiles from ear to ear. His primary duty is now achieved and his secondary on the next phase of the operation, which will be driven by Sister Jones on this rock and Brother Lewis on the other.

  Sister Jones and Brother Lewis begin a carefully orchestrated dance. In reality, they have little to do at this point vice smack an abort button if something goes terribly wrong.

  The two black holes begin to move and be pushed away by the exotic matter. The top black hole moves down which moves the exotic matter which moves the bottom black hole, which rebounds from the Hawking radiation containment field and pushes itself up moving the exotic matter and the top black hole. At one meter per second, the process works perfectly.

  “Increasing speed. On to test two.” Sister Jones announces and makes the needed changes to the computer program. She and Brother Lewis watch instruments and glare ahead out of their windows, pretending they can see something in the visible light spectrum.

  The two black holes continue their dance through the exotic matter. At ten meters per second, the fields are operating efficiently and well.

  The protocol, decided well in advance by the University science labs steering committees is to wait ten minutes at each of the agreed upon speeds after five meters per second. Sister Jones bites her fingernails as she waits for the clock to tick out on the current speed of experimentation.

  “Moving to level three, speed one hundred meters per seconds.” Brother Lewis announces to the research team. The program moves the Hawking radiation fields in unison and increases the speed of the black holes in their dance with each other through the antimatter. The team waits and watches.

  The team makes their way slowly and methodically through the next
level at 1,000 meters per second. The one-meter distance separating the black holes seems more and more insignificant. Knowing that there are two black holes furiously dancing with each other back and forth, demanding mathematical guarantees as they interact with each other and the exotic matter is mind numbing. The energies being played with are enormous. Either of these black holes could consume the research habitats and the asteroids they reside on in a millisecond if they got loose.

  At 10,000 meters per second, the first hints of a gravity wave and space time ripple are visible on the team’s sensitive detection equipment. It is right on the edge of detection. The equipment is silent for a moment, then speaks up, then is silent again.

  At 100,000 meters per second, the team is now at a nearly relativistic speed of 1/3,000 the speed of light. The gravity wave detector is chirping at a steady frequency matching the dance of the black holes. Sister Jones turns it down to a manageable level. The volume of the audible harmonics was getting annoying.

  1,000,000 meters per second is almost exactly 1/300th of the speed of light. At this speed, the Hawking radiation containment fields are no longer moving their fields of overlapping high order harmonic radiations on the black holes themselves. Rather, they are extrapolating where the black holes must be and moving their fields ahead of the path to account for the distortion of the space time due to the relativistic speeds of the black holes.

  “Math and theory are mapping well to predictions.” Sister Jones announces. Hakham Katz smiles in return. Part of the protocol agreed to, involves an extended observation period before moving to 10,000,000 meters per second. “I vote to proceed.” “Second” Brother Lewis adds from the entangled communicator. The rest of the staff of research scientists and even interns vote one after the other. Any no votes here, and they will stop. The amount of science collected today will already take lifetimes to study. In the end, all votes to continue.

  10,000,000 meters per second is 1/30th of the speed of light. The black holes are continuing their dance with no noticeable change. All the math and measurements agree to 100 decimal places and match Sister Jones theory perfectly. The protocol is now to observe an hour and wait before increasing speed. Several of the team jump to grab a meal at this point. Sister Jones and Brother Lewis remain glued to their instruments. Eating a small meal brought to them by others.

  Brother Sebastian studies his display and plays with an archaic slide rule for several minutes. He speaks in a low voice but loud enough to be heard on both habitats. “I can see a ripple harmonic now. That is 2X current C velocity.” He smiles large enough to show his perfect teeth.

  At the end of the hour, another vote is taken. Again, it is unanimous. Yes. They continue.

  74,948,114 meters per second is 1/4 of the speed of light. The two black holes are interacting with each other in exactly the mathematical model predicted. The harmonics of the gravity and space time ripples are measured more accurately and strongly at this step. Sister Jones begins the pre-programmed operation to expand the size of paths the black hole travels from one meter to twenty. In a fraction of a second, it is completed. The two black holes are now separated from each other by twenty meters as they travel, vice the single meter they had been traveling.

  “I have .25C gravity well and ripple and its harmonic and second harmonic. That’s 1C!” screams a research scientist from his monitoring station. It is well-formed and stable.”

  “What are the strengths of the first and second harmonic?” Sister Jones asks. A smile forming on her skinny face. “Can you measure the size of the exploitable gap in the ripple? Is it large enough to insert an object?”

  “Yes, it is. I have a high confidence measurement. Maps exactly to your theory, Sister. I can place an object up to the size of a ten-meter sphere in it now. Somewhat larger if it is at velocity. The first and second order harmonic show no loss, they are exactly the strength of the gravity ripple created by the black holes. We have exact and perfect harmonics.” The scientist begins to match Sister Jones grin. It is contagious. Everyone in the two asteroids is smiling now.

  “Let’s sit stable until the end of the observation hour, then we will move to the next phase.” Brother Lewis is unmistakably excited as he makes his announcement on the entangled communicator. The team waits and monitors the newly formed hole in space. The two black holes continue to ripple space and time and gravity, interacting with each other in their entrapped embrace.

  The top black hole forces its way down and back up at .25C forcing the bottom black hole to bounce back and forth at the same speed. The bottom black hole does the same thing, their force multiplying their effect. Their combined .25C space time ripple combines with the frequency harmonic or each other to produce a .5C ripple, which itself forces another ripple at exactly 1C. Light speed space time ripples. The edge of space opens up. It opens up wide. This is the largest and most stable space time inflationary era ripple mankind has ever created. It is large enough and stable enough to walk through.

  “Ready for phase three.” The research scientist announces as the clock hits one hour.

  “Commence.” Brother Sebastian states. As the senior member, he gets the honor of ordering the FTL test.

  Outside the habitats, an unmanned research ship with an entangled communicator and as many instruments as can be crammed into a ship just under a ten-meter sphere and forty meters long enter the location of the predicted space rip at 1,000 meters per second. It travels so fast it is invisible to the naked eye on the asteroids as it zooms through and away.

  “Now we wait.” Brother Lewis announces. The ship has disappeared on radar and IR. It has gone somewhere though. The ships entangled communicator shows the normal telltale signs of side space. A lack of anything outside the ship. No light, no heat, no gravity. Nothing. All sensors directed outside remain unmoved.

  After ten minutes, the ship extends a telescoping antennae, and it folds in upon itself creating the Mobius strip that demands mathematical justice from the universe. The ship enters the universe and reports back all normal. It has traveled far less than a kilometer long colony ship, obviously, since mass is part of the equation. And since speed of entry is part of the equation and it was only at 1,000 meters per second and not a significant fraction of C, it has not traveled that far. A little over 20 light minutes is all. The crews of both manned asteroids celebrate with something close to pandemonium. They have changed the world for the better. Sister Jones has advanced mankind’s knowledge by hundreds of years. The Catholic faith will now be able to colonize star systems far more efficiently. A single jump point like the one at the LaGrangian point research facility can be constructed and used over and over and over again.

  Ships can enter the sphere of the space rip at any angle and at a more leisurely and much lower fraction of the speed of light. This will be offset by a few more hours or a few more days in side space. Trading that for smaller and more economical ships makes this is a tremendous victory. Also, they will never lose a ship again to the chance of entering a space ripple and miss the exact moment and the ripple closing on them. One in 103 ships is still lost this way. No longer. Sister Jones has saved untold lives as well.

  Sister Jones pumps her skinny fists in the air like she has just scored a final second shot to win the Championship. Brother Sebastian watches and smiles from his instruments behind her. “It is a great day for humanity and the Catholic faith!”

  He yells out loud surprising those near him. Sister Jones comes and gives him a hug and a kiss on the cheek. Of all the men that ever lived, only a man trapped inside his own mind for years could have ever seen the way these black holes would react when shaken like this. And only a mind as perfect as Sister Jones’ could have straightened out the gravity wave and side space math then make the theory work.

  On the other Habitat on the Lady Macbeth, Brother Lewis hugs everyone he can reach and yells out loud “God is great!” Only an engineering mind as disciplined and skilled as Brother Lewis’ could have made the en
gineering work on a scale this large. Hakham Katz smiles like the cat that ate the canary. His gravity field and wave overlap and ripple calculations work in practice as well as they do in his new theories. The experiment is a tremendous success for all four of the scientists.

  Within thirty minutes of their discovery, the communicator buzzes with an important communication from the Pope. Everyone quiets down and the communicator is broadcast to both asteroids and all the crew. Sister Jones and Brother Lewis continue their pre-programmed operation to slow the black holes down and store them for reuse.

  “Everyone in the research asteroids Lady Macbeth and Thomas the Magnificent. This is Pope Benedict the Nineteenth. I understand that you have made an important discovery. A most important discovery my aids tell me. One that will change the race to colonize new worlds. One that will advance our society by hundreds of years in advancement. They tell me this discovery that will change the arc of mankind’s colonization of space was made by a young sister named Jones. They tell me she is a frail thing, massing very few kilos and skinny and young.” The Pope pauses to catch his breath or collect his thoughts. “They also tell me that she has the mind of an angel. Pure and disciplined and full of light. Sister Jones would you please lead us all in prayer. In prayer at the joy and the wonder you have created. You honor me and you honor the billions of Catholic souls all over the known systems.”