Dad looked at Gordon, “Can you do anything about Mt. Rainier? Will the Brown Matter make it erupt?”
Jake stood and walked to the window; his bare feet should’ve been cold on the plastic floor, but he found it a comfortable temperature. He pressed his face against the window and tried to peer outside. He thought a shape—a shark?—drifted by. It was large, maybe a six-gill or seven-gill shark, both common in Puget Sound in deeper waters. A shark. That was appropriate.
Behind him, Gordon and Dad were throwing out ways they could potentially stop the volcano from erupting.
Over his shoulder, Jake called, “Why don’t you just use the Dolk’s TAG-GIMS?”
They continued talking as if they hadn’t heard him.
Dad said to Gordon, “There’s nothing we can do?”
Jake turned around and raised his voice louder, “Use Dolk’s TAG-GIMS.”
Gordon looked up and frowned. “What’re you talking about?”
“You know. Dr. Dolk’s invention creating anti-gravity. Mai-Ron Dolk. Why don’t you use that?”
Gordon and Dad looked at him blankly.
Finally, Gordon said, “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.”
So, Jake sat down and told them.
Two Friends
Four years earlier.
The last day before Stefon Dolk, Jake’s best friend, left for the southern continent dawned with a purple glow. Stefon and Jake yawned. They’d stayed up all night, playing the latest version of DinoGrad, a video game where they fought dinosaurs similar to those that had roamed Earth in ancient times. The game had become wildly popular in the last few months. Media commentators explained that Risonians were still struggling with the idea of moving to Earth and wanted to take out their anger in a video game. Jake just knew the game was fun.
After being up all night, they were famished and went to find Stefon’s dad. Mai-Ron Dolk’s laboratory was a mess, as usual. Mai-Ron was small and wiry, and often underestimated. A mistake. His understanding of volcanoes was incredibly rich; the man was—literally—a genius. He backed that up with the ability to make theory practical by building equipment that no one else thought of. But he couldn’t keep files in order. Except his volcano research. He had one briefcase, one computer, and one suitcase where he kept all his volcano papers, databases, and blueprints of equipment. They were his life.
“Stefon, we go in an hour. Are you packed?”
Stefon nodded. He was a head taller than Jake, and very skinny. When they swam, he usually wore a shirt and trunks so no one would see his ribs. And he hated the fight floor because he was required to go shirtless. During training, Stefon usually beat Jake. But on the fight floor, Stefon could never relax, which gave Jake the edge he needed to win the trophies.
“Sir,” Jake asked again. “Why do you have to go for the whole summer?”
Mai-Ron reached out to rub Jake’s hair, but Jake ducked away. Mai-Ron always tried that, but Jake had finally figured out he could move fast enough to avoid the gesture.
Mai-Ron patted his computer and his equipment box. “I think I’ve got this volcano problem figured out.”
“He’s been working on it all his life,” Stefon said honestly. He walked toward the door. “He tells me that all the time.”
Jake went to the open case and looked at the equipment. Living with Swann Quad-de, he’d seen lots of volcano equipment. Lying inside the case were just a couple square packets. Jake picked up one—it felt much lighter than he expected. “What’s so different about this?”
Mai-Ron pushed up his glasses and scratched his nose. “Everything. We’ve been looking at this the wrong way. The Brown Matter changes to Red Matter, which is creating a black hole at the center of our planet, right?”
Jake nodded. “Yes and some scientists think we should use Brown Antimatter.”
“It’s a good theory.” Mai-Ron nodded and paced back and forth. Talking about scientific theories got him excited now. “Everyone knows that when matter and antimatter collide, there’ll be an explosion. But how big of an explosion? If one nanogram, or one billionth of a gram, of matter and antimatter collided, it would give off enough energy to boil a teakettle of water. The Brown Antimatter would need to be in sufficient quantity to counter-act the Brown Matter in the volcano, but not create an explosion the size of a nuclear bomb. It’s been tricky figuring out how to deploy the exact amount needed.”
“What’s the answer?” Jake said. The fabric of the square packet was slick in his hands.
“We’re thinking of it all wrong,” Mai-Ron said. “A black hole is just an extreme case of concentrated matter where gravitational forces become enormous. Instead of focusing on what caused the black hole, I started thinking about black holes. Can anything escape a black hole?”
Jake shrugged, “Theoretically, no.”
“Wrong,” Mai-Ron said. “What you need is a Gravity Lens with a negative index of refraction.”
“What?”
Mai-ron took off his glasses and held them out. “Look. We focus light rays, one type of electromagnetic waves with pieces of glass. But optics is limited by the wavelength of light. If we want to look at smaller things, we use an electron microscope, which is limited by the wavelength of electron movement. Gravity has even smaller wavelengths, so to focus it with a lens, we need an ultra-thin material.”
Jake nodded. “Okay. That sounds reasonable.”
Mai-ron put his glasses back on and took the packet from Jake. He opened one corner of the package and pointed. “This is a Gravity Lens that I made last year when I was in space. It’s a 3-D nano-printed tungsten meta-surface. Across the surface, the gravity refraction index is a gradient and produces an anti-gravity effect.”
Jake stared in awe. “You made an anti-gravity thing?”
Mai-ron chuckled. “Thing? It’s a tungsten anti-gravity gradient-index meta-surface, or a TAG-GIMS. The tungsten will withstand the temperatures in the volcano. The pouch will burn up and the TAG-GIMS will unfurl or unfold, creating enough anti-gravity to slow the encroaching black hole.”
“Is it working right now?” Jake backed away from the pouch.
“Barely. When it’s folded, it’s about 1-millioneth the size unfolded. Only the top layer is interacting with gravity, so it might seem a little lightweight, that’s all. That’s why I had to make it in space and fold it before I brought it back to Rison.”
“So, you can escape a black hole?”
“Hmmm,” Mai-ron said. “Probably not escape. But used early enough, we might slow collapse of matter into the black hole.”
Jake caught his breath. “You can stop the planet’s implosion?”
Mai-ron’s eyes were shining with unshed tears. “We’re going to the Kalaptia Volcano to try it out.”
“That’s in the Holla Sea, in the southern hemisphere?” Jake didn’t want his friend to be so far away all summer.
Mai-Ron nodded and put the cylinder back in his case. “Yes. They are predicting that Kalaptia will erupt this summer, and I want to try to stop it.”
“And if it works?”
“There’s hope for Rison.” Mai-Ron’s forehead wrinkled, and he picked up a second packet. “I meant to take this extra TAG-GIMS to my lab and leave it in the safe there. I don’t know if I have time now.”
Jake held out a hand and shrugged. “I’ll keep one for you. I have a strong-box.”
Mai-Ron looked uncertain, but then he looked at the time display and sighed. “We’ll miss the shuttle if I take time to go by the lab.” He tapped a finger on the packet. “You’ll take care of it?”
“Of course,” Jake said.
Mai-Ron and Stefon dropped Jake off an hour later at his house and left for the airport.
Later, Jake heard the devastating news. The Dolks had arrived at Ocarina, a small town near Kalaptia Volcano, too late. It had just exploded, and the ash created the normal lightning storms. A stray thunderbolt hit their vehicle, and it rolled and crashed, killing everyone, includ
ing Mai-ron and Stefon. Just a freak accident.
Gordon leaned across the table, “You never told anyone about Dolk’s TAG-GIMS?”
“I was nine years old, and I’d just lost my best friend.” Sometimes, the ache of that loss still weighed Jake down. Stefon had always wanted to see Earth and if things had worked out differently, he would’ve been with Jake when he stepped foot on Earth. “When I did think about it, I assumed he’d told other scientists. I didn’t want them to take the TAG-GIMS away from me because it was—” He cleared his throat, the emotions raw even after so many years. “Well, it was the last thing Mai-ron ever gave me.”
“I’ve never heard of Dolk’s anti-gravity thing,” Gordon said.
Jake wanted to smile at calling Dolk’s invention, “a thing.” Instead, his forehead wrinkled. “You’re kidding. The other volcanologist didn’t know what he was working on?”
“No.” Gordon dropped his head into his hand. “If he had a new theory, it died with him.”
Heart thumping wildly, Jake shook his head. “No, it didn’t.”
Gordon lifted his head, and Dad stared.
“I kept the TAG-GIMS. Someday, I had planned to figure out if it really did create anti-gravity. It was a sentimental thing—”
Gordon stammered. “Wh-wh-where is it?”
“In my room at Sir and Easter’s house. In my strong-box.”
“Dolk’s ideas are five years old,” Gordon said. “Surely someone else has done something similar.”
Dad opened his arms wide and said, “Maybe. Maybe not. We have to retrieve that—what did you call it? A TAG-GIMS—and study Dolk’s theory to see if there’s anything useful there. Think of all the time wasted.”
Jake looked from Gordon to Dad.
“We need to get Dayexi here,” Dad rose and went to lean his head against the window. “In three days.”
“What is going on?” Jake asked.
“It takes me almost three days to decompress to get out of here.” Dad pounded softly on the window.
So that’s why Dad came so seldom. Once he came down to Seastead, he stayed long enough to make it worthwhile, usually a couple weeks.
“Can’t she come down to Seastead? She’s dying to see it,” Gordon said.
“Absolutely not!”
“You’re right, of course.” Gordon sighed. “We can’t risk it. I’ll find a quiet place in the Seattle area and make sure it’s secure.”
Dad nodded. “I’ll call and make sure she’s here in three days.”
Thrilled, Jake realized that he’d get to see his mom soon. “So what now?” he asked.
Gordon took charge. “I’ll take you back to your house and meet Sir and Easter. After all, I am David’s father. In fact, he can go with us.”
“And I’ll give you Dolk’s TAG-GIMS?”
“Yes.”
Jake whispered. “Will this really make a difference? Will it save Rison?”
“Dolk was a genius. But still, his theories are five years out of date. And Rison’s core—it’s so unstable. It may be too late.” Gordon said.
“But Mt. Rainier,” Jake pleaded. “You can reverse the Brown Matter there?”
“If Dolk really figured out something, then—we have a chance. And that’s more than I thought we had when we first heard what Captain Hill had done.”
The Globes
While Gordon went to find David and get things set for going back to shore, Dad asked, “Would you like to see my room here?”
He’s trying to make up for not telling me about Seastead, Jake thought. But he was curious to see more of the installation. Still barefoot, he padded behind Dad to his cabin.
Dad’s room had bookshelves—real paper books—scattered among umjaadi globes. He’d had the Risonian water globes on the Moon Base, too, but it looked like he had even more.
“You’ve never told me why you have so many,” Jake said.
Dad smiled sadly. “They remind me of Dayexi.” Dad took the umjaadi globe from Jake and held it up. “She gave me the first one fifteen years ago. Let me tell you the story.”
I was on the first envoy to Rison, a medical officer, the Navy’s expert on comparative anatomy. Your mom and her family volunteered to be examined by humans: your grandparents, Jasa and Chan, and their daughter, Dayexi. We needed a family like that for genetic studies. Swann was there, too, wanting to protect them all, but he had to stand aside and let me do the anatomical examinations and tests.
After the initial examinations, Dayexi invited me to swim in the Risonian pool. We swam and played around some. And then we argued—it was a little thing, nothing important—and then to show that she wasn’t really angry, she dove.
You have to understand: it was one of the first times for me to see a Risonian in action in the water. She dove and let me watch her legs Velcro together and then swim like she had a tail. I’d done the anatomical studies, and even seen the villi work on the examining table. But to see it in the water and the effect it had on her swimming—well, it was something to see.
To demonstrate her gills, Dayexi sat on the pool’s floor for a long time, water-breathing. Just letting me observe, to see for myself that she was—well, alien.
But I didn’t see her as alien. To me, she’s always been a beautiful and fascinating mermaid.
All over the pool’s floor were umjaadi globes with bioluminescent starfish. The pool glowed with life and with possibilities. Watching her, anything was possible that night.
Anyway. When she finally surfaced, she carried this umjaadi globe and handed it to me. A peace offering. She called it a Glow Star.
Of course, she had to show me how to shake it to activate the bioluminescence.
She said, “Keep it. To remember this day.”
I’ve kept it. And every time I see another umjaadi globe, I’m a sucker. I have to buy it. Please, don’t tell her I have so many.
Jake lay back on Dad’s bed, his eyes blurry, and thought about the young Navy officer, so anxious to learn about Risonians. Falling in love with Dayexi, it must have been the best time of his life. Dad loved Mom.
And Mom loved Dad.
It shouldn’t work. It left behind Mom’s life with Swann Quad-de on Rison. It left behind the physical differences in the species. It left behind the struggle of Earthlings to protect themselves and the struggle of Risonians to find a refuge from their own foolishness. It shouldn’t work.
Yet, here he was. Proof that it did work.
Contagious?
To leave Seastead, Dad had to decompress for three days or risk the bends, chokes and staggers. Meanwhile, Mom had important meetings set up that she couldn’t cancel. They had finally arranged for a face-to-face meeting for the next Sunday.
That week of waiting was somber as reports came in from volcanologists studying Mt. Rainier: the crater was bulging at the rate of a meter a day. The temperature of the gases coming from fumarole increased daily, and the amount of sulfur dioxide increased, too.
And, worst of all, the pristine glacier streams and frigid mountain lakes and ponds around Mt. Rainier turned deadly. The newspapers ran stories like, “Stink Killing Fish on Mt. Rainier.” One lake had a massive fish kill, with fish floating on top of the calm waters: rainbow trout, bull trout, dolly varden, whitefish, and salmon. Scientists warned that gases were seeping into lake waters and releasing chemicals that had strange effects.
There could be just one conclusion: Mt. Rainier was getting ready to explode.
“The mountain is rotten,” warned volcanologists. “The snowcapped peak is sitting on soft, muddy slopes. When it explodes, the lahars, or mud slides, will be the biggest in centuries.”
People from the Mt. Rainier area responded by evacuating, streams of cars clogging the streets, loaded down with every possession they could cram into vehicles. Many of the students and faculty at Bainbridge High had relatives or friends moving in with them until the situation calmed. It was a somber week.
Jake w
as nervous, ready to charge to the mountain and use Dolk’s TAG-GIMS, confident that Mai-Ron’s theories would be effective in containing the effects of the Brown Matter. But no decisions could be made till Sunday when Mom would arrive. Gordon and his crew spent the week studying Mai-Ron’s gravity lens and trying to put his theories into a context that made sense.
It might have been a hard week of waiting, except for Em.
Till now, Jake had hung back with Em, thinking that an interstellar love story was impossible. But his parents had made it work. Sure, he was the product of a test tube and wouldn’t have been alive without his father’s skills in the lab. But here he was, half-Risonian and half-human. That meant it might be possible to fall head over heels in love with Em—and expect it to work.
At some point he’d have to tell her his background, but that was years in the future. At fifteen Earth-years-old, neither of them was ready for anything serious yet. But he might reasonably expect her to be his girlfriend. Right?
On Monday morning, Jake showed up at Em’s door before school. She was grabbing her bags and books and trying to tie her tennis shoes all at the same time.
Stepping inside, Jake smiled at her. “That’s why you need me around. To help you carry books and bags.”
She blushed, clung to her gym bag, and frowned. “I do fine by myself.”
Jake stepped closer and put a hand on her shoulder. “Of course, you do. But you’ll do even better with me along.”
For a moment, they stared at each other, until a slow smile spread across her face.
“You’re right,” she said. “You might just make life easier. Certainly, it’s more interesting with you around.”
She bowed slightly to heave her backpack off her shoulder and then held it up for him. He slung it across his left shoulder. Using his best manners, he opened the front door and let her walk through before closing it gently behind them, turning to watch her amble down the front path.
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