by Patin, Eddie
Title
Portal Zero
The “Time of Doors” Series
EDDIE PATIN
Season 1 – Episode 1
(Book 1)
Copyright
“Portal Zero – The Time of Doors Series – Season 1, Episode 1 (Book 1)”
Copyright © 2017, Lost Woods Publishing LLC
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EBooks are not transferable. All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded, or distributed via the Internet or any other means, electronic or print, without the publisher’s permission.
Published in the United States of America by Lost Woods Publishing LLC, 2017
Table of Contents
Title
Copyright
Table of Contents
Book Introduction by Eddie Patin
1 - Chad Murray
2 - Arthur Kline
3 - Kayleen Lugo
4 - Tommy and Jody Shelton
5 - Officer Harvey Swanson
6 - Megan McKinney
7 - Chad Murray
8 - Kayleen Lugo
9 - Arthur Kline
10 - Tommy and Jody Shelton
11 - Megan McKinney
12 - Officer Harvey Swanson
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A Message from the Publisher
Book Introduction by Eddie Patin
The future is now and the doors are open...
In a year much sooner than you think, while scientists and politicians argue about global warming and lack of resources, the United Nations has reorganized itself into the UEA, the first serious attempt at a world government. "Dimension Drive" is being developed for wormhole-based space travel in Europe by the UEA to expand human civilization into the stars.
But the UEA development team responsible for Dim Drive has no idea that they're about to lose control of the portal they're trying to harness because of a massive, unforeseen EMP, and usher in the end of the world as we know it--the Time of Doors...
In America, one of the last superpowers holding out against joining the United Earth Alliance, several individuals across the country are going about their lives, unaware that UEA scientists are quietly conducting the first real test of their new Dimension Drive technology that will change everything forever...
January the 13th, 2017
Heh ... Friday the 13th. The Time of Doors has begun!
Welcome, readers, to another dark and adventurous tale. Thank you for taking the time to look at my book!
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Now … onto the good stuff…
1 - Chad Murray
UEA Science Research Lab, Geneva, Switzerland
“So we’re not actually doing it live,” Chad said, tightening the pivot points of the tripod.
Looking in the bright digital display, he tilted and pitched the camera, little by little, until the composition was just right. Melinda adjusted her shirt, her bra, the lapel microphone tucked into her bright red blazer. She moved a strand of medium-length dark hair out of her face, back to the side where the makeup team intended it to stay.
“No, Chad. This is for later.” She pressed her ruby red lips together, and glared at him. The anchorwoman gave him that look—the look he’s seen plenty in these last two months that spoke volumes of resentment and annoyance.
Too young, her eyes said. Just a dumb kid. A skinny little hipster playing with the big dogs. Even though Melinda had known him for several years when he was in high school and throughout college, even though she was a family friend, he couldn’t shake the feeling that she hated him for getting a hand-up in the network. It wasn’t his fault that she agreed to take him on when his uncle asked.
She could have said no. Chad would have understood, and started as an intern like everyone else.
There were no other twenty-two year old technicians working for senior anchors, after all.
Later, looking back on this moment as he sat on the irradiated ground of the California wasteland, he would laugh at how none of it mattered; how his worrisome little house of cards would soon be ripped to pieces like the rest of the world...
But for now, here he was, deep underground in a secret research facility for the United Earth Alliance, surrounded by soldiers and scientists, shooting something super-important for one of the largest media networks on the planet.
No pressure.
“This is Melinda Ballard reporting live at the UEA’s Science Research Lab under the UEA Office in Geneva, Switzerland.” She smacked her lips. “Geneva, Switzerland. Switzerland.” Melinda was looking at the camera, even though Chad wasn’t recording, repeating bits and pieces of her introduction as if warming up her tongue. Chad knew that she’d been one of the senior anchors for the United News Association for what … six years now? But even still, this particular gig must be a big deal for her, too.
He wondered if she ever got nervous...
With a perfectly manicured hand, Melinda reached over to the table out of view of the camera, and grabbed a bottle of water with a straw. She carefully pursed her lips and took a drink.
“Then why do you keep saying live?” he asked. Chad scratched at his scruffy face, and felt his man bun to make sure his hair was still in place.
She smirked at him, her crow’s feet barely showing under the makeup.
“Because, kiddo, it’s for the viewers.” She put the bottle back on the table and composed herself, adjusting her ear piece. “This is Melinda Ballard reporting live at the UEA’s…”
The camera was pretty-much good to go. Chad had positioned Melinda a third into the frame, and behind her, you could clearly see parts of the desks and computer terminals, the scientists or technicians (whatever they’re called these days, Chad thought) working at their individual tasks, and in the center of the shot was the gate, up at the front of the room.
Gate. Portal. Whatever.
The room wasn’t very large. He and Melinda were set up at the back on the left, and the floor sloped down to the far wall, toward the gate, with three rows of technician terminals and equipment along the way that reminded Chad of a college classroom. There were three long rows of desks, with a central walkway down the middle. The difference between this deep, underground science lab and a small university classroom was that up at the front of the class, where a professor might normally stand with a whiteboard or something, there was only the gate...
Portal Zero.
When Chad was a kid, he watched a movie called Stargate. That movie had a huge portal mechanism with a great, big runway, and a large, rotating ring-thing full of Egyptian glyphs or something. Whenever the characters, the soldiers and such, walked into the portal, it was a huge deal—walking up that runway, rolling up their massive pallets of equipment and
all…
There was certainly no shortage of techno-stuff in this room, but this place—this big test that was coming—it was all rather lackluster compared to Hollywood’s version. The portal itself was a large ring, just like in the movies, about seven feet in diameter, made of steel or some sort of metal alloy, but there were no fancy glyphs or runes or other decorations to make it look magical and cool.
The ring was just a big metal ring, and columns and cases of electrical equipment and sensors were attached to it on the outside of both sides, bolted onto the heavy steel frame. There wasn’t any sort of magical field inside, humming and buzzing and waiting. No black hole, or even a fancy, twisting aperture. On the other side of the ring was just the back wall of the room, about two feet behind it—a solid concrete wall painted UEA baby blue.
A huge array of wiring was connected to the hardware on the outside of the ring, all neatly gathered into two thick tentacles of Cat 5 Ethernet cables, power cables, and other wires Chad didn’t recognize at a glance, all zip-tied together every twelve inches or so, and leading to the various technician desks and terminals. Both of the thick, collected cordage bundles were attached firmly to the concrete floor with black duct tape.
There was no Hollywood bullshit—no regular pointless beeping machines, no holograms, no big laser maps of space with radar stuff or whatever…
It was the gate ... and a bunch of computers.
Not to say that it wasn’t impressive…
This was definitely the first real, live inter-dimensional portal Chad had ever seen—the only portal he’d ever seen that wasn’t on TV or in a video game.
If it worked…
“Alright, ready to do the intro segment?” Melinda asked.
“Sure.”
The senior anchor loosened up her shoulders. Chad looked around at the scientists, all calmly working on their computers, occasionally getting up to talk to a neighbor nearby, or the project director, standing at the back of the room behind them. Four UEA soldiers stood quietly near the entrance of the room behind the news team, two on either side of the sliding glass door, each holding what Chad assumed was some sort of machine gun. They were dressed in blue-grey jumpsuits, wore some sort of ... torso armor ... full of pouches and gear, and had the UEA-colored pale blue helmets on their heads.
Melinda took a breath and smiled. “Are my tits okay?”
Chad’s eyes glanced down, then up again. He nodded, and signaled her to go.
The anchorwoman stood smiling for a while after the red light turned on, then came alive.
“This is Melinda Ballard reporting live at the UEA’s Science Research Lab under the UEA Office in Geneva, Switzerland. Today we’ll be reporting from the UEA buildings of both Switzerland and from the UEA Headquarters in Manhattan, New York, because scientists and organizations all around the world are coming together for the first ever test of the newest technology to advance humanity as a whole. That’s right—I’m talking about the UEA’s new Dimension Drive technology, ‘Dim Drive’ for short.
“Behind me is a team of talented UEA technicians, all under the direction of UEA Science Director Dr. Stefan Freudenstein, one of Germany’s top scientists, who has been working on this technology for the last two years. And what is Dim Drive you ask? When faced with the irrefutable evidence of man-made climate change and resource scarcity of the twentieth century, as proven by UEA and United Nations scientists of the time, ten years ago the newly formed United Earth Alliance announced its United Pilgrimage Initiative, declaring its focus on finding habitable worlds for humankind and the development of fast and reliable deep space travel to get us there…”
Chad watched the camera display intently, and looked up when one of the scientists walked by. The man looked directly into the camera, and his white lab coat glared in the lights for just an instant.
A little messy for the take, but no big deal.
Everything was going fine.
Irrefutable evidence? Chad thought. Those were strong words. Was that right? He shrugged. Well, Melinda would know, he supposed. He’d grown up hearing about global warming and humans raping the world all his life...
“Now,” she went on to say, performing flawlessly for the camera, “the science team is getting everything squared away, and the actual test will take place at any moment! Past the desks behind me is the gate itself, appropriately termed ‘Portal Zero’, which will—hopefully—create a direct means of instantaneous transportation to the other identical gate waiting for us in New York!”
Melinda paused, smiling and nodding her head at the camera for a while. Chad looked down at his laptop screen, and saw that one of the anchors back at the studio in Los Angeles was asking her a question. He had the volume turned low so that it wouldn’t become a distraction, since there was a bit of a transmission delay.
“Yes, indeed,” Melinda suddenly said with a smile. She pivoted to the side a little, allowing the shot, as Chad set it up, to focus more on the portal behind her. There were three small, metal crates sitting on the concrete floor close to Portal Zero, one of them perforated with dozens of holes designed to allow airflow. “The test will consist of not only connecting the two portals, but the scientists will also be passing those three crates through Portal Zero to reappear in New York so that the science team there can check for any flaws in transmission. One of the crates is full of fresh, organic food, another is holding the refrigerated heart of a pig to study the portal’s effect on viable organ transplants, and the other…” She paused, stepping back fully into the shot and giving the camera a totally goober smile. “… is a puppy!”
The anchor woman stood smiling and nodding for several seconds, then flashed a big smile and spoke again.
“It certainly is! He’s a young Jack Russel Terrier, and he’s so cute! We’ll all be rooting for little Max, for sure!”
With that, she stood for a while smiling, then turned away to the scientists.
Chad heard the faint voice of the anchor back at home on the laptop. “We now go to our own correspondent, Katherine Hall, live in New York, to see the other side of the Dim Drive Portal Zero. What’s happening over there, Katherine?”
“How long, guys?” Melinda asked the group of technicians.
Chad heard the correspondence with Katherine playing faintly on his laptop while he thought about the pack of smokes in his jacket pocket. They were saying something about not doing a smaller trial because of ‘critical mass’ or something...
The director’s voice spoke up from the back of the room, thick with his German accent. “It looks like we’ll be ready in about twenty minutes, Ms. Ballard, give or take.”
To let the news team create their own lighting, Freudenstein had turned off the fluorescent ceiling lights at the back of the room. He now stood in the dark, near the soldiers, watching his team work with his arms crossed. The senior scientist’s face was severe, and he was thin and lean. The small spectacles perched on his nose reflected the light of a dozen computer screens.
“Should I stop it?” Chad asked Melinda, who was taking another sip from her water bottle, being careful not to move her hair or mess up her makeup.
“Yeah,” she said. “We’ll start it up again in fifteen minutes or so. That was good.”
Chad was dying for a cigarette, but he knew that he couldn’t smoke down here, and wouldn’t be taking the lift back to the surface any time soon. Instead, he pulled out his vape, pressing the LED-lit button, and took a long drag on the propylene glycol smoke that tasted like caramel cappuccino. The device sizzled, and he blew a thick cloud of vapor toward the ceiling, earning him some looks from the soldiers.
“Do not do that,” the director said suddenly, the disdain in his voice as thick as his accent.
Chad nodded, embarrassed, and stuffed the vape back into his pocket.
“Yep,” Chad said. “Good.”
“Any minute now, Ms. Ballard,” the science director said.
The room had certainly become more animated i
n the last five minutes, the technicians all declaring when they were done with their individual duties and migrating to help each other. The energy of all of the people working on this project was starting to buzz, and the soldiers started standing a little straighter as well.
Chad heard a little bit of techno-speak here and there, but found that could keep up with very little of it, even as an AV guy. It seemed that most of what the scientists were talking about involved physics, which was never Chad’s strong suit.
Plus, he just wasn’t paying much attention to what the others were doing.
Melinda spent most of the downtime sitting on a folding chair and playing on her phone.
Chad sat at his laptop, idly watching one of the anchors in L.A., Brent West, discuss a criticism of the president rejecting the UEA’s repeated encouragement to let go of its antiquated borders and join the politico-economic union of the Alliance. Chad wasn’t entirely sure what he felt about that, but everyone on TV at least sure supported a world government...
Sometimes, he felt a little ashamed that he was still part of a xenophobic culture that resisted the ways of the future. He could feel it in the eyes of all of these UEA people—the soldiers, scientists, and other individuals he’s encountered on this trip—their disapproval was palpable.
But something about that didn’t feel right either...
He didn’t really know what he thought about it. But he’d support his network and stand up for his job—that was for sure.
“Thank you, doctor,” the anchorwoman said. She looked at Chad, and her dark, thin eyebrows arched. “Ready?”
“Uh yeah, should be good—hang on…” Chad stood up from the flimsy plastic and aluminum chair and pushed it back out of the way. He double-checked the camera, checked the levels and output on the laptop, and made sure the shot hadn’t moved.
Everything was ready.
“Just tell me when!”