The Waterhole

by Warren Chazan

  A flashing red strobe light indicated its imminent arrival. Biting into her fingernails, she watched the screen tick over from ninety to one hundred percent. “It’s here. What now? Where do I install it?”

  Simon screwed up his face. “That’s the tricky part.”

  “Jesus, Simon. What now?”

  “You’re going to have to install it on the machine itself, but EMB is much closer to you than to us on our side, and the installation process is much simpler. It should only take you a few minutes.”

  “Simon. It’s twenty-three degrees outside, and it’s at least a five-minute walk over to the machine. We’d be doomed to the same fate as Drew before we got there.”

  Simon shrugged. “I guess I’m out of ideas.”

  Sheri hung her head. She looked over at Chloe, who was playing with a doll whose head she had accidentally decapitated. She couldn’t leave her at a time like this. She looked at the professor, who’d passed out in his chair. There was only Steve, Jack and Janine left. Jack was still nursing his ankle next door and Steve shrugged his shoulders at her. They both knew that he wouldn’t make it thirty feet with his limp, which left only Janine.

  “I’ll do it,” she said, without any prompting.

  Sheri forced a smile. “I can’t ask you to do that. If your body temperature drops more than a degree, you’re likely to end up like Drew.”

  Janine approached Sheri, placing her hand on her arm. “Sheri, please. Let me do this one thing. I’ve done so many terrible things in my life. I’ve hurt so many people, some intentionally, perhaps some unintentionally. I owe this to society and to myself. Besides which, Chloe needs you here.”

  Sheri sighed. “Are you sure?”

  Janine nodded her head. Jack had hobbled into the room on his makeshift crutches. “I’ll do it,” he said.

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Janine snapped back. “You couldn’t make it as far as the toilet with that leg.” She kissed him gently on the cheek and smiled. “I’ve got this one, Jack.” She gently stroked his thick mop of black hair, her eyes filming over ever so slightly.

  Sheri said, “Start piling on the clothing.”

  Janine, dumbstruck for just a moment sprang to life. Jack pulled off his track pants, which she quickly donned over her jeans. She slid her arms through the jacket she’d borrowed from Jack and he helped her into his military coat. Sheri stole the sleeping professor’s thick woolen hat off him and pulled it over Janine’s head.

  “Gloves?” said Sheri. “Anyone got gloves?”

  Steve grabbed a pair from his bag and Janine slid her hands into them.

  Lastly, Sheri pulled off the cashmere scarf that was loosely draped around her neck and wrapped it around Janine’s. She looked like a mountaineer, about to climb the last few feet of the Hillary Step at Everest. All that was missing was the oxygen.

  “Jesus, guys, I’m boiling to death in here,” she said.

  “Good,” said Sheri, handing her the micro-sim. “Now take this. You’re going to head to the nearest pylon of the machine. That’ll be the north-east corner. We’ll point you in the direction. When you get there, you’ll need to unlock the key panel with a code. The code is 6754. I’ve written it down for you.” She handed a piece of paper to Janine, who quickly crumpled it up into her palm and nodded. “Then what?”

  “The panel will unlock and slide away. Inside there’ll be a slot to insert the disc. Once inside, press the upload button next to the slot.”

  “And then?”

  Sheri sighed. “With the way the laws of physics are fluctuating now, pray it’s not too late!”

  CHAPTER NINETY-FIVE

  After being pointed in the general direction, Janine pushed the door release knob and waited for the glass sliding door to open. The force of the wind instantly stole her breath as she stumbled outside. Twenty-three degrees Fahrenheit with a hefty wind-chill factor was no party.

  She weaved between cars in the frozen parking lot, slipping momentarily before continuing across the alien landscape to the north-east pylon. One again, she briefly lost her footing and slipped on the ice, landing in an awkward position, but was saved from serious injury by the bulky cocoon of clothing. She dragged herself up, and then the first stirrings of shivering began to take hold.

  Her body temperature was dropping, and she had to move fast. The pylon was maybe forty feet away, but the icy blast hindered her every move. Each step she took felt almost as energy draining as swimming a lap in an Olympic-sized pool, and by the time she reached the pylon, she was exhausted, shivering uncontrollably and felt the first stirrings of chest pain again.

  * * * *

  Sheri watched Janine on the CCTV. Even though she was able to see her clearly, there was no way to communicate with her as a few hours earlier the entire telcom networks had gone down, most likely due to overload, but at this point other possibilities could not be ruled out. Television broadcasts had disappeared around the same time, probably because millions of people were dropping dead from the new physiology paradigm. To top things off, she was certain the Russian or Chinese missiles would strike the facility at any moment. With time itself in a state of flux, no one even knew when the deadline was anymore. Then she saw Janine fall, just as a call came through from Wesley. She could barely discern his image, despite using their own dedicated satellite for communication.

  “Sheri, we’re evacuating now. The water is a few inches from the pylon. We have to run.”

  Sheri nodded. A few seconds later, all communication with NASA ceased. Even though the flow had been reversed, some of Stromlo’s computers lit up with a multitude of warning lights, strobes flashing away. Sheri was forced to ignore them. She prayed that her colleagues and Simon had made it out in time. They probably didn’t.

  “Warning, communication with Pasadena compromised.” The message was repeated over and over. Chloe came running up to her, and Sheri quickly scooped her up into her arms.

  “Mommy, what’s happening? I’m scared.”

  “It’s okay, honey. Don’t be scared. Mom’s here with you. You’ve been such a brave girl.”

  She stroked Chloe’s golden locks. The child had tears streaming down her cheeks, and it took everything Sheri had in her to hold it together.

  Steve and Jack were standing behind her. Steve placed his arm around Sheri and Chloe. “God, I hope they got out in time,” he said, kissing Chloe gently on the forehead. The two of them glanced over at the CCTV outside. Out the corner of her eye, Sheri saw Jack’s face become ashen.

  “Oh, god, it’s happening,” he said. “Her heart. She’s having a heart attack!”

  CHAPTER NINETY-SIX

  The pain in Janine’s chest was intensifying. She was lying on the frozen ground. The vice around her chest was squeezing the breath from her lungs, pain shooting down her left arm and up into her jaw. Her body was shivering so badly that she almost dropped the piece of paper she was holding.

  Keep moving, Janine, she thought.

  She dragged herself up and trudged on until she reached the pylon. Drained of energy, she located the glass panel with the digital keypad next to it. She straightened out the paper and shakily typed in the number Sheri had written down. The panel slid up, exposing the micro-card slot. At that moment, the clouds cleared and Janine glanced up, catching a glimpse of the enormous moon, almost as bright as the sun hanging in the western sky. The pain in her chest was becoming unbearable, but she pushed on, her warm breath fogging up the glass panel above the slot. An image of Jack came to mind. She could sense him urging her on from inside the building.

  She fumbled inside the pocket of Jack’s coat for the micro-card and inserted it into the slot. As she did so, the pain in her chest reached yet another crescendo and she felt her consciousness starting to cloud over. She slid down the wall of the pylon, her right arm desperately reaching for the upload button in a frantic attempt to complete her mission. Fighting off the agony in her chest and the quickening veil of blackness before her eyes, her right i
ndex finger connected with an irregularity in the metal. Mustering up the last ounce of strength left in her, she pushed down on it, and could only hope that she’d hit the correct button.

  As her vision receded down a dark tunnel, she thought she caught a glimpse of a green light flashing above her.

  CHAPTER NINETY-SEVEN

  Sheri, Steve and Jack watched as EMB instantly recognized the micro-card and the pylon rapidly sprang to life, firing up like a hibernating bear awakened by the arrival of spring.

  “New sequence initiated,” said the loud female voice over the loudspeaker. “Twenty-five seconds until program activation.”

  Sheri saw the distress in Jack’s eyes. Seeing Janine’s lifeless body on the CCTV, lying there, tormented by the ruthless snow and wind, could not have been easy. His eyes welled up and Sheri took his hand and squeezed it. “She’s a hero, Jack. You need to know that and believe that.”

  He wiped his watering eyes. “I was only just getting to know her. And for the first time ever in my life, I knew without a doubt that she was the one.”

  Sheri took Chloe from Steve and cuddled her. Steve once again had his arms around both of them. The room was beginning to light up with flashing diodes, rotating strobes and an ever-increasing deafening hum from the computers.

  “This is it,” said Steve. “The moment of truth.” He shut his eyes.

  Sheri thought about her life, her accomplishments, and her failures, but most of all about what her dad might have thought of her right now. She reached into her pocket and pulled out the charm bracelet he had given her as a child, and for the first time since his death, she snapped it onto her wrist.

  It’s all right, Dad. I forgive you. I know you didn’t desert me, you were just too scared to carry on. I understand that now, and I’m so sorry I wasn’t there to help you through all that pain I can only imagine you must have been going through. My only wish was that you would’ve met Chloe. You would’ve adored her.

  Sheri glanced over at the professor, who with all the activity in the room, was starting to stir.

  “What’s happening?” he yelled, his bloodshot eyes scanning the room like a frightened animal.

  Sheri reached for his hand. “It’s okay, Prof. I think we might have done it.” She extended her arm toward him. “Take my hand.”

  He reached up for it, grabbing it, just as the room began to violently shake.

  “Five, four, three, two, one … prepare for program activation.”

  A blinding flash lasting a few seconds lit up the control room, as EMB sent the program thirteen billion years back across space and time and through a portal to another dimension and universe.

  The room was shaking so violently that it felt like it was about to implode. Bricks, concrete, stone, glass tumbled down from the roof, the noise reaching deafening proportions as an eerie darkness swept through the muggy room. Sheri caught a glimpse through the disintegrating window and was astounded to see what appeared to be stars shooting past them, as if the entire room had turned into an interstellar spaceship.

  The ceiling began to rotate around a growing vortex and they felt themselves being drawn into it.

  “Steve, I can’t move,” cried Sheri, realizing that her body felt like it had been weighted down with lead. An unnerving, terrifying shrill from Chloe was the last thing Sheri heard before everything and everyone disappeared into the spinning vortex. Even light itself was unable to escape the powerful vacuum and was extracted from the world along with them.

  Darkness was all consuming. Nothing was left.

  EPILOGUE

  September 13th, 19:59, 2051 Press Room,

  NASA Headquarters, Jet Propulsion Laboratory

  Pasadena, California

  “Are we ready to go live, Mike?” asked Janine, as she adjusted her beret and quickly polished her front teeth with her index finger.

  “Yes, we are on in three, two, one …”

  “Good evening, America, and welcome. I’m Janine Fuller and tonight I come to you live from NASA headquarters here in Pasadena, California. We follow on from the dramatic developments that have taken place here in the past twenty hours since EMB was successfully launched yesterday. I realize the nation is concerned and confused with the events that have recently unfolded, but we’re hoping at this press conference tonight to be able to fill in some of the details.”

  She turned her head to the side. “Looks like the President has just arrived.”

  President O’Brien entered the room and made his way up to the podium to a frenzy of clicking cameras and chatter. He raised his arm to silence them.

  “Good evening. As most of you would be aware, at precisely 2.35 am Pacific Daylight Time, EMB, after experiencing a flawless first day, was suddenly hit by an energy wave which sent a rippling effect around the globe. Satellites, energy grids and power stations were knocked out for over three hours. The cause of this is yet to be determined, but I wish to reassure you all that everything has been restored back to normal and there seems to have been little damage or long-term effects from this phenomenon. I’ve also been assured that all nuclear facilities around the planet are secure and functioning normally. Nevertheless, to enlighten us about these developments I’ve asked Sheri Johnson, chief scientist for the EMB project at NASA, to be available to answer any questions you might have.”

  Sheri Johnson was seated to the President’s right. She stood up and approached the podium. Dozens of arms were instantly raised. Janine ignored them all and grabbed the first question as if she were the only one in the room.“ Sheri, is it true that your own ex-husband was caught up in this unusual phenomenon?”

  Sheri’s face colored. “Yes, that is true. Losing Simon, Chloe’s dad, was a terrible shock to us.”

  “Can you please explain what happened?”

  Sheri flicked a few loose strands of her hair off her face. “As the President already mentioned, at precisely 2.35 am Pacific Daylight Time, EMB was suddenly hit by an energy surge which affected satellites, energy grids and power stations. As most of America was asleep at the time, many of you probably wouldn’t have noticed this, as by the time you awoke, pretty much everything was back online and up and running normally. Everyone, of course, except six thousand, seven hundred and twenty-three tragically unfortunate people who happened to be wearing the GY6 new-generation micro-restrainer bracelet, of which my ex-husband, Simon Kelly, was one.”

  A deep sigh emanated from the crowd of reporters.

  “For reasons unbeknown to us, this power surge on our planet’s energy grid was in a frequency range that when delivered directly to the human body in an amplified form, interferes with normal cardiac conduction, and all these bracelet-wearing individuals experienced a fatal cardiac arrhythmia.”

  A young reporter in his twenties with a neatly trimmed beard interrupted. “Can you please explain more about this frequency?”

  “The unusual energy burst came through on a very low frequency, one which we scientists usually have very little interest in. Unfortunately, because of the amplification process from EMB, this energy delivery was large enough in magnitude to cause the technical problems that it did. It overloaded our energy grids, and despite built-in safety measures, certain wireless systems were affected more than others, and one of those systems hit happened to be these electronic restraining bracelets. The design engineers of the bracelets have reiterated that this was a freak event, and there would’ve been no way to predict that this tried-and-tested device could’ve been so dangerous.”

  She paused to clear her throat. “My condolences therefore also go out to the families involved in this tragedy. I’d like to point out though that this was a one-off event. There are no ongoing issues that we’re aware of, and EMB is still functioning completely normally.”

  “Any idea what this energy was, or where it possibly came from?” asked Janine.

  “Your guess is as good as mine. Remember, we’re looking back into the early universe, where the physics were very dif
ferent, so most likely this could’ve just been a remnant of the Big Bang, but due to the amplification process, much more powerful than the microwave background that we experience today.”

  A red-headed woman jumped in with a question. “Is NASA likely to look into this further?”

  “Interesting that you mention that, because as we speak I have my partner and colleague, Steve Winslow, doing exactly that. Although this is a common garden-variety energy frequency, he has persuaded me to allow him to study it more closely, as being an ex-SETI devotee, he has a theory that this may somehow be related to extra-terrestrial intelligence.”

  Janine asked, “Are you a believer?”

  “Let’s just say the jury is still out for me, and we had an argument about delving into this, as I think EMB can be much better utilized for more important things than looking at a boring old frequency which most likely was just amplification of some stellar noise.”

  “What about Simon, your ex, tragically taken by these events?” asked Janine.

  “As I said, Simon will be dearly missed by his family, and especially by our daughter, Chloe.”

  An older, balding gentleman said, “My wife was terrified when she turned on the TV this morning. What would you like to say to everyone who has been shaken and unnerved by all this strange activity?”

  Sheri spoke clearly and confidently. “People, you really don’t need to worry. EMB has been tested over and over again for safety, and never once has there ever been any suggestion that the technology may be dangerous. We need to embrace science if we are to move forward and discover our true place in the universe.”

  The President rose and walked over to Sheri on the podium. He placed his hand on her shoulder. “Thank you for answering these questions at this most difficult time for you.”