by Ted Myers
As they approached the main house, Fluffy spoke up: “Bernard, I have an idea. Perhaps if all of us put our heads together—literally—we can make that asteroid miss us. Do you think we could use the principles of your Telepathy Amplifier to build a Telekinesis Amplifier? Maybe we can harness the telekinetic powers of all of us and amplify them to change the course of that thing.”
“That thought crossed my mind too, Fluffy. It’s certainly worth discussing,” said Bernard. “Suppose we all go inside and ‘put our heads together’?”
Inside the main house, they were greeted by Dr. Paul Messner, the astrophysicist. When Fluffy apprised her of the asteroid situation, Mama Angelica had immediately asked Dr. Messner to join the meeting. “Everyone, this is Dr. Paul Messner. He’s one of our professors, an astrophysicist.”
“Dr, Messner! Do you remember me? You were teaching at MIT when I first started there as an associate professor. David Handler?”
Dr. Messner was old, and it took him a minute to process this strange reunion. “Of course, David Handler, the astronomer!” They shook hands and embraced warmly.
Mama Angelica led them into the large lecture room on the ground floor, and they convened around a long table. The human contingent consisted of David Handler, Indira, Riordan, Art, Laura, Mama Angelica (introduced as Dr. Van Dusen), Epps, and Dr. Messner. The animal contingent consisted of Fluffy, Bernard, and Hacker. Art carefully lifted Hacker out of the shoebox and set him on the table. Mitzi and her brood stayed inside. Bernard sat on one of the chairs and Fluffy jumped up onto the table with Hacker. Dave took his big computer (about the size of a glossy magazine) out of its case, turned it on and keyed in the code that linked it to the Galileo telescope. They pulled down the big screen and saw what was on Dave’s computer screen. Dave aimed the telescope in the direction of the asteroid, magnified, focused and pointed his cursor arrow at the asteroid. “It doesn’t look like much from here, but when I do this…” He magnified it 100 times “…you can really see what we’re dealing with.” What they saw was a huge asymmetrical rock with ominous sharp angles protruding on all sides, tumbling end over end through space, coming at them at a terrifying speed.
Bernard, who wore his tablet in his backpack, spoke aloud for the first time. “Fluffy made a suggestion that sounds like it might work. If we can build a device that can harness and project the telekinetic powers of many GABs, aim it at the asteroid, and make it change its course, we might be able to save the Earth.”
“The power of some of these animals is unbelievable,” said Dr. Messner. “Why, Bernard here can lift more than twenty tons straight into the air, with just his mind.”
“Even more if he gets mad,” said Fluffy. “I saw him lift two big trucks! Bernard has created a Telepathy Amplifier that can amplify and receive telepathic communications from the other side of the world. Maybe we can use that model to design a Telekinesis Amplifier.”
“I’d sure like to see that,” said Hacker.
“Hacker is a brilliant engineer and inventor in his own right,” said Fluffy. “How long did you say we have, Dr. Handler?”
“Twenty-five days. Assuming it continues at the present rate, impact should take place on July second.”
“Then we haven’t got a moment to lose,” said Bernard.
And, as the team set to work, Laura was busy making a video record of everything with her handheld. She was about to launch her career as a news reporter with the biggest scoop in history.
“I think I should take Mitzi and her babies to the infirmary for a checkup and then to the mouse nursery,” said Mama Angelica.
“Mind if I come along?” said Hacker.
“Of course not. It won’t take long. I have a new scanning device that will tell us if any of the babies or Mitzi have any health issues in seconds.”
“If you’ll excuse me, folks, I’ll be back soon. Don’t make any rash decisions without me,” said Hacker. He got into the shoebox with his family, and Mama Angelica took them away.
Caramel was tasked with showing everyone to their rooms. Riordan, Indira, Art, and Laura were given nice guest quarters in the main house.
Realizing they could not contribute anything to the Invention Team, Indira and Riordan stayed in their room. The minute the door closed, she gave him a big kiss. “What was that for?” said Riordan.
“Does it have to be for something?”
“No, but I know it was for something.”
“It was for being right. You had a hunch, and you were right. Whether or not all this will be successful remains to be seen, but the fact is, you had a hunch, we took a chance, and—even if we fail—we can go out knowing we tried our best.”
“And if we do go out, I for one will go out in love,” said Riordan.
“I for two,” she said. They kissed again.
“Hey, I was wondering…” said Riordan.
“Yes?”
“Would it be alright with you if Fluffy stayed here with us tonight? I mean, if it’s alright with the school.”
“And Fluffy. How ‘bout if I ask. I’m a stranger to her, and I’d like to get her approval.”
So, they went back downstairs to see if Mama Angelica had returned. She was just getting back. She took Hacker out of her pocket and gently set him down on the meeting table, where the ideas were already flying fast and furious. “What did I miss?” said Hacker. “Somebody bring me up to speed!”
Indira pulled Mama Angelica aside and asked if Fluffy could stay with them in their room. “Did you ask Fluffy?” said Mama Angelica.
“Not yet,” said Indira. “I wanted to make sure it was alright with you.”
“It’s alright with me if it’s alright with her.”
Indira went over to Fluffy and whispered, “Fluffy, your dad and I would like it if you would stay with us in our room tonight.”
At first, Fluffy was hesitant and surprised. She still wasn’t certain how she felt about this new liaison. She looked over at Mama Angelica, and she gave a subtle nod of approval. Indira seemed so sweet and kind, and the fact that she had been the one to ask made a big impression on Fluffy. “Okay,” she said.
That night, Fluffy slept in the bed between Riordan and Indira. She had almost forgotten how much she loved being petted and purring, and she rejoiced at once again being able to snuggle up into her dad’s armpit. And Indira didn’t smell so bad either. They slept happily and peacefully, each somehow knowing that love goes on, even as worlds end.
Jeremiah Epps was given his own guest room. There was no lock on the door. He could have tried to escape, but that’s not what he wanted to do. They trust me! I wonder why… Without his accustomed euphorium nightcap, he couldn’t fall asleep. A thousand errant thoughts raced through his brain. His mind flashed back to the inciting incident, the cat scratching out his eye. Was it the cat’s fault? No, it was his. He was torturing the poor creature, and it was just defending itself. Was it the fault if the GABs that they were as smart and smarter than humans? No, they were the product of human tinkering. Our fault, he thought, and perhaps our good fortune. After what he had seen today, he searched his heart for the hatred that he had always felt for these animals, and he could not find it. At last, he got up and went downstairs. The Invention Team had decided to keep working through the night, and Epps asked if he could sit in. Perhaps he could be of some assistance. He was given a place at the table. Bernard was demonstrating his Telepathy Amplifier.
“Dr. Van Dusen uses crystals to heal,” Bernard was saying, “so I borrowed one— a Clear Quartz Cathedral Crystal, to be exact—and found that it amplified my thoughts when I looked through it. So this crystal is at the heart of my invention. I wonder how it would work with telekinesis…?”
As the sleepy members of the Epsilon upper management team straggled into Meeting Room A, Valerie called the meeting to order, apologized for the late hour and the short notice. She filled them in on what has transpired: Epps’s kidnapping, his astronomer hostages and, the final bombshell, the asteroid. Everyone sat in stunned silence. No one complained about being dragged out of bed in the dead of night. Valerie laid out the escape plan and assigned Aurora, who supervised the IT Department, the job of creating a database of the 10,000 most likely candidates in the Western Hemisphere to be included in the evacuation. Epsilon employees were given preference, but other factors were included, such as race and ethnicity, national origin, areas of expertise, and age. It was important that there be a balance of the best minds and bodies in the creative arts and athletics, as well as tech. It was also important to take a lot of children and young adults, as they would be the hope of perpetuating the human race. “Today is June seventh―almost June eighth,” she said. “It is imperative that the list be complete and all the invitations sent out by June eighteenth. On June twenty-eighth we all leave for Huston and from there take shuttles to Moonbase, where the interstellar spacecraft Epsilon is waiting for us. We cast off for Gliese on July first.”
Anyone who thought that this would be a fair and impartial process by a fair and impartial computer was delusional. Aurora Malvolio-Jones became the most powerful (and popular) person on Earth overnight. The news about the impending doom spread far and wide after the meeting, and everyone was petitioning Aurora for a spot on the ship.
Aurora herself was in a quandary: Should she take her husband or her boyfriend―or both? Of course, Valerie slipped Aurora quite a long a list of people she wanted included, and this was not negotiable. There was a no pets rule because there were no cryogenic pods provided for animals, and some people actually chose to stay and die rather than go without their pets.
The computer program they designed to choose candidates outside of Epsilon was also flawed. For instance, it thought having a baseball team would be a good idea, so it picked a kind of all-star team: the top players in each position who had the highest stats, and, of course, the winningest coach and manager (who, it turned out, had worked together on another team and who were sworn enemies). The only problem was that it forgot to pick another team for the all-stars to play. Not only that, but the gravity on Gliese being nearly twice that of Earth would make a baseball as heavy as a brick, and a bat like a lead pipe. The same blunder was made with basketball, football, and soccer, none of which would be playable on Gliese 667 Cc.
At Animal U, an emergency meeting of all students and staff was called for ten o’clock the next morning. As everyone filed into the Great Hall, the Invention Team—Bernard, Hacker, Dr. Handler, Dr. Messner, and Jeremiah Epps—had been up all night sketching out possible plans for the device and how to bring together the maximum number of telekinetic animals and people to help deflect the asteroid. Dr. Handler repeated the demonstration of the night before, showing the entire community the horrific image of the asteroid coming toward them.
Bernard addressed the room: “We now have only twenty-four days before this thing destroys our planet. Unless we can stop it. We—all of you and all telekinetic beings around the world―are the only hope we have. You’ve all seen my Telepathy Amplifier. We’ve been exploring the idea of building a similar device, only one that amplifies Telekinesis―and much bigger. The idea is if we can all concentrate our telekinetic powers on changing the asteroid’s trajectory in exactly the same way at exactly the same moment, and if we can build a device to project all that power into space and focus it on that object, we just might have a chance. The Invention Team―Dr. Handler, Dr. Messner, Hacker, Mr. Epps, and myself―will work day and night to come up with the plans and a list of materials we will need. Many things will have to be brought in from the outside world, and we can no longer afford to worry about keeping Animal U a secret. Mr. Epps has offered to use his own resources to procure the parts we will need for our invention.” A murmur of surprised approval rose from the crowd. “In a few days, I will use the Telepathy Amplifier to invite all telekinetic beings who can travel to come to Animal U and help us. It will be the greatest and riskiest experiment of all time, but what have we got to lose, right?”
The crowd expressed its approval in various ways: those with hands clapped, the rest meowed, barked, oinked and squeaked to raise the roof.
After the meeting, Fluffy asked Riordan and Indira to come with her. “I have someone I want you to meet,” she told Riordan. She took them to where Jack and Sally lived. “Dad, this is my brother Jack and his wife Sally.”
“So you found him! Hello, Jack, I’m Jim. Hello, Sally.”
Jack and Sally activated their tablets so they could speak audibly. “Hello, Jim,” said Jack. “You did a fine job of raising my sister. She’s the smartest and bravest cat I’ve ever known.”
“In two months Sally will be having kittens,” said Fluffy, “the first new generation of GABs from our freshman...” She cut herself short, remembering the impending doom, and wished she hadn’t spoken.
Riordan and Indira congratulated the happy couple. “Jack, I want to apologize,” said Riordan.
“What do you mean?” said Jack.
“When I got Fluffy five years ago, I left you. You were the last kitten left. I should have taken you as well. Your life would have been much better if I had.”
“I don’t blame you, Jim. None of us can know the future, and my life is wonderful now, so all’s well that ends well, right?”
“That is if we can stop the world from ending,” said Sally, a little tremor in her voice.
Jack looked at her adoringly. “Even if it does, I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Chapter Fourteen – End Times
It was inevitable after the meeting at Epsilon that the news of the end of the world would leak out. Saturday afternoon CNS carried a special bulletin citing rumors of an asteroid headed for Earth and a mass evacuation of the elite cons. Dr. Stephen Boyd of the Harvard Physics department was interviewed about the disappearance of all the important astronomers and the closing of all the world’s observatories. He speculated that the rumors of an asteroid approaching Earth were likely true. But no one had conclusive proof. “No one we can find, anyway.”
When the rank and file employees at Epsilon, the police, the fire department, and Animal Control learned that they would not be evacuated with their elite bosses, they walked off the job, preferring to spend what time remained at home with their families. Epsilon sent everyone home and closed its doors. At the animal detention centers, all the animals were set free. Chaos broke out on the streets, with gangs of young rips looting and burning the structures of the rich.
The same day, Bernard sent out his worldwide announcement through his Telepathy Amplifier.
Within a few hours, Route 28 became a steady stream of animals walking up West Kill Mountain. Soon the road was also jammed with cars full of panicked families and even people on foot who had poured out of the ripcoms to escape the riots. The city had become very dangerous with no police on the job.
In spite of the doomsday rumors, Chief Davis was intent on finding Epps. He had interviewed both Hobson and Valerie, and he was convinced they were hiding something from him.
As soon as Zvonar picked up Bernard’s broadcast, he went immediately to Davis. “It was an amplified telepathic transmission from a place called Animal U on West Kill Mountain. It was from a big dog. He said an asteroid was going to destroy the Earth and he invited all animals to go up there and help them try to move it off course using telekinesis.”
“I’ll bet that’s where they’ve taken Epps,” said Davis.
“It is. I’m sure of it,” said Zvonar.
An hour later, Davis,
Zvonar, and four armed troopers in full battle gear were in a gunship looking down at the unusually heavy traffic on Route 28.
At Animal U construction of the device was already underway. Earlier in the day, two cargo copters from Epsilon factories had delivered the aluminum alloy and tungsten parts the Invention Team had ordered, along with boxes of small electronic components, hardware, and ten perfect Clear Quartz Cathedral Crystals. Now all the animals were putting the parts together on the grassy quad. There were two large parabolic dishes. One would be the projection dish and would be aimed skyward, with a wand in the center that would direct the concentrated beam of telekinetic energy at the target. The other was erected atop a sturdy girder and was turned downward, like a giant umbrella. All the animals would gather under the umbrella which, simply put, would suck up their telekinetic power and transmit it to the projection dish. Under the umbrella, attached to the center post, would be four large video monitors, aimed north, south, east and west, which would display the view from the Galileo to the gathered participants. Hacker and a team of precision mouse engineers were working on the fine circuitry that would be the guts of the control consul.
The sound of the approaching gunship made everyone stop and look to the west. Fluffy was working with Jack, Sally, Riordan, and Indira. Hearing the war copter reminded her of that awful day Fang had died and she had killed the unmanned drone. As the copter came into view, she wondered what she would do if they opened fire. There were people in this one. Hacker, who was on a big work table with his team, called to Mama Angelica: “Should we knock it down?”
“No,” she said calmly, “let them come.”
“I know who it is,” said Epps. “Let me handle this.”