by E. N. Abel
Now, on day eight, dry runs had been successfully performed. The necessary plant control software had already been on that ominous data chip, complete with the missing interface to CERN's power plant so clearly specified, that Kaiser's programmers were able to build it in just three days. This made system testing very easy: the control software directed the production unit and the fusion reactor as if it were a live run, and all there was to do, was reading the values from the instruments. The last and final test was a howling success: field densities and flux control values validated to ten digits behind the comma, the energy transfer from the fusion reactor worked without a hitch. Next step: first live test.
Yesterday Kaiser and Whitewater had decided on a change of location. Everybody knew that a failed antimatter annihilation would have disastrous results, even if they just generated a milligram in the first attempt. To prevent harm to CERN - and Geneva - they ordered an underground test.
Somehow Jennings had foreseen the project board's last-minute scruples and a fitting space was already prepared: CERN's deepest laboratory, a cave-like hall with a good two hundred meters of solid rock above it. That would keep even a small nuclear explosion at bay, especially as dozens of long relief wells had been drilled into the walls, ready to lead developing pressure waves away from the surface. The mandatory power and control lines had been routed down, video cameras and measuring instruments installed and integrated, a freight elevator was available to transport the production unit. They just had to move the machine and connect the leads. That had been done an hour ago. The last touch had been a message from their new partners: the five Gigawatt barrier had been removed.
Now the whole project team was standing in the assembly hall, around the provisional control desk with the large video screen. Everything was prepared, waiting for the start command. One of the technicians had even taken the effort to install a big red monster of a button, to be pressed down to start the machine two hundred meters below them.
Kaiser stepped in front of his assembled personnel, upright and proud. ''Ladies, gentlemen. Well done. We've built the machine and beaten the schedule. If it works as planned we'll be witnessing the beginning of a new age for mankind.'' Pointing to the red monster, he added: ''The button is waiting. Mrs Mayerling?'' He turned to the surprised woman: ''Please come forward. Our success stems from the work of your team, like so many times before. So I find it only fitting, that you, as representative of your team, initiate the run. The honour is all yours, madam.''
A visibly moved Mrs Mayerling stepped forward to the control desk, bent and pressed the button. Immediately the screen showing the underground laboratory lit up. A camera, positioned to look directly into a viewing port of the reaction chamber, showed an empty sphere.
''X-plus 10'' a technician, sitting in front of the control desk, said.
Kaiser looked at Jennings, questioningly, and the project manager answered: ''At x-plus fifty.''
The forty seconds seemed to take forever. A control bar on the big screen inched forward, a clock showed the elapsed seconds.
''Forty-five Gigawatt,'' the technician announced, ''any time now.''
A dot appeared in the reaction chamber, turning super-dark black, then inverting to something entirely different. A stream of gas-like matter seemed to emerge, to immediately be split and separated, one part to the left, one part to the right, into tubes leading away from the chamber.
Everybody stared, fascinated beyond words. In front of their eyes a grandiose creation process happened, unfolding pure energy into matter. Something similar must have happened at the moment of the Big Bang ...
''Sir.'' The voice of the technician called Kaiser back. ''The process is running fine, just ...''
''What?''
''We've exceeded the planned amount already, and by far. At the current setting the reactor produces roughly one gram per second. What's your order?''
''The injector?''
''Filling as planned.''
Kaiser looked at Whitewater, at Jennings, then at Leclerc. All three nodded.
''How many are in the filling station?''
''Four.''
''Fusion reactor?''
''Is cherry.''
''Very good. You have enough reserve space. Fill three.''
''One thousand five hundred seconds total, fourteen hundred forty remaining,'' the man reported drily, watching a progress bar slowly stuttering forward.
For a moment a complete and utter silence dominated the hall, then a single Yeah! sounded up, waking the crowd, invoking more cheers, growing louder and louder, accompanied by frantic applause.
Unnoticed from the assembled specialists and spectators, men in blue jumpers with the 'CERN Security' patch on their shoulders positioned themselves outside around the hall. Half of them hiding their assault rifles that were hanging behind their backs.
Leclerc's sorrows had just multiplied. He turned to Kaiser, speaking quietly, barely audible over the noise: ''We need more security in place! Call the Swiss Police!''
Kaiser, smiling and waving at his troops, nodded. After a moment, he left the hall. There was a prepared phone call to be made.
Chapter 41
Spangdahlem
Tuesday, 08.11.2016
Sitting in Mike's and Ellie's office the next day at noon, Marcel was ready to depart. He was just receiving the latest information on the project's actuals, when a ping from Ellie's computer interrupted the discussion, and she turned to the screen.
''Hey, CERN is powering the antigrav up ... woahh, looks like the real thing: thirty, forty, fifty Gigawatt ... continuous operation at ... fifty-two. Micro-singularity is open, stable.''
''How can you ...''
''The brick has a quantum transmitter unit integrated. We can remote-control it.'' Mike looked at Marcel. ''Please don't be upset about this: the generator must stay in CERN's hands; it's just too easy to abuse. If it's removed from your compound, it will self-destruct, but there are other ways to screw things up. So we are keeping an eye on it in case the swells - sorry, your valued scientists, of course ...'' - that drew a grin from the old soldier - ''... do something really stupid with it.'' He smirked. ''Like X-raying it.''
Again there was a minute of silence, then Ellie carried on: '' Woahh, they are really up for it now: estimated antimatter amount: one gram per second.'' She looked at Mike: ''Phase Three.''
The young man turned to Marcel in earnest: ''I need your word now. Your word on your Legionnaire's Honour.''
That caught Marcel's attention. He looked into Mike's eyes.
Mike took an SD card from his desk-drawer, slipped it across the desk to his guest. ''This contains important data, mon sergeant. It's encrypted.''
Marcel stared at the chip.
''The only one who can ever have this, the only one we will ever trust is your Colonel Leclerc. But you, my friend, you have the key. Only you know the password for the fractal algorithm. I want your word that only Leclerc ever gets hold of it. He will know what to do with it and to him we pass it on.''
''Where does this trust come from?'' Dupont asked, unsettled.
''Honneur et Fidélité.''
The old sergeant looked at his glass, swirled the cognac, then replied: ''You have it.''
''When do you plan to depart?''
''Now. I've seen enough. Lieutenant,'' he looked at Mike.
''Mon sergeant?''
''I will return as soon as I can, try to get you some juice. Stay low in the meantime. And try not to do anything stupid.''
''Oi, mon sergeant.'' Mike stood, saluted in the American way.
Marcel, nodded, took the last sip, got up to shake-hands: ''See you in two days the latest.''
Chapter 42
Beijing
Tuesday, 08.11.2016
It was midnight when Chan Li leaned back. After a few minutes of deep breathing, she picked up the phone, dialled General Xao's direct line. He answered on the first ring.
''Germany,'' was all she said.
When the General entered, he found a sleeping girl in the arms of a young man. He sat on the desk, waited in silence. After five minutes the lieutenant softly shook Chan Li to wakefulness.
''Sorry,'' she said, recognising her superior. She sat up groggily and wiped her eyes, then logged into her machine. A map appeared. She rose to speak, but Xao waved her off.
''First: how did you find them?''
That caused a few deep breaths, before she answered: ''I hijacked the download link at the Australian ground station, found a trap door with the same signature as in our satellite. Deep implant. I tried to use it for my purposes, force it to forward a traceable message, but nothing worked. Too good for me. It took me nearly the whole day, then I had an idea.'' The General was hanging on every word from her lips. ''I couldn't imitate a valid message as I didn't have the encryption key, so I continuously failed. But I did have a copy of the original one ... why not re-send it from our satellite to that ground station, imitating a signal from space and watch its reaction? So I tagged every exit in the downlink.'' She caught Xao's uncomprehending look, and quickly changed course: ''I mean I installed a software that could trace a leaving message at every possible exit of that ground station and sent the message again.''
Xao summarized: ''You mean you broke into our satellite, reprogrammed it and used it as a transmitter for the message?''
''Yes.'' Chan ducked a bit, expecting a thunderstorm to hit her.
But Xao only shook his head, disbelieving: ''Please continue.''
''It worked. The ground station routed the message, and I traced it to ...'' she pointed on the map on her LCD screen, ''here. Bitburg, Germany.''
Xao was astonished: ''What is there?''
''An abandoned American air base. I was able to identify the end point of the connection - a 3G access point - and broke into the German Telecom's access point catalogue. This way I pinpointed it to four-/five hundred meters.''
The General rose: ''I'll send someone at once.''
''Sir,'' Chan lifted her hands, ''please ...''
Xao sat down again.
''May I suggest a different course of action?''
''Go ahead ...''
''I was thinking: these people have hidden themselves very well. They will have extended security in place at that location. If the identified area is not the real end point but just an intermediate station, they'll route the signal back into the net. If an unknown or even just unusual person shows up now ...''
''I understand, they will scare and break the lead.''
''Yes. But see, from the documentation you handed me, we know they want to build a spaceship. A spaceship working with an anti-gravitational drive.''
''Correct.'' Xao could not guess where this was going, but was very interested.
''Now, we can't create antigravitation, obviously.''
''And?''
''But we can measure it, meaning we can measure changes like fluctuations to a gravitation field. It's a complicated set-up but feasible.''
''I'll take your word for it.''
''How about this: before we send in the troops, we fly over that area. With a chartered plane - they sell sightseeing flights right there. Take our latest gravitation probe on board with us. We let the plane turn a few rounds around the air base, then land and disappear again.''
''I still don't ...''
''If they want to finish their spaceship, go to outer space, they will have to test their drive system, there's no way around that. And thereby produce irregularities in the local gravitation field. And these we can measure.'' She leaned back.
The General nodded thoughtfully.
''We might have to do a few flights, four/five a day. Maybe we can come up with a story why we have to do that. Scientific survey or something like that. It would even be cheap and totally without risk for our officers - that air passenger should be a German native, of course. Just a thought.''
The lieutenant smirked, then grinned openly. Xao shook his head. ''Unbelievable. You came up with all this yourself?''
Chan Li looked at the ground. ''Maybe I was lucky.''
This was when Feng Chin stepped in: ''Luck had nothing to do with it. She worked like a maniac fourteen hours non-stop, needed over sixty attempts to push the message through that ground station, forty more to trace it to the German access point. And, what she did not tell you is: she hacked one of our espionage satellites and re-positioned it to get you this.'' He pulled a handful of high-resolution laser prints from under a stack and handed them to Xao.
The General took one look: the sheets contained detailed and enlarged photos of the target areas.
Xao shook his head again: ''You broke into two of our satellites - one a secret one - and hijacked them?''
Chan remained silent, looking at her shoes, but Feng Chin laughed out loud. ''That's not all.'' He turned to the woman. ''Come on, tell him the rest.''
Xao stared at her: ''There is more?''
''Well,'' she started spluttering, 'Well ...''
''Chan!''
''Yes, sir. Well, I tried to think like these people. See, I believe they are not bad people, they just want their spaceship to lift off. No harm in that. But they are overly smart.''
''Meaning what?''
''These software patches they used on our satellite and the ground station - why didn't they simply remove them and thereby wipe out any trace?''
Xao shrugged.
''Because they couldn't. Like we couldn't. The software is so incredibly good that it can't be removed short of a full reprogramming. And that can't be done remotely. You would have to bring the satellite back to Earth. That's their weak point: they are so smart that they've outsmarted themselves.''
The lieutenant picked up: ''Chan believes that the access point in Bitburg is just another intermediate. The signal is taken from there and routed somewhere else. She checked the accounts of people using that access point and every landline in the area. They all led to known users, and that specific message wasn't routed to any of them. That access point is too obvious for an end point for our wizard here. So she thinks they have another method of data transfer, either an unregistered physical line or one so advanced that we can't detect it.''
''So Bitburg isn't the end.''
''I believe not.'' Chan stood by her hypothesis. ''But an old air base is the ideal place to build a small spaceship out of public sight. Big, cheap hangars, good infrastructure and an air field one can use in case of emergency.''
''But not Bitburg?''
Feng Chin picked another print from the stack: ''This is the abandoned air base Spangdahlem. It's twenty kilometers from Bitburg.''
''So we'll have to fly ...''
''Over both.'' the lieutenant concluded.
''It may all be nonsense,'' Chan threw in quickly.
The Head of Chinese intelligence looked at the girl sitting on her chair, young, a bit fragile. ''Doesn't matter. This is the best lead we have, and we'll follow it.'' He nodded to Chin. ''Drive her home and make sure that she does not come back before tomorrow afternoon.'' Then he turned back to Chan: ''Very well done. My thanks.''
They all got up, but before Chan left she said: ''One more thing, General: my many attempts to track the target of the message will have triggered something. They are more than likely warned - I would be. And: there should be other interested parties by now too ...''
''We'll hurry,'' Xao promised, hiding a smile. ''This is work for the field department. Go home now.''
Chapter 43
Geneva/CERN
Tuesday, 08.11.2016
Kaiser suspiciously eyed the roughly cone-shaped plastic canisters that stood on their flat end in front of him. The technician-on-duty simply had set the two injectors on the desk of his boss and left without a word. A little more than a foot high, each of the golden bottles contained exactly five hundred grams of Anti-Tritium, the nuclear equivalent of twenty Megatons TNT.
A little progress b
ar and a timer at the bottom of the injector showed the remaining load of the integrated battery pack and safety time until the magnetic containment would fail ... some forty hours and a few minutes. Were the injector placed into a docking station by then - fine. If not - boom. A very, very big boom at that. Clean one too - no radiation.
Nobody ever had witnessed an antimatter explosion of such a magnitude; naturally Kaiser had no idea of its effects. But to be truthful, it was one of the experiences he could do without. He looked at his friend Paul Leclerc: ''So?''
''Make a guess.''
''You have found those people.''
Leclerc nodded.
''As your adjutant is missing, you have send Marcel to pay them a visit.''
Leclerc nodded.
''He has reported back to you.''
Leclerc nodded.
''And he has told you a story about how nice and trustworthy those guys are.''
Leclerc nodded the forth time.
''And you trust them.''
Leclerc shook his head: ''I trust Marcel.''
''And he trusts them. I understand. But to hand you this,'' he pointed at the spindles, ''I need a bit more. So enlighten me.''
''I know those guys.''
''What ... ?''
''They were German infantry. Well, better: a bunch of German volunteers in the American Special Forces. Rescued my ass at Chagcharan.''
''Chagcharan?''
''Afghanistan. I was there with my unit. In 2011.''
''Foreign Legion business?''
''Yes, protecting the fatherland's interests. You know how it is.''
Kaiser nodded. He had never been a soldier, but he knew about integrity. And political plots.
''The Taliban had us trapped,'' Leclerc continued. ''... dead to rights. Only moments and they would have killed us all. Suddenly those soldiers showed up, right out of nowhere. Attacked with a fury the like I've never seen before, like a bunch of ancient Viking raiders: Thor behind them, bunch of pussies in front of them, Valhalla waiting. Didn't seem to give a fuck and shot the shit out of the insurgents, just about wiping them out. Bought us some air - enough to turn the tables. It was a fucking miracle, I tell you. Wouldn't be alive without them. Marcel neither. Later I learned that they were Americans.'' He took a long breath: ''I also learned that the Taliban already had a name for them: A-Shaitan-Allemande - the German devils, because some of them were Germans, or of German origin, I suspect. Put a fat bounty onto their heads too, but no-one ever succeeded in collecting it.''