Thanks to Malady for his help editing and for ideas.

I’d also like to apologize in advance for the bending of physical laws in the following chapter. I am aware of MOND, for those of you who are as well, but I suppose I don't like the theory, so I decided to ignore it in this book. Author’s prerogative, I guess. In my defense, I’ve been watching some lectures from the Royal Institute lately, and maybe it’s gotten me thinking a bit more – sideways?

I have been enjoying some documentaries on gravity also. They were heavy.

To Return Home

2.4

John and Marc got busy maneuvering the ship to a position where we were in line to reconnect with the command center and downstairs section. I wasn't sure I liked the idea, but it seemed to be the only choice, under the circumstances.

Mama was monitoring Amos’ memories while our ship accelerated slightly and drew alongside. At the same time, Daddy was monitoring her very closely, and I think he was ready to pull the plug if anything should go awry. So was I.

“What's happening, Bernie?” Daddy asked.

“Nothing, Vern. All I see happening is a celebration. Some type of praise for the ‘Emperor.’”

As I watched Mama, she started to turn absolutely green. I suspected what was happening, and asked her, “Do you want us to stop so you can check out of his memories for awhile?”

“Rosie,” she said. I appreciate it, but remember. I'm experiencing his memories, so they're in mine as well. I can't forget anything he does. I don't want anyone to be... You know what I'm saying, Rosie.”

I nodded. “Okay, Mama.”

I turned to look at John, and it was apparent he had seen Mama's expression. He turned back to the controls on his desk and flipped a switch. He had told me what everything did, so I knew we were now locked into position beside the downstairs section.

As if to confirm, he and Marc glanced at each other and nodded. Then Marc looked at Paula. “Okay, Love. It's your turn.”

My sister stepped forward and John pressed a button. The entire desktop flickered and changed, becoming another complete system.

Now, it was a security board, with a single monitor where John could make sure we stayed in place. Paula touched a few controls and we watched the large display showing where the connection from our central ring to a “U tube” could be clearly seen. Or rather, what had been a connection. Several feet of the tube was gone. It was now a mangled mess; pieces of metal superstructure twisted this way and that. The tube was completely stationary in our view, but we could see the starfield tumbling beyond the ship. We were aligned perfectly with the downstairs section, exactly where we should be, but with no physical connection.

Paula slid her index finger very slowly on a touchpad, and we saw some of the crumpled metal move out of the way. It was as if a tunnel was being inflated in the opening, pushing the destroyed structure back together.

There was something that was almost, but not completely, out of the range of my senses on the screen that was widening as she moved her finger. I knew what it was, but it was beyond belief. She was projecting some solid light into the opening, and it was creating an anchor point. As she strengthened the field, the light became more and more tangible, and soon, it looked exactly like the passageway that had once been there. She repeated the process three more times, and we were connected back to the command center and downstairs.

That connection was tenuous, though. Unlike the real “U tubes”, if we had a power fluctuation, these could be lost, or even destructive to the rest of the connection.

I turned to my mother. “Can you tell us exactly where Amos’ fail-safe is?”

She nodded. It was very apparent that she was sickened by what Amos was doing. A few minutes later, she said, very quietly. “It's in the number one U tube, next to the upstairs ring.”

“Where?” Marc asked.

He touched a contact and another control panel shimmered into existence. He manipulated it, and a 3D display appeared above Daddy's desk. The display showed the sealed door into tube 1. I watched fascinated as we seemed to move through it. We saw where Paula had repaired the curved access way. Slowly, we made our way toward the downstairs section. We came to the J tube that led to the command section and Marc stopped the advance.

Looking toward Mama, I was surprised. She looked confused.

“Bernie?” Daddy asked.

Mama shook her head. “I didn't see the spot.”

“We've passed it?” John asked.

“Yes. But I didn't see it.”

Marc made our viewpoint turn around, and we slowly made our way back. We were almost to the door when Mama said, “Stop!”

Immediately, we stopped moving.

“Turn to the right.”

The image panned right, and Mama looked confused again. “It should be here,” she said.

“I had to repair this part, Mom,” Paula told her.

“There was an access panel that was here. The dead man switch was installed in there behind the door motor.”

“I didn't remake the door motors because the doors are welded shut. We’ll have to cut a hole to get through.”

“So it's gone.” Daddy said. “Nothing to worry about.”

“I don't think so, Vernon,” Mama said. “It was in a very secure case. The only thing that could break it is the thing inside. It hasn’t exploded, but it hasn’t disappeared..”

“Just a moment, ” Paula told us. “Before we jump to conclusions...” We watched as above the table, we saw a replay of her repairs to the tube.

“I don't see it,” Mama said after we watched it for the third time, “but that doesn't mean it's not there.”

“What do we do, then?” I asked.

Paula was way ahead, however. She was speaking to some of her security people. “We’re going to need to inspect outside our connection to U tube 1. I need Carstairs and Fonzarelli.”

“We need to talk to Vic and Trent too,” Marc said.

“What are you thinking?” John asked.

“If that thing is out there, we need a way to contain it.”

“The feedback loop,” John stated.

I had heard them talking about the possibility of a field powered by an explosion, which to me sounded like some sort of wonderful idea, but to me it seemed ridiculous. How could you make a field to stop an explosion with the explosion itself? “Guys, is this really possible?” I asked.

John looked at Daddy and explained their idea. “If that thing goes off, the energy is going to go somewhere. We’re thinking of simply diverting its force.”

“How?”

I had watched John devour books and tapes – every bit of information he could find, about gravity – as if he was a gravity well himself. He was a brilliant structural engineer, and the ship we were traveling in was a direct descendant of one of his own projects. For a few thousand years, he had studied the effects of gravity and how it worked. His own ideas boosted our engines by reshaping space / time, so everyone knew he was the best expert we had in the field.

When he tried to explain to anyone what he was wanting to do, only Marc had any idea what he was talking about. He looked at Marc with a, “please help” look.

Marc said, “John’s idea seems to be the best one I’ve ever seen, Dad. There really isn’t any technology involved which can fail. It’s all based on physical laws, which can’t.”

Daddy nodded. He knew Marc was probably speaking the truth, but it would never sound like that to anyone else. “Okay?”

Marc explained. “You understand that the force from an explosion in space will follow a straight line until it’s stopped, right?” Mama rolled her eyes at that. Daddy just fixed Marc with a stern look. “Silly question, right,” my brother in law said, hastily.

“Gravity deals with warps in space time. I won’t get into the equations that we’ll use to create this, as some of them are incomprehensible, but the general idea is this. We propose to reshape the curve of space-time around the explosion if it occurs.”

“How would that help?” Daddy asked.

“Time runs faster in the presence of gravity. Actually, it’s why gravity occurs. The more space-time is bent because of matter, the faster time will have to run. What we’re proposing is the increase of gravity inside the explosion. What this will do is burn out the explosion in an eyeblink. It will never be able to do any damage to anything else, because the force of the explosion will run its course in the faster time.”

“So won’t that make the explosion simply expand faster?” This was from Mama.

“No. To shift time that much, the gravity will be too extreme. The explosion will actually be closer to an implosion.”

I stared at my husband, and rather than asking my brother-in-law, I asked John directly. “So will this be time making the explosion run its course too fast to affect us, or gravity imploding the explosion?”

I saw the sides of his mouth twitch up. “Both, Hon. Either way you look at it, one effect causes the other. Which one actually stops the explosion doesn’t matter.”

Daddy seemed to consider. “Okay. It’s obvious that you two are for this procedure,” he said to the men. “Paula? Rosie? What do you think?”

I trusted John completely. I knew how many times he went over the figures he would use in this. He liked acting in a way that made people think he was not as smart as he was, but I knew he was a genius. I nodded my head. “Yes,” I said.

It wasn’t necessary for Paula to say anything, as my vote sealed it, but she agreed as well.

“Five out of five,” Daddy said. “I wouldn’t normally agree to this, but if it goes off in our vicinity, we’re done for.”

-=#=-

It didn’t take very long for the preparations to be made. The bomb shield was simply a component of our engines, set to boost its power by the explosion. As soon as the power level increased, it would start diverting more and more power to the gravitational field it created.

I wasn’t happy that John needed to go out with them as they searched for the explosive. I stood over the hologram in Daddy’s office, watching as John and the two ‘red shirts’ made their way through the area, meticulously checking for the thing. I felt like Princess Leia, listening and watching watching as the Rebel Alliance Pilots tried to stop the Death Star from destroying their rebel base. I could hear John and the other’s voices as they talked, and I could see them as they moved around the superstructure.

Suddenly, John stopped. He slowly moved to what looked like a simple box, but it clearly didn’t belong. It was connected to the U tube by a power cable.

“If we cut that cable,” Mama told him, “It’ll go off.”

I wondered how many megatons the warhead was. I knew it was a simple design, similar to a massive version of the test bombs set off at the Marshall Islands millennia before.

“Gotcha,” John said. He moved the box closer to it, and turned it on. As he flipped the switch to activate the shield, I watched as the wires leading to the bomb seemed to melt away, as if they aged beyond belief. John made an adjustment on the device, and the wires parted. Suddenly, there was a flash of light, as the bomb detonated, then everything went black as all light was pulled into the vortex.

-=#=-

Please don’t forget to leave kudos and comment! I really appreciate your opinions.

– Rosemary