Neither Andi nor I mentioned John. We drank lemonade, and, until the rain stopped, I sat in the home theater and played a few rounds of war games with the boys while Andi sketched us. I let them win, of course, ‘cause I don’t know when I’ll have time to come back and see them again.
Only when I was at the door, giving Andi a good-bye hug, did her eyes well up with tears. “I can’t remember what his voice sounds like anymore,” she whispered. “And I never wanted to forget.”
I held her in my arms for a very long time.
* * *
Hollywood—present day
I M-fanned back into Malibu as the sun was setting. I don’t like to miss the sunsets over the Pacific at this time of year. The sun paints the clouds orange and pink, with bright yellow halos. June gloom will arrive in several weeks, and with its marine layer coming in around 3:00 pm, you won’t be able see anything out my windows at all for most of the day, even the paparazzi crouching behind the dunes. It gets pretty lonely sometimes…
The first thing I did was prop up Andi’s sketch of us on my desk in my bedroom. I was so glad she gave it to me. I’ll add it to the others I’ve mounted on the wall as soon as I can find the right frame.
My very next task was to open the windows, especially in the living room where Spud was ‘cogitating’. I knew we were able to regenerate our lungs with one trip to Nejinsen, but I still didn’t want to breathe all that smoke.
Spud ignored my sour face, and began cryptically, “Van Allen Belts.”
“Yeah …?” I waited.
“Radiation belts around the Earth.”
“I know that,” I said, exasperated.
“Most planets don’t have them. They’re burned off by the sun.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“So, why does the Earth have them?” Realizing I wouldn’t have a clue, he raised a hand and answered his own query, “The Earth’s magnetic field traps the radiation.”
I nodded, pretending to understand.
“Or.”
Sigh. “Or?”
“They’re the remnants of attempts to transition to other branes …”
“Well, that’s a leap. Literally.”
“Bear with me. I shall try to explain. What are the belts made of?”
“Sugar and spice.” No response. “Green cheese?”
Spud was not amused. “Charged ions.”
“Okay …?”
He sat back, pursing his lips. “I’m not an astrophysicist, but …”
I snorted. “You should be.”
“Recall, we were only in the portal for a second or two. We needed something, an energy source, perhaps, to propel us forward. Our Ergals, even together, couldn’t provide enough power to make the transition.” Spud leaned forward, his eyes bright. “What if—and this is simply a presumption—what if the Somalderis somehow provides or channels energy. One is then able to fully transport to another brane.”
I’d like another brain right now, I thought, as Spud continued, excited. “Without the Somalderis, one would need to provide one’s own energy. An enormous amount of energy.”
“Mm-hmm.” I shrugged. “Then how ‘bout using a nuclear bomb?”
Spud grinned. “Bravo! So, you try to harness nuclear energy to push you into the next dimension. But—”
I nodded. There’s always a ‘but.’ “Something goes wrong?”
Spud echoed my nod. “Very wrong. The energy is still inadequate, and, as you are ejected there is a nuclear backdraft. Voilà, you have created a Van Allen Belt.”
I frowned. “But, if what you’re saying is true, they, the belts, would have to be pretty recent. I mean, wasn’t the Bomb only invented in 1960 or something?”
“In 1945 or something. I did a little atmospheric measurement before we left Kohlis,” Spud glanced at his Ergal. “I read no Van Allen belts in BC.”
“Really? Wow.” I checked my Ergal’s reference files. “Says here Christofilos and Van Allen did their work on the belts in the 1950s…”
Spud nodded. “That fits perfectly into our timeframe. No belts in ancient times. Belts now. The nuclear blowback then must have created the belts sometime soon after 1945. Van Allen finally confirmed the belts’ existence in 1958. Now all we require is evidence tying the belts into a nuclear explosion in the late forties or early fifties of the 20th century.” He paused for a brief moment. I saw a hint of an ironic smile. “And we both know who has access to that evidence.”
Spud looked at me earnestly. I rolled my eyes and let out a long, long sigh.
* * *
Earth Core—present day
Temporal analysis at Earth Core was Ev’s baby. We needed access to Earth radiation tracking data from the past hundred years or so to prove Spud’s theory. And the only way to get it was through Everett Weaver. I wished I hadn’t been so hard on the dork all this time. I hated having to eat crow.
Oh, well, nobody ever said acting was easy. Well, yes they did, but anyway. Back at Earth Core, I came up behind Ev and gently put my arm around his shoulders. It took all my skills to push the words “I’m sorry” through my gritted teeth.
Everett wasn’t entirely convinced of my sincerity. “What do you want, Rush?”
Innocent eyes. “I just wanted to apologize. I haven’t been very nice to you really.”
Everett stared at me for a few moments, frowning. My eyes dropped, drawn to the pizza stains on his shirt. Dork. Finally, Everett sighed and said, “Okay.” He turned back to his holos.
I smiled and nonchalantly started ambling away. Wait for it. Wait for it.
“Hey!” Ev called out to me.
I turned towards him, batting my big blues.
“Hey,” he continued, looking sheepish. “I thought you were, uh, kidding. Thanks.” He smiled, genuinely pleased.
I smiled back, and turned back away. Wait for it … Wait for it…
“Rush!” Ev said again. I turned around and smiled. “Anytime you need anything, you know …”
Warm smile. “Thanks, Ev. I’m okay.” I shrugged oh so casually. “But, hey, now that you mention it … Spud was asking me about something earlier today …”
* * *
New Mexico—1947
June 12, 1947: No Van Allen Belts. June 14, 1947: Van Allen Belts. Contact metrics. June 13, 1947: Chaves County, New Mexico.
I had on Amelia Earhart duds, right down to the aviator goggles. Spud wore a leather cap with some military-type insignia and a madras shirt and jeans. We both looked very Grapes of Wrath.
Spud guided us to the right coordinates, and we settled in under a large oak tree to wait for whatever was to come. I could only pray that any nuclear backdraft wouldn’t blow us away with it.
The night was unusually crisp for summer, and I drew my legs up under my arms to stave off the shivers. I looked up at the black sky, and, to my surprise, actually saw stars. LA’s bright lights reflect back up into the sky after dark, drowning out the constellations. I had almost forgotten what Earth’s night sky was supposed to look like.
The flash woke me up with a start. For a split second, I was blinded, and then the dark sky returned as it had been. Several hundred yards ahead of us, a glowing mass streaked to the ground, bursting into flames when it hit. Spud and I leaped up and started to run towards the burning site. Suddenly, Spud shot out an arm and knocked me back, pulling me behind another tree. My irritation turned to curiosity when Spud put a finger on his lips and pointed in the direction of the fire. A shadowy figure had arrived at the site and with—a Zygan-type stun gun?!—in hand, was extinguishing the flames.
We crept through the rim of oak trees around the clearing where the thing had crashed. We could now see remnants of what looked like some kind of a spaceship scattered over several feet of charred grass. Spud Ergaled us some binoculars and we scanned the site from our hiding place among the trees.
The ship seemed to be shattered into a number of pieces. At its center was a pod, which, though bl
ackened from the heat, looked intact. I increased my binoculars’ lens magnification. It was clear that the pod was shaped like a humanoid, with a trunk, limbs, and a large head. Armor of some kind?
The shadow man was struggling with the pod to no avail, and finally—lasered!—it open with his stun gun. I looked at Spud. I was certain that Terrans didn’t have laser guns in the 1940s—or even lasers for that matter. Off-worlders? Or, worse, rogue Zygans?
We continued to watch as, grunting, Shadow Man pulled out what looked disgustingly like a burned body from inside the pod, and laid it on a patch of green grass.
The body lay still, unmoving. Shadow Man knelt next to it, crouching over it, his back to us, shaking with spasms.
“Is he crying?” I whispered to Spud.
Spud shrugged and motioned for me to be quiet.
“Hey!”
“What is it?”
The voices came from the other side of a small hill across from our hiding spot. We crept back deeper into the woods a bit, circling around to get a better view. Shadow Man had jumped up at the sounds, and grabbed the burnt body in his arms.
As he looked around the horizon, his hand reached in his pocket and he pulled out a stop watch—an Ergal?!. And, only a split-second before two hollering ranchers came running over the ridge, Shadow Man and the body disappeared.
I was as white as a ghost and Spud was even paler. As he had been scanning the area, we had both caught a glimpse of Shadow Man’s face. We didn’t have to speak the name. We both instantly knew who Shadow Man was. Gary.
Chapter 13
Double Trouble
Sol System Space
We Ergaled straight to the Zoom Cruiser, still staying in 1947. We didn’t dare show up on Earth in the modern era. If Gary had decided to run a trace of our recent tracks, he’d be waiting for us when we returned. And somehow, we didn’t really expect we’d get a very warm reception. We held off until we were well past Ceres before we M-fanned into the present.
Spud told nav to go into hyperdrive and then leaned back in his seat, eyes closed.
“Gary looked so young …,” I observed to no one in particular as the stars flew by on our windscreens.
“I’d say he was in his mid-twenties then,” Spud said, still “sleeping.” “He left that part of the story out yesterday.”
“No kidding. Who do you think the guy who died was?”
“I’m not sure,” Spud said, opening his eyes and sitting up. “In fact, I’m not sure anyone did…” A momentary pause. “What if,” he continued, “the body was Benedict?”
I sat forward, facing Spud. “Whoa! No way!”
Spud held up a hand. “No, wait. Let us review what we have learned. Gary has a desk job for Earth Core. After Mingferplatoi, after Harvard. Working his way up the ladder to mediocrity.”
I nodded. “That’s our Gary.”
“Then Benedict appears and takes him on that joyride to another dimension he related to us.”
“Okay, I’m with you.”
“Only instead of Benedict remaining in Level Three, as Gary had said, they both came back. Now their goal becomes to return to this Level Three—or, as we really should label it, Brane 5—and stay there. They run through the similar calculations and speculations to ours, and decide to try a nuclear bomb to provide the energy to push them all the way through the portal.”
“Okay … but why go back in time thirty years to the 1940s?”
Spud chewed on his lip. “I think because there was a lot of above-ground nuclear testing in that area then. Perhaps they figured that it would be less suspicious if anything went wrong.”
“Which it did.”
“Apparently.” Spud scratched his chin. “So let us suppose Benedict is the risk-taker, so he assumes the role of the test pilot. He dons some kind of protective suit, and detonates the nuke just as he crosses the portal. Boom. Backdraft. He’s blown back to--”
“Is there a portal in near where we were in New Mexico?”
Spud shrugged. “I didn’t get anything on my Ergal close by, but, the portal they used could be anywhere within hundreds of miles. Arizona, Nevada, Colorado … The blowback could have thrown him all the way to where we were waiting in Roswell.”
“Roswell! Of course. The ‘alien invasion’.” I quoted with my fingers.
“Gary’s admitted he blew a mission at Roswell. What if that ‘mission’ wasn’t an invasion from outer space, but from another brane …?”
I took in a sharp breath. “So Benedict gets burned to a crisp and lands at Roswell. Gary goes and finds him, pulls him out of his not-so-protective suit and then Ergals out, leaving the remnants of the suit …”
“And the bomb. Which could resemble the broken pieces of a ship. The suit looks like …?”
“An alien …”
Spud nodded. “Exactly.”
We stared at the stars for a few moments in silence. I hesitated. “Then Benedict’s dead?”
Spud didn’t answer right away. “Perhaps. Perhaps not. He may have died and been anastasized. Or if he lived, regenerated his injured parts. Or … Benedict could simply be a political tool, and not really exist any more at all …”
“A tool? Whose? Gary’s?”
Spud said quietly. “Perhaps. Perhaps not.”
* * *
Back to Zyga—present day
As our Zoom Cruiser whizzed through the last leg of our journey to Zyga, we both sat quietly, trying to digest the events of the last few hours. No offense to the Kharybdians, but the muddy waters had gotten much deeper. If Gary had been a friend of Benedict’s, was his allegiance to the Omega Archon, or to the outlaw? Was Gary himself still working for Benedict, a double agent like Wart? Did he send us after Sutherland hoping we’d fail, to help Benedict succeed? And, if Gary had gone to the other side, who else at Core—or beyond—had he taken with him?
I could only hope that Ev wasn’t one of them, and that my favorite dork had kept his mouth shut—literally—about our temporal research on radiation belts. If Gary found out, he could probably guess that we were on to him. In that case, we were dead meat. Gary could use his cred and authority with Zygint to convince Central that we were the traitors. We’d be arriving at Zyga soon. Would we be greeted as citizens or enemies of Zygfed …?
“Spud?”
He raised an eyebrow.
“The Somalderis …”
He smiled wanly. “Ah yes. The Somalderis.”
“Agriarctos told me he’d seen the Somalderis years ago. In the past. Why didn’t Gary and Benedict go back and steal it to use?”
“Maybe they did. And battered the gates of heaven with the ram …” Spud said in a soft voice, adding mysteriously. “A man who has never been to heaven is driven by hope. A man who has lost heaven is driven by desperation.”
Spud pulled out his Ergal and smiled. “Perhaps we should revisit our Milton.”
I nodded, not wanting to reveal that I didn’t have a clue what he was talking about.xxii
* * *
The Kharybdian Enclave, Zyga—present day
We didn’t dare touch down in Mikkin until we were sure that Zygint hadn’t discovered our detective work. Instead, I followed Spud back into the mud of the Kharybdian enclave. We’d come to Zyga in stealth mode again, and my stomach was still churning from the rough entry. I was grateful that I hadn’t eaten since I don’t know when.
Eikhus greeted us with a soothing warm shower and led us in to his thal. We were surprised to find Matshi and Nephil Stratum waiting for us in the sala.
Matshi looked good. His limbs had grown back fully, and he was smiling. I was glad to see him less depressed.
Nerea welcomed us with dewy hugs, and invited us to munch on some thikia. “Eikhus has a new recipe. They’re delicious.”
And they were. I didn’t realize quite how hungry I’d been. Even Spud seemed to eat with some vigor, and without the grumbling that usually accompanied his encounters with things Kharybdian.<
br />
After a hearty meal during which Spud filled in our friends about our adventures, we relaxed with mugs of Chidurian Ale, courtesy of Matshi. Despite the drink’s relaxing benefits, I noticed a hint of tension had crept into the Chidurian’s features. When I could catch him alone, I would try to find out why, I decided.
“Ergal records show nothing, but my contacts did find some references to a Somalderis,” Nephil Stratum relayed to us. “Kolhis—”
“Where we were,” I interjected, grimacing at my memory of the Georgian thug.
“Also, Sparti, Uruk, Judea,” she continued. “Nothing much after that.”
“Anything in the US?” Spud asked. “New Mexico? Nevada?”
“No. Nothing. The last report was thousands of years ago in any case.”
“Any connection with Orion?” asked Matshi.
“No. Sorry,” Nephil Stratum said softly.
Ah. Ulenem’s outburst to save Orion was clearly on the Chidurian’s mind.
Spud leaned forward in his seat. “Matshi, does Orion Alpha have Van Allen Belts?”
Matshi shrugged his shoulders. “Never checked. My ship has always been radiation shielded, just in case.”
Eikhus shot a waterspout to his holo. “No Van Allen Belts,” he told us, as he scanned the display.
Spud looked disappointed.
“But,” Eikhus continued, “There are Trapezalnitaks.” He turned back to face us. “Radiation belts.”
“Capital.” Spud’s excitement trumped his annoyance. “How do they compare with the Van Allen Belts?”
Eikhus re-checked his computer. “Stronger. Much stronger. Especially the inner belt. They seem to be products of fusion reactions.”