The next day, school went normally as usual. However, after school, was where the real investigations started happening. Kayla, Lenny and I made their way to the observatory that day. Kayla was especially stoked about seeing the jump points. We drove together and arrived after a twenty minute drive up the mountain roads. Well all showed our IDs and then headed up to the main telescope area.
"Okay, so these jump points are located right in the center point between the earth and the moon." I said as I started to calibrate the telescopes.
"Right, set the viewing angle to 40 degrees and set direction to northeast. Set zoom to 40x." Lenny stated.
"Got it." I chimed as I set the telescope up. I checked the view. The jump points were visible but slightly out of focus.
"Lenny, half turn on fine-tune please." I said.
"On it." Lenny said as he turned the fine tune knob halfway. The jump points were clear as day.
"There they are." I said as I looked. They seemed to be almost lined up.
"Could be a matter of days before they are perfectly aligned." I stated.
"We ought to get the exact time and day." Kayla said as she got out her notebook and started to write down the information that was given already. She was making a formula in order to figure out the exact time when the jump points would be lined up.
"Okay, so I figured something out. The jump points when drawn on this paper move about a half inch closer per day." Kayla concluded.
"But now we gotta convert that, which is easy since the telescope has a line making simulator programmed onto it." I stated as I calibrated the telescope to show the line as if the jump points were already lined up. Kayla solved the formula in about 3 minutes.
"There. According to the formula, we've got 1 day, 8 hours, 23 minutes and 54 seconds until lineup." Kayla said.
"Wow right down to the second..." Lenny commented.
"So I guess we meet back here tomorrow?" Kayla asked.
"Yep, same time." I answered. We left the observatory and went our separate ways. When I arrived home, I went to finish up some leftover assignments. However, when Kayla went home, she spent almost all night researching about the jump points, which cost her the first two classes the next day due to her oversleeping. I had to call her when I had the chance and sadly, Kayla ended up in lunch study, which meant we couldn't talk about the jump points. At lunch, Lenny and I simply talked about classwork that we did.
"Seriously, we must have a conversation with Kayla. You know how she gets completely obsessed with wanting to know more about something, which there's absolutely nothing wrong with that curiosity. It gets dangerous when you put more emphasis on it to the point it causes you to miss the more important things, like school." I stated.
"So true, but you know how Kayla is...once she dips her foot in the water, she'll dive right in and wouldn't want to get out the water until she's seen and learned everything there is to know about something." Lenny replied.
Our group didn't get together until after school, which meant there was even less time for us to chat about the plan for when the jump points connect. Of course, we all had a stern talk with Kayla about her obsession. The thing with Kayla is that she can be quite stubborn at times, and because of this, she really didn't take our advice. After the conversation, we started on our business with the jump points.
During the drive to the observatory, we really didn't mingle as much. I felt bad that we had to talk to Kayla the way we did, but because she was one of the best students in our class, we didn't want her to fail. Once we arrived at the observatory, Kayla's demeanor slowly began to change.
"It's only a matter of time before those jump points are lined up." Lenny stated as we pulled into the observatory. When we arrived in the telescope room, I went to check the settings.
"Awesome! The settings are just the way we left them." I said with a smile as Kayla went to sit down. She quickly pulled out the formula she made from yesterday and calculated the time left.
"We have exactly 1 minute left!" Kayla said with a smile as she made her way to the telescope, gesturing me to move out the way so she could see the jump points. Lenny had set up a timer on his watch for 1 minute. The time ticked away.
"Forty seconds." Lenny started to countdown.
"Thirty seconds."
"Twenty seconds."
"Ten, nine, eight, seven, six..." Lenny counted down. Kayla was hogging the telescope for herself. Everytime I tried to get beckon her to scoot over so that I could see, she would shove me away. I managed to get a small glimpse of the jump points.
"Three, two, one, zero, alignment achieved and connection established." Lenny said. The jump points were perfectly in line. They seemed to connect with one another via a form of light.
"So...what now?" Lenny asked.
"We wait. We must have a way to be alerted if something crosses over into our world via the jump points." I said.
"And then we gotta find it. I can't wait to see who comes through the jump points." Kayla said.
"I mean, we know from movies that whenever something arrives on earth from another world, there is a bright light. Therefore, we should make devices that respond to high amounts of lumens." I suggested.
"Great idea. Let's head on over to my place. My dad has a lot of the tools and stuff we need." Lenny said as I started to power down all of the equipment.
During the drive to Lenny's house, Kayla was completely fixated on the light radiating from the connected jump points. I was a little worried about her that she would completely become obsessed with whatever comes through the jump points. When we arrived at Lenny's house, we immediately got to work assembling the lumen devices. Thanks to a video, we were able to find the best way to construct the devices. Kayla was beyond excited, to the point that she just stared at the changing numbers on her own device. After a little more discussion, we went our separate ways. Kayla went home...and still could not stop staring at the number on her device...