//------------------------------// // Chapter 20: Quirks and Quarks // Story: Brightly Lit 2: Pharos // by Penalt //------------------------------//     Onwards through the cosmos hurtled the blue bolt of energy.  Barriers of time, space and dimension fell to the unprecedented blend of science and magic, blazing through them like a heated needle through a stick of butter.  A thousand times a thousand worlds, empires, and entities of unfathomable power bore witness to the blazing spear of power as it crossed the heavens, and not all of them were what one would call friendly.     But at least one of them was…     “Twilight!” Applejack yelled, as she pelted along the road toward the crystal edifice on the border of Ponyville.  The orange mare was more noted for her endurance, as opposed to her speed, but on the ground she was as fleet of foot as her friend Rainbow Dash, the fastest pony in all Equestria.     “TWI!” gasped the earth pony, sliding to a halt in the border between day and night that gave the Princess of Friendship her name.  “TWI!”     “She knows, Applejack,” declared Spike as he opened the door to the castle, quickly stepping to one side and gesturing toward a flight of stairs.  “Go up, take the first left, then a right and up the next set of stairs.  That will take you up the viewing platform.”     “Thanks Spike,” Applejack said, and having caught her second wind tore through the halls of the Castle of Friendship like an orange blur, arriving on a broad balcony with heaving sides.       “Current location, fourteen hours, twelve minutes right ascension,” Twilight was saying, eyes glued to a large telescope as Starlight Glimmer stood to one side taking notes on a large whiteboard.  “Sixty-two degrees declination, magnitude negative two point four.”     “Hate to bother ya in the middle of all yer science stuff, Twilight, but I gotta know.  Is it them?” Applejack panted out, second wind exhausted.     “It might be,” Twilight allowed, multitasking as she studied the shaft of blue light that was slowly transiting the evening sky while holding a conversation and bringing a second instrument to bear with her magic.  “Double-check me Starlight.  I’m reading a thaumic frequency of eighty two point six five.  What do you get?”     “Eighty two point six five one eight seven,” replied Twilight’s student, looking at the readings on her own instrument.  “A perfect match for Equestria’s magical signature.  And before you ask, yes, I made sure that the atmosphere wasn’t overlaying its signature over that of… whatever that is.”     “Rarity, can you take a look at this?” Twilight requested, and Applejack realized with a start that she hadn’t even noticed the alabaster mare standing off to one side.  The fashionista was looking unusually shabby, her usually elegantly styled mane drawn back in a fraying, but no nonsense ponytail that echoed Applejack's standard look.     “Of course,” Rarity replied, a slight trace of hoarseness in her voice.       “Sorry Applejack, we need to get in as many measurements as we can on this before it disappears,” Twilight said, stepping aside to give Rarity room while scooping up yet another analytical device in her magic.  “How much longer Starlight?”     “Two minutes or so, at its current rate of movement.  There’s another sort of energy mixed up with the… comet too.  Something I don’t recognize,” Starlight answered.     “How do you focus the image, and can you make it larger?” Rarity was asking, and a moment later Twilight’s magic adjusted a few knobs.  “Thank you, darling.  Well, it definitely doesn’t look like any sort of comet I’ve ever seen.  If anything, it looks like a very long gemstone.  It even has facets.”     “How many facets?” Starlight inquired, as she began to add Rarity’s observations to the whiteboard.       “Sixty-two,” Rarity responded almost instantly, followed by an exclamation of, “Oh!”     “Oh what?” Applejack asked, feeling very much out of place amongst the three unicorns.     “Sixty-two facets are reserved for gems cut for the Princess,” Rarity explained, and although Luna was a personal friend of the generous pony, Celestia would always be ‘the Princess’ to Rarity, “the Ashoka cut was designed specifically for her and she took such a shine to it that nopony has ever dared offer a gem with that cut to anypony else.”     “Does that mean Princess Celestia made that thing up there?” Applejack demanded, almost dancing on her sturdy hooves.     “Not necessarily, but it does mean that whatever that phenomena is, it’s based off of an Equestrian gem that was cut for the Princess,” Twilight offered, before turning to Starlight and asking, “How many of the stones enchanted for Lee Ung were—”     “All of them,” interrupted the unicorn, having anticipated the rest of the question.  “I’ve got the complete inventory here, and they were all gifted gems and they all used the Ashoka cut.”     “Then that there’s a signal!” Applejack shouted joyously.  “Them Canadians figured out how to send up a flare.  We can bring Apple Bloom and the others home!”     Twilight looked over to her student, hope in her eyes.  A hope that was dashed a moment later by an almost imperceptible shake of the head.     “What? What?” demanded Applejack, having picked up Twilight’s reaction.     “It’s not enough,” said Twilight, deflating as the phenomena above started to fade as it finished its transit of the heavens.     “You said that we needed a signal.  Some kinda beacon, just like that.  So Ah don’t wanna hear any excuses.  Ah just want Apple Bloom home,” Applejack stated firmly, and Twilight could hear the hurt and frustration in her friend’s voice.     “Applejack, there’s an infinite number of dimensions out there,” Twilight began, thinking of an allegory her friend could not only understand, but accept.  “That signal tells us to look at all the odd numbered dimensions, so how many are left?”     “Half, of course!  Ah ain’t stupid, Twilight,” growled Applejack, right up until her mind worked out what her friends were driving at.  “But half of infinity’s still infinity, ain’t it?”     “At least we know which half to look at,” Rarity offered, leaving the instrument to wrap her friend in a powerful hug.  “I want Sweetie Belle home more than anything.  There is no price I would not pay to have her here right now—”     “Oh really?” commented Discord, popping in from a sideways corner of reality.       “You already said you can’t find them, Discord, and now isn’t the time to pretend you can,” huffed Twilight; drawing magic to her horn in case the draconequus needed to be chased off.     “Oh fine,” Discord huffed in annoyance.  “I was just trying to inject some levity into the situation.”  The mixed being disappeared again with one snap of a taloned hand.     “I really wish he could find them,” Rarity sighed, the energy she’d had moments before oozing out of her as it sunk home that for another night the Boutique would be empty of the chatter of her sister and the Cutie Mark Crusaders.     “You ain’t spending tonight alone again, Rarity.  It ain’t good for ya,” declared Applejack, deciding to do something about how her glamorous friend seemed to be collapsing in on herself.       “It’s quite alright Applejack.  I’ll be fine,” Rarity said, trying to move away from her earth pony friend only to discover she was held in a grip of steel.     “No, you won’t be fine, and Ah won’t be either.  Not until the Crusaders get home,” Applejack countered, holding the white unicorn to her side.  “Yer family, and family sticks together when things get tough.  So you and me are gonna march over to your place, grab a bunch of your frou-frou stuff, and then head on back to Sweet Apple Acres, ya hear?”     “I’m not allowed to say, ‘No’, am I?” Rarity asked, a small smile on her tired face.     “Not a chance, an’ Rainbow Dash neither, once Ah manage to get ahold of her,” Applejack stated.       “Twilight, can I… '' Spike's voice trailed off, and Twilight didn’t need more than a tiny bit of her prodigious intellect to finish the question in the drake’s voice.     “We can manage without you for a few days, Spike,” Twilight responded, drawing a pleased smile from her number one assistant.  “Go and help Granny Smith take care of them for me, okay?”     “You betcha Twilight!” Spike answered, and the two science minded ponies were left to ponder their next course of action as the last bits of blue radiance faded from the night sky.     “Hello Mr. Prime Minister,” the President said into the phone, chatter in his office having come to a halt so he could take the call in peace.     “Is there anything we can do to help?” Trudeau asked, without preamble.     “Everything appears to be contained to just the one area of the university, and casualties were incredibly light,” Biden responded, as another staffer tapped a section of a piece of paper in front of the President.  “There is one thing my people would like to know though.”     “What is it?” the prime minister answered.     “Have any of your people done any sort of high-energy experiments with any of the Equestrian gems you have?” Biden asked, his tone urgent.  “We need to know if anything like this has happened anywhere else, and what sort of precautions we should take to avoid a repeat of what happened.”     “We only know of the two that were still in Brightly,” was the PM’s response.  “One is cracked and damaged, so we’ve left it with the people there.  The other one has a rather useful property to it, and so we aren’t willing to accidentally use it up through rash experimentation.”     “I wish Texas A&M had been a little less willing to risk the gem they had,” sighed Biden, speed reading a note shoved in front of him.  “What’s the other stone you have capable of?”     “It detects the level of ambient magic in the area.  The University of British Columbia is trying to use it as a sort of detector to try to find any more of the forty-two stones,” Trudeau answered candidly.  “What do the other stones that you have do?”     “Both of them are survival oriented.  So, we’re guessing they were among the original gems Celestia enchanted,” explained the President.  “One will turn a rock into an apple, once a day.  The other will make a pint of water drinkable, no matter how fouled it is.”     “They still have power in them?” Trudeau asked, surprise in his voice.         “One of the kids at Texas A&M found out that you can recharge one by discharging a few car batteries into it.  That’s why the stones were there, to see if anything more about them could be discovered,” Biden answered, and inwardly cursing a moment later for giving away something for free in the exchange.     “Incredible.  We’ll have to give that a try if we find any other gems to see what they do.  Oh, one other thing,” Trudeau added, surprising the older man.     “What’s that?” the President asked, letting a little of the surprise he felt into his voice.     “There are still Equestrians in Brightly,” Trudeau stated, and Biden felt like he was in mid-air for a moment.  “Three young ponies were swapped in some manner with the princesses and Miss Velasquez when they were pulled through.  The Premier of British Columbia has told me that someone has been sent to Brightly to check on them.”     “Well, that’s good to hear.  Considering how one of our citizens is involved in that situation, I’d appreciate it if we were part of anything happening with them,” Biden said, improvising on the fly.     “We’ll be sure to keep you fully informed,” Trudeau responded, before adding,  “America is, and always has been one of Canada’s best friends, and I hope that being candid with you we can restore some of the goodwill that was lost when Equestria first came to Earth.”     “I appreciate that Justin, and thank you,” Biden replied.  “Your nation has always been one of our closest allies and you people have always had our back.  I’m looking forward to working closely with you again.”     “Thank you, I’ll speak to you again tomorrow, if you’re available, and hopefully I’ll be able to share some news about these three new Equestrians,” Trudeau concluded.     “Until then,” Biden replied, cutting the connection.     “Oh shit,” sounded a soft male voice in the silence following the call.     “Jake, what’s wrong?” the President asked, fixing his National Security Advisor with a look.  “You’ve gone white as a sheet.”     “We need to track down and secure every single one of those alien rocks, and we need to do it yesterday,” insisted the man, sweating as he tapped messages into his phone in rapid-fire succession.  “I mean it, Sir.  Every single other national security issue needs to take a backseat to getting those stones into American control.”     “I get that magic is a wildcard, and that we need to be on the forefront of any research into them, but aren’t you going a little over the top here?” counseled the President.     “No Sir.  If anything, I’m understating the situation.  We need to beg, borrow, steal, blackmail and if necessary go to war to make sure each one of those stones are controlled by either us or an ally,” the man pressed his phone to a sweating cheek and urgently said, “Pete, it’s Jake.  We need to retask Mercury immediately.  Crisis meeting in ten minutes, and make sure everyone is there.”     “Jake, what the hell is going on?” the President demanded.     “Sir, after what happened in Texas one of the boffins at DARPA asked a question, and when no one could answer it, the question got kicked up the chain of command because the potential answers have thrown every single strategic planner in the country into a panic, myself included just now,” responded the National Security Advisor.     “What question?” asked the 46th President of the United States.     “Sir, what happens if someone straps one of those Equestrian jewels to a nuke and sets it off?” posed the advisor.     “Oh shit.”     “Can you believe it was just sitting there in the old geology samples?” Konstantin asked his friend, as they quickly strode down the halls of one of UBC’s many buildings.       “I told you we should have started in the uncatalogued section first, instead of the known samples,” replied Art, who was the very epitome of a hungry university student, his tall lean build eating up the meters with a stuttering stride.     “Ya, ya,” rebutted the heavy-set Manitoban man.  Konstantin was third generation Canadian, but his name reflected his parent’s desire to maintain their Russian cultural traditions.  “What really should have tipped us off is what the sample is made of.”     “The label said ‘beryl’,” Art commented, breaking stride to weave around another student whose nose was down in his phone.  “How is that a clue?”     “It’s the type of beryl that’s important.  Don’t forget, I’m a double major.  Physics and geology,” Konstantin boasted, pumping his legs a bit to keep up.     “You can generalize all you want, specialization is where it’s at. Which is why I’m on the Dean’s List for particle physics,” shot back Art, holding open the door so the pair could exit the building.  “Spill.  Why is the type important?”     “It’s not just a piece of beryl.  It’s a faceted piece of golden beryl,” Konstantin explained, puffing as he broke into a sprint toward a cab that was just offloading a fare.  “Heliodor .”     “Helio—what?” Art asked, easily sliding into the other side.     “Heliodor, or ‘Sun’s Gift’ in greek.  And you remember what Princess Celestia said she was the princess of?” Konstantin panted out, leaning back into the seat.     “Holy crap, you’re right,” agreed Art, before catching the eye of the cab’s driver and saying, “Take us to TRIUMF.”     TRIUMF or the “TRI-University Meson Facility” had stood on the south edge of the UBC campus for over forty-five years and was still the world’s most powerful cyclotron in existence.  The device was capable of summoning up charged hydrogen ions of up to 520 million electron volts, and then hurtling them outward at seventy-five percent of the speed of light down several beam pathways, making the facility able to conduct multiple experiments at once.     The device was massive, sturdy, well maintained and a hyper-powered scalpel carving its way into the mysteries of the subatomic realms.     “Do you have it?” demanded Dr. Smith, the facility’s director, as the two young men trotted toward him.     “Right here, Doctor,” Art answered, passing over the metal sample box that was labelled ‘Golden Beryl, donated 1975, donor unknown.’     “Excellent, grab your dosimeters and take your stations.  We go hot in twenty minutes,” Smith ordered, taking the box and spending a moment to open the container and marvel at the faceted stone inside.     “Are you sure this is wise?” ask Dr. Aloud, the chief operating officer.  “Especially after what happened earlier today.”     “It has to be done, particularly in light of the tragedy in Texas,” Dr. Smith responded, his voice even.  “Now that it’s known that Celestia’s gifts react strongly to high energy particles, the world needs to know which particles are the cause, in what combination they react and whether or not that reaction can be controlled.”     “I hope you don’t intend to go with full power immediately,” cautioned Dr. Aloud.     “Certainly not,” scoffed the director.  “We have an entire regimen of experiments to conduct and we will start with the least energetic of them, and only then progress forward in a gradual and methodical way.”     “In that case I’ll take the stone to the targeting array on Beamline Four,” stated Dr. Aloud, holding out her hand for the case.     “Thank you.  Be sure to bring as many sensors online for the tests as you can as well.  We need as many different eyes as possible on this,” added the director, passing over the sample.     Twenty minutes of frantic activity later, Dr. Smith was standing behind several engineers as they watched the massive cyclotron build up power.  Watching them in turn from a visitor’s gallery were several members of the university’s science faculties, a pair of local politicians, and a member of the local news media.  A reporter for the news-talk radio station CKNW who had caught wind of the goings-on and been allowed in on the condition that nothing they observed could be broadcast live.     “Power at one million electron volts.  Prepare to energize the beam for one second,” stated Dr. Smith in a commanding voice.  “Energize in three… two… one… Energize.”     There was a distant thrum of power and subsonic vibration that seemed to be felt more than heard.  A few seconds later one of the technicians reported, “Energization successful and within standard deviations.  Beginning spin down procedures.”     “No readings on any sensors,” reported another of the personnel.  “Nothing on ATLAS, NMER, ARIEL, or any other sensor.  It’s like we didn’t do anything at all.”     “No results at all?  We should have at least picked up scatter from the beam’s impact, as we did when we tested the diamond detectors for CERN,” noted Dr. Smith.  “Very well.  We’ll continue with the experiment protocols.  Prepare for a second energization.  Two million volts, same duration.”     Over the next three hours, the main cyclotron was spun up to power over fifty times as the chunk of rock was subjected to an ever increasing bombardment of charged hydrogen ions. The initial excitement had worn off, and both politicians had left pleading prior commitments, but the reporter stayed on, citing the fact that he was being paid by the hour to stand around in an air conditioned room drinking coffee.     “Four hundred million volts, thirty seconds duration, Beamline Two,” stated Dr. Smith, his tie somewhat loose now.  “Three… two… one… Energize.”     “Energization successful and within standard deviations.  Beginning spin down procedures.” announced the tech, for the umpteenth time a minute later.  A second announcement shattered the room's decorum a moment later.     “Positive result on ATLAS!” called out a graduate student working on her doctorate, and pressed into service to monitor the array of instruments now aimed at the gold stone.  “We have data from NREL, ARIEL, DRAGON, TITAN… Sir, everything is lit up.  Positive results from all detectors.”     “Confirm that the results are valid and not interference, then back everything up to the offsite location,” Dr. Smith ordered, before turning to the now very interested reporter.  “We maintain an offsite data center which we back up any experimental results to.  Just in case of a catastrophic failure.” “Just like in Texas,” noted the reporter.  “You seem to have gotten a result.  Now what?” “We’ll pause here for a bit and make sure the readings are valid before pressing on,” Smith said. “Provided the results are valid, what do you press on towards?  From what I understand, you’re nearing the limits of what you can put out,” asked the reporter, discreetly holding a micro voice recorder between the two of them.  “We only had plans for two more energizations.  The first is a maximum power energization from Beamline One at the full five hundred and twenty million electron volts that we are capable of,” Smith stated, with more than a little pride for the facility in his voice.  “The second is what one of our graduate students fancifully referred to as our ‘Omega Beam’.” “Omega Beam?” the reporter queried, mouth quirking in a smile.  “You folks are firing what amounts to a particle cannon from science fiction and you have something called an ‘Omega Beam’?  I’ve got to ask, what is it?” “If the first energization indicates that there is anything of value from increasing the power beyond maximums, I’ll describe it to you.  Otherwise, you’ll just have to wait,” Smith replied, a smug smile crossing his usually disciplined face for a moment.   “Anything you say, ‘Doctor Darkseid’,” chuckled the reporter, clicking off the recorder.  It would be a good bit of humour to liven up what could be an otherwise fairly dry report. A full hour later and nearly five hours after the series of experiments began, the nearly fifty year old cyclotron began spinning up to its maximum power setting.  Hydrogen atoms were pulled from their reservoir, ionically charged and then sent into a spiraling course as they accelerated to three quarters of the speed of light.  Then at just the right moment those ions struck a piece of graphite laced foil, stripping away the electrons and leaving only the oppositely charged protons behind. The shift from being attracted to repelled by the cyclotron’s massive magnet sent the beam of energized protons down a tube that had been evacuated of all air.  This was the beamline that guided the elemental particles toward their target at relativistic speeds.  A few miniscule fragments of time later, the subatomic fury struck the stone and this time, something changed. Beam met stone, but the gem was more than just a simple rock.  It was a crystalline lattice of prismatic facets that had been further enhanced by the addition of a framework of the reality warping powers of magic wielded by a centuries old being in the cause of her most dearly held values.  Friendship and Harmony.   Every single measuring device in the entire building registered that something monumental occurred at the moment of beam impact.  A fact punctuated with exclamation point of multiple alarms and an array of flashing lights. “Shut everything down!” Dr. Smith yelled, unnecessarily as the various scientists and technicians scrambled to do just that.  It took nearly a minute later, but eventually the alarms were silenced, leaving only a series of flashing lights. “Energization successful and within normal parameters until twenty eight point four seconds duration, at which point magnet sector four went out of standard operating guidelines,” stated the tech from the operations group.  “We have damage to the main cyclotron.  No idea how bad as yet.” “DOCTOR, YOU HAVE TO GET DOWN HERE!” screamed a voice through the intercom.  A voice Dr. Smith immediately recognized as the man who oversaw the physical creation and observation of all of TRIUMF’s complicated targeting arrays.   “Jim?  What is it?” Smith demanded, pressing the old intercom button.  “We’re a little busy up here.” “You have to get down here and see this,” insisted the old electronics expert.  “It’s incredible.” Dr. Smith and the reporter exchanged a look, the latter getting a near imperceptible nod of permission and a moment later the two were dashing through the massive facility, every unoccupied technician and scientist hot on their heels.  In what seemed to be seconds later, the group dashed into the containment area that was the end point for Beamline One and the location of its targeting array holding the piece of golden beryl. The stone shone with the colours of a setting sun.  Rays of energized power flowed outward from the sixty-four facets of the stone creating a rectangular outline of yellow-red light on one wall of the chamber.  An outline that was slightly larger than a door frame, but that had not been the true reason for the urgent call for witnesses, as incredible as that sight was. The true wonder was that within the borders of that outline there could be seen, not the wall that the light was projected on, but the image of a moonlit beach with gentle surf to one side and a forested cliff on the other.  Stepping closer, Dr. Smith could even make out what appeared to be a set of wooden stairs emerging from the woods. “Is that?” panted the reporter.  “Is that a portal?  Did you make a portal?” “Possibly,” allowed Smith, taking a moment to study the phenomena.  “If it is, it is an unstable one.  The edges are collapsing in on themselves.” Everyone could see that the director was right.  The golden gateway was slowly shrinking in size even as they watched. The entire group was torn between the joy of scientific accomplishment and the burning design to press onward into a new frontier.   “What no—” one of the graduate students was about to ask, when a smartphone went sailing through the air, passing through the doorway of golden light and landing in a clearly visible location on the sandy beach.   “Track my phone,” said the reporter, as the edges of the light began to accelerate inward.  “I fired up my tracking app before I threw it.  If that’s anywhere in the world with cell service, we can find where that beach is.” “Good thinking,” Smith warmly declared, as the portal’s closure continued to accelerate.  “Wreck Beach,” said the targeting tech, a few moments later, as the radiance from the jewel gave a last shudder before disappearing entirely, and taking the portal with it.  “His phone is on Wreck Beach, about three kilometers from here.” “Huh, I wonder where it would have gone if you guys had used that ‘Omega Beam’ thing of yours,” the reporter commented.  “Maybe next time,” Smith allowed.  “Maybe next time.”