//------------------------------// // Chapter 3 // Story: The Conversion Bureau: Threshold // by Guardian_Gryphon //------------------------------// Earth Calendar: 1/19/2102 05:30 GMT ACV-10 UES Yorktown 5 NM East of the Azores Puller was thankful that the hatches on the Yorktown were mostly pneumatically operated slide configuration. On older ships, the doors opened on hinges, which made opening an exterior portal in windy conditions a risky proposition for one's fingers. The Colonel smacked the bar on the door; a carryover from the previous configurations, that served the dual purpose of being a manual release incase of pneumatic failure. The wind whipping across the deck promptly filled the ante-chamber with a moaning roar, augmented by the whine of aircraft engines. The flight deck smelled strongly of jet fuel. While most land vehicles, Drones, and even VTOLs, had converted to hydrogen fuel cell, or a hybridized system long ago, fighter aircraft still needed a full on traditional jet engine, fueled by traditional chemical substances, to maintain a competitive edge. Obtaining fuel was not a problem, despite the scarcity, given that military fighters were the only major consumer of jet fuel in the world. All other craft that required combustion as a process in their engines were run off a somewhat slower, and less efficient form of hydrogen cell hybridization with less costly propellant alternatives that were fairly easy to produce. Puller forced his way out into the wind, looping the closed strap of his helmet over one shoulder to keep the gusts from taking it over the side. A mistake like that was a nugget move; one nobody ever lived down if it happened more than once. Puller's armor was black, with the red striping of Fire Team Sigma, and a silver emblem of the aforementioned greek letter on the left shoulder-guard. The helmet was the same shade of barely-reflective black, and mirrored the same angular kinetic resistant edges found on the rest of the gear. The basic design was standard for Special Forces troopers, though it came in a veritable cornucopia of colors and patterns, both with and without striping in varying patterns and shades depending on the unit. The colonel noted that a drone, one of the largest military models, was being attached to one of the ship's four magnetic catapults. While most fighters and VTOLs didn't strictly need, or weren't compatible with, a catapult, they were still necessary for certain craft, both manned and unmanned, and sometimes the massive burst of initial speed was a combat advantage to launching fighters. As he forced his way through the spray-filled, freezing gusts, Puller watched in fascination as the almost fighter-sized AI driven turboprop flew off the deck with the distinctive snap-hum-whizz of a cat-launch. The UAV was likely intended to do an initial scoping of the islands to get a lay of the land up close, and ensure that sat-intel hadn't missed any critical dangers related to the anomaly. Puller muscled his way through the wind, careful to remain outside the lines, both visible and invisible, that designated hazard zones. A single moment of mental lapse on a carrier deck in flight operations status was a good way to get sucked into an intake, tripped over the side on a hose, axed in half by a drone propeller, or smashed to a bloody pulp by the multi-ton motorized munitions and fuel carts that were whizzing back and forth. And those were just the initial horrors that came to the marine's mind. He finally found relief from the wind on the leeward side of a VTOL. Three of the craft were lined up side by side, and a crowd of airmen were busy closing panels, attaching munitions, loading relief supplies, checking control surfaces, and in general ensuring that the vehicles would bring their passengers home safely. Puller noted that several universal mounting ports carried not their usual missiles and chain guns, but pulleys, rescue aparati, high-lumen spotbeams, and even a small sensor suite. Lieutenant Sorden, 'Firebrand', poked her head out of the cockpit of her VTOL and flashed Puller a smile, shouting to make herself heard above the cacophony of sound, "Booboo all better?" "More or less!" She glanced back at her control board, comparing it to a preflight checklist loaded on a DaTab strapped to her leg, "We're out of here in five! This would go alot faster with some help." Puller nodded, and carefully swung around the nose of the aircraft, letting himself into the gunner and co-pilot's seat via the left hatch. He had never understood why VTOLs and helicopters followed a convention of putting the pilot on the right, in defiance of every other aircraft. He pulled the side-swinging canopy closed, and slammed the latches firmly into place, cutting out some of the ambient noise. Firebrand did the same and cast a glance over her shoulder. In the rear of the vehicle, more members of fireteam Sigma were busy helping the airmen on deck to finish loading the craft. The cargo was mostly medical supplies, blankets, rations... the things a rescue operation required to run 'smoothly.' Or as well as could be hoped. Firebrand turned back to her console, and flicked a switch. Most craft ran off of touchscreens and holographic HUDs, and a few even had voice control via an AI; but to a one they all had traditional buttons, switches, toggles, and levers for critical functions like throttle, eject, engine start, and master arm. There was no getting around the need for tactile feedback, and unconditional reliability, in some situations. She glanced at her checklist again, "Master Arm?" Puller ran the switch up and down once rapidly. His panel responded with two tones, and a green bar, acknowledging that the system should be checked, but not activated, and reporting success. He nodded, "Green." "Avionics have cleared POST and boot, showing full startup. Testing control surfaces..." Firebrand jiggled the craft's control stick, simultaneously pumping the rudder pedals, and glancing over her right shoulder, out the window, to see that the appropriate fins were moving. She smiled, "Alright looks fine here, give me a check on port flaps, fins, and surfaces." Puller repeated her appraising glance, carefully noting the disposition of each object as it moved in response to more agitation of the stick and pedals. He nodded once more, "Left side good." "Allright. Booting external sensor pod, while that's loading I'm gonna run a check of the engine pod actuators, keep an eye on your side will ya?" The two had been doing the same preflight for so long that it was practically instinct, but they always repeated the steps aloud. It was better safe, than sorry in thousands of charred pieces scattered over the ocean, or a field somewhere. Puller watched as the VTOL's hybrid turbine engines swiveled on their pods. The craft was possessed of four such pods, two large ones near its center, held out on stubby, curvaceous wing struts. The other, smaller pods were attached either side of the expansive two-finned tail. "Left side good." Firebrand returned her gaze to the control board, "Right side good. Sensor pod had POSTed and booted, tied into communications feed. Sending test ping to Yorktown AI... ping returned." She tapped her mic, keying it to the VTOL's external speaker, "Clear backwash zone. Clear backwash zone." She then reached forward, and flicked two physical switches, tapping several areas of the touchscreen as a followup, "Spinning up turbines." A whine filled the cabin as the powerful engines began to come to life. The whine morphed into a growl, and Puller could see leftover seawater on the deck skittering away from the engines' downdraft. "Startup complete." Firebrand keyed her mic to the flight's main operations frequency, "Island, Firebrand, requesting comms check and mission designation." After a few moments, a male voice returned over the speakers, and presumably the pilot's headphones, "Island acknowledges; comms check verified. Your flight is assigned to my station, callsign Airstream. Your designations for this mission are Speartip one, two, and three. Verify that mission objective packet has arrived on your scopes please." Puller leaned forward and read his screen as data filled it. He pushed his own helmet on, and keyed the mic, "Verified. Objectives and OpSpec have arrived; we have been appraised. Ready to depart in sixty." "Acknowledged. Call back when the flightline is green." Firebrand tapped her mic once more, "All aboard who are coming aboard. Speartip two, Speartip three; check in." "Speartip two; loaded, and ready." "Speartip three, same here." A knock came on the bulkhead, and one of Puller's soldier's poked his head into the cockpit, "Doors shut back here, take us away." Firebrand grinned, "Flightline, Speartip one, we're prepped for departure, awaiting green light." "Flightline here, LSO says you're cleared out over the port side, maintain angels two until the four mile perimeter. Transferring you to Island, good luck." Puller waved out the canopy glass to the LSO, "Roger." A moment later, the ship's Island connected again, "Firebrand, Airstream; flightline says you're good. Island has cleared you for flight ops, punch it when you feel it. Come home safe." "Gotcha. Leave a light on for us." Firebrand flexed her gloved hands around the throttle, "Speartip flight, we're on for a port side departure. Ramp up engines, prepare for formation operations. Keep it low and tight, you know how this works." She glanced at Puller, "Cinch those straps down, its bumpy out there." Without further ado, she gently pulled the throttle quadrant back, the engine's previously 'loud' growl swiftly eclipsed by an immense roar of unbridled power. As if slaved to one master control system, the three VTOLs levitated several inches all at once. Firebrand sucked in a breath, and let it out slowly, "Speartip one, coming right." She inched the stick and rudder pedals over, and as if part of some choreographed ballet, the VTOLs revolved in near-perfect synchronization, to face away from the ship. "Call it boss." Puller nodded and leaned back hard in his chair, "Stomp on it." Firebrand obliged, kicking the rear engine pods into forward as quickly as they would go, accelerating the VTOL from zero to nearly eighty miles an hour in the space of three seconds. The other craft followed suit, and once they were up to speed, the main engine pods rotated to level, and another kick indicated the transition to their top speed of two hundred and sixty miles an hour. Puller held a hand to the side of his helmet, "Speartips away. Back in time for dinner." He closed the channel and sighed, "More or less anyways." Earth Calendar: 1/19/2102 07:02 GMT Earthgov Council Facility Harrisburg Pennsylvania Lawrence Thornton hated wake up calls. He was used to a life where he could set his own timetable; flying across the globe and being 'tossed' as he put it, into a strange guest suite was not an ideal way of generating the conditions for sleep. Not for him. Perhaps soldiers, and veteran politicians, could adjust their internal clock as if they were flipping a switch; but Thornton had never been forced to get up before ten AM in his life. Therefore, when a sharp knock at the door of his room harshly interrupted his adolescent sleep cycle, it left him grumpy, groggy, and thoroughly frustrated. Thornton staggered to the door, and wrenched it open. Cal's smiling visage greeted him, backlit by the normally dim bulbs of the artful hall sconces, which seemed to blaze with the fury of the sun to the scientist's unready eyes, "Gooood morning sunshine. Sleep well in the Yank bed? Of course you did." She clapped him on the shoulder twice in an infuriatingly patronizing and cheerful manner, "Come on, put those British brain cells to work. Powers That Be want to see you in short order, then our flight will be here. You want to have time for food? Better suck it up and put the pedal to the metal." With that, Cal shut the door. Thornton was thoroughly blindsided, and not a little ticked off, by the sarcastically over-joyous stream of words she had all but spewed at his exhaustion addled mind, but he did have enough active gray matter to realize that she was right about one thing; breakfast would have to be soon, or never. He decided to forego a shower; flying on a private aircraft didn't bring with it the 'grunge' inherent to most traditional forms of global travel. He pulled a shirt and slacks from his duffel, realizing for the first time that they were likely used; he had accidentally switched them with his few clean garments in his haste to pack. That would be the ten for tenth time he had encountered such a mix-up leaving his flat for a trip, he reflected ruefully. Most of those times he hadn't even been in a hurry. He shrugged, donned his change of clothes, then stood for several seconds as if anchored to the floor. His lips moved, and his fingers danced as if playing a symphony. The peculiar ritual was a habit of Thornton's; his body tended to do compulsive, hyperactive things when he was engaged in deep thought. Thornton's conundrum resulted from the hurried nature in which he had been pulled from his flat, and his work. His brain was the sort that could switch tasks at a speed bordering on the paranormal, but only when it chose to of its own instinctive accord. When his brain wanted to fixate, it could fixate for hours, days, or even years. He had spent most of the flight still locked into mentally replicating and refining his last experiment, consequently he hadn't caught up to current events, not really and truly, and thus had no real conception of what to do next. Eventually he decided it would be best to take his bag with him. He could acquire information about the location of food merely by associating his DaTab with the building's network, and if the so called 'Powers That Be' wanted him after that, he presumed they would find him. He had no particular sense of compulsion to find them. As he shouldered his bag, he used his free hand to connect his DaTab to the complex's wireless network. A helpful popup instantly offered access to a map, complete with directions displayed in real time. Apparently the Harrisburg campus had four different places to eat, two with a large selection, but defined hours, and two speciality eateries that were open 24/7. Given the time, Thornton decided he'd have the best luck with the nearest specialty eatery, and struck out down the corridor. The Harrisburg campus was truly well appointed, and Thornton made this evaluation from experience. His position with the Biotech party afforded him a generous salary. The floors were carpeted in tan, trimmed with maroon, forest green, or a bluish shade of purple, and Thornton's analytical mind realized that the color depended on the direction the hallway ran. The lights that were spaced every few meters were artful, but simplistic; chrome oval fittings with a soft white, pleasant bulb, producing the best-guess equivalent of sunlight at dawn. Due to his quick decision, Thornton's breakfast turned out to be the expensive equivalent of synthetic Chinese takeaway. Given that sometimes his eating habits eschewed the patterns of a normal human to the point of severely endangering his intestinal tract, it was a net gain over his usual morning meal. As he had predicted, he was summoned shortly after procuring his food. Agent Konem strode into the near-empty lounge area and swiftly took a seat opposite the groggy scientist, "Looks like a nutritious part of a balanced breakfast." Thornton had never been particularly good at detecting sarcasm, having always been of the opinion that attempting to sort it out from regular conversation was a waste of time and energy; so he merely raised an eyebrow and continued forcing down fork-fulls of artificial noodles. After a few moments of silence, punctuated only by the sound of chewing, Thornton opted to indulge his curiosity, "Ralph, right? Say Ralph... what's with the blonde? Your partner I mean." Konem grinned and shook his head, "Word of advice? Don't call her that. Ever. The first thing you learn with Cal is to stop seeing her as a woman first." "So she's one of those tomboy types?" Konem squinted at the ceiling, searching for good descriptors, "Mmmmm not exactly. She's a woman too, and she knows it, but she's not a woman *first* or foremost." "Which makes her... what?" Konem answered sharply, and seriously, "A weapon." Thornton exhaled, his eyes widening in an expression of part disdain, part resignation, "Ooook. So clearly she's not the social type." "You have *no* idea." Thornton worked in an over-large bite of noodles, speaking around the unchewed mass, "Thrill me." "She once beat a man into a coma with his own fist because he pointed an unloaded gun at someone during a political rally." "That doesn't seem physically possible," The words were followed by a swallowing noise. "That's probably what bubba joe terrorist thought... until he met Cal. She knocked the gun away, grabbed his empty right fist in her own hands, and despite the fact that this guy kicked and struggled like a maniac, she used his own fist as a bludgeon." Thornton made to finish off his food, but paused with the fork in mid-air, "What ever happened to the guy?" Konem rose, and shrugged, "Last I heard he was a bigger vegetable than your leftover celery." Ralph paused, then inclined his head in the direction of the sickly green objects, "You gonna eat that?" Thornton shook his head avidly, "You can stomach it? I can't *stand* synth-greens. Something not quite right about 'em. I wrote a paper on it once, turns out the way the hydroponic kelp is reorganized by the nanoparticles introduces..." Konem snagged the celery sticks deftly from Thornton's tray before he had a chance to deposit his trash in a receptacle, interrupting his verbose scientific explanation with a loud crunch as he bit into the artificial food, "Your loss my friend. Your loss." Cal would never admit it to anyone; but she was embarrassed. Thornton had laid hands on Councilor Innara's DaTab exactly three minutes earlier, by the blond agent's count, and in that time he had accomplished more with the device than she had ever managed in an entire lifetime of trying to learn their operation. The scientist had placed the rectangle of plexiglass on the table in front of him, and was feverishly manipulating data with both hands, not even pausing when he occasionally compulsively ran his left hand through his hair; his right hand simply took over for the tasks of both appendages temporarily. In total it only took the man five minutes to review the information provided to his satisfaction. Thornton leaned back and sighed, displaying an expression of concern that looked unfamiliar and infrequent for his visage, "This is all direct pull-down from satellites and monitoring stations? No manipulation? No filters?" Sulerahmen nodded, and Korvan, who had arrived a minute into Thornton's probing of the data, added his own affirmation, "This has only been seen by two hundred people on the planet, at most." Thornton raised an eyebrow, "And what did they tell you?" Councilor Innara leaned forward ever so slightly, "That this was a threat not to be taken lightly." Korvan inclined his head, "Admittedly, there are still some dissenting voices that are calling the prevailing interpretations of the data exaggeration..." Thornton stiffened, "This is no exaggeration. If anything? Its an *under* estimation. I'm not sure what they've told you but whatever they said... multiply it times a thousand." Sulerahmen's eyes narrowed, "Are you suggesting...." Thornton shook his head, "No suggestion, no implication. I hate unquantifiable. No I'm *telling* you that this could well lead to a full scale extinction event." For several seconds, there was no response, beyond Konem shifting uncomfortably, so Thornton stood, and continued as he began to pace, "I'm gonna just assume none of you know much about Quantum State Differentials, or Kerint's Gravitic Equations, and such, so here it is simply..." He pointed to the table, and the holo projection controls it contained, "May I?" Councilor Sulerahmen nodded, and Thornton went to work, his fingers dancing over the keys like an expert pianist, until he had summoned the precise non corporal glowing interface he needed. The scientist fiddled with the hologram for a moment, then turned to the group, "See this sphere? This is us. Not the globe, the universe as we know it. Now this is a stretch, but try to understand that the perimeter of this little ball touches every point inside it, and no point inside it, simultaneously. So for all intents and purposes location is non-relevant from the standpoint of traditional spherical trigonometry." Konem groaned, "Oh I hated that class." A glare from Cal made it apparent that his interjection was ill timed. Thornton continued running a hand through his hair, spinning the blue tinted orb obsessively and randomly with the other, "This is us. Everything you could ever see, measure, explore... quantify.... about the extent of this universe. This quantum reality. Now all that holds it together is energy; energy is matter, matter is energy, time is energy, space is matter... its all the same basic building blocks arranged in differing complex higher patterns." Cal shivered involuntarily. She didn't really grasp the full extent of the British physicist's words, but the way the sphere of light framed his face gave him a sudden ominous aspect that completely overrode the initial impression of the absent minded ditzy geek. Here was no mere man, but a potential destroyer of worlds. This disheveled, compulsive, and all together unnerving man continued, speaking with true gravity for perhaps the first time in decades, "Now this little ball... this is not the extent of existence. If you're familiar with string theory, or Mengelisk's ideas of quantum perceptual affect, you've got some grasp of the many worlds theory. Put simply there are likely other universes, and worlds, and energy within the void around our little sphere." Korvan squinted, "And you're saying they could affect us in some way?" "They already do, but usually not in a way that you can see without large scale instrumentation. This case is... different. Whatever is happening in the Azores, right now, is simply the initial manifestation of an interaction between something out there.... and this." Thornton tapped the side of the sphere for emphasis, "Because of the way this... new energy, is entering our system, it is manifesting here and now. I can't say *what* it is... yet.... but I can put it in numbers I suppose...." The scientist glanced out the window at the Harrisburg complex, "How much electricity does a city use per year? Have you ever looked at the statistics? Now how much does every city on the planet use? How much have they used in their lifetime? Even if you don't know, you probably grasp that its nothing in comparison to the energy produced by our sun in a mere day. So how many suns are in our galaxy? Millions? Trillions? Some of them produce orders of magnitude more energy than our sun in their lifetimes. Try, if you can imagine for a moment, to add all that up..." Thornton punctuated the last words by pinching his index finger with his thumb, and forming a new holoprojection; a pure white pointed rod. He tapped the ball twice, and it expanded enormously to reveal that it was composed of many many smaller spheres, networked by a web of lines. "Say one of these is us; our local gravitational plane. Earth maybe. Its not to scale, but close enough for now. See the rod? This is energy. More energy than the Human race has produced, or ever will produce, in its lifetime. More energy than our star, than any star, than all the stars in our local cluster combined will produce in ten of their lifetimes. This is what's happening. Right now." Thornton turned, and rammed the rod into the edge of the bubble. The point of light pierced the web of lines, and impacted a bubble, shattering both the smaller sphere and the rod into millions of glittering pixels. "Ever see someone break a snow globe? That's what our planet will look like if this incoming energy is focused, or if its Zero-Point momentum potential is too high." Cal couldn't resist voicing her concern, "You're saying... what? That the planet is going to get shaken up as a whole?" Thornton shook his head, "Maybe.... or maybe it could result in a cascading shatter effect that engulfs the planet and shoves our entire local gravitic plane out of our universe. I can tell you right now that either one is a distinct possibility... but this is not going to go away. It *will* get worse. The only question is how *much* worse." The scientist rubbed his eyes. To Sulerahmen it looked as if he was frustrated; upset that the responsibility of an issue so weighty had come to bear on him. Upset that his routine had been upended, and his expectations soured. Silence reigned for several minutes as everyone did their best to take in the revelation. Councilor Innara spoke first, "More than ever, I am convinced that we need a better grasp of the anomaly before we can hope to mitigate its effects... if such a thing is possible. My contacts have responded quickly; a craft is arriving within the hour to ferry you to the Azores, Mr. Thornton." Korvan stood, Cal thought she detected a slight nervous tic in his legs. The Councilor picked up his hat, and fidgeted with it for several seconds, "Lawrence... this? What you've told us? This needs to stay sub rosa. If the public becomes aware of the potential magnitude of this, before we have answers to their questions, it's going to be a nightmare. Keep everything you say, and do, with regards to the anomaly, limited to the people in this room." Thornton nodded. Sulerahmen picked up where Korvan left off, "I'm sending my agents with you for this assignment. They carry my authority, and should be able to ensure that you can procure the equipment and transportation you need. They're also with you to act as protection, not just for you, but for the secrecy of the situation until such time as it can be discussed publicly without serious negative ramifications." Cal and Konem traded surprised glances; this was the first they had heard of their part in the assignment. Innara had backup security, to be sure, but she rarely dispatched both of her trusted agents to an assignment simultaneously. It was yet another grim testament to the seriousness of the situation. Thornton sighed, "Well... I suppose another flight on the Skyrunner is out of the question?" Cal smirked, "I hope you can sleep in a jump-seat. Ever ridden out a carrier landing before?" Thornton's only response was a slight groan. Earth Calendar: 1/19/2102 08:00 GMT Port of Madalena The Azores Pico Island had doubtless once been a verdant tropical paradise. Due to the popularity of the Azores as a getaway destination for the empowered, some of its original green had been imperfectly restored with the help of holography, and synthetic plants. The resort portions of the island therefore evoked a sense of artificial, tepid, but somewhat satisfying beauty; like a well trimmed golf course. Pico was the heart of the tourism industry for the archipelago, and as such the port of Madalena was a shining example of a small, modern, wealthy seaside city. The rest of the islands were home to the year-round general populace, and dipped much closer to the poverty line. In some places, rumor was that the islanders didn't make enough for a full family to subsist; getting by largely on the aid of the Earthgov. The expansive canopy of the VTOL afforded Puller a good view of the city as the craft passed over the port-proper on its way to the capitol building. The capitol had once been split between several cities on differing isles, but Earthgov had opted for consolidation as a means to efficiency. As if tracking with his thoughts by clairvoyance, Lana snorted, "Politics always follows the money eh?" Puller shifted uncomfortably; the flight had been just long enough for his body to begin to tire of the restrictive seat, and yearn for action, "I doubt anyone down there; big money, little guy, or politician, is gonna be happy that we're here." Firebrand exhaled in agreement and fixed her eyes on her instruments. She knew that *she* wouldn't react well to someone telling her she had to abandon her home, possessions, and roots, without chance of ever seeing them again. Between glances at her panel, and keeping her eyes on her landing vector, she noted that the roads leading to the port were a jammed morasse of cars, trucks, vans, and people on foot. Obviously the evac order had already come in, at least to the major municipalities. Puller took note of the massive logjam of humanity as well, and reflected that the main problems were going to be twofold; first the sheer logistical issue of moving so many people, and second the fact that many of the lower income natives were going to strongly resist a forced evacuation. As the VTOL swept in over the long, plasticy green, artificial grass strip before the capitol dome, Firebrand interrupted her CO's thoughts, "Hey, spot me on that side would ya? I'd hate to come down crooked on something." Puller dutifully gazed out his side of the vehicle, and gave a thumbs up, "You've got a good twenty feet between us and the nearest obstacle." With a curt nod, Firebrand gracefully flared the VTOL, and brought it down on the synthetic grass so smoothly that Puller had to double check to be sure they were down. His pilot reached out and began flicking the engine cutoff switches with a grin, "The captain has turned off the fasten seatbelt sign, it is now safe to move about the disaster area." Puller shot her a glance, raising his eyebrow. She shrugged, "Relatively speaking."