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QBLH
by
Lazarus Cain
Episode 17
Something's Cooking in Chicago, or Was That Manhattan?
Qblh ignored the bickering. Idiot would be at full potential tomorrow, and he could return to Artemis with the Box fully charged. He reminded Idiot to steer by Cygnus to re-aquire the material that John needed.
A mass of journalists and media mobiles had the Fermilab surrounded. Word had seeped out that the aliens were going to perform some form of power experiment. The air was alive with speculation as to what was happening. News about anti-matter had leaked out, and as a result a small amount of "scare groups" congregated. Some Ivy League scientists calmed the scare with their optimism concerning the upcoming revelation of new energy technology previously undreamed of. Another news story reported that the aliens were creating some new exotic fuel which was to be used for interplanetary travel. Many ears perked up at the thought of such a possibility. Yet the fuel was to actually be used for time travel.
"Time travel fuel! Can you imagine that?" was the comment of an NBC broadcaster.
"With these beings, who knows what is possible?" came the answer from the co- anchor.
"The legendary yacht, the Flying Dutchman is reported to be moored off Chicago. We are warded off in our attempts to approach the yacht." A local reporter commented. "Something very big is expected to happen at the Fermilab in a very short while. Both of the Amazon ambassadors are together with a small group of unidentified executives. The Pentagon seems to also have a great deal of interest in this experiment."
"Undoubtedly they must see some form of potential for this thing as being a powerful weapon."
The truth was that the military was not involved. Jim and John wore their military apparel so as to retain their disguise. Antiope's friends had no idea who Jim and John actually were. As far as Earth was concerned Antiope was the mastermind behind this project. General Armstrong knew otherwise as did others, but as of yet, there was no evidence that Jim was on Earth.
Antiope Industries had so far bought a major interest in General Electric's Hughes Division, Boeing-Douglas, Lockheed-Martin, IBM, Intel and Microsoft to name but a few. She had just now invested heavily in electrical power industry. She had even gone so far as to intimidate some of her oil suppliers to keep the oil flowing freely, promising withholding of vital support to those who would not cooperate.
Yet Antiope was simply the custodian to Qblh's wealth, because Jim made the major decisions as to what technology would be developed. Helen took no interest in the experiment. Genie was just recharging its batteries as far as she was concerned.
Flying over the traffic and the crowds, the helicopter landed in front of the main entrance. Saying nothing John escorted Jim into the building quietly as Antiope and Helen attracted all the attention.
Not wishing to be observed Qblh activated Idiot and the Merkabbah. "Idiot you know your way from here, conform your self into the form most suitable for reception of all local gravitational disturbances and associated energy emissions within a radius of one mile. Situate yourself at the far end of that field to receive the energy. I believe you know the coordinates, Idiot."
"Yes, Jim. I am quite prepared and all systems have been verified as 'go'."
"Good. Then let's proceed. We have a lot of work to do. Stand by to a absorb. I want to watch the fireworks with the ladies. "
John had directed the shift manager to bring the unit up to full power prior to his arrival. His own merkabah unit melded in with the shape of the accelerator. He provided the spectators with a special instrumentation display which provided many details concerning the energy field as it was observed. The frequency of the beam would shift as he would accelerate the anti-proton production rate. The receiver unit would reflect the proton portion of the wave and absorb the anti-matter creating a vortex which would serve to amplify the beam and permit an exponential runaway of high current, in the form of anti-protons.
In disbelief the spectators observed a natural phenomena occurring in the laboratory whereby a vortex into the receiving unit was sworn by some to be an artificially created black hole.
John had focused the anti-proton beam and Idiot had aligned the Box's transponders so as to resonantly absorb all incident power. All light energy was absorbed by Jim's box in full view of the spectators.
The voltage required to accelerate the proton beyond the event horizon was on the order of a few hundred billion volts. No one had any idea as to how all the power was being generated. They were too dumbfounded by the spectacle to ask.
John concentrated on the production while Jim flirted with Antiope. "I imagine they will try somehow to imitate this beam. Not any time soon, I guarantee you that."
Antiope responded. "I should think not. It almost looked like you were making a portal or a black hole."
"Genie is creating a vortex capable of absorbing the anti-matter energy and is containing it within one of the Box's submanifolds."
"Of which there is an infinite number."
The distance that the beam spanned was arbitrary. Jim and John could have just as easily selected another distance. The distance was simply a result of finding a convenient location for the sender and receiver. The Earth scientists soon noticed that the beam ceased to emit light and started to absorb light as it began to acquire a black almost shiny texture. They were amazed at the sheer power of the beam. Using the Fermi accelerator, John stepped up the energy insertion process somewhat by high frequency coupling his dimensional unit with the beam. Idiot's receiver would reflect the undesired energy back to the source. John's unit would reflect the beam again, but adding additional hf energy in the process. In effect, a sort of standing wave pattern was being created and harmonically bound within the beam space.
Observers were bewildered as to how Antiope Industries had managed to develop the transceivers, but most of the observing physicists seemed to have a good handle on understanding their observations. The beam's energy density accelerated exponentially. Jim told Helen that Idiot was establishing a Poynting Vector with a magnetic spin. It was more than just a laser or a particle beam.
"This is what we look like when we time travel." He told her.
Eventually the power of the beam was great enough to create proton antiproton pairs. Idiot's receivers were tuned to absorb the antiproton energy for its on board fusion reactors and antigravity systems.
Just to be humorous, Jim had Idiot convert the twenty-two pounds of proton energy into gold. The corresponding ten kilograms of absorbed antiproton energy was stowed by Idiot for internal use. Once the required amount of energy had been received, John's controller was signaled to commence a power down sequence.