The Way of the Dhin by John L. Clemmer

Author:John L. Clemmer [Clemmer, John L.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: John L. Clemmer
Published: 2016-05-08T23:00:00+00:00

Vandenberg

Ethan leaned back in one of the Herman Miller chairs that populated the workroom. Electronic whiteboards covered two walls, with two electronic flip boards as backups once the walls were too full of notes, equations, diagrams, and whatever other content the teams might cover them with during a workday. One of the remaining walls held a high-resolution projection screen, which had views in each quadrant, comprising the interior of the capsule, the view through the viewport, with a view of the engineering lab and the control room completing the real-time feeds. He stared at the ceiling, one of the few uncluttered spaces in the room, in order to clear his mind.

No matter how exciting Jake’s adventures are, I have to remain focused on my goals here—to reverse engineer the Dhin engine and manage the prototyping project. Watching him moment-by-moment doesn’t improve my chances of bringing that to fruition. Well, no matter what else we do or don’t accomplish, Alice has the communications team working on the faster-than-light solution. So we have one win soon. Certainly not the biggest win, but nothing to dismiss out of hand. And it shows that it’s possible for us to reverse engineer the tech. Finally.

He sat upright and pulled up the status reports from the particle physicists at CERN II. From the little he’d known about the nature of subatomic particles, he’d learned a lot more since being here. The team explained to him that “if he thought he understood quantum mechanics that meant that he didn’t understand it.” Paraphrasing, Richard Feynman had said that, and if anyone should have understood quantum mechanics, it ought to have been him.

The latest real-time summary reports did show something interesting that might eventually be helpful. That indicator lamp that Jake pessimistically worries is a warning light. It does slowly start to change back to its original color, but it goes further in the green direction each time he jumps. But since it moves both ways, it can’t be a ‘low fuel’ warning—can it?

Either the engine has a way to ‘refuel’ or recharge slowly, using zero-point energy or whatever it was Chuck was brainstorming about. Or, it’s just a ‘wait a bit’ warning so something doesn’t overheat. Though the engine doesn’t seem to give off heat. We’re just guessing, still. But it’s knowledge we didn’t have before, and it must mean something. Why else have an indicator at all?

Ethan checked off on a list that he’d reviewed the status report, and then flipped through his pad to the next item in his worklist. Xing had the engine’s ‘energy field’ testing team working with heavy loads and was doing some work with quadrupeds working inside and outside the capsule. Those were new tests though they seemed to confirm much that they already knew or suspected. Even with the capsule packed with the heaviest load they could fit in it with the robots, there was no effect on the capsule’s capabilities or the field’s strength, even with a large radius setting.

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