The Second Ship Read online

  Exiting through the kitchen door, the same one he had entered two hours earlier, Abdul moved into the backyard, then down onto the steep canyon slope that dropped off directly behind the house. His car was parked over a mile away, in the parking lot of an all-night grocery store, and he would not chance walking along streets to get back to it. It was full of gas for his run to the border, but that run would have to wait until he had returned to his hotel and sent the message.

  A small sound brought Abdul to a sudden stop. It was impossible to move on the steep, shale-covered slope without making some noise, but the noise he had heard had not come from him. The light from the quarter moon created more shadows than illumination, but to Abdul's trained eyes it might as well have been daylight. In the shadows on the slope ahead, another shadow awaited him. In the shadow's hand, moonlight glinted from the blade of a knife.

  Abdul glanced up the hill. He was much too near to the houses to risk the sound and attention a gunshot would produce, unless he absolutely had to. Apparently the shadow's thoughts were similar.

  Aware he had been spotted, Abdul's adversary stepped out from his hiding place, moving at a steady walk toward Abdul. American Special Operations Forces agents, whether they were Army Rangers, Green Berets, SEALs, or Marine Recon, had a unique look and smell about them. Then there was Delta Force; most of the group had served in multiple types of special operations roles—cross-dressers, as Abdul thought of them.

  Over his years of encounters with them, throughout the Middle East and Africa, Abdul had developed the ability to immediately spot which breed of the beast he was dealing with. Lean bodies, hungry eyes, the stink of reckless self-confidence, tattoos over large portions of the younger ones’ bodies.

  They came home from their wars around the world, quickly became bored with civilian life, and went back to what they knew best, becoming mercenaries or, as they preferred to be called, security consultants.

  This one had the ex-Delta stench about him. That was good. It meant there would be no backup coming.

  The two men lunged at each other simultaneously. Abdul spun aside from the underhand thrust of the merc, his own curved knife barely missing his opponent's throat. Abdul reversed the arc of the blade, sweeping in low, a move that was blocked with a left forearm.

  The merc was good, no doubt about that, but not nearly good enough. Abdul drove his body forward so the other man’s knife grazed his side but missed vital organs. With a rapid twisting motion of his wrist, Abdul dislodged his knife from the merc’s block, bringing it up flat, the tip sliding smoothly in through the man’s solar plexus.

  Immediately, the merc grabbed Abdul’s knife hand in a grip of iron strength, but it was too late. The entire length of the blade had penetrated the man’s chest and lung. Still, Abdul had to marvel at his strength of will. Ever so slowly, the merc forced the blade from his body as his other hand pressed forward, locked in Abdul's grip.

  As the knife jerked free of the merc’s chest, a small stream of arterial blood spurted into Abdul's face. There was no second spurt of blood. Abdul should be drenched in the slick, warm wetness of the merc’s blood, but he wasn’t. Instead, a slow, knowing grin spread across his opponent's face as the fellow's grip continued to strengthen, driving the merc’s knife closer and closer to Abdul's throat.

  Apart from a great sense of sorrow, as the knife smoothly parted the skin of his neck, Abdul had only one more thought: “Now that is the correct amount of blood.”

  21

  The national news media was rife with speculation about the sensational quadruple murder in Los Alamos. Fingerprints found in the house had quickly been identified as belonging to the international terrorist known as Abdul Aziz, and although a stolen car with the same prints was discovered nearby, no trace of Aziz himself had yet been found, despite a wide net of roadblocks and FBI raids.

  Since the murdered man was one of the inner circle of physicists reputed to be working with Dr. Stephenson on the Rho Ship, a host of theories were being generated about what information might have been forced out of him before he died. Dr. Stephenson made the rounds of several Sunday-morning talk shows in an attempt to provide reassurance that nothing of great national significance could have been revealed. Project information was far too compartmentalized for that. No single person on the project had unfettered access to all the information.

  “Except for you,” a reporter had pointed out.

  Dr. Stephenson had merely smiled that cold, thin smile of his and moved on to the next question.

  Amidst congressional outcries, government security for the lab and its personnel was increased yet again, with special security contingents now being assigned to protect top figures on the Rho Project in much the same way that the secret service provided security for the president and his family.

  In the midst of all of this excitement, Heather and Jennifer had finally gotten Mark’s interest focused back on something other than basketball, although that game remained at the top of his priority list.

  Over a year ago, Heather had read an article on quantum twins. Quantum theory predicted and experimentation had shown it possible to produce a pair of particles that shared the same quantum state. If something was done to one of the particles that changed its state, the state of the other particle changed at exactly the same time.

  This was true no matter how much distance separated the pair, something that at first glance appeared to violate the special theory of relativity's prohibition on any information traveling faster than the speed of light. But the twin particles were bound together as if by magic.

  The alien equations suggested a way to create a pair of semiconductor switches, each doped with a quantum twin that controlled the open and closed state of the switch. Apply a current that closed one, and its twin would close, no matter if it was located across the room or across the galaxy.

  As Heather finished explaining the workings of the quantum twin microswitches, Mark’s eyes lit up.

  “The switches communicate with no transmissions?”

  Heather nodded. “None whatsoever.”

  “That means we could send untraceable communications,” Mark said.

  Jennifer leaned forward. “More than that. We could send and receive any kind of digital data—video, audio, computer data, anything.”

  “And,” said Heather, “if we put one of the twins in a device, all we have to do is hook up the other twin the same way and we get a clean remote copy.”

  Mark rose to his feet. “We’re going to need some decent electronic tools to build them.”

  “I think we should ask Dad,” said Jennifer. “You know how he’s always trying to get us interested in the stuff he does.”

  “That’s a great idea,” Mark responded.

  “And I’ll see if my dad will chip in a little cash too,” said Heather.

  Convincing their fathers to outfit them with a set of good electronic instruments turned out to be the easiest part of the task. Both dads were ecstatic that their kids had finally gotten interested in electronics projects. They even scrounged up a used oscilloscope and red laser, the types commonly found in college labs.

  All that week, working around homework sessions and basketball practice, the smell of solder hung heavy in their workshop, which was set up in a corner of the Smythe garage. By Thursday night, the laser modifications were complete, and while it would never burn a hole through metal, the end product was a laser capable of producing variable frequency light in a very tight beam, something that was crucial for the doping process that made the alien microswitches work.

  Given time, Heather felt confident they could eventually improve the process to the point where mass production would be possible. For now, though, they just needed a single working quantum twin microswitch pair.

  Exhausted but happy, Heather said good-bye to her two friends and made her way back to her house. It was funny. There were boatloads of news media reports and, no doubt, scads of foreign agents scurrying around the ar
ea, trying to dig up something on the Rho Ship. But here, right under their noses, was a small lab getting ready to produce its own alien technology components. And the whole thing was being done by some high school kids out of a garage in White Rock.

  Heather’s dad greeted her as she entered the kitchen.

  “You look happy. What are you smiling about?”

  “Oh, nothing, Dad. Just high school stuff. You know.”

  Giving her a hug, he nodded. “I can only imagine. It’s getting late, though, and you do have school tomorrow. Not to mention, we’re all going to Mark’s first game tomorrow night. I hear he’s pretty good.”

  “He'll have to be for good old LAHS to have any chance. Last year was embarrassing. I felt sorry for our cheerleaders.”

  Her father grinned. “We can always hope.”

  “Where's Mom?”

  “Oh, she’s taking a bath before bed. I’m headed up to join her.”

  “Okay, Dad. That sounds really good, think I’ll try it myself.”

  By the time Heather finished her bath and tucked herself under her covers, her eyelids were so heavy she could barely keep them open. The dreams began almost before her head hit the pillow.

  She was in their workshop in the corner of the Smythe garage. Mark was there. So was Jennifer.

  Heather found herself staring at the oscilloscope readout, the display filling her head with equations as Mark manipulated the laser. His fingers moved the controls, delicately positioning the beam with a dexterity that he alone could manage, using the microscope to confirm his pointing accuracy.

  Suddenly the images in Heather’s head changed, the equations governing the quantum manipulation decaying toward a singularity.

  The laser was not generating the quantum twins. Instead a microscopic black hole appeared, a tear in the space-time fabric of the material being manipulated.

  Spotting the danger, Mark’s hand moved with unnatural speed to turn off the power switch on the back of the laser, but the subatomic blackness continued to grow. And as it grew, it consumed the nearest atoms. In an accelerating spiral, the event horizon expanded until the garage itself shrieked with the force emanating from the microscopic aberration.

  As Heather looked up to see the horror in Jennifer’s and Mark’s faces, she realized the truth. The end of all things lay there, growing beneath that microscope, and there was absolutely nothing they could do to stop it.

  22

  High atop Pajarito Plateau, the noise inside the Los Alamos High School gymnasium was deafening. Word had spread throughout the community of the Hilltoppers’ new junior point guard, so the game was standing room only. And Marcus Aurelius Smythe had not disappointed.

  The game against the high school’s 4A Division II rival, Taos, was enough to ensure a capacity crowd on the first game of the season, but never had the gymnasium seen a crowd like this one. The fire marshal had to start denying entrance to a horde of latecomers. Luckily for the home team, most of the late arrivals were from Taos, so there were few tears shed by local residents. Outside, though, police had their hands full with angry Taos High alumni and fans.

  Those inside were being treated to a basketball handling magic show the like of which northern New Mexico had never seen. The young point guard wove his way between his opponents, spinning, whirling, and dribbling between his legs and behind his back in a manner that left the opposing players stumbling over themselves, often falling to the floor in a confused tangle. Mark seldom took a shot himself, preferring to dish off the ball to teammates, who responded with a scoring bonanza.

  By the time the starters were pulled from the game, midway through the fourth quarter, Mark had amassed twenty assists and had scored thirty-two points, many of these on free throws as the other team had resorted to fouling him to try to get the ball from his hands. Throughout the stands people reverently whispered the names of Hall of Fame point guards, as if their spirits inhabited the building.

  The game ended with the Los Alamos Hilltoppers doling out a devastating loss to Taos, 113 to 72. As the buzzer sounded, the crowd rushed out of the stands down onto the court, everyone in a frenzy to pat the back of the young star. The resulting confusion made it impossible for the teams to make their way from the court back to their locker rooms and resulted in injury to two elderly women who were knocked to the ground in the crush.

  Only after the police inside the gymnasium were reinforced by those who had been stationed on the outside was order restored and the crowd escorted out of the arena. In the cold air of the late November night, Jennifer stood beside Heather staring back toward the gym.

  “Oh my God. He’s done it. My crazy brother has done it. We’re as good as dead.”

  Heather laughed, threading her arm through Jennifer’s as they waited for their families to join them. “Well, he’s certainly done something here tonight, but I doubt he’s killed us.”

  “You watch. His fans are going to swamp us. We’ll probably have the press hanging around too. I don’t even want to think about what else might happen.”

  Heather shrugged. One thing she had to admire about Mark Smythe: he never did anything halfway. He wanted to make his mark on high school, and he appeared to be well on his way to accomplishing that.

  “Oh well. No use worrying about something that hasn't happened yet. We’ll just deal with it as it comes.”

  By Sunday, the buzz about the hot young guard from Los Alamos had reached a new level, due to the team's domination of their second opponent in two nights, thanks to Mark’s outstanding play. As Jennifer predicted, a band of interested onlookers and newfound friends suddenly attached themselves to Mark, making it difficult for him to get any time to himself.

  Heather tried calling several times but could not get through on the phone line. Finally she walked next door to find Jennifer with her nose buried in a book while Mark was closeted in his room doing homework.

  Jennifer smiled at Heather, although the smile appeared somewhat forced. “Sometimes I hate being so right.”

  Heather sat down on the couch beside her. “I’ve been calling you for thirty minutes.”

  Jennifer pointed to the phone line that lay curled up uselessly on the floor, the plug a foot away from its wall jack. “We had to unplug it to get some peace. Everyone in town wants to talk to Mark, and quite a few people from out of town. We even had kids we don’t know dropping by to see if he could hang out. If this keeps up, I’m going to move in with you.”

  “We’ll just have to hope the novelty wears off soon.”

  About that time, Mark walked into the room wearing his charcoal gray sweat suit and tennis shoes. He looked exhausted.

  “What’s the matter?” Heather asked. “You look awful.”

  “Thanks. Good to see you too, Heather. Actually I didn’t get much sleep last night. The team bus had a flat on the way back from Espanola. It was three a.m. when I got in. Then some assholes started calling me at seven o’clock this morning.” A scowl spread across his features as he glanced toward Jennifer. “And you know who kept walking in and handing me the phone.”

  This time Jennifer’s smile was real. “If you want to be the big superstar, you have to pay the price. Besides, I’m not your personal answering service.”

  “And I’ve got this big honors Spanish paper due tomorrow, which I only started today. So, yes. You might say I’m a bit worn out.”

  “I’m sorry about that,” said Heather. “I want to raz you too, but you look so pathetic. I can’t do it.”

  “That’s okay. Doc’s been making up for it. I keep expecting to look up and see ‘I told you so’ tattooed on her forehead.”

  Jennifer inclined her head. “Imagine when the student body sees their new basketball hero in the hallway tomorrow. Thank God we don’t go to school on a cruise ship. The thing would roll over when everyone rushed to your side of the boat.”

  The image of the school tilting up on one end and going down like the Titanic while Mark yelled, “I’m king of the w
orld!” started Heather laughing so hard that tears began rolling down her cheeks.

  The twins stared at her until the chortling contagion spread, first to Mark, then to Jennifer, leaving them all gasping for breath and clutching at their sides. Just when it seemed that they had gotten their mirth under control, one of the three would give out a snort and the whole thing would start up again.

  Mr. Smythe walked into the living room, took a long look at the three of them laughing uncontrollably on the couch, then shook his head and walked back into the kitchen. Understanding high school students was a task that required mental energies well beyond what he was prepared to expend on a Sunday afternoon.

  23

  Happy as Heather had been to see the snow arrive, she was even happier with the sudden warming that melted it away. Fresh snow was fun and could sometimes get you an extra day off. Old snow made you feel as gray and dirty as it was. Luckily, New Mexico's state symbol wasn’t the sun for nothing.

  Work in the Smythe garage continued unabated, although most often now it was just her and Jennifer. She was thrilled with the progress they had made on the project.

  First, they had successfully produced an acceptable pair of quantum twin microswitches, something that would have certainly been worthy of a Nobel Prize, if they were at liberty to reveal what they had accomplished.

  They had used these in two circuit boards, which converted the signals back and forth between analog and digital. They then added a programmable interface that allowed them to send or receive signals on either end, amplifying the output so that it could be routed through a computer system.

  Next they repaired and modified their damaged model airplane, adding a larger fuel tank and a set of solar panels on the tops of the wings and fuselage. Incorporating components from a handheld PDA computer allowed them to program a flight route and provided for control of the onboard camera and microphone.

  Lastly they added one of the quantum twin circuits to the receiver-transmitter on the aircraft. The plane could still receive control signals from the ground in the traditional radio way. But it could also be switched to receive commands through the quantum twins—or QTs, as they had started calling them. It could even send video and audio output through the QT circuitry.