John Ringo: Into the Looking Glass

He flipped over to another screen and was doodling equations when the door opened and Tchar and the ardass entered.

Bill stood up and half bowed to the ardass, who he now realized was something like the World President. The ardass apparently didn’t notice, simply taking a seat on one side of the table as Tchar settled at the end.

“We have a device,” Tchar said, whistling tonelessly for a moment. Bill suspected it was a throat clearing. “We found it on an abandoned world. It appears to be of an ancient technology. We have, thus far, performed a few experiments with it and been unable to determine its purpose. We know it releases energy, in excess of input, but we are unsure why. Simple energy release does not appear… rational.”

“Energy in excess of input sounds great,” Bill said, frowning. “I can think of any number of reasons you’d want that.”

“Not the way this releases energy,” Tchar said, pulling papers out of a pouch. “These are our experimental findings. We have had them translated into English. It has been recommended that you, personally, be given the device to continue the experiments.”

“Well… thanks,” Bill said, glancing at the ardass and then away. “But if you guys…”

“You have touched the face of God,” the ardass said, quietly. “You are worthy. May your travels be honorable and increasing in knowledge.” He nodded at Bill, then stood up and walked out.

“I would suggest you read the briefing papers carefully,” Tchar said, standing up also.

“How big is this thing?” Bill asked. “Can we get it through the gate? What’s it look like?”

“All of that is covered in the papers,” Tchar said, waving at them. “But you can get it through the gate, easily. You have an expression in your engineering, a ‘little black box,’ yes?”

“Yeah,” Bill said, puzzled.

Tchar reached into another pouch and removed… well it looked like a black deck of cards. Or a card-sized “monolith” from 2001 . He set it carefully on the table and then slid it across to Bill.

“Do not let it be in contact with significant voltage,” Tchar said, whistling again. “That would be… bad.”

Bill picked up the black box and looked at it. As an anomaly it was classic.

“This is it?” he asked, incredulously.

“May your journey of knowledge be more fruitful than mine,” Tchar said, gesturing at the door. “A guard will conduct you back to the gate.”

After reading the briefing papers, carefully, they had chosen to conduct their first test on a deserted world connected to one of the gates. Bill still couldn’t believe his eyes as he looked across the ten-mile-wide crater.

“Yep,” Warrant Officer Miller said, leaning sideways on his four wheeler to spit. “Putting a charge on it sure causes one hell of a bang.”

“A double A,” Bill said, shaking his head. “A friggin’ double A. I hope like hell nobody every really figures out this technology or kids will be making hundred-megaton nukes for sixth-grade science class.”

They rode down the side of the newly formed, and quite warm, crater with Bill keeping a careful eye on the mounted Geiger counter. But there was, effectively, no radiation over background. The explosion had blasted material into space, but with no evidence of a nuclear explosion. The ground wasn’t even glassed.

They finally reached a spot near the center of the crater and started hunting around. It took them nearly an hour but, sure enough, there was the little black box, sitting in the dirt as if it had fallen there, entirely unharmed.

“This is just bizarre,” Bill said, shaking his head and picking up the box. “It’s not even warm.”

“I am,” Miller said. “Let’s get out of here.”

“We’re going to need to find another world to blow up,” Bill replied, starting his four-wheeler.

“Damn,” Miller said as they cleared the gate. They’d waited a few hours for the area to cool off but there was still a tornadic wind blowing dust around. “What did you do this time, Doc?”

“Look at the sky,” Bill said, wonderingly. Clouds were running in every direction as if the entire atmosphere of the planet had been disturbed. As it should have been given the incredible mass of dirt in view. The explosion had apparently dug an even bigger crater and the side of it looked like a small mountain range. “I hope like hell we didn’t dig to the mantle!”

“We’re going to need more people to help hunt for it this time,” Miller said. “Next time, we’re not going to use as much juice.”

“It was a car battery!” Bill snapped. “How was I supposed to believe twelve friggin’ volts would cause this sort of explosion? There is no rational explanation for this!”

“Holy Toledo,” Miller said, wonderingly. He hit the gas jets on his EVA pack and turned around. Sure enough, the gate was floating in space. “Didn’t we just put this thing down on a planet yesterday?”

“That’s not the scary part,” Bill said, spinning around. “Didn’t there used to be a sun?”

“Uh…” Miller said, spinning himself. Sure enough, the nearest star was far, far away. “Did it move?”

“No, I think it went away,” Bill said, turning and looking out towards what he thought was the plain of elliptic. There might have been a faint line of light out in every direction. “The term we’re looking for here is nova. Maybe supernova.”

“That explains the explosion through the gate,” Miller said. “Good thing we fed it through two planets, first. If it had blown back in Arkansas things would have been bad. By the way, how are we going to find a black box in the middle of interstellar space?”

“We know the direction of the box,” Bill said, sighing. “If it runs to form, it’s going to be floating right where we left it, relative to the gate.”

They jetted outward and found the device in less than fifteen minutes. It appeared to have remained stationary when everything else… went away.

“Right,” Bill said, grasping the enigmatic device and pocketing it. “Three phase current is definitely out .”

“Okay, I think I know what it’s doing and why,” Bill said, addressing the Troika with the addition of the national science advisor. “It’s forming a micro black hole.”

“Now, those I know something about,” the President said. “Wouldn’t stuff be sucked into them?”

“With a stable black hole, yes, Mr. President,” Bill replied. “But a micro black hole is unstable. Theoretically, they were only formed during the big bang. And they don’t hold their matter inside, but let it out. What happens, I think, is that the device grabs all the matter in a certain area, based upon input, and uses it to form a black hole. But part of that matter is its power input system. When that goes away, the hole destabilizes and releases all the trapped matter as energy.”

“Causing a very big bang,” the national security advisor said.

“A very big bang,” Bill said, nodding.

“So it’s a bomb,” the secretary of defense said. “A reuseable nuclear hand grenade?”

“Maybe,” Bill said. “Maybe not. I’ve got another idea.”

“Well, don’t leave us guessing, Dr. Weaver,” the national science advisor said, acerbically.

“Well, I got to thinking, sir,” Bill said, musingly. “There was this Star Trek episode where the Romulans were trying to use micro black holes for an improved warp drive…”

“You think it’s a drive system?” the national security advisor said. “Really?”

“Really,” Bill said, grinning. “And I think I can figure out how to apply power to form the black hole off to the side. Using that we can generate a warp field. Theoretically. It makes more sense than a reuseable bomb.”