Quantum Visions 6 Page 2
I said, “We’ll converge on it when I say NOW.” They all nodded.
As the cook advanced the barrel, Emily circled a ways behind the thing. She held the sheet by one edge and lowered the other edge to the floor.
As I moved the pan toward it, it went into the twist and I yelled “NOW!” It knocked the pan out of my hand and made another twist as Emily rammed in. It sprang off the sheet into the barrel and the kid capped it. We slowly righted the barrel and it vibrated for a moment, stopped, vibrated again, went silent.
I turned to the cook and asked, “How’d it get in the salad bowl?”
The kid said, “It might have been in there when I brought it out from the walk-in,” then turned to Emily, “I’m Lawrence, by the way.”
That got us all to introduce ourselves. The cook was Bernie, and he suggested we check the walk-in while he stayed with the thing.
As we approached the walk-in Lawrence said, “I made the salad yesterday for lunch.” He turned to Emily, “It was hardly touched, so I saved it for this morning.”
“Lawrence,” I said, “wouldn’t you have noticed it?”
“Morning set-up is a mad rush,” he said, “It could have been at the bottom. I don’t think it weighs much.”
He pulled the door handle and I felt the chill.
“The middle rack on the right,” he said, pointing to a space on a wire rack, “is where the salad bowl was.”
On the rack above it were two white boxes, almost perfect cubes about six inches tall, and the corner of one was torn open.
I pointed, saying, “The handiwork of our little friend, maybe? It could fit if it curls like a sow bug.”
Lawrence muttered something.
“What?” I asked.
“I put those there yesterday,” he said, “They belong to Dr. Strasshower.”
“These are Dean Strasshower’s?” Emily asked. “What are they doing here? What’s in them?”
“I don’t know. They’re only here for today,” he said. “The regents are having his lab inspected. Something about getting more grant money. He asked if I would keep them here.”
Emily’s face tightened. “You put the professor’s biohazard in the cafeteria’s refrigerator?”
He tuned to me, “Biology is a prerequisite I need to score high on.”
Emily said, “We need to get Strasshower over here. When is the inspection?”
“Early this morning. It might be over by now.”
Without a word she headed out the back door.
#
While she was gone we carried the trash barrel next to the walk-in and Bernie had Lawrence get a mop and broom. Inside the torn box I saw a quart size plastic bag with water dripping from a tear. The other box looked fine, so I left it alone.
Soon I heard Strasshower uttering something with Emily prodding him from behind. He was in slacks and a sport coat, and his gray eyebrows beat down as his goatee yammered, “Let me see how it’s doing.”
I lifted the lid and the thing did its twist.
“Oh my, it has grown some in just a day.” He turned to Emily, “That twirl is how it swims. It’s amphibious.” He turned to me and asked, “What about the other box?”
“It’s still sealed.”
He nodded. “We must get them back to their habitat.” Motioning to the walk-in, he said, “I thought it would be cold enough to keep them inactive. We’ll need some ice.”
We got some ice from Lawrence, and as we left Bernie said, “I told them it was a turtle. Somebody’s practical joke.” We thanked him and went out the back, Emily and I with the barrel and Strasshower the other box. His lab is in the Life Sciences building next to ours. We took the elevator to the second floor and he stepped a ways down the hall, fumbled for his keys, and we entered his large laboratory classroom.
“This way,” he said, and we passed the benches to a corner with different sized aquarium tanks. I could hear the bubbling filters and aerators. Tiny water falls flowed over little mock beaches of rocks and plants. He stopped at the largest tank, which was about ten feet across and five feet high, sitting on a low stand. One quarter of it formed the beach.
“The water is kept near freezing,” Strasshower said. “I have fish food, algae tablets and bits of dried shrimp mixed in the silt.” He opened the box. “Let’s see how you’re doing.”
The bag bulged with water. I saw a little version of our friend in the barrel. It twirled and he cooed at it, “Aw, there, there.”
He stood on a stool and sat the bag in the water.
I said, “He’s just a little guy.”
Strasshower glared at me. “That has got me concerned. I thought they were both fairly big even at this size.” He turned, wagging a finger at the barrel. “But this is something else. You see, they were the same size yesterday.”
It had tripled in size. I thought of it doing that each day. “It will be The Monster That Ate Cleveland by the end of the month,” I said.
“Oh, this is some growth spurt caused by the warmer temperature.” He turned to Emily. “You said it was eating lettuce, a diet unknown to it. That must have raised its metabolism somehow. Well, we’d better put it in.”
We lifted the barrel and the thing splashed into the tank. It immediately twirled and circled the bag that contained its friend.
Strasshower stood on his stool with his hand to his chin.
I said, “You might as well let the other one loose,”
He shrugged with a nod, and with a pocket knife slit the bag and dumped it in. They twirled around each other and settled to the bottom, their clusters of eyes swaying.
“Good, they’re getting along,” Strasshower said, “and at this greater size she’s quite beautiful.”
Emily smiled and said, “It’s the girl. What are they? They look familiar, but I can’t come up with anything.”
“Opabania regalis,” he said proudly, “from the Burgess Shale.”
“The Burgess Shale,” she said. “You mean fossils of the Burgess Shale?”
He nodded with a grin.
“From Cambrian fossils,” she said, “of half a billion years ago? Fossils are just mineral replacement. There’s no tissue. How can you genetically engineer from that?”
“By working with the descendants,” he said. “This is why I didn’t want them here during the inspection. If the regents had any idea of what I’ve discovered, the whole thing would be moved to a more prestigious college and I’d lose control. I need a little more time for more examples when I publish.”
“OK,” Emily said, “what did you discover?”
“Well, the segmented body and lobes of the Opabania fossils classed it as an arthropod, and it is now understood to be the ancestor of tardigrades, the eight legged micro-animal that is found in many parts of world, living in temperatures ranging from boiling to hundreds of degrees below zero.” He turned to me with a smile, “That little creature can survive after near complete dehydration, lay dormant for years, and when rehydrated, return to eating and reproducing.”
“Right,” I said, “a kind of undying monster. And you’ve accidently made one that triples in size every day.”
“Oh,” he waved me off, “that has to be a fluke. We’ll know in a day or two.”
“So,” Emily said, still looking at the tank, “you tampered with the genes of the tardigrades and inseminated them somehow...”
“On a microscopic scale,” he said.
“... and after some trials ...”
“Yes,” he said.
“... you came to an Opabania...lookalike.” She turned to him, having finished.
“Oh,” he said, “it’s the species, I’m sure.”
“That’s not what I’m getting at,” she said, “Where are the trials?”
“Oh,” he said, his hand going to his forehead, “I completely forgot about them. No harm. This is when I would have retrieved them anyway. Come on.”
He led us down the stairs and out, and turned sharply to the back of the building where some hedges ran along the wall. He got down on his side to look under them. “There they are,” and pulled out a white box exactly like the ones from the walk-in. He handed it to Emily.
“They don’t need the cold temperature,” he said, “so I placed them here this morning.”
Emily replied, “Can’t you use the right word, Professor? You didn’t place them, you hid them.”
“Oh, please,” he said. “Open it.”
She opened the box and pulled out a bag half full of wet soil. The motion caused the creature to surface and we saw an eight-legged thing about two inches long. It circled once and dug down again.
Strasshower smiled. “They’re later in the evolution. I went back from them.”
He reached under the hedge. “Hmm.” He pulled out the box and opened it hurriedly.
“Oh no,” he said. He pulled out a muddy plastic bag with a hole in it, turned the box over, and there was a shredded hole.
Emily turned to me. “Déjà vu?”
Strasshower got down and started searching under the hedge. “We must find it. It will burrow into the soil.”
He got out his pocket knife, and groaned and twisted under the hedge, plowing a little furrow. He got to his knees panting. “It’s gone deep right here.”
The grass easement merged with the athletic field.
“How fast can he dig?” Emily asked.
“Very fast, obviously,” Strasshower breathed, and added, “It’s ‘she’, by the way.”
“A female, probably ready to be a single mom?” she asked.
He shrugged.
She handed him the other bag, “I rea
lly need to get to my classroom. I hope all the best for your little digger.” She waved at us and strode off.
Strasshower looked up at me and, and for the first time that I can remember, was at a complete loss of words.
The End
1
After 30 all-star games, the van transporting 11 boys from Batavia, Illinois is stuck in the mud on the way to Williamsport. They are on a small side road leading from the motel back to the highway.
Coach Terry gets out in the pouring rain to inspect the situation.
“Ok, everybody out of the van,” he leans in the door to tell the boys.
“But it’s raining,” complains Scott.
“We’ll get wet,” adds Mike.
“Everybody out,” says Coach Jim, Robby’s father. “We’ve got to make the van lighter.”
Grumbling and still sleepy in the barely dawn hour, the boys grab their jackets and get out onto the muddy road, amidst the thunder and lightning.
But the van is still too heavy.
Coach Rick gets out and has his son Robby get behind the wheel. Both coaches and most of the larger boys start to push the van when a brilliant flash of lightning strikes the van!
At that exact moment, a free Quark Charm particle was created at Fermilab and shot out at near the speed of light colliding with the electricity from the lighting bolt causing a rift in the space time continuum.
Before the sound of thunder follows, the van, with Robby inside of it, disappears!
2
Robby looks around at the suddenly sunny morning. The rain and bad weather are gone. He looks behind him and the guys are gone, his dad is gone, everybody is gone! Robby opens the door, and hops out of the driver’s seat. Walking around the van twice, he realizes that something happened.
Looking down he sees that the road is no longer there. The van is now in the middle of a field.
Remembering his Morse code from one of his earliest merit badges, Robby honks short, short, short, long, long, long, short, short, short, the international distress signal. He honks it several more times before he decides to conserve the batteries of the van.
He looks around. The big hill the motel was on is still there, but there is no longer a motel.
Getting out of the van, Robby hollers, “Heeelloooo!”
As he listens to only his echo, he realizes that he is alone.
He’s not lost, he’s right with the van; it’s the other guys that are lost. Knowing that he must stay near the van, knowing that the worst thing he can do is to leave it, he decides to explore the immediate area around the van.
He gets back into the van and grabs his backpack. He snags a couple of waters from the ice chest and just for safety brings one of the aluminum bats with him.
He decides to hike up the hill to where the motel was to get a look around.
3
“Grrrrrrr,” a snarling wolf suddenly comes from behind a clump of bushes.
Robby brings his bat up to defend himself if necessary. He knows that a dog would be unlikely to attack, but had no idea about a wolf.
“Go away!” he shouts at the skinny, hungry creature, swinging the bat to possibly scare it away. “Go away!”
The wolf falls down, a spear suddenly sticking out of its side.
Robby stands there, watching the dying twitches of the wolf when he sees a boy slowly creeping up to reclaim his spear.
“Who are you?” Robby timidly asks.
The boy, keeping a wary eye on Robby, puts his foot on the wolf and yanks out his spear.
“Hello,” Robby says again, watching the boy hold his spear up like he’s going to throw it. Robby realizes that with his baseball bat, he might be perceived as a threat. He gently puts his bat down and takes off his backpack.
“I’m friendly, see,” he says holding up his empty hands. “Thanks for saving my life. I’m Robby,” he says pointing to himself. “Robby,” he repeats. Who are you?”
“Ke’nbesIt nzet,” says the boy, lowering the spear.
Robby looks over his savior and sees a boy that is a few inches smaller, a lot skinnier, but with much more defined muscles, darker skin, and almost naked. He has several pouches tied on various strings hanging around his waist, and one larger pouch over his shoulder.
“Do you want a cookie? Or something to drink?” Robby says trying to make friends with someone who spoke a different language.
He opens a package of Oreos and offers one. “These are cookies,” Robby says eating one himself. Fleet Feet carefully reaches out and takes a cookie. He sniffs it carefully and takes a small bit. He takes a bigger bite and gives his first smile to Robby.
“See, they’re good,” Robby says opening a water bottle. He takes a sip and then offers it to Fleet Feet.
The Indian boy grasps the water bottle and studies it carefully. He sniffs the container, as well as the water, before taking a sip. He hands it back to Robby and pulls the pouch off his shoulder. He unfolds the top and takes a small sip of his own water before holding it out to Robby.
Closing up his bottle, Robby takes the gourd and carefully sips.
“Water,” says Robby, pointing to both containers.
“Mbish,” says Fleet Feet in his own language.
Peace and water sharing having been established, Fleet Feet pulls a knife from one of his hanging pouches. He sits down and starts to clean the wolf. Although it does not have too much meat, he does not want the kill to go to waste. Although a little grossed out, Robby watches the process.
“So do you know where we are?” Robby asks. “I mean I think I know where we are, but when are we? I mean when is this year? What year?”
Fleet Feet listens but does not understand.
“
Robby shares more cookies with his new friend as the meat cooks. They each share their water with each other, alternating sips and containers.
Sitting in the dark, watching the sparks leap from the fire, Robby is reminded of something his dad explained to him about tiny particles called quarks. When the particle accelerator at Fermilab where his father worked blasted the particles together it created tiny, virtually invisible sub atomic particles, that only remained stable for a short time. They were always trying to increase the speed of the collision to discover smaller and smaller particles. The drawings of the collisions, reminded Robby of the sparks from the fire. Robby began to get homesick and miss his mother and father.
After eating, Robby indicates for Fleet Feet to follow him back to the van. Robby gets in the van to get a couple of gloves and a ball. He then shows Fleet Feet how to wear the glove and proceeds to explain and mostly demonstrate how to play catch.
Fleet Feet is a fast learner and can soon throw the ball far harder and more accurately than Robby.
Robby wishes that the boy was on their team. Then gets homesick wishing he wasn’t separated from them.
During one of their breaks, Robby gets some candy out of his friend Scott’s backpack and shares it with Fleet Feet. They share water again as the day turns to night.
Fleet Feet prepares another fire near the van, as Robby gathers big branches to turn it into a bonfire.
Clouds begin to form and a slight drizzle starts. The drizzle quickly turns into a full on downpour while thunder and lightning fill the sky with light and sound.
Fleet Feet refuses to follow Robby into the van, and makes his own bed underneath. Robby starts the car and gives the SOS honk as lightning once again strikes the van. The free Quark Charm finally resolves into nothingness and lurches space-time back onto its regular path.
4
The van starts moving, the boys cheer as Robby realizes he is back to his own time.
Since the van returns to the exact instant it left, no one except Robby experiences anything unusual.
In fact, Robby begins to doubt what happened until a few hours later when Scott complains that someone stole his candy.