At the Outpost of Fate

CHAPTER 12 — THE SOURCE

As soon as Dodge deactivated the Float Car, Jocasta felt something moving against her leg. It was the strange metal rod she had stolen from the Empire State Building and which she had kept concealed from her companions for several days now in a hidden pocket in her trousers. The movement was barely perceptible, a faint tickle of static electricity against her skin, a slight tugging as if the rod was being attracted by a strong magnet. In that instant, she understood how Dalton had pulled off the astonishing feat of navigating across the featureless landscape without ever consulting a map, utilizing a compass or trying to get a fix on the Southern Cross.

Evidently Dalton was fond of his secrets, even when there was nothing to gain by protecting them. Getting through his defenses was going to be more of a challenge than she had anticipated. How delightful. I wonder what he'll say when he finds out I've been keeping secrets as well.

Dodge switched off the light, but after only a few moments in darkness, Jocasta realized that there was a faint blue light emanating from the ice.

"We have to go on foot from here," he explained. "There's a chance that some unfriendly folks may have gotten here ahead of us. We're not exactly loaded for bear here, so avoiding detection is going to be critically important."

"And what exactly will we be doing while we're avoiding detection?" Jocasta had to struggle to keep a note of concern in her voice. She couldn't remember when she had last felt so exhilarated, so alive. Probably not since she and Falcon….

"Looking for anything that can give us an advantage against… well, against whoever it is that's trying to get control of this place. The truth is, I don't know what we'll find here. I've only been here once and the circumstances were very different."

"I'm sure my readers would love to know more about those circumstances." It was, she decided, what Amelia Dunham, star reporter of the London Telegraph Herald would do.

"No comment, Miss Dunham."

She mock-pouted in the darkness. Dalton had no sense of humor.

"Were you able to determine the source of the power at work here?" asked Newcombe. "If I could just understand how this technology works, I might be able to develop a defense against it."

"First things, first. We need to find out if we're alone here."

Jocasta knew that the man who had commissioned her to steal the rod had no earthly clue where they'd gone, but like the scientist, she was curious to see what secrets the place held. While money was only an incidental consideration, she had no doubt that the secrets of the Outpost would be the score of a lifetime. Part of her was secretly pleased that Schadel had chosen to break faith; this was turning out to be so much more interesting.

With Dalton in the lead, they moved back into the main tunnel. Jocasta was barely aware of the cold now; it actually seemed warmer in the tunnel than at in any time since they had left Chile. Either she was becoming inured to the chill or the laws of physics were being bent. Newcombe voiced his opinion that something like the latter was the case.

Silhouetted against the faintly glowing blue wall, the scientist stripped off his gloves and placed a hand against the ice. "Astonishing. It's like the ice is actually giving off light and heat without melting."

"When we were here before, it was brighter."

"It seems brighter just since we've arrived. I wonder if it's a cycle or if it's somehow reacting to our presence."

By the time they reached what Dodge had called "the central chamber," pure white light was emanating from the ice and it was warm enough that everyone removed hats and gloves and opened their jackets to avoid overheating. Fuller and Burton both had their guns drawn, but it was plainly evident that they were the only humans in the ice cave.

"Well that's a bit of luck," Jocasta observed.

"So what now?" asked the FBI agent.

"I'll go back and retrieve the Float Car," Dodge announced. "We can establish a base camp here and then begin exploring. I can draw a partial map from memory, but obviously what we're looking for is going to be in unexplored territory."

Fuller turned to Burton. "You should go with him."

The central chamber seemed to be the hub of a wheel, with tunnels radiating out like spokes. After only a moment in the cave, Jocasta discovered that she could not distinguish which path had brought them. Dodge however, had no such difficulty and confidently strode off down one of the nearly identical paths, with the rough pilot in tow.

Newcombe, driven by a scientist's thirst for knowledge, continued studying the composition of the walls. He managed to chip away a few pieces of ice, upon which he performed various experiments — covering them in cupped hands to see if they produced light, warming them to see if they would melt, even tasting them. Jocasta watched him for a while and when she became aware that Fuller was staring at her with the same intensity as the physicist scrutinizing the ice. Something about his gaze was profoundly discomfiting and she moved closer to Newcombe.

"What news, Professor?"

"Oh, I'm not a professor actually. I don't teach—"

"I was joking, Findlay Dear."

"Oh." His eyebrows furrowed, then he cracked an embarrassed smile. "Well, Amelia, darling, I have discovered that this ice is… well, it's just ordinary ice. Whatever is causing it to give off light and heat diminishes as soon as it's separated from the matrix."

"Matrix?"

"You might liken it to the coals in a fire. When they are heaped together, they give off radiant energy and sustain one another. But when you take one away, it rapidly cools and just becomes a chunk of carbon ash. That's an imperfect comparison of course. Whatever's at work here is much more sophisticated. The ice transmits the energy without being significantly affected by it. Probably some kind of variation of the Leidenfrost Effect."

Jocasta sneaked a glance at Fuller who had moved over to join them. He was no longer staring at her, but his presence still made her uncomfortable.

"Leidenfrost Effect?" she asked.

"Yes. It's what happens when you put a drop of water on a hot skillet or when witch doctors walk barefoot over hot coals. The moisture creates a thin insulating layer that dissipates some of the heat, temporarily at least. In this case, I would surmise that the ice is somehow releasing energy from the source — somewhere within the matrix — and then refreezing just as quickly so that there is no net loss of ice."

"You're saying there's a rational explanation for this?" asked Fuller, evincing unexpected interest.

"Of course. There's a rational explanation for everything, Special Agent Fuller. We live in a rational universe."

"What about magic? Or the spirit realm?"

"Magic, in my experience, is either trickery or in the case of the things we witness here, technology advanced beyond our capacity to fully understand. A hundred years ago a radio or telephone would have seemed like magic. The laws of physics didn't change, only our understanding.

"As to 'the spirit realm' as you call it, I haven't seen any compelling evidence that any such thing exists, but if it does, by its very definition, it would exist in a different universe."

"Different universe?"

"I assume you are a Christian man, Special Agent Fuller. You believe in heaven and hell. Do you think that if you could fly up high enough in an airplane, you would discover heaven? Or if you traveled deep enough beneath the earth's crust, you would find where the devil lives? Of course not. You accept that these are different planes of existence. Such an understanding is implicit in the use of the word 'realm.' "

Professor or not, Newcombe was certainly enjoying the chance to educate his somewhat captive audience.

"Now, there's nothing in our understanding of physics that contradicts the belief that there are other universes or alternate realities or what have you, but then neither is there any way to prove their existence. But if someone were to cross over from one reality to another, they would be subject to the physical laws of whatever universe they were in. I promise you this, if Jesus really walked on the Sea of Galilee, then it's because it is physically possible to do so and one day we shall discover how to do it as well."

"Perhaps with something like the Float Car?" Jocasta suggested.

"Exactly, Amelia, darling." Then a perplexed look came over the scientist's face. "Of course the Float Car doesn't react well with water, so it couldn't have been that."

Distracted by his own tangent, Newcombe began speculating aloud on other rational explanations for divine manifestations, but Jocasta wasn't really listening. Her interest in the subject was strictly practical and it was limited to the potential uses for the object in her pocket. She already knew it could be used for flight and evidently to make a person impervious to bullets; what else could it do?

Walk through walls maybe? Now that would be a trick.

"So you're saying that we could one day develop the technology to cross over into the spirit realm?" asked Fuller. "Move back and forth between heaven or hell and earth?"

"Not precisely. I think it very unlikely that heaven and hell exist anywhere except in the minds of believers, but yes, if it is possible to move between these different planes of existence, then we will someday figure out the means to do so. Of course, there's a difference between what is theoretically possible and what can actually be done. Frankly, I wouldn't want to mess around with energy on that scale. Quantum mechanics allows for the possibility of alternate universes, but not in the same space. One would annihilate the other."

"It could blow up in your face?"

Newcombe laughed. "If you didn't know what you were doing, it could destroy everything. Opening a door to another universe could mean the end of this one."

"Ah, so only as a last resort then."

Jocasta suddenly had an idea. "What about mental energy?"

"Eh? Psychokinesis? Mind over matter? Well, again, I suppose it's theoretically possible. Brain waves are a sort of electricity, so I imagine it might be possible to build a device that can interpret those waves, the same way a radio can turn sound into electrical energy and then back again. I suppose you could then focus that energy to affect an object over a short distance. It's a question of energy."

She moved away from the two men, Newcombe still rattling on about the laws of physics and surreptitiously placed a hand on the metal rod.

Show me your secrets.

A tingling sensation shot up her arm, as if she had touched an electric wire and she reflexively jerked her fingers away. Nevertheless, whether it was the result of her own psychic prowess or simply the proximity of the device, the Outpost responded.

The floor at the center of the chamber, only a few inches from where Jocasta was standing, abruptly fell away, as though it had melted instantaneously, to reveal a spiraling ramp descending deep into the heart of the ice. She jumped back, letting out a surprised yelp.

Newcombe and Fuller both turned to see what was the matter, prompting her to give an innocent shrug. "Look what I've found."

Newcombe regarded the newly created passageway as though it was a personal insult. "That wasn't there before."

"No it wasn't." Jocasta flashed her most winning smile. "Let's see where it goes, shall we?"

"We should probably wait for Dodge to come back." Newcombe looked to Fuller to back him up, but the G-man only shrugged.

"Oh, Findlay Dear, where's the fun in that?" And with a trill of laughter, the Fallen Angel started down the ramp.

Despite being made of solid ice, the sloping surface was not the least bit slippery. Jocasta could barely contain her enthusiasm as she swept down the ramp. She stopped counting the number of orbits, but given that there was about twenty feet of clearance between the floor and ceiling of the passage, she estimated that she had descended almost three hundred feet before the tunnel let out onto the floor of a high-domed chamber. The circular ice cave was about a hundred feet in diameter, without any other exits and featureless but for one unusual adornment.

Situated at the exact center of the chamber was a pillar of metal, about twenty feet high, topped with something that looked like a coiled snake. The base of the column was buried in the ice, like the tip of Excalibur in the anvil, just waiting for the true king to arrive. It was the same kind of metal as the concealed staff and as she approached, she could feel the magnetic attraction between the pillar and the item in her pocket.

"That's got to be it!' Newcombe declared as he joined her on the floor of the domed chamber. "The source of the energy."

Throwing his scientific caution to the wind, he hastened toward it.

"Findlay Dear, I'm not certain you should—"

"Nonsense. It's the same metal as the exoskeleton device. It's perfectly safe."

"I think this might be a little more—"

"Stop right there, Miss Palmer."

Jocasta ignored Fuller's shout, but she could not so easily disregard the iron grip that suddenly clamped onto her upper arm. So focused was she on Newcombe, however that it took a moment for the full impact of the FBI agent's words to hit her. She turned slowly to face him, her denial silenced by his steely stare. Instead, she whispered only one word. "You."

"Congratulations on a job well done, Miss Palmer. Now, if you'll just hand over the Staff, I'll settle your account."

Newcombe paid no heed to the drama unfolding behind him, but instead rushed forward and began examining the column. Without a moment's hesitation, he reached out and placed his palms against it.