Starship: Free Mars

Part 8: Payoff

Their marriage ceremony was small and simple. Tate invited Seth to stand up with him, and Glory invited a naval colleague. Glory’s mother was dead, and she never mentioned her father. Afterwards, they took the day off and toured a few sights in Hellas. Glory offered to take him out on the surface again to see the sunset, but Tate was content to spend the evening with her at her, rather, at their, apartment. Content. Yes, he was content, and he liked the feeling.

Three weeks after the wedding, their work on the Franentz Equation had starting to jell. Tate thought they had developed a pretty good interpretation of the outlines of the theory. When complete, they would have a description of the interactions between the fusion process itself and the complex interplay of the plasma’s pressure, heat flow, and electromagnetic fields. Once they could model a complete reaction system, they would have the tool they needed to design the engine.

During the team’s regular midmorning meeting, they were comparing the latest pieces to the intricate puzzle when they heard a commotion out in the hallway leading to their shared offices and workroom. There was a knock on the door, and the departmental secretary stuck his head in. “Excuse me, doctors, but the President…”

“Is this our brain trust?” President Carlson’s booming voice interrupted. He pushed the man aside and strode into the room. “The finest minds on Mars—all in one room!” he announced arms stretched wide to encompass the whole office. “Hello, everyone. I’m Andrew Carlson, and I just had to come down here to Hellas to meet you and tell you what great work you are doing.”

President Carlson proceeded around the table introducing himself to each of the mathematicians. Big even for a Martian, he was bluff and hearty with a politician’s acceptable good looks, but safely distant from strikingly handsome.

Carlson knew personal tidbits about each of them, and when he came to Tate, he said, “And here’s the newlywed. Congratulations, Tate! How is your wife and that precious little one on the way?”

Knowing political bonhomie when he saw it, Tate was nonetheless impressed by how good the man’s personal attention made him feel. “She is doing just fine, sir. The Navy gave her a desk job for the time being.”

“Great! Glad to hear it.” And, Carlson was off the the next mathematician at the table.

The door opened again, and Wieger came in the room looking frantic. “President Carlson,” he gasped, “If we would have known you were coming, we could have had a presentation ready to explain our progress…”

Carlson held up a big hand and interrupted. “Relax, Vicam. Wouldn’t have understood it anyway. No, I’ve heard they are making good progress, and I just wanted to come down here root ‘em on, you know?” He pumped his clenched fists in the air a couple of times and went back to his conversation. Desperate for some input, Wieger button-holed one of Carlson’s staff while the President continued around the room.

Another of the President’s people introduced himself to Tate. “Dr. Richardson, I’m Paule Gaulaven. We appreciate how you are keeping Navy Secretary Bloom up to date with the mathematical end of things. Mathematics was her academic specialty, and she likes to keep up.”

“More than happy to help.” Tate’s non-mathematical research had turned up Bloom’s interest, and he had been more than happy to provide some inside tidbits to Wieger’s superior. 

“In fact,” Gaulaven continued, “Bloom’s interest has gotten us to do some planning for how we can implement this technology.” He shook his head. “Resource-wise, it’s awfully challenging.”

Tate could tell there was something unsaid. “But, the pay off?”

Gaulaven smiled. “Staggering. Simply staggering. We’ve been Earth’s poor cousins for so long…” He looked wistful for a moment, but he focused back on Tate. “We hope you can make it happen.”

“We already know it can be done,” Tate nodded. “That’s a big help right there.”

The man smiled. “Well, it was a pleasure to meet you, Tate. Do you mind if I call you Tate?”

“Not at all, sir. Anytime you need more information on what is going on with our project, give me a call.”

Gaulaven looked him in the eye. “I will take you up on that offer, Tate.”

After the President and his party had left, Wieger stood there looking out of sorts. Being the type of bureaucrat he was, Tate knew he was torn between feeling pleased by the President’s personal attention and unhappy because the situation had been out of his control. Finally, Wieger said, “Okay. Everyone back to work. Enough fun and games for one day.”

Their work was fun, but today’s game had been the icing on the cake for Tate.

Four months later, Tate was startled awake by Glory’s touch on his shoulder. He looked around and realized he was still sitting at their dining table. “Tate? Are you coming to bed?”

Reaching up for her hand, Tate said, “Yeah, I guess I dozed off there.” He looked back at the papers spread out on the table in front of him. He had brought home his notes on a knotty little problem they had been working on the last three days. The Franentz Equation appeared to be complete. Even better, it gave the right answers. The size of the containing fields needed to squeeze the plasma enough to cause ignition and at the same time control the energy produced had worked out to match the information they had about the construction of the Artemis. Any larger, and the energy density would be too low. Any smaller, and periodic instabilities in the plasma would tear the engine apart.

Yet, those instabilities captivated Tate. He had tried different sizes and configurations of the containing field, and each had a wildly different set of capricious fluctuations. But there was structure there. He knew there was, but he could not capture it. What was it trying to tell him? The picture was enticingly out of focus.

“Tate?”

“Huh? Oh, Glory. I’m sorry. This is…” he gestured at the papers. “It’s chess puzzle. I know there’s something here. A surprise-mate-in-two type of thing, but I’m not seeing it.”

Glory turned his face towards her. She stood there with her hand on her swelling belly. She was beautiful. “Come to bed, Tate. You will see it in the morning.”

Right. His brain was fried. “Sure.” He patted her hand and stood up.

Sandy eyed the next morning, Tate took his tea over to the couch and sat down. Glory was still in bed with the cat cozied up beside her. He looked at the stack of papers on the end table where he had left them last night. Instabilities. In the topologically-based notation they were using, they could almost be Pencian operators.

He took a sip of tea. Pencian operators. He picked up the papers and riffled down to the calculations for level one. Then level two. He took a deep breath and looked at the structure of the level three instabilities. Pencian operators. Good grief! How could he have missed it?

Taking the papers to the table he spread them out and looked at them. Pencian operators. Now he knew everything there was to know about the instabilities. Everything. He could solve them for any condition. Even better, he knew how to control them. Create a enlaced counter field, and the instabilities would fold in on themselves concentrating the plasma even more…

Glory interrupted him an hour later, and by that time he could not restrain his joy. “This is it!” he cried. “If this checks out, we can build a plasma engine with as much thrust as one of the engines on the Artemis but only one or two meters across.” He knew she did not understand the mathematics, but he went through it quickly with to reassure himself that it did hold together.