The Null Prophecy Read online

  Occupy the World was opposed to so-called green technology. It claimed (correctly) the sharp blades of wind farms were slicing and dicing innocent birds, including endangered species, even bald eagles. And the mirrored panels of huge solar farms heated the air immediately above them to 800 degrees, frying more birds than the Kentucky Colonel.

  In Allie’s estimation it was an illustration of the null prophecy in a nutshell.

  “No,” she said finally. “We’re gonna be late as it is, and you know how I hate that.”

  SATURDAY, APRIL 22 (8:21 A.M. PACIFIC DAYLIGHT TIME)

  They arrived at the north gate of Naval Base Point Loma and were cleared by security. The MP raised the wooden arm and waved them through.

  A few minutes later Allie spotted a man built like a lifeguard and sporting red trunks and a white T-shirt standing with crossed arms in front of a hangar-like building. His attractive features were marred by a conspicuous frown.

  “I think that’s him over there and he doesn’t look happy. Let me handle this.”

  Allie scrambled out of the van ahead of the crew.

  “Dr. Sinclair?”

  “Yes.”

  She was surprised at how handsome he was. She was expecting a geek.

  “So sorry we’re late,” she said, extending her hand. “I’m Allie Armendariz.”

  He shook her hand. “Good to meet you.”

  “This is my producer, Eva Freiberg, and over there is our cameraman, Phil Pitman. We all call him Pitsy.”

  Eva shook Sinclair’s hand. Pitsy, already unloading the equipment, gave him a quick nod.

  “Everything’s all set,” Sinclair muttered. “Follow me.”

  Calder Sinclair claimed to have invented the perfect vehicle, a boat of some kind that supposedly ran on energy extracted from the quantum vacuum. Clean, limitless energy, he said, would change forever how people lived.

  If true, she thought, he’d get the Nobel Prize in physics and become the most famous inventor since—well, since the creator of the wheel. But it was a very big if. She was always being solicited by quacks claiming to have invented a better mousetrap.

  Eva walked alongside Sinclair just ahead of Allie. She overheard her producer saying, “She’s still going to be able to ride with you, like we discussed, right?”

  He nodded curtly and hastened them toward the water’s edge.

  A man of few words.

  She gazed across San Diego Bay at the city skyline, her thoughts returning to Lolo.

  I need to be there for her.

  At moments like this Allie wished she had more free time and actually resented her job, her success, her whole way of life.

  What have I become?

  Who have I become?

  As they neared the water she had a thought.

  ¿Por qué no?

  After a moment’s consideration, she decided—yes, she’d do it.

  “Here she is,” Sinclair said. He’d led them across the sand to a varnished wooden pier moored to which was a sleek, cherry-red vehicle. To her it looked like a cross between a ski boat and a rocket ship. It was roughly the size of a modern fighter jet.

  Sinclair, grinning wryly, gestured to it extravagantly. “My Hero.”

  She looked at him askance and chuckled.

  He stepped onto the pier, walked up to a metal footlocker, and proceeded to open it. “I named her after Hero of Alexandria.”

  “Ha, very cute,” she said, recalling the first-century maverick who was considered the greatest inventor of the ancient world. Hero refused to believe in horror vacui, the then widespread conviction that a vacuum did not exist naturally and could not be produced in the lab either. “As I recall he never did manage to create a vacuum—though he died trying, poor devil.”

  Sinclair, having plucked a silvery garment from the footlocker, was pulling it on. “Yeah, but he sure was vindicated when Torricelli finally did.”

  When he finished dressing, he fetched out another suit and held it up to her.

  “Here, this should fit you. It’s Nomex.”

  Allie took the flight suit and looked around. “But where—?”

  Smiling, he gestured to a large porta-potty a short distance away.

  SATURDAY, APRIL 22 (8:25 A.M. PACIFIC DAYLIGHT TIME)

  Everything about Allie impressed him—and helped to assuage his annoyance about their being late. For years he’d watched her reports on television and knew she had a first-rate mind. It was why he offered her the story.

  But he was surprised by her genuine beauty. It wasn’t just television smoke and mirrors. Her remarkable height—just short of his—long, wavy auburn hair, large emerald eyes, and creamed-coffee skin composed someone quite stunning.

  It made him ache for his late wife, Nell—and his daughter, Sara, who’d recently left for Australia to study marine science.

  “All set!” the producer called out. “Shake a leg everybody!”

  Pushy, he thought. But clearly efficient.

  A few moments later he and Allie eased into canvas sling chairs set up on the beach for the interview. The morning was warming up nicely; the sky was as blue as the water. It promised to be a picture-perfect spring day.

  AA: “Dr. Sinclair, I’d like to—”

  CS: “Please, everyone calls me Calder.”

  She smiled.

  AA: “I’d like to start by asking you how Hero came to be.”

  Calder drew a long, deep breath.

  CS: “All right. Well, as a kid growing up in Seville, Spain, near a river, I always dreamed of inventing a boat that’d go as fast as a rocket ship.”

  AA: “Why?”

  CS: “I don’t know. It just struck me the land and sky had already been conquered—and space, too. Oceans cover more than seventy percent of the earth’s surface and to me they represent the final frontier. Still wide open and wild, you know? Ripe for the taking.”

  AA: “But there’s more to Hero than just speed, right? Tell me about that.”

  CS: “Okay, well, when I was an undergrad at UCLA I started learning about the quantum vacuum, how scientists believe it’s the foundation of all physical reality—the source of space, time, energy, and matter. I was so fascinated I started studying the work of guys like Hendrik Casimir, Dirk Polder, and Willis Lamb.”

  AA: “The pioneers.”

  He nodded, feeling thrilled to be talking to a kindred spirit.

  CS: “What floored me was the idea a vacuum is not nothing. It actually houses invisible energy fields that are the source of everything. It’s like science’s answer to the idea of God.”

  Allie grinned and nodded.

  CS: “I remember doing this one experiment. I put an inflated balloon and a pot of cold tap water under a glass dome and sucked the air out of it. The balloon grew bigger and bigger until it exploded. And the tap water boiled, even though it was still at room temperature. That’s when a little bulb went off in my head and convinced me nothingness, or seeming nothingness, has amazing powers.”

  The surrounding stillness was rent by a loud air-raid siren.

  “Cut!” the producer yelled.

  “Sorry about that,” he said. “It’s only a munitions test. The siren always goes off to warn everybody on the base.”

  “What do you mean, munitions test?” Allie said.

  “They’re probably about to test insensitive explosives. Either that or the new sonar. This is one of the Navy’s biggest installations in the world. There’s always something going on here.”

  He caught sight of Allie giving her producer a knowing look.

  “Is there a problem?”

  “No, no,” Allie shook her head. “Uh, I’m just wondering: is the test going to interfere with Hero’s run this morning?”

  “Not at all. We’re operating on different sides of the peninsula. Besides, Hero’s run this morning has been cleared by the Pentagon. They want to see it happen as much as I do.”

  “Roll camera!” the producer said in a rushed voice.
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br />   Allie appeared anxious about making sure the camera was rolling before pressing on.

  AA: “What you just said about the Pentagon’s interest in today’s test run—is it because Hero was created for military purposes?”

  He raised himself in the chair to emphasize his response.

  CS: “No, I did not create Hero for military purposes. I created her to show the world that a clean, limitless energy source exists that has never been used before. It’s a game changer.”

  Allie, hesitating, looked to her producer.

  CS: “Please, can we just move on? We were talking about how Hero works when the siren went off.”

  AA: “Okay. Well, then, let’s talk about how she’s built. How strong is she? I mean her hull—how much punishment can it take? The ocean can be pretty brutal on ships. Just ask the engineers who designed the Titanic.”

  CS: “She’s virtually indestructible.”

  AA: “No, really.”

  CS: “I mean it. It was a huge part of the challenge I faced. After figuring out how to extract energy from the vacuum, I needed to invent a casing for the Q-thruster hard enough—”

  AA: “I’m sorry, Q-thruster?”

  CS: “Hero’s main engine. I needed to make the hull strong enough to contain the pressures of matter-antimatter explosions. I finally created it: a laminate of boron carbide ceramic and stainless-steel-tungsten foam a thousand times tougher than what NASA uses for rocket engines.”

  Allie looked down at her notes before continuing.

  AA: “So how do you see Hero being used? If not for military purposes, then—”

  CS: “Who foresaw the future of air travel? Or cars? Or spaceships? One thing I can say for sure is my technology will relieve traffic congestion on the roads and in the skies by creating a viable transportation alternative. As I said, the oceans are wide open right now. With my technology we can build high-speed ships that’ll ferry people from one country to another, faster, more safely, and more comfortably than airplanes. And with no pollution or fear of ever running out of fuel.”

  AA: “Faster than flying?”

  CS: “You bet.”

  He paused for effect.

  CS: “You’ll see.”

  SATURDAY, APRIL 22 (10:03 A.M. PACIFIC DAYLIGHT TIME)

  A small crowd of uniformed Navy bigshots gathered on the beach to witness the event. Inside Hero’s cabin, Allie was strapped snugly into the passenger seat, cocooned in suit, helmet, and gloves. Calder explained, like race car drivers, they needed to be protected against fiery collisions—an explanation that left her more than a little jittery.

  Through the large, bubble-shaped windshield she watched Eva and Pitsy on the pier filming the prelaunch process. Two wide-angle lipstick cameras mounted inside Hero’s cockpit gave a clear view of the interior.

  At Eva’s request she went through one last sound check, after which all was ready. She gave them a half-hearted thumbs-up, suddenly second-guessing her decision to do this story. She swallowed hard and double-checked her harnessing.

  Anything for ratings, right?

  Calder, seemingly nerveless and seated in the forward compartment, ordered her people to evacuate the pier and reset on the beach. A moment later she heard him speaking on the radio.

  “Point Loma, this is Hero One, over.”

  A flat male voice responded. “Hero One, this is Point Loma, we copy, over.”

  “Hero One requesting permission to launch, over.”

  A pregnant silence was finally broken by the words, “Permission granted. We’ve cleared the area of traffic. Good luck, Dr. Sinclair, over.”

  “Thanks, Scotty, over and out.”

  Scotty, Calder explained, was Point Loma’s chief communications officer. Several moments later he began voicing the final countdown.

  Her entire body resonated with the drumming sound of her accelerating heartbeat.

  “Three . . . two . . . one. Ignition.”

  At first she was aware of only a high-pitched whirring sound. Then there was a loud explosion and abruptly she was slammed against the contoured seat with such violence she almost blacked out. She willed herself to focus, to speak coherently to the interior cameras.

  “Hard to breathe . . . everything happening so fast . . . Ay! What was that?”

  Later, when reviewing the video, she learned what she felt at that precise moment was Hero rising on her skis and hydroplaning across the surface of the ocean at four hundred knots.

  “Calder!” she shouted into her helmet’s mic. “Is everything okay?”

  “Roger,” he said phlegmatically.

  A few moments hence the ride smoothed out dramatically. The sensation was like being in a glider plane—quiet, fast, enlivening.

  “Wow!” she exclaimed. “This is amazing!”

  It was going to be a challenge, for sure, to explain to her viewers how Hero worked. Perhaps she’d compare Hero’s source of power to an empty gas tank that wasn’t really empty.

  She realized people thought of a perfect vacuum as being the absence of anything and everything. But science, in its mind-bending way, believed a perfect vacuum still contained lots of invisible stuff—space, time, matter, and above all, energy fields. Sinclair was claiming to have found the Holy Grail of science: a way of tapping the enigmatic, ghostly fields for unlimited quantities of real, tangible, combustible power.

  Her thoughts were interrupted by an ear-shattering buzzer. An instant later Hero seemed to slip out of control. The cabin shuddered with such vehemence she worried it’d break apart.

  “Allie, listen to me—” Sinclair’s voice broke off.

  She felt Hero glancing off a wave and going airborne, felt her weight lift off the seat. A moment later the vehicle slammed onto the water with a heavy thud that rattled her insides. She then felt Hero swing around hard to port and saw through the expansive windshield a coastline pan into view.

  They were heading straight for the Navy ships parked at Coronado Island!

  Allie was about to cry out just as she felt Hero braking. Her helmeted head jerked forward while her captive upper body strained hard against the leather harnessing, causing the straps to creak. Several dizzying moments later the violent shaking quieted down and the vehicle sloshed roughly to a halt a mere few feet short of a Navy destroyer.

  “Allie, are you okay?”

  Hero bobbed gaily in the water.

  “I’m so sorry. That was not part of the plan.”

  She let go of her breath, still trembling from the ordeal. “Yeah, I think so. But what in the world was that all about?”

  Silence.

  “The collision avoidance system,” he said quietly. “Something went wrong.”

  They rode back to the pier without conversing. When they arrived, Calder shut down Hero’s engine. Navy ensigns scurried about the pier, roping the vehicle and lashing her to large metal cleats.

  Allie quickly undid her harness, eager to get out.

  Sinclair threw open the windshield, stood up, and removed his helmet. “Allie,” he said, turning to face her, “I’m really sorry about the snafu. But Hero’s propulsion system worked perfectly. That’s big news, right?”

  She was still trying to regain her composure. “Yes—yes, it is.”

  “Are you open to giving Hero a second chance?” There was a silent pause. “I hope you are. You really need to, actually; it’s important.”

  CHAPTER 3

  FAMILIA

  EASTER SUNDAY, APRIL 23 (11:45 A.M. PACIFIC DAYLIGHT TIME)

  IGLESIA BUEN SAMARITANO; EAST LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA

  Moments after the closing hymn, hermana Diana burst into the Sunday school classroom to collect her two boys. “Allie, you missed a good sermon.”

  “Sí, hermana,” she said, bundling up the boys’ art projects—decorated crosses made of ice cream sticks—and putting them into a brown paper bag.

  “It was about how the resurrection represents turning over a new leaf. Starting a new life. At one poi
nt, your brother asked if we knew what the first commandment in the Bible is.”

  Standing alongside the boys, her hands on their shoulders, Allie thought about it for a moment and immediately knew what was coming. She was the only one in her family who wasn’t married, divorced, or even engaged. By Old World Mexican standards, she was in danger of ending up a lonely solterona.

  “Sabes que es, right?” Diana said.

  Allie wouldn’t be baited. “Of course. It’s about worshiping only God and nothing else.”

  Diana didn’t miss a beat. “Well, that, too, but no. It’s in Genesis where God commands Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply.”

  La hermana Magaña entered the room. “Oh sister,” she said, “you missed a really good one.”

  By the time the last children were returned to their parents, Allie was left questioning why in creation she was letting herself do this. Why during these past few months she’d been rising extra early on Sundays—contractually, her only day off—dressing up, and driving an hour out of her way, only to be—

  Carlos appeared at the door. “C’mon, Allie, they need you!”

  One look at her brother’s brown, beaming face and any doubts about what she was doing vanished.

  Estos son mis reices.

  “Give me a hand,” she said, instantly setting about to tidy the small room. “Unless it’s beneath the senior pastor’s pay scale.” She chuckled.

  “Yeah, right, my pay scale,” he snorted, straightening the chairs. “Trust me, it’s waaaay below yours, little sis. Besides, remember what the Bible says: ‘If you want to be a leader, you have to be everyone’s servant.”

  She paused and gave Carlos a wan smile.

  He’s the real deal.

  And me?

  Despite her religious upbringing, it wasn’t until grad school that her eyes opened to the possible existence of God. At Cornell, enrolled in courses where she was learning about the deep-rooted order and beauty of the universe, she couldn’t help but ask: How did it all come to be? The answer offered by science—that it was all a magnificent accident—was simply not intellectually satisfying. It required a gratuitous amount of faith in the scientific method—brilliant as it was—to believe such a shallow hypothesis.