“Can you give me some more background as to what to expect? The base has a small fleet of mining bots and scout drones and plenty of poly-matter and utility foglets. If you tell me more, maybe I can prepare some specialty equipment.”, Sam asked.
A look of pain and regret formed on Bill's face. “I know this is before your time, but do you know the story about New Boston Bay?”
“Yeah. The explosion had wiped out the MIT campus and everything else in a 10-mile radius. Wasn’t that a terrorist attack?” Sam asked, wondering where Bill was going with this.
“That was one theory of many. However, there was no radiation from the event ruling out nuclear bombs and it wasn’t an explosion but rather an implosion. The event did produce a flash of light and thunderous noise but no explosive scattering. MIT and great Boston appear to have imploded and left behind a 10-mile-deep crater that quickly filled in with seawater. Submersibles sent in had never found any debris; the school, city, and a sizable chunk of the earth all disappeared near instantly.”
Bill took a shallow breath, gauging Sam’s reactions. “Despite the lack of evidence, I know a little about what may have occurred. I had several colleagues working there. I might have been there myself if I wasn’t off traveling around the system setting up the Oort Comet capture program for the MTC.”
“My friends there were working on zero-point energy way back then. I recovered some of the cloud records of their experimental designs and plans from before the event. The day of the implosion was the team's first scheduled test of their newly completed ZPE reactor prototype.”
“I know in my gut that the ZPE reactor was likely flawed in some way. I remember my dislike for the experiment as soon as I heard about it, but I warned them against scaling it up until they validated their theory more. My experiment is similar in that it is prying into the base state of the vacuum. Looking at their setup, I think I understand exactly where they went wrong. I won’t make their mistake, but these are uncharted waters, so better safe than sorry. “
“I think I understand,” Sam said, her face suddenly taking on a concerned expression. “What kind of safety protocols are you implementing for this test?
“Location and distance are our primary controls. Amundsen is plenty wide and deep enough that any, um. … energetic outcomes will not affect us or endanger anyone else. There shouldn’t be another soul within 200 kilometers except for you, me, and Max.” Bill said with a grim and determined attitude and continued.
“EM shielding and George’s recommended regolith buttressing dampers will protect those of us nearest. The Casa de Mitchell fabricator is cranking out passive protection modules as we speak, power and communications are triple redundant, seismic sensors, and automatic shutdown protocols. I think that’s about it.” Bill took a deep breath “We are as prepared as we can be.”
“That does answer some of my questions,” Sam said. “But you mentioned that this was a dimensional experiment and not a ZPE experiment. How exactly is it different? I don’t want our new business venture to implode like Boston.”
Bill hesitated, unsure how to quickly condense almost two decades of observations and theory into a neat explanation for Samantha. She was very smart and creative, but dimensional theory quickly bogs down into jargon that proves very hard to translate.
“Casa?” Bill prompted, “Do you think you could summarize our work and observations leading to this experiment without my usual jargon?”
“[Of course, Bill. It will be my pleasure.]” Casa said as her avatar took over.
“[My creation by Bill is a direct result of his need for a dedicated assistant in formulating his theories and observations. So, this background and our quest to derive his theories are my origin story if you will.]”
“[I should start with scientific theory prior even to this age of abundance from about 100 years ago. Most scientists at the time were creating more and more energetic tests to smash particles together and analyze the subatomic debris. They wanted to understand the building blocks and forces of the world. Einstein’s theories of relativity and motion had many confirming experiments and likewise, quantum mechanics had its own confirmed rules, but the two did not neatly mesh.]”.
Casa lit up the air using the foglets in the room to paint holograms of the evolution of particle accelerators and image some of the historical experiments to enhance her lecture.
“[For both theories to work and to mesh, the foundational math required an increase in the base number of dimensions from our three observed dimensions of length, width, and depth, plus another of time; to a much larger number of 11 theoretical dimensions. Of course, there was much skepticism about the number despite its need to enable the theories to mesh. There was no empirical evidence and no effective means to test the theory. The prevailing scientists discounted the lack of evidence implying that the extra dimensions were not active and “rolled up” upon themselves to justify their use in connecting theory without the need to experimentally prove them.]”
“[Scientists like my friend and creator Bill took this grudgingly as a partial and incomplete answer, but it became relevant again to Bill as he began to observe some very odd discrepancies in orbital mechanics and gravitational observations. He documented tens of examples where the gravitational signatures of large bodies like the moon we are on as well as Deimos, Titan, and several asteroids were not in alignment with their material composition and density. Both Luna and Phobos have slightly less gravity than is calculated based on their known composition and density. Jupiter’s moon Io and the asteroid Vesta both have notably more mass than their volume predicts.]”
“[The fabled dinosaur killer comet was believed to have been caused by disruptions in the Oort Cloud by a still unfound 9th planet. The gravitational disruptions have been confirmed but the extra planet responsible for the Oort disruptions is still defying all searches. The question that needs answering is how a gravitational anomaly of such mass can have no visible evidence. One answer is that a primordial black hole might be in the cloud. Another is Bill’s theory, that a concentration of extra dimensional matter is located there without the accompanying visible matter in this dimension.]”
“[Bill’s theory expects that most stable orbital bodies were formed in conjunction with their extradimensional or shadow matter counterparts. So, all the stable bodies are carrying extra mass and that matter’s presence has a weak additional mass effect through dimensions and vice versa. To prove his theories, Bill needed some unstable orbital events to shake loose the gravitational pairings between our primary matter and their shadows to observe the gravitational differences.]”
“[To find these examples, Bill engaged himself in a contract with Mars Terraform LLC, to assist them in their long-term projects to seed Mars with Oort comets. Their plans were and still are to knock small comet bodies into safe impacts on Mars, raising its global temperature and to add water content significantly over the long timelines proposed. Bill designed, fabricated, and shepherded a fleet of fusion probes to hunt, grapple, and push small comets into targeted Mars impact sites.]”
“[After years of logistics, fabricating, and positioning the fleet of mass-driving space tugs; many of the cometary bodies were finally in motion. Bill studied the gravitational effects of the masses in motion and began to see what he was after. He logged case after case of mass quantifications on the comets. To achieve optimum Martian impact target sites, Oort comet trajectories were frequently modified with other stellar bodies with slingshot maneuvers for course changes. Bill would intentionally miss his trajectories to require his fusion probes to drive course corrections. This gave him updates on comet masses. On about 2% of the comets, there was either a loss or gain of mass that didn’t correlate to probe and comet expected mass losses post slingshot. In effect, Bill’s efforts to shake loose the shadow mass was marginally effective and his data proves it.]”
Casa’s light show continued with graphical overlays of comets raining down into Sol’s gravity well toward Mars with notations marking consistent masses and anomalies.
“[Bill’s theory is that at least 3 of those troublesome rolled-up dimensions are actually active but invisible to us, with shadow matter obeying similar gravitational rules as our own. The data from before and after course corrections revealed and documented numerous gravity anomalies.]”
“[Bill’s plan for an experimental path to complete his thesis has some similarities to the MIT team’s ZPE tests but with some important differences.]”, Casa continued.
“Come on, Casa. I was an art major. What is ZPE?” Sam gave her a questioning look.
The hologram pictures morphed to show two plates impossibly close together, zooming in to show their atomic-sized micro-distance spacing.
“[Scientists have found that even space is not truly empty. It’s filled with tiny invisible things called virtual particles. These particles are always popping in and out of existence, kind of like how bubbles form and pop in a glass of soda.]”
“[Now imagine two metal plates very close together, so close that the virtual particles can't fit in between them. Experiments with closely positioned plates show a small but real force pushing the plates against each other, even though they are not touching. This is called the Casimir effect and the force is caused by the pressure of particles popping in and out in surrounding space. But since the plate’s proximity prevents the virtual particle events between the plate, the energy and therefore pressure between the surfaces are lower. Scientists can use these metal plates to study and measure the Casimir effect, and it's one way to learn more about these tiny virtual particles that are always around us.]”
The hologram shifted to show an array of Casimir plates with annotated positions and electron beams shooting down the edges.
“[We understand that the MIT’s team was trying to pull energy out of the vacuum by forcing localized virtual particle creation at the plate interface and shunting them away before they could recombine into a net zero energy collapse.]”
“Ok. That went a bit over my head, but that’s ok. So, what went wrong?” Sam asked.
“[Bill and I have two theories as to what may have gone wrong with their experiment. Firstly, physical laws prevent the concept of “free” energy. There is always a cost, even if it’s not obvious. We think that drilling down to true vacuum energy levels and continually extracting virtual particles may have built up dimensional stress…. like winding up a spring. We think the imbalance may have grown until it snapped, and the resulting collapse would have equalized the energy imbalance and swallowed greater Boston in the process.]”
The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.
“[The second theory is that the beams collecting the positive and negative particles did not fully contain them. We are talking matter and antimatter generation on a particle level, but the scale of the test equipment would have quickly accumulated significant amounts. If they built up and bleed into each other, the EM holding fields may have burst causing the whole area to be punched right out of the weakened spatial matrix. Antimatter and matter annihilation is perhaps the most energetic event we can produce. If this method accumulated anti-particles without appropriate containment, then the result is not surprising.]”
Sam paled considerably at the realization of the magnitude of forces this experiment would be tweaking. She picked up a wine glass from the table and quickly downed the contents.
“Well,”she said, reaching for a new bottle. “This will certainly be the most exciting thing I’ve done so far this year. And terrifying too, but exciting for sure.”
“What’s to be afraid of, eh? We’re just going to carefully kick the foundations of reality a bit.” Bill joked.
“[We assure you, Sam, that we will not be following the path of the New Boston Bay event. Unlike them, we will not be depleting the dimensional field energy or attempting to harvest its virtual particles.]”, Casa soothingly answered. She continued with her holo-show and highlighted the safeties in place. Neither Bill nor Casa noticed, but Sam’s eyes narrowed slightly. She had not expected empathy from the sub-AI Casa.
If she failed the AI equivalency test then it must have been shy by the width of a pair of Casimir plates, Sam thought to herself
“[Without creating an energy imbalance, we will drop a small local field to true zero energy and then attempt to lock this field in place. We feel that the true vacuum is needed to enable cross-dimensional effects. Virtual particle creation is exceptional evidence of cross-dimensional translation. We have run many experiments with a true vacuum, all without ill effects. This will be the first attempt to stabilize the local field. Our attempts, while traveling, were unable to provide sufficient energy to hold the field long enough to lock it. Unlike MIT, we are trying to affect a controlled reaction instead of trying to harness space-time energy.]”
Sam was still a bit nervous but calmed more as she realized that Bill and Casa had been working toward this for some time, slowly and cautiously.
“I may have missed it. The MIT scientists were looking to siphon energy and you said you’re not. So, what exactly are you hoping to achieve?” Sam asked. Bill perked up and answered.
“I’m hoping that this may lead to the equivalent of the long-sought and never found wormhole phenomenon. To be able to travel without the speed of light limitations by taking a shortcut into the dimension next door.” Bill said excitedly.
“Once we unleashed all the big technology advancements, so far, we have had 7 big efforts to send colony ships out to the stars. 4 went to Alpha Centauri, one to Barnard, one to Wolf, and one to Lalande. Alpha Centauri is about 4.3 light years away. The first travelers left about 20 years ago. They still have at a minimum another century to go. Long life, perfect recycling, suspension, fusion, and AI make this possible, but what a boringly long trip. If I can get there first, maybe we can pick the slow pokes up on the way.” Bill spoke with passion.
“Alright then!”, Sam declared. “What else do you need from me for the big experiment?”
“[We need to update the safety shielding for the test stage and finalize the Casa de Mitchell’s power and processor connections alongside the base’s conduits. I’m also going to deploy sensor platforms ringing the stage to monitor the EM and gravity fields. I don’t think we will be ready today, but maybe early tomorrow.]” Casa stated.
Bill petted Max’s head. “Max, you’ve been very patient. Are you ready for some fun?”
“[Boring talk. Time for play!]” replied Max via his vocal assist implants.
“That right, Max! Let’s get suited up and go look at the test stage!” Bill crowed. He activated their helmets and raced Max to the foglet air wall at the mouth of the hanger.
Bill and Max returned to the hangar tired after running out and around the test site. Even though it was kilometers away, the bounding leaps across the moon's surface ate up the distance quickly. Bill grew frustrated with the slow bounding. His wings wouldn’t work with no atmosphere, no foglets to provide powered assist, no electromagnetic fields for the superconducting paths in his body to work against. He made a note to configure and fill some reservoir pockets about his body for some compressed gas.
“Hey Sam, the test site is almost ready. I see Franklin is already deploying drones to move the test stack and reconfigure the area for a safer depth.”
“[Casa de Mitchell and Amundsen systems are at full charge with smart matter capacitors building up an extra 20% over base capability limits. Links between the ship and base are active with external links to Tranquility and Earth’s satellite network are open and ready.]” Casa said.
Bill smiled; he had waited so long for this. Tomorrow would be the big day. This experiment was the culmination of his work for the last two years of planning. It would hopefully validate a decade of work and study. While nanotech and AI had vastly magnified everyone’s capabilities, maintaining his status as a scientific leader required creativity and risks. If he could confirm his theory, he knew world-changing applications would follow.
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The next day, Bill and Sam’s daemons provided an updated plan for base security. The new plan added EMP missiles and Nerf cannons for perimeter defense. Inside the base, a significant amount of programmable matter was targeted for replacement with fabricated tiles and paneling. They even managed to insert disabling code for the poly matter just in case it was needed. Emergency open and close cell foam canisters were strategically placed throughout the base to act as deterrents and emergency breach sealing. Both Bill and Sam were satisfied with the non-lethal approach and authorized the daemons to start making the changes.
Bill used the crater wall sensors to display the stage block at the bottom of the crater, 20 kilometers away from the hangar. A sizable configuration of poly matter as a large Autopod was configured into a stacked array of quantum dot matrices embedded into the center of his custom-design superconducting flywheel, all lit up with spotlight illumination. Bill had performed countless iterations building to this moment. The Casimir stack would drill down to a true zero-energy vacuum while spinning up to sufficient velocity to produce a relativistic frame-dragging effect isolating the field from the vacuum energy perturbations.
Once the device bottomed out to true zero-point energy and the frame dragging prevented virtual particle ingress from filling the true void, then and only then would the Casimir stack shift and morph into nested conic sections. The last step was for the conic sections to separate, allowing Bill’s anchor array to be launched into the center to stabilize the spatial defect.
In past experiments, the anchor array had failed every time. The anchor was also built of configurable quantum dots. The Casimir Stack's matrix was configured for strength to maintain the array’s stability while spinning up to high-speeds where natural materials would fragment and explode in a heartbeat. The anchor would use the same polymorphic materials, but for a different reason. They were designed to flex into novel configurations rather than using their capabilities for reinforcement. Its armature would dynamically adjust its configuration, guided by heuristic programs to allow it to evolve and form a theoretical tesseract stabilizing circuit.
His personal house ship Casa was going to provide the bulk of the very large initial jolt of power needed to empower the tesseract. His past failures had proven to have energy needs beyond the modest 100 MW fusion reactor he used previously. This time with the addition of the outpost’s triplet of reactors and his ship Casa as well, he doubted he could fall short of the power this time. The power drain, while worrying due to its magnitude, gave him confidence that his theories were sound. He was shaping the fundamental structure of the vacuum and playing with these forces required effort.
No free lunches, he thought, but I’m paying for a nice meal and hope to get a good one!
As the base modifications continued, Bill and Max went back to their quarters for the night. He was overdue to check in with the family on a virtual visit. His ex-wife Elsa was still locked down at Mystery Immersives in New York and his son Bo was still traveling the ReFormed States of America courting sponsors for the Diamond Man circuit. Mira, his daughter, was in classes at Tranquility University, not close to Amundsen but at least on the same orb. Tomorrow would be the big day.
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The following morning after a hearty breakfast, Bill, Sam, and Max were at the hangar. Franklin had informed Sam late the previous day that all the installation was complete for the power plants. The water processing was already working as well, although moving the ice would take the drone team another week. Franklin appeared eager to move on, and perhaps a little apprehensive about the safety remodeling for the upcoming test.
“Are you sure you don’t want to stay for a bit and relax Franklin?”, Sam asked.
“I’m good Sam, I’d rather be back in my Rover Bus,” Franklin replied, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. “All the ice Mr. Mitchell brought is like as not to trigger a slew of projects, I can’t miss out. Chum is in the water and sharks got to feed. Take care now.”
As he left, Bill and Sam headed over to Casa to review the latest data on the Casimir Stack’s systems composite. Casa’s vocal assist unit greeted them as they stepped into the control bay.
“[Good morning! The systems check is complete, and we are ready for the test.]”
“Thank you, Casa,” Bill said. “I think our approach to finalizing the Tesseract circuit is sound.
Like the last time, we are trying to alter and reconfigure the circuit, in additional dimensions, within the center of the Casimir stack void. We need to pull out the stops with computational simulations to drive the Tesseract circuit’s evolution. We need to hold the frame dragging field until the circuit configuration stabilizes. Once it’s done, I hope it will hold the field without the stack needing the frame drag velocity.”
“[All of your personal daemon assistants are ready, each with a dedicated server to assist in driving circuit simulations]” replied Casa, “[we also have reserved remote servers from Tycho City via fiber links and have multiple high bandwidth COMM lines active with Earth’s Star Link server satellites.]” Casa continued, “[Bill, if needed I believe I could reconfigure my neural architecture to achieve higher computational speeds.]”
“I’m sorry, Casa, I know that your current neural structure is slower than it could be, but I do believe it’s better for you in the long term. You mean more to me than just a computational appliance, I appreciate you for who and what you are.”
Bill had designed Casa’s hardware and software into a novel configuration that encouraged massive parallel thought processes and tangential thinking at the cost of pure computation speed. The United Nations had mandated that all AI required testing on both their speed and intelligence. Any AI that exceeded human normal speed and IQ by more than 125%, was granted full sentience recognition with citizenship but they were also required to have both hardware and software governors to throttle and potentially terminate AI that tried to bootstrap themselves into superintelligence.
Bill was conflicted on this rule as he wanted Casa to be able to grow into her full potential but understood the UN's concerns. Uncontrolled intelligence amplification could become an existential threat. Casa’s designation was a bit of a sore point between them. Bill regularly wanted Casa to avoid pushing herself when she felt she was capable of more. While her low Turing score meant she wasn’t recognized as a full person, it also avoided mandatory installation of hardware governors and kill switches.
Bill hated the rule and did not want the UN tapping into Casa while she aided him in his spacial research, and he would oppose anyone having the capability to remotely kill her. He had personally taken an AI test himself with his cognition assist modules active and easily scored 1.7 against the standard human baseline. He despised the human centric and hypocritical requirements and regulations against artificial intelligence. He also knew from personal experience as a front-line Samaritan, that any weakness like a built-in regulator or kill switch could and would be hacked. This would put Casa in danger anytime she opposed a tech lord-level player. While warlord types hadn’t been a significant problem since the OughtFifties, occasional terrorists did cause trouble. Casa understood the need for caution, but she also wanted to be her best.
“Okay, Casa. It’s time. I will be needing your full intellectual power to run the circuit simulations. We have all the pieces to run the diagnostics: you, me, the daemons, and Max.
It’s time to see if we can change the world again. Ready?”, Bill said with excitement.
“[Ready]” Came the response with a chorus and a whuff from Max. Bill smiled and flexed his fingers and mentally triggered the test to begin. Sam refilled her glass with more wine, trying hard to avoid spilling any with her shaking hands.
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