The Time Portal 2: Escape in Time (4 page)

After strong encouragement, Dr. Lindstrom allowed the men to take him back to the safehouse. It was for his own safety and he knew it. As a favor to Doc, Lucky made a promise to do his best to surround him with a hedge of protection. Once there, the professor was given his own quarters and Lucky was more than happy for him to set up a small laboratory in the hidden room. The professor remained much to himself, was an easy-to-get-along-with guy, but he always appeared preoccupied, his mind working, never at rest; a contradiction of sorts as he came across to everyone as a bit of a scatterbrain. One night over dinner, Lucky asked the professor to explain how his magnetic propulsion system worked. This was one of the few times that animation filled his face. This was his life, what he loved talking about. Quickly, he began searching through his drawings, scouring each one until he found what he wanted. He began by explaining that he had a miniature, working prototype hidden away and would be most happy to share that with the three of them.

“But what I really want,” the professor said, “is to build a full-scale prototype.”

Lucky asked, “How much room do you need for that?”

“Oh, well, the saferoom is fine for a full-scale engine, but the body of the craft would need to be built in a barn or a warehouse, away from prying eyes.”

“Okay,” Lucky answered. “Mickey, Sam and I will look for a space, but in the meantime, how about getting to work on the engine? What do you need to get started?”

“Well,” he said, “this is going to require quite the shopping trip.”

“Professor, never you mind. You make the list and we’ll do the buying.”

The professor walked over to the bookshelf in the room, grabbed a spiral notebook, ripped out a page, and took his seat. He reached into his lab coat pocket and pulled out a pen. Meticulously, he scanned the drawings, and then began to scribble onto the piece of paper. Meanwhile, Sam and Lucky picked up the remaining drawings and tried to make sense of them.

“Gee,” Mickey said. “Reminds me of the blueprints we had to memorize for each new mission. I remember thinking I never want to see angles and lines and graph paper ever again.” He laughed.

“Right,” Lucky chimed in. “Felt like architecture or engineering school at times.”

“Gentlemen and . . . um, lady,” Lindstrom said, just a little annoyed. “This is far more complex than that. Get me these things and if you don’t mind the mess, I’ll get started immediately.“

Days passed and the professor locked himself away in the safe room, only coming out for short stints to eat, have a cup of coffee, or treat his eyes to a brief change of venue. He had a rule, too, a condition. No one was allowed inside the saferoom, stating that it “interferes with the creative process. Can’t have you novices asking questions all the time over everything and getting me sidetracked.”

Finally, one day, Lucky had had enough. He walked over to the saferoom door and gave it a hard knock. No answer. He knocked again. Still, there was no answer. Then he knocked, hard, several times allowing his frustration to be heard.

“Okay, that’s enough,” Lucky said. “Lindstrom, I need to see something. I need to know that you’re in there doing something. How the heck do I know that you’re really building this engine? You could be inside there just having a little tea party for one. Open up. I need to see something.”

Slowly, the door opened and there stood Lindstrom with a big smile covering a large part of real estate on his face.

“Come in,” he said.

Lucky entered and looked around the room.

“I said I had a small prototype hidden but I didn’t say where. It was here.”

Lindstrom then removed a large sketchpad from his attaché. The pad was filled with diagrams, drawings and pictures.

“Hold on, professor,” Lucky said, and he walked to the door, opened it.

“Hey, Mickey, Sam, come on in here. The good professor is about to explain some things.”

Mickey and Sam entered the room and each took a seat. Lindstrom began.

“The magnetic propulsion system works differently than the presently known laws of magnetic attraction and repulsion. This system works similarly to the planets in our solar system and how they revolve around the sun.” He then drew a long tube on a blank page.

“This tube,” he said, “can be made of any material because the tube itself isn’t as important as what’s constructed around it.” Next, he drew lines around the tube. “These represent magnets.” He explained that it was necessary for magnets to be secured around both the interior and exterior of the tube. The professor then drew a large circle, representing a metal ring, and drew smaller rings, inside of the larger one, on and on with all the rings fitting into each other without touching. The rings had ceramic magnets. Each magnet had a space separating it from another magnet that was attached to the metal circle. The metal circles with the magnets represented planets in orbit. The ceramic magnets were secured to each smaller circle until the last one fit into the next larger one.

“The rings must fit into each other, starting with the largest down to the smallest so that they do not interfere with one another as they undulate up and down. It is important that enough room is allowed between the circles so that there is free movement, without fear of one circle’s magnets touching the other circle on its upward or downward motion, once activated.”

Lucky and Mickey just stared. Sam tilted her head to the side.

“Okay,” Sam finally said. “I’m not sure I get it, but keep going.”

Lucky smiled. Somehow, he felt that she did.

Lindstrom continued. “The invention is based on the principles that guide our planets around the sun. It’s that simple but it’s that complex,” he added. “The same force that controls our planetary system is used in the magnetic propulsion system.”

He flipped the page of the sketchpad. On that page, he drew a picture of another something. It wasn’t a tube this time, but rather a solid metal shaft, which he called the activator.

“When the activator is placed into the magnetic laced tube,” the professor said. “The energy caused by the interaction of the magnets causes the rings to rise and fall.”

At that point, he put down the pad and walked over to a duffel bag, the one he had hastily packed when Doc told him that his buddies were coming to get him. He reached inside and pulled out a tube, a tube with magnets attached to it, and passed it around the room. Then he picked up a ring with ceramic magnets attached to it, and did the same. Lucky took each item, examined it carefully, and passed it on to Mickey, who was sitting next to him. Mickey, having very little patience with this stuff, glanced at it and passed it on to Sam, where she studied it intensely. Around and around she turned the ring as though each new revolution would reveal something that the prior spins did not. When the tube and ring made their way back to the professor, he picked up the tube and snapped it into a round pedestal. It acted as a base, securing the tube and holding it upright. Next, he placed the rings around the tube ensuring that the magnets in the rings didn’t touch any other rings. He started with the largest circle and worked his way down to the smallest. Once everything was to his liking, he took the metal activator and began to slowly insert it into the magnetic tube. As the activator descended, suddenly the rings sprang to life and began rising and falling until they were moving in perfect tandem with one another.

Lucky, Mickey, and Sam all sat there intrigued, almost hypnotized, watching the rise and fall of the rings orbiting the shaft in unison with each other. It was fascinating to watch.

“Gentlemen and lady,” the professor interjected. “You are now watching a perpetual motion machine, something the experts said was impossible to build. This is the model, my prototype.” And with that, the professor once again took the floor as the academic in him came out. In quick succession, he began firing questions first at Mickey, then Lucky, and then Sam, like he was the teacher and they his students.

“Since I have used my theory to produce a reaction, then, by definition, I have proven that my theory works and proving the theory is the first step toward creation. Now, the next step is to examine the potential of such a device,” he added. “So . . . how do we use this system to drive our cars or fly our planes or, better yet . . . as the propulsion system for spaceships, yes, spaceships in outer space?” he asked.

He walked to the bookcase perched not so perfectly flush against the anterior wall. There was approximately a half-inch space gap. He reached behind the bookcase, slid his hand down a bit, and pulled out a circular platform, approximately five feet in diameter. He took four wooden legs, standing up against the wall, and bolted each of them into its bottom, underneath, and placed the platform, now supported by the legs onto the floor, into the center of the room. Next, he took his model and secured it to the platform; he grabbed a long steel rod, measuring approximately four feet in length, which substituted as an activator. This too, had been hidden in the space behind the bookcase.

“Pay careful attention,” Lindstrom said as he stepped onto the platform. With the metal rod in his right hand, he slowly positioned it over the magnetic tube and, inch by inch, slowly began inserting it. As the activator descended into the tube, the rings, underneath the platform, came alive. Once again, they began to rise and fall and rotate among themselves until they settled into a steady rhythm. As the rod worked its way farther and farther downward, the platform began to levitate right off the floor. Clear, audible gasps filled the room. All three of his “students” sat transfixed, completely speechless.

Lucky broke the silence. “What the hell,” Lucky said. “I feel like I’m sitting in a séance.“

“If I hadn’t seen this with my own eyes, I would’ve never believed it,” Mickey said. “Yeah, Lucky, like some giant Ouija board or somethin’.”

Sam just sat silently. Lindstrom did not respond. Working in reverse, he began removing the rod. As he did, the circle began taking its place on the floor once again. He stepped off and smiled.

“This is the project on a much smaller scale and it’s not easy to duplicate because every part of it has to fit perfectly in proportion to the whole. In other words, the magnets have to be the right size and strength and they have to be placed in the correct positive/ negative as it relates to each corresponding magnet. The rings’ magnets need to be spaced at the correct intervals and the magnets have to emit the exact magnetic radiant potency. Even the outside tube has a set of small, flat magnets placed like a series of steps, just like those you find on a spiral staircase. The only requirement for the activator is that it has to be a metal to which magnets react. After many failures, it took me a while to finally learn that the system needed an activator in order to work, and once I understood that, it all fell into place; the system functioned perfectly on the first attempt.”

“Come on,” Lucky said. “Let’s head out to the kitchen. Boy, Lindstrom, this is something else. Need to digest it all with a little drink.”

“Yeah,” Mickey agreed. “This shit is somethin’ else. Hell, I need two drinks.”

“Now, now boys,” Sam teased. “What’s the matter? Big strapping agents can’t handle this sci-fi stuff? Heck, we’ve been reading about this technology for years. No offense, professor, but I’m surprised it’s taken so long. This can be huge for countries, any country, any government,
anywhere
. Good thing you’re here. That was a good move, going to see Doc. There’s a strong likelihood that, if anyone, just one person, knows about this, there might be a bounty on your head.”

Lindstrom’s face fell. “My unfortunate thoughts as well,” he answered.

Lucky set out a few glasses, grabbed a bottle of scotch and a bottle of rye. He raised the scotch and asked who wanted it. Mickey nodded yes, the professor did as well, but Sam chimed, “Not for me. Got sick from it once. Can’t handle the nasty smell of it. Hit me with some rye.”

Into each glass, Lucky poured a nice, stiff shot.

“Cheers,” said Mickey as he raised his glass. The others followed suit and then clinked their glasses. Almost in unison, they downed their two ounces of undiluted, unadulterated, eighty-proof alcohol.

“Ah,” Lucky said as he slammed his glass onto the counter, upside down. “Now, professor. Now that just makes our little physics lesson here all the more interesting.”

The three friends and Lindstrom sat down at the large kitchen table and the professor picked up right where he left off.

“This system will work on a larger craft. Just picture this,” the professor said, “a saucer shaped aircraft with a system installed in it, similar to this one, but much larger and with some modifications.”

He took a sheet of paper from his sketchpad and as he explained each step, he drew it onto the pad, giving a clear illustration as to what it would look like in its completion. There was a floor, cutting through the center of the craft, separating the top and bottom halves. In the center, through an opening in the floor, the magnetic tube protruded. The activator was in the tube and a computer assisted lever controlled the up and down movement of the activator, thus controlling the vertical flight of the craft and locking into place after reaching a desired height. A push of the lever forward set off a series of computer-activated gyroscopes. A backward tug or a to-the-side pull changed the craft’s upward motion to lateral.

“What kind of gyroscope? What do they do?” Mickey asked.

“A vibrating structure gyroscope,” the professor was quick to answer. “That functions much like the halteres, those dual appendages right behind the wings of insects. Miniaturized devices on this principle can be used as a relatively inexpensive type of altitude indicator and I feel this is the type of gyroscope we should use in this system.”

“Sorry I asked,” Mickey snipped.

“Okay, Mickey,” Lindstrom said. “Let’s break it down. The physical principle is very simple: a vibrating object tends to keep vibrating in the same plane as that of its vibrating support.”

“Professor Lindstrom,” Lucky jumped in. “It was much better when you drew it out. We’re pretty good with everything so far, but this is getting up there a little bit.”