Space & Time

Chapter 6- Gone Too Soon (Ode to D.A.)

As the team of Russian Cosmonauts prepared for impact back on Earth, it is important to note when Sergei and Leon were developing the molecular liquid diffusion energy and propulsion system, they only had one other man on earth involved with perfecting the science and technology. His name was Nikolai Rasputin.

Nikolai was unable to pass his psychological evaluation and never received certification as mission ready to join the other families on their journey to Mars.

Disenchanted with his government, Rasputin was saddened his wife and son Igor would not be moving to Mars. Rasputin approached a scientific colleague to continue working on the molecular liquid diffusers in secret after the mission began.

The scientific colleague of his had unknowingly fallen in love with Scarlett, a beautiful CIA double agent who was able to capture the initial secrets of the propulsion system as Nikolai‟s colleague would talk about the confusing science in his sleep.

The CIA received vast amounts of information that, unfortunately, their best scientist could never follow or duplicate.

One night as Scarlett‟s intentions aroused suspicion and her cover was almost blown, she gave her unknowing informant a cocktail before bed and he died in his sleep of congestive heart failure, leaving Nikolai as the only man to understand and harness the power of Sergei and Leon‟s work.

The CIA recorded the limited data they had obtained and filed it under lock and key in the back of a secure storage room.

A new custodian discovered the old research data decades later. Doug got bored and began a massive clean out of the declassified file rooms in 2001. The drawings and notes he found most interesting were the files about the Molecular Liquid Diffusers. Doug gave them to his twelve-year-old son who at the time was an avid mechanical engineer understudy and preparing to enter college at MIT as soon as he turned thirteen.

Doug's son, Adam, was so enthralled by the data, he spent the next twenty-eight years trying to unlock the secrets of harnessing the almost unlimited power of the molecular diffusers. While Adam spent his time working as an aeronautical engineer for several aircraft companies, he spent all of his spare time replicating the research Sergei and Ivan began in the 1960's. The moment of success finally came to him on a hot summer night in May.

He had finally cracked the code. Adam spent a few more months verifying his math and conclusions for accuracy. In the end he had discovered not only how to duplicate the propulsion system which took the four rocket ships to Mars decades earlier, but he was able to amplify the power by a factor of ten with more stability and less fuel.

This would effectively pave the way for inter planetary exploration and deep space research.

Adam decided to share his life-changing discovery free to the world in the fall of 2027 at the New Technology and Science Symposium in Manhattan, New York.

Adam finalized all of his presentations and every possible preparation he could think of was completed. As he was driving in his beautiful dark blue 1969 Ford Galaxie with a powerful gas guzzling 429 V8, he smiled knowing tonight the world would change forever and his research would be the catalyst for the change. He inherited the pristine collector car he drove from his grandfather, Arthur, who had earned his income from writing guides and travel journals for hitchhikers.

It was getting dark and starting to rain. Adam hated driving the car in the rain, but since he viewed this as a special occasion, he wanted to arrive in style. He had never been to New York before and was relying entirely on the Google Map feature on his iPhone 12s to get him there.

What Adam did not know was thousands of feet above him two space ships from 1969 were making an unplanned reentry into the Earth's atmosphere.

Unprepared for the onslaught of satellites and space debris, the two ships unintentionally crushed or knocked out of orbit all of the small satellites used by Garmin GPS and Google Maps to provide locations and directions to their customers in the North Eastern United States.

Adams directions quit and his screen went blank precisely as he was turning off the freeway to take a shortcut the friendly voice on the phone told him about in order to avoid a prolonged traffic delay on the bridge.

Adam looked around and was not comfortable in the area where his device stranded him. It was full of run down shops and boarded up houses. Adam slowed the car to a stop to think about how he could get back to the freeway. He had unintentionally pulled into the territory of the notorious exiled Japanese yasuka gang leader Victor Lee Hurg.

V.L. saw the Galaxie and had to have it. Several of his thugs were able to pull Adam from the car and proceeded to beat the unarmed engineer to a bloody pulp. Victor stepped over the collapsed engineer‟s body, sat in the driver's seat and began to rev up the engine. He handed all of Adam‟s belongings over to one of his henchmen to torch with his cigarette lighter.

Then the delinquents got into the beautiful classic car and sped away leaving a fifty-foot skid mark starting near Adam's body and the burning pile of his luggage and research. Later that night a police officer patrolling the area who responded to the small fire saved Adam.

Officer T. McMillan called for backup and an ambulance immediately. This was oddly improbable, because for safety reasons, ambulances typically never went into the neighborhood. The paramedics arrived on scene and stabilized Adam then took him to the emergency room. Adam woke up two days later in the intensive care unit completely unaware he missed his scheduled presentation and in fact could not remember any of the research he had been working on for the last twenty-eight years.

Adam sat up as the nurse came into check on him. She simply asked how he felt and what his name was. Adam paused, scratched his head and replied, "I have no idea what the answer is to either question..." The incident with the gang left Adam alive but with massive brain injuries and complete amnesia. Adam continued to mentally regress and eventually spent all of his time running around telling anyone who would listen to him aliens were coming and the world was about to end by a giant explosion.

The gang's unfortunate, untimely and unprovoked attack caused one of the greatest scientific discoveries of all time, a discovery that ultimately could have brought about interplanetary colonization and even unlimited electricity and power resources to the Earth, to be burned in a heap lying in the middle of a desolate road by a few worthless thugs out looking for fun.

The only positive thing left for Adam remaining to look forward to would be the attention of one of the aides working at the mental institution where he now lived, Susan. Susan was fond of Adam and every Friday she would get him a special lunch of his favorite tuna fish sandwiches. He would spend hours entertaining her with his crazy thoughts on the origination of sandwiches and sandwich makers. Finally after a year of her kindness he gently grabbed hold of her hand one afternoon as she was turning to leave and looked into her kind eyes, she smiled at him as he said, "Susan... so long, and thanks for all the fish."