Macomber
adjusted his glasses as cover to rub his temple to stave off the impending
migraine. Andrews and Peterson were at it again, not ten slides into Andrews’
presentation.
“The ion
drive’s mesh? That’s what you’ve come up with? What could the mesh possibly
have to do with anything? It’s a simple weave of metal held on by four small
screws.”
“Yes, and
it’s missing. I’ve combed through everything else, and there’s nothing out of place.”
“Could a micrometeoroid
have struck it?” Carr asked.
“Unlikely—”
began Andrews.
“Are you
out of your mind?” Peterson broke in. “Any impact would have hit the vehicle
itself. To hit the mesh, and only the mesh, it would have to have exactly the
right velocity, the right angle, all lined up with Hermes perfectly in order to
avoid leaving any other trace.”
Andrews
shrugged and nodded.
Carr, put
in his place, sank into his chair a little, scribbling a hangman’s noose on his
pad.
“Keep
going, Walker,” Macomber said.
“Okay, so,
like I was saying, the mesh is the only thing out of place. Now, we know
roughly when the mesh came off because Hermes logs the voltage usage. Because
the mesh was part of the ion engine’s system, we’ve got spare voltage because
it wasn’t engaged.”
“That
doesn’t tell us what happened to it, or how it could be responsible for the
satellite ending up 87 light days out of the solar system in a few days’ time,”
Peterson fumed.
“Actually,
it wasn’t a few days. The log registers that the voltage change happened 27
hours after our last communication.”
“That’s
imposs—”
“Peterson!”
Macomber snapped. “Andrews, continue.”
“Thank you,
sir. As I was saying, the voltage changed happened 27 hours after our last
communication. So at that time, the mesh was no longer there. There are only a
couple of possibilities that I can see. The first case is that the mesh was
consumed in a chemical reaction that somehow propelled the satellite.”
“Unlikely,”
Carr said, “there isn’t a reaction energetic enough to push a satellite to
faster than the speed of light.”
“On account
of Einstein,” Peterson muttered.
“They’re
right. The pictures also don’t show any kind of damage or thermal shock to the
skin of the vehicle, so a chemical reaction is unlikely.”
“What’s the
other idea?”
“A tachyon
current could have interacted with the mesh, pushing Hermes. Since the stress
on the mesh would have been so great, it would have been ripped off the ion
engine.”
“It would
explain the FTL,” Carr mused.
“Special relativity
has ruled out tachyons because they violate causality,” Peterson was more
vocal, this time, but semi-civil.
“Twenty-seven
hours,” Macomber said, punching numbers into his digital pad.
“Yes, sir.”
Andrews nodded, pointing at the slide. “That’s when the ion engine registered—”
“Hermes is back
to normal, ion engine speeds?”
“Yes, sir.”
Macomber
whistled, shaking his head. He did the calculation again, with the same result.
“Hermes traveled 87 light days in 27 hours, if your theory about the mesh is right.
That means it traveled 3.2 light days per hour.”
“That’s
over 75 times the speed of light,” Carr said.
“Seventy-six
point eight,” Peterson corrected.
“What’s the
name of the facility where they claim to have observed tachyons?” Macomber
asked.
“Shen-Yu.
But it’s unconfirmed,” Peterson said.
“Only
because it’s the only facility like it in the world,” Carr said.
“Shen-Yu.
Well, it’s time I talk to their director. We may have just observed them, too.”