AMP Armageddon by Stephen Arseneault Page A

"The Duke is ego driven. Perhaps he doesn’t fear us. He may view the complex as invulnerable. He doesn’t know that we have his core in our possession. He probably can’t imagine a scenario where we would be able to penetrate the complex. We may still not be able to, even after our efforts here.
    "It is very possible that we will not be successful in our attempt to contain that black hole. We may also find that our attempts to control it falter, or that the gravitational effect it creates is insufficient to overwhelm the active skin when applied."
    I laughed. "There you go again, spreading the sunshine! Maybe it’s time you started having positive thoughts about all this."
    Frig replied, "Perhaps if I wished for a magic hat, as Admiral Chaulk suggested that Admiral Zimmerman do—is that the positive thinking that you are suggesting, Sir?"
    I again laughed. "No. But that was funny! I can still see Zimmerman’s face. That Chaulk is so deadpan. I miss those guys."
    On the forty-second day, the containment structure was receiving the final components as suggested in Quan’s design. A complete inner and outer sodium skin would allow the structure to be moved into position, in two separate pieces, around the black hole. The containment plates would be brought online and the inner skin turned off. In that instant, we would learn whether or not our attempts were for naught.
    Frig spoke. "I am powering up the structure BHD. The journey back to the supernova will take approximately three hours. Positioning will require another hour after that, at which point we can attempt containment."
    The hours passed quickly.
    I crossed my arms as I leaned back in my chair. "I can’t believe we are about to try to capture a black hole. That tells me that with the technologies we now have, there is almost nothing that would be impossible. Excluding magic or fantasy things, of course. And I have to wonder what we might do with these technologies should we fully understand them."
    Frig replied, "How do you mean, Sir?"
    I turned in his direction to speak. "Well, there are no flying, fire-breathing dragons and there are no magic wands, but what physical things might be possible if we were to have a full understanding of black holes, or apparent other dimensions? How small do quantum particles and their interactions go? We barely know anything about those things other than how to make use of them in some way. Heck, we don’t even have a full understanding of gravity! We sure make use of it, though."
    Frig continued his work at positioning the structure. "Hmm. I find it interesting that you would contemplate such things, Sir. That is not the Don Grange of old."
    I laughed. "Yeah, but the Don Grange of old didn’t have countless hours to sit around and think. He was too busy trying to save his ass."
    Frig stopped for a moment to look in my direction. "I seem to remember many Messenger flights where the Don Grange of old spent thousands of hours playing a game called Bollox. I will have to say that I find your new intellectual curiosity refreshing."
    I replied, "OK, well, you be refreshed, then."
    Frig spoke. "Sir, the structure is in place. I am powering up the containment plates now."
    I pulled the image of the structure up on my holo-display. "So, we get this thing operational. How will we know if we have contacted the active skin of the complex? And if we overwhelm that skin, how do we keep from ripping the complex apart?"
    Frig smiled. "Both excellent questions, Sir. I theorize that we will know when the gravity beam of the weapon has interacted with the sodium skin because a pitch-black sphere should appear. A single point of bright light should show from the point of contact as the intense gravity pulls all the light currently absorbed by the skin into that one point and back towards the containment structure."
    I shook my head. "Hmm. I actually understood what you were saying there. All forms of energy and light that are moving around