Radiation Hazard (The Stasis Stories #3) Read online

  “Yeah. It’d have to pass around half the circumference of the blimp, which is seventy-eight and a half feet. That only leaves a smidge over eleven feet to dangle on each side, whereas the distance to the ground will be half the diameter, or twenty-five feet.”

  “Damn!” she said, “I’d sell my soul to have a calculator like that in my head.”

  Gunnar said, “Let’s do it in the morning. I’ll bring another rope and we can tie them together.”

  “Okay,” Kaem said, “But we need to start working on it first thing in the morning. That temporary Stade’s only going to last fifty kiloseconds.”

  “And, my captain, my genius,” Gunnar asked sarcastically, “how long is that?”

  “Oh, sorry. That’s 13.91 hours. It was just a little after seven PM when we stazed the blimp’s inner Stade, so we’ve got to check it, possibly weld on knobs and roll it, staze any defects, blow up the positioners, inflate it a little more, then staze the outer layer, all before nine o’clock.”

  With a scoff, Gunnar said, “I’ll go get the rope right now.”

  “It’s already too dark for us to see whether the rope’s deforming the top of the bag.”

  “First light then.”

  Kaem queried his phone. “Sunrise is gonna be at 5:51 AM. Let’s meet here at 5:40. I’ll bring cheesy biscuits.”

  Lee said, “I’ll bring coffee.”

  “I’ll bring the rope and my drone,” Gunnar said.

  “Hey!” Arya whined, “What about my beauty rest?”

  “You don’t need to be any prettier,” Gunnar said, sounding grumpy, but Kaem thought he’d meant it as a compliment.

  ***

  Despite the early hour, everyone was cheerful. To Kaem’s dismay, the rope did show some soft spots on the top of the blimp.

  Lee’s idea of welding Stade bumps to the big Stade inside the blimp worked as soon as Gunnar had fashioned some Styrofoam bumps covered with Mylar they could staze onto it. They’d weld on a bump through the zippered window, turn the big Stade—which was easy because it was frictionless and as heavy as air—then weld on another bump and roll it a little farther. When they’d turned it far enough that they could feel the soft spots through the Mylar near the stazing fixtures, they zipped the window closed while holding the bump through the Mylar. They blew just a little air into the blimp to firm up the soft spots and stazed it again.

  The soft spots disappeared.

  Even Gunnar grunted a little cheer. He set the pump going and ran it for four minutes, which by calculation should have given them an outer Stade shell a little over a centimeter thick. They only needed a millimeter, but he’d rather have it thick than have defects.

  The rest of the team ran around inflating the spacers, which were inflatable pillows inside the wall of the Mylar blimp that acted to center the inner Stade. They were also made of Mylar so they’d leave defects in the Stade shell. Defects that could act as windows to let in a bit of sunlight if it served as a building or be used to pressurize and depressurize the Stade blimp. Fortunately—since they couldn’t have reached them otherwise—Gunnar’d thought far enough ahead to have the spacers up top have long inflation hoses dangling from them.

  Finally, Kaem stazed the outer shell to make their actual Stade blimp.

  They were done with time to spare, so they all went out to breakfast together during the wait to see what they’d find when the inner Stade disappeared.

  ~~~

  When they got back, the inner Stade was gone. The Stade blimp that remained was almost complete—of course excepting the windows left by the positioning spacers—but there was a defect near one end where the Stade hadn’t been centered well enough.

  Upset, Gunnar swore and said, “I shoulda gone for a three-centimeter wall thickness. It wouldn’t have weighed that much!”

  Kaem said, “It wouldn’t have weighed anything till you got to higher altitudes. But this isn’t a big deal. We can weld a patch over that hole.”

  Gunnar frowned, then smiled, “Yeah, we can cut sheet Styrofoam to fit, then put Mylar over it.”

  “The big problem’s going to be getting the Mylar to stay touching the blimp. We can’t stick it to Stade.”

  “I’ll cut a ring of Styrofoam we can push up against it.”

  Kaem sighed, “I guess I’d better talk to Mr. X about how we need an even more powerful stazer to staze blimps with. Especially for blimps even bigger than this one.” He sequestered himself in a corner of the building and started designing the circuits for the high powered stazer he would later claim came from the mysterious X.

  When Gunnar was ready to weld the patch over the hole in the blimp, Kaem helped him. When they had a moment alone, he said, “Hey, we need to test the thermite system on the stazer.”

  Gunnar frowned, “You’re just going to waste a stazer?”

  “Yeah, I want to be sure it totally destroys the electronics. Making sure we can keep anybody from stealing the tech is worth the cost.”

  “You built an extra one to do the test with?”

  “Yeah, but if it fails the test, the stazer we’re currently using won’t be any good either. Well, I mean it’ll still work, but we’ll have to worry all the time about it getting stolen. We want to make sure we’ve got a thermite system that works before we make a bunch of stazers and rent them out so other people can start stazing things.”

  Gunnar drew back. “I thought you were going to do all the stazing?”

  “Stazing’s going to be happening all over the world Gunnar. I can’t do all of it! But we can try to be sure no one can reverse engineer one, then build their own.”

  When everyone was ready to go home that afternoon, Gunnar and Kaem started setting the extra stazer up near the door of the big room. They set Gunnar’s phone up on a tripod so it could video the event.

  Lee stopped by on her way out. “What’re you guys doing?”

  “The stazers have systems in them that’re intended to keep people like Ricard Caron from opening them up and trying to reverse engineer them. Mr. X wants those systems tested.”

  “Really? How do they work?”

  Kaem lowered his voice into that of a caricature movie villain. “I could tell ya, but then your life would be forfeit.”

  “Really?”

  “No.” Kaem smiled at her, “It’s some kind of thermite pyrotechnics that’re supposed to destroy all the electronics in the case. Not sure exactly how it’s supposed to work but it doesn’t sound safe. So, we’re gonna set it off, then fly out through the anteroom and watch it on my laptop outside.”

  “Whose phone is that?”

  “Gunnar’s”

  Lee turned to Gunnar, “What if it destroys your phone?”

  “I’ve been wanting a new one. Kinda hope it goes up in smoke so the company’ll have to buy me another.”

  “Can I watch with you guys?”

  “Sure,” Kaem said, “but step all the way outside so you won’t slow my exit.”

  “Your exit?” Gunnar said. “I’m the one who’s setting this thing off. It requires expertise with tools. Besides, I can’t risk you getting hurt. My investment would go up in smoke.” He picked up a power drill with a socket wrench on the end of it. He pointed, “Any bolt, right?”

  Kaem thought about arguing, but he still hadn’t set up a system to tell the others how to build stazers if he got hurt. Reluctantly, he nodded.

  Lee picked up the laptop with the vid displaying on it and stepped out through both doors to stand holding the outer door open. Kaem held the inner door open and nodded at Gunnar.

  Gunnar spun the bolt out, dropped the drill, and hustled out past Kaem. Behind him, an alarm started coming from the stazer. A moment later a vocal message said to clear the area as the stazer was about to be thermally destroyed. This began to alternate with the alarm.

  Kaem let go of the inner door, made sure it was swinging closed, and then hurried out behind Gunnar. They all gathered around the screen. Lee said, “Just removing a b
olt sets off the thermite?”

  Kaem nodded, “Apparently so.”

  After a minute, Gunnar disgustedly said, “Nothing’s happening.”

  “Give it another few seconds,” Kaem said. “A grenade could’ve gone off inside that double boxed Stade and, other than the bang, we wouldn’t know it.”

  Suddenly smoke started pouring out through the little vent holes in the case. Kaem turned and gave Gunnar a high-five.

  Puzzled, Lee asked, “Why are you guys so excited? This is Mr. X’s thing, right?”

  “Um, yeah,” Kaem said, “it’s just good that something’s gone right today.” He looked at Gunnar, “You think it’s safe to go back in there and see how bad the fumes are?”

  Fortunately, Lee wasn’t looking at them. Gunnar nudged Kaem with an elbow as he spoke in his usual crotchety tone, “Haven’t got a clue. I have no idea how much thermite X used. Um, but it does look like the amount of smoke’s falling off. Give it a few more minutes and I think we can crack the door and take a sniff.”

  They let five minutes pass. Then, with Lee carrying the laptop so they could keep an eye on the stazer, they made their way to the inner door and cracked it. The smell of hot metal and melting/burning plastic wafted out, but it was mild. After a minute or two they opened the door the rest of the way and stepped inside.

  Gunnar passed his hand through the much-diminished smoke coming out of the vent holes on the near side. “Warm, not hot,” he said.

  Sounding puzzled, Lee said, “I never noticed all those holes.”

  Kaem shrugged, “We need them for ventilation to keep the electronics cool, especially since Stade’s a perfect insulator. There’s a lot of small ones at big offsets to make it impossible to look inside with fiberoptic devices. But, because the Stade of the cover’s so rough and reflective, they’re not very noticeable.”

  “Oh, yeah. That roughness must be why you can kind of get a grip on the stazer.”

  “Your skin gets pressed into the indentations and holes. That gives you a grip just like on a bumpy glass.”

  Gunnar had picked up the drill and started spinning out the rest of the bolts. This produced little bursts of additional smoke as the other fuses ignited, but it was obvious that the main thermite fire inside the case was out.

  He spun the nuts out of the inner Stade box and lifted the lid off of it too. More small puffs of smoke came out, but they still weren’t worrisome.

  As Gunnar spun the bolts out of the inner steel box, Lee turned to Kaem. “The inner box is metal?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Why not Stade?”

  “So, someone can’t rapidly open all the boxes by using another stazer to de-staze all three Stade boxes bing-bang-boom.”

  “Oh,” she said.

  She stared thoughtfully as Gunnar carefully touched the lid of the steel box and proclaimed it “Warm, but not hot.”

  Lee asked, “What if they de-staze the two outer boxes bing-bang, then just unscrew the bolts on the inner steel box.”

  “I don’t know. I’d imagine Mr. X has something planned to fire off the thermite in that situation too, but I don’t know what it is.” Kaem shrugged as if mystified, “Heck, I’m not even sure how unscrewing a bolt on the outer case sets off the thermite inside the inner case.”

  Gunnar lifted off the lid of the steel case. When he did, a small puff of smoke wafted up, then they were all staring at a mangled mess of electronics that looked as if it’d been melted, then violently rearranged. “Holy crap!” he said.

  Kaem would’ve said it was the most gleeful tone he’d ever heard in the man’s voice. He’s getting off on this. I’ll bet he loves firecrackers too. He turned to Lee, “You think you could look through that mess and figure out how to build yourself a stazer?”

  Though Kaem had been joking, she took him seriously. “If you’d like. Can I wait till tomorrow to give it a try?”

  “Sure,” Kaem said. “Mr. X would like to know whether this is good enough, or whether he should try to build something better. If you give it a pass, he’ll start building us some more stazers.”

  Gunnar grabbed his stuff, “I’m outta here. I’ll clean this up in the morning.”

  “See ya,” Kaem said as Gunnar exited. Lee echoed the sentiment.

  Lee turned to Kaem, “Grumpy as he is, I’m starting to like him. Um… Can I buy you dinner?”

  “Uh,” Kaem said, caught by surprise. “Sure. I’ll buy though. After all, you’re on half-pay.”

  She snorted, “Plus half from Space-Gen. I can afford to buy dinner.”

  They took an Uber, stopping at their apartments to change. It turned out her apartment wasn’t that far from his new one, which wasn’t far from work. His was fairly close to Arya’s because he’d planned it that way.

  Then he and Lee took the Uber to a little hole in the wall restaurant nearby called The Kitchen. “I love this place,” she said, “The ambiance is terrible, kind of like a café. But the food’s amazing. Mostly Italian, but with other flavors from all over the world.”

  “I’m… picky and don’t like weird flavors. But I like Italian, so it’ll be good.”

  As they got out of the Uber, she said contemplatively, “I thought you’d have your own car.”

  “I ran the numbers. It’s cheaper to take Ubers. Especially because my apartment’s close enough I walk to work most of the time.”

  “Aren’t you flush with money from your share of Staze?”

  Kaem shrugged. “It’s a small share. I guess I could be doing pretty well if Staze makes a lot more money someday.”

  The hostess seated them at a table near the back. There, Lee offered some suggestions on the menu.

  Kaem started freaking out. Is this a date? he wondered. Or are we just workmates out for a meal together? Am I cheating on Arya? It doesn’t seem like it would be cheating. We’ve only gone out to dinner and a movie once. We haven’t even kissed… unless that kiss on the cheek she gave me counts? Besides, aren’t her parents arranging her marriage? And I think you’re supposed to date several different people before you settle down, aren’t you? Being sickly, Kaem’s dating life in high school had been non-existent. And in college, trying to send every penny home to his family, he hadn’t socialized either. And, if I had asked any girls to go somewhere with me, they probably would’ve said no. No. Make that definitely would’ve rejected me. Lee’s probably only interested in me because of Staze. Arya isn’t interested. She didn’t say anything about being exclusive—

  “Kaem?” Lee said.

  He suddenly realized she’d said his name once before. And she’d been talking before that! “Huh? Sorry, I was thinking about… something else. What’d you say?”

  “I was asking if I could go with you tomorrow when you go look at the toxic land. Or is the project you’re bidding on down at the coast some kind of secret?”

  Ah, this is a business dinner, Kaem thought. He was relieved that he didn’t have to worry about whether he was cheating on Arya.

  And, he felt terribly disappointed to learn Lee hadn’t asked him to dinner just because she liked him.

  “Kaem?”

  “Um, yeah. You’re welcome to come. Same old stuff about keeping Staze’s secrets apply, but I’d love to have your insights.”

  “What kind of thing are you bidding on?”

  “You heard about the accident they had at the Surbury reactor?”

  “That’s down at the coast?”

  “Close to it,” Kaem said. “They cool the steam cycle for their generator turbines with water from one of the big estuaries.”

  Lee frowned. She spoke carefully, “I’m not a supporter of nuclear energy. Especially now that solar’s so cheap. What are you planning to do for them?”

  “When people say nuclear ‘can’t compete on price,’ that’s only true if you’re talking about building a new plant. The capital costs are so high it can’t compete if you have to invest the money to buy the land and build a reactor. But, if you’ve alrea
dy got a plant, then it’s very competitive. So, shutting a reactor down without getting your money’s worth out of the original investment is fiscally irresponsible. Also, you can argue it’s better for the environment than solar.”

  “What? How can it be better for the environment?”

  Kaem shrugged, “Solar farms use a lot of land that otherwise could be wilderness. Solar cells don’t last forever. And they’re not being recycled, they’re going in landfills.”

  She drew back, “Nuclear produces radioactive waste that lasts thousands of years!”

  “Not very much of it. All the spent fuel waste ever produced in the US could be stacked seventy feet high on one football field.”

  “Okaay,” Lee said slowly, “But isn’t Surbury already shut down because of their disaster?”

  “Um, if you’re gonna go with us, you need to call it an ‘event,’ not a disaster. They don’t like the connotations of the d-word.”

  “Come on! They had a nuclear meltdown. It destroyed their plant and released radioactive cesium! That’s a freaking disaster!”

  Kaem held up his hand. “They had a small meltdown that destroyed one reactor. They’ve still got another reactor and the plant’s still making electricity. Though it’s true they vented a small amount of steam contaminated with cesium 137, but the amount of radioactivity released wasn’t enough to endanger anyone. Even someone standing right next to the plant for the entire venting episode would’ve only got about ten-millirems.”

  “And, how much is ten-millirems?”

  “Ten-millirems is ten-millirems,” Kaem said with a grin. “Sorry, I know what you’re asking. It’s about the amount of radiation you get from a chest x-ray.”

  “I wouldn’t want to get a chest x-ray every day.”

  “This wasn’t every day. Just one day. But still, they’ve got a highly radioactive reactor that isn’t functioning.”

  “And Stade reflects radiation. So, are we going to build some kind of Stade robot that can go in there and work on it?”

  “Hah!” Kaem leaned back in his chair. “I hadn’t thought of that angle. How are you thinking that’d work?”

  “I haven’t thought about it. I was just asking if that was your plan.”