There's No Place Like Mars: Chapter 7

Three weeks previously:

The room oozed eminence and all that entails. There was loads of plush leather, books from floor to ceiling on four walls, and a fire place dominating one wall with busts of famous scientists lined up on the mantle. An elderly man wearing a three piece tweed suit appeared out of thin air and sat down in an over-stuffed armchair while seeming to address someone who was not present in the room.

“Yes?” said the old man who had just appeared. “I don't know. Something big, he says.”

There was a pause, while the man glanced around the library.

He continued, “Look, it won't take long. Just let the interns take care of it. They're not so stupid that they can foil that experiment, trust me.”

Another, somewhat—but not much—younger man appeared abruptly. And glanced around, saying, “Ahh, Dr. Vorschatz, a pleasure.”

Dr. Vorschatz said, again to someone not present, “Okay, the others are showing up. Bring me a brandy and leave me.” To the new arrival, he said, “Dr. Benford, I trust you know what this is all about?”

“Not a clue. But if it's anything like the last time Polus invited us here, I'm sure we'll all have a good laugh.”

“I'm not in a laughing mood,” said Dr. Vorschatz, reaching up into the air, nodding as a brandy snifter appeared in his hand.

Dr Benford sat on one of the sofas and propped his legs up on the coffee table.

The awkward silence had no chance to settle as a number of other scientists, theologians, and philosophers all appeared in rapid succession, taking in their surroundings and seating themselves about the room according to an unspoken hierarchy. More distinction allowed more plush. Age and discipline also seemed to be factors. Of course, when you're only present as a hologram, it was all about appearance.

The room was buzzing with conversation and after a matter moments as the collection the most senior thinkers in known human society, from all over the solar system, exchanged speculations about why Dr. Maron Polus had requested their presence. Plenty were annoyed about it. They said they wouldn't even be here if it wasn't for the late Dr. Byron Polus. Apparently, being the son of the greatest scientist of the 21st century had its advantages.

Suddenly, a set of double doors swung open and a young man strode in with all the arrogant swagger of the gentleman scientist riding his father's Nobel winnings. He had black, wavy hair combed back from a prominent forehead. Dark, blazing eyes, intelligent, but conceited. Finally, Maron Polus wore a black suit and tie with a rich, dark red shirt. He carried a briefcase, which he set down on a desk at one end of the room. Eighteen pairs of holographic eyes watched him as he unlatched the briefcase and pulled out a data disc.

Finally, he turned and addressed his captive audience, and act that an untrained observer might mistake as somberly executed, though everyone present knew that he relished the opportunity to have this league of luminaries here in front of him. Completely at his whim. Like so many times before.

It helped that Maron Polus was a brilliant scientist in his own right. But it didn't help that he was completley insufferable. This was the last time they were likely to indulge the upstart, at least in so informal a setting. But it was also the last time he needed them to. Today would be a day of days.

“Greetings fellow men of the mind,” he began.

The merely eyed him critically, a tactic that only served to fuel his rapture.

“I have in my hand a disc that contains the detailed data resulting from a lengthy experiment that I only completed last week, and which I have only finished analyzing today. I am so pleased you could all join me on such short notice.”

A few sparse grumbles were all he was met with.

“My fellow scientists and philosophers and men of divinity, I have brought you here today to show you what will possibly be the most important discovery of the century, my father's work notwithstanding.”

The reminder of who his father was brought some grudging goodwill out of his audience.

“It was scarcely a few decades ago that my father found a way to make Bose-Einstein condensates large enough to allow teleportation of raw materials a easy and cost-effective. The Polus Method. It was this research that allowed us to mine more efficiently, build glorious cities on Mars and Ganymede, and allow for things like food replication. The ability to build nearly anything from degenerate matter is the cornerstone upon which modern technology rests. And research into further implications and mechanisms behind the phenomenon is the widest avenue of modern physics and chemistry today.”

The collection of luminaries stared at him, betraying only the most tactful amount of their annoyance at his insistence on stating the very, very obvious.

“But there's one thing that we've never been able to do. One thing that math and ethics and philosophy refuses to make a reality. We could, theoretically, use the Bose-Einstein condensate to 'teleport' a human being. However, the systematic obliteration and reconstruction of a human body skates too fine, raises too many questions, and makes it impossible to be a practical application of the technology. But what if I said I had discovered a phenomenon and a set of equations that might just make practical human teleportation the smallest achievement of the next six months.”

That got their complete and undivided attention.