Chuck vs. New Year's Eve at Eureka

A New Year's Wish

Still waiting. Not much longer to go. So still don't own Chuck or Eureka.

The distinction between the past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.

-Albert Einstein

Chapter 1—Section 5

Christmas Morning

B&B

Sarah looked out the window as she went to sit on the bed. It had snowed and everything had a little on it. She saw the Sheriff's vehicle with its lights flashing pull up in front of the B&B.

Chuck looked out the window with Sarah. Sarah reached down and got the boxes off the floor. She got her top out of the box and gave Chuck his. The tops were Kevlar armor Christmas presents. Chuck nodded and turned around.

The door bell rang. On the way to the door Sarah turned and kissed Chuck before she opened the door.

Jack and Henry were at the door. Jack said, "Guys we have a slight problem. I hate to bother you but could you follow us?"

Chuck said, "Sure, where we going?"

Jack replied, "We'll have to head up to GD and show you. Tess is already up there. You should probably take your own car."

Sarah asked, "Do we need to get Casey?"

"I had Jo go over and get him. He and Doc Ski were not answering their phones," Jack answered. "They'll be up there."

Jack and Henry went ahead and got in the Sheriff's car. They waited for Chuck and Sarah.

Chuck took Sarah's arm and walked to the driver side of her Porsche. He opened the door and when she was in, he shut the door for her. He went around to his side and got in.

"Well, I guess this will be our second Christmas Day surprise," Chuck said just out of the nervousness of not knowing what was coming.

"Okay, so what was the first surprise?" asked Sarah.

Chuck realized he just put himself into a trap, "Well, maybe not a surprise, but better than the presents. You said, we said, we love each other."

"I know. This will be one of my most memorable Christmases. I do love you. We can make our lives together normal and what we want," said Sarah.

Chuck looked at her for a second, "There's a 'but' coming right?"

"Not really a 'but', I gave you the pullover armor for a reason. I know we both would and have risked our lives for each other. I for one do not want you to risk your life for me." She paused and looked at him briefly, "And I can tell from the serious look, that you do not want me to risk my life for you. Right?

She saw him nod his head. "Okay, then. We have to talk with each other. I don't want to be negative, but you can't decide to do something that is or could be dangerous without us talking about it.

"I love you. And somehow that means we try to keep each other alive. Okay, now I feel like I am rambling." Sarah closed her mouth.

Chuck smiled, "No, you're not. Take this as a Christmas present. I promise that I will talk it over with you. And I accept your present that you will talk it over with me. Is that presentable?"

He got a poke to the ribs out of that one.

Sarah looked at him for a second, "One other thing, Casey knows you got the download of Henry's database from Kim and I know that Zane knows there is something different, but you have to cover yourself. I may not be able to help you."

"I'll just say the answer was something simple from a college course. I already did that once with Beckman. She seemed to accept that as the reason. You think that will work?" Chuck asked.

"Should work. I'll tell Casey that pass along a comment or two from what you say. But Chuck, you can't play around about this. It has to be serious. And whatever you say needs to match what you did in the past." Sarah paused. "Is there anything else?"

"What? Other than I'd rather be back at the B&B?" Chuck winced again, as the comment threw another poke in the ribs.

"Okay then, we are back to the Christmas music for the rest of the day," Chuck said putting Straight No Chaser back in the stack.

Global Dynamics

Chuck and Sarah walked into Tess' office. Already there were Jack, Henry, Casey, Doc Ski, Jo and Zane. Tess started, "I have a problem that I need help with. Section 5 is gone."

Chuck asked, "How?"

Sarah asked, "How could someone move Section 5?" Chuck smiled at her.

Henry broke in, "We really don't know yet. There was an alarm. Everyone, really only five people, cleared the area. When they went back the door opened to a rock wall. We have been digging through it since this morning."

"There have been no new experiments. You have seen all of them," Tess looked at Sarah.

"So, you asked us to stay because we figured out the lights?" asked Chuck.

Jack said, "That's why we ask you to come help us. I tried to put together anything recent that might cause something like this but it did not work. Henry said, most of it was certainly not possible, and what was would not have done the job."

"I know it is important to get Section 5 back, but is there some deadline? Are we working against a timeline?" asked Sarah.

Tess answered, "We actually have kind of a factory shutdown over the holidays. But we need to get it back by the first of the year. We have a timing issue on the first of the year. To get that done right, we'll need Section 5."

"So, we start looking for ways to make Section 5 disappear. Do we try the simple ones?" Chuck asked. Chuck wrote a little note.

"Or do we try to find who did it?" asked Casey.

Sarah looked at Chuck and Casey. She raised her eyebrow, "I think we would like to help you. Casey, if you could find some suitable place to inform General Beckman. Let's try to figure out what might have happened. Then I think Casey and Jack or Jo, or both could begin to look for suspects.

"So, let me have a guess. Doc, do you have some portable machine you could use as a sort of lie detector?" Sarah looked at Doc Ski. She nodded her head. "Good, then you can go with them."

Sarah was smiling as she looked at Chuck. "Chuck, maybe you can come up with some idea?"

"Sure, are you going to stay?"

"Yes, you know I am," Sarah said with a smile.

Chuck got next to her and said in a whisper, "Good, then you can figure out what to tell Ellie." Sarah winced at the thought.

Sarah looked at Tess, "You must have already tried to figure this out. Jack, what did you think?"

Chuck nodded and slipped her a piece of paper, 'Check what was already been done.'

Jack looked at Tess, "The first thing I thought was that there was an earthquake that fell in on Section 5. The rocks at the entrance looked like the ones from the cliffs near here. But Henry was right; there has never been an earthquake here. And there was nothing on the Richter scale."

"Okay, a silent earthquake. So if an earthquake did cause rocks to fall on something, the building or whatever would still be at the bottom. Could we find out if it is still there?" Chuck looked at Tess, "Can you use radar or something to look for Section 5? Like they look for coins?"

Tess answered, "We tried that, but the rocks have too much ore to get through them."

Chuck pressed on a bit, "Do you have some pattern recognition software? Could we get the early returns back from the radar and then blank them? That way you could see beyond the blanked out areas. If you get a uniform return at some depth, then that would be the floor of Section 5 and what is left of the equipment?" Chuck saw Casey give him a look. "What junior electronics and FAA radars for a class project."

Casey shook his head.

"We could try that. It will take this afternoon to get it set up. Zane could you help?" asked Henry.

Chuck asked, "Wait, can I ask a question?" Tess nodded. Chuck began, "The first case Jack was involved in had something to do with tachyons. Henry would a bigger beam be able to encompass all of Section 5. And then displaced it, right? Send it to another location?"

"Well, it's not that easy to do. The device was a point of origin emulator. But the original device had a few flaws. It created a time distortion. It was not controlled," Henry began.

Chuck stared at Sarah for a second. Softly he said, "You know you are always my light."

Chuck got one of the terminals and started some calculations, "Henry, if we used the tachyon reference in causality, and assumed that we could capture the whole of Section 5, could you basically burst it in a faster-than-light signal to another location. And then while at that location burst it back. The sum of that would break relativity and put Section 5 back before the first burst. How could you regulate the time?"

Sarah became wide eyed, "What?"

"Oh, simple Star Trek 101 advanced particle physics. Actually it is similar to what we did with the DeLorean," Chuck answered. "But Henry, we were generating the signal from within the car. Unless you can think of how someone could move something as big as an impulse reactor in Section 5, how could you move Section 5 from a generator outside the facility?"

Zane spoke up, "Well, that's the dilemma. You would need something the size of the Enterprise reactors."

Henry laughed, "Actually, Zane is right. From outside it would be impossible."

"Okay, how about your own power source?" asked Chuck.

Tess said, "Well, turns out that we don't have a reactor to power the facility. Back when this was designed, they made an underground hydro generator. There is a large underground river very close that is used."

"Do you have enough single reactors for your labs to build that power?" asked Sarah.

Everyone looked at her. "Hey, had to take out a power plant once but the target was really the factory. It didn't close the factory. They had a series of hidden emergency generators." She returned their look, "Don't ask."

Henry said, "We will have to go count them. I really don't know how many we have."

"Neither do I," said Tess. "I'll get Fargo. How many would be needed?"

"Let me start some calculations on that," Henry said.

Chuck asked, "Well first, what else could do this? What happened to the first guy who worked on tachyons?"

Henry thought a minute, "The first guy, Walter, was lost in a temporal implosion."

"If we had a temporal implosion in Section 5, what would be left of it?" Chuck asked. "Would there be any residual energy?"

Henry said, "Yes, we showed there would be. We could check that. I have the equipment to that in the Section 4 Research lab."

"Well, what else is there?" Chuck looked at Henry. "So, if someone went back in time and changed something, that change keeps going through the next period. I guess what I am getting at, it if you changed time and stopped work on Section 5, and then we would not know that Section 5 existed. Is that right?"

Henry bent his head down, "Yes that is right."

Zane then asked, "So, if the Enterprise could transport people, it would be easy to transport a thing. Can we do that?"

Chuck looked at him and said, "Well, there are a few problems with that. Henry, tell me if I am wrong. You have to know exactly what you are transporting to be able to replicate it on the other side. So, if you had a picture in a frame and knew the exact dimensions, but not what the picture was; you could get a frame with the exact dimensions, but the picture instead of being a puppy, could be an abstract of cubes. For us, the practical problem would be that if someone wanted to find out something from Section 5, they would already have to know what that was, in order to replicate it."

"Yes, that's right. Using a transportation system, they would have to know what was there," Henry nodded.

Sarah said, "Well, Martha can disappear. Could Section 5?"

Chuck looked at her and said, "Good question. I did not get to see that happen. Henry, would that work?"

Henry sat there for a moment, "I guess you could. But that does not explain the rock wall."

"So we could possibly get through the wall and find some kind of field that hides Section 5?" asked Chuck.

Casey started to grumble, "So what does that get us? A bunch of theories but no solution, and no likely suspects?"

Jack said, "Well we could get a list of the people who could have the expertise to do these projects and go check them out. So we would be looking for an earthquake maker."

Tess said, "A seismologist."

Jack nodded, "Then a guy who makes tachyons." He looked at Tess.

Tess smiled, "An astrophysicist in particle physics."

Jack then asked, "So what is the guy who makes things disappear, Houdini?"

Sarah said, "Would that be someone like Doctor Scott who ran the demo?"

"Actually, he would be a good starting point. You are looking for a physicist with experience in electromagnetic force fields or light refraction." concluded Tess.

Jack asked, "How many seismologists are there here?"

Tess used the terminal and said, "We have one. Doctor Ed Righter is our resident. We do not show him at GD. So, likely he is at home right now." Tess looked around the table. "Why don't we continue with the earthquake idea first. We already have the radar down there. Jack, you could go check out Doctor Righter."

Sarah turned to Casey and asked, "Can you tell Beckman?"

"No problem, I'll need to stop in one of the more secure rooms." Casey asked Tess, "Which one would that be?"

"Oh, Doc Ski can take you. That would like be the Infirmary." Tess answered.

As everyone started to go Sarah took Chuck's arm and whispered, "I thought you agreed that you would come with something simple to match your answers with. What's with the Star Trek 101?"

Chuck turned into her and gave her a kiss as Henry went by. He whispered to her, "That one resonated with Henry. He and some of the others are probably Star Trek fans and would know the association."

"Well, stop it, or I'll resonate you. It needs to be something Beckman can understand." She gave him another kiss and went over to Tess.

Tess said, "I see you have started to figure out how to un-complicate things."

Sarah answer, "Yes, we are working on it. I do want to thank you. And thank you for the gifts this morning."

"Oh, we all thought that GD could contribute to your protection, especially after what you did for us," Tess smiled.

"Well, thank you." Sarah thought she would continue to check, "Is there anything else you can think of that could do something like this?"

Righter's House

Jack, Casey, Doc Ski, and Jo left for Doctor Righter's place.

The doctor's house was covered in snow. The front yard had a newly built snow fort and two snowmen. The front door had a Christmas wreath.

Jack knocked on the door. Doctor Righter opened the door, "Well, Merry Christmas Sheriff. And everyone else, Merry Christmas."

Jack stood there, "Yes, Merry Christmas. Can we ask a couple questions?"

"Why certainly, come in." He yelled to the back of the house, "Honey, we have a few guests." About the same time a small toy helicopter came flying by the front door. It was followed by two more helicopters all dashing for the first. "Hey, you guys. We got company. Take it to the back room." A monster truck came careening around the corner followed by two real dogs chasing the dog bone that was chained on the back of the truck. "Jake, what I tell you about teasing the dogs."

Jack looked a little bewildered, "Well, we will make this short. Could you make an earthquake around here?"

"You know there hasn't been any earthquakes around here in recorded time. It is one of the reasons they picked this location for Eureka." The Doctor looked at Jack, "But you are asking whether someone could create an earthquake?"

Jack nodded, "Yes, we are trying to find out whether that is possible."

"Well, you know I just do readings? I would imagine if you put enough explosives on one of the fault lines you could start an earthquake. But to do that here would be almost impossible. There is no fault line around here," the Doctor shook his head.

The next entry around the corner was MaryJo. She came screaming around on her new three wheeler. The Doctor tried to corner her but she turned around and sped off.

Jack turned around and looked at Doc Ski. She said, "No problem."

Jack said, "Well, that's it. Thanks Doc and have a Merry Christmas."

Jack, Casey, Doc Ski, and Jo met back by the Sheriff's car. Jack said, "Well, what do you think?"

Doc Ski said, "Well, he wasn't lying. What he said was the truth or at least what he believes is the truth."

Global Dynamics

Tess, Sarah, Henry, Zane and Chuck went to the opening to Section 5.

On the way down Chuck told Zane, "Hey, thanks for the Call of Duty."

Zane replied, "We got Tess to get permission for us to get you some advanced stuff for your job. That Call of Duty is fun to play." They knuckle punched. "But with the 3D edge, it is being tested as a new battle simulator."

"Well, thanks that's great," said Chuck. Chuck caught up with Henry and thanked him too.

When they got to the opening, the mining crew had already dug out five feet of the rock. They were in the process of putting up a new piece of bracing for the walls.

The radar they had used was now off to the side. Zane connected another computer to the radar interface and connected it to the network. Chuck and Henry connected their laptops to the network.

After getting the crew out of the way, they got the first returns from the radar. Henry worked out the blanking for the first ore deposits. It was a simple angle and timing blanking scheme. Chuck kept track that there was actually some area that was not blanked. They worked on the blanking and found that even at the by extending the range gate to five hundred feet they only got more ore to blank out.

Henry asked, "Tess, what do you want to do. We now know there appears to be more rock out there. The idea of a earthquake or rock slide is not right."

"It's almost four, let's call it quits for this approach. Let's go get some Christmas. Thank you for coming," Tess said.

As Chuck and Sarah headed back to town, they stopped by the main street in time to see the Christmas parade. The high school had a float with school colors and benches for the basketball team. The school marching band played. Chuck and Sarah stopped at the Café Diem stand for a Hot Chocolate.

Chuck had his arm around her waist watching Santa's float go past. Chuck said, "Merry Christmas." He gave her a hug and bent over to kiss her.

Sarah said, "Merry Christmas."

There was a large pop across the street. The building across the street waivered. Light passed through it and then it disappeared.

A/N A little holiday fun. Please review.