It's an Alternate Life
by Gary D. Snyder
Part 10:
At 4:30 that afternoon Cindy was on her bicycle nearing the designated power transmission tower. She had waited until her parents had left to do some last-minute Christmas shopping, and Jimmy had briefed her carefully on how to initiate the power transfer before her departure.
"Once you activate the recharge cycle it shouldn't take more than 5 or 10 minutes for the power cells to be fully charged," Jimmy had told her.
"Can't we just charge the cells enough to undo this one thing?" Cindy had asked.
"Technically, yes, but the transfer amperage will be pretty high and I don't think you'll want to touch the unit until it's finished charging. That reminds me – you might want to stay back about 15 feet or so during the charging operation to avoid any unpleasant shocks. What's the weather like?"
"The forecast is for temperatures in the high 50's and sunny. I shouldn't have any problems getting out there in an hour or so."
Once that had been done Cindy had downloaded Jimmy back into the Reality Extrapolator 4000 and waited for her opportunity to leave. The ride out was uneventful, although even with only a sweater on she had begun to feel overheated by the time she reached her destination. Per Jimmy's instructions at 4:45 PM she placed the unit directly under the high tension wires, accessed the Power Management menu, activated Direct Charge, and backed up about 15 feet.
No sooner had she stopped than a bright bolt of energy leaped from the power lines overhead and began to bombard the small device. On the screen, barely visible from where she was, a progress bar appeared and began to crawl across the small screen with almost maddening slowness. Well, that's that, she thought. It won't be long now.
Cindy was correct, but not in the way she had hoped. Although Jimmy had been able to disable the monitoring at the local Retroville power station he could not have hoped to circumvent all the safeguards or escape notice in all of the interconnected electrical grid. The power surge was detected upstream and an inquiry sent to the Retroville station and when the readings didn't add up an inspection of the monitoring system uncovered Jimmy's handiwork. Suspecting the worst the manager of the plant put in an urgent call to the appropriate government agencies, who in turn alerted the military.
The military was nothing if not efficient. Less than 5 minutes after the detection of the power surge General Abercrombie had scrambled a flight to assess the situation at Retroville power station. 2 minutes later, as the power cells reached 96% of full charge, the two jets made their first flyby of the area and immediately saw the electrical arcs from the power lines.
"Brass Hat, this is Sleepy Weasel," the lead pilot radioed. "We have the source of the disruption in sight. It appears that someone or something is draining the power directly from the power lines. Please advise on course of action."
"Sleepy Weasel, this is Brass Hat," General Abercrombie radioed back. "This may be a terrorist attempt to bring down the entire regional power grid. Take whatever action you feel is necessary to terminate the disruption."
97%.
The pilot with the call sign Sleepy Weasel hesitated. "Brass Hat, this is Sleepy Weasel. Offensive action might destroy the tower and take down the entire Retroville power system."
The answer came back almost immediately. "Sleepy Weasel, this is Brass Hat. I repeat, take whatever action you feel necessary to terminate the disruption."
"Roger that, Brass Hat, we acknowledge and are setting up for attack run."
98%.
The jets wheeled about in a great arc and sped towards the tower where Cindy was waiting impatiently for the charging to finish. She had been aware of the jets' initial flyby but had been too absorbed in the status of the recharging operation to pay much attention to them. As she saw the sleek fighters begin their attack run towards the tower, however, she became painfully aware of their intent. This can't be happening! she thought in a panic. Desperately she looked at the Reality Extrapolator, trying to force the charging to complete through sheer will power.
99%.
Sleepy Weasel flipped through his controls, jockeying his targeting reticule towards the base of the electrical arc. "Target acquired," he stated as the reticule turned from white to red and an audible tone filled the cockpit. "I have tone. Missile armed and locked. Firing." With that, he pressed a button on the joystick, and a surface-to-air missile detached from beneath one of the figher's wings and sped away towards its target. "Missile away. 4 seconds to target."
The progress bar completed its slow march, at last reading 100%.
3 seconds.
Cindy saw the fiery glow of the approaching missile in the darkening sky just as the arc of electrical energy ceased. Fueled by pure adrenalin she made a diving leap for the Reality Extrapolator 4000 and scooped it up in one motion. Frantically she began pressing the buttons needed to undo this nightmare, muttering aloud to herself as she did so.
"File. Select." Don't look at the missile.
2 seconds.
"Scenario. Options." Don't look at the missile. Just the screen. Only the screen.
1 second.
"Undo!"
As the now-familiar visual shock wave passed through her time seemed to freeze, slowing everything around her. Some 10 yards away she saw the missile heading towards her, and the distortion moving to meet it. The shock wave engulfed the missile, causing the deadly projectile to waver and vanish like a passing mist, and then sped onward to similarly envelope and dematerialize the jets beyond. It's over, Cindy thought with relief.
That was all she had time to think. A brutally cold wind slammed into her like a fist, knocking her into a deep drift of snow.
End of Part 10.