Hank took a deep breath of relief. “Then it is off, at least, for twenty-four hours.”
Another howl from McEvoy. “That’s just it! ‘It’s still running. It hasn’t got any power source, but we put a test block on the transmitter plate and it goes poof and turns up on the receiver—or disappears—or what have you, just the same.” McEvoy mopped his forehead with a handkerchief. “Hank, I just got through testing air-flow in that laboratory. That machine is busy sucking atmospheric air in one end and pushing it out the other when we aren’t feeding it something more solid. It’s moving two cubic yards of laboratory atmosphere from one side of the room to the other every minute, molecule by molecule.”
Hank stared at his chief’s face on the screen. “John, it can’t be operating without power.”
“Well, maybe it can’t, my friend, but it is. And whoever took those bites out of Manhattan and upstate New York isn’t any happier than before.”
“What do you mean?”
“More land grabs,” McEvoy said. “Security blacked them out, as soon as I’d talked to the Joint Conference, but the bottom floor and two sub-basements of a Camden District office building went about an hour ago—just vanished—and the whole forty stories above it fell into the hole. Talk about a mess. And now a theater in Jersey City has been hit. Sliced the whole thing off four feet from ground level, people and all. Only thing it missed were a couple of small children and the theater cat—”
“Like sighting in a rifle,” Hank muttered.
“Huh?”
“The old time rifles the Germans used in the First World War,” Hank said. “No sight adjustments, so they had to guess distance and windage. Took about three shots before the sniper could get his range. But that fourth shot—hoo, boy!”
“Look, man, I don’t know what German rifles have got to do with—”
“I mean that these aren’t random strikes,” Hank said tightly. “I don’t think they’re retaliation, either. They want that thing stopped; they’re grabbing for the chunk of our universe that has that transmatter in it, and their aim is lousy but they’re getting closer. And I don’t think they’re going to stop until they hit target zero.”
“But I’m trying to stop it for them,” McEvoy groaned. “If you have some other ideas—”
Hank shook his head, thinking furiously. Some kind of feedback circuit or reverberation that kept it operating with the power cut. The way a radio would keep operating for a few milliseconds after it was unplugged; only a “few seconds” in this case could mean days, maybe weeks—
“John, dismantle the thing.”
McEvoy shook his head. “I don’t dare. The Joint Conference made that clear. If we tear it down, we’re vulnerable to arrest. We’ve got hold of one we can’t let go, Hank. A working transmatter has been too critically important for too long. If word ever got out that one was operating and then was dismantled, every stock exchange in the world would fall apart at the seams. It’s that bad. The economy would just crumble.” He glanced over his shoulder.
“Anyway, I’ve tried it and it doesn’t work. At least I’ve dismantled some of the circuitry that could be reassembled quickly. It doesn’t seem to make a bit of difference. You’ve got to get back here and help me get it stopped.”
“I’m working at it,” Hank said. There was an idea in his mind—where was Robert?—only vaguely formulated, but an idea. “I’m getting some impression of what we’re dealing with, this other universe, I mean. There isn’t any real contact, but there has been some exchange. Something we’re doing is stirring up trouble over there, maybe trouble like we never dreamed of. And even dismantling the transmatter may not help now. Look, give me a couple more hours here, and then I’ll be back. If there are any more strikes, getting any closer to the lab geographically, call me at once. And John—” Hank hesitated, then took the plunge. “Be sure you have constant contact with at least three points outside the lab, including one on the West Coast and one in Asia, with orders to call me here if—well, if contact is broken.”
“You mean you’re thinking—”
“—the same thing you are,” Hank said. “That the Thresholders’ aim may get better. That they may hit target zero and get the transmatter and you with it.”
He flipped off the connection before McEvoy could protest and turned back to the room again just as Robert Benedict reappeared, out of nowhere, with a curious black object in his hand.
“Where did you go?” Hank Merry demanded, as the family crowded around the youth.
“Back through again,” Robert said.
“Oh, Robert,” Gail said. “You’ve got to tell us when you’re going. Especially after that box thing. It just isn’t safe, and if worst came to worst, I could at least go through after you.”
Robert looked weary, tired and drained. “I thought I’d never get back; it seemed like hours in there.”
“Only a couple of minutes, on this side,” Hank said. “But your mother’s right.”
“That long? It’s usually only a fraction of a second on this side. I must have been there a long time.”
“But why did you go?” Hank said.
Robert turned angrily. “I didn’t have much choice about it, so stop climbing on me. This time they pulled me through.”
“You mean they tried to drag you back?”
“They didn’t just try. They did it. I didn’t even realize what had happened until I was across. And it was the same thing as before, only more so. More pressure, more fear, more tension. And then another of their little presents before they pushed me back out again.” He held up the object in his hand, blinking at it. “And the same feeling, that I should be pleased with it, somehow.”
He turned the object over in his hands. It looked like a lump of black plastic modelling clay, irregular, but with a smooth hard pellet at one end. He molded it in his hands, fashioning a small animal figure. It took shape readily and held it. “Good clay,” he said. “See how soft and smooth it is? Now look.” He pressed the pellet in the end and tossed the figure casually to Hank. “Think fast,” he said.
Merry caught it, then wrung his hand with a squeal of pain. The figure fell to the floor with a dull thud. Merry picked it up, gaped at it. “Why, it’s as hard as rock.”
“I’ll go one better,” Robert said. “It looks like cast steel to me. Now squeeze the pellet again.”
It was solid, hard, cool and metallic in his hands. Hank squeezed the pellet end sharply with thumb and forefinger, and suddenly the mass was soft and pliable as putty again. He jammed the nose of the animal figure with his thumb, leaving a deep dent from his nail, and squeezed the pellet again, felt the material abruptly congeal in his fingers, warming slightly as it hardened. He stared at it closely, tapped it with a fingernail. “It is cast steel.”
“Yes. With a difference, as you see. They gave it to me. I think they dragged me through to give it to me. They tried to keep me there again, and they’re still frightened, plenty frightened, and they tried to frighten me again, too, but this time I was onto them. One thing I was sure of. That last gadget, the box, caused some real chagrin over there. It wasn’t supposed to disintegrate walls, at least this was the strong impression that I got. They were horrified to know that something odd had happened with it, and they knew, apparently.”