Teleport This Read Free Page A

“They’re here, maybe not in person, but they’ve learned enough to communicate directly in English and with fairly good grammar. So either they got here and learned everything there is to learn super fast or they’ve been here all along waiting for someone to contact them. Either way, we’re in the hot seat.”
    “What do you think we should do?” asked Gilbert. “Should we contact the government?”
    “I’ve seen enough TV shows to know that in situations like these you never contact the government. They send out a super secret agency guy who takes everything you got and then makes it seem like you either disappeared or got hit by a truck or something where the body can’t be recognized. Then they keep you on ice in case they need you later. As soon as they don’t think you can give them any new information, you’re gone.”
    “I never realized you watched so much TV,” said Gilbert. “Well, you did mention one important thing and that was ice, though I don’t want to be kept on it. Instead, I suggest we put some in a couple of glasses and surround it with alcohol to aid our thinking.”
    “I was just waiting for you,” said Simon. “You know I hate to think alone.”
    So it was just over an hour later that our boys convinced themselves to at least look at the teleport plans before making a decision to contact anyone; whether it be the government, the press or their colleagues. Gilbert didn’t want to admit it, but he’d seen those same TV shows.
    Looking over the plans quickly turned into making a list of the necessary materials and in no time at all that turned into developing a detailed project plan. Before they knew what hit them, they had taken a leave of absence from their jobs and began working fulltime with Simon writing the code and Gilbert assembling the teleport station.
    One night, after dinner, Gilbert brought up a topic that both of them had been avoiding, “Hey Simon, do you have any idea how any of this stuff we’re building actually teleports a person through space faster than the speed of light?”
    “Nope, not one bit. Every so often I think I get a glimmer of understanding, but then I look at the next piece of the puzzle and it’s like what the heck are we doing.”
    “Okay, I wanted to make sure it wasn’t just me. Makes you feel a bit apprehensive, doesn’t it? I mean, sooner or later one of us will have to get onto that thing and wave bye-bye while the other watches. And this thing generates enough power to fry someone all nice and toasty. Makes me just a tad nervous, getting in that thing with no idea of what makes it go.”
    “Thousands of people travel on planes every day with absolutely no understanding of jet engines or the physics around lift or anything else that make them fly without any problem at all.”
    “True,” said Gilbert, “but many of those people take a valium before they board.”
    “My point still stands. You don’t have to know how a thing works to use it. Millions of people use microwave ovens every day with absolutely no idea how they work other than it has something to do with microwaves and they only know that because it’s in the name. If they had been named Super-Speedy ovens, most people wouldn’t even know about the microwaves.”
    “I’m not arguing your point,” said Gilbert. “I’m just trying to understand how it applies to our situation. Are you suggesting that we hire someone to hypnotize us into thinking we’re getting on a plane or heating up pizza instead of attempting to teleport across the universe?”
    “Of course not,” said Simon. “I’m just saying that we shouldn’t be so worried just because it’s not our design and we don’t fully understand how it works.”
    “Don’t fully understand it? Look, near as I can tell, we’re going to put ourselves inside a homemade, time varying, electro-magnetic quantum accelerator and blast ourselves into oblivion. I’m a little bit more than worried.”
    “I can