"Even quantum mechanics," Bill answered. "What's the word from Eustis?" "The Titcher are in full control of both sides of the gate," Earp replied. "More units from the Third ID have responded but they can't regain control of the gate. They've managed to hold them to a perimeter but they're taking horrible losses doing it."

"Drop a nuke on it," Weaver said.

"From orbit?" Crichton asked. "Only way to be sure?"

"Pretty much," Weaver replied. "I don't know if National Command Authority has caught up with what a problem the Titcher are. If we don't push them back and close up that gate we're toast. As a species, I mean, not just the United States."

"They can only fit so much through the gate," Earp protested. "We can hold them back; we just need to get enough troops in place."

"And what if they open other ones?" Bill asked. "Besides, what we're seeing is what they canfit through the gate. We haven't seen what they're throwing at the Mreee. I think what we've seen is the tip of the iceberg. Once they start growing forces onthis side of the gate it'll be all over but the shouting." He sighed and rubbed his face. "I think I need to tell Washington how to run the war. Again." He picked up his cell phone and punched in the number to the national security advisor.

"White House, National Security Advisor's Office."

"This is Dr. Weaver. I need to talk to the NSA."

"She's in a meeting at the moment, can I take a message?"

"Ask her to call me back as soon as possible," Bill said. "And she'll have to get me authorized a secure link. There's something she needs to know." He turned to the three in the room and frowned. "Not one word of this conversation leaves this trailer, understood?"

"Understood," Crichton said, looking at the other two. The two civilians looked shocked but they nodded their heads.

"You're serious?" the NSA asked.

Bill hadn't had any problems getting into the secure communications trailer. A light colonel had turned up, apparently briefed on the earlier SNAFU and abjectly apologetic. Passes had been tendered, a Humvee carried him over and he'd been ushered into the inner sanctum ahead of a line of officers including a very pissed-off-looking major general.

"Yes, ma'am," Weaver said. "I would strongly suggest nuking the site and setting up something like a nuclear land mine at all the others."

The NSA licked her lips and nodded. "Everyone is here right now. I think I can get them all free. Stay there and I'll try to get them all into the Situation Room."

Weaver waited patiently until the view changed from the NSA's empty chair to the Situation Room. It was the same people he'd dealt with on Saturday. The President, the secretary of defense, the NSA and the Homeland Security director. They all looked worn; the director was actually looking haggard. "Authorizations all straightened out, Doctor?" the SECDEF asked.

"Yes, sir, thank you."

"Okay, Weaver," the President said. "Explain why you think I should nuke one of my own cities."

"Mr. President, what I learned from the Mreee makes me think that it's the best possible option and we can't wait too long," Bill said. "The Titcher have a standard method of invasion. They take a bridgehead, establish a terraforming colony and then start replicating themselves from biological material on the far side. The terraforming process involves some sort of biological that eats and destroys all local life, spreading out from the bridgehead. As they get more material, you can think of it as fertilizer, they start building more and more Titcher and larger and larger combat organisms. The Mreee hold them off with those ray guns, which from the sounds of their effect are pretty powerful. We don't have any, yet, that I know of. Our tanks can just barely damage their worm tanks and from what the Mreee said, the worm tanks are thelittle weapons. If we don't stop them, soon, we'll be looking at Escape from Florida. And, sir, we've detected over thirty points that probably can be accessed by the Titcher and more are forming all the time. It might be necessary to nuke them not once, but repeatedly and in multiple different spots."

The President closed his eyes and leaned forward in his chair, holding his head in his hands.

"I'll take input from you one at a time," he said, sitting up and straightening his shoulders. "Homeland Security?"

"I'd like to kick it to the secretary, Mr. President," the Homeland Security director said. "We can evacuate the area. Most people have left of their own accord. Ten hours, maybe, to ensure evacuation.

A clean weapon will minimize fallout. We can survive it. If Dr. Weaver is right, and we've gotten the same reports from the Defense and State personnel that have been meeting with the Mreee, then . . . I don't see any choice. If they break out in a more populated area . . . that will be harder. Eustis . . . is a small town. Break out in Atlanta or Cleveland or Los Angeles and . . . I'm not sure that bears thinking on."

"Mr. Secretary?" the President said.

"We have clean weapons," the secretary said. "Reasonably clean. The fallout isn't going to be that bad, especially if we can use an airburst, which will be hard because of their defenses. I'd wish we had neutron bombs but . . . we don't. We've lost nearly a brigade, more including the initial National Guard force, trying, and failing, to hold the perimeter. We don'thave the forces to hold them, at present time, to a ground perimeter. I have been considering Dr. Weaver's suggestion for the last few hours myself and I have to concur. Delivery, especially airburst delivery, will be . . . difficult."

"National Security?" the President said.

"Concur," was all she said.

The President steepled his fingers and nodded. "Dr. Weaver, thank you for your help. I, obviously, want you to continue with your work. I cannot stress enough the importance of determinating how to control this phenomenon. For your information my decision is affirmative. Means and methods will be left to the Department of Defense in consultation with the Department of Homeland Security. Keep this under your hat until an announcement is made." "Yes, Mr. President," Bill replied. "I will."

The President looked up in annoyance at someone off the camera and Bill saw an officer carry a message form to the secretary of defense. The SECDEF looked at it, nodded and turned back to the camera.

"There's been another Titcher breakout, this one in the hills of Tennessee," the SECDEF said. "A team found it looking for one of the inactive bosons. It appears that they are already colonizing. Several hills are covered in what is described as 'green fungus.' Doctor Weaver appears to have hit the problem on the head."

The President grabbed his head again and sighed, angrily.

"Doctor Weaver," he said, looking the camera right in the eye. "Youmust figure out how to close these GATES.".

"I will, sir," Bill said. "I will."

7.

"I have an authorized launch code, do you concur?" the captain of the USSNebraska said.

"I concur," the executive officer said, swallowing hard. They'd already reprogrammed the targeting of the missile.

"I concur," the navigation officer said, pulling the red key out to hang on a necklace around his neck. The weapons officer was responsible for making sure the weapon launched and followed its track but if the sub didn't know where it was then it would hit the wrong spot. There's no such thing as a "near miss" with a nuke. Be off by a fraction and it was going to hit Orlando or Gainesville for sure. They'd checked the course track twice and even gone up to periscope depth for a GPS reading. It still didn't make him happy to be firing a nuke at Central Florida.

"Concur," the engineering officer said. He already had his key dangling from his hand.

"Concur," the weapons officer said. The youngest of the five officers required for launch authorization was silently crying.

"Insert keys," the captain said. When all five were inserted he continued. "On my count of three, one, two, three," and they all turned. They actually had a few fractions of seconds to play with but it was best to be sure. Green lights turned red and a klaxon started going off.

"Tube twelve is opened," the weapons officer said. "Tube twelve is armed and reports ready to fire." His hand shook over the covered switch.

"I'll take it," the captain said. He stepped up behind the weapons officer and lifted up the switch. "Are we targeted?" "All clear," the weapons officer said, stepping back from a board he never wanted to see again in his life.

"Firing," the captain said, flipping the switch downward.

There was a dull rumble and then a shaking sensation as pressurized gas pushed the missile out into the water and then the missile ignited. The sub was moving and it ignitedbehind them but it still sounded like a depth charge going off close alongside.

"Send message to COMSUBLANT," the captain said to the communications officer. "1432 hours Zulu, this date, launched one missile from tube twelve. Target Eustis, Florida."

It had been necessary to do more than simply clear the area. The Russians were barely a nuclear power anymore but they still maintained a nuclear watch and informing them was a good way to avoid an accidental WWIII. Then there had been the press, and the United Nations. There had been acrimonious recriminations even before the launch on Tennessee, which, because it was an uninhabited area, had occurred first. Protests had broken out in Washington, New York and San Francisco, not to mention throughout Europe where major riots were reported. Then there was the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, which prohibited nuclear testing, especially aboveground. A Presidential Finding had been written covering the fact that this was not a Test but an act of war. The Test Ban Treaty didn't cover those. Despite that fact, France, China and Pakistan had all immediately stated that they considered the treaty nullified and intended to restart nuclear testing immediately.

The Titcher had engaged the MIRV warheads on the way down. There had been some fear that the nukes might prematurely detonate-the Titcher weapons seemed to form some sort of fusion reaction when they impacted-but that was not the case. Four of the MIRV warheads from the first firing and three in Eustis made it through the Titcher fire and detonated.

"We've been asked to warn people, again, not to look in the direction of Eustis," the anchorman said. He looked haggard and worn from being on camera for most of the last three days. He was doing voice-over for low-light camera which currently showed an open field with a line of pines at the far end, the moon rising in the background. "Our cameras have been specially shielded but anyone looking at the impact from within about fifty miles is going to be flash-blinded. If you experience flash blindness, call your local 911 operator and remain calm. The blindnesswill pass. Everyone within seventy miles of the event is reminded to please open windows in your home and take pictures off the wall. Secure fragile objects. The military says that the impact will be at any time. All we can do, is wait."

There was a short, unusual, period of silence on the television and then the screen flashed white. The camera that had been being used for feed wasnot shielded but New York switched immediately to another whichwas and the video showed a series of domes of fire. The light must have been blinding; it was bright even through the heavy filters on the camera.

Dr. Weaver got up from the chair and went to the door, opening it and leaning out to look north. Sure enough, there mushroom clouds were twining amongst each other. Robin had squeezed into the door behind him and it was a sensation he thought he'd remember for the rest of his life, watching mushroom clouds reaching for the troposphere, roiling and pregnant with evil, while two small but firm breasts pressed into his shoulder blades. He noticed that he was enormously horny. And he remembered that he'd forgotten to call Sheila back and tell her that he wasn't in Washington and wouldn't be in Huntsville any time soon.

Just then the ground shock hit and he had to clutch the door frame to keep from being knocked out of the trailer. Robin grabbed him for the same reason and it just made things worse. "We need to get inside before the blast front gets here," he said, leaning back into the room.

"Yes," she said in a small voice.

"We're right at the edge of where the military will let civilians stay," a reporter was saying in an excited voice. "We just got hit by the blast front . . ." For a moment he was drowned out as a wave of noise enveloped the trailer. It shook on its foundations and one of the computers gave a pop and the monitor showed "No signal" but other than that there was no damage. "And that was extremely frightening but we're in a bunker and we rode it out fine."

"Is there any danger of radiation in your area?" the anchor asked.

"Well, we've got radiation detectors and they haven't gone off," the reporter said. "The military says that the bombs are going to be as clean as they can make them, since they're bursting in the air. And the winds are from the west, so the explosion is downwind of our current location. Units of the Third Infantry Division are standing by and I can hear them revving up the motors in their big tanks and fighting vehicles.

They're going to go right into the blast zone as soon as they get the okay and try to snatch back the gate from the Titcher. I understand it's going to be much harder in Tennessee where the terrain doesn't let them get their fighting vehicles up to the gate."

"Thanks for that report, Tom," the anchor said. "And you take care, you hear? We've got another report from Oak Ridge, Tennessee, which is close to the gate up there. Melissa Mays is standing by with a live report."

"I'm here in Oak Ridge where the best way I can describe it is a festival is going on," the reporter said in a bemused voice. "About a thousand people, lab workers, shopkeepers and others including schoolchildren were out to watch the nuclear attack on the Titcher stronghold. All of them were wearing the same dark glasses we had been issued by the military and when the bombs went off they broke out in spontaneous cheers. Since then it's just been an air of carnival. People have opened up beer kegs and started a barbeque in the town square. I'm talking with the mayor of Oak Ridge, Phillip Lampert. Thank you for speaking to us, Mr. Mayor."

"My pleasure, Melissa," the portly man said. He had a sandwich in one hand, a beer in the other and heavy, dark-tinted, goggles dangling around his neck.

"Can you explain these remarkable events?"

"Well, as I understand it, some sort of particle was generated at the University of Central Florida . . ."

"No," the reporter corrected. "I mean this . . . this . . . party. Most people would be crying at the sight of a nuclear weapon going off right next door."

"Well, little lady," the man said in a voice like he was speaking to a small child. "Since 1943, when the U.S. government decided that the best place to hide their new super bomb research was a sleepy little town in the Tennessee mountains, Oak Ridge has been the main site for nuclear research in the entire United States. Some towns have steel plants, some towns have the local car and truck plant, Oak Ridge has nuclear weapons. We don't make them here anymore, but we live with their existence every day of our lives and most of the people around here have never seen a shoot . . ."

"A what?" "A nuclear explosion," the mayor continued. "Above ground nuclear testing was ended before you were born but they used to take our parents out to Los Alamos to see the shoots, sort of like taking the employees to another factory to see how their parts are used. Besides, from what I've seen of the Titcher, it was the smartest thing the President could do and it took a lot of b . . . courage. I'd rather watch fireworks than have them invade the town."

"But aren't you worried about fallout?" the reporter pressed. Surely some of these idiot rednecks were going to have to realize that setting off a nuclear weapon was much worse than any conceivable alternative.

"Little lady . . . I'm sorry, what was your name again?"

"Melissa Mays," the reporter said, tightly.

"Miss Mays, did you have a job when you were in high school?"

"Yes," she said. "But the question was about fallout."

"What was the job?" the mayor pressed.

The reporter took a moment and then said: "I worked in a McDonald's."

"And I'm sure you were a bright spot in that cheerless place," the mayor replied, giving her his very best "I know you think I'm a male chauvinist and I just don't care" smile. "Miss Mays, between my junior and senior year, and again between high school and going to UT, I worked in a lead-shielded room pouring batches of green, glowing goop from one beaker into another beaker. I met the woman who is still my wife in that lab. We have two beautiful children who are straight-A students and neither of them have two heads. Now, Miss Mays, do youreally think I'm going to be troubled about a little cesium from an airburst?"

"No," the reporter admitted in a defeated tone. "Thank you, Mayor Lampert," she added then turned to the camera. "Well, that's the news from Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where the party looks to continue into the wee hours of the morning."

"Thank you, Melissa, for that . . . illuminating report," the anchor said, bemusedly.

"Gotta love high-tech rednecks," Weaver said, turning down the sound.

"I can't believe they're having aparty for God's sake," Robin said.

"I can," Earp replied. "You've clearly never been to Oak Ridge. I think the mayor is wrong, the radiation has had an effect: they're all insane. No, they're crazy but not insane. They just know what they're talking about and it makes them seem a little crazy. The mayor was right. Nuking Eustis was a tragedy; people lost homes and possessions that they loved and cherished and they'll never get them back. There might have even been a few that were missed by the evacuation sweeps and were killed. The only thing that was lost in the hills of Tennessee were some deer and bear and undoubtedly some rare and endangered species of plants and salamanders. But they were going to be lostanyway if the Titcher weren't stopped.

The Titcher consider it their job to makeeverything endangered, rare or extinct except Titcher. They're a pain in the ass. Wish we could be one to them." Weaver was smiling at the rant but he stopped at the end. "Say that again."

"Well, the Titcher see it as their job . . ."

"No, the last bit," Bill said, closing his eyes.

"I wish we could be a pain in their ass," Earp replied.

"Got it," Weaver said, opening his eyes. "Thanks. I need to go find Chief Miller."

"I've talked with three or four other physicists today," Weaver said to the secretary of defense and the national security advisor. The President and the Homeland Security director were both out showing the flag and trying to explain why it had been necessary to nuke two spots in the continental United States.

"And we're all pretty much in agreement that what the bosons are doing is establishing stable wormholes."

"And those are?" the secretary of defense asked.

"Basically what we're seeing," Weaver replied. "Instantaneous 'gateways' to another place. Meisner, Thorn, and Wheeler are the main guys to go to; hell that is why THE general relativity book is known as MTW rather thanGravitation as it is titled. I sent an email out to Kip Thorn and one of his colleagues Michael Morris but got "Out of Office" replies. I then tried Stephen Hawking but he didn't respond except to say that they were "interesting" which means he'll think about them for eight years or so and then point out several things I missed but conclude I was right despite not taking enough care in my assumptions. The one thing we're not getting is neutrino emissions, that I know of, but neutrino detection is very difficult. I've got a call out for a mobile neutrino detector but the only one is in Japan. The point is that one theory of wormholes is that if you dump enough energy into them, they destabilize."

"How much energy?" the NSA asked. "Electrical or what?"

"Well, bigajoules, actually," Weaver replied. "Like, a nuke."

"You want another one?" the SECDEF asked, angrily. "Atthe wormhole? A ground burst? Do you know what sort of fallout that will cause?"

"Yes, sir," Bill replied. "But I'm not planning on detonating it onthis side."

"Oh."

"And I think we should send an assessment team in after the explosion, maybe before as well."

"You can't get an armored vehicle through the gate," the SECDEF pointed out. "And people outside of vehicleswill be at risk from residual radiation."

"Not if they're in a Wyvern they won't."

"Oh. My. God." Chief Miller said in a voice of awe.

The suit was crouched on its knees, multijointed metal fingers splayed out on the recently laid gravel. Its "chest" was open and a seat and arm-holds were clearly displayed along with a complicated control panel. It was vaguely humanoid, like an artist's rendition of a robot, with an idealized human face on the "helmet." "The original design came from a gaming company of all things," Bill said, walking around the suit. It gleamed silver in the overhead lights, a titanium shell laid on a Kevlar underlayer. "The first ones were unpowered and the best aerobic workout you'll ever have. But they were designed for a later powered version. We just tuned the design up, put in piezoelectric motivators, sealing, environmental systems and improved the electronic suite. Oh, and a little radioactive shielding."

"Why?" the SEAL asked.