Polar Shift

"So you never did discuss the Kovacs Theorems?" Gamay said.

"Yes, of course we did. We were bad poker players but good scientists." He reached over to a shelf on his desk and pulled out two booklets, which he handed to the Trouts. "We ran off these copies of the original article in which Kovacs discussed his revolutionary theories. This is an abstract of a conference on his work held here about twenty years ago. It was mostly a dump-on-Kovacs affair. They're on sale for $4.95 apiece. We've got biographies you can buy for a little more, to cover the cost of printing."

Paul and Gamay perused one of the booklets. The dense text was written in Hungarian, and was heavy on long, incomprehensible mathematical equations. Trout gave his wife a "That's it" grin and leaned forward, preparing to launch his tall body from the chair and out the door. Sensing his impatience, Gamay touched his arm.

"The books I see on the shelves are highly technical, and you said you were a physicist with the lab, so we'd value your opinion. I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but you must know that there has been a great deal of controversy over Kovacs and his theories. Was Kovacs nothing but a brilliant quack? Or did he have something?"

"He definitely had something."

"But he never proved it by experiment, and refused to release details of his findings to the public."

"That's because he knew the information was too dangerous."

Gamay smiled. "Forgive me, but that sounds like an excuse to hide his failure."

"Not at all. It was a respect for mankind."

Trout sensed that Gamay had a plan, and went along with it.

"If he cared about mankind, why did he work for the Nazis?" Trout said.

"He had to work for the Nazis. They threatened to kill his family."

"I understand that's exactly what happened," Gamay said. "It's all such a shame, don't you think? The man's wife and children died for this." She slapped her knee with the brochure. "An empty theory about deadly extra-low-frequency electromagnetic waves."

Frobisher's pale cheeks turned the color of boiled lobster. After a moment, the frown on his face dissolved into his big-toothed smile.

"That was a skillful job of baiting me." He looked from face to face. "Now, please tell me who you really are."

Gamay glanced at Paul, who nodded his head.

"We're with NUMA's Special Assignments Team," she said. "Would you like to see some ID?"

"I believe you. What are a couple of people from the world's largest ocean studies organization doing in Los Alamos, far from the Atlantic and the Pacific?"

"We think that the key that will unlock the mystery of some unusual ocean disturbances can be found here in New Mexico."

He furrowed his brow. "What sort of disturbances?"

"Whirlpools and giant waves big enough to sink ships."

"Please excuse me, but I still don't know what you're talking about."

"One of the NUMA scientists we talked to suggested that the disturbances could have been caused by disruptions in the earth's electromagnetic flow. He brought up the Kovacs Theorems."

"Go on," Frobisher said.

Taking turns, they told him about the ocean disturbances, and the speculation that they were man-made.

"Dear God," Frobisher said, his voice hoarse. "It's happening."

"What's happening?" Trout said.

"NUMA or not, you've blundered into something much larger than anything you could imagine."

"We do that a lot," Trout said. "It's part of the NUMA job description."

Frobisher stared at Trout and Gamay. Their calm expressions brought him back to earth, and he got a grip on himself. He went into the kitchen and returned with three cold bottles of beer, which he offered around.

"We've told you who we are," Gamay said with her beguiling smile. "Now perhaps you'd tell us who you are."

"Fair enough." He gulped down half his beer. "Let me start with a little history. Most everyone knows about the letter Einstein wrote President Roosevelt."

Trout nodded. "Einstein said that with a controlled chain reaction a reality, an atomic bomb was possible. He suggested that the United State develop such a weapon before the Germans did."

"That's right," Frobisher said. "The president appointed a committee to look into it, and the result was the work here at Los Alamos. Few people know that near the end of the war, Einstein wrote a second letter that has never been published. In it, he warned of the dangers of electromagnetic war, based on the theorems. But unlike Kovacs, who was considered by some to be a bit of a quack, Einstein's opinion had weight. Truman was president by then. He appointed a committee to look into Einstein's suggestion, and out of that came a research effort similar to the Manhattan Project."

"We've heard that the Russians were pursuing the same line of research," Gamay said.

"That's right. By the mid-sixties, we were neck and neck with the Russians."

"How far did the research go?"

"Far. They concentrated on the land rather than the sky, and created some earthquakes. After the big Alaskan quake, this country retaliated. We caused some nifty floods and droughts in Russia. That was all small potatoes."

"Floods and quakes hardly seem minor occurrences," Gamay said.

"That was only the warm-up. Scientists from both countries discovered about the same time that the combined force from their experiments could cause major changes in the earth's electromagnetic field. A top secret meeting between the two countries was held on a remote island in the Bering Sea. Scientists and government officials attended. Both countries were presented with evidence showing the serious consequences of further experimentation using the Kovacs Theorems."

"How do you know all this if it was so secret?" Gamay said.

"Simple. I was one of the participants. We agreed to end research and get back to lesser evils, such as nuclear warfare."

"It's hard to believe there is something worse than a nuclear holocaust," Gamay said, raising an eyebrow.

"Believe it." Frobisher leaned forward in his chair and lowered his voice from habit, as if he thought that the room was bugged. "Keeping the secret was considered of such consequence that a security apparatus was set up in each country. Anyone who became too inquisitive or knowledgeable about Kovacs and his work was discouraged or, if necessary, eliminated."

"Then the Kovacs Society wasn't formed as a cover for a poker game?" Trout said.

Frobisher smiled. "That story usually turns most people off. No, the Kovacs Society was formed here as part of the setup. The reasoning was that it would be a first stop for someone interested in his work. If you had wandered in here a few years ago asking questions that crossed a certain threshold, I would have made a telephone call and you would have disappeared. You're lucky the unit was disbanded a few years ago."

"What happened?" Trout said.

"Budget cuts," Frobisher said with a smirk. "Loss of institutional memory. The few people who were acquainted with the agreement died, taking the secret to the grave. No one was around to support the budget item, so it was cut. As time went on, Kovacs and his work faded into the woodwork. Like Nikola Tesla, Kovacs has become a cult figure of the conspiracy nuts, only lesser known. Most of the people who stop by here are crazies, like one guy who had a spider tattooed on his scalp. The more serious-minded are put off by my Froby act."