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communication devices.
    “Abby, can you hear me? Is your comm unit
working?”
    “Yes, it is. Can we go inside the
reactor?”
    “Wait until Drew does his thing and gives us
the all clear signal.” Lucas looked at the pea-sized camera mounted
above the video monitor. “Okay, brother, we’re ready.”
    An upward stream of air blew past them as the
process began. Thirty seconds later, Drew gave his brother a
thumbs-up signal. Lucas entered a five-digit numerical code into a
keypad next to the video monitor and waited for the inner door to
unlock and slide open. They both stepped inside.
    The reactor was a metal sphere the size of a
commercial walk-in freezer, with a series of cables and heavy
industrial piping above it that fed into the backside of the unit.
There were dozens of valves, conduits, and other industrial
components leading to and from the reactor’s base.
    “What’s kind of material is this?” she asked,
tapping on the reactor’s housing with her pen.
    “It’s one of Dr. Kleezebee’s inventions. He
calls it VX-312. We call it tri-tanium.”
    “Like in Star Trek,” she quipped.
    “Exactly. It’s a chemically altered blend of
hardened titanium and tungsten composites, which have been infused
with a series of interwoven membranes of nanocrystalline diamond
fiber. It can withstand fusion-level temperatures and intense
gravimetric sheer.”
    She adjusted her headgear, then pointed to
one of the eight rectangular devices installed evenly around the
perimeter of the reactor in forty-five degree increments. “What are
these?”
    “Superconducting electromagnets. They’ve been
specifically calibrated to allow us to control our gravity wave
experiment.” Lucas saw her looking up at the elongated tube
attached to the dome of the reactor, which extended to the ceiling
at a 45-degree angle. “That fires a focused, cold neutron beam at
the core. It’s what jump-starts the experiment.”
    He unlatched and slid open a protective
shroud covering the midsection of the reactor. Inside was a white,
egg-shaped receptacle the size of a thermos bottle, which was being
held at the exact center by a surrounding lattice of non-metal
struts.
    “What goes inside?” she asked after looking
inside.
    “That’s the really cool part. Follow me and
I’ll show you.”
    They completed decontamination procedures and
removed their hazmat suits before stepping out of the chamber. They
returned to the center worktable where Trevor was standing.
    Drew joined them, maneuvering his wheelchair
up an elongated aluminum ramp and onto a permanently installed
platform next to the worktable.
    Lucas pointed to the three metal boxes near
his feet. “These were just delivered today. Trevor, would you do
the honors?”
    Trevor lifted one of the boxes with ease and
put it on the worktable before cutting the bands of yellow security
tape with a pair of sheers. He unsnapped three metal clasps along
the front of the box, opened its hinged cover, and then pushed the
box closer to Lucas with one hand.
    Lucas put on a pair of safety gloves before
removing the surface layer of the packaging material. Inside was a
perfectly round black sphere the size of a baseball. Lucas removed
the sphere with both hands, straining to lift the object up high
enough for all to see.
    “This material is called ‘Unbiunium’ which is
a new super-heavy element recently discovered by the U.S. Navy. Its
atomic weight is 121, which is why we call it ‘Element 121’ or
E-121 for short.”
    “I thought elements larger than ninety-two on
the Periodic Table were theoretical and do not occur naturally.
Even if they could be synthesized by fusing two heavy elements
together, wouldn’t the resulting substance be unstable and
instantly decay into lighter elements?”
    Lucas’ arms were getting tired. He lowered
the sphere down to chest level and held it still for her
inspection. “Yet here it is, stable, and in solid form. Kleezebee
said he pulled a lot of strings to