Breakthrough(27)

“Okay.” Borger started the video in half speed. He reached behind himself for another can of Jolt cola without looking away. He appeared to be constructing a small tower of empty Jolt cans on his shelf. Judging from the number of cans Caesare wondered if Borger was a shareholder.

Borger popped the can open and watched as the Triton descended through the deep blue water. There was no sound but the video quality was crystal clear. At just over three minutes in, the first signs of interference appeared with just a few tiny white dots that were barely noticeable. As the timeline increased, the dots became larger and more frequent but were still nothing more than a minor distraction.

Suddenly the interference became noticeably worse and Borger leaned forward. He stopped the video and rewound. He played the same several seconds over and over repeatedly and stopped on a specific frame.

“What is this?” he asked mostly to himself.

Caesare leaned in. “What?”

Borger went back and forth between the series of frames. He pointed to the screen in the upper right hand corner. “This right here.”

Caesare looked closer. A subtle but lightly colored shape appeared out of the blue. As each frame was played, the shape sharpened ever so slightly and began to resemble a line with a gentle curve. “Hmm… a reflection of light from the sub’s interior light, maybe as it hits the front Plexiglas?”

“Maybe,” Borger said pursing his lips. He continued watching the frames again and again. The shape grew more and more distinct until the interference finally became so bad that it overwhelmed the rest of the picture. He backed the frames up again. “I don’t think it’s a reflection.” He pointed to a small speck on the screen. “Ocean water is loaded with small pieces of debris and organic material. Look closely here…we can see a small piece of that moving past the window in this upward direction. And here it passes over the white shape. If the shape were a reflection this small speck would have disappeared in the glare.”

Caesare nodded. “Right.”

“It’s possible that it could be some other video anomaly, but I doubt it.” He played the video forward again. “Unfortunately right here the interference gets so strong we lose it.”

Caesare straightened himself up. “So we’ll never know.”

“Well not necessarily,” Borger replied closing the window on the computer and opening a program. He typed a number of commands too fast for Caesare to follow.

“What do you mean?”

“What I mean is,” Borger said as he now moved in and out of windows and programs. “Is that we may be able to remove some of that interference.”

“How do we do that?” Caesare pulled up a chair and sat down.

“If we can identify the rate and degree of interference, the computer may be able to calculate for it and remove the interference from the screen. This is a technique that astronomers use with ground based telescopes called ‘adaptive optics’. The earth’s atmosphere distorts the light passing through it so scientists have come up with a way to use a laser to measure this distortion and allow the computer to correct for that distortion. The result are images almost as clear as the Hubble telescope produces, orbiting far outside of our atmosphere.”

“Of course we don’t have a laser to measure with.” Caesare pointed out.

“That true,” replied Borger. “But we have the next best thing.”

“Which is what?”

Borger smiled. “Mathematics.”





Clay leaned against the back wall of the bridge and waited with Alison and her team to hear back from Sally or Dirk. Lee Kenwood sat in front of the computer and looked through some of the system’s logs. He looked up at Clay.

“You know Mr. Clay, I mean John, I can record this session if you like.”

Alison spoke before Clay could answer. “I’m sure they’ve been recording this from the moment we started.”

Clay looked at Alison and then at Lee with a shrug. “She’s right.”

Lee smiled nervously. “Ah.”

“I’m going to get some air.” said Alison as she opened an outside door not far from where they were standing. Chris followed her out.

Alison grabbed the rail to steady herself and looked over the side of the ship into the blue water. “I swear these guys are all the same.”

Chris frowned looking uncertain. “I don’t know, I’m not sure if this guy fits the mold that we’ve come to hate.” He looked at her trying to get her to grin.

She was not biting. “Didn’t you hear what he just said? He admitted to recording this whole thing without us even knowing.”