Payload

Boston, 1970

Victor Bergman stood still, staring at the picture on the wall of the conference room. In an architect’s drawing the new design for the military vessel dubbed the Hawk stood on the launch pad mated with its launch vehicle, a huge ungainly LOX tank flanked by two SRB’s. So much weight to push off the ground to get so little payload into orbit. There was something wrong with this. Something…

“Dr. Bergman?” A voice behind him said, sounding bored and slightly put out. “Was there something else?”

“No…” Victor shook himself slightly and looked away from the mesmerizing design and straightened. “No sir. It is an intriguing design.”

“Very much so. And now that the funding has gone through, production should begin within a few months. In a few short years, we’ll have those on the launch pad and the Saturn V will be completely obsolete.” The department chairman practically swelled with pride. He had been part of the design team on the Hawk project since day one.

“It does offer certain advantages over the current system.” Bergman admitted. The reusable solid rocket boosters and external fuel tank were a much more efficient design than burning up the multimillion dollar stages of the Saturn rockets. But still, so little payload was lifted. Even the civilian equivalent, the Space Transport System, being popularly referred to as the Space Shuttle, lifted very little for the incredible amount of tonnage of fuel used. There had to be a better way.

He could feel himself slipping back into ‘the zone’ as Elizabeth called it. Better not do that in front of Dr. Gerhardt. He gathered up the notebook and file folder from the meeting and with a nod, passed the department chair and hurried out of the room. He needed to think. It seemed to be right on the tip of his brain. Something he and Elizabeth had talked about just the other day...

“Victor!”

He was striding across the quad. No jacket, notebook still in hand when she caught up with him. “Elizabeth, I didn’t see you.”

“Of course not,” she said, matter-of-factly. “Here, put this on.” She handed him his jacket and took his notebook from him. “What’s got you so worked up?”

“It’d just an idea…”

“It always is. Anyway, are you going home?”

“Home?” he immediately thought of the flat in London where he had grown up and his mother still lived.

“Your apartment?” Elizabeth pointed down the street. His apartment was another four blocks away. “It looked like that was where you were headed. Although in this weather you would freeze solid before you got there.” She handed him his notebook once he had pulled on the jacket. Then she handed him the bright blue shoulder bag containing her own books. “Here, take this too. I have a session reserved in the practice room. Then I’ll come by with Chinese, okay?”

“How about a nice curry?”

“We just had that a couple of nights ago. What about a geographical compromise and I bring Pad Thai?”

“Acceptable.” Victor agreed and smiled at her, the fog of concentration lifting a bit. Elizabeth always knew what he needed.

She smiled. “Good. See you shortly.” She picked up her pace and headed away at an angle toward the College of Music and the rehearsal hall. Victor watched her go with appreciation. Her long dark hair swung back and forth in a silky dark wave over the hand knit poncho. She swung the violin case with a confident air and dodged around an approaching bicyclist with grace. The bicyclist did a doubletake, obviously enjoying the view of the way she filled out those dark blue bell bottom jeans she wore, bells swaying as she walked and some of the beads and embroidery she had embellished them with sparkled in the late afternoon sun. Victor took a moment to give thanks that the universe had brought Elizabeth into his life.

Later that evening, Elizabeth perched on the arm of the sofa, chasing down the last noodle in the takeout box with her chopsticks. “So, tell me all about it.”

Victor had spent the afternoon trying to capture that thought. He’d finally taken a marker and drawn a sketch of the Hawk on the wall across from the sofa. Then he’d added the formula for calculating lift from the Earth’s surface. Then he’d plugged in sample numbers and was quickly coming to the conclusion that if it took that much fuel to lift every pound of payload off the surface, the space program was doomed. It was all about the payload.

Elizabeth listened with all seriousness. She had glanced at the formulas on the wall as she came in, and he knew she was every bit as aware as he was what they meant. She put down the empty container and chopsticks, took up the marker and drew a mock-up of the civilian STS next to the Hawk. Then she added some figures of her own. She moved away from the wall and took in the whole picture.

“We’ll have to paint this wall before the lease is up,” she said, her pragmatic streak showing. She turned and looked at Victor. “Maybe we can bolt a sheet of plexiglass to the wall. It would be easier to clean off.”

“Or just put a piece of glass in a frame. Then we could move it around.” Victor suggested. They exchanged a smile “Excellent suggestion.” Elizabeth sat beside him and they both looked at the equations. “Well,” she said finally. “Looks like the best way to move more payload is to change gravity.”

Victor looked at her. That was it. That was it! Something they had discussed just a few weeks ago as Elizabeth planned her research for an independent study class that he was assigned to advise. He reached for her blue bag that he knew contained her notebook, set it on the coffee table in front of them and began rifling through the tidy notes she had made. He found the page and Elizabeth leaned over his shoulder. Almost simultaneously they reached for the marker. Victor was slightly closer to it. Elizabeth dumped everything out of her bag and scooped up another marker and they raced for the wall. They talked simultaneously. They finished each other’s sentences. They finished each other equations. Words, numbers and more arcane mathematical symbols tumbled over each other.

“If you treat gravity as a weak force—“

“Common quantum states—“

“--String theory, String theory—“

“All you would have to do –“

“—becomes a simple application of force—“

“—a minimal amount of energy required –“

“—amazing fuel savings –“

“--and at that point the payload could be—“

“—practically no limit to—“

“—and then relative gravity would be completely negotiable!”

Dawn was breaking outside the window as the two stood back, the wall in front of them completely covered with tiny writing. They were out of breath, but exhilarated rather than tired. Elizabeth put her hand on Victor’s shoulder. “Victor, darling. I don’t think we’ll need to paint the wall.”

“No?”

“No. I think they’ll be wanting to put it in a museum after you accept your Nobel Prize.”

Victor shook his head and put his arm around her. “When we accept it,” he corrected.

“I don’t have an doctorate degree yet.”

“You will,” Victor said with quiet confidence. “Once it is written, this will be your dissertation.”

Elizabeth’s eyes grew wide. “But you’re post doctoral. You should publish…”

Victor kissed the top of her head. “There will be plenty to publish from this. For both Doctors Bergman.”

“We’ll need to build it.” Elizabeth’s eyes roamed over the equations. “I need more engineering courses!”

Victor laughed. “We’ll take them together. Always a good idea to have practical skills as well as the theoretical.”

Boston, 1990

“Professor Bergman?”

“Yes.” Victor Bergman looked up from the display of photos and drawings depicting both the military Hawk, models one through eight, and the civilian STS from Space Shuttle to Eagle. The first models of each attached to the ungainly fuel tanks.

“I am Patricia Morgan, curator assigned to this exhibit. We are so honored you could join us.”

“The pleasure is mine,” Victor said, taking the younger woman’s hand and bowing to bring it to his lips. She had a lovely café au lait complexion and wore a form fitting business suit with short skirt. “Your correspondence has been a delight, Dr. Morgan.”

“Why thank you, Professor. I want you to know that I’m very sorry for your loss. Dr. Bergman was invaluable in assembling the collection.”

Victor nodded. The automobile accident six months before had taken away his heart in more ways than one. “She was most anxious that her papers and research be preserved.” He straightened and took her arm and they continued into the main room of the exhibit. A white wall caught his eye. “And she was very well aware that this was the true beginning of an effective space exploration program.” It was the actual drywall from their first apartment. Elizabeth had insisted that they sign and date the wall that morning when they had worked through the formulas that allowed the manipulation of gravity. It had certainly changed everything.

“The Bergman effect does seem something on the order of magical.” Dr. Morgan said.

“Only if you don’t know the math. To Elizabeth, it was obvious.”

“And to you?”

“Well, it was obvious to me that something had to change if the space program was to have an efficient way to get payload into space.”

“And now it’s a reality. We truly couldn’t have built Moonbase Alpha, or the space dock or space station without the Bergman generator.”

Others were waiting within the room for the dedication of the exhibit. Many were dignitaries from the space program and the still young world government. But Victor’s new artificial heart still beat at its regular pace. Elizabeth would have been excited, he knew. He wondered how long it would take him to learn to be excited again. He wondered if this numbness was due to his injury or his loss of Elizabeth. He could almost imagine her slipping her hand into his, feeling her excitement through the connection. She would want him to go on, to have new adventures, and find new ways to push humanity farther into space. Until he found his own ability to be excited again, he would have to channel her. He stepped into the room to the sound of applause.

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