Gravity Versus Gravity, page 27
“Including the water?”
“Yes.”
“Can we take our anti-gravity suits and security harnesses off?”
“Yes, you can. And if all of you will now let me concentrate on my work, I’ll be grateful.”
The crane operators started to chat amongst themselves, and Henry got down to his work.
Sandra was sitting with both her arms on her forehead. “It seems like several thousand viruses have attacked my computers at the same time,” she said.
“Not just your computers,” Jeremy said.
“The data has just gone berserk. What mass are your computers showing?”
“I don’t think you would be getting figures other than what we have on our screens.”
“How much?”
“Seventy-five million tons.”
“Yes, that is what I, too, have.”
“And number of objects? Is that the same as on the counter?”
“Yes, the automatic counter. The mechanical counter is lagging behind by a large margin.”
“Has to. The poor chaps would not have been able to count objects when the zero-gravity area hit the Thames.”
“Does the impact area get affected due to the larger mass?”
“No, the area would almost be the same. However, it will receive a lot more than we had expected earlier.”
“Would the water come down as a heavy downpour?”
“Given how much has gone up in the air, I would expect the impact to be more than of a three-degree hurricane.”
Henry got a call from Thomson. “I’ve seen everything on the screen. Is everyone safe?” Thomson asked.
“Yes. Everyone is safe. The crane operators had a close shave, but they made it on time.”
“I can see that the Bridge is almost gone.”
“Maybe only about five percent is left on either side.”
“Can you confirm that the zero-gravity event is over in the area?”
“Yes, it’s over.”
“I would like to visit the site.”
“The Bridge, you mean?”
“Yes, the Bridge.”
“Okay.”
“I’ve some instructions to give for the follow up action. I would like you and Sandra to join me. Shall we say that we’ll meet after thirty minutes at the Bridge?”
“Perfect,” Henry said.
Thomson’s voice was grim. He had obviously been shocked at how the event had ended.
After exactly thirty minutes, Thomson, Sandra, and Henry reached the Bridge simultaneously. Thomson had a big team with him - surveyors, engineers, officials from the Thames Water Authority, municipal officials, emergency workers and a small medical team.
Henry had two men with him, including Harley Quinn. Two crane operators were stationed when Henry reached. He had asked them to go to the Bridge after his telephonic conversation with Thomson.
All those who had gathered looked aghast. The municipal officials were the most shocked.
“Doomsday,” one of them said. “I’m sure that the bridges of London did not look half as bad during the Second World War.”
“It will take at least a year to get the Bridge in place,” Quinn said.
“Let’s go and have a closer look,” Thomson said to Henry. Everyone else followed them.
A small portion of the Bridge about ten meters long stood precariously. It was inclined and looked as though it could give in at any moment. The iron chain which held the Bridge from above was immersed in water on both sides. The pavement adjacent to the Bridge and the road had deep cracks. Two boats, which were docked on the embankment had got crushed by impact from the waves. Over a thousand pieces of debris floated on the river. Most of them had collected near the embankment. Many fish had died due to the sudden impact and were scattered from end to end. And the water itself looked like soup broth with small and large areas of foam.
Thomson turned around and said to his team, “All of you have a good look at the place. If any of you observes that an urgent work needs to be done, please to it. Those with immediate work would stay, and all others would return.”
The team surveyed the site for about ten minutes. Thomson said, “Did any of you find any work needing speedy action?”
Quinn raised his hand.
“Yes, Harley,” Thomson said.
“Both ends of the Bridge can go down any moment. This can happen even as we are standing here.”
“And what will happen if that takes place?”
“The boats may get crushed completely. A part of the pavement and road may go down along with the Bridge. More fish may die.”
“Will we have a huge wave which may come up to the ground?”
“No,” Quinn replied.
“And you don’t anticipate any danger to human lives if that happens?”
“No.”
“In that case, we’ll leave the work for later. It may take us several weeks to bring the situation to normal in Central London. We can take care of the Bridge when we are done with other important jobs.”
Thomson got into his car along with Sandra and headed towards the DIMA Control Center. Others went back to their respective places. Henry was relieved that he could now concentrate on what lay ahead.
Al was monitoring the movement of the area of zero-gravity from his office. When the zero-gravity event began, he was quite convinced that it would not reach the Thames. His calculations kept on showing that the area would end just hundred meters before the Thames.
“How is it going?” Samantha said, putting her hands on Al’s shoulder at nineteen minutes past eleven.
“So far, only a few hundred things have gone up in the air.”
“A few hundred?”
“Yes, that is few. I had thought that it would be in the thousands.”
“On television, they showed only one bicycle going up.”
“They don’t want to create a panic.”
“I’ve even seen several bikes go up.”
“Hell’s bells!” Samantha said.
“And what about the Thames?”
“I still doubt if the zero-gravity area will extend into the river.”
“I cannot watch this live for long,” Samantha said, retreating to her room.
She returned after twenty-five minutes. Al was worriedly looking at the screen. A carton went up in the air less than a hundred meters from the Thames.
Al looked at Samantha. “You know what?” he said. “I think I’m wrong.”
They looked at the screen in horror. After a few seconds, there were a few ripples near the river bank. In no time, the ripples turned into high stationary waves of water.
“The worst part is yet to come,” Al said.
“What are the cranes trying to do?” Samantha said.
“They are trying to reinforce the Bridge to prevent it from collapsing.”
“Will they succeed?”
“Five cranes would not be of much use. But there is no harm trying.”
Al and Samantha saw how the water was swelling under the Westminster Bridge. It was moving up slowly as though pulled up by a magnet. It reached the Bridge. Samantha closed her eyes. When she opened them, she saw in horror how one end of the Bridge had started to rise and warp. It became twisted under the force of water. And then there was a bang.
“I can’t watch this. I’ll close my eyes, and you let me know what is happening,” Samantha said.
“The Bridge is giving up. Several loose pieces of concrete, stone, iron, and debris from the Bridge have started going up. And underneath the Bridge, a column of water is getting formed, which is getting bigger every moment. The Bridge is gone. The water and debris from the Bridge are going up in the sky. The debris in the air has become twice as big.”
Samantha opened her eyes and saw the huge debris in the air and the broken Bridge below.
“What an awesome spectacle!” Samantha said.
“I bet it was,” Al said.
“I wonder if I would ever see anything of that kind again. The amount of water that went up in the air could have filled the Serpentine Lake.”
“Maybe two.”
“Will all this water fall as a huge mass in Devon?”
“Fortunately, not. It will spread as it moves towards Devon. When it does fall, it will be more like torrential rain from a hurricane for a few minutes rather than the whole thing coming down all at once.”
“Does your work get over now?”
“I don’t know when my work would get over. This mission seems to have become a part of me. But I really hope that it gets over after our aerial recce.”
“What is the largest object that went up?”
“A car.”
“A car?”
“Yes, and a tree, too,” Al said, getting up from his chair.
“A tree too? But how could a tree go up if it had not been cut down?”
“It was a dry tree. Someone forgot to cut it.”
“I'm not sad that London is less green now with the absence of that tree. But how could it go up?”
“As I’ve said earlier, the gravitational pull of the comets was very severe in certain places.”
“You are looking so normal. You seem to be behaving as though this is something that happens every day.”
“What is the use getting excited? I’ve done my bit,” Al said, “Let’s have a break and have coffee. I would have to monitor the impact after an hour.”
Outside they met Joe Cummings. “Is the event over?” he asked.
“Yes, the zero-gravity event part one is behind us,” Al said.
“I was talking to someone over the phone some time ago. He said that there was a big bang when the event got over.”
“That was the Westminster Bridge collapsing.”
“What?”
“Yes, the Westminster Bridge is history now. One part has gone up in the air, and the other is inside the Thames.”
“What about Big Ben?”
“It was too big to go up in the air. But it might not be showing the right time anymore.”
“And the Houses of Parliament?”
“They too must be intact. They are even bigger.”
“Oh yes, they are,” Joe replied.
23
Lake Hutton is situated in the middle of Cranbourne. Due to its idyllic scenery, the Lake is a favorite spot for retired people. Houses surround the Lake on the southern side.
Cranbourne was under the path of the debris. DIMA had given an orange warning for the place, one below the red warning for Devon.
“Have the houses in Cranbourne been vacated?” Louisa Weaver asked.
“We had issued a warning over television,” Jess Horton replied.
“Did we not send people to the place to personally advise the residents?”
“Louisa, you know better. From where do we get the people and time to do this? We can think of Cranbourne and other places in the path now because we are done with London,” Jess replied.
“Some of the homes don’t have a television,” Louisa said.
“Well, it’s too late to do anything. The road to the Lake is narrow and goes over several hills.”
Jess called the Cotswold Television Center, and another warning was issued.
“If a huge debris falls into the Lake, the waves generated could be dangerously high. There is a possibility that the houses may survive. However, if there are people inside, there might be some casualties.”
In Lake Hutton, Archie and Alice Robinson were one of the three couples that had not left their homes. They had moved into their retired home a month earlier. The home had just been set, and they were too tired. More importantly, both believed in their good luck, which had followed them all their lives.
“What will happen, will happen,” Alice had said when her neighbor, Amelie Jones had told her about the zero-gravity event.
“We are in the direct line of the debris cloud. And it would be safe to vacate. The calculations show that nearly all debris would fall in Devon and a few on the way. The probability of something big falling before Devon is low. The chances that one might fall in the Lake is nearly zero. But who knows what might happen. Why take a risk?” Amelie had said.
“Does almost zero mean there is a one in a million chance that I might be hit from above?” Alice had asked with an ironical smile on her face.
“Possibly one in ten million.”
“I’ll tell you this, Amelie,” Alice had said. “If debris is to fall here, it would fall right over my head. I’m not afraid. But I can also tell you that the odds of surviving an accident may not be much more than that.”
“So, you’ll stay put?” Amelie had asked baffled.
“Yes, sure I’ll. And so will Archie.”
“Good luck to you,” Amelie had replied.
“And good luck to you, too,” Alice had said before going inside to tell her husband about the conversation.
The next day, the Joneses had spent the whole day packing their caravan and their pickup truck. Amelie was shuttling between the caravan, the truck, and her house. Her husband carried the bigger items, and Amelie helped him if the item was very big. This went on for several hours.
Alice had planted herself next to the window. The Joneses are paranoid, she had thought. They have vacated their house completely. All this trouble for nothing. They’ll load everything, unload them at another place, load them again and unload them here after a few days. They seem to have been hit by the imaginary storm already.
“Are you not going to play chess today?” Archie had shouted from inside the house.
“I’ve something more interesting going on here. We can play chess every day. But it’s only once a while that one gets to see the Joneses making a fool of themselves.”
Archie had come into the room and looked through the window. “Don’t you feel we are taking a huge chance?” he had said to Alice.
“We don’t have an alternative,” Alice had replied. “If we are so out of our luck, we would have chosen some other place. If nothing is going to happen to us, nothing is going to happen to us here either.” She had then drawn the curtain on the window in the kitchen and gone back to her kitchen, where she had found that the meat had been overcooked.
“I’ll go fishing,” Archie said at one in the afternoon on the thirteenth of September.
“Don’t go far,” Alice said. “If it starts pouring, you better be around to rescue me from the floods.” Archie laughed, too, as Alice burst into laughter. “This nonsensical zero-gravity episode,” she continued. “I wonder if it’s true. There might be a normal dark cloud which everyone thinks is a debris cloud.”
“I think it’s true,” Archie said. “Andrew’s sons saw the binary comets with their telescope several weeks ago.”
“Well, Elle saw them without a telescope. And she said that it looked no different from a normal star.”
“It’s visible in the night, they say, and it looks huge,” Archie said. “We should have looked up at the sky in the night. How forgetful we are!”
“Comets have come and gone for five billion years. Why is it that something of this kind is happening now? I smell something fishy. I even think that this character Al has been created to conjure up something. I’m just not able to point my finger exactly at what the government is up to.”
“Just look at us retirees. If the government had paid a little more attention to us, we could have had a better house and a better living. Anyways, I’ll do some fishing and try not to think about this evil day.”
“I’ll do the vacuuming while you are away.”
Archie put on his fishing gear and was out in a few minutes. When he was outside, he looked at the sky. “Too bright a day for any debris cloud to appear. Let me go and get my hat and sunglasses,” he muttered. Alice had started vacuuming and did not notice Archie getting in and getting out of the house.
Archie threw his line from his boat tied at the bank. Usually, he would catch a fish in the first five or ten minutes. This time there was none. He removed the harness of the boat and moved a hundred meters into the Lake. There was no breeze at all, and his boat stood still when he let off the oars. He looked at the rows of houses on the bank and on the hill. There was no sign of life. As he threw the line once again, he looked at his house. Alice had drawn open all the curtains of the house, and her silhouette was visible as she vacuumed in the kitchen.
Archie caught a fish within seconds. Another. Then another. He looked at his bucket which was half full in five minutes. He looked at his house again. He waved. Alice carried on with her vacuuming. She did not notice Archie waving at her.
Archie had caught a small fish. He threw it back into the water. It started getting a little dark. Archie looked up. There was indeed a black cloud in the distance. However, it looked no different from an ordinary cloud. Just to be safe, he planned to catch one or two normal sized fish and return home. He caught a large fish in seconds. My lucky day, he thought greedily. If I catch two more of this size, I would break my life long record.
But the next fish never came. Archie kept on postponing his departure.
Alice had finished vacuuming and cooking. She looked through the left window. The Joneses were gone. She walked across to the right window. Archie’s boat seemed to have gone farther off. She looked up and saw the dark cloud. This cloud looks like a monster. I feel scared from inside the house, she thought. What is Archie still doing there? She opened the window and started waving at him. Archie did not notice her. He was lying down with his hat on his face and holding the fish line tightly with his right hand. I hope he has not fallen asleep, Alice thought. Archie had not. His back had started to ache, and he had decided to lie down for some time.
There were no boats in the vicinity. The place was so empty that it looked haunted. The only sound was the chirping of birds and sound of waves. Then everything became silent. Even the waves seemed to have become gentler. The sound of water splurging against the boat was barely audible. Archie took his hat off from his face and looked around. Everything looked the same, but the silence grew. A sudden loud sound from the birds broke the silence. All the birds seemed to have suddenly decided to chirp at the same time.
