Timecachers (5 page)

Adam paused, carefully choosing the words he would use to bring up the subject of the LANav’s anomalies. “I briefly mentioned the stray signals that Dr. Odan wants us to evaluate. After the standard testing is completed, we will begin to conduct some research into these anomaly beacons. This part is not scripted, since we don’t really know what to expect.” No one objected, but all three team members shot Adam questioning stares, expecting him to elaborate.

“I know you all are dying to know more about these beacons,” Adam said, “but there really isn’t a whole lot more to tell you. Ed has asked that we investigate following one of the anomalous beacons and give him a report on what we find, and how the device reacts while tracking the beacon.”

“Just what may I ask is he expecting us to find?” Tom asked. His cottony, Virginia accent had a trace of suspicion.

Adam had anticipated Tom’s reaction. If anyone was going to question this part of the testing, it would be Tom. “I’m not sure he has any particular expectations. They made a few modifications to enhance the device’s ability to track them, but the anomalies could be nothing more than some kind of static or noise.”

“Certainly they wouldn’t have committed engineering resources to add the functionality to track these beacons without some idea of what they are.” He was aware of the budget constraints most engineering groups must work within. It was very unlikely the designers had not considered what the return on their investment would be.

“You’re right, Tom, but keep in mind that most of the developers on this project are used to working in an academic environment rather than a commercial one, so they might more readily agree to development work that has no apparent commercial application. They’re used to the freedom of conducting pure research. Their curiosity was piqued enough for Dr. Odan to commit resources to the additional development effort.”

“What the heck would appeal to a bunch of egghead academic dudes from MIT?” asked Sal. “Is it going to lead us to a cornucopia of pocket protectors?” He winced when Alice gave him a kick under the table. “Ow! Hey, knock it off, woman; that hurt!”

Adam ignored the disruption and continued. “Odan said they suspected that the beacons may be caused by some sort of disturbance that occurred at some time. He wanted some of the testing team members to be knowledgeable in the geology and history of the area. Could be magnetic materials were unearthed by mining activity or something along those lines. Once we follow the beacon, we’ll know what’s there, and maybe we can determine what is so special about the spot.”

Tom stroked his close-cropped beard as he processed Adam’s statement. “Hmm, now why couldn’t they just plot out the origin of the beacon using topographical maps or satellite imagery to see what’s there?”

“They have, and came up with nothing that would account for the anomalies. And apparently the beacons are not just a single point, but a series of points. There is a strong, initial point, followed by a series of weaker, branching beacons, almost like a child’s ‘follow the numbers’ drawing. Maybe ‘point two’ in the drawing will become stronger once we get to point one so we can follow the numbers.”

“Dang,” said Sal, “and wind up with a picture of the Easter Bunny? Or better yet, a map to the girl’s shower room at MIT! Awesome! My dreams come true!”

“Aw, how cute. I didn’t know you still believed in the Easter Bunny, Sal,” Alice goaded.

“I’m talkin’ honeys, not bunnies, funny girl.”

“Anyway,” Adam tried to get back to a serious discussion. “Ed simply wants us to follow the beacons as far as possible and provide him with some feedback about what we encounter. Most likely a dead end, but I’m looking forward to the back-country hiking and climbing in the mountains of Georgia, so even a dead end won’t be a total loss. At least not as far as I’m concerned.”

“Hang on just a darn minute, dude,” said Sal. “Part of the testing is going to be using a hand-held navigation device and following it to some point to discover what’s there? This is starting to sound a lot like geocaching. I don’t know how excited I can get about testing a new device for the kiddie-cachers to use for finding a box of McToys in the woods.”

They were all familiar with the geocaching game. The basic concept of the game is that someone hides a box of stuff in the woods somewhere, publishes the coordinates on the web, and the “players” use a GPSr to try to find it. The box is usually a metal, weather-tight, army-surplus ammunition can with a log book inside for the finders to record their visit and also may contain a few items to trade. The boxes are placed in somewhat hard-to-reach places so that finding them presents a challenge—either a long hike or climb to get to the spot. Avid hikers and climbers would usually have a GPSr with them, so geocaching can add some extra fun to a long hike. In the beginning the geocaching community was small, and finding the cache was done clandestinely so others wouldn’t find and remove the boxes, not knowing what they were there for. As the price of hand-held GPS receivers declined, making them affordable to more people, geocaching caught on as a popular game for novice hikers, kids, and a fun family activity. Also, the commercialization of the game by some web developers changed it from an activity for hardcore outdoor enthusiasts to a hide-and-seek pastime for the masses. This was good business for the GPSr manufacturers and web developers, but the plethora of geocaches diminished the appeal of geocaching to the more athletic outdoorsman. Nowadays most caches were hidden in easy-to-get-to spots in a tiny container like a film can or pill bottle, and a typical cache hiding place today was under the skirting of a lamp post in a shopping center parking lot. There were still some challenging caches being placed, but the objective of most new cachers was to find as many caches as possible. The website encouraged this by posting the number of cache finds each person had, so the higher the number, the more status they acquired. The result was an excess of easily found caches and lots of geocachers driving around trying to log as many caches as possible.

“If it were a geocaching test, I’d be talking to Nutso Dana, not you guys,” Adam replied.

“Bunch of nitwits wandering around mall parking lots looking for an Altoids® tin,” Sal said. “Most of ‘em couldn’t find their butts with both hands and an anatomy chart.”

Sal knew that Dana was still very much into geocaching, almost to the point of obsession. He and Dana had a competitive relationship, and they never missed an opportunity to take a shot at each other. Before the shakeup at OSI, the two often geocached together, although it seemed they spent more time arguing than caching. He and Dana remained friends, but clashed constantly, and Sal was usually vocal about his disagreements with Dana.

Sal was still the most active geocacher of the team, whether he admitted it or not, although he had much less time for the game now that he worked as a contractor. Sal and Dana still got together for the occasional caching trip, but that didn’t prevent Sal from criticizing Dana’s obsession with the hobby. Sal’s opinion was that a serious geocacher should only do challenging caches, while Dana did them all, challenging or not. The disparity of style provided fresh quarrelling material, which comprised the essence of their relationship.

“I seem to recall you doing quite a bit of geocaching yourself, Sal,” said Alice.

“Yeah, but the ones I did took a little bit of intelligence to find.”

“Good thing they only took a little bit,” Alice countered.

“In a way, part of the testing is a little like geocaching,” Adam said, before Sal had a chance to come back with a rejoinder. “We don’t know exactly where following the beacon will lead. Maybe to nothing at all, but I’m certain we aren’t going to be led to an ammo can or a lamp post. As far as we know, the beacons are not coming from any manmade source. We may be taken to a natural phenomenon of some sort.”

“Awesome, dude. Or maybe ancient geocaches placed by aliens centuries ago,” said Sal.

“More likely,” said Tom, “the anomalies are caused by an aberration in the time reference that the device uses for synchronization. My guess is that there will be nothing physical for us to find.”

Adam agreed with Tom’s opinion. Still, his natural curiosity made him anxious to find out what was causing the anomalies, even if it was improbable that they would find anything of significance. Just as with geocaching, the prospect of finding a unique prize encouraged people to dig through the ammo box, regardless of how many times they had been disappointed by finding nothing worthwhile.

Once again Adam brought the conversation back to business. “You guys are on board for this project, correct?” he asked Tom and Sal, getting nods of agreement from both. “Great! I have the preliminary test plan completed, which I will email to Alice today to go over and add in any extra details. Alice, if you will finish that up and email the final document out to the entire team for review, we should be set to go. I’ll reserve the tickets for all of us leaving one week from today from Philly International to Atlanta, Georgia. From there, we’ll rent an SUV large enough to carry all of us and our gear and head out to Chattahoochee National Forest. That’s where we’ll be executing the test scripts, so I’d suggest you all spend some time on Google Earth to familiarize yourself with the area. I have hardcopies of the topographic maps of the area and everything else we need for traditional orienteering. You should bring along your own handheld GPS receiver, too. I’ve made copies of the TSO LANav documentation for each of you to look over. We can get together once again before we leave if necessary, but I believe we can handle everything through email and over the phone.”

Adam was happy to have their commitment and relieved that no one expressed any serious doubts about the project. He would spend the rest of the week getting ready for the trip and scrutinizing the final test plans. He wrapped up the meeting, settled the check, and headed for the Yukon with Alice to drive her back to OSI. As they were heading out the door, he could hear Sal in the background, singing his best Alan Jackson “Way down yonder in Chattahoochee…”

Chapter five

I
f they had not been so busy preparing for their trip, the team would have observed the dramatic changes brought on by the warming weather. The stark branches of the bare trees had burst with pear-green buds, and vibrant yellow blossoms of daffodils and forsythias transformed the grey winter landscape to a colorful springtime setting. Delicately slender blades of grass sprouted on the lawns that had been mostly dry and hay-brown only a week before.

Adam always enjoyed the spring metamorphosis. This year it had passed him by mostly unnoticed. The hectic preparations for the trip to Georgia made the week pass quickly, and he was feeling the pressure of the rapidly approaching start date. He was usually unruffled about executing a test plan, but this scenario was different from any other project they had ever done before. His anxiety was compounded by the fact that they would be conducting the testing remotely, and he was determined not to overlook anything. If this project ran smoothly, it could potentially open doors to many new business opportunities for him and his team.

He made adjustments to their packing list as he discussed the project in detail with his team. They were beginning to realize the complex logistics of the project. Even Sal, whose first concern was if he could check a case of beer as baggage, took on a more thoughtful tone with several relevant suggestions.

Adam felt much less overwhelmed once Alice took on the task of consolidating everyone’s packing list into a single inventory, ensuring nothing would be duplicated or forgotten. Tom recorded the measurements of all the equipment and personal belongings so they would know exactly how much cargo space was required. Adam was proud of the team he had assembled. He was certain he had selected the best resources for the project. They might appear to be overly fun-loving and high-spirited to some, but Adam knew that each could be counted on when they were needed the most.

The equipment was gathered at Tom Woody’s house for him to finish the measurements and finalize the packing. The others would only have to bring their personal gear in a single carry-on to the airport. Everyone had been traveling long enough to know it would make check-in smoother by shipping all their gear as cargo and only bringing a small carry-on with them.

Adam and Tom arranged for the local airport shuttle service to carry them and all the gear, while Alice and Sal would be meeting them at the Philly terminal. They dropped off the bulky ruggedized packing crates with the air cargo handlers, and had just entered the security queue to get to the gate when Alice and Sal arrived. They heard their familiar voices echoing over the constant drone of airport background noise as they approached the queue.

“I do believe the other two members of our team have arrived,” said Tom, nodding his head in the direction of Alice’s reverberating voice.

“I told you we had plenty of time to get here, Sal. You did NOT need to drive like you were at Dover Speedway. Those poor folks you cut off are probably still shaking!” Alice’s voice echoed through the terminal as they approached.

“Serves them right. They were poking along in the left lane. Besides, those dudes were from out of state. Somewhere down south. Why the heck is it every car I see with southern plates is poking along in the fast lane? Don’t they know what a passing lane is for down there?”

“Oh, hush. Just because they were from out-of-state didn’t mean you had to cut them off. How would you like it if they treated you like that when you were driving in their state, just because you have New Jersey plates?”