Read Online Jaunt by Erik Kreffel - Free Book Online Page A

where guests were allowed unparalleled access to the holographic chamber’s many activities, as if one were indeed a participant in the gallery itself. A computer terminal below the monitor provided constant streams of data to observers in the event of a failure or error in the gallery’s systems.
    Moving past the monitor, a narrow door appeared to the right, bearing a tiny, obliquely inscribed word: GALLERY. With their heads craned upwards, then cranked around, they absorbed as much of the atmosphere as possible while filing through the threshold. Measuring at least thirty square meters, the facility was devoid of any and all equipment. Illumination was provided by a circle of lights directly above the assembled staff that cast a smattering of shadows across the walls, giving the gallery a rather Spartan appearance belying its reputed price tag.
    On the west wall was an affixed panel twenty centimeters in height, wafer-thin and smooth, which Gilmour realized was the control panel for the holographic simulation. Standing near it was de Lis, gesturing broadly with Roget, appearing to be having quite the animated discussion. The junior scientists stood with the senior staff, forming a semi-circle in the center. Checking faces, Gilmour accounted for everyone but Valagua.
    The assembled staff had but a few moments to mingle before Valagua showed up, brandishing an equipment case slightly larger than a holobook. He parted the crowd and headed straight to the control panel on the wall. Presenting the MP with a pass key, the Marine ran it through a groove at the head of the panel, allowing Valagua’s codes to activate the controls underneath. Valagua slid the security panel up, revealing a touchscreen. He attached his equipment case squarely onto the control panel’s surface, which accessed the gallery’s software.
    As Valagua finished, de Lis cleared his throat, grabbing the crowd’s attention. “Thank you all for coming at such short notice. As you are aware, Javier has been putting in some long nights here at the office. You’re about to discover what his hard work has accomplished.”
    De Lis then backed away, letting Valagua have his presentation.
    Valagua tapped an icon on the control panel, dimming the overhead lights. Only two beacons remained, permitting Valagua to see his panel. He followed with a series of buttons, each emitting a tiny chime during the machine’s warm-up period.
    After a moment, light barraged the group from all directions, like an interrogation. Once Gilmour and Mason had regained their wits, they saw that the blinding brilliance was the gallery’s walls turning translucent, letting through a stream of photons from an array of pyramids sandwiched between the gallery’s opaque exterior and now-revealed fullerene interior.
    Photons spilled forth into the seven colors of the spectrum, flowing and pooling into a flat, amorphous holograph hovering a meter-and-a-half above the floor. The project scientists backed away from the image, watching it maneuver. A squared plane condensed from the amorphous photons, which was soon sculpted into a series of blue troughs and red peaks, with a smooth green sheet as a median of the two.
    Valagua’s simulation evolved further for several more minutes, rendering a virtual terrain, complete with snow caps, rivers, flora, and various soil strata. Even a scaled sun rose to the zenith and descended in the west, appropriately situated for his reckoning of the date. A final touch brought dusk and the appearance of the constellations above the heads of the scientists.
    Valagua stepped to the edge of the image and began, “Allow me to present Nepal, sixth October, Nineteen hundred and forty. Our research indicates a small team of Allied reconnaissance officers were traveling along this route...” a single gesture from his index finger illuminated a blue beam, which traced a path over a low mountainside, “...and witnessed what I—and the senior staff—believe to be