“And the Cold Fusion idea was killed?”
“If so! Fleischmann worked on his Cold Fusion until his death in 2012. He had generous research grants. The US Navy gave money, and the Italian INFN. Fleischmann even got himself an apprentice genius: Vincenzo Rossi, an Italian engineer. Based on the Fleischmann research, Rossi made a machine called D-CAT. I believe the press release was dated 2011.”
“That's why I did not hear these names,” Kate says, “In the 2011, I was just one-year-old! I did not care about the machines. Even a Barbie doll was way over my level.”
“What did this machine do?” I ask.
“The machine was top secret. Rossi said it converted nickel into copper. At the same time, on one kilogram of nickel the machine could produce ten kilowatts of electricity for ten thousand hours.”
“Ten kilowatts of electricity? But this is…” I see how Kate moves her lips calculating something in the head, “Shit! Your solar-charged light bulb here – about two watts. Ten kilowatts – it's five thousand such light bulbs! Each house in our Slum can have a light!”
“Ten kilowatts is not as much as you may think, dear Missis Bowen. In the modern slums we don't have enough electricity. But before the Meltdown the electricity was way more accessible. For instance to boil a kettle, you need one and a half or two kilowatts. Do you remember electric kettles?”
“The electric kettles? Yes, I remember them quite well! I was… six years old. Or maybe seven, not sure. We still used an electric kettle. But then they cut our electricity for no-payments, and since then we boiled water whatever way we could.”
“But if Rossi invented this wonderful machine, why there was the Meltdown first place?” I ask.
“In 2015, Vincenzo Rossi disappeared.”
“Disappeared?”
“Yeah. The rumors were that he was assassinated. The oil companies did not want people to have cheap energy.”
“And the Rossi's invention? The machine?” Kate asks.
“Everything disappeared. Someone stole all the papers and all the computers, smashed the laboratory instruments, and sat the place on fire.”
“What a shame,” I say, “If Rossi was alive, the Slum kids wouldn't collect cow dung now. But what did this Rossi have in common with our Chen Te-Sheng?”
“Pretty much everything. Twenty years ago, Chen was the Chief Scientist at the Rossi's research lab.”
“So you're saying someone is trying to kill Mister Chen?” I exclaim, “No, wait, that's stupid. Who would want to kill him? The oil companies are all bankrupt, and the oil is controlled by the Senate commission. Besides, Kate guessed right about the double. They didn't want to kill Chen! They are after the Rossi's invention! Right?”
“Right. They are after the D-CAT.”
“But of course! If somebody has such a machine…” I ruffle my hair, “Damn! Damn! With such a machine… Wow! The Meltdown will be over! Ten kilowatts! Surely, one can make more than one machine! One machine for each Patch. No, I'm talking nonsense again! No freaking Patches! We don't need slums anymore! Everybody can have a big house. And in every house there will be this energy machine…”
“In the house you can have water taps,” ,Kate smiles, “Just open the tap – and get as much water as you want: a bucket, or a barrel. No, not barrel! You can fill a bathtub! Can you imagine, Wile E. Coyote: a bathtub full of hot water?”
“You know, Road Runner, we can quit the Police! We will buy a car! No, not just a car. We buy a camper! A Winnebago with a king-size bed! There are still some in the slums. Of course, they don't run now, but we can fix it. Put a couple of electric motors in, and make it run on electricity. We can go anyplace we want. California! We are the Navy sailors! We both have served in the Atlantic, now must look at the Pacific too.”
Mr. Lee looks at us with a sad smile. He turns to his desk and picks the finished scroll. From a silk-clad box he pulls a huge inkan[2]. After rubbing the surface over porcelain ink pad, he exhales and presses the stamp in the lower right corner of the scroll. The print is dark-red and sharp, like dried blood droplets.
“Done,” He says, “Do you want me to translate?”
“Yes?”
“As any Chinese saying, this can have multiple English translations. I like this: ‘Apparent is not always real.’”
“Which means?”
“Which means there is no secret. Rossi's machine – it's nothing more than a clever investment scheme.”
“A what?” In my mind, my huge double-bed Winnebago sill whines with its powerful electric motors, rushing towards the Pacific coast.”
“An investment scheme. Martin Fleischmann was our patient. Psychiatric. But Vincenzo Rossi was totally sane. More normal than yours truly, for sure. His laboratory, patents, production plant, and everything else – it was a clever way of squeezing money out of brave but uneducated investors.”
“Are you absolutely certain?”
“Absolutely. I know this first-hand from my friend, Chen Te-Sheng. He told me so, and I remember it word-to-word: ‘Just once, I've betrayed science for money, and I've paid with my life, many times over’.”
“Betrayed science?”
“Yes. Who could blame him? It was 2008, in the midst of the Global Financial Crisis. Chen was a recent immigrant, with his Ph.D. in high-energy physics, his wife out of work, and his three-years-old son. Because of the crisis, all the research grants had been discontinued. The Universities had no interest for yet another Taiwanese physicist. Vincenzo Rossi came at the right time! All Chen had to do was to carry the power output measurements and turn a blind eye on some, let's call them – scientific shortcuts! Chen decided to do some work for Rossi, just to make some easy money and get the family through the GFC. He understood the risks, of course: the scientist's reputation is such a fragile thing. But he decided to take his chances.”
“And what happened next?” Kate asks.
“Chen wanted to work for just one year, but ended up with seven full years. His salary was too good to be true. As an Assistant Professor in any Uni, he could not make a quarter of this amount. Then, towards the end of 2015, Rossi had disappeared with all the investors' funds. A very smart move: he did it just before the Meltdown, and his trail went cold rather quickly. The former Chief Scientist ended up in plain view, and the hunt for Chen had begun.”
“Who was hunting? Intelligence agencies? Spooks?”
“Some intelligence agencies participated too. But how to say it… indirectly. You see, after the Meltdown, a lot of former spies went freelancing for the private companies. There were many takers: Israelis, Italians, the Mainland Chinese, Russians, British. Even our dear CIA participated, but not on behalf of the American Government, they already worked for some Middle-East money bags. Chen's laboratory technician was kidnapped in 2017. No doubt the boy was tortured, but could not tell anything useful. The technician was a diligent idiot with no IQ to speak of. Chen and Rossi hired such on purpose, so the boy knew nothing about physics or chemistry. The following year, Chen's wife died in a car crash. A very strange death, as you may imagine! In 2018, the highways were mostly empty, only the rich had money for gasoline.”
“Chen could just come clear and tell everyone the machine had never worked.” Kate says.
“As if he did not try!” Lee sigh, “Nobody believed him! Well, that's not true: he managed to convince the Israelis and the Russians. But the rest just assumed that Chen was hiding the real discovery – to cash it up at some later date.”