On the Detection of Dark Matter

"Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit. SHIT!" Kuwaya exclaims, navigating around the server rack that Meng had expected him to install last week and continuing down the hall.   "Kuwaya! Stop running. You aren't going to make it. We'll get it next time." Lmar’s voice is loud in Kuwaya’s earbuds.   "No. I can do it."   "We'll get it next time."   "No! Now is the time! The calculations show a 73.5% probability that the gravity wave from the black hole collision will interact coherently with the detector and observe dark matter. Who knows when another wave will come along like that."   Lmar throws his hands up in the air. “Fine! Then take off your socks. Increase your coefficient of friction so you can run faster. You forgot to put your shoes on again.”   Kuwaya hops in the hallway, pulling off his thick wool socks. “Thanks.”   Lmar looks at the computer display in front of him. “The capacitor still isn't charging, and we have 3 minutes and 20 seconds till the gravity wave passes.”   “I know! I know!” Kuwaya growls.   “What do you think is wrong?” Lmar asks.   “I think I forgot to finish connecting it to the transistor after installing the new one.”   Lmar blinks. “Ku...fuck. Get your ass down there.”   “Working on it,” Kuwaya responds, ducking underneath an exposed pipe.  Lmar, I'm here! I can feel the energy. It’s incredible.”  Kuwaya, we’ve had this conversation. First, you cannot feel energy fields. Second, you are in a Faraday cage, remember; so there isn’t an energy field to feel. Which further proves my point, it is all in your head. 1 minute, 20 seconds.”   No, it is not, Kuwaya thinks to himself. He squats down before a large complex mechanism in the center of an otherwise empty room. He takes a deep breath before moving his hand towards a small unattached red wire.   Russell enters the control room and sees Lmar, who is staring at the video feed of Kuwaya working. “What the hell are you doing here? How many times do I have to tell you, Lmar, you do not work here.”   “Dammit,” Lmar hisses to himself. “Russell, look, I know, but save it. Kuwaya’s at the detector and a coherent gravity wave will be passing in 48 seconds.”   Russell’s face turns white as he moves to look at the video feed. “What's he doing down by the detector? Fuck, Lmar! Why did you let him do that?”   Lmar’s face mirrors Russell's. “Why? What’s wrong?” Russell grabs the microphone hanging around Lmar’s neck.   Kuwaya removes his hand from the small red wire as Russell’s voice booms in his ear, “Kuwaya, get the fuck out of there now. I disengaged the Faraday cage for maintenance. You fucking didn’t log any detector experiments for tonight.”  I can feel the energy. It’s incredible.Kuwaya hears himself inside his head. “Fuck!” he says as he watches his hand move back to the red wire. There is a blue-white arc from the capacitor to his hand as the gravity wave activates the detector.  I can feel the energy. It’s incredible.Lmar hears Kuwaya inside his head as the arc from the device inside the room overwhelms the video feed and momentarily whites out the display.   Lmar immediately jumps out of the chair. He grabs the emergency medical kit off the wall as he runs towards the room where Kuwaya is. Russell aggressively rubs his hands over his face and hair. He sits in the chair Lmar vacated and stares at the video feed. He speaks into the microphone, “Kuwaya? Kuwaya, where are you? Are you ok? Answer me, damn you!”   Russell watches Lmar enter the room and look around. He leaves the room, comes back, looks at the video feed, and shrugs with his hands up miming, “I don’t know where he is.” Russell gets up to follow Lmar when he hears a small beep from the computer, then another, then another. Russell sits back down in astonishment as he watches for the first time in human history, small bright green pulses appear on the monitor. “He did it,” he whispers, “I’ll be fucked. He actually did it."  
To learn what happens to Kuwaya, read this


Cover image: by Okan Caliskan

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