03: Trinity, Act I

written by Daniel Manning
directed & sound design by Mischa Stanton
[back]

[[SFX: tape recorder starts]]

SALLY GRISSOM (SG): The system we’re proposing... it generates a field that negates the effects of what I’m calling the Grissom mechanism. Essentially, masses within the field localized to a spatially-consistent region are pulled along a timelike curve towards regions of spacetime with a high supersymmetric density. Project Rainbow inadvertently created such a region by catalyzing a singularity-like reaction among the particles present—                        

BILL DONOVAN (BD): [jumps on her presentation] Sally. Sall- Sally. SALLY.

SG: Is something wrong?

BD: You’re doing it again. You've got more syllables than a silk-tongued thesaurus. I can’t understand a word you’re saying.

ESTHER ROBERTS (ER): With all due respect Director Donovan, it’s a fairly simple concept. The experiment in Philadelphia two years ago created a Lorentzian manifold–

JACK WYATT (JW): –a Lorentzian manifold that is able to simulate a pseudo-timelike curve that breaks the Cauchy horizon, effectively creating a causal structure that...

BD: Stop. All of you stop. No one can understand what in Christ’s name any of you are saying. It’s all just babble. This isn’t going to fly at the Oversight Committee inspection next week. They're coming from Manhattan, and I'm not going to be upstaged by that boom town.

ER: I’ve heard them calling it Judgment Day in the rec hall.

BD: They shouldn’t. That’s a habit I’d like you all to break. Demonizing the Oversight Committee doesn’t do you any favors.               

SG: Well, technically, we’re not demonizing them, we’re deifying them.

BD: You’re not as clever as you think you are, and you underestimate the capacity of the men you’re going to be speaking to. They are not easily stunned by playing hot potato with journeyman rhetoric.

SG: You want us to dumb down the science?

BD: I want you to make it something I can understand without a goddamn PhD! And don’t call it the Grissom mechanism. You sound delusional.

ER: It’s not like we have the time to teach an advanced course on the physics of relativity. The work we’re doing here is at the forefront of scientific understanding. If you think it’s difficult to understand, have empathy for we who have to explain it all.

JW: We wouldn’t know half this stuff if it weren’t for Dr. Grissom’s research.                        

SG: You got pretty far without my... research.

ER: Director Donovan, we need the Committee to renew our budget. We need continued operational redundancy. I mean, we only have one inhibitor array. What if it breaks? What if it gets zapped back to the Eldridge? Dr. Grissom’s prototype is the only thing like it in all of creation. And, Doctor, as an aside, what possibly could have inspired you to junk every iteration of this device before we started working for you?

SG: I... wanted a clean start.

BD: I read the reports every week and I still barely understand what you people are doing. I need you to relate to people.

JW: We’re trying Bill, we really are, but they have to meet us at least halfway! We’ve got a ton of information that it took us years to understand. And now we’re just supposed to condense all of that work into a bite-sized morsel for these fat cats to feed on?

SG: I’m sorry, Donovan, could I just get something clarified please?

BD: What’s that, Doctor?

SG: You aren’t talking about Manhattan the island, are you?

BD: I need you to tell me everything you know. All of it. Right now.

SG: I... I didn’t realize. That’s happening soon?

BD: Tell me. How much do you know from... What do you know?

SG: I can’t say anything. You know I can’t. I’ve given you the speech enough times before.

ER: What are you both talking about?

BD/SG: It’s classified.

SG: I’ll tell you when you’re older.

BD: If you know about Manhattan, then you should know telling me won’t stop any of it. It’s too big now. You can get off your soapbox.

SG: Soapbox? We’re talking about... Trinity is exactly the kind of thing I’m talking about, Donovan. What you think you know doesn’t even compare with what I've seen. You can’t even fathom what I know. Trinity might just be the worst thing we've ever done. As a species.

BD: Just tell me: does it end the war?

SG: Sure, fine. Yeah. It ends the war. It ends your whole preconception of war. It turns war from a boxing match into a chess game, feigning stalemate from now until the end of time. You should feel right at home.

[[SFX: Sally slams the door behind her]]

JW: ...So... Should we—

BD: Just get out.

ER/JW: [babbling as they exit]

[[SFX: radio tuning]]

SG: Diary of Sally Grissom, July 9, 1945. I’m stuck. Donovan wants me to design a practical demonstration of the Timepiece, and I have no idea what I’m supposed to do. I’ve been banging my head against a wall for hours, but nothing’s tumbled out. It was relatively simple to work out the principles of pulling objects to the right time in the same place–everything gets pulled back to Philadelphia in 1943, but if you relate the rate of spatial acceleration to the Earth's motion and stop going backwards before you get to the Eldridge, you can land at a precise time. But for now, that’s only in theory. In practice, it’s a more difficult to literally perceive it, and immeasurably more difficult to explain it to someone else. It’s a problem of light cones and timelines. Whatever you send back would just disappear from my perspective–I don’t receive an orange I send myself today, because I never did yesterday. Of course, in some different version of the timeline I did receive the orange, but it’s not part of my history. It’s not like you could track that kind of stuff between...

[[SFX: static distortion]]

SG: ...problem of light cones and timelines. Whatever you send back disappears, and it’s a crapshoot whether you’ll be around to see something arrive. Like, an orange appears on my desk, right? What do I do? Do I just wait a day and send it back to myself? That would just loop back on itself again and again, aging a day at a time until the orange shrivels into dust. If I get a new orange to send back, do I have to make sure it’s the same orange, but a day younger? How do I know I’ll make the same choice of fruit? How do I know there isn’t some poor Sally Grissom out there somewhere among the Blind Eternities who wakes up one day drowning in a sea of oranges? So you see the problem. I’ve got Roberts and Wyatt already working overtime to get a new prototype running before Judgment Day, and it’s unfair to them to throw another impossible task, so I’ve got to do this one myself. [sigh] I need a break from this.                

[[SFX: radio tuning; sounds of a diner]]

ANTHONY PARTRIDGE (AP): Sally, you’ve got to lighten up. Judgment Day isn’t going to kill you.                        

SG: Oh thank goodness. I’ve been breaking my back myself over this for months.

AP: No, that’s about right. I’ve been through rigamarole like this before. It’s terrible. Just not as bad as it looks.

SG: [bitter] Oh, what a relief! Thank you. You should give motivational speeches. Partridge, it’s not just that I have to show off something impossible, I have to do it in front of my boss, the head of the OSS; the director of Strategic Sciences; and the goddamned president.

AP: Who?

SG: You know, the Oversight Committee: Donovan, Leslie Groves, Dwight Eisenhower?

AP: You mean General Eisenhower?

SG: ...Yes. I meant that. That is what I meant.

AP: Oh come on Sally, you’re a horrendous liar. You know something, just spill it.

SG: No, what? Why would I…

AP: Does Ike becomes president?

SG: You’re cra–no, you’re crazy, man! That’s… not–

AP: He does, doesn’t he?

SG: What, I don’t even know— [more bluster]

AP: You know, you ought to put that sort of slip-up to work. You could make a fortune gambling on horse races or something.

SG: I didn’t think to bring a sports almanac with me.

AP: Tell me again what’s impossible about this experiment.

SG: You just can’t observe it. Either you live in a world where you didn’t receive the item you send, which makes the machine look defective, or you live in a world where you did, which just looks like sleight-of-hand.

AP: Why not just send someone back an hour or so and have them come report? Guess a number written down on a piece of paper after the fact, or something.

SG: Well it’s all about relativity, isn’t it? The only reference frame that lets you observe the journey is the traveler. From an observer’s point of view, either you haven’t changed anything or the change was always a part of history. So the only way to show the committee how the machine works is to make them the subjects as well. And I don’t want to deal with Bill Donovan’s wife asking why her husband has vanished from the face of existence. That, or I might as well do a parlor trick. I’m just... stuck.

AP: It sounds like you could use a vacation.

SG: [laughs]

AP: How many days before your head’s on the chopping block?

SG: Five days before Judgment Day. Six until I’m driven out of town in an unmarked black van.

AP: Walking away for a while is the best thing you can do now. Get some fresh air, get your head on straight.

SG: I... uh, I don’t think my arrangement with Donovan gives me any vacation days.

AP: Who says the boss has to know? We’ll make it like a company road-trip. I’ll bring Helen. And we should bring our staff along. My man Quentin Barlowe has had his head in the trenches for months now, and I’m sure Esther and Jack could use some sun.

SG: Barlowe? The quiet one who follows you around the lab like a studious puppydog?

AP: He may be quiet, but he pulls his weight. Probably more than he should.

SG: Partridge, if all of us ran away in the middle of hell week, the project would completely run out of time. Which is just as ironic as it sounds.

AP: Well, you could always use the Timepiece, go back a few days, pick up where you left off...

SG: I don’t even know why I came to you for help!

AP: Sally, trust me, you want to take a breather right here. You’re stuck because you’re in too deep. You all are. I want the three of you in front of my house at oh-seven-thirty tomorrow morning. We’re going on vacation. And you don’t get any say in the matter.

[[SFX: radio tuning; dialogue is muffled]]

JW: Dr. Partridge, you are aware that Judgment Day is in four days time?

HELEN PARTRIDGE (HP): I tried to tell him you all wouldn’t want to go.

AP: She successfully told me, and then I successfully ignored her. This is what you all need, and that’s the last word.

ER: It’s irresponsible to abandon the Timepiece presentation like this! We just don’t have the time!

SG: Listen Roberts, Partridge is right. You’ll be dead by Christmas if we keep working at this rate. Are you going to work yourself into an early grave, or are you going to get in the car?

[[SFX: car doors opening, everyone clambers inside]]

JW: Where are we going, anyway?

AP: Las Vegas, Nevada. A couple days of card games and drinking will do you all a world of good.

ER: Vegas? For what, craps and call girls? No thank you.

JW: Actually, that sort of business isn’t legal in Vegas anymore. Roosevelt clamped down on it a few years back after the base opened.

AP: Glad to know Wyatt's an expert on Nevadan prostitution law.

JW: I’m not the expert! My cousin is a mechanic down there.

AP: Oh, sure. Your “cousin” is the expert.

JW: Are you calling me a pervert, pal?

HP: Anthony, stop...

AP: [laughs] All right, Jack. I’m just yanking your chain.

QUENTIN BARLOWE (QB): Dr. Partridge, are you sure this is a good idea? I think I might rather just stay home for the weekend.

AP: Not a chance, my friend.

ER: Uh, am I the only one that’s never heard him speak before?

SG: Come on, guys. I know we’re in crunch time here. But there’s no sense driving ourselves crazy over this. Let’s drive to Vegas instead.

JW: All right, but I’m not a pervert.

SG: Duly noted, Wyatt. What about the rest of you?

ER: Well I guess there’s no sense staying behind if I’m the only one working.

SG: Brilliant!

[[SFX: car engine turns over, drives down dirt road]]

AP: So, what’s the plan?

SG: Hand me that blanket.

JW: Plan? What do we need a plan for?

HP: Didn’t you know? Dr. Grissom’s not allowed out of town.

ER: What? Wait, that’s ridiculous! Why?

[[SFX: Sally hides under the seats]]

JW: Dr. Grissom, what are you doing? / SG: Just, be cool! Move your legs! Move your legs. / JW: Hey, what! / ER: Dr.— aah! / QB: ...Good grief.

[[SFX: car brakes, Anthony rolls the window down]]

GUARD: Good morning Dr. Partridge, headed offsite?

AP: Yessir, taking some measurements out on the mesa. The wife packed a picnic.

HP: Good morning, officer.

GUARD: Morning, ma’am. Can you all show me your passes please?

[[SFX: all hand over their passes]]

AP: Here you go.

SG: [whispers] Ow! Don’t kick!

GUARD: Seems a little cramped in there.

ER: Uh... Yeah, all the equipment in here sure does make for a tight fit...

GUARD: Everything’s in order. You have a nice day, and be careful now.

AP: Thanks! You have a good one.

[[SFX: car drives off; Sally emerges]]

SG: Smooth, everyone. Real smooth.

[[SFX: tape fast-forward]]

ER: Dr. Grissom, may I ask you about something?

SG: Shoot.

ER: What's Manhattan?

SG: An island in New York. Aren’t you from there?

JW: The first American ship to make an authorized visit to Tokyo Bay?

SG: Wait, really?

JW: The Centennial is this year. A lot can happen in a hundred years of diplomatic relations.

SG: And it’s called the Manhattan? Huh.

ER: Dr. Grissom, you know what I’m referring to. When you and Director Donovan were talking. Manhattan, and Trinity.

SG: They're code words.

AP: Code words you shouldn't know about, by the way. Curiosity killed the cat.

ER: Yeah, but you guys know what it is. I'm not going to tell anyone. I'm just curious.

SG: You know how we're working on a cross-your-heart-top secret science project? So are they. Manhattan is like us. Trinity is their Timepiece.

ER: They're building a... a gadget like ours? Something for the war?

SG: Not quite, it's... a little more direct than ours.

AP: And I'm still not exactly sure what Trinity is. I only have a rough hypothesis because I’ve kept my ear firmly clamped to the ground, and it's my job to figure out what people will do next.

ER: So then, what is it? You said something about a deterrent? Changing war from a boxing match to a game of chess?

SG: Something like that.

AP: You're not going to tell her, are you?

SG: Not a chance. She'll find out soon enough.

[[SFX: tape fast-forward]]

ER: How could you possibly believe that?

QB: It’s spelled out in the text, clear as day!

JW: Irrefutable evidence!

ER: But he can fly!

JW: So what?

ER: So what? Jay Garrick has to run everywhere! Do you know how much friction that builds?

QB: We’re not talking about flying!

SG: We might as well be! Superman is faster than a speeding bullet.

QB: So is The Flash.

SG: Superman gets his powers from the yellow sun’s radiation! The Flash got his powers from, what, heavy water?

JW: Hard water.

SG: Hard water! That’s ridiculous! He got kind of wet and can run fast? Please.

JW: Well, what if they were running the race on a Kryptonite track?

ER: Irrelevant! The stuff they make up in the radio show doesn’t count. Non-canonical.

QB: In a land race between the Flash and Superman, the Flash would win.

SG: Not a chance!

JW: The Flash can catch bullets!

SG: Superman doesn’t need to! They just bounce right off him. Come on, Superman can fly faster than the speed of light!

ER: ...No, he can’t.

QB: What are you talking about?

SG: I, uh... never mind.

JW: Superman is just a dope in a cape wearing his underwear on the outside.

ER: Jay Garrick wears a dumb helmet.

JW: You take that back!

[[SFX: tape fast-forward; car radio tuning, until a song comes on]]

HP: Oh, I love this one!

[[SFX: Helen sings along to “Til The End of Time”]]

Til the wells run dry
And each mountain disappears
I’ll be there for you to care for you
Through laughter and through tears                        

So take my heart in sweet surrender
And tenderly say that I’m
The one you love and live for
Til the end of time

SG: Helen... That was beautiful.

HP: You really think so?

[[SFX: tape fast-forward]]

ER: It's absolutely sweltering in here. How could they possibly be asleep?

HP: I think unconsciousness is the saner choice, in this heat.

ER: How long have we been driving?

AP: The better part of nine hours. Just another hour or so to go.

HP: How long?

AP: That’s why we left so early this morning honey. I wanted to make sure we got there before sundown.

ER: What possible benefit could the six of us get out of some resort town?

AP: Esther, have you ever been to an amusement park?

ER: I went to Coney Island a couple of times when I was a kid...

AP: When I was in college, I had this one midterm that was kicking my ass. Some report on orbital motion. And I just couldn’t finish it. I worked for four solid days and by the end, I couldn’t even force my fingers to write it. The deadline was breathing down my neck, I was losing sleep. And then on top of that, I had to leave town for Thanksgiving and visit my grandma in Pennsylvania. I didn’t want to go, I wanted to finish that report, but my pop would’ve beat me halfway to Bethlehem if I didn’t show up. And she lived right near to this amusement park. Dorney Park, I think. And my grandma, being the kindhearted old lady she was, saw me moping, and drove me over there to spend the day.

ER: And when you went, you rode on some roller coaster and had the stroke of genius you needed to finish the report?

AP: Not quite. But I did have a fun day. Not a care in the world. All my worries melted away. Did wonders for my mental health.

ER: So what does this have to do with the price of peas in Duluth?

AP: Well, Grandma Partridge was a wonderful woman, but it was at the end of her life, and she had grown a bit... forgetful.

HP: [gasp] She forgot you?

AP: She was supposed to pick me up at 5, but didn’t come around until 8.

HP: Oh no!

AP: Three hours I spent in the parking lot, where the anxiety of losing valuable work time crept back.

ER: And that’s where you had your epiphany?

AP: Esther, you’re missing the point: I didn’t have one. I got back to my room, sat down with my typewriter, and finished the paper. No epiphany. But the time loss forced my hand. There’s no room for writer’s block when the clock is ticking down on you. I didn’t have time for self-doubt. I only had time to finish.

ER: So you aced the report?

AP: Not even close. I was a hair’s breadth above failing.

ER: ...You’re not exactly giving me a boost of confidence here.

AP: See, in the end I just didn’t have enough to say about the topic. I would have failed whether I’d gone to Dorney Park that day or not. The point is, that you’re going to finish your Timepiece presentation no matter what. Because you have to. Your team knows what it’s doing. You’ll wake up the next day, and you’ll have succeeded, or failed, and then you eat breakfast, and then you move on with your day. But you guys were working yourselves into an early grave. This way, you still get to live.

[[SFX: tape fast-forward; car slows, engine turns off]]                        

HP: I just mean that you might have a better go of it at a university, somewhere you’d be appreciated—

AP: Helen, I don’t want to talk about it right now. [louder] We’re here, guys!

[[SFX: everyone awakening, yawning, etc]]

JW: What time is it?

ER: A little bit after eleven.

SG: So this is Las Vegas, huh?

AP: Is this not a thing people do where you’re from?

SG: No, we did. It’s just... different.

ER: I’ll say. There’s enough neon here that it’s practically daytime. It’s like Times Square in the desert.

AP: Okay, get your things, everybody. I’ll check in, and we’ll reconvene in the morning.

[[SFX: everyone gets out of the car; radio tuning; muffled sounds of a café; a bag unzips, sound focuses on dialogue]]

QB: He wasn’t in the room when I woke up, I assumed he was out on a run or something.

ER: I haven’t seen him since we parted ways last night. AP: Should we send out a search party?

SG: Wait, no, I see him stumbling towards us over there. Pretty sure he’s wearing the same clothes from yesterday.

AP: Look who decided to show up this morning... early afternoon.

JW: Long night.

SG: Testing the Nevadan prostitution ban, I presume.

JW: I decided to check out some of the slots after you all went to bed.

QB: How much did you lose?

JW: Actually, I won $5... It was only after the gambling did I spend $4.75 on drinks.

SG: That’s where they get you.

ER: They also get you on the slots, on the tables, at the hotel...

SG: This town is essentially an empty pit you're supposed to throw money into.

AP: Aw, lighten up ladies. This is supposed to be a fun weekend! Sometimes the pit throws money back.

ER: I don’t think it’s fun paying someone to possibly give you your money back.

JW: You could just have fun playing the games.

ER: I’d rather win them.

SG: You should play more blackjack then.

ER: Why?

SG: You know, basic blackjack strategy, counting and stuff?

ER: I’m not familiar.

SG: Oh man, any of you guys have a deck of cards?

QB: I’ve got one up in my room.

SG: Come with me, guys. I’m going to blow your minds with math.

JW: Didn’t we come here to avoid doing work?

[[SFX: radio tuning; a dealer on a crowded casino floor flips a card.]]

DEALER: Twenty-one. Again. Well done, miss.

[[SFX: mild applause]]

ER: My lucky night!

[[SFX: radio tuning; the group at a fancy jazz place, drinking]]

JW: To Doctor Sally Grissom. For without her crazy card algorithm, we’d be sober and broke.

ER/QB/HP/AP: Here, here!

SG: Aw, I just showed off the numbers. It was Roberts that played the game.

ER: But without the help of you five I’d be drinking alone tonight.

HP: Alone and rich.

ER: This morning I knew just as much as you all did about the statistical analysis of blackjack.

HP: Not quite all of us. A bit more than me, I’d say. Just a tad.

QB: It was pretty scintillating stuff, actually.

SG: We should keep the card-counting on the down-low—uh… Private.

HP: I think we can each keep a secret by now.

JW: We’ve got a bleeding time machine in our backyard, for Christ sake.

[[SFX: Anthony smacks Jack]]

AP: Watch it!

JW: Oh come on, no one’s spying on us.

SG: Another round for you all?

JW: Aaaaabsolutely.

ER: Here, take some dollars. Keep the drinks coming.

SG: Be right back.

[[SFX: radio tuning]]

SCIENTIST: And they’re the ones asking us if it’s safe? I’ll put down five bucks says the whole Southwest goes up in flames...

SG: [in background] Hey, could I get a sidecar, a dry martini, a French 75, two scotch with bitters, and a gin and tonic?

BARTENDER: Coming right up.

SCIENTIST: ...And I might as well put another two on the whole thing not even working. By now, I’m not even sure that—

SG: That’s a fancy recorder you’ve got there.

SCIENTIST: Yeah, it’s... top of the line.

SG: Use it for dictation often?

SCIENTIST: Work stuff, yes. Excuse me—

SG: What do you do?

SCIENTIST: I’m a physicist.

SG: No way! Me too! Who do you work for?

SCIENTIST: The-the government. Out in New Mexico.

SG: How’s that going for you?

SCIENTIST: I can’t really talk about it.

SG: Okay, but... How’s it going?

SCIENTIST: Well, I’m on whiskey number...

[[SFX: glasses clinking]]

SCIENTIST: That many.

SG: That bad, huh?

SCIENTIST: Sitting on a wobbly stool waiting for the end of days.

SG: I know how you feel.

SCIENTIST: I very much doubt it. I’ve seen the end coming. I know what happens when the primordial energies of the universe collapse on themselves. I know there won’t be any escape.

SG: You feel like the building blocks of the universe are playthings in your hands, and it’s going to rip the world in two. And you wish you could go back to working in theory, to writing equations in notebooks. You wish the world would stop taking knowledge meant to better mankind, and using it to kill each other. That about sum it up?

SCIENTIST: ...who are you?

SG: Like I said. I’m a physicist too.

SCIENTIST: Where did you come from?

SG: You're in Los Alamos, right? I'm in Polvo. Couple hours south of you. Same kind of stuff you’re doing, but we’re with ODAR instead of ACE.

SCIENTIST: I haven’t heard of it.

SG: And no one here knows what you do. Except for me. So we’ll call it even.

SCIENTIST: All those people... I see their faces in my dreams. Millions of voices engulfed by roaring flame. Their blood is on my hands. Their silence weighs on me. So I’m drinking. Drinking until I’m flat on my back, or the world ends. Whichever comes first.

SG: And which one does come first?

SCIENTIST: Keep your eye on the horizon tomorrow morning and you’re going to see some serious shit. Might be the last thing you’ll ever get to see.

SG: I don’t doubt it.

SCIENTIST: They told me we were going to help end the war.

SG: It’ll end it. It’ll change the conversation. Evil men will always do evil things, but that’s on them. Not you.

SCIENTIST: How do you know?

SG: If it helps, pretend it was a lucky guess.

[[SFX: glasses clinking]]

BARTENDER: Here ya go, sweetheart.

SG: That’s my stop.

SCIENTIST: Enjoy your drinks, for however long you’ve got.

SG: Quite a bit longer than you might think. Take care.

[[SFX: The Scientist takes a sip and stares off into the distance; Sally walks away with her drinks]]

SG: [in background] Where’d they go? Guys? Guys?

[[SFX: radio tuning]]

SG: Diary of Sally Grissom, July 15, 1945. It turns out that our after-dinner chat wasn’t taken too kindly by the casino staff. Who would have guessed they wouldn’t appreciate us loudly babbling about cheating on the floor?

JW: You were the one who taught Esther to count cards!

SG: Which I guess might have been a little bit my fault. And so they kicked us out of the hotel.

ER: Not kicked as much as literally thrown...

SG: You know that you’re not supposed to be listening to me record these, let alone giving color commentary?

JW: We’re helping.

ER: We’re helping!

QB: You're not.

SG: I found them outside the casino with our bags. They're ruddy with Nevadan dirt.

AP: Nice imagery there, Virginia Woolf.

SG: We checked into a new hotel–I hope the staff at the Last Frontier don’t talk to the ones at El Rancho. That’s where we are now. Unfortunately, it was the last room at the inn and the six of us have to share it.

ER: [grabbing the mic] Dr. Grissom talks in her sleep!

SG: Nope, don’t want to hear it. Leave before I start telling this thing all of your terrible secrets.

[[SFX: exeunt, save Sally]]

SG: Ah, peace and quiet. Well, I still haven’t figured out what I’m going to do on Judgment Day. It’s been a nice break, but my head’s not any clearer than it was when I left. I have to literally upstage a nuclear bomb, and the Timepiece just doesn’t pack the same visual punch. If the Committee is expecting something like the A-bomb out of us, they’re going to be disappointed. Our device doesn’t knock down houses, level entire towns, or light up the night sky with the power of suns. I don’t know what Donovan expects me to do, save pull a rabbit out of my–

[[SFX: door knock]]

AP: [on the other side of the door] Sally.

SG: What?

AP: You’ve been requested out here.

SG: I’m not done with my recording yet!

ER: Dr. Grissom, this is more important. Just come outside.

SG: What are you talking about?

[[SFX: door opens]]

CHET WHICKMAN (CW): Good evening, Dr. Grissom. You are under arrest for the violation of the Espionage Act.

AP: Our chaperone is here.

[[SFX: tape recorder stops]]     

ars PARADOXICA is created by Daniel Manning and Mischa Stanton.
Episode 03: Trinity, Act I features –

Kristen DiMercurio (Sally Grissom) 
Reyn Beeler (Chet Whickman)
Rob Slotnick (Bill Donovan)
Robin Gabrielli (Anthony Partridge)
Susanna Kavee (Helen Partridge)
Katie Speed (Esther Roberts)
Zach Ehrlich (Jack Wyatt)
Lee Satterwhite (Quentin Barlowe)
Cameron Scott Nadler, Barry Stanton, John French Williamson (additional voices)
with special thanks to Isabel Atkinson

Production help from Jake Stanton. This episode features the songs “Stardust,” performed by the US Army Blues, and “Til The End of Time,” performed by Susanna Kavee, as well as original music by Mischa Stanton.
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