Al Yad was well aware his reputation was growing. World governments had begun to fear him. He would explain to his followers that he wished to let this fear build further. And only when it had reached its apex would he unleash his wrath upon the world.
But he would have to provide further demonstrations of his power. Make sure his followers continued to understand he expected absolute fealty, and that he saw them as insects, his to crush at his whim.
“And do you agree with them, Ahmad?” he asked evenly.
Ahmad became paralyzed. Al Yad watched him squirm, knowing he was trying to decide if this was a test. But what was being tested? His loyalty? Or his honesty? “Of course not, Great One,” he said, having chosen loyalty. “I would never question The Hand of God.”
Al Yad was about to respond when Tariq Bahar rushed into the chamber, narrowly missing a collision with a bird and cage sitting on a pedestal at the entrance to the room. Bahar was Al Yad’s head of military and intelligence. The man had recruited a legion of mercenaries and true believers around the world, pressing them into serving the Great One.
Al Yad welcomed the sight of him. Unlike Ahmad, a simple functionary, interchangeable with thousands of others, Tariq Bahar was highly skilled, and highly useful.
“A thousand apologies, Al Yad,” said Bahar. “I didn’t realize you were occupied. I will come back another time.”
“Speak,” demanded Al Yad.
Tariq Bahar glanced meaningfully at Ahmad. “This is very exciting, but sensitive information, Great One. Perhaps it would be better if we were to speak of it alone.”
Al Yad glared at the man. “I said to report,” he whispered. “I won’t ask again.”
“We’ve narrowed Shaitan to a geographic territory,” said Bahar without hesitation. “And we have a further lead.” He went on to explain in detail, including his recommendation for how they should proceed. “Request permission to follow up personally,” he finished. “Immediately.”
Al Yad was pleased by the news. It still didn’t solve his problem entirely, but finding his nemesis was at least a step in the right direction.
Under other circumstances, his improving mood might have saved his aide’s life. But Ahmad had heard things he should not have heard. Al Yad sighed. At least the man would enter the afterlife knowing he had served him to the best of his capacity. As an example for others. What better sacrifice could a man make?
Al Yad gestured toward Tariq Bahar. “Permission granted,” he said. “I know you’re eager to get started, and I’m just as eager. But remain here a few moments longer.”
Al Yad turned to his aide. “Ahmad, I am unhappy with your lack of faith in me,” he said simply. “But there is still a way for you to help our cause.”
“Anything,” pleaded Ahmad.
Al Yad nodded. There was a sound like a concentrated concussive blast and Ahmad’s eye’s bulged from their sockets. The man clutched at his chest for just a moment before toppling to the marble floor. Bahar was startled by this event but managed to keep his face impassive.
“I burst his heart,” Al Yad told his head of military and intelligence. “He doubted my judgment. He wondered why we have yet to strike at the infidel.”
While this was not technically true, this narrative would better serve his needs. “Ahmad was a trusted aide, as you know. But I demand total, unquestioning loyalty,” he explained. “So before you go, make sure my followers get an accurate account of what happened here. Make sure they understand the price of disbelief.”
“As you command, oh Great One,” said Tariq Bahar.
Al Yad gestured at Ahmad’s body on the floor with a look of distaste. “And have someone clean up this mess,” he said evenly.
8
So Theo Grant was really Brennan Craft, thought Alyssa. Which wasn’t the least bit helpful. This name meant nothing to her.
A dozen questions ricocheted around her skull. She rose from the conference room table and pulled a bottle of water from a small refrigerator in the corner, not offering one to Major Elovic.
She returned to her chair across from the major and stared at him accusingly. “So when I was with this Craft,” she said finally. “Were you listening in? Did you eavesdrop on our entire conversation?”
Elovic shook his head. “I would have liked to,” he replied candidly. “But there wasn’t enough time. I didn’t get wind of your . . . date, until this morning.”
“That still gave you plenty of time to give me a heads up,” snapped Alyssa. “You knew this bastard’s game and you didn’t warn me?”
“I couldn’t. I wasn’t willing to risk that you might accidentally tip him off. Brennan Craft is too valuable. But rest assured, you were never in any danger. The strike team wasn’t quite ready when Craft picked you up, but we were confident he wouldn’t try anything—at least until he brought you back to your house.”
Alyssa tore the cap from the bottle of water and took an angry gulp. They were confident. How very comforting.
“And you did a great job of distracting him while we prepared,” added the major.
Yeah, she thought wryly, she was distracting him. That was her goal. Anything for her country, even when she didn’t know she was doing it.
And she was never in any danger? That was the most ridiculous statement she had ever heard. According to the major, neither was Craft. Until all hell broke loose. And barely surviving a curtain of bullets being sent in her direction didn’t qualify as danger-free.
Alyssa glared at Elovic for several long seconds, but decided not to confront him. “So tell me about this Brennan Craft.”
“Uneventful childhood. His dad died when he was fourteen, and his mother raised him after that. Good kid. Brilliant. One of only four kids from Iowa to get a perfect score on his SATs the year he took them. As far as we can tell, well adjusted and stayed out of trouble.” He paused. “Loved physics and science and was accomplished in these disciplines, even in his early teens. And a computer programming prodigy. The Mozart of computer code. Could have gone to Harvard or MIT. Any guesses where he did go?”
Alyssa shook her head. “Not a one.”
“The theological seminary. To become a Catholic priest.”
This did take her by surprise. “No kidding?”
“No kidding. But this was where he began causing trouble. Near as we can reconstruct, he went into the seminary because he was raised a devout Catholic, and his mother always dreamed her son would be a priest. By all accounts he was very spiritual as well. So when he promised her on her death bed to go into the priesthood, he followed through, even though we believe he had reservations.”
“So far you’re not exactly painting the picture of America’s Most Wanted here.”
“He butted heads with the establishment almost immediately. He wrote letters asking the church to seriously consider abolishing the no sex, no marriage rule of the priesthood.”
“Was he having an affair at the time?” asked Alyssa.
“We don’t think so. But we know he was brilliant and quickly became versed in all aspects of the science of human sexuality. He argued that science had shown the criticality of forging physical relationships in achieving a healthy brain chemistry. Infants not touched enough growing up became severely damaged. Not just sex, but even touch, releases all kinds of chemicals and has all kinds of effects on the brain. I read his letters, but I don’t remember the chemistry and neurology he cited.” He raised his eyebrows. “I imagine you’re familiar with this data, though.”
“Yes. And I agree with him. The running joke is that the lack of sex makes people more intense, winds them up, messes with their heads. But it’s not a joke. It’s a critical need, and in my view, something whose contribution to the human condition and mental health can’t be minimized.”
Major Elovic smiled. “You and Brennan Craft really do have a lot in common,” he said.
“No we don’t!” snapped Alyssa angrily. “He just made sure he filled out his online dating pr
ofile to match my interests. The match was too good to have been real.”
“That’s the odd thing,” said the major, tilting his head. “It was real. Craft misled you about his intentions, but as far as I can tell, not about his interests and the personality type he prefers. He may have been using you, but you two really are highly compatible. At least on paper.”
Alyssa scowled, unsure if this information made her feel better or worse.
“With respect to the abolishment of celibacy rules,” continued Elovic, repositioning himself in the black mesh office chair in which he was sitting, “Craft also laid out a comprehensive argument that this policy might have the unintended effect of attracting those struggling with their sexuality.”
“In what way?”
“He argued that young men who were devout and spiritual like he was, but who had a healthy appetite for sex, and a desire to have a family someday, would be less likely to go into the seminary with the celibacy rule in place. For some this would be one sacrifice too many. But imagine a young man who had an unhealthy interest in young children, and who was trying to suppress this. This man might see taking a vow of celibacy as a tool to help him battle these inner demons. And not always successfully.”
“I see,” said Alyssa. It was an interesting thesis. Even if this were true only one percent of the time, it would lead to an enrichment of this type in the institution. And denying members something that was so integral to the human condition, with known mental and physical health benefits, was likely to result in any number of unintended consequences.
“I’m not really doing his arguments justice,” added Elovic. “Craft is a brilliant writer and logician, and he was very persuasive.”
“Did the church take him seriously?”
“Not so much. Finally, frustrated that he couldn’t at least get a hearing, or generate more of a debate within the church, he left. After only being a priest for eighteen months.”
Elovic walked to the refrigerator and removed a bottle of water of his own. “But he didn’t lose his virginity until a month after he left the church,” he said, as he closed the refrigerator door. “I have to give him that. He may not have agreed with celibacy, but he apparently stuck by it.”
“Now how would you possibly know when he lost his virginity?” asked Alyssa.
“He wrote about it. Tried to continue the argument on a personal blog, but got nowhere with that as well.”
“Now that is a blog I’d like to see,” said Alyssa, smiling for the first time since the attack on her home. Her bitter demeanor was finally retreating. She was relatively cheerful and full of humor by nature, and could only maintain a state of rage for so long.
“I’ll e-mail the link to you,” said the major. “But Craft described his first sexual encounter as utterly mind-blowing. Earth-shattering. Life affirming.”
Alyssa couldn’t help but wonder what this enthusiastic encounter had been like for the woman involved, whom Craft had clearly made the center of the universe after denying himself for so long. It might have been awful, but she suspected it had been amazing.
“Meanwhile, he began taking classes in quantum physics,” continued the major, having returned to his seat. “Didn’t care about a degree, but by all accounts became an expert. World class in the field.”
“I guess quantum mechanics is an interest we really do have in common,” noted Alyssa. “Although he pretended to only have a layman’s knowledge of it, like I do.”
Elovic scratched his head. “So what is that, exactly?” he said. “Craft was at the top of the field, so I should probably at least know the gist of it.”
“Even after reading several books on the subject,” said Alyssa, “a gist is about all I can give you.” She paused to gather her thoughts. “First, you should know it’s the most successful theory in the history of science. It’s predictions have been verified over and over with uncanny accuracy. And something like thirty percent of our economy stems from our knowledge of this field. Computers, cell phones, MRIs, lasers. You name it.”
Elovic leaned back in his chair with a thoughtful expression.
“Relativity works in the realm of the large. It deals with gravity and mass and speed. Quantum mechanics deals with the very small. Elementary particles. Like electrons. Both paint a picture of a universe that seems ridiculous. Crazier than something out of a fantasy novel.”
“For instance?” prompted Elovic.
“Relativity shows that as an object speeds up, time itself passes more and more slowly for it. At the speed of light, time stops altogether.”
“You’re right. It does sound like something some crazy person made up.”
“It’s been confirmed beyond a shadow of a doubt. Time moves at a different rate for our GPS satellites in orbit than it does down here. Einstein’s equations correct for this discrepancy. Perfectly. This really is how the universe works. The reason it’s so counterintuitive is that we’d have to travel millions and millions of times faster than we do to notice it.” She paused. “As for quantum effects, these are best experienced at the subatomic level. Another realm for which humans have no exposure or experience.”
She tilted her head in thought. “It’s like a fish professor teaching other fish—you know, a school of fish,” she added, grinning at her own joke, “his theory of air. The fish instructor could prove it all he wanted, but no matter how smart a fish, the concept would always be counterintuitive to a creature who had only ever experienced water.”
“Good analogy,” said Elovic.
Alyssa took a deep breath. Quantum theory was all but impossible to explain well in a short time. It didn’t make a lick of sense. It was so crazy it made relativity look sane.
She began by describing what many believed to be the most important experiment ever done in the field: the double slit experiment.
Cut two slits side by side in a metal plate, and put a screen behind the plate. Now send a stream of photons through the slits, and observe the light pattern you get on the screen.
If the photons behaved like particles, you would expect to see two lines on the screen, right behind the two slits. If the photons behaved like waves, the peaks and troughs of the waves traveling through the two slits would interfere with each other, and create a pattern more like a barcode. It was a very simple experiment, and it was expected to yield a very simple result.
But it didn’t. It yielded an impossible result.
If you did the experiment, you got a wave pattern. A barcode. Fair enough. But if you shot electrons through—or any other particles, for that matter—one at a time, you still got a wave pattern.
This just wasn’t possible. How could photons interfere with each other if they were going through the slits single file? A single photon or electron couldn’t split, go through both slits as a wave, and interfere with itself. Yet it did.
Stranger still, if you tried to cheat by watching the slits to catch photons splitting and going through both, they didn’t anymore. Suddenly, you got the two-line pattern characteristic of particles. Nature seemed to know when you were looking.
This was only the beginning of the crazy effects of quantum mechanics. Particles could be joined, entangled, and have some kind of instantaneous metaphysical connection, even across the entire universe. Particles could be at an infinity of places at once, and popped into and out of existence randomly, creating a froth of particles and energy in the vacuum of space.
The longest-standing theory to account for this was that a particle could be anywhere until it was observed. When it was, it immediately collapsed to a discrete location. On some level, the reality of the universe depended on conscious observers.
The implications of this had been causing physicists to pull out their hair for over a century, and called into question humankind’s fundamental understanding of the nature of reality. If an observer could alter the universe by his observation, then didn’t the universe require consciousness to even exist?
When Alyssa had
finished her brief explanation, like everyone else ever introduced to the subject, Elovic had trouble believing it. But she knew that further explanation wouldn’t help. It was time to get back to Brennan Craft.
“You said Craft became an expert in quantum physics,” said Alyssa. “According to whom?”
“According to everybody. The people at all the top universities are familiar with his work. Many call it groundbreaking.”
“And he never got a formal degree?”
“No.”
Alyssa considered this. Craft was clearly a once-in-a-generation intellect. Reaching the pinnacle of a scientific field like quantum mechanics without any formal training was almost unheard of.
“During this time he also whipped up a computer algorithm,” continued Elovic. “I won’t describe what it did, because I don’t quite understand it. But suffice it to say it was a breakthrough in data handling, analysis, and storage. Which he sold to Eben Martin.”
“The Eben Martin?” said Alyssa. “The billionaire?” But even as she said it she knew it was a dumb question. He was the only Eben she had ever heard of—which he pronounced ehben, with a soft E.
“Yes, except he wasn’t a billionaire then. Eben Martin founded Informatics Solutions based on Craft’s algorithm. Craft didn’t want money. Instead, he received shares in Informatics Solutions. A year later he cashed them in for fifty million dollars.”
Alyssa’s mouth fell open. “Fifty million dollars?” she repeated.
“Maybe I should have said, only fifty million dollars. Had he waited a few years longer, his stock would have been worth billions.”
“And he pretended to be poor,” mumbled Alyssa.
“He didn’t make you pick up the check, did he?” said Elovic wryly.
Not waiting for a response, he continued. “So after becoming an acknowledged leader in the field, and then in his spare time creating intellectual property that set him up for life, Craft suddenly went silent. We think this is when he began going off the rails. We suspect schizophrenia, like the Unabomber, who was an unparalleled mathematical genius before he became paranoid and delusional. Anyway, Craft began reading numerous spiritual and metaphysical texts. He emerged a few years later as a disciple of a scientist named Bernard Haisch.”
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