by Barry Klemm
“He died of a cerebral haemorrhage, but you can see plainly how they beat him to a pulp,” Joe said grimly. “A brilliant young man, top scientist, but he was a radical and independent soul who didn’t want to devote his talents to making weapons. But that wasn’t why they killed him. They killed him because they wanted Project Earthshaker. They wanted to control it. There was nothing he could tell them that they didn’t already know. It was just that they didn’t control the source of the data. They beat him to the point where he would be paralysed for life. If the haemorrhage hadn’t killed him, he’d have been an permanent invalid. This is how we treat our brilliant young minds.”
The two Treasury agents were as respectful of the dead as they were of the living. They stood by without comment while Joe Solomon delivered the eulogy of Val Dennis. He did so there, in the morgue at the hospital, because he knew there would be no chance at any graveside. Val Dennis had donated all of his body to medical science and insisted there be no funeral. The sad thing was that so few of his body parts would be of any use.
“We have to go now, Mr Solomon,” the older agent said.
“I just wanted you blokes to be sure you know who you’re working for,” Joe said coldly as he spun his wheelchair around and led them out.
And so he continued to lead, for there were two other sets of agents, identical to these, who would accompany him everywhere he went from now on. And he could go anywhere he wanted. At least there would always be someone to push the wheelchair, which was their own fault since they had deprived him of his motorised one.
“Take me to your offices,” Joe insisted. “It’ll save us all a lot of trouble.”
They didn’t interrogate him, not as such. There was no nice cop, nasty cop routine nor any of those techniques. They sat him down and gave him tea. The room was plush leather couches and coffee tables and they all sat about informally. No one took any notes, but there was a video surveillance camera on the wall with the red light on.
“There are just some broad questions we wish to put to you, Mr Solomon. You are under no obligation to answer them. Since you have not been formally arrested, nor warned of your rights, this interview cannot be used in evidence. The video recording is for reference only and is not considered admissible evidence in court.”
“I want to confess everything,” Joe insisted.
“You’ll need to do that in writing, Mr Solomon.”
“Bring me pen. Bring me paper.”
“Perhaps it would be better if you answered our questions first, Mr Solomon.”
“Ask away.”
“We are interested in certain extensive properties you purchased on behalf of yourself or others in California and Nevada during the period from the 15th of December last year until the 19th of January this year.”
“I bought every bit of land I could lay my hands on.”
“And what have you paid for it so far?”
“Nothing. It’s only been a month or so since purchase was arranged. The first payments aren’t due yet.”
“But, on the 15th of next month, the first payments will begin to fall due.”
“Yes. Arrangements have been made for payment as they fall due.”
“What arrangements?”
“There’s a numbered account in a Swiss Bank.”
“Are you prepared to provide us with details of that account?”
“Don’t be bloody silly.”
“Have you any idea what funds are available in that account?”
“No idea. But plenty.”
“We find that hard to believe.”
“There was too much money. I got tired of counting it.”
“So you refuse to answer.”
“No. I don’t know the answer. And the account is arranged such that it can only be accessed by the claimants, for the sum claimed, for ten days after the date due.”
“A curious arrangement, Mr Solomon. How was it made?”
“The bank’s agents handled it. I know nothing.”
“I see. Now. You seem to have arranged for all those properties to be divided into allotments and made available to certain persons.”
“That’s right. Anyone who lost property in the 19th of January disaster is entitled to an allotment, free of charge. The allotment of their choice, on a first come first served basis.”
“You’ve given them the land.”
“That’s right. All persons whose property fell into the sea are entitled to an allotment.”
“And what plans do you have for development of the allotments?”
“None. The government has provided reconstruction funding. I’m providing land for them to do that reconstruction on.”
“Yes. So we understand. But... Mr Solomon, if you’ll forgive me, we can’t quite see how you intend to profit from these arrangements.”
“There’s a wide margin for profit. Built in is an agreement that if any of the allotments are exploited for profit, we own ten percent of it. It’s likely to amount to a great deal.”
“But if they just build a house and live there...”
“No charge.”
“Well, there are matters of land tax and other charges...”
“It’s up to the government to collect those, when and where and how it thinks appropriate.”
“This is a very strange arrangement, Mr Solomon.”
“Strange circumstances require strange arrangements.”
“But, since the January 19 subsidence, the value of these properties has increased a hundred fold and more.”
“That’s right.”
“Yet you claim to give them away.”
“I do. I have.”
“Still, you see how our suspicions are aroused.”
“You Treasury blokes will always have a problem with generosity.”
“Generosity. Yes. But tell me, in consideration of the increase of value of the properties, were they bought with prior knowledge of the increase?”
“Certainly.”
“From what source was this knowledge obtained?”
“General press releases from Project Earthshaker.”
“Project Earthshaker being Professor Harley Thyssen?”
“Project Earthshaker being Project Earthshaker.”
“But Project Earthshaker did not exist at the time.”
“Oh yes it did. It was just that the government tried to pretend it didn’t exist.”
“Nevertheless, it must be regarded that Project Earthshaker was embodied wholly or in part in the person of Professor Thyssen.”
And finally, finally, Joe could see where they were going. It was almost disappointing to him. It wasn’t him they were after at all. He was just a small fish. He was just the bait.
“Professor Thyssen played no part in nor had any knowledge of these transactions,” Joe said coldly.
“Surely you were acting on his behalf?”
“Nope. Completely autonomous.”
“Or with his permission.”
“Professor Thyssen has no control or interest in my activities whatsoever.”
“I see.”
“No you don’t. Professor Thyssen has never had any authority over me. He has never directed my activities in any way. He has never sought any information regarding my activities nor sought to guide them in any way. He has no idea about this still.”
“He doesn’t know that you are giving his property away?”
“Not his property. Never was.”
“It was purchased for or on behalf of Project Earthshaker of which he is regarded as the executive authority.”
“No. The Project is leaderless. All parts of it are autonomous. Professor Thyssen has no executive authority in the Project nor any authority over me or anyone else in the project whatsoever.”
“A very improbable arrangement, Mr Solomon.”
“We live in improbable times.”
“All right then. Now, if we may, there are some interesting facts concerning your purchase of extensive
properties in Brazil...”
*
They had been stopped continually throughout Zambia. The march had continued relentlessly at around seven miles a day by Maynard’s calculations, and it had been ninety days since it began at the fall of the Malawian capital Lilongwe. At first they had travelled within their own country, roughly following the road that ran north parallel to Lake Nyasa, until Andromeda had returned from her conference with the Earthshaker group and turned them west, or at least slightly north of west.
On the day following Thyssen’s impromptu visit, two very officious Zambian gentlemen arrived. They brought with them a huge stack of outstanding fines and duties to be paid. Such payment was to be made in US dollars.
“In Zambia, only bribes are to be paid in US dollars,” Andromeda Starlight told them.
“You accuse us of taking bribes. This is outrageous. There will be further fines...”
“Captain!…” Andromeda called over their heads.
The immediate response was that Captain Maynard turned out twenty of his most heavily armed men, clumping into a line directly behind the two officials but they were not to be so easily intimidated.
“Lock and load,” Maynard ordered, and his men responded with well drilled skill. The two officials turned now to confront the soldiers, while Andromeda towered over them behind. And then she saw the solution to the confrontation with a clarity that shocked her—after all, despite Thyssen’s warnings, she was sure that it would not be right to fire upon these men, however corrupt they might be. The right answer was so obvious that she carried it out in the same instant she thought of it. All she had to do was reach forward, and with a grand sweep of her hands, cracked the heads of the two officials together.
They went down, both of them, in a rather awkward embrace. Andromeda stood over them triumphantly. Captain Maynard was staring at her in complete disbelief.
“I can’t believe you did that,” he murmured.
“Well, captain,” Andromeda said with an assurance that she definitely didn’t feel. “It sure was better than shooting them. In this part of the world, people get shot all the time, but how often does something like this happen?”
Maynard, still shaking his head in disbelief, called to a medic and between them they got the two dazed officials back onto their feet. Hastily, they rushed them off to their cars. Their drivers and attendants looked on in utter bewilderment. Then the cars were gone.
Maynard dismissed his men and walked over to Andromeda. She could shrug it off.
“I just did it on impulse. And maybe, when word of this little humiliation gets around, some of these jokers will be a little more reluctant to harass us.”
“Oh yes,” Maynard smiled. “I should imagine a lot of people will find this incident quite unforgettable.”
“Being unforgettable is what they pay me for, Cap’n,” Andromeda smiled.
But she proved to be right. There were no further Zambian officials after that.
*
And so it was back to the House of the Golden Carp where they could sit on the wide verandah and survey the countryside in the evening glow, served saki by the geishas in their colourful kimonos and lament upon the hardship of their lives.
“We never even went close to meeting the deadline,” Brian said grimly.
Why did he bother? Wagner was wondering, looking at him sideways. They all did the same thing. Miracles immediately—the impossible takes a little longer. Harley asked and they tried to deliver, against all odds.
“Trouble with the government?” Wagner asked conversationally. He presumed that Brian would get around to explaining why he had been summoned here eventually. You just had to be patient with him.
“Not at all—well, you know how the Japanese are—it’s all bowing and scraping and exchanging compliments but they need all that ritual to be polite because underneath they are just as inefficient as any bureaucracy,” Brian said without the slightest consideration that it might have been a racist generalisation. “Anyhow, as I suspected, they were dead keen to get rid of the pilgrims. They’ve had to guard them day and night to protect them from gangs of hooligans anyway. Then, when Lorna went on the telly and did her magic cure routine, they were hooked. Y’know, she even learned her lines in Japanese. That impressed ‘em.”
“Always was a smart girl, that Lorna.” Wagner said begrudgingly.
“Too smart for you and me,” Brian said with a grin.
“What you gotta ask yourself is, will she be too smart for Harley too?” Wagner said with a sly grin.
“Yeah, I heard about that. Now that she’s got to the top, where does she go from here?”
“Well, one day she’ll be old and ugly and us guys will stop falling for her charms,” Wagner laughed.
“Assuming, of course, that any of us get to be much older and uglier.”
Okay, enough jocularity. Back to the serious stuff. Brian was so predictable.
“You don’t believe, then, that Thyssen has a miracle up his sleeve?”
“Oh no,” Brian laughed. “I know he does. The problem is, even if it does work, it’s gonna be bloody nearly impossible to pull off.”
“Tell me about this miracle,” Wagner said, knowing fully what he was letting himself in for.
“It has to do with the Third Law of Thermodynamics.”
“I thought there were only two.”
“There were. Well, there are. It’s only me and Harley who reckon there’s a third one.”
“Refresh my memory on the first two.”
“The first one says the universe will remain constant forever. But there’s small print, which says that what it really means is that the amount of material, or elementary particles, that make up the universe will remain the same. What it doesn’t say is that those particles can change, from matter to energy or vice versa, and that the balance will not stay the same. There’ll just be the same quantity of them. Then there’s the second law, which says that eventually all particles will be converted into matter and there won’t be any left as energy and the universe will become entirely dead matter. The Heat Death of the Universe. Entropy.”
“Yeah, right,” Wagner said. “Got all that.”
“Okay. So, in very general terms, the stars continually produce Bosons and the Black Holes continually swallow stars. But every star is slowly dying, producing less Bosons, while black holes continually grow larger and more numerous. Every day, there are more Fermions and less Bosons, and that’s been happening since the Big Bang.”
“So it’s inevitable.”
“So it seems, except, there is one exception. Of course, the evidence is slight and we have only one sample planet to work with, but it seems one source of Bosons that is continually expanding, and that is thought.”
“Thought?”
“Yes, well, call it what you like. Intelligence, sentience, cognisance. But I prefer to call it just plain thought. You see the neurons firing in your brain and every other brain are Bosons. Thought, whatever it is, generates Bosons.”
“So you figure that one day we’ll grow up to be big enough and nasty enough to take on black holes?”
“Precisely. Not soon, of course. But we can assume that wherever there are life forms and evolution is taking place, Bosons are being generated. And one day, us and all the billions of other beings from inhabited planets out there will be so numerous and widespread about the universe that the effect will be to reverse entropy.”
“Holy Jesus. We’re failing to save a planet and you’re plotting to save the universe.”
“Exactly. So that’s the Third Law of Thermodynamics. Thought runs contrary to the Second Law and can overcome entropy.”
Wagner, goggle-eyed, took one more saki than he might earlier have needed. “Now come on, Brian. Just exactly how much evidence is there to support this theory?”
“Not a lot. But, some scientists think there might be something in it somehow. And we do have absolutely no idea what thought is and how it function
s. This is the best theory going around.”
“And Harley thinks all this somehow has something to do with the Shastri Effect?”
“Harley is a sensible man with a strong scientific reputation to protect and he is admitting no such thing. But he’s letting me get away with believing it.”
“Well, I’ll wait until Harley says so, if you don’t mind.”
“Suit yourself.”
“Let’s get back to the subject in hand, shall we?”
“Which subject was that?”
“About moving these difficult Japanese.”
“Oh, right. So you think the fact that Harley plans to move as many pilgrims as possible into the path of the Brazilian Shastri Event isn’t the same subject.”
“He’s doing it because it’ll cure them.”
“I believe he has another reason.”
“Like what?”
“Look, it’s a random universe, right? Except here on Planet Earth where the laws of physics and maths work for us, despite the fact that they don’t work in reality. There is only one possible explanation for that.”
“That, somehow, we make those laws work.”
“That’s right. Whenever those random elementary particles fall under the influence of our collective consciousness, they conform to the rules by which our minds operate.”
“You’re kidding me, right?”
“Take it as serious as you like, mate. But I reckon Harley’s idea is that, down there in the earth’s core, there’s a chunk of the random universe on the rampage. And he figures that if he can get enough people, with linked brains, all directing the same thought toward the singularity at the moment when it is most vulnerable and closest to us, we’ll hit it with Bosons and force it to conform.”
“Good God.”
“And how will he get them all to think the same thing at the same time?”
“Because at this last instant, they’ll all be feeling exactly the same thing at exactly the same time. Pain.”