Final Theory

by Mark Alpert

  “Well, some physicists have speculated that there may be a particle called a sterile neutrino. They call it sterile because it usually doesn’t interact with any other particles in our universe. The sterile neutrinos fly through the extra dimensions and pass right through our brane like water molecules through a sieve.”

  “Let me guess. The unified theory has the equation for this particle, too.”

  She nodded. “Yeah, it’s in the paper. And the equation predicts that twisting the spacetime of our brane can generate bursts of the particles. If the brane is twisted enough, the sterile neutrinos can shoot out of one part of our universe and travel to another part by taking a shortcut through the bulk. Take a look at this.”

  She pointed at a reproduction of another diagram drawn by Einstein:

  David recognized the picture. “That’s a wormhole, right? A bridge that connects distant regions of spacetime?”

  “Yeah, but only sterile neutrinos can take this kind of shortcut. And according to the unified theory, the particles can gain energy as they move through the extra dimensions. A hell of a lot of energy if the beam of neutrinos is oriented in the right way.”

  David shook his head. This was starting to look bad. “What happens when the energized particles come back to our universe? Does the theory say anything about that?”

  Monique closed the laptop and turned off its power. She wasn’t going to let David see the final equations in the paper. “The returning particles can trigger a violent warping of the local spacetime. The amount of energy released depends on how you set up the experiment. Under the right conditions, you could use this process to generate heat or electricity. But you could also use it as a weapon.”

  A breeze rustled the needles of the pine tree beside them. Though the air was still warm, David felt a chill. “So you can choose the point where the particles reenter our universe? Launch the beam of sterile neutrinos from Washington and ricochet it through the extra dimensions so that it hits a bunker in Tehran?”

  She nodded again. “You’d have fine-tune control over the coordinates of the target and the size of the blast. A single burst of sterile particles could take out a nuclear lab in Iran or North Korea, even if it’s buried a mile underground.”

  Now David knew why the FBI had chased them halfway across the country. A weapon like this would be perfect for the war on terror. The Pentagon could eliminate its enemies without deploying commandos or cruise missiles. Because the particle beam would travel through the extra dimensions, it would evade radar, antiaircraft fire, and all other defenses. “How much energy can the beam deliver? What’s the upper limit?”

  “That’s the problem. There’s no limit. You could use this technology to blow up an entire continent.” She held the laptop at arm’s length, as if it might explode at any moment. “But here’s the worst part: it’s a lot easier to build this kind of weapon than to manufacture a nuke. You don’t need to enrich any uranium for a warhead, or launch a ballistic missile to deliver the thing. All you need are the equations and a team of engineers. The Iranians and North Koreans could do it without much trouble. Not to mention Al-Qaeda.”

  David turned away from her and stared at the campfire. “Shit,” he muttered. “No wonder Einstein didn’t want to publish it.”

  “Yeah, it’s pretty clear he understood the implications. In the last part of the paper he included the formulas for generating the extra-dimensional beams. You’d have to warp a tiny piece of spacetime in a perfectly spherical pattern. You could probably set it up by smashing protons together in a collider.”

  David’s heart started pounding. “You mean someone could build this weapon using a particle accelerator?”

  The campfire shifted in the breeze and for a second Monique’s face seemed to disappear. “The accelerators at the national laboratories are already designed to maximize the number of particle collisions. You know the Tevatron, the collider at Fermilab? The physicists there can cram trillions of protons into a particle beam that’s narrower than a human hair. Of course you’d have to adjust the collider in exactly the right way to warp the spacetime and generate the sterile neutrinos. But Einstein’s equations would allow you to calculate the necessary adjustments.”

  Her last words rang across the dark clearing. David nervously looked over his shoulder and saw Graddick toss an empty Dinty Moore can into the fire. Then the mountain man picked up another can, a full one, and headed for the thicket where he’d parked his station wagon. He was going to wake up Elizabeth to see if she wanted any supper.

  David turned back to Monique. “Okay, we have two choices. We can smuggle the flash drive across the border and make contact with the UN or the World Court, some organization that can be trusted to safeguard the theory. Or we can hide the thing ourselves. Maybe we can find a better place than—”

  “No, we can’t hide it.” Monique removed the flash drive from the USB port of the laptop. The small silver cylinder glinted in her palm. “We have to destroy it.”

  David’s muscles tensed. He felt an urge to grab the flash drive out of Monique’s hand. “Are you nuts! This is the Theory of Everything!”

  She frowned. “I know what it is. I’ve spent the past twenty years working on this problem.”

  “Then you know we can’t throw it away! We have to save it, not destroy it!”

  Monique wrapped her fingers around the cylinder. “It’s too risky, David. If Einstein couldn’t keep the theory hidden, what makes you think you can?”

  He shook his head, bursting with frustration. “Dr. Kleinman told me to keep it safe! Those were his last words, ‘Keep it safe.’”

  “Believe me, I don’t want to do this. But we have to think of everyone’s safety. The terrorists want this theory just as much as the government does, and they’ve already come close to getting it. Remember the soldier in the Warfighter program, the one with the number 3 on his helmet?”

  She tightened her grip on the flash drive. As David watched her, a visual memory of Einstein’s equations flashed through his mind. It was still gibberish to him, but he remembered several of the formulas. “It’s too late,” he said. “We’ve seen the theory. It’s in our heads now.”

  “I didn’t show you all the equations. And my memory isn’t as good as yours. After we destroy the flash drive, we should turn ourselves in to the FBI. They’ll interrogate us, but they can’t force us to say anything. I’d rather deal with them than the terrorists.”

  David grimaced, recalling his interrogation in the FBI’s complex on Liberty Street. “It won’t be so easy. Look, why don’t we—”

  A distant shout interrupted him. It was Graddick’s voice. He came running back to the clearing, sweaty and wild-eyed. “She’s not in the car!” he yelled. “Elizabeth’s gone!”

  JESUS FUCKING CHRIST, BETH THOUGHT, there’s nothing but trees here! Barefoot, she stumbled down the dirt road, trying to find a way back to the state highway. The woods were so thick she couldn’t see a damn thing, and she kept stubbing her toes on the roots and rocks. She’d left her pumps behind in the fat fucker’s station wagon and now the soles of her feet were cut all to hell, but she didn’t care. What she needed right now was a long hit of meth, and even though she had $300 stashed in her pants, she sure as fuck wasn’t going to find any dealers in the goddamn forest.

  She finally saw a light up ahead, blinking through the leaves. She sprinted toward it and came to Route 68, a one-lane road glowing faintly in the moonlight. All right, she thought, we’re back in business. Sooner or later, some horny good ol’ boy would drive by. She slapped the dirt off her feet and brushed the hair out of her eyes and tucked her T-shirt into her pants to make her tits stand out. But the highway was empty. Not a single fucking car. After ten minutes she began walking down the road, hoping to find a gas station. It wasn’t very cold but her teeth started chattering. “Shit!” she screamed at the trees. “I need a fucking hit!” But all she heard in reply was the crazed whine of the cicadas.

  Beth wa
s just about to collapse when she rounded a bend and saw a long, low building. It was a small strip of stores—a gift shop, a post office, a propane supplier. Hallelujah, she thought, civilization at last! Now all she needed was a truck driver who could give her a lift to the nearest city. But as she ran toward the building she noticed to her dismay that all the stores were closed and the parking lot was empty. She clutched her stomach, suddenly nauseous. And then she saw it, in front of the post office: a BellSouth pay phone.

  At first she just stood there, paralyzed. She knew a number she could call, but she didn’t make a move. Of all the people in the world, this was the last bastard she wanted to speak to. But he’d told her long ago that she could always call him in an emergency, and she’d memorized his cell-phone number just in case.

  Beth went to the phone. With trembling fingers she dialed the operator and placed a collect call. After a brief wait, the bastard came on the line.

  “Hello, Elizabeth dear. What a pleasant surprise.”

  JONAH, THANK GOD, HAD FINALLY fallen asleep. For the past three hours Karen had watched him struggle against the cords binding his ankles and wrists. That monster Brock had also tied a gag over Jonah’s mouth to muffle the boy’s screams, and of course this only made him more terrified. Karen was bound and gagged, too, but she could feel her son shivering as he lay next to her on the floor of Brock’s van. Her worst agony was that she couldn’t comfort him—couldn’t put her arms around him, couldn’t whisper, “It’s all right, everything’s going to be all right.” All she could do was touch her forehead to his and try to make a soothing noise through the damp rag over her mouth.

  Sometime around midnight, after they’d traveled at least two hundred miles, Jonah stopped screaming. His exhaustion overcame his terror and he drifted off with his wet face pressed into his mother’s neck. Once he was asleep, Karen squirmed onto her side so she could get a glimpse through the van’s windshield. She spotted a sign: EXIT 315, WINCHESTER. They were in Virginia already, heading south on I-81. She had no idea where the hell they were going, but she was willing to bet a lot of money that it wasn’t the FBI headquarters.

  Brock was in the driver’s seat, eating potato chips from a family-size bag and listening to a rebroadcast of the Rush Limbaugh Show. Even the back of his head was ugly, with pink splotches below his hairline and behind his ears. She closed her eyes for a moment, remembering the cold smile on the agent’s face after he shot Gloria Mitchell and pointed his gun at Jonah and Karen. Then she opened her eyes and squinted hard, aiming all her silent fury at the ugly son of a bitch. You’re dead, she whispered into her gag. Before this is over, I’m going to kill you.

  IN DISGUST LUCILLE SLAMMED HER fist on one of the huge transparent spheres in the Virtual Combat Simulation lab. After spending sixteen hours dissecting the lab’s servers and terminals, a team of Defense Department computer experts had just concluded that the data stored in the war-gaming software had been irretrievably lost. Now it was eight o’clock in the morning and Lucille was madder than a boar in a peach orchard. The army had thoroughly botched the search for the suspects; after letting them slip off the base, the post commander had waited two hours before alerting the state police in Georgia and Alabama. The Delta Force had set up checkpoints on some of the major highways leading out of Columbus, but at least half the roads in the area were left unguarded. The plain truth was that they didn’t have enough troops. The army had sent so many soldiers to Iraq that they couldn’t even defend their own backyard.

  Lucille turned away from the spheres and slumped into a chair. While the Pentagon’s computer geeks packed up their equipment, she dug into her pants pocket and found a pack of Marlboros. Luckily, there were two cigarettes left. She removed one of them and began searching for her Zippo, but she couldn’t find it in either her pants or her jacket. Jesus, she thought, what the hell happened to that thing? It was her favorite lighter, the one with the Lone Star on it. “Goddamn it!” she shouted, startling the computer geeks.

  She was just about to apologize when Agent Crawford came into the lab, looking as cocky as ever. He marched up to her chair and leaned over so he could whisper in her ear. “I’m sorry to interrupt, ma’am, but I have something from Washington.”

  Lucille frowned. “What now? Does the SecDef want to reassign the case to the Marine Corps?”

  Crawford held up a palm-size digital recorder. “Someone left a message on your voice-mail at headquarters. One of the administrative assistants forwarded it to me.”

  She sat up straight. “Is it another sighting? Did someone recognize one of the suspects?”

  “No, it’s better than that.” Grinning, he pointed at a private office adjoining the lab. “Let’s go in that room so I can play it for you.”

  Lucille jumped out of her chair and followed Crawford into the office. A burst of new energy filled her tired limbs, as it always did when she got a lucky break. Crawford closed the office door.

  “I think you’ll recognize the voice,” he said. He pressed a button on the digital recorder and after a few seconds it began to play:

  Hello, Lucy. This is David Swift. I see from the newspapers that you’re looking for me. I suppose you want to continue the conversation we started back in New York. I’ve been a little busy the past couple of days, but I think I can make some time for you this morning. I’ve turned on my cell phone so you can find me. I have just one request: Don’t bring any soldiers with you. If I see even one helicopter or Humvee, I’m gonna pulverize the package I picked up at Fort Benning. I’m willing to cooperate, but I don’t want any trigger-happy commandos pointing their guns at me. Are we clear?

  THEY CALLED THIS MOUNTAIN RANGE the Great Smokies because of all the water vapor rising from its tree-covered slopes. Mixing with the hydrocarbons exuded by the pine forest, the vapor usually thickens into a smoky blue haze that shrouds the rugged landscape. But this morning a stiff breeze had dispelled the mist and David could see mile after mile of sunlit hills and valleys, stretching to the horizon like a great, rumpled blanket.

  He stood at the top of Haw Knob, looking down at a one-lane highway that twisted along the steep eastern slope, some six hundred feet below. No black SUVs had come down the road yet, but it was still early. The FBI needed some time to retrieve his cell phone’s GPS coordinates, which had been transmitted to the nearest tower when he’d turned the thing on. And then of course the agents had to formulate their assault plan and assemble their strike teams. From the summit David had an excellent view of the trail that the agents were most likely to use, a path that started at the highway about half a mile to the south. He would see the men coming long before they arrived.

  Graddick had left his station wagon on a dirt road a few miles to the west. He’d led them to Haw Knob and planned to retreat to his car before the agents pounced, but now that the time was near he seemed reluctant to leave. He stood in front of Michael with his big hands covering the boy’s head and murmured some unintelligible words, a blessing probably. The batteries in Michael’s Game Boy had finally died a few hours before, but the teenager had accepted this event with equanimity and now seemed the better for it: he appeared more alert than usual, turning this way and that, completely unbothered by the fact that his mother was no longer with them. Meanwhile, Monique glanced anxiously at David, waiting for him to give the word. Although they’d already discarded the laptop, throwing its shattered remains into the Tellico River, she still held the flash drive in her fist.

  David had agonized over the choice for much of the previous night. The Einheitliche Feldtheorie was one of science’s greatest achievements, and erasing its equations seemed like a wanton act, a crime against humanity. But Elizabeth’s disappearance had made it clear that they couldn’t hide forever. Sooner or later something else would go wrong and the soldiers would find them. Then the Pentagon would have the unified theory and nothing in the world would stop them from using it. Within a few years the army would build devices that could launch sterile particle
s into the extra dimensions and destroy every terrorist hideout in the Middle East. The generals might be able to keep the theory to themselves for a while, their new secret weapon in the war on terror. But no weapon can remain secret for long. Eventually the knowledge would spread to Beijing and Moscow and Islamabad, and the seeds of the world’s annihilation would be planted. No, David couldn’t let that happen. He had to break his promise to Dr. Kleinman and eliminate the last traces of the theory. Until now he’d resisted that irrevocable step, but he couldn’t put it off any longer.

  He stepped toward a jagged, gray, semicircular outcrop that jutted from the summit like a giant tiara. Reaching across the rock shelf, he picked up a loose chunk of quartzite with a tapering edge that would fit in his hand. A stone tool, he thought, like something a prehistoric caveman might’ve used. He turned to Monique. “All right, I’m ready.”

  She came to his side and without saying a word placed the flash drive on the shelf, which was nearly flat. Her face was tense, almost rigid. She pressed her lips so firmly together that David imagined she was trying not to scream. It must’ve been excruciating, to sacrifice the very thing she’d spent her whole life searching for. And yet that was her decision. If Einstein himself could’ve looked fifty years ahead and seen the awful start of the twenty-first century, he would’ve done exactly the same.

  David raised the heavy rock. As he held it above the flash drive, he gazed again at the dazzling green mountains all around them, folded and bent in myriad shapes like the wrinkles of spacetime. Then he swung his arm down and smashed the rock as hard as he could against the silver cylinder.

  The plastic case shattered and the circuit board inside cracked into a dozen pieces. David aimed his second blow directly at the memory chip and the silicon disintegrated into hundreds of black shards, each as small as a pencil point. He kept pounding the thing until the chip was reduced to dust and the surrounding pins, circuits, and switches were a hash of metallic flecks. Then he scooped the debris into his palm and threw it over the lip of Haw Knob’s eastern slope. The strong wind caught the dust and scattered it across the pine forest.