approached him, showed up at his apartment. No wonder he had tracked Bretti down-the world’s oldest grad student.
He swallowed hard, close to hyperventilating, took a half step toward the man on the floor, then ignored him entirely. No turning back now. He had to deliver the old Penning trap with whatever load it had managed to store in two days. Maybe that would be enough. It would
The FBI man’s handgun burned a hole in his pocket. He wanted to get rid of it, but he couldn’t leave it there. Fingerprints, evidence… he didn’t know what sort of magic the crime lab could do these days.
How could things go so wrong so fast? First the emergency beam dump on Sunday, which caused a power outage, blowing the hell out of his demo stash. And now some FBI suit came snooping around when he was transferring the last day’s run of p-bars.
Why couldn’t the bastard have waited another ten minutes? Bretti would have completed his task, and no one would have suspected. Nobody was supposed to see him at Fermilab. During his week of vacation, he should have had plenty of time to slip off to India, make his delivery, take his payment, and get back to Illinois to pretend that nothing had happened. Nobody would have noticed, or cared, except maybe Dumenco and his unexpected results.
Well, after the curmudgeonly Ukrainian’s radiation exposure, Dumenco wouldn’t be chasing lost antiprotons for long. He certainly hadn’t spent much time being a good advisor, helping Bretti make it through the academic hoops, taking the grad student under his wing, using a bit of professional pull to get him through the hard parts.
Crap, the old fart only cared about his own theories and the damned Nobel Prize. Now, maybe Bretti would have to accept it for his dear-departed mentor.
Nicholas Bretti took a deep breath. The fading rush of adrenaline had left him with a case of the shakes. He had to move fast before anyone found the man he’d shot. He had to take his equipment and get out of there.
Over at his work station, Bretti carefully disconnected the transfer mechanism from the Penning trap. Working quickly, he attached the much smaller, but much more efficient crystal-lattice trap and accelerometer to a port upstream from the main detector, where the substation tapped into the Tevatron flow. The crystal trap was the real key, a treasure chest for storing antimatter-but it needed nearly a week to collect enough p-bars to make it worthwhile.
Similar to the hundreds of other diagnostics attached to the beam channel, his small device had never drawn attention. Many teams of technicians had their own equipment in these substations, and nobody ever messed with someone else’s diagnostics. It just wasn’t done.
Instead of passively imaging the intense, rotating beam of p-bars, Bretti’s lattice trap would bleed off antimatter particles after they had been laser cooled and slowed by the accelerometer.
Glancing at an oval clock that one of the grad students had wired to run counterclockwise, Bretti saw that it hadn’t been more than three minutes since he had fired the shots. Still, much too long. He had to get out of there.
Grunting, Bretti lifted the disconnected Penning trap. Its case was lined with high-efficiency lithium-ion batteries, making up the majority of the weight. Two insulating Dewars, one inside the other, held the Penning trap itself-three strips of room-temperature superconducting magnets that created a precise magnetic field shaped like a bottle, bouncing the p-bars back and forth along the axis. Over time, the bottle would leak, but the lithium- ion batteries would keep the magnetic field alive long enough for him to get to India, while he filled the more efficient crystal-lattice trap that could literally hold nine orders of magnitude more antimatter.
He walked carefully away from the isolated substation as if carrying a suitcase full of bricks. He locked the door to the blockhouse-with any luck, and with many of the temporary hires on break, the agent’s body wouldn’t be found until Bretti was safely out of the country.
Making his way to his car, Bretti realized he didn’t even have time to drive back to his apartment and pick up his bags. He had a plane to catch.
This early on Tuesday afternoon, Bretti didn’t have to worry about rush hour traffic heading into downtown Chicago. Still, with his battered nerves, he didn’t want to push his luck finding a parking spot for his small red Saturn-leased, but still a good bargain on his grad-student salary. He couldn’t walk for blocks lugging the bulky Penning trap. Every bag lady and cab driver would spot him and wonder. He tossed a cigarette out the window and started for the embassy.
But first he pulled off to the side, stopping by a jetty on the shore of huge, gray Lake Michigan. The old concrete jetty was just remote enough that no one questioned people who stopped to gawk. Gold and red leaves from a cluster of trees hid him from others along the shoreline. A place for early-morning joggers; not many in the midafternoon.
The traffic was sparse, and he waited scant seconds before he fumbled in his pocket for the stolen FBI handgun. The gun was slick and still seemed hot-hot from firing the bullets that had torn into the agent’s flesh. Bretti thought he could still feel the heat on the barrel, the unexpected
Standing on the jetty, he tossed the handgun underhand into the chilly depths where waves churned with the brisk October breeze. The heavy gun made a soft splash like a gulp, and was swallowed up by the gray surface.
Much farther down the shore, a kid threw stones into the water, then ducked back as a wave splashed against the rocks. He waved at Bretti, who was too terrified not to wave back. Bretti was back in his car and jockeying into the fast lane in less than a minute.
“Not enough time as it is,” he muttered while clutching the steering wheel.
Racing down embassy row near Lakeshore Drive, Bretti passed stately buildings hidden behind ten-foot wrought-iron and brick fences. Immaculate guard shacks nestled beside every gate, partially obscured by thick shrubbery. Some embassies were protected with bulletproof glass windows; others were more inviting, giving an impression of openness-friendly nations, proud and colorful flags. The whole area oozed high society-the kind of life Bretti deserved, not some apartment hole in the burbs.
Bretti pulled up to the guard gate of the Indian embassy. Inside the shack, a guard took notice and motioned for him to stop. He hadn’t thought what he would say, but he rolled down his window anyway.
The faint smell of flowers and spice drifted into the car. A curving cobblestoned driveway wound around immaculately kept gardens. Not much like the boring homes around Batavia and Aurora -he would sure as hell be glad to get away from that. But first he had to get through the gate.
The embassy itself stood behind a fortress of aesthetically pleasing protective buffers-beige flower planters each the size of a small car, thick stone columns, ornate wrought-iron fencing. Unseen among the splendor, Bretti knew sophisticated microwave sensors stood watch over the compound.
A dark man wearing a white coat and turban, maroon pants, and a long ceremonial sword emerged from the guard shack. The man smiled through a black beard and mustache, but his eyes never lingered on Bretti. Instead, they swept back and forth along the red car for unforeseen threats.
Bretti recognized him. This was the same guard who had been present the two previous times he had visited the Indian Embassy.
Placing his hand on the silver hilt of his curved sword, the guard smiled tightly. “Welcome to the Indian Embassy, sir. What may I do for you here today?”
“I’m Nicholas Bretti,” he snapped, irritated that the man didn’t recognize him. “I have an appointment with Mr. Chandrawalia.”
“Very good, sir.” The guard reached into the shack, pulling out a clipboard. He ran his white-gloved fingers down a list. “Ah, yes, Mr. Bretti. You are somewhat late. Would you please park your car outside and enter through this gate?”
“I have an important…
The guard lifted an eyebrow. “You may unload the item here if you please while you park your car outside.”
