Blasphemy

might be completely stable. In which case, it would drift down to the center of the earth and hang out there, swallowing up more and more matter until . . . krrrrch! Good-bye Earth.”

“There’s a chance that might happen?” Ford asked.

“No,” said Kate irritably. “Melissa’s just teasing you.”

“Ninety-seven percent,” intoned Dolby.

“Luminosity at seventeen point nine two TeV.”

Ford lowered his voice. “Kate . . . Don’t you think even the smallest possibility is too high? We’re talking about the destruction of the earth.”

“You can’t shut down science on outlandish possibilities.”

“Don’t you care?”

Kate flared up. “Damn it, Wyman, of course I care. I live on this planet, too. You think I’d risk that?”

“If the probability isn’t exactly zero, you are risking it.”

“The probability is zero.” She swiveled her chair, roughly turning her back on him.

Ford straightened up and noticed Hazelius still looking at him. The physicist rose from his chair and strolled over with an easy smile.

“Wyman? Let me reassure you with this little fact: if miniature black holes were stable, we’d see them everywhere, left over from the Big Bang. In fact, there’d be so many that they would have swallowed up everything by now. So the fact that we exist is proof that mini black holes are unstable.”

Corcoran smirked at the sidelines, pleased at the effect of her words.

“Somehow I’m not completely reassured.”

Hazelius placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “It’s impossible that Isabella will create a black hole that will destroy the earth. It simply can’t happen. ”

“Power steady,” said St. Vincent.

“Beam collimated. Luminosity eighteen point two TeV.”

The murmuring in the room had increased. Ford heard a new sound—a faint, distant singing.

“You hear that?” Hazelius said. “That’s a sound generated by trillions of particles racing around Isabella. We’re not sure why there’s a sound at all—the beams are in a vacuum. Somehow they set up a sympathetic vibration transmitted by the intense magnetic fields.”

The atmosphere on the Bridge was thickening with tension.

“Ken, take it up to ninety-nine and hold,” said Hazelius.

“Will do.”

“Rae?”

“Luminosity just over nineteen TeV and rising.”

“Harlan?”

“Steady and cool.”

“Michael?”

“No anomalies.”

Wardlaw spoke from his security station across the room. His voice was very loud in the hushed atmosphere. “I’ve got an intruder.”

“What?” Hazelius straightened up, astonished. “Where?”

“At the perimeter fence up top, around the elevator. I’m focusing in.”

Hazelius strode over, and Ford quickly joined him. A greenish image of the fence materialized on one of Wardlaw’s screens, seen from the perspective of a camera mounted high up on a mast above the elevator. It was of a man, pacing restlessly along the fence.

“Can you zero in?”

Wardlaw hit a switch, and a different view sprang into focus from the level of the fence.

“It’s that preacher!” said Hazelius.

The form of Russ Eddy, as gaunt as a scarecrow, paused in his pacing and hooked his fingers into the chain links, peering in with a suspicious scowl on his face. Behind him, the moon cast a greenish glow across the barren mesa.

“I’ll take care of it,” said Wardlaw, rising.

“You’ll do nothing of the sort,” said Hazelius.

“He’s trespassing.”

“Leave him be. He’s harmless. If he tries to climb the fence, then you can speak to him over the loudspeakers and tell him to scram.”

“Yes, sir.”

Hazelius turned. “Ken?”

“Holding at ninety-nine.”

“How’s the supercomputer, Rae?”

“So far, so good. Keeping up with the flow of particles.”

“Ken, take it up a tenth.”

The flower on the screen flared, flickering and spreading, running through all the colors of the rainbow. Ford stared at the screen, mesmerized by the image.

“I’m starting to see the very lowest end of that resonance,” said Michael Cecchini. “It’s a powerful one.”

“Take it up another tenth,” said Hazelius.

The writhing flower on the screen grew more intense, and two faint, shimmering lobes appeared on either side of the central point, darting outward again and again, like a grabbing hand.

“All power systems go,” said St. Vincent.

“Up a tenth,” said Hazelius.

Chen hit the keyboard. “I’m starting to see it—extreme space-time curvature at CZero.”

“Up a tenth.” Hazelius’s voice was calm, steady.

“There it is!” said Chen, her voice resonating across the Bridge.

“You see?” said Kate to Ford. “That black dot right at CZero. It’s as if the spray of particles was just briefly passing out and then back into our universe.”

“Twenty-two point five TeV.” Even the laid-back Chen sounded tense.

“Steady at ninety-nine point four.”

“Up a tenth.”

The flower writhed, twisted, throwing off veils and sprays of color. The dark hole in the center increased, its edges flickering raggedly. The resonance suddenly lunged outward, right off the sides of the screen.

Ford saw a drop of sweat crawl down Hazelius’s cheek.

“That’s the source of the charged jet at twenty-two point seven TeV,” said Kate Mercer. “We seem to be tearing the ‘brane at that point.”

“Up a tenth.”

The hole grew, pulsating strangely, like a beating heart. In the middle it was black as night. Ford stared, drawn in.

“Infinite curvature at CZero,” said Chen.

The hole had grown so large, it swallowed most of the center of the screen. Ford suddenly saw flashes in its depths, like a school of fish darting about in deep water.

“How’s the computer?” Hazelius asked sharply.

“Flaky,” said Chen.

“Up a tenth,” said Hazelius, his voice low.

The flecks increased. The singing noise, which had been steadily rising, added a hissing, snakelike overtone.

“Computer’s getting funkier,” said Chen, her voice tight.

“How so?”

“Take a look.”

Everyone was now standing before the big screen—everyone but Edelstein, who continued reading.