But she wasn’t the only one with a Higgs projector. The one I had used to escape from prison was in my pocket, synched to the lenses I had borrowed from Nick. I didn’t know how to do much with it, and I had a feeling Jean had some custom subroutines in her version that she had written herself, but I had to try.
My mind raced. I remembered how I had tunneled the flour canister into the decorative table in my house when we found the projector… and a wave of dizziness hit me. That had been my double, not me. Once again, I was remembering something that I, the Jacob in prison, had never done.
I remembered how the table had exploded. I could tunnel a bullet or even a paper clip into Jean’s brain, and she could do the same to me. I didn’t want to kill her, though. I wanted to get the projector away from her. The problem was, she might have no such reservations about killing me.
One of the possible Chances became clear, a new version with a beautiful face, slimmer, with clear, round eyes and a closed mouth. “There she is!” Jean cried, exultant, her eyes wet with tears. “There’s my child!”
CHAPTER 37
“Why doesn’t the varcolac have any eyes?” Elena asked.
“I have no idea.” It didn’t seem like a very pressing question. I was pacing again, angry, intent on finding a way to escape. “We barely understand who or what it is. It’s utterly alien—just not the kind from outer space. Though, for all I know, maybe it travels in space, too.”
“Is its body real? Can it be hurt or destroyed?” Elena asked.
I considered it. So far, we had seen no evidence of weakness, though the body seemed physical enough. I wasn’t sure that, even if we could destroy the body, it would have any effect on the creature itself. “It must have fabricated its body in imitation of humans. Maybe it just doesn’t realize that eyes are an important feature.”
“Or they were too difficult,” Alex said. Alex and Alessandra’s voices were so identical that I had to look to see which of them was speaking. Alex still cradled her broken arm. It filled me with fury to see her hurt and not be able to help her, so much so that it was a moment before I realized what she had said.
“Too difficult to make eyes?” I said. “A creature who can jump between universes and who plays with reality like clay?”
“Could be. He hasn’t mastered facial expressions, that’s clear. Eyes are expressive,” Alex said. She shrugged, which jostled her broken arm and she gave a little moan.
“You’re doing great,” I said. “Hang in there. We’ll get you out.”
The idea that there were things that were beyond the power of the varcolac to accomplish was encouraging. Of course, Alex might be wrong. The varcolac might wear no eyes because it found them redundant or repellent. But it was something to think about.
I began pacing again, tracing the limits of my cage, trying to find some chink in the armor. I had no tools, no weapons. I had a solid cinderblock wall on one side and an invisible electric fence on the others. It was a simple and effective prison.
“Please stop,” Elena said. “Sit down.”
I kept pacing. “There must be a way out,” I said.
“And you’ll find it if you sit and explain it to me,” she said.
She had always known me better than I knew myself. I sat.
“Now why is all this happening?” she asked.
I skipped over most of the details and jumped to the main point. “Brian Vanderhall and Jean Massey found a way to alter the Higgs field in our universe.”
“What’s the Higgs field?”
“It’s a background field that gives particles their properties,” I said. “It affects how much mass things have, what kinds of elements are possible, what their properties are—really, just about anything. Assuming you can control it, you can play God. Break the laws of time and space.”
“And what does the varcolac have to do with it?”
“What do you mean?”
“You said these creatures have always been here, in our universe, unseen but present. Why can we see them now? What changed?”
I opened my mouth, then closed it again. I realized that I didn’t really know. It was possible that they could do it all along, but something tickled at my memory, something Brian had said… “That’s it!”
“What’s it?” Elena asked.
“Brian said the varcolac was tied to the collider. That it feeds off of the exotic particles the collider produces, and draws from its power. And here it is, operating out of the collider’s central power hub. It’s not roaming the world, going wherever it wants to. It has to stay close to the collider, or at least it has to keep coming back again. The collider is what keeps it going, giving it the power to make these physical manifestations. There are hundreds of electromagnets here drawing thousands of volts every second.” I drove my fist into my other hand. “That’s got to be it.”
“What does it mean?” Marek asked. “What do we have to do?”
“We have to shut off the power to the collider,” I said.
“Can we do that from here?”
I shook my head. “We can’t even touch the wires, never mind reach the breaker boxes. Besides, they’re computer-controlled; I doubt it’s a matter of simply flipping some switches. There are probably passwords, or even physical keys. What we need to do is call the control floor, and get them to shut the power down.”
“How do we do that?” Elena asked. “Our phones don’t work down here.”
“No, we’re too deep. We need someone outside to do it for us,” I said.
“Which is impossible,” Marek said.
I closed my eyes. I saw a flash of Jean Massey, of her office at the NJSC, of Chance lying on her desk. The other Jacob might have his own troubles to deal with, but at least he was free to move around and use his phone. “Maybe not impossible,” I said.
CHAPTER 38
Jean’s hand hovered over the Higgs projector, just moments from erasing the life of her child. The original Chance was still there, in the flesh, but the physically perfect version was superimposed over her, like a second movie projected onto the same screen.
I flicked my eyes through the projector subroutines and chose StrongNuclearForce. A selector icon appeared in my vision, and I used it to select first Jean, and then the office wall. Jean and the wall were suddenly attracted to each other by a force far stronger than magnetism. She was hurled sideways and crashed hard into the paneling.
It wasn’t enough. I ran toward her, hoping to grab her projector, but before I could reach her, I was thrown backward against the wall. I got up, ready to retaliate, just in time to see a swivel chair come crashing down on top of me. The metal base struck the side of my head, and I saw sparks. She was too fast for me, too accustomed to the interface and familiar with the subroutines.
Chance started to cry. Her face turned red, and she clenched her tiny fists while her wails filled the room. Jean rushed back to her, put a hand on her chest, and made soothing noises.
I tried to get up again, but my vision swam. I saw Elena in an underground room, and in that moment, I heard a voice saying, Turn off the power. I didn’t have time to think about what it meant. I scrambled to my feet and fumbled with the StrongNuclearForce pointers again.
“This is none of your business!” Jean screamed at me. “Just leave me alone.”
My pocket burst into flame. I threw myself back onto the floor and rolled to put out the fire on my pants. It worked, but the projector was burned beyond recognition. The message “Signal lost” flashed briefly in my vision. Just that quickly, Jean had won.