Michael Burstein - Broken Symmetry

Illustration by Randy Asplund-Faith

No one saw the first four explosions. Only two people witnessed the fifth explosion, and it killed one of them.

Jack Levinson and Daniel Strock, fellow math teachers at the local high school in Waxahachie, Texas, always spent their Sunday afternoons bicycling along the path of the old, abandoned Superconducting Supercollider main ring. Its sixty-mile circumference surrounded the town, a greater distance than either of the two friends ever bicycled on any given day. Instead, they liked to drive to the spot on the ring where they had last left off their biking, pedal for a few miles, and then return to their car. In bits and pieces, they had made a habit of completely finishing the path of the accelerator every few months. Not that they could see the old collider ring, of course, since, like most particle accelerators, it had been built underground. Nor did a track actually run above the buried ring. They bicycled on dry grass that looked the same everywhere, so that unless you knew the collider was beneath your feet, nothing in the way the ground appeared would tell you otherwise.

On this particular October afternoon, shortly after starting their ride, they stopped for a moment to relieve their thirst. They remained straddled on their bicycles. Jack reached down for his canteen, and poured the cool water down his parched throat. He offered it to Daniel, who shook his head. “I’m busy,” he said, checking his compass against a map.

“Come on,” Jack said, “you’d better take a sip if you don’t want to end up dehydrated.”

Daniel smiled. “Nah, I can take it.”

“You say that each and every time, and last week I almost had to carry you back to the car. Here.” Jack thrust the canteen at his friend, who took a sip and tossed it back.

Jack looked around. “Which way now?”

“Well,” Daniel said, turning the map around and squinting into the Sun, “I think we go—this way!”

As he spoke the last two words, he jumped back onto the pedals and sped away from Jack. Jack shook his fist, and almost lost his balance getting back onto the bicycle. Daniel was already thirty feet ahead. Laughing, Jack shouted, “Damn you! You always try to turn this into a race—”

A large explosion interrupted him, a loud boom accompanied by a blinding flash of light. He hit the dirt instantly, his body remembering the air raid drills from elementary school. Duck and cover, that’s what they always said to do. In a moment, the boom turned into the echo of a distant rumble, and Jack looked up.

The explosion had left a gaping hole in the ground, right where Daniel had been pedaling. Smoke drifted lazily out of the hole. Daniel and his bike lay off to the side, thrown by the force of the explosion. Jack jumped off his bike and ran over to his friend.

“Daniel!” he screamed, and what he saw shocked him. Daniel’s body was bruised and bleeding all over, and covered with metal fragments. He didn’t react to Jack’s scream.

Jack regained control and gently shook Daniel on the shoulder. It was scorching hot, and Jack pulled his hand away in searing pain. As he did, pieces of Daniel’s shirt and flesh came with it.

Jack spat on his hand in disgust, and took another look at Daniel. His friend’s head lolled off to one side, and he looked as limp as a rag doll. He was dead. Jack assimilated this information as best as he could, and passed out.

“Sheriff, Mr. Levinson has been in a major accident, and I don’t want you getting him all worked up. ”

“Don’t worry, Doc,” said Sheriff Bob Kingsley in his natural drawl. He fixed his eyes in a squint and looked at the two Ellis County deputies, who nodded in agreement. The three made a strange picture, standing in the antiseptic white hospital hallway in uniform. Kingsley wore a ten-gallon hat over his dark, curly hair, the one affectation he allowed himself. “We just want to ask him a few questions. ”

Dr. Korn shook his head. “Only one of you. I don’t want him to get too excited.”

Kingsley shrugged and followed the doctor into the hospital room. He emerged a few minutes later and headed over to the nurses’ station, his deputies in tow.

Waiting at the station was Sam Stratton, of the FBI. “Well?” he asked Kingsley, in a clipped voice.

“Well,” echoed the sheriff. “Mr. Levinson saw another hole form. ”

“That makes five, now. And the first direct evidence that the ring is dangerous. It was an explosion, right?”

“Yep, and a pretty nasty one from what Levinson said. He’s still shaken up over the death of his friend. ”

Stratton dismissed Kingsley’s concern with a wave of his hand. “OK, Sheriff, thanks for your time. I’ll take over the investigation from here and call in my people.” He reached for the phone, but Kingsley interceded by grabbing his wrist.

“Begging your pardon, Mr. Stratton, but this is still Ellis County, and the area of the collider is still under my jurisdiction.”

Stratton glared at him. “We have jurisdiction over federal land. ”

Kingsley smiled. “Ah, but it ain’t federal land anymore, is it? Hasn’t been for quite some time now. ”

Stratton pulled his wrist out of Kingsley’s grip, and brushed it off on his pants. “Very well, Sheriff. So what do you plan to do?”

“First thing I’m going to do is set up police barricades and declare the ground above the ring off limits. It won’t keep out everyone, but it should give us a few days of leeway before the press catches wind of it. ”

“That’s exactly what I was planning to do. I don’t see why I shouldn’t be the one to supervise.”

“They won’t respect your barriers as much as they’ll respect mine, Mr. Stratton. Most of these people have an idea of who I am, and trust the sheriff’s office. You’re just the guy they sent in from Austin.”

Stratton squinted at Kingsley. “I can bring in the army, if necessary.”

Kingsley frowned. “The army? You don’t really want to antagonize the townsfolk unnecessarily, do you? People don’t usually go out to the collider anyway. What’s the point of attracting all that attention?”

Stratton glared at him. “I still need to call in some people. Scientists.”

Kingsley shook his head and smiled. “Call in your scientists if you want, Mr. Stratton, but I’m going to call in mine. Probably just as good.”

“Yours?” Stratton asked, with the slightest hint of a sneer.

“Yep, mine. I’m going to call in the guy who knows all there is to know about this accelerator. Got to know him a little over ten years ago, when he first came to direct the project. He’s back at Harvard now. If anyone knows what caused this thing to start burping over the past month, he would.” Kingsley turned to his deputies, and in an even voice, said, “Get me Roy Schwitters. ”

The Superconducting Supercollider had been up and running for over a year now, and Ray Shwartz still couldn’t figure out why they weren’t able to get any data. He squatted in an underground access corridor, next to the main ring, and inspected the wall separating the two. The fluorescent light and white walls made it easy to see, and what Ray found annoyed him. There was nothing wrong with the wall. It was completely whole.

Footsteps echoed from behind and interrupted him. He stood up, pulled up the knot of his tie and mopped his bald head with a handkerchief; despite the air conditioning system and its infernal hum, Ray still felt hot from the Texas climate. He was more used to the climate of Boston, or Seattle. “Yes?” he asked, turning around.