Broken Symmetry

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. ”

1. Spin Up

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.

Dr. Julia Kristin Anderson came around the comer. “Hello, Professor Shwartz—I mean, Ray,” she said, and smiled.

Ray smiled back at her. Kristin had her Ph.D. for a year now; they were more colleagues than teacher and student. And yet she still couldn’t break her old habits of calling him “Professor.”

“It’s OK, Kristin. At least you didn’t call me ‘Director.’ What’s up?”

She squatted down next to the wall that Ray had just examined, and checked it herself. “Completely intact.”

“I thought we might have had a resurgence of the fire ants,” Ray said, “but I doubt even they could chew through that. ” They laughed for a moment as Kristin stood up, and then Ray continued. “So what news do you have for me? It’s obviously not a problem with the ring. ”

Kristin’s face settled into a more somber expression. “I wanted to tell you this personally.” She paused.

“Yes?”

“Apparendy, there’s nothing wrong with either the scintillators or the computers. The particle detectors should be working perfectly.”

Ray closed his eyes and sighed. “Damn. That’s what I was afraid of. How many beams have we run since the collider became operational? Almost a hundred, right?”

“Ninety-three, if we include the beams at the beginning that did yield data.”

“It wasn’t enough.” Ray pulled a sheet of paper out of his pocket. “Damn it, Kristin, I wish I could figure this out. The SSC was my major goal in life. I know this may sound silly, but it was to be the grand culmination of the years I had spent doing physics. By now, we were supposed to have found the Higgs boson and verified the theory of Grand Unification. Instead, we’re getting nothing.”

He passed the sheet over to her. “I mean, look at that. Everything points to the collider running smoothly.” He ticked points off on his fingers. “We re having no problem generating proton beams and antiproton beams in the containment rings; you and I have just ascertained that the ring walls are unharmed; and now you’re telling me that the detectors are fully functional as well.”

She studied the sheet and nodded. “True.”

“Well, then, Dr. Anderson, tell me, what piece of equipment is malfunctioning? Because I certainly can’t figure it out!”

She glanced around the room. “I don’t think anything is malfunctioning at all.”

“Nothing at all.”

“That’s right.”

“Then why aren’t we getting any data?”

“Professor—Ray, are you willing to entertain a—well, listen to a hunch?”

“I’ll accept anything at this point.”