Entanglement

by Michael Brooks

  'What the . . . ?' Virgo said. He lost the power of speech for a moment. Then it returned. 'Who are you? And what the hell are you doing in my house?'

  Immediately, Virgo realised he knew the answers to both questions.

  CHAPTER 12

  THE MAN HELD OUT a hand. 'Laszlo Gierek,' he said.

  Like they were meeting at a conference. Virgo recognised the gaunt look, the drooping moustache, even the agitation in the set of his mouth. But he didn't remember seeing a hunted look in Gierek's eyes before.

  'I couldn't find the disk last night.' Gierek's gaze shifted back and forth, like he was scared to make eye contact. 'I'm sorry that Paul involved you in this, but I need the disk back.' He hesitated. 'You should lock your doors at night, by the way. I thought I'd at least have to pick a lock, break a window or something.'

  Virgo stared at the hand still extended towards him. 'Last night?' he said. He wasn't thinking fast enough. He was dazed. 'You took my passport last night?'

  Gierek handed it back. 'Only because I couldn't find the disk. I'm sorry to postpone your vacation, but I need the activator disk back.'

  Virgo slid the passport into the back pocket of his jeans. 'Activator? For what?'

  'For a little machine I built.'

  Whoa. Slow down.

  'What's going on, Gierek? Who killed Paul Radcliffe?'

  'My guess would be Alex Genovsky,' Gierek said. 'But I'm sure that name means nothing to you.' He raised an eyebrow, and the motion lifted the left side of his moustache. 'At least I hope it does.'

  A bursting anger rose in Virgo's chest, but he held it back. If Gierek had travelled across the Atlantic for this, there really was a story here. Fine. This was an opportunity: a shortcut. They could go and get the disk from Andy, and on the way, Gierek could tell him exactly what was going on. He owed him that much. And it would save Andy's forensics work getting him into any trouble.

  'I don't have the disk on me. I gave it to someone to look at.'

  Gierek's eyes widened. 'And what did they find?'

  'You tell me – what's the machine it activates?' Virgo took a leap. 'Have you built a quantum computer?'

  Gierek looked away. 'I don't know what Paul told you, but he made a bad mistake bringing you into this. It was unnecessary – I think he wanted to punish me; I told him I'd been working on something without him.' Gierek looked back at Virgo. 'Paul and I have shared many projects, but I had to keep this thing from him. I was working with . . . with someone else, someone I wanted to keep away from Paul. For his own sake, you understand?' Gierek's eyes were pleading for a moment, like he was seeking absolution. 'And then it all got out of hand, and I didn't know who else to turn to.'

  Gierek moved across to the window and craned his neck to look up and down the street. 'I just wanted him to help me expose . . .'

  'Expose what?' Virgo asked.

  Gierek turned, but ignored the question. 'I saw him speak to you: I followed you both outside the hall in Baltimore. I saw him give you the envelope. I knew straight away what was in it. What did he say to you?'

  Two could play at not answering questions. 'You don't know?'

  Gierek stared at him. 'You want a story? Is that it?' He shook his head. 'You don't want this story.'

  Virgo held his stare. Gierek seemed nervous enough to keep talking as long as there was silence to fill.

  'No, the disk doesn't activate the quantum computer,' Gierek said. His gaze had dropped away now; he was looking at the floor. 'It activates another machine. For what it's worth, I call it the entanglement generator. It looks like junk – it's wrapped up in a blanket in a cupboard in my lab – but it has its own peculiar power. I gave the disk to Paul so he could go and have a look at it; I thought he could help me decide what to do about it.'

  Gierek really was giving nothing away here. What was going on?

  'And now you want the disk back?'

  'It's the only one I have. It's vital evidence if I'm to stop . . .' He broke off. 'Yes, I want it back.'

  Virgo was furiously calculating in his head. Where was the story here? The disk? Or the quantum computer?

  'Is there a quantum computer?' he asked.

  Gierek suddenly looked grim. 'Why don't you call your friend? We can talk in the car.'

  It was something. Virgo stood up. 'OK,' he said. 'Let's talk in the car.'

  Gierek pulled the door open and headed downstairs.

  Virgo followed. By the time he reached the bottom of the stairs, Gierek had wandered into the sitting room. He was staring at the pictures on the mantelpiece.

  'I'll just get my jacket,' Virgo said, heading for the kitchen.

  'Is this your daughter?' Gierek called. 'She's very beautiful. How old is she?'

  Virgo picked up his jacket from the kitchen table. He realised that he hadn't locked the back door last night – he'd unlocked it to put the rubbish out after they came back from Katie's race, and hadn't locked it again. He wondered how many other nights the door had been open access for burglars.

  'Fifteen,' he called absent-mindedly. Where was the key?

  He'd lock it now. The key was on the top of the microwave. Where it always was. He could almost hear Rachel say it. The thought made him smile.

  A crashing sound came through from the sitting room, the shrill ring and tinkle of breaking glass. Virgo ran through to the front of the house, key in one hand, jacket in the other, to see what Gierek had broken.

  He froze at the doorway. One small window pane was shattered. Gierek was sprawled over the coffee table, blood pouring from a dark hole in the middle of his forehead.

  In the back of Virgo's mind, the part that was still working, he heard a mild scratching at the lock on the front door.

  His mental processes were grinding slowly, on rusted neurons. Eventually, it clicked. Someone had shot Gierek through the window. And now they were trying to get in through the door.

  He ran. By the time he reached the back door, he heard a sound that he had only ever heard in the movies. Three gunshots, fired through a silencer. They would have destroyed the lock on the front door. As Virgo yanked the back door open, he heard the front door crash against the wall in the hallway. It crossed his mind that this must be a mistake, that somehow everybody had converged on the wrong house. He heard the front door slam shut.

  Virgo careered out of the back door and ran across the block paving of the patio. In a couple of seconds, whoever had killed Gierek would be coming after him. The dead man's voice rang through his head.

  My guess would be Alex Genovsky.

  CHAPTER 13

  VIRGO SCRAMBLED DOWN THE garden towards the back gate. Halfway across the lawn, he slipped on the wet grass; it was only as he fell to the ground that he realised he was still holding his jacket. Good: his car keys were in the pocket.

  He got up again and made for the gate. Pulling it open, he leapt into the narrow alley between the rows of houses. Pushing past the overgrown thorn bushes that reached up from the cracked base of the alley walls, he ran parallel to the street and then turned sharply down a gap between two houses. He stopped. There was no sound except birdsong and the thud of his heart.

  He looked back. Was anybody chasing him?

  Not that he could see. They would still be frisking Gierek, looking for the disk.

  This could only be about the disk.

  If he came up out of the alley, onto the street here, maybe he could get to his car. Whoever it was wouldn't know him. If he looked nonchalant enough, maybe he could just be a passer-by, getting into a car and driving away. Then what? It didn't matter, not yet.

  Virgo slipped his jacket on, then pulled the car keys from the pocket. He held the remote lock between finger and thumb, finger on the button, and began to walk.

  He came out into the street forty metres up from the house. The car was twenty metres away. He would have to walk towards the house. Without looking up. Without his eyes lifting to the front door.

  He only managed ten paces before
he risked a glance.

  The day's light was cold and harsh; the street looked unwelcoming. It was empty too; that time of day when everyone had gone to work or was immersed in their morning routine at some anonymous shopping centre. No one else was there to see the black-coated figure standing on his doorstep, just behind the bay tree in his front garden. He saw a mesmerising rainbow flash of dispersed sunlight as the figure slipped something into a pocket. He knew that refraction: it was some kind of CD. Gierek had been carrying a disk. Another disk.

  Virgo felt an overwhelming urge to stop everything, to think. But not here. He hit the button on the car's remote lock.

  He'd forgotten about the beep. The jolly electronic chirp sang out from his silver Ford and told him the doors had been successfully unlocked. Virgo was only five paces away from the car, but he saw the dark figure turn and move out from behind the bay tree.

  He knew he wouldn't make it. Time to decide. He turned on his heels, the most suspicious of moves. Now, he really had to run.

  Virgo heard the accelerating steps behind him. Gierek's killer would have seen him turn back into the alley. But if he got to the wall fast enough he'd be able to scale it and disappear into the allotments behind the trees.

  He hit the wall at full pace, leaping at the last second. The jump took him halfway up, and he scrambled the rest, oblivious to the scraping of flesh on brick. He could hear no noise now, just the insistent willing in his head to get over the wall.

  He dropped to the ground, and pumped his legs on past the trees, into the allotments, then leapt the fence. He risked a glance behind. His pursuer was coming over the wall now. If he kept going, he would be in among the row of cottages in thirty seconds. There was a cut-through. He'd be able to double back, go round the back and head along Beaufort Road, then back down to the car. It was facing the right way; he could make the getaway. Then what? Past the cottages now. He couldn't hear anything behind him. He would make it. He'd be OK. Keep running. The car was open; all he had to do was jump in and start the engine.

  There it was. And he could hear running feet behind him, a light tread, an athlete's stride. He kept going. He had the car door open. The key went in. The engine started. Don't stall. Rev hard. Bring up the clutch. The engine screamed, and he pulled out into the road.

  He had made it.

  The car roared beneath his feet, but not loud enough to cover the sound of three more distinct pops. He was being shot at. He was bloody well being shot at.

  He threw the car sharp left into Kingston Road, turning to look over his shoulder. A silver Mercedes pulled forward, advancing effortlessly up the road. He rolled back in his seat and took another sharp turn, then another, and another. With each manoeuvre there was a two-second respite, then the Mercedes appeared again, unshaken.

  Fifty metres ahead, a green light beckoned him over a crossroads. He could hear the deep burn of the engine as he floored the accelerator, plunging the car towards the mess of traffic ahead. A line waiting to turn right, across his lane. The light before him was amber.

  Then red.

  The engine roared higher, now whining, and Virgo shivered with adrenaline. The clenched muscles in his jaw pulled his face taut. He didn't have time to draw the seatbelt across his chest, and now he couldn't move his arms. He tried to imagine what it would be like when he hit the windscreen, whether he'd feel the lacerations or just the dense thud of impact and then the vacuous relief of unconsciousness. He remembered the look of disbelief on Katie's face as the car knocked her off her feet. He remembered his own initial shock – that someone would run a red light, careen into a thirteen-year-old girl, and then make the decision to keep going. Just drive away, leaving a body and a life in tatters.

  One of the waiting cars skimmed across the road in front of them. Would the next one wait? Virgo wondered what it felt like to have metal rip the flesh off bone. Katie knew. He remembered running to Katie's still body as it lay bleeding onto the asphalt, the sense that it was his fault, that he had done it. He hit the horn, and kept his palm pressed down on the centre of the steering wheel. The sound filled the road. People on the pavement were turning to watch. He could sense the Mercedes behind him, gaining ground with each second that ticked past.

  He glanced at the dash. Eighty miles per hour. Time slowed and he saw the wrinkled face of the driver waiting to turn right ahead, the man who held power over his life. He was wearing a brown tweed hat. The look of pure terror on his face told Virgo it would be OK. He was frozen to his spot on the other side of the road. He wasn't going to make the turn. The Ford flew on down the hill, and Virgo took his hand off the horn. Turning to look behind again, he saw the traffic kick back into life, and then halt in chaos again. Three cars were piled up at the crossroads, and a silver Mercedes ploughed into the fray.

  As he rounded the bend at the bottom of the hill, he breathed again.

  He had got away.

  CHAPTER 14

  ON THE OTHER SIDE of the world, Gabriel MacIntyre wrenched at the wheel of his Escalade. Jesus. How could he drive around in a vehicle this size and still have people not let him into the traffic? Maybe because he couldn't steer the fucking thing. It was like a tank. When he bought it, he told himself that Jennie would be safe inside, that nothing would get to her through this amount of metal. He hadn't considered the fact that it would drive like a leather-upholstered cargo container. It was a battering ram on wheels. He'd kill somebody else's kid one day, for sure.

  It was all getting fucked up. Marinov didn't seem to give a flying crap about Red Spot's vulnerability. He knew nothing about this journalist, but he wasn't 'overly concerned'. Why the hell not?

  If Gierek had passed on something about the quantum computer – maybe even the blueprints – they needed to nail this journalist to the ground.

  He never used to be like this. Ellie had fallen in love with a gentle, sweet-tempered Arkansas boy, so gentle he couldn't bear to brand the cattle on his daddy's farm. He believed in love at first sight. It had happened there in his first semester at college. From the first moment, he would have moved heaven and earth to give her everything she ever needed.

  It was still true. But look at what the world had done to him. Now, he was only the simple, lovelorn farmhand when he was at home. The rest of the time, he was doing everything he could to stay afloat. Like the rest of the rats in this stinking ocean. Christ, what was with this traffic? He punched at the radio's buttons, willed it to find a station that would tell him why every soul in Massachussetts was sitting inside stationary vehicles on the Interstate. What kind of monster had they created here? People spent hundreds of dollars every month for the privilege of encasement in their own metal box. How fucked up was that?

  Gierek was a liability. They had a working quantum computer: what did they need Gierek for now? And if he was going to start going weak at the knees, talking to his colleagues after all this time, they couldn't waste a moment. Every minute he was out of their sight was a catastrophe.

  Come on. Come on. At college, before all this shit happened, he used to drive a Corvette that moved like a cat.

  Jesus. They had a quantum computer. They were going to listen in on White House communications while a trick that baffled Einstein brought a fleet of airplanes under their control.

  He was so far out of his depth, he could hear his father laughing till the whisky snorted through his nose. He could understand the entanglement, the idea of his box in Newton connecting with atoms across the world, flipping bits and erasing data. But the way entanglement tied billions of calculations into one inside the quantum computer, then performed them all simultaneously: that blew his mind.

  Marinov had assured him it was the same thing as his own little box, really. But his box just messed with people's computers. It was a white-collar crime – hardly even a crime. Caveat emptor. These companies had compromised their own computers by using a competitor's software. But the quantum computer was something else – that was a violent, unprovoked assault; that w
as a street mugging, a hit and run. It beat passwords to a bloodied pulp: found them, crushed them, walked away with the key. It seemed wrong that something as elegant as quantum entanglement could be used for something so mindlessly brutal.

  They had to get this under control. They had to nail Gierek. And the journalist. Of course, he was being selfish – who the hell wouldn't be in this situation? Gierek had created the entanglement software, and Marinov had delivered it. But he would be better off if they were both dead. At least he knew what made Marinov tick: it was green and it had George Washington's face on it. But Gierek? What if he was turning over a new leaf after all this time?

  And where did the journalist fit into this? Maybe Marinov was right to be glad they would get them both. Alex would pop them both out of the picture, he'd said. And get the disk.

  What was on this disk, anyway? It was hard to believe there was anything on it. He'd imagined Radcliffe's muffled screams in his sleep last night. There was no way the scientist would have lied to protect anyone. Not when that kind of agony – the kind that these people knew how to inflict – was running through his system.

  The traffic queue evaporated as quickly as it had materialised. How did that happen? Ten more minutes and he'd be at the office. Ten more hours and he'd be home again, home in time to kiss Jennie goodnight. He'd just creep into her room and stare – like he did almost every other night. The desire, the drive to see her dark, melting eyes was taking him over, though: it was all he'd seen in his mind yesterday. He'd go in and kiss Jennie while Ellie fixed him a drink. She never let the maid do that; it meant there was at least one thing she could do for him every day, she always said.

  He didn't deserve her.

  It damn near stopped his heart to think about Ellie and Jennie. And to think about the damage if this stunt with the planes all went wrong – well, that gripped his lungs and squeezed them empty.

  Marinov said it would all be taken care of in just a few hours. And he would just have to trust him.