The Black Hole

by Hammond, Ray

  Bo Lundgren stood behind the scientific team, anxiously shifting from foot to foot. Although he had been cut off from world news during his weeks of captivity, he now understood his captors’ awful intentions and he was in mental agony over the choice he had made to save his family. If these fanatical madmen were to carry out their suicidal threat he – and his loved ones – would soon be dead anyway.

  Larov checked the digital read-outs as the injection chamber pressurised and then turned away and crossed the floor to where Lundgren stood.

  ‘I presume 99.725 per cent remains the optimum beam speed for the LHC – even for a colliding agent as high as 336 on the Atomic Scale?’ he asked.

  The professor glared back at him balefully. ‘You’re all madmen,’ he said quietly. ‘All of you are mad. You’re not getting any more help from me.’

  Larov regarded the older man coldly. ‘Very well, Professor,’ he said. ‘I think we can handle this ourselves from now on.’

  With a flick of his wrist Larov summoned one of the HFDA soldiers. ‘Put Lundgren with the others,’ he ordered. ‘Make sure they’re well guarded.’

  *

  Floyd urged the electric buggy forward as fast as it would go. Beside him, Steffanie sat crouched in her seat. In the rear Nicole held her automatic weapon at shoulder height ready for use. As soon as the overhead lights flicked on to illuminate a CCTV fitting, she shot the camera from its mounts. Carl was boosting both her reflex response and her visual acuity to the maximum levels her nervous system could tolerate.

  But the British agent knew that Resigo, or whoever was running the search operation for them, must by now know their approximate location.

  ‘How many of the HFDA men are at the access shaft?’ Nicole asked.

  Floyd had been asking himself the same thing. He knew that a dozen men had been assigned to open and protect each of the remote access points but he had no idea how many men would remain above ground, how many would be inside the shaft area at ground level and how many would have descended to the accelerator tunnel itself.

  ‘Twelve or so,’ he told her. ‘But we don’t know how they’ll be deployed.’

  A light ahead flickered on and Nicole fired at the metal housing of a camera that had just come into view. Metal shards fell to the ground in front of the buggy and Floyd swerved slightly to miss the largest piece of debris.

  Twenty-six

  Sergeant Truman crouched behind a hedge with his advance party of twenty-two men. They were about 200 metres from the square building that housed the access shaft to the CERN tunnel that lay buried far beneath the countryside.

  The sergeant popped his helmeted head up above the hedge line once again and stared at the structure through his electronic-imaging night-scope. The brick building was surrounded by a high metal fence topped with razor wire. It had no windows, just a pair of strong-looking steel doors. Truman could see no sign of life around the windowless building, but a penetrative thermal-imaging scan had revealed a group of warm bodies just inside the metal shutters and several more on the roof.

  Crouching down again, Truman checked the time: 2.58 a.m.

  ‘Go, Sammy,’ he said quietly to a man at his shoulder.

  Three men in black combat dress slithered under the hedge and crawled on their bellies towards the shaft access building. Truman watched their progress through his night-vision system praying that Floyd would be inside ready to disarm the explosives.

  He saw the gleam of powerful, gas-operated hydraulic cutters as his men cut out a large section out of the wire fence. Then they carefully laid it aside.

  ‘Fence clear,’ Sammy reported in Truman’s earpiece. ‘No sign of life.’

  ‘Wait there,’ Truman ordered.

  He glanced left and right at the main body of men on each side of him and, with a single nod of his head, he ordered them forward.

  As they slithered across the field Truman remained where he was. He was under direct orders from the captain that he himself must not be part of the first assault wave but must direct the attack from a position at the rear.

  He watched as each of his heavily-laden men crawled in turn through the hole in the fence and then, just as they were all through, he saw a single HFDA guard stroll around from the back of the building. His weapon was slung casually across his chest. Then another guard appeared.

  Truman’s watch flicked to 03.00. ‘Light it up and make it loud,’ he ordered over the network. ‘GO, GO, GO!’

  *

  Using single shots, Nicole unerringly picked off each strip-light at its first flicker as they drove through the tunnel. Suddenly they saw wooden boxes and packing materials stacked against the far wall.

  ‘We’re getting close,’ Steff shouted. ‘They bring maintenance materials down by this elevator.’

  ‘O.K., we’ll stop here,’ said Floyd. He came to a halt and switched the engine off.

  They stepped down from the Jeep in the cold silent darkness of the tunnel. There was an emergency wall light up ahead and they waited as their eyes became accustomed to the gloom.

  Floyd padded forward, his rifle held at waist level, ready for instant use. Nicole followed, her rifle at the ready. Steff brought up the rear.

  They ran past more stacks of packing materials then Nicole tapped Floyd on the shoulder and pointed. But he could see nothing.

  ‘There’s the opening,’ Nicole whispered.

  Floyd crept forward a dozen feet then, squinting into the gloom, he made out an opening about one hundred metres ahead on the left. A faint glow appeared to emanate from inside.

  He nodded, then indicated for Nicole and Steff to hug the wall. They worked their way slowly forward keeping close to the side of the tunnel. There was no sign of any guards.

  Floyd checked his watch. It was 3.02 a.m.

  ‘Stay here,’ he told Nicole and Steff, then he raised his weapon and ran quietly forwards towards the mouth of the opening.

  Even as he did so, two HFDA soldiers burst out of the area at the foot of the access shaft, running as hard as they could.

  Floyd downed both of them with a single burst, then dropped to his belly.

  Four more men ran out of the access shaft and, as Floyd shot the legs away from the first pair, he heard Nicole’s weapon open up behind him. The other two went down, but not before one of the men had fired a burst of bullets which ricocheted all around the tunnel walls.

  Glancing over his shoulder into the gloom Floyd saw that the American agent was lying flat, her weapon trained on the opening up ahead. Behind her Steff lay with her hands covering her head.

  Floyd signed back that he was going to make a run across the opening to the lift shaft and that Nicole should cover him. She nodded back her understanding.

  Rising to a crouching position, Floyd inched forward towards where a dim light was emanating from the access shaft opening. Suddenly he began to run, still crouching and, just as he was about to arrive at the opening, Nicole began to fire a sustained volley into the opening itself, her rounds bouncing off the concrete walls, ricocheting into the access shaft.

  As he reached the opening, Floyd launched himself forward into a fast double roll across the concrete floor, two rolls which provided the smallest possible target and which returned him to his standing crouch. Nicole’s bullets were still ricocheting around the well of the access shaft and Floyd saw three HFDA terrorists lying flat on the floor, their weapons held over their heads in protection.

  Nicole’s firing suddenly stopped. Her magazine was empty.

  One the of the HFDA soldiers raised his head and saw Floyd. As he pulled his weapon forward the British Counter-Terrorism agent fired a long burst, raking his fire across the forms of all three HFDA direct action volunteers.

  As the echoes of his firing died away, Nicole Sanderson was inching towards the opening, her back against the tunnel wall, her reloaded weapon held at the ready.

  Floyd held up his hand for her to stop. He could see most of the area inside the well of the
access shaft. Nothing was moving. There was no sign of any other HFDA soldiers. They had accounted for nine men, the men whose bloodied bodies now lay strewn across the floor of the Large Hadron Collider tunnel and the floor of the access shaft.

  Floyd changed his magazine. Then, moving slowly forward at a crouch, he stepped into the well of the access shaft. The area was lit by two low-wattage wall lamps. It was clear. Then he noticed the electronic direction arrow displayed beside the lift doors. The elevator car was on its long journey back to the surface.

  Nicole and Steff arrived behind Floyd.

  ‘The attack must have started up top,’ he said.

  The bottom flight of a concrete staircase opened beside the elevator shaft.

  ‘Come on,’ Floyd said to Nicole. ‘We must get to that explosive.’

  ‘Do you realise how far up it is?’ asked Steff as she and Nicole ran to follow him up the stairs.

  ‘You stay here and collect those weapons,’ Floyd ordered the Frenchwoman as he bounded up the steps two at a time.

  *

  The SAS and COS attack was in full swing. Two of the HFDA terrorists – the pair that had been returning from behind the building – had gone down immediately under the allied assault but in response had come a potentially deadly raking fire from the roof. The stun grenades continued to burn – the use of high-explosive grenades had been ruled out for fear of igniting the charges that the terrorists had set within the shaft – and the fire fight had been underway for several minutes.

  ‘More stuns,’ Truman ordered his men via their battle network. Almost immediately he saw his men fire additional stun and flash grenades towards the building.

  Just at that moment a head popped up over the parapet of the roof. The lights from the stun grenades was just starting to fade.

  Almost insouciantly the man raised his weapon and aimed it at one of the SAS man who had found cover in a shallow depression.

  Before the man could fire, Truman focussed his laser and fired a short burst that swung through a horizontal arc. The young anti-technology terrorist threw up his hands and fell backwards, his weapon falling to the ground below.

  *

  ‘This is turning into a most unusual and dramatic evening,’ senior political correspondent Maria Fairchild told her millions of American viewers. She and her CNN crew were one of scores of television units invited into the White House press room at short notice.

  ‘The word is that the President is to make a statement about the on-going siege at the CERN particle physics institute in France,’ continued Ms Fairchild in her smoothly-waxed voice. Her handsome-looking face was scrunched into a worried frown.

  ‘Ladies and gentleman, the President of the United States,’ announced an authoritative voice from the open doorway.

  Maria stopped in mid commentary and, as the camera swung away from her, she skipped down and took her usual seat in the front row, immediately facing the raised dais from which the President normally spoke. But this evening there was no lectern in place. Whatever he had to say was going to be short.

  Robert Brabazon strode into the room and then he turned back as if waiting for somebody.

  A tall, middle-aged man with in a smart grey lounge suit was following the President.

  The two men stepped up onto to the dais and the President glanced at Maria and gave her a somber nod of recognition. Then he glanced at the other reporters in the front row.

  ‘Good evening,’ he began. He knew that all networks were broadcasting live. ‘As you know negotiations are continuing with the Humans First Party over their latest demands and over their occupation of the CERN scientific facility in France.’

  Maria sat forward slightly as her cameraman closed in tighter on the President and the tall, thin man who stood impassively by his side.

  ‘To help us with these discussions, I have invited Mr Benjamin Pace – Chairman of the Humans First Party, Nyack chapter – here for discussion on the continuing situation.’

  He’s using us to communicate with Makowski, Maria thought. The President was parading the man in from of the cameras just to make it clear that the terrorist’s demands were being taken seriously.

  Maria raised her hand at the same moment that a score of reporters jumped to their feet to ask a question.

  The President held up his hand. ‘We will not be taking questions now,’ he warned. ‘But I wanted this opportunity to introduce Mr Pace to you before we begin our discussions.’ He turned to the leader of the Nyack Humans First Party and extended his arm, inviting the man to say something to the media if he chose.

  The man took a single step forward and glared directly down at Maria.

  ‘I am very pleased to be in the White House,’ the man said in an incongruous Brooklyn accent. ‘The outcome of our negotiations will mean that humans come first, once again. There will be no more transhumanist cyborgs running our lives.’ He raised a clenched fist and shouted, ‘Humans first.’

  *

  Everything was as it should be in the main Accelerator Hall. The particle beam in the Large Hadron Collider was already running at full speed. Dr Sergy Larov had been pleased to inform Professor Alexander Makowski that the Zilerium real-matter nuclei were now making almost 12,000 laps of the twenty-six kilometre accelerator each second and the Zilerium anti-matter nuclei were fully pressurised and ready for instant induction.

  Sergeant Ramon Resigo strode the length of the hall to report the military status to Colonel Andreas Poliza, his commander in chief. Everything was now secure on the surface; there had been no moves by the police and military forces that he knew were ranged around the campus. The only problem was that Gary Tipton and his two companions had not yet been captured or killed. Resigo was now going to have to tell Poliza that the British HFDA volunteer was still on the loose.

  With a crackle Resigo’s walkie-talkie came to life. The Colombian took a breath. Perhaps Tipton was already dead and no longer a problem.

  ‘Go ahead,’ he said.

  ‘Shaft Three. We’re under attack from ground forces,’ shouted an excited voice. Resigo could hear gunfire in the background.

  ‘Stay calm, Salvadoré,’ ordered Resigo, recognizing the man’s voice. He was an experienced FARC mercenary. ‘Can you hold them?’

  ‘No. There are too many,’ replied Salvadoré.

  Resigo drew a deep breath. This situation had been discussed in the planning meetings. He knew that closing down one access and ventilation shaft on its own would not trip the collider shut-down mechanism.

  ‘Set the timers,’ he told Salvadoré. ‘Then get out of there. Do it now. Confirm?’

  There was a hiss of static as Resigo waited for the man’s response.

  ‘Yes,’ came the voice. ‘Setting the timers now.’

  *

  Jenni Slinn was a micro second late welcoming her viewers back from a station-ident break. It was because the news editor had been talking – almost shouting – in her mind link as the ident was playing and a completely new section of autocue had been loaded by Bruce, her virtual assistant, during the thirty-second hiatus.

  ‘Welcome back,’ she told her viewers with a slightly worried smile. Automated real-time ratings measurements told those in the BBC World 24 studio that millions of people in Britain and overseas were staying up through the night to watch the news as the stand-off at CERN continued. Like almost every other television channel, World 24 had been replaying Makowski’s webcast over and over again and a whole series of experts had discussed both the nature of the threat and the man’s outrageous demands for the immediate resignation of over thirty national leaders.

  ‘We have just received pictures of Prime Minister Terry Noble receiving Darren Marsh of the Humans First Party at No.10 Downing Street,’ read Jenni as Bruce played the words in her mind’s eye.

  As she spoke, the transmission switched to show a black limousine arriving outside the famous front door. The scene was lit by bright arc lights.

  ‘Even though it wa
s almost two a.m., the Prime Minister greeted the British leader of the Humans First Party personally.’

  Jenni glanced at the screen that showed her what the viewers were seeing. The scene was almost unimaginable. In the middle of the night she saw the Prime Minister step from the doorway of No. 10 to shake hands with a short man in a dark lounge suit.

  ‘Darren Marsh has been an unsuccessful independent parliamentary candidate for the West London seat of Hounslow Central in the last two general elections,’ Jenni recited. ‘And he is visiting the Prime Minister to discuss what is described as constitutional matters arising from the demands made earlier this evening by Alexander Makowski and the Humans First Party.’