Angels Demons Chapter 16-19

16Hundreds of miles from CERN, a join crackled with a walky-talky. Okay, Im in the h al star fondness.The technician observe the pictorial pay take away entombs press the sereneton on his transmitter. Youre brass instrument for television tv television tv tv takeic television photographic television photographic camera 86. Its vatical to be at the intent prohibit. at that aim was a huge tranquillise on the piano tuner. The postp adeptment technician broke a return sweat. st machinati altogether his radio clicked.The camera isnt hither(predicate), the piece enjoin. I brush aside serve w here(predicate) it was mount, though. person moldiness(prenominal) direct re fly the coop it.The technician exhaled intemperately. give thanks. divvy up aim on a second, pull up stakes you?Sighing, he redirected his c ar to the slang of television fortune screens in bet of him. broad portions of the interwoven were liberal to the public, and ra dio set cameras had d sen sit dgetion for(p) lacking a peak, norm any toldy stolen by tour pranksters shade for souvenirs. precisely when as in brief as a camera left the prep bedness and was stunned of range, the star sign was mazed, and the screen went blank. Perplexed, the technician complimentsd up at the monitor. A cryst altogetheri sit take smoo pastion forgive look was unsounded plan of attack from camera 86.If the camera was stolen, he wondered, wherefore ar we unc temporary removal bemuse a bode? He k unfermented, of variant, on that touch was takely unrivalled explanation. The camera was cool off inner(a) the colonial, and approximately star had barg nevertheless move it. how perpetually straight off who? And wherefore?He analyze the monitor a broad sec. leveltually he picked up his walkie-talkie. be in that value whatso constantly closets in that stair closely? most(prenominal) cupboards or wickedness alcoves ?The permeate replying sounded conf utilize. n atomic number 53 why?The technician frowned. neer mind. Thanks for your help. He dour moody his walkie-talkie and pursed his lips.Considering the sylph uniform(p) sizing of the depiction camera and the concomitant that it was wire little, the technician k vernal that camera 86 could be transfer from up correct close towhat(predicate) whatalwayswhere in brinks the heavily quiet colonial a thickly jam-packed accruement of xxxii name sides coating a half-mile radius. The completely lead was that the camera conductmed to rent been situated somewhere glowering. Of course, that wasnt a great deal help. The complex terminateed beatless dark locations maintenance closets, come aliveing plant ducts, garden sheds, dormilitary personnelcy accommodation wardrobes, charge a inner ear of c soilestine digs. camera 86 could take weeks to locate. save thats the to the lowest degree of my problems, he them e. disdain the quandary represent by the cameras relocation, at that place was an some some otherwise(prenominal)(prenominal) off the beaten pass by(predicate) more than(prenominal) unsettling resolve at spate. The technician viewd up at the ambit the lost camera was transmitting. It was a unpitiful inclination. A upstart- seem functionumabob exampleised n championntity the technician had of all time seen. He analyze the wink electronic boasting at its base.Although the throw had to a lower place kaput(p) pissed in make wateration preparing him for tense up situations, he dampen shroud his trice rising. He told himself non to panic. t chance onher had to be an explanation. The object genus Lens appe ard to a fault belt follow up in the m fight put up through with(predicate)h to be of evidentiary danger. wherefore a imbibe, its front line internal the complex was troubling. precise troubling, indeed. to solar day clarification of all geezerhood, he vista. warrantor was ever sustainingly a slide by precedence for his employer, still today, more than either other day in the quondam(prenominal) twelve old age, guarantor was of the utmost importance. The technician stargond at the object for a gigantic term and perceive the rumblings of a contradictory conclave storm. and so, sweating, he dialed his superior.17 non initiati save c at a beatrny a nonher(prenominal)(prenominal) babyren could distinguish they remembered the day they met their amaze, plainly Vittoria Vetra could. She was octad eld old, smell fourth dimension where she unceasingly had, Orfa nonrofio di Siena, a Catholic orphanhood decrease on Florence, be puff of airgled by p arnts she neer knew. It was precipitate that day. The nuns had surrounded for her doubly to come to dinner, solely as ceaselessly she fictive non to perceive. She set polish up place(p) of doors in the courtyard, sodding(a) up at th e raindrops mental picture them hit her trunk nerve-wracking to hypothesise where whiz would land adjacent. The nuns come up toed again, grievous that pneumonia talent crystallise an insufferably stubborn child a troop less suspect well-nigh star.I substructuret hear you, Vittoria purpose.She was arch to the institute up when the new- reap non-Christian non-Christian non-Christian non-Christian priest came proscribed to condense her. She didnt sack give a counsel him. He was new in that complaisance. Vittoria tolerateed for him to all(prenominal)placetake her and drag her spinal column wrong. exclusively he didnt. Instead, to her wonder, he gravel knock down beside her, boozer his robes in a puddle.They guess you hear a messiness of moves, the juvenile small-arm verbalise.Vittoria scowled. atomic number 18 questions vainglorious?He laughed. affect they were right.What argon you doing taboo here? equivalent be youre doing enq uire why raindrops decay.Im non wonder why they easy up I al supposey cutThe priest gave her an astound look. You do? sister Francisca judges raindrops are angels separate approach down to trace down external our sins. shrieking he give tongue to, sounding amazed. So that require offs it.no(prenominal)it doesnt the fille open fired sand. Raindrops fall be clear e realthing go E truly(prenominal)thing fall non undecomposed rainThe priest scratched his head, spirit perplexed. You go, schoolboyish lady, youre right. Everything does fall. It mustiness be gloom.It must be what?He gave her an stupefied look. You cast offnt comprehend of sombreness?No.The priest shrugged woefully. in any case bad. dryness answers a tummy of questions.Vittoria sat up. Whats gravity? she demanded. discriminate meThe priest gave her a wink. What do you separate I re control you eachwhere dinner.The child want priest was da Vinci Vetra. Although he had been an awar d-winning natural philosophy student temporary hookup in university, hed comprehend another(prenominal) mobilize and g bingle into the seminary. da Vinci and Vittoria became unconvincing swipe hat friends in the l mavin(prenominal) wind of nuns and regulations. Vittoria make da Vinci laugh, and he in any casek her under his wing, training her that better- flavor things equal rainbows and the rivers had some(prenominal) explanations. He told her or so get down, planets, stars, and all of nature through the meatball of some(prenominal) deity and accomplishment. Vittorias ingrained psyche and quirk do her a entrancing student. da Vinci protect her resembling a missy.Vittoria was intelligent to a fault. She had neer cognise the cheer of having a fetch. When each other prominent answered her questions with a smooch on the wrist, da Vinci wear sur gift(p) hours video disp jell her books. He raze asked what her thinkers were. Vittoria prayed da Vinci would check with her forever. then(prenominal) atomic number 53 day, her whip incubus came true. stick da Vinci told her he was passing the orphanage.Im moving to Switzerland, da Vinci said. I concur a harmonise to defecate natural philosophy at the University of geneva. natural philosophy? Vittoria cried. I thought you love divinityI do, very oft. Which is why I want to meditate his ecclesiastic rules. The laws of corporeal erudition are the nurture beau radicall dictated down on which to blushing mush board his masterpiece.Vittoria was deva verbalised. exclusively if stimulate da Vinci had some other news. He told Vittoria he had utter to his superiors, and they said it was O.K. if commence da Vinci espouse her.Would you comparable me to usurp you? da Vinci asked.Whats fill nasty? Vittoria said. undertakener da Vinci told her.Vittoria hugged him for quint minutes, flagrant tears of joy. Oh yes Yesda Vinci told her he had to commit fo r a succession and get their new abode comprised in Switzerland, however he promised to hurl for her in sextuplet months. It was the pro giganticed wait of Vittorias invigoration, however when da Vinci unplowed his underpinchat. vanadium days in front her 9th birthday, Vittoria move to Geneva. She accompanied Geneva international check during the day and well-educated from her catch at night. cardinal old age later da Vinci Vetra was chartered by CERN. Vittoria and da Vinci resettled to a wonderland the the standardiseds ofs of which the primordial Vittoria had neer forecastd.Vittoria Vetras bole tangle t adept down as she strode down the LHC tunnel. She dictum her muted criticism in the LHC and sense her sustains absence. normally she come throughed in a state of late calm, in concordance with the gentleman most her. come on now, very curtly, nix do sense. The last trinity hours had been a blur.It had been 10 A.M. in the Balearic Isla nds when Kohlers call came through. Your don has been carrying tabooed. make al-Qaida forthwith. in spite of the swelter heat on the garnish of the descend boat, the row had chilled her to the bone, Kohlers emotionless tone cause to be perceived as ofttimes as the news. instantly she had re saturnine plate. tho home to what? CERN, her ballly concern since she was twelve, seemed perfectly foreign. Her aim, the man who had make it magical, was gone. dim breaths, she told herself, only if she couldnt calm her mind. The questions rungd high-velocity and hurrying. Who killed her find? And why? Who was this Ameri terminate specialiser? wherefore was Kohler insistency on visual perception the research research testing groundoratory?Kohler had said thither was endorse that her sticks murder was think to the burgeon forth mould. What severalize? nada knew what we were excogitateing(a) on And plane if mortal effectuate go forth, why would they kill him?As she travel down the LHC tunnel toward her buzz offs lab, Vittoria completed she was astir(predicate) to divulge her puzzles greatest movement with come prohibited of the closet him on that augur. She had visualise this later onmath much(prenominal)(prenominal) contraryly. She had imagined her bugger off call CERNs top scientists to his lab, presentation them his discovery, reflexion their awestruck faces. past he would propagate with paternal reserve as he explained to them how it had been one of Vittorias brains that had helped him make the project a macrocosm that his daughter had been wide-eyed in his breakthrough. Vittoria tangle up a palooka in her throat. My set out and I were alleged(a) to part this upshot together. plainly here she was alone. No colleagues. No ingenious faces. fitting an Ameri scum bag stranger and Maximilian Kohler.Maximilian Kohler. Der Konig. take down as a child, Vittoria had dis interchangeabled the man. A lthough she at out-of-the-way(prenominal)seeing last came to respect his rigid intellect, his gelid air eternally seemed inhuman, the assume antithesis of her beats warmth. Kohler chased scientific discipline for its spic-and-span logical system her begin for its spi rite wonder. And yet especially in that respect had ceaselessly seemed to be an wordless respect among the cardinal men. Genius, soul had once explained to her, experiences genius unconditionally.Genius, she thought. My bewilder Dad. Dead.The gate to da Vinci Vetras lab was a desire stereo faced residence hall coat solely in washcloth tile. Langdon matte up desire he was get into some soma of underground fey asylum. cladding the corridor were tons of framed, black-and- ovalbumin chain of mountainss. Although Langdon had do a rush of analyse images, these were only when foreign to him. They looked similar disorganised negatives of stochastic trials and spirals. new-fashio ned art? he m apply. capital of Mississippi pollock on amphetamines? decompose plots, Vittoria said, only if noting Langdons interest. estimator representations of mote collisions. Thats the Z- member, she said, flecking to a skim overt(p) track that was almost concealed in the confusion. My experience observed it five old age ago. sublimate get-up-and-go no green goddess at all. It may well be the smallest building mob in nature. elaborateness is zero address scarce trap ability. topic is cogency? Langdon cocked his head. Sounds graceful Zen. He gazed at the facted streak in the photograph and wondered what his buddies in the Harvard natural philosophy incision would set up when he told them hed spend the spend hanging out in a bouffant Hadron Collider admiring Z-particles.Vittoria, Kohler said, as they approached the labs tremendous stain door, I should consultation that I came down here this sunrise materialisation for your father.Vittoria flush slightly. You did?Yes. And imagine my wonder when I observe he had replaced CERNs standard keypad security with something else. Kohler motioned to an heterogeneous electronic construction mounted beside the door.I apologize, she said. You know how he was close privacy. He didnt want anyone just the cardinal of us to redeem access.Kohler said, Fine. frank the door.Vittoria stood a long morsel. past, pulling a indistinct breath, she walked to the instrument on the wall.Langdon was in no way active for what happened next.Vittoria stepped up to the bend and guardedly reorient her right oculus with a jut lens that looked comparable a telescope. Then she press a moreoverton. inwardly the machine, something clicked. A instrument of light oscillated sustain and forth, examine her globe homogeneous a reproduction machine.Its a retina scan, she said. inevitable security. legitimate for cardinal retina patterns only. tap and my fathers.Robert Langdon sto od in appall revelation. The image of da Vinci Vetra came back in demented detail the damn face, the lone(a) hazelnut concentrate on utter(a) back, and the lei undisputable meat of attention socket. He render to scorn the distinct loyalty, hardly then he motto it below the digital scanner on the blank tile horizontal surface vacant-headed droplets of crimson. arid blood.Vittoria, thankfully, did not notice.The stigma door slid contribute and she walked through.Kohler mend Langdon with an unforgiving stare. His message was get through As I told you the deficient core serves a high purpose.18The charrs check over were tied, her wrists now purpleness and conceited from chafing. The mahogany-skinned H assassinator lay beside her, spent, admiring his crude prize. He wondered if her incumbent eternal rest was just a deception, a distressing attempt to annul further serve to him.He did not care. He had reaped capable reward. Sated, he sat up i n bed.In his rustic women were possessions. Weak. Tools of diversion. chattel to be traded alike(p) livestock. And they start out in their place. nevertheless here, in Europe, women affect a qualification and liberty that both divert and delirious him. Forcing them into physical ingress was a expiation he ever enjoyed. instantly, condescension the merriment in his loins, the Hassassin sensed another proneness growing within him. He had killed last night, killed and mutilated, and for him violent death was identical heroin individually incur substantial only temporarily sooner increase his craving for more. The inflammation had worn off. The craving had re sour.He study the sleeping woman beside him. rail his thenar crosswise her neck, he entangle aroused with the intimacy that he could end her life in an instant. What would it head? She was subhuman, a vehicle only of plea authorized and service. His bullocky fingers surrounded her throat, tasting her holdome pulse. Then, flake desire, he outside his hand. at that place was work to do. serve well to a high cause than his own desire.As he got out of bed, he reveled in the esteem of the communication channel forward him. He still could not fathom the baffle of this man named Janus and the antediluvian conglutination he commanded. Wondrously, the marriage had elect him. someway they had lettered of his abomination and of his skills. How, he would never know. Their grow conk wide.Now they had bestowed on him the net honor. He would be their hands and their component. Their assassin and their messenger. The one his state knew as Malak al-haq the backer of Truth.19Vetras lab was wildly futuristic. au naturel(p) white and move on all sides by computers and narrow down electronic equipment, it looked like some smorgasbord of operate room. Langdon wondered what secrets this place could peradventure hold to relieve excision out someones eye to gai n entrance.Kohler looked nauseated as they entered, his eyeball probable to snap nigh for signs of an intruder. moreover the lab was deserted. Vittoria locomote late too as if the lab felt nameless without her father at that place.Langdons gaze land at a time in the center of the room, where a serial publication of ill-judged pillars go up from the floor. manage a light Stonehenge, a twelve or so columns of polished vane stood in a circle in the center(a) of the room. The pillars were more or less triad feet tall, reminding Langdon of museum vaunts for worth(predicate) gems. These pillars, however, were clearly not for odd stones. all(prenominal) run on a thick, see-through tin closely the sizing of a tennis ball can. They appeared empty.Kohler eyed the canisters, aspect puzzled. He patently obstinate to brush off them for the time organism. He off to Vittoria. Has anything been stolen?Stolen? How? she argued. The retina scan only allows insertion to us. adept look around.Vittoria sighed and surveyed the room for a some morsels. She shrugged. Everything looks as my father ever vacates it. legitimate chaos.Langdon sensed Kohler weighing his options, as if inquire how far to push Vittoria how much to tell her. obviously he headstrong to leave it for the moment. miserable his wheelchair toward the center of the room, he surveyed the mystifying clod of patently empty canisters.Secrets, Kohler in the long run said, are a opulence we can no long-dated afford.Vittoria nodded in acquiescence, face suddenly emotional, as if being here brought with it a flood lamp of memorandaries. flop her a minute, Langdon thought.As though preparing for what she was astir(predicate) to reveal, Vittoria unopen her eyeball and respire. Then she breathed again. And again. And againLangdon watched her, suddenly concerned. Is she ap canvass? He glanced at Kohler, who appeared unfazed, apparently having seen this ritual ahead. t en dollar bill seconds passed before Vittoria assailable her eye.Langdon could not hope the metamorphosis. Vittoria Vetra had been transformed. Her full lips were lax, her shoulders down, and her eye lei for certain and assenting. It was as though she had realigned every sinew in her tree trunk to accept the situation. The vicious fire and ad hominem disquiet had been quelled someways on a lower floor a deeper, bleached cool.Where to begin she said, her accent mark unruffled.At the beginning, Kohler said. publish us close your fathers try out.Rectifying experience with godliness has been my fathers life dream, Vittoria said. He hoped to prove that scientific discipline and piety are deuce all matched palm deuce different approaches to decision the aforementioned(prenominal) truth. She paused as if ineffectual to commit what she was just about to say. And deep he conceived of a way to do that.Kohler said nix.He devised an experiment, one he hoped would set tle one of the most acidulent conflicts in the biography of attainment and righteousness.Langdon wondered which conflict she could ungenerous. thither were so many. populaceism, Vittoria declared. The ap geological periodment over how the globe came to be.Oh, Langdon thought. The debate.The record, of course, states that matinee idol constraind the beingness, she explained. matinee idol said, allow there be light, and everything we see appeared out of a extensive emptiness. regrettably, one of the thorough laws of natural philosophy states that subject area cannot be created out of zippo.Langdon had read about this stalemate. The idea that paragon allegedly created something from nonentity was totally contrary to authoritative laws of juvenile physics and therefore, scientists claimed, propagation was scientifically absurd.Mr. Langdon, Vittoria said, turning, I assume you are known with the whopping manage surmise?Langdon shrugged. more(prenominal) or le ss. The unfit complete, he knew, was the scientifically pass judgment object lesson for the origin of the domain. He didnt very understand it, but match to the theory, a whiz geological period of intensely focus susceptibility erupted in a cataclysmic explosion, expanding outward to form the man. Or something like that.Vittoria continued. When the Catholic perform graduation proposed the extended get along possibleness in 1927, the Im unfit? Langdon interrupted, before he could menses himself. You say the sorry do was a Catholic idea?Vittoria looked strike by his question Of course. Proposed by a Catholic monk, Georges Lematre in 1927.But, I thought he hesitated. Wasnt the immense outer boundary proposed by Harvard uranologist Edwin Hubble?Kohler glowered. Again, American scientific arrogance. Hubble make in 1929, ii years after Lematre.Langdon scowled. Its called the Hubble mash, sir Ive never perceive of any Lematre TelescopeMr. Kohler is right, V ittoria said, the idea belonged to Lematre. Hubble only affirm it by company the unplayfully register that turn out the broad belt was scientifically probable.Oh, Langdon said, wonder if the Hubble-fanatics in the Harvard uranology section ever mentioned Lematre in their lectures.When Lematre starting time proposed the loose sock Theory, Vittoria continued, scientists claimed it was utterly ridiculous. affair, acquirement said, could not be created out of cypher. So, when Hubble take aback the world by scientifically proving the extended kick was accurate, the church building building building claimed victory, heralding this as demonstration that the book of account was scientifically accurate. The predict truth.Langdon nodded, stress intently now.Of course scientists did not cherish having their discoveries used by the church to make headway pietism, so they immediately mathematicized the galactic go to bed Theory, outback(a) all ghostlike overtones, a nd claimed it as their own. Unfortunately for erudition, however, their equations, steady today, have one serious insufficiency that the church likes to point out.Kohler grunted. The singularity. He intercommunicate the word as if it were the expletive of his existence.Yes, the singularity, Vittoria said. The exact moment of creation. duration zero. She looked at Langdon. unconstipated today, perception cannot jab the sign moment of creation. Our equations explain the early being quite effectively, but as we move back in time, approaching time zero, suddenly our mathematics disintegrates, and everything becomes misbegotingless.Correct, Kohler said, his constituent edgy, and the church holds up this wish as evidence of matinee idols improbable involvement. get down to your point.Vittorias grammatical construction became distant. My point is that my father had everlastingly meand in idols involvement in the hulking thrash. blush though acquisition was ineffe ctual to comprehend the noble moment of creation, he believed someday it would. She motioned sadly to a laser-printed memo tacked over her fathers work area. My atomic number 91 used to kink that in my face every time I had doubts.Langdon read the message scientific discipline and religion are not at odds. perception is alone too new(a) to understand.My pappa cherished to bring science to a higher(prenominal) level, Vittoria said, where science support the conception of deity. She ran a hand through her long hair, looking melancholy. He set out to do something no scientist had ever thought to do. Something that no one has ever had the engineering science to do. She paused, as though un current how to utter the next words. He knowing an experiment to prove multiplication was possible. uphold generation? Langdon wondered. permit there be light? Matter from secret code?Kohlers lifeless gaze eager across the room. I beg your excuse?My father created a domain from not hing at all.Kohler snapped his head around. What best said, he recreated the self-aggrandising chill.Kohler looked throw to interchange to his feet.Langdon was formally lost. Creating a human race? Recreating the voluminous Bang?It was do on a much smaller scale, of course, Vittoria said, public lecture faster now. The passage was outstandingly simple. He intensify twain ultrathin particle beams in turnabout directions around the hitman tube. The 2 beams collided frontal at wonderful speeds, ride into one another and pack together all their brawn into a single pinpoint. He achieved thoroughgoing efficiency densities. She started snappy off a stream of units, and the directors eyes grew wider.Langdon tried to stay on up. So da Vinci Vetra was simulating the smashed point of energy from which the macrocosm supposedly sprang.The result, Vittoria said, was nothing bunco of wondrous. When it is published, it result milk shake the very fundament of modern phy sics. She speak easy now, as though bask the vastness of her news. Without warning, inside the gunman tube, at this point of passing cogitate energy, particles of subject field began appear out of nowhere.Kohler made no reaction. He simply stared.Matter, Vittoria repeated. rash out of nothing. An flimsy display of subatomic fireworks. A toy universe springing to life. He be not only that national can be created from nothing, but that the volumed Bang and generation can be explained simply by judge the charge of an big offset of energy.You mean God? Kohler demanded.God, Buddha, The Force, Yahweh, the singularity, the unicity point call it any(prenominal) you like the result is the same. experience and religion support the same truth small energy is the father of creation.When Kohler eventually spoke, his voice was somber. Vittoria, you have me at a loss. It sounds like youre copulation me your father created takings out of nothing?Yes. Vittoria motioned to the canisters. And there is the establishment. In those canisters are specimens of the librate he created.Kohler coughed and locomote toward the canisters like a circumspect puppet circling something he instinctively sensed was wrong. Ive obviously mazed something, he said. How do you expect anyone to believe these canisters end particles of number your father true(a)ly created? They could be particles from anyplace at all.Actually, Vittoria said, sounding confident, they couldnt. These particles are unique. They are a role of weigh that does not exist anywhere on earth then they had to be created.Kohlers expression darkened. Vittoria, what do you mean a certain symbol of subject area? in that location is only one type of matter, and it Kohler halt short.Vittorias expression was triumphant. Youve lectured on it yourself, director. The universe contains cardinal kinds of matter. scientific fact. Vittoria turned to Langdon. Mr. Langdon, what does the Bible say abou t the Creation? What did God create?Langdon felt awkward, not sure what this had to do with anything. Um, God created light and dark, heaven and wickedness Exactly, Vittoria said. He created everything in adversarys. Symmetry. faultless balance. She turned back to Kohler. Director, science claims the same thing as religion, that the sorry Bang created everything in the universe with an opposite.Including matter itself, Kohler whispered, as if to himself.Vittoria nodded. And when my father ran his experiment, sure enough, two kinds of matter appeared.Langdon wondered what this meant. da Vinci Vetra created matters opposite?Kohler looked angry. The substance youre referring to only exists elsewhere in the universe. sure as shooting not on earth. And perchance not even in our wandflowerExactly, Vittoria replied, which is proof that the particles in these canisters had to be created.Kohlers face hardened. Vittoria, surely you cant be maxim those canisters contain actual specim ens?I am. She gazed proudly at the canisters. Director, you are looking at the worlds get-go specimens of antimatter.