‘Look, he’s circled some of the readings in red. What do they signify?’
‘Those are the electromagnetic radiation readings,’ replied Serena. ‘It looks like he’s highlighted the times when they reached a peak.’
‘He’s also scribbled some notes in the margin next to them,’ Tom observed. He read the first one aloud. ‘Sichuan, China, twelfth of May, 2008. Richter scale, eight. Eighty-three thousand, five hundred dead and three hundred and seventy-five thousand injured.’ He turned to the next section and found a similar notation by the peak readings. ‘Do you have a pen?’ he asked Serena, who scrabbled around in her briefcase and managed to find one. He started to transfer Morantz’s observations onto the last page in the dossier, which was blank.
Sichuan, China: 12th May 2008. Richter scale — 8.0 / 83,500 dead, 375,000 injured.
Viti Levu, Fiji: 9th November 2009. Richter scale — 7.7 / 58,000 dead, 170,000 injured.
Haiti, Caribbean: 12th January 2010. Richter scale — 7.0 / 316,000 dead, 300,000 injured.
Maule, Chile: 27th February 2010. Richter scale — 8.8 / 44,800 dead, 111,000 injured.
Fukushima, Japan: 11th March 2011. Richter scale — 9.0 / 550,000 dead, 1.2 million injured.
When he finished writing, he gave a long, low whistle.
‘The dates of these earthquakes match exactly the dates when the Collider was operational. When did you say the Collider was last out of action following the leakage incident?’
‘It happened just before I arrived,’ said Serena. ‘So it would be about February 2010.’
‘And you said that it wasn’t operational for just over a year, as a result?’
‘Yes, we fired it up again in March 2011.’
‘That tallies.’
‘Are you saying what I think you’re saying?’ Serena turned to Tom, searching his face for the answer.
‘I’m not sure what I’m saying. But what I do know, is that Morantz thought that the Collider was responsible for causing the deaths of…’ Tom quickly did the sums in his head. ‘Over a million people, not to mention whatever the death toll in Istanbul will eventually be.’
‘Shiva is using the Collider as a tool to destroy the world,’ said Ajay, standing behind them, looking over their shoulders. They had almost forgotten he was there.
‘Why would Shiva do that?’ Tom asked, trying not to sound condescending.
‘Because it is written in the scriptures, that when Shiva performs the Tandav, the cosmic dance of death, at the end of an age, the world will be destroyed and a new one will be reborn.’
‘And you think that time is now?’
Ajay nodded, solemnly.
‘Do you think Morantz took his own life because he felt guilty about the earthquakes?’ Serena asked Tom.
‘It doesn’t make sense. Why the hell didn’t he tell somebody about it?’
‘He was going to,’ Ajay answered. ‘I saw Professor Morantz the night he died. He came to my room because he wanted to read the cuttings on my wall. He said he was compiling a file that would prove the Collider was responsible for causing these earthquakes and he would show it to the newspapers.’
‘That makes even less sense,’ said Tom. ‘If he was going to expose the Collider, why would he commit suicide before he’d had a chance to speak to the press?’
‘Perhaps it wasn’t suicide,’ Serena ventured.
Tom was silent for a while, trying to remember something that Frederick had told him over dinner. And then it came to him. He repeated his thoughts out loud.
‘Frederick said that Morantz came to see him the afternoon he died. He’d told him that they needed to destroy the Collider before it destroyed the world, and that Deiter knew all about it and was letting it happen.’
‘So, Deiter could have killed Morantz to stop him going public?’
‘I don’t like the guy, but I wouldn’t have put him down as a genocidal manic,’ Tom scoffed.
‘You’re right,’ said Selena closing the file. ‘I think we’re getting a little carried away with our suppositions, or we’ve drunk too much red wine. But what do we do now?’
Tom checked his watch. It was two-thirty in the morning. ‘Let’s sleep on it, and in the morning I’ll speak to Frederick. Do you mind if I hang onto this, Ajay? Incidentally, why haven’t you shown it to anybody else?’
‘I trust only you, Professor, sahib.’
‘What about your father?’
‘I trust only you, Professor, sahib,’ Ajay repeated.
CHAPTER 14
Ajay returned to his room, feeling relieved that he had given the file to the Professor and was confident the sahib would do the right thing. He knew, as soon as he’d met him at the airport, that he could trust him. His assured demeanour, considerate attitude and gracious mannerisms all indicated that he was a man of integrity.
He regarded himself as a good judge of character, despite being betrayed by the only other person he’d respected and loved.
Ajay was eight when Frederick applied to the courts in India to act as guardian for his best friend’s child. With no living relatives and the only other alternative being an orphanage, it was just a matter of formality that he was awarded custody. Ajay couldn’t remember much about his father, but he did keep a photo of him, which Frederick had given him, by his bedside. The picture was of Ajay, as a boy, sitting on his father’s knee, both smiling at the camera for posterity. He had mental pictures of his mother from what Frederick had told him about her, but they were fuzzy and didn’t hold any sentimental value.
He had grown up in Dusseldorf, where his father had worked before the accident, moving in with Mr and Mrs Volker following the tragedy. They were kind to him and eventually he came to accept them as his parents. Frederick and Irma were unable to conceive a child themselves, so for their part they treated Ajay like the son they could never have.
Being in a minority of one at school, he was often picked on and bullied by the other pupils. He found solace in religion, preferring to learn from the Pandit at the local Hindu temple than his teachers at school. Frederick had always encouraged him to follow his ancestral creed, in order to preserve a sense of heritage and cultural roots.
He was fascinated by the folk stories and traditions that had been passed down through the generations and would often spend any spare time he had helping out at the temple with the menial chores, just so he could hear the priest recount some more fables. And that was how he spent his adolescence; whilst his peers were discovering the vices of drink, drugs and girls, Ajay would be learning the Vedic Texts, the most ancient religious teachings which define ‘truth’ for Hindus.
At the age of 16, he had given up on school altogether and spent his days shadowing the priest, whom he had become close to over the years. He even considered devoting his life to the faith and becoming a Brahmin or teacher of scriptures, like his mentor, until it was explained to him that he didn’t come from the right caste and, therefore, would never be accepted as a priest. This rocked his conviction somewhat and he began to spend less and less time at the temple and more and more time moping in his bedroom, which led to the inevitable clashes with his parents.
Without any job prospects, he fell in with the wrong crowd and discovered the vices that he’d missed out on while growing up, namely drink and drugs. Unable to afford either habit, he reverted to stealing, firstly from his parents and then, as the habits took hold, from houses. He was arrested for burglary, after someone recognised him whilst leaving a house by the window, and he was sentenced to two years in prison suspended for a year on the condition that he sought professional help for his addictions.