The GoldenCity

As time passed, the computer woke up and became aware of its power. Dressler explained that the machine was able to learn from its mistakes and approach complex problems from different angles. During the second hour, Dr. Assad asked the computer to use Shor’s algorithm-a sequence of instructions that broke large numbers into smaller divisors. During the third hour, the machine began to examine the symmetries of something called an E-8, a geometric object that had 57 dimensions. After five hours had passed, Dr. Assad’s monitor screen went blank for a few seconds, and then the calculations continued without pause.

“What just happened?” Michael asked.

Dressler and Assad glanced at each other. “It’s what we saw last time,” Dressler said. “At a certain point, the computer begins sending substantial amounts of particles off to another realm.”

“So it’s like radio signals sent off into space?”

“Not exactly,” Dressler said. “It will take light years for radio and television signals to reach another galaxy. Our computer’s electrons are going to some place that’s not so distant-a parallel level of reality.”

Around the sixth hour, one of the technicians was sent out to get dinner. Everyone was munching on chips and sandwiches when the monitor screen flashed several times. Dr. Assad put down her mug of coffee and Dressler scooted his office chair over to her work station.

“It’s coming,” he said.

“What are you talking about?” Michael asked.

“The messages from our friends. This is what happened before,”

A dark wall of “plus” symbols flashed onto the screen. Then spaces appeared between them like holes in a wall. A few minutes later, the computer began creating geometric patterns. The first ones were flat like paper snowflakes, but then they gained dimension and symmetry. Balls, cylinders and cones floated across the screen as if they were being pushed by underwater currents.

“There!” Dressler shouted. “Right there! See it?” And everyone stared at the first number-a three.

More numbers appeared. Groups of them. Michael thought they were random, but Dr. Assad whispered, “This happened before. They’re special numbers. All prime.”

The monitor screen showed equations using different symbols, and then the equations vanished and shapes returned to the screen. Michael thought the shapes looked like balloons, but then they became living things: fat globular cells that divided in two and reproduced themselves.

Then-letters. At least, Dressler said they were letters. At first, they were geometric scribbles and scrawls that looked like graffiti scratched on a window. Then these symbols become solid and more familiar.

“That’s Hebrew,” Dr. Assad whispered. “That’s Arabic… definitely. Chinese… I think. I’m not sure.”

Even Boone looked enchanted. “I see an A and a T,” he said. “And that one looks like a G.”

The letters arranged themselves in lines. Were they in code or just random groups? Then spaces appeared between the letters, forming three-letter, five-letter, and twelve-letter segments. Was that a word? Michael asked himself. Do I see words? And then words appeared in different languages.

“That’s the word read in French,” Dr. Assad said with flat voice. “And that’s the word see in Polish. I spent a month in Warsaw when I was…”

“Keep translating,” Michael said.

“Blue. Soft. In German. Those new words look Coptic. English now. Infinity. Confusion…”

The words joined each other, forming phrases that sounded like surrealistic poetry. Dog take the star road. The random knife with whiskers.

By the eighth hour, messages were being sent in several languages, but Michael focused on nine words written in English.

come to us

come to us

COME-TO-US

2

When she had finished her geometry problems, Alice Chen slid off the bench, grabbed a scone from the breadbox, and pushed open the cooking hut’s heavy door. It was cold and windy on Skellig Columba, but Alice left her quilted jacket open. Her black braids swung back and forth as she hurried up the pathway that connected the three terraces on the northern edge of the island. Two rainwater catch basins and a garden with parsnips and cabbage were on the final terrace, and then the pathway disappeared and she was striding across rocky ground dotted with sorrel and saw thistle.

Alice scrambled up a boulder, kicking off bits of black lichen as if they were ashes from an ancient fire. When she reached the top, she turned slowly around and surveyed the island like a guard who had just climbed up a watchtower. Alice was twelve years old-a small, serious girl who had once practiced the cello and built forts in the desert with her friends. Now she was living on an isolated island with four nuns who thought they were taking care of her-not realizing that the opposite was true. When Alice was alone, she could assume her new identity: the Warrior Princess of Skellig Columba, Guardian of the Poor Claires.