The Quantum Prophecy

“Much of what has been written about my life as a superhero is apocryphal at best.”

“Apocryphal?” Colin asked.

“Made-up,” his mother said.

Max continued. “Yes, we fought crime, helped people, tried to make the world a better place. If you’ve been given a gift – like I was – you’re honour-bound to use it for the greater good.”

“And can you tell us what happened ten years ago?”

“Despite what a lot of people have been saying, I wasn’t there. So your guess is as good as mine, Garth. All I know is that Ragnarök had built some enormous machine and was driving it straight for Manhattan. Then… well, who can say? There was a big explosion and that was it. No more superhumans.”

“Except yourself – and your brother and sister.”

Max nodded. “Exactly. I have no idea what happened. Josh and I visited the site the following day. All we found was a lot of wreckage.”

“No bodies?”

“No.”

“Doesn’t that seem strange that you have no more of an idea what happened than we do? Surely you must know something?”

“Now, that’s why I don’t usually do interviews! You have to remember that we lost some very good friends during that battle. Energy, Quantum, Titan, Apex, Paragon… all the others. We fought alongside them for years.”

“I know, but—”

Max interrupted him. “Do you think that if I knew something I’d just sit back and let it go? Would you? If some of your closest friends suddenly disappeared, wouldn’t you want to investigate it? We did everything we could to find out what had happened to them.”

The interviewer said, “Can you tell me, then, why you and the other members of The High Command weren’t present at that final battle?”

“We might have been superheroes,” Max said, “but even we couldn’t be in two places at the one time.”

“But there were other superhumans who weren’t present, and they’ve also disappeared.”

“This is apparently true,” Max said.

“Care to suggest how that might be?”

“No,” Max said. “I mean, I’ve got a few ideas, but nothing concrete. Nothing that hasn’t been suggested before. Maybe they retired from the business, just as I did.”

“And may I ask, why did you retire? If you don’t mind speaking about that.”

“Whatever happened ten years ago… well, as I said, your guess is as good as mine. We do know that every other superhuman in the world disappeared that day, heroes and villains included. Roz, Josh and I talked about it – at length – and we came to the conclusion that with all the supervillains gone, we weren’t needed any more.”

“Yes, but—”

Max interrupted him. “We realised that we could do more good by focussing our efforts on other areas of our lives. MaxEdDal Pharmaceuticals specialises in effective, low-cost medicines that have certainly saved more lives than I ever could have as a superhero.”

“Don’t you miss those days?”

“At times… but I don’t miss the constant struggles, or the fear that one day a new supervillain might emerge who would be powerful enough to destroy the planet. At least we know that if there are no more superhumans, there will be no more supervillains.”

Max Dalton turned to look directly into the camera. “So for better or worse – and I firmly believe that it’s for the better – the age of the superhumans is over.”

4 (#ulink_d9a805d6-62e4-551c-a13f-3dd0bc674e7a)

VICTOR CROSS SAT in a dark room, the only light coming from the two computer screens in front of him.

His fingers flew over the keyboard as, on one screen, computer codes appeared line after line, page after page.

On the second screen, a complex computer-generated image of a large silver ball rotated slowly. Cross watched this as he typed. He didn’t need to watch the other screen. He knew exactly what was on it.

The letters and symbols on his keyboard had been worn away on all but two of the keys: backspace and delete. Victor very rarely used them. He didn’t make mistakes.

Cross was twenty years old, tall with an athletic build. He normally kept his blond hair short, but it had been months since he’d last had time to get it cut, and it now hung over his face.

The phone beside him buzzed once. Victor hit the “Speaker” button. “Talk to me.”

“It’s me. What’s the situation?” The voice was electronically disguised, giving it an artificial, machine-like quality.

“I’ve just heard from the extraction team. They’ve got Joseph.”

“Good. You know what you have to do?”

“Of course. We’re all prepped and ready.”

“The tech team are on their way to you now. They should be there within the hour.”

“Good,” Victor said. “My own team are going to be working around the clock on the nucleus. It’ll take a couple of days. You’re sure that we can contain him for that long?”

“Shouldn’t be a problem. Keep me posted.” The call was disconnected.

Victor continued typing at the same ferocious speed.

He had a complete mental image of the computer program he was writing. All his fingers were doing was transferring the program from his brain into the computer.

Even as he typed, his mind was occupied with several other matters. In the background, he was considering ways to speed up the typing process. The ideal solution would be some sort of human-machine interface through which he could upload his programs directly into the computer. That would save a tremendous amount of time.

At the same time, he was wondering how to deal with the coming situation. He knew from experience that not everything would go according to plan, because other people were involved. Computers did what you told them to do, but people had a tendency to do what they believed they were supposed to do.

He set another part of his brain working on ideas for alternative plans, just in case anything went wrong.

Victor was aware that most people didn’t – or couldn’t – use their brains in the way that he used his. The average person could keep no more than six or seven different thoughts going at once, and most of those were of the “What will I have for dinner?” variety.

But Victor could run dozens of different thought processes at the same time; he could program his brain as efficiently as he could program a computer.

A mental alarm reminded him that he’d now been working for eight solid hours and that it was time to take a break.

Victor pushed himself back from the computer terminal, yawned, and ran his hands through his hair.