Boundless

  Chapter Four

  Waneta road, Bethesda, Maryland

  Inside Doctor Lynn’s apartment, we quickly set to try and figure out why we were now targets. First, Uncle Henry placed a call to the ALMA observatory back in Chile trying to reach Professor Ted Borelli, but the line seemed dead causing much frustration in the room. Next, using Doctor Lynn’s laptop, we accessed my emails. A message instantly popped in my inbox and it was from Eel.

  The man sent to after you today at the university is Asmir Mandić

  Age: 37

  Nationality: Bosniak

  Weight: 6 foot 5

  Appearance: light mustache, no beard and has a blue scar running right from under his left eye

  Employer: CIA

  Job Description: hit man

  And Ds, Try to stay alive. I am counting on you.

  It was Uncle Henry who spoke first.

  ‘The man who picked me up from Chile had a blue scar running from under his left eye. At least we now know who we are up against and it’s not very comforting is it? Are we therefore to count on this Eel guy to keep us alive?’ I don’t think so. Look, we are up against the goddamn CIA for Christ sake! All because of some strange radio wave message. Who knows, it could be a fake, a fabrication, aimed at more government funding for the SETI program.’ He looked very upset and kept constantly pacing inside the room.

  'Henry, please.' Doctor Lynn said gently. He obliged sitting down.

  ‘What happened to your phone Henry?' she asked staring at him from across where he'd sunk his tall frame right next to mine in the comfortable smooth brown leather sofa.

  ‘I left it at the Walter Reed hospital front office. I wasn’t given much of a chance to retrieve it on our way out.’ His blue eyes fixed on me.

  ‘Do you Henry think, the Eridanus Super void was caused by a possible Quantum fluctuation?’

  ‘I believe so.’

  ‘Since we are on the same team,’ I interrupted, ‘it’s only fair that I understand what you two are talking about.’

  ‘Danny’, Uncle Henry said staring intently at me, ‘When you look up into the night skies, you see many stars grouped together. We astronomers place imaginary lines connecting them. Some form pictures, some form images of animals and others are derived from Greek mythology. Those grouped images are what we refer to as constellations. So, the Constellation Eridanus is represented as a river. Its name is derived from the ancient Greeks and was among forty or so listed by the second century astronomer Ptolemy.’

  ‘And a Super void,’ Doctor Lynn chipped in, ‘is a region of space-time from which gravity prevents anything, including light, from escaping. This empty space, stretching nearly a billion light-years across is devoid of any matter such as galaxies or stars, and gas, and neither does it contain the strange and mysterious dark matter, which though not seen can be detected. So, if your new alien friend Eel happens to be in this Eridanus area code, he or she might just find themselves getting swallowed up by this pitch black monster sooner than we can imagine.’

  ‘I’m a little confused,’ I interjected, 'and I stand to be corrected. If this empty space or super void whatever, doesn’t contain any of that stuff you just described, how then is it able to swallow planets whole, because it must have some kind of force, and which force or gravity is what it uses to drag stuff into it.’

  ‘Danny my boy,' Uncle Henry replied ‘you are proving quite smart for a waiter, our family genes I guess but, the scientific explanation is that black holes contain dark energy, which is yet to be verified of course, but can be seen as the opposite of gravity. While gravity pulls matter together, dark energy on the other hand tears them apart creating black holes and is what I believe partly explains the universe's rapid expansion at such an accelerated pace as these two try to cancel each other out. Although, I should add, this too, is still yet to be proven, a mystery of science.’

  Just then, another message popped up onto the computer screen.

  Go to the Embassy of Nepal, 2131 Leroy Place NW Washington DC 20008 tomorrow 4:00pm. Three passports, 2 MALE and 1 FEMALE await you. You will use these to travel to Petra, Jordan via Kathmandu. The names on the passports are;

  Male: Baikuntha Yadav

  Male: Girija Magar

  Female: Saraswati Rai

  Stunned, I typed and pressed the send button.

  Why?

  You want to stay alive?

  What are we to do in Petra then?

  Retrace our history and try to stop this mistake before it happens.

  How?

  You will find out once you get there. Reach me when you arrive at Petra.

  Good luck. You'll need it.