BROKEN SYMMETRY: A Young Adult Science Fiction Thriller (9 page)

“Blaire . . .” Damian locked eyes with me. “What Charles is trying to say is you can walk through mirrors.”

Chapter 8

“
Nuh-uh,” I
said, shaking my head as my heart sank. And I had already gotten so excited. “It must have skipped a generation. If I could walk through mirrors, I would have known by now . . . you know, accidentally fallen through.”

Charles smiled. “Thankfully, it’s almost impossible to discover your ability to break symmetry by yourself
—
which is why there are only a handful of active carriers instead of thousands. Here, I’ll explain
—
”

“Charles calls it
breaking symmetry
,” said Damian. “It’s still just walking through a mirror. He likes the nerd lingo.”

“You’re not helping,” said Charles.

“I’m just saying take it easy on her,” said Damian.” She’s been here a week.”

“Fine. I’ll start from the beginning,” said Charles. “The term
breaking symmetry
comes from a phenomenon in quantum mechanics . . .” He trailed off, seeing my blank expression. “Actually, let’s back up even more. When you hold a ball in your hand, it feels like it’s made of stuff with a consistency . . . something solid, right? Well, it turns out that’s an illusion. It’s actually made of billions and billions of tiny particles called molecules, which in turn are made of atoms
—
”

“Okay, okay, you didn’t have to back up that much,” I said. “I took Chemistry last year.”

Charles looked relieved. “Think of breaking symmetry like this,” he said. “If I shine a single particle of light
—
a
photon
—
at a piece of glass, there are two choices, right? It could pass through the glass, or it could be reflected. In other words, one set of initial conditions can cause two radically different outcomes. In physics, the moment it chooses one of those branches and not the other is knows as
breaking symmetry
. And you get a split.”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “What does this have to do with walking through mirrors?”

Charles sighed. “I told you, Damian, you should have let me explain it to her first. Now she’s lost her focus.”

Damian just smirked.

“I have not lost my focus,” I said. “Geez, sorry I don’t have a PhD in quantum mechanics.”

“Blaire, it’s just high school physics,” said Charles. “Please tell me you’ve heard of the double-slit experiment?”

“I vaguely recall it,” I lied.

“Good. So you know that every time a subatomic particle has a choice between two paths
—
that is, every time it
breaks symmetry
—
it actually takes
both
paths simultaneously and you have a split.”

“What’s a split?”

“It’s when the universe splits in two. In one universe, the photon passes through the glass. In the other, it gets reflected. You’ve heard all this before, right?”

“The idea that there are parallel universes? Isn’t that just science fiction?”

“Actually, it’s pretty easy to prove,” he said. “In the double-slit experiment, you shine a single photon of light through a pair of slits, and you get a pattern of interference that indicates the photon is being influenced by photons in parallel universes. It’s pretty well-documented, in fact. This interference is happening constantly, every time there’s a break in symmetry. Every time there’s a split.”

Silence followed.

“And you, like our subatomic friends,” said Damian, uncrossing his arms and standing up straight, “can break symmetry. And it’s time for me to teach you how.”

***

“There are three rules.” said Damian, once I’d signed the briefing (Charles still assured me I could back out at any time) and Charles and Amy had left us alone in room B.

Both my proximity to Damian and the fact that we were locked in a small, sound-proof room together heightened my awareness. Every crinkle of my shirt, every gasp for breath, every thump of my heart resounded right inside my ear drum.

I eyed the mirror, itching to stick my hand through, to test it out
—

“Blaire.”

“I’m listening.” My attention snapped back to him, and his hardened stare made me flinch.

“What we do is dangerous,” he said.

“I know that. Obviously.”

“No you don’t,” he said. “Listen to me. Every time you crossover, you go to a place that
isn’t real
. You will begin to question what
is
real . . . and you will lose yourself. Do you understand me?”

I nodded.

“This is the
source
,” he said, gesturing around us. “This is real. This is our home . . . this is where we belong.” He pointed to the mirror. “That’s a
reflection
. It’s not real. It exists only when you break symmetry
—
and only until you destroy the mirror. Do you understand?”

Again, I nodded.

“You will only use the mirror in this room or room A to crossover. Once you break symmetry, it will be your only entry into the reflection and your only exit. Should you try to reenter the source through any other mirror, you will only break symmetry again. You’ll create a reflection of a reflection. Two levels down. Blaire, do you understand me?”

I swallowed. “Yes.”

“If you go through a mirror, and the mirror breaks before you come back
—
while you’re still on the other side
—
do you know what happens?”

I shook my head.

“We call it being
orphaned
. It’s the worst fate imaginable. You’re trapped inside the reflection . . .
forever
. Got it?”

A chill surfaced under my skin. I nodded.

“Okay,” he said. “Now let’s go over the rules.”

“What the hell were those?”

“Tips.”

I rolled my eyes. “Okay, Damian. I get it, it’s
dangerous
.”

He chuckled. “You have no idea, Blaire.
No
idea.”

“If it’s so freaking dangerous, why do it?”

“You’re right,” he said. “There’s very little in this world that justifies using crossover. Most carriers lose themselves after discovering their ability. They get lost down there. They vanish. There’s a reason Charles is so fussy about everything; he’s meticulous, he’s careful, he’s professional . . . that’s how he’s survived so long. He’s earned my trust and that’s why I do this for him. That’s all you have as a carrier. Trust.”

He didn’t answer my question. “Well I don’t trust you, Damian.”

He smirked.  “I already know you do. Rule number one: after every walk, you destroy the mirror. The symmetry’s broken and it no longer functions as a mirror. It’s a portal now between two parallel universes, and it has to be destroyed.” He stared at me. “Got it?”

I nodded, feeling my eyes glaze over.

“Blaire, I’m not kidding around.” The intensity of his eyes made me want to shrink.

But the last few hours had frazzled my brain, I couldn’t muster more attention. “I’m trying,” I mumbled.

“Do you know how to break the mirror when you come back?”

I raised my fist. He raised his eyebrow.

“No good?” I said.

“Try it.”

“Now?”

“Punch it as hard as you can. Try it.”

“But that would hurt,” I stepped up to the mirror and assessed the glass. “I could kick it.”

“Go on, try it.”

“No, Damian, I’m not going to kick the mirror.”

“Kick it, Blaire,” he ordered.

“Stop talking to me like that,” I said. “You’re scaring me.”

“Good. I was worried you didn’t feel fear,” he said. “When you’re back in this room and there’s something chasing you, you won’t have time to think. Break the mirror, Blaire.”

Tentatively, I tapped the mirror with my foot, half expecting my foot to pass right through the glass. It didn’t. Still a normal mirror.

His hardened expression melted and he actually laughed. “Come on. Seriously. Pretend it’s my face.”

I kicked it harder. The mirror wobbled.

“Right, I forgot,” he said with a smirk. “I’m too pretty. Pretend it’s Amy’s face.”

I glared at him, lip curled. My foot slammed into the mirror, and the whole frame shook. I thought he would jump in and stop me, but he just stood there.

The mirror hung intact, unblemished.

“Move over,” Damian pushed me out of the way and lined himself up with the mirror in a Karate stance. He lunged, and his boot hammered into the mirror. The impact echoed like a gunshot, and the walls of room B trembled in the aftermath. The lights flickered.

The mirror quivered to rest,
unbroken
.

Huh? My jaw slackened. I couldn’t believe it
—
he should have kicked a hole right through the wall.

Damian eased his leg down and swiveled to face me. “These mirrors are our only way back,” he said. “We don’t take chances. So how do you break the mirror?”

I glanced around the room, and then I saw it. Duh, Blaire,
the axe
.

I stepped up to the wall and coiled my fingers around the handle. With superhuman effort, I hoisted the axe above my head, my whole body straining. I took a deep breath, averted my eyes, and let the steel edge plummet toward the mirror.

Damian caught the hilt just inches from the mirror’s surface. “Good, Blaire. But this is your backup plan.” He relieved me of the axe, and remounted it on the wall. “There’s an easier way. You’ve done it before.”

Ah
 . . . my eyes flicked to the red button. Sometimes I can be so dense.

“Right,” he said. “The red button. When you come back from a crossover, your first thought should only be to press the red button. Do nothing else. Just press the red button, and everything will be okay again.”

“Question. What’s the point of all this?” I said. “I mean, isn’t a reflection just going to be exactly the same as here, as the . . . uh
—
”

“Source?” he said.

“Yeah. Why bother crossing over if we can just do the same thing in the source?”

“After you break symmetry the reflection starts to diverge from the source.”

“Yeah, but why?” I said. “Wouldn’t my reflection just step out of the mirror and do exactly what I was doing but in the source, cancelling out the effect?”

Damian nodded his head. “You’re starting to get it. That doesn’t happen because you crossover
into
your reflection. She doesn’t come out. You go in. That means anything you do in the reflection stays in the reflection. If you wanted to you could rob a bank in a reflection, kill a dozen cops, and make it back to the source before they caught you. It would be like it never happened. The money wouldn’t even be missing.”

I searched his black eyes. “You’ve done that, haven’t you?”

“A reflection isn’t real, Blaire.”

“What happens when a mirror breaks?” I said. “What happens to everything on the other side?”

“It disappears. It vanishes. It no longer exists.”

“So the universe is destroyed?”

“I’m sure it stays out there somewhere, but it can never connect to ours again, so it’s as good as nonexistent. Didn’t you learn that in your philosophy class?”

“Right. Like if a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, it doesn’t really make a sound,” I said. “Okay, so break the mirror when I’m done. Got it.”

“Number two,” he said. “Never, ever, ever, ever,
ever
nest crossovers. No crossovers within crossovers.”

I needed a moment to think about this one. So that would be like crossing over into a reflection, finding another mirror, and crossing over again. “What’s wrong with that?” I said.

“Three reasons. One
—
you’re guaranteed to get lost. You’ll lose your way and you won’t be able to find your way back to the source . . . the
true
source. Two
—
each time you go down a level, that’s one more mirror that could break. You’re twice as likely to get orphaned.”

I waited, but his explanation had ended. “The third reason?”

He hesitated before answering. “It’s not clear exactly what happens to us when we go through one mirror, what the side effects are. The effects are cumulative each time you crossover. But nesting trips would multiply the effects. My guess is you wouldn’t make it very deep.”

An uneasy fog filled my mind. “What does it do to us?”

“Crossing over . . . it hurts a little. It does something to our bodies.”

“You mean it causes damage?” I thought of my father’s MRI, the lesions inside his body, the internal bleeding. “Am I at risk?”

“Not at first,” he said. “Only if you do it too much. Okay, are you ready for rule number three?”

Though I still wanted to voice my questions about crossover side effects, I nodded. This was all too much.

“The last rule is the most important.” His gaze held me prisoner. “Blaire, I mean this one. I
really
mean this one
—
make sure nothing living comes back out with you that didn’t go in with you.”

***

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked, alarmed.

“
Reflections
,” he said. “Of people. When you crossover, you won’t have to contend with your own reflection, but you’ll have to contend with ours. It’s best if you don’t run into our reflections down there, otherwise we’ll start asking questions. We’ll want to come back up with you. That’s why each of these rooms has a private exit, which you use in the reflection. Only when you’re back in the source can you use the door we came in through.”

I nodded. “I think I’m getting the hang of this.”

“No, you’re not, Blaire. Trust me, you’re not. This stuff is going to mess with your mind. You’re going to stay up at night thinking of the permutations. You’re going to have nightmares about getting stuck in a mirror, nightmares about not being in the true source. Believe me, you do not have the hang of this.”

“So far, all you’ve said about crossing over is that it’s crazy unsafe, it screws with my mind, and it’s most likely going to permanently damage my body. It sounds like suicide. Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t walk out right now.”

“That would be smart. The door’s right here.” He stepped out of the way.

Just go, Blaire.
While you still have the chance. “You won’t chase me or haunt my dreams?” To test his proposition, I edged toward the exit, away from the mirror.

He shrugged and stuck his hands in his pockets. “I promise.”