Dr. Richter knocked on the door.
No answer.
He knocked again, louder, coupling it with ‘Eradani, it’s Dr. Richter’.
No answer.
He knocked again, with both hands, so hard that the door rattled in its hinges.
The door opened.
‘Yes?’ said Jo, obviously a little irritated at having to have moved.
‘Ah, hello. You’re... Jo, right? Is Eradani in?’
‘Depends,’ said Jo.
‘On what?’
‘On whether she’s in or not.’
Dr. Richter impressively suppressed the urge to yell at her. ‘Please, if she’s in, ask her to come to the door. It’s very urgent,’ he said, as nicely as he could.
‘Why?’
‘It just is. I need to speak to her about some work,’ he said. ‘Really, I do.’
Jo just stood there smiling at him. After about ten seconds, she shoved the door open. ‘Okay,’ she said brightly. ‘Come in.’
‘Thanks,’ said Dr. Richter. He entered the room and looked round for his tutee. She wasn’t there. He turned to Jo, puzzled. ‘Well where is she?’ he asked.
‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Why?’
‘I haven’t got time for this,’ said Dr. Richter angrily. He pushed his way past his hostess and marched off down the corridor, his coat trailing menacingly behind him, just how he liked it.
‘Hmm,’ said Jo to herself, closing the door. She strolled back across the room and jumped onto her bed. She grabbed a board rubber from her bedside table, sat up and rubbed something off the ‘write’n’wipe’ board hanging above her bed.
<=> <=> <=>
Dr. Richter waited for the lecture to finish. He sat in one of the nice, comfy blue chairs that were situated in a little waiting room by the theatre’s exit.
He had often seen students sitting there, waiting for the theatre to be vacated. They would sit down in little groups, of never more than three or four, and they would never, ever, under any circumstances, talk about physics. They would talk about the night before, or about music, or about the state of the national economy. Anything other than physics.
He looked around the little room. To his right was a windowed partition wall that separated the room from the main corridor. Behind him was the entrance to the smaller lecture theatre, the one he usually lectured in. He loved that room, partly because he could laugh at all the students trying to squeeze into the tiny little seats, but mostly because at his fingertips was a bank of little buttons, each of which controlled an individual aspect of the theatre. This button: the projector screen. That button: the blinds. The other button: well, he was never really sure what the other button did. Anyway, it was all very hi-tech, and all very prone to not working.
The large lecture theatre, the one currently hosting Eradani, lay in front of him. There were two doors out of the theatre: one leading into the waiting room, the other into the corridor the beyond the partition wall. Nobody ever used the door into the waiting room, it was pretty useless. The other door was much more useful, bringing you out by the stairs.
He heard a door open. He looked in the direction of the large theatre, but the doors were still closed. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see students walking past the partition wall and then turning down the stairs. They had come out of the small lecture theatre’s side entrance, no doubt having had to suffer a theoretical physics lecture.
As the last of the theorists made their way down the stairs, the door to the large theatre opened, and dozens of students started to shove through the small gap and squeeze down the corridor to the stairs. Dr. Richter kept an eye on the students. He recognised most of them from his own lectures. Some he knew quite well: those he tutored, those he taught in workshop class and those who kept annoying him at the end of his lectures by bombarding him with a barrage of questions. He saw Frank walk past, telling somebody something they clearly didn’t want to know. He saw one of his tutees walk past; a girl called Joy who never seemed to have a pencil case or, indeed, any pencils. He saw a cluster of girls walk out. He didn’t know any of them, but he recognised them as being friends of Eradani. He stood up to see if she was among them. He couldn’t see her face in the crowd, but he could see her shoulder-length brown hair bobbing up and down. He moved to the door in the partition wall and opened it. ‘Eradani,’ he called. The hair stopped bobbing and made its way over.
‘Hiya,’ she said brightly. ‘What’s up?’
‘We need to talk,’ he said.
‘About what?’
‘Come to my office,’ he replied. He grabbed her arm and started marching her off down the corridor.
‘What are you doing?’ demanded Eradani as she struggled to free her arm.
‘I’m walking you to my office,’ said her lecturer. ‘It’s important.’
Something in his tone made Eradani stop struggling. Very rarely did he sound so serious. In fact, she had only heard him speak like that once before, but that was when he had come close to being assassinated by a hitman who’d mistakenly thought he was an international drugs baron, a peculiar little episode that had never seemed to reach a satisfying conclusion.
They marched on down to the end of the corridor, down the ramp, through the tearoom, down the stairs a floor and onto the study bridge.
Dr. Richter stopped. ‘Hold on, wasn’t Frank dismissed from the course?’ he asked.
Eradani looked at him. ‘What?’ she said.
‘Frank Robinson. I thought he had been asked to leave.’
‘I don’t know,’ said Eradani. ‘It’s news to me.’
‘Oh, well,’ said Richter. ‘Doesn’t matter.’ He continued walking across the bridge to the building that housed his office, this time letting Eradani follow of her own free will.
<=> <=> <=>
Once again, Eradani made herself comfortable in the Doctor’s personal office. He grabbed his plush, gas-cylinder chair and wheeled it over in front of her. He grabbed something off his desk and sat down.
He looked her straight in the eyes.
‘What is this?’ he said. He held out his copy of Cofomaristics. Eradani felt a shiver run up and down her spine. ‘Tell me what this is!’ he demanded.
Eradani slumped back in her chair. ‘It’s exactly what you think it is,’ she said. ‘It’s a theory.’
‘No, it isn’t,’ he said, ‘it’s a nightmare. That’s what it is. A nightmare of gigantic proportions.’
Eradani felt that, on the face of it, this was perhaps a bit of an over-reaction.
‘Did this come from Computer Science?’ he asked. Eradani opened her mouth, then closed it again. ‘Well, did it?’
‘No,’ she admitted. ‘No, it didn’t.’
‘I knew it,’ said Dr. Richter. Eradani could see he was fuming. He flung the booklet at her. ‘So, tell me, then,’ he said, his hands actually shaking. ‘Go on, tell me.’
She folded the booklet back, smoothing out the crumpled pages. ‘It’s from Professor Hughes,’ she said, thumbing through the leaves.
‘Hughes?’ He looked surprised. Eradani thought he may have guessed already, but obviously he hadn’t. ‘Hughes,’ he said to himself quietly. ‘Why didn’t you tell me before?’ he asked.
‘You would never have done the experiment,’ Eradani said. ‘Would you?’
‘No, I suppose not,’ he admitted.
Eradani could tell that something major had happened. He was far too worked up to just be curious about the origins of the paper. ‘What’s going on?’ she asked. ‘What’s happened?’
Dr. Richter looked up at her. His eyes were the eyes of a troubled man. ‘I was driving home last night,’ he said. ‘I had the radio on. “Science on the Waves”, on Radio FMFM. They broadcast Cofomaristics, Eradani. To the whole country. They broadcast it.’
The shiver in Eradani’s back turned into a full-blown quake. ‘No, surely not?’ she said, hopefully.
‘Eradani, I heard it. I heard them laughing at it. At us! They actually named us. We’re finished. Do you hear? We’re finished.’
‘But, who could have...’
‘I don’t know. How many people know about it?’
‘Well, there’s you, me, Professor Hughes and... and Jo.’ Eradani started to bite her nails. Maybe she shouldn’t have shown it to Jo.
‘Who’s Jo?’ he asked.
‘My roommate.’
‘Your roommate? Her? You showed her this?’ He was amazed. He may have only met Jo briefly, but she certainly didn’t strike him as being tremendously trustworthy.
‘I’m sure she wouldn’t have told anybody,’ said Eradani meekly.
‘Oh, so it just found its own way to the journalists, did it?’
‘Well, it may have been Professor Hughes,’ she suggested.
‘Possibly, yes,’ admitted Dr. Richter. ‘But why? How would he gain from it?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Oh, what a mess, what a mess. We don’t know who told the press, we don’t know why. All we do know is that our careers in physics are over.’
‘Over?’ said Eradani. ‘Why?’
Dr. Richter threw another bit of paper at her. She unfolded it and read it.
Due to recent events, the university has decided to suspend the education of Eradani until a full review can be arranged. Dr. Tobias Richter is also to be suspended as of today until further notice.
This is the decision of the Faculty of Science and is final.
You may appeal against our decisions at the appropriate time.
Eradani had to read the note three times before it sunk in. She brushed her hair back behind her ears. ‘Why?’ she said.
‘Because we have brought disrepute to the school,’ said Dr. Richter. ‘They don’t want the likes of us here, making it a laughing stock. You’ll get official notification yourself tonight, most likely.’
‘But it’s just a suspension. They’ll let us back.’
‘No,’ he said, laughing ironically. ‘It’s just the way they do things. It’s procedure. The suspension is indefinite. As soon as they arrange a proper hearing, we’ll be politely requested not to return. I know the way it works. I’ve seen it happen. We’re literally being booted out onto the streets.’
Eradani couldn’t fully comprehend this. Was that it? She would have to leave? Just like that? After all the work she’d done, all the effort she’d put in? Had it all been for nothing?
‘So, what do we do? I mean, what am I going to do?’ she asked, although she knew it was a pretty unanswerable question.
‘I don’t know,’ said Dr. Richter, feeling just as sorry for her as he was for himself. He could understand the university punishing him, but to drag Eradani into all this was a step too far. ‘I really don’t know what we’re going to do. I suggest you go back to your room for a bit and have a think. Maybe there’s some other career that you’ll find interesting.’
‘More interesting than physics?’ said Eradani incredulously. ‘Are you mad?’
‘I just think you should consider it,’ he said calmly. ‘I’ll have to do the same.’
‘Yeah, but I’ve just wasted two entire years of my life,’ said Eradani.
‘I know, I know. But something will turn up. I assure you.’
<=> <=> <=>
Mr. Tompkins sat in his study. He tapped his fingers on the green upholstery of his armchair, deep in thought.
Deep down, he knew it was wrong, but the order came from the very top. He knew he would be greatly rewarded if he succeeded, but he didn’t know what would happen if he failed, or if he refused.
He looked around his room. He looked at his green desk, his green wallpaper, his green carpet, his green radiators. He noted how nicely green everything looked. Just how he liked it.
He made his decision. He stood up, put his green top hat on, picked up his green cane and marched out of his green house in his smart green suit, crossing his pink lawn to get to his green Reliant Robin.