“These phenomena are inexplicable, but they are real,” she continued. “They are true anomalies…and they so fundamentally undermine the current model of consciousness that we now find ourselves at a crossroads of human understanding, a juncture where an ever-widening circle of brilliant minds—neuroscientists, physicists, biologists, and philosophers—are seeing no choice but to accept the same shocking truth…quite simply, that our established scientific views of how the human mind works are no longer adequate. It’s time for a new model. It’s time to admit we don’t know the answer to a very simple question: Where do our thoughts, talents, and ideas come from? And that, my friends, is the topic of tonight’s talk.”

  The Golěm’s taxi rounded the final corner toward Crucifix Bastion, and the lab came into sight in the distance. But when he saw what was before him, he immediately pounded on the Plexiglas divider. “Zastavte! Zastavte!”

  The driver lurched to an abrupt stop.

  The Golěm thought he would be alone here, but to his surprise, an ÚZSI sedan was parked in front of the building. Nobody should be here at this hour!

  He sent the taxi away and approached the bastion slowly on foot, moving discreetly through the woods that surrounded the facility. As he drew closer, he saw that the entry door to the building was shattered. The foyer was gaping open, its floor scattered with glass.

  Did ÚZSI break into Gessner’s lab?

  If so, The Golěm suddenly feared he might have difficulty retrieving what he had come for. Without it, I won’t be able to gain access to Threshold.

  The Golěm saw nobody moving inside the shattered foyer, but he did notice movement at the far end of the courtyard. Seventy-five yards away, a lanky man in a suit gazed out over the low enclosure wall and spoke on the phone.

  An ÚZSI officer?

  One of Gessner’s contacts?

  Either way, his presence here was a problem…and needed to be rectified.

  CHAPTER 26

  At the far end of Crucifix Bastion’s courtyard, Captain Janáček ended his phone calls and peered over the low stone enclosure wall into the deep ravine below. Strangely, in this moment, he felt totally alive. Whether it was his perilous downward view or the morning’s events that he found so thrilling didn’t really matter.

  It has been a good day.

  His years in law enforcement had been increasingly frustrating as Prague became overrun with tourists. Everyone demanded a safe city, and Janáček did what he could do, but he was constantly being reprimanded—either for lack of results or for being too aggressive.

  Choose one or the other, Janáček argued. Iron rule. Or chaos.

  He had been passed over numerous times for the chief position at ÚZSI after his handling of a group of carousing American college students a few years back. When confronted by Janáček, the kids had pushed back—drunk, entitled, and belligerent. Disgusted, Janáček threw them in prison for the night, determined to teach them a lesson.

  As misfortune would have it, one of the boys was the son of a U.S. senator, who immediately placed a livid call to the U.S. embassy. The boys were released on the spot, and a lawsuit was promptly filed against Janáček for “excessive force” and “emotional damage.”

  Janáček had never recovered professionally.

  Today I’m showing the Americans who is in control.

  The demolition team had just confirmed their imminent arrival, and Janáček had arranged a press conference for an hour from now. He could already envision the photos of himself escorting a prominent Harvard professor and a top American scientist out of Crucifix Bastion—both in handcuffs.

  These two Americans put lives at risk today, he would announce austerely. All in the name of seeking publicity for a book.

  Admittedly, Janáček’s allegations were not entirely honest, but he was confident his lie would remain hidden. His nephew Pavel had helped cover Janáček’s tracks. ÚZSI was a brotherhood, and it was understood that in law enforcement, sometimes one had to bend the rules in order to enforce them, especially in the face of the U.S. embassy’s appalling influence in this country.

  As Janáček relished his impending vindication, his phone began to ring.

  When he saw the caller ID, he gave a self-assured smile.

  Speak of the devil. Janáček had clashed with this woman on numerous occasions and had always lost their battles. Not today.

  “Madam Ambassador,” Janáček answered. “It’s always an honor.” He made no effort to hide his sarcasm from the American diplomat.

  “Captain Janáček,” the ambassador said. “Are you at Crucifix Bastion?”

  “I am indeed,” Janáček said arrogantly. “I am waiting for a demolition team and plan to take at least one American into custody.”

  “Attaché Harris is here with me,” the ambassador said, her voice forceful, “and he is convinced that there is no way Katherine Solomon or Robert Langdon had anything to do with planting a bomb.”

  “Then why is Ms. Solomon resisting arrest?”

  “Captain Janáček, I will say this only once. There are intricacies to this situation of which you’re not aware—”

  “Fuck your American intricacies, Madam Ambassador! What I am aware of is that you have no jurisdiction at Crucifix Bastion, and there is nothing you can do to stop me from enter—”

  “A DOST!” the ambassador exploded, her outburst in Czech startling Janáček.

  Having silenced him, the ambassador continued in a fierce whisper.

  She spoke six words…and six words only.

  Janáček felt like he’d been hit by a truck.

  In that instant, everything changed.

  CHAPTER 27

  As the elevator slowed to a stop on the lower level, Langdon’s pulse was already racing, partly on account of the claustrophobic cabin but mostly over his deepening concern for locating Katherine.

  She’s got to be here somewhere…

  When the door opened, Langdon found himself in a long corridor whose rough-hewn stone walls looked like those of an eight-hundred-year-old fortress, which in fact they were. In stark contrast, the hallway floor was an elegant herringbone inlay of stained hardwood, extending away from the elevator, illuminated by evenly spaced, tastefully dimmed, recessed lighting.

  “Katherine?” Langdon said softly, stepping out of the cramped elevator, his eyes adjusting to the soft lighting.

  As the door closed behind him, he peered down the corridor and saw five elegant wooden doorways, spaced out along the right-hand wall of the hallway, each framed in an arched, stone doorjamb. This lab looked less like a neuroscience facility than it did a lavish boutique hotel.

  “Dr. Gessner?!” he called, sensing there was no way Lieutenant Pavel could hear him upstairs now.

  The first door Langdon reached opened into a large, elegant office suite with stone walls, lush carpeting, and high cabinets. On the desk sat two computers, a landline, and mounds of paperwork. Apparently, this was where Gessner did her real work.

  “Hello?” he called, peeking into an adjoining office—a smaller space whose desk was decorated with photos and a fake plant, along with a magenta water bottle on which were penned the words Пей воду! Langdon had no idea what it meant, but he recognized the Cyrillic alphabet and recalled Gessner saying her lab assistant was Russian.

  Stepping out of the assistant’s office, Langdon moved down the hall to the next door, which bore a symbol Langdon did not immediately recognize.

  For a moment, he thought it was a modified circumpunct—the ancient symbol of a circle with a center dot. It also looked vaguely like the logo of the Philadelphia Flyers hockey team. A moment later, though, he realized it was actually a modern pictogram depicting a supine person slid into a large tube.

  Imaging lab, Langdon realized, rapping loudly on the door.

  Silence.

  “Katherine? Are you here?” he called softly.

  He pushed and the door opened. The room lights snapped on automatically, revealing an elaborate control station that overlooked two massive imaging machines—a CAT scan and an MRI—both unattended.

  Langdon backed out of the room and continued down the hall to a third door. The sign here gave him sudden hope.

  VIRTUAL REALITY

  Gessner had mentioned her work with VR, and Langdon now wondered if maybe the two women were inside, engrossed in some kind of full-sensory VR session, and had not heard the intercom.

  Langdon’s lone experience with VR had been intensely unsettling. A student had persuaded him to try a rock-climbing simulation called The Climb, and when Langdon pulled on the VR headset, he immediately found himself perched precariously on a thin ledge, thousands of feet in the air. Despite knowing he was standing safely on flat ground, Langdon was paralyzed with fear, his center of gravity was severely disoriented, and he was unable to take a single step. Incredibly, the virtual reality had been more persuasive than the actual reality his brain knew to be true.

  Never again, he thought, knocking loudly on the VR room door as he pushed it open.

  “Katherine?” he called as he entered. “Dr. Gessner?”

  The space beyond was a small, carpeted chamber with stone walls and one freestanding recliner in the middle. It looked like a single-seat home theater with no screen. On the back of the chair hung some bulky head-mounted goggles with cables running to it.

  This place is eerie, Langdon thought. And Katherine isn’t here.

  He quickly left the VR room and walked several more steps down the hallway, passing a restroom equipped with an emergency eyewash and a cubicle shower. Empty.

  Continuing on, Langdon arrived at what he now realized was the lab’s final door. The sign read:

  TECHVELOPMENT

  This trendy new term, pervasive among youthful tech start-ups, was one Langdon knew only because Jonas Faukman had once derided it as a “gratuitous amalgamation,” arguing that young people who lacked the energy to spell “technological development” should not be given millions of dollars to develop anything at all.

  Langdon knocked lightly and pushed open the door.

  Last chance, he thought, willing Katherine to be on the other side.

  As the door swung inward, Langdon found himself momentarily blinded. The room was glaringly bright…and noisy. Harsh fluorescent lights buzzed above a white tile floor, industrial fans roared, and an incessant beeping cut the air like some kind of warning alarm. Langdon was immediately on edge.

  “Hello?” he shouted over the noise. “Katherine?!”

  Stepping inside, he saw a maze of assorted worktables strewn with electronic gear, tools, parts, and blueprints, all giving Langdon the sense he had entered the lair of some mad scientist. Beyond the cluttered counters, at the back of the room, stood a cumbersome rack of gear that looked like an awkward hybrid of an archaic mainframe computer and an industrial generator. Cooling fans whirred from the device along with a loud and relentless beeping.

  “Is anyone here?” he yelled into the frenzy.

  Langdon made his way toward the machine, noticing the heavy braids of tubing and wires emerging from its side and winding across the floor to a secondary device—a slender, low-slung container made of clear plastic or glass. Beneath its transparent cover, the interior radiated a soft glow.

  What in the world is this?

  The size and shape made Langdon think of a sleeping pod.

  Or a coffin, he realized, suddenly unnerved.

  As he neared the pod, he could see its transparent shell was heavily fogged with condensation from whatever was happening inside. The beeping continued. He carefully approached, arriving over the pod, and peered down through the glass lid.

  Langdon instantly recoiled in horror.

  Lying motionless inside the pod, shrouded in thick swirling mist, was the hazy outline of a human form.

  My God…Katherine?!

  CHAPTER 28

  On the second floor of the U.S. embassy, Michael Harris felt off-balance as he stepped out of his private conversation with the ambassador. Having just been partially “read in,” Harris was still trying to process the full implications of the classified information the ambassador had now shared with him.

  She had not shared everything, he sensed, but one thing was crystal clear: Today is about much more than a bomb scare at the Four Seasons.

  Harris gathered himself and quickly headed back downstairs to Dana’s office, wishing he had talked to the ambassador before involving Dana. He found her at her computer, engrossed in multiple video feeds of Charles Bridge. Shit.

  Dana glanced up as he entered. “I located your woman with the spiked tiara, Michael. She’s very cute. You never told—”

  “Turn it off, Dana,” he said, rushing over to her. “I made a mistake.”

  “But you asked—”

  “I know. I’m sorry. Turn it off, please. Now.”

  Dana eyed him warily and stood up. As a six-foot-tall former runway model, she was one of the few women who could look Michael Harris in the eye. Before she could say a word, however, Harris crouched down near the floor.

  “Seriously?” she said. “Begging me on bended knee?”

  Not exactly. Harris reached under her desk and pulled a plug, cutting power to her computer.

  Dana saw her display go black. “What the hell are you doing?!”

  “I need you to trust me,” he said, standing again.

  “You have a lot of secrets lately.”

  You have no idea, he thought. “Look…I’m just asking you to go back to work and forget I ever asked you about any of this.”

  Dana’s glare was unflinching, and Harris sensed she had no intention of letting this go. Digging deep, he mustered a playful smile and lowered his voice to a whisper. “The walls here have ears. How about I tell you everything over dinner tonight?”

  Dana’s eyes brightened, her full lips pouting with promise. “Takeout? Your place?”

  Harris winked. “Food optional.”

  She smiled. “I like the way you think, Mr. Harris.”

  Harris blew her a kiss and headed out.

  Minutes later, he was in one of the embassy’s black Audi A7s, zipping along Tržiště Street. He had expected to be going directly to Crucifix Bastion, but the ambassador had ordered him to do something for her first.

  “Mr. Langdon will be safe a bit longer,” the ambassador had told him. “Captain Janáček is well under control.”

  An understatement, Harris knew, having just witnessed the brutal phone call between the ambassador and the captain. Janáček overplayed his hand…and lost. He would be licking his wounds and behaving perfectly until Harris arrived.

  Despite the alarming nature of everything Harris had learned from the ambassador, he felt a veil had been lifted, revealing much more about the puzzle pieces on the table and how they were connected…Harris’s off-book work for the ambassador…Gessner’s lab at Crucifix Bastion…the woman on Charles Bridge…and even the upcoming publication by Katherine Solomon.

  Dana Daněk was fuming.

  You have no authority over my actions, Michael Harris.

  You’re my lover, not my boss.

  The attaché’s condescending sweet talk of dinner had infuriated Dana. Moreover, his strange behavior had only served to increase her intrigue about the mysterious woman on Charles Bridge.

  Conveniently, the famed bridge was monitored by more security cameras per square foot than anywhere else in Prague—including a pair of 360-degree arrays atop the bridge’s guard towers and thirteen eye-level cameras embedded in the gas lamps.

  Choosing one of the aerial panoramas, Dana had rewound the feed to archived footage beginning at 6:40 a.m. To her surprise, the woman in a spiked halo was already there, lingering on the eastern end of the deserted bridge as if waiting for someone.

  But waiting for whom?

  Dana had called up an eye-level camera and zoomed in on the woman’s face, displeased to see that the costumed woman was young and pretty, with deep dimples and big doe eyes. Her body looked petite and fit beneath her tight black coat.

  Is that why Michael is interested in you?

  It seemed inconceivable that Michael would ask Dana to research a romantic interest, and yet perhaps he was playing a cruel game with her. For weeks, her intuition had been telling her that Michael was with someone else.

  A woman always knows…

  Confident that Harris was now gone, Dana crawled under the desk, plugged in the computer, and rebooted the surveillance portal.

  She navigated back to the pretty woman and had every intention of finding out where the woman had gone…but first there was a far more pressing question.

  Who the hell are you?

  One of the duties Dana performed for the ambassador was to confirm the identities and backgrounds of any visitors who showed up at the embassy requesting service or asylum. All she needed was a passport photo or a screen grab from the embassy’s security gate cameras, and an entire world opened up. Nowadays, thanks to advanced facial recognition software, identifying any individual on the planet took only a matter of minutes.

  Sorry, sweetheart, Dana thought, capturing several high-quality close-ups of the woman’s face. But you can’t hide from me.

  She uploaded the photos into the embassy’s international facial recognition database. If this woman had a criminal record anywhere in the world, she would be identified within thirty seconds. If not, her photo would be sent through a massive international database of photos collected from passports, driver’s licenses, and major media.