Even though Langdon recognized this could well be a turning point in science history, the momentous impact of the breakthrough was not foremost in his mind. He was far more focused on the ramifications of Katherine’s incredible bad luck.

  She proposed an inconceivably brilliant idea in her book…only to learn the CIA is already secretly developing it.

  While the coincidence was stunning, Langdon knew the cliché “Great minds work alike” had been borne out countless times through the ages; Newton and Leibniz independently invented calculus; Darwin and Wallace simultaneously envisioned evolution; Alexander Graham Bell and Elisha Gray both invented a telephone device and filed patents within hours of each other. Now, it seemed, Katherine Solomon and the CIA had both figured out how to make artificial neurons.

  “This all makes sense now…” Katherine whispered to herself, staring absently into space. “It’s no wonder I was targeted…”

  “It’s an incredibly unlucky coincidence,” Langdon said sympathetically. “At least now we underst—”

  “This is not a coincidence, Robert!” Katherine’s eyes were alive with anger. “The CIA stole my idea!”

  Stole? The claim made no sense to him; clearly the CIA had been developing artificial neurons long before Katherine had started writing her book.

  “They stole my design!” she repeated. “All of it!”

  For as long as he’d known Katherine Solomon, Langdon had never heard her make a single irrational claim, much less a paranoid outburst. “I don’t understand,” he said, offering a reassuring smile. “You’ve been writing this book for a year, and the Threshold program is more than twenty—”

  “I’m not being clear,” she said, cutting him off. There was a fierceness in her eyes that he had never seen before. “My manuscript included a section about artificial neurons, which explained the details of this very design. But in that section I was talking about my passion and work as a young grad student, when I was already dreaming about the future of noetics…designing hypothetical technologies that future scientists might one day use to deepen our understanding of human consciousness.”

  Her meaning suddenly became clear to Langdon. “My God…what?!”

  She nodded. “Yes! Robert, I first proposed—and documented—the exact design for these artificial neurons in my postgraduate thesis…twenty-three years ago.”

  CHAPTER 105

  Katherine could see from Langdon’s stunned expression that he was still struggling to comprehend the logistics of what she’d just told him.

  “This is my exact design for artificial neurons,” she said, tapping Threshold’s classified binder. “From twenty-three years ago. There’s no mistaking it.”

  “So you wrote your doctoral thesis on artificial neurons?” Langdon asked.

  “Not directly, no. I was in neuroscience, and my thesis was titled ‘The Chemistry of Consciousness’—a geeky paper about neurotransmitters and awareness, but at the end, just like in my manuscript, I wrote a section about the future of consciousness research. I fantasized about various hypothetical breakthroughs, including the most significant advance that could ever occur in my field—artificial neurons—a technology that would finally make possible a true H2M interface and allow scientists to monitor the brain’s consciousness in new ways…and finally to see how it all worked.”

  “And you’re positive…there’s no coincidence with the CIA’s work?”

  “Robert, the neurons in this binder are identical to what I proposed in my thesis, right down to the nomenclature! The description literally refers to ‘nanoelectric biofilaments’ and ‘bilateral organo-technic fusion’—both are terms I made up!”

  Langdon now looked convinced. “Wow…for starters, that means you, Katherine Solomon, figured out how to make artificial neurons…while in grad school?”

  “I was a kid with an overactive imagination. The idea was a fantasy. Don’t forget that twenty-three years ago, artificial neurons were science fiction!”

  “So were genetic engineering, self-driving cars, and AI,” he countered. “But here we are. Courtesy of Moore’s law.”

  True, she thought, the future comes at us faster every day.

  “Twenty years ago, people in the field assumed artificial neurons would turn out to be silicon-based, which made sense considering neurons were essentially binary on/off switches like those in a computer chip. I disagreed and argued in my thesis that because the ultimate goal of artificial neurons would be integration with the brain, any true solution would need to be biological. And so I let my imagination go, and I designed, in great detail, my best guess at how such a neuron might someday be created.”

  “I’d say it was a pretty good guess,” Langdon said, still looking impressed. “The CIA has probably been working on developing this for decades…and finally succeeded. The question of ownership or credit is another issue.”

  “I’m just wondering how they heard about my idea…or got their hands on it.”

  Langdon shrugged. “Well, they are the largest intelligence-gathering operation in the world.”

  “Actually,” Katherine said, memories now flowing. “It just now occurs to me…” She hesitated, lost in thought.

  “Tell me on the way out,” Langdon urged, picking up the binder and heading for the door. “We need to get out of here with this—and get it into the ambassador’s hands. Let’s hope it’s enough.”

  Katherine hoisted her shoulder bag and followed Langdon across the lab, her thoughts now racing. “Something odd happened with my thesis. I never really understood it, and I haven’t thought about it in decades…but it might explain something.”

  “What happened?” Langdon asked as they hurried across the brightly lit computer lab in the direction of the revolving door.

  “My thesis adviser at Princeton,” she recalled, “was the A. J. Cosgrove, legendary chemist, who took me under his wing. He loved my thesis and told me he believed it could win a Blavatnik Award—a national prize for postdoctoral science research. Anyhow, I lost, which was fine with me, but for some reason it really pissed off Cosgrove, and he ended up having some kind of spat with the head of the prize committee, a hotshot professor from Stanford. When the dust finally settled, Cosgrove told me I deserved the prize and that I was denied for ‘reasons other than merit.’ I chalked it up to academic politics. But I told him I didn’t care, because I had decided to pursue noetics anyway. Then he said something strange. He said that before I left neuroscience entirely, he strongly suggested I…” Katherine stopped short of the door. “Oh…no.”

  Langdon turned. “What is it?!”

  Katherine closed her eyes in disbelief, setting her bag onto a worktable. In all the chaos, it hadn’t dawned on her until this very moment. “Robert,” she whispered, opening her eyes and running a hand through her thick dark hair. “There’s an even bigger reason the CIA needs my book to disappear forever.”

  Clutching the SIG Sauer pistol he had taken from Field Officer Housemore, Finch leaped off the Threshold transport and hurried across the familiar platform and through the unmanned security center. After finding his officer’s corpse in the lobby, he’d rushed down to Gessner’s workroom, where, with brutal clarity, his worst fears had been confirmed.

  Brigita was murdered.

  Finch had immediately called for agency backup, but with his local field officer now dead, he knew the arrival of on-site support was going to take time. This situation was becoming increasingly alarming, and delicate, and prudence dictated he handle the crisis without delay. Finch was an expert marksman and was eminently capable of neutralizing anyone he might encounter.

  As he entered the OPS hallway, he was relieved to see all the lights in this section were off. Then again, he had been instrumental in designing this subterranean structure, and he knew the lights timed out every ten minutes; technically, the darkness was no guarantee that he was alone down here.

  Finch still could not fathom that Housemore and Gessner had been murdered. Even more disturbing was the unlikely identity of their killer. While pulling Housemore from behind the couch, Finch had been startled to find a metal epilepsy rod on the carpet. Someone had clearly dropped it, and there were only two epilepsy patients who had ever entered Crucifix Bastion—Sasha Vesna and Dmitri Sysevich—both taken from the same institution.

  And Dmitri, I have been assured, is no longer with us.

  The notion that Sasha had killed anyone seemed almost unthinkable. Gessner had always described her as timid and kind. Then again, Sasha had reportedly attacked an ÚZSI officer today, which implied something was terribly off-balance with the woman. Her brain had been under a great deal of pressure, and it was not out of the question that she’d suffered some kind of mental breakdown.

  Sasha murdered Gessner? It seemed unthinkable…and yet, if Sasha discovered what Gessner had done to her, that would be strong motivation. Even so, Finch doubted Sasha was capable of all this…at least, not alone.

  He took a hard right into BIO, relieved to find the surgical area dark. When the lights came on, everything appeared to be in order. Finch eyed the robotic surgeon hanging from the ceiling. So far, Gessner had used this technology to perform only two human surgeries—one successful, one catastrophic.

  Finch was in no mood for surprises and intended to search the facility completely, starting with a systematic sweep of the medical section to confirm that nobody had slid under a bed or into a closet, hiding long enough for the motion lights to time out.

  If someone had penetrated Threshold, Finch would not let them slip past him.

  Anyone who had seen this place…would not be permitted to exit alive.

  Deep in the SMES vault, The Golěm gazed up into the open ventilation shaft. High above him, he could barely make out the dappled daylight that filtered down through the perforations in the R2-D2 statue’s domed head several stories above in Folimanka Park.

  For obvious reasons, quench vents like these were left open at all times to allow for emergency ventilation. They were sealed only to pressure-test the vault for leaks, and only under very specific conditions…specifically, the total absence of liquid helium.

  Today, there will be a slight change in protocol.

  Mustering his strength, The Golěm climbed up on top of the humming ring of metal. The top was rounded and perilous, but his boots had good traction. He could feel the faint vibration of the machine as he reached for the ceiling and steadied himself by grabbing a crank handle protruding from the ceiling. This handle worked a series of pullies that moved a thick plate of metal affixed to the ceiling.

  The test cover.

  A square panel of steel was supported in a track whose rails ran on either side of the vent’s opening. This panel, like a giant manhole cover, could be cranked into place and tightened with butterfly screws, sealing the opening and rendering the room airtight.

  Not surprisingly, the steel covering was emblazoned with bright red stenciled letters.

  NEBEZPEČÍ! NEZAVÍRAT!

  DANGER! DO NOT CLOSE!

  Ignoring the posted warning, The Golěm began turning the handle.

  Within a minute, this vault would be airtight.

  CHAPTER 106

  An even bigger reason? Langdon could not imagine what additional motivation the CIA could have to destroy Katherine’s manuscript. Her book reveals a new top secret CIA technology. Game, set, match…

  Katherine had stopped short and turned to him, her face a mask of concern in the harsh halogen lights. “I think Professor Cosgrove must have known something was wrong,” she said. “After his argument with the Stanford guy, he gave me a final assignment before I left neuroscience for noetics. It was an unusual request.”

  “What did he want you to do?”

  “He insisted that part of the education of any future scientist was to undergo the process of applying for a patent. He said he loved my creative approach to the artificial neurons, and even though the patent would never be granted, the process of applying would—”

  “Wait…” Langdon said. “You’re saying you filed a patent for these artificial neurons?”

  “It was an academic exercise,” she said, nodding. “Cosgrove warned me that my application would be denied for ‘lack of utility’ because it was not buildable. Nonetheless, he urged me to think it through, get as technical as I could, imagine tools, technologies, and materials that did not yet exist, and to go through the process of filing the application. And so I did! I filled out a fourteen-page application as best I could and mailed it in. My patent was denied, as expected, and I never gave it another thought…”

  Until now, Langdon realized, incredulous. She’s face-to-face with her own invention.

  “In retrospect,” Katherine said, “it occurs to me that Professor Cosgrove might have been protecting me when he told me to file a patent…” She paused, her voice catching. “As if he knew the real reason my thesis was denied.”

  “Because your technology was being secretly appropriated by the CIA?”

  “Stolen, yes.”

  “But how would Cosgrove possibly know the CIA did that?”

  “That’s a mystery to me,” Katherine said, “but my gut tells me he knew. Years later, I found out that I was the only student Cosgrove ever pushed to apply for a patent.”

  “That’s suspicious.”

  “Yes, and Cosgrove was insistent. I remember him saying, ‘Don’t talk about it, Katherine. Just do it.’ He’s long since passed away, or I’d call him.”

  “Do you still have a copy of your application?” Langdon asked, imagining it was a fairly dangerous piece of paper to have lying around.

  “I certainly did…but any copies I had mysteriously disappeared from my files at some point. I always assumed they got lost in the shuffle of moving, but now…”

  They probably stole those too. Langdon shuddered to think that the CIA had been watching Katherine for such a long time, but it explained a lot.

  “But here’s the thing,” Katherine continued. “All those years ago, when I received a rejection from the patent office, I had to laugh—it was fourteen pages of my most earnest scientific efforts stamped with a bright red DENIED on every page. I showed it to Professor Cosgrove, and he didn’t seem as amused as I was, but he asked if he could keep a copy for posterity and for ‘when I became famous.’ Of course I said yes.”

  “So Cosgrove has a copy?!”

  “Yes,” she said, her voice suddenly emotional. “When he died about ten years ago, his sister showed up on my doorstep with a sealed manila envelope and said part of his final wishes was that this envelope be delivered to me.” Katherine’s voice caught. “Sure enough, it contained my old rejected patent application—faded but still very much intact.”

  Incredible. Langdon was now convinced that Katherine’s old professor had known something was suspicious with the handling of her thesis paper and her patent application. The question of how Cosgrove knew what he knew was still unanswered, but clearly he had taken measures to ensure Katherine retained proof.

  Leverage, Langdon thought. That’s what this represents. “Where is that copy now?” he demanded, suddenly afraid the CIA might have gotten to that one too.

  “In my desk at home,” she said. “Last I knew.”

  “We need to go,” Langdon said, motioning toward the door. “If the CIA discovers—”

  “There’s one more thing you should know.” Katherine shifted awkwardly and then looked Langdon in the eye. “While I was writing the final chapter of my manuscript about the future of noetics, I was describing my youthful, wide-eyed dream of creating artificial neurons. On a whim, I decided to include a copy of my failed patent application—all fourteen pages stamped DENIED—in the book, because I figured sharing my own early failure might help inspire other young scientists who faced rejection along the way.”

  Langdon was speechless. The final piece of the puzzle.

  Katherine’s patent application would have been published in her book for the world to see. No other motive was required for the agency to take desperate action against her.

  Threshold is the Manhattan Project of the future of brain science…and Katherine was about to publish blueprints for their atomic bomb.

  Langdon could only imagine the legal nightmare for the CIA if a watchdog group like the Federation of American Scientists discovered that a prominent noeticist’s patent application had been denied…and then stolen by the CIA without the applicant’s knowledge or compensation.

  It would be an investigative reporter’s dream.

  The book included a bold vision for a breakthrough technology that represented the missing piece in the global race for a true human-to-machine interface. At the moment, the CIA alone possessed it…but if Katherine published, all bets were off.

  Whatever specific purpose the CIA’s implants might serve, Threshold clearly had the potential to provide the CIA with a secret and unmatched technological advantage.

  But that’s not all, Langdon realized. Threshold is a potential gold mine.

  If the CIA decided to bring proprietary H2M technology to market, Q would become the richest venture capital firm in the world, capable of funding every operation the CIA ran. Either way, secrecy was paramount.

  “What’s more,” Katherine said, “this explains why Brigita bragged to me about her patents last night. She raised the subject because she was on a reconnaissance mission. Remember she asked me if I had any patents…or if I’d ever applied for a patent?”

  Langdon remembered it well. “And you said you hadn’t!”

  “I just didn’t want to get into it. And it was quite a long time ago.”

  “No wonder Finch panicked last night,” Langdon said. “Gessner probably told him that you not only rebuffed her request for a signed NDA but rejected her request for an advance copy of the manuscript, and she must have reported that you’d also blatantly lied about never having applied for a patent! Finch would have suspected you were jockeying for personal gain and preparing to publish some kind of bombshell exposé.”