I think the only apt description for particle physics these days is ‘punch it until its maths come out.’
[AN: I always thought particle physics was throwing tiny bits of the universe at each other to see what fell out of the crash…]
It looked like a cross between sanskrit, greek and cuneiform. Because of the lines and brackets, Kylie guessed it was intense math. She boggled in amazement at her roommate, Katie, as she worked on the complicated sigils before her. A girl five years Kylie’s junior was working on punching a hole in the universe.
And if you judged her only by the way she sprawled on the floor to scratch sigils into the battered notebook, one might guess that Katie Walker was playing at being a college student.
She finished half a page of complicated sigils and circled it in red pen. “This is it. This is the formula.” Katie grinned up at Kylie and showed her the page like any other kid her age would show her fan art of New Kids on the Block. “D'ye ken what this means?”
“I’m an art major,” said Kylie. “I don’t even know the names of half those symbols.”
“This is math that’s goin'a change the world.” She sprang up to sit next to Kylie, her auburn ringlets bouncing. “This is the trick o’ the universe. We’re goin’ le'p straight through all th’ stages o’ civilisation, ye ken.”
“…stages?”
“I keep tryin’ tae get ye intae science fiction…” Katie rolled her eyes. “Stage one is us, ye ken. Usin’ t’ resources o’ one planet fer energy. Stage two is usin’ the energy of their sun. Completely tappin’ ye ken.”
“Oh, like solar panels?”
“Er. More'n ‘at. Probably more like a Dyson sphere o’ solar panels, but yer gettin’ there. Stage three… is usin’ whole galaxy o’ stars. This,” Katie tapped her circled math, “Will be tappin’ a whole other universe. We’re goin’ tae pierce a brane.”
Kylie winced at her enthusiasm. “Is that murder or medicine.”
That earned her another pained sigh from Katie. “Not B-R-A-I-N. B-R-A-N-E. It’s short for 'membrane’. It’s the wee layer 'twixt one universe an’ the next. And I found one…” another tap at the math in her book, “that’s nowt but pure energy. We plug intae tha’… we never have another worry fer energy again.”
Sitting there in a dismal dorm room, staring at half a page of inscrutable math in a 99-cent store notebook, Kylie stared at the sigils that could change the world. She felt like she was standing on the edge of a cliff. Something like a caveman trying to jump to the moon. She wondered if Einstein had tried to share his theories with someone like this, and if they had felt the same way.
“Are you going to show your professor?”
Katie blew a raspberry as she put her book away. Just like that, she was a fifteen-year-old kid again. “Nah. He wouldnae understand. What I’m goin’ tae do is celebrate.” She took out her Savings Jar and unloaded it onto her bed. “Pizza and doughnuts.”
“Rock on,” grinned Kylie.
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