The Null Prophecy Read online

  By the time she arrived at Harvard, the possibility of a higher intelligence was very real to her. Seeking a credible elaboration on the nature of this posited deity, she dove into the sacred literature of the world’s main belief systems: Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, Judaism, even Transcendental Meditation. But she avoided the Bible because it wasn’t exotic, not like the other religious literature she’d studied. It seemed unlikely to her the Bible contained anything earth-shattering she hadn’t already heard a million times from her parents while growing up.

  But she was mistaken.

  After eventually reading the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, she learned Christianity’s worldview was radically different than any other religion’s. For example, God’s favor was not limited to only a certain people; nor could it be earned by anyone, but was offered freely to one and all.

  Most shocking of all, she learned, Christianity’s worldview was identical to science’s take on reality. Universal truths she’d learned as a physicist—for example, that absolute truth exists, time is linear, and significant parts of reality are hidden from us—jibed perfectly with fundamental truths espoused in the Bible.

  The revelation was a game changer; it persuaded her to become a follower of Jesus. But to this day—five years after her conversion—she fretted that her Christian beliefs were still mostly intellectual. She didn’t feel the kind of deep emotional and spiritual joy she saw in her brother.

  It was why she’d returned to this church, founded by her parents and now pastored by Carlos and his wife, Alicia. Perhaps some of Carlos’s bona fide spirituality would rub off on her. In the meantime, she told herself, she was at least reconnecting with the family, friends, and community from whom her ambitions and success had estranged her.

  When they finished cleaning up, she grabbed her purse and followed Carlos out the door.

  “I spoke to Lolo’s doctor,” she said in a quiet voice.

  “Yeah, me too.”

  “It’s serious. She’s become convinced the world is coming to an end. What are we gonna do?”

  “What can we do? Her world is coming to an end, as far as she’s concerned. She was so hoping for a family. Our little rebel was finally growing up. It’s awful.” Carlos’s husky voice broke; he hesitated.

  “And Dallan—” Allie let out a small growl. “God forgive me, but I’m so angry at him right now I want to—”

  “Allie, Allie. It’s not his fault.”

  “Oh, really? No one knows what causes delusional disorder, but the research says stress is one of the main triggers. If Dallan hadn’t filed for divorce—”

  “C’mon, Allie, he doesn’t even know what’s happened. They can’t reach him where he is—something about bad communications. But he’s supposed to be back in Boulder tomorrow. Anyway, we can’t change the past. Right now our baby sis is in trouble; that’s all that matters. But she’s in a really good hospital, okay? And I checked out the doctor—he’s top drawer. So we’ve just gotta pray, Sis. We’ve gotta trust the Lord, surrender it to him.”

  “I know, I know . . .” She stopped. “But I have an idea.”

  After she’d explained it to him they resumed their walk to the church kitchen.

  “What are they cooking this week?” she said, putting on a happy face. “I’m starving.”

  A tradition of the church was to offer the congregation a hearty meal following the service—a comida, it was called. She remembered it from childhood, when the ritual was started by her mom and dad.

  “I’m not supposed to say,” Carlos said with a knowing smile. “It’s a surprise.”

  She groaned inwardly.

  Oh, Lord, they’ve remembered.

  When they stepped into the kitchen, Alicia and a group of church sisters cried out, “Happy birthday!”

  Allie brought her hands to her mouth. “Oh, you guys! Thank you.”

  The giddy entourage led her by the hand to the parking lot. It was decorated all around with red, green, and white streamers and big, hand-lettered signs declaring HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ALLIE and HAPPY EASTER and HE HAS RISEN!

  “When did you guys do all this?!”

  “During the service, when you weren’t looking,” Alicia answered joyfully.

  Mariachis strode out from the main building and began serenading her with “Las Mañanitas,” the traditional Mexican birthday song. By the time they were done, the entire church—everyone colorfully dressed in their Easter finest—were gathered around her.

  “Speech! Speech!” the crowd shouted.

  She was used to doing live television, of having to vamp for hours if necessary. But this.

  “Honestly, I was hoping you wouldn’t know!”

  Laughter.

  “Don’t worry, you’re still young!”

  The voice belonged to Albert Hernandez, the oldest son of her dad’s best friend. He’d started chasing after her in kindergarten at Belvedere Elementary and now owned the largest Chevy dealership in East Los Angeles. He was still unattached.

  She didn’t feel young but chuckled anyway. “Yeah, right.” Then she thanked everyone—los queridos hermanos de la Iglesia Buen Samaritano—who for the most part belonged to families she’d grown up with, who’d known her grandparents, her parents, and her brothers and sisters since they were born.

  “You’re like my family, you know?” Her voice was cracking. “You are my family and I love you. I love this church.”

  “We love you, Allie!” voices cried out.

  She continued, “You know, just because I don’t live in East LA anymore doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten where I came from or who I am. I never want to forget. These are my roots and I’m proud of it. Thank you for loving me as much as I love you. God bless you.”

  She blew them all a kiss.

  “Okay, enough already or I’m gonna start chiando!” Carlos yelled. “Let’s eat!”

  The church members cheered.

  She saw them bringing out Mexican hot dogs, her favorite junk food. “What are you trying to do—make me fat?” she wailed, shaking her head.

  Alicia, carrying a metal platter piled high with bacon-wrapped wieners, was quick to answer, “Actually, yeah!” and the others laughed.

  Allie shook her head, smiling.

  They never let up.

  She spotted an apron on a nearby table and went to put it on.

  “No way, girl,” hermana Diana protested, “not on your birthday. Take a break.”

  But she insisted. She wanted to forget she was a year older and still single. She wanted it to be like any other day. She wanted to help serve. “You know what Jesus tells us,” she said lightheartedly, tying on her apron. “He wants us to be a servant to all.”

  While dishing out food, she was repeatedly wished a happy birthday and asked how old she was. She gave them her stock reply: “Old enough to vote, okay? Reporters never give away their secrets.”

  When Albert’s turn in line came he didn’t need to ask her age. It was the same as his: thirty-four. “Felíz cumple, Alejandra. You’re looking good.”

  “Thanks, Beto, you’re not looking bad yourself.”

  He’d been Garfield High’s star quarterback and still kept in shape. He had dreamy, caramel-colored bedroom eyes and she liked the way he combed back his straight black hair. But their worlds were very different now.

  She held up a plain, bacon-wrapped wiener in a bun. “What do you want on it?”

  “Like always, remember? The works.”

  She chuckled. “Still with the macho stomach.”

  “Hey, I hired two new employees this week. Business is booming.”

  She looked down and started heaping on the various toppings.

  Here it comes.

  “My offer still stands, you know. I found this great location on Cesar Chavez and Soto. We could start a chain.”

  Beto was after her to partner up in business—not to mention matrimony. No one had ever accused him of being a shrinking violet.

  “I know,” she sa
id. “But right now I’ve got my hands full, brother. Maybe someone else.”

  “Never,” he said, giving her a determined smile.

  When she was done piling on the pico de gallo, pineapple, avocado, grilled jalapenos, and crema, she handed him the heavy plato. “Here you go, patron: one TJ dog with everything on it. Make sure you chew before swallowing.”

  At the end of the comida Allie went to her father, who was seated under the big sycamore at the edge of the parking lot. Her heart broke to see him without Mom.

  Her parents had been an inseparable couple for forty-two years. For the first eight of them he was an atheist. But after witnessing what he believed to be the miraculous healing of her brother Carlos, he dropped to his knees and converted to Christianity. Afterward, the two love birds built this church from scratch using donated materials. Just like that, her father went from being Lupe the shoe repairman to the Reverend Guadalupe Armendariz—and her mother, from housewife to First Lady Betty.

  Late the previous year her mom was diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s. Recently, because she was worsening, they needed to put her into a nursing home. It was a decision tearing away at her dad, who was sixty-one years old and still physically healthy.

  She dragged over a nearby chair and sat next to him. “Hey, Papá. You need anything? Did you have enough to eat?”

  He smiled and nodded. “How did you like our little birthday surprise? Everyone pitched in. We wanted it to be special.”

  “You really got me; I wasn’t expecting it. Thank you.”

  She stared at his large, friendly face.

  Don’t say it.

  “Now if you guys could only whip me up a husband . . .”

  He gave her an indulgent smile, then reached over and placed his wrinkled hand on hers. “You’re still young, mija, you’ll get your chance. Be patient.”

  She shifted herself around in order to look straight at him. “Pa, I had my chance and blew it; you know that.”

  He pulled his hand away. “Ay, Diosito, mija, not Phillip again. Don’t tell me you’re still carrying that around.”

  Phil Gutierrez was someone she’d met in grad school at a seminar on the spatial correlation of galaxy clusters. They were first-years, she in physics, he in astronomy. Early on he came onto her with a fiery amorousness that spooked her. But after getting to know him, she came to believe their love was meant to be.

  He was smart, sensitive, handsome, and wanted a family. Everything seemed perfect—until graduation. He was offered a job at Jodrell Bank Observatory in England, she, a teaching position at Harvard. In the end, she broke off their relationship and went to Cambridge. To this day that agonizing decision and its ghastly fallout still haunted her. In her weaker moments, despite Christianity’s teachings and admonitions, she wondered how God could possibly ever forgive her.

  No one must ever know the whole story.

  Not even—

  “Papá, you don’t understand. He’s married now and has two great kids. There are times when I think that could’ve been me. I have my career—which is great, I love what I do—but I want more.” She paused. “I want to love a man like Phil, and be loved by him. But it’s never going to happen, I just feel it. I had my chance and I blew it.”

  Her father sat up and sternly pointed a finger at her. “Don’t talk that way; it’s blasphemous. You’re not God. You don’t know what He has in store for you. I liked Phillip; he was a nice boy. But he’s not the only man out there worth having. Dreams take sacrifice; yes, okay, you sacrificed. But look at you: you’re beautiful, you’re intelligent, you’re successful. What man wouldn’t want to marry you? Beto sure wants to.”

  She reared her head. “Dad, please!”

  A silence fell between them.

  Sacrifices.

  If he only knew.

  “I hear you’re thinking about having Lorena move in with you,” her father said quietly.

  Einstein had been wrong about one thing: it was possible for information to travel faster than the speed of light. The Armendariz family grapevine was proof.

  “Dad, she’s all alone. I can’t just let her fall apart without doing something.”

  “I know, I know, we all feel that way. The only question is, what’s best for her?”

  “What’s best for her is to be with family. People who love her.”

  Her father shifted his gaze in the direction of the church. “I don’t disagree. But she also needs professional help, mija.” He paused and then looked at her. “And you are very busy.”

  Over the years her father made it abundantly clear to family and friends he was proud of her success. Even when she was a girl, a girl wanting to be a scientist, he’d always encouraged her to go after her God-given destiny. But his words now, although spoken gently and with evident love, felt like an indictment.

  Who have I become?

  “Your sister is telling everyone at the hospital ‘the end’ is about to happen and she wants to see Jesus coming back to Earth.” His head fell, so all she could see was his thinning white hair. “Pobresita.”

  A day earlier the doctor told Allie on the phone Lolo’s delusional disorder appeared to be of the type called “grandiose.” Furthermore, her delusions fell into the “bizarre” category, meaning they could not possibly happen in reality—at least, not as far as science was concerned.

  The odd part, he further explained, was DD patients typically behaved normally until and unless the subject of their delusions came up or was challenged. So it was difficult to know how to treat them effectively; psychotherapy was a realistic option, but certainly not institutionalization.

  She scooted her chair closer to her father and put an arm around him.

  He lifted his face. “I know you mean well, mijita, but I want you to pray about it before acting, okay? There’s no rush. She’s in good hands at that hospital. Carlos checked it out.”

  Growing up, she had learned to trust her father’s judgment, especially when it came to people and relationships. It was a gift she wished she’d inherited.

  “Sí, Apá, I promise.”

  The two sat quietly together, watching and waving to the last of the people who were getting into their cars and leaving. She resisted looking at her watch.

  “I hear you’re not coming with us this afternoon to visit your mother.”

  This was the part of today she’d been dreading. “I’ve got to do an interview up north, in Mountain View.”

  He turned and trained his eyes on her. Those piercing brown eyes. As kids, they’d always marveled at their father’s x-ray vision and quaked whenever it was turned on them. “He can see into a person’s soul,” Mamá would say. “It’s what makes him such a good pastor.”

  “For your big special next month?”

  “No, it’s a live shot.”

  “Who are you interviewing?”

  “Jared Kilroy. He’s the new head of NeuroNet—a real whiz kid.”

  He continued looking at her.

  “It’s a big exclusive. No one’s ever interviewed him before. No one’s really ever seen him.”

  “That’s good, mija, that’s good,” her father said, looking away and smiling weakly. “I’m proud of you.”

  There was an awkward pause in the conversation.

  He turned to her. “But it’s Easter, mijita,” he said finally. “And your birthday. It’s not right.”

  “I know, apá, I know. It’s just that—”

  What? That when push comes to shove, career trumps even family?

  She stood up. “Dad, I’m so sorry but I better head out, otherwise I’m going to be late. Please tell Mamá I’ll come see her this week, I promise. Give her a big abrazo for me, okay?”

  She bent over to kiss him.

  He took hold of her hand and looked up at her. “Mija, please be careful.”

  Tears blurred her eyesight, but she easily imagined the sadness in his kindly visage. “Sí, Papá, I promise; don’t worry.”

  As she
walked away, his last words echoed. “Mija, please be careful.” She knew he’d meant it not just as a polite send-off but as a spoken prayer as well, a warning.

  And not just about this afternoon’s live shot.

  CHAPTER 4

  STORMY THOUGHTS

  EASTER SUNDAY, APRIL 23 (4:15 P.M. EASTERN DAYLIGHT TIME)

  CANADIAN FORCES STATION ALERT; NUNAVUT, CANADA

  The monstrous Herc thumped safely onto the hard-packed, snowy runway. Dallan heaved a huge sigh of relief, joining in the eruption of applause from the plane’s other grateful passengers. After the horrifying experience at the polynya and being grounded overnight in Thule, it felt good to be back at the station.

  Deplaning, he cast a wary glance skyward. The sky looked more bloody, more garish than when they’d left the previous morning. The pole’s magnetic shield was clearly deteriorating.

  Heaven help us: it’s gonna be like the polynya.

  Brody came alongside him. “Be ready. We might need to evacuate, and pronto.”

  He answered with a curt nod.

  As director of the U.S.’ largest space weather forecasting facility, Dallan was used to reporting about solar storms, extra-bright aurorae, and disruptions to communications caused by radiation coming from the sun. But this . . . a possible complete collapse of the entire polar region’s magnetic shield—a gaping magnetic hole! Without any protection whatsoever from the magnetic field, without anything to filter out the sun’s lethal radiation—good god! People, property, the very air would be incinerated.

  The bright yellow Snowcat rumbled up to the plane and stopped. Dallan watched the chief of staff jump down from the cab and rush up to the major. He overheard him say, “Sir, something’s happening. You need to see this.”

  He, Brody, and the others piled into the Snowcat and were driven to the northern tip of the island.

  “Oh, good lord!” Dallan exclaimed when he disembarked.