In a book-lined study hidden away in the backstreets of Cambridge, a solitary figure pores over a graduate thesis. He is a wiry man of indeterminate age, somewhere between forty and sixty, with dark hair falling over his brow, a close-cropped salt and pepper beard and a prominent nose. Alex Hafau is the pre-eminent authority on Celtic philology, a Knight of the Realm, a chess master, and the writer of a dozen detective novels in the style of the Italian Giallo genre. 

His desk phone warbled, and Alex momentarily wondered where he left it. He lifted the pile of papers he was putting off marking under which he hoped the phone hid, swept his eyes around the room for a clean surface on which to place them, and finding none, deposited them on the floor under his desk, next to his satchel and box of sandwiches.

“Alex,” he said, picking up the receiver.

“Alex Hafau?”

“The same,” Alex responded, “who’s calling?”

“Ah, that’s good,” responded his caller, “I am Tony Grachist, Professor of Theology at Corpus Christi. We may need your help. We’ve found something remarkable, and we think it may interest you.”

“What do you think you’ve found?” Alex asked.

“Oh, we’ve found it,” said Grachist mistaking the purpose of the question, “I’m looking at it now and it’s decidedly anomalous.”

He described a text buried in one of the most famous books in the world, the Saint Augustine Gospel, “it wasn’t there yesterday, but it is now and it’s in Welsh. I’d be grateful if you could call over.”

Alex agreed to go straight over and soon he was chaining his bike to the railings opposite the facade of Corpus Christi. Grachist was waiting for him and they shook hands warmly before walking quickly across the quad to the steps leading to the reading room. Inside, there were two guards at either end of a table, on which sat the St Augustine gospel, the oldest surviving Latin gospel.

“I was looking for a text and I found this…” said Grachist as he donned a pair of white gloves. Alex did likewise and stepped alongside the tall figure pointing at the book. 

What he saw shocked him. There, bound carefully between the Latin texts, was a page in ancient Welsh.

“There’s more,” said Grachist as he turned the pages, “all completely integrated into the gospel as if they’d always been there. A total of…”

“Thirty-eight pages,” said Alex.

“Yes!” Grachist exclaimed, “how did you know?”

“This,” said Alex, “is the Book of Aneirin. There is one copy, and that is in the National Library of Wales. What you’re looking at is Y Gododdin, a medieval poem by Aneirin, which dates from about 600 AD. What’s it doing in the Augustine?”

“I have no idea,” said Grachist, “it just appeared.”

“Let me have a look,” Alex reached out and turned the pages until he reached the end. There, he found something out of place, a handwritten note which looked like a mathematical formula. He pointed at it, “This is odd. Has anyone been writing in this?”

“Good Lord, no,” exclaimed Grachist. “That was there when we found it.”

“It looks like maths to me,” Alex mused. 

“Mathematical formulae may as well be Martian,” Grachist said. “Perhaps we need another expert.”

“I’m meeting Paul Anchor, a physicist, tonight,” replied Alex, “we play chess together. I’ll show it to him.”

“You can’t take it out,” said Grachist, putting a protective hand over the book.

Alex smiled and produced his phone, “I’ll photograph it.”

Once Alex took the photographs, he hurried back to his bike. As he walked, he rang his old friend, Marcus Tillman, at the National Library of Wales. Their conversation was brief, but Tillman confirmed the Book of Aneirin was still in place at the library.

“So, a new copy,” he thought as he rode across town. He would have to get permission for it to be dated, and that would be difficult: he imagined the hurdles he would have to jump. He pulled up outside “La Jula”, an Italian coffee house near the post office, and walked inside, ordered a coffee and sandwich before pulling his laptop from his bag and connecting his phone. Once he had downloaded the photographs, he scanned them intently.

“Hello,” said a voice he vaguely recognised, “are you Alex Hafau?”

He looked up and there she was, Katherine Sandberg. It was thirty years since he last saw her, but Alex would know her anywhere. He remembered her touch and her scent, the warmth of her and her tears as he went off to Cambridge and she went to Durham.

“Katherine Sandberg?” Alex half stood, “I don’t believe it.”

“It’s Lyden now,” she answered with a gentle smile.

“What are you doing here?” Alex asked.

“I’m meeting scientists to talk about funding,” she said. 

“Have a seat,” he insisted. 

“I don’t want to interrupt,” she replied, nodding at his laptop.

“I’m just looking at some pictures and waiting for a friend,” he said.

“Not naughty pics, I hope,” she laughed, her eyes crinkling. 

Alex could feel the old emotions stirring as she lowered herself into the chair.

“Not exactly,” he said, “although some passages are a little fruity.”

He swivelled the laptop around so she could see.

“What’s that,” she said, pointing at the note.

“Ah,” said Alex, “the anomaly within the anomaly. What you’re looking at is a fourteen-hundred-year-old poem, which has somehow become lodged in a five-hundred-year-old bible. The text is an oddity. It looks like mathematics.”

“Let me look,” she said, grasping the laptop, “As you know, I did physics and maths at Durham. I’m rusty, but I might make sense of it.”

She zoomed into the text and reached into her bag, pulling out a pair of spectacles.

“It’s modern,” she said, “and I have a feeling I know what it is, but it looks incomplete. And what’s this?”

She pointed at the letters SCGBL at the end of the formula.

“SCGBL,” Alex said, “I don’t know. Perhaps it’s a reference to the rest of the formula.”

“Another ancient book?” Katherine pondered.

“Could be,” replied Alex. He thought for a moment, “I’m not sure what though, maybe another bible?”

“Name some famous bibles,” she said, “if this is what I think it is, it could be really important.”

“The Gutenberg,” he offered, “The Book of Kells. The Book of Deer. They don’t fit. What do you think it is?”

“It looks like a mathematical description of fusion reactor containment field geometry,” she said deliberately. “If it is, then it’s probably the most important formula in existence. It would solve everything.”

“Even Brexit?”

“Especially Brexit,” she looked at him, “are you a Remainer by any chance?”

“Of course,” he replied, “most academics are.”

“Ah,” she said. She pursed her lips. “I voted for Brexit. I thought it was my duty to do so. I’m having second thoughts now, though.”

“Many people thought that it was their patriotic duty,” Alex said, nodding his head sadly. “But the bloody Tories forced it through.”

“Before we go on,” she said tightly, “I should explain I am the Conservative Member of Parliament for Groomsby-over-Lark in Northumberland and Minister for Science in Higher Education.”

“Oops,” said Alex.

“Oops indeed,” she allowed herself a small smile, then poked him in the chest, “And you, mister, should have heard of me.”

“Politics!” Alex huffed, “I avoid it like the plague. Anyway, you haven’t heard of me either.”

“Oh, but I have,” she said, then reeled off, “Professor Sir Alex Hafau, reader in Celtic philology and linguistics, Medieval Welsh and Irish language and literature, and a talented novelist. I’ve been following your career with interest all these years.”

“Why didn’t you get in touch?” Alex looked at her. She was the same Katherine. His Katherine.

“Politics,” she said, “I married well, two kids and a career ladder up which to clamber. I kept promising myself I’d take a trip to Cambridge. Time and tides meant it never happened until now.”

“And here you are,” he said. 

“Yes, here I am,” she replied, “and here you are, Alex. I…”

She faltered, and they looked at each other. Alex recalled the first time she touched him. Her translucent skin was so soft, her long fingers lightly brushing his forearm as he retrieved the book she dropped in the common room. Since then, a lot of life had passed by, but it was nothing at all at that moment.

“I missed you,” she said finally. 

“And I missed you,” he admitted. 

“You know, we’re a pair of old fools,” she said, dabbing at one eye. 

“Yes, we are,” he answered quietly. “We should have got in touch. If only to say hello.”

“I was hurting,” she said. “I spent my first year crying myself to sleep, waiting for you to walk back into my life and say you were sorry.”

He sighed, pursed his lips, and reached out his hand. She took it and they looked at each other for long seconds, each silent in the coffeehouse hubbub, waiting for the moment to pass, each not daring to lift the stretch of that instant. 

“Would you like a menu?” Renata, the short, pallid-skinned server, interrupted them.

“No, it’s okay,” said Katherine, “a coffee, please: black, no sugar.”

“So,” said Alex tentatively. 

“So,” she replied. “What about this bible? Any more ideas?”

“Did you say you are an MP in Northumberland?” Alex asked as an idea popped into his head.

“Yes, why?” 

“Wasn’t there a bible from your neck of the woods that went for a whole bundle of money? I think it was the Lindisfarne Bible.” 

“Oh. My. God.” Katherine said. “You’re right, and it has another name. I’m such a fool. I helped raise the money to keep it in the country. It’s at the British Library. It’s also known as the Saint Cuthbert’s Gospel.”

“SCG at the BL,” Alex said. 

“Bloody hell, Alex,” she said, “We need to get to London.”

“What about your meeting?”

“Sod the meeting,” she said, “if this pans out, they can have as much cash as they like. I’ll call for a car.”

“I’ll have to ring my friend to explain,” Alex said. 

“A girlfriend?” Katherine asked.

“No, I’m afraid not,” he replied, “there hasn’t been one of those for a long time. Celtic philology isn’t that sexy, I guess.”

“Celtic philologists are, though,” Katherine said with a wink. “Who is it then?”

“Paul Anchor. He’s something in the faculty of hard sums. I’m not sure what,” Alex replied, “I only know him through chess club. We were due to play tonight.”

“I know Paul,” Katherine said, “he might be useful. He’s a nuclear physicist at the Cavendish.”

“I’ll call him,” Alex said. 

He found Anchor’s number and called him: “Hi, Paul. Sorry to bother you. About tonight’s chess game…”

Alex explained about the Book of Aneirin appearing in the Augustine gospel, the handwritten note on it and what Katherine suspected it might be. After confirming their location, he hung up.

“He’s coming straight over,” he said.

“You know the thing that gets me,” said Katherine, “is how did a Welsh poem turn up in an Italian bible?”

“Beats me,” said Alex, “how did you know it’s Italian?”

“I thought everyone knew that,” Katherine replied after the briefest of pauses.

Ten minutes later Paul Anchor came rushing through the door. He waved at Alex and came straight over. 

“Hello Minister,” he said, taking her proffered hand. “Alex, you old rascal, you didn’t tell me you knew people in high places.”

“See,” she said to Alex, “Paul knows me.”

“Yes, only too well,” Anchor said with a grin, then turned to Alex, demanding, “let’s have a look at this formula, old boy.”

The laptop was still open on the table, and Alex turned it so Paul could see the formula.

“Jesus H Christ,” Anchor gasped, “you’re spot on, Katherine. This IS the first part of a formula leading to plasma containment. Do you know where the rest of it is?”

“We think so. It’s in the British Library Rare Books reading room,” Katherine said, “And my car should be here any minute now to take us there.”

“Won’t it be closed?”

“Nothing ever closes for government ministers,” she said confidently, “not avenues, not clubs, and especially not libraries dependent for their funding on my vote. I’ll call ahead.”

They trooped out and stood on the kerbside, Katherine with her phone clamped to her ear, talking in low, firm tones to a civil servant.

“Good,” she said finally, “make sure someone is there to meet us.”

A black Jaguar pulled to the kerb and a tall, well-muscled man with military shoulders and a face like the side of an industrial waste skip stepped out, opened the rear door through which Katherine climbed and indicated Alex should join her in the back while Paul took the front passenger seat. 

“The A505 and A1(M) are at a standstill between Letchworth and Stevenage,” said the driver, “so I’ll go via the M11 and enter London from the North East. Is this a blue light trip, ma’am?”

“It is, Philip,” Katherine answered.

“Very well, ma’am,” he replied, flicking a switch on the dashboard. The surrounding road glowed with the blue light of an emergency vehicle and he touched a button on his neck. 

“This is Gov14, approaching the M11, Southbound from Cambridge,” he said, “we have a priority 1A requirement, please ensure the route is clear for high-speed travel.”

A voice came from a speaker, “Roger, Gov14, clearance priority implemented. Do you require an escort?”

“No, we do not, control,” he replied, “this will be a very high-speed transit, just make sure the roads are clear.”

“Roger,” came the reply as he gunned the engine. Alex gripped his armrest as the Jaguar streaked through the streets and down the ramp onto the M11 towards London. 

Approximately an hour later, the driver slowed, then pulled into the kerb, blue light still flashing. In one swift movement, he exited the car and pulled Alex’s door open, extending a steel-clamp hand to help him out. 

“Well blow me down,” said Paul, checking his watch, “an hour and fifteen minutes from Cambridge to London.”

“You get used to it,” said Katherine as she stepped onto the pavement, just as three men and a woman appeared hurrying towards the car. One man offered his hand to Katherine. 

“Minister,” he said with a note of wariness in his voice, “Tom Allenby, Deputy Director. This is Greg Johnson, rare books lead, his assistant, Toby St Michael and my PA, Jayne Crick. I understand you want to look at the St Cuthbert’s Gospel?”

“That’s right, Allenby,” Katherine said.

“There’s a bit of a problem with that,” Allenby replied, looking worried, “we can’t get near it.”

“What do you mean, you can’t get near it?” Katherine snapped.

“It’s glowing,” he stammered, “and as we approach, the glow intensifies, and the air gets hot.”

“I see,” she looked at Alex and Paul. “Were you expecting this?”

Alex shrugged, and Paul looked thoughtful. 

“Not really, old girl” said the physicist, “I’d like to look at it before committing to anything.”

“Lead the way,” commanded Katherine. 

“Up the stairs, first floor, to the right,” he called after her. Paul and Alex looked at each other and followed behind. They climbed the stairs and as they did so, they could hear a throbbing hum coming down the corridor and a similarly pulsating light emanating from a partially opened door near the end of the corridor.

“It’s in there,” said Allenby, raising his voice and pointing at the room with the glowing light, “we can’t get closer than about six feet.”

Katherine approached the door cautiously and pushed it aside with her foot. What greeted her was the strangest of sights: near the end of the room was a lectern which was turned to face the room. On it was a glass case enclosing the bible which was glowing orange and blue and issuing an intermittent hum in time to the glow. As she walked towards it, the air heated up and before she had made a dozen strides towards it the air was impossible to breathe. She retreated and stood by the door.

“Any ideas now, professors?” 

Paul stepped forward, “Let me see how far I can venture, chaps.”

He walked towards the bible but again had to turn around before he made more than a few strides.

“Beats me,” he shrugged expressively, “I don’t know how it’s doing it.” 

“Has anyone tried cooling it,” Alex offered, “you know, putting ice near it?”

“Worth a try,” Paul said, “we could slide it across the floor. Where do we get ice though?”

“Leave that to me,” Katherine. Two calls later she announced consignments of water ice and dry ice would arrive at the front of the building within the hour.

“Meanwhile,” she said, “I don’t know about you, but I could do with a damn good cup of tea. Do you have any, deputy director?”

“In my office,” he said, “please walk this way.”

They reconvened in the deputy director’s office, which was at the front of the building on the third floor, overlooking Story Garden.

“I’m sorry,” he said, “it’s not bone china, but I rarely share tea with guests, so I didn’t feel it warranted the expense.”

“Deputy director,” said Katherine, “if I remember rightly, and I’m sure I do, your budget is about one hundred and forty-two million pounds. Are you telling me, you couldn’t spare a few pounds for some decent china?”

“We prefer to spend it on books, Minister,” Allenby replied.

“Good for you,” Katherine said, as he handed her a cup. She took a sip and smiled, “at least the tea is good.”

“Thank you, it’s Bai Hao Yinzhen,” he said, “a little luxury I permit myself in these austere times.”

Katherine raised an eyebrow at Alex but said nothing. 

“It’s tidy,” said Alex, “but I like a nice cup of Yorkshire. Not so strong that it’ll take the skin off your ribs, but enough to taste after a curry.”

“Tell me,” said Katherine, “what time did this nonsense with the bible start?”

“We’re not sure,” replied Allenby, “the room we display the gospel in is being redecorated, so we put it in the conference room last Thursday. We didn’t notice the problem until we opened up when we got your call.”

“You’re saying,” responded Katherine, “you have a nine-million-pound bible stuck in a conference room with no CCTV for five days and nobody popped their head around the door just to check it’s okay?”

“Well, no, not quite,” admitted Allenby, “we made sure it was secure. The room is in the centre of the building with no windows, there’s only one way in and I have all the keys. Naturally, I checked on it, but until lunchtime today, which was the last time I checked, it has been okay.”

“So, after lunch, it started glowing and giving off the humming noise, but you didn’t notice it,” she persisted.

“We noticed the hum about an hour after your PPS called,” Allenby said, “other than that, there has been nothing out of the ordinary.”

“What did you do when you heard the hum?” 

“I opened the door,” said Allenby, “and that’s when we noticed the glow and the heat gradient.”

“What did you do then?”

“I waited until you arrived,” he replied, “assuming this was the reason for your visit.”

“You’re kidding me,” Katherine snapped, “you mean to say you have one of the most valuable books in the world sitting on a lectern glowing and humming and it didn’t occur to you to call the authorities?”

“Minister,” Allenby said, adopting a defensive posture, “I assumed this was the reason for your unannounced visit.”

Katherine’s phone rang, and she picked up the call. “The ice has arrived. They’re taking it up to the room.”

They got to the conference room just as four men pushing large trollies emerged from the lift. On the trollies stood insulated containers about the size of milk churns. They were being led by Allenby’s PA, Crick. Stopping outside the room, she dismissed them after they handed over insulated gloves and aprons, which Paul and Alex donned, and pushed the trollies into the conference room one at a time. Paul took the lid off the first container and dry ice vapour poured out over the floor.

“I guess we empty it onto the floor and slide it towards the book,” he said.

“Use the water ice first,” insisted Katherine, “the dry ice will damage the floor, so we’ll only get one shot at it.”

“Good thinking, Batman,” said Alex and winked at Katherine. She smiled back at him. They pulled two more lids off the churns, eventually finding the ice.

“Okay, chum,” said Paul, grabbing one handle and rocking the churn over, “you grab the other handle, and we’ll tip it here, then slide it across the floor.”

To Alex’s surprise, the ice came moulded into skittles-ball-sized spheres. 

“I thought they’d be cubes,” he said.

“I specified balls,” said Katherine, “I thought it would be easier to roll them to the lectern.”

“More good thinking,” Alex responded, “anyone would think you’ve done this before.”

“I assure you I haven’t,” she said dryly.

Alex took a ball in each gloved hand and waited for Paul to join him.

“On the count of three,” he said, “One, two, three.” 

They rolled the balls at the lectern. Paul’s were travelling slightly faster than Alex’s and so reached the heat gradient boundary first. Within seconds they evaporated into clouds of steam. 

“Hmm,” said Katherine, “not exactly a resounding success. Maybe if you co-ordinated your speeds, it might do better.”

They tried again, this time with Paul matching Alex’s bowling pace. Once again, the balls evaporated before they reached the lectern. 

“This isn’t working,” said Alex, “maybe we need to overwhelm it. What if we shake out a churn in the bible’s direction and send a couple of dozen balls of ice its way?”

“Worth a try,” answered Paul, “perhaps we should take a run at it and release the balls nearer to the lectern.”

“Okay, but let’s not get too close,” agreed Alex, “I don’t fancy being steam cooked today.”

They rehearsed their run-up with an empty churn, Alex counting it out, and then selected a full churn from the trolley.

“Okay, here we go,” said Alex, “on the count of three, start jogging towards the bible, release when I say.”

Paul nodded, and they gripped the sides of the churn. 

“Are you ready?” Alex asked. Paul nodded. “One, two, three, go…”

They jogged towards the lectern and the hum increased in intensity as Alex gave the command to release. They threw the contents of the churn at the bible and the ice balls rolled speedily towards their target as the two men tried to halt their own progress. Alex was on a wet patch and slid down onto his back, his momentum carrying him forward inexorably towards the bible and its heat gradient. In his path, the detritus of partially evaporated ice balls made slowing his careening slide towards the lectern impossible. He looked back to see Paul diving to one side as he continued to slide, then his feet hit the base of the lectern, knocking it over and spilling the bible, still in its case, towards him. It landed squarely on his chest and the pulsating light finally went out. The humming died, and Alex looked up at the transfixed group at the other end of the room. Katherine had her hand over her mouth, Allenby was reaching to him with an outstretched hand, Crick froze in a silent scream as Paul tumbled against the sidewall.

“Got it,” he said, clutching the Bible to his chest, “I guess the ice worked.”

He looked at the steaming remnants of the ice balls gathered around his feet, “Or not, as the case might be.”

He got to his feet, still clutching the now dormant bible, and walked towards the gathered audience. Instinctively, they backed away.

“It’s okay, it’s inactive now,” he called.

“Walk slowly,” said Katherine, “if the air heats, or the bible glows again, put it down gently and leave it.”

“Will do,” said Alex, feeling slightly proud of himself. He trod towards them as Crick unfolded a table, indicating he should place the Bible on it. The others shuffled cautiously towards the table, but the bible showed no signs of life as they approached.  

“It’s you,” said Katherine, “you’re the key.”

“I guess I am,” replied Alex, “but that doesn’t matter. What does matter is we now have access to the bible.”

He opened the lid of the case, flipped the Bible’s cover open, and there on the first page was the cover sheet of the Red Book of Hergest, a fourteenth-century text containing the poetry of the Cynfeirdd. In the bottom right corner was a series of mathematical symbols, the second part of the puzzle.

“Come and look,” he said to Paul in a low voice.

Paul picked himself up and walked over to the table. He looked over Alex’s shoulder at the formula, scanning it for several minutes before announcing, “It’s incomplete and it ends with another clue that isn’t part of the formula.”

“What does it say?” Katherine asked.

“Is there not treacle at Gilead?” Paul answered, “I really don’t know what that means.”

“How the hell do we work that out?” Katherine asked, looking perplexed.

“It alludes to another bible,” said Alex, “try a search engine.”

Katherine tapped the words into her phone, “It says here this is a reference to the fifteen-forty-nine edition of the Bishop’s Bible, also known as the Treacle Bible, because of a mistranslation of a verse in Jeremiah, the word treacle was subsequently amended to balm in later editions. The Balm of Gilead signifies a universal cure.”

“That fits. Does it say where the bible is located?” Alex asked.

“There are loads of them,” said Katherine, “at least two are mentioned on the first page: one in Paignton and another in Stranraer, but that one was stolen.”

“I bet that’s our baby,” said Alex, “the Stranraer one I mean.”

“I’ll get one of my staff to call Paignton and check on their copy,” said Katherine. She did so and minutes later a confirmatory email arrived with the news Paignton was a dead end.

“You know, guys,” said Paul, “I think we might crack this without hunting around for another bible.”

“How so?” Katherine asked.

“We have two parts of the puzzle, with the third part just out of our reach,” Paul replied, “maybe we have more than one way to get to the end and one of them is to science the hell out of the damn thing now we know the direction it’s headed in. Anyway, I’m going to take some pics of that formula before I go.”

“Is this going to cost me money?” Katherine smiled wryly.

“You bet, old girl,” said Paul, “more than you can imagine.”

“Oh, I have a pretty big imagination,” Katherine replied, “unlike my Cabinet compatriots. But I think I can sell it to them. You’d be amazed at what untold riches will do to a politician.”

“You know,” said Alex, “I don’t think I would be.”

“As for you, Professor Hafau,” Katherine said, “we have some explaining to do about you, and some catching up to do about us.”

“What can I say? I’m just a lucky charm,” he said. “Are you sure you don’t want me to go to Stranraer?”

“Hold that thought,” she replied, “but for now, I could kill a steak. How about you?”

“What are we waiting for?” He replied. 

They linked their arms and walked towards the door. The others followed, but Katherine stopped at the door, turned to them and said, “Sorry guys, my ministerial budget will only stretch to two covers. I believe there is a pizza parlour on the corner of Euston Road, and I think Deputy Director Allenby is buying.”

With that, they went back to the Jaguar and away to a restaurant conveniently near the house she formerly shared with her recently deceased husband.

*

Katherine Lyden put the phone down and picked up the folder containing her speech to the Conservative Party conference: the opening shot in her leadership bid. The speech was as fine a crafted piece of polemic as she could make it. Now her operatives assured her the original bibles were back in place, and the microwave projector and lasers that refracted off shards of metal in the glass case surrounding the Saint Cuthbert’s bible were removed, she could move this part of her project forward.  

She opened her safe and placed her speech carefully inside, next to a cloth-wrapped package. This she removed and placed on her desk, where she unwrapped it and stroked the cover of the Stranraer Treacle Bible copy, in which she had commissioned an insert which was an exact copy of Llyfr Du Caerfyrddin, The Black Book of Carmarthen. Writing carefully in a disguised hand, she inscribed the last page with the final part of the fusion plasma containment geometry formula. She would have it placed in Kirkmaiden Old Parish Church when she was safely in place at 10 Downing Street. There it would be discovered, and she would ensure Paul and Alex would be called to the scene.

Ancient Welsh literature was always Alex’s first love, but she was content to be his second. Just as discovering the key to fusion would always be the means to securing her legacy only once she had climbed the greasy pole. Replacing the bible, she closed the safe, smiled and padded upstairs, where asleep in her bed lay her future husband, Alex, her one, only, and everlasting, great love.