SATURDAY, JUNE 26, 2021, 11:00 AM
THE WEST WING, THE WHITE HOUSE, WASHINGTON, DC
THE PRESIDENT is pacing around the Oval Office in a state of volcanic excitement, his eyes pinned on the sunbeams on the thick beige carpet. He does a full counterclockwise circuit of the room, under the indifferent gaze of a Winston Churchill in bust form, although the Washington framed above the fireplace seems hardly any more attentive.
There are four people waiting in chairs, facing the presidential desk: the special advisor, the secretary of state, a scientific advisor, and lastly Adrian Miller, captivated by the majestic eagle in a panel of the Resolute desk, Adrian, to whom the head of protocol gave a clean, perfumed white shirt as soon as he arrived: And we’ll take the opportunity to give your T-shirt a quick wash, Professor Miller.
“I don’t feel like calling that little French asshole,” the president sulks, going back to sit down.
“We’re holding sixty-seven French nationals,” says the special advisor. “And it’s an Air France flight. We’re going to have to call him, Mister Pre—”
“No and no. First, I’m going to call Jinping. How many Chinese do we have?”
“About twenty, Mister President. But we’ll call the French president right after.”
“Yes, we’ll see. Jennifer, pass me China. And Professor Muller, in a few minutes I’ll put you on the line to Jinping, right?”
The President turns to Adrian Miller, who reminds him vaguely of that actor in Forrest Gump, what was his name again? But with something more teenaged about him.
Adrian doesn’t reply. The exhaustion of sleepless nights is taking its toll, and he’s a little dazed to realize, this is nuts, it’s nuts, I’m in the Oval Office with the president, I’m going to talk to the Chinese president, and I’m wearing a white shirt.
“Professor Muller, I’m talking to you…”
Tom Hanks, there, that’s it, thinks the president. He reminds me of Tom Hanks.
“Yes, Mister President,” Adrian acknowledges. “It’s Miller, Mister President.”
“I was saying, I’ll hand you Jinping, you can explain for him.”
“Should Professor Miller answer all his questions, with no exceptions?” asks the special advisor.
The president raises his eyebrows, looks for a response from the secretary of state, who nods and says, “Tell him everything you want to, Professor. We don’t know much, anyway.”
“Mister President, I have the Chinese president for you,” says a woman’s voice.
Eleven thousand kilometers away, in the conference room of the West Building Compound in Zhongnanhai, a hand picks up.
“Hello, President Xi,” says the President. “It’s very late, I’m so sorry.”
“I wasn’t asleep, dear president.”
“Well good, good. I’m calling you about an extremely important matter. We’ve been confronted with an unprecedented situation. The whole world is confronted with it, and that’s why you’re the first person I’m calling. I’m with my scientific advisors right now. They’re here to assist me at any time. Here’s the thing: two days ago, an Air France plane landed on U.S. soil. A plane that already landed three months ago.”
“Really? Planes often land several times,” says the Chinese president, stifling a laugh. “Especially with regular flights…”
“It’s more complicated than that. I’ll hand you over to one of my scientific advisors, Professor Adrian Muller from Princeton University.”
Adrian gets up, takes the handset that the president passes to him, and stammers, “Professor Adrian Miller, Mister President…” then tries to be clear and brief as well as exhaustive.
He is met by incomprehension on the other end of the line.
“The plane landed twice?” asks the Chinese president, “Twice?”
The conversation goes on for some time, and Adrian answers questions about the cumulonimbus clouds, DNA tests on the passengers, the conditions in which they’re being held…After presenting the facts, he moves on to the different hypotheses, trying to explain the inexplicable. In the face of the Chinese president’s astonishment, he often has to go back over things. After a long fifteen minutes, the president insists on having the list of Chinese nationals being detained at McGuire Air Base.
“You can bet they have it already,” mutters the scientific advisor, shifting in her seat. “They know where every Chinese person is at any given moment, so, surely the ones that boarded a Paris–New York flight in March…”
“We’ll let our special services handle any contingent problems,” the Chinese president concludes, “say goodbye to your president for me, and tell him I’ll call him back within an hour.”
Then the man from the Middle Kingdom hangs up, and Adrian does the same and goes back to his chair. The American president sits motionless, apparently stunned. The mathematician studies this unsophisticated man, and reaffirms the soul-destroying notion that by accumulating our individual obscurities, we rarely achieve collective brilliance.
“They’re bound to be out there arresting the ‘doubles’ of their nationals already,” the secretary of state thinks out loud.
“We’ve contacted President Macron, Mister President. He’ll be on the line in a minute,” says the special advisor.
“I have a problem with the French, and that guy in particular. Whatever. Jennifer, pass me the arrogant little jerk.”
The telephone vibrates, the president drinks a glass of water and picks up with a forced-looking smile.
“My dear Emmanuel, it’s so good to talk to you. I hope you’re well, and your charming wife too. I’m contacting you about an extremely important situation…”
Eleven thousand kilometers away, Xi Jinping looks briefly at the night closing in peacefully over the Lake of the Middle Kingdom in the new Forbidden City. He had hundreds of ginkgo trees planted all along its banks, so that he can gaze at them and meditate. He’s always been fascinated by these primitive trees. Their ancestors existed millions of years before even the dinosaurs appeared, and will outlive the human race. A plant version of a memento mori. Then Jinping goes to sit at the conference table again. A dozen or so people are seated around it, both military and civilian, all silent. They listened to Miller’s explanations, taking only a scant few notes. These are the blackest of black swans, improbable events like this with unfathomable consequences.
Screens around the presidential conference room are showing images taken by the brand-new Yaogan 30-06 satellites, deployed all around the globe. The definition is excellent: the number on the Air France Boeing can clearly be seen, as can the long procession between the plane and the hangar, and the nonstop aerial ballet of helicopters. The faces of each passenger also appear: for two days now the Ministry for State Security has been gathering all possible information about them, with no less efficiency than the NSA.
“That’s it,” Xi Jinping summarizes glumly. “They’re in the same shit that we were in last April with the Beijing–Shenzhen flight from January. They’re holding two hundred forty-three people at their base on the East Coast…Compared to how many already from the Airbus?”
“There are three hundred twenty-two of them, Comrade President,” says a general. “Most of them are still at the Huiyang military air base.”
“Should we tell the Americans about that flight?” asks a woman in civilian dress.
“Not right away. Maybe never. They haven’t asked for any of the fifteen Americans on board. They’re not missing anyone.”
“So, they think so too…” says another four-star military man, “the simulation hypothesis is the most prob—” “Yes, they think so too,” interrupts the president. The president of 1,415,152,689 programs.
AS ADRIAN LEAVES the White House, the head of protocol catches up with him in the corridor, and hands him a black tote bag with an American flag on it.
“Your T-shirt’s in there, Professor Miller. We washed it and took the liberty of…mending it. I will also say that I had to type ‘Fibonacci’ into a search engine to understand your ‘I ♡ zero, one, and Fibonacci.’ Very funny, if I may say so. You can keep the shirt, of course. You’ll also find a sweatshirt with a White House logo on it. The president insisted on autographing it for you personally.”
Adrian doesn’t have time to get a word in before the head of protocol adds a straight-faced, “Don’t worry, Professor. We gave him a water-based pen, it’ll come out in the first wash.”