“I’m with Erik on this,” I say.

“Oh never mind,” Albert says. He crumples the paper into a ball and tugs off his sweater. He digs into its loose weave and begins pulling out a thread. It unravels until there’s a small hole in the arm of the sweater. “I could take this yarn and make a new sweater, correct?”

I nod.

“But if I did,” Albert continues, “I would destroy this sweater.”

“So Arras is unraveling Earth,” I say, “but we know that.”

“Unfortunately, the existence of Earth is more vital to the universe than my sweater is,” Albert says dryly. “If I unravel this sweater, it has no great effect on space-time, except to make me a bit colder.”

“What happens to the universe if Earth unravels?” I ask.

Jax jumps in. “A singularity.” But then he looks sheepishly at Albert as though he’s spoken out of turn.

Albert waves off Jax’s interruption. “No, explain with your images. It’s much easier to understand.”

“I got the sweater bit,” Erik says to Albert.

“What’s a singularity?” Jost asks. I’m surprised he’s here given that he finally has his daughter back. I suppose her return is a reminder of what he’s fighting for.

“Well, it’s sort of like this,” says Jax.

On-screen the image shifts. We watch Arras grow from the Earth, leaving behind a hole in its wake. Although Arras stays the same, the lines of light flowing into Arras from Earth leave a larger and larger hole. Eventually the hole grows so large that Earth begins to collapse into itself. A final bright flash of light leaves nothing more than a large black circle in its wake.

“What the Arras was that?” I ask.

“That’s a singularity,” Albert says in a grim voice.

“Basically, by taking Earth’s resources, Arras is jeopardizing Earth’s existence in the universe,” Jax explains.

“But where did it go? Where’s Earth?” Erik asks.

“In the event of a singularity, Earth will cease to exist. A massive well of gravity will pull everything—even light—inside the singularity, destroying Earth and Arras.” Jax pauses to let this sink in.

“What happens inside a black hole?” I ask.

“We don’t know,” Jax says. “Gravity is infinite in one, so it’s impossible to tell.”

“Meaning?”

“Nothing. Nothing will exist.”

“So in this scenario,” Erik asks slowly, “everyone dies?”

“Yes. Death. No doubt. The atoms might survive somehow and somewhere, or rather the leptons, quarks, and other subatomic knickknacks.” Albert says the words with a fair amount of annoyance, as though this is all perfectly obvious. But even hearing him say it doesn’t make it feel any more real.

“Cormac must not know this. Even he wouldn’t be so foolish as to destroy everything,” I say.

“He knows,” Jax says. “More and more of the Guild Tailors and scientists have been defecting—fleeing to Earth and seeking us out. We believe he’s planning a controlled demolition.”

“What does that mean?” I ask slowly.

“If he can mine enough resources from Earth and then control its destruction, he might be able to prevent the singularity.”

“Might?” Erik says, shaking his head. “Fantastic plan.”

“There has to be a contingency for this,” Dante says, running a hand through his hair.

And then I realize there is.

“Protocol Three.” To my surprise it’s Loricel who speaks.

“What is Protocol Three?” I ask Einstein. He has to know, with his intimate knowledge of the Guild.

“Cormac mentioned it. Well, actually, he sort of threatened it.”

“That does not shock me,” Loricel says. “Protocol Three is the ultimate threat response.”

“Stop speaking in riddles,” Dante demands.

“There are three protocols for dealing with trouble in Arras,” she says.

“Protocol One is alteration,” Erik says. He shrugs at me, mouthing, Misspent youth.

“The Guild employs Protocol One to contain information and deal with troubling behavior,” Loricel explains.

“They used it here,” I tell them.

“But the dissent was widespread and Protocol One became ineffective in coping with the situation,” she continues. “Which leads to Protocol Two.”

“They sever an entire sector from Arras,” I say.

“Have you ever wondered why it is the Guild of Twelve Nations?” she asks.

I swallow hard on the question and nod.

“Only four sectors remain of the original twelve,” Loricel says.

“The others were severed?” Jost asks.

“Yes. When a sector became too progressive, it was separated from the whole, or when a disease broke out, or if one wanted its independence. Protocol Two was how they dealt with these situations,” she explains.

“So Arras was larger?” Dante asks.

“It was more divided. Once a separated sector ran out of resources and unraveled, we extended the remaining sectors to take its place.”

“And no one noticed?”

“Over time as sectors were detached, we simplified the map and revised history to reflect that there were only four sectors. Because of education control, it was easy for the Guild to ensure the people only knew what they were told.”