Unknown 9 by Layton Green (each kindness read aloud txt) 📕

“That was easy,” Cal said.

She read the caption. “The om symbol. Interesting. I didn’t know that.”

“Om? As in, chanting monks and yoga class? Ohmmm?”

“That’s the one.” She followed the link, summarizing as she read. “A Sanskrit syllable spoken as a mantra, om has been in circulation for thousands of years . . . considered the primordial sound . . . The exact meaning is uncertain, but most believe it symbolizes the essence of consciousness and reality . . . infinite language, infinite knowledge . . . that which is mysterious and inexhaustible.”

“It’s good they didn’t try to do too much with it. Aimed nice and low.”

“The om is all over Eastern religion: Jainism, Buddhism, Sikhism, Hinduism. I think it’s clear the symbol is pointing us toward India. But where? It’s an enormous country.”

“The double helix has to be the key to how they all fit together,” Cal said. “Is it a code, a formula, what?”

Andie slowly shook her head, and they spent the rest of the morning trying to answer that question. She started by researching Aryabhata himself, and discovered his contributions were truly vast for the time period. He was the first to calculate pi to four decimal points, deduced that the Earth rotates daily on its axis, and proclaimed that eclipses are caused not by a demon named Rahu but by shadows of the Earth and moon.

She moved on to the history of the zero and the om symbol, trying to find a common thread.

Two hours later, they still had no good leads tying everything together.

“It’s got to be the double helix,” she muttered to herself. “It’s far more modern than the others. And the om symbol is literally everywhere.”

She already knew the double-helix structure, identified in the 1950s, was present in the DNA of all known organisms, and held the key to life on Earth. By 2003, scientists had mapped the human genome, which contained over three billion base pairs—the largest collaborative biological venture in history. The Human Genome Project revealed that human beings were all 99.9 percent alike, and that our physical differences reflect environmental factors in the gene code, rather than core biology. It drove a stake into the heart of misguided race theories.

She and Cal also learned that outer space was not the sole province of vast distances: it shocked Andie to discover that unraveling the DNA of every cell spooled inside a single human being would stretch for more than ten billion miles, twice the distance of Pluto from the sun.

Exposing the secrets of DNA had led to a host of advancements, including the sort of genetic engineering that allowed scientists to play God. The possibilities were limitless. Exhilarating. Terrifying.

But those were questions for another day. Nothing they had found so far helped them advance the Star Phone puzzle.

“Break time,” Cal said, cracking his knuckles. “I need a coffee refuel.”

Andie started to disagree, then gave in. She could use some fresh air, and she knew from experience that taking a break from a thorny problem, such as getting a good night’s sleep, gave the brain’s neurons a chance to assimilate information and could lead to unexpected connections.

There was no sign of the pilot as they walked through the house. Cal headed for the coffee supplies while Andie stepped through a set of French doors onto a brick patio overlooking a hillside that sloped down to the sea. A grapevine-covered trellis provided relief from the bright sun. Here and there a scraggly wildflower had squeezed between the seams of the handlaid bricks.

Staring at the azure water in the distance caused Andie to reflect on her mother. Some of Andie’s fondest childhood memories had occurred on weekend trips to the beach. Invariably, as soon as they walked onto the sand at Cape May, her father had grumbled about the humid weather before retiring to a lounge chair under an umbrella with a novel and a cold beer. Her long-limbed mother, raised on a farm in landlocked central Ohio, would kick off her designer sandals and stay in the water for hours with Andie, laughing and frolicking, bodysurfing the waves. Andie remembered her staring longingly at the historic pastel homes on the other side of the sea oats, which had looked as grandiose as a storybook palace.

She had not succumbed to these memories in years, but seeing her mother in Venice had unleashed a floodgate of emotion and remembrances Andie couldn’t seem to hold back.

What happened after you left, Mom?

Where did you go?

What did they do to you?

“The coffee’s black, bold, and bad to the bone,” Cal said as he walked onto the patio and handed her a porcelain mug. “Reminds me of our friend and savior.”

“Zawadi’s fairly badass,” Andie admitted.

“I have a feeling she knows more about the Leap Year Society than she’s telling us, but I don’t see a high probability of forcing the information out of her.” He took a sip of coffee. “That reminds me: there’s something I’ve been meaning to bring up about Dr. Corwin.”

“What about him?”

“I know you think very highly of him,” Cal said carefully, “but he did get you into all of this.”

She bristled. “Actually, he tried to keep me out of it. He told me to take the message to Dr. Friedman and stop right there. If I hadn’t gone looking in Dr. Corwin’s office . . .”

“Andie,” Cal said with a pointed look.

She hesitated, then looked away. Though it was true Dr. Corwin had taken steps not to involve her, he had still chosen to deliver the message, knowing there was some risk involved.

A risk that had manifested in the form of Omer and a gun.

“I can accept that he made a hard choice,” she said. “Whatever the Enneagon is, Dr. Corwin believed that protecting it was more important than ensuring there was zero danger to me. He did his best, and I can’t fault him for that.”

“I can,” Cal said quietly. “He’s doing the same thing as the Ascendants. Choosing his agenda