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first noticed the phenomenon.
    “I wish first to thank you all for coming to this conference and second to commend you on the preparatory work that you did in record time to present important data here to the international community. We have more than ninety nations and every continent represented. In short, we have evidence of a force that is a form of dark matter, with no known origin, which is expanding within the universe.
    “We are here to discuss just what is the physical and scientific nature of this dark matter. And if we determine that this force is dangerous, what can we do to prevent this new force from damaging or destroying us?”
    As he consulted his notes on the laptop screen, he tried to hold in his emotions and remain the cool, competent professional in a leadership position during a potential crisis. Could he steer these scientists, bureaucrats, and politicians toward a constructive, unified conclusion and even toward the correct action for the sake of their planet?
    Never had Chang felt so vulnerable, not even in his astronaut days when he had been disconnected from his own EVA line, the umbilical cord that connected him to the space shuttle, and to life. Then there had been only one choice, only one right action—to try to save the life of another human being. Here, in the face of this amalgam of scientific reality and moral imperative, he simply did not know the answer—or the answers—and he would have to trust the minds of many others even as he tried to guide them to the right choices that might affect every person on earth.
    In this task, he reported directly to the President of the United States. The two had spoken the week before the opening of the international conference. Chang had briefed President Jackson on the agenda and the expected attendees.
    “Can we get a handle on this phenomenon, Dr. Chang?”
    “We are going to try, Mr. President. The Russians, Japanese, and Australians are particularly cooperative and open to sharing their own research with the rest of us. We have opened all our satellite data to scientists around the world. It’s the only way we will be able to ask others for their research results. Either we all cooperate or we all go down together.”
    “What, exactly, do you mean by ‘all go down’?”
    “A terminal event, Mr. President.”
    “Terminal event?”
    “The end of all life on this planet.”
    “It’s that serious?”
    “We believe it might very well be the case, Mr. President.”
    “What can my administration do to help you in your work? What resources do you need to stem this tide?”
    “Well, at the moment, it is a matter of data-gathering and analysis. For that we need global involvement—without delay. You can encourage the Chinese and the Europeans to be more cooperative. I don’t think they realize what is at stake here.”
    “I’ll contact the leaders today—personally. Meanwhile, good luck with your meeting. You have a lot on your shoulders.”
    Jason Chang realized that what the President had said was true. But that didn’t help very much. Now, as he gazed out at the faces of so many scientific colleagues and competitors, he tried to put aside the burden of what he knew and focus on the simple yet urgent duty of communicating his knowledge with those who had answered his invitation.
    This moment was very much like the liftoff of the space shuttle—at which time he had to put out of mind all the information he had crammed into it for years. Instead of thinking, he became pure action and reaction. He recalled the fearsome thrill of the shuttle’s thrust into flight even as he stood before his global peers—then he put all emotion out of his mind.
    “For this task,” he continued, “all of us as men and women of science must put aside purely national and parochial interests for the good—I should say, for the survival—of the planet.
    “What we at NASA have been calling dark matter has appeared from nowhere—or, more correctly,