Liana was the first non-staff member through the doors of the Robarts Library Storage Annex. The claim of the "7° shear" from a 1937 McConnell report—even if suggested by her three-year-old—had been an itch she couldn't scratch all weekend. Professional pride, not gold, drove her. She took the Subway downtown, dragging a surprisingly compliant Percy with her.
At the desk, Liana slammed the request slip down. The weary student assistant retrieved the Minor Geological Surveys, 1937 volume. She ignored the subtle ink smear of the isoclinal fold Percy had left in the log book on Sunday, focusing entirely on the pages inside.
Percy sat quietly nearby, playing with two small blocks, one gold, one black. He watched his mother with the intense, cold concentration of a general observing the main line of attack. He knew this volume held the key to the future.
Liana found the original McConnell entry and scanned the data. The lateral vector was clearly listed as 70°, not 7°. The "7° shear" was officially a mistake—a typo likely corrected in a later printing, or just a ridiculous, random piece of trivia picked up by Percy. She let out a small, relieved sigh, ready to dismiss the entire weekend.
As she closed the heavy volume, a piece of folded, sepia-stained paper—the acid-free flyleaf Percy had stolen and aged—slipped silently from the center crease and fell onto the cold, grey linoleum floor. It wasn't bound or numbered, suggesting it had been hastily placed there decades ago, forgotten.
Liana knelt to retrieve it, her academic curiosity instantly piqued. The paper was clearly old, and on it was a simple, hand-drawn geological sketch: a specific greenstone belt structure, with a small, unmistakable circle near the Hemlo region, carefully drawn in sepia ink. Inside the circle was a single, chilling question: "Anom.?"
The professional shock hit her like a physical blow. A forgotten, uncatalogued addendum to a 1937 survey, referencing a massive anomaly in the exact structure Percy had mentioned, discovered minutes after she had validated a tiny, related data point. This was beyond coincidence.
Liana didn't call the police, a lawyer, or a press conference. She acted as a trained, professional geologist. She tucked the map safely inside her field notebook. Her immediate reaction was to treat it as a legitimate, forgotten discovery—a potentially career-defining find. The protocol was clear: secure the data, verify the data, and establish precedence.
She took Percy out of the library and straight to a public payphone booth. She called the CBC.
"Terry, I need the afternoon clear. I have an urgent, unexpected research obligation that relates to the show's historical accuracy," she said, inventing a quick lie. "It's critical. Can you put the payment through for this week, please? I need the funds immediately." She knew the $7,000 CBC check was already in the system; now she needed that cash liquid and available for immediate verification costs.
Back at her U of T office, the forged map clutched in her field notebook, Liana pulled out the Golden Grid map Percy had drawn on Saturday and compared it to the McConnell sketch. The cross-sections matched.
She began drafting a highly technical, preliminary report, using the forged map as primary evidence. Maternal guilt, combined with professional ambition, was now weaponized. She would use her legitimate academic resources to secretly verify what she now feared was an actual, profound historical cover-up.