Langdon and Sasha Vesna leave the bastion by descending a wooded slope, then emerge into Folimanka Park and hurry south through the morning pedestrians. While walking, Sasha quietly shares a conclusion from the EPR pod’s display: she believes Katherine never entered the bastion, because the readout indicated Brigita had been in the pod since late last night, longer than anyone could survive.

As they move through the park, Langdon tries to convince himself Katherine may have simply returned to the hotel, but he cannot shake the fear that something is wrong. He reflects on the past three days with Katherine, during which their longtime friendship unexpectedly became a passionate romance, and he recalls moments sightseeing in Prague and talking about her newly finished manuscript and her anxiety about whether people will accept new ideas.

Langdon remembers Katherine arguing that minds resist paradigm shifts, citing entanglement and mind-body effects as examples of truths that took time to be accepted in practice. Langdon adds his own anecdote about a student rejecting evidence in favor of faith, reinforcing Katherine’s concern that both the public and academics cling to old models; Katherine teases him and asks for patience, insisting he read her manuscript to understand her “big breakthrough.”

A horn snaps Langdon back to the present. Sasha leads him out of the park to a taxi stand, and they get into a cab; Sasha gives the driver an address and then calls Michael Harris on speaker. Sasha tearfully tells Harris that something terrible happened to Brigita and relays the discovery; Harris, shocked, says he is at the bastion now and adds that ÚZSI is there and does not yet know Brigita is dead.

Harris confronts Sasha about attacking an ÚZSI officer; Sasha says the officer attacked Langdon. When Sasha starts to mention Langdon’s plan to go to the embassy, Harris warns that ÚZSI will intercept and orders her not to say their destination on the phone; he signals he knows she is heading to her apartment by saying to “tell Harry and Sally” hello, and promises to arrive in about twenty minutes. After the call ends, Langdon realizes Sasha trusts Harris, worries about how to protect her after the assault on the officer, and notes the time is just past 9 a.m., stunned at how quickly his morning with Katherine has become a crisis.