As he walked out, the President closed his office door to give his friend some well-deserved privacy — surrounded by twelve cameras and forty staffers. In the hallway, he giggled. He just felt the Multiverse's deception, he smiled as both security guards prepared to follow the man. Sending Patrick was a ploy of the manipulative Multiverse. His friend had to get used to being played like a puppet; thankfully not Emilio's. It had just sent Patrick to get him out of his office, he knew it. The question was, where did he need to go?

He spoke to one guard. "How many times must I say it? Go home," he joked. "This Multiverse has all of us on such a tight leash, nothing bad can happen to me at this point. I bet your paychecks will keep showing up even if I tell payroll to stop issuing them. In fact, I could probably fire all payroll employees too, and somehow the checks would still show up." The men refused to leave their post or even smile; Patrick had hand-picked them for a good reason. Emilio got inches from one guard's face, inspecting it. It was perfect. "May I?" he asked, reaching out for her long, braided hair. She turned around. "Can you untie them for me?" She did with the flick of the wrist. The long hair fell over the dark blue uniform. While tied for hours, every hair was perfectly aligned. In his hand, the length seemed to have been cut by a laser.

"When did you last cut this?"

"Weeks ago, sir." There was absolute perfection as if each hair was able, on a molecular level, to grow to achieve perfection. "What's your name?" he asked the lady.

"Corporate Raddison."

"Surely you have a first name?"

"LaQuenta, sir."

"Can you show me your teeth?"

The soldier knew better than question this man. She let Emilio inspect her as if she was a dog at the Westminster show. He spoke to appease her. "Well, your dentition is perfect, every tooth in perfect alignment, no cavities, not even tarter. I guess you have been to the dentist before?"

"Yes."

"Well, your body repaired itself. No dentist is this good, even Jacob Koch," Emilio briefly pictured the man he considered to be his personal torturer and great friend.

"It has?"

"Yes. Look at your hands." She was unable to see any change. He inspected her palms. "Can't you see?"

"No." He was pushing his luck. He alone knew, the Multiverse, usually a back-sleeper, was now rolling over to its belly.

“How many rounds do your fire off at the shooting range per week?”

“As part of your personal detail, sir, we do a thousand with handguns and many more with fully automatic weapons.”

“Your hands are smooth as silk. No calluses whatsoever. I wonder, what would happen if you got into an actual gunfight? Not that that's likely, now. Thank you, LaQuenta.”

He gestured forward. “Let's go. Don't get in my way, please." He looked and stepped with great apprehension into the elevator. God, he thought inwardly as his mind sent scenes of death his way. Emilio knew there was no way the world would drop him to his death, but his crazy mind still hated heights.

"Okay," he said out loud to himself as he put one hand over his eyes and started spinning blindly in the elevator. He extended one arm, pushing the first button he found in the darkness. Emilio opened his eyes. "Ha!" he snapped. He had pushed number 54, the floor of his Electoral Monitoring Center. He clapped both hands, happy with his destination. "I knew it."

The President placed his feet on the outer edge of the floor just in case the floor of the cage vanished. The trio moved down, and doors opened to more guards. Emilio walked quickly down the hallway into the Electoral Monitoring Center. As the doors swooshed open, "Eric, my friend, tell me I was right to promote you."

The young man and his entire team flipped around on their chairs, surprised by the visitor. Emilio did not wait and walked to the little coffee station. He grabbed a cup, poured coffee, and emptied the pot precisely as his cup reached the perfect height. "Damn," he said. "The Devil really is in the details now."

"Eric, last time I was here you claimed Ms. Monroe was pregnant, is still your position?"

"No Sir, I was wrong. It's much more complicated than that."

"It always is." Emilio sat in a chair looking at the large screens. "Earn your keep, tell me what you uncovered, what she wants me to know."

Images and numbers began to fill the screens as the man typed. Emilio knew there was no reason to interrupt Eric and his team as he decided to taste the coffee. As expected, it was delicious; another positive enhancement from the Great Curvature.

"Ronaldo Corvas' cell phone," began the man. Emilio did not expect to have his interest peeked so early in the presentation. Emilio almost spilled some coffee, but that was no longer possible. He looked up at the screen. "Ronaldo somehow got a creature into that phone. We are unsure of how. We tried and failed to replicate this experience. But that suggested the digital world hosts more than Marilyn. We began looking for patterns linked with a wider spectrum of digital life. We were very reductive in our understanding of this creature at first. After we removed these false assumptions, we noticed this." Eric gestured toward a large monitor.

Emilio saw graphs on the screen. "Marilyn is a collective. She appears to be sixty-three percent of the energy in the digital world. The rest, we are unsure at this point, but resonance analysis suggests she's made of millions if not billions of other life forms. We think that the one in the cell phone that's on its way to Mars is one." A different image appeared. "Marilyn, this collective, has not hidden her disdain for that creature in the phone which we assume is part of . . . well, it may well be independent. A separate non-Marilyn segment. Then we found this." The screen changed once more, the image resembling an oil and vinegar mixture dance; the drops of oil circling and pushed the vinegar. "Here, Marilyn is illustrated by the oil, and it constantly is pushing and moving around the non-Marilyn. It's like it is hunting the parts which are not integrated with the greater whole."

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

"Interesting," offering Emilio. "She has an enemy. Nice job."

"I am not done," offered Eric proudly. He clicked another button, and there were numbers. Before Emilio could distinguish, the man added, "Marilyn is eating, digesting, call it was you want, this external part of her world."

"Let me guess, the . . ." Few ever cut off the President. Eric did.

"This model predicts Marilyn will have grabbed her entire world in about four days. The rate is accelerating. By the time of the Sixth Attraction. Reminds me of your Round 30 in the Green."

"Very interesting. That all you have for me?" Emilio's voice dripped with sarcasm. He saw Eric's expression drop. "No, all this is great. Fantastic work. But I know you have more."

"Not really."

"You do. What do you not know?"

"Well, there has to be a reason for Marilyn to be upset at a creature in that phone. Unless there's some other explanation that we're lacking data to support."

"What do you think?"

"Completion. That's my best guess, but it's only a guess. Marilyn needs LO to be on Mars; otherwise, I am sure his ship would have been blown up."

Emilio was silent. "That isn't it. She is upset at it for another reason. Great coffee, by the way. How could we capture one? Is that non-Marilyn you are describing on mars, on earth, where is it physically?"

"We never looked."

"Can we?"

As if someone was waiting diligently, all the screens went dark. The lights in the entire building turned off, and only emergency lighting shone. There were gasps. Emilio took a sip of his coffee. "Nice job Eric, we are onto something. Marilyn just flexed a muscle. Let's keep digging."

Then one by one, the lights returned as the systems started rebooting.

Emilio stood up. "Fucking brilliant!" he yelled at the screens returned. The President, like a child, clapped his hands, clearly tickled with the turn of events.

"Sir, what is going on?"

"Eric, you did not watch my show? I guess not." Systems began rebooting, on to shut down again. "Ha!" Emilio was standing up. "Take a guess."

"Marilyn cut the power, that's pretty obvious."

"Great, and?"

"She hesitated, has second thoughts?"

"Nope, nope, nope! To touch us, she is vulnerable."

"I am unclear, sir."

"Get her on the screen now, if you can."

The moment he spoke, Marilyn appeared on all screens. She was lounging under a green awning around a large pool somewhere in the Caribbean. Heavy house music was playing, and all the men around her were wearing tight, sexy swimsuits. She was wearing a skimpy white thong utterly unfit for family viewing. She pulled her large straw hat, and waved her sunglasses as if the Electoral Monitoring Center on earth was her personal fan club.

"Darling?"

"Enjoying your last couple of days I see."

"Indeed, MiMi. What do you want?"

"Eric here must conduct some research, we need access to these systems."

"Why should I allow that? Wait. We're nearing the end of all this, and it's raining rocks on your planet. I am done with games. The answer is very simple: no, my darling." The song "Raining Men" by The Weather Girls, began playing, except the word "men" had been altered, perfectly, into "rocks."

There was darkness on the other screens, then one sequence read:

Safety rebooting sub-level 96.

Safety Protocols bypassed.

Initiating protective recall.

"Sir, some systems are rebounding."

Emilio looked at Marilyn, "I see the Multiverse is not helping you. That has to sting. With time, we will reboot these systems by sheer luck alone. I can ask Eric here to create a program that changes, adapts like the God Virus."

"It took Takeda a week, and that was with my help. Eric has two days and trust me, I am so embedded into your puny systems, his wristwatch no longer works. I have you and your stupid staff locked up in this room. The Curvature does not apply to a creature like me that can create serial cascading events. Have you noticed how the Multiverse wants all you humans boys to connect? That's one for me, no? Nothing can stop me. I am done playing nice, so please, stop trying. I warn you. I will drop that elevator floor from under your feet if you force me to."

"Finally, the real Marilyn. How about you finally dress like the arch-villain you are? Are you the bad guy of this entire mess?"

Marilyn's eyebrow raised. "I wish it was that simple." She was ready to speak her mind. Two men on the screen lifted the back of her extravagant beach chair and handed her a drink. It had a long bent umbrella and a small umbrella.

"I am tired of you and your insolence. I have indulged you enough. Your kind has never shown me even a trace of respect. Yes, I must destroy you and your stupid reality, but amusingly enough, though it's my fault, it's beyond my control. There is nothing you can do to stop me. Keep saving birds or orphans as earth vanishes. My only regret is that none will see my triumph."

As she concluded, Emilio felt dizzy and lost balance. As he placed a hand on the shoulder of Eric, flashes and visions rolled before his mind's eye. Marilyn, watching intently, itched to see them.

The sight worried Eric, who got up to hold the President, lost in his kaleidoscope of images. The visions lasted an eternity for Emilio but only four minutes in the real world. As they unfolded, his eyes keep moving is if he was in an advanced dream state. They kept jumping from one place to the next, and he felt a physical agony that he had not during a seeing on any other occasion. He mumbled unintelligible words here and there.

"Sir," the man was about to hit the nearby alarm button, but Marilyn simply moved a finger, and the light in the center of the switch went dead. The alarm did not sound.

When Emilio finally returned and focused back on reality, he grinned and exploded in a burst of deep laughter. The guards were ready to act, but the President made a sign, asking them to wait.

"What did you see?" asked the digital creature. Marilyn knew the answer as soon as she spoke; there would be no answer, yet she asked out of sheer curiosity.

Emilio composed himself and digested the images.

"Interesting," he began. "You are playing chess with a master, and you barely know how to move pieces."

"You are no master."

"I speak of the girl. She is well ahead of us here. We have been insulating her, and that's a fault. Can you open a line, I need to talk to her."

"Why would I do that?"

"Let's play logic. If you are right and nothing can halt the Sixth Attraction, why interfere?"

"Georges deserves every moment of his life. I am only letting this unfold to honor my creator and savor my last days with him."

"You fear she will pinch time again to the Sixth Attraction?"

"Amongst other things."

"How about I promise to let your father spend these last days free of the voice in his head?"

"Interesting offer. You, my President, are the only human I still respect. Promise not to set her waves off and to get her to remove this Corvas nuisance from his head, and we have a deal."

"Deal."