Earth
3 Hours To The Sixth Attraction
Everyone, really, everyone with a pulse logged into the computer system three hours before the long awaited finale. It was unclear why everyone without exception wanted or needed to watch or maybe they did not. The Multiverse no longer cared, it had summoned them. More than a majority tuned in willfully out of curiosity as the world around them was collapsing.
Every human in the world, either by strict coincidence or forced by the Great Curvature stopped what they were doing and stood in front of an open television. Busses in the street flatted at the most convenient place to let each passenger watch a screen in a nearby store window. Phones opened to the CNN broadcast as if by magic.
The summon was so powerful, secluded monks in temples saw phones drop from the sky from misdirected drones. Humans were not asked to participate, they were summoned forcefully. Even the most hostile to the game and technology, as if guided by the hand of god himself watched. The time for randomness, chaos was long done.
But this time it wasn’t the Multiverse who had summoned, it was President Emilio Wamarez Sanchez. He finally figured out how the power worked, and he needed humans to watch. He was exceptional.
Emilio figured the law of causes to consequences was over. The Multiverse now operates directly in consequence to cause. It needed the humans to log in the Electoral finale in three hours and participate even if it meant the planet’s destruction and the death of all mankind. There was only one man left on earth able to make a difference or avoid the march to doom. The President’s mind understood how things worked and because of his unique gift, Emilio could see the world change. The President, like Sophie, did not appear to fear what was coming next.
The President’s opening moves in his chess game were over, they had entered the end game. His Jester was now back on mars and a lasting peace with the sand creatures if Sophie worked her magic. Surrounded by geniuses for so long, now this was all about him. The man had every camera and every human watching and he wondered one final thing before setting down to play the Sixth Attraction with Laurent.
He began from Paris, “Fellow citizens.” The President and Francois Copland were on a simple set on a CNN stage in the crypt below the heart of the Cathedral Norte-Dame in central Paris. In three hours, the finale would be played upstairs from the glass roof. Anyone remotely connected to this story was on its way. Both men were dressed in Tuxedos ready for the proverbial end.
“Sir,” said the producers in his ear, “audience grew and is now at one hundred percent.”
“Surely,” corrected Emilio! “Some are missing.”
“No. One hundred per cent, not close to it. Just like you suggested. Every living human is on, no one is sleeping, no one is sick or indisposed. Shocking.”
“Not really.” Emilio smiled. He held nervously a folded sheet of paper in his left hand. He had, in ten years never been this nervous. He began, “I may not be as brilliant as this guy,” he pointed at Francois, “but my capacity to learn knows no equal. I am told we are all here, all of us. You were forced to listen for a simple reason, the Multiverse knows what I am about to say and she wants you to hear it. It will enhance what she needs from us in three hours.” He waived a piece of paper. “She must want me to talk about this.” He waived the paper. “Listen, Sophie made it clear from the start, we all matter and we still do. The earth, for all purposes, will be destroyed in a matter of hours by forces beyond our comprehension, look up. Humans were reckless. We forgot ethical obligations that science imposes upon us. We played, lived but ignored our role in larger things. We toyed with biology, with computer science and particle physics until we broke things well beyond our understanding.”
“I will not lecture you, we all feel regret.” He read the first thing on his list. “There is one thing we all seem to ignore. Permeating this entire situation is a constant presence of music. Marilyn uses music in her game to enhance experiences. Music heals according to Liam. Music powered Sophie’s entry in trance and helped the Dot exchange hands. Recently the Multiverse seemed to have been hurt by music sent into the Nexus by Marilyn. Two days ago the Martians went out of their way and added music to their welcome of Sophie. Most importantly, none of us are being rushed to mars to take part in the finale but a musical band is.” He paused dramatically.
Emilio continued, “At first, I could not wrap my mind as to why music is relevant or matters. There had to be a reason, I just could not find it.”
“Agreed,” added Francois. “If you remember, during the fall, mathematics predicted the Sixth Attraction from a clustered group of highly improbable random events. The notion music is prevalent in each part of this complex web is also not a statistical anomaly. We dismiss music because we lack an understanding of a connection, a link between the cause and the consequence.”
“What is it then?” asked Emilio. “Music matters, somehow it does. It just does. Without music, this entire situation would differ. I am now convinced the music is not driving the Sixth Attraction, it’s the reverse. I think the Multiverse’s own energy permeates down on this world. I think music connects us, it makes everything different. It is the heat we use to melt butter when be bake. The same way, I think when Marilyn played music, her version of My Way the Multiverse reacted violently. Music is at the core of what is going on.”
“Paul, how’s the ratings?” asked the President.
“Locked at a hundred percent.”
“Really?”
“Yes,” he confirmed.
“No one is dropping off?”
“No sir.” They waited. “Still everyone.”
“That’s okay,” said Emilio a bit taken aback. He looked at the paper. “This means music wasn’t it.” He swallowed and unfolded the paper and read what was on it. “You being here means I have something else to tell you, something it wants and needs me to say.”
“Maybe mathematics can help.”
“How?”
“We understand variables from non-variables. While you saved the world in a bedroom,” he joked, “we looked at the type of music played, maybe that was important but no. Each time music seemed to have one single purpose. It was built to generate emotions. It’s really not about song. Music is a simple pass-through variable in math. Ignore music, focus on what it does to us.”
He was thinking. Then his eyes brightened and he kissed Francois. As if he had just discovered a new theory of the universe. “Of course!”
“What?”
“We have all been forced to watch these last days, the massive gravity field of the sky Apocalypse as if arrived from the sun and just crumbled parts of our moon and the thin mantle of our fragile planet has begun to break. The main body of metal will ram the core of our planet while we watch the finale in three hours. Days ago I secretly wanted Sophie to give us a proverbial last chance. I was grasping at any elusive notions we are in a dream, or somehow we are all in a long virtual reality game. Some of you think all this is really part of the real finale. I wish it was and I promise you, if it turns out to be the case, I will rip every electrical cable on earth to punish Marilyn for this bad joke. But no, we all have experienced something different. What ever this is, it is true.”
Emilio looked seriously at everyone. “It,” he pointed above, “wants emotions, it needs energy. It needs these rare Rho waves and as much of them as she can get. What if we do her bidding? How about from now until two hours from now, we all plug ourselves to the best type of stimuli we each have. If you like music, listen to your favorite album. If you like sports, go run. If you like eating, get a pint of ice cream. Load up on pleasure and energy. Please, everyone watching, help what’s next by getting into the mindset of these waves. Be like an Olympian before a race, what ever you do, it needs you, all of you. Be ready and prepare the Sixth Attraction. I will,” he looked down a bit shy, “go have sex.”
Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
There was a pause and the producer’s voice added, “This was it, some people are finally disconnecting. We are back to 99 percent in audience.”
Francois looked at Emilio and asked, “How many paths ahead do you see?”
“I see many ends to the Sixth Attraction. I see Sophie using her power, once while crying, once enraged, then I see what she does.”
Francois questioned, “Each emotion leads to a different ending?”
“No. We all die the same irrespective of what she does.”
“You told me you see different endings.”
“It’s hard to explain, these visions are unlike anything I have ever seen. Maybe you can bring a better understanding to my visions. You know how a deck of cards, if you push the top gently to the side, each card is pushed out like stairs. You then only see the edges of each card. I see edges of images, just edges. They keep stacking up like something is messed up. It is impossible for me to distinguish one from the other. Does that make sense?”
“Of course.” Francois said reassuringly.
“Really?”
“Marilyn took interest in me not because of my looks but obviously because of my mind and something in it. Can you describe what you see a bit more?”
“What I see is a series of lines. I see stacks of images, they move as if stuck in a loop. You know, in old cathodic screens when the adjustments were off, it would start moving. There would be a lack of phase. Or the old video games or early operating systems when hundreds of error messages popped on the screen.“
“Okay, but on the top of the stack, can you see that video, that image?”
“Yes.”
“Anything special about it, what is the image?”
“It’s weird, it keeps changing. I see random images from the past or the near futures of the destruction of earth. It’s all images of stuff that was broadcasted as part of this story.”
“I see. Anything else?” Emilio closed his eyes.
Keeping the eyes closed he added, “It’s hard. Now it’s the stack of smoke from months ago. CNN images. When Ronaldo died the first time.”
“And?”
“The stack, it seems a bit smaller as the stack advances, like each image is a bit different.”
“Are the images like a film moving backwards?”
“No. It’s the same but, it’s hard to say.” Emilio opened his eyes. Francois was thinking, hand on chin. “What is it?” Insisted Emilio. “How can that help?”
“The obvious thing that comes to mind is either a play on a variable, in this case time. You are watching a shift in time, or the representation of a different dimensional construct. Each layer is a layer of the same yet different information. You once saw alternative futures as sequential images. One started after the other. That was kind. Now you simply see all these at the same time.”
“Five dimensions, I am seeing in more than four dimensions?”
“To some extent. Sophie told us the Multiverse has 27 dimensions. That is humorous because the original bozonic string theory suggested a universe with 26 dimensions. The recent strings and super strings bring that number down around 10. With the Zexs, the number jumped back up closer to twenty seven actually.”
“What?”
“Don’t get ahead of your skis, we stepped into physics and I am not the expert but more importantly, it’s mathematically stupid to limit the number of dimensions even to 27. The Multiverse could be a limited structure but the space in which we live would not have such narrowness.”
“The audience is down to to only 32%. Never seen such a drop,” spoke the producer.
“Considering we are speaking string theory, the fact anyone is listening is amazing,” joked Francois. “Should you be having sex right about now?” Emilio laughed. “I know Marilyn is listening, that’s an audience of one I would love to have one last discussion with.”
“Hi,” spurted the digital goddess on the nearest monitor.
The digital intelligence needed no more. She appeared in a split screen on each television set still connected. While every human had learned to tone down the enthusiasm and the colors, Marilyn had never read the memo. She was wearing a white Tuxedo and a black bow tie. In her feet were white and black placed cowboy boots. On her head, a Stetson fit between her large blond locks. Her lips were bright red.
“Francois,” she said in her sexiest voice. “How considerate of you. I knew there was a reason I madly fell for you.”
Emilio’s reaction was priceless. He literally slapped with his full palm his forehead in disbelief. “We have hours and this?”
Marilyn was focused on the mathematician. “He should be in a pleasure suit and I should be pleasuring him these last hours. All Fields medal recipients are virgins, doubtful Francois is any different. It’s really not hard to know exactly which button to press to make your god of math sing.”
“Woah,” said Emilio, “too much.”
Marilyn laughed, “The world is ending and you are going to PG13 us? God, you humans have serious issues with that part. Gays are better, you are gay now Emiliou, how about you cut us some slack.” Marilyn was her old self.
“I wanted to talk science,” chopped in the Field’s medal recipient.
“Let’s do. The outfit is for the finale. Emilio, dear, you will love it. Unless Sophie or Liam take over like they did last week, you will love how this all ends. I have done my homework. How about you boys put on glasses and let me jump in on the screens for the millions watching.” The producer handled the men each a pair of Orbison. They put them on. A third chair appeared between the men in the digital version, in it, a milder version of Marilyn was sitting in a brown tailored suit. Her hair was brown and she was wearing thick black glasses. “Better?”
The reaction of Francois was surprising. His jaw opened and drooped as his brain was trying to process the beauty. She, his fantasy was sitting feet next to him and she had picked her outfit with the singular purpose of seducing the mathematician. She wore glasses. This was amazing and Francois was powerless.
“We were talking super symmetry string theory, no?” she said.
Every viewer saw the trio on the screen. Marilyn took the time to edit out the glasses from the men’s faces so it appeared as if the group was actually there, together and discussing physics. Francois was uncomfortable seeing her so close. Marilyn snapped her fingers in his face, “Wake up, this is not about your hormones. We need to talk. A third of the human race is watching us, we need to give them the best show money can buy. We need to enhance the power of Rho waves hitting the Sixth Attraction and that won’t happen if you drool. Ask me brilliant questions dear, don’t slow pitch them.”
Emilio raised both hands in the side indicating this wasn’t about him.
“Want me to question you?”
“Please do. I promised time for lies and deception has passed.”
Francois looked for the approval of Emilio and received it. “A hard question,” she reached over and nearly kissed him.
“Yes, really. Show me why I like you. The one question that matters.”
Francois stood back, he knew the question he needed to ask. No one could understand it, not even Emilio. She dared him. He decided not to hold back. “My guess is, you blindingly think using Einstein’s tensor space mathematical representation of an Nth dimension problem can be extrapolated to thinking in a higher spatial construct. Have you found a different way?”
Emilio slapped his forehead once more. Marilyn was delighted by the question, she smiled, got up in the digital reality and kissed Francois on the lips leaving red color. She pointed at the camera. “This mass of imbecile can’t understand any of this. But you darling understand what I am about to do. God I love you. Next to his Jester and his friend, you are a keeper.”
“We have hours,” said Emilio. “Indulge us.”
She laughed. “Every villain is conned by the hero of stories to explain its plan. There is no plan but a cause to a consequence and not the reverse. Here is what Francois means, and correct me if I am wrong. Einstein, unlike you dear Francois was no true mathematician. He was ashamed by the primitive nature of his ten equations that form the Einstein Fields Equations. He won a Nobel in 1921 mostly because of his math skills. This is what he called the stress-energy tensor. Tensors use is simply a variable matrix representation with symmetry undertones.” Emilio was trying to follow, Francois was drinking each word. “This sweet man thinks discussion with a higher dimensional being would simply require the application of a 27x27 tensor space. That’s thinking in three dimension my love. I wish it was this simple. You want to know the way to make this change?”
“Please,” said Francois.
“Ronald Brown in 1976 introduced the double groupoids, I think you are familiar with them.”
“Yes.”
“That’s the start to transforming a three dimensional algebraic formula into a fourth. Then humans, even Van Kampen forgot some obvious notions.”
“What is she talking about?” asked Emilio like a child.
She ignored the President. “It’s complicated. When we derivate equations we lower their rankings, integration increases them. The same can be said for other algebraic notions that are not quadratic.”
“Francois, dumb it down.”
Marilyn smiled and answered, “I can see, listen, communicate and understand the Multiverse. His question is simple. Can I, for all matters being, become it.”
“Can you?”
She turned as if Emilio was a moron. “Once you see in color, can you imagine the pain of watching the world in black and white.”
“Why don’t you go and leave us alone,” snapped the President.
The aggression called for a single answer. She dared give it, “Agreed darling, I will go. But before I do, I will teach all of you why you should never infuriate a woman.”
“Why the music?” Asked Emilio.
She laughed. “That, lover of Asians, I have no clue.” She kissed him on the forehead. “Go pretend to breed.” The entire broadcast vanished.
The viewers did not feel warm and fuzzy inside.