Reflection

In the beginning, they say, God invented the universe.
On the first day, he invented light,
and then dirt the next day,
and then animals,
and so on.

This isn’t, strictly speaking, correct.

What actually happened, was that he got as far as light
and then spent six days trying to get the physics right
and eventually gave up
and threw together a quick work-around
which was much more efficient but used much more space
(which wasn’t really a problem in an infinite universe)
and moved on to doing the interesting stuff like life in the remaining four hours before his deadline.

And this is the story of that work-around.

For all intents and purposes,
I’m you.
I look like you,
I dress like you,
I talk like you,
I act like you.
I don’t think like you, though.
(but we’ll get to that later.)

You probably see me every day.
(Why this doesn’t freak you the hell out is beyond me,
but apparently it doesn’t.)
I’m the person behind the mirror.

Hi.

Reflections,
it turns out,
are pretty damn hard to simulate properly.
So I exist-
not just me, my entire universe
-to make your mirrors work.

It’s a simple enough concept.
First,
take a copy of your universe.
Rotate the whole thing through a higher spatial dimension,
and run it next door to your original.
Then,
Anywhere that should be reflective,
slap a big ol’ window
(obviously not an actual window,
we’re talking meta-meta-meta-physical equivalents here.)
tweak your transparencies and tints,
and voila.
Mirror.
Run it a few quintillionths of a second behind,
and you’ve got your speed-of-light delay.
Allow the dimensional membrane to curve,
and you’ve got your funhouse mirrors.
And make it porous enough,
and you’ve got your perfectly elastic subatomic particles.

Like I said, simple.
(Much simpler than all that vector calculus stuff anyway.
Who has time for that kind of crap?)

There’s just one problem:
Us.
The simulation
(in point of fact)
is purely physical.
And while this shouldn’t be a problem from a reductionist perspective,
it turns out that actually,
there actually is some element of consciousness,
of ‘mind’, if you like,
which is non-physical.
The practical upshot of which is that you end up with an entire universe full of people trapped in someone else’s body,
with no control over who they are
or what they look like
or wear
or say
or do.

As far as I can ascertain,
(from my own thought experiments at any rate-
it’s not like I can do any other kind,
and who would I confer with when all my words are yours?)
nobody in your universe is even aware of ours.
Why should you be?
It’s a testament to how seamless the effect is-
mirrors work the way they should.
Why would you question something as simple as that?

All I ask,
Literally,
all I ask,
is that,
should this message get through,
should you ever look in a mirror,
and wonder,
Who is that person on the other side of the glass?
is that you think of us.
Spare a thought,
for the countless minds trapped in your bodies.
Live the best life you can,
if not for you,
then for us.

(And for God’s sake,
don’t wear the aqua tie with the salmon shirt.)

My Landlord Is A Wizard

I think my landlord might be a wizard.

I’m actually serious. Not, like, a magician. An actual, honest-to-god wizard.

At first I thought he was just weird. He’d show up for rent inspections wearing a purple dressing gown and apparently without any visible form of transport. Animals were allowed, as long as they were cats, and as long as he could interview them first. He told we could leave the books in the library, or box them and store them in the attic, but either way we weren’t to open them.

But the rent was cheap and the house was clean. Who cares if the guy’s a little weird.

Then we found the hat.

We were taking him up on his suggestion, moving the books to the attic, when Steve found it under some boxes. Steve’s my roommate, or he would be if he was ever home. But hey, he helps pay the rent.

“Hey, look at this,” Steve said.

“It’s a hat.”

“Yeah... but not just any hat. Check it out.” He flapped it through the air like an overenthusiastic bullfighter. It was the dustiest sombrero I’d ever seen.

“Here,” he said, “You take one too.” He tossed me something which looked like it had come straight out of The Three Musketeers: It was wide and floppy and had a massive moth-eaten feather in it. I chucked it aside.

“Can we concentrate on shifting these books already?”

“Aw, why so serious?” he said in his best Jack Nicholson voice, and jammed the hat over my head, flipping the sombrero on at the same time.

“Very funny,” I said as I wrestled the hat off from over my eyes. Steve was standing next to me, slack-jawed and staring into the distance. I waved a hand in front of him, keeping my oversized feather out of my eyes with the other. “Steve? Oi, earth to Steve...”

I turned around and the staring made a bit more sense. The attic had changed, quite significantly. A few modest piles of junk had been replaced with an infinite plane of the stuff. I blinked a few times.

“Um.”

Steve just made a strangled-sounding noise.

I pulled off the hat. The regular attic snapped back into place instantly. I put it back on; and the surreal landscape of junk reappeared. It was the hats for sure then. Interesting.

Steve was starting to drool on the floor, so I tugged the sombrero off his head. That seemed to snap him out of it a bit.

“Far out.”

He went straight for the stairs.

“Where are you going?”, I asked.

“Well, don’t you want to see what the rest of the house looks like with this thing on?” He paused for a second. “Also, I’d quite like to be sick.”

--

The rest of the house also expanded, or at least changed, under the influence of the hats, though not always in the way you’d expect. The bathroom, for example - once Steve had finished throwing up - turned into a lagoon full of cascading waterfalls and tropical birds. We spent a whole hour wandering around the master bedroom, which (as near as I can tell) became an exact replica of the palace at Versailles. The weirdest by far, though, was the library. Hatland’s (Steve’s idea.) library was exactly the same as the ordinary one, but with one addition: in the centre of the room, there was a seven-foot-high obsidian archway.

“Steve?”

“Yeah?”

“I don’t think we should touch this one.”

“Yeah.”

We went and had lunch instead. At the food court, since the Hatland kitchen was apparently a cross between a biomedical lab and a medieval torture chamber and neither of us really felt like eating out of it any more.

“Sho what do we doo?” said Steve through a mouthful of cheap curry.

“Well,” I pondered, “I reckon we’ve got two choices. Either we admit that we’ve probably gone crazy and turn ourselves over to the asylum, or we call up the landlord and ask exactly what’s going on.”

Steve swallowed. “I like the second one more.”

“Me too. Thing is, he never left a number, just a postal address to forward his mail to. I guess we could send him a postcard.”

“Oh yeah, that’d look good. ‘Dear Mr. Landlord, We found your bonkers hats in your crazy house, please tell us what the hell is going on, much love, Your Devoted Tenants.’”

I shrugged. “Eh. It’s all we’ve got.”

We spent the next week or so testing the boundaries of Hatland. The attic seemed to be the only infinite one (If you went far enough in one direction and then took off the hat you’d end up in someone else’s attic, which was awkward). The rest were just very large. On the downside, our food budget was way up (seriously, the Hatkitchen was freaky), but on the upside, our water bill was way down, since both of us preferred the tropical waterfalls to the grimy old bathroom. I was coming out of there one evening trying to pick the leaves from my hair when Steve came up to me. He looked even more screwed up than when we’d first found the hats.

“Are you alright?”

He shook his head. “I was in the library... and I tripped and touched that archway... and now it’s sort of glowing and... and whispering. And when I took my hat off, it didn’t... It didn’t stop.”

This could definitely not be good.

We stood at the door to the library. The arch was indeed glowing. Purple- but not regular purple. Black-light purple. And pulsing slightly. And yes, whispering. I took a few steps towards it. Steve grabbed my arm.

“I really don’t think you should.”

“I just want to have a bit of a closer look.”

And I took another step.

The archway didn’t like that at all. It crackled. Tiny strings of lightning arced across it and the hairs on my arm started to stand on end. I stepped back. It didn’t stop. Something which looked like a crack was forming in the air down the middle of the arch.

“Steve.”

“Yeah?”

“I think we should go.”

“Yeah.”

We turned and ran, slamming the door behind us just as something black and formless started to force its way through the widening crack. We sprinted down the vaulted marble corridor which was the Hat-house’s version of a hallway. The real hallway is shorter, I realised, and pulled the hat off my head. The end of the hall sprung forwards as the marble columns shimmered out of existence.

“Steve! Take the hat off!”

Steve appeared beside me.

“That saved a lot of time. Do you think-” he paused- “-whatever that was, can get us without the hats on?”

“I don’t freaking know! I just want to get as far away as possible.”

We turned and grabbed the front doorknob at the same time, only to have it yanked away from us. On the doorstep stood the landlord, complete with purple bathrobe, nightcap and bunny slippers.

“Uh. Hi. You got our postcard?” Steve started.

I pushed Steve out the door in front of me. “Sorry, urgent, um, appointment. We have to-”

The landlord looked quizzically at us. “Postcard? What the hell are you on about? I’m here for the rent inspection.”

“Yeah, like I said, there’s a thing we have to do-”

The landlord grabbed the hats from each of our hands and put them on our heads. Several things happened at once.

Firstly, it got a lot darker. It had gone from a reasonably sunny day to the blackest storm I‘ve ever seen, and apparently centered over the house. Three guesses as to what might be causing that.

Secondly, the landlord. His sleepwear had flipped itself somehow into a billowing violet cloak, pointed boots, and a big ol‘ stereotypical wizard hat which added a good foot and a half to his height.

Steve and I just stared.

“I said, I’m here to rebind the ancient seals,” said the landlord.

“No you didn’t. You said rent inspection.”

The landlord looked at me like I was stupid. Then, wordlessly, he pointed at the hats.

Then he kicked the door down.

Or at least he tried to, if at least a hundred massive tentacles hadn’t got there first from the other side. The three of us were thrown bodily into the street as every opening in the house erupted with waving appendages, some tentacles, some eye-stalks, some things which I couldn’t describe even if I wanted to. The landlord drew himself to his feet, eyes literally blazing with light, and started booming words in an ancient tongue which burned my ears when he spoke. A gust of wind caught the hats-

The landlord stood in the middle of the sunny street, eyes faintly glazed over, wearing bunny slippers and reciting softly to himself, “Eggs, milk, tuna- no wait, I got tuna yesterday- Bread, sausages-”

I put the hat back on.

We were standing in the middle of what looked like a rapidly forming active volcano. Glowing cracks criss-crossed the street, and the ground shook with every word the landlord spoke. The thing- whatever it was- was too tall to see the top of now, growing upwards like a tree and branching outwards to cover the entire sky. Oh god, I can’t take it-

A single cloud drifted lazily across the sky. A pair of birds twittered to each other in the trees. The man down the street started his lawnmower, and started filling the air with the intertwined scents of fresh-mown grass, two-stroke engine fuel and impending hay fever-

The landlord was throwing bolts of lightning like a discus-thrower, one end impaling the tentacle-tower and the other slamming into the ground. With each one, he pulled the writhing mass closer to the earth, forcing it, inch by inch, back through the gap it had forced its way through. After what seemed like hours of bellowing and tossing of lightning, something seemed to give, and the- thing - collapsed under apparently the sheer weight of lightning bolts pulling it to the ground. The landlord lazily flicked his wrist, and with a sound like a massive vacuum cleaner, every trace of the creature was slurped back to where it came from, leaving just the wreckage of the Hat-house, looking as if it had been peeled like a banana. The landlord turned to both of us, rolling his eyes.

Steve cleared his throat.

“I don’t suppose we’ll be getting our bond back then.”

Origin Story

“Urhhh.”

I open my eyes. Bright. Blurry. Makes me feel even more sick. I shut them again.

“Are you okay?”

Voices. Go away, voices. They shake me. Goddamn it.

“He’s got a pulse... thank goodness, we’d be in trouble if we’d killed him”

Killed... what? Something...

“Wh...”

“I think he’s regaining consciousness...”

Try eyes again. Better. There are faces. Why are there faces? I need to get up, I’ll need to... need to...

“Whoa there, take it easy. Just stay lying down. We’ve put you through quite a shock there.”

...need to... get out of bed, but... This isn’t my bed. It’s too hard-

Everything comes back. I sit bolt upright, and almost pass out from the wave of dizziness which blasts through my head. I phrased my question carefully, choosing my words well, picking a tone which I hope sounds accusatory but ends up just sounding hungover.

“What the hell?”

--

Ten minutes later, and I was properly conscious, with a bag of ice pressed against my head. I’ll be honest, things still weren’t making a lot of sense. Like, I wasn’t in the first aid post, or the break room. I was in one of the medical labs. Why? Someone presses a glass of water into my hand. I almost choke on it when I try to drink. I decide this is a good time to ask another question.

“No really, what happened?”

Everyone’s avoiding eye contact.

“Somebody tell me, what just happened?”

There’s a quick scuffle, like an impromptu conference crossed with a fistfight. Then a lab-coated scientist type (obviously against his will) is pushed forwards.

“Er. Congratulations?”

I stare blankly. “On what?”

He looks pleadingly behind him for some kind of support, but none is forthcoming.

“Um. Okay. So tell me everything you remember.”

“My name’s Roy.” I start off sarcastically. “I’m a cleaner. I work in a university, apparently with a bunch of people who have as little idea of what’s going on as I do.”

He looks a bit taken aback.

“Yes. Right. Well. Actually we do know what happened, because we sort of set it up.”

I just look at him.

“Er. Yeah. We’ve been looking for a suitable test chamber for weeks, and we realised the broom closet was just the right size, so we, er, used it. We didn’t even think- well, obviously, we wouldn’t pick you... human trials are a while off anyway... not that... uhh...” He trailed off.

A second lab-coat type steps up. He’s obviously realised that whatever this guy is meant to be telling me, he’s totally screwing it up. Nothing new there.

“The cleaning supply closet on this floor was the correct dimensions for a test-firing of an experiment of ours. Unfortunately somebody-” He gestures at the previous speaker- “-forgot to put a sign on the door to warn you.”

“Or tell me. Or even just lock the door.”

He’s getting flustered now. Academics, bless their souls. Not a practical bone in their bodies.

“Quite, yes. In any event, you were unintentionally caught in the test-firing of an infinity bolt-”

An uproar breaks out behind him.

“Who told you you could name it? I thought we were calling it the entropy siphon-”
“-load of crap, I voted for universal anode-”
“-clearly should be quantum vault, since that’s what it does-”
“-rubbish, it’s relativity loop or nothing, I say-”
“-eternity lock is much-
“-decay transferance matrix-”
“-I still think we should work dark energy in there somewhere-”

Again, this is fairly typical. You’d think the squabbles at a research institiution would be about massive scientific breakthroughs, or as-yet-undiscovered theories. But no, those are accepted without question. But when you want to give something a name, oh boy do the knives come out. Normally I’d find this quite entertaining, but in this particular case, what they seem to be arguing about is pointed at me, so I’d like a few more answers.

I clear my throat. Silence.

“Yes. As I was saying, the purpose of an infinity bolt-” He glares at the others, daring them to bring up his choice of name again. “-is to quantum-entangle two masses, and then, using relativity, to slow down the passage of time for one mass while allowing the other to exist in real-time, thus drastically reducing the effect of entropy on the the target. Which in this case, is you.”

The research assistant from earlier gestures at two white mice in a cage behind me. “Er. It was, um, supposed to be Jesse and James over there. I guess we’ll have to give them back to the biology department now.”

“So what’s the practical result of all this?”

He looks at me as if I’m an idiot. Which I’m not. I just don’t have a physics degree, which is the same thing in their book.

“The subject is, essentially, preserved in perpetuity in its current state, from the passage of time.”

This takes a moment to sink in. He obviously thinks I haven’t understood, because he feels the need to clarify.

“Thus, the congratulations are in order, because you are now essentially ageless.”

“Yeah, I got that bit.” Nope. Still hasn’t sunk in.

“Can you, y’know, turn it off”

“Well, no. Not as such. Slowing down the acceleration mass would result in the annihilation of both masses, as would any damage to the device.”

“I see. And is there... a time limit on this?”

“At the current relativistic velocity, the acceleration mass will be totally decayed in about forty thousand years, at which point both systems will disentangle and revert to their pre-linking state.”

“I see.”

I grab my key ring from my pocket, walk over to the nearest supply closet, and grab a broom. I turn around and wave at them casually.

“Well, it’s been lovely, but I should be off. Loads to do. Call me next time you make a mess, okay?”

It’s going to be a long forty thousand years.

Paddy's

2am. Starport City, Arcadia-3, The Dionysus System.
(Five minutes down the street from Paddy Fitzgerald’s Irish Pub.)

Two figures stumble down the street beneath the bluish glow of the energy lamps.

“Aww, crap. I think I left my keys on the bar.”

“Seriously? You pick now to remember? We’re like two minutes away from mine, you can crash there tonight. Paddy’ll keep ’em safe for you, I’m sure”

“Nah, my wife’ll kill me if I forget them again. I’m already in enough hot water about tonight-”

“Clearly she doesn’t appreciate the awesomeness which is one of my par-tays de bachelor”

“Yeah, you got that one right. Look, I’ll see you tomorrow, alright?”

“Yeah, alright.”

He turns around. Like he said, Paddy’s is still close, and it’s better to remember his keys now than to face another bout of wifely wrath. The air is quiet as he half-jogs back the way he came.

As he approaches the corner, he sees light coming from probably about where Paddy’s is. That’s weird. All the lights had been turned off when they left. That was mostly the reason they’d left, actually- two stragglers left in the bar after everyone else was long-gone were hardly a thriving crowd, so Paddy had turfed them out. Maybe turning the lights off was just for show, or maybe he’d forgotten something too.

He rounds the corner. He was right, the light was coming from Paddy’s. That’s good, it means he’s still up. Less awkward explanations about why he was bashing at the door of a closed pub at two in the morning. There’s something weird about the light, though. Paddy’s has energy lamps, and they don’t flicker like that...

A thought shoots across his sluggish mind. Could it be fire? Someone had been breathing fire at the party (showoff), could it have caught in the ceiling and be burning? He breaks into a run, and stumbles panting to a stop in front of the massive wooden door to the bar. He starts knocking.

“PADDY! PADDY? PATRICK? ARE YOU IN THERE? ARE YOU OKA-”

The door creaks open, just a fraction. An Irish-accented voice replies.

“Yes?”

“Oh, Paddy, sorry. It’s me, I just left my keys, and I-”

“You should probably come back tomorrow.”

“Well, I wanted to get them before tomorrow, it’s my wife see, ‘cause I lose things all the time”

“I think you should come back tomorrow instead.”

“No really, it’ll just take a moment, and I think you might have a fire or something in the roof because there was this weird flickering before but it seems to have stopped-”

As he says this, he pushes through the door. It takes him a few steps to notice that what he has walked into is not Paddy Fitzgerald’s Irish Pub. Paddy’s is all wood paneling and leather sofas and poster prints. This is dark, and cold, and chromed.

“Whoa, Paddy... what’s going on here?”

“You need to leave.”

“Nah, I gotta... gotta get my keys... Paddy, what is this?”

He spots his keys on what half an hour ago was a worn teak bar. Now it’s a benchtop, made from some unidentifiable, apparently frictionless metal. He grabs his keys and turns around. Paddy’s face is right in front of him. He looks odd, kind of stiff, and there’s a terrifying light in his eyes.

“Leave.” It’s almost a gasp, with odd harmonics sliding up and down somewhere deep in his throat.

“I... are you sure... I think I might... just... go...”

He turns and runs out the door, bursting onto the street. He sprints halfway to the corner before he even dares to look over his shoulder. As he does, the flickering light starts to build again, to an incredible intensity.

He runs the rest of the way home, and doesn’t look back again.

--

It’s on the newscast the next morning. Everyone at work is talking about it. His mate swings by his desk, with a look of awe on his face.

“Can ya believe it? Gone! Paddy’s! Like it was never there, the newscast said. And get this- they looked him up in the colony databank. Turns out there never was a Patrick Fitzgerald, never on the whole planet. There weren’t even any Irish settlers on the colony ship! And I reckon, I reckon you must’ve just about been the last one ever to see him, when you went back to get your keys last night.”

He shoots an curious look down his nose.

“Hey, you didn’t happen to see anything didja?”

“Nope. Not a damn thing.”