Section F: Fairy Tales & Physicists

Chapter 11

"No way!" Fields had been out of his depth all day long; confused, abused, made fun of, surprised, overfed, and just generally uncertain about pretty much everything. But of this one thing, he was completely sure. "This is a manhunt—"

"Not a witch-hunt?" interjected Peregrine, expression innocent.

It was becoming apparent to Fields that responding to his partner's ribbing only encouraged her, so he limited his reaction to a frosty glare. "—and we are not taking some geriatric, mind-melding freakazoid with us, regardless of how many bloody universes it's got its toes dipped into. I mean, the princess is bad enough, but at least she's got a mean kick up her sleeve. This thing? No way."

The entity took these protests with evident good grace. "Oh, I quite understand your concerns, young man. This vessel is some way past its prime, I grant you. But never fear, good old Ken has a few miles left on the clock yet. He's really quite spry for an eighty-two-year-old, particularly once he gets going. I'll keep up—provided you stick to a gentle walking pace and are prepared to stop for regular breaks. Oh, and we'll need to make sure we don't stray too far from a restroom. When it's time to go, Ken's bladder brooks no argument."

Peregrine clapped her hands together. "Excellent, that's all settled then. Okay, let's hit the high—"

"No." Fields' voice was resolute—he'd had just about enough of being walked all over. "Quite apart from the fact that its...vessel basically has one foot in the grave, how do you even know we can trust this...this...entity? How do you know it's on our side? For that matter"—he was suddenly also damned if he'd meekly accept yet another nail being hammered into the coffin of his rapidly expiring understanding of the nature of reality—"what do you know about it, period? I mean, I realise we've seen some pretty weird shit today, but an intelligence that spans the multiverse? How does that even work? How did it come to be? How do we know it's real? How do—"

Flashing a quick smile at the old man tottering unsteadily before them, Peregrine hauled Fields to one side. "Will you quit it?" she hissed. "You're embarrassing me in front of the entity."

"No, no, that's quite alright, Peregrine." With a chuckle, the old man flopped back into the wheelchair. "If it will satisfy this sceptical new partner of yours, I'm quite happy to tell the story of my origin."

Peregrine's jaw dropped. "What? But I've been asking you to tell me about that for years. You've always refused."

"Yes." The weathered face smiled cheerfully up at her. "And what fun it's been. But you've never had anything I really wanted before. At least, not really, really."

"But—"

"Shut up, Peregrine. Now, pull up a patch of grass, the lot of you. Make yourselves comfortable. And listen..."

Picture a world. A world of blue oceans. A world of sweeping plains and of rugged mountains, a world of frozen tundra and of ancient forests, a world breathtaking in its beauty and stunning in its grandeur, yet a world at times terrible in its harsh indifference to the multitude of tiny creatures forging their insignificant lives upon its fecund surface. A world, in fact, much like the Earth.

For it was the Earth. But not your Earth, oh no. This Earth was but one of the multitude that sprawl along their very own probability curve, a curve which is itself but a single thread among the countless infinity that each contribute their own tiny share to the rich weft and warp that make up the inconceivably complex, pan-dimensional tapestry that is the multiverse.

The Earth in question was my Earth. And, as similar as it may have been to yours in its physical characteristics, it was remarkably different in one key aspect—its inhabitants. Of which I was one.