Dr. Arman Voss was known for two things: brilliance and bad ideas that somehow worked.
His workshop sat crooked at the edge of town, cluttered with half-finished machines—boots that could walk up walls (they walked sideways instead), a toaster that predicted the weather (accurately, but only during breakfast), and a pen that wrote apologies before you made mistakes. That one had sold surprisingly well.
But his newest invention was different.
It hummed.
Not loudly—just a quiet, persistent hum that seemed to exist somewhere between sound and thought. Arman called it The Possibility Engine, though his assistant, Lila, preferred the name “absolutely not.”
“What does it do?” she asked, eyeing the strange orb of glass and copper coils.
Arman grinned, pushing his goggles up. “It shows you what could happen… if you made a different choice.”
Lila crossed her arms. “So it’s like regret, but with visuals?”
“Exactly!” he said proudly. “Except interactive.”
Before she could protest, he flipped a switch.
The room shimmered.
For a moment, everything doubled—two desks, two chairs, two versions of Lila staring at him. Then the second version blinked, turned, and walked out the door.
The shimmer faded.
Lila blinked. “Did I just… leave?”
“In one possibility, yes,” Arman said, scribbling notes furiously. “Fascinating! The machine creates branching realities and lets us peek into them.”
Lila stared at the door. “I don’t like that version of me.”
Arman barely heard her. He was already turning dials again.
Soon, the workshop filled with flickers of other lives. In one, Arman was rich and famous, signing autographs. In another, the workshop was abandoned, covered in dust. In yet another, Lila was the inventor—and Arman was her assistant, looking very annoyed.
At first, it was thrilling.
They watched versions of themselves succeed, fail, argue, laugh. Every choice opened a thousand more. Stay or leave. Speak or stay silent. Build or destroy.
But then something changed.
The flickers stopped fading.
One version of Lila didn’t disappear. She stayed, standing silently in the corner.
Then another Arman appeared—older, tired, eyes heavy with something like warning.
“You need to turn it off,” the older Arman said.
Present Arman froze. “What—how are you still here?”
“You kept it running too long,” the older version replied. “The possibilities don’t like being watched. They start watching back.”
The humming grew louder.
The walls shimmered again—but this time, they didn’t settle. The workshop fractured into overlapping realities. Doors led to different versions of the same room. Shadows moved where no one stood.
Lila grabbed Arman’s arm. “Shut it down. Now.”
“But think about it,” Arman said, eyes wide with a mix of fear and fascination. “We could learn everything—every outcome—every mistake before it happens!”
“And lose ourselves in the process,” Lila snapped. “Which version of you gets to decide what’s real?”
The older Arman stepped closer. “I didn’t listen either,” he said quietly. “That’s why I’m here.”
The humming became a roar.
Arman hesitated… just for a second.
Then he reached for the switch.
The moment it clicked off, everything collapsed inward—light, sound, possibility—folding into silence.
The workshop was whole again.
One desk. One door. One Lila.
Arman sat down heavily, breathing hard.
Lila looked at him. “Well?”
He managed a weak smile. “I think… I invented something that should never exist.”
She nodded. “Good. So what are you going to do with it?”
Arman looked at the silent machine.
Then he picked up a wrench.
“Make a toaster,” he said. “At least toast doesn’t break reality.”
From that day on, the Possibility Engine was never used again.
But sometimes, late at night, Arman would swear he heard a faint hum—
—and wondered which version of himself was still listening.
No comments:
Post a Comment