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The Self-Contained Reality Door
by Sergio
“ente
per ente” Palumbo
Edited by Michele Dutcher
A Mare Inebrium story
Mare Inebrium Universe created by Dan Hollifield
“It smells like a storm is rolling in…” Max whispered to himself.
Standing at the entrance of the spacebar as he had many times before,
the bartender looked towards the brown, barren hills situated not far
from the busy, well-lit spaceport of Bethdish as the night quickly fell
over them. Time to go inside, he told himself, before he walked through
the doors, readying himself for the work to be done. The next long
hours would be spent inside those walls and in its many rooms, where
eyes could see things which had never been spotted previously, and ears
could hear words that had never been spoken on this planet before today.
As usual, the delightfully furnished and stylishly designed inside of
the Mare Inebrium SpaceBar, the famous live venue regarded as
one of the finest in the whole star sector, boasted an award-winning
decor with vibrant and colorful offerings of diverse food and beverages
that combined fresh local produce with interplanetary flavors. The many
themed-rooms were crowded with different species walking around,
sipping their drinks and juices, while chattering in a mish-mash of
languages, accents and dialects. Their unique voices continuously
filled the vast hall, with even Max the bartender finding it difficult
at times to completely understand all of them. Everyone present seemed
to want to be free of the drudgery of the working hours spent outside
this bar, as they were all here to have an entertaining, good time.
Of course, there were always a few unpleasant issues a bartender had to
deal with, problems to be solved and regrettable events that commonly
popped up. Max put his mind to the small tables he had bought just a
week ago, and that he would need to remove soon. He had placed them at
the left end of the main room to give that space a new look, but now
they would need to be hurriedly set aside as, unfortunately, the
peculiar yellow glow of the tubular leg in the middle of each one
reminded the slim and translucent aliens from Whrabl of their secretive
mating rituals – making the tables highly offensive to them when
publicly displayed. The bartender didn’t know much about that strange
species but the fact that their organs were said to be diffused -
spread out in a larger system within their bodies - meant that it was
better not to openly upset them.
Well, there were always unknown circumstances you hadn’t considered,
studied or found out about yet, Max thought. Like that time
he had tried to change the style of the armchairs used by the Olhvx,
hoping to make their section as comfortable and cozy as possible. Those
aliens were the horrid-looking pilots of the large Deep-Space Fuel
Tankers from The Blue Belt of Forgotten Asteroids, possibly the ugliest
starships in the entire sector. However, he had been told that such
additions were just too similar to the old version of the armchairs
they had used in the recreation areas aboard their long hauls where a
terrible accident had occurred a few years ago and the furniture had
been sucked into open space because of a sudden hull breach - along
with a few well-liked crewmembers. So, such things were highly despised
and needed to be removed immediately. Again, this had been another
circumstance he didn’t know and one that had to be taken into
consideration, in the best interest of the Mare Inebrium itself, of
course.
Max had also pondered over putting a few tall ancient monolithic
structures here and there in the main room, as if they were mysterious
artifacts from a long-lost civilization on a planet whose culture had
been extinguished at the beginning of a Stone Age no one knew anything
about. However, after his recent disappointments in decorating, despite
his very good intentions, he had thought twice before putting his next
plan into action. What if his choice would offend those primitive
corpulent aliens from Stone Jungle Planet that were so massive that
they could no longer run and likely had trouble walking, but were very
strong and could greatly damage the rooms if they became enraged? Or
what if the faux ancient drawings he imagined putting here and there on
such structures were reputed to be illegal by the Nle-e-e-e-n whose
unusual shapes and structures included erectile tissues in various
places all over the body or in strange locations that could remind them
of their own strange, and funny looking features?
As you can see, a lot of troubles usually inhabited the ever-working
mind of a man like Max. And he wasn’t somebody who went in search for
trouble, obviously.
And now the Mare Inebrium had new competition by a new spacebar, ‘The
Five Arrows of Space-Time’, which had been completed less than month
ago and was also close to the spaceport of Bethdish. As it always
happened, a new venue attracted customers the same way the new opening
of any promising restaurant on the planet made people curious and eager
to have a look. All of that made any owner or bartender think about
upgrading his own spacebar or making new offers to his regulars. The
sooner, the better…
As Max moved to the room he had set aside as his personal office space,
where he spent his time looking over documents and taking a break
whenever possible, he looked at what time it was and thought that it
was almost three. Every single week, it was the same story over and
over again.
That was the day when he had to take care of some business, willingly
or unwillingly. On those evenings, it commonly became a sort of
unending parade of sales agents from the most varied worlds that came
to this planet and entered his office trying to sell him their new
products or beverages. These sales visits usually went like: this drink
comes with these colored bottles now; or that well-known wine is out of
production because of the ongoing civil war on planet Flrewbl (well,
there always was a new or ongoing war on that desperate world…); or
that food has happened to prove fatal for some minor species and it is
now illegal – those kind of usual things. He certainly preferred to
deal with the salespeople directly, but he wasn't always at the bar of
course.
It was only after the short Uikl with fins spurting out from his back
and from under his bulbous eyes too - which he immediately
blew off because it was the fourth time he had told him that the muddy
beverages he proposed wouldn’t be a good fit at his bar, though they
might be really appreciated on his native world that was made mainly of
quagmires and shallow water… - that another guest paid him a visit.
Well, this was an unexpected guest by all means.
The young man, around 30 or maybe 35, entered and stood before him, his
hair bristling and a soft smile on his lips. He undoubtedly looked like
a decent guy, dressed in an ordinary jacket and trousers, which wasn’t
exactly what the bartender was used seeing in the sales agents that
usually came here. And he had never seen him before…
“I don’t remember meeting you before,” Max told him. “Have you ever
been here?” the bartender asked, eyeing him curiously, as he gestured
for the guest to have a seat.
“This is my first time at the Mare Inebrium ever,” The chestnut-eyed
man admitted. “Though I’ve heard many things about the great renown of
this place of yours…”
“Ok, why are you here today? Trying to show me some new snacks, or
tasty beverages?”
“Well, actually I’m here to sell you a completely different thing…By
the way, my name is James Munsey, from Mars,” the young guest revealed.
“So, what is it? Tables, chairs, computers…What are you selling?”
“I’d like you to consider buying a door. To be clearer: a
Self-Contained Reality Door.”
“A…what? Listen to me, I already have automatic doors, glass doors,
wooden and metal doors for all the various themed-rooms on this level,
and many reinforced doors elsewhere. As a matter of fact, last week we
opened another large room with an Irish-themed setting…” the bartender
told him, making a sour face and looking ill-at-ease.
“Yes, I know you have all such modern doors, and many old ones. I mean,
I haven’t seen all of those with my own eyes, but given how big this
venue is, it certainly must have a lot of doors in. What I am trying to
sell you, however, is a completely new door that I have built myself,”
the other insisted.
“So, you deal in furnishing bars with doors and the likes? You don’t
look like an experienced sales agent…”
“I’m not. Actually, I am a scientist, and what I’d like to sell you is
a door that is a machine to connect this world with another dimension.
You certainly know about the theories in quantum-mechanical science
about parallel universes that are separated from each other by a single
quantum event?” James asked.
“What are you saying? What,
precisely, do you want to put in this bar?”
The young man didn’t appear to be disappointed by his question, nor did
he stop talking. “Throughout history going back to almost all ancient
societies, people have believed in other dimensions. After all, the
debate about various parallel universes has always been nothing less
than the meaning of reality itself. It was discovered and confirmed
recently that the world of existence we live in is a membrane, floating
in an eleven-dimensional space-time multi-universe. And there are,
maybe, many, or endless membranes.” He took a long pause and looked at
Max. “Normally travel between these membranes is impossible, and only
gravity, being the warping of space-time, has long been supposed to
allow things to freely float into the space between universes. Most of
those parallel dimensions are also reputed to probably be dead ones,
consisting of a formless gas of subatomic particles, such as electrons
and neutrinos. In these universes the protons might be unstable, so all
matter as we know it would slowly decay and dissolve. But the truth is,
simply, that there are more habitable dimensions than we could ever
think of, and an unending number of life forms living there…”
The bartender nodded in silence, then replied, “You seem to be well
grounded on science, by all means, I’ll give you that much.”
“As a scientist, I am, thanks. The reasons to get through and reach
those other membranes I was talking about are pretty simple: to go
exploring, to see and colonize more worlds than you could ever imagine.
In the mind of a few researchers there is also a more practical purpose
for wanting to leave the membrane we live in and reach others:
ultimately, to escape the eventual death of our own dimension, one day,
in the distant future. Think about the amount of assets from thousands
of planets and millions of cultures that have been spent, the sweat of
thousands of engineers and physicists, and the numerous corporations
that have gone into painfully assembling, piece by piece, the
technology to get to other universes. Some made it, at least in part,
though with disappointing consequences until they quit while others
disastrously failed. But here I am, with my new device, and it is based
upon a science that no one ever thought to turn to so as to achieve
this ultimate goal! And although I can’t give you the secrets of my
device today, it’s the result that counts, and I can prove to you that
it works!”
“So, did you develop such a device by yourself?” Max inquired of the
salesman. “I’ve heard legends about the military on the planet Ilwiii
working on a similar machine. There have always been tales in space
about somebody trying to build a device to get to another dimension.”
“Actually, my research began in earnest when I heard about the attempts
of that warlike planet to reach orher universes. But I developed a
completely new device, building on studies of the Ilwiii.”
“I hope you’re not trying to sell me some military secret from Ilwiii
themselves.” The face of the bartender darkened. “That species appears
to hardly take lightly any creature stealing their ideas. I don’t want
to wake up one day and find my space bar invaded by cyber soldiers,
indestructible Ilwiii mecha or robotized flying wings with guns
everywhere just because they heard about you having been here.”
“I did not. Though based on that research, it’s just the rules of
physics that come into consideration, and their work on such a matter
gave me the right motivation. All the rest of the design is mine and
mine alone!” a serious James replied in a convincing voice.
“Okay, let’s say that I believe you,” a dubious Max nodded. “What’s in
it for me?”
"Doubling your customers, at least, and by means of a single door..."
the other made it clear, smiling.
“Your self-contained reality door…”
“Exactly!”
"Uhm..." Max whispered. After all, it seemed that there was easy money
to be made here…and without much effort from him.
"Think about this again: a door leading to another dimension that is
right in your bar, through which many and many new customers can step
through, every night, every week, all year long. And all you need to do
is allow me to do some work and build it in this bar."
"What's your pay in all of this?" asked the bartender, still appearing
to be unconvinced.
"Maybe a part of the profits. Perhaps my end could be fifteen percent…”
James proposed.
"Seven percent, no more..." he replied. ”After all, the danger in
having such a new machine in my bar is all on me. What if it explodes
or something goes wrong one day?"
"Seven percent it is."
"So, why are you so interested in building such a device here in my
bar?"
James smiled softly. "If it works, and I can test it here over a long
period of time, maybe it will be a chance for me to become rich. I
could eventually sell it to many other venues undoubtedly."
“This would be good for you, of course, which is your goal. But my
first thoughts are always on my business. On second thought, I might
have a try at it and see what happens…”
“You’ll be pleased, you can count on that!” the young man yelled.
*****
A glamorous half-human, half-Tblimt singer sat on a glowing chair
situated on the stage, surrounded by goblin-like musicians. The
appreciative crowd gleefully listened to his songs under the
yellow-brown lights of that part of the spacebar.
Business as usual. This was what Max, the bartender, used to say, but
now business was booming, having increased exponentially because of the
draw of the new self-contained reality door.
The young salesman, James, had built his miracle of science. There were
a multitude of new faces, most of them from species completely unknown
or unheard of before - after all, how could have it ever been
different, as his new customers were from a different dimension? They
kept coming and visiting his spacebar, spending their gold coins and
precious gems, which served as a universal currency for the moment, as
they seemed to have value in both realities. Max was certain that
sooner or later some other means of exchange would be made
available…
Within a few days of that door letting new and new creatures in, it had
been a continuous mix of unprecedented clothes, strange costumes and
unusual behaviors that had appeared on this side of reality in the Mare
Inebrium. Certainly there were more unknown species than the bartender
and his assistants had ever seen before. And there had always been many
varied alien beings that came here from many different space systems,
every single night, because of the great renown of the spectacular
spacebar, even before another dimension had become available.
For a few minutes Max stood in the middle of the main room on the
ground floor and looked around. There were already some peculiar
Furr-Iel-Nms with hairy pointed tails, several JKLeen from
Grand Space Island II and a few Fymv
males with huge mugs full of more than one type of ale from Earth, all
mixed together. Since the time that door had opened a portal to another
group of worlds, many other new species had appeared, so many in fact
that their unending names could only have been kept track of with a
powerful quantum computer. Some looked completely different from the
aliens native to Max’s dimension, though others did not, and all
species had many features in common with the creatures you commonly
could find in the Mare Inebrium. This was a marvel in itself when you
took into account that they came from an alternate reality, or a
parallel plane of existence, that lay just past that strange new
doorway.
Max was thinking of going back to his office for a break, when he
suddenly changed his mind. Another representative from an unknown alien
species was spotted by him while walking through the main room on the
ground floor. The bartender noticed something in his facial expression,
and in the way he moved that strangely attracted his interest. Short,
dark-haired, no glasses or mustache, he was dressed in medium brown
colors with a grayish colored apron. This outfit reminded him of the
clothes he usually wore while on duty, except for the color of his
apron… Max noticed his perceptive eyes, the experienced look he gave to
the customers next to him as they entered and exited the rooms
adjoining the main one. At this point a question popped into his mind
so Max approached the new alien patron and asked him, “If I may…what’s
your name?”
“Me? I’m Mahlz…” the other replied, eyeing him with a smile.
“What?” Max said.
“It’s Mahlz, pretty common on the world I come from. There is a huge
busy spaceport there, too, not too different from the one you have here
on Bethdish.”
“Really?” Max added. Every one of his new alien customers had a story
telling how incredibly they had come into the Mare Inebrium’s dimension
or how varied their life was on the other side of that door/portal. Of
course, Max usually let them ramble on as he attempted to understand
their point of view. After all, there were already so many different
experiences to be recounted from alien species before the doorway had
been activated, so one could only imagine how many strange ideas were
now represented given the fact that new beings from another dimension
were coming here every night. “Pleased to meet you, anyway. I’m Max,
the appointed bartender of the Mare Inebrium.”
“So, our names are similar. This is why you looked surprised when you
heard mine, probably. And I’m a bartender, too, and the proprietor of
Hlub Hulfd, which in your language could be translated as The Drunk’s
Sea, more or less. It’s a spacebar, several centuries old. We have many
customers there just as you have here.”
“Centuries old? So, has it been handed down from one generation to the
next?”
“Actually, things on my side of the portal are a little different than
here.” The other approached Max, looked deep into his eyes, stood in
silence briefly before revealing his truth. “I must confess that I’m an
immortal. And, from the way you behave, and the overall sensation that
I have in my mind, which is a particularity of my species, I see that
you’re an immortal as well. How strange we met right here and right
now.”
“An immortal, you say? How could you tell?”
“Being an immortal is something that can’t be kept secret for the ones
like me, and looking into the depth of your eyes I was immediately able
to see how experienced and very smart you are. This depth of mind is
not like you can find in common individuals… I don’t think I am
mistaken.”
You could tell from Max’s expression that he was worried.
“Oh, well, sorry if I have offended you, it was not what I wanted to
do. Actually your peculiar condition was pretty clear - but you may
have reasons to keep this a secret to the common customers, or to the
mortal species that come here,” a more cautious Mahlz said.
“Well, possibly you were not mistaken, maybe I really am an immortal.
But this is not a thing I want to share with others on this planet,”
Max uttered in a low tone.
“I see…maybe it’s not a well-spread knowledge on this world, but
immortality is pretty accepted where I come from,” the other added. “So
we have many things in common, even more that I imagined when I first
saw you. And do you want to know another funny thing?”
“What else?”
“I really like this bar, I truly mean it…in a way it’s so lively,
trendy and full of customers from so many varied species I know so
little about…I wouldn’t mind adding this venue to the list of
properties I own on more than nineteen planets. In fact, this might be
a great addition, and I have a good taste for good business, I rarely
make mistakes when it comes to profits. Maybe I’ll make you an offer,
one day or another…This is just something that I’m evaluating at
present.”
“What makes you think I’m going to sell you this bar, one day or
another?” Max sneered.
“As I told you, I have really a good instinct for such things, and it
never happens that I can’t close a deal like this when I want to. I’ll
make you an offer so rich that you can’t refuse. No one refuses my
offers where I come from, and for many reasons...but for now we’re just
talking. Anyway, if I decide to make you that offer of mine eventually,
I would certainly change many things, starting with the personnel – at
least that’s how I see it,” said Mahlz smiling. “Now if you will excuse
me, I would like to sample the food.”
“Of course, as you like…” As the other man went away, the way Mahlz had
talked left a sense of bitterness in Max’s mouth. How should he
interpret such words? Had Mahlz made a menacing threat, or were those
terms just the show of power of someone who knew how rich he was and
that he always got what he liked, in the end? In either case, this
wasn’t something that pleased him, surely. Or, maybe, was there
something else that Mahlz was hinting at, something illegal?
Max had a sense that there was much more that Mahlz wanted to say, but
couldn’t and that sense overpowered all other thoughts in the
bartender’s mind.
There were too many things he didn’t know about the many species that
come from that other dimension night after night, and new
representatives from unknown populations kept coming and going. Were
they, or some of them, ruled by a sort of galaxy-wide mob or space gang
that didn’t allow too many choices for the few that dared oppose such
aims? And was Mahlz a member of it all? Or one of their men of power?
He supposed there was more to discover about Mahlz’s uneventful
behavior, that unbearable air of confidence and dangerous control. But
he also saw no reason to waste time about that now.
*******
“You have to put an end to it…” a cold Max told James. The two were in
the bartender’s office and his words made it clear that he was not
going to accept a refusal or a different opinion. Max had thought it
all over and had come to this final conclusion.
"What? Why...?" the other tried to oppose.
“You know, there has been a considerable increase in the amount of
turmoil and fighting among customers of different species, and the
coming of new and unusual creatures has just added more trouble. My
security has had too many problems to deal with since the doorway was
put in.” A saddened Max made a face, but he knew that this was just
half true. Actually, the men in his security force had lots of
experience in preventing things from getting out of hand in the Mare
Inebrium, and they were perfectly capable of dealing with new and new
customers from different alien species that came here every night.
But there had been a real issue recently with fighting among beings
whose consequences had proved to be unexpected. As a matter of fact,
every crime that occurred in the spacebar had to be judged according to
the law of the place, though this was the law in this dimension.
However, the plane of existence those new aliens came from had other
rules dictating that all these new customers had to be treated
according to the laws of the planet they were from. So, such problems
could become a sort of hellish thing for the lawyers here, with a
serious debate about which set of laws to use. And there were no
interdimensional agreements about how to deal with those accused, at
least not yet.
“So, is this the reason why you want to destroy all my hard work? Do
you think you can stop it? I have made my project known, and it has
attracted a lot of attention. I can always continue it by getting other
funding, and this will happen easily. I will just build my portal again
elsewhere,” the angered James burst out.
“I am afraid not…” the bartender replied. “The problems your device
caused here have also attracted the attention of the authorities and
they have issued a ban on your project. At least, for the time being it
is illegal to continue the usage of your door, until they study the
matter more seriously and more deeply. And I think this ban is going to
be ordered also on many other worlds and last for a very long time,”
Max uttered. He knew that also such thing was not entirely true. In
fact, he had personally hired a lawyer to send a request for such a
ban. His attorney was an eccentric man, a master at turning all the
easy things into difficult ones: older than 79, he was of ancient
Italian origin, or so he said, and he recounted that the country his
family once came from was long accustomed to a judiciary system that
was slow, very complicated and that, in other words, simply had never
worked at all. If he was allowed to operate on different planets for
enough time, the lawyer always said having a laugh at it, he would
bring that inefficiency and unending legal trouble to many other
worlds, spreading confusion and uncertainty everywhere. That meant that
he would prolong the legal procedure of that ban far and wide, for many
and many years, and in the end only a very dubious decision would be
made by the judges, possibly, thanks to his devious experience. So, the
matter wouldn’t be settled for a very long time. Which didn’t displease
the bartender in this case, anyway…This also meant that Max would not
see that dangerous device operating anywhere in their dimension for
centuries probably, which meant that he wouldn’t meet that worrisome
Mahlz again.
“The road to new science can’t be obstructed nor can it be stopped
forever!” the other man insisted.
“I believe you’re wrong about that. Do you think that the science that
a few years ago was developed and meant to increase the life of the sun
of Kluen’s system – that ended up with turning that star into an
unwanted supernova - or the gun that drained life energy from the
wielder himself to fire more powerfully, was ever allowed to reach any
marketplace, in the end? You know that such dangerous researches were
stopped…” Max retorted.
The other didn’t reply, but anger didn’t leave his face.
"As far as your door is concerned, there are simply too many
differences, and too many problems involved, you see..." added the
bartender, trying to make the deluded James see the truth. "Our
universes are too different..." He added this in a low tone, though in
his mind he was actually thinking of the fact that there were way too
many similarities, inappropriate similarities, and he could still see
the image of Mahlz in his mind’s eye. 'I can't bear the presence of
anyone else like me – the result would be too dangerous,’ Max told
himself, while keeping an eye on the other man.
“We simply can’t allow the differences between our dimensions create an
issue for the whole sector, for our universe! If allowed to go on, this
could result in endless fighting, cruel battles or maybe even a war one
day,” Max uttered without any doubt in his voice. But he knew the
safety of his universe wasn’t his only concern, as a matter of fact.
According to the info the bartender had gotten thanks to his secret
informants, Mahlz's goals were usually obtained using disasters and
assassinations, which seemed to be the easiest way of achieving true
perfection in Mahlz’s mind. Damaging his financial adversaries through
murder or scandal or ruin were the remarkable things Mahlz appreciated
most of all.
Not exactly the alien customer, or person, you would like to deal with,
or stumble into by chance… The thought of the two of them ever to cross
paths again made him feel ill at ease. Besides, he couldn’t ever allow
that one to violate one of this spacebar’s simplest rules: never try to
rob a bartender of his beloved job or take his place and put him out of
business, undoubtedly!
What better option did Max have than to close the door - that
Self-Contained Reality Door - once and for all? ‘Do your best to keep that
passage shut,’ a cunning Max told himself as James moved
away in despair. ‘In
doing so you'll also keep away all those unwelcomed winds and very
troubling whispers that have come to your ears so far’.
What really counted, Max surmised, was that the door of wisdom that lay
in his mind would never be shut, certainly.
THE END
© 2017 Sergio Palumbo
Bio: Sergio Palumbo is an Italian public servant who
graduated from Law School working in the public real estate branch. He
has published a Fantasy RolePlaying illustrated Manual, WarBlades, of
more than 700 pages. Some of his works and short- stories have been
published on American Aphelion Webzine, WeirdYear, Quantum Muse,
Antipodean SF, Schlock!Webzine, SQ Mag, etc.,and in print inside 32
American Horror/Sci-fi/Fantasy/Steampunk Anthologies, 52 British
Horror/Sci-Fi Anthologies, 2 Urban Fantasy/Horror Canadian Anthology
and 1 Sci-Fi Australian Anthology by various publishers, and 22 more to
follow in 2017/2018.
He is also a scale modeler who likes mostly Science
Fiction and Real
Space models, some of his little Dioramas have been shown also on some
Italian (scale model) magazines like Soldatini, Model Time,
TuttoSoldatini and online on American site StarShipModeler,
MechaModelComp, on British SFM: UK site and Italian SMF .
The total list of Sergio's publication credits was
once typed up and
printed in full, whereupon it immediately underwent gravitational
collapse from its own mass, and became a black hole that swallowed
three nearby solar systems...
“Michele Dutcher, aka Bottomdweller, lives in a
carriage house in Old Louisville Kentucky with her border collie –
Daisy Dukes. She has a BS degree in Elementary Education from Indiana
University with minors in theology & sociology and has been
writing Science Fiction stories for about a decade. She edits all the
first drafts of Sergio’s short stories.”
E-mail: Sergio
Palumbo
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