Other Worlds Than These

“I know. Everything possible has to happen.” The gym bag is set between his feet. Staring at the worn plastic handles, he says, “Right now, a trillion Josh Thorngates are handing their gifts to you. We’re identical to each other, right down to the Heisenberg level. Our gifts are the same. The only difference is that in these other universes, some bug near Alpha Centauri runs right, not left…or a photon from some faraway quasar goes unseen… or some tiny bullshit like that…”

Josh hesitates, for an instant. “So what are the odds?” His expression is serious. Determined. “If you have a random trillion entities with my genotype. Named Josh, or not. From this Earth, or somewhere else. What are the odds that just one of them is going to see this stupid-ass poem?”

“That is a fine question,” the Authority replies.

Josh almost grins. “Thank you. I guess.”

“Three gifts. If you please.”

“Aren’t you going to give an answer?”

“No.”

The grin dissolves into a grimace. With a practiced formality, Josh sets the three items on the surface of the ocean, watching them sink and vanish. But the Authority remains silent for longer than usual, prompting Josh to ask, for the first time, “Are they unique enough?”

“Enough,” is the verdict.

“Give me a journal,” Josh says. “I want a very specific journal.”

“Such as?”

“From a world where I’m the last living human.”

A moment later, a drab brown journal falls from the first make-portal, bringing with it the scent of fire and rot.

Grabbing the prize, he says, “And now, another journal. From a world where I’m the very first human being.“

The second portal opens. Another volume falls to the floor. In every way, it is the same as the first: the same brown cover, the same stink of decay and heat, and inside, the same handwritten words translated into Josh’s language.

The surprise freezes him. But aren’t there stories about this sort of coincidence, or joke…or whatever you want to call it…?

“What else?” the Authority asks.

Then after a quiet moment, it says, “Josh.” It says, “What else would you like today, Josh?”

He snorts and shakes his head. “A digital,” he manages, sticking to his original script. “I’m the last human male on Earth, and all of the surviving women have to come to me for sex—”

The disc hits the floor, rolls until it collides with his gym bag, and then falls onto its back.

He doesn’t pick up the disc. Instead, with a low, wary voice, he asks, “Who built you?”

“Everyone built me,” the voice replies. “Everyone builds me now.”

“But who started you? Who built your foundation?” Josh presses, asking, “Do you know? What world, and what people, began piecing you together?”

Silence.

“I mean, it must have been ages ago, and a very advanced world.”

“Unless I am lying,” the Authority warns, “and nobody built me.”

Josh flinches.

“You should ask your other question again,” the voice recommends.

Eyes wide, Josh begins to open his mouth.

“Not that I will supply any answers,” the Authority interrupts. “But you should pose the question. ‘How likely is it that I will be noticed?’ Ask, ask, ask, and perhaps something good will come from that wondering.”

“You are to be the future,” they tell me.

But there is no future.

“The scourge doesn’t know your tissue, your taste,” they explain to me. “We made you so that we could cross with you. Our offspring will acquire your immunities, and you will father an entirely new species. Beginning now.”

But the scourge spreads faster than anticipated, and when it doesn’t kill, it drives its victims insane. Even now, the mob runs like rivers in the street. Even here, inside this armored laboratory, I can smell the fires as the city burns—

“Time is short,” they admit.

I spend my days squirting my unique stuff into important little bottles.

“Time is very short,” she moans.

She is small and thick and smells like an animal. With my eyes shut and my nose wrapped in a towel, I crawl on top of her, and push, and pump, and in my head, I try to imagine any creature more desirable than this…

What begins with an intoxicating, addictive joy can eventually grow stale. Imagination carries the soul only so far. More than you realize, you tend to make the same basic requests of the Authority: to see versions of yourself dressed in power, fame, and incandescent wealth. And to balance that equation, you occasionally glance at yourself in the throes of misery and despair. Sometimes, this is enough. You never ask for more. But sometimes, after ten years, or a thousand, your capacity to learn and feel astonished has become noticeably dulled. Gradually, inexorably, that sweet initial thrill fades into a soft emotional hum. Then your only obvious choice is to cast an even larger net. You want to see yourself, you tell the Authority. Except that you spell out an important change or two. Little alterations—a stitch here and a tuck there—all buried in your otherwise equal genetics.

No matter how brilliant or wise, every male inevitably asks to see how his life would have progressed with a larger, more talented penis.

While females always hunger for greater beauty.

Many, many times, this is where it ends. You never progress past a diet of simple what-ifs and prurient eavesdropping. Then the rest of your narrow existence is spent sitting at home, watching digitals or immersions where gigantic or perfectly gorgeous versions of yourself share their days with equally spectacular specimens.

They could be married. They often joke that they are husband and wife in every universe, except for this one. Pauline is pretty, and she is sexually creative, and she absolutely adores Josh. And Josh worships her. Isn’t it astonishing that they found one another? Two people so perfectly meshed… it’s a rare blessing in any age…! Their friends and siblings aren’t nearly as lucky, they realize. Time after time, they find themselves taking bleak comfort from the divorces and other, larger tragedies that afflict those around them. Josh has been with Pauline for ten years, and in another ten or fifteen years they will start their family. That’s the plan. The inevitability. Another decade spent as the golden couple, and then they will gladly move to their next joyous stage.

They always visit the Authority together. Two avid users, they first met in the waiting room, Josh leaving just as Pauline came inside. Of course they still use separate rooms. Only an official attendant can enter with a client. But afterwards, they always share their new treasures with each other. Josh likes to collect digitals showing alternate incarnations of them as a couple. Sexual interludes. Weddings. Babies born. Or graceful double funerals at the end of happy shared lives. On this particular day, he requests two digitals: Pauline’s birthday is next week, and he wants a celebration from a highly advanced world—a place where people never age and his love has turned a robust and youthful one million years old. The other digital comes from what might be an even stranger reality— where Pauline is a queen, the ruler of a decidedly alien world, and Josh is the ignorant peasant boy who has been brought in to serve the queen’s not-so-delicate needs.

“And your third request?” the Authority presses.

“The Divine One,” says Josh. “I want an undated journal from Him.”

The despot has always intrigued him. Every year, without fail, Josh allows himself another little taste of that spoiled, silly god.

With a thump, the last item hits the floor.

Josh reads the first line. “NO NO NO, LIAR, NO!” He laughs, puzzled and a little thrilled. Then with the digitals in his pockets and the journal in his bag, he leaves, stepping out into the hallway to find Pauline waiting for