Quarantine

Whoever the collapse made real would mimic my protestations of ignorance. The knowledge must be distributed, like the knowledge in a neural net. No single neuron in my brain embodies any of my skills—so why should I expect any version of me to hold the secrets of my smeared self? And whether the smeared Nick Stavrianos rediscovers the skill anew each time he comes into being, or whether the knowledge survives the collapse, encoded in some ‘hologram’ in my brain, there are no virtual martyrs, no self-sacrificing alter egos who use the mod to give me what I want, at the cost of their own existence.

And my smeared self? He’s no martyr; he has no choice. One way or another, he must always end up collapsed.

Which is not to assume that he must always end up collapsed as me.

Just when the whole business is beginning to seem almost mundane (I want totals of seven… I get totals of seven… what could be simpler than that?), Lui hands me a wad of sealed envelopes.

‘These are lists of one hundred random outcomes. You might try making the dice produce them.’

‘You mean, read through the list as the dice are thrown?’

He shakes his head. ‘What would be the point of that? Consult the list after collecting the data—but before you collapse, of course.’

I baulk at this, instinctively—and fail, four nights running. And the truth is, I’m glad to fail: defiantly, blasphemously, self-righteously fucking joyful—as if my failure implied some kind of reprieve for all the discredited, ‘reasonable’ explanations that I thought I’d stopped clinging to long ago. How can I make the outcomes match, when I don’t even know what they are? Of course I’m failing! It’s just not possible.

At the same time, I know full well that this task is nothing special, nothing new. It no more requires ‘clairvoyance’ than the other experiments required ‘telekinesis’. It’s just a matter of choosing the right eigenstate: of making the right present become the past.

On the fifth night, as before, I note the results in a MindTools scratchpad, then pull an envelope from my pocket at random and tear it open. After the first three matches, I’m sure that the other ninety-seven will agree, but I diligently check them one by one.

I don’t feel the least bit disoriented—or resentful—until after I’ve ticked the OFF switch and collapsed. But then, given the choice, why would I?

Lui gives me a combination padlock and suggests casually, ‘Why not open this on the first try?’

‘By throwing dice?’

‘No. On your own.’

‘Using von Neumann?’

‘No. By guessing.’

I sit in the anteroom, waiting for Po-kwai to fall asleep. I wonder what she dreams about when I borrow the mod; nothing at all, if my smeared self chooses her state correctly… but without waking her and asking her (before collapsing), on what basis does he make that choice?

Maybe versions of me do wake her and ask her.

I deprime, smear, then wait five minutes. I want to be sure that I’ll end up ‘sufficiently smeared’ to operate Ensemble—and it’s far less off-putting to go through all the waiting now, before even attempting the task, than to leave it until I’ve succeeded—and find myself confronting the fact that I have no choice: I can’t, I won’t, collapse too soon.

The whole question of the timing of the collapse still unsettles me. Po-kwai has it easy; she’s given no choice. In my case, there must be eigenstates in which I choose to collapse earlier, or later, than I do in the state that’s finally made real. These attempts are inconsequential, of course; the collapse is only real if it makes itself real. That sounds uncomfortably circular, but at least it’s consistent: the entire wave collapses precisely when the chosen state includes the action which brings that about. Or rather, it’s consistent from the point of view of the version who becomes real—but what about the versions who attempt to collapse, and fail? Do they know that they’ve failed—and what that means? Or are they just mathematical abstractions who know nothing, feel nothing, experience nothing?

I take the padlock from my pocket and stare at it with increasing unease. People are notoriously bad at inventing truly random numbers; I wish I’d decided—before smearing—to ignore Lui, and use the dice. What if the combination is 9999999999? Or 0123456789? I have no doubt that it’s physically possible for me to hit the keys in any order whatsoever—but am I psychologically capable of ‘guessing’ such a ‘non-random’ sequence?

Well, I’d better be. Because if I’m not, I’m sure my smeared self—with the help of Ensemble—can find someone else who is.

I laugh that off. Change equals suicide? That’s Po-Kwai’s line, not mine. Besides, surely it’s too late for such qualms; if nothing’s real until the collapse, then surely I’ve ‘already’ collapsed. This whole experience has already been selected—and I’ve already become whoever I have to become in order to open the lock. And it doesn’t feel like much of a change to me.

But as I move my index finger towards the keypad, I suffer a sudden shift of perspective:

I’m one of at least ten billion people, sitting in at least ten billion rooms, confronting at least ten billion locks. If I guess the correct combination, I live. If not, I die. It’s as simple as that.

What makes me think that I have ‘already’ succeeded? The fact that the room looks normal? The fact that I’m experiencing anything at all? If the collapse doesn’t manufacture experience—if it merely selects it—then why should the perceptions of any one version of me be radically different from the others? Why should the state that happens to become real be the only one that seems real?

I start to put the lock down—nobody’s forcing me to go through with this—but then I think: That’s the very worst thing I can do. My smeared self is going to choose someone who opens the lock, not someone who abandons the whole experiment. If I give up, my chances of surviving are zero.

I stare at the lock, and try to psych myself out of these absurd fears. I’ve smeared before, and come through. Yes, of course I have—or I wouldn’t be here at all. That says nothing about my situation now. I shake my head. This is ludicrous. Everybody collapses. What do I think—everyday life is founded on a process of constant genocide? If I couldn’t swallow that for hypothetical aliens, why should I swallow it for human beings?

Hypothetical aliens? Who do I think made The Bubble?

So… what am I going to do? Sit here and wait for Lee to turn up and take the decision out of my hands? Or do I plan to find a way to spend the rest of my life unobserved? But even that wouldn’t save me: when the chosen version of me chooses to collapse, I’ll vanish—unless I am the chosen version… and the odds against that are worse than ten billion to one.

I don’t know what breaks the spell, but suddenly—mercifully—I’m sceptical again. Part of me muses: // quadrillions of virtual humans really are dying every second, then death is nothing to fear. It’s a purely intellectual observation, though; I don’t believe I’m going to die. I raise the lock and hit ten keys without thinking, almost without looking, then I stare at the tiny display above the keypad: 1450045409.

Too orderly? Too random?

Too late. I tug the ring.

Lui stands by the central pond in KowloonPark, throwing bread to the ducks. I think he’s seen too many bad spy movies. He doesn’t even glance my way when I’m standing right beside him.

I say, ‘There’s not much point pretending you don’t know me; I think our employer might already be aware of the fact.’ He ignores that. ‘What happened last night?’

‘Success.’

‘On the first try?’

‘Yes, on the first try. ‘ I glance down at the pond, and try to decide if I want to kill him or embrace him.

After a moment, I say, ‘It was a good idea. The padlock. It was torture—for five minutes—but I have to admit that in the end it was worth it.’ I laugh, or I try to—it doesn’t sound at all convincing. ‘I tell you, when that fucking thing sprang open, I’d never been so happy in my life. I almost died from sheer relief. And… there’s no logic