III—The Lord of the Near and the Nigh
“What did Migdal and the other scientists seek in their well of Babel?”
“The elemental particle of the Standard Model of particle physics.”
“…”
“…”
“They would have to reinvent the Universe.”
“They did. Well, in a way.”
“They would have to make a universe. Any universe. Make apple pie.”
Estela knocked on the door as though she wanted to tear it down. Her hair was uncombed; she sweated. I offered her coffee, which she swallowed in gulps as I watched in silence her trembling hands. At last, she confided in me that she had had a horrible dream: Monsters with the heads of snakes walked towards the house of Doña Iluminada, her friend; they played flutes that looked like phalluses, but moved like the tentacles of a squid.
I tried to calm her down. I told her that it was just a dream, that she need not worry, that we were all uneasy, due to the electrical failures and the telephone grid, which was now inaccessible. But Estela interrupted me and said, “No, my child, it’s not that. It’s just that, this morning, I went to visit my friend, Iluminada, since there’s no phone. When I was about to turn the corner at Donceles and República de Argentina, I heard a music that gave me goosebumps and I remembered the dream. I approached slowly, to see where it came from, but the ones playing were not monsters, no. They were my friend, Jacinto, and his children. Imagine: My godson walked as if possessed, as if he could see something that was not there. I ran to my friend’s house to see what was happening and I found her very calm, making tamales. She told me they were for the Tloque Nahuaque, because he supposedly came to our world, thanks to the scientists in Europe that had found his nature. She also told me other insanities, like, she wanted to go to the pyramid of the Templo Mayor to adore the spheres of the beginning, or something weird like that. How can I not be afraid? She is my friend and she is going insane, my child. Who will look after my godson if Jacinto is also wrong in the head?”
Doña Iluminada had lived for more than thirty years just a few metres from Templo Mayor in the centre of the city, but she had never visited it; Estela assures me that her friend had not heard of the experiments made inside the particle accelerator until there was talk of an accident, and that this might have caused the electricity and communication problems. Nevertheless, she prepared tamales and thanked the subterranean discoveries, for she believed that what had happened in Europe was not a tragedy but a wonderful encounter with what had been long sought after.
“One time, I asked Migdal if there existed the possibility that, following the theory of the multiverse, we were always in a branch where the Higgs does not exist. He asked me to take out my gun and find out.
“Migdal did not believe that the probabilities would ramify to create many worlds. He would say particles exist in all their possible states at the same time, but that, when we interacted with them, they would be forced to choose one possibility, the one we would finally observe.
“What would happen if one particle would not respond to either of the two theories? What would happen if it would exist in all its possible states and, like this, we observed it? What if, also, it multiplied to be in infinite universes?
“You’d have to make apple pie.”
Estela explained to me that Tloque Nahuaque, the Lord of the Near and the Nigh, had been to the Aztecs the Master of the Near and the Far, for they believed he is near all things and all things are near him. They had given him many names and representations, such as ‘Tezcatlipoca’ or ‘Ométeotl’; however, his greatness was such that there is no single word that will contain him, for he is in everything.
IV—The Higgs Boson
Imagine the origin, the primordial chaos, the instant in which none of the primogenial particles had mass. He, who shines in all instants and in all times, manifests, touches the chosen, and provides them with mass. That is how everything begins.
Imagine your weightless flight, Migdal. Now look at the monitor and see the results of the test. You found it.
“The Tloque Nahuaque can also revive the dead, my friend. It’s so good that you came to help me with the tamales,” said Doña Iluminada, as Estela amassed the dough in a strange state of disturbance: The meat which would be used to prepare the dish for the god was none other than that of her godson.
“They say He demands sacrifices now that he has given us knowledge of his nature, miss. Carlos Guarda, a university teacher, came to see us and said the Higgs (He calls him like that) has shown us already how the universe began, that we should thank his wisdom. That is why we will deliver him Danielito,” Mr. Jacinto said as he played with a wooden flute and continued: “Carlos Guarda told us we should let him drop from a very high place, so he could achieve terminal velocity (God knows what that is), but the steps of the Templo Mayor are broken and the highest we have is the roof. That is why my wife thought we should make more tamales, so the Tloque Nahuaque does not get mad.”
V—The N-Sphere
The last report from Migdal was confusing. He talked about iridescent spheres and the representation of a being of four dimensions in our space of three, how it is possible to draw a sphere on paper because the tridimensional figure can be sliced to form circles. “Our tridimensional universe is immersed in a sphere of four dimensions and, at the same time, in another more complex. Until infinity,” the document reads. “That is why He can manifest in this space, but remain outside of it; be in all points and instants, touch a particle, give it mass, create and recreate the Universe.”
The electricity fails more and more. Slowly, I adapt to the idea that we might never again have telephone service or an Internet connection. All I know of Europe and the particle accelerator is that they lost contact with the surface and the efforts to descend are useless. The rest is speculation. I’ve learned of many suicides and violent deaths. Estela says that they are sacrifices to the Tloque Nahuaque, as they call him in Mexico City, but that, in every town, he has a different name. “There is no word that can contain him, my child. He, inside and outside the world, sees everything and knows everything. It is impossible to distance oneself.”
Somebody bakes apple pie.
DOLLY IN THE WINDOW
By Robyn Seale
Robyn Seale was born in 19-diggity-7, at a time when the nation briefly outlawed the 8. After short periods called “childhood” and “college”, she created a Lovecraftian webcomic, and illustrated a number of print comics. She lives somewhere in the Midwest, where she hopes Dagon will be summoned on a flood plain to help explain the number of bait/tackle-shop-and-restaurant combo businesses.
HEY. NEW GIRL. Im Joelle. Welcome to the Nabrinious official Orphan Asylum Fer Girls. Lemme be the first to welcome ya. As you can see here, youll be bunkin in this gurgeous, six-by-eight room with me, your lovely host. Whats yer name?