"Hey Avery what are you doing over there?" said Forfast, standing next to the couch in front of the TV. The house didn't have much of decoration yet, as if residents just moved in. Avery at the far end of the room looked a bit worried and replied: "Have you seen my stones?" He was in deep thoughts, trying to wake up and remember his dream. Looking for whatever the stones he has lost, it caused him to be lost in himself. For a moment Forfast felt some kind of emptiness in his mind. Looked back at Avery if he is still busy with his stones.

"I am glad you are here today Avery, it is so nice to have you as a guest and companion.". But he couldn't remember what was the occasion to have him in his house. It is like they were friends long time ago. "Strange, I don't know how did I meet with this guy. The guy who feels like a best friend to me!". Did he have any other friends? Actually, he doesn't remember the day before or last week or any of the past presence. There were some memories, but all were very blurry. His inner voice was asking "Who is this guy, why do I call him Avery? Where is this place? Do I live here?"

He opens the TV, surprised how it is still working with all the dust accumulated on top of it. Boring news on the TV again with one common thing, all channels were focused on a strange scientific discovery. They say now it is possible to bring things into existence!

Huge Step For Mankind

"My dear fellows, this is not a simple achievement in history, since our step is taken towards information!" Until now all the focus was to gather and find patterns in big data collections. Information technology evolved to mean not only to transfer, receive, store or analyze data but also a whole new idea: existence.

Scientists accomplished a way to convert information to existence. It happened during the research project on time travel. While physics were being tested at the limits, they discovered information links between every and each part of the universe. Any alteration made to the link would be transmitted instantly. In a summary report, from the bright mind of Dr. Forfast, says "It looks like the whole existence of the universe is like a giant computer or more like a brain. A brain which experiences by dreaming."

After the week's hard work, Dr. Forfast needed solitude and a party with himself to celebrate the achievement. That day going from work to home, he stopped by the buffet to buy some drinks and chips. "Hey Avery, you know we couldn't make a time travel possible yet but instead now we can bypass time! If we ever wanted something to have happened then we can create it to happen. Memories Avery, memories... If you can play with them you can employ the universe to dream for you. Dreams that are so real."

Avery has been working in the buffet for a year now. At his counter playing with his stones as usual. He looked so fascinated about them as if you could tell he is an archeologist. He was strange, not much talking. Always keeping a low profile. Dr. Forfast liked him because of his isolated life. It is like he keeps himself away from humans, things, ideas or any kind of memory, he is trying to conserve himself. But on the other side with his stones, he is trying to remember. They are his anchors to something. Something that he can not remember but he can not abandon at the same time. Crazy guy. He too needs a drink. "My friend do you have anything to say other than playing with your precious stones?"

"Then you wouldn't know if you have succeeded since this new physics toy may cause loss of events or memories that you can not identify. When memory fades away then there is nobody to remember, and it dies." says Avery.

Waiting for an expected outcome was one thing, but will there be any other results as well that we will not be aware of? Simply because they will be on the dark side of our memories? That also meant bringing things instantly into existence from information, would simply erase some other existing information and it's sub-links. In the old days, we had to consume energy to build things and anything to happen was taking some time. Now he says we need to feed the fire of existence with a replacement. "Also you would not know who or what would be the next target to be deleted." Dr. Forfast was about to burst a hard laugh on his face but managed to cool down. How could he comment on such an advanced field of investigation? People are spending an important part of their lives just to be accepted into this institute. "Anyway Avery, good to hear your voice at the end, you are my favorite, you know right?"

3,2,1...

This is the day of the final experiment. The government was also informed about it. Results will be checked by observing the public effect. At some point, the government didn't think much about ethics because they saw the potential as a weapon. It could be used to manipulate the whole world. So the target was to change the memory of a soccer game result played the day before. If they can make it be remembered as the home team wins instead of loose then the experiment will be considered as successful. Since all the people who watched the game or heard the result will remember only the altered result after the experiment, scientists needed a simple way to know if the memories are really changed. The dilemma is; if they use a control subject who watched the game yesterday, then as soon as the experiment finishes subject's memory supposed to contain the new result. So he can not differentiate before and after. On the other hand, if they use a control subject who didn't watch the game, also he can not be altered because the necessary link would be missing. The simple solution came from one of the assistants. There will be an isolated place with two isolated rooms. In one of the room, there will be one attendant who doesn't know about the game while on the other room there will be another attendant who knew the game result. The trick was to use another information as a barrier which is supposed to stay unaffected by the experiment. There is a soundproof glass wall between two isolated rooms and the subject who knew the game result would lift his left hand if he remembers loose. The subject should periodically think about the game result and if he remembers it as win then he should raise his right hand. So the other peer can detect any memory change. Of course, to protect the intactness of the subject, who didn't know the game result, he was not informed about which hand means win or lose. They trusted the setup. If the information is missing it can not be altered.

Head of the search group announced the count down from 10 back to 0. All the people with sharp white coats didn't hesitate for a moment. It started. Dr. Forfast was coming back from his office a bit hurried. Directly he stood in front of the project leader and said: "I think we need to revise the calculations again. If we condense so much of information on to one point it can start over everything not like that as we know." With the relaxation of hundreds of checks by hundreds of scientists, the leader did not take it seriously. He had to think of not only workers but also investors. The project deadline was already postponed 5 times. It has to be done this time. "Sorry doctor, it is too late to make any kind of theory right now, the process is already initiated." Dr. Forfast slowly turns around and heads to his office not knowing what to do or feel. How did they miss such an obvious mechanism so far? It is like free fall during sleep, it feels so real that when you hit the ground during sleep, you wake up! Same here, it may cause the so-called giant brain to wake up! And nobody knew what would be next.

Just before the silence: "Hey doctor, what is it exactly your findings of wrong calculation?"



THE END



PS: If you are interested in drawing, you can find how to sketch Dr. Forfast in Basic Character Drawing: Dr. Forfast.