“Welcome to HIGH!!!! I’m Hilbert, and this is my Infinitely Grand Hotel!!!” A five-foot tall stick figure with an orange glow about him was standing in the middle of the turquoise field, waving at his new guests--a human in a silver spacesuit and a hothead in dark purple attire. The orange building in the middle of the blank white space beyond made these three out-of-place figures seem normal. “Aahhh, I see! You guys aren’t dead consciousnesses! You’re a Hole and a Sponsored Being! Well then, I suppose you have business here, then, yes? Has an Infin sent for you? Or The Boss? Or The Narrator? Or…” “No, Hilbert, no one sent for us,” grunted Lord Flare. “We’re here for a little vacation, right, Dr. Athena?” “Uhhh… yes! Yes, we’re here for a little vacation!” Hilbert just grinned and said, “Okay, good! Just make sure you don’t stay too long! Otherwise, the other Infins might get cranky and kick you out!” Suddenly, a red lever popped out of the ground and Hilbert pulled it with his stick-figure hands. The entire turquoise planet they were on suddenly zipped towards the orange cylindrical building, revealing more intricate details on the building such as myriads of windows, clouds labeled “HIGH” circling it, random signposts, and huge wormholes every few miles of building. “How long is this building?” asked a bewildered Dr. Athena. “Oh, just infinitely long. It’s a Tipler Cylinder!” “Wait, doesn’t that mean that we should be traveling back in time by being around it? I don’t see it rotating, either.” “Oh, not that kind of Tipler Cylinder! When I say ‘Tipler Cylinder,’ I mean an infinitely long cylindrical building built by my homie, Tipler! Just like if it were built by my other homie, Koch, it would be called a ‘Koch Cylinder!’” “How exactly did you guys build this place? And why is it that it’s named after you if some person named Tipler built it?” “Silly Hole, we’re not people, we’re Infins! And it’s my hotel because I bought it off of Tipler, fresh after zher birth! For a few billion spare Universes, yes, but it was fun. How was it built? You can ask Tipler or Koch that, they’re the experts. I’m just the owner of this hotel by name.” A shocked Dr. Athena just stared at Hilbert as their turquoise world stopped in front of a gargantuan wormhole on the building, with bridges sticking out of it. One of these bridges conveniently hit their side of the planet, extending out in front of the three. “Ta-Ta, now! Make sure to make your trip short! I don’t want to fill out tons of paperwork!” Lord Flare grabbed a stunned Dr. Athena by the arm and they went onto the carbon nanotube bridge, heading toward a larger-than-life wormhole while Hilbert and zher turquoise planet shot away into the distant blankness of their reality. “Ow, hey, why did you just--” They stopped in front of the wormhole and Lord Flare grabbed hold of both Dr. Athena’s shoulders. In a very serious tone, he whispered, “Listen. We do not have time for chit-chat here. Hilbert is a very mellow Infin--zhe and zher two ‘homies’ are quite possibly the only Infins I actually like, they’re the only ones that actually treat the sentient beings within them humanely--but if we remain around here for too long, the other Infins will get agitated. And after all I’ve done, we could risk them resetting the game again!” “But why would you take me here, then? And how in the Multiverse is it that an Infin can be that normal-sized? I thought you said they were the size of multiverses themselves!” “I’m taking you here because I’ve been here many, many, many times before, and have an excellent grasp of what areas to avoid, how long we can stay, and how to curb any Infins we happen to meet. The potential benefits outweigh the potential negatives. Already, you have received some confirmation that I was telling you the truth earlier from Hilbert. And as for how Infins can be that small, they just can. Each one has the power of a multiverse. They can compress themselves if they want. They can appear in any form they want. Now, let us proceed, shall we?” The two walked into the portal, effectively entering HIGH--Hilbert’s Infinitely Grand Hotel. … “ROAAAAARRRR!!!!!” “Hello, sorry I bumped into you, do you mind--” “Ho-ho-ho, I’m Santa Claus!” “Welcome aboard the ISS!” “Who am I?” All around her, there were people running, walking, standing, sitting, and even rocking back and forth. Some of these disembodied consciousnesses were more sane than others. “Dr. Athena, don’t mind all these beings running around here and there. There’s a near-infinite number of undead consciousnesses in here. Grab my hand, let me take you somewhere where there’s fewer people--” “HEY YOU!!!!!!!! I REMEMBER YOU!!!!! YOU KILLED ME!!!!! AND I DEDICATED MY WHOLE LIFE TO SERVING YOU!!!!!” They stopped short. Suddenly, all of the random aliens ran off into the many doors to the side in fear, leaving the two in a wide rainbow hallway face-to-face with a tall Hothead with yellow inner flames, red outer flames, two long three-fingered flame hands and two long flame feet. He was floating in the air, and he looked really angry. Lord Flare just smirked. “Flareo, I do not have time for this. Move out of the way.” Dr. Athena asked, “Who is this guy? Why does he have flame feet instead of boulder feet? And you killed him?” Lord Flare just sighed. “This is Flareo. He’s one of the Sponsored Beings, sponsored by Infinichange. He got lucky and got the Hole Piece that makes him able to reincarnate, so all of his dead consciousnesses--like the one right here--end up at HIGH while only one of him is down in the Multiverse. Why does he have fiery feet? Because he’s--” “THE FIRST HOTHEAD TO EVER EXIST!!!! YEAH, I ROCK!!!! WOO-HOO!!!!! I’M AWESOME!!!!! HEY, YOU FORGOT TO MENTION HOW YOU ESSENTIALLY RAISED ME, THEN FORCED ME TO BE ONE OF YOUR FOUR COMMANDING GENERALS, THEN KILLED ME WHEN YOUR EMPIRE COLLAPSED!!!” Lord Flare just sighed. “Why do you care? You got reborn anyway. In a much better form, I may add. All you are is a memory--a lost memory of whatever version of Flareo is in the Multiverse right now, being the standard arrogant individual he is.” Flareo just shouted, “YOU DARE CALL ME ARROGANT!!!! I WILL PERSONALLY--” “Flareo, what do you think of the Infins?” Flareo blinked. Then he shouted, “I DON’T CARE ABOUT THE INFINS!!! I’LL BLAST THEM OUT OF THE WAY!!! THEY ARE NOTHING TO ME!!! I AM THE MOST POWERFUL BEING IN THE MULTIVERSE, AND I WILL HAVE MY REVENGE BY TEARING YOU TO BITS!!!” Lord Flare turned to Dr. Athena and told her, “As you can fairly see, Flareo is an overconfident, excessively stupid, rash, aggressive, complaining, privileged brat. Anyone with the least bit of common sense knows that the Infins cannot just be ‘blasted out of the way.’ Nor can I easily be ‘torn to bits.’ To Flareo’s credit, though, he has obliterated plenty of planets with his bare hands in his day. Not nearly as many as Darkness has, though.” “THAT’S IT!!!! I’M GONNA--” Lord Flare opened the nearest door, took Dr. Athena’s hand, and got them both into the room, closing the door as Flareo blasted flames all over the hallway. They were in a strange, emerald room, filled with water bottles chattering everything they knew about Holes, some of which confirmed what Lord Flare had said earlier, and some of which was completely new: “Thel, Wizel, Orakel, Morel, Eurtcel, Zilchel, Krinfiel, Infinitel, Acel, Hel!” “All the ten Holes, in one whole list!” “Except Thel is just the official name of the Hole of Everything,” “Eurtcel is Lectrue backwards! Did you notice!” “Hey, ho! All those Holes always bickering. Did you hear, every Hole hates the guts out of at least two other Holes?” “Wow… why is that?” “Who cares! Anyways, they’re too divided to ever team up against the Infins! Let’s talk about dinosaurs now!” “Okay!” “This way!” screeched Lord Flare as he led Dr. Athena to another door, this one labeled, “Infinite Library.” They found themselves coming out of a wormhole into a place filled with infinitely long and infinitely tall bookshelves, stretching for infinity. “This here is the Infinite Library. It contains every single possible book ever written or that ever will be written. The only downside, however, is that since the vast majority of books possible contain nothing but nonsense combinations of letters, it’s practically impossible to find any book of value here. Unless, of course, you’re friends with the manager here. Which I am.” If one were to study the inner workings of the library, one would find that the books were just segments of the number Pi, translated into words and images. The infinite, non-repeating constant holds all the answers of existence, in every language, if one is willing to sift through a lot of nonsense. Dr. Athena, however, was in no mood to even comprehend what was going on anymore. She had encountered a flaming monster, some talking water bottles that said how the Holes were always bickering and hated each other’s guts, and now some infinite library. She had millions of questions bubbling in her mind, but no idea which one to ask first. She was frustrated, however, that Lord Flare seemed to be taking her through this “hotel”--more like a place of pure madness, to her--randomly, to random people and places just to confirm that what he had told her back at Flare Castle was 100% accurate. “FINE! I BELIEVE EVERY WORD YOU SAID BACK AT YOUR CASTLE! NOW TAKE ME OUT OF THIS CRAZY--” “Dr. Athena, I would like you to meet someone.” Suddenly, a strange, pale blue humanoid being with five long tentacles and two large arms popped out of nowhere. Zhe had purple rectangular glasses on and purple orbs all over zher body, each one connected to the ones next to it with an indigo line. Each of the tentacles ended in a wormhole, bringing it across the entire library, as if this being needed to be everywhere at once. “Hello, once again, Lucas Flare! Long time no see! Remember me, The Narrator!” Lord Flare mockingly replied, “Yes, ‘The Narrator,’ I remember you. How can I forget the being who nearly caused my IMMINENT DEATH AT THE HANDS OF THE BOSS WHEN I WAS A CHILD, SCARRING ME FOREVER?” The Narrator did not seem to notice this hostile tone. “Oh, relax, you survived your Infinichess Game with The Boss just fine! You saved my career! I owe you forever for that--” “HECK YES, YOU DO!!!! Now, if you would be so kind, may I check out a book? A book titled, er, what was the title, again?” Lord Flare put a finger on his black sunglasses and scanned over a long list of book titles on his virtual reality interface, until he finally came across the one he was looking for. He smiled, took a deep breath, and said, “I would like to order the… errr… I’ve got to be real specific, don’t I? The completely-in-English-completely-consistent-for-every-Universal-timeline-Acel-will-ever-visit-completely-100%-true-non-technical-easy-to-understand-non-superfluous-non-pathogen-filled-same-size-as-the-last-book-Acel-read-book-with-everything-anyone-can-possibly-need-to-know-about-Holes-and-Infins-and-Sponsored-Beings-and-the-Multiverse-that-is-perfectly-legal-and-that-will-go-perfectly-with-my-current-plan-and…” Lord Flare spent about ten minutes going on about intensely detailed specifics about the book he wanted, leaving Dr. Athena to browse the shelves, finding nothing but books with gibberish titles on them, from “Acxbe” to”gadradradradradr”--and this was only a fraction of one shelf. Finally, Lord Flare was finished, and The Narrator yelled, “Alright, Lucas! Just remember--don’t let the Infins know, or they’ll try to fire me again!” The Narrator flew off, and returned with a sparkly white book titled, “The Mez: A Beginner’s Guide” and handed it to Lord Flare, who in turn gave it to Dr. Athena. Lord Flare sighed and said, “This book should in theory give you all the information you need to catch up on for the time being. You can keep it--” The Narrator confusingly interjected, “Wait--you’re going to hand it to someone else? Why--” Lord Flare ignored the now heavily sweating Narrator, who was panicking about getting fired again, and continued, “--but make sure you do not lose it. If this book falls into the wrong hands--well, this edition is the one where no one but you can read it, but just in case… just don’t let it fall into the wrong hands, okay? Otherwise, The Narrator over here will be all over me, pleading for me to beat The Boss at another traumatizing game of Infinichess again. I barely won the first time--and that was by sheer luck--and I will be forced to play that stupid game again if The Narrator calls on me to help zher not get fired again. I don’t want to deal with it, so just don’t lose it. Understand?” Dr. Athena simply nodded, but replied, “So this book is the only reason why we came here?” Lord Flare shrugged. “What did you think we were going to do, go to the Afterlife Resort and party in a pool of infinite possibilities all day? Let’s leave already.” And with that, they left the Infinite Library, with The Narrator biting zher nails, muttering about how everything was going to end horribly for zher if the Infins knew zhe had given away that book… … A graying Aerstron Mill was halfway through his list. He looked grudgingly at the place he knew Dr. Athena might be, but he wished she wasn’t. Hilbert’s Infinitely Grand Hotel. And the only way Aerstron knew to get there was to die. If she was dead, it might be difficult or even impossible to locate and recover what was left of her consciousness in HIGH. Mill looked down at his hands. A hundred years of time travel had begun to take its toll on both his body and mind. His skin now glowed faintly orange, and his hair whisped through the air as if there was a fan continuously blowing on it. His body had begun storing tremendous amounts of energy while moving through time at such high speeds. He had barely begun to understand the effects of time travel on his physiology. But he understood the psychological impacts it was having as well as he did quantum mechanics. The energy was interfering with the functionality of his neurons. Causing them to fire randomly, resulting in strange behavior and random thoughts. He was slipping more and more. At first it began with an occasional outburst of unexplained giddyness, but within a few years he was having violent outbursts of irrational madness. He learned not to fight the fits, but use them to his benefit. He had thought of some of his most amazing equations and inventions during the times he was in their clutches. The Forebearer glided in gently toward the massive orange tube. Aerstron sighed as he looked toward it. … As Dr. Athena and Lord Flare roamed the halls again, toward the exit of the hotel, dodging monkeys on typewriters and random screaming spherical creatures, Dr. Athena stopped and squinted her eyes. Lord Flare turned around and was about to say, “Why did you stop?” when a huge, white-hot column of flame blasted him all the way through a wall, into some other room. Flareo dashed over and yelled, “GOT YOU!!!” as he followed Lord Flare into the room. But Dr. Athena completely forgot about Lord Flare. It was impossible… purely impossible… Standing right by the enormous wormhole that led outside was Aerstron Mill. She immediately ran up to him and screeched, “HOW DID YOU GET HERE? ARE YOU DEAD? WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU!?” “I’m not dead! Are you? I’ve been looking for you for a long time. I’ve found you so many times, but it has always been the wrong time. Tell me, what is the last interaction you can remember having with me?” Aerstron smiled and let loose his familiar laugh. Dr. Athena breathed a sigh of relief and declared, “No, I’m not dead either. When have we last interacted? Oh, it was back in that one taxicab in Weirdo Drinc Universe--” Aerstron scooped Dr. Athena up into a hug with one swift move. “I’ve finally found the right you! Let me tell you, you are going to have some fun times. Ah, but no spoilers! I have so much to tell you, as well as some messages from you.” He did not notice that he was losing control over the pent-up energy stored in his body, and Dr. Athena’s space suit began to heat up. “Err… why is my suit heating up? Hold on--” She looked at the cover of the book she had received and saw on the bottom a special note: “Voice-activated search engine.” “Err… Mez, show me how to learn how to use my Hole powers or whatever to survive without this spacesuit!” Suddenly, the pages flipped over to page 1003, where it read, “Just close your eyes and pretend that you are invincible.” That’s not very helpful, she thought, but then she just shrugged and said, “May as well.” She closed her eyes and removed the suit, revealing her standard lab coat and jeans underneath. “I’m invincible, I’m invincible, I’m invincible, I’m invincible,” she kept on muttering to herself, apparently ignoring the fact that Aerstron Mill was standing in front of her, shocked that she had just removed what was essentially her life support system in this alien environment and was STILL ALIVE. Dr. Athena opened her eyes and tried acting calmly. “O-kay,” she said, “That was...weird. So this book really does work. Meaning… Lord Flare actually was telling the truth all along. Hmmm… Strange how that worked.” As if she were noticing Aerstron’s presence for the first time, she said, “I have lots to explain. First, let’s leave this place before the Infins find out we’re here. Do you have a ship, or something?” “Do I have a ship?” Mill let out another hearty laugh. “Come on, I think you will want to see this.” He lead her through the enormous wormhole and to the end of a large bridge. “Now tell me, what do you see?” Dr. Athena was clueless. All she could see was empty space past the end of the bridge. Without warning, Mill took a step off the edge and disappeared from sight. Dr. Athena screamed. But just as her scream trailed off, Aerstron’s head popped back into view. “Tricked you!” He said, eerily reminding her of Weirdo Drinc. He then proceeded to take her by the hand and pull her over the edge as well. Dr. Athena found herself within a massive antechamber, full of all sorts of plants and streams, complete with a miniature ultraviolet sun burning near the ceiling far above. “And this is only a very, very small portion of my ship! Lets walk around for a little bit and talk,” Mill replied with a small smile. Dr. Athena returned the smile and replied, “Certainly. We have tons to discuss!” Then she suddenly remembered Lord Flare, who had practically gave her a free ticket to all sorts of power by going to all the trouble of teaching her about what was going on with the Multiverse and getting her this book… the book she was holding in her hands...the book titled: “The Mez: A Beginner’s Guide.” She bit her lip. She would hate to leave Lord Flare alone in the hotel… then again, he knew how to escape...he was probably getting mauled by Flareo right now… But Aerstron wasn’t worried about Flare. He knew that right now, outside the ship, Flare was frozen in time, about to connect a nasty left hook with Flareo’s jaw. He smiled at his old friend’s tenacity. Ah, he’ll be fine, Dr. Athena thought--quite possibly the most sinister thought she had ever had in her life. She still remembered that Lord Flare was in the process of obliterating multiple versions of Earth...but then again, to prevent a Game Reset, which would be much, much worse if it were ever to happen… what a paradoxical character, this Lord Flare was… She decided to forget about Lord Flare and grabbed ahold of Mill’s hand, and they both walked off, exploring both the ship and their adventures… TO BE CONTINUED… ~Lord Fell-caller ~Pentachorus
Posted on: Fri, 11 Jul 2014 07:21:20 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015