A Short Story: Can You Hear Me?
Mark sat in the easy chair, gently smoking his pipe and looking into the empty distance of his living room. A fan was on overhead. Mark had just finished reading a short story and was with apathy trying to inspire a few thoughts about it. Mark's glasses were on the stand beside him, and the living room furniture was a blur. Nothing stood out, and Mark liked it that way.
Nothing except for a dull light that flashed on and off in the corner. Mark turned his head to look at it and put on his glasses. The light was the brass pendulum of an anniversary dome clock as it spun back and forth, catching the sunrise through an open window on the other side of the room. Mark watched it distractedly before returning to his collection of short stories.
Three billion light years away a small, dome shaped creature was thinking into a machine it had just built. The machine could transmit messages across space and time by traversing the strands that held the universe together. The creature had not yet perfected the machine and could not know what part of existence its message would affect in order to make itself heard.
The small, thinking dome knew the machine worked, for it was built on the simplest of principles: that any change in any part of the universe simultaneously affects every other part of the universe. Admittedly, the effects were diffuse, and the machine attempted to focus those effects and produce a noticeable change in one place. The creature was now hoping that something would see or hear or feel its message and reply, but none came.
By an unbelievable coincidence, the creature's language was one of short clicks and longer beeps that coincided to human Morse code, dots, dashes, letters, words--the whole thing, a perfect coincidence. Sitting in his living room, Mark had never learned morse code, almost no one did anymore. Had he, Mark would have been able to translate the dull flashing of the light into a very readable message: Can you hear me?
Mark could not hear his anniversary clock, and because the creature's tampering with space and time had offset the rhythm of its pendulum, the clock was 6.66 minutes behind. Mark arrived late to work that morning and was fired by his boss, whose wife had left him the night before.
Nothing except for a dull light that flashed on and off in the corner. Mark turned his head to look at it and put on his glasses. The light was the brass pendulum of an anniversary dome clock as it spun back and forth, catching the sunrise through an open window on the other side of the room. Mark watched it distractedly before returning to his collection of short stories.
Three billion light years away a small, dome shaped creature was thinking into a machine it had just built. The machine could transmit messages across space and time by traversing the strands that held the universe together. The creature had not yet perfected the machine and could not know what part of existence its message would affect in order to make itself heard.
The small, thinking dome knew the machine worked, for it was built on the simplest of principles: that any change in any part of the universe simultaneously affects every other part of the universe. Admittedly, the effects were diffuse, and the machine attempted to focus those effects and produce a noticeable change in one place. The creature was now hoping that something would see or hear or feel its message and reply, but none came.
By an unbelievable coincidence, the creature's language was one of short clicks and longer beeps that coincided to human Morse code, dots, dashes, letters, words--the whole thing, a perfect coincidence. Sitting in his living room, Mark had never learned morse code, almost no one did anymore. Had he, Mark would have been able to translate the dull flashing of the light into a very readable message: Can you hear me?
Mark could not hear his anniversary clock, and because the creature's tampering with space and time had offset the rhythm of its pendulum, the clock was 6.66 minutes behind. Mark arrived late to work that morning and was fired by his boss, whose wife had left him the night before.