config.body.transition.name: 'fadeInOut' config.body.transition.duration: '300ms' config.style.page.style: 'none' config.footer.left: '{restart link}' config.footer.right: '' -- [align right] # Double [[Start->Start Right]]You wake up in a hospital room with no memory of how you got there. The room's empty. Through the [[only window->Window]], you see the sky. Rationally, you should be panicking right now, but somehow, you feel calm. Part of you *knows* you're supposed to be in this room, even if you don't know why. There's two tables: [[one by your bed->Bedside]] and [[one across the room->Round]]. A [[closed door->Door]] leads outside the room.There's a window to your right that shows the sky. Upon closer inspection, it's not an actual window: it's a screen showing a picture of the sky. Realistic, but not real. {back link}On the bedside table is a clipboard with your personal information. Your height, weight, eye color, name. The data makes sense, but you don't recognize the name written on the clipboard. Was that supposed to be you? {back link}There's a round table across your bed. On it is a chessboard with metal pieces, all set up, ready for a game. You don't remember much, but you remember how to play chess, at least. {back link}The door is solid and white. You open the door to see a nurse standing on the other side. "I see you're awake," he says. [["Who are you? Why am I here?"->Door 2]]"Who are you? Why am I here?" "I'll explain everything in a second." The nurse walks to the round table. "Do you want to play a game?" You turn around and slowly walk to the table. The nurse gestures on either side of the board, offering you your choice of color. [["I'll take black, then."->Chess]]"I'll take black, then," you say before seating yourself. The nurse opens with e4. "What do you remember?" the nurse asks. You respond with e5. "I remember that I was a college student," you say. "I'm in my fourth year, studying physics. I remember applying for grad school. I remember how to play chess." The nurse responds with d4. [["But I don't remember my name."->Chess 2]]"But I don't remember my name," you continue. "I don't remember anything I've studied. I don't remember [[any family]] or friends." You respond with exd4. "Do you remember anything else?" he asks. "Anything at all?" "Let me guess," you say. "This is some sort of experiment, right?" The nurse responds with c3. "Yes," the nurse says. He produces a [[sheet of paper->Chess 3]] from his uniform and places it in front of you.Running through the word *family* over your head feels like it hits a bump. *Family.* You think again. *Family.* You feel like you could start remembering something if you probed your memory harder, but you're afraid of what you might discover. {back link}It's a contract. It's signed by the same name in the clipboard. You take the contract and scan it. You read that you… or whoever this person is… has signed off most of their memories for the duration of the study. "We're testing one particular interpretation of the many-worlds theory," the nurse says. "Do you remember at least that?" [["I do."->Chess 4]]"I do," you say, "but what about the many-worlds theory?" You respond with dxc3. "In the current chess position, I have a choice," he says. "I could capture your pawn with the b-pawn, or with my knight. Or I could move bishop to c4, another standard move. You'd have to anticipate all scenarios and analyze accordingly, right?" [[The nurse touches his knight.->Chess 5]]The nurse touches his knight and responds with Nxc3, [[capturing the pawn->Pawn capture]]. "I don't see where you're going with this," you say. The nurse gestures for you to respond. [[You move your bishop to c5.->Chess 6]]The Danish Gambit. You don't remember how you learned it. It's an antiquated opening, rarely played in top-level chess. You accepted the gambit as presented, because you think you can convert the material advantage to a win. Where did you learn that? Chess club, probably. {back link}You move your bishop to c5. "Come," says the nurse. He stands up and gestures for you to follow. "Let's take a walk outside." [[You stand up to follow.->Outside 1]]You follow him to an empty hallway, with several identical doors on either side, leading to an elevator at the end. The nurse leads you to the elevator and presses the button in the front panel. You notice that the button is neither up, nor down, but *right*. The elevator doors open and you both enter. The nurse takes out some keys from his uniform, and places one in a keyhole next to the floor(?) buttons. The key has a green label with some writing on it, but you can't make it out from this distance. He presses the button for floor C. [["Where are we headed to?"->Outside 2]]"Where are we headed to?" you ask. The elevator starts moving, as promised, *right*. "A place that'll answer your questions," says the nurse. "The [[records]] room." A few seconds later, the doors open to [[floor C.->C 1]]Records. Things you wish you kept. A scrapbook of baby pictures would be just the thing to help you remember everything you've lost. You have no memories of being a baby, though, or for that matter, childhood. You don't remember anything before you started college and moved out from home. Home? {back link}The doors open to a large, dark, room with beige walls, lined with bookshelves and drawers. Reading desks flank the sides of a dim central lamp. One desk has a stack of papers on it—looks like it's been used recently. The nurse walks to the desk with papers and sits down. He hits a switch near the base of the central lamp, lighting up the rest of the room. He invites you to sit across him. [["How much have I forgotten?"->C 2]]"How much have I forgotten?" you ask. "Weeks, months, years? From how my body's aged, it can't have been more than a few years, but who knows where in between." The nurse pulls a sheet of paper from the stack on his desk and hands it to you. It's a newspaper clipping. There's a photo of you, or at least, someone who looks like you, standing in front of a chalkboard with random physics equations. The article's about how this person was awarded an undergraduate physics research prize, for their work on quasisymmetry. "This is from last month," the nurse says. "Do you remember that?" [["I do."->C 3]]"I do," you say. The memory isn't perfectly clear, but it feels like it happened. You remember saying the words in the interview, the ones attributed to this name, the one that's apparently yours. "We tried to induce amnesia centered around aspects of your identity: your name, birthplace, family, close friends," the nurse said. Come to think of it, you don't remember any of those things. "Unfortunately," he continues, "it seems like we've caused some long-term memory loss of the past two weeks or so as well." [["But why?"->C 4]]"But why?" you ask. "What's the point?" "Let's take a naive view of the many-worlds theory. Whenever you make a decision, suppose that the world splits, one for each choice you could've made," he explains. "Normally, you wouldn't be able to communicate between these worlds." "Okay," you say. "Go on." "The hypothesis is that if you can get two minds in diverging worlds to be similar enough, then perhaps you *could* communicate," he says. "If you can't tell two things apart—" [["They might as well be the same."->C 5]]"They might as well be the same," you finish. "We planned to induce this with amnesia," he says, "but that [[didn't quite work]]…" As the nurse continues explaning, you get the unshakeable feeling that he's lying to you. Has it really only been two weeks since that article was published? For all you know, this could be your [[hundredth loop->C 6]].How didn't it work? It seemed to work pretty well. You don't remember much, except, perhaps, your dad. Your dad? Chess. Cars. Scrapbooks. Lucky. Random words, no connections. You want to remember. {back link}Every time the experiment fails, wipe your memories and start over. Without an external way of finding the current time and date, everything might as well be fabricated. You need to know if you've been here before. The other thing about quasisymmetry is that it's time-independent. Time is not something that runs in a straight line, because time doesn't "run" at all. Everything that's ever happened already has, and is happening all the time. The question is now: is there a universe where you're seated on the table across from you? [[Yes.->Sync 1]]Yes. There they are, right now, in as much as there can be a *now*. "Hey?" asks the nurse. "Are you still paying attention?" You try self-synchronizing. Think of a number… ten. [[Did they get it?->Sync 2]]They got it. Ten, the right number. Or perhaps, the *left* number? You don't know what their universe's chirality is with respect to yours, but due to quasisymmetry they're either the same or mirrored, right? Your turn to receive. Think of a number… [[One.->Sync Fail]] [[Two.->Sync 3]] [[Three.->Sync Fail]] [[Four.->Sync Fail]] [[Five.->Sync Fail]] [[Six.->Sync Fail]] [[Seven.->Sync Fail]] [[Eight.->Sync Fail]] [[Nine.->Sync Fail]] [[Ten.->Sync Fail]]No, that didn't work. Your head aches, and your vision starts to blur. "Jeez!" says the nurse. "Are you okay?" You hear the sound of a chair sliding back. "Ah, I see," says the nurse. "Looks like we'll have to start over again." You hear a whirring, buzzing sound. The next thing you see is black. [align center] **END**Yes. That's good. One-in-a-hundred chance of coincidence now. You know you could repeat the experiment if you wanted more confidence, but you're convinced. Your vision begins to swim. You see yourself sitting on the opposite table. You see yourself sitting on the table you are now. You see the table you're sitting in empty, a vacant seat instead of you. You see a laptop on the desk you're in front of, or across of? You see the year, and it's two years into the future. Or is that now, and is your mind still two years in the past? [[Then, you fall over.->Sync 4]]"Oh shit," you hear. It's the nurse's voice. "Are you okay?" You feel like a butcher knife is splitting your brain into halves. A black line cleaves through the center of your vision. The line rips open, filling your vision with black. "No, no I am not okay," you hear yourself saying. "My head hurts. I'm seeing double." You feel the nurse shaking your shoulders. "Hello? Hey? Can you hear me?" "Yes, I can hear you!" you say. "I already said I wasn't okay!" "I didn't… what?" The nurse pauses. "Hey! Hey!" [[More knives split your vision.->Sync 5]]The buzzing gets louder. You see more copies of yourself. It starts with four, then twelve, then fifty, possibly hundreds. All here, in this office. Each split making the copies look smaller and smaller, farther and farther away. One copy stands out. They look like a five-year-old version of you, with their back turned against you. [[You walk towards them.->Sync 6]]You draw closer. You see that they're sitting behind a table, the one you were just looking at. You come closer and see that they're playing a game of chess, playing against someone older. Sitting next to the board is a sleeping dog. Their opponent, your opponent, pats the dog's head gently. The closer you get, the more details of his face that you see. A double chin, a light stubble, square glasses, graying hair. You see the board. It's the Danish Gambit. They're about to… you're about to [[move your bishop->End 1]].You focus. You see through their eyes, the eyes of five-year-old you. Your eyes are only a few inches above the surface of the table. The chess pieces look taller, much taller than you remember. You watch yourself lose the game, your positional advantage quickly disappearing, as your opponent deftly converted his material lead to a win. You both laugh. He stands up, and you do too, [[and you give him a hug->End 2]].You're so tired. "Do you *have* to go?" you ask. He smiles weakly. You know the answer already. He, too, must be tired. [[A knife drops.->End 3]]You watch as the knife splits the man in half, one copy going left, another going right. You see yourself walking right, as the left copy disappears. You watch as another knife drops from the sky, splitting yourself in half, again, and again, and again. You keep moving, left, right, left. You see thousands upon thousands of copies of yourself pass by. You [[never see the man again->End 4]].The tiny square in your vision, the one you were using to look at yourself, fades to black. You feel like you lost. *One more chance,* you tell yourself. This time, you'll find the winning path. You'll do things differently this time. Don't trust the nurse. Distract him, run away. It'll be different. *One more chance.* You turn around and see the nurse. He sighs. He whispers something you can't make out. You see him pull out a taser, and you don't resist. [align center] **END**