novelxo Chapter 7: Inflation
Atkinson tried to swell himself up, pushing his chest out as he entered the magisterial anticancer. The marbled columns stretched up to the ceiling fresco too complex to take in its magnificent details, on the long walk to the desk at the end. It was clearly designed to overwhelm the senses, and put the summoned employee of the Multiverse Construction Corporation (or the M.C.C. as it was generally known), in their place.
Portraits of past directors of note lined the ample spaces between the columns. Each seemed to follow the staff member in his, hers or its progress with their eyes, as the summoned proceeded up the almost imperceptible slope. Gooch, Leyland and Hobbs to name but a few, seemed to shower suspicious looks down on Atkinson. As the now crest fallen man finally approached the stout wooden desk.
Then he waited the interminably long moment for the secretary to the board to look up from her work. He finally plucked up the courage to initiate the exchange, but as Atkinson drew breath, the guardian of the sacred doors raised a finger, and his advantage was lost. Then a buzzer sounded, and without raising her eyes from her paperwork the secretary announced, “The board will see you now.”
The floor to ceiling doors opened in, and rubbing his hands together Atkinson almost stumbled in to the corridor beyond. In contrast to the Secretary’s office, this was plain white and had only had one feature to it, a considerably smaller set of double doors at the far end. As Atkinson almost crept down this new room, he nervously glanced over his shoulder and noticed the doors behind him were now shut, barring any retreat.
He soon found himself at the set of doors at the other end, and then Atkinson noticed that in contrast they had quite a shabby appearance. He paused for them to open, they didn’t. He gave a feeble knock and a voice boomed out “Well come in if you’re coming.” And he pushed the left one open. It gave a faint creak, and Atkinson found himself staring in on a changing room.
Wooden benches lined the middle of the long room, while stout oak lockers either side filled the walls. Afternoon light shone in at the end, and a round of faint applause could just be heard in the distance. All this was lost on Atkinson, as his eyes were riveted to the eleven men in various states of undress, as they changed from white uniforms in to more formal attire, as befitted a member of the board.
“Ah there you are Atkinson, well don’t just stand there man.” And the director of the board held out a long cloth burlap bag that Atkinson took, as the impressive figure strode past him. If it helps, think of sir Ralph Richardson, the resemblance is quite uncanny, especially in the voice. To Atkinson’s disconcertment, as they returned to the corridor a new room presented itself, with a wide expanse of plush carpet running between the amply spaced walls. An impressive table sat in the middle, with five places down each side and the director’s chair at the far end.
“Just pop that in the cupboard” commanded the director over his shoulder. And casting his eyes about, Atkinson found an oak wardrobe in the corner to his right. By the time he had slid the bag on to the shelf at the top, which was the only space free of finely cut items of attire, the rest of the board had assembled. And the director sat with his fingers together staring intently at him. Gulping, Atkinson approached the near end of the table, where a less impressive chair than the rest resided. At a nod from the director he sat down, it creaked.
“Now Atkinson we’ve been having some trouble with your department for some time now”, the director accused Atkinson. Then as if remembering something, he suddenly mellowed. “But I’m forgetting my manners. Let me introduce you to the men who hold your fate in their hands.” He indicated first left then right as he proceeded down the table.
“Taylor”, think of Jimmy Edwards. The opulent man gave Atkinson a toothy grin, as he absently played with his moustache. “Parfitt”, who looked uncannily like Jack Hawkins. His gaze in contrast to the jovial Taylor held Atkinson in a stern appraisal of him. “Barber”, who was the spitting image of Terry Thomas, and raised a disinterested hand as if dismissing this minion. “Griffith”, a facsimile of John Mills, who like Parfitt, gave Atkinson an appraising look, but in a more friendly way. “Edrich”, who following in the vein of his colleagues, could be mistaken on any sunny afternoon for Ian Carmichael. His friendly face turned to Atkinson, but he could detect no judgement in it. “Randall”, the man looked the twin of Brian Blessed, and he suppressed a verbal greeting that Atkinson suspected could have flattened a house. “Snow”, his mournful visage completed a picture of Alastair Sim. He merely nodded his greeting in a magisterial twitch of his head. “Brown”, who had a more than passing resemblance to a young Richard Attenborough, keen to make his way in the world. His furtive glance at Atkinson almost felt like a dismissal. “Boycott”, who could get work any day impersonating Orson Welles in his latter years, beard and all. His confident gaze almost put Atkinson at his ease. “And Bird”, who was an exact double of Stephen Fry, right down to his permanently broken nose. He was too close to elicit a full stare, so Bird contented himself with a wink.
“Now Atkinson; oh don’t fidget so” chided the director. And Atkinson froze, intent on his words. “We’ve been having a lot of trouble with the figures from your fellows in the production department.” He turned to Edrich as if to prompt a confirmation. “Oh rather”, and Edrich was about to elucidate when the director’s attention switched to Parfitt, “Do you have the figures for production output?” Parfitt cleared his throat before replying. “The propensity for badly tuned universes is up thirty seven per cent in the last quarter.” The director cut him off, “Which under normal circumstances would be perfectly acceptable.”
He paused allowing the jovial look on his face to become a frown. “But we live in a real world, with real costs to be met. And a sudden upturn in the inflation rate could spell disaster for us all.” He let the words sink in before turning to Brown. “You have the figures don’t you Brown?” As if surprised Brown snatched up a sheet, and read off the relevant facts. “With the devaluation of the pound, and a general sluggishness in the economy as a whole. The overall costs exceed profit margins, by.” The director cut in once more, his voice a mixture of disinterest and pomposity. “It simply isn’t good enough man. We have to streamline the process if we want to be economically viable.” He raised his hand as if in despair. “I can think of no alternative but to take a firmer grip on the reigns, and look in to the whole bally process. Surly we can find something that will make your department perform up to scratch.”
Atkinson sat ridged; such a thing had never been heard of in all the time he had been here, the board taking a direct interest in the day to day running of the plant. All around him the other ten men seemed agog at the director’s decision, with cries of “But the time it would take sir”, “Think of our commitments” and “we’d stand no chance with the ashes.” But the director held up his hands once more to calm the rebellious men. “It simply has to be done. I suggest we adjourn immediately and have Atkinson here.” He waved his hand down the table dismissively, “Takes us on a tour of the facility. To acquaint us with the finer points.” The director beamed, “You never know, we might be able to spot something that may save the day.” Then he looked up and down the table, “Well gentlemen.”
Atkinson looked down to rise, and when his eyes rose once more the boardroom had been replaced with the more familiar setting of his own office. With it’s view of the multidimensional generators, as they glowed outside his window. He gave a start to see the board members stood in a tight huddle behind him, now clad in white lab coats and individually named yellow hard hats. The director stood at the front.
“Well Atkinson, where do we start? I can’t be hanging round all day”, and he indicated the door. In the second it took Atkinson to compose himself, he realised he was similarly clad. And feeling more at home now, he cleared his throat. “Gentlemen we should begin out tour with the power generator plant. If you will follow me please.”
Then he opened the door, and held it for the board to follow. The sight of her boss suddenly emerging from his office with the full board, had Atkinson’s secretary miss Pfnutt, staring agog. Then her boss informed her, “Hold my calls miss Pfnutt, I’ll be back late.” As each member of the board passed, they doffed their caps and nodded politely. Edrich following up the rear Remarked, “Pleasure to meet you dear.” Causing the poor girl to blush.
Meanwhile Atkinson was already herding the party on to a transporter, usually designed to shuttle workers about the complex. He didn’t fail to notice that the seats seemed to be plusher than the usual bill of fare, but he didn’t comment. Hopefully this model might remain after the tour. Doing a quick head count Atkinson indicated for the driver to set off, then he turned to the group.
“The power generation for all the plant is located inside a singularity, where the only conditions exist to maintain a stable source of the exotic forces needed. A sub contractor maintains the singularity itself, Frozen Star limited. They have a ninety nine billion year contract, and are currently only a little under nineteen billion years through it. The director leaned over and addressed Brown. “Check the fine print, we may be able to get a better tender put out.” And Brown simply popped out of existence, while the others turned back to the front, as if a colleague suddenly disappearing was an everyday occurrence.
Atkinson continued, “We will be shortly pass through the event horizon, but there is no need for concern as every transporter is equipped with a Newton Watney field generator.” But evidently his party was unconcerned anyway, as they stared out of the windows admiring the glowing band being dragged round the black hole, as it warped up and over the top in a pyrotechnic display. And then they were in.
Off in the distance the party could just discern a vast structure, not unlike a monumental set of scaffolding. “This is where we tap the power needed to run the hyper-spacial field inducers.” Snow raised his hand, and Atkinson’s attention was drawn to him. “What’s the output level of the plant?” As if he had the relevant figures tattooed to his eyelids, Atkinson’s eyes flicked up momentarily before he replied. “The singularity runs at thirty seven per cent, this allows for energy drainage and over capacity. While maintaining safety limits well within ICC regulations.” Snow seemed very satisfied with this fact, and made a note of it in a small note pad he had produced.
By now the tour had got close enough to appreciate the vast size of the complex, as various technicians scurried about in the routine operation of this section. As a whole the party took in the diligent activities. But it was Barber who asked, “Have you done a time and motion study on the process?” Atkinson produced a sizable document from his pocket, that had no right to be in such a small compartment, and gave a silent thanks to a secretary who kept his rolled up dimensional filing system up to date. “I think you will find the labour force is kept up to full efficiency, again in line with ICC regulations. We run a fine line between cost effectiveness and any union concerns.” Then he passed it to Boycott, who tossed it casually back to Barber for perusal. “Nice catch”, Bird joked. “Well that all seems to be in order” the director said, as he turned to his colleagues. “Any further questions gentlemen?” But the rest of transport seemed satisfied. And the director turned once more to Atkinson, “Well young man, I think we had better move on.” And it was he who nodded to the driver.
The driver set the transport moving, but not away from the monumental edifice before them. He seemed to be headed towards an ever-shifting blurred section of the structure. “Is that a Belinsky-Khalatnikov-Lifshitz singularity?” asked Randall enthusiastically. With a smile at this almost schoolboy exclamation, it wasn’t Atkinson who answered Randall’s question. But Taylor who furnished him with the relevant information. “No I think you’ll find that this is a Thorne-Nolan singularity. They’re less trouble than the BKL ones.” And then with a slurping noise they passed through it. The light show outside seemed to amuse the members of the board located at the back of the transport, until the director turned and commanded, “Oh do pipe down there, this isn’t an away day.”
Suddenly all was black outside, and the transporter’s engines slowed to a dull hum, the only indication that it had come to a halt. Atkinson stood once more, “Gentlemen, the production floor. As you can see we are between jobs or you could witness a new universe in production. I assume the technician is adjusting the controls for the off.” He indicated a tiny window apparently floating in the void of to the left of the bus. And at a nod from Atkinson, the driver put the left indicator on before turning towards the tiny light.
This time as it stopped the transport’s door opened, and indicating that they should exit, Atkinson intoned “Gentlemen.” A brief stroll across what seemed to be nothing took them to a wooden porch, of a wooden shack, of which the patch of light turned out to be a window in. As the group briefly waiting for Atkinson to follow Brown suddenly reappeared clutching his paperwork. The director turned to him hopefully. “Any luck Brown?” But with a slight shake of his head, Brown had to ad mitt “Sorry sir, they seemed to have closed every loophole. I bet they used the firm of Gauss, Euler and Riemann to draft the final document.” But the director had already turned, dismissing Brown as Atkinson had arrived.
After a brief knock he pushed the wooden door open. The inside of the shed was sparsely furnished. There was a small table in the corner, on which sat a kettle plugged in to the wall and various tea making accoutrements. Stood next to it was a green metal cabinet, proclaiming to be the repository of spare UC1836 units. And in smaller letters underneath a stern warning announced that the units must be signed in and out. There was a clipboard hung off a hook below that with only one person’s signatures on it. Finally below the window sat a bench with a scatty looking longhaired, lab-coated technician.
He rose in the shock of not only having his sanctum invaded at all, but by none less than the entire board of directors. The small crowd almost filled the room when they were all jammed in, and key members had to jostle for position round the bench. “Tomkins, the board are keen to get a feeling for the process. Do you have the latest production schedules?” Atkinson started off in a loud and imposing tone, which he quickly trailed off to a casual one, given the confines of the situation.
As Tomkins riffled through some notes on his desk, Griffith popped his head through the crowd, and pointed rather awkwardly over Taylor’s shoulder. “So that’s the UC1836 unit is it? It’s a bit small.” The yellow plastic brick was about a foot wide, and along its side the legend UC1836 was picked out in bold black letters. A power cord snaked out of the back to a socket on the wall. On the top there were six big black dials, each labelled with a unit N, E, , , Q, and D. Apart from them the only other features to the unit where the power button, an indicator light, and a big red button labelled initiate.
The director seemed to be getting agitated by the group’s shuffling, as Tomkins dug out the relevant paperwork. Until with a “humph”, the room began to swell out until it was about eight times it’s former size. Also there seemed to have appeared some wooden folding seats, each with a blue and white striped cushion on it. The visitors bustled about finding a suitable spot and finally got settled.
“The production schedules sir.” Tomkins handed the paperwork to Atkinson, who glanced at the sheets then let them rest on his lap. “I think an explanation in to the operating techniques wouldn’t go amiss at this juncture in time”, prompted the director, and the board nodded in assent. “With perhaps some refreshments afterwards?” asked Brown hopefully, to be shushed down by those around him. With a start Tomkins looked to his immediate superior for confirmation. “Tell the gentlemen the operational procedure Tomkins”, Atkinson’s reassuring voice rang out.
So with a cough Tomkins indicated the small box. “This is the UC 1836 unit. So named because it is a universe creator, and the model number pertains to the mass of the proton to the electron.” With a wave of his hand the director cut him off. “Get to the point man, we haven’t got all day.” He turned to bird, “What time is the second test due to begin?” “Three sir”, Bird replied. And once more fixing his stare on Tomkins, the director commanded, “Now tell me exactly what you do with this device to make our universes.”
With gulp Tompkins indicated the box once more, “You set the dials to the numbers written down on the production schedule.” He indicated the note sat on Atkinson’s lap, “And press the initiate button, then wait for the singularity to expand to shipping size. The new universe is ejected automatically in to it’s own probability matrix ready for dispatch.” With the patience of a schoolmaster waiting for a fuller answer to his question, the director prompted Tomkins further. “And what do these dials represent?”
With the first hurdle over, Tomkins began his lecture in earnest, warming to the crowd and growing more animated as he spoke. “Well the first dial N is the ratio of Fe or electrical force in the universe, to Fg or gravitation force. Like all the other variables except , it has no unit. Basically if N is reduced you get a tendency for stars and planets to be smaller, therefore you get less real estate. But the galaxies do form quicker. Now on the down side, the largest life forms that could evolve would be insects, with very thick legs. But hey those guys do like to live on top of one another don’t they. Now your average inter stellar distances do get reduced, meaning quicker colonisation times. But the stars do have a tendency to burn out quicker, so it’s all hands to the pumps in the evolution race, before it’s too late to escape the origin star.
Now it you increase N vastly complex structures can be formed which is very pretty. My personal preference for N is about ten raised to the power of thirty six, which also happens to be the black hole ratio.” He pretended to crush something between his cupped hands. “If you squeeze that number of atoms in to the space of one, you get a black hole.” He looked up grinning.
“Moving on to the next dial we have , or the proportion of hydrogen mass converted to energy when it fuses in to helium. We find that a value of nought point seven per cent works well, as any lower percentage leads to inefficient fusion, and the hydrogen simply never become helium.” Tomkins waved vaguely at a chart of the elements that was pinned to the wall. “And if you don’t even get helium, none of the other elements will be produced either.” Randall raised his hand and asked, “So what happen if we make higher?” Staring directly at the board member, Tomkins answered in a trice. “Good question, basically if you increase the percentage, everything happen too quickly. You use up all the hydrogen, and none is left over to actually power the stars long term. Which leaves us in the dark, and cold” he added.
Pointing at the third dial Tomkins surveyed the group. “Now this dial has a very interesting effect. It controls the actual density in the universe, as opposed to the critical density derived by calculation. And is the ratio of the two. Essentially if the figure is lowered, it induces an unending expansion, which a lot of clients find appealing, due to the wide vistas it provides. There’s nothing like the challenge of a frontier that’s always expanding. Of course there is the eventual breakdown of complex matter as it is spread too far, but some clients like that. Now if we raise the figure, we can induce a level of stability, which is very popular. A lot of clients like to know there’s a point when intergalactic distances cease to be a matter of calculation, and can be quantified. It’s good for the bus timetables. But if we tweak it up a little more, we can actually get the universe to collapse after a bit.
Now I know what you’re thinking. Who’d want a universe that only lasts a while, and then everything ends in a fire sale. But a lot of entities find popping off site for a quick holiday during the hot season, not too much of a burden. And would you believe it, due to the laws of conservation of energy that universe just pops up again. A sort of serialisation of the product. Plus the added bonus is we can sell them a bijou universe to holiday in.”
This time the director asked a question, “And do you have a preferred value for this ?” He pointed at the clearly labelled third dial. Tomkins held his gaze for a heartbeat then said, “If I had to pick a number it would be quite near to one. Assuming we use four per cent baryonic matter mix, the balance of which being made up from non baryonic matter and energy, or ballast as the delivery boys call it.” The director nodded appraisingly; then he indicated that Tomkins should continue.
“Dial four is the cosmological constant, if you pardon the pun. And it is denoted by , it’s a sort of weak anti gravity that only affects empty space. We find it keeps the ball rolling so to speak. But it has to be kept low, or galaxies have trouble forming. And nobody wants that; we had to discard a few universes that turned out that way.” Griffith raised his hand, “How high can it go?” Tomkins had that figure already memorised from trial and error. “We generally don’t like to go over two point zero three six raised to the power of ten to the minus thirty five, per second per second.” “Per second per second” blurted out Bird. “Oh do keep up Bird”, chided the director. “The chaps already said ’s the only value with a unit.” Bird sank lower in to his seat, as Tomkins continued at a nod from the director.
“Next up we have dial five or Q, as we like to call it. It’s the ratio of the energy needed to break apart galaxy clusters, as opposed to the rest mass of those galaxy clusters. It’s a texture device, as it denotes the roughness of the universe. Some like to call it ripple amplitude by I prefer the more cosy description, it adds an air of liveability. Now this effect actually occurs very early on in the process, but as you can appreciate it’s quite important. Lets just say no one wants to move in to an unfurnished universe. Now if the value is too high all you get is massive black holes, but if it’s too low there’s only gas. Neither case being something I’d want to buy. I find a value of about one in a hundred thousand usually brings about a nice result.”
He paused as if the mainstay of his lecture had come to an end. “And the last dial?” prompted Parfitt. “Oh that’s just the number of unfurled dimensions. We usually leave that on three plus one. After all who would want a digestive tract that would cut you in two. And we found the invers cube law in a four dimensioned or higher universe plays havoc with gravity. Planet’s orbits tend to exist on a knife-edge, so they fly off track far too often. We got a lot of complaints before we withdrew that option. There are in fact ten dimensions, but most of them are best left unexpanded for the proliferation of string.” “Did he say string?” asked Edrich. “If I have any more idiotic interruptions”, threatened the director, as he turned again to Tomkins in a more jovial tone. “Now I’m sure you can furnish us with a demonstration of the UC 1836 in action”, and he leaned back to enjoy the show.
Tomkins set the dials to his favourite values, and pushed his palm down on the big red button. Inside the room all was still, but way out in the void beyond the window a bright spot appeared. “I’ve adjusted the magnification of the window to give us infinitesimal time increments, or all the good stuff will be done before we can see it, and altered the wavelength of the light for our spectrum of vision.” He adjusted a small nob on the window frame. “And now if I zoom in you can see the proto universe as the initial conditions are set in stone. Not that the elements for stone exist yet.”
The bright spot suddenly grew in size. “That’s just the me adjusting the magnification, but if you look closely you can see the faint ripples forming.” There was a sudden rush, as once more the sphere expanded at a phenomenal rate, and the group as a whole flinched back in their seats. “Something wrong with your window Tomkins?” demanded the director, but with a shake of his head Tomkins spoke to the window, his eyes fixed on the phenomenon, which even now seemed to have stopped expanding. He said just one word, “Inflation?”
Now the sphere took up the whole of the window and beyond. “You mean to say it just inflated at a rapid rate, then went back to a normal expansion rate? When did this occur?” The director was up on his feet. Tomkins checked the read off from the windowsill, and turned to reply. “Not long at all sir, it happened between ten to the minus thirty six seconds and ten to the minus thirty two, an infinitesimal fraction of a second.”
The director had an appreciative look on his face, as he surveyed the newly formed universe. “Nice even temperature range. Would you say this was a stable well adjusted universe Atkinson?” Now Atkinson was on his feet studying the sphere. “It certainly looks good sir, and with a considerable reduction in production time. Why it must have inflated faster than the speed of light to reach this stage so quickly. I’ll get quality control to run a diagnostic on it, and send you the results.”
But the board were already stood, as the director shook the technician’s hand. “Interesting effect Tomkins, an even temperature throughout and a considerable saving in production time. We may have got the new product needed to save the corporation.” Then he turned his attention to the board. “Well gentlemen, it looks like we won’t be late for the test after all. I had to admit I thought we were on to a sticky wicket, until Tomkins here saved the day.” And with that Atkinson was left alone with the technician. “Looks like you’ve got a bigger shed to work in Tomkins. You could apply for a bed, so you don’t have to just sleep in your chair. That’ll be a nice bonus for you efforts.”
But the technician was busy looking out of the window again. “I can’t say the same for you sir”, came the non-committal reply. And guessing Tomkins’ meaning, the production manager ripped open the shed door. His face fell as he gazed out on yet another beat up old transport. And he mused to himself, “Well at least I don’t have to walk back to the office.”