The scratching of the monk's quill, hunched over a book, was soothing. The dim light of the oil lamp cast dancing reflections on the ceiling. From the cell window, the sound of chanting drifted in. The mass touched the chords of my soul, reminding me that I was still human. A child of the universe, somewhere deep within my being, craved a miracle. But the one I had become smiled sarcastically at such dreams.
I ended up in the monastery by accident. Colleagues had warned that quantum mechanics lies on the opposite pole from logic and the physics of the macro-world. But to be this far apart! As long as you don't step beyond the bounds of theory, everything seems like a fairy tale. But the very first steps of practice smeared me across the continuum like liquid oil over boiling water. After the very first jump, I realized I wouldn't be coming back. And not because there was no place to return to, but because "I" no longer existed.
Existing in a superposition before a trillion choices, every moment of his life, a human preserves his integrity. At least, so it seems to him. But I am not a lazy man. I chose the quantum transition and, essentially, ceased to be anything constant. Stepping into the capsule first among humanity, altering the symmetry of bosons and fermions, I gained the ability to be anywhere, anytime, and... lost my body, leaving my consciousness, so to speak, in a state of undress—without a shell.
In the first instant, the horror of what was happening kicked me out of the shell of existence. The state of displacement was nothing like flight. I was simply everywhere and simultaneous, though I could have sworn I was sitting at home on the couch. Whatever my eyes fell upon, it immediately froze. Raindrops, the flight of birds... At times, it seemed I could see light. Yes, light itself, as it moved. After which, I "permitted" the world to continue moving, and everything around me came to life.
Stabilizing what was happening didn't always work, and certainly not immediately. I wasn't controlling time and space at all. I was merely observing them. And the moment I stopped doing so, the universe around me would either freeze or change so unrecognizably that my consciousness could find no way to describe the changes. The only way to stabilize the world was through tireless observation and assessment of what was occurring. I wouldn't say it wearied me, but it disturbed me. It seemed the surrounding reality was playing a game with me called "staring contest." The main thing here is who blinks first.
I suddenly realized that the stability of our dimension, created by someone's boundless genius, is more of a joke than an unshakable dogma of physics. The fine-tunings of the universe acted flawlessly, preventing the disintegration of the infinite multidimensionality we call our home. Judging by my sensations, we never saw anything at all, believing in the hardness of matter comparable to the hardness of our delusions. To my surprise, I turned out not to be the only one. Life at the subatomic level was seething. Streams of information filled my consciousness with revelations and concepts that turned the foundations of existence upside down. Multidimensionality was very difficult to grasp. The superposition of a material body and the consciousness hidden within it transitioned into a superposition of quantum consciousness. Only a scientist's skepticism helped me not to go insane. Although the habit of systematizing everything and reducing it to a common denominator was a great hindrance. A different method of perception and thinking was simply necessary, and immediately so.
The first attempt to stabilize was so human that it caused me to laugh at myself. Yes, I instantly "restored" a body from the surrounding matter. I am standing in the middle of the icy desert of an alien planet with an atmosphere of semi-liquid methane and I realize... this is not organic matter, damn it. How I appeared there and why I needed such a body were the easiest questions. It was only later that I realized it’s better to grow gills underwater, and better not to appear on Earth during the Archean eon at all. A bit too hot, and comets are raining down on your head everywhere...
But let us return to the monk. I don't know how long the adaptation to the quantum level took, although, if put in percentages, my skills are clearly hovering around zero. Materialization at a chosen point in the visible universe, in a different body or without one, in any state of matter and time frame—this is a slight bonus to the capabilities that the multidimensionality of the subatomic level gives you. The main problem is—where to go!?
And then I blinked! With what, one might ask? The jump occurred when I tried to observe entangled particles in two different galaxies. Yes, indeed, when observing one, the second also changes, despite the distance. Oh, if only I could tell my colleagues, but it had become boring to converse with humans. And then I shifted my attention from one particle to another. My human perception of space kicked in. Roughly speaking, I tore my attention away from one object and "walked over" to the other. I "blinked."
The result—a monk's cell, I am sitting in a human body staring at a hunched laborer of the holy scripture. Apparently, I had already been saying something to my new acquaintance, because he was frantically writing down my words. The effect of inhibition was caused by the fact that the transition from one level of vibration to another does not always happen instantly.
"Blinked..." repeated the monk after me. "And what is a quantum leap?"
"Where am I?" I blurted out in response.
"In my cell," the monk was genuinely surprised. "Are you unwell? I entered when you were already sitting on my bed and telling a story. A very fascinating story, but there are many words I do not understand. They have already sent for the Abbot."
"Forgive me, I probably drank too much yesterday," I tried to save face. "And you are?"
"Thomas Aquinas, a Mithraist theologian. Glory to Mithra, you are alright. I have a question. In the world where you reside, do angels exist?"
"You could say that. It depends on what you call angels. Multidimensional entities without a material shell, maintaining the settings of the continuum..." here I saw complete lack of understanding in my interlocutor's eyes. "Yes, they exist."
"Glory to Mithra and Ahura Mazda!"
"Forgive me, Thomas, is this Earth?"
"Of course, my brother! Still, you instill anxiety in my heart. You need to rest."
"And what year is it?"
"Since the birth of the Savior or the creation of the World?"
"Clear, it doesn't matter. Tell me, what do you do in the monastery?" I asked a completely idle question, realizing that I had once again been thrown into an alternative reality.
"The only thing that matters—observation," the monk smiled condescendingly. "For the universe is stable only when you see it. Matter is lazy, my brother. One has only to look away, and the firmament strives to disembody itself into primordial Chaos, in order to save the Creator's energy. It is the law of the economy of existence. Therefore, in every corner of the created world, ones such as us observe day and night the visible universe, and beyond the invisible limit, other brothers do the same. Only in this way can we save the world from disintegration."
I went numb and stared at the servant of the church.
"How do you know this?" I squeezed out of myself. "And who places such outposts of observation across the galaxies?"
"He who observes the observers," the monk smiled again. "The Abbot will be here soon. You are not the first wanderer we have had; we will show you the way."
I broke into a cold sweat. I couldn't break free from the body. The shackles of matter bound my consciousness and will.
"Sleep," the monk blew out the lamp, and darkness covered the cell.
Outside the window, the chanting continued...
Chernyshev Vadim Pavlovich Cycle "Bedtime Stories" Copyright © 2025. All rights reserved