Marek Huberath - Nest of Worlds

Babcock informed me that my topic is an old idea. Two hundred years old. Some Bonacci Junior, professor at a university in Llanaig, came up with the series. And he did it better than I did, because mine doesn’t begin at the beginning. I should have figured that out, damn it!

The correct series is:

1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, …

You need two 1s at the beginning for their sum to make 2. The author of Nest of Worlds knew this form of the series, having had at his disposal the works of Bonacci Junior.

Daphne worked till dawn. The article had grown considerably—it could be published now in two or three hefty installments. She kept making corrections and retyped the most marked-up pages. Gary couldn’t doze off because of the clatter of the keys. But he had to stay there; Daphne wouldn’t allow him to go lie down. He spent the night in the armchair, drinking beer after beer as long as there were cans in the refrigerator. When he closed his eyes, he saw Sabine’s breasts, then stopped seeing them—only gray fatigue was left, and the beer ran out.

Daphne, bent over the machine, muttered phrases. Sometimes she crossed or whited something out and put a new page in the noisy roller. She was exhausted, but the end was in sight, so she couldn’t stop. Cold sweat covered her pale forehead.

Sunlight was coming in when she sat back with relief and said, “Finally.” She smiled at him and made a circle with thumb and finger.

Gary lifted his weary, swollen eyes and gave a weak smile. “Tomorrow it begins,” he said. “We’ll get police protection, for sure, against the gang. I’ll take this to Cukurca.”

“Day after tomorrow. It won’t make tomorrow’s paper.”

He nodded agreement. Then his head fell, and he was snoring.

Daphne put the manuscript in order, threw off most of her clothes, and wriggled under the cold blanket. She had trouble sleeping, because it was getting brighter with every minute, the night retreating to the dark corners. She shivered, first from the cold, then from the tormenting pang of hunger, then all sorts of disconnected thoughts ran through her head. At last she lost hold of reality.

At the publisher, she spoke to the man who had temporarily replaced the editor-in-chief. Her article was rejected—that is, it was accepted, but only on the condition of so many changes that she would have had to redo the whole thing.

The basic thesis, of a gang who murdered and robbed people who moved, was well substantiated, carefully argued, so there was no chance of a lawsuit. The editor’s criticisms concerned smaller matters: the style, the vocabulary.

Gary said that this was the typical fault finding crap you got from editors. Daphne threw the papers to the floor in a fury and said she couldn’t look at the article anymore. But they had to fix it without delay, because the substitute editor had given them only three days, and they had a run scheduled soon. Gary took the manuscript to his place. He put it on an end table and dropped into bed. After a night without sleep, he slept like a stone.

He was woken by people moving around suspiciously and a burnt smell. It was evening. He jumped up, and immediately his chin met with a fist. A flash of yellow, and he was on the floor. When he tried to get up, someone grabbed him by the collar, and another blow followed.

“You’re a truck driver, you shit, not a writer.” The words reached him between blows.

The Tunics again, he thought. This time they’ll finish me off…

They were thorough. Each time he fell, he was kicked in the ribs and thighs. As with the last beating, the pain deprived him of the will to fight. Someone kept pulling him up by his pajamas, and there was another burst of yellow, and he lost consciousness.

“Where’s the copy?”

“No copy,” he said, which was true, though it brought another blow. “There isn’t any.” It was too bad that Daphne hadn’t made one. A carbon copy would have satisfied the thugs.

“Stack, he’s telling the truth,” said a muffled voice. “Let’s take it and get out of here.”

A lot of footsteps.

He came to his senses quickly and ran to the dresser for the pistol. He had to get the manuscript back. The pistol was there—the attackers hadn’t found it. Running out, he removed the safety.

Eby was coming toward him up the steps. Apparently he had forgot something. He wore no mask. Gary shot him in the stomach. Eby waved his arms and made a face, as if astonished. Gary elbowed him aside and ran downstairs. He kicked open the door to the apartment on the ground floor. Stack and the third guy turned. They had managed to get rid of their masks.

“You sons of bitches!” Gary roared. “Give me that manuscript! The article!” Aiming at Stack.

“What article? What are you talking about, Gary?” Stack turned as green as his tunic. He stood rigid, at attention.

Gary’s finger must have moved on the trigger, because a shot rang out. Not a shot, a series of shots. Stack clutched his chest and dropped to his knees. Then he was facedown on the floor.

Margot ran in from the kitchen. A bullet caught her as she ran. More bullets flew, whistling. Jutta tried to crawl behind an armchair but didn’t make it. The last of the Tunics took three bullets: in his head, neck, and arm.

Gary looked down at his gun. It was too easy. When had he pulled the trigger? When had he aimed? The weapon was not completely recoilless—he would have felt himself shooting. He remembered one shot, on the stairs, at Eby, but only that one.

He stood, stunned. A police siren sounded in the street. Soon after, someone pinned his arms, someone else took away the pistol, and a third someone put handcuffs on him.

He waited in the cell until evening. Cukurca conducted the interrogation. He didn’t believe Gary’s story, because, as before, Gary had been beaten professionally, without marks. The notes and materials for the article were gone. The manuscript itself had burned, ignited by a cigarette. A charred hole in the upholstery was all that remained of it.

Cukurca expressed doubt that Gary had the ability to gun down his neighbors so efficiently, but he was withholding judgment until he heard from the ballistics expert. Gary’s story did not seem very likely. Fortunately most of the fired bullets were recovered. Gary claimed he had shot Eby only once, but three bullets were found in the body: in the stomach, the middle of the forehead, and the ribcage. Eleven bullets in all had been fired. The magazine of the police-issue Lupar Attac held fifteen rounds, and there were indeed four left in Gary’s pistol.

Gary asked to speak to Daphne, but that turned out to be impossible. Apparently, after his arrest, Sabine had called her, unaware that he and Daphne were a couple. The affair came to light, and Daphne would have nothing more to do with him.

I couldn’t sleep because of Bonacci Junior’s series. The author of Nest of Worlds made use of it, so he must have had some concept of Superworld Zero and Superworld Minus One. Superworld Zero doesn’t present that much of a problem, but Superworld Minus One (required by the first 1 in Bonacci’s series) seems totally absurd. From the formulas you get nonsense: the number of Lands in Superworld Minus One equals zero. The number of Significant Names is 12 -1= 1/12. Nonsense too. From this I draw the simple conclusion: the author of Nest of Worlds devised his laws so that Superworld Minus One would constitute a breach of logic!

Gavein bent back the second half of the card.

Zef had taped on another card: notes written later, perhaps that same day, or else he had taped it to continue his reasoning then and there.