At first, he didn’t have a good idea of how to interact with the nodes behind his lens except to inject photons that would be absorbed by the ones he targeted. Since he didn’t know exactly what would happen as a result of his injections, he needed to create a comprehensive catalog of input-output response profiles by observing the changes that occurred in four dimensions due to his interventions. By using those relationships, he was able to calibrate his LIFE compiler and adjust its interpreter to reflect the higher- to lower-dimensional relationships properly.
Next, he experimented with tens of millions of photon configurations, sequences, and intensities that were representative of the full array of possibilities. He found that the effects of his injections were usually graded but were punctuated by occasional unexpected outcomes due to the presence of chaotic domains that involved particular seminal nodes that he identified as being “central” within the Network. However, as long as his energetic injections were properly placed at locations close to the outputs that he was trying to influence—which included the stock prices he was interested in—he could correlate them with their impacts in four dimensions.
After he had everything working, he returned to what had gotten him started on his investigations in the first place. He discovered that the actual distances between objects and events in the higher-dimensional Network were different from the four-dimensional projections that everyone knew, which meant that what people observed was routinely either foreshortened or elongated. Those transformations together with the overlapping of the signals that were apparent in four dimensions were what allowed the Network’s convoluted topology to be represented in the concise forms that everyone was familiar with—as objects and events as well as the relationships and dynamics that governed their evolution. What he’d discovered was that their appearance was just a wavering footprint of the oscillations from the higher-dimensional space of the Network that impinged on the lower-dimensional boundary of where people existed.
Accordingly, Mr. Gregory concluded that the appearance of nonlocality, which was represented in four dimensions as quantum entanglement, was the result of the overlapping projections of the distribution of information within the higher-dimensional Network. That Network, like a big brother, was wrapped around the four known dimensions and presented itself to humans on the tiny edge that was the only part of it that they could observe. The resulting entanglements—which appeared to people as the connections between things in four dimensions that were otherwise inexplicable—arose because of a higher-dimensional equivalent of a hall of mirrors, where the same image had components dispersed in a holographic type of fashion in a multitude of locations simultaneously.
The overlapping signals that were projected onto four dimensions from the higher-dimensional Network also explained the other puzzling issue of wave-particle duality. Although the different realms of the Network’s activity didn’t appear to be intrinsically interconnected in the representations that everyone could observe in four dimensions, everything about them originated from the same source, which was the higher-dimensional Network. Since consistency of the Network’s internal states was obligatory, all of the objects and events that people recognized in four dimensions had connections to each other at their deepest, most fundamental levels within the Network’s higher-dimensionality, including those that related to the dual wave and particle characteristics of radiation. Consequently, the duality observed in four dimensions was the result of a boundary effect; the compacted information that had originated in the higher-dimensional space of the Network was converted into a form that could be conveyed in a projection onto four dimensions.
What Mr. Gregory had discovered was that the universe he had been taught about in school was the equivalent of only a tiny translucent film that was held together by the much larger dimensionality of the Network. By using his newly invented lens and LIFE analytical system, he was able to explain two of the major inconsistencies in scientific thought that had bothered him the most. He wasn’t sure if his ideas concerning the Network’s higher-dimensional “sheaves” of nodes and connectors were the best way to describe its actual physical composition, but they allowed him to make sense of many of the experimental facts in four dimensions that had previously been an enigma.
Even though the underlying structure of space-time that Mr. Gregory was able to recognize was beautiful, it was also exceedingly complex, which made it extremely difficult to decipher and to comprehend. But the more he thought about it, the more convinced he became that what he’d discovered represented the foundation for everything that existed in the four-dimensional world.
AFTER MR. GREGORY HAD HIS DEVICE WORKING, HE began to conduct scans of the Network on a routine basis. He became accustomed to seeing its ordinary activities, but one night, he saw an unusual pattern. It appeared that some of the Network’s nodes were transferring information at an accelerated rate and that the information exchange was occurring between different regions of the Network in ways he’d never seen before. He wasn’t sure what it meant, but because it was so striking, he decided to monitor it.
Over the next several days, the unfamiliar activity continued to expand. It was notable not only for its scope but also because of the rapid synchronization it was causing in the outputs of an increasing number of the Network’s components. Unlike the other instabilities he’d seen in the past, which tended to become damped as they filtered through to more distant areas of the Network, this one was recruiting more nodes into high-information-density states as it expanded. Clearly, it was a significant change that would have a major impact, but he couldn’t yet tell what it was.
The next day, Mr. Gregory’s LIFE analysis was finally able to recognize the signature of the disturbance. It was an earthquake—one more powerful than any seen in recent times. He still couldn’t tell exactly where it would hit or when, but it was coming.
Shortly thereafter, the details became clearer. The area that would be affected was in Southern California, near Los Angeles, and the quake would hit in early September. Left unchecked, it would result in a large-scale disaster.
Mr. Gregory knew that something needed to be done quickly to avert it, so he tried to deliver additional energy to the nodes at the margins of the disturbance to contain its spread by creating the equivalent of a firewall within the Network. But his valiant efforts were too little too late. The size of the disturbance was massive, and it contained too much energy for him to be able to intervene successfully; his efforts were simply overwhelmed by the advancing waves of information that continued to spread throughout the Network’s different regions.
The only thing he could do was alert the proper government agencies regarding what was about to happen. He thought they would have enough time to confirm the findings and stage an orderly evacuation of the area. The size of the earthquake would be enormous; his estimate was a magnitude of 8.9.
He called the secretary of Homeland Security. “I’m sorry to have to inform you of this, Madam Secretary,” he said. “There is going to be a major earthquake in the Los Angeles area.”
“Are you sure?” she asked, clearly alarmed.
“Yes. Unfortunately, I am.”
“When?”
“In four weeks.”
“How large?”
“A magnitude of 8.9.”
“Oh no!” she exclaimed. “Is there anything you can do to stop it?”
“I’ve been trying, but the activity in the Network just keeps getting stronger,” he answered. “Nothing I’ve done so far has been able to slow it down or contain it.”
“Well, for heaven’s sake, do whatever you can!”
She