by Various
A mighty river curved away from the entrance, emerald and slate colored mountains jutting from the waters like watchful giants. An ancient monastery had been built into the cliffs, whitewashed walls and tiered roof of red and gold pristine under the perpetual sun. Inside would be empty and without the touch of dust or decay.
How could I not feel awe?
There was something far beyond physical appearance that left me breathless, despite myself. The pocket world provided everything. Inside you felt no pain, no anger, no sorrow. You didn’t need to eat or sleep. It was possible you didn’t even age. There was a reason people referred to the multiverse as paradise.
“You are late, Jonathan-sama.”
I jerked in surprise, yanking the recursion door shut with a thud. Kensuke stepped in beside me, placing a hand on my shoulder as I exhaled slowly.
“Forgive me,” Kensuke said in his thick Japanese accent. He offered a small bow. “I did not mean to startle you.”
“It’s okay, Ken,” I said. “Just edgy, I guess. Another fanatic approached me about paradise.”
Kensuke paused thoughtfully, folding his hands before him.
“It is not entirely implausible,” he said. “Do you not think so?”
“It doesn’t matter what I think.”
I could imagine nothing more arrogant than believing I had discovered paradise. Never mind that I didn’t do anything, that the pictures just happened.
“True,” Kensuke said, nodding. “Though there are some who might say reality is nine-tenths perception.”
“What about all the paradise abusers?”
I’d seen plenty of lives torn apart—friends and loved ones neglected, careers destroyed, responsibilities abandoned—all because the lure of the multiverse far exceeded reality. I sold them paradise and they turned it into a drug.
“Eden was lost to us for a reason,” Kensuke said. “Was it not?”
“So who am I to give it back?”
“God works in mysterious ways.”
“I wish he’d work through someone else,” I said. I nodded to the stack of recursion doors. “When’s the auction?”
“This weekend. I scheduled it as soon as I learned of your return. Our patrons are getting restless. You have been gone some time.”
How long had it been this time? I tried to work the days in my head, but they just blurred together.
“How many days?”
“Forty-two,” Kensuke said. “Not including the two and a half you took while sleeping.”
I blinked in surprise. Had it really been so long?
“There are several hundred high-profile patrons on the waiting list,” Kensuke continued.
“Let them wait. I don’t cater to spoiled trust fund kids.”
“Apologies, Jonathan-sama,” Kensuke said, inclining his head slightly. “But those spoiled children are the reason you are able to continue your work.”
I sighed, running a hand through my hair. Sometimes I truly regretted selling the recursion doors, but exorbitant production costs and an empty bank account had forced my hand. And in the end, the doors were my only chance at finding Marie—I wouldn’t hesitate to do it again.
“I’m sorry, Kensuke-san. I know you’re right, but I don’t have to like it. I’ll see to it first thing.”
Kensuke looked at me, deep lines of concern etched in his face. “You will find her, my friend.”
For once, I didn’t trust myself to respond.
• • •
The night of the auction, I sat in my office off the showroom floor, reluctantly awaiting the proceedings. Kensuke had helped me load my latest photos into the swinging display and I used a clicker to shuffle through: a false door at an Egyptian tomb, the inked blue door from Tunisia, a pair of massive double doors from a Spanish church. I flipped through worlds like so many photos in a catalog, sifting through endless realms until my eyes burned and my head felt light.
Nothing.
Hundreds of photos and not one of them brought me closer to Marie. Sighing, I leaned back and thought again about attempting another finite recursion—photographing a door within the pocket world—but instantly dismissed it as too dangerous.
The last time I’d tried, the pocket world had begun to shake. Granted, the tremors were weak, but in paradise nothing shakes. It was enough to realize that the extended recursions affected the stability of the entire multiverse. I was forced to burn the doors.
In retrospect, it made sense. According to the Droste effect, an image within an image could theoretically continue forever. However, in practical terms, it could only continue so far as the resolution allowed.
There was a knock at the door and Kensuke entered. “I am about to open the floor,” he said.
I nodded. “I’ll be out shortly. Thanks, Ken.”
Stretching my arms overhead, I moved into the bathroom and splashed water on my face. I took two aspirin for the headache I was soon to have and started to close the medicine cabinet, but stopped halfway. I cocked my head, staring at the endless reflection created between the cabinet mirror and the vanity mirror. A thought began to form in my head, something that struck me instantly as too risky. But I had to know.
I strode from my office, buried in thought, nearly oblivious to the madness around me. Kensuke had hired extra security tonight and with good reason. Absence really does make the heart grow fonder: we were packed to capacity. This was even more impressive when you considered the bidding started around a million dollars.
I made for the door across the room, trying to appear casual in the hope no one would notice me. No such luck. Before I reached it, the weasel from Renkoda intercepted me. How had he gotten in?
“Could we talk, Mr. Ward?”
“Haven’t we?” I said. “I thought my answer earlier was obvious.”
“It was,” the representative said. “I’ve been asked to give you another chance.”
“Excuse me?”
“No contract this time. We just want to commission you for a special project.”
I eyed him darkly. Special project? What he wanted was a few recursion doors off the record. Doors he wouldn’t have to register with the government. And without government regulation, he could put people inside to work indefinitely.
“We’re done.”
“I really think you should reconsider.”
“Is that a threat?”
“Of course not,” he said, with a faint smile, “merely a suggestion.”
The representative turned to leave, but paused.
“I understand there’s legislation on the table regarding your recursion doors,” he said. “Apparently, some members of the government don’t believe you should be allowed to do… whatever it is you do.”
“They’ve been sitting on that for months. It’ll never pass.”
He shrugged. “Then I suppose you have nothing to worry about.”
I frowned, watching the representative go. Why had he been so confident this time?
“Are you all right?” Kensuke asked.
I took a deep breath and nodded. “Yeah, I think so. Do me a favor and keep things running up here, Ken. I need to check the basement.”
Kensuke inclined his head. “Of course.”
I took the stairs down, passing a voice recognition test to gain access to the basement. Lucky for me, Kensuke was an organizational genius. The entire basement had been outfitted with automated racks like a dry cleaners—except, instead of clothes, there was row upon row of hanging recursion doors. All I had to do was select the date the image had been captured and the racks would shift to the appropriate position.
I found the two I was looking for and pulled them off the rack. Taken almost a year apart on opposite sides of the world, each door was made entirely from mirror. Almost identical in build and shape, they would reflect each other endlessly.
I didn’t know what opening an infinite recursion like that would do, but I had an idea—which is why it had to be a last resort.
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Making a mental note to have Kensuke send the doors to my house, I climbed the stairs back to the auction. The thought of mingling with the crowd for the next few hours depressed me.
It was time for another trip.
• • •
The twin louvered doors sagged against each other, narrow enough to be little more than exaggerated shutters. Faded by a ruthless sun, the turquoise paint peeled, revealing black wood beneath.
I frowned through the viewfinder at the mustard-stained walls framing the doors. Surely Marie wouldn’t be behind something as hideous as this?
We’d come to Agra for the doors of the Taj Mahal, but I didn’t have the luxury to pass up other opportunities. The doors squeaked in the wind, rusty latch barely holding closed. Mumbling in disgust, I took the shot and we moved on.
“What’s it like inside?” Irene asked.
The question actually surprised me. Sometimes I forgot she’d never experienced the multiverse. Maybe it was wrong of me to forbid it, but the truth was, ever since we lost Marie, I’d been terrified of going inside. For all the sense of immortality the pocket worlds offered, they left you surprisingly vulnerable to outside forces. Especially fire.
“Your mother and I used to disappear inside for hours,” I said. “I still remember the first time we crossed over: the lurch in motion as we were pulled forward, the shifting of lines as one world gave way to another, the overwhelming sense of peace. I’ve never felt anything like it.”
Irene stared into the distance. “Peace, huh? Sounds nice.”
I nodded agreement, but I didn’t want peace. I wanted my wife back.
We continued up the road, neither wanting to break the silence. Finally, Irene stopped, pointing at another green tinted door.
“What about that one?”
I looked it over carefully, then shook my head. “Nope.”
“It looks like the last door—”
“You’re just like your mother,” I said with a smile. “There doesn’t have to be a reason for everything. Sometimes you just need faith.”
Irene rolled her eyes. Trying to explain the concept of faith to a teenager was an unenviable task. Certain she was no longer listening, I didn’t waste my breath. It was too hot for talking anyway.
“Can we walk the market?” Irene asked.
I shuddered at the idea of pushing through the throngs of people, but when she looked at me with those green eyes—the same as her mother’s—what was I supposed to say?
“Sure, why not?”
“Awesome! You’re the best!”
I let Irene lead, content to take the backseat for once. We pushed through a sea of color, men and women in a mesmerizing variety of yellows, blues, and greens. She stopped at one of the stalls, examining the local jewelry.
“Mr. Ward?”
A man in a tailored suit stood in the shade of the stall, holding a cloth over his nose. Even across the world I wasn’t safe from the leeches.
“Wait here a minute,” I said to Irene. She shrugged and continued sifting through multihued bead necklaces.
I took the man out of earshot of my daughter.
“How the hell do you people find me?” I asked, then held up my hands. “Never mind, I don’t want to know. What now?”
“Sir, I don’t think you—”
“Who do you work with? Is it Renkoda?”
“I’m not from any company,” the man said.
“What do you mean?”
“I’m from the government,” he said, holding up a badge. “You’ve been ordered to cease and desist.”
• • •
“How can they do this?”
My hand tightened around the glass of scotch, until I was sure it would break. I didn’t care if it did. It was all I could do not to hurl the glass at the wall.
Kensuke looked at me sympathetically across the kitchen counter. He’d come as soon as I called with the news. It was strange, but he was really the only friend I had left.
“This has to be against free speech or something,” I said.
“I’m afraid this is beyond freedom of speech.”
True enough. Even after the government required a permit for ownership, it wasn’t a catchall. People seemed intent on polluting paradise: secret drug factories, human trafficking, murder cover-ups. Just because pain didn’t exist in the multiverse, didn’t mean you couldn’t bring it in. I tried not to think about the consequences of what I’d unleashed.
“You sound like you agree with them,” I said sullenly, staring into my drink.
“I am only being rational, Jonathan-sama,” Kensuke said.
“This is because I turned down the Renkoda contract, isn’t it? They’re punishing me.”
“Whether Renkoda influenced the vote or not,” Kensuke said. “You did the right thing. What you do is a gift and how you use it is up to you.”
“The government can’t stop me.”
“They can and they will. You are one of the most recognized faces in the world. Continuing your work now would be foolish. You have a daughter to think of.”
“I have a wife to think of!” I slammed my drink on the table with a crack. “Or have you forgotten?”
“I have not,” Kensuke said, his expression unchanged.
I continued to drink, amber liquid leaking down my wrist.
“Dammit,” I said, standing woozily. I tripped and stumbled to the ground. Staring into the grooves in the wood, all the fight went out of me. Kensuke helped me to my room and I collapsed on the bed, eyes drooping. “Goddammit,” I whispered.
Kensuke paused on his way out.
“God is the only hope you have left, my friend.”
• • •
My head pounded. I’d slept through lunch and would have slept through dinner if not for the arrival of the recursion doors I’d requested. I left the two photos covered and set them facing each other in my study.
Irene passed the room, headphones on, miming her music. Noticing the covered doors, she lowered the headphones and stuck her head in.
“What’s the deal with the doors?”
“Who said they’re doors?”
Irene gave me a withering look.
“I’m working on a project,” I said, choosing my words carefully.
Irene’s eyes narrowed. “You’re planning something without me, aren’t you?”
I looked down, avoiding her eyes. “I’m sorry, Reenie. It’s too dangerous.”
Reckless, is what I didn’t say.
“I don’t care how dangerous it is. I want to go with you!”
“Irene…”
“Don’t do this to me!”
“Irene!”
She flinched and I instantly regretted my tone—but it had to be done.
“This is not a discussion,” I said. “I will not risk your life on top of everything else.”
“But it’s fine to risk yours?” Irene said. Her face was nearly the color of her hair. “What if something happens to you? Where does that leave me?”
There were tears in her eyes now and I forced myself to look at her. I finally realized why she always begged to come along when I traveled, even though she pretended to hate it. She’d already lost her mother and every time I went away, she lost her father too. Suddenly, I doubted myself.
“Nothing is going to happen to me,” I forced myself to say.
Irene looked up and sniffed. “Promise me.”
I opened my mouth to promise her everything she wanted and more, but I couldn’t.
“You can’t, can you?”
“You just have to trust me,” I said. “I know what I’m doing.”
“How can you possibly know what you’re doing?”
She had me there. I sighed. “Listen, I’m not going until tomorrow morning. We’ll talk more then, okay?”
Her hug caught me by surprise. “I love you, Dad.”
It’d been a long time since she’d called me that. So why did I feel like such a monster?
“I love you too, Reenie.”
I sat in my study for a long time, staring at the covered recursion doors. What a selfish asshole I’d been. Pretending to know how she felt, but never being there for her. I’d traveled the world to save my wife, only to let my daughter slip away. Marie would be ashamed.
There was my answer. I couldn’t risk it—not with Irene to think of. I had sacrificed too much of our relationship already. I’d find my wife, but it would have to be another way.
• • •
Something was wrong.
I jolted awake with a gasp, entangled in the sheets. Moonlight flooded my room, bleaching everything bone white. A cool breeze blew in through the window, but otherwise the night was quiet. I tried to fall back asleep, but couldn’t shake the feeling of anxiety.
Pulling on jeans, I padded down the hall to Irene’s room. It was after midnight, but I swear the girl never slept. Still, I didn’t want to wake her if I didn’t have to. She’d just think I was a crazy parent. I knocked lightly and edged the door open, peering into the darkness.
“Irene?”
Panic seized me as I waited for my eyes to adjust and I flipped on the lights. Her bed was empty.
I tore through the first floor, struggling to breathe as I called for my daughter. She was gone. My heart caught in my throat and I felt my eyes drawn to the floor above me.
Please God, no.
I scrambled up the stairs, taking them two and three at a time and burst into my study. I froze in horror.
“Oh, Irene. What have you done?”
The protective sheets had been torn from the opposing photos, revealing the mirrored doors beneath. Facing as they were, they created an endless hall in both directions.
I took a deep breath to calm myself, trying to slow the pounding of my heart. She couldn’t have been gone long. Yanking on my shoes, I inspected both doors. The one on the right still had a smudge from Irene’s fingers. I wet my lips, pressed my hand against the door, and stepped through.
• • •
I had brought the apocalypse to paradise.
As I’d expected, the infinite recursion had created a path between worlds, a sort of slipstream that enabled me to jump from one to another in a single step. But something in that connection had destabilized the multiverse. The pocket worlds were collapsing.