Superposition by David Walton

into the system—I flipped my switch twice, then three times, then five, etcetera. I barely left the bunker, not to sleep, not to eat. We followed primes with natural ratios like pi and the golden mean, and then more complex mathematics. I programmed my smartpad to control the switch, and soon we had a language of sorts going, based entirely on math. I told them about us—our chemical makeup, our genetics. They sent me formulas to describe what they are—it was fascinating! Soon they were feeding me formulas that I implemented in meta-circuitry on my pad, and that’s when things really started to happen. Through the resonators, we broke the barrier between the macro and subatomic worlds. When we dream of tapping the quantum realm, we think of making faster computers to play video games, but there’s so much more that’s possible. It’ll revolutionize everything, what we think of ourselves, what it means to be human. There’s almost nothing they can’t do.”
    I thought about how that thing in the bunker had behaved, and a chill went up my spine. “And now they know we’re here.”
    Brian didn’t pick up on my tone. “It’s amazing. For more than a century, we’ve looked for aliens in distant galaxies, but they were here all along, right among us. Through us even, in the very molecules that make up our air and food and our own bodies. Another whole civilization, living on Earth—or in the Earth, I should say. The surfaces of things aren’t as important to them as they are to us, and things like gravity and electricity are just one more kind of particle interaction.
    His eyes glistened. “They told me they could make me just like them. I was going to have all their power, live an immortal life across the universes . . .”
    â€œOkay,” Marek said. “We get it. They’re great and all. Practically gods. So how come you’re sleeping in the backseat of your car at the same time as you’re lying dead on your bunker floor?”
    â€œAs I’m what?” Brian asked.
    â€œA bloody corpse with a hole in your chest,” I said.
    â€œWhat are you talking about?” Brian asked.
    â€œLook,” I said. “This is not a thought experiment. You pulled me into this, and I have a right to know what’s going on.”
    â€œI’ve been telling you,” Brian said.
    I braked hard and pulled off the road. I jammed the gearshift into park, and then turned around to face him.
    â€œYou’re saying you don’t know about the body.”
    â€œWhat body?”
    â€œOr the letter. There was a letter for me in your office.”
    â€œThe letter I sent you?” he asked.
    â€œSent me? I found an envelope with my name on it in your jacket pocket in your office. It told me to go look in the bunker.”
    Brian shook his head. “I mailed that letter to you,” he said. “I sent it yesterday.”
    I pulled the letter out of my pocket and waved it in his face. “If you mailed it yesterday, how did I pull it out of your jacket pocket today?”
    â€œI don’t know! What body are you talking about?”
    â€œYou are, as we speak, lying dead in the CATHIE bunker with a bullet hole in your chest,” I said.
    Brian’s face got very pale, and that look of terror came back into his eyes. “Oh, no.”
    â€œExplain to me how that’s possible,” I said.
    Brian stared at me as if he didn’t understand the words. His jaw flapped like a fish on a hook. His gaze, which had been staring off into the distance at some bright, imagined future, suddenly snapped into focus. He began shaking violently. “No, it can’t be,” he said.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œGive me the letter,” he said. “Did you get through the passwords?”
    â€œPasswords, plural?” I said.
    Brian used his finger to scribble “137.036” on the page, and the