So I had this idea, kinda based on Cube 2: Hypercube, kinda based on a dream I had, kinda based on Super Paper Mario, kinda based on this book I read about quantum physics and a garden maze that made no physical sense and all the openings led into alternate universes, kinda based on A Barrel of Laughs, A Vale of Tears.
So I was thinking, there's a group of friends, and whenever they get together, they always end up on weird adventures because one of them can unconsciously quantum jump, but none of them know which of them can quantum jump, because it only happens when they're all together.
So one day as they're hanging out, whoever can quantum jump is about to do it unconsciously, even perhaps feeling it coming on, a brief breeze across their nose, a feeling of dizziness, whatever, when all of the sudden whoever it is falls down or something like that and gets a mild concussion, and the quantum jump screws up and sends everyone to a location in the quantum multiverse that is in no universe at all, but rather floating between them, in a world in which contradictory possibilities manifest and in which contradictory laws of physics apply. Due to the lack of a concrete set of possibilities to manifest themselves in this space (which is in turn due to the space not being within a universe), one's surroundings are mutable, molded by the unconscious. Thus, the friends perceive this world to be similar to our world, to Earth... However, this world is not Earth; in fact, it is very, very different.
Down south there may be a wood whose deepest, most fearsome parts are surrounded by the shadows of event horizons from other universes... In this great forest, if one were to venture beyond an event horizon, one would find oneself unable to escape, for whichever way one went would lead one further into the forest... But perhaps there would be a small crack in the event horizon, an opening via which, if one were to travel across the right pattern of trees at the right pattern of velocities, one might leave and once again see the light of day. And perhaps the only few people who know this sequence of movements would be the ones who have died in this forest, forever lost, whose souls would linger as children of the woods, but whose bodies would lie decomposing in the soil, serving as the snacks of trees. Perhaps these lost souls would see the trees and plants as their dear friends and defend the woods, feeling malevolent toward trespassers, especially those who might litter or start fires.
And then perhaps off west there would be a great desert... Lack of water for long enough may cause hallucinations... But these hallucinations would not necessarily be hallucinations. They say if you stare into the abyss long enough, the abyss stares back, and so it would be that these mirages, these figments, would, if perceived for sufficiently long, seem to enter reality... A lucid dreamer's paradise, but the worst nightmare of one with many worst nightmares... But of course, any reasonable person must question the reality of such things. One may find one's hallucinations as real as oneself, but everything would suddenly seem much less real, and one may begin to ask oneself if oneself is even real at all. And then many days later, one may be found lying motionless on the ground in the central area, as if one had never gone west, shriveled, eyes bulging, frothing at the mouth...
Northeast one might find a waterfall in the sun, beside which it is an incredibly pleasant and alluring prospect to fall asleep. And perhaps when one falls asleep, one enters another universe in one's dreams, and while one is asleep, one would seem to be in a coma, but when one wakes up, one wakes up in another area in the world between worlds, one corresponding to the area to which one chose to travel in one's dream... And perhaps one is trapped there, paralyzed, even, and the only way to return fully to one's body is to fall asleep again and to find one's way back to the waterfall in one's dream, but one's dream is then infested with terrible images of the past... And one must be very careful, for if one is pulled into the past before reaching the waterfall, one will fall down the waterfall and to the bottom of the river, never to be seen again, along with the remains many other quantum jumpers who have died there, digested gradually by current and stones...
Due north, one would find an icy mountain. It is always infinitely tall from the side from which it is viewed; to scale it, one must do so with one's eyes closed. One must take many breaks with this course of action; to leave one's eyes closed for too long would mean to fall from the mountain into another plane of existence, wherein one's progress up the mountain is not real, but complex, and in which one may become trapped without a knowledgeable friend to provide a separate point of view. At the top of this mountain lives an overseer of the crossroads, who may be able to send one to one's universe of origin.
Perhaps there is a great war of mental energies at the moment. Those who have come here have grown frustrated and confused. They have forgotten that they once existed in some reality, that they were once something more than subjects of nothing. Perhaps the quantum jumpers who have found their ways here have formed organizations, societies, and are trying to destroy one another's minds and induce insanity so as to be the first ones to get to the overseer of the crossroads, even though none of them actually remember why they were going to see him/her.
These are just random ideas about what sorts of places and things we might find here. In general, we would find many places and things that defy our most basic assumptions about the nature of reality. Perhaps we can even make them up as we go along.
We didn't ask to be immersed in any of this. We just wanted to have a picnic at the park, or play ball, or celebrate a birthday, or whatever we had been doing when the incident occurred. And we still don't want to be immersed in any of this. Or maybe we do. In this mad Wonderland of broken pacts and living dreams, will you hold your grip on what you believe to be real? Or will you forget who you are and join the ranks of those who exist to destroy minds? Or perhaps you'll lose your conception of physical law and slip away into the darkness to be with the dead. Tread carefully, Alice...
EDIT: I forgot to mention one thing. At the many edges of the paths that one might take in this strange world of worlds, there are hints of information, glimpses of light in the darkness. To ever have any hope of finding the overseer of the crossroads, one must gather this information and fit it together in a logical way... Which will be very difficult, as the information ought to make very little sense and fit together only in esoteric respects.
EDIT 2: Since this is a world dependent on no specific mind but on many of them as observers, the more people die here, the more the integrity of the world will begin to deteriorate, and therefore the more difficult it will become to navigate.
What do yeh think? It's a bit undeveloped at the moment, but perhaps I'll build on it if there seems to be interest.
So I was thinking, there's a group of friends, and whenever they get together, they always end up on weird adventures because one of them can unconsciously quantum jump, but none of them know which of them can quantum jump, because it only happens when they're all together.
So one day as they're hanging out, whoever can quantum jump is about to do it unconsciously, even perhaps feeling it coming on, a brief breeze across their nose, a feeling of dizziness, whatever, when all of the sudden whoever it is falls down or something like that and gets a mild concussion, and the quantum jump screws up and sends everyone to a location in the quantum multiverse that is in no universe at all, but rather floating between them, in a world in which contradictory possibilities manifest and in which contradictory laws of physics apply. Due to the lack of a concrete set of possibilities to manifest themselves in this space (which is in turn due to the space not being within a universe), one's surroundings are mutable, molded by the unconscious. Thus, the friends perceive this world to be similar to our world, to Earth... However, this world is not Earth; in fact, it is very, very different.
Down south there may be a wood whose deepest, most fearsome parts are surrounded by the shadows of event horizons from other universes... In this great forest, if one were to venture beyond an event horizon, one would find oneself unable to escape, for whichever way one went would lead one further into the forest... But perhaps there would be a small crack in the event horizon, an opening via which, if one were to travel across the right pattern of trees at the right pattern of velocities, one might leave and once again see the light of day. And perhaps the only few people who know this sequence of movements would be the ones who have died in this forest, forever lost, whose souls would linger as children of the woods, but whose bodies would lie decomposing in the soil, serving as the snacks of trees. Perhaps these lost souls would see the trees and plants as their dear friends and defend the woods, feeling malevolent toward trespassers, especially those who might litter or start fires.
And then perhaps off west there would be a great desert... Lack of water for long enough may cause hallucinations... But these hallucinations would not necessarily be hallucinations. They say if you stare into the abyss long enough, the abyss stares back, and so it would be that these mirages, these figments, would, if perceived for sufficiently long, seem to enter reality... A lucid dreamer's paradise, but the worst nightmare of one with many worst nightmares... But of course, any reasonable person must question the reality of such things. One may find one's hallucinations as real as oneself, but everything would suddenly seem much less real, and one may begin to ask oneself if oneself is even real at all. And then many days later, one may be found lying motionless on the ground in the central area, as if one had never gone west, shriveled, eyes bulging, frothing at the mouth...
Northeast one might find a waterfall in the sun, beside which it is an incredibly pleasant and alluring prospect to fall asleep. And perhaps when one falls asleep, one enters another universe in one's dreams, and while one is asleep, one would seem to be in a coma, but when one wakes up, one wakes up in another area in the world between worlds, one corresponding to the area to which one chose to travel in one's dream... And perhaps one is trapped there, paralyzed, even, and the only way to return fully to one's body is to fall asleep again and to find one's way back to the waterfall in one's dream, but one's dream is then infested with terrible images of the past... And one must be very careful, for if one is pulled into the past before reaching the waterfall, one will fall down the waterfall and to the bottom of the river, never to be seen again, along with the remains many other quantum jumpers who have died there, digested gradually by current and stones...
Due north, one would find an icy mountain. It is always infinitely tall from the side from which it is viewed; to scale it, one must do so with one's eyes closed. One must take many breaks with this course of action; to leave one's eyes closed for too long would mean to fall from the mountain into another plane of existence, wherein one's progress up the mountain is not real, but complex, and in which one may become trapped without a knowledgeable friend to provide a separate point of view. At the top of this mountain lives an overseer of the crossroads, who may be able to send one to one's universe of origin.
Perhaps there is a great war of mental energies at the moment. Those who have come here have grown frustrated and confused. They have forgotten that they once existed in some reality, that they were once something more than subjects of nothing. Perhaps the quantum jumpers who have found their ways here have formed organizations, societies, and are trying to destroy one another's minds and induce insanity so as to be the first ones to get to the overseer of the crossroads, even though none of them actually remember why they were going to see him/her.
These are just random ideas about what sorts of places and things we might find here. In general, we would find many places and things that defy our most basic assumptions about the nature of reality. Perhaps we can even make them up as we go along.
We didn't ask to be immersed in any of this. We just wanted to have a picnic at the park, or play ball, or celebrate a birthday, or whatever we had been doing when the incident occurred. And we still don't want to be immersed in any of this. Or maybe we do. In this mad Wonderland of broken pacts and living dreams, will you hold your grip on what you believe to be real? Or will you forget who you are and join the ranks of those who exist to destroy minds? Or perhaps you'll lose your conception of physical law and slip away into the darkness to be with the dead. Tread carefully, Alice...
EDIT: I forgot to mention one thing. At the many edges of the paths that one might take in this strange world of worlds, there are hints of information, glimpses of light in the darkness. To ever have any hope of finding the overseer of the crossroads, one must gather this information and fit it together in a logical way... Which will be very difficult, as the information ought to make very little sense and fit together only in esoteric respects.
EDIT 2: Since this is a world dependent on no specific mind but on many of them as observers, the more people die here, the more the integrity of the world will begin to deteriorate, and therefore the more difficult it will become to navigate.
What do yeh think? It's a bit undeveloped at the moment, but perhaps I'll build on it if there seems to be interest.
