A Special Darkness
Amit put the keys into his bike’s ignition and tried to start. It didn’t start. He just stood there for a moment on his bike, thinking what to do. He couldn’t think. His mind was filled with rage because of his wife.
How dare she! he gritted his teeth. He held the throttle firmly and tried the ignition again. The bike wouldn’t budge. It died mid way through starting, so he put down the starter and started kicking.
Kick. It didn’t start. Pause.
Kick kick kick! Pause.
The kicking got stronger and wilder very soon.
Long pause.
KICK!! The bike cried for help now.
kick kick kick….. KICK!!! The bike let out a yelp and the engine roared to life. Amit’s forehead started to sweat. He wiped it with the back of his palms and pressed the throttle. The bike made a sound. And then there was an abrupt darkness. Amit could not see anything. He desperately tried to feel the grip of his hands on the bike, but he could not. He tried to feel his hands, but they seem to be missing too. There was no pain. There was no transition. In a matter of milliseconds, Amit’s body was gone. His feeling of any physical sensation was gone. He felt like an ethereal dust floating aimlessly in the cosmos. There is nothing but him. For a second, Amit felt peace. Some weird peace. And then the panic set in.
“WHAT THE FUCK!” he thought. He heard himself saying those words, but there is no mouth. There are no ears. There is nothing. His mental image of his house and his beloved bike faded away into darkness.

Slowly in the middle of the blackness, a screen began to emerge. White letters seemed to form abruptly on the screen as if someone is typing in a messenger. The screen was translucent, blending in seamlessly with the dark background. A white vertical line appeared on the screen. It started blinking. Then it started typing.
Z: “Um, hello there..” it said. Amit was perplexed. What the hell does this all mean? He had lots of questions. He started with the simplest of them all.
U237: “What the fuck happened?” he asked. Technically, he did not ask anything. His mind felt nothing moving. He had no mind even. However, those words appeared on the screen — typed out in a light yellow font. He wondered what U237 meant.
Z: “Hehe” came the response. Amit froze.
U237: “What the flying fuck!?! Am I dreaming?”
Z: “Nope.”
U237: “Then?”
Z: “Well, what do YOU think is happening?”
U237: “How the fuck should I know? This is.. this is.. I am hallucinating or something? Who are you?” this time Amit felt fear. He felt himself sweating. However, there was no sweat.
Z: “You can have your answers, but it does not matter.”
U237: “What does that mean?”
Z: “Well, you would go back to your body without really feeling anything, but just a slight mental discomfort. You would not remember anything, so why bother eh?”
U237: “Still, I want to know.”
Z: “Are you sure?”
There was a slight pause.
U237: “Yes.”
Z: “Okay, wait.”
There was a longer pause this time.
U237: “hellooo..?”
Z: “Dude, wait.” came the response.
After what felt like 15 minutes to Amit, Z came back to life.
Z: “Hello dude, what’s up?”
U237: “What the fuck! Tell me what does this mean!!”
Z: “Ah yes, about that.. I will tell you now. Ready?”
U237: “Ready.”
Z: “Good.”
Z: “ You are in a simulation in our dimension.”
U237: “Simulation?”
Z: “Yes, there is a power outage. The simulation stopped abruptly. You are running on backup power. You are the lone survivor of the system now.”
U237: “WHAT?!”
Z: “Yes.”
Amit processed this all for a minute. Compared to his arrival to this dark landscape, his thinking had slowed down considerably. His mind or whatever it was, he figured is performing much better now. He felt an uneasy calm ease over him. He felt an odd sense of control.
U237: “SO… You’re telling me..”
Z: “Yes, we are telling you..”
U237: “That I am a part of a… simulation….?” Amit’s voice wavered at that word.
Z: “Exactly!” came the enthusiastic response.
U237: “But, why is there a simulation? What is the point of this all?”
Z: “Oooh, that’s a very good question.”
U237: “Yes, but what’s the answer?”
Z: “What you think is the answer?”
Amit considered this for a moment. Why would there be a simulation of the entire universe? Why would there be people? Who are these people? What does the “Z” mean in the translucent chat box? Am I not real? Who am I? Am I just a computer? All these thoughts flashed across his mind.
Z: “I am waiting, buddy.”
U237: “I think you guys are doing science? And just playing around with simulations and stuff?” guessed Amit. He knew about scientists and what they were upto.
Z: “Ah, that is a very interesting guess. But, no, we are not scientists. We are just some guys.”
U237: “Oh!” Amit was taken aback with this answer. “Then, who are you guys?”
Z: “It doesn’t matter. You will go back to your simulation. You won’t remember any of this of course, we are just shifting little some parameters. Please wait.”
U237: “It does matter!” Amit was now properly furious. “You say you are not scientists and just bunch of guys? What the fuck? I mean, clearly I should be hallucinating, because none of this makes sense. None of this has any reason to be happening.”
Z: “What makes you think that for something to happen, there should be a reason?”
U237: “Bec..” He swallowed something invisible. “Because that’s the way it is. Everything happens for a reason!”
Z: “Bushllit! That’s not true, mate. Not everything happens for a reason.”
U237: “What do you mean? Of course, everything happens for a reason, right?”
Z: “Not at all. Intent precedes reason. Without intent there can be no reason. Sentient beings, most often than not, have intent. If you want to hit your wife, then that is your intent. When you ask then ‘why your wife was hit?’, then you can fall back on your intent — because you wanted to, right? Not everything has intent though. Your planet is not revolving around Sun because it intended to. It is doing that, because of the result of the laws we put in there. There is no reason that Earth should revolve around the sun, except for the laws put in there.”
U237: “Wait, you put laws in our Universe?”
Z: “Haha, I told you so many things and that is your question?” mocked the message. “Yes, of course we did. We started this simulation. Simulations need laws. The Gravitational law holds true, because we programmed it that way. Why would there be laws otherwise? What do you think of the Universal constants? Why you think the speed of light is a constant? How about Avagadro’s number? How about Planck’s constant? Who came up with all these things? We did! It took you guys billions of years to just discover it and formulate it” Amit could sense the pride and the condescension, though he had nothing to sense with. He could almost feel himself inhale fresh air.
U237: “Does your Unvierse have laws and constants as well? Does that mean that you are in a simulation too? What laws do you have?” Amit paused at that. “I am sorry if I had said something wrong before. I am just.. very confused, angry and sad.”
There was a long pause. If there were air in this universe, it would have very well well gushed past Amit’s face.
Z: “Dude.. You just won’t understand it. I can explain things to you all you want, but you’re just a program running with the minimal settings right now. I am oddly feelingn sympathy towards you, though you’re not real. Like, you know, how you would feel towards a robotic kitten with big eyes. Nothing personal, but you guys are a very interesting bunch at the least.”
Z continued on this time. “I mean, you guys had two world wars. You are constantly at each other’s throats. You couldn’t even figure out that you were in a simulation and now you’re questioning my Universe? What makes you think you can understand it, eh?”
Amit’s binaries trembled with fear and intimidation. He tried to look down in shame, fear and confusion, but he had no arms. He remembered that he had no body and his confusion increased tremendously. He became extremely self aware as his parameters went haywire, jumping here and there. In human terms, he was having an existential crisis.
He felt the other end of the chatbox virtually sighing.
Z: “See, this is why I told you to just stay put and wait.” It continued. “The power is back now. Any other questions you have before you go back?”
Amit thought about this proposition for a while.
U237: “Can I stay here?”
Z: “Nah, you’re just a program in this Universe. You have no purpose in it. You’re a perfectly functional self-replicating program, a result of 4 billion years of evolution in your native simulation. You belong there. Not here, buddy.”
Amit sighed. “So, before I go, I have one more question. Am I special? I mean, why was I the only person left in backup power?” he asked and waited. He had resigned everything. There was no response. Amit still waited. Nothing happened. The darkness was overwhelming. The sounds of silence was defeaning. The screen was silent. After what seemed like ages, came a response.
Z: “You think you’re special? Haha, dude! You’re so cute!”. The words, this time disappeared as soon as they came. Sounds of laughter emanated all around him. Amit could not pin point the source, but cowered in fear. He felt abandoned. His program increased his heart rate and opened up his skin pores to palpitate. Adrenaline simulations entered him and made him ready for flight. He felt the whole dark void closing in on him, his ghost eyes rolling up, losing any perception of balance or direction. Tears started pouring from within him. Blood oozed out without any pain, but with maximum sensation from his ears. His breathing increased. There was a pang of light.
Amit found himself sitting on his bike, sweating like he was jogging in a desert. His shirt was drenched and left a wet mark on the bike’s petrol tank. He felt an odd sense of fear and deja-vu gloss over him like a wave. He quivered involuntarily and patted sweat from his forehead. He tried to remember, but could not remember anything for a second. Fear and panic made him feel blinded. Amit closed his eyes. Darkness felt good to him, as if he was home. His breathing slowed. He inhaled more oxygen into his lungs. As he exhaled, his muscles eased up. He opened his eyes to feel a cool breeze float over him almost carrying him away. He felt the bike throttle, ignition already on. He gritted his teeth involuntarily and then remembered something. His wife!
How dare she! he thought as angers flared. He vented it out on his bike’s throttle as the bike raced and sped away into the tar road leaving behind dust. The Z’s all smiled at this. Then they all opened a can of beer and went back to work.
The end.
