Earlier, Berlin

Patrick walked to the desk and grabbed the vial containing the God Virus, he did so very carefully. The man inspected the dark fluid. The solution seemed alive and twisted as a chocolate taffy folding upon itself over and over. Why did Marilyn object to the frog’s release, was it airborne? In silence, he wondered what would happen if he self-administered the solution.

“Where to begin,” Francois had minutes with his friend, not hours. “We humans take randomness for granted because of our evolution as a species on this globe. Animals hear a noise in the wild, most of the time they can’t know what it is, but to protect against the rare predator, the brain decides if the noise is hostile or not. Should it panic or not, hesitation kills and was washed from how we operate. Said politely, we are all programmed deep inside to refuse random, chaos and the unknown. We are allergic to the ‘I don’t know’ mindset. We first created God to answer questions we frankly had no answers to. We then invented science for the same purpose.

“Add on top of that narcissism, these cell phones and you get a population of fools who think they know things but also falsely believe they understand their world and the Universe. Truth is, we are, we live in the rare slice of order in a world made of chaos. Water, molecules, movement, waves, all of it is rest on a hill of chaos.”

“Very romantic of you.”

“Half of what I teach is chaos theory. But chaos assumes one basic thing.”

“What teacher Copland?” joked Emilio pretending to be a student in love with the teacher. The men were great friends.

“Chaos. Chaos assumes more chaos but is defined by limits of order; the same way a parking lot is defined by the streets around it. Marilyn says the fabric of our universe itself is shifting and slowly, we are losing our capacity to decide as this bias increases. The world will start deciding where the rain falls, where air gets breathed, and what babies are born. At the moment every damn molecule moves randomly, well, that’s about to end. The door on chaos is about to close and we do not own the key. This is serious as hell. This virus speeds up the process. Put this liquid in your arm and the universe gets to play piano with you. This,” he pointed, “accelerates evolution and I am not sure mankind needs a million years of evolution in a matter of hours. More importantly, an evolution pushed by invisible hands.”

“Why should we care if this entire dimension is days from vanishing.”

“True, this seems futile.” Francois had to concede the point. “Marilyn wants me to tell you what this virus does and more importantly how the world is changing. This bias exists, always has but in some places it sleeps while in other it roars.”

“What’s the connection with Mercury?”

“No clue.”

“Am I the only one to see the fallacy here?” The President took the vial. “For weeks, this charming Multiverse has been trying real hard to destroy our race and prevent Sophie from saving us. It sets up death trap after death trap as if Sophie on her birthday gets to open one door, not two and it wants to confuse her into opening the wrong one. So I took care of most problems here on Earth and Sophie is on Mars stuck to deal with two things, the game and the ball from the Sun.”

“Seems so.”

“The Multiverse now want these creatures from Mercury to be sent to Mars. Are we not exporting a danger and a confusion to Sophie’s lap? Someone sane here would say that my success at warding off problems from Earth and Marilyn’s protection of Sophie is being thwarted by the Multiverse yet again?”

“When you put it that way.” Francois realized Emilio was right. “Then trash the syringe right now, it’s that simple.”

Emilio walked around holding the virus, he had a very difficult decision to make. He hesitated along time. Finally he said, “This is going to Mercury, we just needs the right host.”

“Really?”

“Yes.”

“What about what you just said?”

“You know, this feels different for three reasons.”

“You never do things easily, three?”

“Hard for me to conceive how, if we rescue a race of stranded creatures, this could be adverse to Sophie in a month. Feels like this might convince the creatures on Mars to help us, no?”

“I guess.”

“Next, Marilyn is on our side, she is also trying to avoid the end and she desires this outcome. But more importantly, my visions are different. They come with emotions and I feel this is different and needs to happen.”

“Did we just waste our time with circular reasoning.”

“As you said, none of this might actually matter if in fact Sophie’s role is not this basic. This could be rearrangement of chairs on the Titanic.”

Emilio told his friend to follow closely as they went out to the elevator. As they approached the large metal door, Francois felt the President tense up. He knew Emilio didn't like elevators and hated basements -- their next destination. Days ago, the President had ordered several of the most dangerous serial killers brought here and placed below the surface in cells in a maximum security area. He just felt like that was the right thing to do, one he had seen in a dream.

The elevator doors opened and quickly made it to the basement of the tower as Emilio closed his eyes of fear. Two guards were waiting inside. “Let's see what 184 in IQ gets these days." Francois felt privileged to be there.

***

Two guards waited in the basement and two more inside the holding rooms. The room where thefirst man sat was paired with a room behind a one-way mirror. Both men walked to the first observation room, hidden from sight. Awaited on a tray was a carafe of Scotch whiskey and a couple of crystal tumblers prepared as instructed by the President. In the room, the French Canadian waited flanked with two guards.

“Watch here,” he grabbed the tray. “The solution to bias and control is simple, either insanity or intellect; both together preferably. If this Universe wants to manipulate a host, let’s make the job as hard as possible. It’s hard to explain why this needs to happen.”

“Not to a mathematician. You actually make a lot more sense than you think.”

The President went to the other room. Christian, the prisoner still in his orange jumpsuit was well over sixty of age. His choice of grooming was strange, he wore mullet and a goatee. Dark circles around his eyes evidenced years of sleep deprivation, caffeine dependence to name a few. The intelligent ferocious eyes had an especially malevolent draw. This was a caged feline, one ready to bounce.

“Who is he?” asked the mathematician to one of the guard.

“Remember the man who tried to release the plague of 2035? That’s him. He has killed well over twenty guards over the past years. That guy deserves a bullet in the head, not eighty year old whiskey.”

Emilio entered with the tray on which was the carafe of alcohol, the two glass tumblers and the syringe.

"Mister Maltais,” Emilio pulled the chair and sat after placing the tray on the table inches from the man.

"Call me Christian," replied the prisoner with his thick accent.

Emilio filled both glasses with the brown liquid.

"Release his mental control,” he spoke to the guard. “Put cuffs on him, tie one to the table."

"Sir?"

The killer seemed puzzled by the unexpected turn of events and the level of confidence of a man that looked rather defenseless. The guard pulled two pairs of cuffs and attached each wrist to a different leg. As both hands stretched, the head was pulled lower to the table.

"No need for the preliminary remarks," said Emilio. The President turned to the guard in the room. "Shoot the cameras and get out. Leave us alone."

"Turn them off?"

"I was very specific young man.”

The guard needed no more and pulled his sidearm. They were in a concrete room. The bullets hit the target, ricocheted, but no one was hurt.

"Leave us alone."

"A first date? What an honor," the criminal said teasingly. The guard got up, opened the door, and left. "How am I supposed to drink?" His hands were tied to each of the table legs.

"I see you don't know me, that's rare these days. I like that."

"What?"

"Let me reset whatever false sense of control floats in that head of yours. You see the needle and likely hope to hold me hostage with it. You noticed this steel table is not bolted to the floor. Your plan, at the moment can work aside from one variable, the glass. If you flip the table, the two glasses and this carafe will fly in a random direction and introduce unpredictability into your actions.” The man was smiling like a child, the President was right. “Your brain, while well structured, cannot anticipate how the glasses will break. I also ordered crystal carved with hundreds of facets to help generate more random, just for you." The French-Canadian was silent. "Said simply, these glasses keeps you shackled, not these cuffs, how ironic, no?"

"Impressive," said the man. The killer's smile was priceless. He was back in contact with someone who was worth his time. His eyes began to move erratically in their orbits as the man formulated a new plan. In less than a second the flutter stopped, and he focused again on his host.

"Intelligent people want to control things, to predict. You will pounce the moment you think you have the upper hand, not before. In fact, you now have concluded my entertainment value exceeded your desire to harm me," continued the President. The killer smiled, he liked this man.

"There is a plan out there that needs some element of chaos introduced into it, and I think you are just what this doctor ordered. I will use you as a tool to help with a mission, save the world. But at the end, you will die. I'd wager that's the first time someone about to manipulate you has had the courage to let you know that upfront."

“I have been locked up and without access to the Internet for decades. As you said, I don’t even know who you are. Why me?"

“The abbreviated version?”

“Always.”

“Well, I was told there is a growing universal bias, the virus in that vial uses this bias to transform genetically a host. I need you to shoot yourself with it, get in a rocket we have prepared and travel to Mercury to rescue in a crater the first alien life form. Because of temperatures and magnetic energy, no automated system can go. Barefoot on that burning rock, you will rocket a hundred life forms made of sand to Mars where a war is brewing. To make matters stranger, a human, a young girl on Mars has godlike powers and might help out entire dimension survive the destruction of the Multiverse. Interested?”

“You seem serious.”

“I am.”

“Why would I do such a thing.”

“Sounds more fun than what you got right now.”

“Definitely.”

“Can I ask for something?”

“Time is very short.”

“I want the guy who put me in prison, next to me.”

“Nick?” The President was well informed.

“Yes. Collateral damage our species can definitely accept. I promise to make him suffer.”

“Deal.”

Emilio emptied the vial in the man’s arm. Nothing seemed to happen.

He got up. “Enjoy the ride.”

The killer looked his way and simply offered, “and they call me crazy.”

“Agreed. Wait until you read the rest of it. Truth be told, ironically, you might actually save the entire dame race you once tried to destroy.”