Zig Zag Read Free

world. As
far as Elisa was concerned, there was far too much to take in right
here in this world, even for the wildest imagination. And she planned
to prove it, at least to the fifteen students sitting in her small
class.
    She
started with a fun, easy example. First, she put a transparency up on
the overhead projector. On it, she'd drawn a human stick figure and a
square.

    "This
man," she explained, pointing to him, "lives in a world
with only two dimensions: length and width. He's worked hard all his
life and earned a fortune: one euro." She heard a few snickers
and knew she'd grabbed the attention of several sets of glazed-over
eyes. "So that no one can steal this euro from him, he decides
to keep it in the safest bank in his world: a box. This box has only
one opening, on one side, which our man uses to deposit his fortune,
and which no one else can open."

    Elisa
quickly extracted the euro coin she'd had with her from her jeans,
and placed it in the square on the transparency.
    "Our
friend feels safe with his euro in that bank. Nobody, absolutely no
one, can penetrate any of the box's sides. Or, at least, no one from
his world. But I can steal it easily, from the third
dimension—height—which is invisible to the inhabitants of
his flat universe." As she spoke, Elisa took the coin back and
replaced the transparency with another one that had on it a different
drawing. "You can imagine how the poor man feels when he opens
his box and finds that all his savings have disappeared. How could
anyone have robbed him if the box was never opened?"

    "Guess
he's pretty pissed off," whispered a boy in the front row with
brightly colored glasses and a crew cut. Laughter. Elisa didn't mind
that they were laughing, nor did she care about their apparent lack
of concentration. She knew it had been a simplistic example,
rudimentary for top-notch students, but that was exactly what she
wanted. She wanted to open the door as wide as possible on their way
in, because she knew only a few would be able to find their way out.
So she stifled their laughter, speaking now in a different, much
quieter, tone.
    "Just
as that man can't even conceive of how he was robbed, we can't
conceive of more than three dimensions around us. Now then," she
said, stressing each word carefully, "this example proves that
dimensions can affect us, even lead to events we wouldn't hesitate to
call 'supernatural'..." Suddenly, they were all murmuring,
talking over her. She knew they would. They
think I'm exaggerating, veering into science fiction. They're physics
students, they know I'm talking about reality, but they can't accept
it. From
the little forest of hands that had shot up, she chose one. "Yes,
Yolanda?"
    Blonde-haired
and wide-eyed, she was one of the few women in a class full of young
men. Elisa was pleased that she'd been the first to take things
seriously.
    "Your
example is unfair," Yolanda said. "The coin is
three-dimensional. Even though it's not very tall, it does possess
height. If it had been drawn inside the box, like it should have
been, you couldn't have stolen it."
    Intense
whispering. Elisa, who was ready for this, feigned surprise so as not
to dishearten her clever student.
    "Good
point, Yolanda. And you're right. Good science is based on that kind
of observation: apparently simple, yet vital. However, even if the
coin had been drawn onto the paper, like the man and the square, I
still could have erased it." Laughter erupted, keeping her from
continuing for a few seconds. Five, to be exact.
    Though
she didn't know it, she had twelve seconds left before her entire
life would blow up around her.
    The
big clock on the wall at the back of the class showed the time. Elisa
glanced at it quickly, never suspecting that the long hand sweeping
across the clock's face had begun a countdown to what would destroy
her present and her future.
    Forever.
Irreversibly.
    "What
I want you to see," she continued, patting the air to indicate
that they should simmer