CREATION

by

Frej Wasastjerna

     Frowning in concentration, he twisted a knob a little. There, increase theta by a couple of milliradians, that should do it. Then decrease rho by half a milliradian and phi by 0.1 milliradian. That should be about right, according to his calculations, and the Lissajous figures in the scope looked the way they ought to... no, that wasn't quite right, increase beta a little, yes, that was it! Now it looked good, now it was time to start pumping energy into the vacuum...

     The excitement built up in his own mind in parallel with the tension increasing in the vacuum. This was something he had done only a few times before, and those times he had just been fooling around to see what happened. This was the first time he had a definite goal in mind.

     The tension kept building, until...

     plop...

     the piece of stressed vacuum broke out of his universe and became a universe of its own.

     There! Now set the viewer to follow it. Yes, it began with a nice big bang! Scan ahead a little... Good, it didn't implode promptly again, as most of his creations had done, it kept expanding. Ahead a little again... Yes, there were particles forming. Now longer time steps, that was no trouble, since there was no connection between time in that universe and in his own. Stars and galaxies, fine, it was going exactly as it was supposed to! Now, still further ahead, to let fusion proceed far enough in those stars to begin building up some heavier elements. He searched out a particularly brilliant blue giant and began to investigate its core... yes, there they were, heavy elements!! Farther ahead, investigate an interstellar dust cloud... yes!!! There were complex molecules in it!!!

     He could no longer contain his excitement but began jumping up and down in glee. The way things were going, this universe might even develop life!

     "Time to go to bed!"

     "Mommy, I don't want to! Lemme stay up a little longer and see if life develops in this universe!"

     "No, honey, small boys need sleep. Remember the test on tensor calculus tomorrow? You need to be fresh for that. You can look more at your universe tomorrow after school, but now to bed!"

     Shucks, just as his homework was getting interesting, he had to go to bed!  Oh well, the day after tomorrow, when they were due to show the teacher their homework in the Universe Creation course, he would at least have a nice universe to show.