Searching Far and Wide

[intricate_engineer]

Glen was creating a prototype for a new gate design. It was meant to be affordable and provide quick transport between individual homes. She tests several objects and a rat and everything seems to be working.

She steps through. Instead of finding herself in the room next door, she finds herself standing on a sidewalk in an empty city. The buildings are tall and perfect, colorless with doorways far too tall for any human. The roads have no straight lines and twist in on themselves. There is no life or sound.
Glen tries to stay calm. She begins to walk along the road, randomly opening doors and exploring buildings that are as silent as the rest of the world.

She opens a door that she hopes will lead onto a roof and is instead met with warmth, and soft noise, and color.

Comments

[intricate_engineer]

"Every living being is formed with something we call a spark. This spark exists outside the physical realm, and we believe exists before the life begins. When a new life is formed, a spark connects to that life and grows with it."

[the_very_best]

"What's your evidence?"

[intricate_engineer]

"Okay, I'm not a meta-physicist, so some of the details might be off."

[the_very_best]

"Sure."

[intricate_engineer]

"Sparks are drawn to each other. It's not obvious when you're already surrounded by life, but if there are only two sparks in an otherwise empty universe and they are given free mobility, they will move towards each other. Sparks also do not exist in isolation, they connect to the sparks of people close to their owner. Individual humans randomly selected from different universes can tell who is from their world. Also, if you put someone in a random world, they can tell if they are in their own even without other sensory input. I can give you copies of the studies?"

[the_very_best]

"Sure... I didn't have an immediate sensory understanding that Milliways wasn't my world or that you were an alien though."

[intricate_engineer]

"The study showed significantly less of an effect when repeated on individuals who were not frequent interdimensional travelers. However, if you were put in a hundred worlds, one of which was your own, you would have a better than random chance of knowing which one it was."

[the_very_best]

"How much better than random?"

[intricate_engineer]

"It varies, but I would say, out of a hundred worlds, you would get it right 10-20% of the time."

[the_very_best]

"That's something but it's not that huge. Why is it that noisy if it's a real thing?"

[intricate_engineer]

"Experience. If I gave you a hundred similar flavors, only one of which you'd tasted before, you wouldn't always get it right. However, if I did the same test with one flavor in common over and over again, your chance of getting it right would increase. With no additional sensory input, an individual can be trained to detect their own home world almost 100% of the time. Even without training, frequent travel raises the percentages. The empty worlds are more significant than variations on ones with life though."

[the_very_best]

"Huh!"

[intricate_engineer]

"If I showed you ninety nine living universes and one empty one, you would be almost certain to get it right."

[the_very_best]

"That's really cool. How do you know the spark model is right?"

[intricate_engineer]

"Originally by talking to species more advanced than us. This gave us an idea of what to look for. Eventually, we were able to detect sparks. Then, we found a combination of magic that could create a barrier to keep sparks out. We found that no new life could form inside that barrier."

[the_very_best]

"Whoa. What happens if life enters it?"

[intricate_engineer]

"It can't. It acts as a barrier to any living thing. The only way to pass through is to die."

[the_very_best]

"...I'm really curious what it'd do to a balled 'mon. Or a PC transfer of one with a cable run through the area."

[intricate_engineer]

"Actually, that's a good point. If I find a way back home, I can test it. I know someone who has access to a barrier."

[the_very_best]

"It'd be a pity if it killed the 'mon but I guess it can just be a Magikarp or something."

[intricate_engineer]

"I don't like killing, but I do use lab rats to make sure portals are safe before I go through."

[the_very_best]

"Some people eat Magikarp. I don't, but I don't go on a crusade about it."

[intricate_engineer]

"Do people eat other types of Pokémon?"

[the_very_best]

"Basically never. We do eat some 'mon-derived products, milk and eggs and fruits and stuff, but actually butchering them is very rare."

[intricate_engineer]

Glen nods.
"I wonder if Pokémon are on average, more intelligent than animals on other worlds? Or perhaps they are just more useful. Pigs are relatively intelligent animals, but are commonly eaten."