A World of Gold

August 1st, 2050, was an ordinary Monday until I fell into a black hole. I crawled out of my bed as always, to the sound of an annoying alarm, with no enthusiasm to get to work. Coffee with too much sugar, burnt toast for my breakfast, and clothes that hadn't been ironed in a year since I got this job. I’m a theoretical physicist working at a private company that wants to harness stellar energy from stars from here on Earth. 

I hated this job, not because I was bad at what I did, but because it was so meaningless to me; any advancement I could make in this field would never truly be mine. I can solve the world's energy crisis or create a stable fusion reactor for spaceships, but no matter what I do, everything would be built on the back of the existing fundamentals created by physicists hundreds of years ago, it would never be something unique to me, something that when people think of it they think of me and me alone, like Newton or Einstein.

I came to work just so I can keep paying my bills, and for the minute amusement that I can achieve by my work. I was on time as always, perfectly at ten o'clock. Everyone was excited because of a machine the engineering department was working on, based on the physics department’s work, of course. I went to see the machine too, as I had contributed to its design. It was a particle collider that could, theoretically, create a stable wormhole connecting the harnessing chamber in the lab to a distant star.

There were discussions of creating a safer, two-way activation system where a satellite would be sent into the sun containing the same wormhole generator as the one on Earth. The idea was that this would create two tears in space that would connect, but they didn't wanna mess with our sun in case something went wrong, so I came up with a laser-based navigation system that could position the other end of the wormhole. They praised me for how well I implemented the concepts of other physicists, how annoying.

The machine was going to start at eleven o’clock. I was under the assumption that the calculations were complete and entered into the machine, but as soon as I entered the room, the team of physicists in charge of the project rushed at me with pages upon pages of incomplete calculations. It was so annoying. They ordered me to complete the calculation in less than an hour as if it were a simple equation. They hovered over me as I worked, questioning everything I was doing. Even with the irritability, I completed the calculations. 

As I was about to recheck the calculations, just in case that I had made a mistake because of these morons around me, Steven, the head of the project, snatched the papers and ran into the laboratory in a hurry and started the input, I didn't stop him because I was confident in my work and because he would only irritate me more.

The clock was two minutes away from striking eleven as Steven completed the input and walked out of the lab with a stupid grin on his face, as if he had contributed anything substantial to this project. The engineering team that worked on the machine was given the green light to start the machine as soon as the input was processed. The machine they’ve been working on for almost a year was finally going to be tested.

Everyone was excited, staring at the solution they hoped would solve the energy crisis. The collider’s beginning phases of activation were perfect; there was nothing wrong with either the machine or the calculations. I was glad that it was going well, even if it wouldn't be completely attributed to me, what small amount I contributed would have my name on it.

As the clock struck eleven, the collider was done; it created a small tear in the fabric of space in two locations and sewed it together, a mini wormhole connecting this laboratory to a star 4.24 light years away. Everyone exploded with joy; they had done it, I had done it, the calculations were perfect, and the global energy crisis was solved by a small team of scientists working for a billion-dollar company. Well, that’s what everyone thought at first as they saw the spatial ripple at the center of the collider. I thought so, too, until someone pointed out that the spatial ripple was spherical. Wormholes are supposed to be conic, not spherical, and that’s when all the physicists, including me, realized what just happened was not the formation of a wormhole, but a singularity, a Black hole!

Some were in panic, others were thinking what was gonna happen, but most were terrified. The fact that the singularity was big enough for us to see its spherical surface meant that it was big enough to destroy the entire planet. By trying to solve a problem, we just created a world-ending abomination right in front of us. As soon as everyone realized the severity of what we had just created, we started running away. I couldn't think of anything in that moment; my mind was completely blank, the only thing I knew in that moment was that I was terrified, and that it didn't matter if I ran, there was no escaping this.

The realization and the following catastrophe occurred within seconds; it started with the machine being crushed out of existence, then the glass barrier separating us from the laboratory shattered. I was pretty athletic, so I ran past everyone else; they were the next to go. I couldn't run far because the singularity had sucked out all the air in the surroundings, creating a vacuum, and the gravity shifted towards the singularity; it felt as though I was trying to run along a wall.

I lost my footing and started to fall towards the singularity.

The first thing I felt as I fell was the immense gravitational pull crushing me, then the loss of air in my lungs. It was painful and I was screaming, but I couldn't hear my voice. As I reached the event horizon, I thought I would die immediately and feel no pain, but I was wrong. I can feel every atom of my body being torn apart bit by bit, I can feel dying, and I’m screaming in pain, and I can't even hear my voice as I’m being crushed to death.

I never believed in an afterlife, even as I'm dying, I don't want to. If there is an afterlife, surely I’m going to hell, after all, I’m the reason that the planet and ten billion people on it died, I’m their killer. I wonder, what is the punishment for destroying the entire human race? Surely even the devil would be disgusted by what I did. Was it the calculations? Engineering? The concept itself? I blame myself, but I don't know if it was my mistake; there’s no point in thinking now. I’m thinking of every minute detail of things I did today, I don't know why, maybe because half my body is now atomized, and I’m wondering why I’m still conscious.

All my life, I didn't do anything because I couldn't do what I wanted, but now, as I’m dying, I wish I had done something, something that I could have been proud of, or at least something to make me happy.

I don’t have any family, the only friends I had were the physicists I worked with. I wanted family and kids, but I never made an effort to start a relationship with anyone. Well, no point in thinking of that either, there is no point in anything now, I am dying, I feel like I’m fainting, from the pain I think, I'm not sure, but I don't even feel the pain now, I don't know what I feel anymore, all I know is that I am sorry for everything.

—

I’m still alive? No, maybe I’m in hell, but if I’m dead, why do I feel like my heart is sinking into my stomach, and as though I’m…is what I was thinking as soon as I regained my consciousness. And when I opened my eyes, my heart sank deeper because I was, in fact, alive and rapidly falling from the sky towards a large city,

“Aaaaaaaaaah!” I screamed,

Even though I was falling to my death, I was glad that I could hear myself again. I started thinking of ways to survive this, as it seemed to be far less of an impossibility than being sucked into a black hole, Black hole! I screamed in my head, The others, are they falling too? I stopped screaming for a moment and started to look around. As I lifted my head with great effort, what I saw was, in a word, Magical.

An enormous piece of architecture entirely made of what looked like…Gold! The design was almost angelic as it bathed in the sunlight, it was radiating with shine, almost as if it was from a fantasy, not reality. I had forgotten that I was falling for a moment before realizing it again. I looked down, and as soon as the mystique of what I saw wore off and the reality set in, I was terrified again. But as I started to lose any small amount of hope I had of surviving, I heard a whirling sound that I didn't recognize and a scream.

I looked to my right, I was confused for a second, then I realized that I was about to collide with what looked like an unusual aircraft driven by children! Am I dreaming, or is this actually happening? I thought as they sped towards me as I fell. Are they trying to catch me? I thought, and I screamed at them in a hurry,

“Fly lower!”

The expression of the kid who was flying the ship changed from shock to concentration.

He flew the ship under me and opened the ship's top. I fell on the ship’s floor, and my heart stopped sinking. I had so many questions running through my mind, but I wasn't able to say anything except

“Thank you.”

Before the kids could say anything, alarms started ringing, and flashing red lights filled the ship.

“Oh no,” The kid piloting the ship said,

“What!?” I screamed at him,

“Uhm, the thrusters are dead,” he said in a calm voice as he turned towards me, and as soon as he completed the sentence, the three younger children in the ship ran to the walls of the ship and held on to the handles on them, and then I felt it again, the sensation of my heart sinking and falling from the sky, only this time I hit the ceiling of the ship,

“Oh, for hell’s sake!” I screamed,

And once again started thinking, How in hell can I survive? Only this time, I wasn’t alone,

“Kron! Do something!” one of the kids screamed.

I was shocked to see the kid in the pilot’s seat be so calm; it looked as though he was trying to restart the engine.

“Hold on, guys!” he said in a calm voice, and then suddenly the ship stopped.

I fell to the floor and took a deep breath to calm my heart, but as I looked around, all the kids were perfectly calm. I took a moment to breathe and collect my thoughts.

“Land the goddamn ship!” I screamed,

And all the kids looked at me and started laughing,

“Don’t worry, mister, the ship might be a piece of junk, but Kron here is the best pilot in the slums,” stated one of the kids as he smiled.

“How did you even get that high in the air? You were nearly above the dome,” questioned Kron, the pilot.

As I looked towards him, my gaze turned to what was in front of me, beyond the ship, the Golden Castle. I almost thought that it was my imagination, but it was real and magnificent; everything else was blocked out of my mind except the fantastical scenery before me, it wasn't just the castle but what looked like an entire city made of gold as far as the eye could see, and it was shining as bright as a star, yet it paled in comparison with the castle. It looked as though the castle was reaching into outer space; it was so wide that I couldn't see its entirety. It looked like heaven, but as I would later discover, it was hell.