chapter seven: Becoming the zero dimension

In the midst of the crisis, Alyssa and Marcus decided not to sit idly by. They quickly donned their spacesuits and obtained clearance to fly into space. This mission was their last attempt to save the day. Their ship was launched with great preparation, and after months of traveling through the silent void, they finally reached the accretion ring of a supermassive black hole.

The sight before them was overwhelming. The rapidly spinning accretion ring emitted blinding X-rays, creating both stunning beauty and deep fear. However, that beauty soon turned into menace. The black hole's immense gravity began to pull on their ship, causing it to vibrate violently. In a matter of seconds, they passed the event horizon, the point of no return. Strangely, their bodies were not crushed by the unimaginable force of gravity.

Alyssa and Marcus woke up in what they could only describe as absolute emptiness. There was no light, no sound, no weight. Even time seemed to have stopped. All the laws of physics they knew seemed to have lost their relevance. No attempts to communicate were successful; any signals they sent were instantly lost in the void.

"Marcus, where are we?" Alyssa asked in a trembling voice.

Marcus took a deep breath before answering. "This is a singularity, Alyssa. The point where space and time cease to exist as we understand them. Here, the laws of physics break down, and there is nothing but existence itself."

Alyssa tried to digest his words. "If there is no space, there is no time… then what is left of us?"

Marcus could only be silent. Their bodies remained intact, but their sense of the world around them was completely changed. Time was flowing in a strange way. From an outside perspective, they would appear to be trapped here forever, but to them, time still felt normal, albeit without direction or purpose.

"This is extreme time dilation," Marcus explained after a few moments of silence. "The gravity here is so strong that it slows time to a near standstill. But that's only true from an outside perspective. We ourselves still experience time locally."

Alyssa stared at him blankly. "So we never age? Never change?"

"Right. There are no physical processes taking place here. There is no space to move, no energy to use. We are like... consciousness trapped in the void."

Alyssa began to feel lost. "What have we done, Marcus? What does this mean? We are in a place where nothing matters."

Marcus tried to calm his own thoughts. "Perhaps, we have become something new. Something no longer bound by the dimensions of space or time."

"What do you mean?"

"We may have become zero-dimensional entities," Marcus answered quietly. "Beings that exist only as pure consciousness without form. Here, there is no space for us to disintegrate, no time for us to age. We simply... exist."

Alyssa paused, trying to grasp the implications of those words. Zero-dimensional beings do not have physical bodies, as bodies require space to exist. They are simply pure existence, unable to interact with the outside world, unable to age, and possibly immortal.

"We have been downgraded to zero dimensions," Alyssa said, her voice full of despair.

Marcus nodded. "But maybe this is not the end. Perhaps this is a form of existence that has never been understood before. An existence beyond time and space, where we are the center of whatever is left of this reality."

They fell silent again, surrounded by nothingness. In the singularity, time had no meaning, and they had no answers. All that was left was their consciousness, wondering about the meaning of existence in absolute emptiness.

As they pondered in the void, Alyssa and Marcus suddenly remembered that they still had the sophisticated computer they had brought from the ship. The device, connected to quantum sensors and advanced physics technology, was designed to study extreme phenomena in space-time, and perhaps this was the perfect time to use it. Although the device had seemingly stalled as they passed the event horizon, they had managed to reactivate its internal systems. The device combined quantum computing technology with the latest theoretical physics algorithms that used the principles of general relativity and quantum mechanics to analyze the physics of singularities.

With the systems up and running, they began an analysis procedure to uncover the nature of the singularity and its mysterious center. Alyssa carefully operated the computer, selecting parameters to delve deeper into the singularity's core, which lay at the heart of the black hole.

"This computer should be able to analyze the distortions in space-time in the space we call singularities," Alyssa said as she studied the device's illuminated display. "But we have to remember that here, the laws of causality as we understand them may no longer apply."

Marcus nodded, fully understanding the challenge they faced. "But even though space-time at the singularity is distorted beyond form, this device might be able to detect smaller quantum energy fluctuations or possibly more complex quantum singularities. We need to see if there is any physical information we can extract from the interactions of Planck-scale particles."

Their computers began mapping the phenomena they detected around them, drawing on the perspective of the extremely curved space-time. Inside the singularity, space and time have behaved like a non-Euclidean substance, a geometric shape that has no conventional boundaries or dimensions. Quantum fluctuations occur on scales smaller than the Planck length, where the laws of physics as we know them—especially general relativity and quantum mechanics—collision.

Their computers calculate and analyze the fluctuating quantum energy, producing patterns that appear irregular but actually reveal hidden complexities in space-time that are otherwise unreachable. These distortions are leading to a deeper understanding of what happens at the microscopic level as we pass through the singularity. Scientists commonly refer to this as "quantum gravitational entanglement," where gravity is essentially inseparable from quantum fields and there is no clear distinction between vacuum energy and quantum fluctuations.

Alyssa and Marcus watched in awe as their computer began to produce maps of energy fluctuations at the Planck scale. They were observing phenomena involving the interaction between the singularity and the manifold fabric of space-time. "We could see that there were subatomic particles trapped in this singularity, but they seemed to be unable to interact with the outside world anymore, but instead were in a superposition of states leading up to the quantum singularity," Alyssa explained with awe.

The computer calculated the possibility that, although this singularity appeared to be an absolute point of nothingness, there was actually a "higher truth" hidden within it: higher or lower dimensions beyond our human senses or conventional physics. Alyssa then activated a "nonlinear gravitational field analysis" mode, attempting to investigate whether there was a geometry of space-time that could benefit from string theory or even M-theory, which hypothesizes that there are more than four dimensions of space-time that can be probed in the context of the multiverse.

Their computers are finally beginning to show the analytical potential for a revolutionary theory: in singularities, they may be able to detect properties of space-time that go far beyond the "missing information" of the black hole information principle. This opens up the possibility of the existence of additional dimensions invisible to outside observers—dimensions that completely contradict the limitations of the three-dimensional space-time we understand. There are even hints that singularities may contain information hidden in the motions of Planck-scale particles that are bundled into a superposition of higher space-times.

"Perhaps we are observing a transition to a higher form of reality. A dimension that is no longer bound by the laws of physics as we understand it, but may be a manifestation of a greater law—the law of the multiverse universe," Marcus says, as if whispering to himself. "These singularities could be gateways to a deeper understanding of the universe—more deeper than we can imagine."

But while their equipment provides an incredible picture, the final conclusion remains murky. This singularity is not just about gravity or space-time, but about our limited understanding of existence. Alyssa and Marcus now know that they have entered a space beyond the dimensions that human science can explain, trapped between the void and a higher dimension—where space and time are simply concepts that no longer apply.

Their computer, despite having only one core capability, has been programmed to surpass the limitations of conventional devices. This core capability, known as the Quantum Relativity Analyzer (QRA), combines the principles of general relativity and quantum mechanics into one super-powerful computing system. The QRA is capable of analyzing and modeling space-time phenomena with incredible precision, even at the Planck scale, where gravity and quantum effects meet. When they directed the QRA to examine the center of a singularity, the device immediately began to process subatomic energy fluctuations at a level beyond the reach of conventional instruments. It took into account the non-Euclidean geometry of space-time around the singularity and began to calculate the effects of space distortions so extreme that the laws of causality become obscured. The QRA used quantum simulations to describe the conditions inside a black hole, using quantum algorithms based on superposition and interference to determine the patterns of particle fluctuations that would otherwise be incapable of interacting with conventional space-time. The QRA even revealed the possibility of hidden "wormholes" within the singularity, which could connect to higher dimensions or even parallel realities. In the process, the QRA began to produce data that seemed beyond the comprehension of human physics, suggesting that the singularity was not a point of destruction, but a gateway to a greater, multidimensional entity that transcended the existence of ordinary space and time. With this ability, their computer proposed a new theory about the existence of information trapped within the singularity, which could affect the fundamental structure of reality and the as-yet-undiscovered laws of the universe.