Part 1.

The Smiths were awaiting the arrival of their first baby. Mrs. Smith was already in the hospital and they were discussing baby names.

"Well, what shall we name our baby, dear?"

"We have had this discussion so many times. I am still of the opinion that we should respect my dad's wishes. My dad was John Smith, I am John Smith the 2nd and my dad wanted his grandson to be known as John Smith the 3rd."

"I know, dear, but John Smith is such a commonplace name."

"Well, I like it."

"Can't we compromise? How about we name him Jon, rather than John? He could be known as Jon Smith the 3rd."

"Well, but he won't be Jon Smith the 3rd, will he? Look this was my father's dying wish, I very much want to fulfill it. I will tell you what, any more children that we have, you may name them anything you wish, I won't interfere. But please, darling, let me name our first born."

"Oh, all right. You know I can't refuse you anything. John it is. But remember your promise, I get to name any subsequent children."

"Thank you, dear. I owe you big time." John kissed his wife.



Interlude (thirty five years later):

Karoscan-34 and Dratto-29 were eleven dimensional creatures (ten dimensions of space and one of time). They were also university students. They had decided on a joint term project for their Physics course (Elementary Universe Design - 1). As they entered Dratto-29's dormitory room, Karoscan-34 remarked.

"So, let us see this new gadget of yours. Pretty good, is it?"

"It is not a gadget, it is a DUD machine (Digital Universe Designer). And pretty good is not the word, it is very good. I will show you its capabilities shortly."

"Well, a gadget, however modern, will not save you. When you are wrong, you are wrong. The universe is like a big lake of water. If one drops a pebble in the water, there are local disturbances, but eventually the ripples smooth over and there is negligible long term effect."

"My friend, you are so wrong it isn't even funny. The universe is nothing like a lake. It resembles a mountain buried deep in snow. The slightest disturbance can set off an avalanche and can alter the landscape significantly. If a small change is made in the universe, it continues to build up until the change reaches gigantic proportions."

"Well, I suppose that is what this gizmo of yours will help us decide. Turn it on, let us see how it works."

"Sure. Sit down. Karoscan."

"Don't mind if I do." He looked up at Dratto expectantly. "How about a drink?"

"Water?" Dratto grunted.

"Don't be silly."

"Well, then, not right now, later. I have a surprise for you later on."

Dratto sat down besides him. "Now, we decided that we select a universe, make a small change in it and observe it over the years to see if it alters the course of events significantly."

"Which it won't."

"Sez you. Anyway, we have to select a universe first."

He turned on the DUD. At once a hyper cube of about 20 cm side lit up in space before them. He punched a key on the remote and the cube was filled with bright spots.

"This is a small portion of four dimensional space, the one that is allocated to the Physics Department, holding several billion simple, three dimensional universes. We have to select one of them."

"Three dimensional? Why can't we work with intelligent creatures? Let us work with at least four or five dimensional beings."

"What makes you think three dimensional creatures are not intelligent? It may not be intelligence as you or I know it. However, animal biologists assure us that there is intelligence in three dimensions. Anyway, students are forbidden to experiment with higher dimensions. Access to DUDs which do that is strictly regulated. As it is, I had to get a requisition signed by Prof. Maravedi-7 before they would rent me this one."

"Couldn't we just."

"No, we couldn't. Don't even think of doing anything extra legal. I don't want to get into trouble along with you. I still remember the caper you pulled last year in the Chemistry lab."

Karoscan winced when Dratto mentioned that. He had organized a party in the Chemistry lab after working hours, using the absolute ethanol supply of the lab. For a while, the party went great and a jolly good time was had by all. Until, that is, Prof. Benoni-4 returned to her lab unexpectedly. She had had a disagreement with one of her spouses and had come to the laboratory to cool down and get some extra work done.

Karoscan had managed to evade the good professor by the skin of his teeth. He could still feel her sharp talons raking his flesh, as her bright yellow tentacle had whipped out and almost grabbed him as he was making his getaway. He had skipped town for a week after that (with Dratto's help). Only a plea of abject contrition, along with an offer to work on one of Prof. Benoni-4's research projects for six months for free had kept the Dean from suspending him for the rest of the term.

"Oh, all right. So we work with three dimensional creatures."

"When Prof. Maravedi-7 signed the requisition, he specifically told me that he will hold me personally responsible for any mischief you may commit. He looked so grim his orange body turned almost red. So you better forget whatever devilry you may have in mind."

"All right, Dratto. You don't have to go on about it. Do we pick a universe at random, or did you have a particular one in mind?"

"I do have one in mind." He again pressed the remote. All the spots except one disappeared. The one remaining spot got bigger and bigger until it filled the whole hyper cube. Then it broke up into galaxies, globular clusters and intergalactic clouds.

"Oh, what a horrible system. Galaxies in various sizes and different stages of decay, no uniformity anywhere, the space littered with cosmic debris."

"It is not a good job, I admit."

"And do I detect a faint microwave radiation in the background, pervading the whole universe? The whole system is polluted by noise. You know, Dratto, there is something very familiar with this universe. Hey, wait a minute. Isn't this the system that nut, Odin, put together? Well, it looks like he took some primordial matter, hit it with a sledge hammer and was done with it."

"For your information, he worked hard to create that system. Imagine taking six days to put together such a primitive system. And the task was too much for him, he had to rest on the seventh day. I remember he was sleeping in his dorm room all day and all night on the seventh day."

"And he did a lousy job at that. I heard he flunked the course and had to repeat it, had to create another system to pass the course."

"That is why Prof. Maravedi-7 suggested we use this system. He said the system is already so screwed up, we can't possibly make it any worse. Anything we do will be an improvement."

"I don't know, Dratto. I suppose three dimensional creatures are entitled to live their life as they see fit, without us interfering in it. What if the change we make creates a really terrible universe, causes a lot of misery?"

"Don't worry, Karoscan. The DUD has a back up capability. Whenever we make a change in a universe, it always makes a back up copy of the old universe. Then if we don't like the results of the new universe, we can always restore the old universe."

"In that case, experiment away."

"OK, you see billions of galaxies in the hyper cube. Now we focus on one galaxy towards the rim." Again, all other galaxies disappeared from the cube, leaving only one bright spot, which got bigger and revealed its shape of double spiral.

"Now, how many stars do you see in the hyper cube?"

"Oh, perhaps 100 billion or so." (if stars are spaced about a centimeter apart, a 10 dimensional hyper cube with a side of 20 centimeters can show upto about one trillion stars, much more that what milky way contains).

"Do you have a particular star system in mind, or do we pick one at random?"

"We pick one at random. I will let the DUD do it."

Again, all the stars except one disappeared, leaving that one star, with its planetary system.

"Let's see." Dratto said, reading the readout from DUD. "The star is closer to the edge of the galaxy than its center, is a G type, yellow star. There is life on only one planet, the third out from the star. The planet is called 'Earth' by the native trimees. There are also signs of unicellular life on a satellite of one of the gas giants, but we will ignore that."

"Trimees?"

"Oh, that is a slang term for three dimensional, or trimensional creatures."

Karoscan unfurled his main tentacle, wrapped it around Dratto and pulled Dratto towards him. Dratto could smell Karoscan's arousal. Also, Karoscan had turned bright, pulsating green, which meant he was horny. Dratto disentangled himself from Karoscan's embrace.

"Now, Karoscan, none of that. You are a green, I am a purple. You can get pleasure from me, but you know I derive no pleasure from you."

"I am sorry, Dratto. I got carried away. Sometimes don't you wish we were like the trimees here. They have only two sexes, rather than our seven and for them it is much easier to find one partner. For us, we have to find six partners."

"Yeah, well. On the whole, I would rather not be a trimee."

"Perhaps you are right. Maybe I will have sex with myself later on. It is not as satisfying as sex in a group of seven, but it is better than nothing."

"Lucky you. I don't have the necessary plumbing to have sex with myself, the most I can do is masturbate." Grumbled Dratto. " Now let us concentrate on the project, shall we?"

"Here, Karoscan, would you like to do the honors? You pick someone at random."

Karoscan took the remote and pressed the random key. This time all the stars disappeared and the hyper cube showed the inside of a household.

"Before we can look at the household properly, we have to take care of a little detail. Here, press your hand down on this pad like I am doing."

In a few seconds, the DUD transferred all the knowledge existing on Earth into their brains. (This is not as far fetched as it sounds. If a ten dimensional creature has same size brain as an average human being, one ten dimensional creature will have the brain capacity of 10 million human beings. Ten million super geniuses can probably assimilate all the knowledge of earth between them. Here we are talking of the creatures with IQ in perhaps six or seven digits, if such a thing is possible, as opposed to low three digits even for a super genius. The entire knowledge available on earth will probably occupy a small part in a ten dimensional creature's brain)).

"What do we have here? Oh, a man named John Smith, thirty five years old. A successful entrepreneur, CEO of John's Auto Parts. His wife is a lawyer and is employed by his company. We see he is about to take his son to a baseball game. A typical family in North America, wouldn't you say, Dratto?"

Dratto went to the mini bar and took out two foaming glasses, filled to the brim.

"Here, try this."

Karoscan looked and sniffed at the glass suspiciously. "Well, what is it?"

"It is beer. That is another neat little feature of this DUD. I had programmed it beforehand, so that when DUD chose a star system at random, it directed the mini bar to synthesize the most popular drinks on the planet. It has synthesized tea , coffee, beer and wine. I thought we will try beer first. It is mildly alcoholic and seems to be very popular in North America. Now, exactly what changes should we do to Mr. Smith to test our theory?"

Karoscan brought the glass to his face, uncurled his drinking tube and dipped it into the glass, took a long gulp of beer and winced. "This stuff tastes awful. Are you sure the mini bar synthesized beer properly?" he asked, retracting his drinking tube.

"I suppose it is more of an acquired taste." Dratto tried the beer. "I rather like it."

Karoscan took another sip. "No, I don't like it. Trimees must be out of their tiny minds to drink something like this. How can this abomination be a popular drink on earth?"

"Not all of earth, but only a part of it, mostly North America and Europe."

"Well, they can keep it. I will finish this one, but no more for me, count me out. Now as to what we should change. Suppose we change his last name, say from Smith to Guggenheimer?"

Dratto thought about it. "No good. If we change his last name that means we will change the last names of his ancestors for the past several centuries. We are talking of a major change here. What we need is a minute change, like making him left handed, or giving him a birth mark on his leg." Then it hit him.

"How about if we change his first name?"

"Good idea. Let us change it by the smallest amount possible. His name is John, how about we rename him Jon? Jon is an acceptable name among the trimees on earth."

"That makes sense. Let us change his name from John to Jon and see how his life changes because of it. That should settle which of us is right."

"That is easy enough to do. Let me rewind the time first, to just before John smith's birth, there. Then I just feed in the necessary information, press the 'activate' key and there, it is done."

"Now we wait for thirty five earth years, I suppose. How much is that in our time?"

"The DUD can slow down or speed up time in three dimensions, it is easy to do. However, normal flow of time is about one of our weekend for thirty five years in three dimensions. Thirty five years in trimee time should be done by day after tomorrow night. We will come back to exactly the same time and see where our subject has landed himself."

"Now let us recapitulate what we see here. This John Smith is highly educated, a professional, owner of a company (John's Auto Parts) which he jointly owns with his wife. His wife is beautiful ("You are joking, right?" Karoscan interjected, as a shudder rippled through his body, from top to bottom). Beautiful by trimee, earth standards, don't be prejudiced. She is intelligent, for a trimee anyway. John is happily married, has fathered a son. He loves his wife and son."

"Do trimees feel emotions, like love or hate?" Karoscan wanted to know.

"Of course they feel emotions. Their emotions are just much more muted compared to ours. Anyway, coming back to our project, do you agree with my assessment of John Smith and his family?"

"I do."

"Now, which of these features do you expect to be preserved in 'Jon Smith'?"

"All of them."

"Well, I expect Jon Smith's life to be totally different from that of John Smith, though I can't say in which way." Dratto said.

"Let us watch for a bit." Dratto pressed a key. Another hyper cube lit up beside the first one. Both the cubes showed identical hospital room, where Mrs. Smith was admitted.

"The first cube shows the progress of Jon Smith. The second cube shows the same time and place from the first universe (which no longer exists), showing the progress of John Smith, so we will be able to monitor their progress together and see the similarity or differences between the two time streams."

"Does the DUD record the progress of Jon smith?"

"It does better than that. Not only it records the progress of Jon Smith, it also compares the two universes and flags the points in time where the two universes deviate from each other significantly. It also digitizes the difference.

"When we look at it tomorrow evening (I will look in from time to time during the day), all we have to do is get the DUD display of the times when there was a significant variation between the two time streams."

"Most of the time the two universes will run along almost identical tracks, so there is no need to look through 35 years of history, we can look only at interesting, deviation points. DUD lets us do that."

"Now as you can see , in both of them we see the hospital room of Mrs. Smith. Mr. And Mrs. Smith are discussing baby names, only this time they will name the baby Jon, and not John."

By now Dratto had turned deep, pulsating purple. "Now Karoscan, I am feeling as horny as you. Let us go and see if we can find individuals of the other sexes; red, orange, yellow, blue and violet and merge into mad, passionate, white sex. We will look in on our Jon Smith tomorrow night. By then he should be 21-22 years old."



The Smiths were awaiting the arrival of their first baby. Mrs. Smith was already in the hospital and they were discussing baby names.

"Well, what shall we name our baby, dear?"

"We have had this discussion so many times. I am still of the opinion that we should respect my dad's wishes. My dad was John Smith, I am John Smith the 2nd and my dad wanted his grandson to be known as John Smith the 3rd."

"I know, dear, but John Smith is such a commonplace name."

"Well, I like it."

"Can't we compromise? How about we name him Jon, rather than John? He could be known as Jon Smith the 3rd."

"Well, but he won't be Jon Smith the 3rd, will he? Look, this was my father's dying wish, I very much want to fulfill it. I will tell you what, any more children that we have, you may name them anything you wish, I won't interfere. But please, darling, let me name our first born."

"I understand, darling, but the name John Smith has unpleasant association for me, let us not go into that. Someone has to be as exceptional a human being as you for him to have the name of John Smith, otherwise it doesn't work for me. Please , won't you agree to Jon?"

"Oh, all right. You know I can't refuse you anything, dear. Jon it is. But on one condition. If we have another son, we name him John, thereby fulfilling my fathers wishes."

"Thank you, dear. I owe you big time." John's wife kissed him.

End of part 1.