The Doorway Effect

Then the next thing you know he died. He didn’t even notice it at the time. He’d been working on the unified field theory. Yes, Einstein’s great white whale. Not string theory or any of that other idiotic nonsense. Inelegant fads. Ugly models patched together with mathematical duct tape. No, sir. God did not play dice. And God doesn’t patch, kludge, tape, solder or trowel. The truth is beautiful. The truth is simple. And he had the simple formula. Let "R" stand for reality. It follows as the night to the day that …

As the simple truth dawned, he realized that he was “dead,” so to speak. This was, of course, the reason why he’d worked the formula out. His insight flowed from the clarity that “death” affords, though he disliked the term. (Vague! Inelegant!) Linguistic wrangling aside, being a "dead," non-corporeal intelligence certainly had its advantages. Unconstrained by the parameters of local space-time, his mind (metaphorically speaking) could see around corners. Cheating? No, math is math. Truth is truth.

Let R = Reality. R =

He had to write it down! Comically, he realized that there was nothing to write with. No matter. (Ha!) The truth burned in his brain. (Mind, intelligence, whatever the hell or heaven it was.) Ineluctable, indelible truth. This lambent knowledge could never be erased. Good thing.

Because he was (if such a thing were possible in this half world) distracted …

By sound. Or something that he experienced as sound. It came in the form of periodic bursts of indiscrete happiness. Like the whoops which irritating teenagers make whilst jumping into a pool.

Confident in his knowledge of the theory of everything, he "looked" around for the source of the "sound."

At this point he perceived an indeterminate series of beings. Beings of light. All standing in a queue. He then realized that he also was standing in that queue. And the queue was advancing? Approaching? A sort of whirlpool? A vortex?

A doorway, yes of course.
A doorway.

Each being of light approached this maelstrom of light and color. Before leaping into it, each being hollered (with what vocal organs he couldn’t begin to guess) something vulgar along the lines of “Yippee!” or “Whee!” He was determined not to follow their example. Referring here to their rude phatic utterances, and not the transition through the doorway. He stayed in line, and patiently awaited his turn.

The basis of his equanimity was easy to grasp.
Upon seeing the doorway, he immediately knew what it was.

This phenomenon was some sort of soul recycling station, to put it crudely. A mechanism of reincarnation. (Oppie would be pleased. And perhaps was.) Dead intelligences enter, and are promptly returned to some new life.

And therein the danger presented itself.

Earthly cognitive psychologists refer to the “doorway effect.” Simply put, passing from one room to another creates an Etch-a-Sketch effect in the brain. Having moved from Room A to Room B, the brain promptly dumps the bulk of its short term memory. It thus forgets the previous experience of Room A and resets, allowing for the creation of a new memories in Room B.

But he wouldn’t forget.

R =

It was now his turn. He would never.

The doorway swirled with garish color.

He leapt through. He didn’t say “Wheee!”

A giant hand slapped him on the ass. He screamed.

He had no idea why.