Notes: As always, I don't own any of the wizards, they're just on loan from my local library, so please don't sue me as I don't really have anything you'd want.
A plot bunny came rushing past me, and then wouldn't get off my leg till I wrote this. It's just there because I love the wizards, and that plot bunny was starting to hurt.
Warning: this fic involves quantum theory used by a total amateur and none of the reasoning is to be taken seriously. We can't have people going round believing me when I say this sort of thing. Something horrible might happen, I mean, look at Mr. Wong.
"It's a Whatsit of Thingumy."
It glowed, the brilliant orange nebular blur fading at the edges of it's elliptical orbit into darkening shades of lilac, indigo and blue, thin tendrils of dark, blue light whipping out from it's edges, and moving so fast that the sparks of octarine fire created as they touched the circular edge of the glass prism, in which it was contained, appeared to create a ring of light around its edge almost as bright as the flickering, pinnacle of orange that hid whatever form of matter was contained inside it.
"Pretty little thing, isn't it?" said the leader of the most powerful men on the disc, straightening his robe across a stomach of entirely wizardly proportions.
Ponder Stibbons looked at his latest discovery and sighed; the general consensus among the inhabitants of the High Energy Magic Building was that it was the most beautiful thing any of them had ever seen. It was even better than the model universe that had contained the Roundworld project.
"Yes, sir." He agreed, with only a hint of exasperation. "But that's not all it is, remember."
"Oh, yes," put in the Dean, "It's a whatsit of thingumy, very powerful and all that."
"Well, we think it's a particle from the centre of the space time continuum itself. What we are dealing with here, gentlemen, is actual matter that's existing as two different coextensive principles at once." This revelation was not greeted with quite the response he had imagined. He looked up at the blank faces of the faculty of Unseen University.
"And that's good is it?" Ridcully glanced at the prism.
"What I don't understand here, is how it's being contained inside that little jar thing. If it's as good as you fellows seem to think, shouldn't it be, you know, space-timing or whatever?"
"Well according to Hex, sir, it is." Ponder looked up at the senior wizards and mentally rubbed his hands together, he could see that this one was going to take several of what his secret mind liked to think of as "lies to wizards." "Hex says that the particle is controlling the time and space around its central orbit so that they are perfectly proportional. And the reason it doesn't seem to be doing much work is that it's existing outside our reality as well as inside the Petri dish..."
Oh, bugger, thought Ponder, walked straight into that one. He watched the Archchancellor's face as he geared up for a bout of serious and, Ponder suspected, purposeful misunderstanding.
"Hang on, I thought you were just telling us it was contained inside the petery dish, and that it couldn't escape. How come it's outside it then?"
"Yes, Archchancellor." Ponder took on the voice adults use when attempting to explain the creaking of bedsprings to a child, who they're pretty sure has been secretly reading the stack of Playboys under Daddy's mattress and is just being really, really bratty. "The Petri dish is keeping the part of it that's existing in our universe safe, but the rest of the particle is existing elsewhere."
"This isn't about those parasite universes again is it?" Put in the Senior Wrangler, who had just taken half a rather soggy looking ham sandwich out of his pointy wizard's hat.
"Well, yes it is actually," mumbled Ponder looking slightly embarrassed. "See, Hex says that since space and time are constant features of every alternate universe, then the space time continuum must be common to all universes." He looked at the beginning of a question forming in the eyes of the Archchancellor and made a decision that was almost certainly going to come back and bite him on the arse, after all the wizards had gone off somewhere and had time to think about what he'd just said. "And anyway, he knows the particle exists in several other universes, because he can see it. We've developed him so that he can exist in several different universes at once, he calculates much faster this way."
He tried not to think about the "we" part of that sentence too much. Ponder was worried, the "quantum improvements" had in fact been Hex's idea. Ponder had agreed to it because there hadn't been a real reason not to, but he felt that there was something wrong with a machine that designed its own improvements. The extra features weren't worrying in themselves; they'd just involved lots of oddly shaped bits of metal and a few extra ants. Hex had even drawn out careful plans of how they should be set up, with helpful suggestions on how it would be easiest to do. Much as Ponder hated to admit it that was the worrying thing about Hex, a machine shouldn't be able to be helpful. It was also disconcerting that now he could calculate much faster, he always seemed to be working out the answer to a question just before you asked it.
"Hang on," said the Lecturer in Recent Runes looking as though his brain has just caught up with the conversation. "How can he be existing in two places at once? Everyone knows that if you try that, horrible things happen."
"It's all down to quantum," Ponder was getting rapidly more desperate.
"Dangerous stuff quantum, different versions of everyone all over the carpet, and all that." Ridcully had decided that understanding quantum wasn't worth the effort, but disapproving of it was another matter all together.
"Yes, Archchancellor," a thought struck Ponder, "but it makes a great saving in, er, time and effort." Quantum was not a word that sat happily in the Archchancellor's vocabulary, but saving was different. Like all people who thought of themselves as good administrators "saving" was a word he relished.
"So this thingy..." began the Dean, eyeing the Senior Wrangler's sandwich jealously.
"Ssh, Dean." Put in the Archchancellor. "Mr. Stibbons is just running his department efficiently, which is more than I can say for the rest of you fellows."
Ponder felt the angry glare of the UU staff on his face. He could feel himself blushing. But, hey said a little voice in his head, at least they seem to have forgotten about the question of the particle's safety. He looked over at the Petri dish, which was currently being watched avidly by the Bursar.
"Whoops, here comes Mr. Jelly." Said the Bursar, and then rather more relevantly, "Pretty all those little sparks and things."
"Oh, yes," said the Archchancellor, "remind us why it's safe again, Mr. Stibbons?"
Ponder Stibbons looked up into the face of ignorance and sighed. "It's all done by spells and things." A look of understanding crossed the collective faces, although there seemed to be a slight air of disappointment in the room.