The Chaos Curse (Kiranmala and the Kingdom Beyond #3) - Sayantani DasGupta Page 0,56
a huge amount of mass being mashed into an infinitely small space.” K. P. Babu took a piece of paper and crumpled it tightly in his hand, holding out the small ball he had made when done.
“Kind of like what almost happened to us at the bottom of that squishifying rabbit hole,” muttered Tuni. I shuddered at the memory.
Einstein-ji twirled his wand in one hand as he continued, “A singularity is something scientists haven’t been able to see, but think exists in ze middle of black holes—what you know as rakkhosh in the Kingdom Beyond. It’s ze point from where ze big bang happened.”
“So, something inside a rakkhosh is why the entire multiverse was started? Sir, can you possibly be saying that rakkhosh are responsible for the birth of everything we know?” Lal gave his brother an amazed look, which Neel returned with a raise of one eyebrow.
“You all got a problem with that too?” snapped Neel.
Lal looked incredulous, but I remembered back to when Neel’s mom had once opened her mouth and I’d been sure I’d seen planets, stars, moons—entire galaxies—in there.
“It’s a theory, of course, but with good evidence to support it,” said Shady Sadie. “We think of a black hole as only destructive, something that gobbles up energy and life, but that’s a simplistic idea, just a singular story about rakkhosh.”
Neel gave me a pointed look. I scowled. It was not simplistic to think that his mother was mostly evil and destructive. No matter what these scientists said.
“Despite my efforts to find the beautiful simplicity of the multiverse,” Einstein-ji went on, “ze truth is, there is also beauty in its complexity and ambiguity. As much as we work to understand it, there are parts of the truth that always slip through our fingers, lie always beyond our understanding.” He flipped this way and that in the air as he spoke, now up, now down, dancing to an invisible cosmic music in the flickering light of the lab’s giant atom smasher.
“And this is what the Anti-Chaos Committee is trying to destroy?” I asked.
“The multiverse may have started from a singularity, but it started expanding outward and outward immediately after the big bang. It’s still expanding—think of all the different, diverse stories being born every day. Well, that is, unless …” K. P. Babu’s words drifted off.
“Unless someone puts a stop to it. Unless someone stops the chaos and kills the diversity of the multiverse,” Neel finished.
“And causes it to begin shrinking,” said Einstein-ji. “As there was once a big bang, there might indeed be a big crunch.”
“But what does all this have to do with the Serpent King and Rakkhoshi Rani getting married?” asked Lal.
“Love, exciting and new …” crooned Tuni. This time, Neel took a swat at him but missed when the bird flew up and out of the way.
“We fear Sesha’s efforts to destroy and demoralize Demon Land by rounding up rakkhosh, khokkosh, doito, and danav recently were just the tip of the iceberg. It is through the power of rakkhosh that the multiverse was born, and it is by destroying rakkhosh-kind that the multiverse can die. Or at least, collapse from its wondrous complexity into one reality, one single story,” K. P. Das said.
Sadie went on, “Sesha realized that killing or imprisoning rakkhosh from all the different clans one at a time was not enough of an energetic shift to begin the universe shrinking. To jump-start the big crunch, Sesha must control the Rakkhoshi Rani’s power, the power that stems from being the elected leader of all the rakkhosh from all the different clans.”
“I’m getting married in the mo-orning,” sang Tuni tunelessly.
“Zip it, Tuni,” I muttered, looking from one serious scientific face to the next.
“Mawage!” chirped Tuni. “That bwessed awangement! That dweam within a dweam!”
“Tuni!” I snapped, while almost at the same time, Bunty growled, “Desist, birdbrain!”
“So Sesha is marrying my mother because he’s trying to steal her power—the power of all rakkhosh-kind!” Neel gave me a triumphant look. “It’s what he tried to do before with those neutron stars. So she must be his prisoner. I was right—she’s not agreeing to this marriage voluntarily!”
“Perhaps,” said Einstein. “But perhaps she has an agenda of her own.”
I raised my eyebrows, giving Neel an “I told you so” look. “Yeah, like maybe she wants the Anti-Chaos Committee to use her power so she and Sesha can, like, rule the singular universe together or whatever.”