Юлия Авилкина – The Syndrome of an Ideal Tomorrow (страница 5)

"I don't owe anyone anything," Thomas said, tightening his grip on the pen. "This world is pure. There are no hotel rules here, and there are none of your laws."

"You’re mistaken," the Conductor took a step forward, and beneath his heel, the mirrored surface of "Day One" cracked into a web of fine fractures. "Balance is inevitable. If you create 'Tomorrow,' you steal it from those who never reached 'Today.' Your guests are taking up space in eternity. Pay for their stay."

He extended a skeletal hand clad in a black glove.

"Your pen. Hand it to me. In exchange, I guarantee these people won't crumble into dust within the hour. Without my seal on their 'time,' they are merely noise in the ether. As soon as you finish writing the last inch of the road, they will vanish along with the fog."

The woman on the bench clutched her bag in fear. A small book in a worn binding slipped out—Thomas caught a glimpse of the name "Brontë" on the cover. She looked at him with silent pleading.

"Don't give it to him," Samantha’s voice rang in Thomas’s head, sharp and clear. "He isn't the master of time. He is its jailer. If you give him the pen, this world will become a new hotel, only with transparent walls."

The Conductor clicked his ticket punch. The sound was as sharp as a gunshot.

"Choose, Thomas. Creative freedom for one—or existence for the many. You like to analyze, don't you? The math is simple: one silver wand against the hundreds of lives you lured here with your 'road'."

Thomas didn't pull his hand away, nor did he clench his fists. Instead, he did what he did best—he froze and began to analyze. His gaze, accustomed to spotting the smallest details in the behavior of the hotel guests, now scanned the very essence of the Conductor.

"You speak of balance," Thomas said, his voice becoming remarkably dry and precise, like the click of a metronome. "You claim that each 'here' costs exactly what 'there' weighs. But allow me to point out a fundamental error in your calculations."

The Conductor froze, his hand with the ticket punch trembling for a split second.

"This world is called 'Day One,'" Thomas continued, stepping to the side and tracing a silver circle directly onto the mirrored surface beneath the Conductor's feet. "There is no accumulated weight from 'there' here. We are at the point of absolute zero. You are attempting to collect a tax on a profit that hasn't been earned yet, charging rent for a space I am creating in real-time."

Thomas knelt and quickly sketched a complex geometric figure inside the circle—a Möbius strip intertwined with an infinity symbol.

"If you are part of a system of weights and measures, then you are subject to logic. In the equation of 'Day One,' you are a variable with no value, because for you, the past does not yet exist here. You demand payment for the existence of these people, but they do not yet 'exist' in the full sense—they are in the process of becoming."

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