Meaning

There was a knock at KMFE's door. He got up from his computer and navigated through a maze of cables. It was Andrew and TDCP. TDCP: Can we come in? KMFE: Sure. Watch the cables. He led them over to where he had been working. They all sat down. TDCP: So, pretty... interesting place. KMFE: It fits my life. I'm programming pretty much 24/7 now. TDCP: Yes, we know that. KMFE: You're here to ask me a favor. Andrew: How'd you guess? KMFE: Old story. The patriarchal hero retires into a quiet life, the young people keep fighting. Then some powerful monster shows up and they come drag the old guy back into the mess. It's a classic plotline. TDCP: Beautifully perceptive, except as we are the same age I would not call you the patriarch. KMFE: Well since you're the one about to propose something crazy (I'm guessing) that makes me the wise one. So what arcane technology do you want me to beat up this time? TDCP: Actually, we weren't after your hacking skills. KMFE: All right now that is the second bad sign. The first is that you want to drag me out of my peaceful life. You know I have a job, work full time, and have given up on crazy schemes. TDCP: And give most of your money away because you don't know what to do with it. Andrew: In other words we think you're bored. Unless there's something we don't know about Democratic Republic of Congo. KMFE: Lowest per capita GDP. I don't trust silly schemes like shipping mosquito nets over to Africa. Poor people need money, plain and simple. TDCP: And the second bad sign? KMFE: You're not after my hacking skills. You see I understand hacking. If I'm working with computers I know what process I go through to get stuff done and I trust it. Of course it's not the only thing I can do, but I don't understand anything else. Even just talking to you people here is a mystery. KMFE opened the bottom drawer of his filing cabinet. He searched around for a folder and took it out. KMFE: But the other way this is like the classic story, is that I've seen worse than you. You guys have some ambitious and idealistic goals, I'm sure, but you haven't seen what that kind of thing can do. But I have. And if you want to know part of what pushed me into a normal life, is that I've seen unreal things. Things that are simply impossible. This world is messed up in a metaphysical way that you haven't even dreamed of. He opened the folder and showed them a picture of a woman standing at a train station. KMFE: And it didn't help that she died. She was the most amazing person I ever knew. She tormented me the whole time I knew her and I never resented her for it. At least never for long. TDCP: KMFE, you barely knew her. KMFE: Oh so you recognize her? TDCP: Of course I do. That's :P. She knocked down the church while we were in it. KMFE: Oh that's right. OK, well, then you have some idea. Andrew: Believe me, we do. KMFE looked nervously at Andrew sensing a hint that the favor they were about to ask involved :P. But she's dead now. TDCP: KMFE, we want you to travel back in time. KMFE paused for a few seconds, keeping eye contact so they wouldn't jump in and say something before he did. KMFE: I think it hardly needs saying that that is a fourth very bad sign. But this better not be one of those things. TDCP: No, it's not. KMFE: You're not asking me to kill Hitler, right? Because you know that's been tried before. TDCP: Time travel has been done before? KMFE: I said 'tried', not 'done'. I'm not meddling with history for you. But I assume you know better. So what is it? TDCP: The thing is, KMFE, we can't tell you. We just want you to do this. Andrew: We think you can ask :P to call you back in time. You met her a long time ago. KMFE: And you believe this because...? Andrew and TDCP looked at each other briefly. TDCP: We don't want to tell you that, either, KMFE. But we're pretty sure this will work. KMFE: Well, you haven't told me what my incentive is. I mean, you could argue that you're old friends, but I think this is a bigger deal than that. TDCP: I assume money won't work? KMFE: Of course not. Look, I'll make this easy, because it's pretty obvious what I really want. TDCP: OK. KMFΕ: I'll do this messed up plan of yours if you tell me why. Andrew: Look, KMFE, I'll give you an incentive. No one has ever gone back in time before. If you don't do this, no one ever will. KMFE: Andrew, you play mean. But come on guys, what is it? I met :P in September 2001; this better not have anything to do with that. Andrew: No, nothing to do with that. KMFE: And this better not be some silly hunt for meaning and purpose and the reason for existence because I'm sick of things like that. TDCP and Andrew looked uncomfortable. KMFE: This is, isn't it! Look, there is no meaning. There is no purpose. Not forward or backward in time. And what really gets me, is the notion that just because something's never been done before, like time travel, that it will provide meaning. People do things that have never been done before all the time. It never tells you anything new. TDCP: You sound pretty indignant for a nihilist. KMFE: Hah are you kidding? Nihilists can be the most indignant people you'll ever meet. But I'm not a nihilist because I never thought meaning mattered in the first place. Andrew: From your perspective then, your task is to gather more evidence that the universe has no purpose. KMFE: There's overwhelming evidence already. Andrew: Not from time travel. KMFE: What, so you want to turn the human race into some sort of grand proof of meaninglessness? Then when World War III comes around you can write it all up and say "look here, everything humanly possible has been accomplished and none of it meant anything"? Andrew: If that's how you want to see it. Andrew was visibly upset about this. KMFE sat there looking reproachful until TDCP tried to explain. TDCP: KMFE, Andrew's coming at this from a different angle. He keeps existing, forever, from one universe to the next, past creation and destruction time and time again. So you just go through your one life seeing no point to anything and you're OK with that. But Andrew's seen more universes than you can count, and every single one has been just as empty. Imagine how discouraging that must be. Now this girl :P comes along who can predict the future, read minds, knock down bridges by looking at them, and he thinks "I haven't seen that before". And he thinks that maybe this is the only chance he'll ever get to find a meaning to existence. KMFE: I further object to the idea that just because something seems to go against reality that it might have some mystery hidden in it. Just because something goes against the laws up physics doesn't mean it's special. TDCP: You may be right about that, but you could still do this as a favor to Andrew Andrew: KMFE, we've told you why, now. KMFE: That's right. You did. Well, I guess here goes.