# Chapter 3
“So, who bought that bus ticket anyway?”
“You did.”
“And then you called me saying you missed the bus at the rest stop.”
“I had an upset stomach and missed the bus. A friend in trouble called you, but you got annoyed. So I caught a taxi by myself.”
“Do you know how much that taxi fare was charged?”
“200,000 won? No, maybe 300,000 won?”
The man who claimed to be Misha’s friend criticized him as a “nerd” despite Misha’s innocent face and clear answers, but Misha seemed unfazed, as if used to it.
Though his words were gruff, the man said he had been following his friend because he was worried about sending him alone. When told Misha had missed the bus, he had told him to wait, but Misha wasn’t at the rest stop and wasn’t answering his phone. On top of that, the large charge on the borrowed card made him wonder if something had happened. As a bonus, when he told the Village Chief about the taxi fare, the Chief jumped up and down saying he would report the driver to the county office.
* * *
Misha was 25 years old, four years older than Hwiseo. Hwiseo was surprised by how young he was, but not as surprised as when Misha introduced himself as a physics Ph.D. When Hwiseo asked if he needed a professional interpreter rather than an amateur like himself, Misha calmly said not to worry since he was there out of personal interest. According to his friend, Misha was an idiot who would be robbed and left in just his underwear within 30 minutes if placed in the middle of LA, but the pressure Hwiseo felt from “California Institute of Technology Ph.D.” didn’t go away.
“That friend is a doctor? At twenty-five?”
“Yes, he must have gone to college early because he’s good at studying.”
Misha wanted to go to the coast where the sea with the fallen meteorite was visible. It wasn’t a beach with fine sand, so tourists rarely visited even in summer, but recently there were many people, perhaps because of the meteorite. Misha picked up a stone from the ground and threw it into the sea. A round ripple formed with a ‘plop’ sound. He repeated picking up pebbles and throwing them into the sea.
“He’s quite unusual, must be because he’s a doctor.”
After more than 20 minutes of this, the Village Chief said he would wait in the car first. Misha’s friend nodded to the Village Chief as he left. The person Misha called Peter was Korean. Peter was just looking at his smartphone despite watching his 25-year-old friend fly halfway around the world just to throw stones.
Even to Hwiseo, who had lived surrounded by aspiring celebrities for a year, Peter was handsome. Unlike those who overflowed with talent and shone brightly, he was like his expensive blue sports car – classic and sophisticated. Even just sitting on the sandy ground, he had a relaxed air like he was on a picnic, which seemed to be something he was born with. He only looked like a man in his twenties when he was scolding Misha; otherwise, the expressionless man who rarely spoke seemed somewhat difficult to approach. Hwiseo chose to squat next to Misha instead.
“What are you doing?”
“Looking for an Einstein-Rosen bridge.”
“A bridge?”
“Not a physical bridge, but a bridge that connects hidden dimensions of space and time. It’s also called a wormhole in hyperspace.”
Hwiseo gave up responding to Misha’s continuing explanation and threw stones toward the invisible space-time bridge.
“It’s been in many dramas and movies, have you heard of it?”
“I think I’ve seen it in movies.”
Despite Hwiseo’s passive response, Misha opened his mouth like an engine revving up. Hwiseo couldn’t understand 100% of what he was saying. He couldn’t tell if it was because he didn’t know the words or because the content itself was difficult to understand.
Misha said that since last year, purely out of interest, he had begun to focus on heavy celestial bodies discovered in deep space and their effects on the laws of space-time. Hwiseo, an ordinary 21-year-old South Korean, was shocked that such a person actually existed.
‘I guess it’s people like him who make air conditioners and computers, and go to space and stuff.’
Respect filled Hwiseo’s eyes as he looked at Misha.
“A wormhole is both a distortion of space and a distortion of time. According to quantum gravity laws, very small wormholes exist randomly for moments and then disappear in unpredictable ways.”
Misha picked up a pebble and drew a long cylindrical tunnel shape on the muddy ground as he spoke. “This entrance is the mouth of the wormhole,” he said, pointing to the round entrance of the tunnel. It was shaped like a morning glory, opening brightly toward Hwiseo. A shadow fell over it, and Peter appeared.
“How long are you going to do this? Get up, I’m hungry.”
Peter said as he grabbed Misha’s arm, who was much smaller than him, and pulled him up.
“Just listen with one ear and let it go. It’s not relevant to ordinary people.”
Peter told Hwiseo, who was confused about why space-time was twisted. Hwiseo realized a beat later that it was his own gruff way of comforting him. Unlike when they arrived, Peter sat in the driver’s seat and drove himself. Hwiseo visited the best hotel in Pohang city for the first time. The Village Chief seemed to be visiting for the first time too, as he caused a commotion when the valet parking employee drove away with the car.
“But I have a restaurant reserved.”
The Village Chief said as he picked up the Jeju red spotted sea bass that he said had been aged for 8 hours. The private room in the Japanese restaurant inside the hotel was luxurious, and the staff explained each dish as they set it down. Hwiseo looked down at a plate of 5kg wild greater amberjack caught in this region, decorated with sea urchin roe like tulips. He wondered if he should be eating this. But seeing the Village Chief, who had done nothing but drop Misha off at the coast every 30 minutes while driving around, picking up two pieces of wild matsutake tempura at once, Hwiseo quickly picked up his chopsticks too.
“So when is Misha returning to America? Is he not going back until he finds that bridge?”
Misha, who had been eating Jeju white sea bream with his face almost in the plate until then, suddenly raised his head and laughed loudly.
“He’ll never find that even if he dies and comes back to life.”
Peter said instead of Misha, who was busy laughing.
“Mr. Peter, so Misha came all the way here to find something he can’t find? Why?”
Despite Hwiseo’s confused question, Peter just continued eating with neat chopstick movements. Misha, who seemed to have calmed down a bit, took a sip of water and said:
“When there’s mass or energy in space, it bends around it. As the mass gets heavier, it dips more, and as it gets bigger, it eventually creates a hole in space-time. That’s a black hole, and black holes are the inevitable result of stellar evolution – when a massive, slowly rotating star in our galaxy dies by imploding. But we don’t know clearly what singularity creates a wormhole, or what that singularity is.”
Misha’s eyes sparkled as he spoke.
“However, time always flows outward. So it continuously creates something. A black hole is the entrance, a wormhole is the corridor, and a white hole is the exit. Just as the Big Bang created the universe, these two singularities – the entrance and exit – create the wormhole. And I’m one of the people who believe we can use that wormhole to travel through time.”
He said that nowadays it’s trendy to think white holes don’t exist, so it could also be described as an instant transportation passage connecting black holes. Of all Misha had said, Hwiseo clearly understood only the words “black” and “white.” The Village Chief asked what he was talking about, but Hwiseo couldn’t answer right away. So, Misha said he was looking for a bridge, a wormhole that transcends space-time, and he believes you can time travel through that tunnel. Peter answered instead of the hesitant Hwiseo.
“He’s talking about a naturally occurring time machine.”
“A time machine?”
“Yes.”
A quiet silence fell, and over it passed the sound of Misha eating his food. The Village Chief, who had even had a glass of expensive sake, broke the silence. He even clapped his hands as if he had gained enlightenment.
“Of course! As expected of a doctor, you’re making a time machine too!”
“He’s not making it, he wants to find it.”
“Are you saying it’s in the sea in front of our village?”
“No.”
Hwiseo silently ate the greater amberjack. The Village Chief muttered to himself, “I don’t understand well because I’m not educated enough,” and picked up a fried scallop. That’s experience for you. The Village Chief, who quickly caught on that food is what counts, offered Hwiseo some grilled scallop adductor muscle, telling him to try it. But Misha, who had broken the ice in the conversation, asked Hwiseo:
“Isn’t it interesting to travel beyond space and time?”
“I can see that physics requires more imagination than I thought.”
“Strictly speaking, it’s quantum physics, but we are dreamers indeed.”
Seeing a scientist who wanted to time travel for the first time in his life, Hwiseo could only smile wryly. It was truly a story that seemed to belong only in science fiction.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
