You Won't.

Flickering lights sputtered alive in an interrogation room. A middle-aged detective circles around the table, finding his seat across from a hawkish old man. His clothes were shabby, and his back hunched, but despite his age the man did not look infirmed or unfit. A black notebook sat on the table between them.

“So, here we are,” the old man croaked.

“Welcome back,” the detective replied. “It’s my understanding this isn’t your first time at this table. You and your little book.”

“No, I suppose it isn’t. But it is my first time at this table with you. And your first with me.”

“According to records you came in previously with a suspicious package. Ended up being that notebook right there.”

“That’s correct.”

“At the time, the officer in charge opened the package. On confirming it was not in fact anything of note, he gave that book to you. And that was it?”

“In a sense,” the old man mused.

“Seems like an unusual interaction,” the detective stated flatly. “Especially since in the time following, that officer hasn’t returned to work. And now here you and your book are again. This time in quite a lot of trouble, and you say the book made you do it?”

“I can’t say that it made me do anything. It’s just a book. It doesn’t have gun on its hip or a lien on my home.”

“Funny stuff,” the detective dismissed. “Explain why you’re in my building then.”

“Simple enough,” the old man adjusted the book on the table, lightly rubbing the cover with his thumbs as he handed it off to the detective.

“Looks like a notebook to me. Pages are all blank,” the detective said, flipping through the book. The paper was crisp and white as if it were never opened or used. The front and back cover were completely black and felt like a hard compressed cardboard, with a texture like tiny scratches dug into it. It felt like a silly thing, but the detective found himself wanting to hold onto the book. To inspect and appreciate the detail in its cover.

“It does appear to be quite empty, but it isn’t. Know it or not you’ve been reading it intently all along,” the old man said.

“What have I been reading?” The detective asked forcing himself to put down the book.

“The Equation. The Algorithm of Everything.”

“What? Math?”

“Exactly that. A mathematical equation that through simple inputs and outputs can answer any question, unearth any mystery, or even tell of time from its beginning to its end."

“Sounds interesting,” the detective sarcastically chided. “You know I was never a math I guy.”

“I know. You preferred history,” the old man said, catching the detective off-guard. “I have a rather interesting bit of history for you. You’re too young to know, but computers weren’t always things that you used at home or owned. Back in the early days, computers were people. Women mostly. The unsung heroes that took humanity to the moon.”

“Back then, they would operate massive machines that ran on ribbons and reels of magnetic tape, miles in length. Programming was done by placing punch cards rather than typing in ones and zeros. Empty space or paper. Put in order, precisely and exactly, or useless. They would pile those hundreds and thousands of cards in catalogues and books. Stacks of papers that became towers looming over hunched working computers. A human being could fill their entire mind on the complexities of these columns of punch cards begging to be brushed out of order. What was lumber became an esoteric tool to reach into the heavens. A jungle made into a house of cards. A tower of Babel.”

The detective found himself unable to interrupt the old man. His throat ran dry, and his gaze locked into the black notebook. He couldn’t think of any words but the ones this old man preached into his head. Words and ideas put into order like punch cards. He felt like a child, hearing grownups speak on the news. Words of great portent that affected the adult world just out of reach. The image of human computers fused to a desk at work and working out math he couldn’t understand. Line by line, measure by measure, sheet by sheet.

Looking at the book he could see into it, gaze past its border like a screen. Faceless women stacking cards that sunk into each other forming hard plates. Massive towers that broke through the thin ceiling panels, swaying with their height and beginning to twist likes serpents that slithered down into the flat plates. They blackened the surface as line wrote over line, equation over equation – ten billion lines that defied legibility. But the meaning nibbled at him. An itch in his grey-matter. A black swarm of termites looking for purchase.

“What the hell is this,” the detective finally forced out, returning to his seat at the table. “What are you after?”

“A large sum of money currently sits in your evidence locker. Following investigation, those funds will likely be reappropriated into your precinct’s budget.” The old man’s voice came out like a billow of smoke. “Instead, you will place that money amongst the trash from your paper shredders and throw it away. Report that rats destroyed the bills over the weekend. I will take those bags from your dumpster.”

“Why would I- “

“If you do this, I can offer you a choice. A choice I was previously given. When I leave here today, I will not be taking this notebook with me. You may keep it or place it with the garbage and money. And that will be that. I will have the money, and you will have your choice.”

“What kind of choice is that? For a notebook?”

“You can act like you don’t feel it,” the old man cooed, “but since you let your eyes fall on the cover, since your fingers touched the black surface. It’s working its way into your mind. Your brain is learning it even when your eyes cannot read it. Your neurons are firing. It’s a fire beginning to roar in the back of your head. Are you fighting it?”

The detective noticed sweat beading on the back of his clenched fists, his knuckles pressed hard into the cold steel tabletop. He felt the tongue of the devil licking at his brainstem, like a stove cooking his skull.

“You could know it all.” The old man’s voice soothed the fire. “Everything and anything. Exactly what could and will happen will lay itself before you, like a film you cannot look away from. You may not ever want to. You're a detective, all things aside you must have a curious mind. A desire to unravel riddles and mysteries. Just touch the book, and you can see it will come to you. It will give itself to you.”

The symbols carved into the cover were like bacteria – too small to see but evident in their presence. The detective’s fingertip grazed the cover once again, and a colony of ants ran up his nerves.

“This is everything. Infinite knowledge. But you want money?”

“Money is what I’ll be getting, yes.”

“And I… I can keep this. I can learn from this?”

“You will know every answer and every question.” The idea alone would always have interested the detective. But here at this table it was different. Adrenaline coursed through him as he stole glances between the old man and the book. He wanted it to be true. It had to be true. He needed it. The ink from papers worked on by those human computers soaked his brain black. Wrinkling his brain. He couldn’t calm himself. Think of something else, he pleaded. Anything else. Say something!

“What if,” he began, trying to find a word to follow. It had to be perfect. Precise. “What if I took this chance. Let you walk out of here. You leave the book…”

“Go on.”

“What if I destroyed the book?”

“Detective,” the old man rebuked him, “you know as well as I and everyone else the answer to that.”