Generally Unlikely was a fairly obvious chap. He was named, according to office legend, after his father—a man whose favorite phrase was, “Well, that’s generally unlikely, but perhaps…”—only to have his surname assigned ironically by a bored clerk. For Generally, most of the world in general was painfully, wonderfully, and unequivocally clear which is why he ignored it most of the time, prefering to spend time “otherwise engaged.”
Generally was particularly adept at critical thinking and while no one really wants to hear about stuff in those terms, he gained a certain self-satisfaction from blurting out things like “the world isn’t flat” or “airplane exhaust isn’t a chem trail government conspiracy.” The timing of these statements was often debated and no one would really say if they were exactly right or exactly wrong. He was a guy who rarely failed to not state the obvious, a trait which wasn’t a desirable attribute to those around him who didn’t want to explain the painfully obvious. His colleagues often found themselves trapped in a conversational loop, failing to justify simple, self-evident facts with premeditated predictability.
Generally worked in the corporate archives of the megalith corporation named the Universally Useful Stuff (UUS). His job required tedious organization of historical patents, product failure reports, and discontinued marketing materials, and offered little room for surprise. This suited Generally, as surprises often complicated the obvious—but there were always surprises—as humans universally fail at the obvious. We’ve all been there.
The ‘Generally Unlikely’ Universal Doorstop
Generally’s current task was clearing out a derelict sub-level archive, designated ‘Section X-0,’ rumored to contain the historical artifacts of UUS’s most catastrophic financial failures. While cataloging a box labeled “1987 Prototype: The ‘Never-Slip’ Office Mat,” Generally encountered an object that, based on the exterior label, was patently misfiled.
It was a small, perfectly smooth obsidian sphere, no larger than a tennis ball, resting on a pedestal of slightly warped, gold-plated plastic. The object had no obvious function, yet its accompanying manifest card read, in faint, handwritten script: “Project Chronos-Stop. Universal Doorstop. Warning: Do Not Power.”
Generally performed a quick dimensional scan and ran a spectral analysis with his handheld corporate device. The results were immediate and completely unambiguous.
He walked calmly back to the main office floor and approached Mr. Dubois, his supervisor, who was currently yelling into his phone about a supplier shortage of adhesive foam.
“Mr. Dubois,” Generally stated, waiting for a pause in the yelling, which predictably did not come. Generally waited until Dubois hung up, then repeated, “Mr. Dubois, I have located an object in Section X-0 that necessitates immediate action.”
“Is it another empty box, Generally?” Dubois asked, rubbing his temples.
“No, Sir. It is a solid sphere, roughly 6.7 cm in diameter. According to the accompanying internal documentation, the object, designated Project Chronos-Stop, utilizes a Balost-River-like micro-singularity to achieve an infinitely stable state relative to its local environment.”
Dubois squinted. “A what?”
“A small, contained, rotating black hole, Sir,” Generally clarified, utterly flatly. “The device was designed to be the ultimate doorstop, using extreme gravitational stability to prevent any external force from moving it. The objective reality, Sir, is that it is a universal singularity containment unit built by the UUS Applied Physics Division in 1987, and it is located in a box labeled ‘Office Mat.’”
“A tiny black hole,” Dubois repeated slowly. “In the archives.”
“That is the obvious physical fact, yes,” Generally confirmed. “Furthermore, the internal decay rate of the containment field is increasing. Simple calculations based on the provided data indicate that the sphere’s containment will fail within 7.4 days, initiating a localized spacetime collapse that will, in effect, destroy the observable universe.”
Generally waited. He had stated the obvious consequence of the observed data.
Dubois picked up a stress ball and squeezed it. “Destroy the universe. Right. Well, we can’t exactly tell the public that, can we?”
“That is a communication problem, Sir, not a physical one,” Generally replied. “The physical problem requires immediate evacuation of the facility and the procurement of exotic matter to reinforce the containment field. The communication issue is secondary.”
“No, Generally, the communication issue is primary,” Dubois insisted. “If we announce ‘UUS has a black hole that will destroy everything,’ the stock drops to zero. Mass panic. Riots. Nobody understands General Relativity. They’re too dim. We can’t explain the math. How do we spin a micro-singularity?”
“It is generally unlikely that the public will grasp the concepts of cosmic censorship or quantum gravity,” Generally conceded. “However, they will certainly notice the imminent cessation of all existence. Perhaps focus on the immediate, observable consequence: A sudden and complete lack of objects and energy.”
Dubois nodded, starting to pace. “Okay, okay. We bury the important parts. We say… we say UUS discovered a ‘Highly Advanced, Non-Volatile, Energy-Sucking Storage Device.’ We issue a corporate advisory saying there’s a slight risk of a ‘Minor, Localized Data Loss Event.’ That sounds unalarming and benign.”
“That summary is factually incorrect and minimizes the terminal risk,” Generally pointed out. “The risk is 100% certainty of universal destruction, Sir.”
“But we don’t say that, Generally! Just file the report with your technical details, but put a cover summary on top: ‘Anomaly Detected in X-0: Low-Priority Risk, Requires Phase II Assessment.’ I’ll handle the corporate response.”
Generally did as he was instructed, detailing the Bodictinist radius, the information paradox, and the 7.4 day countdown in meticulous, emotionless detail, while affixing the required, misleading corporate summary to the front. The obvious truth was now trapped under a layer of easily digestible corporate doublespeak.
Dubois, to his credit, was not entirely negligent. He pulled strings and secured a shipment of advanced shielding materials from a secret UUS research facility—materials clearly labelled ‘High-Density Spacetime Stabilizers.’
On Day 7, Hour 23, Dubois and Generally were in the breakroom. Dubois looked tired but determined.
“We did it, Generally,” Dubois said, stirring his coffee. “The shielding is in place. We managed to stabilize the containment field by, I think, 0.0003% according to the sensor readouts. It’s generally unlikely we could have done more, but perhaps we averted the catastrophe.”
“The stabilization rate is negligible compared to the decay rate, Sir,” Generally corrected. “However, the effort was a measurable positive quantity, which is an observable fact.”
Suddenly, the lights flickered and died. A strange, deafening silence filled the air, a vacuum of sound that seemed to suck the breath from the room. The microwave display went blank. All objects, including Generally’s coffee mug, seemed to shimmer.
“Well, that’s generally unlikely,” Dubois whispered, looking around at the sudden, absolute darkness. “But perhaps…”
Generally, utterly calm, made his final, most obvious observation:
“Sir, the Chronos-Stop device has failed. All local spacetime is ceasing to exist. We are experiencing the predictable outcome of an unstable singularity. Based on the objective evidence, I must conclude that the universe is being destroyed.”
Dubois smiled faintly into the void. “Yeah. Well. It was getting pretty hard to explain things to everyone anyway. Maybe this is for the best.”
And then, there was nothing. No light, no sound, no space, no time, no UUS, and, most importantly to the rest of the universe, no Generally Unlikely to point out the obvious failure of a corporate-engineered doorstop.