(///helicopter.wormhole.bicycle – Western Iceland)
Nobody had ever organised anything quite like it. After years of arguments in lecture halls and journals over whose theory of wormhole generation was the best, it had been agreed that a contest would be staged to try and reach a definitive conclusion.
There were three scientists, and they had agreed to the symmetry of a triathlon determining the outcome. The participants first had to take a helicopter to their laboratory of choice. It would make for good television. Then they had to power up a wormhole using their own theory, directing it towards Iceland, as the volcanic nature of the landscape there affected gravity in a way that all believed was beneficial to wormhole creation. Finally, a quick bicycle ride round a nearby hot spring to add the element of a finish line.
When the day came curious crowds joined the committee at the target location, watching on screens as the helicopters delivered the three geniuses to their respective locations. Live streams from inside the labs then began as they powered up their wormholes.
It was Stig McGillvary, working furiously in the Scottish Highlands, who moved ahead, and the crowd gasped as they saw him disappear in his lab while a simultaneous clear distortion appeared in the sky above them. To great excitement, Professor McGillvary came hurtling through it. Regrettably he was around 100 feet in the air, where he seemed to hang in horror for a moment before plummeting to the ground. The crowd looked away. The committee were relieved at the extensive waivers all had signed in advance.
It wasn’t long before Germany’s Lina Schultz was ready. She disappeared and the crowd waited more nervously now. Nothing happened for a long time. A very long time. In fact, it was hours before they found out that she had emerged in the depths of the Atlantic Ocean several miles offshore, and her presence was only detected due to a nearby nuclear submarine captained by a man who had the good sense to investigate rather than declare war.
So all eyes turned to Australia. Jacob Jones was slow and meticulous. It was a good couple of hours before he seemed to be ready to travel. But then he looked confidently at the camera and disappeared. Moments later, a shimmer on a pathway and he stepped through, beaming with pride.
Delighted, the committee chairman rushed over to him with a bicycle to ask him to complete the challenge.
The downside of Dr Jones’ dedication to his experiments was that he had never really had time to devote to anything else. So as he started off on his ride, he wobbled one way, then the other, and then careered completely out of control straight into the hot spring, where he had time to briefly wish he hadn’t always skipped his swimming lessons before he was poached to death.
The chairman shook his head. Next time he’d organise a knitting contest.
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