Chapter 1
Earth was just a memory, long since vapourised by the dying sun. Billions of years past its main sequence, the Sun was becoming a brown dwarf. The night sky, once so vibrant with galaxies and supernovas was now empty. Stars had gone the way of the Sun, or had collapsed into black holes. There were still black holes but as the Hawking-Penrose theorem predicted, black holes too were evaporating.
The universe was doomed to a slow freezing death, attaining thermal equilibrium, temperatures reaching almost absolute zero. “The Big Freeze” as everyone called it, put a damper on all human activity in the Solar, Centauri, Eridani and the handful of populated star systems
Mankind huddled around the dying embers of these nuclear fires like homeless people.
With the rise of doomsday cults and science blending with metaphysics, astrophysicists were a dying breed of scientists. Isaac Chandrasekhar was one of them. He was one of the few on Mars that kept the hope of human survival alive, without the indulgence in Judgement day religions.
Isaac Chandrasekhar was frustrated. A million years had passed since humanity’s frantic effort to formulate the “Theory of Everything”, only to find what was already suspected, that mankind was doomed. The merciless second law of thermodynamics held sway over everything, slowly draining energy from everything.
Isaac snorted, remembering the Fimbulwinter of Norse mythology. The Norse had almost got it right, except for the parts with the wolves, Valkyrie and Valhalla. He shook himself into reality.
“Don’t think these thoughts, or you might as well join the doomsayers”, he said to himself. He tried to force himself to work. But instead, he shrugged his shoulders. “They’re right anyway. The human race and life is doomed.”
“Hey doc, I bought you some lunch!”, a cheerful voice rang across the hall. Megan Clarke, Dr. Isaac’s assistant was still young and in his wizened blue-gray eyes, naive.
“Poor kid, she still believes in me”, thought Isaac to himself, as he munched a cold sandwich. She had majored in wormhole creation. In spite of the fact that her thesis included vast amounts of negative energy, she seemed to be full of positive energy.
“Dr. Chandrasekhar, have you an idea how to achieve a breakthrough in vacuum energy?” Megan inquired.
“I’ve been working on it for TWENTY ONE YEARS!” hollered Isaac. Megan’s eyes went to the floor, tears forming in her eyes.
“Megan, I’m sorry. It’s just that I’ve not come across a way to solve the mass energy conservation rule.
“It’s ok, doc. I know how frustrated you feel. It’s just that..”, Megan stopped and look away.
“What’s the matter, dear?”, asked Isaac. “You can always tell me”.
“Well, sometimes I feel that the entire hope of the human race rests on our shoulders...”, Megan quietly replied.
“Yes, I feel it too. And it’s true”. Isaac leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. “The doomsayers have not achieved their goal. There are some who still have the will to survive. Not the means, but the will.”
“Are you religious, Dr. Chandrasekhar?”, asked Megan timidly.
“I believe in the creator of the Universe, if that counts as a religion”, said Isaac. “In my ancestors’ religion, they believed that there are times when the universe takes form and times when it dissolves back into nothing. The in-between times are known as the days and nights of Brahma, who is the Hindu god of creation.”
“That’s interesting,” Megan replied. “Do you think there’s a kernel of truth in that myth? The universe takes form from nothing?”
“Ha. There’s no such thing as a free lunch, my dear”, said Isaac. His brow furrowed, he continued, “But, if we take into account the entire mass-energy of the universe and add it all up, then all the positive mass and energy cancels out all the negative gravitational energy which causes the inflation of the Universe.”
“Oh. Then the universe itself might be a free lunch!” laughed Megan.
But her giggles were suppressed when she saw the astonishment on his face.
“You’re brilliant!” shouted Isaac. If we build a chamber and cancel out the positive energy with gravitational energy by creating a false vacuum, we can produce energy from nothing! Voila! Vacuum energy!”
Chapter 2
Days turned into weeks, weeks into months. But the entire human race held their breath. All eyes were focussed on the new hope brought forward by Dr. Isaac Chandrasekhar. The last of the energy sources were brought to his disposal in the last ditch effort to escape the Big Freeze.
Dr. Chandrasekhar worked day and night. Doomsayers were calling Dr. Chandrasekhar’s invention a blasphemy. There were attempts on his life. He had to work under high security. The invention was placed in Mars orbit. The day of reckoning finally arrived.
“Dr. Chandrasekhar will now start the machine which will save humanity!” a distant voice echoed through Isaac’s mind. A sharp poke brought him back to reality.
“Daydreaming again, eh doc?” Megan whispered. “They’re waiting for you.”
“Waiting? Oh yes. Sorry. I was thinking about the creation myth. You see, the old universe was dissolved before the new universe was formed...” said Isaac.
“There’ll be more time to discuss philosophy, doc. Now GO!”, Megan pushed him onto the podium.
Dr. Isaac felt a faint sense of foreboding as he fingered the switch.
“Is the plasmadynamic containment field switched on to contain the vacuum?”, he asked Megan.
Megan could barely be heard above the din of the crowd.
“Yes, doc”, she shouted.
“Ok, I’m switching it on stand back!”
The crowd’s applause was deafening.
Isaac switched on the machine. He had a sudden vision. “Your name is Brahma”, a voice said.
As soon as the circuit was closed, there was a deafening light. There was no explosion. Only a huge amount of mass and energy flung out from the vacuum.
It decimated the visible Universe, reducing everything not to atoms, but to quarks and the most fundamental particles of matter. The expansion accelerated, the negative gravitational energy pushing it out in all directions. Space itself expanded faster than light.
Thus the Big bang was produced.
It's another boring Sunday in my hometown, Coimbatore. What's a green-furred maniacal monkey (me) to do on a holiday in this city? 
