One advantage of the human race having been uploaded into a virtual existence, in this post-singularity story, is that it offers a wide variety of decorating choices not normally available to those of us constrained to a physical reality. For instance, the protagonist (sixth-grader Renée Tae-O (star) (whale) Fayette) says
| (quoted from Altogether Elsewhere, Vast Herds of Reindeer)
My bedroom is a Klein bottle so I don't ever feel like I'm boxed in. A warm yellow light suffuses the room and fades gradually into darkness at infinite distance. It's old fashioned, like something from years ago, when designs still tried to hint at the old physical world. Yet the smooth, endless surface makes me feel secure, something to hang onto, being enclosed and outside at the same time. It is better than Sarah's room in her home, which is a Weierstrass “curve”: continuous everywhere, but nowhere differentiable. Jagged fractals no matter how closely you look. It's certainly very modern, but I don't ever feel comfortable when I visit. So she comes over to our place a lot more often.
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Renée's mother has remained three-dimensional. (Aren't parents embarrassing?!)
However, I am afraid that these remarks will give you the wrong impression about this story. Math provides a sort of comic relief, but this is no joke. Renée's mother is going to explore a distant planet and will never return. The emotional and philosophical consequences of that choice, as well as the whole idea of virtual life, are really what this piece is about.
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