Sequence (4 page)

I never said I was the
smartest
guy alive.

CYNTHIA

Don't be ridiculous. What if you lose? Have you even thought about that?

THEO

Every day.

CYNTHIA

You'd become some ordinary guy whose luck and greed eventually caught up with him. No fame. No fortune. You'd lose everything.

THEO

Just an ordinary guy.

CYNTHIA

But if you don't place the bet, you'd walk away a winner. You'd still be the luckiest man alive.

THEO

Until I die.

CYNTHIA

Isn't that what you want?

THEO

I'll let you in on a little secret. This time tomorrow, I'll be a billionaire. Or I'll be broke. But either way, win or lose, it's going to end. Today's going to be my last bet.

CYNTHIA

I thought they wouldn't let you stop.

THEO

If I lose, they won't care. If I win… well, this time I won't give them a choice.

CYNTHIA

Then why not stop now? Why roll the dice one last time? You could lose it all today.

THEO

I know.

CYNTHIA

Well, Mr. Super-Lucky-Man, if it makes you feel any better, I don't think you're going to lose today.

CYNTHIA hands THEO his briefcase.

I've figured out your secret.

Laboratory

MR. ADAMSON

So tell me. What's the catch?

DR. GUZMAN

The catch is, if you guess
wrong
on the coin flip, there will be a consequence.

MR. ADAMSON

Excuse me?

DR. GUZMAN

Without stakes, how can we truly evaluate the “unlucky” hypothesis?

MR. ADAMSON

So this is some kind of test?

DR. GUZMAN

An experiment, if you will. A critical assessment of your luck. Or lack thereof.

MR. ADAMSON

What do you mean, consequence?

DR. GUZMAN

I'm sure we can think of something. I know I have a bottle of H2SO4 here somewhere.

MR. ADAMSON

h2so4?

DR. GUZMAN

Sulphuric acid. So which is it? Heads or tails?

MR. ADAMSON

Why the egg? Why did the egg come first?

DR. GUZMAN

Ah. We know all new species appear via mutation. Since DNA can only be modified prenatally, the first chicken egg gave birth to the first chicken.

MR. ADAMSON comes across a phone jack in the wall. He follows the wire.

MR. ADAMSON

But a chicken laid the egg in the first place.

DR. GUZMAN

No. A creature which was similar to a chicken, but technically not a chicken, laid that first egg. Likely the Red Junglefowl.

DR. GUZMAN finds a stethoscope, uses it to listen to the briefcase lock.

MR. ADAMSON

Fine, but which came first, the Red Junglefowl or the egg?

DR. GUZMAN

The egg. Same logic. Wouldn't you agree?

MR. ADAMSON

No. I would not. “And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of Heaven.”

DR. GUZMAN

So your money is on the chicken.

MR. ADAMSON

My money is on God. It doesn't matter whether God created the egg first or the chicken first. It's irrelevant. It doesn't matter if it's Watson and Crick. Baskin and Robbins. Ernie and Bert.

DR. GUZMAN

Bert and Ernie. Only thirteen per cent of the population says Ernie and Bert.

As DR. GUZMAN writes 13% on the board, MR. ADAMSON follows the phone wire to a desk.

MR. ADAMSON

Did you get a research grant to study that?

DR. GUZMAN

Somebody did. What I'm saying is, everything has an order. It's fundamental. It's intrinsic. The order is everything.

Under some papers on the desk, MR. ADAMSON finds a cordless phone base.

MR. ADAMSON

Why does it matter if it's Ernie and Bert or Bert and Ernie? They're still the same people.

DR. GUZMAN

Muppets. Ernie has no DNA. Ernie has no parents. Ernie has no God.

MR. ADAMSON

Everything has a God.

DR. GUZMAN

Even Oscar the Grouch?

MR. ADAMSON

Even you.

The cordless phone locator alarm beeps.

DR. GUZMAN holds up the phone handset.

DR. GUZMAN

Looking for this?

She climbs the ladder, places the phone on a shelf, out of his reach.

We have a hypothesis to test. Heads or tails, Mr. Adamson.

MR. ADAMSON

Why not tails or heads?

DR. GUZMAN

Ha! So what you're saying is, it doesn't matter. We all put our pants on one leg at a time. Whether it's your right leg first or your left, the order doesn't matter, right?

MR. ADAMSON

You still end up wearing pants.

DR. GUZMAN

Ah, but that's where you're wrong. It does matter. Would you believe which pant leg you put on first is a question that has significant scientific implications? And, it's predictable.

MR. ADAMSON

Are you telling me you can predict which leg I put on first?

Auditorium

THEO

What's the secret?

CYNTHIA draws on the board: Hs and Ts.

CYNTHIA

I've been analyzing your picks. Tails. Heads. Tails. Tails. Heads. Heads. Heads. Tails tails tails tails tails heads heads heads heads heads heads heads, and, last year, heads.

THEO

I'm honoured. And disturbed.

THEO nudges toward the door.

CYNTHIA

Notice anything interesting?

THEO

About what?

CYNTHIA

About the sequence.

THEO

Like what?

CYNTHIA

How do you make your picks?

THEO

I pick them out of a hat.

CYNTHIA

Bullshit!

THEO

If you really must know, I make my picks by flipping a coin.

CYNTHIA

You pick the result of the coin flip by actually flipping a coin?

THEO

Seemed appropriate.

CYNTHIA

So you take your lucky coin…

THEO

No, I lost my “lucky coin” after year six. So now I use any old coin. It's not the coin that's lucky. Although, I will say, year seven was a bit suspenseful.

CYNTHIA

And you flip it.

THEO

Once a year.

CYNTHIA

And by flipping that coin you got that sequence. Tails. Heads. Tails. Tails. Et cetera.

THEO

The last eight have been heads.

CYNTHIA

Yes. That's quite a feat in itself. Do you know what the odds are of getting eight heads in a row? One in 256.

THEO

Most people are betting on nine in a row. The odds in Vegas are six to five for heads this year.

CYNTHIA

Are you telling me millions of people collectively believe that because you've had eight heads in a row you're more likely to have nine?

THEO

Hundreds of millions.

CYNTHIA

Idiots!

THEO

Why are they idiots? How do you know they're wrong?

CYNTHIA

They're being seduced by the last eight heads. But the odds of the next one being heads remains one in two.

THEO

They still might be right.

THEO checks his watch. He wears it on his right wrist.

What time is it? I should make my pick.

CYNTHIA

This year, I'd pick tails.

THEO

Why tails?

CYNTHIA

Trust me.

THEO

If you're so convinced, why don't you put your money where your mouth is?

THEO opens the door.

CYNTHIA

Okay. If it comes up heads, I'll sleep with you.

THEO stops.

THEO

Go on.

CYNTHIA

Let's examine your sequence mathematically. One tails. One heads. Two tails. Three heads. Five tails. Eight heads. One one two three five eight.

She circles groups of Hs and Ts, then writes 1 1 2 3 5 8.

THEO

That's my briefcase combination. One one two, three five eight.

CYNTHIA

Are you serious? Why that number?

THEO

I've always used that number, ever since I was a kid.

THEO looks at his watch.

CYNTHIA

Do you know what that is? One one two three five eight. It's the first six numbers of the Fibonacci sequence… the most fundamental and universal mathematical sequence ever identified!

Laboratory

DR. GUZMAN

Your right. Then your left.

MR. ADAMSON tries on an imaginary set of pants.

MR. ADAMSON

How do you know that?

MR. ADAMSON circles the room, looking for something he can use to reach the phone.

DR. GUZMAN

Over the course of our lifetime, we will put on our pants forty thousand times. And whether it's right then left, or vice versa, do you know how many times the average person will do it in reverse? Never! From the age of six, we are absolutely faithful to that order. Try doing it backwards sometime. See how awkward it feels. How alien. But why? How does a child even learn which leg to put on first?

MR. ADAMSON

From their mom?

DR. GUZMAN

Precisely! But not how you think. For fraternal twins, the concordance rate on the pant leg order was sixty per cent. In identical twins… ninety-eight per cent.
Ergo
…

MR. ADAMSON

Are you trying to tell me if I put my pants on right leg first, that's genetic? That's crazy.

DR. GUZMAN

I've identified the PLO gene.

MR. ADAMSON

PLO?

DR. GUZMAN

Pant Leg Order. It's X-linked. You get it from your mom, who got it from her dad. I'm hoping to publish the results. If I can make it past the damn peer review.

MR. ADAMSON

I'm sure the Nobel Prize committee will be all over this.

MR. ADAMSON finds a book on the floor.

DR. GUZMAN

How dare you. I've spent a significant portion of my professional career unearthing this gene.

MR. ADAMSON

I don't get it. This is your big idea? One day you say to yourself, before I die, I must figure out the whole pant leg mystery? Then, on to the Colonel's secret recipe!

DR. GUZMAN

I realize it may seem trivial. But what you fail to understand, Mr. Adamson, is that genetics is like real estate. Location location location. It's not the house. It's the neighbourhood. Because you just never know who's going to move in next door.

Making sure DR. GUZMAN is not looking, MR. ADAMSON throws the book toward the phone on the shelf. He misses, the book falls to the floor.

To disguise the noise he sneezes.

Bless you.

MR. ADAMSON

Bless me?

DR. GUZMAN

It's just an expression.

MR. ADAMSON

People used to believe when you sneeze, you are in that brief moment between Heaven and Hell. And if you were blessed, you'd be saved from damnation.

MR. ADAMSON tries again with the book. Again he sneezes.

This time, THEO sneezes simultaneously.

DR. GUZMAN

Noroc
.

Auditorium

CYNTHIA

Bless you.

THEO

Thank you. In Romania, they say
noroc
. To your luck.

CYNTHIA

I'll have to remember that.

Laboratory

MR. ADAMSON

A sneeze means someone is talking about you. One sneeze good. Two bad.

DR. GUZMAN notices the book on the floor. She grabs it, puts it on a shelf.

DR. GUZMAN

You know what three means? You're catching a cold.

Auditorium

CYNTHIA writes on the board…

CYNTHIA

Fibonacci is a recursive sequence, where each number is the sum of the previous two. You start with the numbers zero and one. And you add them together, which gives you the next number, which is one. Then you add the last two numbers together, one and one, and that gives you two. Then again, you add the last two numbers together, one and two, and that gives you three. And so on.

THEO

Okay. So what does that mean?

CYNTHIA

So what's fascinating is that you have been picking your numbers along the Fibonacci sequence.

THEO

I don't understand.

CYNTHIA

Don't you see? The Fibonacci sequence is seen in everything. In science. In nature. In how honeybees multiply. When you cut open a pineapple or a pine cone, they are arranged in a Fibonacci pattern.

CYNTHIA draws a spiral on the board.

And if you draw arcs from Fibonacci numbers, you end up with a spiral, like in seashells, galaxies, and even in our very own molecules. It's in the architecture of the Acropolis. It's there behind Jesus in Dalí's
Sacrament of the Last S
upper
.

THEO

What are you saying, that this Fibonacci has something to do with Jesus?

CYNTHIA

Who the hell knows? But it's everywhere. And Fibonacci gave us
the golden ratio
, which we see in the dimensions of a credit card or a belt buckle or a widescreen TV. The Fibonacci sequence is integral to the structure of the universe and everything in it. It's in our very own DNA.

THEO

But I don't get it. Why am I choosing my coin flips based on these Fibonacci numbers?

CYNTHIA

I was hoping
you
would tell me.

THEO

Is that why you're here?

CYNTHIA

I'm here because there's a genetic disease in my family.

Laboratory

DR. GUZMAN

Of course… I didn't set out on a mission to find the PLO gene. I was going to discover the gene for RP. Retinitis pigmentosa. Cure blindness. Cure myself. That was going to be my life's work.

DR. GUZMAN tries using her white cane to pry open the briefcase.

MR. ADAMSON

That would have been quite a story.

DR. GUZMAN

Damn right. Instant immortality.