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Sleep Tight Stories - Bedtime Stories for Kids
The Chronicles of Blue: The Anonymoose Problem 👽
00:14:24
A bedtime story about a boy from Mars who is a genius
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Foreign. And welcome to Sleep Tight Stories. Blue is awake before his alarm and thinking about math minds already. He loves getting on the site and answering questions and seeing what his followers have to say. When he gets downstairs, he sees Red is up already and he shows her something unusual. The Chronicles of Blue the Anonymous Problem. Blue did not technically need an alarm clock. He just needed one for days. Like today when he'd been up until 2am on masterminds, absolutely destroying a problem that had stumped the site's Top contributors for six days. Six days. He solved it in 40 minutes. He posted anonymously. Of course. Security was paramount. The last thing he needed was some earthling figuring out that the username belonged to a sixth grader who'd been quietly correcting his teacher's equations before she even finished writing them. The regulars had nicknamed him the Inanna Moose. Blue figured they thought the Moose thing was funny, and by now his posts were kind of a big deal on the site. Someone had actually typed the Anonymous has entered the chat last night, right before Blue posted the solution and basically shut the whole conversation down. He let himself feel good about that for exactly three seconds before the alarm went off. Sunday, which meant no school, no schedule, and most importantly, he could make breakfast before Red got up. He got dressed, used the bathroom, and made absolutely sure to splash a generous amount of water all over the mirror. Some habits were worth keeping. He thought he could hear Red snoring from down the hall. Good. She'd probably been up late reading some textbook their mother got her. Or maybe working on one of those mysteries she and her friends were always going on about. Blue had overheard part of one of those mysteries once he'd figured out the answer in about eight minutes. He'd never told her that. He pushed open the kitchen door. Red was already there, mixing something in a bowl. Blue stopped. What are you doing up? Red didn't even look up at him. Good morning to you too, stinky head. I woke up early. Why? I fell asleep reading a textbook. It wasn't especially challenging or interesting. Blue filed that away. He would find Red a difficult and interesting textbook for next week. So what are you making? He went to the fridge and got the milk. Something else Red wouldn't have. Honey cakes like Mother makes. Blue looked at the bowl. Then it read just like her. Haha. Maybe a little different. Their mother's honey cakes were great. Her other cooking experiments were a whole separate situation. While Red stirred, Blue grabbed his tablet off the counter to check math minds one last time, just to see if anyone had responded to the anonymous solution they usually did. Usually something like Incredible work or how does he do this? And Blue was not above reading those. Before breakfast, he had 17 new replies. He scrolled through them quickly. The usual stuff. Then near the bottom, a new post. Not a reply. A challenge. A brand new problem posted directly to the board with a subject line for the anonymous if you're as good as they say. The username was Red Planet Rising. Blue went still. He read the problem. It was pretty good, actually. Harder than the last one. Whoever had posted it knew what they were doing, but that wasn't what he was looking at. Embedded in the problem, in the way the equations were structured, in the specific notation the person had used, were three symbols Blue recognized. He was almost certain he'd seen them somewhere before, in some document or something. Something to do with that mystery thing. He looked up at Red, who was humming to herself and pouring batter. Red Planet Rising. He turned the name over in his head. It wasn't exactly subtle. Then again, it was probably nothing. That was a pretty common kind of username. Space stuff, planet stuff. People use names like that all the time on Earth. But the symbols were weird. Red, he said. Mmm. Look at this. She glanced over. I'm making breakfast. This will take five seconds. She leaned over and looked at the tablet. She read the username. She looked at the problem. She looked at the notation. Then she went back to her batter. Okay, okay. I mean, it's interesting. It's a username literally called Red Planet Rising. And there are symbols in that problem that I'm pretty sure I've seen in your stuff. Red finally put down the spoon. She took the tablet, actually read through the problem properly, and was quiet for a moment. Which symbols? Those three. The nested bracket notation. I've seen that before. Red looked at it for another few seconds. Blue, that's just a notation system. Math people use it. You've seen it, though. I've seen something like it. She handed the tablet back. It's probably just a coincidence. Red Planet Rising is a coincidence. It's a super common username. Like extremely common. Half the Astronomy forums have someone called that. She picked up the spoon again. And math people use unusual notation all the time to make problems look harder than they are. It's like a style thing. Blue looked at the tablet, then at Red. So you're not even a little worried? Not even a little. She poured the first cake into the pan. And you should solve it. Obviously I'm going to solve it. Is it hard? Blue looked at the problem again. It was Genuinely pretty good medium, he said, which on Blue's scale meant it would take him maybe 10 minutes. He sat down at the kitchen table and started working. Red made the honey cakes. Blue worked through the problem for a while. The only sounds were the pan sizzling and Blue's pen scratching across a notepad he'd grabbed from the counter. The cakes came out fine. Better than fine, actually. Not quite their mother's, but close enough that Blue had three without really noticing the problem. Took him eight minutes. He posted the solution, typed Nice try in the subject line, and put the tablet down. He sat there for a second. Red started collecting the plates. You're being nice this morning, blue said. Cleaning up and everything. Can't a sister be nice to her brother? No, blue said. Not for no reason. What do you want? Red laughed and didn't answer, which meant he was right, but she wasn't going to admit it. Blue picked up the tablet again and looked at the Math Minds board. Three minutes after he'd posted Red, Planet Rising had already replied. It said good. Faster than I expected. Here's another one. Blue stared at that for a second. Then he looked up. Red, no, she said from the sink. You didn't even hear what I was going to say. You're going to say, the person replied. And now you think it's definitely suspicious. They replied. In three minutes. They were just sitting there waiting. Or they had notifications on. Who has notifications on for a math forum at Blue checked the time. 8:47 on a Sunday morning. Someone who really likes math. Red turned around and leaned against the counter. Blue, It's a math person. They found someone good and they're excited about it. That's it. That's the whole thing. Blue looked at the new problem. It was harder than the last one. Noticeably harder. And the notation was there again. The same nested bracket style three times now. The notation, he said. Red walked over, looked at the screen, and was quiet for a moment. Okay, she said slowly. I'll be honest. That does look like something. Blue looked at her. But she said, I've also seen that notation in two different Earth math books in the last month. It's an older style. Some people still use it. Which textbooks? One of them is literally upstairs in my room. I can go get it. You don't have to get it. I'll get it. She was already gone. She came back 90 seconds later with a textbook and flipped to a chapter near the back. There it was. The exact same nested bracket notation used three times in a single proof with a footnote explaining it was a formatting convention from the 1970s that occasionally still showed up in competition Math. Blue read the footnote twice. So Red said, okay. Blue said, fine. It's a math person who likes old notation, has a space theme username, and is very excited about the Anonymous. It's still a weird username. It's a very normal username. You know what's a weird username? The Anonymous. Blue pointed at her. The Anonymous is a great username. It sounds like a nature documentary. It sounds cool and anonymous. Which is the point. Red smiled, which Blue found extremely annoying. She went back to the sink. Blue looked at the new problem on the screen. It was genuinely hard. Like actually hard. He might need 15 minutes for this one. He picked up his pen. He solved it in 12 minutes, posted it, and closed the app. Probably just a math person. Almost certainly just a math person. The username was common. The notation was in a textbook. There was no actual reason to think it was anything else. He sat there for another few seconds. Then he opened the app again, just to see if they had replied. They had. It said. Impressive. One more. This one's for real. Blue read the new problem, put the tablet face down on the table, picked it up again, read it once more. He was not going to tell Red about this one. And that is the end of our story. Good night, sleep tight.