Hilbert's
Hilbert's, also known as Hilbert's Hotel, the Grand Multiverse Hotel or the Interdimensional Hotel, was a hotel located in the Void.
Nature
Appearance
Hilbert had a “stunning” stone courtyard, decorated with orange potted topiaries and marble statues depicting rainbow-colored fish. Although the width of the façade was finite, it was infinitely large both in depth and in height, such that “perception tricks” had to be used to allow guests to navigate the lobby, dining room and lifts. The Hotel was always full; whenever a new batch of guests arrived, every floor's worth of guests would be told to move to the floor directly above theirs. As there was no top floor, this ensured that there were always new rooms available even though the hotel was always fool — as per a famous mathematical thought experiment. For this reason, guests were not issued with keys; instead, Door Demons ascertained whether guests would be allowed to enter a given room. (PROSE: The Grand Multiverse Hotel)
Accommodations
The Hotel also had ways to accommodate guests from very different environments. Gravity in the common areas was relative, each individual perceiving the optimal gravity for their own physiology; the rooms, meanwhile, actually transformed to suit the needs, and even the aesthetic preferences, of their incumbent occupants. Like the Interdimensional Tavern and Interdimensional Casino, the Hotel recruited most of its staff from “exiles and refugees” who had ended up adrift in the Void. Hence, they were often resentful and unenthusiastic about their job; the service was consequently slow. Wendy VII theorised that the Hotel's managers must like it that way, as slow service was a mark of class, by opposition to “fast food”. (PROSE: The Grand Multiverse Hotel)
Clientèle
Hilbert's catered to a high-class, wealthy clientèle. Many came to the Hotel to talk business over dinner, staying the night for pleasure. The Queen of the Black Market, for example, once rented a room at the Hotel nominally to discuss a business matter with small-time crook Sylvester Shoebill, but in actuality because she wanted a holiday. (PROSE: The Grand Multiverse Hotel) Lord Thymon himself once visited the Hotel, noting with pleasure that he could sleep there without his eldritch dreams reducing the building to a smoking ruin in the morning. (PROSE: Rifts Crisis Officially Over!)
Behind the scenes
Hilbert's was inspired by, and named after, Hilbert's Paradox of the Grand Hotel, a mathematical thought experiment about the nature of infinity. In the name of the paradox, “Hilbert's” is not the name of the hotel but instead references David Hilbert, the mathematician who came up the paradox itself. The alternative moniker of “the Grand Multiverse Hotel” alludes to the film The Grand Budapest Hotel.
