The Margin Was Too Small For This Time Paradox

The ultimate mathematical plot twist! Pierre de Fermat famously wrote in the margin of his copy of Arithmetica that he had a "truly marvelous proof" for his Last Theorem (no three positive integers a, b, and c can satisfy aⁿ + bⁿ = cⁿ for any integer n > 2), but the margin was too small to contain it. Then he DIED without ever writing it down! The proof remained elusive for 358 years until Andrew Wiles finally cracked it in 1994.

So imagine poor Fermat's shock if a time traveler popped up while he was just casually scribbling his "I totally have a proof but no room to write it" note, only to inform him that this throwaway comment would torment mathematicians for centuries! His face says it all - from smug confidence to absolute panic in 0.5 seconds. That margin note was the 17th century equivalent of "I know something you don't know" followed by ghosting humanity for three and a half centuries!