Claire was the only woman onboard the ship. It so happened that she also had the very unique job of monitoring the radar. It was a thankless job, where she sat all day in front of the holograph and watched for any suspicious objects approaching the ship. It had been 3 days, and nothing had shown up on screen. However, she preferred this job to the alternative, staring into the blackness of the galaxy’s deepest ocean, which was the job of the pilot.
It had been the defining moment of her career, after years of being the radar operator on spacecrafts, she felt relieved and excited when she was chosen to man the radar on the first extra-terrestrial submarine, the Corinthian. There had been much talk about it, after the planet Laguna had been discovered. The planet was pure ocean, an atmosphere and mass similar to that of Earth, but no land, just pure ocean. Estimates and calculations had been done, and scientists have believed for long that the planet-wide ocean was at least 100km deep, and at the bottom of it all, a thick layer of ice probably another 50km deep. This was already much deeper than the deepest part of the Mariana’s Trench on Earth, a mere 10km deep. Many teams have been considering voyages to the planet, some wanted to try touching the bottom. So far, only Claire’s team, Neptunian, had touched the bottom of the ocean.
However, Claire was bored. Ever since they descended into the ocean 3 days ago from their floating base Erodes, the Corinthian had done nothing but sinking. It was an uneventful 2km/h downward sink, and even after reaching the ice layer 2 hours ago, they had encountered nothing. There were sayings and beliefs of gigantic monsters inhabiting the monstrous ocean, but nothing at all. It was a very wet, dull planet.
Claire closed her eyes and recalled the events before the Corinthian had begun its descent. She and the rest of the crew had been living on the Erodes for nearly half a year while the Corinthian was being constructed and tested. Erodes consisted of one large building on a buoyant structure, which itself was huge. It had to be huge, for the waves on Laguna were terrific. They raced at nearly 100km/h and some were nearly 400ft high. The structure had to counter this by being 20km long and wide and the building had to be placed nearly 1000ft above sea level. The structure had 4 legs partially submerged in the water, like an oil rig, and each leg was about 1km long and wide at its base. There were powerful black-hole motors in the legs which helped the Erodes stay put. Sometimes, it even moved the base out of the way of 2 huge colliding waves. The building consisted of an endless array of corridors, labs, offices and living quarters. There was no need of going outdoors, unless to take the shuttle into the orbiting space station. No one wanted to go outdoors anyway, it always rained. There was just so much water on the planet that it kept evaporating and pouring back down again. It was impossible to see the star the planet was orbiting, for it was always covered by dark clouds. Erodes wasn’t the only floating base, there were 3 others for teams that had actually managed to get the financial backing and resources to do research work on this planet, but they were all spaced at least 100km apart. If one team needed help, it had to rely on members of the space station. It was impossible to travel through the insane ocean on its surface.
Claire was the radio operator, so she was largely excluded from the mission planning and technical discussions involving the operations of the ship. However, she had at least the basic knowledge of what the Corinthian would be like. A very simple design, one pointed cylinder, 500m long, 100m wide, built with Acrinix, the strongest alloy ever made by mankind. The hull had to be strong, it was dealing with pressures of 1 MPa. A person ejected at that depth would be crushed to smithereens, if he wasn’t killed by the force required to eject him first. The interior was complete with radio operating rooms, labs and living quarters, not to forget the onboard kitchen, which mainly produced dried processesed foods similar to those used in space travel. The engine room housed the black-hole engine, which provided the power necessary to propel the ship through incredibly dense waters. There was also an electrolysis chamber, which took in the water from the ocean and converted it to hydrogen and oxygen. This initiated addition had saved much preparation time since there wasn’t any need to fill the ship with oxygen before the dive. Other compartments included a weapons chamber and control room.
Claire had remembered the day the Corinthian began its mission. She was seated in the centre of the control room, behind the pilot and co-pilot, observing the 3D holograph for any signs of obstructions within a 10km spherical radius. As the green light was given and the ship began sinking, Claire had turned her head to watch the last of the light disappear. She was one of the four fortunate people to see the last of the light while in the ship, the other being the weapons manager. The other 6 members said goodbye to the light the instant they stepped into the hatch. From then on it was darkness all the way, save for the mini-headlights that shone for a metre in front of the cockpit.
Earlier that day, Claire had cheered with the rest as the ship encountered the ice floor. After it had anchored itself in the ice with its mechanical claws, a few members of the team had deployed their personal robots out of the ship to survey the seabed. This of course wasn’t the actual seabed, it was due to the high pressure that the rest of the water 50km down had turned into ice. The real seabed most probably consisted of rocks, just like the Earth’s oceans. Some of the robots had found interesting things, like queer fish-like creatures swimming around aimlessly. In the depths of the ocean, they had no visual organs, much like those deep-sea fish on Earth, and their body had somehow adapted to the almost unbearable pressure. Scientific studies down here were unusually comfortable, since the team members could lie on their beds while playing with their robots via dataports.
Claire was now drifting off to sleep while the holograph remained as silent as ever. Then, out of the blue, a crew member let out a shrill cry of joy.
“I’ve found something! Something big!”
That was enough to make everyone else abandon their posts and come rushing to his quarters. Claire did a final check on the holograph before doing so. Nothing, nothing at all. What did he mean by ‘something big’?
By now, everyone had crowded over his dataport, which showed the vision of his robot in 3D holo-space. Through the strong head light, it appeared to be looking at some form of wrecked vehicle. To be more precise, it was a severly damaged submersible. The hull had been shattered open, and it seemed completely crushed by some unknown force. So this was the ‘something big’, it wasn’t ‘big’ as Claire had imagined, but it was definitely ‘big’.
“Could it belong to one of the other teams?” asked one of the team members, Marty.
“I doubt it,” said the person in charge of that particular robot, Chris. “The other three knew how stupid it would be to send in a machine not made of Acrinix.”
Nothing else was said as Chris maneuvered his robot to get closer to the wrecked craft. It became apparent that there was no room for anyone inside the interior full of wires and machanical junk. The craft had been unmanned. It could have been one of the other team’s after all, to test the limits of certain materials under pressure.
“Most probably it belongs to the Athenians, they came to this planet only to plan on staying on the surface and doing their experiments from there. I can imagine them throwing away their money to do this kind of stuff, they should have a lot of it without a big ship to build.”
It was Laika, another team member. That was his nickname actually, after the first dog to go in space. His real name was Lawrence and was the only member of the Neptunians not to have any prior space experience before coming to Laguna.
“Hold on,” said Captian Falkes. “The Athenians are located on the opposite side of the planet, are you sure the undersea currents could carry it this far?”
Chris moved the robot even closer to find more clues as to who the craft could have belonged to. It didn’t carry any of the other team’s symbols, nor any form of writing on the hull. It was then mutually decided to take the craft aboard the ship, part by part, using the 6 robots . The robots were not designed for complicated mechanical handling, it was a job best done by human hands.
After 5 hours, the robots had recovered most of the machinary and a fraction of the hull of the submersible. After doing post-mission checks on their own robots, the team members proceeded to investigate the wreckage. Claire had set the radar to auto-alert mode, so she would receive notification should any thing appear nearby. She too wanted to join the team as they searched for clues to the submersible’s origins.
The crew had carried the parts their robots brought back to the lab and were now taking good looks at it. The first discovery was already enough to shock everyone. Apparently, the metal used to make the submersible was a metal even stronger than Acrinix. No lab on Earth could have ever produced the pressure and temperature required to make it. Chris shook his head as he looked at the scraps through his microscope monacle. Meanwhile, Marty and the rest were analysing the machines that had been onboard the submersible. Not only were they made of the same type of metal used to make the hull, but their design was so complicated and full of unknown parts that no normal engineer could have possibly created the circuits involved.
“I don’t understand any of this!” exclaimed Marty in frustration. “Have the other teams done some secret projects of their own and built this?”
“What puzzles me is that despite the toughness of the metal, it still got crushed under the pressure of the ocean. Furthermore, no sign of propulsion could be found,” said Chris.
None of the team members knew what to make of it. It was clearly a mysterious discovery, but that was it, nothing else could be said.
“It must be of extra-terrestrial origin.”
Everyone immediately stopped what they were doing and stared at the wisecrack who said that. It was Laika, the only man who had never been on other planets other than Earth and Laguna.
“Impossible!” said Captain Falkes, a little disgusted. “Our computers have done intensive calculations on the development of this planet, and the chances of it having intelligent life are virtually a million to one. The conditions are just ridiculous.”
“No sir, I meant this is a craft from another planet, not Laguna.”
Everyone kept silent at that moment. Despite FTL travel being in the craze these days, only about half of the galaxy had been thoroughly explored. It wouldn’t be a surprise if another intelligent race had found Laguna first and had already deployed personel to study it. If that was the case, where were they? Why had every team from Earth not reported seeing any signs of these alien beings? Did they grow tired of Laguna and leave?
There was a loud beeping sound from Claire’s auto-alert device, which broke the silence and made everyone jump. Now the attention was on her, as they all followed her as she raced to the control room. The sight that greeted them was an even bigger shock than Laika’s relevation. On the holograph, there was a virtual image of a ship twice as large as the Corinthian. It too was cylindrical in shape, and in every aspect, looked like a bigger version of the ship. It maintained a vigilante on the edge of the radar, in other words, 10km away from the Corinthian.
An alarm sounded in Captain Falkes’ head. He instantly gave the command to shut off all lights and machines. The panicked crew members raced wildly through the ship, throwing switches and smashing buttons. Soon, the entire ship was pitch black and quiet. Even the radar had to be turned off lest the other ship became attracted to the EM waves being emitted. Everyone was now huddled in the control room, waiting for the 2 minutes to pass after which the radar would be turned on briefly, to see if the other ship was still there. None of them had felt so much fear in their lives.
“Why are we panicking?” whispered Marty on instinct. “The ship looked much like ours, it could have been another team’s.”
“If that’s the case, why didn’t the space station pass us any of this data? With a ship that big, it can’t be kept a secret from the organisation,” said Laika in a jitter.
It was true. Big operations that each team were planning had to be made known to the space station, it was a law made to keep track of all the money flow. The space station would then inform the other teams what that team was doing, mainly to promote competition but also to allow for possible agglomeration. The gigantic ship that was a mere 10km away from them now hadn’t been reported. Either someone had broken the law or it was piloted by intelligent beings looking for the submersible they had lost. If so, it was best not to be found.
“What if they had installed a tracking device in the submersible?” Chris said in fear. “They would know where to find us…”
Nobody dared to give an answer. They all began to miss the surface of the ocean, Erodes, Earth and their families. Being captured by aliens at the bottom of a 100km deep ocean hadn’t been on their minds.
“I should turn on the radar now…” said Claire, and she pushed the button to switch on the holograph. To everyone’s horror, the alien ship was now right next to the Corinthian! There was no scream, just shudders of horror as Claire quickly turned off the radar again.
“Are they going to kill us?” another member of the crew chipped in his own nonsensical question.
Once again, no one dared breath a word. If they were to die, it would happen in the next few seconds. The alternative in their minds would be to get captured by the aliens and be subjected to cruel experiments.
3 minutes had passed, and Claire had already missed the interval by a minute. No one complained her, for they were all afraid as to what would happen next. In the end, she turned on the radar anyway, to reveal the truth which everyone was afraid to witness. It was hence a relief to find that the ship had vanished off the radar. It had probably been passing them, and probably didn’t notice them, which was unlikely. To play safe, Claire turned off the radar again and waited another minute. True enough, the ship was no longer there. The rest of the crew started to feel more relaxed.
The danger was far from over however. Falkes ordered a minimal startup of the ship, with only the engine and radar running. The weapons system was also activated, in case the first interstellar war should find its origins here. Slowly but surely, the Corinthian began making a slow climb to the surface. An hour passed, then two, then three, the alien ship never appeared again. Falkes then decided it was more or less safe and ordered the ship to resume full operations, but he kept Claire and the weapons managed on standby.
A day had passed since then, and the Corinthian was now nearly halfway to the surface. Claire hadn’t slept, and neither had the weapons manager nor Falkes. Marty had the good mind to make all three of them a cup of coffee each.
“You guys have it tough,” he said as he passed Claire her cup.
“Thanks,” she said, trying to give a smile despite her weariness.
“Say, why do you think they didn’t take any action?” he asked suddenly.
Claire was a little surprised by the question, but nevertheless tried her best to answer.
“Maybe they weren’t interested in us?”
It was a rather lame answer, but not a bad one considering the situation.
“They must have set up some sort of underwater base somewhere,” said Falkes, hoping to strike a conversation to keep himself awake. “Might not be too far away from where we landed. They should have been looking for their lost submersible, that was their main objective. They were not interested in us, that’s why they decided to ignore us.”
“But it does puzzle me,” said the weapons manager. “They knew where they lost their submersible, then they arrive and find us instead, they should have known we had it in our posession.”
“No, we didn’t have the entire submersible,” said Falkes. “We left quite a number of parts on the ice. They might have found the parts and probably assumed that was all that was left of it.”
“Yes, then there’s the mystery on how the submersible got damaged in the first place,” chimed Marty. “Something must have attacked it, but what?”
A brief silence followed. All the theories had been put forward, but unfortunately, no one was brave enough to go back down there to prove them right. It had been a harrowing experience, and once this encounter was made known, no one would be in a rush to send more ships to the bottom.
“Ah, enough of this. Claire, have you sent the report back to Erodes?”
“Yes sir.”
The rest of the journey back to the surface went on without any incident. The alien ship never returned. Everyone was happy they had made it back in one piece, and they had started a much heated discussion on the frightening encounter. The space station had already received the report, and had dispatched personel to interview Falkes and other members of the crew. However, that was all they could do. The station couldn’t produce EM waves powerful enough to penetrate the 100km of water, not to forget the atmosphere. There was no way anyone would know what was happening down there without actually going down there. The ice and all that had been theories which had been proven correct, but some theories would remain theories. After the descent of the Corinthians, other teams had sent down their own ships to investigate the bottom, even the money throwing Athenians. The ships of 2 teams returned with nothing to report, but the ship of the Alkeies never returned. The crew aboard the team’s floating base Nomadais had reported that before all communications were lost, the captain had let out a blood-curling scream. The ship had been missing for 3 months. As such, research on Laguna still carried on, but was confined to the depth limit of 20km. No one will ever know what was really down there, for now.
Down there
Commander Loita gave off the vibes of salutation as 2 corporals drifted pass him onboard his undersea ship, Elfis. He was tired, and his frequencies have been getting cranky. He floated to his own living quarters and lay on his bed, and groaned as his transparent body hit the dark mattress. It wasn’t even a body, it was pure energy, the energy which would be required to make up the mass of an average human being. It was a lot. Despite this, he couldn’t tap the reserves from his body, but was confined to the energy derived from the metabolism of heat. There was no light down here, not in the ship either, for they didn’t need light. They could feel where everything was.
The war with the Heisians, another race of matter manipulators, had started almost a year ago. They and the Rintians, which was Loita’s race, were the only 2 matter manipulating race of energy beings living on the planet with the endless ocean. The fighting on the seabed wasn’t much, for now, just a few minor skirmishes here and there, but things got complicated when that mysterious ship arrived half a year back. It had been the same shape as the Elfis, just half the size. It had been encountered near the site where a Helsian unmanned reconnaissance vehicle had been destroyed, and Loita was assigned to retrieve it. When the ship arrived, most of the vehicle had been removed, and Loita had assumed the Heisians were lurking around somewhere. When he encountered the ship on the radar, his intuition had told him not to fire. Cautiously, he had ordered for an approach, and had determined the ship wasn’t of Heisian origin. It was another intelligent race. Contact couldn’t be established because all communications and electronics were turned off for some reason, but Loita managed to get a microspy to latch itself on the windows of that ship to take a look.
The image that returned was shocking. From the ship, it was clearly a race of matter manipulators, but the beings inside the ship were also made of matter! It looked as if they were afraid, and Loita realised they were afraid of his ship. He then concluded that this race were aliens from another planet coming to study his, and they must have obtained the wreckage of the Heisian vehicle for research purposes. Not wanting to harm those creatures who had nothing to do with the war, Loita ordered the Elfis to turn back, but he kept the microspy on the windows, for evidence and to keep track.
Loita smiled to himself as he lay on the bed, thinking what that race must have thought of the planet. It wasn’t a place where intelligent matter beings could live, yet he doubted they knew anything about energy beings. They must have thought Loita and the others were residents of another planet that had also come to study the ocean planet. They must have thought there were matter structures nearby for Rintians to stay. But the Rintians didn’t need matter residences,other than the bases where they kept the ships, they stayed on the ice itself. The ships merely served as armour from the Heisian’s energy weapons. Before seeing the creatures, he too didn’t know that matter beings could actually exist. The many images in the microspy had been transmitted to the council of Rintia, who were really fascinated by the find. Following the first ship, 3 more had arrived afterwards and Loita and other commanders were sent to keep an eye on those ships, while keeping themselves hidden. It was thus tragic when a Heisian ship was encountered while an alien ship was under observation. The alien ship was destroyed, and all the matter beings on board were killed.
By now, Loita had got up to his ethereal feet and was staring outside the windows of his living quarters. Through the dark abyss of the ocean, he wondered what wonders were up there, above the surface of the black waters, above the mythical entity of legend which a Rintian had yet to see, the sky.
Sunday, June 8, 2008
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
The Eighth Intelligence
Low Lai Kim, principle scientist of the neurology department, hastened his steps as he glanced at his watch. He was almost 5 minutes late, and while that was perfectly alright within social etiquette, he hated being even a second late. His rigorous training in National Service had taught him the pain of being late, or rather, it induced the unneccessary fear in his civillian life. He knew Dr Ong would already be waiting for him, along with the patient he had mentioned in his email. Why a psychologist would be believe his patient should see a neurologist was unclear to him, why would a mentally defective person need to have his brain examined? Was it that complicated? In the first place, wasn't mental patients the job of a psychiatrist?
Low knocked on the door of the guest room and opened it as calmly as he could, thinking of a suitable excuse to explain his tardiness. Two people were already waiting for him, one was Dr Ong, another was a kindly young man, of around 20 years of age. He had neatly combed hair, dark eyes and a rather high forehead. His attire was neat and presentable, a youth groomed for professional conduct. There seemed to be nothing wrong with this person, he looked more intelligent than most youths of the age. Low began to wonder if this was some kind of joke, since Ong had known him since primary school. Then again, there were adults now, Ong wouldn't take up his time if it wasn't completely necessary.
"Terrence! I apologise for my tardiness, got caught up with this student."
Low was aware that Ong didn't mind, but then again, Ong was a psychologist. Ever since he obtained his degree, Low had always been conscious around him, wondering whether he was secretly analysing his behaviours. Would being tardy qualify as a disorder too?
"You know I'm quite fine with that," said Ong, smiling. "Well, no time for old time reminisciences, I would like to introduce Justin Toh."
The young man stood up from his seat and proceeded to shake Low's hand. There was a firm touch to it, which was a sign of professionalism. Was this really a mental patient?
"It's a pleasure to meet you, Sir," said Toh. "Dr Ong has told me much about you."
His tone was soothing and pleasing to the ear. There was no hint of embroidered speech, everything was sincere and down from the heart. This boy was a kind person. Low nearly blurted out 'There doesn't seem to be anything wrong with you', but refrained from that for he feared it may induce some sort of trigger. He heard of some mental patients like that, kindly on the outside, ravaging murderers on the inside.
"Justin," began Dr Ong. "Would you please tell Dr Low about your problem."
The three of them took a seat on the comfortable couch. It wasn't the inclining one like Ong had in his clinic, but Toh didn't seem to need it. He put his hands together and hunched over slightly, ready to break into his tale.
"Ever since young," he said. "I have this strange ability. You know how a person analyses logical questions such as mental sums, or figures out how to win an argument, they go through a series of directions and plans in their head before acting it out in the real world? Well, the thing is, I don't have to."
At this point, Toh paused. Low was wondering whether he was stopping to let him absorb all that had been said or because he was getting to the depressing part. Then again, not much had been said.
"I can just figure it out, practically instantly, I need not do any thinking. Somehow, I just know how the problem is done, sometimes, I don't even need to learn how to do something. For instance, when I was in primary school, we often had mental sums tests. The teacher would say an operation and we would work out the answer in our heads. Some students are slower, they need to count in their heads. My sitting partner said when the operation '20*4' was said, he would add 4 20's together to get 80. He would do it very systematically, 20, 40, 60, 80. For me, the number 80 was appear in my head almost instantly, I don't know how I do it!"
"Why, this is clearly a case of you being a maths genius," said Low. "I don't see how that's a problem."
"That wasn't all, Sir. We were kids back then, and yes, I admit that I'm not the only one who can do this. There are other bright kids who could work out the answer almost instantly too. But I can do things that they cannot do. We had art class sometimes, and when we weren't drawing, the teacher would bring out a random piece of art for all of us to appreciate. She would then ask questions on what the painter was thinking when he drew it, or rather his mood. If you don't mind me asking sir, how would you go about it?"
Low recalled analysing art like this when he too was in primary school. He was often pretty terrible at it, but the teacher would bring the class through various colour tones, forms and spatial perception to deduce the artist's mood. He gave Toh his answer.
"Yes Sir, that's exactly how the teacher taught us to analyse. Then I said, 'but teacher, isn't it obvious, why do we have to go through so much trouble?' and I was promptly made to stand outside."
Low was by now getting rather interested. It seems that Toh was an art genius as well. He had heard many stories of incredible people performing seemingly superhuman capabilities at calculations and deductions. Now he was seeing one right in front of him.
"Justin," said Ong. "Is the very first person I've seen with an enhanced intuition."
Low was taken aback for a while. Indeed, that was the word that was lingering in his mind, but was hesitant to say it. Intuition! Of course, but could it be studied, could it be quantified, was there an equation for it? His scientist mind ran through all the logic of it all, then sheepishly, he laughed to himself over the fact that Toh would be able to tell in an instant.
"Intuition, you say. That's a rather psychologist field isn't it? Why bring him to me?"
"Patience," said Ong, and he seemed very patient. "Let Justin finish."
"Well," continued Justin. "It was a very good thing at first. I got excellent grades in school without even having to study, I could win arguments easily because I just knew how it was progressing. Then it got scary, as things became harder, you would expect that even a genius would need a fundamental amount of learning, of attending classes. Well, I didn't. I once had the misfortune of being sick for an entire week before a test, and many new things were taught during that week. I was given the option of taking the test at a later date, but I decided to give it a shot. After all, my grades were tip-top, I can afford to take risks once in a while. Then when I took the test, most of the material were taught in the week I was absent, and I somehow knew them all, without even learning them!"
"Could it be subliminal?" asked Low, intrigued. "Did any of your classmates pay you a visit to pass you notes or anything?"
"They wanted to," said Toh. "But it was a flu and I told them out of -" He had wanted to say 'my good heart', but decided to refrain from sounding arrogant. "I told them it was best for them to stay away from me, for I didn't want them to be sick on the week of the test as well. Besides, it was a decision I made on my own, I shouldn't implicate anyone else."
"Ok, so here comes the bad part. Because of my abilities, I was chosen involuntarily as a tutor for many of the weaker students. I protested, because there was no way I could tutor others if I didn't know how I worked out my problems. At first the teachers didn't believe me, but after going through several tutees and causing them to fail, they became pretty convinced that I didn't know the basics of problem solving. But to them, the whole notion of 'I know because I just know', was ridiculous. They began to suspect me of cheating. My mother came to my defence, and after much pleading, they agreed to let me take an IQ test. I scored a full 200."
At this point, Low let out a short gasp. To him, an IQ of 200 was godly. It almost seemed as if a god was sitting in front of him. Toh ignored it, and continued speaking.
"But I didn't know how I was so smart! To me, the answers just appeared in my head, I didn't even think! The logical steps were all missing! After that day, everyone in school shunned away from me, thinking I was some freak or something. And word of it grew, and everywhere I went, people looked at me as some sort of freak. I don't know what to do anymore, I don't want my abilities anymore."
Low nodded his head in sympathy. It was indeed a cruel thing to be ostracised by the rest of humanity, and for what? An ability which you didn't ask for, an ability which you never showed off.
"So that's why you went to see Dr Ong?" asked Low.
"Yes, I wanted to know if there was a way to fix this."
Low had wanted to say 'interesting', indeed, it was. Intuition was a well-recognised phenomenon in the scientific circle, every good scientist uses it to consider almost impossible logic. However, no one knew how it worked, or why it worked. The laymen were taught not to rely on it because anything that couldn't be explained, wasn't reliable to them. However, here was one person who only had intuition to rely upon, and it had brought him misery. If he had indeed said 'interesting', Toh may just come on him like some deranged lunatic, the type he had been expecting to see.
"I'm quite intrigued," said Low. "Why you decided to see a psychologist instead of a counsellor or psychiatrist. A psychologist doesn't do this kind of work."
Low nearly slapped himself when he asked this question. Of course! How would Toh know what made him think that? He just knew. The startled expression on Toh's face already gave him the answer he needed.
"He made the right choice actually," said Ong. "I would have thought that a counsellor or psychiatrist could solve this problem better, but if you think about it logically, this is a problem psychologists are adept at."
"Why is that so?"
"Do you know who Howard Gardner is?"
"The psychologist who came up with the 7 intelligences?"
Low had recalled reading about it a few days earlier, in a random book he found in the library. Gardner was the man who theorised that intelligence came in 7 forms, namely, linguistic intelligence, logical-mathematical intelligence, spatial intelligence, interpersonal intelligence, intrapersonal intelligence, musical intelligence and bodily/kinesthetic intelligence. It was practically the thing that people used to prove that IQ tests were a big phoney, for most of them mainly dealt with only 2 intelligences, linguistic and logical-mathematical.
"Yes, well, what I theorise here is that intuition could be the eighth form of intelligence, the form that supercedes all the other 7."
Ong's tone was so serious, so matter-of-factly, that Low wasn't sure how to react.
"Of course I don't intend to make it public, it's just a personal theory. You know how people would react if I declare something so elusive an intelligence."
"But, you've got Toh here! You can use him as proof!"
At this point, Low realised he had made a very big blunder common among scientists. He was treating a human being as nothing more than a test subject. While Ong winced at this remark, Toh seemed indifferent.
"Dr Ong," he said with a smile, still looking Low in the eye. "I think we should leave. This clearly isn't Dr Low's field of expertise."
Low was terrified now, he had always been careful in front of others to avoid offending them. Now he had made the most basic of mistakes, and the 'victim' was mocking him. He had to find a way to remedy his problem.
"Hold on! I'm sorry Justin," he said. "It wasn't professional of me. Please, what can I do to help?"
"Justin doesn't want his enhanced intuition," said Ong. "I was hoping you could find a way to help correct that."
Toh nodded.
"Yes sir, this is something only a neurologist can do. You can shortwire some nerves or something can't you?"
At that moment, there was an eerie air of silence in the room. This time, everyone knew it, not just Toh. What Toh had just said was the biggest careless mistake for a person of an IQ of 200. A neurologist studies the brain, and while many believe they knew what produced the intelligences, to shortwire the neurons in the brain would be to turn the person into a vegetable. There was also something else, if Toh knew this all along, why did he agree to go with Ong in the first place?
"I don't understand," said Toh, rather sheepishly. "This has never happened in my life! How...how did this happen!?"
The tone wasn't one of fright or disgust, it was one of elation. Toh was happy that he had been wrong, for the first time in his life.
"You see, Justin?" it was Ong that said it. "Do you know why your intuition was wrong?"
Toh shook his head.
"You were overcome with emotion and thus, you blocked out your intuition. Your intuition wasn't wrong, you were right to come to me. However, you were wrong when you agreed with me that a neurologist should be able to do it. At that point in time, you had wanted not to believe your intuition anymore, you wanted to get rid of it, so subconsciously, you shut out your own intelligence."
There wasn't only one shocked person in the room this time, Low was horrified by what Ong had said.
"So that means..."
Ong motioned for him to wait, and continued speaking to Toh.
"Justin, I brought you here today to show you how dependant you are on your intuition, just like other people are dependent on certain intelligences they have. If you remove it, you won't be able to experience the joy everyone else has in life. You would be lost, devoid of all logic and well, I dare say you would be quite a buffoon. You have a powerful gift, Justin, one many people would kill to get. I want you to treasure it."
Justin sighed.
"As I said, Dr Ong, this intuition has given me nothing but trouble."
"The trouble came from your own unwillingness to explore. Everyone can find a way to help others. You are weak in logical intelligence because, well, you never used it. In this case, why don't you let yourself be the tutee, read books on how people would solve problems and ask yourself, how do they do it? The answer would come readily, you already know that, but at the same time, you would get an insight into how others not as extraordinary as yourself, do their best to help others. You can also ask yourself, 'how can I understand the normal workings of humanity?' Then you would find that you are able to fit in."
Toh thought over what Ong had said, it was the first time he really thought.
"You're right, doctor," he said. "Without my intuition, I can't do anything! And of course, why didn't I think of it before! I can use my intuition to help me figure out how to get into the normal workings of society! I can use it to figure out how to make friends! I don't have to fear my intuition anymore, how can I fear something that is really a part of me...wait, that means..."
"I'm sorry to say it, Justin," said Ong rather solemnly. "But all the sufferings you had gone through, you can only blame yourself."
Toh looked on the ground, hanging his head quietly, then looked back at Ong and smiled.
"Thank you Doctor, you've made me seen the light, I guess I wasn't wrong in coming to find you after all."
"That's great, now if you don't mind, I would like to speak to Dr Low here for a moment. Would you mind waiting in the car?"
With that, an elated Justin Toh skipped happily out of the guest room, quite forgetting the proper etiquette. It was alright though, for he was a psychiatric patient who had just been cured.
"Well, you had to take up my time to cure this guy, huh?" Low asked Ong, not with distaste, but rather a little humour. "In the first place, you're a psychologist, how come you go about treating patients like a psychiatrist?"
"Well, I was intrigued," said Ong, in good humour. "The eighth form of intelligence, doesn't that puzzle you? When Justin emailed me, I too was puzzled as to why he didn't choose a psychiatrist, or a counsellor for that matter, but I could tell, somehow, he knew I was the right person to choose. A psychiatrist dealt with madmen and depression, someone he should go to, but by coming to me, he has invoked my interest in this field of research. In a way, you could say his intuition chose the path which benefits the most people."
"Yes, a few questions there though. Didn't you say you weren't going to publish the theory? It's still a little difficult to stomach why he didn't choose a counsellor though."
"Well, I lied at that time, because I didn't want it to interfere with matters at hand. And well, you almost blew it."
Low cringed at this remark.
"You also know that a counsellor wouldn't have any knowledge of the 7 intelligences, and wouldn't be interested in a follow up. I intend to keep in contact with Justin, learn more about his phenomenal intuition, then hopefully publish a paper about it. It would benefit many people who believe they are dumb and inept."
Low saw that Ong was ready to leave.
"Well, I'm sorry for taking up your time, Lai Kim, I understand it hadn't benefitted you at all, but I had to do something for Justin's sake. I hope to make it up to you someday, how about lunch tomorrow? My treat."
"Why that would be excellent, Terrence," said Low gleefully. "Just a few more questions though, how do you know people are going to accept your new paper, and also, how did you learn those skills of counselling? I mean it doesn't strike me that you were a good counsellor, or even knew anything about counselling, no offence."
Ong laughed.
"Well, I guess there's a Justin in all of us," he said. "The answers to those 2 questions are 'I just know'."
Low knocked on the door of the guest room and opened it as calmly as he could, thinking of a suitable excuse to explain his tardiness. Two people were already waiting for him, one was Dr Ong, another was a kindly young man, of around 20 years of age. He had neatly combed hair, dark eyes and a rather high forehead. His attire was neat and presentable, a youth groomed for professional conduct. There seemed to be nothing wrong with this person, he looked more intelligent than most youths of the age. Low began to wonder if this was some kind of joke, since Ong had known him since primary school. Then again, there were adults now, Ong wouldn't take up his time if it wasn't completely necessary.
"Terrence! I apologise for my tardiness, got caught up with this student."
Low was aware that Ong didn't mind, but then again, Ong was a psychologist. Ever since he obtained his degree, Low had always been conscious around him, wondering whether he was secretly analysing his behaviours. Would being tardy qualify as a disorder too?
"You know I'm quite fine with that," said Ong, smiling. "Well, no time for old time reminisciences, I would like to introduce Justin Toh."
The young man stood up from his seat and proceeded to shake Low's hand. There was a firm touch to it, which was a sign of professionalism. Was this really a mental patient?
"It's a pleasure to meet you, Sir," said Toh. "Dr Ong has told me much about you."
His tone was soothing and pleasing to the ear. There was no hint of embroidered speech, everything was sincere and down from the heart. This boy was a kind person. Low nearly blurted out 'There doesn't seem to be anything wrong with you', but refrained from that for he feared it may induce some sort of trigger. He heard of some mental patients like that, kindly on the outside, ravaging murderers on the inside.
"Justin," began Dr Ong. "Would you please tell Dr Low about your problem."
The three of them took a seat on the comfortable couch. It wasn't the inclining one like Ong had in his clinic, but Toh didn't seem to need it. He put his hands together and hunched over slightly, ready to break into his tale.
"Ever since young," he said. "I have this strange ability. You know how a person analyses logical questions such as mental sums, or figures out how to win an argument, they go through a series of directions and plans in their head before acting it out in the real world? Well, the thing is, I don't have to."
At this point, Toh paused. Low was wondering whether he was stopping to let him absorb all that had been said or because he was getting to the depressing part. Then again, not much had been said.
"I can just figure it out, practically instantly, I need not do any thinking. Somehow, I just know how the problem is done, sometimes, I don't even need to learn how to do something. For instance, when I was in primary school, we often had mental sums tests. The teacher would say an operation and we would work out the answer in our heads. Some students are slower, they need to count in their heads. My sitting partner said when the operation '20*4' was said, he would add 4 20's together to get 80. He would do it very systematically, 20, 40, 60, 80. For me, the number 80 was appear in my head almost instantly, I don't know how I do it!"
"Why, this is clearly a case of you being a maths genius," said Low. "I don't see how that's a problem."
"That wasn't all, Sir. We were kids back then, and yes, I admit that I'm not the only one who can do this. There are other bright kids who could work out the answer almost instantly too. But I can do things that they cannot do. We had art class sometimes, and when we weren't drawing, the teacher would bring out a random piece of art for all of us to appreciate. She would then ask questions on what the painter was thinking when he drew it, or rather his mood. If you don't mind me asking sir, how would you go about it?"
Low recalled analysing art like this when he too was in primary school. He was often pretty terrible at it, but the teacher would bring the class through various colour tones, forms and spatial perception to deduce the artist's mood. He gave Toh his answer.
"Yes Sir, that's exactly how the teacher taught us to analyse. Then I said, 'but teacher, isn't it obvious, why do we have to go through so much trouble?' and I was promptly made to stand outside."
Low was by now getting rather interested. It seems that Toh was an art genius as well. He had heard many stories of incredible people performing seemingly superhuman capabilities at calculations and deductions. Now he was seeing one right in front of him.
"Justin," said Ong. "Is the very first person I've seen with an enhanced intuition."
Low was taken aback for a while. Indeed, that was the word that was lingering in his mind, but was hesitant to say it. Intuition! Of course, but could it be studied, could it be quantified, was there an equation for it? His scientist mind ran through all the logic of it all, then sheepishly, he laughed to himself over the fact that Toh would be able to tell in an instant.
"Intuition, you say. That's a rather psychologist field isn't it? Why bring him to me?"
"Patience," said Ong, and he seemed very patient. "Let Justin finish."
"Well," continued Justin. "It was a very good thing at first. I got excellent grades in school without even having to study, I could win arguments easily because I just knew how it was progressing. Then it got scary, as things became harder, you would expect that even a genius would need a fundamental amount of learning, of attending classes. Well, I didn't. I once had the misfortune of being sick for an entire week before a test, and many new things were taught during that week. I was given the option of taking the test at a later date, but I decided to give it a shot. After all, my grades were tip-top, I can afford to take risks once in a while. Then when I took the test, most of the material were taught in the week I was absent, and I somehow knew them all, without even learning them!"
"Could it be subliminal?" asked Low, intrigued. "Did any of your classmates pay you a visit to pass you notes or anything?"
"They wanted to," said Toh. "But it was a flu and I told them out of -" He had wanted to say 'my good heart', but decided to refrain from sounding arrogant. "I told them it was best for them to stay away from me, for I didn't want them to be sick on the week of the test as well. Besides, it was a decision I made on my own, I shouldn't implicate anyone else."
"Ok, so here comes the bad part. Because of my abilities, I was chosen involuntarily as a tutor for many of the weaker students. I protested, because there was no way I could tutor others if I didn't know how I worked out my problems. At first the teachers didn't believe me, but after going through several tutees and causing them to fail, they became pretty convinced that I didn't know the basics of problem solving. But to them, the whole notion of 'I know because I just know', was ridiculous. They began to suspect me of cheating. My mother came to my defence, and after much pleading, they agreed to let me take an IQ test. I scored a full 200."
At this point, Low let out a short gasp. To him, an IQ of 200 was godly. It almost seemed as if a god was sitting in front of him. Toh ignored it, and continued speaking.
"But I didn't know how I was so smart! To me, the answers just appeared in my head, I didn't even think! The logical steps were all missing! After that day, everyone in school shunned away from me, thinking I was some freak or something. And word of it grew, and everywhere I went, people looked at me as some sort of freak. I don't know what to do anymore, I don't want my abilities anymore."
Low nodded his head in sympathy. It was indeed a cruel thing to be ostracised by the rest of humanity, and for what? An ability which you didn't ask for, an ability which you never showed off.
"So that's why you went to see Dr Ong?" asked Low.
"Yes, I wanted to know if there was a way to fix this."
Low had wanted to say 'interesting', indeed, it was. Intuition was a well-recognised phenomenon in the scientific circle, every good scientist uses it to consider almost impossible logic. However, no one knew how it worked, or why it worked. The laymen were taught not to rely on it because anything that couldn't be explained, wasn't reliable to them. However, here was one person who only had intuition to rely upon, and it had brought him misery. If he had indeed said 'interesting', Toh may just come on him like some deranged lunatic, the type he had been expecting to see.
"I'm quite intrigued," said Low. "Why you decided to see a psychologist instead of a counsellor or psychiatrist. A psychologist doesn't do this kind of work."
Low nearly slapped himself when he asked this question. Of course! How would Toh know what made him think that? He just knew. The startled expression on Toh's face already gave him the answer he needed.
"He made the right choice actually," said Ong. "I would have thought that a counsellor or psychiatrist could solve this problem better, but if you think about it logically, this is a problem psychologists are adept at."
"Why is that so?"
"Do you know who Howard Gardner is?"
"The psychologist who came up with the 7 intelligences?"
Low had recalled reading about it a few days earlier, in a random book he found in the library. Gardner was the man who theorised that intelligence came in 7 forms, namely, linguistic intelligence, logical-mathematical intelligence, spatial intelligence, interpersonal intelligence, intrapersonal intelligence, musical intelligence and bodily/kinesthetic intelligence. It was practically the thing that people used to prove that IQ tests were a big phoney, for most of them mainly dealt with only 2 intelligences, linguistic and logical-mathematical.
"Yes, well, what I theorise here is that intuition could be the eighth form of intelligence, the form that supercedes all the other 7."
Ong's tone was so serious, so matter-of-factly, that Low wasn't sure how to react.
"Of course I don't intend to make it public, it's just a personal theory. You know how people would react if I declare something so elusive an intelligence."
"But, you've got Toh here! You can use him as proof!"
At this point, Low realised he had made a very big blunder common among scientists. He was treating a human being as nothing more than a test subject. While Ong winced at this remark, Toh seemed indifferent.
"Dr Ong," he said with a smile, still looking Low in the eye. "I think we should leave. This clearly isn't Dr Low's field of expertise."
Low was terrified now, he had always been careful in front of others to avoid offending them. Now he had made the most basic of mistakes, and the 'victim' was mocking him. He had to find a way to remedy his problem.
"Hold on! I'm sorry Justin," he said. "It wasn't professional of me. Please, what can I do to help?"
"Justin doesn't want his enhanced intuition," said Ong. "I was hoping you could find a way to help correct that."
Toh nodded.
"Yes sir, this is something only a neurologist can do. You can shortwire some nerves or something can't you?"
At that moment, there was an eerie air of silence in the room. This time, everyone knew it, not just Toh. What Toh had just said was the biggest careless mistake for a person of an IQ of 200. A neurologist studies the brain, and while many believe they knew what produced the intelligences, to shortwire the neurons in the brain would be to turn the person into a vegetable. There was also something else, if Toh knew this all along, why did he agree to go with Ong in the first place?
"I don't understand," said Toh, rather sheepishly. "This has never happened in my life! How...how did this happen!?"
The tone wasn't one of fright or disgust, it was one of elation. Toh was happy that he had been wrong, for the first time in his life.
"You see, Justin?" it was Ong that said it. "Do you know why your intuition was wrong?"
Toh shook his head.
"You were overcome with emotion and thus, you blocked out your intuition. Your intuition wasn't wrong, you were right to come to me. However, you were wrong when you agreed with me that a neurologist should be able to do it. At that point in time, you had wanted not to believe your intuition anymore, you wanted to get rid of it, so subconsciously, you shut out your own intelligence."
There wasn't only one shocked person in the room this time, Low was horrified by what Ong had said.
"So that means..."
Ong motioned for him to wait, and continued speaking to Toh.
"Justin, I brought you here today to show you how dependant you are on your intuition, just like other people are dependent on certain intelligences they have. If you remove it, you won't be able to experience the joy everyone else has in life. You would be lost, devoid of all logic and well, I dare say you would be quite a buffoon. You have a powerful gift, Justin, one many people would kill to get. I want you to treasure it."
Justin sighed.
"As I said, Dr Ong, this intuition has given me nothing but trouble."
"The trouble came from your own unwillingness to explore. Everyone can find a way to help others. You are weak in logical intelligence because, well, you never used it. In this case, why don't you let yourself be the tutee, read books on how people would solve problems and ask yourself, how do they do it? The answer would come readily, you already know that, but at the same time, you would get an insight into how others not as extraordinary as yourself, do their best to help others. You can also ask yourself, 'how can I understand the normal workings of humanity?' Then you would find that you are able to fit in."
Toh thought over what Ong had said, it was the first time he really thought.
"You're right, doctor," he said. "Without my intuition, I can't do anything! And of course, why didn't I think of it before! I can use my intuition to help me figure out how to get into the normal workings of society! I can use it to figure out how to make friends! I don't have to fear my intuition anymore, how can I fear something that is really a part of me...wait, that means..."
"I'm sorry to say it, Justin," said Ong rather solemnly. "But all the sufferings you had gone through, you can only blame yourself."
Toh looked on the ground, hanging his head quietly, then looked back at Ong and smiled.
"Thank you Doctor, you've made me seen the light, I guess I wasn't wrong in coming to find you after all."
"That's great, now if you don't mind, I would like to speak to Dr Low here for a moment. Would you mind waiting in the car?"
With that, an elated Justin Toh skipped happily out of the guest room, quite forgetting the proper etiquette. It was alright though, for he was a psychiatric patient who had just been cured.
"Well, you had to take up my time to cure this guy, huh?" Low asked Ong, not with distaste, but rather a little humour. "In the first place, you're a psychologist, how come you go about treating patients like a psychiatrist?"
"Well, I was intrigued," said Ong, in good humour. "The eighth form of intelligence, doesn't that puzzle you? When Justin emailed me, I too was puzzled as to why he didn't choose a psychiatrist, or a counsellor for that matter, but I could tell, somehow, he knew I was the right person to choose. A psychiatrist dealt with madmen and depression, someone he should go to, but by coming to me, he has invoked my interest in this field of research. In a way, you could say his intuition chose the path which benefits the most people."
"Yes, a few questions there though. Didn't you say you weren't going to publish the theory? It's still a little difficult to stomach why he didn't choose a counsellor though."
"Well, I lied at that time, because I didn't want it to interfere with matters at hand. And well, you almost blew it."
Low cringed at this remark.
"You also know that a counsellor wouldn't have any knowledge of the 7 intelligences, and wouldn't be interested in a follow up. I intend to keep in contact with Justin, learn more about his phenomenal intuition, then hopefully publish a paper about it. It would benefit many people who believe they are dumb and inept."
Low saw that Ong was ready to leave.
"Well, I'm sorry for taking up your time, Lai Kim, I understand it hadn't benefitted you at all, but I had to do something for Justin's sake. I hope to make it up to you someday, how about lunch tomorrow? My treat."
"Why that would be excellent, Terrence," said Low gleefully. "Just a few more questions though, how do you know people are going to accept your new paper, and also, how did you learn those skills of counselling? I mean it doesn't strike me that you were a good counsellor, or even knew anything about counselling, no offence."
Ong laughed.
"Well, I guess there's a Justin in all of us," he said. "The answers to those 2 questions are 'I just know'."
Monday, June 2, 2008
Scifi Shorts by others, review!
Hey hey, yep, I decided to put reviews of other scifi stories here instead. I think the atmosphere is better here for that.
ya, I've been reading some works by Asimov over the past few days, his lengthy 'short' stories from 'The complete collection volume 2'. I haven't finished the whole book yet, think I've at least 5 stories to go, but the famous ones were all put in front. Since this is a review, I'll still comment on the stories even if I think they were not so fantastic.
The Ugly Little Boy
In the not too far future, a company known as Stasis Inc has invented a method to obtain individuals from the distant past and bring them to our present time, on the condition that they stay within an area known as Stasis, where normal time doesn't flow. This lady, Fellowes, was brought in to take care of a Neantherdal child that had been brought to the present.
It is a very sentimental story, where the child learns to speak and how Fellowes becomes more accustomed to the boy's ugliness. Then, like in any other sentimental stories, the two were about to be separated, since the boy had to be sent back to his time. By now, Fellowes had felt like his mother, so I guess you can expect what happened next.
Personally, I find such themes overused, about how a person interacts with a strange object or person with first revulsion, then affection. The idea of bringing objects to the present time isn't new to me either, I've seen it somewhere before and I kind of find that idea boring. So, sorry, this story would only get a 3/5 from me.
Nightfall
Wow, throughout this story my heart was like, wooh! racing all the way. Imagine your world was surrounded by 6 suns, well, not orbiting all of them of course, just one, but the other 5 were well in the vicinity. because of that, there was no such thing as night, as total darkness over the landscape. no one believed in night, nor the so called 'stars'. Everyone was terrified of the dark, spend too much time in it and they'll lose their minds.
then there's a cult on the planet, predicting the coming of total darkness, where all men lose their minds and the cities go up in flames. no one believes them, but scientists discovered that they were right after all. an eclipse would occur when only one sun shone in the sky, then the long night begins.
the story follows a young reporter, Theoreon, on this distant planet as he interviews the scientists who believe the coming of darkness was right, on the very night of the eclipse. He stays with them and watches the entire eclipse as it happens. As it happens, the scientists talk of many theories, about how many stars there were, and how they all believed there were to be no more than 6 stars, about how they might survive the long night. and it also tells of the crazy cultists who try to obtain salvation at the last minute. the story continues until the eclipse was complete, and 35 000 stars shone down on the dark land, making everyone lose their minds, and burning their cities for light.
the concept of this story is very different, and a worthwhile read, for it is a situation which would never be imagined on Earth, for we only have one sun, and we know what night is. It is a very interesting portration of the end of days on another planet that has never seen night. a definite 5/5.
Hostess
What is it with aliens that make humanity seem so pathetic? Probably it's because they never die involuntarily, because they never stop growing, and you could expect them to be at least a few centuries old when one visits you.
their equivalent of cancer would known as the inhibition death, where you stop growing, then you die within a year. quite the opposite of cancer actually. after interaction with earth, the numbers of such diseases increase, particularly on the planet closest to earth. a biologist on earth pays hostess to a doctor from this planet, and much to her dismay, he has aroused the interest of her policeman husband. after much pretense and flowerly words, the man kills the alien in an attempt to prevent him from bringing back the truth of the inhibition death to his world.
it is a very interesting concept we have here. the reason why we live limited lives on earth is due to a parasitic intelligence that resides along with us. this parasitic intelligence sucks on our life force, and thus we die after a while. however, other planets don't have such an intelligence, and so are effectively immortal lest they choose not to be. however, we can't get rid of our parasitic intelligence now because we will all get cancer. written by asimov in his position as a biologist, this story is given 4/5 stars for concept and scientific accuracy, and thus possibility that such an intelligence may actually exist.
well, thts all the stories i want to review. the others weren't tht significant to me. i may be reviewing more stories from the book soon. anw, soul machina part twelve will be the next post, thts a definite promise. haha, i think my writing has developed quite a bit after reading asimov's stories.
ya, I've been reading some works by Asimov over the past few days, his lengthy 'short' stories from 'The complete collection volume 2'. I haven't finished the whole book yet, think I've at least 5 stories to go, but the famous ones were all put in front. Since this is a review, I'll still comment on the stories even if I think they were not so fantastic.
The Ugly Little Boy
In the not too far future, a company known as Stasis Inc has invented a method to obtain individuals from the distant past and bring them to our present time, on the condition that they stay within an area known as Stasis, where normal time doesn't flow. This lady, Fellowes, was brought in to take care of a Neantherdal child that had been brought to the present.
It is a very sentimental story, where the child learns to speak and how Fellowes becomes more accustomed to the boy's ugliness. Then, like in any other sentimental stories, the two were about to be separated, since the boy had to be sent back to his time. By now, Fellowes had felt like his mother, so I guess you can expect what happened next.
Personally, I find such themes overused, about how a person interacts with a strange object or person with first revulsion, then affection. The idea of bringing objects to the present time isn't new to me either, I've seen it somewhere before and I kind of find that idea boring. So, sorry, this story would only get a 3/5 from me.
Nightfall
Wow, throughout this story my heart was like, wooh! racing all the way. Imagine your world was surrounded by 6 suns, well, not orbiting all of them of course, just one, but the other 5 were well in the vicinity. because of that, there was no such thing as night, as total darkness over the landscape. no one believed in night, nor the so called 'stars'. Everyone was terrified of the dark, spend too much time in it and they'll lose their minds.
then there's a cult on the planet, predicting the coming of total darkness, where all men lose their minds and the cities go up in flames. no one believes them, but scientists discovered that they were right after all. an eclipse would occur when only one sun shone in the sky, then the long night begins.
the story follows a young reporter, Theoreon, on this distant planet as he interviews the scientists who believe the coming of darkness was right, on the very night of the eclipse. He stays with them and watches the entire eclipse as it happens. As it happens, the scientists talk of many theories, about how many stars there were, and how they all believed there were to be no more than 6 stars, about how they might survive the long night. and it also tells of the crazy cultists who try to obtain salvation at the last minute. the story continues until the eclipse was complete, and 35 000 stars shone down on the dark land, making everyone lose their minds, and burning their cities for light.
the concept of this story is very different, and a worthwhile read, for it is a situation which would never be imagined on Earth, for we only have one sun, and we know what night is. It is a very interesting portration of the end of days on another planet that has never seen night. a definite 5/5.
Hostess
What is it with aliens that make humanity seem so pathetic? Probably it's because they never die involuntarily, because they never stop growing, and you could expect them to be at least a few centuries old when one visits you.
their equivalent of cancer would known as the inhibition death, where you stop growing, then you die within a year. quite the opposite of cancer actually. after interaction with earth, the numbers of such diseases increase, particularly on the planet closest to earth. a biologist on earth pays hostess to a doctor from this planet, and much to her dismay, he has aroused the interest of her policeman husband. after much pretense and flowerly words, the man kills the alien in an attempt to prevent him from bringing back the truth of the inhibition death to his world.
it is a very interesting concept we have here. the reason why we live limited lives on earth is due to a parasitic intelligence that resides along with us. this parasitic intelligence sucks on our life force, and thus we die after a while. however, other planets don't have such an intelligence, and so are effectively immortal lest they choose not to be. however, we can't get rid of our parasitic intelligence now because we will all get cancer. written by asimov in his position as a biologist, this story is given 4/5 stars for concept and scientific accuracy, and thus possibility that such an intelligence may actually exist.
well, thts all the stories i want to review. the others weren't tht significant to me. i may be reviewing more stories from the book soon. anw, soul machina part twelve will be the next post, thts a definite promise. haha, i think my writing has developed quite a bit after reading asimov's stories.
Sunday, June 1, 2008
The Specimen
Ladono switched on the lights over the operating table and motioned for the surgeons to stop work. The cries from the struggling creature lying on the hard metallic board had died out but not before giving everyone working on it a headache.
"5 minutes," he said to the other surgeons who promptly threw their tools into the tray and left the room to take a breather. Ladono couldn't understand it, why was the creature in so much pain? All he did was cut up the surface of the skin, it wasn't as if he drew a knife right into the body.
Ladono followed the other surgeons as they watched the new planet from outside the window of the spacecraft. It was the homeplanet of this creature, a rather melancholic one. All shades of dark gothic colours could be seen, mixed with bright colours of blue and green. He imagined years ago, the planet had been a beautiful one. The liquid of the planet would have been the small blue bits that were remaining, and the vegetation of the planet would be the green areas. There had been areas where neither the liquid nor the vegetation were present, areas of brown. Now those areas were huge, greater than the liquid and vegetation areas. Ladono understood that the brown areas could only sustain the sturdiest of life, and the creature, now lying dead on the operating table, wasn't the sturdiest of life.
The planet had been a home for an intelligent species, a species which somehow couldn't get along with each other and killed each other for their own survival, a very disturbing and angry species. Ladono's ship had arrived at the most perfect timing. A major war had just been waged on the planet's surface, turning the lush blue planet into a sad one. The remnants of the intelligent species were now struggling to survive, and Ladono had managed to capture one of them, roaming around endlessly in the ruins of civillisation.
Through studies by other scientists, the species of the planet consisted of 2 genders, one was the life-bearing gender, the other responsible for the fertilisation of them. This was in contrast to the beings of Planet Cories, where Ladono was from. There was only one gender, and everybody was capable of reproducing asexually. In fact, Ladono had just given birth to his first offspring. The creature they captured was believed to be of the 'female' gender, the life-bearing one. Ladono recognised this by the presence of ovaries and the absense of an external sexual organ. Another thing he learnt of these species, is that they were somehow unreceptive to the idea of appearing in the nude. They wore layers of fabric over their naked bodies, and everyone seemed to do it. It was a running joke among the scientists that the different genders found each other's sexual organ offensive, for they wore an extra layer over those regions. It was hard for the Corians to accept, for to them, nudity was pride in one's body.
It was almost time, Ladona decided to go back to the operating table and analyse the specimen a little before they began further internal work. He saw that the creature had not too fair, not too dark skin, but apparently different types showed different skin colour. However, it was believed that the colour of their blood were all red. In contrast, Corians all had the same skin colour, green, but had different colour bloods. Those from the northern hemisphere of the planet had blue blood, while Ladono, from the south, had orange blood. There were other blood colours too, all across the visible spectrum. The skin colour of the species weren't as constrasting, ranging from very dark, to very fair. The hair of the female was black, long and silky, and hair apparently appeared in other regions too. The range of hair colours were also diverse among the species, from what he knew. Ladono only had a few strands of green hair protruding his ovoid head, and this was about it for the Corians. On the face of the specimen, there were 2 seeing organs, 2 hearing organs, a smelling organ and another organ which all the cries had been coming out from.
"Ladono," said one of the surgeons as he returned. "What do you intend to do now?"
"I was wondering why the creature was screaming so badly when we dissected it, we had taken all the necessary precautions to prevent it from feeling pain."
"I'm afraid we do not have the necessary chemicals," said the surgeon, whose name was Elkis. "The nerves of this organism is very close to its skin."
"Oh, I see," replied Ladono, at the same time wondering why he seemed to be the only one not aware of this fact.
"What do you think about it?" asked Elkis.
"A very simple structure," replied Ladono, toying with his 4 tentacle-like arms. "A head, two limbs on the upper body and 2 at the lower body, their evolution took place for little over a million years, so it's no wonder they look so pathetic. Look at us now, five billion years of evolution, maybe we looked like that once."
"Unlikely," said Elkis. "Our home planet wasn't as beautiful as this one was before. There was a need for our features even in our early stages of evolution. Four legs connected to an elongated body for mobility and speed, tentacles for flexible handling of objects, large eyes to counteract the dim light of our sun. These creatures have it easy, pity they had to ruin their own homeland."
By now, the other surgeons had entered the operating theatre, gathered over the corpse of the female alien.
"Sir," it was Ladono's student, Norto. "I don't mean to be rude, but I think the specimen is dead."
There was laughter among the other surgeons, Ladona too let out a chuckle.
"Yes, we can see that," he replied, trying to stuff down his laughter. "How would that affect our operations?"
Norto wasn't offended, he knew he didn't get his point across like he was supposed to.
"Would there be trouble studying the specimen if it's dead?"
This time, no one laughed. Norto had a point. There hadn't been much preparation for the operation since everyone was really excited about having captured a species from the planet for the first time, and an intelligent one to boot. The first thing that ran in any Corian scientist's mind after capturing a new specimen would be to cut it open. On Cories, no one died of dissection, it was done when the specimen was wide awake. Some medical students even dissected themselves in front of the class to present their findings. All it took was some minor medication to seal back the wound. Apparently, the alien species were very vulnerable.
"What do you propose we do?" one of the surgeons asked Norto.
Norto confessed that he had no idea, because there wasn't equipment or chemicals they knew of that could nullify pain in the specimen. Ladono and the others let out a sigh, the only way they could find out anything new would be to go capture another specimen and try to keep it alive while they were studying it. As such, the remainder of the session wasn't much. In the silence, they extracted internal organs and did a map of the body. They weren't sure exactly what did what, just that the ovaries bore the fruit of the next generation.
"I think I'll raise the possibility of setting up a base on the planet in the next council meeting," said Ladono. "With their civillisation in shambles, we shouldn't have any trouble creating our own down there."
There was much discussion afterwards, until Ladono called off the session. The surgeons took a few cell samples and stored the organs in preservatices before throwing the hollowed-out corpse into deep space.
A few days later, the council meeting was held within the ship. It wasn't a totally grand affair, for there was only one representative from the collective consciousness that was present. He had followed the members of the ship to study the new planet. But he alone was good enough, one could say the entire government was already present. Other than Ladono, the members of the meeting included reknown individuals in their profession. The social analyst was the first to speak.
"Your honour," he addressed the representative. "I have determined that the system of governance on the planet is nothing short of primitive. There isn't one nation on the planet, but rather hundreds, each having their own government whose interest is only for their own people. Furthermore, the government isn't a collective consciousness one like ours, but consists of many individuals all intent on their own needs."
"That's horrible!" said representative Yakan. "No wonder the war broke out. With such messiness, how could they expect to thrive?"
Representative Yakan was one of the 500 members of the collective consciousness. This consciousness was the only government on Cories. Each knew what the other member was thinking, and they all operated with one mind, literary. This resulted in 1 million years of peace.
"Actually," continued the social analyst. "Their system wasn't much different from ours 1 million years ago. We were in the middle of a war among nations back then, until the great rebellion occured and stopped the war before we ended up destroying ourselves. Apparently, on this planet, the same thing happened, but no one bothered to try to stop the war. They fought and fought to the very last man, that's the name of the non-life bearing gender by the way."
"I see," said the representative sorrowfully. "So they weren't as lucky as us."
The social analyst ended his report there, for there wasn't much he could understand from the planet at a glance. Apparently, it was too complicated, the interactions of many separate minds. It was impossible for him to imagine a government that operated like that. After him was the geographer, who gave a detailed breakdown on the tectonics of the planet. After at least ten more speakers, it was finally Ladono's turn to report.
"Your honour, my team have successfully managed to capture one of the intelligent lifeforms that live on the planet. After some study, I can conclude that we're dealing with a very frail species with a very frail mind. As such, I propose the construction of a base on the planet itself to study the lifeforms closer to their natural habitat."
Ladono had already expected the commotion that followed. Representative Yakan was the only one who didn't stir as he carefully analysed the possibilites with the rest of the collective consciousness.
"Dr Ladono," he said eventually. "The rest of the government would need more convincing before we can even consider sending you down there for a long period of time. Do you have any reports to show me?"
Ladono then took out the data he had collected the day he studied the specimen and showed it to the representative. As he looked at it, he was also consulting the relevant expert in the government.
"This is not enough," he answered dryly. "I'm afraid you would have to do more research before you raise that possibility again."
"But sir, that's the problem. The lifeform is just too different from us! We do not have the relevant chemicals, or equipment to keep it alive. We need to go down there, and see exactly how they work. Mesonic scans from up here aren't good enough."
This time, the room was silent. No one knew what to say. The representative was now listening to the thoughts of his colleagues, his gigantic eyes twitching over their comments. Before he could reach a conclusion, the social analyst raised a tentacle again.
"Sir, if I may. I would like to make a personal trip down to the planet too. I want to see for myself how the survivors of the war organise themselves. It would give me a better understanding of how their government had run before."
The whole room was now focused on Ladono and the social analyst. With two people intending to go, the pressure on the collective consciousness was effectively doubled.
"Alright," said the representative. "We have a lot of money and resources anyway, so there's no harm in making a trip to the planet for educational and research purposes. 3 months, the both of you have 3 months, effective tomorrow. You may ask for anything you may need, but after 3 months, if nothing turns up, I'm afraid you would have to pay back the government everything."
The meeting was adjourned, and congratulations were given to the social analyst and Ladono. Ladono now knew the social analyst was called Sydeburn, and after a liquor chat, they were friends. However, they were both faced with a new challenge. How were they going to get the denizens of the planet to accept them? The specimen had been terrified when they brought her up, and cried and struggled as they thrussed her on the operating table. Would they be able to keep their promise to the government? Ladono looked out at the planet again, the melancholic skies now turning ashen gray as it turned away from its star.
"I'm just glad we're not like them," said Ladono with a smile. He then went to find his offspring in the playroom, to give him a good lesson on how fortunate the Corians were.
Moral: Wake up planet Earth! In the eyes of aliens, we're such losers.
"5 minutes," he said to the other surgeons who promptly threw their tools into the tray and left the room to take a breather. Ladono couldn't understand it, why was the creature in so much pain? All he did was cut up the surface of the skin, it wasn't as if he drew a knife right into the body.
Ladono followed the other surgeons as they watched the new planet from outside the window of the spacecraft. It was the homeplanet of this creature, a rather melancholic one. All shades of dark gothic colours could be seen, mixed with bright colours of blue and green. He imagined years ago, the planet had been a beautiful one. The liquid of the planet would have been the small blue bits that were remaining, and the vegetation of the planet would be the green areas. There had been areas where neither the liquid nor the vegetation were present, areas of brown. Now those areas were huge, greater than the liquid and vegetation areas. Ladono understood that the brown areas could only sustain the sturdiest of life, and the creature, now lying dead on the operating table, wasn't the sturdiest of life.
The planet had been a home for an intelligent species, a species which somehow couldn't get along with each other and killed each other for their own survival, a very disturbing and angry species. Ladono's ship had arrived at the most perfect timing. A major war had just been waged on the planet's surface, turning the lush blue planet into a sad one. The remnants of the intelligent species were now struggling to survive, and Ladono had managed to capture one of them, roaming around endlessly in the ruins of civillisation.
Through studies by other scientists, the species of the planet consisted of 2 genders, one was the life-bearing gender, the other responsible for the fertilisation of them. This was in contrast to the beings of Planet Cories, where Ladono was from. There was only one gender, and everybody was capable of reproducing asexually. In fact, Ladono had just given birth to his first offspring. The creature they captured was believed to be of the 'female' gender, the life-bearing one. Ladono recognised this by the presence of ovaries and the absense of an external sexual organ. Another thing he learnt of these species, is that they were somehow unreceptive to the idea of appearing in the nude. They wore layers of fabric over their naked bodies, and everyone seemed to do it. It was a running joke among the scientists that the different genders found each other's sexual organ offensive, for they wore an extra layer over those regions. It was hard for the Corians to accept, for to them, nudity was pride in one's body.
It was almost time, Ladona decided to go back to the operating table and analyse the specimen a little before they began further internal work. He saw that the creature had not too fair, not too dark skin, but apparently different types showed different skin colour. However, it was believed that the colour of their blood were all red. In contrast, Corians all had the same skin colour, green, but had different colour bloods. Those from the northern hemisphere of the planet had blue blood, while Ladono, from the south, had orange blood. There were other blood colours too, all across the visible spectrum. The skin colour of the species weren't as constrasting, ranging from very dark, to very fair. The hair of the female was black, long and silky, and hair apparently appeared in other regions too. The range of hair colours were also diverse among the species, from what he knew. Ladono only had a few strands of green hair protruding his ovoid head, and this was about it for the Corians. On the face of the specimen, there were 2 seeing organs, 2 hearing organs, a smelling organ and another organ which all the cries had been coming out from.
"Ladono," said one of the surgeons as he returned. "What do you intend to do now?"
"I was wondering why the creature was screaming so badly when we dissected it, we had taken all the necessary precautions to prevent it from feeling pain."
"I'm afraid we do not have the necessary chemicals," said the surgeon, whose name was Elkis. "The nerves of this organism is very close to its skin."
"Oh, I see," replied Ladono, at the same time wondering why he seemed to be the only one not aware of this fact.
"What do you think about it?" asked Elkis.
"A very simple structure," replied Ladono, toying with his 4 tentacle-like arms. "A head, two limbs on the upper body and 2 at the lower body, their evolution took place for little over a million years, so it's no wonder they look so pathetic. Look at us now, five billion years of evolution, maybe we looked like that once."
"Unlikely," said Elkis. "Our home planet wasn't as beautiful as this one was before. There was a need for our features even in our early stages of evolution. Four legs connected to an elongated body for mobility and speed, tentacles for flexible handling of objects, large eyes to counteract the dim light of our sun. These creatures have it easy, pity they had to ruin their own homeland."
By now, the other surgeons had entered the operating theatre, gathered over the corpse of the female alien.
"Sir," it was Ladono's student, Norto. "I don't mean to be rude, but I think the specimen is dead."
There was laughter among the other surgeons, Ladona too let out a chuckle.
"Yes, we can see that," he replied, trying to stuff down his laughter. "How would that affect our operations?"
Norto wasn't offended, he knew he didn't get his point across like he was supposed to.
"Would there be trouble studying the specimen if it's dead?"
This time, no one laughed. Norto had a point. There hadn't been much preparation for the operation since everyone was really excited about having captured a species from the planet for the first time, and an intelligent one to boot. The first thing that ran in any Corian scientist's mind after capturing a new specimen would be to cut it open. On Cories, no one died of dissection, it was done when the specimen was wide awake. Some medical students even dissected themselves in front of the class to present their findings. All it took was some minor medication to seal back the wound. Apparently, the alien species were very vulnerable.
"What do you propose we do?" one of the surgeons asked Norto.
Norto confessed that he had no idea, because there wasn't equipment or chemicals they knew of that could nullify pain in the specimen. Ladono and the others let out a sigh, the only way they could find out anything new would be to go capture another specimen and try to keep it alive while they were studying it. As such, the remainder of the session wasn't much. In the silence, they extracted internal organs and did a map of the body. They weren't sure exactly what did what, just that the ovaries bore the fruit of the next generation.
"I think I'll raise the possibility of setting up a base on the planet in the next council meeting," said Ladono. "With their civillisation in shambles, we shouldn't have any trouble creating our own down there."
There was much discussion afterwards, until Ladono called off the session. The surgeons took a few cell samples and stored the organs in preservatices before throwing the hollowed-out corpse into deep space.
A few days later, the council meeting was held within the ship. It wasn't a totally grand affair, for there was only one representative from the collective consciousness that was present. He had followed the members of the ship to study the new planet. But he alone was good enough, one could say the entire government was already present. Other than Ladono, the members of the meeting included reknown individuals in their profession. The social analyst was the first to speak.
"Your honour," he addressed the representative. "I have determined that the system of governance on the planet is nothing short of primitive. There isn't one nation on the planet, but rather hundreds, each having their own government whose interest is only for their own people. Furthermore, the government isn't a collective consciousness one like ours, but consists of many individuals all intent on their own needs."
"That's horrible!" said representative Yakan. "No wonder the war broke out. With such messiness, how could they expect to thrive?"
Representative Yakan was one of the 500 members of the collective consciousness. This consciousness was the only government on Cories. Each knew what the other member was thinking, and they all operated with one mind, literary. This resulted in 1 million years of peace.
"Actually," continued the social analyst. "Their system wasn't much different from ours 1 million years ago. We were in the middle of a war among nations back then, until the great rebellion occured and stopped the war before we ended up destroying ourselves. Apparently, on this planet, the same thing happened, but no one bothered to try to stop the war. They fought and fought to the very last man, that's the name of the non-life bearing gender by the way."
"I see," said the representative sorrowfully. "So they weren't as lucky as us."
The social analyst ended his report there, for there wasn't much he could understand from the planet at a glance. Apparently, it was too complicated, the interactions of many separate minds. It was impossible for him to imagine a government that operated like that. After him was the geographer, who gave a detailed breakdown on the tectonics of the planet. After at least ten more speakers, it was finally Ladono's turn to report.
"Your honour, my team have successfully managed to capture one of the intelligent lifeforms that live on the planet. After some study, I can conclude that we're dealing with a very frail species with a very frail mind. As such, I propose the construction of a base on the planet itself to study the lifeforms closer to their natural habitat."
Ladono had already expected the commotion that followed. Representative Yakan was the only one who didn't stir as he carefully analysed the possibilites with the rest of the collective consciousness.
"Dr Ladono," he said eventually. "The rest of the government would need more convincing before we can even consider sending you down there for a long period of time. Do you have any reports to show me?"
Ladono then took out the data he had collected the day he studied the specimen and showed it to the representative. As he looked at it, he was also consulting the relevant expert in the government.
"This is not enough," he answered dryly. "I'm afraid you would have to do more research before you raise that possibility again."
"But sir, that's the problem. The lifeform is just too different from us! We do not have the relevant chemicals, or equipment to keep it alive. We need to go down there, and see exactly how they work. Mesonic scans from up here aren't good enough."
This time, the room was silent. No one knew what to say. The representative was now listening to the thoughts of his colleagues, his gigantic eyes twitching over their comments. Before he could reach a conclusion, the social analyst raised a tentacle again.
"Sir, if I may. I would like to make a personal trip down to the planet too. I want to see for myself how the survivors of the war organise themselves. It would give me a better understanding of how their government had run before."
The whole room was now focused on Ladono and the social analyst. With two people intending to go, the pressure on the collective consciousness was effectively doubled.
"Alright," said the representative. "We have a lot of money and resources anyway, so there's no harm in making a trip to the planet for educational and research purposes. 3 months, the both of you have 3 months, effective tomorrow. You may ask for anything you may need, but after 3 months, if nothing turns up, I'm afraid you would have to pay back the government everything."
The meeting was adjourned, and congratulations were given to the social analyst and Ladono. Ladono now knew the social analyst was called Sydeburn, and after a liquor chat, they were friends. However, they were both faced with a new challenge. How were they going to get the denizens of the planet to accept them? The specimen had been terrified when they brought her up, and cried and struggled as they thrussed her on the operating table. Would they be able to keep their promise to the government? Ladono looked out at the planet again, the melancholic skies now turning ashen gray as it turned away from its star.
"I'm just glad we're not like them," said Ladono with a smile. He then went to find his offspring in the playroom, to give him a good lesson on how fortunate the Corians were.
Moral: Wake up planet Earth! In the eyes of aliens, we're such losers.
Friday, May 30, 2008
Dialogue from another time
I'm taking a break from soul machina. Honestly, I think the past 2 parts suck. i dont want to rewrite them, but will think of a way to make the remaining parts nicer. anyway, i'm trying a stunt once tried by asimov, regarding a story with dialogue only. hope u enjoy.
"Hello President Steven, I understand you have a job for me?"
"Indeed I do, Mr Fanour, I trust you are capable enough to do it?"
"Whatever my benefactor asks of me, I shall never fail."
"Good, because I want you to help me kill someone again."
"Kill someone? That's easy man, we the mafia have killed many already in this country, who is it that you want dead?"
"Dr Kane Lee."
"What! The eminent scientist working on psionic research? Why would you want him dead?"
"He has disregarded the orders from the government and continued with his research. We had offered him other topics of research such as neurology but he insists on doing psychic stuff."
"I mean why are you so worried about that? True Lee is an eminent scientist, but we all know that psychic research would go nowhere. You don't have to bother about him."
"The problem is he already got somewhere."
"What?! What... you mean he's actually proved psionic powers exist?"
"Yes, doing some stunts with the brain actually, honestly, I was taken aback by the method which he uses. Fluids! Man, can you believe that drinking some enhanced soft drink would give you psionic powers?"
"Man, that sounds retarded, but you told me before stupid stuff in science does happen."
"The entire country, the entire world, is ruled by the government, a commitee which comprises 90% scientists. Ever since the apocalypse, no one has dared question our authority and our competancy. Right now, Lee is out to prove us wrong."
"But that's not exactly what you're worried about, is it, sir?"
"You're right. In the first place, psionic research is wrong. Look how the previous world ended, nuclear bombs, an example of people taking science too lightly. Now Lee aparently thinks he's doing the world a favour, but he could be creating a second apocalypse, only 50 years after the first."
"Why would it be dangerous?"
"Ok, if everyone knew they had remote viewing abilities, we're talking about spying without any equipment. No pretty girl would be able to take a shower without being watched! Synchronocity, everyone tries to affect the world in some way, what a mess that would be! Then precognition, how are we going to face the people who know they're going to die soon? Come on man, and if you know psionic abilities better, you may even say people will start throwing fireballs at each other."
"That sounds adsurb, but sir, why don't you just try to talk to Lee?"
"I did, but he says it isn't the knowledge that is evil, it is humanity."
"Then you want the mafia to help discipline humanity?"
"Yes, that's why I'm paying you to kill him."
"Ok, sir, I will do it for you, because you are my friend."
"Thanks, but remember, you musn't make it known that it was the mafia who killed him, try to make it look like some accident. There have been rumours on the internet that the government actually hires the mafia to do their dirty work, that's why many mafia guys go scot-free. We all know how true that is anyway. So you must not drop evidence which those internet hippies can use."
The next day
"Good evening Mr Fanour, I trust you've done the job?"
"It was pie. I had one of my explosive experts doctor his car's positronic engine. He, his wife and his daughter are dead."
"Excellent, I don't want his family members to say this isn't an accident and go all about collecting condolences in a bid to find the truth."
"The mafia always does a good job in killing the target's relations as well."
"Mainly because I cover for you, but yes, I owe it all to you that the government's power is so strong in a large country."
"Come on, you know it was because you gave the people hope after the tragedy 50 years ago."
"Haha, there are people saying that I was the one who launched the nuclear strike so that I could rule the world."
"That definitely can't be true sir, you've been carefully restricting scientific progress such that it wouldn't harm humanity."
"Quite right Fanour, anyway, I have a follow up job for you. Tomorrow, I want you to send men, or you can go yourself if you like, to Lee's house and search for all his papers pertaining to psionic research. Don't destroy them, bring them to me."
"Will do sir, I ask for 300 000 for such a task."
"That's pretty cheap."
"It doesn't risk my men, and I give you a discount, since you're my friend and the president."
The next day
"Sir, these are the papers my men found in his house, I believe they all pertain to psionic research."
"Excellent, hmm, yes, I do believe you did a good job. Apparently he has indeed gone pretty far in his research, almost to the point where even we cannot deny. It was a good thing you killed him before he did. How's the public responding to his death?"
"Lee has made many important contributions to society before his death. Many people found it tragic, and since it was well-known that he was working on psionic research and that the government was against it, suspicions naturally arose."
"Doesn't matter, throughout human history, peoples have always been suspicious of their government, most of the time they were right."
"It doesn't bother you at all?"
"Why should it? It's not like they're wrong right? I ordered the hit on Laura Iora because she was a feminist, the hit on Reagan Gan because he was gay. These people are a nuisance to the society and had to be taken out. They should be glad those people are gone."
"Yes, but I presume this is the first time you ordered a hit on a scientist, a fellow scientist."
"Yeah, pretty true, still, it can't beat the time I ordered you to blow up a local pub where many tranverstites were said to gather. It killed a lot of innocent people too, didn't it?"
"Yes, but your high-handed methods really can keep the people in line."
"Haha, yeah, I know it works well for small countries, never knew it could work for the world as well. Anyway, I'll destroy the research Lee has done, so that no one else would ever lay their eyes on it."
"And I presume you want me to make sure no one asks questions?"
"Yes, I can pay you for that too. Once again, thanks for helping me keep this evil research at bay."
Note to reader:
Can you make out what is actually happening? Who do you think is right? Dr Lee or President Stevens? Should there be someone like the president to maintain the discipline of rather unruly and rebellious scientists? To what extent does science tamper with the ethics of the human race?
"Hello President Steven, I understand you have a job for me?"
"Indeed I do, Mr Fanour, I trust you are capable enough to do it?"
"Whatever my benefactor asks of me, I shall never fail."
"Good, because I want you to help me kill someone again."
"Kill someone? That's easy man, we the mafia have killed many already in this country, who is it that you want dead?"
"Dr Kane Lee."
"What! The eminent scientist working on psionic research? Why would you want him dead?"
"He has disregarded the orders from the government and continued with his research. We had offered him other topics of research such as neurology but he insists on doing psychic stuff."
"I mean why are you so worried about that? True Lee is an eminent scientist, but we all know that psychic research would go nowhere. You don't have to bother about him."
"The problem is he already got somewhere."
"What?! What... you mean he's actually proved psionic powers exist?"
"Yes, doing some stunts with the brain actually, honestly, I was taken aback by the method which he uses. Fluids! Man, can you believe that drinking some enhanced soft drink would give you psionic powers?"
"Man, that sounds retarded, but you told me before stupid stuff in science does happen."
"The entire country, the entire world, is ruled by the government, a commitee which comprises 90% scientists. Ever since the apocalypse, no one has dared question our authority and our competancy. Right now, Lee is out to prove us wrong."
"But that's not exactly what you're worried about, is it, sir?"
"You're right. In the first place, psionic research is wrong. Look how the previous world ended, nuclear bombs, an example of people taking science too lightly. Now Lee aparently thinks he's doing the world a favour, but he could be creating a second apocalypse, only 50 years after the first."
"Why would it be dangerous?"
"Ok, if everyone knew they had remote viewing abilities, we're talking about spying without any equipment. No pretty girl would be able to take a shower without being watched! Synchronocity, everyone tries to affect the world in some way, what a mess that would be! Then precognition, how are we going to face the people who know they're going to die soon? Come on man, and if you know psionic abilities better, you may even say people will start throwing fireballs at each other."
"That sounds adsurb, but sir, why don't you just try to talk to Lee?"
"I did, but he says it isn't the knowledge that is evil, it is humanity."
"Then you want the mafia to help discipline humanity?"
"Yes, that's why I'm paying you to kill him."
"Ok, sir, I will do it for you, because you are my friend."
"Thanks, but remember, you musn't make it known that it was the mafia who killed him, try to make it look like some accident. There have been rumours on the internet that the government actually hires the mafia to do their dirty work, that's why many mafia guys go scot-free. We all know how true that is anyway. So you must not drop evidence which those internet hippies can use."
The next day
"Good evening Mr Fanour, I trust you've done the job?"
"It was pie. I had one of my explosive experts doctor his car's positronic engine. He, his wife and his daughter are dead."
"Excellent, I don't want his family members to say this isn't an accident and go all about collecting condolences in a bid to find the truth."
"The mafia always does a good job in killing the target's relations as well."
"Mainly because I cover for you, but yes, I owe it all to you that the government's power is so strong in a large country."
"Come on, you know it was because you gave the people hope after the tragedy 50 years ago."
"Haha, there are people saying that I was the one who launched the nuclear strike so that I could rule the world."
"That definitely can't be true sir, you've been carefully restricting scientific progress such that it wouldn't harm humanity."
"Quite right Fanour, anyway, I have a follow up job for you. Tomorrow, I want you to send men, or you can go yourself if you like, to Lee's house and search for all his papers pertaining to psionic research. Don't destroy them, bring them to me."
"Will do sir, I ask for 300 000 for such a task."
"That's pretty cheap."
"It doesn't risk my men, and I give you a discount, since you're my friend and the president."
The next day
"Sir, these are the papers my men found in his house, I believe they all pertain to psionic research."
"Excellent, hmm, yes, I do believe you did a good job. Apparently he has indeed gone pretty far in his research, almost to the point where even we cannot deny. It was a good thing you killed him before he did. How's the public responding to his death?"
"Lee has made many important contributions to society before his death. Many people found it tragic, and since it was well-known that he was working on psionic research and that the government was against it, suspicions naturally arose."
"Doesn't matter, throughout human history, peoples have always been suspicious of their government, most of the time they were right."
"It doesn't bother you at all?"
"Why should it? It's not like they're wrong right? I ordered the hit on Laura Iora because she was a feminist, the hit on Reagan Gan because he was gay. These people are a nuisance to the society and had to be taken out. They should be glad those people are gone."
"Yes, but I presume this is the first time you ordered a hit on a scientist, a fellow scientist."
"Yeah, pretty true, still, it can't beat the time I ordered you to blow up a local pub where many tranverstites were said to gather. It killed a lot of innocent people too, didn't it?"
"Yes, but your high-handed methods really can keep the people in line."
"Haha, yeah, I know it works well for small countries, never knew it could work for the world as well. Anyway, I'll destroy the research Lee has done, so that no one else would ever lay their eyes on it."
"And I presume you want me to make sure no one asks questions?"
"Yes, I can pay you for that too. Once again, thanks for helping me keep this evil research at bay."
Note to reader:
Can you make out what is actually happening? Who do you think is right? Dr Lee or President Stevens? Should there be someone like the president to maintain the discipline of rather unruly and rebellious scientists? To what extent does science tamper with the ethics of the human race?
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
The man who played God (original title Project Universe)
He had been thrown into the streets, his house taken away. Everyday, he had to feed himself by begging. Why? For he had absolutely no job expertise.
It shouldn't have been like this, he was on his way to fame and fortune, why did it have to be like this? He realised the only person to blame was himself.
It all began 6 months ago. A graduate student he was, the brightest one the university could hope to produce. Handpicked by the top scientists for supervision, he was the shining star of the scientific community. He may be all that, but he also has strange desires. Deep down inside him, he wanted to rule over millions, to be a God.
One day, he walked up confidently to his supervisor, and said 'I want to create a miniature universe!'
The supervisor was shocked, could this person really be that brilliant? What kind of stunt was he trying to pull? Create a miniature universe, no one can confidently say how our own universe works, and now someone's trying to build his own. Nevertheless, the supervisor asked him to explain. With all the confidence of a TV presenter, he proceded to draw out a remodelled version of the standard model, with all the mathematical oddities and geometry included. He pointed out how quarks could act as worlds, how atoms could act as solar systems. Effectively, he was combining the small and the big, into one big beautiful theory.
The supervisor was impressed. Every ten thousand years, a genius like this is produced, and he had the privelage of supervising one. The project was given the green light, and the student was given all the equipment he needed.
The challenge? Fit the entire universe into a fishbowl. The hypothesis was that the entire universe was created at a single instant called the Big Bang, the very beginning of time and space. The student had to find the exact conditions in which the Big Bang could occur, then observe it over a period of time. Now, creating the Big Bang was the easy part, at least for the student, how was he going to observe the universe? He would have to wait 15 billion years before conditions became like ours.
Undaunted, he first proceeded to make the Big Bang. Get the right particles from the particle accelerator, torture them under the right conditions, then arrange them in a nano-lattice following SU(3) symmetry. Then, after more configurations, chemical play and whatnot, arrange them into E8 symmetry, Put everything in the fishbowl and wait for ten minutes.
It was a brilliant success, after ten minutes, a bright flash of light was emitted form the fishbowl, and a mini fireball was formed in the centre. Everything had been carefully configured, so the temperature wasn't that hot, but still hot enough to form the mini-universe's version of atoms. The nature of these particles were unknown, for they were even smaller than quarks. According to theory, everything looked like how the early universe would have been, but now, the question was how patient were they?
The student and the supervisor knew they couldn't possibly wait billions of years, they had to find a way to speed up the process. How were they going to accelerate time in the fishbowl? The student and supervisor pondered for hours, days, weeks, over this problem. But there seemed to be no possible method.
Then one day, the student has the most brilliant idea ever. Black holes slows time down to a ridiculously slow pace, why not make a reverse black hole? The supervisor nearly laughed at the mention of this. A black hole hasn't even been made, now you're talking about a reverse black hole? The student then pointed out the recent discovery of the Higgs Boson, then explained how an extremely powerful quantum burst could reverse the effect of the boson and at the same time produce a singularity in space. This would mean obtaining energy out of nothing! It defies the very laws of conservation of energy! The student then pointed out that he has already broke this law when he created the mini big bang, and also the fact that this very law was broken the instant the universe was formed.
The supervisor was amazed, speechless to say the least. The student didn't waste any time indulging in praise. He flew over to the LHC and presented this idea to the scientists there. They agreed to help him, and 2 days later, the first miniature black hole was made by putting the Higgs Boson under great pressure. The next day, the reverse miniature black hole was made. It was different from the original black hole, nothing could come in! The repulsive gravitational force was so strong, it was almost impossible to find a container that could fit it. But find it they did, and the student placed the fishbowl within the vicinity.
Everything was great, 2 weeks passed and the fishbowl universe was now at the equivalent of 15 billion years. The observations over the fortnight had proved the student's hypothesis correct, that the universe he had created was exactly identical to the one we live in. It was literary a miracle. Out of nearly an infinite number of possibilities, this student produced the correct one. He became the youngest person to receive the Nobel prize, at the age of 24. He had beaten Einstein.
Now the student really let it get to his head. He began thinking, 'I've created a universe that's exactly like ours, would it be possible that there is life in this universe that is exactly like ours?"
Another proposal went over to his prof, and by now, the prof no longer wanted to supervise him.
'You've already surpassed the greatest scientist of the 20th century, there's no more I can teach you. Please, let an old man do his humble happy work.'
The student was very pleased about this, so he began to think of a way to extract a specimen from the universe. Now this was a question that stumped even him. By far, there is absolutely no such research or even mention about such a theory, of pulling a lifeform from a universe. It would be alien abduction. Needless to say, how was he going to even see if there was really life there in the first place? Staring at the blackish fishbowl, he began to ponder.
He realised he had no choice, he turned to religion.
All religion states the existance of a soul, and some religions hint at psychic energy, derived from the soul. The student hated religion, seeing it as scriptures written by opium smokers, but now he had no choice but to trust them. He had broken the limits of science, he had to turn to religion now.
The plan was to use a STM. Run the fishbowl through the STM and search for abnormalies within the structure of the universe. The hypothesis was that such abnormalies would indicate signs of intelligent life. Only problem was, the STM worked only on 2D surfaces. No one had used it to observe a 3D fishbowl. As such, the student bought 4 STMs from the university, deconstructed and remodelled them into the formation of a cross. Then, placing the fishbowl at the centre, he turned it on.
Indeed, the constant patterns displayed in the STM monitor did show abnormalities. It was a very peculiar thing, for these abnormalities only showed itself in rare areas of the universe. From the current understanding of our universe, there were many areas in which abnormalities could arise, like black holes or pulsars, but on closer investigation, the signatures didn't look at all like black holes or quasars. It was simply irregular, a massive chaos of fluctuations. The student believed those were the signs of intelligent life. Now the challenge was to extract it.
He had no idea which one of these areas were the replica of Earth, but he believed that Earth was the only place in the universe with our form of intelligent life. That means, he'll just keep extracting samples until he sees a mini-human, or other earth creature. Once again, using a much improved version of the STM, with a ridiculously thin tip, he probed the inside of the fishbowl at the specified locations.
After the third time, he got a strange result. The STM images showed signs of desperately struggling humans! The student was estatic! He had created life! Now how was he going to communicate with them?
The great genius instantly had another idea, locking the mini humans up in a specialised cell, he reconstructed the STM into a communication device. As he did so, evil thoughts ran through his head. 'These people may believe in a God, I am their God!'
The communication device was completed, and the student placed the tip of the modified STM into the cell. In an instant, terror-stricken and desperate faces were seen on the screen.
"Where are we! What are you!" screamed one frightened lady. The student looked around, there were at least 20 people in the cell. Some were lying unconscious, others stark raving mad. The lady and four others were the only sane people inside.
"I am God!" said the student in the best majestic voice he could produce. I created your universe in a fishbowl."
The student hadn't really taken note of the fact that the people also spoke English. He was already pretty confident that they would. On hearing his words, the woman fell to her knees and prayed. The other 4, who realised what was going on, began kneeling as well. The student was even more estatic, the miniature world had really developed exactly like ours, even the same religions existed! But could it be so precise? Was everything exactly the same?
The student decided to question the people on the history of their world. Everything, from what they told him, was exactly the same as the history of our world. There were a few different names, but everything else was the same! Eventually, he asked about his existance, and it really surprised him to learn that he never existed. Now that was strange, for if everything was exactly the same, how come he didn't make the contributions he had made in this world? How come no one made his discoveries? The date the mini-people told him were only a few days apart from his, he should have been there.
Could it be possible that the God of the world cannot exist as a human in the world he created? It seemed that way, but it didn't matter now, for he was the God of the fishbowl universe. He felt power like no other.
"People!" he bellowed in the microphone. "You have angered me over the centuries with your arrogance and materialism. You have forgotten me!" He was sure that the world would develop in that way as well. And he was right. When he said that, everyone suddenly became normal and knelt, praying for forgiveness. Now this was really getting to his head.
"As punishment, I'll destroy one of you!" Then, operating the STM, he picked up a hapless man and crushed him to bits, amongst his crying and begging. At that point, he put away the microphone and let out the most evil laugh a young man could possibly have. The other people cried and begged, while he continued to laugh. Yes! He had the power of a God to these people, he was God!
"I am merciful," he said back to the microphone, though it clearly didn't show through his actions. "I'll send you back to your world, tell them what you have seen and heard, tell them to worship me! Then, every night at ten, sacrifice a young maiden to perform an erotic dance for me! I'll be keeping contact."
God sent the people back via the STM, and all was good, at least for a while. The people went to spread the message to the rest of their world, but no one believed them. God knew this would happen, so he decided to make a communication link directly to the world in the fishbowl.
"I am God!" His booming voice echoed throughout the miniature Earth. "What these people said is true. To prove my existance, I will kill the leader of every country!" Through constantly taking out people for questioning, he had learnt the names and identities of all the leaders of the world. The challenge was of course, to find them. That he could do as well. Having set up the STM monitor, he began probing the frightened faces for the faces of the leaders. Upon seeing them, he sent an electric current through the STM tip and literary vaporised their bodies. The whole process took 2 hours, and by then, the world was already convinced.
God then said that the leaders were sin themselves, for they made the people forget Him. He said to atone for their sins, the people must worship him and send a maiden to perform an erotic dance for him anytime he asked for it. Naturally, he expected some to oppose him, so he quickly found those people and vaporised them as well. Their mistake for opposing him so openly. After a week, everyone in the world was already kotowing to him.
The student, with a new identity as a God, nevertheless decided to abuse his new position. He left science altogether and instead decided to entertain and amuse himself with the hapless denizens of mini-Earth. Being a super sadistic person, he would sometimes ask people to jump off buildings or set themselves on fire.
"It's a good thing when there's religion," he said to himself. "And you are the God!"
But being a God wasn't enough. The people of the mini-universe couldn't give him revenue. So he designed and built a molecular duplicating machine, which works on the principle of the Big Bang, creating mass-energy out of nothing. Now he could enlarge or shrink objects by duplicating it's molecules and rearranging the duplicated molecules into an enlarged version of the object.
"Bring me your currency!" He demanded to the people of his world. "Gather a total value of 1 billion US dollars and place it at the top of the Eiffel tower by 8pm GMT." So they did. After using the STM to extract the money, he placed them, a fraction of the total sum at a time, into the machine. Instantly, real money, from different areas of the world, showed up. He was delighted by now. He went to the currency exchange to convert it to his country's money. Now he was stinking rich!
"Being a God is the best business of all!"
Alas, it has been 6 months. The people of mini-Earth did not like this overbearing God. While many obeyed without question, there were some who secretly planned a way to get rid of him. By studying his movements, they realised that he wasn't omnipotent, like the God they knew from their Bible, nor was he in anyway compassionate. This God was a false one, and can be destroyed.
On the next money transfer, the God had the biggest surprise of all time. One minute he was admiring the little money that came out from the STM, then all of a sudden, he was in a different place. It was a large crossroad, and there were hundreds of people standing around him.
"He's human! Just like us!" exclaimed one girl.
"He's a heretic! Satan's child!" cried another woman who looked like a deranged maniac.
The student looked around, frightened and disbelieving.
"But...but how?"
"What's the matter? Big me?"
The voice...it was so familiar, it was his voice!
Turning around, he saw an exact replica of himself, standing facing him, with his arms folded.
"No...you weren't supposed to exist!"
The other him let out a laugh.
"I exist alright, but fortunately I didn't turn out as crazy as you. I am still finishing my university studies and am contributing to research, but no, I haven't made my name yet, probably that's why you never heard of me."
The student was horrified. He had been so full of himself that he assumed that if he ever existed, he would be as famous as he was in his own world.
"Well, I'll be now," continued the other him. "After observing you, I deduced many hypotheses and concluded that you are indeed our creator, but a sadistic one. I understand that without you, our world could be destroyed any instant, but believe me, we'd rather die than have a bitch of a god like you! And what the hell, you are really my image!"
"But...how....?"
The student realised that this person was as bright as he was, just more modest and open-minded. He deduced that God had been taking money from the people by using a STM, and that the communication links were also by a modified STM. He had seen everything that his crazy self had been doing. He managed to reverse everything, from taking the creator into the universe by a reverse STM, and by shrinking him to pico size by a reverse of his molecular duplicator. He had defeated himself.
"No...I am God! You must obey me!"
"My son died because you told him to jump off the building!" cried one man.
"My daughter was forced to do erotic dances on the street for your entertainment!"
The mob was now coming closer to him, what was he going to do?
"GOD!!!!!" his cried echoed throughout the streets. The mob charged at him, beating him with sticks and clubs.
"Don't use His name in vain, you bitch!"
The mob abused him physically and verbally. He was helpless now, there was no way he could escape it.
The ground began to shatter, the Earth shook. The mob stopped beating him up and wondered what was happening. All of a sudden, the Earth split open, crying the lament of its creator. Hundreds of people fell to the dark abyss, and the student was sent hurtling back to his world.
The student awoke, he was lying down on his lab floor. Looking up, he was shocked to see his other self from the mini world sitting on his chair.
"The Earth felt the pain when your psychic energy turned ugly," said the other him. "It destroyed itself to save you. Aren't you ashamed of yourself? The universe you created loved you so much, yet you treated it like scum. In the end, it even gave up its own life to save you."
The student shook his head.
"No...The universe...the universe isn't alive!"
His other him sneered.
"Man, and I thought the me in this world was as smart as me, you don't understand one bit about fractal consciousness, don't you?"
Actually he did, he had forgotten about it over his lust for power. The universe was alive because we are alive. We are part of a universal consciousness, it is a basic law of the chaos theory.
"I came out as well because I was you," said the other him. "Look, the universe in the fishbowl is gone."
Indeed, the fishbowl was now an empty fishbowl. The universe he had created had disappeared, sacrificing itself to save him. Suddenly, his guilt set in, and he cried like a father longing for a long lost child. The other him shook his head.
"I'm going to do some plastic surgery on myself and change my name, I can imagine the mess you created for yourself in this world."
The other him walked out, and was never seen again. A few days later, the student lost his house, and was thrown into the streets. In an ironic twist of fate, his house had been brought by his other self, under a completely different name. The money he had taken from the mini-universe had somehow fallen into his hands. Now he is begging, for he can't do work. A god doesn't do menial work, a false god as well, but the false god must beg.
In another place, another time, the professor watched a fishbowl universe under the protection of highly sophisticated instruments. He saw the version of himself in that fishbowl meet his downfall, and shook his head. Turning to the heavens, he wondered.
Just how many fishbowls were there?
It shouldn't have been like this, he was on his way to fame and fortune, why did it have to be like this? He realised the only person to blame was himself.
It all began 6 months ago. A graduate student he was, the brightest one the university could hope to produce. Handpicked by the top scientists for supervision, he was the shining star of the scientific community. He may be all that, but he also has strange desires. Deep down inside him, he wanted to rule over millions, to be a God.
One day, he walked up confidently to his supervisor, and said 'I want to create a miniature universe!'
The supervisor was shocked, could this person really be that brilliant? What kind of stunt was he trying to pull? Create a miniature universe, no one can confidently say how our own universe works, and now someone's trying to build his own. Nevertheless, the supervisor asked him to explain. With all the confidence of a TV presenter, he proceded to draw out a remodelled version of the standard model, with all the mathematical oddities and geometry included. He pointed out how quarks could act as worlds, how atoms could act as solar systems. Effectively, he was combining the small and the big, into one big beautiful theory.
The supervisor was impressed. Every ten thousand years, a genius like this is produced, and he had the privelage of supervising one. The project was given the green light, and the student was given all the equipment he needed.
The challenge? Fit the entire universe into a fishbowl. The hypothesis was that the entire universe was created at a single instant called the Big Bang, the very beginning of time and space. The student had to find the exact conditions in which the Big Bang could occur, then observe it over a period of time. Now, creating the Big Bang was the easy part, at least for the student, how was he going to observe the universe? He would have to wait 15 billion years before conditions became like ours.
Undaunted, he first proceeded to make the Big Bang. Get the right particles from the particle accelerator, torture them under the right conditions, then arrange them in a nano-lattice following SU(3) symmetry. Then, after more configurations, chemical play and whatnot, arrange them into E8 symmetry, Put everything in the fishbowl and wait for ten minutes.
It was a brilliant success, after ten minutes, a bright flash of light was emitted form the fishbowl, and a mini fireball was formed in the centre. Everything had been carefully configured, so the temperature wasn't that hot, but still hot enough to form the mini-universe's version of atoms. The nature of these particles were unknown, for they were even smaller than quarks. According to theory, everything looked like how the early universe would have been, but now, the question was how patient were they?
The student and the supervisor knew they couldn't possibly wait billions of years, they had to find a way to speed up the process. How were they going to accelerate time in the fishbowl? The student and supervisor pondered for hours, days, weeks, over this problem. But there seemed to be no possible method.
Then one day, the student has the most brilliant idea ever. Black holes slows time down to a ridiculously slow pace, why not make a reverse black hole? The supervisor nearly laughed at the mention of this. A black hole hasn't even been made, now you're talking about a reverse black hole? The student then pointed out the recent discovery of the Higgs Boson, then explained how an extremely powerful quantum burst could reverse the effect of the boson and at the same time produce a singularity in space. This would mean obtaining energy out of nothing! It defies the very laws of conservation of energy! The student then pointed out that he has already broke this law when he created the mini big bang, and also the fact that this very law was broken the instant the universe was formed.
The supervisor was amazed, speechless to say the least. The student didn't waste any time indulging in praise. He flew over to the LHC and presented this idea to the scientists there. They agreed to help him, and 2 days later, the first miniature black hole was made by putting the Higgs Boson under great pressure. The next day, the reverse miniature black hole was made. It was different from the original black hole, nothing could come in! The repulsive gravitational force was so strong, it was almost impossible to find a container that could fit it. But find it they did, and the student placed the fishbowl within the vicinity.
Everything was great, 2 weeks passed and the fishbowl universe was now at the equivalent of 15 billion years. The observations over the fortnight had proved the student's hypothesis correct, that the universe he had created was exactly identical to the one we live in. It was literary a miracle. Out of nearly an infinite number of possibilities, this student produced the correct one. He became the youngest person to receive the Nobel prize, at the age of 24. He had beaten Einstein.
Now the student really let it get to his head. He began thinking, 'I've created a universe that's exactly like ours, would it be possible that there is life in this universe that is exactly like ours?"
Another proposal went over to his prof, and by now, the prof no longer wanted to supervise him.
'You've already surpassed the greatest scientist of the 20th century, there's no more I can teach you. Please, let an old man do his humble happy work.'
The student was very pleased about this, so he began to think of a way to extract a specimen from the universe. Now this was a question that stumped even him. By far, there is absolutely no such research or even mention about such a theory, of pulling a lifeform from a universe. It would be alien abduction. Needless to say, how was he going to even see if there was really life there in the first place? Staring at the blackish fishbowl, he began to ponder.
He realised he had no choice, he turned to religion.
All religion states the existance of a soul, and some religions hint at psychic energy, derived from the soul. The student hated religion, seeing it as scriptures written by opium smokers, but now he had no choice but to trust them. He had broken the limits of science, he had to turn to religion now.
The plan was to use a STM. Run the fishbowl through the STM and search for abnormalies within the structure of the universe. The hypothesis was that such abnormalies would indicate signs of intelligent life. Only problem was, the STM worked only on 2D surfaces. No one had used it to observe a 3D fishbowl. As such, the student bought 4 STMs from the university, deconstructed and remodelled them into the formation of a cross. Then, placing the fishbowl at the centre, he turned it on.
Indeed, the constant patterns displayed in the STM monitor did show abnormalities. It was a very peculiar thing, for these abnormalities only showed itself in rare areas of the universe. From the current understanding of our universe, there were many areas in which abnormalities could arise, like black holes or pulsars, but on closer investigation, the signatures didn't look at all like black holes or quasars. It was simply irregular, a massive chaos of fluctuations. The student believed those were the signs of intelligent life. Now the challenge was to extract it.
He had no idea which one of these areas were the replica of Earth, but he believed that Earth was the only place in the universe with our form of intelligent life. That means, he'll just keep extracting samples until he sees a mini-human, or other earth creature. Once again, using a much improved version of the STM, with a ridiculously thin tip, he probed the inside of the fishbowl at the specified locations.
After the third time, he got a strange result. The STM images showed signs of desperately struggling humans! The student was estatic! He had created life! Now how was he going to communicate with them?
The great genius instantly had another idea, locking the mini humans up in a specialised cell, he reconstructed the STM into a communication device. As he did so, evil thoughts ran through his head. 'These people may believe in a God, I am their God!'
The communication device was completed, and the student placed the tip of the modified STM into the cell. In an instant, terror-stricken and desperate faces were seen on the screen.
"Where are we! What are you!" screamed one frightened lady. The student looked around, there were at least 20 people in the cell. Some were lying unconscious, others stark raving mad. The lady and four others were the only sane people inside.
"I am God!" said the student in the best majestic voice he could produce. I created your universe in a fishbowl."
The student hadn't really taken note of the fact that the people also spoke English. He was already pretty confident that they would. On hearing his words, the woman fell to her knees and prayed. The other 4, who realised what was going on, began kneeling as well. The student was even more estatic, the miniature world had really developed exactly like ours, even the same religions existed! But could it be so precise? Was everything exactly the same?
The student decided to question the people on the history of their world. Everything, from what they told him, was exactly the same as the history of our world. There were a few different names, but everything else was the same! Eventually, he asked about his existance, and it really surprised him to learn that he never existed. Now that was strange, for if everything was exactly the same, how come he didn't make the contributions he had made in this world? How come no one made his discoveries? The date the mini-people told him were only a few days apart from his, he should have been there.
Could it be possible that the God of the world cannot exist as a human in the world he created? It seemed that way, but it didn't matter now, for he was the God of the fishbowl universe. He felt power like no other.
"People!" he bellowed in the microphone. "You have angered me over the centuries with your arrogance and materialism. You have forgotten me!" He was sure that the world would develop in that way as well. And he was right. When he said that, everyone suddenly became normal and knelt, praying for forgiveness. Now this was really getting to his head.
"As punishment, I'll destroy one of you!" Then, operating the STM, he picked up a hapless man and crushed him to bits, amongst his crying and begging. At that point, he put away the microphone and let out the most evil laugh a young man could possibly have. The other people cried and begged, while he continued to laugh. Yes! He had the power of a God to these people, he was God!
"I am merciful," he said back to the microphone, though it clearly didn't show through his actions. "I'll send you back to your world, tell them what you have seen and heard, tell them to worship me! Then, every night at ten, sacrifice a young maiden to perform an erotic dance for me! I'll be keeping contact."
God sent the people back via the STM, and all was good, at least for a while. The people went to spread the message to the rest of their world, but no one believed them. God knew this would happen, so he decided to make a communication link directly to the world in the fishbowl.
"I am God!" His booming voice echoed throughout the miniature Earth. "What these people said is true. To prove my existance, I will kill the leader of every country!" Through constantly taking out people for questioning, he had learnt the names and identities of all the leaders of the world. The challenge was of course, to find them. That he could do as well. Having set up the STM monitor, he began probing the frightened faces for the faces of the leaders. Upon seeing them, he sent an electric current through the STM tip and literary vaporised their bodies. The whole process took 2 hours, and by then, the world was already convinced.
God then said that the leaders were sin themselves, for they made the people forget Him. He said to atone for their sins, the people must worship him and send a maiden to perform an erotic dance for him anytime he asked for it. Naturally, he expected some to oppose him, so he quickly found those people and vaporised them as well. Their mistake for opposing him so openly. After a week, everyone in the world was already kotowing to him.
The student, with a new identity as a God, nevertheless decided to abuse his new position. He left science altogether and instead decided to entertain and amuse himself with the hapless denizens of mini-Earth. Being a super sadistic person, he would sometimes ask people to jump off buildings or set themselves on fire.
"It's a good thing when there's religion," he said to himself. "And you are the God!"
But being a God wasn't enough. The people of the mini-universe couldn't give him revenue. So he designed and built a molecular duplicating machine, which works on the principle of the Big Bang, creating mass-energy out of nothing. Now he could enlarge or shrink objects by duplicating it's molecules and rearranging the duplicated molecules into an enlarged version of the object.
"Bring me your currency!" He demanded to the people of his world. "Gather a total value of 1 billion US dollars and place it at the top of the Eiffel tower by 8pm GMT." So they did. After using the STM to extract the money, he placed them, a fraction of the total sum at a time, into the machine. Instantly, real money, from different areas of the world, showed up. He was delighted by now. He went to the currency exchange to convert it to his country's money. Now he was stinking rich!
"Being a God is the best business of all!"
Alas, it has been 6 months. The people of mini-Earth did not like this overbearing God. While many obeyed without question, there were some who secretly planned a way to get rid of him. By studying his movements, they realised that he wasn't omnipotent, like the God they knew from their Bible, nor was he in anyway compassionate. This God was a false one, and can be destroyed.
On the next money transfer, the God had the biggest surprise of all time. One minute he was admiring the little money that came out from the STM, then all of a sudden, he was in a different place. It was a large crossroad, and there were hundreds of people standing around him.
"He's human! Just like us!" exclaimed one girl.
"He's a heretic! Satan's child!" cried another woman who looked like a deranged maniac.
The student looked around, frightened and disbelieving.
"But...but how?"
"What's the matter? Big me?"
The voice...it was so familiar, it was his voice!
Turning around, he saw an exact replica of himself, standing facing him, with his arms folded.
"No...you weren't supposed to exist!"
The other him let out a laugh.
"I exist alright, but fortunately I didn't turn out as crazy as you. I am still finishing my university studies and am contributing to research, but no, I haven't made my name yet, probably that's why you never heard of me."
The student was horrified. He had been so full of himself that he assumed that if he ever existed, he would be as famous as he was in his own world.
"Well, I'll be now," continued the other him. "After observing you, I deduced many hypotheses and concluded that you are indeed our creator, but a sadistic one. I understand that without you, our world could be destroyed any instant, but believe me, we'd rather die than have a bitch of a god like you! And what the hell, you are really my image!"
"But...how....?"
The student realised that this person was as bright as he was, just more modest and open-minded. He deduced that God had been taking money from the people by using a STM, and that the communication links were also by a modified STM. He had seen everything that his crazy self had been doing. He managed to reverse everything, from taking the creator into the universe by a reverse STM, and by shrinking him to pico size by a reverse of his molecular duplicator. He had defeated himself.
"No...I am God! You must obey me!"
"My son died because you told him to jump off the building!" cried one man.
"My daughter was forced to do erotic dances on the street for your entertainment!"
The mob was now coming closer to him, what was he going to do?
"GOD!!!!!" his cried echoed throughout the streets. The mob charged at him, beating him with sticks and clubs.
"Don't use His name in vain, you bitch!"
The mob abused him physically and verbally. He was helpless now, there was no way he could escape it.
The ground began to shatter, the Earth shook. The mob stopped beating him up and wondered what was happening. All of a sudden, the Earth split open, crying the lament of its creator. Hundreds of people fell to the dark abyss, and the student was sent hurtling back to his world.
The student awoke, he was lying down on his lab floor. Looking up, he was shocked to see his other self from the mini world sitting on his chair.
"The Earth felt the pain when your psychic energy turned ugly," said the other him. "It destroyed itself to save you. Aren't you ashamed of yourself? The universe you created loved you so much, yet you treated it like scum. In the end, it even gave up its own life to save you."
The student shook his head.
"No...The universe...the universe isn't alive!"
His other him sneered.
"Man, and I thought the me in this world was as smart as me, you don't understand one bit about fractal consciousness, don't you?"
Actually he did, he had forgotten about it over his lust for power. The universe was alive because we are alive. We are part of a universal consciousness, it is a basic law of the chaos theory.
"I came out as well because I was you," said the other him. "Look, the universe in the fishbowl is gone."
Indeed, the fishbowl was now an empty fishbowl. The universe he had created had disappeared, sacrificing itself to save him. Suddenly, his guilt set in, and he cried like a father longing for a long lost child. The other him shook his head.
"I'm going to do some plastic surgery on myself and change my name, I can imagine the mess you created for yourself in this world."
The other him walked out, and was never seen again. A few days later, the student lost his house, and was thrown into the streets. In an ironic twist of fate, his house had been brought by his other self, under a completely different name. The money he had taken from the mini-universe had somehow fallen into his hands. Now he is begging, for he can't do work. A god doesn't do menial work, a false god as well, but the false god must beg.
In another place, another time, the professor watched a fishbowl universe under the protection of highly sophisticated instruments. He saw the version of himself in that fishbowl meet his downfall, and shook his head. Turning to the heavens, he wondered.
Just how many fishbowls were there?
Monday, May 5, 2008
Eyes of the Oracle (part nine, finale)
Lisa felt a searing pain tear through her body as she hit the floor of the lab. She let out a groan as she struggled to get up. Nearby, Kin and the two Ikes were still fighting, though Kin was getting seriously owned by them. Somehow, Silos Max didn't manage to injure Ike, must have been something to do with the no-charging time.
Lisa's presence alerted the brawl members and they all stopped, turning to look in her direction. She realised that she was still dressed entirely in white. The three of them were studying her intently, they could tell something was different about her.
"What did you do?" asked Ike's clone. "Join the PAP?"
Lisa was puzzled by their reaction to her, other than the fact that she was indeed wearing something different. They could see that something wasn't right, but what it was she couldn't tell.
"Your brain patterns," commented Kin. "It's occupying a very rare site of E8, the site of happiness and joy. Where did you go? What did you see?"
"I...I've seen true reality," she said, as bravely as she could. "It is not what you think it is."
Ikes and Kin didn't know what to say.
"Listen," Lisa continued. "It was Silos Max, Silos Max doesn't kill people, it sends them to true reality, can't be explained in words."
Then she continued to tell them about Azareth, the white room, the tea of forgetting, and the empty space.
After all was done, the three of them had no mood to fight. Kin and Ikes sat on the floor, discouraged and depressed.
"All these years, I've always thought we were given a special gift. Eyes of the oracle, the sight of true reality. I never realised it was such a farce," said Kin.
"The constant fight between us, we saw that it has lead to more misery and hardship, yet in the delusion of it all, we believe what we see is the absolute truth, that it was necessary. The concept of nothingness...that has never occured to us..."
Ike was just as sad, Ike's clone didn't say anything.
Lisa decided that she was the one to do the talking this time.
"Guys...you've finally realised it, that true reality is the embracement of nothingness. Over the last few years, both of you have done nothing but try to gain power over the other. You were moving further and further away from true reality."
Kin and Ikes were surprised by Lisa's sudden authorative tone.
"Understanding true reality, it's not something of maths or science, there's no E8 symmetry, no EPR, no quantum, no relativity or black holes, or whatever. True reality is nothing but our origin. The universe was written on it, we came from it."
Kin then stood up.
"Then tell me, what have we been seeing all this while? Why do we need to feel such unnecessary pain on the pretext of being able to see true reality?"
Ike looked up at Lisa, he too wanted an answer.
"Azareth told me what you saw were details. Specific details on how the world was created. You have been given a most unpleasant fate, Damien Lee has already been condemned to hell for your creation. As a result of your eyes, you have been living in unnecessary sadness."
The three of them hung their heads.
"But Ike, you chose the path of God! You found peace with yourself among the sadness! Even though you did fight with Kin. But don't you see? Don't you realise something? Ike and Kin?"
They all looked up at her again.
"Some of what you see, the sufferings and the pains, we can see it too! Not literary like you do, but we can all feel it. I went through a lot of stress as a stock broker, and that resulted in my family breaking up and my friends leaving me. When I think about it now, I realised I was experiencing the sadness and pain you see. True, I don't see extra dimensions and all, but that's not important in this pretext, isn't it?"
The guys shook their heads.
"I have forgotten God, I may go to church, but I have forgotten him. Ike, you were right, I'm a failed Christian. The path you took was more right than mine. I could have chosen to love instead of hate, to do right instead of wrong, to worship God and follow his way, even if I knew about all the sufferings and pain. But i didn't. Kin, you could have helped the world step by step, do you not realise how your actions are causing yourself pain? The eyes of darkness, which you showed, it's the reflection of your soul, wasn't it? You charged Silos Max almost instantly, it was a result of the hatred in your heart."
Kin wanted to say something, but he stopped. He knew Lisa was right, he wasn't just able to see her state of mind, but he could also feel it in his heart.
"What do you now intend to do? You have killed so many already."
Ikes and Lisa all looked at Kin, anticipating his reply, but all Kin did was wallow in despair and pity.
"SOC! Hands UP!"
The voice of Lo caught their attention. Large groups of armoured men rushed into the lab. A few MRF troopers were also among the crowd, ready for the release of sleeping gas.
"Lo!" Ike and his clone jumped.
"Hey Sirs..." said Lo jokingly. "We thought of the sacrifice Lisa made and all, and how you tried so hard to build up your army, we couldn't simply let your effort go all to waste."
"But...weren't you afraid of Silos Max?" Ike's clone asked.
"Hoho, we took care of that. Before we began the mission, I told all our men to call up their families and sever all ties with them, and during the mission, to try not to think about anyone they knew."
Ike laughed.
"That's not how Silos Max works, but I don't know how it works either. No worries though, I've already taken care of everything."
Then he looked at Lisa.
"Lisa took care of everything."
Lo looked at Lisa, then looked at Kin, who was still looking dismayed.
"What did you do?"
Lisa laughed.
"I merely taught the boys a good lesson."
By now, the SOC men were gathered around Kin, pointing their guns at him, though looking a little scared.
"Wait!" Lisa tried to intercede for him. "He was being misled, give him a chance!"
"No, Lisa," said Kin. "It was the path I chose, I shall take full responsibility."
He gave a nod to Ike, who returned the acknowledgement.
"He's going to jail, my jail," he said. He then took out a pair of specially designed handcuffs, which can't be described in words, and placed it neatly on Kin's wrist.
Lisa tried to say something, but Ike raised his hand, telling her that there was no point.
"You've already taught both of us a great lesson," he said. "Now let us do the right thing."
With that, he left the lab, taking Kin with him.
It has been 2 years since that day.
Lisa was now working as a guidance counsellor, dealing with all sorts of different cases. After her harrowing experience that day, she indeed saw new light in her life and decided to take the right path. Now, she's helping others do the same thing. A general philosophy she adopted, to achieve happiness, we must embrace nothing. It was quite a radical strategy for a counsellor, and it wasn't very well received at first, but people eventually saw the light. She felt glad, for it was a pleasant feeling when someone has benefitted from your actions, much better than hounding over money when she was a stock broker. She made new friends, since she had forgotten all her old relationships anyway, and helped them in anyway she could.
The only thing is, she hadn't seen Ike or Kin since that day.
"Hey Miss!"
The voice was oddly familiar, Lisa looked up to see a familiar figure dressed in t-shirt and jeans, walking in a duck manner and looked a little sloppy. The only thing was, his eyes, they were normal.
"You are..."
"Don't remember me already? It's me! Ike!"
"Ike! But your eyes..."
"Kin and I decided to remove them, it was pretty easy, since Damien Lee's paper was sitting around the internet. All we needed to do was reverse the process. Ah yes, Kin's out of jail, he's now working as a freelance artist. I'm now a social worker, working in Dover Park hospice. I tell you, the people there simply love to have me, for I could always tell them exactly what happens after they die."
Lisa smiled, the visit was surprising, but she was nevertheless happy to see Ike again.
"So what happened after that day?"
"I took Kin back to the sealed dimension, you know the one with the mansion? I locked him up in a specially designed cellar, and everyday, I would read to him the bible, the Koran, as well as buddhist scriptures. Eventually, he screamed, 'PLEASE! Just STOP IT! YOu're making me go NUTS!' Ok, so I did. Then I read to him Tang poems and Confucius' teachings."
Lisa laughed.
"You really know how to mentally torture someone."
"Haha! Well, he really couldn't take it anymore, so I stopped. He then promised to lead a good life and never to try to destroy the world again. As proof, he opted to remove the eyes. So we did it together, we were twin brothers after all."
Lisa's smile grew. She was very glad to hear that the story had a happy ending.
"But you're something else aren't you?" said Ike. "You're the only one who have seen true reality! I mean, you're a very special person. I wish I could see true reality too."
"True reality is all around you," said Lisa. "Find it by practicing what you believe."
Ike nodded.
"I will, well, Kin's just about finishing his job, he should be arriving anytime soon."
At that moment, the door flew open again. It was Kin, smart looking and all smiles. He was holding a small painting that he had made specially for that day.
"Hi Lisa!" he said cheerfully. "Look at this painting of mine, it depicts what Ike and I've been seeing with the eyes of the oracle."
Lisa took a good hard look at the painting, but all she could see was a mess of colours.
"You saw a mess of colours?"
Kin smiled and shook his head.
"It was funny, after Ike and I removed the eyes, we completely forgot what we had seen. This is all I remembered of it. But it does reflect a point doesn't it, you can't describe it in words."
They all had a good laugh, and Lisa invited them to dinner that night.
But was there someone missing?
There is, isn't there?
In another place...
"Tell me, Ike," said Azareth. "What additional ingredients do you think we should add in this tea?"
"I told you, I'm only his clone, and if you add anymore ingredients in this tea, no spirit is going to drink it."
Azareth laughed.
"Don't you think we should give this place a makeover?" said Ike's clone. "White is pure and all, but some colour wouldn't be bad."
There was silence for a while, of course Ike's clone didn't mean that, he was just bored.
"So what do you want to do? We can't drink tea forever, there'll be no more left in hell!"
Azareth took out a chess board.
"No, tell you what, let's play scrabble."
Ike clapped his hands and out came a scrabble board. Azareth didn't say anything, but instead started to form the first word.
"We need to return to Earth some day, huh?" said Ike.
"I don't," said Azareth. I've already attained enlightenment 500 years ago. You just came here because you didn't want to live with another Ike."
Ike's clone took a look at the calendar, 80 years till the death of Ike.
'I sincerely hope I like scrabble,' he muttered to himself.
Lisa's presence alerted the brawl members and they all stopped, turning to look in her direction. She realised that she was still dressed entirely in white. The three of them were studying her intently, they could tell something was different about her.
"What did you do?" asked Ike's clone. "Join the PAP?"
Lisa was puzzled by their reaction to her, other than the fact that she was indeed wearing something different. They could see that something wasn't right, but what it was she couldn't tell.
"Your brain patterns," commented Kin. "It's occupying a very rare site of E8, the site of happiness and joy. Where did you go? What did you see?"
"I...I've seen true reality," she said, as bravely as she could. "It is not what you think it is."
Ikes and Kin didn't know what to say.
"Listen," Lisa continued. "It was Silos Max, Silos Max doesn't kill people, it sends them to true reality, can't be explained in words."
Then she continued to tell them about Azareth, the white room, the tea of forgetting, and the empty space.
After all was done, the three of them had no mood to fight. Kin and Ikes sat on the floor, discouraged and depressed.
"All these years, I've always thought we were given a special gift. Eyes of the oracle, the sight of true reality. I never realised it was such a farce," said Kin.
"The constant fight between us, we saw that it has lead to more misery and hardship, yet in the delusion of it all, we believe what we see is the absolute truth, that it was necessary. The concept of nothingness...that has never occured to us..."
Ike was just as sad, Ike's clone didn't say anything.
Lisa decided that she was the one to do the talking this time.
"Guys...you've finally realised it, that true reality is the embracement of nothingness. Over the last few years, both of you have done nothing but try to gain power over the other. You were moving further and further away from true reality."
Kin and Ikes were surprised by Lisa's sudden authorative tone.
"Understanding true reality, it's not something of maths or science, there's no E8 symmetry, no EPR, no quantum, no relativity or black holes, or whatever. True reality is nothing but our origin. The universe was written on it, we came from it."
Kin then stood up.
"Then tell me, what have we been seeing all this while? Why do we need to feel such unnecessary pain on the pretext of being able to see true reality?"
Ike looked up at Lisa, he too wanted an answer.
"Azareth told me what you saw were details. Specific details on how the world was created. You have been given a most unpleasant fate, Damien Lee has already been condemned to hell for your creation. As a result of your eyes, you have been living in unnecessary sadness."
The three of them hung their heads.
"But Ike, you chose the path of God! You found peace with yourself among the sadness! Even though you did fight with Kin. But don't you see? Don't you realise something? Ike and Kin?"
They all looked up at her again.
"Some of what you see, the sufferings and the pains, we can see it too! Not literary like you do, but we can all feel it. I went through a lot of stress as a stock broker, and that resulted in my family breaking up and my friends leaving me. When I think about it now, I realised I was experiencing the sadness and pain you see. True, I don't see extra dimensions and all, but that's not important in this pretext, isn't it?"
The guys shook their heads.
"I have forgotten God, I may go to church, but I have forgotten him. Ike, you were right, I'm a failed Christian. The path you took was more right than mine. I could have chosen to love instead of hate, to do right instead of wrong, to worship God and follow his way, even if I knew about all the sufferings and pain. But i didn't. Kin, you could have helped the world step by step, do you not realise how your actions are causing yourself pain? The eyes of darkness, which you showed, it's the reflection of your soul, wasn't it? You charged Silos Max almost instantly, it was a result of the hatred in your heart."
Kin wanted to say something, but he stopped. He knew Lisa was right, he wasn't just able to see her state of mind, but he could also feel it in his heart.
"What do you now intend to do? You have killed so many already."
Ikes and Lisa all looked at Kin, anticipating his reply, but all Kin did was wallow in despair and pity.
"SOC! Hands UP!"
The voice of Lo caught their attention. Large groups of armoured men rushed into the lab. A few MRF troopers were also among the crowd, ready for the release of sleeping gas.
"Lo!" Ike and his clone jumped.
"Hey Sirs..." said Lo jokingly. "We thought of the sacrifice Lisa made and all, and how you tried so hard to build up your army, we couldn't simply let your effort go all to waste."
"But...weren't you afraid of Silos Max?" Ike's clone asked.
"Hoho, we took care of that. Before we began the mission, I told all our men to call up their families and sever all ties with them, and during the mission, to try not to think about anyone they knew."
Ike laughed.
"That's not how Silos Max works, but I don't know how it works either. No worries though, I've already taken care of everything."
Then he looked at Lisa.
"Lisa took care of everything."
Lo looked at Lisa, then looked at Kin, who was still looking dismayed.
"What did you do?"
Lisa laughed.
"I merely taught the boys a good lesson."
By now, the SOC men were gathered around Kin, pointing their guns at him, though looking a little scared.
"Wait!" Lisa tried to intercede for him. "He was being misled, give him a chance!"
"No, Lisa," said Kin. "It was the path I chose, I shall take full responsibility."
He gave a nod to Ike, who returned the acknowledgement.
"He's going to jail, my jail," he said. He then took out a pair of specially designed handcuffs, which can't be described in words, and placed it neatly on Kin's wrist.
Lisa tried to say something, but Ike raised his hand, telling her that there was no point.
"You've already taught both of us a great lesson," he said. "Now let us do the right thing."
With that, he left the lab, taking Kin with him.
It has been 2 years since that day.
Lisa was now working as a guidance counsellor, dealing with all sorts of different cases. After her harrowing experience that day, she indeed saw new light in her life and decided to take the right path. Now, she's helping others do the same thing. A general philosophy she adopted, to achieve happiness, we must embrace nothing. It was quite a radical strategy for a counsellor, and it wasn't very well received at first, but people eventually saw the light. She felt glad, for it was a pleasant feeling when someone has benefitted from your actions, much better than hounding over money when she was a stock broker. She made new friends, since she had forgotten all her old relationships anyway, and helped them in anyway she could.
The only thing is, she hadn't seen Ike or Kin since that day.
"Hey Miss!"
The voice was oddly familiar, Lisa looked up to see a familiar figure dressed in t-shirt and jeans, walking in a duck manner and looked a little sloppy. The only thing was, his eyes, they were normal.
"You are..."
"Don't remember me already? It's me! Ike!"
"Ike! But your eyes..."
"Kin and I decided to remove them, it was pretty easy, since Damien Lee's paper was sitting around the internet. All we needed to do was reverse the process. Ah yes, Kin's out of jail, he's now working as a freelance artist. I'm now a social worker, working in Dover Park hospice. I tell you, the people there simply love to have me, for I could always tell them exactly what happens after they die."
Lisa smiled, the visit was surprising, but she was nevertheless happy to see Ike again.
"So what happened after that day?"
"I took Kin back to the sealed dimension, you know the one with the mansion? I locked him up in a specially designed cellar, and everyday, I would read to him the bible, the Koran, as well as buddhist scriptures. Eventually, he screamed, 'PLEASE! Just STOP IT! YOu're making me go NUTS!' Ok, so I did. Then I read to him Tang poems and Confucius' teachings."
Lisa laughed.
"You really know how to mentally torture someone."
"Haha! Well, he really couldn't take it anymore, so I stopped. He then promised to lead a good life and never to try to destroy the world again. As proof, he opted to remove the eyes. So we did it together, we were twin brothers after all."
Lisa's smile grew. She was very glad to hear that the story had a happy ending.
"But you're something else aren't you?" said Ike. "You're the only one who have seen true reality! I mean, you're a very special person. I wish I could see true reality too."
"True reality is all around you," said Lisa. "Find it by practicing what you believe."
Ike nodded.
"I will, well, Kin's just about finishing his job, he should be arriving anytime soon."
At that moment, the door flew open again. It was Kin, smart looking and all smiles. He was holding a small painting that he had made specially for that day.
"Hi Lisa!" he said cheerfully. "Look at this painting of mine, it depicts what Ike and I've been seeing with the eyes of the oracle."
Lisa took a good hard look at the painting, but all she could see was a mess of colours.
"You saw a mess of colours?"
Kin smiled and shook his head.
"It was funny, after Ike and I removed the eyes, we completely forgot what we had seen. This is all I remembered of it. But it does reflect a point doesn't it, you can't describe it in words."
They all had a good laugh, and Lisa invited them to dinner that night.
But was there someone missing?
There is, isn't there?
In another place...
"Tell me, Ike," said Azareth. "What additional ingredients do you think we should add in this tea?"
"I told you, I'm only his clone, and if you add anymore ingredients in this tea, no spirit is going to drink it."
Azareth laughed.
"Don't you think we should give this place a makeover?" said Ike's clone. "White is pure and all, but some colour wouldn't be bad."
There was silence for a while, of course Ike's clone didn't mean that, he was just bored.
"So what do you want to do? We can't drink tea forever, there'll be no more left in hell!"
Azareth took out a chess board.
"No, tell you what, let's play scrabble."
Ike clapped his hands and out came a scrabble board. Azareth didn't say anything, but instead started to form the first word.
"We need to return to Earth some day, huh?" said Ike.
"I don't," said Azareth. I've already attained enlightenment 500 years ago. You just came here because you didn't want to live with another Ike."
Ike's clone took a look at the calendar, 80 years till the death of Ike.
'I sincerely hope I like scrabble,' he muttered to himself.
THE END
Sunday, May 4, 2008
Eyes of the Oracle (part eight)
Lisa did not have to go open the door, the person on the other side opened it himself. He was an old man with a nicely trimmed beard and little hair. He looked rather buff, probably an athlete in his younger days, and he wore a white tuxedo with a black tie. His stomach showed signs of success. On seeing Lisa, he acknowledged her with a bow.
"Where am I now?" Lisa asked, getting a little tired from all her adventures. "Another sealed dimension?"
The old man clapped his hands. In an instant, a white table and 2 white chairs appeared in the centre, with 2 white cups with piping hot tea inside. Lisa wasn't surprised by this, she was getting used to all these weird happenings already.
"A very special dimension," replied the old man. "Take a seat would you, have some tea, I'll explain."
She did, and the old man sat down after her. He took a good sip of tea and looked back at her.
"Drink some would you, it's a waste if you don't."
Lisa did, and found the tea surprisingly refreshing.
"It's a special brew," said the old man. "Before souls are reincarnated, this tea is served to them, making them forget everything in their lives before, their identity, their family, friends, everything that may attach them to that life. As such, it would be easier to move on."
Lisa stopped drinking. She studied the tea carefully, not sure whether to believe the old man. She was a Christian, and Christianity has no mention of reincairnation. Furthermore, the tea looked very much like an ordinary tea, nothing mystical or anything like that. She also didn't forget anything. Then again, she had already forgotten quite a fair bit after the severance from Ike.
"It's a Taoist belief," responded the old man, again another person who seemed to be able to read her thoughts. "I know Christianity has no mention of it, but what are we to disbelieve things that we haven't seen?"
Lisa knew the old man was driving a point, but what?
"It only affects souls, you're not yet dead, so you'll be ok. Then again, the severance would have already done almost the same thing."
The old man knew everything that had happened. What was he rather than who was he, should be the question.
"My name is Azarath. 500 years ago, I was created with the same eyes as Kin and Ike, man it was a pain."
"500 years ago! They had such technology back then? But your eyes seem normal! And how can you live that long?"
"They're normal now, but not back then. I was created with a form of magic. Back then they knew nothing about E8, all they knew were how to combine elements and cast spells. It was in 15th century England yes, witches did exist, so did wizards. The world's science today is no different from their magic. But those sorcerers only knew how to do magic, they didn't know why it worked."
"Anyway, I was created by a rather power hungry sorcerer, eager to use me to attain world domination. When I was born, I had the eyes, I could see true reality much like how Kin and Ike does now. Like Damien Lee, the sorcerer knew nothing about true reality, assuming it was just some additions to our known world. But when I was born, I cried for 40 days and nights, for all I saw around me was despair, hatred, anger, all the vices in the world. I didn't even need to experience it for myself, to me, all these evils had form, and they were very scary. The world's really a lot more pleasant now, I don't know what crazy idea Kin has that makes him do this."
"I grew up locked in a magic cellar, for the sorcerer had deemed me a failed summon. But I didn't have to leave the cellar to see the world for what it truly is. A hateful place, full of woe. I felt pity for the many denizens living in it, so one night, I broke out of the cellar. It wasn't easy, but I did it. I decided to become a saviour, to help as many people as I could, try to make the evils go away. But alas, it was my eyes. Everyone fled when I came, they had no sunglasses back then, so I couldn't hide anything. Despaired, I wanted to run away from it all and live in recluse, that was when I met him."
"Him?" Lisa asked.
"I don't know who he really is, but somehow, he knew what I was going through. He wasn't afraid of my eyes, but rather, he told me, 'you can see it as a gift, or a curse, the choice is yours, but there is one thing you must know, what you see is not true reality'."
Azareth paused here, letting Lisa absorb all that he said.
"So...let me get this straight, what Ike and Kin sees isn't true reality?"
Azareth nodded.
"Then what is true reality?"
"What Kin and Ike sees is nothing but the reality of their universe. The visible universe is large but is only large because it is being seen through the eyes of humans, which are small and limited to 5 senses. In actual fact, there's a much larger universe beyond yours, and in yours, at the same time, the real true reality. No science or maths can describe it. I'll explain this shortly. Anyway, the man whom i met never told me his name, just to call him To. To was a traveller, but where he was from or what he does is unknown. He took me to the mountains and taught me everything I needed to know about the real reality. It was very enlightening. Finally, I realised the entire truth, and it was also the day he disappeared, I never saw him again."
Azareth put down his cup and fanned it with his hand.
"I've been living here for 500 years, observing the world and all. The birth of Kin and Ike caught my interest. The E8 theory, that was interesting...So that's what they call it. Anyway, it only describes everything in the visible universe, and Kin and Ike only believe they can see true reality, but they can't. Ike doesn't even know what the Silos Max is supposed to do."
Lisa decided to remain silent. She had been in the presence of many know-it-alls that day, but this one really took the cake.
"Lisa, tell me, what do you understand about time?"
Lisa didn't know what to say, was this a rhetorical question? Apparently it was.
"Time isn't simply what we see with clocks or any other method which is periodic or what. Think of a storybook, at any instant, the story contains the entire plot, from the beginning to the end. However, the reader only reads from the beginning, then gradually he gets to the end. At no point would he know exactly what would happen a few pages later, unless he cheats and flips to the back. The visible universe is like the story written on the book. The past and the future has already been written, but the characters are living it one step at a time, unable to flip to the back pages to take a look. But the person reading it or writing it knows what is really happening, he knows he is reading a book, and that the story isn't real, it is just fiction. This person, knows true reality."
Lisa was surprised, quite unusual for her now.
"You mean to say that all the world, all the universe, is nothing but a big illusion? A mere story written on paper?"
"Yes, if you want it in scientific terms. Some scientists believe in something called the quantum vacuum. Before the Big Bang, that was all there is, a vacuum, nothingness, empty space. But something happened to empty space, the big bang, and the universe was written all over it. It is like the words on the paper. Now imagine you're a character in the book, you are oblivious to how things are going to turn out, so you pray to your God, the creator of the story, to give you some hint. Now the true God wouldn't do that, but if it was you, and you decided to, what do you think the person would become? What would he see?"
Lisa shook her head.
"An avid reader can predict what would happen in the story, seeing how things are building up and with references to the author's mindset. The character that requests for such power can do the same. He can see more details, like what another character may be doing while he's doing something else far away, or see how something would turn out. To make it short and simple, he can see the detailed structures of what the author, you, his God, created for the story."
Lisa didn't understand it one bit.
"I can see you don't understand it one bit. Ok, Ike and Kin are like such characters, just like me 500 years ago. They are given the gift to see deeper details on how God has created the universe, but that is all. They cannot see into the future, only predict it based on enhanced observations and logic, just like the characters in the book. Even that is subjected to uncertainty and all, you never know when the author may decided to add some kind of funny twist. Kin and Ike both don't know what really happens when ten dimensions are squeezed into one point, for it is way too complicated. You may know the math, but think about calculating the full value of pi on a piece of paper, by hand, using mental calculations. So, they only think they know what happens, but what a laugh, Silos Max is actually a good skill, for it brings anyone affected into true reality."
Lisa didn't know what to feel.
"I'm in true reality?" she asked.
"Yes, you are in true reality, but what you see isn't its true form, but rather the form your mind and my mind want to take. My eyes became normal after I entered this realm because there was nothing more that was hidden. I have seen true reality, want to see it?"
Azareth clapped his hands, and immediately, the room and everything in it disappeared. Lisa and Azareth were floating in pure white space.
"This is true reality?" Lisa asked.
"True reality is nothingness. We are born with nothing and go with nothing, because we come from nothingness, and return to nothingness. The tea that you drank were given to spirits because they never accepted this fact, even though it was so obvious. It made them forget, purify their mind and make them accept nothingness. Then, after a brief stay here, they return to the world of form."
Azareth clapped his hands again, the room returned and they were sitting comfortably on the chairs.
"Do you know why this whole room is white? It is the colour symbol of purity. Nothingness is pure, that's why a person who fully accepts nothingness is purest, and thus the happiest. White light is pure light, containing all the colours in the visible spectrum, yet it is pure. This represents the fact that absolute knowledge is no knowledge, and no knowledge is absolute knowledge. Knowledge of true reality, means knowledge of nothingness."
Lisa suddenly began to feel that all this was making sense.
"So we're in the quantum vacuum?" she asked.
"Yes, but it is just a name. It is like the pages of the book the story was written on."
"But that means we can find out how the fight between Kin and Ike would turn out!"
Azareth shook his head.
"We are merely on the pages, still a part of the book. Only God, the author of the book, would know how the fight turns out. But let me tell you a little more before I send you back. Living in this quantum vacuum has multiple benefits. I am not affected by the flow of time and can create whatever things I want. Since there is nothing, nothing can affect me and I am hindered by nothing. As a matter of fact, you should be able to do it too. Go ahead, try something."
Lisa didn't know what to do. She decided to make a rabbit appear, remembering the magic shows she had watched since young. To her amazement, a rabbit really appeared on the table.
"Coincidental that you decided to think of a white creature," laughed Azareth. Lisa laughed too, that was surprising for her, because there was still her world to worry about, but here she was, feeling happy.
"You felt it didn't you?" asked Azareth.
"What?"
"This is the sensation that you have when you enter true reality, it is pure and pleasant, there is nothing to hinder your heart. Kin has done you a great favour."
Lisa felt, deep down in her heart, that she really wanted to stay here forever. It was way better than the terrible world she lived in.
"What happens when a normal person in my world dies?" she asked Azareth.
"They go to either heaven or hell? I thought you knew that? Well, essentially, heaven is for people who are pure at heart, understand the truth and can accept nothingness, having no desire for any worldly illusions. Hell is for people who have sinned, seduced by materialism and thus hurting others to gain their means. They are judged in hell and thus sent for reincarnation, as a means of atonement for their sins, but that isn't in your belief isn't it?"
"So this is heaven?"
"Metaphorically it is, I can say, 'congratulations, you have entered heaven,' , but heaven is just a name, nirvana is just a name, reality is just a name. Hell is just another insert chapter in the story where all sinners go. They are punished, then return to the main story in another form. Those who have made it to heaven are free from the cycle of birth and death."
Lisa thought over what he said. If this was true, then the world was really in serious danger.
"If everyone in the world died now, how many would enter heaven?"
Azareth sighed.
"Only a quarter... around there, in fact, it's already quite a large number. Even though the world has improved culturally, people are becoming more attached to the illusion that is Earth. These people show little compassion, only think of themselves, and have forgotten God."
"Then I must go back," said Lisa. "I must ensure that Ike wins. If Kin destroys the world, those people would be left without a chance! I am but one person, but I must do what I can to help them all! I have been through the sufferings of Earth, I can imagine Hell must be ten times worse. Having experienced the joy of heaven, of true reality, I can't just stay here and laugh while so many are being sent to suffer!"
Azareth got up from the table and walked up to her, putting his hand on her shoulder.
"You are the kindest person I have met, other than To. Very well, I can send you back to your world, the rest is up to you."
Azareth then beckoned Lisa to stand up as well, then he placed both hands on her shoulders.
"Silos Max brought you here, the move to send you back is the reverse of it. It's related to the Unity Chakra somehow, Ike was right on that, I can't explain it in words actually, I'm sure you understand. "
Lisa sure did.
Azareth closed his eyes and focused energy towards his arms. Lisa felt a calm, soothing feeling seep into her body. Her vision of the white room was beginning to fade.
"Azareth," she said. "Do you think To may be God in disguise as a human?"
Azareth smiled and shook his head.
"God doesn't do magic tricks, he only creates opportunities for us to create miracles."
The white room, the table and Azareth faded into whiteness, Lisa felt herself hurtle through smooth, velvety air. The air soon turned unpleasant, and she felt the influence of gravity again. It was clear that she was returning to Earth. She hoped everything would turn out alright.
To be continued...
"Where am I now?" Lisa asked, getting a little tired from all her adventures. "Another sealed dimension?"
The old man clapped his hands. In an instant, a white table and 2 white chairs appeared in the centre, with 2 white cups with piping hot tea inside. Lisa wasn't surprised by this, she was getting used to all these weird happenings already.
"A very special dimension," replied the old man. "Take a seat would you, have some tea, I'll explain."
She did, and the old man sat down after her. He took a good sip of tea and looked back at her.
"Drink some would you, it's a waste if you don't."
Lisa did, and found the tea surprisingly refreshing.
"It's a special brew," said the old man. "Before souls are reincarnated, this tea is served to them, making them forget everything in their lives before, their identity, their family, friends, everything that may attach them to that life. As such, it would be easier to move on."
Lisa stopped drinking. She studied the tea carefully, not sure whether to believe the old man. She was a Christian, and Christianity has no mention of reincairnation. Furthermore, the tea looked very much like an ordinary tea, nothing mystical or anything like that. She also didn't forget anything. Then again, she had already forgotten quite a fair bit after the severance from Ike.
"It's a Taoist belief," responded the old man, again another person who seemed to be able to read her thoughts. "I know Christianity has no mention of it, but what are we to disbelieve things that we haven't seen?"
Lisa knew the old man was driving a point, but what?
"It only affects souls, you're not yet dead, so you'll be ok. Then again, the severance would have already done almost the same thing."
The old man knew everything that had happened. What was he rather than who was he, should be the question.
"My name is Azarath. 500 years ago, I was created with the same eyes as Kin and Ike, man it was a pain."
"500 years ago! They had such technology back then? But your eyes seem normal! And how can you live that long?"
"They're normal now, but not back then. I was created with a form of magic. Back then they knew nothing about E8, all they knew were how to combine elements and cast spells. It was in 15th century England yes, witches did exist, so did wizards. The world's science today is no different from their magic. But those sorcerers only knew how to do magic, they didn't know why it worked."
"Anyway, I was created by a rather power hungry sorcerer, eager to use me to attain world domination. When I was born, I had the eyes, I could see true reality much like how Kin and Ike does now. Like Damien Lee, the sorcerer knew nothing about true reality, assuming it was just some additions to our known world. But when I was born, I cried for 40 days and nights, for all I saw around me was despair, hatred, anger, all the vices in the world. I didn't even need to experience it for myself, to me, all these evils had form, and they were very scary. The world's really a lot more pleasant now, I don't know what crazy idea Kin has that makes him do this."
"I grew up locked in a magic cellar, for the sorcerer had deemed me a failed summon. But I didn't have to leave the cellar to see the world for what it truly is. A hateful place, full of woe. I felt pity for the many denizens living in it, so one night, I broke out of the cellar. It wasn't easy, but I did it. I decided to become a saviour, to help as many people as I could, try to make the evils go away. But alas, it was my eyes. Everyone fled when I came, they had no sunglasses back then, so I couldn't hide anything. Despaired, I wanted to run away from it all and live in recluse, that was when I met him."
"Him?" Lisa asked.
"I don't know who he really is, but somehow, he knew what I was going through. He wasn't afraid of my eyes, but rather, he told me, 'you can see it as a gift, or a curse, the choice is yours, but there is one thing you must know, what you see is not true reality'."
Azareth paused here, letting Lisa absorb all that he said.
"So...let me get this straight, what Ike and Kin sees isn't true reality?"
Azareth nodded.
"Then what is true reality?"
"What Kin and Ike sees is nothing but the reality of their universe. The visible universe is large but is only large because it is being seen through the eyes of humans, which are small and limited to 5 senses. In actual fact, there's a much larger universe beyond yours, and in yours, at the same time, the real true reality. No science or maths can describe it. I'll explain this shortly. Anyway, the man whom i met never told me his name, just to call him To. To was a traveller, but where he was from or what he does is unknown. He took me to the mountains and taught me everything I needed to know about the real reality. It was very enlightening. Finally, I realised the entire truth, and it was also the day he disappeared, I never saw him again."
Azareth put down his cup and fanned it with his hand.
"I've been living here for 500 years, observing the world and all. The birth of Kin and Ike caught my interest. The E8 theory, that was interesting...So that's what they call it. Anyway, it only describes everything in the visible universe, and Kin and Ike only believe they can see true reality, but they can't. Ike doesn't even know what the Silos Max is supposed to do."
Lisa decided to remain silent. She had been in the presence of many know-it-alls that day, but this one really took the cake.
"Lisa, tell me, what do you understand about time?"
Lisa didn't know what to say, was this a rhetorical question? Apparently it was.
"Time isn't simply what we see with clocks or any other method which is periodic or what. Think of a storybook, at any instant, the story contains the entire plot, from the beginning to the end. However, the reader only reads from the beginning, then gradually he gets to the end. At no point would he know exactly what would happen a few pages later, unless he cheats and flips to the back. The visible universe is like the story written on the book. The past and the future has already been written, but the characters are living it one step at a time, unable to flip to the back pages to take a look. But the person reading it or writing it knows what is really happening, he knows he is reading a book, and that the story isn't real, it is just fiction. This person, knows true reality."
Lisa was surprised, quite unusual for her now.
"You mean to say that all the world, all the universe, is nothing but a big illusion? A mere story written on paper?"
"Yes, if you want it in scientific terms. Some scientists believe in something called the quantum vacuum. Before the Big Bang, that was all there is, a vacuum, nothingness, empty space. But something happened to empty space, the big bang, and the universe was written all over it. It is like the words on the paper. Now imagine you're a character in the book, you are oblivious to how things are going to turn out, so you pray to your God, the creator of the story, to give you some hint. Now the true God wouldn't do that, but if it was you, and you decided to, what do you think the person would become? What would he see?"
Lisa shook her head.
"An avid reader can predict what would happen in the story, seeing how things are building up and with references to the author's mindset. The character that requests for such power can do the same. He can see more details, like what another character may be doing while he's doing something else far away, or see how something would turn out. To make it short and simple, he can see the detailed structures of what the author, you, his God, created for the story."
Lisa didn't understand it one bit.
"I can see you don't understand it one bit. Ok, Ike and Kin are like such characters, just like me 500 years ago. They are given the gift to see deeper details on how God has created the universe, but that is all. They cannot see into the future, only predict it based on enhanced observations and logic, just like the characters in the book. Even that is subjected to uncertainty and all, you never know when the author may decided to add some kind of funny twist. Kin and Ike both don't know what really happens when ten dimensions are squeezed into one point, for it is way too complicated. You may know the math, but think about calculating the full value of pi on a piece of paper, by hand, using mental calculations. So, they only think they know what happens, but what a laugh, Silos Max is actually a good skill, for it brings anyone affected into true reality."
Lisa didn't know what to feel.
"I'm in true reality?" she asked.
"Yes, you are in true reality, but what you see isn't its true form, but rather the form your mind and my mind want to take. My eyes became normal after I entered this realm because there was nothing more that was hidden. I have seen true reality, want to see it?"
Azareth clapped his hands, and immediately, the room and everything in it disappeared. Lisa and Azareth were floating in pure white space.
"This is true reality?" Lisa asked.
"True reality is nothingness. We are born with nothing and go with nothing, because we come from nothingness, and return to nothingness. The tea that you drank were given to spirits because they never accepted this fact, even though it was so obvious. It made them forget, purify their mind and make them accept nothingness. Then, after a brief stay here, they return to the world of form."
Azareth clapped his hands again, the room returned and they were sitting comfortably on the chairs.
"Do you know why this whole room is white? It is the colour symbol of purity. Nothingness is pure, that's why a person who fully accepts nothingness is purest, and thus the happiest. White light is pure light, containing all the colours in the visible spectrum, yet it is pure. This represents the fact that absolute knowledge is no knowledge, and no knowledge is absolute knowledge. Knowledge of true reality, means knowledge of nothingness."
Lisa suddenly began to feel that all this was making sense.
"So we're in the quantum vacuum?" she asked.
"Yes, but it is just a name. It is like the pages of the book the story was written on."
"But that means we can find out how the fight between Kin and Ike would turn out!"
Azareth shook his head.
"We are merely on the pages, still a part of the book. Only God, the author of the book, would know how the fight turns out. But let me tell you a little more before I send you back. Living in this quantum vacuum has multiple benefits. I am not affected by the flow of time and can create whatever things I want. Since there is nothing, nothing can affect me and I am hindered by nothing. As a matter of fact, you should be able to do it too. Go ahead, try something."
Lisa didn't know what to do. She decided to make a rabbit appear, remembering the magic shows she had watched since young. To her amazement, a rabbit really appeared on the table.
"Coincidental that you decided to think of a white creature," laughed Azareth. Lisa laughed too, that was surprising for her, because there was still her world to worry about, but here she was, feeling happy.
"You felt it didn't you?" asked Azareth.
"What?"
"This is the sensation that you have when you enter true reality, it is pure and pleasant, there is nothing to hinder your heart. Kin has done you a great favour."
Lisa felt, deep down in her heart, that she really wanted to stay here forever. It was way better than the terrible world she lived in.
"What happens when a normal person in my world dies?" she asked Azareth.
"They go to either heaven or hell? I thought you knew that? Well, essentially, heaven is for people who are pure at heart, understand the truth and can accept nothingness, having no desire for any worldly illusions. Hell is for people who have sinned, seduced by materialism and thus hurting others to gain their means. They are judged in hell and thus sent for reincarnation, as a means of atonement for their sins, but that isn't in your belief isn't it?"
"So this is heaven?"
"Metaphorically it is, I can say, 'congratulations, you have entered heaven,' , but heaven is just a name, nirvana is just a name, reality is just a name. Hell is just another insert chapter in the story where all sinners go. They are punished, then return to the main story in another form. Those who have made it to heaven are free from the cycle of birth and death."
Lisa thought over what he said. If this was true, then the world was really in serious danger.
"If everyone in the world died now, how many would enter heaven?"
Azareth sighed.
"Only a quarter... around there, in fact, it's already quite a large number. Even though the world has improved culturally, people are becoming more attached to the illusion that is Earth. These people show little compassion, only think of themselves, and have forgotten God."
"Then I must go back," said Lisa. "I must ensure that Ike wins. If Kin destroys the world, those people would be left without a chance! I am but one person, but I must do what I can to help them all! I have been through the sufferings of Earth, I can imagine Hell must be ten times worse. Having experienced the joy of heaven, of true reality, I can't just stay here and laugh while so many are being sent to suffer!"
Azareth got up from the table and walked up to her, putting his hand on her shoulder.
"You are the kindest person I have met, other than To. Very well, I can send you back to your world, the rest is up to you."
Azareth then beckoned Lisa to stand up as well, then he placed both hands on her shoulders.
"Silos Max brought you here, the move to send you back is the reverse of it. It's related to the Unity Chakra somehow, Ike was right on that, I can't explain it in words actually, I'm sure you understand. "
Lisa sure did.
Azareth closed his eyes and focused energy towards his arms. Lisa felt a calm, soothing feeling seep into her body. Her vision of the white room was beginning to fade.
"Azareth," she said. "Do you think To may be God in disguise as a human?"
Azareth smiled and shook his head.
"God doesn't do magic tricks, he only creates opportunities for us to create miracles."
The white room, the table and Azareth faded into whiteness, Lisa felt herself hurtle through smooth, velvety air. The air soon turned unpleasant, and she felt the influence of gravity again. It was clear that she was returning to Earth. She hoped everything would turn out alright.
To be continued...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
