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THE GNOMON
by Tony Giovia
copyright (c) 1993, 1996 by Tony Giovia
Preface:
1) The Big Bang created a Universe of energy;
2) Each thing that exists in the Universe is composed of energy;
3) Ideas exist in the Universe, and are composed of energy;
4) Energy can be viewed as matter;
5) Ideas can be viewed as matter;
6) Ideas are defined in terms of other ideas;
7) A Geometry of Ideas follows.
From "The_Geometry_of_Ideas" by Keter Atum.
"Remove the blindfold."
The order was sudden, but I pride myself on my awareness and quick reflexes. As though the words were my own thought I instantly acted. The sensors inside the eyesockets of my blindfold set off alarms when freed from the pressure of my eyes.
I saw a searing white disc and was blinded again. There was a sharp reduction in the speed of the sonicopter, and for the briefest of moments I feared that the Puter pilot had malfunctioned. The alarms were silenced just as my eyes adjusted to the light.
My first glimpse of Living Spaces was skewed by the low approach angle of the copter. I saw, or thought I saw, an immense elliptical ring composed of discrete abutting buildings; the variety of architectural styles was rendered partly delirious by the rising heat of the desert. There appeared to be a complex of roads reaching within the ellipse, and I also caught a sharp glare off what may have been a small lake near its center.
I was neither surprised nor impressed by this egg-shaped anomaly crouching in the sand in the middle of nowhere. Frankly, I was ready for anything; after all, this was the asylum - read "laboratory" - of another head case who had developed another Theory of Everything. I had been chosen for this assignment because I myself had once developed such a theory, and I was familiar with the "psychological types" that dreamed them up.
This particular psychological type claimed to have discovered a scientific method for the study of consciousness.
"Can you believe it?" My companion, a red-skinned (ahem, excuse me: I mean Native American) and inexperienced research assistant, was shouting over the slicing roar of the engines. She had been assigned to me against my will by my editor at Physical Mechanics Journal, and I resented the intrusion on my independence and judgement. I pretended not to hear her.
She insolently began pulling at my sleeve and pointing. I looked heavily at her wide eyes, sending a message, and nodded.
The sonicopter's mechanical voice spoke again: "Landing. Disengage within thirty seconds."
The Puter set us down fifty meters in front of the ellipse, mercifully kicking up no sand. My companion jumped down next to me and pushed me forward. The copter lifted away, leaving us with an explosion as it accelerated through the sound barrier. The heat was intense.
Before me stood a huge space helmet. My companion yelped, pulled out her piCrystallizer and began snapping vivipicts. The "space helmet" was the facade of a spherical building. A tinted visor-like window curved around the top three-fourths of the structure, and along the sides thick black tubes (air-conditioning, I remember hoping) fed into the interior. Various knobs and gadgets sprouted about the helmet, and there was a small tunnel door at ground level.
I wanted to escape the heat and go right in, but my companion prevailed on me for more picts of the exterior. Going through life I have learned a thing or two; therefore I relented, knowing she would otherwise report my refusal to my editor. While she scampered around, I slumped my shoulders and crossed my arms to indicate my current displeasure. I also examined the abutting structures from my stationary point of view.
To the left (my left) of the space helmet, and adjoining it, was a gleaming steel square perhaps fifty meters high; it was tall enough that the curvature of the helmet entered cleanly, cut off and disappearing within; apparently the visor served as a community window from that side. There was a single row of alternating large and small windows running verically down the center of the facade; no two windows appeared to be of the same size. To the left of the steel edifice stood a columned temple topped off by a golden dome and spire. From my angle I could not see how or if it joined with the steel building.
To the right of the space helmet was a stone pyramid (I can think of no other way to describe it); one side was excavated to allow the visor to exist unimpeded, with the glass buttressing part of the pyramids structure. Other than the visor, there were no other windows I could see. To the right of the pyramid was a leaning trapezoid, low and long with a bright red finish. That it shared a wall with the pyramid was apparent but not visible from where I stood.
The other buildings forming the ellipse were difficult to see without my standing further back. Images of thatched roofs, serrated walls (a castle was nearby), hooded arches, skyscraper towers , stained glass and minarets stretched far into the distance on either side of me.
Eventually my companion returned, bubbling with enthusiasm. She decided to immortalize me by picting me with the space helmet at my back.
"Is this the most incredible thing you've ever seen? The building goes on forever! Why do they keep this location a secret?"
As she well knew, "they" did whatever they liked whenever they liked, with or without a reason. She knew "they" controlled all the transportation and communications technologies; and she knew the only thing "they" couldn't control were visionaries such as myself.
What she didn't know was the real reason we were here.
"We have a schedule," I said authoritatively. "Professionals realize the importance of proper time utilization."
My companion's face changed perceptibly as she absorbed this valuable lesson. She nodded her head and escorted me to the tunnel in the maw of the helmet.
Much to my relief cool air greeted us as we entered the tunnel. Our way was illuminated by florescent aureoles. Outside the tunnel, which was deceptively long, we were met by a short, stocky maid. She was wearing a crimson South Seas dress which contrasted unfavorably with her brown skin.
"We welcome you," the maid said with a smile too large for her small face. "I am MakeMake ." She looked from me to my companion. She suffered from some sort of nervous condition, evidenced by her hands which jittered without rest.
"Very pleased to meet you, I am sure," I replied. "We are expected. I am Professor Frost, and this is my companion, Spirit-To-Change. She is a Native American."
While the maid and my companion shook hands and chattered, I inspected the inside of the helmet-building. The visor occupied the front of the structure and half of the ceiling, casting blue -tinged sunlight into the interior; but the rear of the room (despite its height, there was just the one floor) was framed by a white ceramic of incredible smoothness. I say "framed" because the entire rear wall was a gigantic vivapict monitor. Strangely, in the center of the monitor was a circular window not part of the monitor. The view through the window was indistinct from where I stood, but the monochromatic pict in the monitor blazed with bursting constellations of sparks which twinkled and danced in a sea of smoky, seismic currents. The vivipict, which by its nature appears three-dimensional, seemed ready to overflow its surface boundary and engulf the room.
It was not a comfortable feeling. Moreover, all that energy created no sound, as though it were straining behind an invisible barrier as close to me as the wall.
My companion was not unmindful of the display occurring around the maid's head, but an outdated sense of courtesy imprisoned her from asking the question most on my mind.
I suffered from no such sense of courtesy. "What the devil is that supposed to be?" I pointed as I interrupted.
The maid smiled again, more ingenuously than before. The tips of her moving fingers tapped each other. "It's eye-catching, isn't it? All those winking lights. My husband arranges words better than I do, and you will get a clearer picture if he explains it."
"Your husband?" I inquired, disguising my sarcasm. "Does he repair the monitors? The sound isn't working. And the visual, whatever it is, has no color."
"MakeMake is Doctor Atum's wife," said my research assistant. Her tone suggested that this was news to me. My reply assured her that the contrary was true.
"Of course she is. But that doesn't answer my question, does it? May we see the Doctor now?"
The wife-maid's smile was now set in stone, as though I had said something permanently funny. "The Doctor is waiting. He has been looking forward to your visit. This way, please."
Because of MakeMake's short stature I was forced to take smaller than my normal man-sized steps. As we crossed the room I saw several monitors set into the concrete floor; I myself walked over one displaying a pink crustacean crawling across the the bottom of a seabed. The next "room" was the pyramid I had seen while standing outside; as part of that huge ellipse of discrete structures I had seen from the copter, it seemed equally correct to call each building a room of the entire ring, as it did to call each division within a building a room of that building. As we passed beneath the area where the visor supplanted a portion of the pyramid's wall, I noticed figures looking down at us.
The pyramid itself had been hollowed out, but hologram generators created the impression of an intact Egyptian tomb; passageways, relics and temples directed the eye to an inlaid sarcophagas crowned with trails of burning incense. Unexpectedly, hieroglyphics were replaced by tiny vivipict monitors; there were numerous galleries built into the walls right up to the pointed apex, allowing access to the monitors. The rear wall was the same as in the helmet room, a dark hurricane of unstable brilliance surrounding a small circular window.
Several robots were working on the vivipicts in the monitors, re-arranging and re-coloring the elements. The robots had monitors in place of faces; the monitor screens displayed the same images of aphonic turmoil as the rear wall. The screen of the robot nearest me had something that looked like an eye floating amongst the chaos; I noticed that the calf of its otherwise metal body appeared to be human skin covering flexible muscles. I must say that the sight of such a freak would have been unnerving to a man of lesser courage than my own, but it had no effect on me. When I casually pointed the freak out to my companion she hurriedly hid behind her piCrystallizer.
I could see some of the larger wall monitors as I walked; while most contained images of other rooms, a dozen or so were blank, and others were blinking or divided up into multiple screens. Not all the picts were clear; some suffered from severely inadequate focusing. A pict in the floor displayed a monitor within a monitor series, disappearing downward; I felt drawn into it , but I pulled myself away using the extraordinary inner strength so many people have complimented me on. Long after I recovered I helped Spirit-To-Change by answering a question she had asked me.
In this manner we passed through many more rooms; I recorded only a comparative anatomy laboratory, a medieval banquet hall, a large indoor garden, two room-buildings under new construction, a library, and a foul-smelling zoo. Every room contained pict monitors with views into other rooms and other assorted images, and the rear wall of every room was a window -within-a-monitor, displaying the soundless percussion I have previously described. My companion ooohhhed and aaahhhed dutifully as she snapped her picts, all the while bothering MakeMake for details on this or that object. Robots were everywhere, and also a few humans who chose to keep apart from us. Again and again I saw freaks, metallic robots with partially developed human or animal appendages; I was suspicious that Doctor Atum was engaged in illegal experiments, which would explain his desire to work in such an isolated laboratory as Living Spaces.
My suspicions were soon confirmed. We arrived at a spherical room, like the helmet but with a mirrored dome for a roof; the angle of the mirrors allowed us to watch ourselves enter. A rectangular slot running the radius of the dome was open to the sky, servicing a telescope that dwarfed any I had ever seen. Surrounding the curved wall beneath the dome was a continuous pict monitor, with four small windows set at ninety degree intervals.
A man in a white lab coat was working on the exposed circuits of a robot; the machine featured grotesque wings in place of its arms. MakeMake said "There he is." and motioned us to wait. She approached the man from behind, put her arms around his waist and squeezed him, simultaneously whispering in his ear.
I turned away slightly to give them privacy, although I can't say the same for my research assistant. The Doctor appeared to be of Oriental descent, with a small build. The scene continued for entirely too long.
"Doctor Atum," I intoned, making no secret of my impatience. "Doctor Atum, I am Professor Lithic Frost. We have an appointment."
The man disengaged himself from his wife, kissed her hands, and made a gesture that seemed to indicate his respect for me.
"Please Professor, give me a moment," he answered in a voice too deep for his moderate physique. He made a final adjustment to the robot and then closed up the back of its skull; the machine immediately came to life, swinging its head back and forth. Apparently satisfied as to its bearings, it then walked toward and past us out the door. I noticed a whorled mass resembling a pale egg in its visor, and gnarled webbing between its toes.
Doctor Atum nodded and said "Excellent! Excellent!" And with a smile equal to his wife's he rushed up to me, grasped my hand and pumped it like a well handle.
"I am so very pleased to meet you, s very pleased. I am KeterAtum, I am so glad you came. Visitors are always welcome."
I was temporarily taken aback by the force of his enthusiasm, but I must say I recovered my composure before anyone knew it was missing. I extricated my hand from his, citing an old war injury, and introduced my companion.
"She's a Native American," I added, by way of explaining her name. He nonetheless captured her hand as he had mine, vigorously shaking it and pouring forth compliments.
"Such beautiful eyes, and your hair, so long and dark, a gift you share with my beloved wife. Hmmm, let me see, your heritage is ... Navajo, isn't it? I am sometimes correct in these things. North American Indians, your ancestors lived with a beautiful knowledge, that every natural creation is inhabited by power. Do you know of this knowledge, do you believe in the wisdom of your past?"
Spirit-To-Change was repulsed by the Doctor's effusions; he was old enough to be her father. She disguised her feelings by giggling like a schoolgirl. "Yes Doctor, I know of their wisdom, but I don't just believe it, I live it. My great grandmother was called Daughter-To-Turquoise-Woman by her friends."
"Certainly, Turquoise Woman, a shape-changer with the power to pass through an endless stream of lives, always changing but never dying." The Doctor released Spirit-To-Change's hand, and in the same motion embraced her.
I am a man of the world, as you may have guessed, and I myself have often made advances toward women, but never in front of their mates. I looked at MakeMake for her reaction, but she was looking at me as she opened and closed her hands. From her smile I assumed she wanted me to embrace her in a like manner, but I pretended not to notice.
"Er, Doctor," I said firmly, "as you say, you don't get many visitors, so I feel it is my responsibility to inform you that your wife is present."
One final squeeze and he released my research assistant; the hug had crumpled her sweater, forcing her to adjust it properly over her large breasts. I instantly stepped between them and re-
assumed my leadership role. "Well, now that we've all met, perhaps we can get down to business."
Doctor Atum bowed in the Mandarin style, no doubt in apology, but he chose to make the moment ambiguous by erupting into laughter. I towered over him in height; if I were a violent man, I could have crushed him like an insect. I admit, however, that he did have a certain solidity about him. For the first time I noticed his full head of hair. The women laughed good -naturedly as well.
"Professor, we have much to learn from each other. By all means let us begin. Would you like tea? My darling, would you?"
MakeMake, probably grateful to put her moving fingers to work, retired from the room. "Before we sit down, let me show you my pride and joy."
Before I could object Doctor Atum was describing the great satisfaction he received from the instrument in the center of the room, which he said was a combination microscope and telescope. My research assistant politely listened while I pretended to review my notes. Doctor Atum got the message soon enough and led us to a horseshoe-shaped gathering of sofas and chairs; it was then that I noticed that the entire floor was a blank vivipict monitor.
I sat on a love seat which allowed me to place my recorder next to me when Spirit-To -Change sat next to the Doctor on a sofa; MakeMake sat on a separate chair between myself and her husband. Thanks to my rugged physical conditioning my legs did not ache from the long walk through Living Spaces, but I must say the upholstery was comfortable. We were located near the rear wall, and the sparkling lights and thrashing eddies of the monitor loomed above us . I felt entirely too close to it.
"Just what is that, Doctor Atum? There is one in every room." I pointed.
"Please call me Keter, everyone does."
"That's hardly professional, Doctor Atum." The monitor beneath my feet sprang to life; the displayed vivipict was segmented, and under me I saw a filthy jail cell in some cold latitude. I felt as though I was standing on air. Suddenly, the screen went blank again. Not caring to share my feelings when there was work to be done, I straightened my body and pointed at the wall again. "So what is it?" I said, faking a slight breathlessness.
He told me.
I saw immediately that this man was a charlaton. My breath returned. I took out my "snow shovel" and put on my "hip boots". I tilted my head downward, as though I were a very tolerant person who had neared his limits. "An omen of what, Doctor?"
"You misunderstand, Professor. A ... G-n-o-m-o-n."
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