Dream Within the Dream

source

My recent experiments with the mind-altering effects of nicotine first gave me some small capacity to gain access to the Hierion Domain. However, Irhit seems to have taken offense at my use of the Bimanoid Interface. Now I suspect that Irhit severed the connection between my zeptite endosymbiont and my replicoid.

Blessing in Disguise?
For the past week I have not been able to use the Bimanoid Interface. At first I was very upset by this, since I feel like I was making progress towards learning about my own future by means of improving communications with my replicoid in the Hierion Domain.

However, isolation from the Bimanoid Interface might be to my advantage. I believe that Irhit has, through the years, been using the Interface in a "reverse configuration" to suppress some of my old memories. Since Irhit might no longer be able to block my old memories, I've been trying to "re-awaken" one particular memory from my youth, a memory that has always haunted and tantalized me.

The Annotated Alice

Through all of my adult life I've had a very clear memory of my sister reading to me from The Annotated Alice. My sister is quite a bit older than I, and when I was small (before I went to school) we would "play school". I learned all kinds of things from my sister including the wonders of adding and subtracting numbers. As soon as I had grown comfortable adding and subtracting, she set me to the task of working in other systems of numbers besides base 10.

In order to recover the memories described below, I used a large dose of nicotine and put myself into a relaxed, nearly dreaming state where I could record myself speaking. What follows (below) is a combination of my recorded speech during the "trance" and the memories that I managed to retain from that session.

____________________________

source

Trance
One hot summer day when my mother had gone shopping and my brothers had gone outside, I was playing school with my sister. I'd just completed an addition and subtraction worksheet given to me by my sister. After completing the problems that she had provided, I next made up some of my own. I kept looking at my sister and wondering when she would notice that I was done. She seemed completely engrossed in what she was reading.

Finally, growing drowsy in the heat and tired of the numbers, I wondered what she was reading that had her so captivated. I was just learning to read and I sat there for a while trying to figure out the words that were on the cover of her book.

"Ignatious Longbottom" by Doktor A

Finally I asked, "What are you reading?" She said nothing, so I went over and sat down next to her and looked at the pages of the book she was reading. I said, "Read to me."

Without even glancing at me, she started reading, but reading like a zombie: "I can't remember things as I-"

Of course, I did not know what a zombie was, but I knew that she was not reading like normal. I started to giggle and then she looked at me. She said, "Oh, my. I was trapped in the book."

[Even then, she still did not sound like my sister, but she no longer sounded like an automaton. In what follows I label "her" (whoever was speaking to me) as S?]

I pointed to the illustration in the book and asked, "What is that?"

S?: The Caterpillar. Look! The Caterpillar is as big as Alice.

Me: What is a Caterpillar?

S?: You know. We put that wooly bear caterpillar in a jar and it made a cocoon.

I protested, "Caterpillars don't have hands."

My sister shook her head in dismay, "You have such a linear mind. This is a fantasy story."

I asked, "What is it eating?"

S?: It's not eating, it's smoking.

Me: Smoking?

S?:  Like your father does. Smoking tobacco. See the tobacco flowers?

I couldn't figure out how a caterpillar could smoke. I asked, "Why do people smoke? It stinks."

S?:  Tobacco contains a chemical, nicotine. Nicotine can change your brain.

I didn't know what she was talking about. The words she was using and the way she sounded reminded me of my father. I asked, "Who are you?"

[At that point, my sister began speaking like my sister again.]

"Shore Leave" conceived by "Ted" Sturgeon

"I think you ought to tell me who you are...." My sister looked at me with wide eyes and said, "That was odd. I was trapped in the Domain."

Me: Like Alice in Wonderland?

"Yes, it did seem like a wonder land." She hugged me and held me for a minute then she let go of me and she wiped some tears from her eyes. "It was like a bad dream. You were gone, but you are fine." She hugged me again.

"Alice in Nukeland" by Aledin

Me: What do you mean I was gone?

She hesitated then she said, "I'll tell you if you promise to be brave."

"I promise."

"This is a scary story." She got up and went to look and see if my mother had returned home. "Listen! It was on Thanksgiving day. Do you remember? We were going to grandma's house."

Me: "I remember. It was snowing."

She asked, "What else do you remember?"

"We were playing alphabet."

"What else?"

"It was hot"

cyberpunk Alice by  Steven Donegani

"Yes, we were burning up. We did not know, but slush from the road had gotten stuck in the grill. Air was not reaching the radiator. The engine was hot and so father was running the heater at full."

"We all took off our shoes and socks."

"Yes! Do you remember what happened next?"

"You talk about this all the time. We followed the snow plow down the highway. It was so slow, we we were late for dinner."

My sister seemed to gaze off into the distance. "Yes. But that is not what happened first."

"I don't remember anything else."

the Time Teller

"You can't remember. The Time Teller said that I would not remember, but I do. I Do!"

I didn't know what she was talking about. I asked, "The time teller?"

"The first time, father passed the snow plow and then our car skidded and we went off the road. It was a terrible crash."

"Suddenly I was in the Domain with mother. It was a strange place, a plastic world. There were stars in the sky and a pool of water on the floor. Mother grabbed me and said, "We're back in the Domain!"

A woman dressed in black was there....the Time Teller.....she looked like an elf, with long pointy ears and big eyes. She asked mother, "Why are you here?"

Mother: We were skidding off the road. I just had time to teleport myself and my daughter.

Time Teller:  Give me your ring.

"Mother took off her ring and handed it to the Time Teller. The Time Teller took the ring to a device on the wall, like a television, and soon we could see the snow plow. Then we saw our car go past the snow plow and skid off the road. There was a terrible crash."

Rodney Matthews "Alice and the Caterpillar"

Again my sister hugged me. "You were killed!"

I shook my head. "No. We followed the plow all the way to the exit."

"That was the second time. Mother was hysterical when she saw your dead body. She shouted at the Time Teller."

Mother: Fix it! Take us back in time. All we need to do is follow the snow plow.

Time Teller: Let me have a look at the future.

"The Time Teller looked into a device that she held in her hand. I could see that she was holding what looked like a tiny television. I said, 'The future?' and tried to see the images.

Time Teller: Here, see for yourself.

Viewing her future self.

I took the device and suddenly there I was, standing in front of me. It was an image of me. Then I got older. I realized I was seeing myself, in the future.

Mother: Is it wise to let her see her own future?

Time Teller: When I send you back to Earth, she will remember nothing.

The Time Teller had another device that she used to look at images of the future. I was fascinated with the images of myself in the future.

Time Teller: What a mess! Everything is ruined after First Contact.

Mother: Just send me back, before the accident. I'll drive.

Time Teller: No, we'll use your replicoid. Oh, my. But your daughter must go back. This creates a favorable microchange. Oh, my......how amazing.

Mother: What? Show me.

"Then another woman who looked just like mother came in, but she was wearing what looked like technicolor silk pajamas. Looking up from my view of my future self, at first I didn't notice that there were two mothers. I said, 'Where did you get those goofy clothes?' The time Teller waved her hand at the woman in the pajamas.

Time Teller: Go back in time. Six hours. There, the program is complete.

"The woman in the pajamas nodded and immediately left the room. I noticed that mother was still there, using the big television device. I said, "Hey! Who was that?"

source

Mother: "That was my replicoid, a kind of helper."

"I asked, 'Do I have one, too?'"

Mother: This is crazy. She shouldn't know about any of this.

Time Teller: She'll remember nothing from this Domain.

My sister was silent for a while. I didn't know what she was talking about. "That was all. Like a dream of a dream. But now I do remember! My replicoid let me remember. And now you know what really happened. Well, all that matters is that we are here.....we'll always be together!" She grew quiet again, lost in thought.

I said, "That was a funny story. Tell me another one."

"Very well. I'll read you the story of the Cheshire cat." She started reading to me and soon I was asleep.

Until today, I've never been able to remember her story about the Time Teller.

___________________________________

Dreams within Dreams

Click image to enlarge. image credits

I like to think that the Time Teller was Grean. The car accident must have been a chance event, not foreseen by Trysta and Grean when they selected the Buld Reality.

Somehow, my death and the subsequent edit to the timeline that prevented my death.....in particular, the fact that my sister was sent back through time and was later allowed to remember her visit to the Hierion Domain.....it all in some way pleased Grean. When looking into the future, did Grean see that I would one day remember that day when I first heard about the Hierion Domain?

I've always had a special connection to my sister. I just asked her to read my reconstruction of her story about the Time Teller (above). She remembers reading Alice in Wonderland to me when I was a young boy and she admits that she used to make up her own adventure stories, but she has no memory of the Time Teller.
_________________________________

"Strong" by marianne luintje

Image Credits

image credits

For my depiction of "The Time Teller" I needed to illustrate a scene that took place in the Hierion Domain. To create the background (see "Time Teller Room", image to the left) I used a photograph of a leaf called "Strong" by Deviant ART member marianne luintje.

source 1, source 2

To depict the hermaphroditic Kac'hin, Grean, I used two photographs of E. Barbeau.: "Your Call is Very Important to Us Stock 4" and "Secret Agent Stock 7" by Deviant ART member Cassy-Blue.

"sister", details

In order to depict my sister, I made use of three photographs from Deviant ART member "Kristina", at the intergalacticstock gallery. See "Looking Back 6" (these three photographs were taken by "Elizabeth" at PersephoneStock), "Snakeskin 17" and "Snapshot 8".

I wanted to depict both 1) a very young version of my sister and 2) Grean in the act of viewing future versions of my sister (see the images to the left).

viewing the accident scene (source)

My mother is shown near a projected view of the events leading up to the car accident. To depict my mother, I used "Danielle - R.E.S.P.E.C.T. - 2" by FantasyStock.

A couple of other public domain images were also used such as "CIMG2044GS-VIE-Schneepflug" (snow plow).

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Not Holding My Breath

June 1942 Astounding

Five or six years ago rumors circulated that Isaac Asimov's Foundation saga might be put through the Hollywood meat grinder. Given the rather cerebral nature of Asimov's science fiction, I am not surprised that a Foundation movie never emerged from the land of shoot and go boom. Recently, rumors have been floated that 1) Asimov's Foundation, 2) Clarke's 3001 and 3) his Childhood's End (see this) as well as 4) a reboot of the X-Files might all find their way into production as new television shows. As a fan of Asimov, Clarke and The X-Files, I'm intrigued and fearful of what might develop from these projects.

Daneel
The rumor is that HBO intends to tell stories that are based on Asimov's original Foundation Trilogy. Asimov's original Foundation tales were published in Astounding magazine over 60 years ago.....will those old stories mesh with modern sensibilities? Another important consideration is that Asimov later "re-imagined" the Foundation saga, linking the Foundation stories with his positronic robot stories. My advice to HBO and Jonathan Nolan is that they make R. Daneel Olivaw a major star of their Foundation television show and give plenty of screen time to a female robotic character, possibly a "reincarnated" Dors.

August 1944 Astounding

I've previously mentioned my enthusiasm for the way that Asimov inserted Daneel into the Foundation saga. In Forward the Foundation, published the year after Asimov's death, Asimov depicted Daneel as the mastermind behind Hari Seldon. In Foundation and Earth, Asimov showed the end game for the Foundation, a future in which Daneel's Galaxia project might be completed. In the final analysis, "Seldon's Foundation Project" was just Daneel's way to develop the last bits of technology that were needed to make Galaxia possible.

With Foundation and Earth and Forward the Foundation, Asimov showed how to knit together the saga of Hari Seldon and the Foundations with the 20,000 year long effort of Daneel to satisfy the Zeroth Law. This "knitting" was an act of literary genius, Asimov's last great gift to the science fiction genre.

Time Vault

holographic recording of Hari Seldon

The first episode of any Foundation television show should be an hour-long rush to depict the fledgling Foundation on Terminus, mired in its first Seldon Crisis and then culminating with a dramatic appearance by Seldon in the Time Vault. A Second Foundation agent, the daughter of Wanda should be shown at work on Terminus.

".....the Second Foundation is directing the historical course of the Galaxy....." - Pelleas Anthor

Time Travel

April 1945 Astounding

Psychohistory is the key pseudoscientific myth that supports the Cult of Seldon. Daneel makes use of religion as the glue that holds together the forming Foundation. The key miracles of the early Foundation Era are the recordings of Seldon that are timed to play exactly when the growing Foundation faces its greatest challenges.

The End of Eternity
A Foundation television show should show time travel technology being used to make possible the ability of the psychohistorians to seemingly predict the future. The Prime Radiant is a kind of mind-control device that allows the psychohistorians to "view the future" and encode their visions in a mathematical format while preventing them from being consciously aware of the role that time travel technology plays in their work. The role of time travel (and who wields the time travel technology) should be the big reveal in the second episode of a Foundation television series.

In The End of Eternity, the Eternals constantly worked to keep Humanity safe by "editing out of Time" inventions like nuclear bombs and the mass duplicator. Daneel faced the inverse challenge: creating the conditions under which human ingenuity could discover the one last innovation required to complete Galaxia. The dynamic tension between the First and Second Foundations concealed a carefully orchestrated effort to allow research into mentalics and advanced hyperspatial drive technology.....exactly what was needed to complete the Galaxia supermind.

Telepathy

November 1945 Astounding

I'm not convinced that anyone in Hollywood has ever figured out how to depict telepathic communication and the type of non-linguistic  "mentalic" control of emotions depicted by Asimov in the Foundation saga. A Foundation television show needs to flawlessly show "mentalic mind control" and telepathic communication between Second Foundationers and positronic robots like Daneel.

Asimov knew that there was no way to mathematically predict the future and in the decades following the 1940s, concepts such as the "butterfly effect" have entered into the common consciousness. Asimov clearly illustrated that human progress cannot be predicted when he wrote the Mule into the Foundation saga. The Mule was portrayed as a dramatic random factor that could break the magical spell of Seldon's infallibility, a spell that had given the people of the early First Foundation their confidence. After The Mule's rise to power, the First Foundation had to face the fact that a Second Foundation, a cadre of genetic mutants with "mentalic" powers, was secretly at work in the galaxy. I'd rush to show the Mule crushing the First Foundation by the end of the third episode of a Foundation Television series. Bayta should be shown as the key First Foundationer resiting the Mule.

January 1948 Astounding

The central tension of a Foundation television show needs to be based on the audience's ability to identify with the First Foundationers and their struggle to not be puppets of the Second Foundationers. At the same time, viewers must be shown how Daneel is secretly working to use the Foundations for his own purpose (creating Galaxia). And lurking behind Daneel must be the mystery of who it is that has access to time travel technology and who "gave" telepathic powers to the positronic robots.

After the defeat of the Mule, the First Foundationers must be returned to their state of ignorant bliss, convinced that the Second Foundation has been destroyed.

November 1949 Astounding

I'd make Arkady the main character of episode 4, but it needs to be shown how Lady Callia uses her mentalic power to control Arkady. Once the struggle between the First and Second Foundation is established, then a Foundation television series can loop back and do all of Asimov's original Foundation stories in a more leisurely fashion. The fate of Arkady can be left hanging and remain to be resolved at the very end of the series.

Don't Hold Your Breath
I'd love to see something good come out of HBO's ownership of the rights to develop a video version of Asimov's Foundation trilogy, but I'm not holding my breath.

2017 update: Goyer and Friedman/Foundation rumor
2020 update: Foundation on Apple TV

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End of March Update: Fox confirmed that several new episodes of The X-Files will enter production during summer 2015.
Update 2016: The X-Files Season 10

Reality TV: New Miss Universe Contest

Top Syd Turvye

Replicoid Games
"The Arrival"

During the past month I've been blogging about my "visits" to the Hierion Domain. I've been given a few tantalizing glimpses into the Hierion Domain, but I don't really understand what I have "seen" there.

It might be constructive to write down a summary of what I believe is actually happening when I experience the Hierion Domain.....

1) My experiences in the Hierion Domain have all been mediated by my replicoid. Replicoids seem to be a form of artificial life that resides in the Hierion Domain.

2) I believe that we humans are all dual lifeforms, part hadronic organisms composed of cells and part zeptite endosymbionts. By using the Bimanoid Interface, I have been able to establish a communications channel that allows me to remember experiences that I have while my conscious mind is in control of my replicoid. I suspect that this involves a linkage between the hierion and sedronic components of my endosymbiont with the hierion-based components of my replicoid.

source

3) There seems to be an on-going struggle over my replicoid. During recent weeks, Anney has assisted me in using the Bimanoid Interface and she has facilitated my "visits" to the hierion domain. In contrast, I've recently learned that a tryp'At Selfie, Irhit, has been trying to prevent my access to the Hierion Domain. During the past week, since I had my first "direct" contact with Irhit, I've been unable to "return" to the Hierion Domain. Even worse, although I don't understand how, it appears that Irhit has some ability to use the Bimanoid Interface in "reverse direction" in order to exercise control over my body (at least my mind) here in the Hadronic Domain.

Asimov's Coach

The End of Eternity

I'm puzzled by many aspects of my recent experiences in/with the Hierion Domain. One of these intriguing mysteries is my conviction that there is an important connection between my replicoid and my future. I'd like to be able to identify some facts that could anchor my hunch about a link between my future and my replicoid. Here is a brief sketch of my thinking that leads me into this dark mystery.....

Time Travel
What seems like the obvious first anchor point is the central role that Isaac Asimov played in revealing the mechanics of time travel.

Ever since I was provided with the "Thomas infites", I've suspected that it was Thomas (or, more accurately, the artificial lifeform that originated as his nanite endosymbiont) that provided Asimov with information about time travel such as an understanding of the Momentum of Time. However, that was never proven and it might be that Thomas knew very little about time travel.

A few months ago, Ivory provided me with some infites that held some information about the planet Yrwerd. I'm not sure what the source of that information was (possible a tryp'At such as Resh^Ki or Irhit, maybe it came from her interaction with tryp'At Overseers on the Moon) but Ivory's information took on new meaning for me after Irhit spoke to me about his role as my coach.

I now suspect that what Ivory had discovered about Yrwerd is that it was an important source of Interventionist agents who have operated on Earth, a whole second team of agents who have operated on Earth in addition to Thomas and his clones like Parthney.

source

I now have to consider the possibility that Thomas and his clones were little more that a smoke screen that was designed and deployed in order to distract the Overseers while a more secretive (and competent) group our Interventionist agents did the "serious work" that really needed to be accomplished.

I'm intrigued by the idea that there is some close connection between Gohrlay and the tryp'At Interventionists from Yrwerd. It was R. Gohrlay and "her" team of positronic robots who "invented" time travel and used it to "deploy" Trysta here in the Primitive Era of Earth in order to bring into existence the Buld Reality. Did Gohrlay also design and deploy the tryp'At as her tool to "fine tune" the Buld Reality once it was brought into existence?

Since I recently learned of the existence of the tryp'At, I've been trying to develop an understanding of the abilities of various members of the Sedronite family to use the Bimanoid Interface. It appears that Asterothropes like Trysta, Kac'hin hermaphrodites including Grean and tryp'At such as Resh^Ki have all been provided with a fairly advanced ability to use the Bimanoid Interface.

Brick Bradford cartoon with the Time Top (source)

Ivory informed me that "an Interventionist from Yrwerd" had a Selfie that was able to travel back in time from a point in the Ekcolir Reality that is several hundred years in our future and then act as a coach who "inserted" key information about time travel into the Buld Reality. Until this week, I did not know what Ivory meant as a coach, but according to what I learned from Irhit, this probably means that Asimov was influenced by a type of "reverse information flow" through the Bimanoid Interface.

cover art by Robert Fuqua

It is a bit of a puzzle: were special efforts made to "release" key information about about positronic robots and time travel through the science fiction stories of Asimov or did it just happen in the Buld Reality through Temporal Momentum? Ivory's infites contained the idea that the "coach" influenced multiple targets including "Gray". My research has turned up the fact that Clarence Gray was the artist who drew the "Time Top" that was used by Brick Bradford to travel through time.

The Time Top in film (source)

Asimov suspected that most of his ideas for science fiction stories were shaped and influenced by the many science fiction stories that he read as a boy during the 1930s. He had grown tired of reading stories about "clanking, murderous robots" and so he wrote stories about robots that could be programmed to behave and help humans.

March 1932

When Asimov wrote his time travel story, The End of Eternity, he chose to describe his time travel machine as a "kettle". Actually, there were two types: one that was restricted to movement through a temporal "shaft" and another that was unrestricted and could take people back into the Primitive Era of Earth's history, before time travel had been invented.

Mushroom cloud?

Legend has it that Asimov saw a depiction of the Old Faithful geyser in Time magazine (the March 28, 1932 issue). At first he did not recognize it a steam cloud, instead he saw it as a mushroom cloud from a nuclear weapon explosion. He proceeded to imagine a time travel story in which a drawing of a mushroom cloud was used as a "secret message" by a time traveler who was lost in time.

First Contact

In the cover of the March 28, 1932 issue of Time was Charles Street, remembered for a baseball stunt: catching a ball thrown off the Washington Monument. Thomas believed that Asimov was the critical nexus of the Buld Reality and so he spent decades trying to influence the writing career of Asimov. However, it might be that Asimov's true importance in the Buld Reality only came after his death.

source

Ultimately, the link between Thomas and Asimov allowed Parthney (a clone of Thomas) and Thomas to both end up at Observer Base at the same time, an event foreseen by Trysta. Equipped with advanced Asterothrope nanites, Thomas was able to teleport Parthney back to the Galactic Core and, with the help of Izhiun, shut down the pek Observer program on the Moon. I've previously imagined that Asimov played a key role in linking together Thomas and Parthney, but Asimov's rather tenuous role might have been unimportant.

In addition to his career as a writer of fiction, Asimov did a large amount of fact-based science writing. He was one of the early publicists of global warming, ice cap melting and sea level rise. However, did Asimov really ever have a meaningful effect on the rate of fossil fuel use through his writing?

Replicoids in Time

For the past few weeks, since hearing the idea of time traveling replicoids, I've occasionally been contemplating the possibility that my replicoid has traveled through time. If so, then my replicoid could be a valuable source of information about the future. Irhit might be trying to prevent me from gaining control of my replicoid in order to keep me ignorant of what my replicoid learned in the future.

What if Irhit has now permanently cut me off from my replicoid and the Hierion Domain? Is it possible that I already have access to other sources of information about the future? I fear that Irhit has been able to shape and guide my thought processes, and possibly modulate my access to my own memories.

Michael Whelan cover art

I've always thought of my own family as a conventional collection of Earthlings. However, I've always had a special "connection" to my sister and some of my earliest memories are of my sister telling me stories. With hope that my use of the nicotine-based drug that I received from Anney might allow me to recover old memories, I've been trying to revive my old memories with the hope that I might "hear" my sister's words. Using a technique like that which allowed me to "talk to" Irhit, I've tried to recover the stories that my sister long ago told to me. However, I don't know if my "recovered memories" are real or just a self-generated fantasy. I'll try to bring order to these intriguing "memory fragments" in another blog post.

Next: can Hollywood do science fiction?

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Past Lives

Luri the Interventionist (source)

In my previous blog post I mentioned that I had been stimulated to think about my existence in previous Realities. Actually, what I believe recently happened was that I began to gain control of my own brain. I'm now able to think about previously forbidden topics.

Who (or what) has been interfering with my thought processes? My prime suspect became my replicoid. Actually, my hunch was that my replicoid is only the tool of some other person, a hidden "mind vampire" who watched my every move. But how could someone else take control of my replicoid?

A direct approach to obtaining answers to these questions involved asking my replicoid. I've previously described a technique that allows me to interview my own replicoid. Below, I present what my replicoid told me about my analogue in the Ekcolir Reality. But first, a few words about analogues, the versions of ourselves that existed in Deep Time.

Background: Deep Time

Recent Realities of Deep Time

The fundamental features of time travel were revealed to Earthlings long ago in Isaac Asimov's The End of Eternity. Time travelers can could make alterations in a timeline, causing a new sequence of events to occur, replacing the previous course of events. Such changes are called Reality Changes and they separate two different Realities. With help from Angela and Anney, I've been trying to map out the past Realities that existed just before the universe as we know it (the Buld Reality) came into existence.

Note: I've been told that time travel is no longer possible.

know matter

An intriguing feature of the Reality Change is that when a new Reality came into existence, it was amazingly similar to the previous Reality. In other words, the is a powerful "Momentum of Time" (Asimov used the term inertia.)

Sedronic Memory. Most of the universe exists within the Sedronic Domain. A feature of the Sedronic Domain is that it contains a "record" or "memory" of Deep Time, of all the events that happened before our current Reality came into existence. According to Anney, the Sedronic Domain also contains information about the future, but the current dimensional structure of the universe does not allow anyone to access information from the future.

aliens in the Hierion Domain

Temporal Momentum. In addition to the "natural" Momentum of Time, R. Gohrlay's tribe of positronic robots created an "inertial amplifier", an application of the mass-duplicator. Time travel depended on "Eternity bubble universes" which existed in the Hierion Domain. The Eternals were able to apply mass-duplicator technology to hierions. For example, by making hierion-based "duplicates" of people within Eternity it was possible to greatly increase temporal momentum and make it very likely that the same people would be found in adjacent Realities.

Analogues. Thus, almost everyone here in our world had an analogue in the previous Reality, the Ekcolir Reality. Previously, I'd learned that several people were "brought over" from the Ekcolir Reality into the Buld Reality. For example, Trysta, Ekcolir, Grean and Thomas all lived previously in the Ekcolir Reality before they traveled through time and appeared in our Reality. Now, we could ask, did their travel into the Buld Reality by way of Eternity mean that there are now two "copies" of each of them, one being their "natural analogue" in this Reality and the other being the "imported copy" that arrived from the previous Reality? Apparently the answer is no. Trysta, Ekcolir, Grean and Thomas were not humans and the "inertial amplifier" of Earth was only designed to assure that humans would have Temporal Momentum.

Again, Asimov
In The End of Eternity, Asimov mentioned Eric Linkollew, a writer from the 575th century. An analogue of Linkollew existed in a whole series of successive Realities and he was a writer in each of them, but his writing career was somewhat different in each Reality.

I've been told that "duplicates" of both Asimov and Vance were made, so for at least a short time in the Buld Reality there might have been "competition" between those copies for access to a shared replicoid. Also, both Angela and Anney have previously shown considerable interest in the writing careers of the analogues of Asimov and Vance in Deep Time (see in particular this blog post). The issue of "duplicate copies" of individuals, and Asimov and Vance as specific examples, come up in the following, what I'll call the Interview, Part 2. (Part 1 is here)

Interview - Part 2

Replicoid

As was the case for Part 1, in the transcript of the interview (below), the text following "Me2" is what I recorded myself saying, which represents responses that were channeled through my replicoid in the Hierion Domain and produced by means of my replicoid taking control of my speech muscles. The text following "Me" is a textual representation of my thoughts, what I was thinking and "transmitting" to my replicoid in the Hierion Domain.

Me: Did I have an analogue in the previous Reality?

Me2: Of course. Why do you ask?

Me: After our last session together I started thinking about my analogues in Deep Time.

Me2: Analogues? Plural?

Me: I've previously learned about the analogues of Jack Vance in the previous Reality and Asimov's analogues going all the way back to the Foundation Reality.

Me2: Yes, but you had no analogue in the Foundation Reality.

Me: Um....wow. I'm surprised. Why not?

Me2: Well, that's not easy to explain.

Me: I've got plenty of time.

Me2. Simply put, your analogue in the Ekcolir Reality was born into that Reality as a fully new individual, with no earlier analogues in Deep Time.

Me: I see. Is that a rare occurrence, a "fully new individual" suddenly appearing in one Reality of a Reality Chain?

Me2: Not in general, but here on Earth it would be unusual for a human to not to have a set of analogues in each step of the recent Reality Chain.

Me: Wasn't Earth equipped with inertial amplifiers that cause people to have analogues in successive Realities?

source

Me2: It was, but you've made a bad assumption. Your analogue in the Ekcolir Reality was born on a world of the Galactic Core.

Me: Do you mean I'm an alien?

Me2: I'm not sure what you're asking. Biologically alien? No. You're a human, born on Earth. You are not an alien just because your analogue in the Ekcolir Reality wasn't born on Earth.

Me: I'm just surprised. How common is it for visitors to Earth to "slip themselves in" to the Reality Chain? Are there others like me?

Me2: Well, in this regard you might well be unique. I don't know. Anney could try find the answer. Does it matter?

Me: This is the first thing I've ever heard about my analogue. I don't know what to think. Why did my analogue come to Earth?

Me2: I'm not sure how to explain that to you. Do you believe what Anney has told you about Resh^Ki?

Me: What I've heard about Resh^Ki seems rather garbled and confused. What I've heard from Anney seems to conflict with what I learned from Resh^Ki's infites.

Me2: Well, don't get tied up in the bad blood between Anney and Resh^Ki. They each see the world in completely different ways. Do you accept the idea that the tryp'At are a type of human from the Galactic Core?

Me: I suppose. Anney told me that I....or, you....well, my replicoid....has even "merged minds" with Resh^Ki on occasion, but I have no memory of those merging events.

Special thanks to Miranda Hedman for
"Black Cat 9 - stock" that I used to create
the blue "sedronite".

Me2: Okay. None of that matters. The point is, your analogue in the Ekcolir Reality was a tryp'At.

Me: So, I'm tryp'At?

Me2: No. Just a minute ago we both agreed that you're human.

Me: Well, I'm confused. My analogue was a tryp'At, but I'm human?

Me2: Right.

Me: I'm still confused. Are you saying that there is no biological difference between tryp'At and humans?

Me2: There are minor biological differences, but the tryp'At were carefully engineered to be human as judged by the technical criteria of the Trysta-Grean Pact.

Foundations of Eternnity

Me: Okay, but I'm surprised that the inertial amplifiers of Earth were able to assure that a visiting tryp'At in the Ekcolir Reality would have an analogue in the Buld Reality.

Me2: Well, that was not left to chance. You could say that Gohrlay handled both ends of that.

Me: I might say so if I knew what that means.

Me2: Look, it's not that complicated. Gohrlay established the inertial amplification system of Earth and Gohrlay made sure that the tryp'At would be backwards compatible with that system.

Me: So, is it true that Gohrlay is still watching over Earth?

Me2: That's an interesting question. All I can say is that the tryp'At are watching over Earth and Gohrlay designed the tryp'At. Lately, I've been in no position to know what Gohrlay is up to.

Me: What exactly is your position?

clones: Thomas and Parthney

Me2: Let me ask you this: who do you think you're talking to right now?

Me: Well, I've been wondering if I was duplicated by teleportation and if a "copy" of me has taken control of my replicoid.

Me2: You've never been teleported, but that's an academic thought experiment. If someone were duplicated by teleportation then why would either copy have more of a claim on their replicoid?

Me: Shouldn't the original copy keep its replicoid?

Me2: The point is, the two copies would be indistinguishable. Anyhow, it would be a trivial matter to duplicate the replicoid also.....in fact, I think that all the teleporters that were ever used on Earth were set to automatically do that.

Me: Oh. So you are not a copy of me?

Daveed

Me2: Correct. You've never been teleported. And before you ask, you were never sent through time either, so I'm not a time traveling copy of you, either.

Me: That's rather disappointing. I have some odd memories that have led me to suspect that I might have once traveled into the future.

Me2: Given the complex jumble of memories that you carry, how do you keep them all straight?

Me: It isn't easy...often I can't. However, I feel like you are trying to distract me and change the subject. Who are you then, just my replicoid?

Me2: That's rather rude. Are you implying that a replicoid is just a hollow shell, not a complete person?

Me: I need a copy of Replicoids for Dummies. I don't really understand what replicoids are. Right now, as I listen to "your" voice, it seems distinctly different from my own. My suspicion is that my replicoid has been hijacked by someone else.

Me2: Well, the voice differences are mostly a technical issue. The Bimanoid Interface was never designed to allow a replicoid to take control of a linked body out in the Hadronic Domain. Look at the absurd effort you have to go through to allow me to "use your voice". It also takes a special effort from this end, but Gohrlay made sure that I was equipped for the job.

Me: Are you saying that Gohrlay foresaw us having this conversation?

Me2: I doubt it. Fine details like that were apparently all lost in the fuzz of viewing the future. Still, I suspect that Gohrlay made a special effort to make sure that tryp'At could use the Interface well, both forwards and backwards.

Me: So, did you just imply that you are tryp'At?

Me2: Yes, yes, that's what I've been trying to tell you. I started out in life as tryp'At. I'm now well into my artificial second life.

source

Me: This seems to be what has had Anney upset. She hates the idea that a rogue tryp'At like Resh^Ki infiltrated the Hierion Domain. I'm a bit upset too, because it is my understanding that the tryp'At are hermaphrodites.

Me2: Ha, ha. We'll there are two kinds of tryp'At, just like the Ek'col. Most tryp'At are hermaphrodites, like Resh^Ki, but you're male. Analogues can differ quite a bit biologically, but they don't often change sex!

Me: Ah, now I see. You are my analog from the Ekcolir Reality. Did you slip into this Reality by time travel, by way of Eternity?

image credits

Me2: I wasn't consulted, I was just brought over to the Buld Reality and given my assignment. Of course, when I volunteered to go to Earth I gave away my right to be fully informed about the parameters of my mission. I was told that I could not be told exactly what I was getting myself into.

Me: Yet, you still volunteered. What did you think you'd accomplish by coming to Earth?

Me2: Well, the answer to that question is rather embarrassing. I was trained for my mission to Earth and I had a totally bogus conceptualization of why I was sent to Earth. However, I did think that my mission was designed to help the people of Earth.

Me: So, tell me, if you were just inserted into Earth as a visitor from a distant world, how did I end up being born on Earth? Am I not related to my parents?

Me2: Ah, there was a genius at work on that problem, probably old Gohrlay herself! Look, although I was born on another planet, both my parents were stationed on Earth for most of their lives. In fact, my ancestors can trace their origins all the way back to Ekcolir's time on Earth 20,000 years ago. Anyhow, not long before I was conceived, my parents left Earth and went to the Galactic Core. Here in the Buld Reality, they stayed on Earth and you were born.

Me: So what about you? Do you live on Earth? Do I know you?

Me2: What? Oh, I see...you're still confused. Look, I was brought into the Buld Reality to be your coach. I could not do that job if I was in the Hadronic Domain. Look, you know what a Selfie is, right? That's what you call them?

Me: Ivory tried to explain Selfies to me. I thought that Selfies were a Kac'hin innovation.

Me2: Yes, but there are important similarities between the Kac'hin and the tryp'At. Anyhow, when I grew up in the Galactic Core, I had a Selfie. My Selfie came to Earth with me and functioned as my helper and aide. When it came time to jump from the Ekcolir Reality into the Buld Reality it was a situation similar to what happened to Ivory. My nanite endosymbiont was transferred into my Selfie and that hynbid artificial lifeform was who got inserted into this Reality.

Me: Now I begin to understand. Are you saying that my replicoid is a Selfie?

Me2: What? No! Ha, ha. You always find a way to misunderstand things. Don't forget: replicoids can easily share infites and "merge minds". As a tryp'At Selfie, I can easily put my nanites into your replicoid.

Me: I see. And what do you hope to accomplish by doing that?

Me2: I told you, I was your coach, your trainer. It was my task to prepare you for your role in telling the secret history of Humanity to the Earthlings. Of course, I was never told exactly what your role would be. In fact, due to the complexity of the Reality Change that brought this Reality into existence, I suspect there was way too much fuzz...maybe nobody could foresee exactly how things would play out.

Me: Well, coach, what advice do you have for me?

Me2: Eh? Oh, I see. Don't you get it? I completed my coaching job long ago. When I was done coaching you, you were equipped to absorb infites and ready to start telling the world about the Huaoshy. The only problem was that you were ready too early. We put you on hold by inactivating your Bimanoid Interface. I'm surprised that you've found a way to start reactivating it. If you want my advice, here it is: stop trying to connect to your replicoid.

Trysta and Ekcolir

Me: But there is so much that I don't know.

Me2: You have the infites from Thomas and Izhiun. That's all you need. Just write it all down. The only thing that you need to do is share what you know with the world.

Me: I'll certainly discuss your suggestions with the Dead Widowers. Towards that end, please tell me your name and the name of your home world. Also, I'd like to ask you a favor. Since you are done with your coaching job, will you now please stop your occupation of my replicoid?

 Me2: The Dead Widowers know me by the name Irhit.

Me: That's a strange name.

Me2: It's not a real name. It's a code name, from a language spoken on my home world, Yrwerd. [He pronounced it "yearwood", but I recognized the name of the planet: it had been included in the infites that I received from Ivory.]

image credits

Me: I've been told that Resh^Ki is from Yrwerd.

Me2: Yrwerd is the tryp'At homeworld.

Me: So, what about my replicoid?

Me2: Beyond just helping you, my larger mission is to enforce the terms of the Trysta-Grean Pact. I don't think your interest in using the Bimanoid Interface and your efforts aimed at strengthening your contacts with your replicoid are useful, that's not how you should be spending your time. In fact, your contacts with people like Anney by way of the Hierion Domain are only distracting you.

Me: I suspect that you know me quite well. You should know that I'm not comfortable being used as anyone's tool, particularly if I don't know what's going on.

Me2: As far as I can tell, there were only ever three people who had a chance of "knowing what's going on": Trysta, Grean and Gohrlay. Even they could only do their best to establish this Reality. Now that time travel has been taken off the table by the Huaoshy, we're all in the same boat, we have to discover our future.

Me: So, you're going to keep using my replcoid.

Me2: Through your replicoid, I have a line of communication with the Dead Widowers, which is a good thing. Anyhow, I could lie to you and say that I'm going to stop "visiting" your replicoid. There's nothing you can do about it.

Me: I intend to keep improving my contact with my replicoid. I'd catch you in your lie.

Me2: Look, success of the Pact and creation of a good future for Humanity is dependent a precisely balanced flow of critical information to the population of Earth. If you diverge from the plan, you'll ruin everything.

Me: You expect me to trust you to tell me what I should do?

Me2: No, I don't trust you at all, which is why I resisted your attempts to use the Bimanoid Interface.

Me: I see. You don't trust me and you won't do as I ask. So, we will have to battle for control of my replicoid?

Me2: You can't use the Bimanoid Interface like a Kac'hin. You might as well save time and abandon your silly idea that you could ever control your replicoid.

Me: Unfortunately for you, I feel like I used to control my replicoid and I feel like I am making progress towards recovering those old lost memories. Further, I suspect that you are all that is preventing me from recovering those important memories. In other words, I think you've lied to me and I feel like I'd be a fool to follow your advice.
____________________________
At that point the "interview" ended. I now wonder if I'll hear anything more from Irhit.

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