Since
2012 I have been imagining how to interpret
Jack Vance's stories about the future as having been inspired by actual historical events from the
Asimov Reality. In that
Reality, humans had been given access to advanced technology in order to allow people to spread to thousands of exoplanets where human genetics and breeding experiments could be performed.
Human breeding experiments? The goal was to create a human variant that could efficiently use the
Bimanoid Interface, allowing for a kind of technology-assisted telepathy.
Deep Time
Previously, in the
Mallansohn Reality,
R. Gohrlay had created the
Asterothrope. Asterothropes are a human variant with the ability to use the Bimanoid Interface. As hinted at by
Isaac Asimov in his novel
The End of Eternity,
Noÿs Lambent, an Asterothrope from the far future, was able to use her command of the Bimanoid Interface to control the thought patterns of men such as
Andrew Harlan.
However, under the restrictions imposed by
the Trysta-Grean Pact, Asterothropes could not remain on Earth to help guide Humanity into an uncertain future. According the technical definition used by the
Huaoshy, Asterothropes are not human and after the Trysta-Grean Pact was in effect, all non-humans had to be removed from Earth. So, it was back to the old drawing board.
In the Asimov Reality
I've previously imagined that the parents of
Alice Wroke and
Kirth Gersen were
Interventionist agents. Among the Interventionists of the Asimov Reality, a fear had arisen suggesting that alien forces were at work, providing dangerous technologies to humans in an attempt to cause the destruction of humanity in a technological catastrophe. One of the great mysteries was how the "
Jarnell Intersplit" had been created, providing humanity with faster-than-light space travel.
In Gersen's time,
Zodiac Control, a special investigative unit of the
Institute, attempted to take control of the
Jarnell Corporation and learn the origin of "sedron pod" space drive technology. However, even centuries later, during the life of
Glinnes, mysteries persisted about the origins of both the
hierion and the
sedron-based technologies that had been provided to humans. Powerful organizations like the Institute and the
Historical Institute continued to suppress scientific research efforts and keep many planetary populations isolated as genetic laboratory worlds.
It seems possible that Alice's father was an agent for Zodiac Control. Endowed with a special
femtobot endosymbiont,
Howard Treesong was able to influence the behavior of people like
Benjamin Wroke, facilitating his rise to the highest levels of the Institute's hierarchy. Treesong discovered that Alice Wroke had inherited her father's ability to partially connect to the Bimanoid Interface. That allowed Treesong to use Alice as his tool for investigating the
Cosmopolis contest that had been devised by Gersen (a new sister publication,
Extant, was launched to actually host the contest).
I like to imagine that Alice and Kirth had some type of weak telepathic connection to each other via the Bimanoid Interface. As described by Vance in
The Book of Dreams, as soon as Alice came within visual range, Kirth looked out the window and noticed Alice standing across the street. Vance tells us that Kirth took an immediate interest in Alice, for several reasons. We are told that the third reason was, "...rising from his subconscious, and perhaps most important of all."
Zeta suggests that under the terms of the
Trysta Truce, there was very little
Overseer activity during the human space age of the Asimov Reality. The
IPX was controlled by Overseers and their main efforts were devoted to monitoring the efforts of
R. Gohrlay to genetically modify humans. Ironically, Gersen always distrusted the Institute while maintaining a working relationship with the
IPCC.
The Final Reality
After much effort and even some help from the
Phari, R. Gohrlay managed to create the
tryp'At as a new human variant that could remain on Earth in the
Final Reality. The tryp'At could efficiently use the Bimanoid Interface and by
Viewing the future, R. Gohrlay had come to believe that the tryp'At were needed in order to assure the survival of humans as a species.
At the same time when the tryp'At we created, the
Ek'col were crafted by the
pek and
Ekcolir was used to finally end the
Time War. Ultimately, R. Gohrlay realized that the tryp'At were a danger to Earth's future, so she engineered a
change to the Bimanoid Interface. That forced the tryp'At to end their role as the Overseers of Earth.
Wild Isle
There are several interesting "coincidences" and mysteries in Jack Vance's
Demon Princes saga that I like to attribute to the fact that Vance's stories were inspired by actual events but he was restricted from revealing secrets about how we Earthlings are controlled and guided by aliens.
 |
| torture at Brinktown |
An unexplained coincidence in the first novel in Vance's saga is how, in a very short period of time: 1) Gersen learns the names of the 5 Demon Princes, 2) he also learns that
Malagate is an alien Star King and 3) he obtains the encoded location of Teehalt's planet. This odd coincidence is discussed in
my previous blog post.
 |
the final novel in the
Demon Princes saga |
A mystery in the last novel of Vance's saga is how Benjamin Wroke, who works in a casino on Wild Isle, rises to become a member of the Institute's ruling Dexad. I like to imagine that after the death of
Howard Treesong, Alice Wroke and Kirth Gersen visited Wild Isle and investigated the death of Benjamin Wroke. They discovered that Treesong spent considerable amounts of time on Wild Isle trying to maintain his control over profits from the gambling casinos.
Benjamin Wroke had been provided with "cover" and established as an employee at one of the casinos. While trying to penetrate Treesong's criminal organization and learn the secrets of his great success as a criminal, Benjamin worked with Treesong in a scam that allowed them both to rise to level 99 members of the Institute. As Gersen suspected, this required considerable "mind bending", which Benjamin and Treesong were able to accomplish by means of their ability to make use of the Bimanoid Interface.
However, eventually Treesong murdered Benjamin. In fact, Treesong tried to murder the entire Dexad so that he could take control of the Institute. However, it was the mass murder of the Dexad that allowed Kirth Gersen to obtain and publish a photograph of Treesong. At that point, Treesong was able to use Alice as his spy in an attempt to infiltrate Gersen's operation at
Cosmopolis (
Extant) magazine.
According to Caril Carphen, author of
The Demon Princes, Treesong was a master criminal because of his "
organizational genius". He was known for the "
elaborate methodicity of his programs". According to Carphen: "
By all accounts he enjoys the company of beautiful women, none of whom seems to benefit from the association either spiritually of financially. To the contrary, the romances of which anything is known all end tragically, if not worse."
It is only through her lucky collaboration with Gersen that Alice avoids becoming another of Treesong's badly-used lady friends.
Related Reading:
The Alice Investigations
Next: return to
the planet Trullion
No comments:
Post a Comment