Jul 23, 2020

1950s Aliens

Advanced alien technology is used
to build a wise-cracking robot.
Will the robot get the girl?
Back in March, I abandoned all hope of finding any interesting space aliens in new films that are being released in 2020.

Searching the 1950s
The 2020 Search for Interesting Aliens (SIHA) is going retro. Nominated for the most interesting aliens from films of the 1950s are:

1) The Krell. I can't remember the first time I saw Forbidden Planet. I was very young and its ancient aliens, the Krell, made a big impression on me. Sadly, we never get to meet the Krell because they destroyed themselves long ago. However, they left behind advanced technology that Dr. Edward Morbius gets to play around with.

brain boost
Optical Mind Probe
One remnant of the Krell is a brain-booster technology that can give you improved cognitive skills. However, when used on a human, this alien technology turned Dr. Morbius into a 1950s vintage mad scientist who killed all his companions on the original expedition to the Krell home world.

Now star-ship C-57D arrives from Earth. Will the dangerous technology of the Krell be spread to Earth? Is the fate of Humanity to be the same as that of the Krell?

Stranger
What is the dangerous Krell technology that now threatens human civilization? A way of amplifying someone's thoughts and turning them into a manifested electromagnetic entity. From Dr. Morbius' subconscious comes a monster that terrorized the crew of starship C-57D.

2) Venusians. The people of Venus have long been watching television. By watching television shows from Earth, the Venusians have learned about Earthly civilization and so, in the Stranger from Venus, the aliens can speak every human language.

Artificial life: Gort and Klaatu
Has the Stranger from Venus (sadly, he has no name) been using the Krell brain-boost technology? No. The Venusians are telepathic and they can instantly transform thoughts into any spoken language.

Sadly, the Venusians have watched so much Earthly television that they have become stupid. They think the distance between Earth and Venus can best be measured in millions of light-years.

3) Master of His Domain. If aliens ever do reach Earth, chances are they will be in the form of an artificial lifeform that can survive the challenges if interstellar travel. In The Day the Earth Stood Still, the Master is a klunky robot who makes use of a humanoid probe (Klaatu) to investigate human society.

Day 2
After being shot, the Klaatu probe can be quickly healed using repair nanites. Since no other interaction between aliens and humans is possible (in the 1950s, the censors would not allow Patricia Neal to have sex with aliens), poor Klaatu gets shot multiple times, but even when "dead", the Master can bring the Klaatu probe back to "life".

The 2008 remake. I'm in favor of updating old Sci Fi stories for new generations of science fiction fans. The 2008 film is a worthy update, but too long with too many needless special effects and not enough information about the aliens.

meta-Earthlings
4) The Zagons. The aliens of This Island Earth come in several flavors with most screen time given to the fair-haired Metalunans who are quite similar to we humans, but with bigger frontal lobes. Sadly, no, that is not a boob joke.

Energy Crisis. The evil Zagons are at war with the unfortunate Metalunans. Even-though the Metalunans have advanced technology, they don't understand physics. The Metalunans travel across vast interstellar distances and kidnap Earthly scientists because they want Faith Domergue to use superior human scientific abilities to discover how to convert lead into uranium, which will allow the Metalunans to defeat the Zagons.

Other absurdities in the story include a "thermal barrier" that surrounds planet Earth and taxes the air conditioning system of the Metalunan spaceship.

A Metaluna Mutant (right).

The Zagons are the coolest aliens in the galaxy because they come from a comet. Rather than use regulation 1950s Sci Fi disintegration rays to blast the Metalunans, the Zagons hurl big meteors at Metaluna, reducing the planet to a type of Swiss Cheese™ that was gloriously depicted on the Big Screen by advanced 1950s Hollywood special FX.

Sadly, images of the Zagons all ended up on the cutting room floor, but there was one 1950s monster that made the final cut (see the image to the right). Given the available technology for depicting aliens in films during the 1950s, it was probably best to keep your space aliens off screen.

Robby: How many females do you need?

The Winner

In November, I announced the winner of the 2020 retro-SIHA award for the best Hollywood aliens of the 1950s.


Next: an alternate Foundation

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Jul 19, 2020

Space Opera Jones

cover art by Fred Haucke
At the end of last year I mentioned the Raymond Fisher Jones story "Noise Level" that was published in the December 1952 issue of Astounding Science Fiction. In the early 1950s, Jones was making the move towards publishing novels rather than remaining trapped in the pages of science fiction magazines.

Of his two novels published in book format in 1951, only one was a newly published work (The Alien). The other (Renaissance) had been previously published in the form of 4 serial installments in the July, August, September and October 1944 issues of Astounding. I suspect that The Alien was rather hastily constructed (possibly at the request of H. L. Gold) by expanding a shorter story (one that had been rejected by SF magazines such as Galaxy) to book length.

The god of Venus? Interior
art by William Kolliker
As far as I can tell, the first science fiction story published by Jones was called "Test of the Gods" and it was published in the September 1941 Astounding along with Isaac Asimov's famous story "Nightfall". Both "Test of the Gods" and "Nightfall" are built around alien beings on other planets and their religious beliefs.

Natives of Venus and Heaven World
These days, it is not likely that any science fiction story teller would try to write a tale about the religious beliefs of dinosaur-like natives living in the jungles of Venus. However, back in the "Golden Age" of science fiction, many authors tried their hand at a story about life on Venus (for examples, see both this and this).

Chariots of the Gods?
In "Test of the Gods" (which is mercifully short), Jones plays around with the idea that the Venusians would construct for themselves beliefs about a deity that was appropriate for the conditions under which they had to live in the jungle of Venus. At the core of Jones' story is the implicit assumption that "primitive" people, upon being visited by strangers arriving from the sky, would assume that the visitors were gods.

Ancient Aliens
When I first came across this idea in Chariots of the Gods?, I was amused. At the time, I was struggling to understand how people retained their beliefs in absurd ideas that were part of their religious indoctrination.

the Temple of Birth
As a young boy, I was astounded to find myself surrounded by millions of fellow Earthlings who preferred to retain belief in religious doctrine rather than adopt a science-based understanding of the universe. Imagine Jones when he left behind Salt Lake City and went out into the wider world. How did he adapt his religious cultural inheritance to the task of writing science fiction stories? In both The Alien and Renaissance, Jones gives the classic Sci Fi science vs. religion themes some attention.

the War of 1927
Jones was born in 1915. It is hard for me to imagine growing up with your early life having been shaped by relatives going off to fight a war on the other side of the planet and then returning home with fantastic war stories to tell. Jones reached his personal golden age of Sci Fi in 1927 and according to his autobiographical sketches, Jones was strongly influenced by the publication of War of the Worlds in Amazing Stories.

Look at that 1927 magazine cover from Amazing Stories (shown to the right). That is a pretty good visual summary of battle scenes in both The Alien and Renaissance; they are very much a part of the "rockets and ray-guns" tradition. The only questions are: 1) who is blasting who and 2) why?

E. E. Smith; master of intergalactic
adventure. Cover by Jack Gaughan.
Smith and Jones
The descriptions of battle scenes in The Alien and Renaissance could be easily interchanged with each other or other space adventures such as those written by E. E. Smith. Boom!

Having said that, these two novels are not only about blowing things up and someone like myself who does not enjoy military Sci Fi can simply skim through the battle scenes (hint: even as entire planets are reduced to rubble, the hero of the adventure will never be killed).

As much as I enjoy making fun of the Wild West shoot 'em up feel of many early outer space adventure stories, there are some interesting science fiction topics lurking in The Alien and Renaissance. Might there be hidden parts of the universe and might they suddenly be revealed to us? What would happen to human society if telepathy became possible?

a 1963 edition
Evil Aliens
In The Alien, an Evil Alien has taken control of the weak-minded masses of Earth. The Evil Alien wants to rule the universe, so he deploys a fleet of spaceships manned by his human minions. Once all of the impenetrable force shields and unstoppable ray guns have been deployed and unleashed, the story reads rather like a comic book that jumps from battle to battle in an attempt to hold the short attention span of young boys. As we race towards the thrilling conclusion, nothing need make sense as long as there are plenty of explosions and gee-wiz moments.

How popular was the kind of wild-ride space opera story that Jones wrote? We have data for Renaissance. Astounding editor Campbell tabulated reader responses and we are told that the first installment of Renaissance was ranked #1 among the stories in that issue of the magazine. And it wasn't even close; apparently Renaissance was the unanimous choice for best story.

Data from the Astounding Analytical Laboratory.
The Alien begins with the idea that 500,000 years ago there had been a "5th planet" at the orbital position of the asteroid belt. That planet had its own native life and a species of intelligent natives with written language.

Dang it all! We keep loosing
too many planets that way...
However, during a war, the civilization of the 5th planet had been destroyed. In fact, the entire planet was reduced to rubble. Sadly, astronomers have counted the asteroids and measured their sizes and even determined their composition. Apparently, there was no planet between Mars and Jupiter 500,000 years ago, but I don't hold that against Jones and the The Alien. It would be cool to discover evidence of "ancient aliens" and very cool to actually meet one.

Of course, in the dominant tradition of 20th century science fiction, technologically advanced aliens who have traveled half way across the universe are going to have one goal: to posses all the gold diamonds cute girls of the universe. And....

                                                        ...Don't Ask Why
Evil Aliens : they like cute Earth women.
However, for the particular variety of space operatic "cool" that Jones was trying to produce, he needed a telepathic Bad Guy. So not only do archeologists from Earth find remnants of an alien civilization in the asteroids, they find a living alien inside a super-duper alien space-age sarcophagus.

Why does this re-animated alien blast anyone who gets in his way of galactic domination? Well, you know, that is simply what Evil Aliens do.

First book edition by Gnome Press.
Sadly, there are no aliens, evil or otherwise, in Renaissance. The Sci Fi premise is this: while puttering about in his basement, an Earthly scientist invented a way to reach parallel universes. Due to the fact that the planets in these parallel universes have different vibrational frequencies, they exist as if stacked right on top of our universe and it is pretty easy to move from Earth to other planets in the parallel universes. However, the alternate universe planet that is easiest to reach from Earth (Kronweld) is not a paradise.

I think Jones was trying to suggest that Kronweld is a planet locked gravitationally to its star with one side always dark and one side burning under constant illumination. David Kyle seems to have had another idea when he made the Gnome Press cover painting shown to the right on this page.

Radioactive Radiation!
1967 Moewig edition
Jones never let actual science get in the way of telling a rousing Sci Fi adventure. According to Jones, due to the high levels of radioactivity on Kronweld, the residents cannot reproduce (otherwise, they are healthy). However, after being removed from the high-radiation environment of Kronweld for a few years, the residents regain the ability to have children.

You might wonder: why would anyone live on a world where radiation levels are so high that reproduction is impossible? Jones tells us that a thousand years ago there was a devastating series of wars after which the people of Earth turned against science and technology. However, "sorting centers" were created where each newborn baby of Earth is tested. Those newborns with genes that pre-dispose them to anti-social behavior are killed.

Pyramid Books edition
Eugenics
At the same time, the newborns with a genetic endowment that will make them creative and able to carry out scientific research are sent to the parallel alternative-dimensions world of Kronweld where it is their task to develop super-Hi Tek™ atomic technologies and Other Cool Stuff™ that will ultimately allow a scientific elite to take control of the ignorant masses of Earth and turn Earth into a post-scarcity paradise world. Ta-da!

Inside the Birth Temple
However, this "brilliant" plan has gone terribly wrong. Most residents of Kronweld have forgotten about the Birds and the Bees and they now believe that each new baby that arrives on Kronweld after passing through the trans-dimensional gate from Earth is a divine creation of God, being made in a miraculous burst of light.

1975 edition
Renaissance begins with a young Kronweld scientist (Ketan) who has discovered sexual reproduction and the fact that babies come from pregnant women. There is an amusing scene in the story during which the great and grizzled scientists of the Super-High Science Council of Kronweld (who have never seen a pregnant woman) are disgusted by the idea that they each began life by emerging from a woman's vagina rather than a pure and divine burst of light. After the distinguished scientists vomit, they call for the death of the heretical junior scientist.

Before ever being sent through the dimensional gate from Earth to Kronweld, Ketan was implanted with visions of the great Earthly scientist (now long dead) who set up the whole Kronweld project. Through his entire life, Ketan has had occasional mysterious visions of Earth.

the Karildex keyboard
Like a salmon returning to the stream of its birth, Ketan escapes from Kronweld by going through the dimensional gate to Earth in search of answers. He learns that forces have been gathering for centuries that are now ready to obliterate the silly "life is a miracle" rulers of Kronweld society, allowing the enlightened scientists of Kronweld to return to Earth and take their rightful place as the new leaders of Earth. The key technology from Kronweld that will turn Earth into a paradise is the Karildex, a gigantic computer that can collate everyone's wishes and opinions and then print out the optimal choice for every political decision.

Terra Sonderband edition 1959
Alien Life
As a biologist, it is amusing for me to see how Jones tried to explain "the secret of life". The resurrected alien in The Alien has been "living" for 500,000 years as a blob of "pure protoplasm". Under the right stimulation (in The Alien, Jones has a "ray" for every purpose) the alien protoplasm first forms cells then an embryo and then after six months a fully formed alien adult complete with all of its memories from its life of 500,000 years ago. Gee-wiz!

What was the home world of the Evil Alien in The Alien? It was not the destroyed 5th planet of our solar system. It was a distant exoplanet that is referred to as Heaven World. After 500,000 years, Heaven World is deserted and has no remaining atmosphere. However, the remnants of that ancient civilization remain on a nearby moon.

Pushy. Telepathy by brain tumor!
Telepathic Tumors!
We discover that not only are the aliens from Heaven World telepathic, but by transplanting their organ of telepathy into a human (our hero, Ketan), he can also have telepathic powers. Thus equipped, Ketan defeats the Evil Alien and even gets the girl (sorry, Renaissance takes place in the 1940s no sex zone, so don't expect any steamy romance).

In an extra-weird fictional biology twist, readers learn (Gee Wiz!) that the alien organs of telepathy are a type of cancerous growth that is grafted into the bodies of the aliens when they are children.

Hollywood Jones
Jones suggests to his readers that in the future, humans will learn to stop fighting brain cancer and make use of it to develop telepathic powers! That was a silly idea in the 1940s, but it was still used in The X-Files during the 1990s.

Related Reading: 1) a review of The Alien at
                                the MPorcius Fiction Log
2) Asimov's Stephen Byerley stories                  
3) "Dodkin's Job" by Jack Vance
4) "Kitsunegari", X-Files episode
5) My own story with a link between cancer and telepathy.

Next: Retro-SIHA 2020

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Jul 12, 2020

Foundation TV

watch the June 22nd teaser video
Five years ago, I allowed myself to contemplate the possibility of Isaac Asimov's Foundation Saga making it to television. Unless further delayed by Covid19, Apple TV expects to start streaming its Foundation episodes in 2021.

Shorten the Darkness
Foundation is the story of a collection of pulp magazine stories from the 1940s that were almost forgotten. Then, after a long dark age, Asimov finally continued the Foundation Saga, linking events in the downfall of the Galactic Empire to his famous robot character, Daneel.

Will Hollywood mess this up?
But seriously, I do hope that positronic robots play a major role in this television show. However, I'm not expecting anything watchable from a television project run by a comic "book" fan.

Had someone, with no explanation, simply shown me the teaser video for Foundation, I never would have guessed that it was about Asimov's Foundation. I don't mind if Apple starts with the idea behind Asimov's story and goes in a new direction, but I wish they would go in a direction that will not turn Asimov's story on its head (I'm looking at you, I, Robot).

Spaghetti Leprechaun Western Space Opera
A Roman Empire with Space Pasta
I admit, I'm a fan of space elevators, but there are no space elevators in the future of Asimov's Galactic Empire.

So where are the spaceships moving through the galaxy by means of hyperspace jumps?
Going into Hyper-Hollywood Space?

Maybe the image shown above was put in the teaser just to look cool. I don't know what it is, so I'm imagining it is a depiction of a spaceship going to or from hyperspace.

Trip to the center of the GaLAXy.
Maybe in David Goyer's Galactic Empire there is not much demand for spaceships and most people just dress like monks and get around in rowboats.

Who needs light-sabers when you
have a futuristic LED rifle?
I saw a rumor that Asimov's daughter has a role in this production. It will be interesting to hear if she actually gets to veto some of the absurd ideas that Goyer's team tries to cram into Foundation. And hopefully, the silly ToysЯUs flashlight gun shown to the right will look totally cool after the CGI is layered on.
The Emperor Wears the Dress in this Palace from Apple TV and the Ministry of Silly Costumes.

Demerzel

Who knows how people will dress thirty thousand years from now? I hope it is not like this (above).

Mentalics. Five years ago I wrote, "A Foundation television show needs to flawlessly show 'mentalic mind control' and telepathic communication between Second Foundationers and positronic robots like Daneel." Maybe for TV they decided to fuse Daneel and Dors "Tiger Woman" Venabili into one robot played by Laura Birn. It will be interesting to see if they dare to depict a sexual relationship between Hari Seldon and his beloved robotic Tiger Woman.

Related Reading: Season One of Foundation.

Next: The Golden Age of Space Opera

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Jul 11, 2020

Zee Kerub Fwai-chi

1980 - cover art by Stephen Fabian
The page at the Internet Science Fiction Database for Jack Vance's Alastor Cluster series now includes an entry from 2019. How can this be when Vance published the three Alastor Cluster stories back in the 1970s?

Phaedra: Alastor 824
Spatterlight Press authorized the publication of a 4th Alastor Cluster novel. There is some discussion of Phaedra by the author here.

Back in 2014, I began imagining a previous Reality in which Vance had written more than just 3 Alastor Cluster novels. At that time, I imagined that Alastor 1083 was a planet named Yerophet. For his novel Marune, Vance had imagined a native species that he called the Fwai-chi. I populated Yerophet with telepathic natives who are known as the Kerub.

The Elders of Alastor Cluster

From 2014: An Alternate Vance
Like the Fwai-chi, the Kerub have para-psychic powers. Vance never tried to provide readers with any account of how it was possible for the Fwai-chi to be walking around with a bottle that contained Kang Efraim's lost memories. I like to imagine that the seemingly primitive Fwai-chi were actually users of advanced nanotechnology and Efraim's memories were in the form of infites.

For the Exode Saga, I depict Alastor Cluster is an artificial stellar structure that had been slowly assembled by the Phari during the past several billion years. In the case of Phaedra, we are told that "The Elder Race once ruled the entire Alastor cluster." I've never read Phaedra, but I would not mind if you called the Phari an "elder race". They were the first technologically advanced species to arise in our galaxy and they constructed Alastor Cluster, one star at a time.

Fwai-chi: original art
by Darrell Sweet
I like to imagine that each planet of Alastor Cluster has its own native species that was, in the past, a space-faring, humanoid species quite similar to we humans. However, through time, all of them have been altered by the Phari. The goal of the Phari was to shift technology-wielding biological species from the Hadronic Domain into an artificial life existence within the Hierion Domain. However, on many worlds of the Cluster, that shifting process left behind in the Hadronic Domain a remnant species such as the Fwai-chi.

Zeck, Alastor 503
In the case of Zeck, Alastor 503, the home of Jantiff Ravensroke, the original native species is called the Zee, but they have no remaining visible physical manifestation in the Hadronic Domain. Some humans with telepathic abilities can make weak telepathic contact to the Zee, who only remain on their home planet as an artificial life remnant composed of femtobots. Thus, Jantiff grows up with a minimal sensitivity to the so-called "sea-voices" of Zeck. In contrast, Glisten, with her better developed telepathic ability, has a better communications link to the Zee.

Glisten
Alastor Cluster is ruled by the Connatic. Each successive Connatic is part of an hereditary dynasty. The Connatic's authority is built upon the military, an organization known as the Whelm. The current Connatic, Oman Ursht, is reluctant to use military force to solve problems. Oman is part of the Idite dynasty and he enjoys traveling around the Cluster disguised as a wondering journalist named Ryl Shermatz.

Glisten on Zeck. source: The Power of Pause
As described in Vance's novel, Wyst, Jantiff not only saves the life of poor Glisten, but also the life of the Connatic himself. Out of gratitude, Ryl Shermatz (who has revealed to Jantiff that he is more than a journalist and can exert authority as an "Over-inspector in the Whelm") has offered Jantiff a permanent position on the staff of the Connatic.

Thus, back in 2012, I began a fanfiction story in which Jantiff, now an agent for the Connatic, visits the planet Marune (see Assignment: Marune). After an 8 year delay, I'm now writing the next chapter in Assignment: Marune in which Glisten reaches Marune and is able to make progress in learning about the Phari from the Fwai-chi because she is part of a mind clone network.

source
In 2019, in The Power of Pause, the still skinny Glisten was depicted as being in the early part of her first pregnancy while preparing to visit Yerophet.

Here in 2020, I wrote an account of a visit to Yerophet by Azynov and Yōd (see Frost Hills to Bailisbury). In The Yerophet Experiment, Zynov and Yōd not only meet a Kerub (named lo'Whots), but also an Iidi from the planet Dreavero.

I first wrote about the Iidi back in 2016 when I began The League of Yrinna, a kind of sequel to Vance's novel Trullion. The telepathic Iidi have long assisted the Idite clan and the various Idite Connatics. In The Yerophet Experiment, an Iidi provides assistance to Azynov and Yōd and is aware that they are inside a Simulation.

source
The Idite clan is in conflict with the Gensifer clan, who as part of The League of Yrinna have long relied on "space pirates" (the Starmenters of Alastor Cluster) to find and capture the best telepaths, bringing them from the various worlds of the Cluster to Yrinna. I began my account of the the Gensifers at the end of 2015, but I am only now writing an account of events after Duissane reaches Yrinna and uses her telepathic ability to contact the Phari.

August 2020
Before Glisten's visit to Yerophet, Azynov and Yōd visit Ottengla, a world where most of the resident humans are blind. The people of Ottengla live on widely scattered "ranches" where they have a symbiotic relationship with a native species (called the Plesypy) that resembles the horses of Earth (see The Gensifer Clan).

Interior story illustration from the August 1980 issue of Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine.

blue Plesypy foal
In Vance's novel The Book of Dreams, he imagined a population of humans (the Feeks) who devolved into a quadrupedal human form of grazers.

I imagine that the Phari originally had blue-tinted skin and having developed under their influence, many of the remnant species of Alastor Cluster are also blue. The image above by Frank Borth is black and white, but I'm imagining that the telepathic Plesypy of Ottengla are similar in structure to the alien creatures depicted by Borth and pigmented as shown to the right.

Related Reading: Assignment Nor'Dyren by Sydney Van Scyoc

Next: Asimov's Foundation on TV?
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Jul 7, 2020

Return to 2012

image source
Five years ago (see The League of Yrinna), I began exploring the idea that Alastor Cluster was a laboratory for the development of human telepathy. I had the fundamental idea that the replicoid of Isaac Asimov (since named Azynov) could be involved in telling the story of the origins of human telepathy, with the help of the replicoids of Jack Vance and Arthur Clarke. Then a strange thing happened; Azynov went out and found his own partner, a beautiful woman named Yōd.

Thus began the hot and steamy romance between Azynov and Yōd. However, in order for Yōd to send discoveries about the origins of telepathy from inside the AR Simulator to the people of Earth, she would have to use telepathy. There were several obstacles in the way of this. First, Azynov and Yōd would not go into the AR Simulator until after twitino-mediated telepathy had become impossible in the Final Reality. Thus, Yōd would need to use technology-assisted telepathy. Second, the tryp'At were getting in the way by acting like Earth Overseers. They controlled access to the AR Simulator of Observer Base.

image source
Several years were required to find a solution to these two problems. The key to the solution is what I call the Bimanoid Interface. Originally the communications channel that was used to give Earth a form of Temporal Momentum, the Bimanoid Interface was re-purposed for technology-assisted telepathy. However, specificity of communication via the Bimanoid Interface depends on the ability of people to find each others mind patterns within the Hierion Domain; technology-assisted telepathy depends on a type of resonance between brains with similar activity patterns.

The easiest way to ensure that two people can share thoughts by way of the Bimanoid Interface is to link them together in a mind clone network. This was done for tryp'At, and it was their telepathic abilities that allowed them to take control of Observer Base. However, although Yōd was one of the clones of Gohrlay, her sister Zeta went through a process of telepathic "burn in" which left her with only a limited ability to receive telepathic signals from Yōd.

Image credits
(original photographs: Jessica Truscott)
Yōd was rushed to Earth where, making use of infites, she performed a delicate kind of cognitive surgery that finally allowed her to transmit information to the Editor by way of the Bimanoid Interface. This required a boost in the operating energy of the Bimanoid Interface which had the beneficial effect of triggering positive feedback among the minds of the tryp'At, forcing them to abandon Observer Base.

Wishing to provide the Editor with other sources of information (particularly the story archives of the Writers Block) in addition to the AR Simulator, Interventionist agents quickly created a mind clone network that could link a small cadre of specially crafted children by way of Bimanoid Interface 2.

image source
Inside the AR Simulator
Last August, I wrote a story called "The Power of Pause" which was a first step towards showing how Yōd and Azynov might work as a team to investigate the origins of human telepathy. In that story, Yōd and Azynov prepare to go to the planet Yerophet and help Glisten make telepathic contact with the Kerub. In that story, Yōd first learned that she was pregnant, carrying inside her a baby that would grow to become one of the nodes of the mind clone network.

Then, in December of last year, a story called "Sherylyn" arrived from Yōd inside the AR Simulator. That short story was the first part of an account of a visit by Yōd and Azynov to Yerophet.  I was not allowed to learn the whole story until June 2020.

image source
Now, here in August 2020, as part of my celebration of the fiction of Jack Vance, I return to the story of how Azynov and Yōd must work with Glisten on Yerophet to establish telepathic contact with the Kerub. This is during the time when Nirutam is on Earth and Yōd is being actively prevented from communicating any information to the Editor that might interfere with Nirutam's ability to complete her mission on Earth. Nirutam's selfie, Maturin, is at work inside the AR Simulator, allowing the work of Yōd and Azynov to go forward while she simultaneously protects Nirutam.

The story begins shortly after the events depicted in "Frost Hills to Bailisbury" when Yōd and Azynov have traveled to Ottengla (see The Ottengla Introduction), Alastor 284. Azynov and Yōd are then diverted to Zeck (see Notteng of Ottengla). The action must eventually shift back to Yerophet to show Glisten playing a key role in convincing lo'Whots to take part in experiments with a hierion field generator.

new in 2020
Other Plans
Eventually, I want to knit together all of the existing story fragments about how human telepathy was developed in the Asimov Reality. This project began back in 2012 with Assignment: Marune.  However, "The Gensifer Clan" starts with events immediately after those depicted in the last chapter of The Yerophet Experiment.

The second part of "The Gensifer Clan" leads directly to "The Power of Pause". Still to come: Yōd must help Glisten prepare lo'Whots the Kerub to participate in Colleen's hierion field generator experiments on Yerophet (see "The Olivine Intervention").

source
Yōd and Azynov will also appear in the story of the Fwai-chi. Chapter three of Assignment: Marune will depict Glisten making telepathic contact with the Phari. Yōd and Azynov will also be in the story of Duissane on the planet Yrinna. Possibly there will be another story about Yōd and the Society of Matriarchs.

Next: Fans of Jack Vance
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