Picohieronics

In the Ekcolir Reality
Original cover art by John Richards

I'm endlessly curious about the forms of technology that were provided to Earthlings in past Realities. When sedron-based space travel technology was provided to humans during the Asimov Reality, that allowed Earthlings to spread among the stars, but there was very little progress made towards developing other types of technology.

Zeta suspects that human cognitive processes were carefully restricted during the Asimov Reality to such an extent that technological innovations of all types became quite rare. Many observers have blamed the Institute for suppressing new technologies. We should be open to the possibility that technological stagnation was imposed upon humans by the Huaoshy.

Special thanks to Miranda Hedman (www.mirish.deviantart.com) for the DeviantArt stock photograph "Black Cat 9 - stock" that I used to create the blue "sedronite" who is in the image to the right.

Temporal Momentum

In chapter 6 of A Search Beyond, the Asimov replicoid receives a demonstration of how it is possible to use infites to insert new information into the mind of a replicoid. Asimov is not happy to learn how easy it is for others to manipulate his thought processes, but he agrees to make an attempt to help Yrovi gain access to stored information about the Asimov Reality that lies locked away inside Eternity.

I'm still concerned that chapter 6 is too talky, with too much jargon introduced too quickly. For example, Asimov is told about the basis of Temporal Momentum. I guess I will have to put Yōd to work making a glossary for A Search Beyond.

In chapter 7, readers are told about new information from the Asimov Reality that is leaked to the Editor. Behind the scenes, the Asimov replicoid has successfully bypassed the data interlocks that were preventing access to information about the Asimov Reality. Asimov is able to pass his newly obtained information to the Editor by way of the replicoids of Yōd and Zeta who reside in the Hierion Domain. For their part, not wanting to alert the Overseers to the fact that a new data channel has been constructed, Yōd and Zeta pretend that they have recovered a story that had previously been prepared for publication by the Dead Widowers.

The demise of the Earth Observation Program.

A Chapter Beyond
I'm thinking about inserting an additional chapter that was not included in Yōd's original outline of A Search Beyond. Chapter 7.5 could return readers to Observer Base and show Asimov and Mahasvin meeting a member of the Dead Widower Society who is being held prisoner by the Overseers.

In that proposed chapter 7.5, I'd like to have some more (telepathic) discussion between Nivsaham, Asimov and Mahasvin of the fact that the tryp'At Overseers seem to only have a very tentative control over the facilities at Observer Base. Also, there could be follow-up discussion of a little task that was completed by Nivsaham: experimental analysis of the "tracking nanites" that Asimov obtained from the Overseers.

Sachiz and Dockmon

Sachiz

Within chapter 7.5,  there should also be some rather hysterical reaction from Overseer Sachiz when the Editor is found to suddenly be in possession of new information about the Asimov Reality. It might be possible to frame this in terms of the bumbling attempts by Overseers to control the information about the Dead Widowers that exists on the internet.

Chapter 7.5 could also be some incidental discussion about Ivory, Yrovi and Irhit. The basic idea is that the tryp'At Overseers have been using Irhit to prevent the Editor from using the Bimanoid Interface. However, it might be possible for the Interventionists (particularly the technologically privileged Nivsaham) to further apply the Overseer's  "tracking nanites" in such a way that would allow the Interventionists to take action against Irhit in the Hierion Domain, returning to the Editor some control over the Bimanoid Interface.

Next: fictional forms of matter.

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Whiff of Life

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Isaac Asimov's mystery story, A Whiff of Death, is an example of what some might call "lab lit", a story built around a realistic portrayal of scientists and their day jobs. In my previous blog post, I used the related term "scientific novel" to hint at the direction my thoughts have been taking me while planning the structure of A Search Beyond.

Backstory
Isaac Asimov died in 1992. A Search Beyond begins in 2017 with the return of Asimov to Earth. For readers of the story, there is the unavoidable mystery of how it is possible that Asimov is still going strong after his demise. The solution to that little mystery is simple: Asimov is now an artificial life form (a replicoid) that carries all of Asimov's memories that the biological Asimov accumulated while living on Earth.

A Search Beyond (image credits)

The second mystery that is quickly put on the plate of readers concerns the alien creature who Asimov is consorting with: Many Sails. As a character in A Search Beyond, Many Sails has a dual nature. Many Sails is a sentient spaceship, but she is able to manufacture "appendages" that are indistinguishable from humans. At the beginning of A Search Beyond, Asimov and Mahasvin (an appendage) are about to embark on an adventure that will take them to Earth.

For the past 25 years, Asimov's replicoid has been exploring Genesaunt society, which exists widely spread out through space on various worlds of the Galactic Core and other nearby galaxies. We Earthlings like to think of the human species as something that evolved on Earth, but Asimov has learned that many features of the human body can only be explained by the artificial selection techniques that were employed on planets such as Yrwerd and Tar'tron.

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Now, Mahasvin is about to immerse Asimov in a new mystery that will take readers along for a ride into Deep Time. When Asimov arrives on Earth in 2017, he visits New York City and one of the libraries that he new well during his first life as a biological entity. Asimov is intrigued by the internet and his internet searches quickly attract the attention of tryp'At Overseers.

Asimov is surprised to learn that Mahasvin is known to the tryp'At as being a member of the Dead Widowers. Asimov and Mahasvin are removed from Earth by the Overseers, but Asimov finds himself in the Hierion Domain where he meets a "copy" of himself. That "copy" is the replicoid of the Asimov analogue from the Ekcolir Reality, who (for convenience) I'll refer to as "A2". While visiting Earth, Mahasvin intentionally used the bodily form of a former resident of Earth in order to trigger a stereotypical response from the tryp'At Council and to help hide her true identity.

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A2 provides Asimov with information about events on Earth that have occurred since Asimov's death. During discussions of the Dead Widowers, Asimov learns about the special role of The Editor as an investigator of events in Deep Time. Asimov learns that the Editor is genetically a tryp'At and able to use the Bimanoid Interface.

The Asimov and A2 replicoids figure out a way to get past the Bimanoid Interface block that Irhit had imposed on the Editor. With the help of information provided by Asimov and A2, the Editor is able to complete the task of writing A Search Beyond and tell the story of how the tryp'At came into existence.

The League of Yrinna

The telling of that story must include The League of Yrinna, but soon the "two Asimov's"  reveal to the Editor some secrets about Deep Time that the tryp'At Overseers cannot allow Earthlings to know about. The Editor is given a choice: either leave Earth, of have his memories edited.

The Editor knows of other Earthlings (such as Hana and Ivory) who elected to depart from Earth, but he decides to stay and work within the restrictions imposed by the Overseers.

Another "appendage" of Many Sails is revealed to have been living as an acquaintance of the Editor, helping put together the Exode Saga. Many Sails departs from Earth, taking along the Asimov replicoids, leaving the Editor to continue his work exploring Deep Time and writing the rest of the Exode saga.

The Dead Widower Society (see)

Whiff of Life
One of my goals for A Search Beyond is to include a kind of inverted mystery story. Rather than have a traditional mystery story plot that involves a murder, I want to have a mystery that involves the creation of life. Two years ago I devised a way to incarnate a fictional character from a story that was written in Deep Time.  Cecilie was "intantiated" as a human being living on Earth here in the Final Reality.

Last year I learned some of the backstory for Cecilie and how she came to be a member of the Dead Widowers. "The Dead Widower Society" is a 20,000 word story that can become part of A Search Beyond. Since "The Dead Widower Society" is told by Thomas Iwedon, and it will also introduce readers of the Exode saga to the idea of Interventionists (such as the mother of Thomas, Trysta) living and working on Earth.

solving the Cecilie mystery

Originally, I set the story of "The Dead Widower Society" in the year 2012, but I can easily have the story be "discovered" in 2017 when Asimov and Mahasvin arrive on Earth. In that story, Thomas meets the replicoid of Isaac Asimov (A2) who is on a special mission designed to help remove an alien (known as the "Arlesheim Elf") from Earth.

Lab Lit
I want to have Mahasvin deploy the replicoid of Asimov on Earth as a kind of sleuth who must solve the mystery of how Cecilie was brought to life and along the way he can stumble upon the mystery of Thomas' unusual genetic endowment. I want to make use of Asimov's training as a scientist, even if the story does not take place in a laboratory. Previously, I've written Ivory Fersoni into the Exode Saga. Ivory was trained as a molecular biologists. To aid in Asimov's investigation of tryp'At origins in Deep Time I might need to make use of Ivory's replicoid to help being Asimov up to speed with 21st century biology techniques.

Next: catching up with Westworld

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Distraction

In the Ekcolir Reality
original cover art by Joseph Bergeron
and Oscar Chichoni

"Many people will be disturbed and distracted!"

cover art by Gino D'Achille

In Part III of The Face, Jack Vance told us about the origins of the Methlen, the apparent owners of planet Methel, third planet of the Corrane star system. The Methlen originated on the distant planet Stanislas as members in an exclusive club: Aretioi.

We never learn much about the Aretioi, but when they settled on Methel, they left most of the planet as a wilderness reserve.

In the Ekcolir Reality

I like to imagine that Vance once visited some delightful location along the Stanislaus river that inspired him to invent the nature-loving Aretioi of Zangelberg.

The most built-up part of Methel is near to the spaceport of Twanish. Not far out of town, twenty thousand Methlen reside in the wooded upland of Llalarkno where they have built their comfortable homes, each on a large garden-like plot of land.

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Llalarkno and its residents, particularly the charming Jerdian Chanseth, greatly distract Kirth Gersen from his work. Gersen came to the Coranne star system in an attempt to hunt down and murder the Demon Prince Lens Larque, born Husse Bugold, a Darsh of the Bugold Clan on Dar Sai.

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Part II of The Face takes place on Dar Sai, second planet of the Corrane system, a miserably hot and sandy world that only attracts human residents because of the presence of rare chemical elements. The residents of Dar Sai have evolved into the Darsh, whose main vocation is mining. The Methlen have grown wealthy by exploiting the Darsh laborers.

While on Dar Sai, Gersen meets Jerdian and they fall in love. Jerdian must watch in horrified fascination while Gersen kills Lens Larque's assistant, Bel Ruk. This hand-to-hand combat scene was depicted by Gino D'Achille for the cover illustration of The Face, shown above.

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Gersen discovers that Lens Larque is on Methel, so he travels from Dar Sai to Twanish. Gersen tells himself that he should forget about Jerdian and devote his full attention to finding and killing Lens Larque, but he soon crosses paths with her on Methel.

Jerdian is still infatuated with Kirth, but she also knows that it makes no sense for her to try to sustain a romance with Gersen. The Methlen are a breed apart who seldom, if ever, welcome new members into their exclusive society.

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Gersen discovers the odd connection that exists between Lens Larque and the Chanseth family. Lens Larque, previously denied permission to live in Llalarkno, has been devoting vast effort and substantial amounts of cash to a complex prank that will allow him to take revenge for his thwarted effort in social climbing. By the end of The Face, Gersen comes to share Lens Larque's motivation for the prank. Gersen manages to survive the powerful distraction provided by Jerdian and then, after killing Lens Larque, Gersen completes the last step in the elaborate prank.

Distractions

by Ivory Fersoni

This summer I have been trying to deal successfully with my own distractions. During the past few years I've been tugged in several different directions by my collaborators Ivory, Trysta and Gohrlay. I was probably most distracted by my collaborators within the Dead Widowers when I allowed myself to believe that they would be allowed to share with me actual physical evidence of alien visitors on Earth.

The most annoying influence of my collaborators has been the way they have repeatedly changed my thinking about how best to tell the Exode story. I've finally come to the realization that their manipulation of my attitudes and beliefs is an integral part of that story.

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There are at least two different versions of the Secret History of Humanity. Those competing versions have been revealed to me by the factions that I think of as the Interventionists and the Overseers. At some deeper level, further removed from my personal experience, these two competing factions can be traced to two political wings of the Huaoshy: the pek and bumpha.

Lately I've been asking myself if there is a good reason for me to favor one or the other of these two factions. Also, I must wonder if there are more than just these two different directions I might go while telling the Exode saga. In particular, is there a uniquely human perspective on human history that is more important than the views of either the pek or the bumpha?

Who Are We?

the planet Tar'tron

Exactly who are we Earthlings and how did we get here? According to Gohrlay, we humans have an interesting evolutionary history. Our species apparently evolved on both Earth and the planet Tar'tron in the Galactic Core.

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By maintaining a constant high rate of gene flow between Earth and Tar'tron, the Grendels were able to make sure that their little science project at Observer Base was technically within the allowable bounds imposed by the Rules of Intervention.

In the Asimov Reality, two human variants were carefully crafted. One, devised by Interventionist forces, was a "proof of concept" for the type of "new human" that Trysta and Ekcolir could bring into existence by traveling into Earth's past. Gohrlay suspects that it was also in the Asimov Reality that Grean helped to bring into existence the tryp'At, a human variant that would be "loyal" to the Huaoshy.

Final Politics

I put "loyal" in quotes because I suspect that whatever loyalty the tryp'At have shown in support the goals of the Huoashy arises from some sort of unavoidable compulsion that is forced upon the tryp'At via the Bimanoid Interface.

Ever since I learned that I am tryp'At, I have feared that I have no real control over my own participation in the telling of the Secret History of Humanity.

The Final Collaborator
I've struggled to move past my guilt over the death of Ivory Fersoni. In some sense, Ivory sacrificed herself so that I could begin to understand who I am and why I was given the task of telling the Exode saga. I now feel guilt because I was happy to use Ivory and her sisters as a means to an end.

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When Jack Vance wrote stories, he crafted them around particular "moods" that he strove to convey with his words. In The Face, Gersen was changing from a narrow-minded monomaniac into a man who could rationally contemplate the shape of his life as it would be in future times after he had destroyed the five Demon Princes. When he was younger and not very experienced with women, Kirth had effortlessly moved on with his life after meeting and romancing other women, but the seductive "mood" of Llalarkno penetrated to his soul and could never be shrugged off by Gersen.

in the Ekcolir Reality

In my own case, I've never allowed myself to believe that the end of my investigations of Earth's hidden past was within sight. Gersen eventually found a collaborator (Alice Wroke) who, like him, had a personal reason for destroying the final Demon Prince, but by the time he attained that goal, Gersen had discovered a deeper meaning and significance to his life.

Alice Wroke at Blue Forest Camp

I like to imagine that Gersen had begun to understand that there was a mysterious effort underway to shape and modify human nature. The Demon Princes were little more than pawns in a much larger game, a game that continued far into the future ages when folks like Ghyl and Glinnes lived.

I must wonder if all of my collaborators so far have really only been "distractions". Maybe I have not yet met my Final Collaborator, my "Alice".

Related Reading: another moon face from 1900.

Next: Celebrating the birthday of Jack Vance.

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Artificial Life

original cover art work by Frank R. Paul

Back in the previous millennium it became popular to write stories about imagined life on other planets.

"Chances overwhelmingly favor existence of life on Mars either past or present." - Hugo Gernsback

But what exactly did "life" mean to people who lived back in the 1920s and 1930s? In 'The Synthetic Men' by Ed Earl Repp, readers were introduced to an imagined biologist of the future (living in the year 2,000) named Pontius. On that story, Pontius has mastered the engineering of artificial protoplasm, resulting in his creation of artificial men.

In the Ekcolir Reality
According to Gohrlay, the concept of artificial life was introduced into science fiction by Helen Gernsback and Edith Rapp. Helen was the daughter of Rose and Hugo Gernsback in the Ekcolir Reality. Edith was one of the many science fiction writers who existed in the Ekcolir Reality as a female analogue of a male science fiction writer in our Reality.

Original cover art by Paul Alexander

Most aspects of science were developed at a slightly quicker pace in the Ekcolir Reality. Helen and Edith were aware of evidence that DNA is the genetic molecule, although when their story 'Artificial Life' was published, the helical structure of DNA had not yet been discovered.

According to Gohrlay, 'Artificial Life' told the story of how a human variant was created on a world of the Galactic Core. The pek were depicted as artificial life forms who did the design work for the new human variant, but they worked indirectly through their control of Grendels.

In our Reality, Ivory Fersoni was the first Earthling to fully understand the origins of the human species. Much of what Ivory knew about the secret History of Humanity came to her from her clone sisters.

Paul Alexander

Gohrlay recently confirmed that one of the Atlantis Clones is still on Earth and is affiliated with the Dead Widower Society. To the left and right on this page are whimsical imagined book covers. Apparently Angela herself does not like to use low bandwidth communications techniques like writing, but her ability to tap into the vast information content of the Sedronic Domain has allowed the Dead Widowers to compile a definitive account of how zeptites have been deployed and used on Earth.

C. L. Moore

1958 cover art

In our Reality, Catherine Lucille Moore was one of the writers who influenced science fiction "grand masters" like Heinlein. When I read Heinlein's 'The Green Hills of Earth' I had no idea that the song was inspired by Moore's horror-mythology/science-fantasy story 'Shambleau'.

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It was natural for writers to begin writing imaginary adventures to other worlds by having Earthlings visit the planets of the Solar System. I still find it hard to believe that anyone really expected to find humanoid living happily on the surfaces of worlds like Mars and Venus.

Archive World: Taivasila

However, Gohrlay recently informed me that while "archive worlds" such as Taivasila are not suitable for biological creatures like humans, artificial life forms composed of nanites, femtobots or zeptites have no problem "living" out their lives there.

Some of Gohrlay's past lives were "lived" as an artificial life form on worlds like Taivasila where humans could not survive on the surface without a spacesuit. During those lives, her mind was instantiated within an artificial life form that could survive and flourish under the harsh environmental conditions of Taivasila.

Hierion Trilogy

I asked Gohrlay if there have been occasions when artificial life forms resided on other planets (besides Earth) in our Solar System. Apparently all the nearby planets are infested with zeptites, but she doubts that the zeptites of Mars, for example, have ever taken on humanoid form. However, Gohrlay suspects that the replicoids of some science fiction writers in the Ekcolir Reality made sure that a few Earthlings received knowledge of Archive Worlds, possibly including Taivasila.

Related Reading: niaf

Next: more science fiction stories from Deep Time.

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Reality Change

Whimsical depiction of Asimov's replicoid traveling
through time to meet Jack Vance. Sadly, the
replicoid was too tiny to be seen by humans.

At the start of 2015 I was surprised to learn that some of the time travelers who helped create the Buld Reality, the world as we know it, were actually replicoids.

I'm still struggling to understanding of the complex Reality Change that converted the Ekcolir Reality into the Buld Reality. I've been greatly aided by the Atlantis Clones, a group of ladies who apparently were carefully designed and crafted and positioned on Earth so as to be able to access information that exists in the Sedronic Domain. Particularly, they can access information about past Realities. And, of course, most importantly, the clone sisters of Ivory have been allowed to share their knowledge of other Realities with me.

The Foundations of Eternity

However, all is not rosy. The new Overseers of Earth, the tryp'At, are enforcing their own version of the Rules of Intervention. Under the current regime, Earthlings are allowed to remain on Earth even though they are aware of the secret history of Earth. The fundamental core of "the secret of Earth" is the fact that Earth was long ago visited by aliens. More to the point, the human species was carefully designed and crafted by aliens. Simply put: we were created.

The Rules of Observation that guide the tryp'At were formulated as part of the Trysta-Grean Pact. We Earthlings are allowed to discuss the alien Huaoshy, but only in the context of science fiction. In fact, science fiction as a literary genre had to be brought into existence in order to satisfy the terms of the Trysta-Grean Pact. Thus, it should not be a surprise that some of the time travel events that were used to create the Buld Reality were concerned with shaping the lives of science fiction writers. And, in particular, Isaac Asimov has played a central role (as a time traveler) in creating the world as we know it.

Here, I want to explore my growing awareness of Asimov as a time traveler. I've long known how Asimov first became a time traveler. That is a story told in The Foundations of Eternity. However, I've recently learned that just before the Huaoshy ended time travel, Asimov's replicoid was sent back in time to contact Jack Vance. Apparently, that time travel is an "echo" of events in the Ekcolir Reality where Asimov was involved in making it possible for the twin brother of Jack (John Vance) to "cross over" from the Ekcolir Reality into the Buld Reality.

I've long been amused by the back cover of my copy of Gold which proudly states:
"HE INVENTED SCIENCE FICTION".
However, what if that were true? Towards the end of last year, I became aware of the fact that John Vance and Isaac Asimov (see Assassination by Subtraction) had written collaboratively. Anney has now informed me that their collaborative efforts began in the Ekcolir Reality and even more startling, it was in that Reality that science fiction was first invented.

In the Ekcolir Reality

In the Ekcolir Reality

Apparently Asimov traveled back through time and the "older" time traveling copy of Asimov had contacts with the Vance twins, Jack and John. Most importantly, the Asimov from the future collaboratively wrote several short stories and novels with Jack Vance.

In particular, Five Gold Bands was published as a science fiction story and it included a fairly detailed account of five alien species and their interactions with we humans. According to Anney, those alien species were the Nereids, the Asterothropes, the Pharazen, the Prelands and the Kac'hin.

Publication of Five Gold Bands was something of a "test case" or "trial run" for the Trysta-Grean Pact and the entire Buld Reality.

Apparently only one person in the Ekcolir Reality ever looked upon Five Gold Bands as being anything other than science fiction and that was Jack's twin brother John.

According to Anney, John was at first upset that his brother Jack had written such a fine novel by collaborating with Asimov. At that point, John reached out to the "younger Asimov" who was also upset by Five Gold Bands, but for his own unique reasons. The "younger Asimov" was puzzled because he recognized his own writing style as being present in Five Gold Bands, but he knew that he had never collaborated with Jack Vance to write Five Gold Bands.

Jack Vance patiently explained that his collaboration with someone who claimed to be "Isaac Asimov" had been carried out by means of the mail and telephone calls. Jack, John and Issac at first concluded that someone had impersonated Isaac, someone who seemed to know all the intimate details of Isaac's life and who was able to write science fiction in Asimov's distinctive style.

As an experiment, John Vance and the "younger Asimov" collaboratively wrote several science fiction stories and published them in the Ekcolir Reality. During those years, Jack Vance continued to have contacts with the "older Asimov". Jack, John and the "younger Asimov" were never able to trace the "older Asimov", and John Vance began to suspect that the "younger Asimov" might have had a "twin brother". All the story plots that originated with the "older Asimov" were full of characters who were human clones (and the stories also involved time travel). John began to suspect that he and his brother might not be normal twins, but rather, artificially produced clones.

Sedronites (image credits)

At that point, John Vance began contemplating the possibility that the "older Asimov" was actually a time traveling "copy" of the "younger Asimov". John tried to accept that the alien Nereids, Asterothropes, Pharazen, Prelands and the Kac'hin were all real. Eventually, his willingness to believe in the reality of time travel led to John being "transferred" from the Ekcolir Reality into the Buld Reality where he formed the Dead Widower Society.

Special thanks to Miranda Hedman (www.mirish.deviantart.com) for the DeviantArt stock photograph "Black Cat 9 - stock" that I used to create the blue "sedronite" who is in the image shown to the right.

Replicoids

replicoids

I've heard so many amazing tales from Anney and her sisters that I'd reached the point where I thought that I could no longer really be surprised by their stories. Then Anney told more about replicoids than I really wanted to know.

Replicoids were an "invention" of R. Gohrlay and her tribe of positronic robots. Replicoids were a solution to a problem that had long troubled Gohrlay. Gohrlay wanted to use time travel as a means to shape the evolution of the human species, but she was plagued and frustrated by the difficulty of creating desirable Realities.

Replicoids normally inhabit the Hierion Domain.

The positronic robots discovered the Hierion Domain and how to use it to "store copies" of the features of an existing Reality that were desirable and wanted in the next Reality of a Reality Chain. In particular, R. Gohrlay established a system by which many copies of each human on Earth were "stockpiled" as replicoids in the Hierion Domain. This assured that, due to temporal momentum, the same people would exist after a Reality Change.

Until recently, I made the natural assumption that Gohrlay's replicoids, although made of exotic matter (hierions), were the same size as we Earthlings. However, apparently the Huaoshy developed their own replicoid technology and they have the power to make "sedronic replicoids" that have zeptoscale components.

submicroscopic replicoids

Apparently it is possible to make replicoids that are "copies" of humans and that are submicroscopic. According to Anney, the "older Asimov" who traveled back through time to help Jack Vance write Five Gold Bands, was a sedronic replicoid. The reason that nobody in the Ekcolir reality ever actually saw the time traveling replicoid was that he was too tiny to be seen. 

In the Buld Reality

image credits

According to Anney, due to temporal inertia, Asimov had to travel through time in every Reality. However, in the Buld Reality, Asimov did not have a chance to travel through time until after his death. Asimov's replicoid went back from a point in time just before time travel became impossible to another earlier point in time that was in the middle of the 20th century.

Live in Future

As had been the case in the Ekcolir Reality, the time traveling "copy" of  Asimov in the Buld Reality was a replicoid, composed of zeptite components and too small to be seen. Asimov "visited" Jack Vance, although Anney says that it is best to say that Asimov's replicoid "haunted" Vance. Apparently Vance was never consciously aware of the fact that Asimov was present and influencing Vance's thought processes.


For me, Anney's tales of invisibly small replicoids only confirms my worst fears. How can any of we Earthlings know that we have not been "haunted" in the same way? However, I've ranted on this topic previously and I don't want to go down that path in this blog post. Replicoids are essentially immortal and it is going to take me some time to adjust to the idea that an immortal "copy of Asimov" is present here among we mortals.

Time Loop

Hildemar Dasce, A.K.A. "Spock"

According to Anney, Asimov's time traveling replicoid had many subtle influences on the course of science fiction in the Buld Reality, creating a time loop in which information from the future helped to make science fiction into the literary genre that was needed in order to satisfy the terms of the Trysta-Grean Pact. Here are some examples provided by Anney:

1) 1963. Vance's Star King includes mention of both "Spock" and a "fantastic voyage". "Spock" is an alias used by Hidemar Dasce. Vance used the word "fantastic" three times in Star King: once to describe the trip to Tehalt's planet, once to describe the fantastic alien creatures that were native to that world and a third time to refer to the "most fantastic of human constructs".

Anney believes that Vance was in contact with Asimov's replicoid and being subconsciously influenced by Asimov. She thinks that Vance was vaguely aware of the presence of the submicroscopic Asimov replicoid and it was truly the "most fantastic of human constructs".

2) in 1964, Roddenbury included an alien, Spock, in his new science fiction television show.

I've previously mentioned that Star Trek was of minor importance in the Ekcolir Reality, being out-shown by Assignment: Earth.

3) According to Anney, Drexel Bixby was another writer who was influenced by Asimov's replicoid. Writing for Star Trek, Bixby created the episode "Requiem for Methuselah" which explored Bixby's obsession with the idea of an immortal inhabitant of Earth. Anney claims that Bixby was subliminally aware of the presence of Asimov's replicoid and knew that such replicoids are immortal.

4) Bixby wrote the story for Fantastic Voyage. Anney says that Bixby was subconsciously aware that it is possible to make submicroscopic "copies" of people who are composed of hierions or sedrons.

5) Asimov later wrote his own miniaturization novel, published in 1987. Anney claims that by this time, the Asimov analogue of the Final Reality had himself come under the influence of the "Asimov replicoid".

The time traveling Asimov replicoid had been shown a desired future and he was sent back into the past in order to make sure that the desired future came into existence. Apparently that "copy of Asimov" is still on Earth, as an active member of the Dead Widowers.

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