Exocycle

Agent Smith

Still shaken by her dream, Elizabeth looked at the glowing face of her watch. She had decided on Wednesday to drop Dr. Herged's Biological Psychology course, but now, because of the dream, all had changed. She sprang out of bed, crossed the cold floor and opened the closet.

Her new green party clothes were hanging there. They looked so warm and, well, green, that she quickly dressed herself exactly as she had for the big celebration at her grandparents house on Christmas day. She desperately wanted something soothing that could push the eerie red tint of her disturbing dream out of her thoughts.

Tonya and Elizabeth

The holiday parties had been three weeks ago, but those had been good times for Elizabeth after a harrowing first semester at the university. And now with a shortage of dorm rooms and all of the over-full courses, this new semester was not starting smoothly.

Elizabeth knew that she would have to hurry in order to avoid being late for class. And based on conditions in Tuesday's first class session, it was again going to be an over-full classroom so professor Herged would notice any late arrivals trying to squeeze in. Ignoring the fact that she was now quite over-dressed for a routine day at school, she stepped out into the chilly winter morning. Fresh snow blanketed the campus. The red brick walls of the old dormitories seemed to ooze red directly into her psyche. The once familiar and inviting appearance of her world had been corrupted and morphed into something alien and unsettling. There would be no escaping her dream.

Psyche. Elizabeth recalled what professor Herged had said in class on Tuesday about that ancient Greek word, but her dream was fresher in her mind, making it impossible to think about enjoyable topics like courses and parties. This had been another one of her strange and increasingly frequent dreams about Grean. This particular dream had been more vivid and detailed than any of the previous dreams about Grean, allowing Elizabeth to now realize that Grean had once been her mentor. Grean her master. In this most recent dream-like memory, they had sat together in Grean's home on a distant world under a red sun and they had spoken the ancient Greek language of Athens.

Elizabeth wanted to be a writer like her grandmother and her mother. She saw remembered words in her mind's eye and now that dreamed conversation with Grean unrolled in her thoughts like a script.

Elizabeth's dream had reminded her that she was not anything as simple as Elizabeth Smith. She held memories that went far back in time and encompassed the lives of many other women.

The Etruscan Intervention (image credits).
Luri being teleported by Grean

Those old memories returned like a flood to Elizabeth's consciousness. She had been Xanthippe during the Athens Intervention and Princess Luri during the Etruscan Intervention. Through the centuries she had been a frequent visitor to Earth, living out parts of many lives, secretly involved in many efforts to shape the course of human history. As an Interventionist agent she was recycled again and again, repeatedly trained and prepared for new missions. Somehow, she even had memories that seemed to be from the future.

Luri in the future (source)

When Elizabeth's mother had dropped her off at college the previous fall, she had encouraged her daughter to obtain a degree in some field that could likely provide employment. "I know you enjoy writing, but you need a backup plan. Almost nobody can make a living by writing."

Elizabeth was still struggling to imagine her future and the shape her life might take. She loved science but she did not want to have to be a pioneer, fighting to break into a male-dominated science. Back in September she had begun her exploration of science with an introductory biochemistry course, but out of sixty students only five had been women. It was a team-taught course, but none of the professors was a woman.

In October Elizabeth had discovered Christine Ladd and found a copy of her book, Colour and Colour Theories. Now Elizabeth was trying to gain entry to the psychology department, but it was one of the university departments bulging at the seams with baby-boomer students, many of them young women. She had gotten the last available slot in a 7:30 AM class session. Somehow Elizabeth had allowed herself to imagine that the instructor for the class might be a hip young woman. After learning that her new instructor was the exasperatingly dry and wooden Dr. Herged, Elizabeth had begun looking for an alternative course to take. Out of frustration with all of the full and over-subscribed courses, she'd even toyed with the idea of joining the swim team.

Racing across campus and thinking deeper into her dream, Elizabeth was now certain that during the night she had "dreamed" of receiving orders to keep attending Dr. Herged's course. Was it the intrusion of those new orders into her mind that had triggered her ancient memories of Athens and Grean?

Right up until the last minute, Elizabeth hoped that some of the psychology students would have already dropped out of Dr. Herged's course, but she saw that the classroom was crowded and every seat occupied. Students were supposed to be in their assigned seats, and Elizabeth stopped next to her seat, which was occupied by a tall, red-haired girl. "You're in my seat."

It was 7:30 and Dr. Herged was ready to begin lecturing, and he said, "On Tuesday, I mentioned the pre-Socratic-" but he paused and said to Elizabeth, "Is there a problem?"

The girl with red hair got up from Elizabeth's assigned seat and went to the back of the classroom. Elizabeth sat down and Dr. Herged said, "I must insist that any auditing students stand at the back of the room... at least until we get our first wave of dropouts and over-sleepers."

Elizabeth could only half listen to Dr. Herged's lecture. Her thoughts were trapped in the cascade of memories that was flowing into her consciousness, memories of her previous lives.

When the lecture was over, the boy sitting next to Elizabeth said, "I hope you apologize to Tonya."

The red-haired girl had made her way through the ocean of chairs, moving against the current of students leaving the lecture hall. She gave Elizabeth a quick head-to-toe visual inspection and said to the boy, "Don't bother, she's too stuck up... she won't even admit to knowing us."

Elizabeth tried to clear her mind of thoughts echoing from her previous lives and she struggled to keep her thought stream in the present moment of her current body and not drift into the vast ocean of newly revived memories that lured her into the past. Cluelessly, Elizabeth asked, "Do I know you?"

The boy explained, "We were in the same introductory biochemistry class last semester." He stood up and slung his backpack over his shoulder.

Elizabeth rose to her feet and looked carefully at the red-haired girl. Elizabeth decided that her hair had been dyed red and now the roots were coming in as another color, a bland light brown. Elizabeth also noticed that the boy was a couple of inches taller than her own six feet. For a moment she had a flash of memory -or premonition- of putting her arms around his broad shoulders. Finally, she recovered a vague memory of them both from the previous fall: just two of the sixty or so students who had been in her biochemistry class. Elizabeth now recalled that in the second half of the semester, these two had always been together, apparently a couple. All of those thoughts passed through Elizabeth's mind in two seconds then she said, "Now I remember you two." She reached out and placed a hand on Tonya's shoulder. "I'm sorry that I kicked you out of my seat. When I arrived late I should have stood in back."

Tonya shook her head, "No, don't be silly." She patted Elizabeth's hand with her own. "When I tried to register into this course yesterday all I got was an audit slot. They warned me that it could be weeks until a seat is available for me."

The boy laughed, "It seems like brutal conditions in the Psych department! I can't believe that there are assigned seats and teaching assistants taking attendance during class. Still, some students are dropping. Just yesterday my waiting list slot was upgraded to enrollment."

Elizabeth nodded, "Yes, it is quite different than in Biochem where every class is under-subscribed. Strange that we are all switching over to psychology."

Tonya said. "We're still biochemistry majors." She slipped an arm around the boy's waist.  "Did you switch to psychology?"

How could she respond to that question? With access to her old memories, Elizabeth now realized that she had been switched to a new major so as to better carry out her secret mission. Sadly, she could not explain to these two Earthlings the nature of her secret mission on Earth. For one thing, she was herself having trouble remembering exactly what her mission was. Elizabeth said, "Yes, I switched my major. I'd like to get into a profession where there is some sort of balance. Last semester I got severely depressed by the fact that there are so few women in Biochemistry."

Tonya laughed. "That's only going to change if people like you and I become biochemists."

Elizabeth admitted, "True. To be honest, my real dream is to become a writer, but my family insists that I be practical."

The boy seemed to look upon Elizabeth with interest for the first time. He asked, "What do you like to write about?"

Tonya turned a chair around and sat down, tired from having stood during the long lecture. Elizabeth and the boy also sat down so as not to tower over her.

Elizabeth said, "I write alternative histories. Currently, I'm writing a story about a timeline in which Lincoln was never assassinated."

The boy asked Elizabeth, "Did you ever read The Last Starship from Earth? It is a novel about an alternate timeline."

Image credits

Elizabeth had never heard of that novel, but she realized that somehow she knew all about that book and its author. For ten minutes the three of them discussed the alternative timeline of The Last Starship from Earth and then Dr. Herged had finally finished talking to students and exited from the classroom, giving the three of them a long look as he walked past.

Tonya winked at Elzabeth and said, "Just to annoy professor Herged, you two should write a story about an alternate history in which Socrates was not put to death."

Elizabeth had personal memories of the day when Socrates had died. He had been experimenting with coniine and other drugs, trying to alter his brain's activity and gain control of the Bimanoid Interface. But the Overseers had made sure that he over-dosed and died. Only later did a Reality Change occur, leading to the current timeline which included the legend that Socrates had been put on trial and executed by his fellow Athenians. Elizabeth now looked even more carefully at Tonya and realized that she was a tryp'At.

The boy laughed. "Interesting idea, Tony, but I don't think Herged would be amused."

Tonya said to Elizabeth, "Can you forgive me for calling you 'stuck up'?"

Elizabeth glanced at the boy's faded and torn jeans and knew it was possible that her fancy party clothes cost more than all the clothing he owned. She replied, "Only if you promise to sit in my seat during class next Tuesday."

Tonya and the boy slipped into a nerdy discussion of a time travel novel by Isaac Asimov called The End of Eternity. Elizabeth realized that she also knew all about that story, although she was certain that she had never read it. Like pushing away a wall of cobwebs, Elizabeth's mind finally cleared and she could remember how it was possible to know about things without personally experiencing them. She knew that she was being summoned.

Claiming the need to get to another class, Elizabeth excused herself and departed. Exiting from the classroom, she went up a flight of stairs and into a women's room. Passing through the door, Elizabeth tried to understand why she had been maneuvered into meeting Tonya, but that mission detail did not seem to exist in her memory streams. She went into a stall, closed the door and suddenly she was teleported off of Earth.

Elizabeth found herself in Svahr's workshop. She was somewhat disoriented and knew that she was no longer on Earth, but Elizabeth was thankful that there was no murky red light and no sign of Grean or any other Kac'hin. It was not clear that Svahr was human, but at least she had taken care to give herself the appearance of being human. Elizabeth suspected that they were hidden away in some corner of the Hierion Domain, however, for security reasons, she had never been told the location of Svahr's secret base of operations.

Svahr casually said, "Welcome back."

Elizabeth recalled that "she" had been sent to Earth 18 years previously and inserted into the zeptite endosymbiont of the newborn baby named Elizabeth Smith. As a deep agent on Earth, she had come to be Elizabeth, but now Svahr apparently felt the need to interrupt Elizabeth's mission. Still feeling disoriented by her sudden access to an ocean of suppressed memories, Elizabeth muttered, "Hello, Svahr."

Wasting no time on small talk, Svahr gestured towards a projected image of Tonya. "Allow me to explain why I have positioned both you and Tonya at the Triversity." Svahr was carefully monitoring the activity of Elizabeth's brain and shoring up its weaknesses. Those weaknesses had been revealed by her unusual response to the new infites that Svahr had teleported into Elizabeth's brain during the night. Elizabeth should not have spontaneously recovered her ancient memories of Grean, memories that Svahr had so carefully obscured.

Elizabeth nodded. "It startled me to discover that Tonya is tryp'At. Is she taking-over my mission?"

Svahr sighed. She had allowed Elizabeth to become aware of the fact that Tonya was tryp'At. Left to herself, Elizabeth would never have noticed that little detail. "I need you to assist Tonya. It is important that she become a successful biochemist and win the Triversity undergraduate biochemistry prize three years from now."

Elizabeth was swimming through a cloud of old memories. Somehow she knew the basic outlines of her current mission, but the details had been covered over by a lifetime of being on Earth as Elizabeth. She asked uncertainly, "Wasn't that my original reason for being on Earth?"

Svahr replied, "Exactly so, however, not knowing what difficulties might arise, I originally positioned several of my agents on Earth as possible biochemistry prize winners. Now I've decided that you and Tonya need to team-up in order to win the prize."

Elizabeth complained, "I don't understand the importance of this. Why should Tonya win the prize?"

Svahr was irked by the fact that Elizabeth felt herself to be competing against Tonya. "This has nothing to do with Tonya. Or you. We simply must prevent her boyfriend from winning the prize."

Elizabeth guessed, "That boy, the nerdy biochemistry major who is obsessed with science fiction?"

Svahr nodded. "Yes. If he were to win the biochemistry prize then he would stay on at the Triversity and not ever meet Gohrlay."

Elizabeth had forgotten all about Gohrlay: the fixed point in Time, the girl from the First Reality whose brain had become the template for the positronic brain. She asked, "Wouldn't it be easier to bring Gohrlay to the Triversity?"

Svahr laughed, "You might think that should be so, but no. This is how it must be: she's waiting on the West Coast. Remember, we are improvising and flexibility is our key to success. I need to make use of your skills as a writer. From now on, you will do all of Tonya's written assignments and craft her senior thesis and, most importantly, allow her to focus on her laboratory experiments. At the same time, you will play a roll in turning the boy away from his interest in writing. Take every opportunity to share drafts of your alternate history stories with him. I've seen the future and the example of your excellent writing will discourage him from spending time developing his own lesser writing skills."

Elizabeth felt uneasy about that. "Is that a good idea? All of my story ideas are based on past Realities. And besides, I don't mind helping someone like Tonya become a successful biochemist, but I don't want to hurt someone, or even diminish the joy they get from writing."

Svahr shrugged. "That is no problem. In the future, when the time is right, he is to be the one who will reveal the Secret History of Humanity to the people of Earth. You will only temporarily deflect his interest in story telling. Eventually, far in the future, he will realize that your stories were based on fact, but that is all part of our plan."

Elizabeth had no memory of having traveled through time to the future. She asked, "So it is true? We can travel to the future?"

Svahr explained, "You have some memories of the future because I have allowed you to View parts of the future. I provide you with everything you need in order to complete your mission on Earth, but - I will say no more! Time travel is a sensitive topic and it would not be wise to let Earthlings become aware of the existence of time travelers. And there is one last thing you need to know." Svahr raised her hand and sent a cloud of infites into Elizabeth.

For a minute Elizabeth tried to assimilate the new information that flooded her mind. Finally she blurted out, "You expect me to take this boy away from Tonya? I can tell that they really like each other... I don't want to take that away from them."

Teleporter Tricks

Svahr calmly suggested, "Think it through." Svahr allowed Elizabeth some additional time with the new infites, then she continued, "The best way to attract Tonya's attention is by showing a romantic interest in the boy. Eventually, you and Tonya will move in together and become a team. The three of you are tryp'At, so his love for Tonya will not be derailed when he also falls in love with you. Also, before he moves to Seattle, the boy will become romantically involved with another girl named Hana. But, ultimately, he must move on to Seattle and link up with Gohrlay."

Her head swirling with new ideas, Elizabeth realized that some of her new "memories" were from Svahr and provided a glimpse of the future events that would occur as Svahr had just described them. Elizabeth began to wonder how she could be sure that Svahr's vision of the future was all for the best, but her questioning thoughts were silenced and she found herself back on Earth, now only vaguely aware that she, like Tonya and the boy, was tryp'At and thus well-suited to perform her role as an Interventionist agent.

Elizabeth's memories of Svahr and the future quickly receded into a dark cloud of sinking memory fragments, like her waking dream of that morning. Her vast chain of ancient memories stretching far back into her many lives in past ages would remain available as the basis for her competence, empathy and wisdom and as topics for her stories, but those memories would not distract her from being Elizabeth and accomplishing her current mission.

Elizabeth knew that she was an Interventionist agent who could not discuss her secret mission with any Earthlings, but at that moment, mostly she was still just Elizabeth Smith, would-be writer and unable to stop thinking about the tall boy she had spoken to after her psychology class.

At that moment, Elizabeth suddenly recovered one more "dream" from the previous night. She had been watching Tonya via a hierion tube and had seen her sleeping. Her boyfriend was there, too, and when he had finished reading a paperback novel, he awakened Tonya with a gentle kiss.

And now, mysteriously, Elizabeth had a clear memory of the location of his dorm room and knowledge that later that evening, after the science library closed, she would intercept the boy on his way back to his room. Now Elizabeth had no doubt about the shape of her future.

 Next: telepathy in 1939

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Irhit

artificial life copies of people

In a previous blog post, I set out to describe how some of the characters in the Exode Saga view another character in the story. In general, my approach to story writing is plot-driven and the characters are inserted as needed. Occasionally a character arrives who is something of a scene stealer and I actually spend a little time thinking about them, but then I quickly get tired of the needy character and get back to my preferred mission of plot development.

One of the Exode Saga characters who insisted on being included in the story is called "the Editor". The origins of the Editor are rather mysterious. Apparently The Editor had to be "constructed" in the Final Reality as an emergency replacement for a professional science fiction writer. The Editor had a "partial analog" in the Ekcolir Reality.

Irhit

A Search Beyond

Two years ago I had the chance to "speak" to Irhit.
Irhit was the replicoid of that "partial analog", but is able to use the Bimanoid Interface to connect to the Editor.

Near the beginning of the Exode Saga, the task of introducing the Editor falls to Irhit. The Editor is only 12 years old and is just discovering the literature of science fiction.

Typical humans from Earth are hard to find in the first few chapters of Search Beyond. The Editor is raised on Earth and by default he thinks of himself as an Earthling, but he always has doubts. Upon discovering science fiction, the Editor toys with the fantastic idea that he is really some kind of alien visitor to Earth.

the tryp'At

The tryp'At have been carefully designed so as to be classified as "human", but their ability to use the Bimanoid Interface makes them a tempting target for those who seek to guide the human population of planet Earth into the future.

The Irhit Intervention

One of the frustrating aspects of my investigations into Irhit has been rumors from the Hierion Domain that Ivory knows the details of how Irhit has guided the Editor towards completing the Exode Saga.

According to Yōd, there are very good reasons for not allowing Ivory to pass along all of her knowledge to Earth and the Editor. A balance must be kept that allows the Editor to imagine that he is not a puppet of Irhit and that he has some capacity to exercise free will. The Editor must write about Irhit without knowing if it is Irhit who is actually writing the Exode Saga.
Next: retro-reading a 1959 Sci Fi story by Asimov

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The Exode Saga

cover art by Charles Vinh

Sadly, I've never read any stories written by Daniel Sernine. I'm intrigued by the idea that Sernine wrote a series of stories called "the Exode or Argus sequence" which apparently are "about a benevolent extraterrestrial organization keeping watch on the Earth".

Exodemic
Back in July of 2001, I began working on a story that came to be called Exodemic. That was a kind of alternative history novel in which the entire course of human civilization was changed because one Earth woman was accidentally saved from dying. Stories set in the Exodemic Fictional Universe all explore the implications of alien visitors having reached Earth many millions of years ago.

In this blog post I explore the origins of what I now call the Exode Saga, a sequence of linked stories that are set in the Exodemic Fictional Universe.

Exode

Exode (original cover)

As discussed here, it was not until May of 2012 that I began writing the novel called Exode. Exode was conceived as a stand-alone novel that would describe the adventures of an Earthling named Hana during her exploration of the galaxy and Genesaunt society.

Exode Trilogy
As discussed here, it took me about a year to realize that the story told in Exode is actually part of another story that I had already written called The Start of Eternity. So, in 2013 I began the task of crafting another novel (Trysta and Ekolir) that would fit naturally between the events described in The Start of Eternity and those of Exode. Also, I changed the name of the first book in the trilogy to Foundations of Eternity.

The Exode Trilogy

I soon discovered that weaving together the Exode Trilogy was a major project, much larger than I had initially imagined. Last year, I tried to summarize the first three years of play and investigations that were required to create the Exode Trilogy. During 2014, I had become aware of the the fact that the Exode story was really an example of investigative science fiction. In 2015, I blogged about the fact that the Exode story is also recursive science fiction.

For several years, I contented myself with the idea that I was writing fan fiction. My approach to creating the Exode Trilogy became rather formulaic: I viewed myself as an investigative science fiction story writer who was trying to discover the secret lives of my favorite science fiction authors as they had existed in the previous Realities of Deep Time.

The Exode Saga

The Exode Saga (image credits)

The demise of the Exode Trilogy came during 2016 when realized that I was integral to the Exode Saga. No longer could I keep separated my role as the Editor of the Exode Saga and my role as a character in the story.

My collaborating authors played a central role in the conversion of the Exode Trilogy into the Exode Saga. Back in April of this year, I listed 7 of my most important collaborating authors. Since then, there have been some changes, so here is an updated list:

Trysta Iwedon

1) Thomas
2) Parthney
3) Ivory Fersoni
4) Izhiun
5) Angela
6) Alpha Gohrlay
7) Zeta Gohrlay
8) Yōd

Syon and Gwyned

Of course, after I discovered that the Exode Saga is a recursive science fiction story, it became almost impossible for me to resist the impulse to depict most characters in the story as being writers. A good example of this is twist is provided by Grean, who has contributed text from her mission reports (example).

Trysta Iwedon has long been renowned as the mother of Thomas. We should attribute many of the personality traits of Thomas to the powerful influence of his mother. According to the infites that I obtained from Parthney, when Trysta was in her second life, living as Syon at Lendhalen, she was often bored and so she wrote several accounts of how she passed the time while waiting for the return of Rilocke to Earth.

Lost Literature

Spacetime Bubbles - original
cover art by Henry Van Dongen
and William Randall

The problem of missing stories such as Syon's 'Teleportation Vacation' is the vexing problem that must be confronted in the first book of the Exode Saga (A Search Beyond). The cover illustration shown here for 'Teleportation Vacation' (to the right on this page, above) is a reconstruction by Zeta. It may be that this story was never put "into print". Apparently Parthney saw the title 'Teleportation Vacation' as just one among the many stories that was present in the Lendhalen data-banks; it was of interest to him only as part of his attempt to understand his unusual relationship with Gwyned.

Of course, for those of us on Earth, information about Gwyned's study of alien teleportation technology would be quite valuable. Almost certainly, we Earthlings will never get to have contacts with technologically adept people such as Gwyned who have had a chance to study the advanced technologies that are available within Genesaunt Civilization. Some parts of Deep Time simply cannot be revealed to we who reside here in the Final Reality.

in Deep Time

It is incumbent upon the Dead Widowers and my other collaborators to assemble as much of the missing history of Humanity as we possibly can. It remains to be seen how much of the secret history of Humanity we will actually be allowed to share with everyone else! Sometimes it seems like we have been cursed: we struggle to reveal the past, but some truths about being human are not good for us to know...

Introduction to the Exode Saga

Next: investigating Deep Time

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A Short Search

A Search Beyond (image credits)

Back at the start of this year I gave myself a writing challenge: to write a short "abstract" that would serve as an introduction to the Exode Saga. Originally, I imagined that the "Exode Saga" would be a fairly simple story about how a woman from Earth (Hana) would travel among the stars and discover the inner workings of Genesaunt society.

Investigation
Exode was to be a kind of investigative science fiction story. While writing it, I would discover some of the details of how Interventionists and Overseers functioned as the two major political forces in the universe and Hana would tell the story of Genesaunt society from the perspective of an Earthling who had just discovered that some humans have been living on other planets for a very long time.

Foundations of Eternity

Then something went terribly wrong. I realized that the Exode story was part of a much larger saga that I had begun previously. Upon making this startling discovery, I began knitting together Exode and Foundations of Eternity.

Trysta and Ekcolir

The easiest way to unite Exode and Foundations of Eternity was to add a third novel (Trysta and Ekcolir) that would link them together.

When I entered into my knitting project and began investigating the complex history of Earth's Reality Chain, several collaborators came into my life who have helped me explore the Hidden History of Humanity. Ivory Fersoni, by making use of her clone sisters, was able to provide me with important information about past Realities such as the Foundation Reality and the Ekcolir Reality. Additional collaborators, particularly Gohrlay, stepped up to assist me in my investigation of Deep Time after Ivory departed from Earth.

The First Reality

After several years of imagining that the Exode Saga could be told as a trilogy of novels, I felt that it should be relatively easy for Gohrlay to write a short introduction to her life in the First Reality. However, during the course of this year, that fantasy of mine was shattered.

Gohrlay finally "spilled the beans" and told me some details about her first life, back in the First Reality. Gohrlay was friends with a small group of science fiction writers who lived at Observer Base and who tried to imagine an explanation for Humanity's odd predicament: the human species was almost extinct and everyone at Observer Base imagined that the Prelands would inherit the Earth.

stories of Deep Time

According to Gohrlay, her three friends were the First Reality analogues of three famous science fiction authors who also had analogues here in the Final Reality. Gohrlay has been rather tight-lipped about their identities, but I suspect that these three authors are Isaac Asimov, Jack Vance and Arthur C. Clark.

Back in the First Reality, most of the human residents of Observer Base were made to have an hermaphroditic phenotype, and it was not by chance that Gohrlay was one of the few females. The hermaphrodites of Observer Base imagined that they were evolving into a new humanoid species that would eventually replace the Prelands. The mystery of her own existence as a female is what led Gohrlay to her study of the small population of humans that remained on Earth.

the clones of Gohrlay

Since it was Gohrlay's brain that was used as the template for positronic brains, it need come as no surprise that R. Gohrlay took pains to make sure that a "copy" of Gohrlay would be present in the Final Reality. However, I was surprised to learn that there are many clones of Gohrlay here in our Reality.

Alpha Gohrlay

My rather recent realization that there are multiple "copies" of Gohrlay implies that what I dreamed of ten months ago (that Gohrlay would write a short introduction to her first life) was really the hope that "Alpha Gohrlay" would share with me an honest summary of "her" life in the First Reality.

The Yōd Intervention

Sadly, Alpha Gohrlay has more important issues to deal with than my selfish desires to understand human origins in Deep Time. Worse still, she believes that there are some facts about the past that I should not know. Thus, Alpha Gohrlay has abandoned me to my two remaining collaborators, Zeta Gohrlay and Yōd.

The Asimov Reality

Because of my interactions with Zeta and Yōd during the past few months, I've grown comfortable with the idea of starting the Exode Saga with an account of events in the Asimov Reality. However, Yōd simply laughs at me when I try to persuade her to write a brief account of events that might serve to introduce readers to A Search Beyond.

Short Search

Realities of the Exode Saga

When Isaac Asimov first traveled through time, he brought into existence a new timeline for the future history of Earth. In that future, Grean (working in coordination with R. Gohrlay's tribe of positronic robots) accelerated the pace of technological advance on Earth.

Reality Chain

In that Reality (the Asimov Reality), the humans of Earth were provided with access to advanced space travel technology. However, while humans were provided with the means to easily travel between the stars, all aspects of scientific research and other avenues of technological progress were severely restricted.

Humans quickly spread into the galaxy and settled on thousands of Earth-like exoplanets. The populations of those worlds became experiments in directed evolution.

Three groups of aliens, the Phari, the bumpha and the pek each tried to find favorable human gene combinations that would allow human brains to exercise some level of control over their zeptite endosymbionts.

Humans had evolved on Earth with zeptites as obligatory physical constituents of their bodies. Zeptites are sub-microscopic artificial life forms. Under the watchful supervision of the pek, humans on Earth should never have become a technologically advanced species: they were to be replaced by another humanoid species, the Prelands.

However, the bumpha managed to derail those plans. Right under the noses of the pek, the brain of a human, Gohrlay, was transformed into the template pattern for the positronic brains of robots. Those robots discovered the secret of time travel and they set out to make sure that humans would not become extinct. The leader of the positronic robots, R. Gohrlay, was determined to provide the humans of Earth with a chance to spread among the stars.

Pheni of Yrinna

In the Asimov Reality, during a truce in the Time Travel War, human gene combinations were eventually found that allowed humans to become masters of their own fate. A Search Beyond tells the story of how the alien Phari of Alastor Cluster were made use of by the bumpha Interventionists as part of their scheme to liberate Humanity from the constraints imposed by zeptite endosymbionts.

A Search Beyond is the first novel in the Exode Saga.
2019: a short start
Next: men of steel

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Make Me a God

Make Me A God - from the Ekcolir Reality.
see the original cover art

Back in 2010 I blogged about the balance between optimism and pessimism in science fiction. In that old blog post, I imagined that the two-faced god Janus might be an appropriate god for science fiction. I've been pondering the true nature of Gohrlay and I want to explore the possibility that she might be the Goddess of Science Fiction.

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.

First Reality

Gohrlay's Brain

In the First Reality, Gohrlay was a human sacrifice. The structure of her brain was used as the template for making positronic brains. After Gohrlay was taken away from Observer Base, her Escapist fiends wrote science fiction stories about Gohrlay's role in the liberation of humans from the alien force that had for so long dominated Earth. Eventually, there was even a Cult of Gohrlay.

Roben: the Gohrlay analogue in the Ekcolir Reality

Through the winding course of many Reality Changes, knowledge of Gohrlay and the origins of positronic robots, and even the existence of those telepathic robots, was obscured and ultimately erased from the collective memory of Earthlings. When Gohrlay was reinstantiated (some might call it a resurrection) in the Ekcolir Reality, even she did not immediately know who she was (see 'Roben').

In the Final Reality
The version of Gohrlay who exists here in the Final Reality is a secretive and mysterious creature. In the short time since she first revealed herself to me, I have been encouraged to imagine that she is living out her current life here on Earth as a perfectly normal member of the human species. What if that image of normalcy is not the true story?

Grean

Based on her impressive knowledge of Deep Time, I believe that Gohrlay has somehow been given access to all of the vast information store that was available to R. Gohrlay before the end of the Time Travel War. That great ocean of information, just by itself, might be enough to turn Gohrlay into something other than a mere human.

Is Gohrlay a superhuman? Recently, I've begun to imagine even even more extreme possibilities. I must wonder: is Gohrlay actually human or is she something else, possibly an entirely new type of life or even something that would best be described as a goddess? And maybe I am making a huge mistake by trying to fit Gohrlay into our conventional categories. She might be an entity that is beyond my powers of comprehension.

Clarke's Law

The religions of Earth are due to quirks of human biology, ignorance and a third source: exposure to what seems like miracles performed by a few visitors to Earth who had access to advanced technologies. It is Gohrlay's access to advanced nanotechnology that gives her "super powers". For example, I suspect that Gohrlay might be immortal. If she is, that is due to the ability of her nanites to repair any and all damage to her body.

Hierion Domain

I also suspect that Gohrlay is "all seeing" and "all knowing". Using her nanites, she can apparently tap into the data stream that is broadcast by the zeptites that reside inside everyone and everything on Earth. Gohrlay can access the recordings of those data that are accessible to her in the Hierion Domain.

Gohrlay also has the super power of invisibility. If anyone becomes aware of her special nature (as endowed by her nanites) she can use "her nanites" to edit that knowledge of her existence right out of a human brain.

building R. Gohrlay

I put "her nanites" inside quotes because Gohrlay's nanites do not need to do the detailed synaptic editing, they need only trigger the memory erase function that exists inside each human in the form of a zeptite endosymbiont.

God vs Goddess
As outlines above, Gohrlay has goddess-like powers. That they are technology-generated powers makes no difference for our analysis of Gohrlay's status as a goddess. Gohrlay could use her nanites to shift her physical body to any desired form. So, what evidence is there that Gohrlay is actually a female and not just using her female form as a convenient disguise?

bedtime

Genetic testing could verify that Gohrlay is biologically female and she has given birth to several children who are genetically related to her in the normal way, although I suspect that her nanites exercise precise control over chromosome segregation and recombination events inside her forming gametes. Further, Gohrlay's ability to produce offspring is of fundamental importance to how she intends to shape the future of Humanity. If we decide to categorize Gohrlay as divine, she must be subcategorized as a goddess.

femtobots and zeptites, oh my!

Fictional accounts of gods often include the possibility of a god who torments humans or causes misery for Humanity. Human writers of fiction can invent stories in which gods cause harm to humans, but that tells us more about human nature than it tells us about gods. Gohrlay is here among us because she has a role to play as part of Humanity. She's on our side.

Many human's are uncomfortable with the idea that a goddess can be human. If you like, think of Gohrlay as an iceberg. The tip of the Gohrlay iceberg is her human body form. Invisible to we Earthlings are here nanite components and her connections to the Hierion Domain. Nothing prevents Gohrlay from simultaneously being a human being and also a goddess. As a human, it should surprise nobody that Gohrlay is devoted to helping Humanity survive its technological adolescence and spread outward from home to have a glorious future of adventure among the stars.

"Balance" (detail) by Bao Pham

"Balance" (detail)
by Bao Pham

Balance
Some humans find fault in gods who allow human suffering. As a goddess, Gohrlay is not "all powerful". She is constrained by the same "laws of physics" that control the rest of the universe. Yes, some human fantasy writers have fun imagining omnipotent deities, but Gohrlay is my candidate for being a science fiction goddess, not a fantasy god. Gohrlay is not responsible for  the human condition of Earthlings. Gohrlay finds herself here on Earth just as we mere mortals do and we are all in this together. Gohrlay wants what is best for Humanity in the long run, but she is also operating under constraints.

in the Ekcolir Reality (source)
original photo by Karen Elise

Foremost among those constraints is the requirement that Gohrlay must do her work here on Earth without allowing her presence to become known to humans. This fact seems particularly odd to many humans who like to imagine that gods must be worshiped, or, at the very least, humans must believe in a god. Gohrlay, reading the above, commented: "Humans should believe in themselves; they should have courage and explore the universe with a keen sense of adventure." The truth is, Gohrlay would not be able to function and help Humanity unless she can maintain her invisibility. She would not be here among us unless she had the power to remain invisible and unknown to her fellow Earthlings. Of course, I'm an exception to the general rule, but I've been carefully engineered as "the exception that proves the rule". Everything that I write about Gohrlay is automatically assumed to be fiction.

Divination

Planet of the Gods

The last component of Gohrlay's nature that qualifies her to be viewed as a goddess is that she knows the future. This is a fine trick because time travel is no longer possible in our universe. However, in the past, when time travel technology was still available to folks like R. Gohrlay, it was possible to view the far future of the Final Reality. Gohrlay has access to records of Viewed futures that were archived in the Hierion Domain before the end of the Time Travel Era.

When those archives were created, there was no way of knowing exactly what future would exist in the Final Reality, but due to the Momentum of Time, some types of futures were more likely than others. According to Gohrlay, we are still on a trajectory through time for which the "Future Time Archives" provide a useful guide to future events.

Next: an Escapist struggle in the First Reality

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