Walt and Leigh Richmond

by The Lost Millennium (html)

  "If you re-read the Book of Revelations as a series of training-film scenarios translated through the eyes of a primitive, it comes through…"

  "It looks as if we're going to school now, Rahn," Zad said. "Seven lenses. What a beauty!"

  "How on Ura did you acquire equipment like the Juheda and that movie apparatus!" Rahn exclaimed. "Your grants must be the most liberal known to scientific history!"

  "Ah," David explained proudly. "This is only partially from research funds. Haven't you heard that I went commercial? I had some research funds that could be allocated to the Juheda, of course, but they weren't nearly sufficient. So I began commercializing. I've sold books and articles—I even wrote some science fiction—with sound scientific bases, I might add. Two were bought for the movies. And I've been making films for the Educational TV channels. I've just been signed up by the Knight Interests to make a series of cartoon-films on biology which will be used on commercial channels.

  He chuckled as he ran the lead on a film-strip through the maze of cogs and clips under the projector's soft white cover. "I've even been given two of the Knight Interests' top technicians and this equipment to take with me on the trip. I plan to make films of everything we do, of course."

  Zad and Rahn both looked at the biologist in complete awe. I think," said Zad solemnly, "that I shall sign up for one of your classes—not to learn molecular biology, but to learn the gentle art of commercial success in science!"

  "What I'm going to show you," said David, disregarding her comment, "is the opening sequence of the new series and then one of the cartoons. The one we did on radiation is among my favorites," he added, "even though it is rather out of date."

  Leaving the projector, he went around the room drawing drapes that covered the entire wall surfaces, creating a theater atmosphere in the big cafeteria. "This room," he said, "doubles as dining hall, theater and classroom.

  We'll use the Juheda as a sea-going school after we finish this work.

  "You realize," he added, "that in going commercial, I have also had to be somewhat grandiose and a bit—well, folksy."

  The music came up in a blare of trumpets with a background chorus, and the screen cleared to show David seated at his desk. Around him was the zodiacal circle in the vivid colors of the highly technical art of the movie. In the place of each sign of the zodiac were two technicians in white laboratory smocks, a bunsen burner or crucible beside each as he worked at some task.

  At each of the four major inner points of the zodiacal circle was a figure illustrating one of the four branches of biology—a lion, a calf, an eagle, and a prehistoric man. Behind each of the four was the head of a seven-lensed color camera recording its movements, and each of the four moved restlessly.

  Before the desk was the huge lens of a microscope; at the front of the desk were replicas of the seven interstellar ships, their frosted ice lighted from within as from the great stardrives of such ships.

  "Hello," said the screen David. "This is the study of biology—the story of all creation that is written in the planet around us and in the stars in our galaxy. The book of life is an open book, open to him who has eyes to see and ears to hear."

  As he spoke, the outer part of the zodiacal wheel turned and moved beneath the camera to become a circle at the base of the picture, while the lens of the microscope that had been at the base moved before the four biological specimens, enlarging them; each of the four made his normal hunting sound—the eagle screamed; the lion roared; the lamb bleated; and the man made grunting, pre-symbolic noises.

  Then the lens faded and the animals in their turn slowly revolved into their place in the zodiacal ring which lay now at the foot of the scene, while a movie projector rolled up beside David at his desk, a duplicate of the one David was using now. From a pile of seven cans of film at his right, the screen-David selected a film and placed it in the projector.

  From the bunsen burners and the contents of their crucibles smoke rose to obscure the scene as the trumpets blared again. The chorus completed its theme, while an announcer's voice declared, "The study of biology—the study of life. The study of what was and is and is to be…"

  The picture flicked off, and David switched on the lights. "That's the opening sequence for each of the films," he said in his own voice again. "What do you think of it—for commercial appeal, that is? We're competing with all the guff the movies are spewing forth," he added, apologetically, "and we've tried to give it enough drama to catch at least a good part of the normal movie audience."

  Rahn's voice held nothing but admiration. "I'd say it's rather terrific. It's dramatic, but what's the harm in that?"

  "Rahn's right." Zad's voice was enthusiastic. "That's terrific, David. But what do the Knight Interests get out of it?"

  "Prestige. Status. Institutional advertising. Identification with basic research that will go a long way towards cancelling out their robber baron reputation. They don't need to advertise their products any more, just their trade name; but they do need to keep their public image gleaming. This does that without seeming to be commercial."

  The kitchen door opened and a food tray was wheeled into the room.

  "Lunch is ready," said David. "But while it's being served, let me show you the cartoon figures we drew for a radiation sequence. Then I'll be good and leave my toy and eat." He flicked off the lights again, and speeded the film through the projector. A few unidentifiable sequences flashed by, and then he slowed the projector down as a vast army of tiny cartoon figures came on the screen. The miniature, animated shapes were ferocious, with faces like a woman's, teeth like lions, scales like iron breastplates, and tails like scorpions. Each figure was glowing with internal radiation.

  A shout of laughter greeted him as he stopped the projector and flicked on the lights.

  "So that's what a gamma ray looks like!" Zad said as she caught her breath.

  "They live up to their looks in the script, too," David said proudly. "They torture people by stinging them, but it takes five months to die, and it's a mighty battle. In the long run they're routed."

  Zad and Rahn were still laughing. "David, that's good," said Rahn.

  "Anybody that loves cartoons—and that includes me, upper case—knows they've got to be gory. Cat smashes mouse, mouse is smashed flat until he un-flats. People will eat that up," said Zad.

  Lunch was hilarious, and by the time the three had toured the Juheda from top to bottom of its three levels, examined its atomic motors ("Why not broadcast-power?" asked Zad. "I may be too far down to get it during storms when I need it most," David told her.) the day was far spent.

  As they left the dock it was already dusk, and the passing circular carapets had switched on their riding lights. In the gathering twilight, the six round "feet" that circled the rim of each carapet rather like glowing upside-down megaphones, and the more perfect central foot cast a burnished light from the motors onto the ground beneath; while the seven riding lights that duplicated their positions topsides looked like tiny fireflies hovering in the air. Through the round, clear-plastic bodies of the vehicles, the figures of their occupants could just be made out.

  "They look so dainty and fairy-like," Zad said softly. "If you couldn't hear the motors, you could almost believe in fairyland."

  "I'm not sure that what we have now is not fairyland," David told her solemnly. "We've the power of genies; and we're breaking through to so many secret, magic knowledges. I wonder if we're capable of handling all that's in our hands these days? It takes gentleness," he said quietly, "to protect the magic of fairyland."

  IV

  The archaeologist broke off suddenly and stood up, stretching. He wandered to the edge of the canopy and stood looking up at the desert stars beginning to twinkle through the dusk. Then he turned again to the engineer.

  "We know the Juheda was at sea when the avalanche occurred," he said. "Lord Lyon may just have gone to sea as he planned, but I rather imagine that he left hastily—that his work was uncovered, a
nd the public raised a hue and cry…"

  "Are you sure his name wasn't Noah? There's a great flood in every mythology. And the avalanche you're setting up would have caused floods." The engineer's skepticism was unalloyed, but he was obviously enjoying the logic of the build-up.

  "No." The archaeologist was quite positive. "No. Noah's flood was later. It was caused purposefully, and it didn't happen until 4400 BC. The crew of the Vaheva helped Lord David create the flood, the first time they came back,

  "No. But Lord Lyon was underseas when the big avalanche occurred, and he was in a plastic arc of similar dimensions to those he gave Noah before the 4400 BC flood. He may just have gone to sea in the routine course of events, but I rather imagine …"

  As Rahn put the carajet down in the University parking lot an hour later, two figures were taking off from near the biology lab, with the whirling streams of fire over their heads that indicated the use of the uncomfortable, back-strap, heli-jets.

  "Darned if I can see why anybody would want to ride on one of those things." Zad seemed genuinely puzzled.

  "Oh, they're not so bad. Beat the parking problem as easily as a bicycle and with a lot more get up and scat." Rahn spoke almost offhandedly. "Pacia and Dade both have them. I think they get about as much kick out of riding the darned things as one of those ski enthusiasts gets from jumping over snowbanks up in the Layas."

  "We're taking some along on the Juheda." David stretched his lean figure out of the seat. "They stow easily and provide transportation when you land. Come on in the lab for coffee," he added, helping Zad out.

  The three strolled across the quiet campus towards the big biology building, savoring the serenity of the scene and the feeling of content that had grown among them.

  David opened the door to the lab and was gesturing them in, when suddenly he froze.

  Barring their way, hands clenched, face white, was Memph Luce.

  At the sight of Lord Lyon, Luce's hands unclenched and he let out his breath with a sigh of relief.

  "What on Ura …" David's voice was completely startled.

  "We had two visitors." Luce was speaking almost through clenched teeth, and his voice was high with strain. "I found them when I came in. They were in the experimental section, David."

  "The … damn! Who?" The biologist's voice was suddenly fierce.

  "Dade Ellis and Pacia … your wife, Captain." Luce spoke to Rahn.

  "Pacia?" Rahn was puzzled.

  "I … I threw them out, David. I had to be … quite ungentle about it. They—talked of going to the civil authorities, and took off by heli-jet."

  "We saw them leave," Zad interpolated quietly.

  Rahn interrupted, rather brusquely. "What would Pacia and Dade be doing in the biology lab in the first place, and why would they threaten to go to civil authorities in the second? It—well it doesn't seem quite in character. Even if you were rude, they had no right to be here."

  David seemed not to have heard. "How long had they been here before you found them?"

  "I gather quite some time. They seemed to be familiar with every … with every…"

  Zad said abruptly, "I think this is a matter between you two. Perhaps Rahn and I had better leave. Or perhaps Rahn, as captain of the Vahsaba, could be of some help to you, if you'd care to make matters clear enough so that it would be possible."

  David turned to his assistant. "How serious were their threats? How serious did they sound?"

  "They sounded quite serious. Quite, quite serious. And from their attitudes I would think so too."

  "If I can be of any help," Rahn interjected, I'd be glad to; though I can't think that Dade and Pacia would go to authority for anything so idiotic as being thrown out of where they didn't belong. Dade is rather short tempered, and perhaps that was just his temper speaking. He's apt to be over his tantrums as quickly as they appear."

  "I think perhaps we had better call on your assistance, Rahn." David hesitated, and then said fiercely, "An experimental laboratory can be quite shocking to a layman who does not understand what work is going on. We do not," he said with deep emphasis, "indulge here in inhumane experiments—but we've had some rather unfortunate results from some of the means we've tried—unfortunate and unexpected. I think a man of Dade's character—and perhaps your wife as well—might misunderstand what they saw, and perhaps feel impelled to take action against what would appear to them …" His voice trailed off despairingly.

  "I see. Yes, if he thought something untoward was going on, Dade—and Pacia too—would be apt to take direct action. But what could have brought them here in the first place?"

  "The cannus." Zad's voice was positive. "Dade is completely enamored of the beast. He and David had quite a row about it."

  "Oh. Yes. Pacia mentioned it. Well, I shall see them each. Pacia tonight, Dade first thing in the morning. Put your mind at rest, David. I know you well enough to know that whatever you are doing is all right. I'll forestall any actions they might take. The captain of the ship," he added wryly, "does have a bit of authority."

  "I'll show you what upset them if you like?"

  "No need at all. I know you rather well, and I'm not a bit worried about whatever is being done under your authority. I'll tend to those two—and I've got to get on to my desk. There's a mountain of work waiting. Thanks for showing me the Juheda. It was a treat."

  "Thank you for taking care of this rather—unfortunate occurrence."

  Zad turned to the biologist. "Why not make a night of it, David? Come along to my place, and we'll get hold of Bon now. I want you two to meet, and if you're leaving soon it had better be right away. Would you like to come too, Memph?" she turned to the younger man. "You'll be quite interested in what we're doing with the memory tap, and Bon's going to outline the work for the biology department."

  Luce was still pale, but he was making an effort to pull himself together. "Thank you, but I think not," he said. "I rather think someone had better be here, and I've a bit of work to do." His eyes looked haunted.

  David took Zad's arm. "If you can get your man tonight, that will suit me exactly," he said. "I'm skeptical, but I shan't want to leave without knowing your work."

  "Where do you get this memory tap business? I know we have the memory tap in its early stages today; but I've never seen a reference to it in history or mythology." The engineer was fascinated with the wealth of detail in this yam.

  "Oh, the memory tap comes down quite clearly on several lines. Through Bon's work after he left David, probably in a quarrel over methodology—you'll find a rather distorted version of it in the Karma concept today; and even the biologist used it in his work to re-create the race of man he thought had been exterminated. You'll find references to it all through the Old Testament, instructions on how to control the 'beast within'. They were rather complete, those instructions, originally, but most of them have been lost. You see, about 50 BC, it was decided that the work of weeding out mutations and breeding the race true had to end; measures were taken to cancel out the system of burnt offerings and the memory tap and to substitute a system of ethics."

  "You insist on those mutations?"

  "Oh, there were mutations. Almost one hundred percent at first. The animals that have been found crushed with human bones and pottery shards in caves a thousand feet above sea level; and in frozen piles several hundred feet high in the arctic regions as a result of the tidal wave that happened when the flood conditions were stopped too fast—they're almost all throwbacks.

  Mammoths, mastodons, sabre-toothed tigers—throwbacks. It was a major anomaly in the evolutionary dating sequence. Much too recent, the bones much too fresh, to match our ideas of when such animals roamed the earth. The race the biologist created were throwbacks, too; but that was due more to the creative techniques than the mutation hazard, against which he protected them as much as possible.

  "But when he had to put his people out of the Juheda into the Guarded Area so that they could have the reproductive faculty witho
ut introducing its chemistry into his closed ecology—they did mutate, badly. The record of his work to weed out the mutation factors is quite complete. The first incident occurs in the Cain and Abel sequence. You remember that Cain brought the 'fruits of the ground' as an offering to the Lord? And the Lord 'had not respect' for Cain's offering? While Abel brought meats, and the Lord had 'respect unto them.' The carbon 14 in the atmosphere wasn't immediately lethal; there was simply too large a proportion of carbon 14 instead of carbon 12 in the carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere, and I gather the body could handle it in the concentrations in which it existed. But it was a genetic hazard—even more to the plants than animals, since the plants reproduce faster; and even more to the animals than man.

  "The Lord was probably quite distressed to see how badly the plants were mutating, quite possibly making them inedible and poisonous. Edible plants are delicate and mutate easily. The edible strain of potatoes, for instance, is a close cousin of a descendant of the deadly nightshade. Tomatoes were long thought to be poisonous, and probably were; our new edible varieties just came into existence through mutation some time in the last few hundred years. Many of the other vegetables we eat are closely associated with generally poisonous species—even such innocent plants as carrots and parsley.

  "When Cain and Abel brought their offerings, the Lord was distressed at the mutating plants, probably found them poisonous, and forbade the children to eat them. But the animals, though mutated, were edible. Of course, the children misunderstood. I gather Cain thought the Lord loved his brother better than himself, a typical childish reaction. Abel may have thought so too. At any rate, it led to the first murder.

  "Then the means Lord David used to breed out haemophilia comes through quite clearly. The bargain he made with his people that each male child would be circumcised by the time he was eight days old was one of the most binding. There was no way he could eliminate haemophilia from the female carriers, who don't develop it themselves; but by circumcision he could weed it from the males. Any boy-child haemophiliac bled to death, of course, when he was circumcised.