by Larry Hunt
Light is composed of photons. The theory is they move though space as electromagnetic waves. Without going into some technical data, I’ll say photons are made up of atoms. They possess frequencies too. These ‘les hommes en argent’ have figured out how to tap into these sub-atomic particles and convert them into words.”
Captain Scarburg jumped in. “You mean ‘convert them into pictures’? You said ‘words’ by mistake.”
“No words, is correct. I’ll explain. When a light wave strikes an object, depending upon the energy of the light wave, remember this you guys: ‘the energy of the light wave’, the frequency which electrons vibrates in the material will depend on the type material. The amount of external energy applied will determine if the light wave can hold on to its electrons and not produce protons of light. Guys, right now, forget everything you ever knew about photons and photography; this stuff we do is way out there in fiction land. It is beyond what you know as reality.
The main thing the ‘les hommes en argent ’ are interested in is what happens when light hits an object and is reflected. Some atoms in certain materials have loosely held electrons. The photograph’s atoms hold many free electrons that readily jump from one atom to another within the same material. When enough energy is applied, these energized electrons start vibrating. These electrons will come back out of the object as a light wave with the same frequency as the incoming wave.” ‘She finally stopped for a minute to catch her breath.
At this break, Sarge said, “All of this particle, atom shit is giving me a headache.” He got up from the table saying he needed a Winston. He walked out the door, onto the mezzanine, down the stairs and across the floor to the outside morning air. Mumbling all along, “I’m leaving all this techno crap to the two pointy heads in that lab! Well from the sound of her the “three pointy heads” up there!”
After Sarge left, Miss Lu began taking again. “You both understand light possesses properties of both a wave and a particle. As a particle photons of light exhibit both wavelength and amplitude frequencies. Photons have no mass but we know when light strikes any surface, the surface emits electrons called photoelectrons.
We constructed a vacuum chamber allowing a picture to be inserted into one end; at the other end is a complicated apparatus called a Photoelectron Collector. Focus a laser beam of light and a tremendous amount of energy, remember I told you about ‘the energy of the light wave’ this is where it is used, on the object, in our case a picture; photoelectrons are released and will move toward the collector at the other end.
Next a current is created in the wires that connect the two ends. Once the photoelectrons are collected they are re-assembled to re-create the ‘slightly’ altered original picture. There are a couple of complicated instruments; one is called an 'Optical Homodyne Imaging Detector'. Inside this machine the end result happens but time does not permit detailed explanation at this time. Gentlemen this is merely a kindergarten version of the science that is being performed inside this machine. I emphasize, they use a tremendous amount of electricity to perform these tasks.”
Captain Scarburg spoke, “So you are telling us you can transmit pictures over a distance using this ‘collector’ thing?”
"Captain, transmitting of data is already being accomplished everyday, this is multitudinous more complex than that. When I arrived I had to piece together most of what went on here. I believe, these 'silver men’ started out, like you said trying to broadcast pictures, not like our television, but somehow different.
I really believe it was more than over the air transmission; they were sending information in something they call ‘digital’ format. They named the units of data ‘bits’ and assign binary values of 1 or 0, just like my professor was trying to do. They then combine the ‘bits’ into ‘bytes’, which can represent single characters of text or individual dots on photographs that they call ‘pixels’. A name they stole from my professor. I do not know if I told them or they ‘read’ my mind but they further developed my professor’s 1s and 0s concept. But I truly believe they already possessed the technology for the transmitting of information, they were working on something bigger, much bigger!”
The Captain spoke looking puzzled, “This knowledge is big!”
“As the saying goes, ‘Oh, you ‘ain’t seen nothin’ yet’, ‘Miss Lu said. These ‘people’ along with our help have developed a method to not only to send a picture but they have discovered, down on the sub-atomic level, additional data that has been captured and stored on these pictures when they were taken.”
Spook said to Miss Wu, “You lost me there!”
“Thanks, Dr. Kim, I’ve been lost with their technology for a long time. I found out they have broken atoms down to what we always thought was the atoms basic level – the electron, neutron and protons.
The ‘les hommes en argent’ have discovered electrons, neutrons and protons ARE NOT the basic building blocks of atoms. They have found information is stored deep within atomic particles. The Nano area, as they call it. They have learned how to retrieve this information and manipulate it for their own use.”
Spook mumbles, ‘I’ve got two doctorates and I’m still lost, the Nano what?”
“Okay, I don’t exactly understand what they do or how it is done. But in simple English they have tapped into a whole new dimension of particle science knowledge we never knew existed.
Someday this will be a whole new field of scientific study.
As I said 'the silver men’ call it Nanotechnology. What I actually do understand, and this is going to blow your socks off…see all those boxes and boxes of photographs along the wall?” The Captain and Spook both nod in agreement.
“They can insert any photograph from any one of those boxes into one of their machines. And, you all have already found, I’m sure, the large power plant outside; charge the photo with hundreds of thousands of volts of electricity. This charge causes the sub-atomic particles to separate these Nano particles they discovered or already knew about, of course, without actually splitting the atom (that would be bad). The original photograph appears on the other end but… but… wwwwith… sssssomething … eeeelse…..!!”
“What...? What...? Tell us!!!! Both of them said excitedly. They sensed this was something big!
“What else appears on the photographs?”
“Sound… sound… and movement. They get both sound and movement from photographs!”
“Hold up for a second,” the Captain said as he got up and hurriedly walked out onto the mezzanine. Leaning over the railing and looking toward the hole at the front door he yelled, “Pop! Pop!” His voice echoed in the large open chamber as he yelled again, “Damn it, POP where are you?” His voice echoing even louder this time.
Sarge sticks his head inside and yells back. “What! What the hell do you want?”
Little ‘S’ said, “Get back up here, quick. Miss Lu has something you need to listen to!”
Sarge walks back through the hole imitating the front door. Flicks his un-smoked cigarette butt out into the front yard and thinks, ‘I hope this ain’t more atom particle junk. They ought to understand by now I don’t grasp nothin’ about such stuff!’
Sarge hurries back up the steps; walks back into the room. Pulls out a chair making a terrible screeching noise as the metal legs slides across the floor. And then he tries to sit down as quietly as possible.
Miss Lu slightly annoyed continues. “ I said these ‘les hommes en argent’ insert a photograph into one end of these machines and retrieve a copy of the picture on the other end. But when the finished product emerges it is complete with its own movie track!” They are getting the actual words that were being spoken at the time the photographer took the picture!!!!
Now THIS did peek Sarge’s interest, “Words…! Words…! What kind of words?”
“I do not know how to explain the process any plainer. I’ll just have to show you.” With this she got up from the table and moved over to one of the big metal mac
hines - there were four of them. Sarge thought they reminded him of old pinball machines, in a funny kind of way.
She asked them to gather around the machine to observe the demonstration. Once all four had assembled around the device Miss Lu asked Spook if he would be so kind to get her a photograph from one of the boxes. Any box, it does not matter, and any photograph that he chooses would be fine.
Dr. Kim rummaged around in the boxes looking at first one then another picture. He would stare intently at one shake his head and toss it back. After a number of discards he finally settling on the ‘one’. A photograph with a caption which read “President Abraham Lincoln reviewing Antietam battle field with Allen Pinkerton and Major General John A. McClernard, Oct 3,1862”.
He thought if she gets anything from this picture I will be surprised. It’s over a hundred years old!
Walking across the room, not toward Miss Lu, but directly to Little ‘S’, “Take a look at this, what do you think?” Said Spook handing the picture to the Captain. Spook had already learned, in addition to his scholarly knowledge, Little ‘S’ considered himself quite an amateur historian. The ‘War Between the States’ as he referred to the Civil War, being a favorite of his.
Little ‘S’ grasped the photo. Walked over to a good light source, and surveyed the picture quite absorbedly.
Little ‘S’ motioned Big ‘S’ to come view their find. When the three of them had their heads close together, Little ‘S’, in a hushed voice so that Miss Lu wasn’t able to hear their conversation, sighing, said, “Well, this picture is the real thing. This is a photograph taken after the Battle of Antietam. “Ahem”, he said, “as we in the South refer to it as the ‘Battle of Sharpsburg’; as I recall, the battle took place in September of ’62. The man on the left, in the derby hat, is Alan Pinkerton. He started the Secret Service. Of course everyone recognizes Ol’ Abe Lincoln in the middle who had come to survey the battlefield. The general on the right, I suppose based upon the caption, is General McClernard; however, I’m not too familiar with him.
I have seen this picture many times before. This is quite a famous photograph and the photographer was none other than the distinguished Civil War photographer, Mathew B. Brady; however, let’s not provide Miss Lu with any more information than she needs.” Turning to her he asked, "Miss Lu do you have a pair of scissors?”
“Well, let me think, yes, I think so, Captain. There should be a pair in the work desk behind you,” she said pointing at the desk with her finger. The Captain retrieved the scissors and neatly removed the caption identifying the photograph and he, sighing, handed it to Miss Lu.
“First,” she said, “the photograph must to be processed through the Magnetic Synchronizer or as we call it the Magsync. I’m just a chemist, so I cannot begin to explain the theory behind how it works. I have heard others here say the Magsync manipulates atoms on the molecular level, in that Nano area.
Whatever happens prepares the photograph to allow sounds and images to be extracted. In scientific terms – it just works. The team, to which I am assigned, never worked on the Magnetic Synchronizer. I’m sorry I cannot tell you more about how it performs, or whatever it does. All I know is it uses a tremendous amount of energy.”
She smoothed the photo out. Straightens the corners and carefully inserted it, face down, into the adjustable picture size slot at the front of the Magnetic Synchronizer. Pushed a quarter-sized button and almost instantly the original emerged from a slot next to the one she had just used. The photograph is next inserted into a second slot, face side down again; she flips a switch; pushes a couple of buttons with strange symbols or writings on them; lights on the device started blinking and the machine began to hum.
The three men looked at each other. All were thinking the same thought…. that sound this machine was making was exactly the same humming sound that big white disc thing out by the river makes.
In just a few seconds Miss Lu walked from the head of, what could be called the front, of the device to its rear and pressed a switch. This switch had those odd looking symbols on it too.
Immediately, upon touching the button, a little drawer about ¼ inch thick and about five inches wide slowly and silently slid out. Lying on the little emerging shelf could be seen a round glistening object resembling a round thin piece of lustrous silver metal.
She reached down and picked up the shiniest circular metal-like disk that any of them had ever seen. Sarge immediately thought of a highly polished metal 45-rpm vinyl record, but totally slick. It lacked grooves and was about half the size of a record.
Each in turn wanted to feel and touch the beautiful round marvelous object and identify the composition material. Their first thought - metal - no, plastic - no, it must be some type of unknown polymer substance. The little circular disc felt extremely light. And when held up in front of their faces their images were as plain as if they were viewing themselves in a mirror.
Removing the little ‘metal’ disc from the first machine she let the men examine it. She then used the disc to perform a procedure in another smaller machine. She pressed a symboled button. As before a little drawer exactly like the first came silently sliding out.
This time they all moved closer to get a better look at that little drawer. When it slid out and stopped they noticed it had an indented section that was exactly the same diameter as that lustrous disc.
“Miss Lu placed the shiny disc in the groove and again pressed the button. The tiny drawer reversed its course and disappeared within the machine. The small door in front closed shut.
This device had, what appeared to be, a small television screen built into the machine above the drawer device; however, the screen size was no more than about 10 or 12 inches in size.
Sarge thought, ‘Never did see a TV this small. Guess they haven’t heard about those new 21” jobs.”
But as soon as she had pushed the button an image appeared on this small TV screen. The screen wasn’t a TV. It was showing an image of the photograph… there was Mr. Lincoln, General McClernard and Mr. Pinkerton but….oh no…it can’t be…this has to be trickery…the three men on the photograph...no it wasn’t just a still photograph anymore, these images were moving. Moving as if they were on a television show, but something else… they…. they were now IN COLOR and TALKING to each other!!!!
In the background, could be heard the words, partially indistinct:“Mr. President I (indistinct word) it would (indistinct words) better if you put your hat back on.”
The President replied, “Dag nab it, Mathew, ever since Mary give me this darn stovepipe hat I always have to have my picture took with it! I hate this dab blasted thing!”
General McClernard laughed and said, “Sir your admiring public has gotten used to that hat."
Mr. Lincoln motioned to Allen Pinkerton, “Git into this here dad burn phottygraph Alan. I need somebody to make me look good.” All three men in the picture laughed. “Git on with it Mat….” At the word ‘Mat’ the ‘moving color photograph’ stopped, ending Miss Lu’s demonstration.
“That’s as long as we have been able to record a ‘photograph’, said Miss Lu. “That’s what we have been working on recently, trying to extend record time.”
At first Sarge, Little ‘S’ and Spook just sat there. They did not look at each other. They were flabbergasted. All they could do was stare at the now blank screen. Then Sarge started laughing, not just a chuckle but also a big belly guffaw.
“What is so funny?” Little ‘S’ said quizzically.
“Who would have thought Abe Lincoln sounded like Walter Brenner (TV star of The Real McCoys of the early ‘60s)!” Sarge said still snickering. “I bet if this thing played longer Abe would have been limping too (Walter limped in the TV series)!”
After the laughing session the Captain was the next to speak seriously. “Miss Lu I do not want you to take what I am about to say the wrong way – hell, how else can you take it - Miss Lu, I know you have worked here for a while, and you mea
n well... but somehow or by some ulterior motives these ‘silver’ guys have fooled you all.
This is some kind of illusion – this machine is obviously hooked up to some kind of Hollywood movie making equipment that delivers, I must admit, a frigging, excuse the French Miss Lu, good product. Something like this would surely sell like blazes back in the States.” Laughing, he said, “Walter Brennan did made a good Abe Lincoln ‘tho, I do admit?”
“She responded, “I can see how strange and unbelievable this is. At first it was to me too, but I found out it DOES work. This is REAL!!
What the ‘les hommes en argent’ were trying to do was expand the scope of the photographs with their sound - to push them to talk and move longer than just a few seconds that they now can capture. They believed they had the technology that could expand the movement and speech up into minutes, but we had not gotten that far…yet.
What you just witnessed on this demonstration is the maximum length that we have been able to produce movement and sound, about 30 seconds.
Another ‘captive’ told me they were close to producing sound from written items, such as documents, letters or manuscripts. She was a part of the team working on that. Can you just imagine what doors that would open up? You might get to hear the conversation that took place as the signers of your Declaration of Independence put their pens to that document.
Our instructors, I’m sorry, our captors call those little shiny circular storage devices Disc-Compactors; we just call them Compact Discs or shortened it to CDs.
At the current time the ‘les hommes en argent’ can only put something on a disc one time, it cannot be used over and over. We cannot use it again so we call them just a CD-R, recordable only.
We can put dozens and dozens of pictures on one disc but we are, at the current time, unable to erase the data and record on the same disc again. Our captors refer to them also as ‘Write Once Read Many’. We were currently working on a disc that 'the silver men’ say will be able to be used over and over and they termed it a Reusable Disc Compactors. We called it a CD-RW for ‘CD read and write’.”
