Strontium-90
Page 14
“No. As I’ve told you, I’m an ignorant old man.”
“An avatar is a god who has descended to Earth in bodily form.”
Socrates let his stubby fingers play in his beard. “You are an avatar?”
“I have said so.”
“And an avatar is a human disguise for a god?”
“That is what I said.”
“Because you say that you are a god, and if you truly are, then your statements would necessarily be accurate at all times. But I have heard you claim to be a singular god, and also a combination of men’s souls. You cannot be both. Therefore, you are neither a god, since you have spoken falsely, nor do I believe a great hairy brute like you to be the cup of men’s souls. What are you then, or tonight do I dream most strangely?”
Kong averted his gaze from Socrates.
“Hm,” Socrates said. “Let me begin in another way. Why have you come to me?”
“I need help.”
“Help of what sort?”
“I’m stranded,” Kong said.
“Can you be more specific?”
“The Dictates tell me not to.”
Socrates eyebrows arched high. “The Dictates? To me that sounds like a code for living.”
Kong cocked his head to the left. “Yes. I suppose that’s true.”
“How can I help you if you will not tell me the exact nature of your problem? Or, put another way, if I were to tell you that I suffered and that I needed help, wouldn’t I first have to tell you how I suffered?”
“Yes. I suppose so.”
“Yet, if I were to say, ‘I suffer because I’ve not eaten for three days nor drunk any water,’ wouldn’t you then know how to help me?”
“Yes. I would.”
“Yes, exactly. Now then, hairy brute who talks to me at night, if I am to help you, you must tell me how you are stranded.”
Kong massaged his low forehead before saying, “I come from the future.”
Socrates sat very still and his pupils darted back and forth, as he observed Kong. “That is an imprecise statement Do you mean to say that you come from my future? That is, do you claim to come from beyond the veil of death?”
“No.”
“Then you claim to come from my future, say, when I’m seventy-two.”
A wisp of gray smoke rose from the helmet. Kong shook his huge head. “There is no future that I know of where you are seventy-two.”
Socrates sucked in his breath, saying quickly, “Please, let me remain ignorant of the manner of my death and the age of my passing.”
“Agreed.”
Nodding, Socrates said, “Then you claim to come from a future where I no longer live?”
“Yes.”
“I see. How many years in the future do you claim to have traveled from?”
Two thousand, seven hundred and two years.”
Socrates’ eyes widened. “Far indeed. Are all men shaped such as you?”
“I am not a man. I am a gorilla.”
“Your shape is manlike, though most beastly, to be true. Tell me then, how may I help?”
“I come to you, Socrates, because as I’ve recorded the Assembly debates on the Sicilian Expedition and gone at times to the gymnasium to record other arguments, I’ve heard many men say that our are the wisest thinker in Athens.”
“I have never seen you in the gymnasium nor in the Assembly.”
“Observe.” Kong pressed a stud on his belt. He became invisible, though a hazy outline like a heat wave over a hot road showed where he sat. A click, and he was visible once more. “In just such a fashion have I recorded the various debates.”
“Amazing!”
“Perhaps it is; I know no other way. In any regard, I’ve watched you and I understand why others say that you are wise. Because of my troubles and an injury to my helmet, I thought it wise to seek the best advice.”
Socrates nodded sagely.
“When I returned to my pod and pulled the lever for the return trip home, lightning struck my vehicle and a small jolt of energy struck my helmet. Although the auto-computer made repairs to the ship, because my helmet was damaged I could no longer figure correctly the coordinates to the next portal opening.” Kong withdrew a sheet of parchment from a pouch and handed it to Socrates.
Socrates examined it. When he glanced up, he said, “I do understand the markings.”
“While I do understand the markings, I cannot understand their combined or related meanings.”
As Socrates handed back the parchment, he asked, “Did you understand the parchment before the lightning jolt?”
“Yes.”
“Why did the lighting striking your helmet impair your knowledge?”
Kong drew his huge black brows together. Finally, “To speak so would go against Dictates. Even to talk as I do goes against the Dictates.” He frowned thoughtfully and added, “Perhaps that is why my knowledge is impaired.”
Socrates pulled at his beard. “Who gave you these Dictates?”
“The robots who survived the war.”
“Robots? War?”
“Yes.”
“Can you tell me about the war, and these robots?”
“Of the war, I can only tell you that radiation and germs destroyed all mankind.” A darker wisp rose from the helmet as it crackled instead of hissed. Kong bent his head and grated through clenched teeth, “Ah. I was not to tell you such things.”
“Yet now you have aroused my curiosity, a thing that I’ll admit to being easily aroused. You must tell me more.”
“I cannot.”
Socrates blinked and then grinned slyly. “I have the answer to your problem. But to gain the answer you must first answer my questions. Agreed?”
Kong frowned and then suddenly smiled, showing his huge yellow fangs. “Yes, your logic conformed correctly with the Dictates. To gain your help, I must answer. Indeed, you are wise. Ask away.”
Socrates rubbed his hands. “What are robots?”
“Metal, manlike machines with high computer programming.”
“Hm. You speak in various riddles. Let us see if we cannot find a better answer. By metal machines, do you mean like a plow?”
“In that like a plow the robots are metal, but unlike a plow, the robots can act in an independent manner.”
“Yet isn’t it true that a man must stand behind a plow to control the oxen and steer the machine?”
“Yes,” Kong said, “from what I’ve seen of your time, that’s true.”
“But if a man took a nap, couldn’t the oxen still pull the plow?”
“Yes, the man could do that.”
“But would the plow still be correctly tilling the field, or would it rather randomly make crooked furrows?”
“I do not know. Do you?” Kong asked.
“Yes. The plow would not correctly act like a plow—as man designed and uses it—unless a man had his hands on the plow.”
“So your point is?”
“If all men are dead, as you say, how then can the robots act in the manner that men designed them for?”
“I suppose they cannot, except for the computer programming.”
“Which is?”
“Fixed data and codes that tell the robots how to act.”
Socrates’ brow drew tight as his fingers plucked at his beard. “An interesting idea. Are you saying that a computer is like a machine that could steer a galley?”
“Yes, if the programming were set up correctly?”
“But the men set the codes?”
“Yes.”
“Hm. And all the men are dead in your future world?”
“Yes.”
“Then it is the will of the dead men, through the robots, that gave you the Dictates?”
“I suppose that is logical, though my logic functions are rather low due to my helmet damage.”
“What does the helmet contain?”
“Cybernetic interfaces that link computer data chips directly to my brain.”
> Socrates breathed hard, sweat beading his forehead. “Your world is most strange. Why are the links there?”
“After the war, with mankind dead, the robots grew fearful or lonely, I’m uncertain which. We, meaning the other altered gorillas, try hard to understand them. They wished to revive man, but only gorillas still lived. So the robots did the best they could. Capturing our parents, they took us as babies and interfaced computer chips with our minds, thereby giving us greater reasoning abilities. Then, because the robots were unsure how to correctly program the computer data chips in us to make us conform to true humanity, they sent select gorillas through the just-discovered time portals to record man and his actions. The recordings would then be distilled and placed in the cybernetic data chips. The new true humans would then be served by the robots. The robots state that as their goal.”
Socrates tapped hard on the stone floor. Finally, he stirred and asked, “Why not instead take men to your future?”
“Alas, we cannot. Oh, we tried, but every time the man arrived in the future, he was dust. Future travel is impossible for all things except what started in the future.”
“Most strange,” Socrates whispered. “Let me think for a time.” He closed his eyes and sat very still. Finally, as he opened his eyes, “You cannot think fully because your computer helmet is partly damaged?”
“I think that is correct.”
“You only think? You do not know?”
“I—” Kong frowned again, his low brow furrowed. “Once I heard another gorilla whisper that if the Dictates were breached, breakers set in the helmet would impair full knowledge. It was hinted that the robots didn’t want such gorillas back in the future.”
Socrates nodded slowly and asked, “What is the greatest good?”
Kong’s eyebrows rose. “For me or for my society?”
“For you.”
“To gain more computer data chips.”
“Why?”
“I gain more reasoning ability and can think better and quicker.”
“Yet how can that be better, for you are also controlled more? Or consider it this way, as more computer chips are put in your helmet, the Dictates grow stronger and you have less freedom of thought.”
“That’s untrue.”
“Is it? Have you ever been free to talk about your world before?”
“No, it is forbidden…”
“You see what I mean?”
“I do.”
“Instead of examining man, who has already given you the Dictates and destroyed himself, why not examine yourself and understand why you do what you do?”
Kong’s lips bared in a snarl as another crackle sounded from the helmet and a column of black smoke wisped up. He growled, “That would go against the Dictates.”
“But if you would have a living society of thinkers, of men, you must not be controlled by the dead hand of the past. Instead, you must go forward and find out new secrets. Is that not your goal?”
“I’m not sure that I understand.”
“Is your goal to be like men, to become men?”
“Yes.”
“Are men forbidden by their inner thoughts to discuss certain ideas?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Then you think correctly, for they are not. You must throw off the Dictates of the robots.”
Kong winced as his helmet crackled.
“Until the robots’ control is destroyed, for they sound like tyrants to me, you cannot become what you wish.”
Kong lifted his lips in another snarl. “You do not understand properly, Socrates. Your advice goes against the Dictates, and therefore goes against the greater good.”
“But you have already gone against the Dictates. Because of the damage to your helmet, you have gained half-freedom. Now your knowledge is impaired. Is that for your own greatest good?”
“I—I,” Kong stammered. His helmet crackled and buzzed, and a finger-thick stream of black smoke puffed up. He blinked rapidly and ground his teeth together.
“To become a man, you must go beyond the Dictates.”
A buzz popped from the helmet, quickly switching to a low hum and then silence. Kong’s eyes widened in surprise. He looked at the parchment in his hand.
“You have discovered something,” Socrates said. “What is it?”
“The Dictates,” Kong whispered, “they seem to be gone.”
“Gone?”
“I understand how to go back home, how to use my time-pod.”
“Can you discuss the Dictates with me?”
“Indeed, but they are unimportant. They do not control me any longer. I can decide my own actions now.”
Socrates nodded, a slow smile spreading across his face. “Then you are now a man.”
Kong smiled back, revealing his yellow fangs. “I remember now that a time portal will open on the island of Salamis in another three hours. I’ll float the pod over there and go back in time to the Trojan War. I’ve always wanted to witness it, but I was forbidden to go. Thank you, Socrates, for the dialogue.”
Socrates nodded and smiled once again, and then he rolled back over to sleep while Kong quietly took his leave.
The End