Tales of the Vuduri: Year Three

by Michael Brachman

  “This is a saft,” he said. “We use it to ride across on the rope.”

  “How?” Rei asked.

  “We’ll show ya,” replied Melloy. He waved at Tridin who moved forward and handed Rei his piece of metal.

  “Please be sure that gets back to me,” Tridin said. “And good luck to ya.”

  “Thanks,” Rei said, confused.

  Tridin turned and headed back to the tree. He waited there but for what, Rei did not know.

  “I will show ya how to go across,” Melloy said, “but it is nawt really difficult.”

  With that, he looped his saft over the rope, grabbing one handle in each hand and backed up to the rope’s anchor point against the tree. He ran, full-speed, toward the river and just as he came to the edge, he pulled his legs up against his chest and then extended them upwards so that his body formed an ‘L’ shape. He began gliding over the river. The composition of the safts must have given them a very low coefficient of friction because it appeared that Melloy’s velocity did not decrease at all until he was on the other side. With an athletic turn, Melloy flipped off the rope and landed perfectly upright.

  “Now ya,” said Steben. “Run hard.”

  “All right,” said Rei. He paced back to the tree where the rope was tied and placed the saft over the rope. He grabbed onto the leather-like thongs tightly and started toward the river. He ran as hard as he could and accidentally made one step into the river before he pulled his legs up into a sitting position. He tried to curl up and point his legs upward but his abdominal muscles were far too unused to accomplish it. Luckily, there was sufficient distance between him and the water that it was enough that he stayed in a ball-shape. He glided noiselessly over the river, only glancing down once or twice. When he got to the other side, he had absolutely no idea how to stop so he just let go and tumbled over and over again, coming to rest in the sand of the far bank.

  “I’ve seen better,” Melloy said, laughing. He picked up Rei’s saft and put it within the folds of his cloak. “But ya made it so that’s all that really matters.”

  Pretty cool, huh? You are the first person in the 21st century to have ever seen a saft.

  Entry 3-080: March 16, 2015

 

  Why do we sleep?

  Why do we sleep? It may seem like a simple question. After all, trying going without sleep for even a day or two and all sorts of bad things happen. I will give special dispensation to parents of newborns because the baby needs to be cared for and it takes a while before it settles into a routine.

  You will recall from an earlier post, that in the original long-form version of Rome's Revolution, I postulated that Vuduri did not sleep. They need to rest, to restore their bodies but their minds never shut down. I eventually rejected this idea because it made the Vuduri, especially Rome, too weird.

  Many animals, starting with reptiles and up, all sleep so it is something we inherited a long time ago. Obviously resting in itself can rejuvenate the body. So the newborn's parents can rest but they still suffer the mental effects of sleep deprivation so while rest and rejuvenation may be one part of it, it can't be all of it.

  There must be something in the brain that requires a "time-out" so that it can do something that cannot be accomplished when the animal or person is awake. I've heard theories about memory consolidation from short-term to long term and dreaming kind of makes that confusing.

  In an article published in Science, scientists have performed experiments proving that sleep is the time when our bodies clean out our brain of waste products that build up during the day. If you don't sleep, this cleanup cannot occur and so the toxins, waste products, whatever you want to call them build up which is why sleep-deprived people act goofy. The scientists called it β-amyloid clearance. Interesting, the β-amyloid peptides have been implicated as a possible cause of Alzheimer's disease.

  Check out the article for yourself if you are interested but the only reason I bring this up is because my original proposal that the Vuduri do not sleep would be invalid from a biological perspective. Good thing I changed it!

  Entry 3-081: March 17, 2015

 

  The Milk Run is live!

  Hooray. After a year and a third (six months longer than I expected), my fourth novel in the Rome's Revolution series entitled The Milk Run is now live. Here is Bruce's amazingly beautiful cover (click on it for a larger image):

  https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00USMQH52

  The paperback should be posted by next week. Tomorrow, I'll give you the rest of the buy links if you want to check it out. You can read the blurb here.

  Entry 3-082: March 18, 2015

 

  The Milk Run web site is live!

  A while back, I explained how it was no longer optional to create your author platform in the modern world. Not only do you have to write quality books, you have to promote them traditionally (e.g. reviews, advertising) as well as via social media. All of my books have a Facebook page and I tweet about them constantly.

  I created an umbrella web site for all of my books so that a person could see the scope of what I write and how they inter-relate. I also create one web site per book. The web site for The Milk Run is yet one more using the same basic template. Here is an image:

  There are certain features that I like to keep common across all of the web sites. First, I like a tag line across the top which links back to Rome's Revolution, the trilogy that started it all. Also, I put a link, using my name as the launch point, that takes you to the "umbrella" site. I always put in the extra line: "If you are looking for some science in your science fiction, this book is for you!" to show people that I write hard science fiction as opposed to fantasy, steampunk or whatever.

  I make sure that my blurb prominently displayed so people can quickly read about the novel. On the left hand side, I put a copy of the paperback cover. Some of the web sites arm that image with a link to my book trailers but this web site just takes you to a super-high quality version of the book cover.

  I also put the "buy links" for the book so that if people are interested, they can acquire the version that appeals to them. Finally, at the bottom, I put a logo-based link to another book that might be of interest.

  So, at first glance, this web site looks like the rest of my web sites in its basic organization. However, there is one little treat remaining. Bruce put an Ice-saberoo in the painting, kind of a Where's Waldo thing. See if you can find it.

  Here is the link to the web site: https://www.the-milkrun.com. Happy hunting and make sure the 'Roo doesn't get you first!

  Entry 3-083: March 19, 2015

 

  Why do we dream?

  A few days ago, I asked the question why do we sleep as it pertains to the Vuduri. I concluded they had to sleep so their brains could recover from a potentially toxic build-up of β-amyloid compounds that are naturally occurring in the awake brain.

  But why do we dream? Or specifically, why do the Vuduri dream? You may recall a little while back, I wrote a post about a nightmare that Rome had in the middle portion of Rome's Revolution. I wrote this back in June of 2007. What was weird is that I had just thrown it in to stretch out the novel and years later, it ended being the exact final battle at the conclusion of Rome's Evolution which I didn't even start until 2012. How could I have known? Who knows? Maybe these stories really are true!

  Anyway, why do we normal human beings dream? And don't you find it odd that now, even in 2015, scientists still don't really know?

  Do we dream to erase or come to grips with painful memories? Do we dream as part of the active cleanup process that I described yesterday? Do we dream because our brain needs to merge elements into new and sometimes bizarre combinations to prepare us on how to deal with future issues?

  I can tell you this. We only dream during REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep. If you are drugged or anesthetized or in another part of the sleep cycle, you are not dreaming. So maybe a better question would be why do we need REM
sleep? The fact is that scientists can demonstrate that during REM sleep, our brains are operating nearly indistinguishably from an awake person. Maybe REM sleep is a survival mechanism that allows us the benefit of sleep but we'd be geared up and ready to go if something should attack us. Like an early warning system?

  Here's my theory. If we need to sleep to clean out the toxins built up during a hard day of thinking, then REM sleep is the brain's way of testing whether things are "all clear" and the β-amyloid peptides are sufficiently expunged. It is known that certain neurotransmitters, such as serotonin, histamine and norepinephrine are turned off during REM sleep, perhaps replenishing the supply for the next day. So the brain is in a wacky state and dreams don't need to correspond to reality to test out how clean the brain is.

  So if dreams are simply a "brain experiment" maybe they don't mean anything. Does that disappoint you? It does me. However, like sleep, dreaming must serve some purpose so that is why the Vuduri dream as well.

  Entry 3-084: March 20, 2015

 

  What would a fetus dream about?

  As we discussed yesterday, while we cannot be sure why we sleep or dream, it is very clear that we must. However, if you have never experienced anything, like a baby still in the womb, what would you dream about?

  This was the problem presented to Rome after she first made contact with her unborn son, Aason, in the middle portion of Rome's Revolution. Rome had just awakened from a nightmare that was a portent of her battle with MASAL's Sipre at the conclusion of Rome's Evolution. She went from sleeping sound to wide awake and her heart racing wildly. Since heartbeats and muffled sounds were about all Aason could hear, this awakened him as well. Here is that little passage:

  Rome screamed. She sat bolt upright in bed, totally awake. She was shaking. She looked down at her abdomen and could see it was still fully distended. Hesitantly, she probed and found Aason there, resting quietly.

  “Mother?” Aason asked from within her womb. “What is it?”

  “It is nothing, baby. I just had a bad dream,” Rome said reassuringly.

  “What is a dream?” Aason inquired.

  “It is a picture in your mind. It is not real.”

  “Do I dream?” Aason asked her.

  “I do not know. Do you?” asked Rome. “Can you tell a difference from when you are awake and when you are asleep?”

  “Yes. I am awake now.” Just to prove his point, he kicked her gently.

  “I can see that. When you are asleep, do you know it?”

  “Sometimes. Sometimes I can tell,” replied her fetus.

  “Then I think you dream,” concluded Rome.

  “What was your bad dream about, Mother?” Aason asked her.

  “I was trying to get to your father. And someone came along who wanted to take you from me,” Rome said, shivering at the remembrance.

  “That is a bad dream. I want to be with you, always,” said Aason.

  “You will be, little Aason. We share a bond like no other. You will always know where I am and I will always know where you are.”

  “Does Father share this bond as well?” Aason asked.

  “No. His bond is different. But it is still special. I cannot wait to meet you and for you to meet him,” replied Aason’s mother.

  Interesting problem, huh? How do you describe color to a person who had been blind since birth? How do you describe music to a person who has been deaf since birth? It is hard to describe something in a modality without invoking other parallels using the same modality.

  Entry 3-085: March 21, 2015

 

  Copyright Infringement

  In my blog, I like to spice it up once in a while with amusing images. I use Google Search to find images and check to see if they "belong" to somebody. If there was no copyright notice or credit, in my naiveté, I thought that was sufficient.

  I was wrong.

  In very simple terms, if you don't know where an image originated or who owns it, you are running the risk of copyright infringement. There are companies out there, legitimate companies, that have huge stockpiles of images and will license those images to you. But sometimes unscrupulous individuals, or even naive ones like me, post those images, uncredited. And thanks to the power of Google, those images get scraped, indexed, copied and disseminated until they are everywhere. The original trail taking you back to the original image gets lost and no matter how you found it, legally you may not copy that image without the express written consent of the original owner.

  The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DCMA) exempts platforms like Goodreads, Facebook and Twitter from culpability but not the people posting images. The burden rests on the poster to make sure they have the right to post the image.

  There are a few places you might be able to go to find license-free images like Pixabay and Wikimedia Commons but even they are not sure bets. You don't know if the posting person lifted it from a copyrighted source so beware!

  There is a really neat image search engine called TinEye that lets you upload or point to an image and it tells you where that image is also found. It ranks them in terms of relevance and if any one of the links is a copyright owner source, you'd best steer clear. However, if TinEye does not find the image, that still does not mean the image is not copyrighted. It only means the image is not in their database.

  In my case, once the image in question was discovered and I was notified, I removed the image immediately. However, that is not sufficient. You still must pay the piper. After some surprisingly civil negotiations, I licensed the image (even though I'm not using it and never will) and that's that.

  But I want to warn you, this is a serious thing. If you don't know who holds the copyright, then by default, you don’t have permission to use the work. Think before you post!

  Entry 3-086: March 22, 2015

  I see dead people

  Yeah, I know. I borrowed that line from M. Night Shyamalan's The Sixth Sense but my reference is in relation to Rome's Revolution. What I am getting at is that Rei Bierak is very much alive in the 35th century but everyone he knew or ever came in contact with from his past is long dead.

  You may recall last year, I gave you the complete story of The Deucadons and how they arrived on Deucado. I had to write that story so that when people discussed it, I didn't paint myself into a corner. Here is a brief conversation that Rei had with Melloy about it as they were on their way back to the secret Ibbrassati enclave:

  Rei said to Melloy, “Tell me about the Beta Hydri mission. After your ship got there. How did you end up here? Do you know?”

  “Oh, that,” Melloy said. “They don’t teach us much but that is one thing that they do teach us. There once was a brave Captain. His name was Harrison.”

  “Captain Dan Harrison?” Rei asked.

  “Yeah, that’s it,” Melloy said.

  “I knew him,” Rei said. “I met him once. OK, go on.”

  “Well, Captain Harrison and the Ark arrived here because Beta Eydri…”

  “Beta Hydri,” Rei corrected.

  “That’s what I said,” said Melloy. “They arrived here because Beta Eydri did nawt have any habitable worlds. So the Ark’s computer decided to come here.”

  “I gotcha,” Rei said. “Secondary target.”

  “Perhaps,” Melloy replied. “So they got here and Captain Harrison was awakened and there was a problem with the ship.”

  “What kind of problem?” Rei asked.

  “It could nawt do the reentry right.”

  “Do you know why?”

  “Naw. The ship was wrong. They had no wings. They were goin’ to burn up.”

  “So what did they do?” Rei asked.

  “Captain Harrison did a special thing. They broke the ship into three pieces. They spun the front part of the ship around and attached it to the middle part, where all the frozen people were. There was a rocket attached to the front. It was supposed to be for goin’ back up into space and retrievin’ the cargo section. But
instead, they used up all the fuel to slow the whole Ark down. So when they landed, there was naw way to go back up into space and recover the cargo ship.”

  “So…they used the SSTO booster as a retrorocket?” Rei whistled. “My god! That must have been one hell of a maneuver.”

  Melloy sighed. “Captain Harrison died. Commander Cooper died. Commander Salazar died. But most of the colonists survived.”

  “I’m sorry,” Rei said. “But still, the rest of the crew made it. Why didn’t they just refuel the SSTO booster and go back and get the stuff?”

  booster as ya call it was destroyed. They say crash landin’. That’s why all the command crew died.”

  “Oh, so the SSTO and command capsule got wrecked?” Rei asked.

  “I suppose so. Many years passed. Much pain. Their backs, like ya said. Always in pain. But they made it true. They fought and they worked. They built a living out of nothin’. The plan was always to get back. Before they could build back to space, the stroid hit and that was the end.”

  I put the poignant comment in bold. Subjectively, to Rei, it had just been a couple of months since he last saw Captain Harrison. But in this strange new world, the man Rei knew had been dead for 500 years, half of a millennium. Even though this is legal time travel, it is still odd to think about so many dead people as still being alive.

  Entry 3-087: March 23, 2015

 

  More on camouflage

  In a previous article, I discussed how convenient it was for the Ibbrassati to have camouflage netting to place over Rei's Ark, right after it crash-landed in the middle part of Rome's Revolution. While the camouflage was actually a mesh, it looked a little like this: