Through the Eye of Time

by Trevor Hoyle

  Then – nothing.

  The cup would cease to exist. The atomic structure which obligingly kept to the shape of a cup for the purpose of drinking tea would quite arbitrarily decide to take on some other formation, or perhaps not to assume a definite pattern at all. Chaos would rule. Particles would interact at random in a formless plasma of non-matter. Or perhaps entropy would come, once and for evermore, to hold the universe in a state of lukewarm apathy. The ultimate heat death in which everything stayed where it was because it couldn’t be bothered to go anywhere else. In the absence of matter and energy interchange, communication would cease. Lightspeed would become a meaningless and futile concept. Spacetime would be defunct. And without these universal ground rules time itself would stop. Dead.

  Karve believed intellectually in the probability, if not the actual possibility, of these thoughts; he was too much the scientist to refute them and turn his face away in blind obstinacy. Intellectually yes, they could happen, but emotionally his own senses rebelled against the dogma of clinical scientific objectivity. The feel of the cup touching his fingertips could not be measured by any device known to man. The sense of well-being he experienced from the broad shaft of sunlight warming his hand, and the memories it evoked of other sunfilled days, could not be contained in a scientific treatise or marked by the indices on a Gaussian curve. Even looking out, as he did each day, from the apex of the pyramid, imbued his whole being with the inexpressible wonder of vibrant life so that the entire body of human knowledge lay in its shadow. The fact of existence, the mystery of creation, were still the abiding and elemental truths.

  The sheets of figures, the innumerable grey columns, called him back to duty. He was an old man, his days of innovation and creativity long past. His brain was now the repository of a million facts, a human card index lacking the spark of synthesis which was the basis of scientific inquiry.

  Only connect, he thought. The answer was that simple.

  His First Assistant came through on audio. Karve listened patiently but yet with a trace of weariness to some meandering second-hand complaint from RECONPAN. It had been filed by deGrenier, who had insisted on a personal interview with the Director.

  ‘I would have thought,’ Karve told his First Assistant, ‘that Systems Engineering or perhaps Archives could have settled this to everyone’s satisfaction.’ The two areas he most dreaded becoming involved with, and this particular problem combined them: hardware and administration.

  ‘DeGrenier has taken the matter up with both sections, sir, and neither can offer an adequate explanation.’ The First Assistant paused, and then like a mother hoping to reason with a recalcitrant child: ‘I think under the circumstances it might be wise …’

  Karve pushed the CENTiNEL report to one side. ‘Send deGrenier in,’ he said, and while he waited studied the china cup and saucer on the desk as if expecting them to dematerialize before his eyes.

  DeGrenier was brisk, businesslike and to the point.

  ‘I’m sorry to take up your time, Director, but somebody has been tampering with the information retrieval system. Yesterday I requested biographical details to build up a Subject Profile and this is what came up.’

  Karve took the yellow print-out, comprising several sheets folded concertina fashion. He read:

  RATE OF DECAY AS PER UPDATED CENTiNEL REPORT (REF 29-1493b/0012) IN ACCORDANCE WITH MASTER FILE (HEAD QUARK/SUB ANTI/SUB CHARM/SUB STRANGE) WITH THE FOLLOWING ADDITIONS, DELETIONS AND AMENDMENTS:

  Then followed row upon row of symbols and figures, several thousand of them neatly tabulated in blocks of electric type.

  ‘I take it that these aren’t the biographical details you were after,’ Karve said dryly, glancing up at deGrenier.

  ‘No, they are not. May I sit down?’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Karve said. ‘Please. How rude of me. Would you care for some tea?’

  ‘No, thank you,’ deGrenier said stiffly.

  These hardliners, Karve thought. Nothing must stand in their way. A screw strips its thread and they have a nervous breakdown. Though that wasn’t entirely fair, he chided himself; deGrenier was a gifted and dedicated scientist who virtually single-handed had developed the RECONPAN project from a feasibility study to the point where it was a practical research technique. It wouldn’t be too long before operational trials were under way. The Director had never been absolutely sure how RECONPAN functioned or what its specific purpose was supposed to be. No doubt it would be useful for something.

  ‘This kind of thing is most disruptive,’ deGrenier said portentously. ‘We’re already behind schedule and to have some fool tampering with vital information …’

  Karve smiled in his gentle myopic way. This image of bumbling academic was a subterfuge he had brought to a fine level of accomplishment. ‘Are you suggesting that someone is deliberately falsifying information?’ he said, his tangled grey eyebrows forming a line of undergrowth above his polarized bifocals.

  ‘Well, perhaps not deliberately,’ deGrenier amended.

  ‘You used the word “tampering” which implies an act of wilful malpractice. Or a practical joke.’

  ‘I take a dim view of practical jokes.’

  ‘It seems to me that either it’s a system malfunction or human error. I shall have to find out who or what is responsible. I’m sorry if your work has been impaired in any way.’ He smiled his gentle lingering smile.

  ‘I had to wait hours for that information and when it arrived it was worse than useless. Pages of meaningless figures.’

  ‘Meaningless?’ the Director said. ‘Not to someone working in the field of study relating to quarks. There are other projects here in addition to RECONPAN.’

  It was the nearest Karve could bring himself to an outright rebuke. As deGrenier stood up he said: ‘Whose biographical details were you seeking?’ And holding the print-out aloft: ‘In place of this meaningless jumble?’

  ‘Theodor Morell, German National, round about the period 1936 to 1945 Pre-Colonization.’

  ‘Not a name familiar to me.’

  ‘Rather unlikely unless you’d made a special study of the mid-Twentieth, in particular the Second World War. Morell was a top Nazi physician. Not a great deal is known about him and I was hoping to fill in the background. Instead I received the life history and mating habits of the mythical quark.’

  It was the first time he had known deGrenier make a remark that was intended to be humorous. His curiosity was aroused. He said, ‘Was Morell qualified? I mean, was he a good doctor?’

  ‘The evidence so far, what little we have, would suggest not,’ deGrenier said, pausing by the door. ‘He sometimes used drugs without knowing what effect they would have, experimenting on his patients and giving massive overdoses.’

  ‘I see.’ Karve was looking over his bifocals at deGrenier’s legs. They were rather nice legs. The scientist seemed unaware of this flattering scrutiny, though she might not have considered it all that flattering, coming from the Director of the Institute, a man more than twice her age.

  ‘So it would be fair to describe him as a quack.’

  ‘I suppose so,’ deGrenier said indifferently.

  ‘That might explain one or two things.’

  ‘Might it?’

  Karve nodded slowly and dropped the print-out on the desk. ‘I’ll see that this finds its rightful owner.’

  ‘Thank you, Director.’ Her face had relaxed into a tentative smile. It was quite rare for Pouline deGrenier. She went out.

  Yet another reason for being alive, Karve thought, the pleasure a beautiful woman could bestow simply by her presence. It wasn’t healthy for a man of his age to have such notions. The desire would be awakened but not appeased, and his casual appraisal of her legs might have led to other fanciful flights of imagination which old men were supposed to have outgrown – as if advancing years killed the urge completely. They did not, of course, merely the opportunity.

  Karve reached out to take the cup from its saucer and as he did s
o the handle came away and the cup smashed itself into dozens of tiny fragments, too many and too small to count.

  *

  Queghan waited philosophically for the third coincidence.

  He was not by nature a patient man but he had taught himself to curb his restlessness, knowing that the harder he sought the third coincidence the further it would recede. The only way to snare it was by allowing it to catch him.

  The print-out arrived in his room on Level 17 with a note attached, which read: ‘Gremlins at work again. Or would it be more accurate to say a quirk in the system?’ and it was signed ‘Johann’.

  Karve had evidently made the right connection. But as one of the founders of the metaphysical science known as Myth Technology his working hypothesis for life was based on the principle of acausal relationships. No two events were necessarily connected in direct sequence, though the connection was there if you knew how and where to look. In his book The Hidden Universe Karve had referred to these connections as ‘the leys’ – intangible filaments of meaning which held everything together: man, matter, energy, space, time.

  Queghan detached the note and underneath it was the triangular stamp with which each Section identified the material in its possession. Inside the triangle the word RECONPAN followed by the initials ‘P. deG’ and the date of receipt.

  Why had Pouline deGrenier received the information pertaining to HEAD QUARK/SUB ANTI/SUB CHARM/SUB STRANGE? Was it that the cyberthetic system had got its wires crossed? But the system was supposedly proof against errors of that kind, self-programmed to detect and rectify them.

  Now supposing, Queghan thought, indulging in his favourite pastime, supposing the information relating to the quarks was in some way pertinent to the RECONPAN project but that Pouline deGrenier had failed to make the connection. It would possibly mean that the cyberthetic system (or something guiding the system) was pointing them in the direction they didn’t realize was the correct one – rather like a guide dog leading a blind man away from a precipice he doesn’t know is there.

  Supposing, too, that the same applied in his case. He had asked for information on the decay rate of quarks and been offered instead a fictional character called Charles Bovary and an obscure doctor who had something to do with the Hitler movement on Old Earth.

  And supposing he was just chasing rainbows. Maybe a micro-circuit had flipped its lid and everyone in the building was receiving cuckoo information. Some suppositions, unfortunately, had the leaden ring of cracked bells.

  Queghan pressed the ALERT tab on the input terminal and sat back as the lights started to blink and the machine hummed to itself. He had a love-hate relationship with the cyberthetic box of tricks, and it wouldn’t have surprised him to know it felt the same; they were old sparring partners.

  After several moments had elapsed the system said: Can I be of service? Evidently tired of waiting.

  ‘I’m perplexed.’

  The human condition, so I’m told.

  ‘I can do without the homespun philosophy.’

  I’ve just been oiled.

  ‘And the cyberthetic wit.’

  Sorry. Do you need me or are you just passing the time of day?

  ‘How’s your memory of the Second World War Pre-Colonization?’ Queghan asked.

  There was a slight, though significant, pause.

  Comprehensive.

  ‘It isn’t on your mind? I mean obsessively.’

  I’m not programmed for obsessions.

  ‘Aren’t you the lucky one.’

  That’s a matter of opinion.

  ‘You gave me some incorrect information yesterday, Cyb.’

  Not possible. If it was incorrect there must have been an error at the input terminal. I have registered no malfunction in the past twenty-four hours.

  ‘That’s your discreet cyberthetic way of saying that I punched in the wrong question.’

  I am stating a fact No malfunction occurred.

  Queghan took out a pack of Nexus-T. He extracted one of the coloured plastic tubes and inhaled deeply. His senses seemed to vibrate in the fumes. He said:

  ‘What do you know about RECONPAN?’

  Had the cyberthetic system been programmed to sigh it might have done so. A lot, it said.

  ‘Is it classified?’

  Yes. Do you require the security reference?

  Queghan released purple fumes into the still air. They ascended to the ceiling in a hazy spiral. As a mythographer he had clearance on all projects within MyTT, classified or not. The system was humouring him. He let a few seconds go by, just to show which of them was the human being.

  ‘Do you find Pouline deGrenier attractive?’ he said at last.

  I know what attractiveness means but I don’t comprehend it. You mustn’t play semantic games with me, Queghan, it isn’t fair.

  ‘You’ve been playing games with me.’

  Not true, the cyberthetic system protested. It sounded almost hurt. A machine with offended feelings.

  Queghan said, ‘Is RECONPAN anywhere near operational?’

  One moment. The system went away and delved into the depths of its billionfold cellular memory. There was a muted beep and then: Experimental trials are scheduled but they are having difficulty with the tissue cultures which are not retaining the neurons as expected. Reconstruction of the Subject’s memory file is as per classification in—

  ‘Never mind the classification. As I recall, and you can correct me if I’m wrong, RECONPAN is the reconstruction of a human brainpan.’

  Correct.

  ‘How is this achieved?’

  By complete analysis and correlation of all material in Archives; everything written or known or recorded about the Subject – letters, books, speeches, newstapes, sound recordings, contemporary accounts and documents – every known fact is processed and a neurological simulation of the Subject’s brainpan is constructed in the laboratory. The current difficulty is due to Psycho-Med being unable to stimulate self-generation of tissue cultures.

  ‘Explain.’

  The brain functions but is not technically alive. In order to achieve operational capability the tissue cultures must be capable of generating and transmitting neurochemical data.

  ‘And they haven’t managed to do this.’

  No.

  Queghan took the fumes into his lungs and the room seemed to shimmer as the drug distorted the parallax of reality.

  ‘Have they chosen the Subject for the experimental trials?’

  Yes.

  ‘Who is it?’

  Adolf Schicklgruber by birth, later known as Adolf Hitler. German National, early Twentieth Pre-Colonization. Austrian by birth, became German Chancellor in—

  ‘Thank you, Cyb,’ Queghan interrupted gently. ‘I do know who Adolf Hitler was.’

  *

  If there was any dissension at MyTT it usually revolved round Johann Karve’s original dictum that the proper field of study was the interpretation of past and future myths. This statement of the Institute’s primary aim had sparked off a continuing debate which occasionally flared into open confrontation.

  Karve proposed that myths and legends were repositories of knowledge – ‘centres of human consciousness in which we find certain intuitive and elemental truths’ in his phrase. As a useful analogy he often compared them to the eye of a hurricane, the dead-still centre of a vortex where nothing takes place but around which a mad whirl of activity is going on. ‘Imagine time as a vortex,’ he said in his lectures, ‘rushing around in a frenzy of apparently meaningless and random interactions. Time is composed of events, in our case events on a human scale which mark off the passing years, and now and then these events coagulate at a particular spatio-temporal co-ordinate. This is what we call a myth. Now if we can analyse myths and interpret them correctly we shall gain an insight into the underlying meaning and purpose of the Metagalaxy – an eye into the elemental nature of time.’

  Those on the mystical or metaphysical side of the Two Disciplines
could accept this readily enough, but for those on the other, more concerned with the practical development and application of advanced technology, these were concepts not easily grasped or gratefully received.

  As a hardline scientist working in Myth Technology Pouline deGrenier tried to embrace, somewhat awkwardly, the two extremes. It was a contradiction she was not unaware of. In private conversation with Léon Steele, her Third Assistant, she sometimes referred to her ‘schizophrenic position’ in the Institute, of being neither fish nor fowl.

  Steele was a young man of nervous disposition. He had once thought himself to be (perhaps he still was) in love with Pouline deGrenier. He had assisted her on the RECONPAN project for over a year and their relationship had been cordial until the sweating grunting struggle had taken place in a dusty subsection of Archives (HEAD WAR/SUB PRE-COL/SUB WORLD II) and his ardour had gone off the boil. Since then he had tried, with a fair measure of success, to play the role of the intense, dedicated professional researcher.

  The trouble with this was that he found her physically unbearable to be near without being able to touch: his calm and rational self told him not to be such a fool while the rest of him lusted after her like a child in front of a confectionery display. Though he still insisted to himself that he was definitely, emphatically, categorically not in love with her.

  This didn’t prevent him from offering her a few minutes of rather fawning sympathy: ‘The Director is out of touch,’ he agreed. ‘What else can you expect of an old man?’

  ‘The establishment is going downhill. How can we get on with our work if the systems we rely on, and in particular the information retrieval circuit, are not functioning properly? He smiled. The man actually smiled as though the problem was unimportant. It wouldn’t surprise me – it really wouldn’t surprise me if he doesn’t know what the RECONPAN project is all about. You’re right, he’s too old; out of touch …’

  That cold briskness in her voice, she hated it. It sounded in her ears like the voice of someone she wouldn’t wish to know. It had an unpleasant grating quality, lacking all trace of emotion.

  Léon had the annoying habit of pulling at his finger joints whenever he was listening to anyone, and now he nodded his head sympathetically to the accompaniment of clicking bone.