The Gods Look Down (11 page)

In response to Blake's question Dagon said, ‘If I thought the information totally without value I shouldn't be here. My point is that the experiment has not elicited the information we were seeking. But it would seem I'm in a minority of one.'

‘What about the Aleph?' Blake said. ‘Isn't that a piece of vital information? The Kabbalah makes no mention of it as far as I can recall.'

‘Perhaps because it never existed,' Dagon said blandly.

‘You saw the tapes.'

Dagon sucked at the air. ‘What I
saw?
' he said, ‘was the visual interpretation of a neurological landscape. Our heads are filled with a million images and impressions which do not necessarily correspond to reality. How do we determine what has a basis in the real world and what has not? Fact or fancy, that seems to be the nub of the dilemma.'

‘So the whole thing was imaginary,' Milton Blake said, nodding his head rapidly. His face, dark and handsome, was sullen with anger. ‘That's your considered opinion.'

Queghan said, ‘Much of it had the quality of mythic experience that one would expect: medieval setting, mad alchemist who believes himself to be immortal, attractive wilful daughter, young novice come to learn the dark secrets of the magic arts. It only lacked a laboratory in the cellar with bubbling liquids and flashing blue sparks.'

‘You're forgetting a prime ingredient,' Dagon said. Something gurgled down below and he waited a moment. ‘The shambling idiot of enormous strength who tries to destroy his creator; the stuff of pulp fiction.'

‘I hadn't forgotten him,' Queghan said, looking at Blake.

‘Then I take it that you agree – the tapes are only of marginal interest? If we don't know what's valid and what isn't how can we proceed?'

‘It depends on which scientific point of view you subscribe to. To a Myth Technologist the tapes are a source of valuable research data: the information is all there if we care to interpret them in the appropriate way. However, if you find the whole
thing of no practical value …' He looked away from Dagon, his face austere and composed. He felt no need to sell the uses and benefits of mythic projection to a non-believer.

‘I'm prepared to listen,' Dagon said, as if conferring a favour. ‘Myth Technology isn't my field, I know very little about it. But perhaps it has a contribution to make.'

Milton Blake was infuriated by this smug complacency. It took an effort of will not to say what was on his mind. He looked at the mythographer, whose expression was unperturbed, and was saying in a quiet, even voice:

‘We can approach the data in one of two ways, either as an accurate representational account of the events we saw, the people involved, and their actions as depicted in the tapes; or we can put them to semiological interpretation.'

‘Semiological?' Blake said.

‘The theory of how signs and symbols convey meaning. It's the process by which myths and legends are formed and become part of the collective consciousness of a race. I'm suggesting that if we regard the tapes as a mixture of fact and fable we might come near to understanding them.'

Dr Francis Dagon operated the parachair and backed it away from the display. Under the concealed lighting his skin had the taut dead pallor of synthetic material. He said, ‘Let's begin with the Aleph. Is that an historical fact or a metaphysical symbol?'

‘It could be both. Metaphysical symbols are the concentrated expressions of underlying reality, metaphors of intrinsic meaning which might not be capable of being expressed in any other way. The Aleph is a good place to start. On one level it's part of the Kabbalistic ritual, a cipher which stands for the source of divine power. Now we can either assume that it's an imaginative device, with no basis in reality, or that it actually existed. If it did exist then the people of the time would have no words capable of describing it – in the same way that the texts describe a machine in anthropomorphic terms because they lack a technical vocabulary. If this interpretation is correct the Aleph can be only one specific object: a Temporal Flux Centre.'

‘Is there any real evidence to support that?' Blake said.

‘The transmutation of base metal into gold. It could only be
achieved by nuclear interaction at a very high energy level, either in a particle accelerator or surrounded by the conditions which exist inside a Temporal Flux Centre.'

Dagon said, ‘A Temporal Flux Centre being …'

‘A Black Hole,' Blake said.

‘But surely a Black Hole – or Temporal Flux Centre as you call it – is a body which occupies astro-physical space. How could it appear on Old Earth in the 13th century?'

Queghan shrugged. ‘I don't know. Theoretically there's no limit to the size of a Temporal Flux Centre: it can be as large as the universe or as tiny as a single atom. There are mathematical models which encompass both extremes. The Aleph, in modern technological parlance, is and can only be a point of infinite spacetime curvature. Which might also explain one or two other interesting ideas contained in the tapes.'

Dagon said sharply, ‘What are they?'

‘One of the main characteristics of a Temporal Flux Centre – as its name suggests – is that time is altered, held in stasis. In practical physical terms a Temporal Flux Centre occupies zero space and is independent of temporal flow.'

‘Yes of course,' Milton Blake said with some excitement. ‘It exists “outside of time”, occupying another dimension.'

‘It's one explanation.' Dr Francis Dagon sounded grudging in his acceptance of the idea.

‘The only one that fits all the known facts,' Queghan said. ‘Dagon ben Shem Tov believed he was capable of altering the past in some way, and the only object in the universe not bound by time in the conventional sense is a Temporal Flux Centre. If he was able to control it perhaps he could, after all, “tamper with the past” as he claimed. The question is …' Queghan looked for a moment at at the blank display ‘… which past was he referring to?'

‘There are more than one?' The ceramic spheres turned in their sockets and settled on him. Had they been able to display a guarded scepticism they might have done so.

‘In the mythological sense, yes; any of which could have – might have – existed in a specific spacetime continuum.'

‘Might have but didn't.'

‘We don't know that,' Queghan said. ‘The probability of
their existing is what matters. It's a concept of quantum theory but I shan't bore you with the details.'

‘Concerned with the Principle of Indeterminacy,' Dagon said, and noting the mythographer's expression said, ‘I've done some background reading on the subject. But you don't say how this so-called tampering took place,
if
it took place. Or why it was necessary. What could be gained by it?'

‘These are questions I can't answer, but perhaps you can.'

‘I don't see how.'

‘As a scholar of ancient texts you should be able to say whether there's any reference, relating to that period of Biblical history, where a particular religious sect attempted to lead the people astray. It would be about the same time as the appearance of the machine, give or take a couple of hundred years.'

Milton Blake felt that he'd lost the thread of Queghan's reasoning. ‘Why a false religion?' he asked.

‘Because, according to the tapes, Dagon ben Shem Tov said a rather curious thing: he said that many prophets from the time of Kish onwards had foretold the coming of the Saviour
but that no such Saviour had ever appeared.'

‘As far as he knew, that is,' Blake qualified.

‘Exactly. As far as he knew. Doesn't it strike you as very strange that a man of his intelligence, a philosopher-scientist, shouldn't know of the existence of Christ? And Daneri also said that no record of the Saviour was known to them: they knew of the prophesy and nothing more.'

‘How do you explain it?' Dagon asked. His curiosity had gradually overcome his apparent hostility to the mythographer's thesis.

‘I don't think I can in terms that you would find acceptable. I can deal with it mythologically by supposing Dagon ben Shem Tov to be inhabiting an alternative past in which Christ was never born. Yet he also speaks of creating a Saviour in his own likeness which would seem to indicate—'

‘The founding of a false religion,' Blake said excitedly. ‘Now I begin to see.' But just as suddenly as the light of understanding had dawned in his eyes it dwindled again. ‘If Dagon ben Shem Tov inhabited an alternative past how will it help if we study the records of our own history? Surely
the two are completely separate, they don't relate to each other?'

‘Again, we must refer to the tapes. Dagon ben Shem Tov speaks of the
Qabalah
which I assume is the medieval equivalent of the Kabbalah. He also mentions the Ark of God which is referred to often enough in the Judaeo–Christian Bible. So there
are
points of similarity between our history and theirs. The two pasts – if that's what they are – intersect at certain points and share the same events, perhaps even the same people. What we have to look for is evidence in our own history of these points of intersection, and looking for the “Saviour” of a false religion wouldn't seem a bad place to start.' He glanced up and said without irony, ‘Unless Dr Dagon has a better idea.'

Dagon smiled bleakly, a ghost passing fleetingly across a lighted window. The implant in his chest made a hollow sound as he drew breath. ‘It occurs to me to wonder how much of the information in the tapes is strong enough to support such an investigation. As a Myth Technologist you will of course have complete faith in your own methods, but your faith might not be sufficient to sustain my belief.'

Milton Blake said, ‘Chris was invited to participate in this experiment at my personal request; he doesn't have to justify his methods to you or anybody. If you don't want his help why don't you say so and we can save ourselves a lot of time and effort?' He had spoken his mind at last but it irritated him that he'd given way to the impulse. He curled his fists and pushed them into the pockets of his lab coat.

The mythographer stood up and his height seemed forbidding in the small soundproof room. A defective light fitment in the ceiling jarred the silence with its persistent drone. He looked down at the half-man in the parachair.

‘I can understand your reluctance, Dr Dagon. As a hardline scientist you require proof in the accepted scientific mode. Unfortunately – or fortunately, depending on your point of view – Myth Technology doesn't and cannot function by those rules. It is by definition a metaphysical science and deals with those areas of inquiry not accessible to Aristotelian logic. You ask for positive proof that the information in the tapes is objective fact and not subjective fantasy – but in fact it's the latter which has the most value. As a mythographer the only thing I have to
offer is my “gift” for mythic projection, and that, it seems, is the one thing you wish to discount.' He stood before the display console and folded his arms. ‘And if I did offer proof wouldn't it be subject to the same doubt, the same distrust? You don't accept Myth Technology as following accepted scientific procedure and therefore everything I say is liable to be suspect in your eyes.'

‘Though you say it most persuasively.' Dr Francis Dagon bowed his head slightly. He went on in his soft inflectionless voice, ‘I have been trained to proceed slowly, step by step, and to verify each step before proceeding further. Yours is a different discipline and one I find hard to accept. However, some of your guesses – intuitive insights, whatever you care to call them – suggest one or two possible approaches that hadn't occurred to me. Further study of the Judaeo-Christian Bible, as you suggest, might shed new light on the subject.'

‘You know,' Milton Blake said, hardly concerned to hide his annoyance, ‘you talk as though mythic projection was an everyday commodity of little practical value. Are you aware of the risk involved? Do you realize—'

‘I was present during transmission,' Dr Dagon said curtly. ‘I saw everything that happened.' He made the smallest of movements with his rounded shoulders. ‘Everything appeared to be under control.'

Queghan looked down on him: the lines around his eyes and mouth were especially pronounced, the planes of his face almost angular from the overhead illumination. ‘Is it possible to genetically alter the reproductive process? I'm thinking in particular of a single artificial cell which could be persuaded to reproduce itself into a living organism.'

‘If you mean is it possible to alter the structure of a cell under controlled conditions, the answer is yes. It would depend, of course, on the nature of the cell – with bacteria it's a fairly simple operation. Once we have the basic enzyme we can provide it with the conditions necessary for continuous replication. Does that answer your question?'

‘Not altogether,' Queghan said. ‘Molecular biology isn't my field but I seem to recall that it's possible to insert fragments of DNA into other chromosomes and reproduce a chain of identical genes. Is that so?'

‘The method is known as cloning. And yes, it can be done. The end result would be to produce a species of identical units, each a carbon copy of the original cell. I've done some research myself on plasmids, the subunits used in the process.'

‘So I believe.'

‘Is your interest in cloning general or specific?' Dr Dagon asked. The electronic discs of his eyes sought out Queghan's face and tried to decipher its expression.

‘Has this ever been done outside the laboratory?'

‘Not that I know of—' He checked himself and qualified this by saying, ‘Of course research is proceeding all the time and perhaps there are certain techniques which would make this possible. Though whether anything above the level of a bacterial cell could be reproduced outside the laboratory, I very much doubt.'