Every college in America has its traditions. And many of them make very little sense at all. Like my alma mater being the Cyclones and having a Cardinal as its mascot. Or KSU being the Wildcats and yet the band plays "The Wabash Cannonball," which is about a train. Now, yes, there are explanations for these. On the surface, however, these traditions are easy to pick fun at, especially when people take them too seriously, as too many people do.
So, in that spirit, (and after growing up in Lawrence and having to listen to the "Rock Chalk" chant innumerable times), I simply can't resist taking a jab at this chant that has always to me seemed as bizarre as Wabash at KSU.
(Paraphrasing from The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by CS Lewis)
"I'm thinking of a limmerick," said Eustace, "that goes something like this:
"Rock Chalk Jayhawk KU."
"Well chalk and Jayhawk don't rhyme, to begin with," said Lucy.
"It's an assonance," said Eustace.
"Don't ask him what an assy-thingummy is," said Edmund. "He's only longing to be asked. Say nothing and perhaps he'll go away."
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Story: The Lethe, pt. XXIII
“You’re right, Commander,” Dobbins said. “Our mission is nowhere near over. We’re going to need some help.” He activated his hyperwave. “Dobbins to Hyperion.”
“Hyperion. Brackers here, sir. How did it work?”
“Quite well, Commander. All of the androids are neutralized, including the Mayor.”
“Sir?” Brackers’s voice betrayed total confusion.
“I’ll fill you in later, Commander. For now, get three shuttles ready for launch. We’re going to head to the control room to make docking a little easier for them, and then we’ll see if we can get the Lethe’s passengers and human crew together to fill them in on the situation.”
“I think we have already partially completed that second part of our mission, sir,” Skylar called from the far side of the room.
He had gone to stand by the large windows that overlooked the town square. Down below, a vast crowd had gathered, all roaming around and looking confused. They stayed away from the steps of the Town Hall, as if they expected someone to come out of the doors at any minute.
Dobbins walked over to look. “Well, that changes our plans a little.”
He spoke again into the hyperwave. “Mr. Brackers, launch those shuttles as soon as they are ready. We’ll have docking ports ready. Perhaps we’ll be able to have some good news to report by the time you get here. Dobbins out.
“Mr. Zhang, Mr. Sapens, go to the Control Center and get the docking bay doors open and three docking ports free. The rest of you, come with me. We’ve got our work cut out for us.”
They exited the Mayor’s office and descended to the main level. Zhang and Sapens continued down to the Control Center, while the rest of the team moved to the main doors of the Town Hall.
Dobbins paused before going through the doors. Outside, he could hear the murmuring crowd as it congregated. The tone of their voices indicated confusion and worry. He pushed the doors open. The crowd outside quickly became deathly quiet in anticipation. The silence lasted exactly three seconds before a great outcry of panic and confusion erupted. People shouted over other people, some asking questions of each other, some yelling questions at Dobbins, and everyone creating such a cacophony of voices that he could not understand anything being said.
The crowd of well over 1000 people consisted of men and women of just about every age from teenagers upward. Most were dressed in the simple clothing of farmers. All, however, seemed genuinely distressed at Dobbins’s appearance on the Town Hall steps.
Dobbins motioned with his hands to try to silence the crowd, but his effort initially met with little success. Finally, a middle-aged man climbed up four or five steps and with much effort managed to quiet the crowd.
“Citizens of Larson,” the man said, “I have no idea why this man is standing here instead of our Mayor, nor why old Leon the Watchmaker is here with him, but I am sure that there is a good reason if we will only allow him to explain himself.”
“Is he going to explain what happened to all of our security personnel, Micah?” demanded a man near the front of the throng.
“I don’t know what he knows,” responded Micah, “but give him a chance to explain himself. Perhaps the Mayor sent him here.”
The crowd began to shout approval and disapproval of the suggestion at the same time. With some effort Micah quieted them all again. “Let him speak, I said,” he ordered strongly. “After that, if his answers aren’t to your satisfaction, you’ll all be welcome to ask as many questions as you wish, provided that we do it in some sort of order to give the poor man a chance to hear you. As it is, I’d be surprised if he’s understood a thing you’ve been shouting at him. So, everyone calm down, stop shouting, and listen.”
He turned to face Dobbins, looking at the captain with a look of confused interest.
Dobbins began to speak, “I am Captain Christopher Dobbins of the Earth Hyper Ship Hyperion. We have been sent here to escort you the rest of the way to Elysion…”
The crowd began to erupt again into a wave of noise. “He’s nuts!” some shouted. “He’s a Radioactive!” others screamed. “Let him speak,” a third group clammered, “there’s got to be an explanation for his presence here.”
Micah again motioned for the crowd to quiet down, which they eventually did, allowing Dobbins to continue.
“Apparently,” Dobbins said, “your Mayor, Dante, took over many years ago and has been lying to you. You are not on Earth at all. You are on a generational starship, the Lethe, bound for an inhabitable moon named Elysion.” Some in the crowd began to grumble again. “Listen to me!” Dobbins shouted over the noise, stifling the dissent. “Your Mayor, as you call him, has deceived you into thinking that you are the sole remnants of nuclear holocaust. That was not true. Like I said, you are passengers aboard a starship, colonists for a new world. We were sent here to help you complete your journey to this new world.”
“And why should we believe you?” demanded the same man who had challenged Micah earlier. “For all we know, you’re some group of survivors from a different town that managed to cross the radioactive waste to get here. Maybe you’ve killed the Mayor or thrown him in prison, and know you’re here to try to take over with this absurd story of a starship. As far as I’m concerned, you’re whole story is too convenient. A starship? Really? If we are on a starship, why is it that I can clearly see blue sky above me with the sun rising and setting? Why is it that this world is all that there is and that it is impossible to leave this valley without dying?” Many in the crowd muttered their approval.
“We could be lying,” Dobbins answered, “but we’re not. We can prove to you that your Mayor, Desmond, was not who he claimed to be. As far as the appearances around you, you should know about holography. The sky you see is just a holographic projection. And of course you can’t leave this ‘valley.’ To do so would require you to leave the ship.”
Cries of protest broke out again. This time, Micah spoke up over them, “Captain, you say that you have proof that Desmond was lying?”
“We do, Micah,” answered Dobbins. “If you will give me a couple of minutes, we can bring the proof down to you.”
Micah addressed the crowd. “People of Larson, I say that we give this Dobbins the chance to prove his claims. He needs a couple of minutes to bring us this proof…”
“More like manufacture it,” shouted a cynical voice from the middle of the crowd, drawing scattered laughter.
“To bring us his proof,” Micah repeated, “that the Mayor has been lying to us. At that point, you all will be able to see and judge for yourselves.”
“Hey, Micah, remember that we still don’t know why every member of our security force is unconscious. Perhaps this Dobbins can explain that,” another voice called, to the approval of many.
“Yes, I can.” Dobbins responded, “if you will give me one second to send some of my team to retrieve the proof of Desmond’s lies.
He spoke to his team in a quiet voice, “Skylar, Samuelson, go up to Desmond’s office and get Desmond down here as fast as you can. Bring all of the pieces that you can carry.”
They quickly went back through the doors, running for the stairwell.
Dobbins raised his voice to the crowd. “Your security personnel are all androids. We had to disable them because they were preventing us from contacting you and because they posed a threat to us and to you. They are the ones who have been enforcing Desmond’s will upon you.”
Again, disbelief ran through portions of the crowd. “Androids? How can that be?” someone asked.
“Androids! Of course,” another said in response, “it makes perfect sense. Think about the odd color of their eyes!”
A debate broke out within the crowd, some agreed with Dobbins and others vehemently objecting to the idea.
As before, Micah exerted much effort to quiet the crowd, finally succeeding. By the time he had done so, however, Skylar and Samuelson had returned, each carrying various pieces of Desmond.
“Here,” Dobbins said, motioning to the pieces of the android, “is our proof of Desmond’s lies: Desmond himself. He was an android.”
The crowd stared at the pieces of their former mayor in shock. Finally, a woman in the crowd found her voice. “If he’s an android,” she said, “then you can reassemble and activate him, again. Show us that this is truly him and not just a clever forgery.”
“I’m afraid we can’t do that,” Dobbins responded. “Desmond overloaded its neural network about fifteen minutes ago. The physical pieces are here, but even if we were to activate it, nothing would happen. This android is in need of a major overall before it will ever function again.”
At this statement, yet another argument broke out among the crowd. This time, Micah was unable to quiet the multitude despite his best efforts. As the arguing raged, Dobbins’s hyperwave chirped.
Activating it, he spoke, “Dobbins here.”
“Captain,” Brackers’s voice said, “Brackers. We have those shuttles ready, and Mr. Zhang reports that the docking bay is now ready to accept them.”
“Excellent, Commander. Send them over at once. It looks like we’re going to need a lot of help.”
“Aye, sir,” replied the first officer. “Hyperion out.”
Someone in the crowd noticed Dobbins talking on the hyperwave. “Hey, Dobbins, who are you talking to?” she shouted.
“My ship,” Dobbins answered her. At this, even more noise broke out, voices shouting about invading armies and the destruction of Larson.
As the chaos mounted, Dobbins grabbed his blaster, set it to maximum, and blew the light post on the right-hand side of the stairs into pieces. As the debris cloud cleared, the crowd stared at him in shock.
“My apologies,” Dobbins said, “but I needed you attention. Please, listen to me. We will gladly answer any and all concerns that you have, but we need to do it in an orderly fashion.”
“Captain Dobbins is right,” Micah added before Dobbins could continue. “And I propose that we do it this way: as a crowd, we’re never going to accomplish anything except a riot. Why don’t we hold a town meeting, in one hour, in the main assembly hall?”
Despite minor protests, this plan appeared acceptable to almost all of the passengers. They slowly made their way out of the town square, some heading directly for the assembly hall on the far side of the square, others down various side streets to attend to whatever business they need to handle before coming to the meeting.
“Thank you, Micah,” Dobbins said.
“My pleasure, Captain,” replied Micah. “You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting for someone else to come to free us from the tyranny of Desmond’s rule. I thought I was going to be found out for sure.”
“You weren’t brainwashed like the rest of the passengers?” asked Ella.
“No, ma’am,” answered Micah. “Let’s just say that I found creative ways to avoid being taken in.”
“Sounds like Leon,” Skylar observed.
“You mean that there’s someone else?” Micah asked.
“Yes,” Dobbins answered. “Leon Sapens, the chief engineer.”
“Well, I’ll be…” Micah said in surprise. “I thought for sure I was the only one left.”
He paused for a second, as if pondering the reality that he was not alone, and then added, “Captain, I suggest you prepare for the meeting coming up. It is not going to be easy to convince these people that what they’ve been told for the past 10 years is all lies.”
“We will,” Dobbins said, “but who are you? What was your original role on the Lethe?”
“My first name you already know,” Micah replied. “My last name is Packard, and I was one of the colonists headed to the new world, primarily intending to be a member of the medical clinic’s staff.
“Now, if you’ll excuse me, Captain, I need to head to the Assembly Hall to make sure that it is set up properly for this meeting.” He descended the steps at a moderate pace and strode off purposefully, not showing any signs of hurry
“Hyperion. Brackers here, sir. How did it work?”
“Quite well, Commander. All of the androids are neutralized, including the Mayor.”
“Sir?” Brackers’s voice betrayed total confusion.
“I’ll fill you in later, Commander. For now, get three shuttles ready for launch. We’re going to head to the control room to make docking a little easier for them, and then we’ll see if we can get the Lethe’s passengers and human crew together to fill them in on the situation.”
“I think we have already partially completed that second part of our mission, sir,” Skylar called from the far side of the room.
He had gone to stand by the large windows that overlooked the town square. Down below, a vast crowd had gathered, all roaming around and looking confused. They stayed away from the steps of the Town Hall, as if they expected someone to come out of the doors at any minute.
Dobbins walked over to look. “Well, that changes our plans a little.”
He spoke again into the hyperwave. “Mr. Brackers, launch those shuttles as soon as they are ready. We’ll have docking ports ready. Perhaps we’ll be able to have some good news to report by the time you get here. Dobbins out.
“Mr. Zhang, Mr. Sapens, go to the Control Center and get the docking bay doors open and three docking ports free. The rest of you, come with me. We’ve got our work cut out for us.”
They exited the Mayor’s office and descended to the main level. Zhang and Sapens continued down to the Control Center, while the rest of the team moved to the main doors of the Town Hall.
Dobbins paused before going through the doors. Outside, he could hear the murmuring crowd as it congregated. The tone of their voices indicated confusion and worry. He pushed the doors open. The crowd outside quickly became deathly quiet in anticipation. The silence lasted exactly three seconds before a great outcry of panic and confusion erupted. People shouted over other people, some asking questions of each other, some yelling questions at Dobbins, and everyone creating such a cacophony of voices that he could not understand anything being said.
The crowd of well over 1000 people consisted of men and women of just about every age from teenagers upward. Most were dressed in the simple clothing of farmers. All, however, seemed genuinely distressed at Dobbins’s appearance on the Town Hall steps.
Dobbins motioned with his hands to try to silence the crowd, but his effort initially met with little success. Finally, a middle-aged man climbed up four or five steps and with much effort managed to quiet the crowd.
“Citizens of Larson,” the man said, “I have no idea why this man is standing here instead of our Mayor, nor why old Leon the Watchmaker is here with him, but I am sure that there is a good reason if we will only allow him to explain himself.”
“Is he going to explain what happened to all of our security personnel, Micah?” demanded a man near the front of the throng.
“I don’t know what he knows,” responded Micah, “but give him a chance to explain himself. Perhaps the Mayor sent him here.”
The crowd began to shout approval and disapproval of the suggestion at the same time. With some effort Micah quieted them all again. “Let him speak, I said,” he ordered strongly. “After that, if his answers aren’t to your satisfaction, you’ll all be welcome to ask as many questions as you wish, provided that we do it in some sort of order to give the poor man a chance to hear you. As it is, I’d be surprised if he’s understood a thing you’ve been shouting at him. So, everyone calm down, stop shouting, and listen.”
He turned to face Dobbins, looking at the captain with a look of confused interest.
Dobbins began to speak, “I am Captain Christopher Dobbins of the Earth Hyper Ship Hyperion. We have been sent here to escort you the rest of the way to Elysion…”
The crowd began to erupt again into a wave of noise. “He’s nuts!” some shouted. “He’s a Radioactive!” others screamed. “Let him speak,” a third group clammered, “there’s got to be an explanation for his presence here.”
Micah again motioned for the crowd to quiet down, which they eventually did, allowing Dobbins to continue.
“Apparently,” Dobbins said, “your Mayor, Dante, took over many years ago and has been lying to you. You are not on Earth at all. You are on a generational starship, the Lethe, bound for an inhabitable moon named Elysion.” Some in the crowd began to grumble again. “Listen to me!” Dobbins shouted over the noise, stifling the dissent. “Your Mayor, as you call him, has deceived you into thinking that you are the sole remnants of nuclear holocaust. That was not true. Like I said, you are passengers aboard a starship, colonists for a new world. We were sent here to help you complete your journey to this new world.”
“And why should we believe you?” demanded the same man who had challenged Micah earlier. “For all we know, you’re some group of survivors from a different town that managed to cross the radioactive waste to get here. Maybe you’ve killed the Mayor or thrown him in prison, and know you’re here to try to take over with this absurd story of a starship. As far as I’m concerned, you’re whole story is too convenient. A starship? Really? If we are on a starship, why is it that I can clearly see blue sky above me with the sun rising and setting? Why is it that this world is all that there is and that it is impossible to leave this valley without dying?” Many in the crowd muttered their approval.
“We could be lying,” Dobbins answered, “but we’re not. We can prove to you that your Mayor, Desmond, was not who he claimed to be. As far as the appearances around you, you should know about holography. The sky you see is just a holographic projection. And of course you can’t leave this ‘valley.’ To do so would require you to leave the ship.”
Cries of protest broke out again. This time, Micah spoke up over them, “Captain, you say that you have proof that Desmond was lying?”
“We do, Micah,” answered Dobbins. “If you will give me a couple of minutes, we can bring the proof down to you.”
Micah addressed the crowd. “People of Larson, I say that we give this Dobbins the chance to prove his claims. He needs a couple of minutes to bring us this proof…”
“More like manufacture it,” shouted a cynical voice from the middle of the crowd, drawing scattered laughter.
“To bring us his proof,” Micah repeated, “that the Mayor has been lying to us. At that point, you all will be able to see and judge for yourselves.”
“Hey, Micah, remember that we still don’t know why every member of our security force is unconscious. Perhaps this Dobbins can explain that,” another voice called, to the approval of many.
“Yes, I can.” Dobbins responded, “if you will give me one second to send some of my team to retrieve the proof of Desmond’s lies.
He spoke to his team in a quiet voice, “Skylar, Samuelson, go up to Desmond’s office and get Desmond down here as fast as you can. Bring all of the pieces that you can carry.”
They quickly went back through the doors, running for the stairwell.
Dobbins raised his voice to the crowd. “Your security personnel are all androids. We had to disable them because they were preventing us from contacting you and because they posed a threat to us and to you. They are the ones who have been enforcing Desmond’s will upon you.”
Again, disbelief ran through portions of the crowd. “Androids? How can that be?” someone asked.
“Androids! Of course,” another said in response, “it makes perfect sense. Think about the odd color of their eyes!”
A debate broke out within the crowd, some agreed with Dobbins and others vehemently objecting to the idea.
As before, Micah exerted much effort to quiet the crowd, finally succeeding. By the time he had done so, however, Skylar and Samuelson had returned, each carrying various pieces of Desmond.
“Here,” Dobbins said, motioning to the pieces of the android, “is our proof of Desmond’s lies: Desmond himself. He was an android.”
The crowd stared at the pieces of their former mayor in shock. Finally, a woman in the crowd found her voice. “If he’s an android,” she said, “then you can reassemble and activate him, again. Show us that this is truly him and not just a clever forgery.”
“I’m afraid we can’t do that,” Dobbins responded. “Desmond overloaded its neural network about fifteen minutes ago. The physical pieces are here, but even if we were to activate it, nothing would happen. This android is in need of a major overall before it will ever function again.”
At this statement, yet another argument broke out among the crowd. This time, Micah was unable to quiet the multitude despite his best efforts. As the arguing raged, Dobbins’s hyperwave chirped.
Activating it, he spoke, “Dobbins here.”
“Captain,” Brackers’s voice said, “Brackers. We have those shuttles ready, and Mr. Zhang reports that the docking bay is now ready to accept them.”
“Excellent, Commander. Send them over at once. It looks like we’re going to need a lot of help.”
“Aye, sir,” replied the first officer. “Hyperion out.”
Someone in the crowd noticed Dobbins talking on the hyperwave. “Hey, Dobbins, who are you talking to?” she shouted.
“My ship,” Dobbins answered her. At this, even more noise broke out, voices shouting about invading armies and the destruction of Larson.
As the chaos mounted, Dobbins grabbed his blaster, set it to maximum, and blew the light post on the right-hand side of the stairs into pieces. As the debris cloud cleared, the crowd stared at him in shock.
“My apologies,” Dobbins said, “but I needed you attention. Please, listen to me. We will gladly answer any and all concerns that you have, but we need to do it in an orderly fashion.”
“Captain Dobbins is right,” Micah added before Dobbins could continue. “And I propose that we do it this way: as a crowd, we’re never going to accomplish anything except a riot. Why don’t we hold a town meeting, in one hour, in the main assembly hall?”
Despite minor protests, this plan appeared acceptable to almost all of the passengers. They slowly made their way out of the town square, some heading directly for the assembly hall on the far side of the square, others down various side streets to attend to whatever business they need to handle before coming to the meeting.
“Thank you, Micah,” Dobbins said.
“My pleasure, Captain,” replied Micah. “You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting for someone else to come to free us from the tyranny of Desmond’s rule. I thought I was going to be found out for sure.”
“You weren’t brainwashed like the rest of the passengers?” asked Ella.
“No, ma’am,” answered Micah. “Let’s just say that I found creative ways to avoid being taken in.”
“Sounds like Leon,” Skylar observed.
“You mean that there’s someone else?” Micah asked.
“Yes,” Dobbins answered. “Leon Sapens, the chief engineer.”
“Well, I’ll be…” Micah said in surprise. “I thought for sure I was the only one left.”
He paused for a second, as if pondering the reality that he was not alone, and then added, “Captain, I suggest you prepare for the meeting coming up. It is not going to be easy to convince these people that what they’ve been told for the past 10 years is all lies.”
“We will,” Dobbins said, “but who are you? What was your original role on the Lethe?”
“My first name you already know,” Micah replied. “My last name is Packard, and I was one of the colonists headed to the new world, primarily intending to be a member of the medical clinic’s staff.
“Now, if you’ll excuse me, Captain, I need to head to the Assembly Hall to make sure that it is set up properly for this meeting.” He descended the steps at a moderate pace and strode off purposefully, not showing any signs of hurry
Sunday, January 24, 2010
Commentary/Editorial: Voter Backlash
Voter backlash against the majority party is a common phenomenon in American politics. It happened in 1980. It happened in 1992. It happened in 2008 and 2010, at least in the Massachusetts special election. Numerous commentators have dissected voter backlash, but I think they're missing a key component: voters presume that the government can (and will) fix the problems the country is facing.
In some cases, this presumption is correct. In the case of foreign policy decisions, financial decisions (spending, taxes), or moral decisions (e.g. the Watergate or Lewinsky Scandals), the government has the ability to fix the problems and failure to do so is rightly seen by the voters as a failure on the part of elected officials.
On the other hand, there are other times when the government faces voter backlash because the voters have unrealistic expectations of their government. In 2008, voters blamed the government for the state of the economy (and expected them to fix it immediately), even though the government was only partially to blame (and thus only partially could fix it, and even then not immediately).
Now, the backlash seen in the 2010 special election is probably a mix of both. On the one hand, voters rightfully recognized that the Democrats in Congress were not doing a good job listening to their constituents and addressing the issues that government could fix. On the other hand, voters also expected too much from the government. They are looking to government to fix all of society's ills.
This trend, that Americans in general are becoming too dependent on their government, concerns me. If we are looking to government to solve our problems, then we are going to be sorely disappointed because the most significant problems facing this country are not governmental; they are moral. And the government cannot fix a moral problem like this, only God can.
I know that many will probably object that we as Americans have "been there, done that" with Christianity. If by Christianity, they mean the social religion where people put on their Christianity along with their church clothes, only to drop it just as fast, then, yes, America has already tried it and failed. I am not saying we need to return to a society where we are Christian on the outside but non-Christian on the inside. America's moral problems, from fraudulent accounting to teenagers making self-destructive choices, cannot be fixed by a veneer of Christianity. (After all, we had those same problems even we had the appearance of being a "Christian society.") Instead, we as Americans need to turn to Jesus Christ in a way that we never have as a society: wholeheartedly and deeply. Unless many Americans surrender their hearts to Christ and allow Him to change them from the inside out, I think we will continue to face the same challenges and continually find ourselves disappointed when the circumstances do not improve as we would like.
So, as the 2010 election cycle swings into gear, I hope that the voting public tempers its expectations of what government can and cannot do. Government cannot fix many of the problems of America. It certainly can make many things worse. (That is why I would like to see a more balanced power structure in Congress. Having one party in control has not worked well in our country's history.) Ultimately, the problems at the core of American society can be fixed only at the altar, not at the voting booth.
In some cases, this presumption is correct. In the case of foreign policy decisions, financial decisions (spending, taxes), or moral decisions (e.g. the Watergate or Lewinsky Scandals), the government has the ability to fix the problems and failure to do so is rightly seen by the voters as a failure on the part of elected officials.
On the other hand, there are other times when the government faces voter backlash because the voters have unrealistic expectations of their government. In 2008, voters blamed the government for the state of the economy (and expected them to fix it immediately), even though the government was only partially to blame (and thus only partially could fix it, and even then not immediately).
Now, the backlash seen in the 2010 special election is probably a mix of both. On the one hand, voters rightfully recognized that the Democrats in Congress were not doing a good job listening to their constituents and addressing the issues that government could fix. On the other hand, voters also expected too much from the government. They are looking to government to fix all of society's ills.
This trend, that Americans in general are becoming too dependent on their government, concerns me. If we are looking to government to solve our problems, then we are going to be sorely disappointed because the most significant problems facing this country are not governmental; they are moral. And the government cannot fix a moral problem like this, only God can.
I know that many will probably object that we as Americans have "been there, done that" with Christianity. If by Christianity, they mean the social religion where people put on their Christianity along with their church clothes, only to drop it just as fast, then, yes, America has already tried it and failed. I am not saying we need to return to a society where we are Christian on the outside but non-Christian on the inside. America's moral problems, from fraudulent accounting to teenagers making self-destructive choices, cannot be fixed by a veneer of Christianity. (After all, we had those same problems even we had the appearance of being a "Christian society.") Instead, we as Americans need to turn to Jesus Christ in a way that we never have as a society: wholeheartedly and deeply. Unless many Americans surrender their hearts to Christ and allow Him to change them from the inside out, I think we will continue to face the same challenges and continually find ourselves disappointed when the circumstances do not improve as we would like.
So, as the 2010 election cycle swings into gear, I hope that the voting public tempers its expectations of what government can and cannot do. Government cannot fix many of the problems of America. It certainly can make many things worse. (That is why I would like to see a more balanced power structure in Congress. Having one party in control has not worked well in our country's history.) Ultimately, the problems at the core of American society can be fixed only at the altar, not at the voting booth.
Friday, January 22, 2010
Story: The Lethe, pt. XXII
Commander Ella retrieved her scanner from where it had fallen from the guard’s hand. After a quick scan, she exclaimed, “Captain, you’re not going to believe this! Desmond is an android!”
“What?” Skylar exclaimed. “That can’t be. He doesn’t have purple eyes!”
“True,” Dobbins answered thoughtfully, “but some other aspects of this situation make sense. Who better to lead a group of androids in a rebellion than an android? I didn’t realize that Fleet Com had put an android in the first officer position. Mr. Sapens, why didn’t you know that?”
The old man shrugged. “I didn’t know myself, Captain. And I never really thought to ask. He seemed a bit cold, a bit distant, but I guess I figured it was his way of being in charge, you know, of separating himself from those underneath him. Since he didn’t look like those other walking machines we had roaming around, I figured that he was another human like us.”
“The question remains,” Zhang said, “how an android programmed to assist the Lethe wound up taking over the ship entirely.”
“A good question, Mr. Zhang,” Dobbins answered. “Perhaps we should ask him. Mr. Sapens, can you re-activate Desmond?”
“Are you sure that’s the wise thing to do, Captain?” Leon asked. “After all, he was just about ready to have us all sent off to be brainwashed.”
“Yes, I’m sure. He can’t hurt us without his security androids to help. And they’re permanently disabled now, unless they receive the activation code.”
“That’s just my point. He’ll be logging into the computer system the second we turn him back on. He wouldn’t need but a few milliseconds to figure out he to re-activate the other androids. I’m not sure it’s safe to activate him, again.”
“We could take off his arms and legs,” Zhang said. “Without those, he wouldn’t be able to get to a computer terminal.”
“That’s a good idea, there, sonny,” Leon responded, “except that, being an android, Desmond also has a wireless link to the computer. He could get into that system faster than we could turn him off again.”
“Could you disable his wireless receiver?” Samuelson asked.
“I suppose I could, although it’d take me a few minutes to find where it is. I haven’t had to work on any androids in quite a while.”
“I could help,” Zhang offered. “Together, I’m sure we can disable that function and still have Desmond be fully functioning.”
“Do it.” Dobbins ordered.
Leon and Zhang set to work detaching Desmond’s appendages. First, they straightened Desmond into an upright, seated position. Then, they began the task of removing his arms and legs. Within a couple of minutes, only his torso and head remained. The rest of him sat against one wall, useless without their connection to the main body. With Desmond now without extremities, Leon and Dobbins began the delicate task of tracking down and deactivating the wireless receiver that usually linked Desmond to the central computer. After twenty minutes of searching and scanning, they found the receiver behind Desmond’s left ear and removed it from his head. After closing the access panel behind the ear, Leon opened Desmond’s central chest cavity and touched a sequence of control buttons, re-activating the android.
Desmond’s head, which had been slumped backwards without the support of artificial muscles, snapped into a normal position. His eyes searched around the room, and he appeared to be trying to move his arms and legs. When he did not move, he quickly looked at himself before speaking. “Very clever, Captain,” he said to Dobbins. “It appears that you have me exactly where you want me. Why did you re-activate me? Do you wish now to gloat?”
“I want answers, Desmond,” Dobbins replied. “Where is Captain Loman? Why did you take over? Will you help us undo the damage you’ve caused by deceiving all these passengers?”
Desmond smiled a cold smile. “Captain, what makes you think that I am going to answer any of your questions now when I did not before? You can take me apart until only my power cells and head remain. I will not tell you anything. Besides, since you are so clever, I am sure that you will figure everything out relatively quickly. And I think you will also find that it will not be so easy convincing all of the passengers that they have been deceived.
“Now, Captain, since I obviously am not going to help you at all, I think I shall be going. Good bye, Captain.”
Desmond’s eyes rolled back into his head, which began twitching left and right fitfully.
“He’s re-formatting his neural network, destroying himself!” Zhang exclaimed as he rushed to try to power off the android before the process could be completed. He quickly opened Desmond’s main panel and began frantically working inside the cavity. He was too late. Within seconds, Desmond’s eyes rolled back forward, appearing empty, unfocused, and vacant. His head slumped forward and sank down to his chest.
Zhang grabbed a scanner and waved it over Desmond a couple of times. “It’s no good, sir,” he reported. “This android is gone. The neural network is fried beyond belief. How he managed to accomplish such a task is beyond me. There are so many directives in his programming that should have prevented him from willfully setting up a cascading neural overload like that.”
“He did quite a few things that went against normal android directives,” Samuelson observed. “He must have malfunctioned in some way. I wonder if we’ll ever find out how.”
Zhang shook his head. “I don’t know. Maybe if we took him back to the Cybernetics Lab in North America, they might be able to find a cause. I’m pretty sure, though, that this overload has fried all of his—I mean “its”—memory, processing, and relays. It will never function again.”
“Regardless of the cause,” Ella said, “we have another task ahead of us: getting the Lethe to Elysion and helping the colonists get themselves established. I have a feeling that it won’t be easy after all these years of manipulation.”
“What?” Skylar exclaimed. “That can’t be. He doesn’t have purple eyes!”
“True,” Dobbins answered thoughtfully, “but some other aspects of this situation make sense. Who better to lead a group of androids in a rebellion than an android? I didn’t realize that Fleet Com had put an android in the first officer position. Mr. Sapens, why didn’t you know that?”
The old man shrugged. “I didn’t know myself, Captain. And I never really thought to ask. He seemed a bit cold, a bit distant, but I guess I figured it was his way of being in charge, you know, of separating himself from those underneath him. Since he didn’t look like those other walking machines we had roaming around, I figured that he was another human like us.”
“The question remains,” Zhang said, “how an android programmed to assist the Lethe wound up taking over the ship entirely.”
“A good question, Mr. Zhang,” Dobbins answered. “Perhaps we should ask him. Mr. Sapens, can you re-activate Desmond?”
“Are you sure that’s the wise thing to do, Captain?” Leon asked. “After all, he was just about ready to have us all sent off to be brainwashed.”
“Yes, I’m sure. He can’t hurt us without his security androids to help. And they’re permanently disabled now, unless they receive the activation code.”
“That’s just my point. He’ll be logging into the computer system the second we turn him back on. He wouldn’t need but a few milliseconds to figure out he to re-activate the other androids. I’m not sure it’s safe to activate him, again.”
“We could take off his arms and legs,” Zhang said. “Without those, he wouldn’t be able to get to a computer terminal.”
“That’s a good idea, there, sonny,” Leon responded, “except that, being an android, Desmond also has a wireless link to the computer. He could get into that system faster than we could turn him off again.”
“Could you disable his wireless receiver?” Samuelson asked.
“I suppose I could, although it’d take me a few minutes to find where it is. I haven’t had to work on any androids in quite a while.”
“I could help,” Zhang offered. “Together, I’m sure we can disable that function and still have Desmond be fully functioning.”
“Do it.” Dobbins ordered.
Leon and Zhang set to work detaching Desmond’s appendages. First, they straightened Desmond into an upright, seated position. Then, they began the task of removing his arms and legs. Within a couple of minutes, only his torso and head remained. The rest of him sat against one wall, useless without their connection to the main body. With Desmond now without extremities, Leon and Dobbins began the delicate task of tracking down and deactivating the wireless receiver that usually linked Desmond to the central computer. After twenty minutes of searching and scanning, they found the receiver behind Desmond’s left ear and removed it from his head. After closing the access panel behind the ear, Leon opened Desmond’s central chest cavity and touched a sequence of control buttons, re-activating the android.
Desmond’s head, which had been slumped backwards without the support of artificial muscles, snapped into a normal position. His eyes searched around the room, and he appeared to be trying to move his arms and legs. When he did not move, he quickly looked at himself before speaking. “Very clever, Captain,” he said to Dobbins. “It appears that you have me exactly where you want me. Why did you re-activate me? Do you wish now to gloat?”
“I want answers, Desmond,” Dobbins replied. “Where is Captain Loman? Why did you take over? Will you help us undo the damage you’ve caused by deceiving all these passengers?”
Desmond smiled a cold smile. “Captain, what makes you think that I am going to answer any of your questions now when I did not before? You can take me apart until only my power cells and head remain. I will not tell you anything. Besides, since you are so clever, I am sure that you will figure everything out relatively quickly. And I think you will also find that it will not be so easy convincing all of the passengers that they have been deceived.
“Now, Captain, since I obviously am not going to help you at all, I think I shall be going. Good bye, Captain.”
Desmond’s eyes rolled back into his head, which began twitching left and right fitfully.
“He’s re-formatting his neural network, destroying himself!” Zhang exclaimed as he rushed to try to power off the android before the process could be completed. He quickly opened Desmond’s main panel and began frantically working inside the cavity. He was too late. Within seconds, Desmond’s eyes rolled back forward, appearing empty, unfocused, and vacant. His head slumped forward and sank down to his chest.
Zhang grabbed a scanner and waved it over Desmond a couple of times. “It’s no good, sir,” he reported. “This android is gone. The neural network is fried beyond belief. How he managed to accomplish such a task is beyond me. There are so many directives in his programming that should have prevented him from willfully setting up a cascading neural overload like that.”
“He did quite a few things that went against normal android directives,” Samuelson observed. “He must have malfunctioned in some way. I wonder if we’ll ever find out how.”
Zhang shook his head. “I don’t know. Maybe if we took him back to the Cybernetics Lab in North America, they might be able to find a cause. I’m pretty sure, though, that this overload has fried all of his—I mean “its”—memory, processing, and relays. It will never function again.”
“Regardless of the cause,” Ella said, “we have another task ahead of us: getting the Lethe to Elysion and helping the colonists get themselves established. I have a feeling that it won’t be easy after all these years of manipulation.”
Sunday, January 17, 2010
The Mysteries of Friction
While on the way to a Scholars' Bowl tournament in Riley, KS, yesterday, the suburban I was driving hit a patch of black ice and slid off of I-70 and into the median. Praise God, no one was hurt, and the only damage to the suburban was a flat tire. The odd part about the whole situation was that I was not driving that fast, certainly not as fast as people who were passing me moments before I slid off. While we were stuck in the median waiting on a tow truck, innumerable vehicles passed along the same spot on the road, and none of them slid off the road. It's as if the black ice that we hit was no longer even there. For whatever reason, a combination of factors caused us to lose traction and slide off of the road. Friction, thou art a fickle naive.
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Story: The Lethe, pt. XXI
The team left the shuttle and proceed carefully through the hallways towards the town hall. Dobbins explained his plan to the team as they headed forward. Their goal was to get into the Mayor’s office, where they expected to find Desmond. Based on Leon’s knowledge of the Town Hall, this office was on the upper floor of the building, unless Desmond had moved it. They would sneak back in through the auxiliary entrance and work their way upward to Desmond’s office, hopefully encountering minimal resistance along the way. The only other option was a frontal assault on the Town Hall, something that would draw every security android on the ship.
They arrived at the Control Center door and had little trouble bypassing its lock. Inside, the same two androids they stunned previously fell again, disabled with a shot from Samuelson’s blaster. “Rough day for those two guys,” Skylar commented.
The team moved through the Control Center itself and found the staircase that led up to the upper levels of the Town Hall. With Ella constantly scanning ahead for androids, they crept up the stairs, ready for a fight at any minute. When they reached the top floor, they paused while Ella scanned for guards on the floor. She could detect two in front of the mayor’s doors and one inside the mayor’s office.
On Dobbins’s signal, Samuelson and Skylar burst through the stairwell door and disabled both android guards with one shot each. The team quickly stormed into the Mayor’s office.
Inside, they found themselves in a vast, open, airy room. Along the far wall stood a vast bank of windows that overlooked the town square. Doors on either side led off to other rooms. A bank of computers stood along one wall and seemed to be a miniature control center. Lavish couches and opulent tables were placed all around the room, giving the room the appearance of the lobby of a five-star hotel instead of an executive office. In the middle of the room was a vast desk, piled in papers. Beside the desk stood a woman, presumably the mayor’s secretary, a middle-aged woman who started at the newcomers in shock. Seated behind the desk was the Mayor himself, who looked up as the team entered. His face showed no indication of shock.
Smiling slightly, he said, “Captain Dobbins! So nice of you to drop in. I just had received word that you and your team had not arrived as expected at the security facility. How nice of you to save me the trouble of having to track you down. You will, of course, surrender right now.”
Dobbins ignored the other man’s arrogance. “We need to talk, Desmond. Your mutiny of this ship is unacceptable. I expect you to relinquish command to Chief Engineer Sapens right away and assign yourself to the brig. That’s an order.”
“I am afraid that I cannot do that, Captain,” replied Desmond. “You see, on this ship, I give the orders; I do not take them. Momentarily, I think you will find that twenty guards will be coming through that door. I summoned them here via a silent alarm as you came in.” The sound of the stairwell door opening and closing came from the hallway outside the room. “Ah,” continued Desmond, “here they are now.”
Twenty guards entered the room, all of them the same height and build, some with brown hair, some with blond, but all with unnatural golden eyes. They pointed their blasters at the team. “Surrender your equipment, now,” ordered one of the androids.
Dobbins and the team had no choice but to comply. As they began to hand everything over to the guards, Dobbins hyperwave communicator began to chirp.
“You may answer it, Captain,” Desmond said smugly, “but no tricks.”
Dobbins grabbed the device and activated it. “Dobbins.”
“Captain,” responded Brackers’s voice, “Brackers here. Lieutenant Sawyer did not find anything on her search, sir. But she contacted Fleet Com, who sent us back the necessary program. We’re ready to run it when you are, sir.”
Desmond looked at Dobbins in a threatening manner.
“Hang on, Commander.” Dobbins ordered. “I’m not quite ready for it, yet.”
“Is everything all right, sir?” Brackers asked.
“Yes, everything’s Code Blue,” Dobbins answered. “Get everything set-up, but wait for my order to execute.”
“Understood sir,” Brackers said. “We’ll wait on your order. Hyperion out.”
“Excellent job, Captain,” Desmond said condescendingly as Dobbins handed the hyperwave over the guards. “Anything more foolish would have cost you dearly during the re-programming. We have ways of making it, shall I say, less comfortable, if we need to.”
Dobbins did not respond at all.
“Are you not going to say, ‘You will never get away with this, Desmond?’ ” asked the Mayor, mockingly.
“Do you really think that I’m going to say something that cliché?” countered Dobbins.
“No,” responded Desmond, “but you do have an entire ship out there, and you could send more of your crew over here and take over my town. I cannot allow that to happen. Call your ship again, Captain, and order them to…”
The beeping from the computer bank interrupted Desmond’s orders. One of the android guards spoke up without even looking at the computer screen. “Mayor,” he said, “someone is accessing our computer system without authorization.”
“Who?” demanded the Mayor.
“I do not know, sir. It appears to be coming from outside the ship.”
Desmond glared at Dobbins. “Very clever, Captain. I did not realize that Fleet Com had changed the code for personnel in distress over the last 30 years. I am afraid, however, that your little plan, whatever it is, is going to fail miserably.
“Jam all external and internal communications,” he ordered the guard.
The guard attempted to comply, but before it could complete the procedure, the computer sounded a different warning tone and began to display a ten-second countdown.
“Sir,” the android said flatly, “someone has activated the android shutdown proto….” It collapsed to the floor, unable to complete its report. The other nineteen guards likewise shut down and fell to the floor.
To the team’s complete astonishment, Desmond, too, slumped forward in his chair, apparently unconscious.
They arrived at the Control Center door and had little trouble bypassing its lock. Inside, the same two androids they stunned previously fell again, disabled with a shot from Samuelson’s blaster. “Rough day for those two guys,” Skylar commented.
The team moved through the Control Center itself and found the staircase that led up to the upper levels of the Town Hall. With Ella constantly scanning ahead for androids, they crept up the stairs, ready for a fight at any minute. When they reached the top floor, they paused while Ella scanned for guards on the floor. She could detect two in front of the mayor’s doors and one inside the mayor’s office.
On Dobbins’s signal, Samuelson and Skylar burst through the stairwell door and disabled both android guards with one shot each. The team quickly stormed into the Mayor’s office.
Inside, they found themselves in a vast, open, airy room. Along the far wall stood a vast bank of windows that overlooked the town square. Doors on either side led off to other rooms. A bank of computers stood along one wall and seemed to be a miniature control center. Lavish couches and opulent tables were placed all around the room, giving the room the appearance of the lobby of a five-star hotel instead of an executive office. In the middle of the room was a vast desk, piled in papers. Beside the desk stood a woman, presumably the mayor’s secretary, a middle-aged woman who started at the newcomers in shock. Seated behind the desk was the Mayor himself, who looked up as the team entered. His face showed no indication of shock.
Smiling slightly, he said, “Captain Dobbins! So nice of you to drop in. I just had received word that you and your team had not arrived as expected at the security facility. How nice of you to save me the trouble of having to track you down. You will, of course, surrender right now.”
Dobbins ignored the other man’s arrogance. “We need to talk, Desmond. Your mutiny of this ship is unacceptable. I expect you to relinquish command to Chief Engineer Sapens right away and assign yourself to the brig. That’s an order.”
“I am afraid that I cannot do that, Captain,” replied Desmond. “You see, on this ship, I give the orders; I do not take them. Momentarily, I think you will find that twenty guards will be coming through that door. I summoned them here via a silent alarm as you came in.” The sound of the stairwell door opening and closing came from the hallway outside the room. “Ah,” continued Desmond, “here they are now.”
Twenty guards entered the room, all of them the same height and build, some with brown hair, some with blond, but all with unnatural golden eyes. They pointed their blasters at the team. “Surrender your equipment, now,” ordered one of the androids.
Dobbins and the team had no choice but to comply. As they began to hand everything over to the guards, Dobbins hyperwave communicator began to chirp.
“You may answer it, Captain,” Desmond said smugly, “but no tricks.”
Dobbins grabbed the device and activated it. “Dobbins.”
“Captain,” responded Brackers’s voice, “Brackers here. Lieutenant Sawyer did not find anything on her search, sir. But she contacted Fleet Com, who sent us back the necessary program. We’re ready to run it when you are, sir.”
Desmond looked at Dobbins in a threatening manner.
“Hang on, Commander.” Dobbins ordered. “I’m not quite ready for it, yet.”
“Is everything all right, sir?” Brackers asked.
“Yes, everything’s Code Blue,” Dobbins answered. “Get everything set-up, but wait for my order to execute.”
“Understood sir,” Brackers said. “We’ll wait on your order. Hyperion out.”
“Excellent job, Captain,” Desmond said condescendingly as Dobbins handed the hyperwave over the guards. “Anything more foolish would have cost you dearly during the re-programming. We have ways of making it, shall I say, less comfortable, if we need to.”
Dobbins did not respond at all.
“Are you not going to say, ‘You will never get away with this, Desmond?’ ” asked the Mayor, mockingly.
“Do you really think that I’m going to say something that cliché?” countered Dobbins.
“No,” responded Desmond, “but you do have an entire ship out there, and you could send more of your crew over here and take over my town. I cannot allow that to happen. Call your ship again, Captain, and order them to…”
The beeping from the computer bank interrupted Desmond’s orders. One of the android guards spoke up without even looking at the computer screen. “Mayor,” he said, “someone is accessing our computer system without authorization.”
“Who?” demanded the Mayor.
“I do not know, sir. It appears to be coming from outside the ship.”
Desmond glared at Dobbins. “Very clever, Captain. I did not realize that Fleet Com had changed the code for personnel in distress over the last 30 years. I am afraid, however, that your little plan, whatever it is, is going to fail miserably.
“Jam all external and internal communications,” he ordered the guard.
The guard attempted to comply, but before it could complete the procedure, the computer sounded a different warning tone and began to display a ten-second countdown.
“Sir,” the android said flatly, “someone has activated the android shutdown proto….” It collapsed to the floor, unable to complete its report. The other nineteen guards likewise shut down and fell to the floor.
To the team’s complete astonishment, Desmond, too, slumped forward in his chair, apparently unconscious.
Sunday, January 10, 2010
The Thaw Is Coming
When the numbers of snow on the ground (8) is greater than the high temperature (2), it must be a cold winter day. That was the story for the 2nd half of last week. It has been well below freezing for multiple days, now. Some relief from the bitter cold came today, with a high in the 20s. Forecast highs for later this week are above freezing. Finally, the numerous inches of snow can melt. I'm ready for warmer weather, even if it's only slightly warmer.
Wednesday, January 06, 2010
Story: The Lethe, pt. XX
They turned to face the speaker. He was just over 6 feet tall, had brown hair and brown eyes. Four security androids flanked him, two on a side.
“Well, Captain Dobbins,” Desmond continued in a flat voice, “I give you and your team full credit for getting this far. When I saw the reports that you had escaped from the brig, I figured it was only a matter of minutes before we re-captured you. I underestimated your ingenuity. Congratulations.
“And, now, your blasters, please.” One of the security androids stepped forward and relieved Samuelson of his weapon.
“How did you find us?” asked Samuelson.
“Quite simple, really,” replied Desmond. “I knew that once you had escaped from us initially that you would eventually come here and try to shut down my androids. All I had to do was watch for unexpected computer access and then bring four of my best guards down.
“Enough answering on my part. Now, you will answer my questions. Where are the other members of your team? How many other people have you contacted besides the Watchmaker?”
No one answered.
“No one wishes to answer?” Desmond said menacingly. “Very well. You leave me with little choice. Take them back to the security center by the underground route, and prepare them for interrogation, level 5. No tactic is off limits.”
The android guards moved around the team and began to prod them towards the auxiliary entrance. “Come on, human,” ordered one, “get moving.”
Suddenly, Samuelson grabbed one of the guards by the hand and executed a perfect judo throw, tossing the android against a wall. The other androids responded immediately, opening fire on Samuelson, who collapsed to the ground, gasping for breath but otherwise unhurt. The blasters had been set to stun.
“As you can see,” Desmond said, “we value your lives, at least, right now. Any more tricks, and that attitude could change. Take them away!” He spun around and left the Control Center.
One of the guards dragged Samuelson back to his feet, while another helped the fallen android to its feet. It was unharmed by the attack. The guards positioned themselves behind and to the side of the prisoners, giving them no options for escape.
They walked out to the hallway and turned right. They continued on in silence for about a minute when the sound of a blaster echoed off of the walls. The two guards on the prisoners’ left collapsed to the ground. The other two guards looked around, desperately searching for the source of the blaster fire. A second blaster shot resounded, and the remaining two guards also fell over, disabled.
A ventilation panel in the wall just slightly ahead of them opened up, and from out of the duct crawled Skylar, blaster in hand.
“Nice work, Mr. Skylar,” commended Dobbins, “but why are you here? I ordered you and Commander Ella to stay board the shuttle.”
“I know, sir,” replied the young helmsman, “but we thought it would be wise…” he paused to sneeze. “…to use the shuttle’s sensors to keep track of your progress, just in case you got into any trouble. It sure looks like it’s a good thing we did, too. When we saw that there were…” again, a sneeze, “…androids confronting you in the Control Center and that they were escorting you back towards the Security Station, we quickly hatched a plan to rescue you.”
“A plan that involved you crawling into an air duct,” added Ella as she came around the corner from her hiding place. “Better you than me.”
“Ah, come on,” Skylar responded. “It was kind of fun, like those games I used to play as a kid. Although,” he paused yet again to sneeze, “it was a bit dusty.”
“Did you contact the Hyperion?” Dobbins asked.
“Yes,” answered Ella, “but we didn’t get to explain the situation very well before we had to come rescue you.”
“Well, then, let’s head back to the shuttle. I’m sure Commander Brackers would like an update on what’s going on. Then, I want to pay our dear friend the Mayor a little unannounced visit.”
Before they headed down the hallway, Leon and Zhang quickly pulled out the power module from each of the androids. There was no sense in allowing them to recover from being stunned and reporting the escape to Desmond or one of his minions.
They soon arrived at the shuttle and went in. As Samuelson and Skylar worked on assembling the necessary equipment—scanners, blasters, portable hyperwave radios—Dobbins contacted the Hyperion and filled Brackers in on their adventures to that point.
“It sounds like it’s quite a mess over there, sir,” said the First Officer when Dobbins had finished. “We have the teams you requested, sir, but it sounds to me like you need some back-up. I could have two security teams over there in twenty minutes.”
“No, Mr. Brackers, not yet,” answered Dobbins. “I don’t want to start an all-out battle over here with androids. I’m worried that the passengers might get hurt. Instead, have Lieutenant Sawyer search the Hyperion’s computer to see if she can find a program that we could put into the Lethe’s computer that would disable all of the androids at once. Contact me once you’ve found something. While you’re doing that, we’re going to go pay a visit to Mayor Desmond Loman.”
“Aye, sir,” replied Brackers, “good luck.”
“Well, Captain Dobbins,” Desmond continued in a flat voice, “I give you and your team full credit for getting this far. When I saw the reports that you had escaped from the brig, I figured it was only a matter of minutes before we re-captured you. I underestimated your ingenuity. Congratulations.
“And, now, your blasters, please.” One of the security androids stepped forward and relieved Samuelson of his weapon.
“How did you find us?” asked Samuelson.
“Quite simple, really,” replied Desmond. “I knew that once you had escaped from us initially that you would eventually come here and try to shut down my androids. All I had to do was watch for unexpected computer access and then bring four of my best guards down.
“Enough answering on my part. Now, you will answer my questions. Where are the other members of your team? How many other people have you contacted besides the Watchmaker?”
No one answered.
“No one wishes to answer?” Desmond said menacingly. “Very well. You leave me with little choice. Take them back to the security center by the underground route, and prepare them for interrogation, level 5. No tactic is off limits.”
The android guards moved around the team and began to prod them towards the auxiliary entrance. “Come on, human,” ordered one, “get moving.”
Suddenly, Samuelson grabbed one of the guards by the hand and executed a perfect judo throw, tossing the android against a wall. The other androids responded immediately, opening fire on Samuelson, who collapsed to the ground, gasping for breath but otherwise unhurt. The blasters had been set to stun.
“As you can see,” Desmond said, “we value your lives, at least, right now. Any more tricks, and that attitude could change. Take them away!” He spun around and left the Control Center.
One of the guards dragged Samuelson back to his feet, while another helped the fallen android to its feet. It was unharmed by the attack. The guards positioned themselves behind and to the side of the prisoners, giving them no options for escape.
They walked out to the hallway and turned right. They continued on in silence for about a minute when the sound of a blaster echoed off of the walls. The two guards on the prisoners’ left collapsed to the ground. The other two guards looked around, desperately searching for the source of the blaster fire. A second blaster shot resounded, and the remaining two guards also fell over, disabled.
A ventilation panel in the wall just slightly ahead of them opened up, and from out of the duct crawled Skylar, blaster in hand.
“Nice work, Mr. Skylar,” commended Dobbins, “but why are you here? I ordered you and Commander Ella to stay board the shuttle.”
“I know, sir,” replied the young helmsman, “but we thought it would be wise…” he paused to sneeze. “…to use the shuttle’s sensors to keep track of your progress, just in case you got into any trouble. It sure looks like it’s a good thing we did, too. When we saw that there were…” again, a sneeze, “…androids confronting you in the Control Center and that they were escorting you back towards the Security Station, we quickly hatched a plan to rescue you.”
“A plan that involved you crawling into an air duct,” added Ella as she came around the corner from her hiding place. “Better you than me.”
“Ah, come on,” Skylar responded. “It was kind of fun, like those games I used to play as a kid. Although,” he paused yet again to sneeze, “it was a bit dusty.”
“Did you contact the Hyperion?” Dobbins asked.
“Yes,” answered Ella, “but we didn’t get to explain the situation very well before we had to come rescue you.”
“Well, then, let’s head back to the shuttle. I’m sure Commander Brackers would like an update on what’s going on. Then, I want to pay our dear friend the Mayor a little unannounced visit.”
Before they headed down the hallway, Leon and Zhang quickly pulled out the power module from each of the androids. There was no sense in allowing them to recover from being stunned and reporting the escape to Desmond or one of his minions.
They soon arrived at the shuttle and went in. As Samuelson and Skylar worked on assembling the necessary equipment—scanners, blasters, portable hyperwave radios—Dobbins contacted the Hyperion and filled Brackers in on their adventures to that point.
“It sounds like it’s quite a mess over there, sir,” said the First Officer when Dobbins had finished. “We have the teams you requested, sir, but it sounds to me like you need some back-up. I could have two security teams over there in twenty minutes.”
“No, Mr. Brackers, not yet,” answered Dobbins. “I don’t want to start an all-out battle over here with androids. I’m worried that the passengers might get hurt. Instead, have Lieutenant Sawyer search the Hyperion’s computer to see if she can find a program that we could put into the Lethe’s computer that would disable all of the androids at once. Contact me once you’ve found something. While you’re doing that, we’re going to go pay a visit to Mayor Desmond Loman.”
“Aye, sir,” replied Brackers, “good luck.”
Sunday, January 03, 2010
Snow
I haven't seen this much snow in Topeka in my seven years hear. I haven't yet measured the total amount of snow on the ground, but I did measure the new snowfall: 2 inches. I would guess that there are probably 6-7 inches of snow on the ground right now. It's not going away anytime soon, either. The cold weather is forecast to continue throughout the week, and more snow, combined with high winds and bitter cold, is forecast for Wednesday and Thursday. Ah, winter indeed has returned to Topeka after an absence of several years.
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