Convergence on a Panoptic Newtonian: The Interstices of Heaven by Forrest Aguirre Mount Laguna thrust up a cold spine from California's arid plains a short distance from famed Palomar. Amateur Astronomer, a community college science teacher, chattered his jaw to aching in an effort to generate body heat. The red light of the metal dome did little to warm him. Such is the lot of those who expose themselves to the mountain air for a peek into eternity. His tender fingertips sparked cold pain as he punched in the celestial coordinates. Tomorrow, Mr. A thought, I will bring gloves. 05347n2107. Zeta Tauri. Tien Kwan - Chinese: "The Gate of Heaven". A shell star, simultaneously building and compressing layers of plasma in something akin to massive solar prominences. Some theoreticians felt that the star was going through a transformation, pupating from a merely large, mature star into a spectacular red supergiant. Mr. A stared intently, his whole attention on the beauty of the whirling nuclear furnace. A buzzing in his ears, the side effect of such intense concentration, pushed out the creaks and squawks of the steel shell encasing him. His shivering had stopped. "Oh, to see the eye of God." Approximately 940 light years away, that same star (called Zeta Tauri by Amateur Astronomer) hurtled away from an insignificant speck (named Sol by nearby planetary inhabitants) at a speed of fifteen miles per second. Not far from this slowly accreting star (un-named, incidentally, by its erstwhile orbiters) flew a craft, a large craft. A planet's population, their world since engulfed by the outer layers of the stellar giant, had been evacuated into this leviathan construct of metal and plastics. The planet's inhabitants had fled not only to escape the impending conflagration, but to pursue a pilgrimage, a religious pilgrimage - to find the Grand Diety. Selphank was aboard that ship. He felt that God had abandoned them. Selphenk worked in distribution. His job was to arrange meal time for engineering. Every day he would calculate calories, enter data and prepare a mealtime production plan: times, drop off locations, portions, even the temperature of delivered foods as they sat waiting for a hungry mob of engineers to consume. It was boring work. Dull. Flat. He wished he could work with his friends Malph and Cophleeter - in engineering. They met at mealtime, after Selphenk had finished his deliveries. Malph and Cophleeter welcomed the small talk - a break from number crunching and structural data formulas. Still, Selphenk would ask questions about their projects, always wanting to know more, though their social structure forbade transference once one was assigned his or her life's work. Dreaming was not forbidden. They cut a diverse trio. Selphenk was small for his species, dark haired, with all three eyes a deep green, like the saltwater bodies of their old homeworld - consumed and evaporated now by the fires of their dying star. Malph was larger - significantly larger. In Selphank's opinion Malph should have been chosen for the guard: fair-skinned strapping chest; thick, muscular arms; long blond hair; two blue eyes and a pink central eye. One more genetic mis-step and Malph would have been an albino. Cophleeter could have been Selphenk's cousin, judging by her looks. Her long, raven hair, thin features and observant awareness lent a familial similarity to her friend. But her ice blue eyes, bright as young stars peeking out from a dusty nebula, set her apart from Sephlenk. She was the smartest of the bunch - the best fit for engineering. The ship's thinking machine had made a correct decision when assigning her a post. She was always first to speak. "Selphenk, you must quit moping." "She's right," Malph interjected. "You'll never be happy if you keep on sighing and scuffing your feet along." "Easy for you to say, you're in engineering. Did you ever think that the thinking machine made a mistake when it chose me to cater?" "Selphie! Cophleeter cut sharp. "You can't say such things. The thinking machine was assembled by the High Data Modulator, a position granted by God himself." Selphenk lowered his head to the table, whispering: "But you can't tell me that the HDM is infallible. He's old, one of the oldest of our kind. Who knows what age has done to his mind. Besides, he's missing an eye. Maybe he missed something while keying in my number." Malph seemed concerned. "That's borderline blasphemy, Selphie." "It is blasphemy!" Cophleeter corrected. "My faith has been destroyed," Selphenk pined. "I've felt down since we left planet. What has it been? Three, four hundred years now? It was such a lovely planet. Why did God have to let it be destroyed? I've gone down hill since. My parents' passing, the work assignment, everything that means anything to me has been taken or demeaned. What do I have to live for?" "Don't even hint at such things, Selphenk. We are your friends -- we will help you, help to restore your lost faith. In the meantime, have faith in us." Amateur Astronomer drove home bleary-eyed. He was used to the exhaustion, however, and drove on like a robot - auto piloting curves and turns in half sleep. He had driven this route so many times, crawling up the mountain, out of the squalor below, to the telescope where he sat all night numb to the world, swimming among the stars. That was his real home, the interstices of heaven, churning with the galaxies, pulled in by black holes, dancing waltzes with the binary systems. Earth was no home. It was a prison. He longed for something better, beyond the mundane, the mortal --he sought God within the void. The astro-theologian pulled into his cracked parking place, exited his rusty hatchback and entered his apartment, careful to avoid the crowd of gang-bangers at the corner of the building. His life didn't amount to much, but maybe it was worth keeping for a few more looks at the stars - so he steered clear of the crack hounds, the dealers, the discontent kids who had been spoon fed on video violence from infancy. No need to lose it all for an accidental shoulder bump or wrong look. Mr. A kept his eyes to the ground when in his own neighborhood. The mail was sparse and depressing. Student loan payment overdue, phone service on the verge of being cut, alimony payment requirements raised and junk mail from the four corners of the globe. The newspaper didn't help much either. A newly-elected Republican governor: chances were high that community college education would take a hit. No doubt astronomy would be the first thing to go in the science wing. Nothing was sure. The signs were not good. Maybe life wasn't worth keeping, Mr. A crawled through grave thoughts of the future, the present. He fell asleep on the couch, half covered under a midden mound of junk mail. Malph and Cophleeter were good to their promise. It was slow work restoring their friend's faith, but they had made some progress in the first few time segments since their meal meeting. While in his presence they were always careful to notice, point out and accentuate the positive. Together they read the religious primers they had enjoyed while in childhood. Sephlenk began again to find a sense of spirituality that had been absent - replaced by a cynical jadedness - for some time. It felt good to feel young again, fresh, open eyed, almost innocent, almost honest with himself and others. His depression was lifting. They arranged to meet together for a meal . Selphenk was on time, waiting as the food grew cold. Cophy and Malph were late, as was the whole engineering contingent. Selphie's annoyance shocked into panic, however, as a siren claxon erupted from the access tube leading to engineering. Within seconds firebots and safety-department workers in yellow radiation suits flooded into the tunnel, heading for engineering's central core. The ruckus was incredible, worse than the rioting that broke out when the planetary evacuation was announced so long ago. Security police entered the dining area, pushing Selphie and the crowd of curious onlookers to the back of the hall as rescue workers brought forth stretchers strapped with the charred, broken remains of a small group of engineers. Malph was among them. Selphenk stood on tiptoe, looking over the security guards' shoulders to see Cophleeter, clothes singed, but relatively unharmed, bobbing up and down as she ran alongside Malph's stretcher. Worry stretched itself across her strained countenance. The group disappeared through a side door, heading for the ship's medical section. Selphie abandoned post to find his friends. He jogged the whole distance to medical - a quarter of the colony ship's length away. The fear and anxiety coursing through him drove his body on, forbidding him to stop even long enough to start up a grav-platform and simply levitate across the gigantic inner cylinder of the ship. He was blind as he ran, not noticing the throngs of people, the vehicles, the pleasant artificial afternoon sunshine, not even the ludicrously huge windows on either horizon through which one might glimpse the passing stars. Everything was a blur, save for the occasional "Medical" sign and flashing directional arrow. Artificial darkness had fallen by the time he arrived there, a holographic star field in the middle of the moon-sized chamber mimicking the night sky of the homeworld. He would surely be punished for missing the administration of the evening meal. He didn't much care. Fifty-seven stories up and through three hallways he found Cophleeter sitting in a chair outside Malph's room. She sat, exhausted, watching a news monitor mounted to the opposite wall. "Cophy!" He stumbled, gasping for air. "Where's Malph?" "Selphie, what have you done? You look terrible." "I ran. Where's Malph?" Cophleeter choked back her tears: "There was an accident. We were working on a new drive - something faster, incredibly fast, to get us to our destination, to God, more quickly. One of the fuel containers sprung a leak. Many engineers were burned by the flaming fuel. Malph tried to stop it up and . . ." She wept bitterly. "Selphie, Malph's gone." Prickles washed over Selphenk's skin, his gut turned to rot. He stared blank ahead, numb, all three eyes on the news monitor. Only after the initial roar dimmed from his ears did he come our of his haze and realize what was happening on screen. The report bot recited its notes in a digitized monotone: 44-07:159 Rescue and security teams respond to emergency assistance calls from engineering. 44-07:170 Teams arrive, engineering reports leak contained, several casualties. 44-07:173 Victims medivaced, next of kin notified. 44-07:190 Rumors circulate of secret HDM directive regarding construction of a new space-folding engine. HDM office does not respond to inquiries. 44-07:220 Calls reach news monitoring central reporting that HDM support staff have not returned home from work, though release time had passed. 44-07:240 Rumors circulate of a coup attempt by HDM staff. 44-07:242 HDM staff issues statement to the press: "Members of the press and public, the office of the High Data Modulator greets you. Recently circulating rumors of a coup are unfounded. The staff surrounding his holiness, the HDM, have taken no actions to jeopardize his safety or health. To the contrary, the support staff are concerned now, more than ever, regarding the disposition and well being of his holiness, the HDM, as he attempt to assess the seriousness of today's ostensive accident at our engineering facility. Thank you, our prayers are with you." 44-07:243 A renegade news camera bot, some say in the employee of conservative extremists, breaks into HDM offices. We now go to video footage. They watched the monitor, entranced. Whimpers and tears turned to gasps and shock: A long hall appeared before the camera bot. It flew past the marble walls, the statue niches and artificially sunlit alcoves, then turned sharp left to a set of heavy double doors. Unintelligible shouting could be heard behind the doors. The view turned, swept even more quickly donw the hall, then out an open window. It blurred sidelong across a swatch of the colony ship sky, a quick panoramic view from near the center of the cylinder unfolding, then focused on a large set of dark tinted windows. One could easily recognize the back side of the hallway doors seen earlier in the sequence. The cam-bot's time display, lower right corner, read 44-07:243. His Holiness, the High Data Modulator, stood in full purple-robed regalia, staring out the window directly at the camera bot. He smiled stupidly, like an imbecile that somehow made it past the euthanasia patrol, then his two remaining eyes twitched wildly beside his one empty socket. He dropped to his knees, laughing hysterically. Behind him a group of sharp-suited onlookers shook their heads, seemingly at a loss regarding some grave problem. Gil Shrenk Lipsis, HDM personal secretary, paced back and forth. "I warned him about the dangers - he would not listen." "Warnings aside, the public will be outraged, and can you blame them?" a woman from an unseen corner of the room called out. Solit Tenbron, Deputy of Public Relations, was next: "What can we do? We tell them the truth. Would God want anything less." Security Chief Tiling: "God doesn't have a potential riot on his hands. You remember what happened when we left the world. Sheer panic - thousands dead, a bloodied exodus, at best. At worst, the worst debacle to ever befall our population. If word of the HDM's condition got out, the results would be catastrophic." "The situation cannot go on like this," Lipsis said. "Sooner or later the public will find out. There is much we can do to distract attention from our problem." "And what of the HDM?" the woman's voice again. Lipsis was now standing beside the HDM, looking at the floor, unaware of the spying cam bot. He muttered something inaudible to His Holiness. The effect was immediate. The smile sloughed off his blessed face, a look of mixed fear and determination filling his eyes even as they emptied of jocularity. The HDM took three steps back, then ran full speed into and through the plate glass window. A siliconide aerosol sprayed out into the colony ship atmosphere, His Holiness's blood feathering out in white wisps from his shattered body as artificial gravity flung his lacerated frame to the ground some five hundred stories below. Lipsis looked down, enthralled by the tumbling body as it somersaulted to doom. Selphenk and Cophleeter found themselves holding hands, palms sweating, as the vid clip ended. Amateur Astronomer left for the mountains. He felt he needed a break from the city below, a ride through the rarefied air to clear the soul. First there was the 5 AM shootout across the street - the police fled, outgunned - then a slashed tire before school started (it was finals day), then the news that his position would be cut to forty percent next fall. He drove to the observation dome, not on business, but on a pilgrimage, a search for meaning in a California that had none. The cold seemed particularly numbing that night. Depression had deep-seated itself within his brain matrix, an emotional nadir shining darkly at the withered heart of his dying spirit-self. Physical discomforts seemed amplified as he struggled to prep the equipment for viewing. The night held little hope of soothing his agitated inner-being. 05347n2107: The Gate of Heaven. And he felt nothing could be further from the truth. Not even the stars could save his soul. Cophleeter and Selphenk walkedhand-in-hand to a nature park near medical. Their friendship, pushed over an emotional brink by Malph's sudden death, had churned over into something other. They were sad, oblivious to their surroundings, blind to the rainbow-hued rivers and falls, the shining chrome cloud bubbles, the blue luminescent animals that flitted from plant to plant like living message courier bots (only more graceful and tender); the couple noticed none of these things. All they saw were each other's eyes - the friendship, the mutual pain, sadness, consolation . . . and love. Only the ship's warning siren pulled them from their romantic day dreaming. Others rushed too and fro seeking shelter or transport, mothers scooping up children in their arms, security police doing their best to maintain order before social entropy gained momentum into a downhill slide of looting and chaos. The two friend-lovers hid among a patch of tall plants, unsure of the cause for excitement and unwilling to be caught up in the commotion.. They would take advantage of the situation to be alone - something not easy to do, given the cramped quarters of the ship. The last whistles of law enforcement faded into the sub-inner surface levels of the ship, but a voice, a thousand voices unified, like an immense choir speaking in the same monotone, spoke out over every news monitor station within earshot. Cophy and Selphie jogged out of the abandoned park to hear the news bot's hollow voice echo out over the curves, streets and buildings of the upper levels. 45-29:243 Authorities warn all citizens to take cover in the lower levels in preparation for device ignition. Cophy cupped her ear to hear, then: "No!" At standard time 45-29:265 authorities will activate our new space-folding device. An HDM office directive states that the suicide of His Holiness proves that God is angry with our slow process to find and greet him. Thus the ships new mechanism will be brought online in an effort to accelerate our search for God. "No, Selphie, no. It hasn't been tested. How can we be sure it will work? Malph . . ." Selphenk put a finger to her lips and smiled: "Faith . . . faith. I think I may have found it again. The bottom's dropped out, what have we got to lose now?" "Each other." And they held each other and smiled and wept. Amateur Astronomer's eyes welled with wet. There was no justice in this world. Every interstice of reality seemed to dead-end as a money issue. His life, an inner voice told him, was not worth the carbon from which he was made. The heavens were a hell, an empty void of meaninglessness - just like his soul. Hopelessness, depression, engulfed him, wrapped him tight. Weary, he resigned himself to the final ride home. There would be no more. Nothing. The second hairpin down at 80 miles per hour would send him vaulting, flying like an angel, to embrace the rock bed below. The Big Sleep - where money did not matter. He sighed and took his last look into the lens, the last view of true beauty before his plunge. But even this was fogged, smudged . . . or not. Amateur Astronomer wiped the wet from his eyes. The glow inside his 'scope was just that; not a smudge, not moisture, not a product of depressed hallucination, but a real glow coming from within the scope, growing stronger. He checked the CCD camera to make sure everything was working as it should - it was; adjusted the focus - no difference; checked cabling - all OK. The light grew brighter, blinding, as it shot out of either end of the scope. He looked at the sky where yellow punched through the blue night, but the beams were so brilliant that he doubted his sanity. His head swirled. He hit the floor in a faint. Sparkles of consciousness exploded in the darkness of their heads, awakening, resurrecting, as it were, their minds. Artificial dawn broke, the power flickers and burst waves of light from the space-folding device's ignition only quickly fading memories, images of another time, another space. Cophleeter and Selphenk woke in each others' arms, groggy, but with their erstwhile sense of loss disintegrating fast. They had survived the fold. But had they arrived at their destination, the place where God dwells? Selphie was looking for something other than the static that sssshhh'd out from the news monitors. Cophy scanned the inner cylinder of the colony ship for signs of life. There were none. At least none of their kind. She stopped cold. "Selphie, look up." The panoptic gaze of God, glory in all its omniscience, shone down on them. An immense eye, larger than the ship's end windows, stared down over their world. They had, indeed, arrived. Amateur Astronomer looked into the telescope, mouth agape. A tiny world, complete with cities, odd-angled mountains, clouds of animals flying through the little atmosphere, flitting from tree to tree. And just to the corner of his vision, where the imperfect lens magnified the scene below in a clear sliver of view, two creatures, bipedal, humanoid, stood embracing and staring up at him. The suicide trip home vanished from his life's future history. Money was unimportant now - and would never be a problem again. The End. "Forrest Aguirre’s fiction has appeared in "Twilight Showcase", "Flesh & Blood", "Indigenous Fiction", "The Earwig Flesh Factory", "Redsine", and "Dark Planet", among others. A chapbook collection of his short-short fiction is in the works. He reviews for "Project Pulp" and "Tangent Online", and is currently serving as Co-editor for the Ministry of Whimsy Press’s "Leviathan 3" anthology."

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