Sympathy for the Devil - By Tim Pratt Page 0,248

put it in my pocket.

“When I returned home to America and was able to look through the reference books in my library, I discovered something staggering: The Heidelberg Cylinder had been used in every great modern invention. The cotton gin, the first steam engine, the telephone, internal combustion engine. You name it and a version of the cylinder was one of the components. It was the essential piece in every one of those innovations. It was the things that made them all work. I was astonished and then utterly skeptical so I researched further. Different versions of the cylinder were used in the first telegraph, the television, computers. Sometimes it was made of a different metal, or Bakelite, then plastic, carbon—you get the point. It was the part that made these earth-shaking inventions work, Mr. Gallatin, but no one had ever noted the connection. One man-made object made all these things possible.

“I couldn’t believe that no one had ever made the discovery. And then it hit me—no one was supposed to make the discovery! The Heidelberg Cylinder is meant to be invented again and again in its different guises and then put into the workings of whatever new different machines we dream up in the future.

“Because do you know what the Cylinder really is? The concrete proof of our immortality. The result of the human mind and spirit working as one to solve problems and overcome them. Any problems. Physical proof of the fact we can do anything we want, even live forever if we choose, if we set our minds to it.”

I looked at it and rubbed my mouth. “That thing?”

“Yes, that thing.”

I picked it up, turned it over. It was black and there was nothing written on it. Definitely not any “Heidelberg Cylinder.”

“How come it’s black and there’s no writing on it?”

“Because once you realize what it is, it changes into something else. Something someone else will need to discover its importance. For me it was the brass object I described. For the person who had it before you it turned into a sixteenth-century Persian lock. For you it became a baseball bat.”

“Then what is it now?”

“I don’t know. Probably something from the future.”

Reaching out to pick it up, I stopped when he said that. “But I didn’t discover anything with the baseball bat. Definitely not any of that stuff you were saying about man’s immortality: I just brained the caveman with it.”

“Yes, but that’s because I’ve chosen to intervene. There simply isn’t enough time for it to happen in the slow and proper way it should. Mankind is in jeopardy and we must work quickly to avoid a catastrophe. I’ll tell you the end of my story briefly and you will understand.

“When I grasped the extraordinary importance of the Heidelberg Cylinder, I became obsessed with my search and found it again and again the further I looked. But what was I to do with my discovery? Who should I tell and in what context?”

I had to interrupt. “When did you turn into, uh, what you are?”

“Once we’ve learned about the Cylinder, all of us change eventually.”

That made me stand up. “What do you mean? Change how?”

“It varies from person to person. I can’t say how it will affect you.”

I was getting nervous again. “But what about Brooks and Zin Zan? They’re both normal. They’re weird but they’re normal.”

“For now, because both of them are new to the group. But sooner or later they will change and take on new forms. We call it ‘hatching.’ As I said, I can’t tell you what forms either of them will take, but they will definitely metamorphose into something entirely different.”

“Do they know that? Do they know they’re going to change?”

“Of course Mr. Gallatin, and they welcome it.”

“So does that mean now that I know, I’m going to change too?”

“Yes.”

“But I don’t want to change! I like my life.”

“I’m afraid we need you more than you need your life. I want to show you something.”

Before I had a chance to protest, everything changed. In an instant, a blink, half a breath, we went from jungle to paradise.

I’d heard it before but now I know it’s true: paradise is what you want it to be. If you imagine angels with wings and harps sitting on gold clouds, that’s what you’ll see. Perfect gardens where lions dance the cha-cha while beautiful women serve you ice-cold rum? Then that’s what it will be. I didn’t know my paradise until I saw it. The moment

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