Chapter 42 Chapter 42 The Glass Temple

"If we do," Messer said, "do you think the creatures will stop us?" "Maybe, that's what I want to try. Why do you look at me like that?" Newton said. Messer made a secret grimace at him, which meant he was about to make a private joke. "I was wondering, Captain, if you thought Rama was yours. Before, you banned any attempts to break into the building. Why did it change? Did the Mercurians give you the idea?" Newton laughed, then stopped abruptly.This is a very sensitive issue.He wondered if his answer was right. "Maybe I've been overly cautious because I want to avoid trouble. But this is our last chance. We'll have to retreat anyway, and we have nothing to lose."

"That assumes we retreat in an orderly manner as planned." "Of course. But the creatures never showed hostility, and besides the crabs, I don't believe anything else could catch us if we ran." "You run, Captain! I'm going to leave politely. By the way, I think I understand why these creatures are so polite to us." "But, Messer, it's a little late for a new theory." "I'll have to say it anyway. They think we're Rama. They can't tell the difference between the two oxygen-breathers." "I can't believe they're that stupid!"

"It's not a question of being stupid. They're programmed separately for various functions, and we haven't even got a reference system to identify them." "Perhaps you're right. We'll figure it out once we get down to business in London." Joe Cafu has always admired those old bank robbery movies, and he didn't expect to play a similar role now. Deserted London city streets.There seemed to be threats everywhere.This is just his psychological effect. In fact, he doesn't believe that there are vigilant residents hidden in those sealed and windowless buildings. Once they find that intruders have touched their belongings, they will rush out angrily.In fact he was pretty sure that this whole combination of institutions, like any other city, was nothing more than a warehouse district of some kind.

But another fear, also based on plots from old crime movies, may be more valid.It wouldn't be the ringing or whistling of alarm bells, but it was reasonable to assume that there would always be some kind of alarm system in Rama, otherwise how would the bio-humans know when and where their service was required? "Anyone not wearing goggles, turn your back," Willa Myron ordered.The laser beam burns the air, arousing the smell of carbon monoxide, like a sharp knife, stably cutting through secrets older than human beings. Nothing material could resist this concentrated energy, and the cutting proceeded smoothly at several meters per minute.In a short period of time, a part the size of which can be accessed by a person has been cut out.Myron pushed hard, and there was a hollow reverberation.

Again, as he had originally entered Rama, Newton thought of the archaeologists who opened the Egyptian tombs.He didn't expect to see piles of gold.In fact, he could not have imagined at all what he was about to see when he got in, the flashlight beaming ahead. His first impression was of an ancient Greek temple made of glass.Inside the building, from floor to ceiling, hundreds of columns one meter in diameter stretched out in rows and disappeared behind the darkness illuminated by the torchlight. He walked to the nearest one and shone the beam straight into it.Like a crystal prism, the light beam fanned out from the other side of the column, and then focused again and again, dimmer and dimmer, in a row of columns behind it.He seemed to be in some kind of complex optical demonstration array.

"Very beautiful," Messer said matter-of-factly, "but who needs a forest of glass pillars?" Newton tapped it lightly.It sounded solid, but it sounded more metallic than crystalline, which baffled him.He remembered a useful proverb he heard long ago: "When in doubt, say nothing and move on." The next pillar looked exactly the same when he heard Messer exclaim. "I could have sworn the pillar was empty and there was something in it." Newton immediately turned around and looked over. "Where?" he said, "I see nothing!" He looked along Messer's finger, but there was nothing, the pillar was completely transparent.

"Can't you see it?" Messer said in disbelief. "Come here and see. Oops! I lost it." "What's the matter?" Joe asked.But it took several minutes for his question to be answered. Turns out the columns are not transparent at all angles, or in all lighting situations.If you turned around it, something would suddenly appear, like an insect in amber, and disappear at a slightly different angle, appearing solid. "," said Cafu, "it's like a museum of the Earth." The explanation was so simple that Newton became skeptical and looked at images stored in other columns.

There are all sorts of hand tools (albeit for some kind of big and special hand), utensils, small machines with chain discs, instruments, surprisingly similar household meals, kitchen utensils, including knives, plates, if placed on Earth On the dining table, they will not attract attention except for their size.They were all there in one piece, along with a hundred other less recognizable things, often several kinds crowded together in the same column.A museum exhibit would be more logically laid out, with interrelationships between items, whereas here various things seem to be placed randomly.

They took pictures of the images in the crystal pillars, and the changes in their items gave Newton a clue.Maybe it's not the exhibits, but the catalog index, arranged strictly and logically in some alphabetical order. "Well, that's what it is," said Newton, "a kind of three-dimensional image--template--dimension blueprint for catalog retrieval, if you will." "For what purpose?" "You know the theory about biological beings that don't exist until they're needed, and then they're made or synthesized in a pattern that's stored somewhere."

"I understand what you mean," Messer said slowly while thinking, "When the Rama people need any kind of servant, just press a certain code number, and a replica will be created according to the model stored here. Made it." "Roughly so. But please don't ask me for details." The pillars are getting thicker and thicker, and now they are 200 meters in diameter.It seems that the Ramas are still sticking to the one-to-one ratio. In order to speed up the progress, the four people split up to capture the three-dimensional images inside the crystal pillars as soon as possible, and took photos.They were lucky to find this place.I am afraid there is no better choice than this "Sample Rama Relic Stereoscopic Image".But this is also the most frustrating thing, there is nothing here but a phantom of nothingness.More than once Newton couldn't help but want to cut open the crystal pillar with a laser in order to take some material things back to the earth.But he clearly knew that this was just like a monkey fishing for the moon.

"Captain--Carl-Will--come see this!" Cafu called. Inside a two-meter-diameter column was an elaborate war robe, or uniform, apparently worn by an upright being much taller than a man.In the middle was a metal band, encircling the waist or thorax, or no equivalent on earth, from which projected obliquely three thin tubes, evidently for the upper limbs - three arms in all. There were also a lot of protruding pockets, buckles, elastic straps, and the like, from which protruded tools, tubes, discharge rods, and even some of the little black boxes you'd find in Earth's electronics labs.The whole outfit is almost as complex as a spacesuit.Although it is obvious that it only provides a portion of the species it is intended to wear. Is this species the Rama man?Maybe, Newton thought, we'll never know.But there is no doubt that the thing that wears it is intelligent, because it is impossible to use these cutting-edge equipment if it is only an animal. "About two and a half meters tall," Messer mused, "not counting the head. Whatever it looks like!" "Three arms—and conceivably three legs, of the same basic type as a spider. Do you think it could be accidental?" "Probably not. We design robots in our image. We can expect Rama to do the same." While they were looking at this set of exhibits in awe, Rousseau's voice from the hub was heard, full of urgent concern. "Captain, you'd better come out and go outside." "What's the matter—are the bio-humans coming towards us?" "No, it's worse than that. It's getting dimmer." ----------------------------- Notes: