March

“It’s not going to work. How could it possibly work? You’re building a machine that does not make sense. You understand that, right? Please tell me you understand, Stu.”

Stu went to stand up and promptly smashed the top of his head against a pipe that snaked briefly out of the nest of gizmos and greebles that he was buried in. He swore briefly, rubbed the sore spot, and extricated himself from the technest.

“Look Andy, just because you keep saying it’s impossible-”

“No, I’m not saying it’s impossible. It is impossible. It doesn’t even make any sense to think it could be. You’re talking about philosophy, not physics.”

Stu grinned at his lab partner.

“Actually it’s neither. It’s metaphysics, Andy. Metaphysics. A totally different animal. You mind handing me that seven-eighths wrench while you’re over there?”

“Metaphysics is philosophy, you idiot.”

“If Kant had the tools we have today, he could’ve done more than just talk about metaphysics.”

Andy let out an exasperated snort.

“That’s not even the right metaphysics. You’re thinking of Aristotle. Who, I want to remind you, was a philosopher. How are you this dumb for a genius?”

“I just have the knack, I suppose. Pass me the welder? Close your eyes.”

Sparks cascaded from steel in a shower of blinding blue-white. Andy sighed and screwed his eyes shut against the glare. It was stupid, yes, but even worse it was a waste of funding. Their project on miniaturized particle colliders would not be bankrolled in perpetuity, and after the grants ran out, what then? Maybe high school science if he was lucky, but it was not impossible to find himself slinging lattes at Starbucks again. 

“Can’t you just wait until after we finish the collider? There’s still so much we’re struggling with. You remember the collider, right? It’s just your baby, so I thought you would have cared more.”

Stu looked up, blinking away the blindness from his eyes. 

“Look, Andy, I still care about the collider. But we’re at the phase where we can have the interns run diagnostics for a couple weeks. We have the time, just chill out.”

Andy sighed.

“Okay, fine, but I don’t even know what the point is. What is this supposed to do, make some perfect object? How is that better than a 3D printer?”

Stu laughed.

“It doesn't make anything. The goal is to be able to image an object, reinterpret the data, and algorithmically reconconstruct it on a metaphysical level and display it.”

“Okay, but won’t the item being displayed inherently lose its metaphysical status in the act of being rendered?”

“None of the interns thought to ask that question. I supposed that’s why we’re partners and they’re interns,” replied Stu, dropping a wink. “But yes, you would normally be correct.”

“Normally?”

“I’m not using a traditional display. Instead, the user wears a helmet with an electromagnetic generator that is tuned to manipulate the neurons directly in the brain, thus bypassing traditional sensory limitations.”

Andy blinked for several seconds, then began to cackle.

“You know, you really had me going for a second there, Stu. What you’re talking about is impossible. It’s impossible all the way around.” Stu shrugged, nonplussed.

“If you say so.”

June

“Okay, walk me through it again,” said Andy, polishing off his fifth beer. He and Stu were relaxing in their shared office, throwing darts (and missing) at the battered old dartboard that hung crookedly on the back of the door. 

“I am positive the metaphysical recombination unit is operational,” said Stu, slurring slightly as he closed one bleary eye and lined up his toss. The dart thudded into the doorjamb. “It’s the electromagnetic brain interface that’s being a bitch. If I could just implant some electrodes in a brain I would, but alas, a medical doctor I am not.”

“Hell, you should have said something, I know someone who can help, I met her at this party back at MIT. Specializes in computer-neuron integration. Smart as shit.”

“No shit, mister MIT,” laughed Stu.

“Do you want her info or not?” replied Andy. Stu sighed and nodded.

“Is she cute?” he asked. 

“Will that help your research?” 

“Not at all, my man. Not at all.”

August

“Holy shit, I can see it,” whispered Stu rapturously. 

“Describe it,” said Marcia. “For the data.” Andy watched from his chair, off to the side, as Stu’s eyes darted back and forth rapidly behind the optical feedback recorder. A monitor traced the arcs of Stu’s eyes in looping, multicolored whirls, denoting velocity and trajectory. 

“It is a white teapot, clunky, with visible polygons. I can see it, clear as day. Virtual reality has nothing on this, guys.”

“So when do you hook it up to the metaphysical reconbobulator five-thousand?” asked Andy. His tone was sarcastic but there was a hint of genuine wonder hiding just beneath the surface. Stu’s ultimate goal was still ridiculous, he thought, but the applications of the visual interface were breathtaking. The collider might not even matter if it panned out. 

Stu pulled off the headset and blinked in the bright laboratory light. 

“I’m lining up some animal trials first. We won’t know what they’re seeing, of course, but I’d like to establish some baseline biological data before I strap it into my noggin.” 

“Makes sense,” replied Andy. “But then again, I majored in particle physics, so what do I know?”

“You know plenty,” said Marcia, not looking up from the laptop where the data from the experiment was already loaded into an arcane looking spreadsheet. “I suspect we might actually need your expertise with some of this information. I’m not positive, but I think having someone who can parse quantum interference might come in handy.”

“I see how it is. You only like men who can parse quantum interference fields,” said Andy, smiling crookedly. Marcia looked up from the screen long enough to fix him with a withering, icy expression.

“Bold of you to assume I like men at all,” she said before returning to the data. 

October

“Is the camera on?” asked Stu nervously. Andy nodded and gave him a thumbs up. Stu cleared his throat and looked into the lens; presentations had never been a strong suit of his.

“This is primate test zero-one. Invertebrate tests oh-one to ten inconclusive. Mammal tests oh-one to nineteen showed elevated heart rates, followed by long lasting lethargy.” 

Behind him, a rhesus monkey sat strapped into a cushioned chair with a rat’s nest of wires attached to its head via a foam helmet. The monkey’s eyes were wide and appeared frightened. A part of Andy felt a pang of guilt, but he tried to ignore it. It wasn’t an invasive test, after all.

“Beginning control image,” said Stu to the camera. “Control image consists of a green sphere.” 

The rhesus abruptly stopped fidgeting and stared into the empty space approximately four to five feet in front of it. It let out what sounded like a curious chitter. 

“Subject exhibiting predicted reaction,” intoned Stu. He glanced over at a monitor that had various vital statistics displayed in wriggling lines. “Sensors are indicating positive visual activity. Now imaging test object.” He turned and began to shuffle with something connected to the enormous pile of haphazard tubing and cables behind him. Andy cleared his throat. Stu turned around, remembered the camera, and cleared his throat somewhat sheepishly. 

“Oh, yes. Um. Test object is a banana. Object is being placed in the metaphysical imager.” He placed a banana (one of six, the other five being stored in the lab’s fridge for an after-test snack) in an aluminum box with a bright green glass door. Stu fussed with the fruit for a few moments more, then closed the door and pressed the first of three buttons on the machine. 

The air filled with a loud, ominous hum. A small display above the green glass door blinked on and a progress meter flashed into life. Behind the glass, a bright light radiated out, too bright to look at directly. After thirty seconds, the light dimmed and the door clicked open.

“Test object remains undamaged,” said Stu, holding the banana up to the camera. It looked fine, but it would be carefully set aside after the test for advanced spectrometry analysis. A second indicator light clicked on. “Now rendering metaphysical image.”

For five long minutes, the progress bar inched its way towards one-hundred percent. Though Andy hadn’t had a cigarette in nearly five years, he suddenly found himself craving one badly. Craving anything that could distract him from the mounting anticipation. 

At last, the second light dimmed and the third light began to blink. The display changed from a bar to two simple words.

‘IMAGE READY’

“Transmitting metaphysical image to subject, in three...two...one!” said Stu excitedly. His finger mashed into the button.

For a few heartbeats, nothing happened. Then the monkey’s eyes grew wide. Its mouth dropped open in an almost human expression of shock. And wonder? Or was it horror? Andy couldn’t tell, and reminded himself not to anthropomorphize the poor thing. 

Then the monkey began to shriek. 

It strained against the straps tying it to the chair, shaking its head back and forth in a universal display of negation. Urine and feces dripped from the vinyl cushion as it voided its bowels. 

“Stu?” Andy said nervously. Stu looked up towards him, face ashen.

“S-shutting off the metaphysical imager,” he said, turning and slamming a large red button labeled “Emergency Shut Down.” The machine behind him shuddered once, twice, then began to wind down.

The rhesus monkey slumped over in the chair, head hanging limply on its chest. It blinked its eyes. It drew breath and exhaled. According to the leads adhered to its chest, its heart was beating. But it did nothing more than sit in a catatonic daze. 

“Checking brain wave telemetry,” whispered Stu hoarsely; none of the other test animals had exhibited such a reaction. He turned and grabbed a strip of paper the machine was spitting out. “Subject exhibiting elevated levels of theta and gamma waves. All other waves in normal levels.”

Later that night, the three scientists sat in the office, passing around a bottle of Jameson. 

“How’s Greg?” asked Andy wetly; the whiskey was still burning his throat from the last slug he’d taken; sadly his brain remained unaffected. 

“Primate subject oh-one,” corrected Marcia. “We don’t name the subjects. It’s for the best.”

“Screw that,” replied Andy hotly. “We tortured that damn monkey, the least thing we can do is call him by his name.”

“His condition is the same,” interjected Stu. His voice was dull and listless. He grabbed the bottle from Andy and took a deep drink, grimacing as the liquor burned its way down his throat. “He’s non-responsive to external stimuli, elevated theta and gamma waves, vitals in nominal ranges. He’s not brain dead. It’s almost like whatever he saw was seared into his brain, and now it’s all he can see.”

Marcia scoffed. 

“That’s all very gothic and spooky, Stu, but it’s hardly scientific. The truth is we don’t know what’s happening. We have a sample size of exactly one. That is nothing. These symptoms could be the result of dozens of different variables, with no guarantee that they have anything to do with the imager. We’ll need to do more tests.” Andy blinked in astonishment.

“You want to do that to more monkeys?” he said, eyes wide with horror. Stu stared miserably at the floor, took another swig of whiskey, and nodded.

“As many as it takes. I’m not giving up on this.” 

“Then count me out,” spat Andy. “I’m done with this.”

“I didn’t realize you had such a bleeding heart,” replied Marcia scathingly. Andy ignored her, however, and directed his baleful gaze directly at Stu.

“And I thought he had one.”

December

“We’re getting good readings off the last test, Andy,” reported Daryl. Andy nodded, leaning over the grad student’s shoulder to look at the data. The collider was exceeding expectations on all fronts, and while it couldn’t hold a candle to that huge bastard at CERN, it also wasn’t twenty-seven kilometers long. If they could just iron out a few of the hiccups with the system, then room scale collision physics could be on the table, and with it a renaissance in scientific breakthroughs. 

“Doctor Crane? A call for you?” Another intern was perched nervously at the door to the lab. Kevin. A timid kid, but unparalleled with his understanding of quantum physics. 

“Thanks, Kev. I’ll head that way right now. Shame we can’t have our phones in the lab. Oh well. Daryl, run the tests again, please. I am curious about the magnetic field variances we’re seeing towards the end of the tests.”

Andy stood straight, the small vertebrae in his back popping audibly from beneath his lab coat. As he turned, he looked towards the spot where Stu’s machine had once stood, where the bonobo monkey had gotten its poor brain scrambled for his stupid dream. 

Back in the office, he walked over to his desk (now the only one in the room), and picked up the phone. 

“This is Doctor Crane,” he said. His voice was thin and tired. 

“Andy. It’s...It’s me. Stu.” Andy’s heart notched up a few BPM.

“Stu.” It was more accusation than salutation.

“Look, Andy, we left things in a bad place, but we could really use your help. I could really use your help.”

“What about Marcia?” Andy spat. “Between the two of you, there should be more than enough brainpower to go around.”

Stu sighed through the telephone lines. It hissed and crackled through the electrical conversions. 

“It’s the quantum interference. That’s what’s holding us back, and you’re the best in the field.” Andy laughed derisively. 

“We both know that’s not true.”

A sad chuckle crackled back in response. 

“Yeah, I suppose we do. But you’re also the only one who might give us a shot. The Pentagon is going to cut the funding soon. We’ve gone through so many... Look, that’s not important, what is important is that we really need your help on this. I’m not asking you to come here and leave what you’re doing, just...Look, just let me send you the data, maybe you can take a look and at the very least point us in the right direction.” Stu’s voice had taken on a pleading quality. “Andy, we are so close.”

“Close to what? I don’t even understand what the point of your machine is.” 

For several long moments there was nothing but the hiss of the phone line.

“Andy, it’s the truth.” 

January

“Stu, are you absolutely sure about this?” asked Andy nervously. 

“Are you kidding? The last batch of chimps are doing fine.” Stu looked excited, almost feverish, beneath the cap of wires and electrodes. 

“That’s debatable,” replied Andy dryly; two of the animals had managed to commit suicide. Marcia said it was a fluke, that they had simply bitten their tongues during the procedure and died as a result, but Andy wasn’t convinced. What he was convinced of, however, is that Stu might follow in their footsteps had Andy not helped him out. The man had sunk everything into the project; Stu’s wife leaving him hadn’t even been enough to stop him. Besides, Andy had to admit that Stu was at least partially correct. Most of the bonobos from the last trial run, after Andy had corrected for the quantum interference, were conscious. If one could call it that.

He had shown up at Stu’s new lab a week after the phone call. By then, there had been over twelve rounds of primate trials, each trial testing approximately five primates. It was an obscene rate, and when Andy had asked Stu how he was getting the authorization to fry so many monkey brains, the man looked down and mumbled something about special government permitting. Andy decided it was best not to know. 

But the last batch, the ones tested after Andy had sent over his data revisions, were actually alert. But also strange somehow. The surviving bonobos alternated between a near rapturous obsession with bananas, and a violent rejection of the same fruit, often with no discernable provocation. Andy had even observed some of the primates drawing crude variations of the fruit, though this universally ended in frantic outbursts of rage from the subjects. 

“Based on what we learned from this last batch, we isolated the sentience factor in relation to the outcome of the metaphysical imaging. Turns out those hippy pseudoscientists were onto something with the quantum consciousness theory afterall. Higher levels of observable sentience resulted in more stable emotional outcomes, and even elevated levels of cognition. Think, Andy, these monkeys saw the truth, and it changed them. But the simple ones, the rhesus monkeys and the lemurs, they couldn’t handle what they were seeing, so they shut down. The bonobos, they are right on the edge. But a human? The difference between us and them is so vast, Andy. I know it will work.”

And so Andy found himself strapping his former college roommate into the same chair that had scrambled the brains of so many unfortunate animals, running the pre-test preparations under the icy gaze of Marcia, who had been very vocal about Andy’s usefulness for the project.

“Stu, c’mon man, you don’t have to do this.” Andy was terrified. Whatever it was that Stu’s machine did, it was no good, and it didn’t take a doctorate to see that. “Look, it’s not worth the risk, can’t you see that?” Stu smiled sadly at him from the chair.

“Andy, it’s not about that anymore. I just...I have to see it. See it for myself. I want to see the truth.” Andy looked at him, sighed, and tightened down the final strap. 

“Well I hope that whatever it is this machine shows you is worth it.”

Andy turned and made his way to the edge of the lab, trying not to think about the last time he’d seen the machine in action, and thinking about it anyway. 

Marcia turned on the camera. Andy watched the red recording light blinking like a heartbeat.

“This is human test zero-one. Primate trials have shown mixed results, with batch twelve resulting in notable increases to cognition in forty percent of population,” she intoned, her voice outwardly clinical but brimming with the same proselytization as a preacher. Her eyes burned with a manic fire.

“Test object for human trial is an apple,” continued Marcia, picking up a red delicious from a steel tray by the computer. Andy saw that it had a sizable bruise on one side, as though dropped by clumsy hands. He wondered if that would impact the test. “Placing test object in metaphysical imager.” She placed the red delicious in the green windowed box and closed the glass door. 

“Rendering metaphysical image.”

Stu must have upgraded the machine, because the hum was now far greater than the last test Andy had been present for. It etched itself into his bones, vibrating the marrow like sand in a drum. A snatch of music blared through his skull, and he realized in a dreamy sort of horror that he was picking up radio signals through a filling in his molar. 

“Object imaged.” Marcia paused at the control console, and for a brief moment her face softened. “Are you ready, Stu?”

Stu looked up, his face pale and drawn, but he nodded.

“Transmitting image.”

Stu’s eyes grew wide, wider, wider until Andy was sure they would simply fall out of his skull like a couple of loose bearings. His fingers curled reflexively on the armrests of the chair. Terror mounting, Andy saw that one of Stu’s fingernails had torn itself free from the nailbed, scarlet dripping from the digit in rivulets across the ripped vinyl. His jaws snapped shut with a loud click and his feet began to drum up and down in his restraints. 

“Turn it off, you’re killing him!” Andy screamed, but Marcia ignored him, her feverish eyes locked onto Stu’s thrashing body.

Something in Stu’s nose let loose and blood began to stream from both nostrils, staining the front of his coffee stained MIT sweatshirt. For one incoherent moment, all Andy could think about was how he’d lent the shirt to Stu so they could pick up chicks at the bar after midterms. They staggered home that night unsuccessful in their mission, but drunk and happy. It seemed so ridiculous, so impossible.

One of the monitors recording Stu’s vitals began to bleat an alarm. Marcia glanced at it, disregarded, and turned her attention back to Stu, who was now letting out a low moan from behind his clenched jaws. It wasn’t until the command console let out its own beep, a cheerful little chiptune, that she finally wrenched her gaze away.

“Image transfer successful, terminating link.”

Stu arched in the chair, every muscle straining. There was a low ripping sound, and the strap holding down his right arm gave way. The arm sprang out like high-tension steel, fingers curling and uncurling, the elbow locked straight out. And then he simply collapsed back into himself, like a puppet with its strings cut. The vitals monitor began to beep a little louder.

“Subject’s respirations arrested-” Marcia began to say, but was immediately drowned out by Andy’s frantic, inarticulate cry of fear.

“He’s not breathing!” he howled, rushing forward. But before he could reach him, Stu’s eyes opened and he took a deep, shuddering breath.

“Stu, are you okay?” Andy asked apprehensively. The seconds ticked by as Stu stared out blankly. But then his eyes seemed to clear and he looked up at Andy with something approaching cognizance. 

“I saw it, Andy. I saw the truth.”

February

“This is incredible, Stu, how does it work?” Andy stared at the box on Stu’s desk with naked wonder. Within the flimsy cardboard stamped “EGGS” was a faintly glowing cloud of shimmering light. Around the edges of the box, a series of neodymium magnets and nine volt batteries were wired into a crown of humming electrons. 

“I can’t explain it,” Stu replied sheepishly. Dark circles hung beneath his eyes like bruised fruit, and his face was drawn and gaunt. “When I saw the magnet, I understood it, but I can’t put it into words. It’s so simple. We’ve got it all so backwards, we’ve always had it so backwards. Tens of thousands of years of scientific progress, and we might as well still be painting in caves.”

“But this. This is stable, room temperature plasma contained by a magnetic field powered by dollar store batteries and housed in a damn egg carton.” 

“Yes.” replied Stu simply. 

“And it’s not melting our faces off.” Stu shrugged, smiled devilishly, then stuck his hand into the box. Andy screamed, not sure if he was going to be incinerated, or if Stu’s hand was going to disintegrate. But neither happened. The shifting swirls of ethereal light simply warped around his hand.”

“The magnetic field is tuned so that it will avoid the current of any foreign object. Try it.” 

His heart still pounding in his chest like an autohammer, Andy reluctantly placed his hand into the swirl of light. There was, maybe, the smallest tickle of sensation, like the hint of a summer breeze, but that was all.

“And how much energy is this generating?” asked Andy incredulously. 

“About five megawatts. But it’s just a proof of concept.” Stu’s tone was embarrassed. No, Andy corrected himself. He was being modest. 

“You could power a small town with this,” Andy whispered, thunderstruck. 

“That’s just for starters,” Stu said. “Scaled up, we could shut down every power plant in the world. Think about it. No more coal, no more oil, no fracking, no nuclear waste leaking into water tables. Just unlimited, pure energy.”

“Jesus Christ, Stu. This is... This is big.” Andy fell down into his chair. He ran a hand through his hair, unable to wrap his mind around it.

“This is exactly what I wanted to build the Semele Device for.”

“Please tell me you aren’t sticking with that name,” sighed Andy, exasperated. It was clearly a discussion that was well worn. “It’s a bit on the nose. Besides, don’t you think it’s maybe tempting fate?”

“There is no fate,” replied Stu solemnly. “It’s like... It’s like a watch, all the gears and springs and catches, everything perfectly designed and balanced.”

“Blegh, I’m sorry I mentioned it. I’m tired of hearing about your great ‘Truth’ to be honest.”

“You should see it, Andy. You won’t believe it. It changes...God, it changes everything. Hell, it might be God.”

“You know I’m a Catholic,” Andy retorted, managing a smirk. “I’ll not have any of that blasphemy.” The attempt at humor fell dead on the air, however, and Stu looked down at Andy with the infuriating expression of mingled pity and arrogance that had grown to dominate his features since he’d first seen the apple through the machine.

“It’s okay, Andy. You’re not ready yet. But you will be.”

March

Andy stared sadly at the packed up remains of his laboratory. The grants funding his collider project had been cut. Not due to budgetary concerns; nothing so banal as money. No, the technology had been rendered obsolete. Because Stu. Stu and his damned Machine. 

“Hey boss, call for you.” It was Kevin. The last of the interns to watch the ship go down. 

“Thanks, Kev. I’ll take it in a second.”

“I’m sorry about your project.” Andy could hear the words the kid was leaving out. Sorry about your project. Sorry it’s meaningless because Stu invented a collider that you can put in your pocket. Oh, and did I mention that it outperforms the LHC that CERN has? Sorry, doc.

“Yeah,” replied Andy. He walked past Kevin, patting him on the shoulder on his way through the door. His office was stripped bare, his research packed into cardboard filing boxes. He hadn’t bothered labeling anything. What was the point? On the desk, the ‘call waiting’ indicator light blinked like a malevolent red eye.

“Hello?” he barked into the receiver.

“Andy. It’s me.” Andy felt the room constrict around him as his internal temperature seemed to drop a few degrees. 

“What do you want?” he spat. There couldn’t possibly be anything that Stu could need him for. He wasn’t enlightened. 

“I just wanted you to be the first to know.”

“The first to know what?”

“I figured out how to image complex electronics. I didn’t think it was possible at first. But it is. I imaged a cell phone. It was beautiful, Andy.”

Andy pulled the headset slowly away from his head with numb fingers. His hand seemed to be a mile away. He pulled it back.

“What?”

“A cell phone. I imaged it. It was difficult. It almost killed me. But I have it. It’s a part of me now, the truth of it.”

“Stu, what are you saying? Tell me what you’re saying.”

“The Semele Device. I’ve made some modifications to it. It was easy, especially with all of the resources I’m getting from the Pentagon now. They give me whatever I want, no questions asked.”

“Stu?” Andy looked up at the walls. The blood was rushing in his ears now, humming louder and louder. The edges of the room, previously a nice, boring plumb, began to lean, the corners bending at strange angles. 

“I’ve made it wireless, Andy. Now we can all see. We can all see the truth. Isn’t it beautiful, Andy? Isn’t it beautiful?”