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Job the Conqueror
Jan. 28th, 2007 12:37 amWith my portable aetheric telegraph's galvanic unit strapped to my back and my faithful assistant Deuxmains carrying the rest of the Hertzian apparatus, I arrived in the fair American city of San Francisco expecting only a weekend of lively colloquy with my fellow ingénieurs of wireless communication. When we assembled in the ballroom of the Savage's Head Grand Hotel, however, no sooner had we begun arguing the fine points of multiplexing and modulation when there sounded an ominous key-note, as of a pitch-pipe, and a singular personage ascended the dais. Hatless, dressed in the blue work trousers of a Forty-Niner and the black seaman's garb known as a "turtle-neck" to the men who round the Horn, he fixed us with the magnetic gaze of a man who had seen to the end of time.
"I have no name known to mortal men," he said, "but you may call me Job, for my sufferings have been many, and justice is what I seek. And while you carry on with your petty squabblings, I have set in motion my plan to become your master!"
There was some commotion. "How many divisions does he have?" whispered Deuxmains, with the Gallic jocularity for which he is known.
"Silence!" cried the mysterious Job. "What is it you worthies seek? Communication with the far ends of the earth, no matter where you roam? I have studied your devices, and they are pathetic! The steam-rig of Herr Rummkorff here: it requires three men to carry it! M. Le docteur Durand: your multi-function tranceiver is ingenious in principle, but no man should have to tap Morse signals through a binary decision-tree to activate it. No, what we need is something entirely new!"
He held aloft a self-contained device a mere two feet in length, a black slab proportioned approximately one by four by nine, an eerie phosphorescent glow emanating from its front surface.
"Goodbye to all that, I say! What I have achieved makes all your works seem like feeble infants' toys. Behold: a missive received this moment from the former Vice-President!" And as he held the black slab aloft, we saw that it bore the man's face and a page of finely printed text, plain as day.
"A simple application," said Job, "of heretofore unsuspected properties of selenium... I shall be the master of all speech, the mediator of communication between men. And through Communication my empire will flourish, an empire of words and sentiments, of images and music; an invisible kingdom more powerful than all the warring potentates of the sorrowing earth!"
"It is as if reality itself wavers in a region about him," whispered the amiable Deuxmains.
"Where is the telegraph key?" asked Dr. Velikov of St. Petersburg.
Job became red in the face. "No keys! No key can be insanely great!"
"May we examine it?" shouted Herr Rumkorff from the front row.
"You may not," snapped Job. "It doesn't ship until June. But then, tremble, ye mighty! And if that does not work, the electric armaments of my burrowing aerial submarine will seal the deal."
"I have no name known to mortal men," he said, "but you may call me Job, for my sufferings have been many, and justice is what I seek. And while you carry on with your petty squabblings, I have set in motion my plan to become your master!"
There was some commotion. "How many divisions does he have?" whispered Deuxmains, with the Gallic jocularity for which he is known.
"Silence!" cried the mysterious Job. "What is it you worthies seek? Communication with the far ends of the earth, no matter where you roam? I have studied your devices, and they are pathetic! The steam-rig of Herr Rummkorff here: it requires three men to carry it! M. Le docteur Durand: your multi-function tranceiver is ingenious in principle, but no man should have to tap Morse signals through a binary decision-tree to activate it. No, what we need is something entirely new!"
He held aloft a self-contained device a mere two feet in length, a black slab proportioned approximately one by four by nine, an eerie phosphorescent glow emanating from its front surface.
"Goodbye to all that, I say! What I have achieved makes all your works seem like feeble infants' toys. Behold: a missive received this moment from the former Vice-President!" And as he held the black slab aloft, we saw that it bore the man's face and a page of finely printed text, plain as day.
"A simple application," said Job, "of heretofore unsuspected properties of selenium... I shall be the master of all speech, the mediator of communication between men. And through Communication my empire will flourish, an empire of words and sentiments, of images and music; an invisible kingdom more powerful than all the warring potentates of the sorrowing earth!"
"It is as if reality itself wavers in a region about him," whispered the amiable Deuxmains.
"Where is the telegraph key?" asked Dr. Velikov of St. Petersburg.
Job became red in the face. "No keys! No key can be insanely great!"
"May we examine it?" shouted Herr Rumkorff from the front row.
"You may not," snapped Job. "It doesn't ship until June. But then, tremble, ye mighty! And if that does not work, the electric armaments of my burrowing aerial submarine will seal the deal."
