First part and backstory: https://poal.co/s/scifi/788197 > > The Secret of the Bull > I don't know, my listeners, how to begin this story—a story I myself would not believe if I hadn't experienced it firsthand. Let me start when I opened the door to the Taurus Works casino. A hellish noise hit me. The air inside was no longer air, but a seething sea of tobacco smoke and jazz rhythms, the clinking of glasses, and a confused jumble of singing, snatches of conversation, and the wild pounding of countless fists on tables, chairs, and wood-paneled walls. Feet were also contributing to the noise — someone seemed to be dancing somewhere. In a word, my listeners, it was anything but solemn! “What a great place, ma cherie!” I said to Mademoiselle Sisa. She had followed close behind me and smiled at me with the same charming smile she had greeted me with at the gatekeeper's lodge at Gate One. “Oh, those are the ladies from the secretarial offices, the directors, the engineers, the foremen, and the gatekeepers. They're celebrating a farewell. They want to have one last wild time before...” “Before what?” “Well, Mister Still will tell you. He promised your boss he would lay his cards on the table, and he will! We'll just have a little refreshment here, and then I'll take you to the CEO. Agreed, monsieur?” Without waiting for me to nod, she called a few incomprehensible words to the bartender behind the bar. In no time at all, two glasses filled to the brim appeared. The bartender looked like Albert Einstein —no, he was Albert Einstein, if he could have been Albert Einstein! My eyes had adjusted to the tobacco smoke. Suddenly, I saw familiar faces everywhere — politicians, scientists, movie actors, musicians, painters, writers, athletes — faces that every child knows. Suddenly I knew who Mademoiselle Sisa reminded me of. I drank to her. Immediately I was enveloped in a pink, pleasant haze that seemed to make me completely uncritical. “You're the Olympic champion in — well, I don't know what. That's right, isn't it? But your name wasn't Sisa, was it?” I managed to say. Mademoiselle Sisa laughed. “Names are smoke and mirrors — that's what they say, isn't it?” “But all these famous people here in the casino — how did they get here? That can't be true, can it?” I said with my last ounce of strength. But immediately afterwards, I shrugged my shoulders and was no longer surprised when I bumped into the president of the republic. “Pardon, mon Général!” I stammered. The tall president gave me a friendly pat on the back and turned to a famous American film actress, with whom he walked gracefully to the bar. “Nice people!” I nodded uncritically. “And they make a lovely racket! Shall we have another drink?” Mademoiselle Sisa smiled, took me by the arm, and pulled me toward the exit. “Maybe later — in a thousand years. Now Mister Still is waiting for us. Come on, Gaston! Too bad, you're a nice guy!” I felt as if she was looking at me with regret. But I didn't care. What kind of drink had that been? We left the casino and walked through endless assembly halls, whose conveyor belts stood still and were completely deserted. We crossed courtyards whose yawning emptiness was brooding under the Camargue sun. Not a sound could be heard. The whole factory was deserted. What a contrast to the noise in the casino! Why had I actually come here? Despite my rose-colored daze, something occurred to me — the hood ornament from my boss's wife's Taurus car. “Why, mademoiselle,” I said, “did you unscrew the hood ornament from my Taurus in the driveway and put it in your coat pocket?” “You mean Frims — ” “Frims? Who is Frims?” “Frims, the general music director of the opera ‘Thirty-Three’. May I thank you on his behalf for driving him home?” “You're welcome, mademoiselle!” I said politely. “No problem!” What did I care about Frims? We had arrived at a flat, one-story building. The sun's rays bounced mercilessly off the white exterior wall. We hurried inside and found ourselves in a huge, cool hall. Seven large doors were covered with nautical charts. I recognized seven seas — the Pacific Ocean, the Atlantic Ocean, the Mediterranean Sea, the North Sea, the Indian Ocean, the Arctic Ocean, and the Southern Ocean. “Hello, cherie!” I said — without surprise — to my companion, “Are the Taurus Works switching to maritime shipping?” “We almost did!” said a male voice behind me. “But we changed our minds. Welcome, Monsieur Mercier!” I turned around and found myself face to face with Horace Still. The Chief Executive Officer of Société Anonyme Taurus shook my hand and then turned to Mademoiselle Sisa. “Do we have Frims?” he said, audibly concerned. “She has him in her coat pocket,” I nodded. “The general music director had a pleasant journey. From Hamburg to Marseille by train, from there to the Camargue on four wheels. Actually, you were supposed to get the hood ornament back...” Mademoiselle Sisa and Mister Still laughed. Then the Chief Executive said, “I know. Actually, we weren't supposed to get the ball back until you had your interview. But don't worry, Mister Mercier! Your interview is assured. Please follow me!” Horace Still strode toward a narrow spiral staircase that led upstairs. I prepared to follow him; Mademoiselle Sisa seemed to want to stay behind in the hall. “But you mustn't leave me, Mademoiselle!” I protested. The CEO looked at me strangely. “I'm afraid, my friend,” he said, "that in a few minutes you will be in for a very unpleasant surprise! But come along, Sisa, I can store you upstairs too." He had addressed the last words to the girl. She nodded and followed us up the spiral staircase. I don't want to make the story more exciting than it already is. In any case, we soon found ourselves in a laboratory. Strange devices stood on long tables. “I had to build each of these complicated devices from a tiny basic unit. For example, this one!” He pointed to a machine that looked like an oven. “This,” he continued, "is a machine that produces physical, three-dimensional tissue by synthesizing matter from the corresponding atoms in space. My so-called replicator needs only water and air to produce any substance. From the simple elements of hydrogen, nitrogen, and oxygen, it builds higher elements and combines them according to plan. The energy released in the process can be used for the endothermic synthesis of heavier elements, such as gold." Gold? I'm quick on the uptake, even with a pink haze in my brain from a mixed drink that — I'm sure was meant to prevent me from sounding the alarm before it was all over! I said, “So, with the help of this replicator, you created the gold pieces in the amphora that Monsieur Etienne Tantin ‘accidentally’ found on his property?” Sisa looked at me admiringly, and Horace Still nodded. “You are very clever, Monsieur! Too clever,” he said. “Many of you are too clever. I underestimated you. You and us — that can't end well. What else would you like to know?” “Everything, of course!” I smiled, ignoring the dark meaning of his words. “What controls the replicator?” Horace Still picked up a tiny metal cube that lay with others in a small container. “This matrix,” he said, "is the product of an information collector, a kind of X-ray machine. You can see it there in the corner. You know that every object in the physical world can be completely determined by two factors — the composition of its material and its blueprint. Your body, Monsieur, consists of five times ten to the power of twenty-seven atoms. My information collector could scan your body atom by atom and store a chain of electrical impulses in this metal cube. If I put this matrix, in which the composition and blueprint of your body are recorded, into the replicator, a second Gaston Mercier would very quickly stand before you!" “You're out of your mind, man!” I cried. “Who are you?” “A pilot!” said Horace Still. "However, my intelligence was trapped in a robot body for thousands of years. Because no organic being could withstand a journey through a flood of deadly rays for millennia. And imagine the endless time spent in a tiny capsule!" “Of course. Extremely unpleasant!” I agreed. My rose-colored uncritical attitude continued unabated, “But what does all this have to do with the Taurus car?” My curiosity was undiminished. “To explain that to you,” said Horace Still, “I have to go back a little. And I'll show you a film.” He turned on a screen, and a color image immediately appeared. A huge red sun stood above a green, slightly rippled sea. The sea receded, and the horizons closed together to form a shimmering green sphere. “These images,” explained Horace Still, “were taken from a capsule that left the planet forever!” The planet, which seemed to consist of nothing but a single expanse of sea, shrank and disappeared. The red sun also grew smaller and smaller, becoming a shimmering star. Suddenly, the star flared up in a bright explosion. “Our scientists,” said Horace Still, “foresaw the catastrophe in time and took measures to bring us to safety. Bodies and intelligence contents were stored in the information collector, the tiny memory cubes were placed in a container, and the robot pilot, insensitive to all possible harmful influences, set out on a journey to find a new home. I traveled from solar system to solar system, but it was only after more than five thousand Earth years that I found the planet that offered us suitable living conditions.” The screen still showed the bright supernova in the midst of an infinite sea of stars. I know, my listeners, what a supernova is; I have dabbled in astronomy. That was a supernova — but which one? “What is the name of this star?” I asked. “Chinese astronomers,” said Horace Still, "observed the supernova in July of the year 1054. It has long since faded. In this drawer,“ Horace Still pointed to a desk next to an open, circular window, ”you will find a photograph from the Mount Palomar Observatory. It shows you the structure that remains of our sun. Later, when you leave, Gaston, you can take the photo with you. But now back to the Taurus!" Horace Still turned off the screen. I looked at Sisa, who was sitting on the edge of the lab table smoking a cigarette. “The last one!” she said and nodded to me. Final part 5: https://poal.co/s/scifi/788311