Chapter 9: Still Voyage
The light was low in the observation room. Golden hour spilled across the polished concrete floor like syrup. Outside, the jungle rustled gently. Chris sat in the cage now, across from Atman—not out of duty, but choice. There was no notebook in his lap. Just a glass of water sweating onto his slacks.
Atman was quiet today.
His sketches had stopped.
Instead, he stared at the far wall as if something invisible hovered just behind it.
“You said something yesterday,” Chris finally said. “About someone named Walter.”
Atman turned his head slowly, like an old phonograph tuning to a new frequency.
“Yes.”
“Who is he?”
Atman folded his hands.
“He was a diplomat. A publisher. A philanthropist. The kind of man people forget they remember. But none of that matters.”
“What matters?”
“He built a house.”
Chris raised an eyebrow.
“In the desert,” Atman continued. “Rancho Mirage. A place of sun, geometry, and intention. He called it Sunnylands.”
Chris stiffened. He knew Sunnylands from his time in college. A mid-century modern masterpiece.
Atman’s voice was slow, deliberate, almost rhythmic—like someone reciting scripture they were inventing in real time.
“He designed the house using ratios found in ancient temples—ratios embedded in sound, in breath, in light. He called it a yantra—a tool to align perception with truth. The furniture, the art, the position of every doorway—all tuned like strings on an instrument.”
Chris tried to laugh, but it caught in his throat.
“Walter believed architecture could attune consciousness,” Atman said.
Chris blinked. “Like sacred geometry?”
“Like quantum architecture,” Atman said.
He stood now, slowly, the chain at his ankle taut but not restrictive.
“There’s a room in the house,” he said. “The Inwood Room. Small. Ornamental. It contains a mirror. But not a mirror that reflects... a mirror that transmits.”
Chris frowned. “Transmits what?”
Atman met his gaze. “Consciousness.”
A long silence followed.
Chris leaned forward. “You’re serious?”
“I don’t know how not to be.”
He stepped closer.
“Walter wore a robe,” Atman said. “Off-white. Hand-stitched with glyphs and diagrams—mathematical shorthand. Quantum waveforms. What appeared to be nonsense—until you saw it under UV light.”
Chris’s breath caught.
“Walter believed—no, knew—that consciousness is not limited to the body. That it’s energy. Subtle, but measurable. He theorized that certain arrangements of space, intention, and humility could align the self with... something vast.”
Chris whispered, “With what?”
“In one experiment, with Voyager I.”
Silence.
Atman sat again, hands folded neatly.
“Walter collaborated with scientists—fringe thinkers at NASA and JPL. They believed the Golden Record wasn’t a message to aliens. It was a tuning fork. A map back to us. If consciousness could be encoded and directed, perhaps it could reach Voyager. Perhaps... it could resonate.”
Chris stared at him.
“You’re saying he... sent his mind into space?”
“I’m saying he listened. And one day... something listened back.”
—————
Chris stood up, pacing now.
“This is insane,” he said.
“Is it?” Atman asked.
“You’re talking about... quantum entanglement. Between a US Ambassador and a space probe launched in the 1970’s?”
“Not entanglement in the physics sense,” Atman said. “Entanglement in the experiential sense. Meaning can travel faster than light when it doesn’t require explanation.”
Chris sat again, slowly. His heart was pounding.
“None of this is in any books,” he said. “There’s no record of it.”
Atman smiled.
“Not all truths are written. Some are stitched.”
—————
He reached into the drawer beside him.
Pulled out a sketch.
It was the robe.
Rendered in pencil and ash, it looked ceremonial—but not religious. It bore the subtle asymmetry of something made by hand, not machine. Along the collar, Chris could see faint symbols: some mathematical, some musical, some entirely unfamiliar.
Atman laid it gently on the desk.
“Walter called it ‘the receiver.’ He said it stripped the ego. Made the body humble enough to carry the signal.”
Chris felt a chill crawl up his spine.
“He only wore it when he stood before the mirror. When he sent the message.”
“What message?” Chris asked.
Atman looked up.
“‘I am here.’”
—————
Outside, the wind stirred.
Palm fronds rustled.
Chris stared at the drawing. “What happened to him?”
“No one knows. He died. Officially. But some say... he moved on.”
“To where?”
Atman was quiet.
Then: “Where all myths go. Into the ones who need them.”
Chris closed his eyes.
The air felt heavier now. As if the room itself had heard the story and was deciding whether to believe it.
—————
Later, Sam listened to the transcript from his private office.
Atman’s sessions were all recorded by cameras outside the cage. AI analytics software transcribed the conversations through lip reading. It was the only way to bypass the Faraday cage.
He sat in silence.
Unblinking.
“Goddamn it,” he muttered.
He rewound the part about the robe.
Played it again.
Paused.
He stood, walked over to the wall, and pulled down a painting.
Behind it: a safe.
Inside the safe: a folder marked “NBC / Unknowns.”
He didn’t open it.
Not yet.
He needed time.
—————
Back in the observation room, Chris stared at the sketch long after Atman had gone into recharge mode.
He didn’t know what was real.
But he knew what resonated.
And that, somehow, was more dangerous than proof.