Most people find the view from the observation deck of a skyhook to be overwhelming. Those with a tendency for vertigo usually cannot bear the sight of the planet's surface hundreds of thousands of metroi below their feet, with only a pace's width of ectoglass separating them from the abyss. But it is the only way to make even a half-way accurate record of traffic to and from the planet, and so the scribes sit here, carefully watching and noting each flyspeck that passes over the orb below.
I have never been bothered by the sight. The deck is perfectly safe. I can calculate the strength of the observation window at a glance, as easily as I read the positions and trajectories of the four hundred and twelve ships - now four hundred thirteen - currently swarming the astroport at the Lyceum. An assignment that is knuckle-whiteningly terrifying for most is so profoundly dull for me that I can perform my duties and record this journal while only using .4 percent of my brain.
Three days have passed since communications from Alexandria ceased. There has been no word from the mission sent to investigate the closure of the Nikeon Gate. I will likely miss my kid sister's 60th birthday celebration next week, though I doubt she would mind. I am precisely ten years older than she is, and I look ten years younger than her youngest daughter, something that has never sat well with her. I stopped keeping count of my own birthdays at forty, once I realized how pointless such things are for an archon: after all, even I cannot count to infinity.
I am up here today because Lysimachos wants a report on how the Nikeon closure has impacted out-of-system traffic. I personally believe that more accurate data could be obtained directly at the Lyceon Gate, as local transport hardly seems relevant, but Lysimachos is being cautious. So here I am, bored out of my skull. At least at Lyceon I could see the ships I'm counting. I do not think it has occurred to my handler that my visual acuity is hardly any better than a mortal's, and has nothing to do with my processing speed. From up here, all I see are black dots over the daylit side, the sparkle of sunlight off hulls on the horizon, and the glint of running lights over the sliver of night surface. I watch, I count, I tally up the numbers, and as I perform this blindingly uninteresting task, I write about how bored I am with one hand while reading a news feed with one eye and an inferior theatrical adaptation of Kalliantes' Deucalion with the other. I find this current 'retro' vogue to be profoundly irritating. It's not as if most people are even familiar with the originals anymore. 74 percent of the students at the Lyceum come for the sciences, in spite of Aristotle's insistence that a proper education gives equal weight to all forms of knowledge.
My talents are totally wasted on this work. Foremost center of learning in the Empire it may be, but even the Lyceum pales in comparison to the Great Library on Alexandria. I have only been permitted back for brief visits since my awakening, and in the few hours I managed to sneak in the Library I could only read 26,407 of the over fifty billion books. Lysimachos says he wants to pace me, to make sure I don't burn out my talent, but I have figured the odds at 346,588,724:1 that I would be unable to assimilate the entire Library without causing an aneurism. What Lysimachos doesn't understand is that my talent does not just allow me to assimilate information quickly, it compels me to. I have a knowledge addiction, and merely tabulating the traffic patterns of an entire hemisphere is hardly adequate to assuage that.
I have an itch in my mind. It wants to know what is happening on the throneworld. The rumors say that the Megas Basileus is dead, which is impossible, or missing, which is merely unlikely. One of the news reports I am reading at this moment states that the Diadoche of Athens is considering limiting traffic through the Piraeus Gate until there is more news from Alexandria. This measure would reduce the net mercantile traffic of the entire Empire by 2.1%, resulting in starvation on some of the more heavily industrialized worlds.
Aeolus just messaged me. Lysimachos wants my report first thing in the morning. 6 hours from now. It takes 11.2 hours just to get down the lift. Hopefully Hermetios will be back from his mission by now, and I can catch a ride to the surface. Suddenly, everybody is in a hurry.
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