The Grand Museum
Musical Theme: Modest Mussorgsky - Pictures at an Exhibition - Promenade.
- Also known as the Armillary Sphere Museum or Museum Proper.
- Run by -- and quite possibly the actual source of -- Mel.
- Also home to the Curators faction.
- Older than the universe, or so they say...
- Rumors and speculations about links between the Museum and other anti-entropic places...
Nature of the Museum Proper
Constructed of memories, powered by dreams, the Museum consists of three circular halls (Ruby, Amber, and Sapphire) connected by six nexus points (Light and Dark variations of Garnet, Emerald, and Amethyst): an arrangement known as an armillary sphere.
The Museum is not necessarily located within the Puzzlebox, but perhaps right next to it. Transporter gateways to and from each nexus can be found in the Mess, one to each Warp, generally in historical/intellectual areas.
The Museum itself is controlled by a massively distributed nanomachine AI which dedicatedly maintains the physical parameters of those creatures, places, and things within it, using an Anti-Entropy field: no damage or harm, whether accidental or purposeful, can come to anyone or anything within the Museum's halls.
More than mere warehousing, though, the Museum's goal is preservation of artistic expression: the artist's own personal, subjective viewpoint. To this end, the Museum also generates a Subjectivity field, which allows the visitor a subjective influence on the Museum environs: to be able (depending on mental discipline and practice) to move objects, oneself, and others about through mind power, and even to generate new items, possibly for exhibit. Unlike the Puzzlebox's Instantiation system, this Subjectivity field is geared less toward function and utility, and more toward expression and craft.
Finally, deep within the Museum lies an area where the Subjectivity field is so strong that one's every thought is instantly made real and solid, referred to as the Theater of the Mind.
Although access to the Museum is completely free, Mel has been known to personally give out tickets to prospective patrons.
Physics of the Museum Proper
The Museum's anti-entropic infrastructure is built something like Oliver Wendell Holmes's [one-hoss-shay]: every part is just as strong as the rest, so that no effort, short of destroying the entire Museum at once, can damage it. Unlike the Puzzlebox, though, the Museum cannot reconstitute itself if destroyed, so it gains in prevention what it loses in healing.
For an exhibit which contains its own pocket world or dimension, that exhibit's own physical attributes will be maintained within it. The following laws apply to the Museum's halls, offices, and direct vicinity.
- Active Entropic Prevention - Patrons are automatically put into a state of physical 'grace' when they enter the Museum Proper. No amount of physical form can harm a patron, as the Museum strictly maintains the original physical parameters of those within it. Because protecting 'mind' would inhibit one's ability to experience and react honestly to exhibits, the active entropic protection does not extend to psychological state.
- Law of "Metron Ariston" - Any sapient being and its associated construction smaller than 1 centimeter or larger than 2.5 meters will automatically be resized to the lower or upper limit. This does not affect staff.
- Law of Relative Environment - All creatures (patrons included) automatically exist in an environment native to their optimum survival. For example, fish will be able to swim in the air next to birds.
Patrons are expected to act in a civil and courteous manner to each other and to staff. Troublemakers may be ejected and prohibited from future entry.
Unfortunately, there is a loophole to the anti-entropic nature of the Museum: It IS possible to suicide one's self through sheer force of will within the confines of the Museum, but it takes a truely diseased mind to acchieve a feat like this. It is much more common to see this happen within the Theater of the Mind since it multiplies will to levels capable of doing this much more easily.