The First Pillar is one of the six bizarre uncut diamonds the size of a brick intended to be used in the Machine.
History[]
Early History[]
Though unconfirmed, the six Pillars were most likely constructed by the super-ancient beings, since they included them in their second trial.
At a currently unknown point in Earth's history, the Super-Ancient Beings discovered the Dark Sun and set about constructing a machine that would repel it before it came too close to the planet. During their endeavors, they managed to reshape six diamonds into the Pillars, doing so in a technological process that would appear to modern humans that they had been shaped this way naturally. The First Pillar was also made to be cleansed by the tool known as the Philosopher's Stone, which would work in unison with the Firestone of the Golden Capstone to prepare the Pillar to be set into its corresponding Vertex of the Machine during a Titanic Rising event.
Though they were able to prevent the Dark Star from approaching in their time, the Super-Ancient Beings knew that even after they were gone from the Earth, there may yet be intelligent life, and so left the Pillars and Sacred Stones so that human kind could use them to aid their attempts to rebuild the Machine. They were also able to manipulate the Pillars' molecular structure so that when they were placed into their Vertex, give whoever possessed it would gain a reward; for the First Pillar, the reward would be Knowledge.
Eventually, all of the Pillars came to be kept in Egypt under the Pharaoh Khufu's keep, however, the priest Thuthmosis later stole the Pillars and the Sacred Stones and took them with him as he fled Egypt. Taking one the name Moses, he would keep the Pillars within his familial line until they ended up with Jesus Christ. Apparently unaware of their importance, Jesus would end up scattering the Pillars, and putting the Earth's future in greater jeopardy. The First Pillar was among four Pillars which Jesus gave to his brother James, and was later kept at a fortress in Van.
In the thirteenth century, Genghis Khan and his army invaded Van, and he took possession of the First and Third Pillars. Genghis would give the First Pillar to a Bedouin tribe as a gift of thanks for aiding him, a tribe which would soon become the Royal House of Saud. The Pillar would be passed along the Saud line up until the present day, where one of its members, Abdul Rahman al Saud / Vulture, had access to it.
Prior to the end of 2007, Vulture entered into an alliance with Wolf and the CIEF in order to restore the Machine, and came to the agreement that Vulture would get to keep the First Pillar and its reward once it had been laid in its Vertex.
The Six Sacred Stones[]
When Jack West Jr called together a new meeting of small nations to detail what Wizard had discovered about the Dark Star, and come up with a plan to find the Pillars and restore the Machine. Vulture infiltrated the meeting to discover what the coalition knew and piggyback on their initial efforts, and when Jack asked everyone to share what they knew regarding the Machine and its components, Vulture admitted that his family possessed a Pillar.
After rescuing Wizard and Tank and retrieving the Philosopher's Stone, Jack requested that Vulture arrange for his Pillar to be sent to Mortimer Island where they would cleanse it. Once it arrived at Mortimer Island under the watch of Vulture's guards, Wizard, Julius and Lachlan used the Philosopher's Stone to cleanse the First and Fourth Pillars, the process giving them a lustrous sheen and solidifying the Helium-3 voids into a strange silver material.
With only a day until the first Pillar had to be set, the team headed out to the First Vertex, which they'd discovered to be somewhere beneath Lake Nasser near Abu Simbel. After discovering the doorway into the Vertex hidden beneath the lake's surface, the Pillar opened the entrance when placed into the Machine symbol's carving. As Jack, Wizard and Zoe Kissane made their way down, the Pillar they held deactivated the traps that prepared to activate. As the time for the Titanic Rising approached, Jack used the Pillar to activate a bridge to the inverted pyramid's summit, and then set the Pillar on its tip. After the Vertex fired its laser through the Pillar into the abyss, the pyramid's clamping mechanism released the Pillar, and Jack saw that a triangular piece had been removed from the Pillar's end and left on the pyramid.
Iolanthe then betrayed the team and attempted to leave Abu Simbel with the Pillar, Wizard and Lily, but a quartet of suicide bombers from the Japanese Blood Brotherhood scuppered her plans as they attempted to destroy the Pillar and Firestone. Taking advantage, Wizard began fleeing with Lily and the Pillar, and after a long chase some of Jack's team managed to get away on the Halicarnassus with the first Pillar, intending to next find the Neetha tribe and the Second Pillar.
Vulture was annoyed that Wolf's forces had failed to secure his Pillar, but after the American reminded Vulture of the exact nature of their bargain, Wolf had the Saudi pay off several African governments to locate Wizard's team to retrieve the Pillar. Meanwhile, as Wizard's team began their search for the Neetha tribe, Alby Calvin and Lily began looking over the Thoth writing that had appeared on the first Pillar's flanks, uncovering some of the knowledge its rewards offered.
When they were captured by the Neetha tribe, Yanis the warlock discovered they possessed the First Pillar and the cleansing stones, and took the artefacts and secured them away. When Wolf, the CIEF and their hired Congolese soldiers invaded the village, Zoe and Alby attempted to flee with the First and Second Pillars and Sacred Stones, however Alby was forced to choose to save Zoe over securing the Pillars, and ended up captured. In the aftermath, Wolf was pleased to have recovered the Pillars and cleansing stones.
The Five Greatest Warriors[]
After departing the Table Mountain Vertex, Wolf and Rapier met with their allies, and presented the First Pillar to Vulture and Scimitar to fulfill their side of their agreement.
A few months later, when Vulture and Scimitar were kidnapped by Carnivore's men, the First Pillar they had with them was claimed by the Russian royal.
After Carnivore and his forces took the Sixth Pillar from Jack's team in the Dead Sea, the royal proceeded to take all six Pillars in his possession to the final Vertex on Easter Island. Once within the Vertex, Carnivore laid out the first five Pillars with the Sacred Stones on an altar while awaiting the moment to place the sixth.
After Jack took down Carnivore and his men and placed the final Pillar with Lily, he secured the remaining five Pillars and left the Vertex. Hiding them away, Jack informed his superiors within the Coalition of Minnows of the outcome, but when he was asked about the Pillars, Jack lied and claimed that they had all fallen into the abyss. After he was gifted with a farm in the Simpson Desert, Jack hid the five Pillars in an old salt mine on the property and sealed them away, knowing that despite the potential their rewards held, it was far better that no one used the Pillars at all.
Properties[]
Appearance[]
Like all of its sibling Pillars, the First Pillar initially appeared as a diamond with a cloudy appearance, with an anomalous void in the center containing a liquid form of Helium, H-3. Upon being cleansed with the Philosopher's Stone, the Pillar became more like translucent like glass, with the Helium void becoming silver in appearance.
After being placed in the First Vertex, a triangular section was excised from the end placed into the inverted pyramid, and 'glowing' white writing in the Word of Thoth appeared in order to provide its reward.
Purpose[]
The First Pillar is intended to be placed at the massive underground Temple-Shrine located beneath Abu Simbel, the First Vertex of the Machine, during a Titanic Rising. When the Pillar is set, a triangular shape is removed from the bottom end of the Pillar, creating the tip of the inverted pyramid and thus readying the Machine.
In addition to its use within the inverted pyramids, the First Pillars is able to disable the traps of its respective Vertex through an unknown mechanism.
Reward of Knowledge[]
The reward of the First Pillar, 'Knowledge', appears as formula and text on the sides of the Pillar, in the Word of Thoth, upon the Pillar's successful placement into its corresponding Vertex. As Alby and Lily discovered, the secrets given by the Pillar (one on each of the four sides) include; instructions for an ultra-strong yet ultralight form of carbon-fiber; a diagram of the star Sirius and its two companion stars, Sirius B and Sirius C, which is a zero-point field; and an explanation of the Universal Expansion Problem. The fourth piece of knowledge was never revealed.
Trivia[]
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