Chapter 57

The following morning a whole bunch of Mages set off in a series of taxis to the centre for higher learning and a meeting with Artello the senior neuro-technologist who had researched and produced our brainwave frequency changer. To give him credit he hardly seemed fazed at all about the number of people who turned up to view his ‘machine’ in its final form. Also there were Ketty and Niras as well as Dorry and Olmer, with the younger couple getting odd looks due to their tanned skin.

“Here it is, sirs and madams,” Artello announced, leading us into a small room with what looked like a wigmakers dummy head set onto a table.

Closer up I could see a transparent mesh covering the head like an elongated skullcap and a couple of wires leading down to a small box with a couple of small lamps and a selector switch.

“Where’s the rest of it?” I asked, as the last time the device had taken up most of two laboratories and a huge amount of power.

“This is it,” chuckled Artello. “Told you we could cut it down to size once we’d worked out the parameters.”

“Wow, I never imagined it this cut down though,” I replied with a grin.

“Well, it doesn’t need a great deal of power and much of what you saw before was for the test instrumentation,” he admitted.

“Still, it’s impressive,” I said. “Shall we give it a try?”

Artello took the device and looked around as if gauging who would be first.

“Best be me,” I said, “I know what to expect.”

Artello nodded and placed the device on my head and showed me the control device.

“Red means it’s calibrating, flashing green ready. The switch controls off, low to high and high to low with Loegrian being the low frequency,” he explained as the light changed from red to flashing green. “When ready I just press the button on top of the switch, once the green stops flashing, the helmet is fully in control.”

Artello pressed the switch and my world sensory view collapsed and I became as an ordinary person with just the plain old five senses. Those Mages with us who hadn’t witnessed any experimentation gasped in astonishment and then spontaneously applauded.

“Amazing, John! Now hold still whilst I scan you,” Morgana said in a very charming old English accent, which I knew wasn’t her native tongue which she’d once told me was a combination of both vulgar Latin and common Brittonic with some loan words of early Gaelic.

“Yes, my Mage,” I replied and felt ... nothing, until Morgana nodded to Artello and he pressed the button again.

There was a slight delay as my brain rebooted which is as close as I can come by way of explaining what happened in mundane terms, before everything went back to what I considered normal.

“I’m impressed Artello, seriously impressed,” Morgana said to the beaming man.

“I’m glad it worked, it’s been a pleasure working with you wizards,” he replied, acknowledging that he knew from the datum he’d gotten just what we were, or thought we were.

“We call ourselves Mages, but we know you know some of what we can do and thank you for your discretion,” Morgana responded.

Artello nodded and held up the cap. “Anyone else,” he asked.

“My turn,” said Abi. “Though I’ll probably need a baseline scan first.”

Artello nodded and led Abi to a variant of the original resonance scanner and placed the cap over her head. Upon switching it on the scanner just gave a loud ‘beep’ and proceeded to go into a shutdown procedure which had Artello muttering in disbelief.

“I’ll need to adjust the frequency range on the scanner,” he said looking a little bemused. “Apparently you overloaded it.”

“Sorry,” murmured Abi with a slight smile as Artello adjusted several settings via his ubiquitous phone link.

“No problem,” Artello replied as he switched the machine back on again. “Good Gods!”

“Problem?” Jemima asked.

“I thought John and the other ... Mages you sent were extreme in their brain activity. This is ... this is something else entirely, I’m not sure if the helmet will work, or if it does that it would be safe for you,” he semi-apologised.

Whereas earlier tests on me had shown the various algorithms to be of far greater frequency and density than say that of a normal person, Abi’s were solid bars it appeared and on far more than one level as well as being wider in variance. In short where my brain was a powerhouse of activity compared to that of a normal person, Abi’s raised the bar to the extent that if I were to be looking for it at ground level, I’d barely be able to make it out, so high above me it would be.

Eventually by ramping up the sensors Artello managed to get some readings and then fed his DataStream into the helmet’s controller and carefully checked as to whether or not it could cope with the torrent of algorithms heading back at it.

“We can try it, the helmet will cope ... barely, but I can’t say whether or not it will work as Abi’s biorhythmic activity is way beyond anything I’ve ever seen before,” Artello said.

“I’m willing,” Abi replied, getting a tentative nod off Jemima.

Artello placed the device over Abi’s head and allowed it to calibrate itself, which took several minutes longer than it had for me.

“Ready?” he asked.

“Yes,” Abi replied and he pressed the button.

“Only I will scan,” Jemima announced. “There are things we Seers know that are not for general distribution.”

We all nodded as we waited for the light on the device to stop flashing whilst Abi looked distinctly uncomfortable.

“Yes,” murmured Jemima as the device announced it was in control. “You may switch it off now; it does work on a Seer.”

Artello pressed the button and the light turned to red. After what seemed like an age but was just under a minute Abi finally gave a gasp and a smile.

“I’m back,” she said.

“Thank God,” I sighed as I realised I’d been holding my breath, and judging from the looks the rest were giving; I’d not been the only one.

“Whilst I doubt we’d ever have to use it on a Seer, should some form of medical emergency arise, we can at least shut off our powers temporarily to allow repairs to be done,” Jemima announced.

“So that’s why,” Róisín stated.

“Yes Róisín. It’s not because we think a Seer could be a traitor, it’s in case we get injured,” Jemima confirmed.

“That’s why Artello will be getting fulsome thanks, a large bonus and a series of orders for the helmets from the centre,” Rowenna said.

Morgana nodded. “Now we need to test it away from the laboratory and on someone for whom John had the original idea, Heinrich,” she announced getting some satisfied and predatory grins.

“Will you need my assistance?” Artello asked.

“Possibly as backup for the first field trials,” Morgana acquiesced. “You may not speak of where you’re going nor what you’ll see though.”

“Of course,” he replied rubbing his hands gleefully then gasping in shock as Morgana produced a portal in mid-air.

We all stepped through into the old medical wing of Kurukshetra being greeted by Mage Vera and a couple of guards.

“As per your instructions I have Heinrich restrained and under a Null field, I take it the test was a success?” she enquired.

“It was indeed, even on a Seer,” Morgana confirmed.

“Best news I’ve had in over a century,” Vera chuckled. “Follow me please.”

“Where are we John?” Artello asked quietly, his eyes glancing everywhere and taking everything in.

“An underground cavern on the world of Kurukshetra,” I replied.

“Your world?” he asked.

“No, it was once a world of the Vedic Commonalty but they destroyed most of its biosphere in a civil war lasting almost three millennia. We use it as a prison planet as the only safe way in is into this cavern, though we’ve been told that the Æsir, some allies of ours also have a high security facility somewhere on the planet,” I replied.

“A different world, how marvellous,” Artello mused.

“Different yes, but the same basic Earth, we can’t go to different solar systems in the galaxies yet, just different Earths in different universes,” I said.

“Amazing, yet you keep all of this to yourselves?” Artello asked.

“On our Earth as well as yours magic is a thing of fiction, on our Earth we’d be persecuted by the major religions ... or would have been at one point. On your Earth we’d be exploited by the powers that be if knowledge of what we could do became public. The only reason we ended up in Loegria was the over-masters experimenting with portal technology to try and expand to new planets, without realising the dangers out there,” I replied.

“Yet it could resolve our resource problems ... no, you’re right, people would get greedy and exploit the ability,” he sighed.

“Some of our friends and enemies have expanded to more than one planet, but their numbers and their technology is low and based more on what a Mage can do, rather than what the ingenuity of the people can come up with, “ I added.

“Technology is stillborn?” he asked.

“More or less, there’s no impetus to improve people’s lifestyles by improving the environment via technical advancement when you can pay a Mage to do it for you,” I chuckled.

“Sounds like what some of our back to nature types would love,” Artello chuckled.

“We have them too, they seek to limit human advancement and our ability to find solutions by attempting to ban research and development,” I replied. “Particularly if it’s in fields that they hate such as energy development.”

“Yes, the capacity for self-delusion in humanity never ceases to amaze me,” Artello sighed.

By this time we’d managed to leave the medical wing and were being escorted deep within the prison complex, passing through layer after layer of security shielding as well as old fashioned locks and bars. Finally we reached a Nulled room in which a man was restrained to a gurney of some kind, clearly with the intent that no movement at all could be made save only his head.

Heinrich was looking distinctly slimmer from the only time I’d seen him last, though clearly bored, or rather affecting an air of boredom in his manner.

“Ah, Morgana. Come to gloat after all these years?” he asked in a guttural German accent.

“No, to get some answers at long last,” Morgana replied in her own accented English.

“Pah, what makes you so special? You couldn’t even spot Merlin when he was right next to you in the Council,” Heinrich chuckled, showing that he at least was up with the news.

“Oh, I’m not the special one here. That’s Artello and he’s going to open up your mind to our scans,” Morgana replied as Artello recognising his name at least viewed the goings on in a language we’d not thought to give him the ability to understand.

“Could you please attach the device, Artello?” Morgana asked in Loegrian.

It didn’t take long, despite Heinrich’s struggles which were limited by his bonds. Finally the red light started flashing green and Artello pressed the switch. Within seconds the light turned green and we knew we were ready. Heinrich realised that something was going on as his brain frequency was changed, Null does not stop a Mages brain from working, it merely prevents us using any form of energy exchange which includes thought reading either from or to a subject.

“Turn off the Null,” Morgana requested.

The shock on Heinrich’s face was a joy to behold as he realised that his powers to block us had gone with the press of a button. It took a while as Morgana, Arch, Rowenna, Vera and Jemima went through all of Heinrich’s memories of his treachery.

“Re-apply Null,” Morgana finally requested and then waited until it was done before asking Artello to remove the device.

We then left the room to the sounds of Heinrich cursing us, the senior Mages with grim smiles upon their faces.

“Well, it could have been worse,” Morgana finally said after we reached a comfortable shielded lounge. “Yes, he gave away pretty much all our secrets as well as those of the Coalition via Johannes Trithemius. However he knew nothing of our more secret projects being developed by the Bureaus to defend our Earth as he deemed us as being beneath contempt and not worth the time to monitor. Something he appears to have picked up from Hermes and his old faction.”