Drood and Bryan had been left on their own for a while now. They gazed out in silence at what Hulke had become. Drood was perched on one of the laboratory stools, Bryan sat cross legged on top of one of the work benches. Polly had brought them some food, mostly sandwiches and fruit, but they weren’t particularly in the mood for eating. She had long since disappeared to a meeting, but had promised to return as soon as she possibly could.
“Look at it…” breathed Bryan, slowly shaking his head. “England’s green and pleasant land.” Drood began resting his chin on his hands, his eyes looking away from the endless urban sprawl of London.
“What I’m worried about is that within the next few months, you and I have to become brilliant scientists, invent all sorts of clever shit and become heroes to these people.” He sighed heavily and rubbed his eyes. “I really don’t feel up to doing all that today.” Bryan climbed slowly down from his perch on the work bench and listlessly toyed with the sandwiches for a while, but he soon lost interest and wandered to the back of the laboratory. He tested several walls by waving his hand in front of them, pretty much like Polly had earlier, but none of them seemed to be willing to clear. But then one did…
“’Ere, Drood!” He called. “Come ‘ere and look at this!” Drood sighed and slowly got up.
“What now? Don’t tell me – they’ve put crazy paving over the Amazon rain forest and stone clad the Andes…?” His voice tailed away as he stood next to Bryan and they stared through the window Bryan had just cleared. “Is that what I think it is?” Drood breathed softly. Bryan nodded and even allowed his eyebrows a quick waggle.
“Drood, my dear chap, I rather think it is.” The other side of this wall was another laboratory, but far less cluttered. There were two control consoles to one side, but in the middle was what appeared to be a large shower cubicle. Cables ran from the base of the cubicle to the consoles and, directly over wherever any person wanting a shower would have stood, were dazzlingly white apparently plastic pen nibs, six of them. But these were big pen nibs, at least half a metre long and a good 100cm in diameter. Emblazoned across the front sliding door of the cubicle was the words “Hinchcliffe-Camfield Corporation” and then just below that the words “Chrono-Displacement Model SH101”. Drood and Bryan looked slowly at each other.
“Do you think we should?” Asked Bryan eventually. Drood looked back at the machine in the laboratory for a moment, and then glanced back to Bryan.
“Should what?”
“Get in there. Have a closer look.” Bryan was eager. Drood leant back from the glass and sighed.
“If, and I mean IF we go in there, we are just going to look at it Bryan. We are not going to start randomly pressing buttons, are we? We could end up anywhere.” With this affirmation from Drood, Bryan was straight away trying to find the doorway in. This was no easy feat as all the walls seemed exactly the same with no obvious entry point. “Did you hear me, Bryan?”
“Oh yes!” Said Bryan loudly, moving along the wall and sweeping his hand over each and every inch, trying to find anything that might trigger a door to open. Inevitably, he found it. With an almost heartfelt sigh, a door shape materialised in the seemingly solid wall and then retracted into the ceiling. Drood and Bryan stood in the doorway, gazing across at the machine in the darkened laboratory.
“How do you get any lights on in here?” Whispered Drood. Bryan looked up at the ceiling.
“Computer! Lights!” He called. Drood was about to sneer that this wasn’t Star Trek, when the lights, as if some Lothario was testing his dimmer switch before a big date, glowed up to a reasonable brightness. They both took slightly tentative steps into the room. Drood moved forward and finally found himself close enough to the machine to almost touch it. He reached out a hand, paused for a moment lost in a mixture of thought and awe, before he finally made contact with it with his hand. He moved his fingers up and down the outer shell. It felt disappointingly like a food mixer or a microwave oven.
“How on Earth did we invent this?” He whispered, hoarsely. “How does it even work?”
“It connects to the synapses of your frontal lobes and helps you to focus on the era, date or event you wish to visit with the use of the visualiser circuits.” Bryan seemed remarkably well informed on how this contraption worked.
“How does it connect to your synapses?” Asked Drood, slowly turning round. His eyes soon proved that Bryan had found all the answers.
“With this I guess!” he cried, cheerfully pointing to his head. Bryan was wearing what appeared to be a glitzy hi-tech crash helmet with various strands of fibre optic cables snaking out of the back and leading across to one of the consoles. He was also clutching a thick book entitled “The Hinchcliffe-Camfield Chrono-Displacement SH101 Operators Manual”.
“Bryan! For Christ’s sake take that bloody thing off!” Drood moved sharply towards Bryan, who backed away defensively.
“Hold hard!” Shouted Bryan. “It’s not even turned on! Nothing can happen!” Drood calmed slightly. He would still be happier if Bryan wasn’t wearing the crash helmet.
“Just be careful, alright? Don’t touch anything else.” Drood implored him. Bryan tapped a salutary finger to his forehead and nodded slightly. Unfortunately he didn’t notice the tiny red light flicker on at the back of the helmet as he had tapped the front. Bryan inclined the manual towards Drood.
“It seems pretty simple to operate, if these instructions are to be believed.” He laid the book open on top of the nearest console as Drood leaned in next to him for a closer look. “All you do is make sure the helmet and the booth are fired up, visualize on the exact place and time you want to go to, the Chrono-Displacement circuits select an undisturbed piece of space and time where you wish to go, and enfolds them in a singularity.” Drood looked at his friend wearing the daft helmet.
“What the hell does that mean?” he asked slowly.
“A singularity is, approximately, a place where quantities which are used to measure the gravitational field become infinite. Such quantities include the curvature of space-time or the density of matter. Space and time are eventually distorted enough for the continuum to exist in its whole in one place, and the chrono-displacement can take place.” Bryan reeled this off in a very matter-of-fact voice. There was a long pause as Drood just stared at Bryan.
“How in the name of fuck do you know THAT?” Drood squeaked this most indignantly. Bryan held up the small smooth remote control-looking unit that Polly had been using earlier.
“You would not believe the weird shit Wikipedia has listed in the year 3596…” His eyebrows waggled tremendously. Drood went to snatch the unit from him.
“Did you steal that from Polly?” He shouted. Bryan held it up as high as he could, and seeing as he was a good foot taller than Drood at the best of times, easily fought off any chance Drood had of getting it back.
“I have been leant this by the fair Dr Fielding. I asked her if she had anything I could read before she went off to her meeting. She gave me this.” Bryan lowered the unit as Drood’s attempts to snatch it ceased. Drood was looking flustered now.
“Come on Bryan, lets get out of here before someone comes in and finds us…” He reached up to remove the helmet from Bryan’s head. It was only then he realised the door they had entered this laboratory through had vanished, and they were faced with another long faceless row of a wall. Bryan was trying to pull away from Drood.
“Hold on! Hold on!” he yelped. “Just stop and think for a moment, will you?” Drood stopped momentarily.
“What now?”
“You’re worried about not becoming a great inventor? But we know you DID become a great inventor, because it says so in all their history books. So who is more likely to be wrong?” Bryan looked imploringly at Drood. “Drood-bloody-Hinchcliffe, or the Encyclopaedia Britannica?” Drood sighed dramatically and slumped onto the small stool next to the console.
“OK, but Bryan, how are you and I going to invent all of the things we are supposed to invent and patent, between now and Christmas?” He let out another dramatic sigh for good effect. This dented Bryan’s confidence not one jot. He held up the information unit Polly had lent him.
“We have all the information of when, what, why and how in this little beauty…” he announced, before moving over and stroking the outside of the Chrono-Displacement Unit. “And here we have the ability to make dreams come true…” Bryan lent across and grabbed Drood by the hand, he yanked him into the shower cubicle part of the machine and stepped in next to him. “We decide where and when we need to go, put our minds to it, so to speak…” There was a slight pause. “So, where do you want to go first, Professor Hinchcliffe? VE Day? England winning the World Cup in ’66? Far off into the unimaginable future, or back to Hulke in Roman times!” Bryan was quite a salesman.
“Roman times would be cool…” breathed Drood. “The Roman’s bore the arse off me, but it would be great to see what Hulke was like then. Before the Priory.” Bryan beamed at him, like a teacher who’s particularly dim-witted pupil had just managed to solve a simple bit of artithmetic.
“OK, so you just close your eyes, imagine exactly where you want to go. Visualize it…” Unknown to Bryan, on the console opposite them, lights began snapping on as the system began talking to the helmet on his head. “Visualize it, Drood…! Want it!” There was a sudden deep rumble of power units kicking in, a crackling badly tuned radio sound filled the air, and with an ear-drum pummelling backwards popping noise, in the blink of an eye both Bryan and Drood snapped out of existence.
“Look at it…” breathed Bryan, slowly shaking his head. “England’s green and pleasant land.” Drood began resting his chin on his hands, his eyes looking away from the endless urban sprawl of London.
“What I’m worried about is that within the next few months, you and I have to become brilliant scientists, invent all sorts of clever shit and become heroes to these people.” He sighed heavily and rubbed his eyes. “I really don’t feel up to doing all that today.” Bryan climbed slowly down from his perch on the work bench and listlessly toyed with the sandwiches for a while, but he soon lost interest and wandered to the back of the laboratory. He tested several walls by waving his hand in front of them, pretty much like Polly had earlier, but none of them seemed to be willing to clear. But then one did…
“’Ere, Drood!” He called. “Come ‘ere and look at this!” Drood sighed and slowly got up.
“What now? Don’t tell me – they’ve put crazy paving over the Amazon rain forest and stone clad the Andes…?” His voice tailed away as he stood next to Bryan and they stared through the window Bryan had just cleared. “Is that what I think it is?” Drood breathed softly. Bryan nodded and even allowed his eyebrows a quick waggle.
“Drood, my dear chap, I rather think it is.” The other side of this wall was another laboratory, but far less cluttered. There were two control consoles to one side, but in the middle was what appeared to be a large shower cubicle. Cables ran from the base of the cubicle to the consoles and, directly over wherever any person wanting a shower would have stood, were dazzlingly white apparently plastic pen nibs, six of them. But these were big pen nibs, at least half a metre long and a good 100cm in diameter. Emblazoned across the front sliding door of the cubicle was the words “Hinchcliffe-Camfield Corporation” and then just below that the words “Chrono-Displacement Model SH101”. Drood and Bryan looked slowly at each other.
“Do you think we should?” Asked Bryan eventually. Drood looked back at the machine in the laboratory for a moment, and then glanced back to Bryan.
“Should what?”
“Get in there. Have a closer look.” Bryan was eager. Drood leant back from the glass and sighed.
“If, and I mean IF we go in there, we are just going to look at it Bryan. We are not going to start randomly pressing buttons, are we? We could end up anywhere.” With this affirmation from Drood, Bryan was straight away trying to find the doorway in. This was no easy feat as all the walls seemed exactly the same with no obvious entry point. “Did you hear me, Bryan?”
“Oh yes!” Said Bryan loudly, moving along the wall and sweeping his hand over each and every inch, trying to find anything that might trigger a door to open. Inevitably, he found it. With an almost heartfelt sigh, a door shape materialised in the seemingly solid wall and then retracted into the ceiling. Drood and Bryan stood in the doorway, gazing across at the machine in the darkened laboratory.
“How do you get any lights on in here?” Whispered Drood. Bryan looked up at the ceiling.
“Computer! Lights!” He called. Drood was about to sneer that this wasn’t Star Trek, when the lights, as if some Lothario was testing his dimmer switch before a big date, glowed up to a reasonable brightness. They both took slightly tentative steps into the room. Drood moved forward and finally found himself close enough to the machine to almost touch it. He reached out a hand, paused for a moment lost in a mixture of thought and awe, before he finally made contact with it with his hand. He moved his fingers up and down the outer shell. It felt disappointingly like a food mixer or a microwave oven.
“How on Earth did we invent this?” He whispered, hoarsely. “How does it even work?”
“It connects to the synapses of your frontal lobes and helps you to focus on the era, date or event you wish to visit with the use of the visualiser circuits.” Bryan seemed remarkably well informed on how this contraption worked.
“How does it connect to your synapses?” Asked Drood, slowly turning round. His eyes soon proved that Bryan had found all the answers.
“With this I guess!” he cried, cheerfully pointing to his head. Bryan was wearing what appeared to be a glitzy hi-tech crash helmet with various strands of fibre optic cables snaking out of the back and leading across to one of the consoles. He was also clutching a thick book entitled “The Hinchcliffe-Camfield Chrono-Displacement SH101 Operators Manual”.
“Bryan! For Christ’s sake take that bloody thing off!” Drood moved sharply towards Bryan, who backed away defensively.
“Hold hard!” Shouted Bryan. “It’s not even turned on! Nothing can happen!” Drood calmed slightly. He would still be happier if Bryan wasn’t wearing the crash helmet.
“Just be careful, alright? Don’t touch anything else.” Drood implored him. Bryan tapped a salutary finger to his forehead and nodded slightly. Unfortunately he didn’t notice the tiny red light flicker on at the back of the helmet as he had tapped the front. Bryan inclined the manual towards Drood.
“It seems pretty simple to operate, if these instructions are to be believed.” He laid the book open on top of the nearest console as Drood leaned in next to him for a closer look. “All you do is make sure the helmet and the booth are fired up, visualize on the exact place and time you want to go to, the Chrono-Displacement circuits select an undisturbed piece of space and time where you wish to go, and enfolds them in a singularity.” Drood looked at his friend wearing the daft helmet.
“What the hell does that mean?” he asked slowly.
“A singularity is, approximately, a place where quantities which are used to measure the gravitational field become infinite. Such quantities include the curvature of space-time or the density of matter. Space and time are eventually distorted enough for the continuum to exist in its whole in one place, and the chrono-displacement can take place.” Bryan reeled this off in a very matter-of-fact voice. There was a long pause as Drood just stared at Bryan.
“How in the name of fuck do you know THAT?” Drood squeaked this most indignantly. Bryan held up the small smooth remote control-looking unit that Polly had been using earlier.
“You would not believe the weird shit Wikipedia has listed in the year 3596…” His eyebrows waggled tremendously. Drood went to snatch the unit from him.
“Did you steal that from Polly?” He shouted. Bryan held it up as high as he could, and seeing as he was a good foot taller than Drood at the best of times, easily fought off any chance Drood had of getting it back.
“I have been leant this by the fair Dr Fielding. I asked her if she had anything I could read before she went off to her meeting. She gave me this.” Bryan lowered the unit as Drood’s attempts to snatch it ceased. Drood was looking flustered now.
“Come on Bryan, lets get out of here before someone comes in and finds us…” He reached up to remove the helmet from Bryan’s head. It was only then he realised the door they had entered this laboratory through had vanished, and they were faced with another long faceless row of a wall. Bryan was trying to pull away from Drood.
“Hold on! Hold on!” he yelped. “Just stop and think for a moment, will you?” Drood stopped momentarily.
“What now?”
“You’re worried about not becoming a great inventor? But we know you DID become a great inventor, because it says so in all their history books. So who is more likely to be wrong?” Bryan looked imploringly at Drood. “Drood-bloody-Hinchcliffe, or the Encyclopaedia Britannica?” Drood sighed dramatically and slumped onto the small stool next to the console.
“OK, but Bryan, how are you and I going to invent all of the things we are supposed to invent and patent, between now and Christmas?” He let out another dramatic sigh for good effect. This dented Bryan’s confidence not one jot. He held up the information unit Polly had lent him.
“We have all the information of when, what, why and how in this little beauty…” he announced, before moving over and stroking the outside of the Chrono-Displacement Unit. “And here we have the ability to make dreams come true…” Bryan lent across and grabbed Drood by the hand, he yanked him into the shower cubicle part of the machine and stepped in next to him. “We decide where and when we need to go, put our minds to it, so to speak…” There was a slight pause. “So, where do you want to go first, Professor Hinchcliffe? VE Day? England winning the World Cup in ’66? Far off into the unimaginable future, or back to Hulke in Roman times!” Bryan was quite a salesman.
“Roman times would be cool…” breathed Drood. “The Roman’s bore the arse off me, but it would be great to see what Hulke was like then. Before the Priory.” Bryan beamed at him, like a teacher who’s particularly dim-witted pupil had just managed to solve a simple bit of artithmetic.
“OK, so you just close your eyes, imagine exactly where you want to go. Visualize it…” Unknown to Bryan, on the console opposite them, lights began snapping on as the system began talking to the helmet on his head. “Visualize it, Drood…! Want it!” There was a sudden deep rumble of power units kicking in, a crackling badly tuned radio sound filled the air, and with an ear-drum pummelling backwards popping noise, in the blink of an eye both Bryan and Drood snapped out of existence.
1 comment:
You can't stop here - more, more!
I've nominated you for an award - details on my blog.
Post a Comment