Silently, the Church of Eldomen knew there were theistic practices outside the castle walls. Secret, hidden, underground, they taught their terrible beliefs and spoke of one's fortune in the "afterlife", a myth which the Church thought was the most punishable idea. These heretics, when discovered, were punished rather severely, for it could not be allowed for these foolish practices to be deceiving the gullible public against Atheism, which was the only belief that followed common sense.

Waet never cared for any of that. The tortures the Church imposed seemed contradictory to Atheism's basic teachings of love for your fellow man ("Life is all that one has; let us make our Lives in Love"), which taken at face value seemed like the nicest way to live, but he just got a nice job out of the situation and figured best to keep his big mouth shut.

Still, it was strange to him how there could be such violence that was justifiable (governmentally) in an increasingly advanced and intellectual society.

- - -

When Waet and his apprentice, Rold, had finally decided they had done enough preparations, there were ten minutes left until the hearing. He quickly gathered his notes and, making sure they were in order this time, put them in his bag and hurried out of the library, Rold at his side. They would have to get to the Hearing Room by reaching the lowest level of the Guest Wing by traveling down two flights of stairs, making a left, then walking through a vast archway, traversing into an enormous botanical garden with strange multi-colored flowers, crossing a small bridge, going through another tower's archway, climbing two more flights of stairs, making another left, going down a hallway, and proceeding through the large marble door on the other side, engraved with the words "Royal Hearing Room". To save time, none of that will be described.

The Hearing Room was large, but not uncomfortably so. On either side there were concentric semicircular benches, each nearly filled with scholars, physicists like himself except probably of higher rank, and others of knowledgeable nature. They looked angry. On each wall was a gigantic Eldomish crest, and like everywhere else inside the castle, it was decorated with mostly red material. Where did they get so much red dye? Waet thought back to the garden, then immediately remembered the flowers were in fact multi-colored… did they only take the dye from the red flowers? Was that enough? Were the other flowers simply chopped up and used as fertilizer? Did the dye even come from the flowers at all?

Looking at the far end of the Room, Waet shivered uneasily… had he gotten the time wrong somehow? At the center of the back wall on thrones sat their Royal Highnesses themselves. They were the dark-brown-haired king with a rugged beard, and the queen, with smooth, long flowing black hair. On either side, Waet assumed, were their respective advisors. In front of them, closest to Waet himself, was a podium with an elderly man standing at it, apparently franticly defending his case.

"But… but surely you realize that under current laws of physics, the possibilities are endless! No-nobody knows what could be out there!" the man stammered. Nobody in the room looked impressed or amused, except for the king, who looked the latter. However, Waet alone wore a look of confusion.

"Professor Kentz" muttered Rold quietly from his left side. "They brought him here under suspicions of teaching his students alternate views, you know. Heretical stuff."

The current Hearing continued. Still wearing the amused expression, the king spoke forth, "Professor… do you teach physics? I'm aware that you do not. Therefore I realize that you're not nearly as fit to understand it as some more, cooperative and competent physicists, who do not insist on such ridiculous notions as yourself." Waet noticed now that the other smiling one in the room was none other than the king's advisor, who apparently had speaking privileges but chose not to use them at this time. "Ah, here comes one now, hello Mr. De Goug." The king continued, noticing them.

Upon hearing his name, Waet knew everyone would turn to the entrance of the room and look at him in an instant, which they did. He was again aware how oily his face felt.

The man at the podium also turned and looked at Waet, very fearful and with mouth agape. If he thought Waet would be able to save him now…

"He… Hello there" Waet replied not too softly, but smiling weakly. "Bad… bad time?" he continued, trying to pretend the king was an old friend, which he wasn't.

"This Hearing has gone on long enough, past the time allotted." The king said, ignoring Waet but answering his question nonetheless. "Take him away", he commanded, motioning towards the professor. The queen, sitting next to him, frowned but said nothing.

"I've… I've done nothing wrong!" Professor Kentz exclaimed while being forced toward on the other side of the room by two guards. The heavy door closed with a bang, which echoed through the Room, and then all was silent. Someone coughed.

"Tiresome… now, the next Hearing, I presume, Mr. De Goug?" asked the king.

"I'm ready." Waet replied. The shock of the previous incident was subsiding, and now he was collecting the pieces of his proposal in his head, while walking anxiously up to the podium. On the left side of the lowest bench was a place reserved for Rold to sit; Waet could see him out of the corner of his eye when at the podium.

"Let's make this quick… Mr. De Goug, I understand you have been brought here from your home planet Guratha? On… charges of a crime…?" The king appeared to be thinking. Waet was about to cry out, but the king continued, "…no, an experimental proposition. Ha!" he laughed.

"Heh… hehe…" Waet clicked his tongue. "And yes… I propose an experiment that will prove the existence of multiple dimensions, not just the three we can observe."

Waet heard murmuring and whispering throughout the Room. He hoped they wouldn't do that after everything he said.

"Very interesting, Mr. De Goug, very… but before I hear the actual ideas behind it, tell me… what would be the negative effects of your success?"

Apparently he was getting right to the point; Waet was afraid of this. "Negative…? Your highness, the only reason I study physics is for the pursuit of Knowledge…"

"Intentions aside, tell me… what would be negative about it?"

"Well… I suppose… certain people could… interpret things in a way… the wrong way, of course… that certain dimensions could be… lacking in laws?"

More murmuring, a little louder. Perhaps that would happen after every other sentence instead?

"I, for one…" this was the queen who began, finally, in a beautiful, strong voice, "believe that any implications from Mr. De Goug's experiment would not be his fault. If his reasoning is valid, we shouldn't stifle it for mere political reasons…"

"Why… why of course" answered the king. "After all, we're not hypocrites!" he said, which received nervous laughter throughout the Room, all but from his advisor, who looked sour. "Now, what is your… actual experiment?"

Finally. "I have made designs for a small starship which can attempt to travel in all directions at the same time." He paused, letting the absurdity sink in. "However, there is one small but very important modification. Aboard this starship, there must be an object of highly excessive density. Namely, a neutron star.

"Imagine, if you will, a simple flat starship, on a two-dimensional plane. It can only traverse in two dimensions, correct? Unless…" he took one of his random papers, "…it was bent. Normally, if this two-dimensional ship were to create force in all directions at once, it would either implode or explode, resulting in the respective destruction. This is because it has nowhere to move. If merely a small portion of this ship was bent into the third dimension… a small degree of protrusion... the two-dimensional forces would send this slightly off-balance object into the third dimension.

"In our own three-dimensional world…a piece of paper, on a table, being squished from all sides, would crumple upwards. It does have a place to move. The problem with the two-dimensional starship in the two-dimensional universe is, it doesn't 'know' it can move 'upwards'.

"This problem translates into the three-dimensional starship I propose to have built. How would it know it can move 'upwards' when it's so much more convenient to just explode? The neutron star is the answer."

"Mr. De Goug…" the king interrupted, "It has long been predicted and guessed at that neutron stars propel objects into some 'other dimension', but there is no proof. Why are you so sure?"

"I've done research, and I'm sure of it. It would only take a low-power star, one that's possible to control, and it must be in the exact center of gravity of the ship…

"If timed properly, the neutron star will send a selected, infinitesimal part of the ship into some other dimension, which will cause the normally-explosive pressure of the surrounding forces to merely "flip" the rest of the ship outside…"

"… and if this works", continued the king, "what will it look like, and how will you… return from this… 'outside' dimension?"

"To the observer, I'm not sure… I believe the ship will appear to get small very rapidly, perhaps just seeming to disappear all at once as soon as the process begins. After a few seconds, the ship's engines will turn off, and gravity will send the ship back to its exact starting location… that is, it will re-appear…"

Once again, he heard murmuring, and a distinct chuckle. "Gravity?" asked the king, skeptical.

"Well, yes… remember the flat piece of paper? The two-dimensional plane must be perpendicular to the force of gravity, or else everything would slide down to one side. A two-dimensional object flipped upwards by the process would fall back down, due to three-dimensional gravity. I've calculated exactly what needs to happen in order for my ship…" was it 'his ship' now? "…to flip directly upwards, that is, perpendicular to our plane, and fall back to where it once was."

"And you'll be on this ship while this is going on?"

"Yes. I don't know what I'll be able to observe, or if I can even observe anything in this state, but yes."

"I see…" the king looked troubled, but intrigued all the same. "Those who accept the validity of the experiment?" Almost every listener in the room raised their hand. One scholar, a balding man in his mid-40's, stood up.

"Mr. De Goug? I appreciate the innovation in this idea, but what about…"

For the next several minutes, Waet was asked questions about very technical, scientific things indeed, and answered them skillfully.

"Then, it's settled!" exclaimed the king, after no further questions. "For the remainder of the day, and until the scheduled… launch…? Ha! The scheduled launch, which will be at eight in the evening, our engineers will build Mr. De Goug's ship to its exact specifications. Denco, Mr. De Goug's papers, if you will…"

Apparently this was the name of the king's advisor. From his lower seat beside the king, Denco proceeded to get up and walk over to the front of the podium. Waet had selected nine papers, the neatest ones: they were the schematics and detailed descriptions of the ship. Cheerfully, he handed them to Denco, who to Waet's surprise exchanged a snarl so subtle that only Waet could see it. It seemed to say, "You were lucky."

When it was over, the various Knowledgeable ones filed to exit from the Room. Was his Hearing the last of the day? Waet himself stuffed the rest of his less important notes into his bag, again, and looked over to Rold, who looked ecstatic. "Waet, that was excellent!", he said in a not-so-hushed whisper.

"I do hope it works…" Waet replied, even though he himself couldn't help but feel satisfied with it.