"I hate it when they insinuate that they feel superior to us!" shouted Gwen. As a matter of course Ad had cast a Muffliato spell before they commenced their consultation.
Isabelle smiled, patting her shoulder to calm her. Gwen knitted her hands. She felt like smoking a cigarette, but that was, of course, out of the question; smoking was prohibited in the whole Ministry. There was one smoking room, but it wasn't in the Department of Mysteries.
"Well, they are not," Ad stated matter-of-factly. He went behind his desk, rummaged in one of his files and turned some pages. "Let's see. We are dealing here with a proprietary method…"
He closed the folder with a bang that made Gwen and Isabelle start, took another one out of his shelves and flipped through it. "Here we are," he murmured. "Section 378, Article 42, Confidentiality and Disclosure of Information, Paragraph d) Intra-departmental exchange of confidential information … hem hem hem …" He sat down.
Isabelle and Gwen looked at him, fascinated. Ademarus' lips were moving silently.
At last he lifted his pale face to look up at them as if astonished to find them still standing there.
"Well," he said, "in this specific case, Crow has to obtain the Head of Department's approval." He nodded at them. "We are dealing with an entirely new method, a method to isolate, extract, and conserve memories from a conserved brain, in our case. It is proprietary information," he added.
"He would not have to if we had not applied for a patent?" asked Gwen, looking relieved all the same.
"No, I assume not."
"Thanks, Ad."
Gwen and Isabelle left Ademarus' office, but Crow had already left the Brain Room. Bob, the Tank manager, was filling some liquid into the big tank, interrupting his work now and again to take measurements with the help of his wand. Steam emitted from the tank.
"Where is Crow?" Gwen asked Honoria, who was now talking animatedly to Eleanor Dusk. "How are you, Eleanor?"
"Crow has left since he is 'very tied-up at the moment'," Honoria made an effort to imitate Crow's sonorous voice. "He asks you to come to the Death Chamber and 'notify him of the result of your general meeting as soon as you've reached an understanding'."
"I am fine, thanks," Eleanor beamed at Gwen. Her blonde long hair fell like pure gold over her flowing long pink robes. "I am sneaking into the …er … Death Chamber to bring my husband his sandwiches. I put them all in my bag, instead of his."
Eleanor cast her eyes down shyly and Gwen smiled. She liked the younger woman, who had recently married Archibald Dusk, one of the Death Chamber staff members. Her loveliness and beauty seemed to do Archibald a world of good, he looked a lot less gloomy than he used to after his divorce. Well, the Death Chamber seems to make people a bit sombre. Perhaps Crow should look for a partner, too, Gwen thought.
"How are you doing in the Planet Room?" Gwen asked.
"Oh! Fine, I hope!" Eleanor beamed. "But I still have to learn a lot even though I've been working there for more than three months now! I'll tell you later, I must hurry to see Archie and then go back to my working place. Hope to see you at lunch." She waved at both women and rushed to the door leading to the Death Chamber.
Honoria and Gwen looked at each other grinning. "Young love," sighed Honoria, who was some ten years older than Eleanor. "How beautiful!" She looked at her wristwatch. "I must hurry now – have to prepare some things for the trance session." She turned, her flowing robes billowing in her wake.
Gwen went to the desk, where 'Ernie' was still floating lazily inside the small tank. The Brain Room was now devoid of people. Bob had left with some boxes and cases, Isabelle had gone to their office, Ad was still working in his own office, Firmin was nowhere to be seen, either.
Vivi had not returned from her mission in the hospital, and James Croaker was on leave for some weeks. James' job was the analysis of famous witches' and wizards' brains. Currently he examined Adalbert Waffling's brain, which Vivi had procured.
Gwen liked the atmosphere of the empty Brain Room, the silence, the shimmering green liquid in the tank, and its soft occasional gurgle, the bright lamp lights. She took a deep breath.
Shall I return you to the others? she thought looking at 'Earnie', which was still very sleepy. At this moment Bob returned.
"The solution inside the tank has been restored to its usual quality," he informed Gwen. "I am still analysing my vials of runespoor fang venom, some have the usual concentration, but some have not. I do not understand this." He looked worried and stressed. "They are always locked-up and normally nobody can tamper with them."
"Do you mean someone has…?"
"No, no," he said anxiously, "I do not know, I do not want to make accusations."
Gwen took 'Ernie' back to the big tank with the picker arm and released it inside so it could be restored to its usual "good humour". She'd fish it again later. She informed Bob of what she'd done, so he could adapt the solution again, since the transfer from the smaller to the big tank involved the entry of some of the former contaminated solution. He sighed and nodded.
She wanted to go to the Death Chamber and have a word with Crow.
~ooOOooOOooOOooOOoo~
Gwen opened the door leading to the Death Chamber. After the brightness of the Brain Room with its series of lamps hanging low on golden chains, the large rectangular Death Chamber was very gloomy. It was only dimly lit, and its cold air made Gwen shiver slightly. She looked down at the ancient stone archway that stood, unsupported by any surrounding wall, on a stone dais raised in the middle of a sunken stone pit. She steeled herself. It was not the first time that she had entered the Death Chamber and she knew about the tattered black veil that hung in the archway fluttering slightly even though the air was so quiet in here. She could hear those soft voices behind the veil, and felt their attraction. She did not descend the steep steps towards the pit, but remained on the highest level.
She looked at the doors and wondered which one lead to Crow's office. Two men emerged from one door, one, in his sixties, was slender and tall and wore a short white beard, the other was a black, tall, muscular wizard with spectacles and black hair in his forties. Both were talking in low voices. Gwen knew Alex Campbell, and Ivo Gilmour. They and Mercia Borthwick formed a team and were concerned with the study of afterlife.
"Excuse me, Mr Campbell, Mr Gilmour," Gwen addressed them. "Could you please tell me where I can find Mr Crow."
"I suppose he is in his office," replied Ivo Gilmour with his deep voice. He looked at her, his eyes twinkling behind his spectacles. "It is the second door right here." He pointed to one of the line of doors on Gwen's right side.
"Thank you," she said. She'd never have found it alone. There were no names at any of the doors and the line of doors continued on the other wall.
~ooOOoo~
"I see."
That was all Suplinius Crow said, his lips curling in a faint sneer, when Gwen had told him that the Head of Department had to give her approval.
Gwen folded her arms. Silence fell like a heavy cloak. She just stared at him, not daring to look around leisurely in his meticulously tidy office. Everything seemed to be straight and correct in here. A screen in the centre shielded the rest of the room from curious looks.
"Well," Crow looked at her and stood up. "Then I'll go and ask her. I'll approach you and your team as soon as she gives her approval."
Gwen nodded, turned around and left Crow's office.
She wondered whether Agatha Hill would give her consent. Surely she would ask Crow why he needed to learn the new technique, and he would not dare not to tell her. When Agatha Hill looked at you with her sharp steel-blue eyes, you would not try to withhold the truth. But then, Crow seemed to be a really superb occlumens, Gwen thought. After having studied the subject with the help of 'Earnie' (and some other brains) for some time, she could tell by now.
She looked for some instants at the veil, fascinated by its fluttering and the soft voices that seemed to call her. She and Isabelle had often wondered why they heard those voices, while Ademarus, for instance, did not. There were rumours, only those who had been with someone who died could hear them, others ascribed the voices to a particularly high sensivity, others argued it depended whether one believed in an afterlife, or not, and those who did could hear the voices. The Death Chamber staff, as usual, maintained their silence. She rubbed her arms to warm them.
Then she saw Alex Campbell emerging from his office. He extracted his wand and started descending the stairs to the Arch. When he noticed Gwen, he stopped and waited silently until she left the chilly chamber.
~ooOOoo~
Back in her usual working place she blinked at the sudden brightness, and took a deep breath of relief.
"Ah bon, there you are. What did Crow say?" asked Isabelle eagerly, when she caught sight of Gwen. She was busy working with Jérôme and Dolly, the latter being a brain with no occlumentic or legilimentic abilities whatsoever, scribbling something on a sheet of parchment.
"He was not overly excited when I told him he needed Hill's consent, but he's going to ask her," Gwen informed her colleague.
Isabelle nodded. "So that's cleared, then. Hem, t'sais, I think I found the place in the brain where the legilimency happens. There is a small area inside the legilimens' brain that is more active than the one of a – let's say – normal wizard. I don't know whether this is either congenital or acquired. Anyway, this area seems to be activated as soon as you put it in front of a person, or even in front of …er… another brain."
Isabelle pointed to an area somewhat down on the backside of the brain.
Gwen looked at her with interest. Up to now she had been examining the Occlumentic brains, and Isabelle the Legilimentic ones, but they always discussed their work and theories amongst themselves and with Ad.
At this instant Ademarus left his office, and joined them at their table in the Brain Room. Isabelle told him about her findings, and he nodded earnestly.
"Does it matter whether you expose the brain to someone with Occlumentic abilities?" he asked her thoughtfully.
"Yes, indeed. When I put it in front of a non-Occlumens – that is Dolly, in our case – and use the Measuring spell, I can determine a rise in energy, which remains steady," Isabelle replied. "But if I put it in front of an Occlumens, I can measure just a short peak of activity, a sudden drop, and then nothing more."
"Perhaps this part of the Legilimentic brain is able to receive waves … waves containing images or something like this," Gwen blurted out.
"Well," Ad looked at her, "what an idea! What makes you say that? Waves – that sounds quite Mugglish." He shook his head. "Anyway, I have to leave for a while, Agatha Hill wants to see me about this Crow business. Let's discuss this topic later on."
Gwen and Isabelle watched him leaving, they could tell he did not like to abandon his work. They resumed their debate.
"Waves?" Isabelle looked at Gwen, puzzled.
"Well, it is a Muggle concept. I read an article about brain activity in a Muggle magazine the other day," Gwen shrugged. "They talk about waves." She took a quill and drew a wave on a piece of parchment. "They say, there are different types of waves, alpha, beta, theta and delta waves and so on."
"J'vais voir," Isabelle mused. "I'll see what I can do. Perhaps you can show me this article? How are you doing with your Occlumentic brains?"
"Oh, I've made similar tests to identify activity, but as Ernie shows some anomalies, I have to repeat some of them. Yet up to now, everything points to the same area you showed me. Isn't that a bit strange?"
~ooOOooOOooOOoo~