-Hey there guys, it´s been a while since I posted something... I think almost three years! Well, what can I say? I am back and I will post a few chapters on this story and of course on some other project. I plan 2019 to be a more productive year. So stay tuned and have fun with that chapter :)-

Keswick was still puzzled. After all Dudley´s clue 'You´re needed in the lab' was a bit cryptically. But if he´s really needed there, he wouldn´t hide away whatever´s waiting there for him. Bravely he stepped into the lab and he understood what Dudley meant.

If the dog had told him 'Work with the human scientist' he would probably never set a foot into his former domain that was conquered by this insolent wannabe scientist. He would have probably went on this train job with them.

Keswick had to gulp down his anger which stirred in him from only seeing this Isaac guy and walked to the scientist who sat on a chair that was too small for him and was bend over a piece of paper which lay on a table which also was too small for him. All in all he looked a little like an adult that had to sit on a table for a fourth grader.

This ridiculous view brightened Keswick´s mood to the point that he was able to grin a little. The fourth grade would actually the only place where his behavior would be appropriate. Keswick´s eyes fell on the sheet of paper in front of him and he frowned.

The signs were all Greek to him… well not actually Greek but they were foreign. Different from everything he had ever seen and heard of. He couldn´t tell if Isaac was calculating something of just did some creative writing. The only way to find out was asking him.

Keswick cleared his throat and the scientist almost fall from his chair. "Dammit!" he yelled and panted heavily. "Why are you scaring me?! Is that some kind of primitive initiation rite?"
"No…" Keswick was able to remain friendly despite of this dig, mostly because he felt satisfaction from scaring him. "I was send here by Dudley to help you."

"You?" Isaac stood up from his chair and looked judgingly down at the little scientist. Isaac started circling around him still eying him critically. "Hmm... I was not hoping so but lacking other alternatives you seem to be the best I can get. Okay, you are hired… on probation."

"Pardon?" Asked Keswick. "I am an t..t..trained and skilled scientist!"
"Oh, of course you are." Said Isaac laughed with a voice so loaded with arrogance that Keswick clenched his fist. The little rebel was never a friend of violence, not even after the invasion.

Of course, things that had to be done were done and he wasn´t proud of them. But this guy made him so angry he wanted to punch him right into this impudently grinning face. But Keswick restrained himself, after all these aliens were the only chance for them to survive this.

"Keswick was your name or am I mistaken?" Asked Isaac as he walked to a part of the lab that he had obviously refurnished. Gone was the variety of colors of dirt of that has colored the old rotten tables. A circular shining white table top hovered calmly over the ground and on it was nothing but a big glass flask filled with a blue transparent fluid.

Keswick looked intrigued at the fluid.
"Yes." He meant with his eyes fixed at whatever behind the glass was. "K..K..Keswick."
"Okay, Keswick, before we start I have a few questions for you." Isaac grabbed a device from the table that reminded him of a pencil but in the next second it emitted light from its side. It seemed to be some kind of clipboard.

"Just a..a..ask." the scientist sighed expecting Isaac to spit venom but instead Keswick was disabused quickly as the tall man asked his first question.
"Well…" Isaac started writing something on his clipboard and then handed it to him. "Solve this."

"Uhm… w…w…what is that?" Keswick tilted the scree to the side, maybe the letters would make more sense if he read them from top to bottom.

"The basic equation for a tachyon field with altering particle flow." Isaac meant and turned it back. "I have solved most of the differential equations for you, this should not be too hard. I give you… hmm… an hour. Yes you have an hour to interpret it."

"Just an hour?!" Asked the little scientist. "This is 1000 years ahead of everything I have ever seen!"
"Well, that is not my fault, is it?" retorted Isaac and Keswick couldn´t help but see the little grin on his lips. That guy wanted to test him, and Keswick would show him what he was made of.

Keswick took a deep breath and stared at the clipboard. This formula must have a logical structure so all this variables in front of him must be have a background in some way. But for interpreting this formula he needed to know these backgrounds and it would need more than 10 years of concentrated research to find out the formulas or constants that these variables represented.

There was no way that he could just interpret that.
Keswick´s eyes stared disillusioned on the hologram. He wasn´t even staring at this for one minute and already knew that it was pointless to keep on. Dead end.

"That´s p..p..plainly unfair!" protested Keswick turning around on his chair waving the clipboard. "I can´t solve that without more background!"
Isaac looked up from the papers over which he sat. "Pardon?"

"I can´t give you an interpretation for that without any further information!" Keswick hopped of his chair and walked to Isaac to lay the clipboard back onto the table. But the scientist stopped him with a dismissive gesture.

"Look at the lower left corner of the board. There is a library that should provide you with some helpful information."
"Oh…" Keswick spun on his heel and climbed his chair silently.

He had to admit that he could have seen that if he had paid more attention on the whole device he was holding. There was a good visible symbol with a little book on it in the lower left corner. That must have been the additional information Isaac talked about.

Not knowing what expected him Keswick pushed the button and… it was indescribable. Keswick suddenly had access to knowledge he had not even dream of. New techniques, theories, experimental proofs about things that were far beyond sci-fi for him were suddenly revealed and lay open in front for him ready to be read.

And the little scientist didn´t hesitate a second to sink into a world consisting of numbers and logic.
"Hey, are you done?" Isaac tapped his shoulder. His cold blue eyes looked expectantly at Keswick. But Keswick just looked embarrassed at the tabletop. He had completely forgotten about his task after diving into this reservoir of almost endless knowledge.

"Wha…What?" Keswick looked perplexed at the clock at the wall of the lab. Already more than an hour has passed and that brought Keswick into a more than sticky situation. He glided of his chair and scratched the back of his head while giggling. "Uhm… about the i..i..interpretation…"

"You do not have a bit, right?" Isaac crossed his arms frowning seriously.
"Oh, well I…" Keswick tried desperately to find an excuse for his failure. But Isaac seemed to understand the way he acted.

"Why did you not have any results?" Isaac sighed annoyed and started massaging his temples with closed eyes.
"Well, I… I was just carried away delving through the library… I c..c..couldn´t stop reading."

The circular motions with which Isaac´s fingers ran over his temples suddenly stopped. "Excelent." The scientist started grinning and opened his eyes. Eagerly he grabbed Keswick´s holoboard and tapped furiously with his fingers on it.

"Fantastic, really, you read 20 entries! That is more than I could expect. You even read the one about the common quantum field theory." Isaac grinned down at the short scientist that felt weird receiving so much high praise from his tall colleague.

"Indeed. It was quite i..i..intriguing. Especially the parts that allow you the manipulation of fields for a practical use."
"You would not believe what some institutes made with fields." Isaac uttered an almost romantically sounding sigh. "Imagine a whole building made from artificial fields. It´s almost like creating matter from nowhere!"

"Isn´t that a bit i..i..inefficient?" Keswick asked crossing his arms.
"Sure, of course, but it is so impressive to see that, to walk on that, to lay your hand on it and realized that it feels like normal stone. Much better than holograms that just use weak fields. You really think it is real. Well, until they switch of the power." Isaac laughed abated and ended on an almost melancholy note. "Then the dream dies."

"I wish I c..c..could see these dreams." Keswick voice captured the melancholy and reflected an almost depressive mood back to Isaac.
For the first time since they arrived, and only for a brief moment, Isaac´s expression resembled something similar like compassion.

"I could tell you." The tall scientist meant trying not to let his words mirror the pity his face expressed for a few seconds.
"No… No we have b..b..better things to do right now." Keswick meant and cleaned his scratched glasses with his dirty labcoat.

"Indeed, we do have." Isaac cleared his throat and typed a few things onto the holo clipboard before he handed it back to Keswick. "But right now you are not a big help for me. The best thing you can do now is reading the chapters I just marked. One is about communications the other is about cybernetic. We will have to expand your knowledge on this so you have at least a base." Isaac looked with a disgusted face at the walls. "And we have to do it from the limited and primitive resources we have. René will come and help us after he optimized this pitiful joke of a generator."

There he was again, Keswick was almost afraid not seeing Isaac being a jerk. He had nearly reconsidered his image of him. Smiling a little he walked back to his seat and started reading. Isaac was right about that one thing, he wasn´t a big help. Yet. But Keswick would change that quick, this time he would show him what he was made of!