Fred's Quest - Chapter 150: Symptoms and remedies.…

"There are three symptoms," the dragoness stated solemnly. "No information was given in this book about the length of time between the appearance of symptoms....at least in the parts that were still legible! But, there was a vivid warning about how much time we'd have to remedy the problem before it was too late: an hour!"

Grim faces all around are all that the dragoness who is Chairing this meeting sees.

"Now," she says. "We have the three symptoms, happening in this order. First, there would be unexplained transportation of analogs from other planes of existence.....and perhaps temporary swapping of physical locations from one Otherworld to another. Second is something like the second, but it involves permanent swaps between worlds....in other words, the place isn't going anyplace! The last involves the pull of gravity itself; severe spells of noticeable increases and decreases in Terra's pull on objects.....so if you feel light headed.....it might not be just a figure of speech."

"Now I was not trying to alarm people," Malachi begins. "Well, you sure are doing a good job at it." murmurs Astra under her breath. "But when the symptoms start to occur, the safety features of the slipgates are removed. I am only aware of one safety, but the books says there are others. The safety deals with teleporting the user of the Crystallic while the user was holding the item. If the safeties off, the user can transport himself anywhere without fear of destroying the Crystallic nor being stuck between universes.

"Sometimes the user gets lucky and neither his item nor himself get zapped by the safeguard.....rare but it happens." The dragoness warns. "Our Dragon Synizn unintentionally challeneged the safety by forcing the Cyrstallic to transport self and adventurers to Panaras (re: 2244). See, the slipgate you arrived on was in rubble.....and therefore out of commission. Yes, you contacted something in charge of the slipgates, it could only take all of you so far.....the Crystallic took up the slack."

"I saved the....'best' issue for last," Malachi states. "That way, the other issues, which ARE important, could be resolved and people be in a good frame of mind to come up with something to the problem at hand. See...."

The dragoness sighs and shakes her head before continuing.

"See.....Moondancer totally destroyed the one page that listed the remedies for breakdown," the dragoness sighs. " All that was left was a sentence stating that there were two ways of doing it, one mor sure than the other. I hope that somebody......"

"Say no more," Demi-fox Synizn chuckles. "I happen to know that the process that destroys a Cyrstallic!" He then explains (re: 1807).

"And since the source I got this information from was Atlantian literature-though in the same class as what you have there, Malchi-so it should work."

"Uh....I think I have a doubt I've got to share," Probe states, worried about something. "It's obvious that Malachi is worried about the possibility of the Enemy nuke in Gelda has shortened the operational life of the slipgates. However.....this solution sounds like it never took into account what kind of damage is crawling around inside the slipgate system. I mean what if you go out and smash the Crystallics .... Yeah ....and find out that something in the 'off switch' is dinked up by the the damage done to the slipgate system? Then what?"

"Well," Malachi murmurs. "That's what I was going to cover next.

"While you folks who are going out to fix things up with the Crystallics.....ALL of you keep eyes and ears out for anything....even wild rumors....on what the second way of shutting down the slipgate system, take notes!" the dragoness says. "More than that....nothing I can do or say about it.

"Meeting adjourned."

Malachi's image flickers, leaving only the image of Probe staring at the mirror, dumbly.

A 'Keep you ears open and eyes peeled' message?! Probe thinks to himself. Good NIGHT!! Then again.....that's what I and my family of spies are good for!

As the meeting breaks up, Probe calls his brothers and sister spies/AI/Golems and told them the story. One AI is "absent." A quick scroll through his messages told him what had happened. The Phantoms, the equivalent to the CIA of the old USA, had given orders that she would be on special assignment and was under radio silence......

Probe saw that the message was authentic, and then said a few choice words (to himself) about the Phantom agents preferences in....certain areas that needn't be mentioned here!

Though legal and on the up and up, it would have still been nice to let the sight supervisor: Probe, in on the little gag!

1. Now then......

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