The Alchemist’s Portal

The Alchemist’s Portal

by

Kim Acco

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locations, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

World Castle Publishing, LLC

Pensacola, Florida

Copyright © Kim Acco 2019

Smashwords Edition

Paperback ISBN: 9781951642044

eBook ISBN: 9781951642051

First Edition World Castle Publishing, LLC, November 25, 2019

http://www.worldcastlepublishing.com

Smashwords Licensing Notes

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in articles and reviews.

Cover: Karen Fuller

Editor: Maxine Bringenberg

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we are not contending against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore, take the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. Stand therefore, having fastened the belt of truth around your waist, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the equipment of the gospel of peace; besides all these, taking the shield of faith, with which you can quench all the flaming darts of the Evil One. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Pray at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints….

Ephesians 6: 10 - 18

CHAPTER 1

Somewhere in the seventeenth century in Prussia, astronomers were observing the night sky and saw a very bright shooting star that was accompanied by a resounding thunderous clap. They were mystified by this sound heard on a clear, moonless night. The ground shook beneath them, leading to the inference that the star had struck the earth.

The astronomers charted the trajectory of the star to locate the landing site. After a long search, they came across a swath of felled trees in a forest. At the center, a large rock lay broken into fragments. They imparted much significance to the rock because it had fallen from the heavens. Every piece was collected for research. Not long after that day, the men who handled the rock fell ill with symptoms of vomiting, bleeding, burns, and peeling skin. There were ensuing fatalities, and it was concluded that they had to contain the specimens safely. By chance, they chose a large, lead coffin.

The alchemists of that time received news of the incident and wanted to investigate the possibility of an undiscovered ore. A group of three delegates journeyed to a farm near the landing site where the coffin was stored. After interrogating the farm’s residents, they realized the lead contained the sickness that emanated from the ore. For protection against the hazard of contamination, they fabricated lead armor and glass to properly examine it.

A rich aristocrat who was a great supporter of alchemy lived in a castle in the neighboring region. He met with the alchemists and invited them to carry out their experiments in his personal laboratory. His wealth provided them with everything else that they needed.

The delegates were God fearing men, as many were in that era. Since the object had fallen from the sky and exhibited powerful properties to kill men by striking them with invisible rays, they were convinced that it must have arrived directly from Heaven itself. These particular alchemists were strong adherents to a principle that a gateway established between Heaven and Earth would aid to achieve higher levels of spiritual enlightenment or purification. Sharing this school of thought, they endeavored to build the gateway. So far, they had been unsuccessful with the available materials of science in its infancy. It was proposed among themselves to try again with the strange, cosmic metal. After several trials of alloying the ore with different metals to provide malleability and cohesion, the best result was yielded with a substance called molybdena. Since the goal was to create a passage from one place to another, they ultimately decided to cast the mixture into a shape of a door frame. Arcane symbols and religious art were inscribed on it. The delegates had hoped with the right incantation that they could at least establish a connection or bridge a line of communication. Stepping through would be the next phase.

The aristocrat and the alchemists were gathered in the laboratory.

A man in a skullcap started to recite the incantation. Oh, Sophia, you gave birth to the son of chaos. Lord, cast him out of this world, the source of evil and the sullying of our spirits. We have created this passage, forged with metal that rained down from the sky like manna from Heaven. We beseech you to boil away the impurities and the poisoning metals that corrode our souls. Take our putrefied flesh and distill it until only that which is pleasing to you remains. Clarify and pour the extract into our original molds. Return us to this world whole and purified. With this door, let us pass through death and resurrect anew like your Son, the male ore of purity.

One of the alchemists who wore a monk’s habit stepped forward from the rest. He faced his palms towards the gateway and said, Lord, like Jacob, we consecrate this creation as a gate to Heaven, a ladder by which we can ascend to You, a path to climb, to pass through its summit and to descend from it in holiness. Expose the sacred lapis within, the divinity in us all that is buried in our corrupted bodies.

The frame started to vibrate, which incited them to persist with their experiment. The pitch of the vibration increased, while the frame began to glow with intensifying luminescence. The men became frightened and stopped chanting. They backed away from the light and shielded their eyes. There was a great flash of light that immersed the encompassing area.

Far away from the castle, in Rome, the Vatican had received intelligence of the discovery of the ore, as they were vigilant of alchemists’ activities. An envoy was summoned into the papal office and was commanded to travel to the castle for reconnaissance. He hastened to the location, but when he finally reached it, he did not find anyone to speak to. Instead, the castle was barren of any life. The former occupants were nowhere to be found. He began to search the laboratory for clues leading to their whereabouts and to find samples of the ore.

Then the envoy approached a stove and noticed its shadow behind it. The shadow mystified him because he was unable to discern the source of light causing it, and saw that there was a second shadow made by the sunlight streaming in from a window. His eyes came across more shadows of objects on a table against a wall. He lifted a mortar and was astonished that its outline remained in its place against the wall. He touched the shadow to see if it was really there. Then he saw what he believed to be the silhouette of a clergyman, judging by the shape of the vestment and the tonsured head. The discovery of two more shadows made his blood curdle. An abomination had occurred and needed to be investigated. He swallowed his fear and hunted fruitlessly for any traces of the ore. With providential care, he gathered up the drawings and documents of the alchemists and returned to Rome with a detailed report. Wild theories about the event were spawned from the limited knowledge of those times. Eventually, the deep mystery was pared down to a fleeting curiosity. Nobody was able to confirm if the event had actually happened. The alchemists’ research remained archived throughout the ages.

* * *

On the moon, somewhere in the latter half of the twenty-first century, Doctors Jonathan Fullam and Satako Matsuo were resident petrologists employed by the Terran Paramining Company. They walked together down a hallway to the locker room where the radiation suits were kept. Fullam chose a double extra-large size to accommodate his height, while Matsuo picked a small one because there was nothing smaller. The pair unhooked the suits from their pegs and sat down on a bench to remove their gecko boots, whose soles provided increased traction in the lower gravity. They started to pull the gear over their form fitting gravity jumpsuits.

This one smells like B O, said Doctor Matsuo, as she gathered up the excess of one of the legs.

It’s that or the smell of your rotting flesh from a radiation burn, replied Fullam.

You’re a dull killjoy.

Mine smells like poo.

The petrologists slipped on the protective boots and finished with gecko overshoes. They inspected the security of each other’s suits then returned to the hallway, carried on in the prior direction, and entered a concrete room. A large shipping container with incorporated electronic gauges sat isolated in a corner.

Doctor Fullam moved to a quietly chirping gauge. He tapped the keys of its display a few times, reading the data provided with each function. Okay, no changes in the last seventy-two hours. I think we can put it on the test rig.

An hour had passed when the two doctors finally removed their suits and had safely installed themselves in an adjacent viewing room. The laboratory was crammed with monitors, touch pads, and complex meters of varying designs. Through a dark green visor, a sedan-sized block of nondescript stone was seen clasped in a sophisticated vise.

Matsuo set her eyes on a monitor and saw that the stone’s image was too distant. She tapped the screen to activate a zoom and slid the function for a better view. Turning on X-ray, she said, using the touch pad in front of her. On the screen, a ghostly picture revealed that a rectangular frame was stationed within the rock. Unknown interior solid confirmed. She took a moment to form her next thought. Maybe it’s just a piece of building material that was inadvertently buried during the mine’s construction.

Fullam weighed the hunch. Good theory, but they found it far from the site. Also, there is no record of its shipment to the moon. And why is it radioactive?

Maybe the rock itself is exhibiting an undiscovered geological trait. It’s only ten years since we’ve started mining here. We can’t know everything yet, Matsuo replied. Fullam nodded reluctantly. Let’s find out its true shape, she continued. I’m turning on MRI.

She reached up, flipped a safety cap, and pressed the button behind it. The din of pulsating machinery and ventilation began gently in the background. They waited for the MRI to finish. Hearing a bell, they looked up at a screen where the completed image presented itself and dumbfounded them. It was a door frame covered with dozens of bizarre etchings. They refrained from immediate comments.

What the heck is that doing inside there? Fullam finally asked. Those look like alchemic symbols!

Matsuo eyes widened with surprise. How do you know that? Is that a hobby of yours? She zoomed in one of the etchings. Look, a dodecahedron. What about all this other medieval stuff? She dragged the pointer from one cryptic character to another and stopped on one of them. What’s this?

Fullam moved closer to the monitor to look at a cross topped with a circle and crowned with a crescent. It’s the symbol for mercury. He tore his eyes away from the monitor and bent down over the touch pad in front of him. I want to try another view. Initiating gamma ray, he said, touching the keypad.

No, wait! We don’t— said Matsuo. He quickly withdrew his fingers from the pad. We could have tried a micrograph first.

Not today, we couldn’t.

The pair apprehensively turned their heads to a new monitor. The frame started to vibrate and the symbols began to glow. They stood up and backed away from the laboratory equipment before them as it all began to shudder violently. The monitor now commanded their attention, and they watched the door frame disappear in a blinding light. Matsuo sprung for the laboratory’s panic button on the wall behind her and slapped it down hard as a white flash flooded the room instantaneously.

* * *

It was the middle of June in Washington, D.C., Magister Wilhelmina Grand had already been given the location of her first assignment, having been ordained several days ago at the basilica. The diocese had billeted her at a convent in the city. She returned from her usual morning run and was heavy with anticipation. She took a shower, pinned up her mahogany brown hair, and dressed in a crisp, new clerical shirt. After fastening her collar, she thought it felt too tight. They had warned her that it may seem to constrict for a little while. Just don’t gain weight, they kept teasing. She walked briskly down the floor’s main hall to a stairwell and hurried down the steps. There she greeted an aging nun curtly, causing her veil to billow as she swiftly passed her. The nun opened her mouth for a reply, but Will was gone.

Will was going to the first meeting with her supervisor, Magister Levin Kraal, Director of the World Mission Department, Special Branch. She could not get a clear answer from anyone as to what the specialty was. Her colleagues only offered vague notions of faraway, isolated locales where they use animal fat to burn for reading lamps. They wished her luck finding coffee shops.

Magister Kraal was away from his office at the seminary most of the time, so it was a rare occasion for anyone to meet him there. The opportunity had never risen for Will, which made her flex her imagination concerning his physical appearance to include stereotypes of old men. She pictured someone in need of an ear hair trim, and who was decrepit and desiccated with wiry, unruly eyebrows. A portly man was visualized with a variety of health problems that would slow them down while conducting services. This portrait led to the notion that perhaps she was hired to do all the leg work while he stationed himself somewhere comfortable to do the paperwork, snacking on whatever he could reach at arm’s length. The idea vexed her a little. She shook the negative thoughts away and softly touched the doorbell.

Magister Kraal answered it and trampled on the presuppositions about his appearance. He was tall and had a lean build. Penetrating blue eyes highly contrasted with kempt, snow white hair. With a smile, he motioned to the interior of the office. It’s a pleasure to meet you, Magister Grand. Please come in and take a seat.

The pleasure is mine, Will replied. She looked at the two chairs in front of the desk. Both were occupied with towers of books.

Oh, pardon me, Kraal said. He cleared the books off the nearest chair and piled them on the desk. She sat down while he sat on the other side, disappearing behind the pile and all the other clutter already there. Sorry for this mess, he said, as he casually shoved aside some of the disorder to see her. How was the ceremony? There were seven of you, right?

Yes, it was deeply moving, Will replied, and pressed a hand on her chest, and overwhelming, but in a good way. All those people wanting to be blessed. There was a lot of food at the reception.

"Gras before the fast," he said half seriously.

She said nothing for a moment, not knowing how to reply. Well, fasting is not a problem for me. Sometimes I choose to go hungry rather than eat from the cafeteria here.

Kraal laughed politely at her lame comment. "You won’t catch me eating their senate bean soup every day. No, we won’t be starving ourselves. However, we do need to stay fit, so we should lay off the desserts as much as possible. There are unique requirements for service in this department. Maybe you