a battery of tests

It was dawn and it was moist. Green droplets clung to everything. Ossip spied a beautiful spider web, laced in dewy pearls. He hugged his jacket tighter about himself as he trotted behind Lorelei’s long legs.

Ossip was handling an enormous suitcase. It hobbled him as he tried to keep up. The doctor too was carrying a suitcase, even larger than Ossip’s but he carried it as if it were empty and not full of bespoke equipment that he had built just for the occasion.

They arrived a the portal. The slit Lorelei had taken to calling it. Ossip noticed that Lorelei was angrier lately. He had been snapping at everybody and occasionally mutilating Marrionetta when she said things he didn’t like. Ossip hoped that a day of running experiments would put the doctor in a better mood. Ossip himself was excited about the tests. He could put the trials and the braintrust and the whole maggoty situation he felt overwhelmed by aside. He could focus instead on logging read outs, measuring currents, notating only what was provable.

Ossip had always been aware of the portal. Everyone on the circus grounds knew that it was somewhere. He was surprised when the doctor told him that he had identified its exact location. He knew vaguely that it was somewhere near the big top. He had always assumed that’s why the big top had been erected where it was. The steady stream of Dreaming Damned was such an ordinary part of circus operations that he had never thought to locate or study the portal itself. Ossip had always been more fascinated by the people who came through, rather than the medium supplying them.

The Dreaming Damned were haunting and marvelous, in Ossip’s opinion. They were graceful. Everything they did was a smooth, uninterrupted gesture. Like the little ballerinas in a lady’s jewelry box. They never seemed perturbed by anything, although a few would come through with ghastly expressions on their faces. Still, no matter their apparent demeanor upon arrival, they always seemed to light up at the circus acts. Their vacant eyes would glow. Their gapes and horrors would turn to creasing joy and wide smiles. The strangest part was how quickly they could unclasp their hands and applaud, even as everything else about them was placid and still. Ossip loved the Dreaming Damned. They were so curious and strange. And they paid his meal ticket.

Lorelei was unloading his suitcase. He produced a number of small contraptions that were meant for scientific observation. There was a photo-scatter spectometer, a sono-echo collector, open diodes, conductive pigment,  telescopic binoculars, and a combination claw-crowbar.

Ossip opened his suitcase. Inside was a large, leather bound ledger, a pencil, and an electric generator with a hand crank. To Ossip, the generator appeared to have a face. It looked upset.

Lorelei took a palm full of the conductive pigment and gently blew it towards the portal. The pigment was silver and glittered in the air. To Ossip’s amazement, bits of pigment clung to the portal, making it more visible than ever.

Both man and boy were momentarily stayed by the enunciated appearance of the portal. It — the slit– had a jagged configuration. Its line shifted this way and that as if had been torn through the thin air. Very subtly, it seemed to billow and undulate. It was mesmerizing, shimmering in the cold cling of morning.

Lorelei smirked and selected a diode. He also had a clothespin. He attempted to clasp the diode to portal, pinching at either side of the portal, trying to make the diode stay. Ossip felt himself perk up as he watched the doctor’s hands move about the seam of the portal. It was taking a while. Every time the doctor seemed just on the verge of getting the clothespin to stay, the fold of the portal seemed to slip out of his grasp. Evidently there was a silken quality to its membrane that made it difficult to work with.

“Hmmm,” Lorelei sniffed the air and put the diode back in his tool kit. “Interesting.”

Next, he took out the photo-scatter spectometer. “Ossip,” he said. “Get the ledger. I’ll need you to write down some numbers.

Lorelei began pointing the spectometer at the portal. It pulsed flashes of light. First, white light. Then blue. Then red. Lorelei called out numbers as the colors rotated through several times.

Once that was done, Lorelei picked up the crowbar with the claw at the end.

“No,” said Ossip instinctively. Lorelei looked at him. Ossip hunched his shoulders, certain that he had irritated the doctor. He expected a tongue lashing.

Instead, the doctor looked at the crowbar for a long time. “Perhaps you’re right,” said Lorelei. “No need to get carried away so early.” Lorelei set down the crowbar and instead picked up the telescopic binoculars.

The binoculars’s shaft was as long as Lorelei’s arm. It widened towards the lenses, creating immense magnification at the other end. So when Lorelei peered through the binoculars, to focus the lenses, Lorelei’s blue eyes appeared sensationally enlarged at the other end. Ossip stifled a laugh. The doctor did not notice.

Once he was satisfied with the focus, Lorelei turned the telescopic binoculars towards the portal. With care, he nestled the end of the binoculars into the portal. It was an exciting moment. Lorelei, forgetting himself and the entire stupidity of the insolent circus, looked at Ossip with genuine feeling. Their eyes met in a passionate salute to scientific observation.

Lorelei then proceeded to push the binoculars through the seam. They entered despite a snug sense of resistance.

Lorelei’s insane face lit up with emotions that Ossip had never seen in him before. With an open mouth, Lorelei peered through the binoculars. His breathing became heavy.

Ossip felt freshly the morning dew clinging all over his face and hands. He stood at attention for a long time but the doctor just proceeded to look without speaking.

“Can I see?” Ossip asked quietly.