Seven Point Eight The First Chronicle - By Marie A. Harbon Page 0,32

be able to withstand the speed travelled on a train, or when we believed flight was impossible, but it happened. That’s not to say it will be easy. Mankind has always been destined for the stars, ever since we gazed at the heavens through a telescope.”

Grace looked over at him, with a strangely enigmatic smile on her face, like a geriatric version of the Mona Lisa.

Paul had a sense of déjà vu as he completed a thesis on his findings at The Institute, and he found himself standing before a committee, the ones who pulled the strings for this particular facility. It was a somewhat smaller board, comprising of Max and two funding directors.

They used the communal living area as a makeshift presentation area, with the three members of the board sitting at the tables adjacent to the bay window. It was more informal, as they had cups of tea and a plateful of digestive biscuits on which to pontificate. The residents were either upstairs undergoing testing, or they had the day off. Paul stood before them, notes in hand, and his typed report sat on the table in front of Max.

“Thank you for the time and hard work you’ve put in here at The Institute,” Max began. “Please, summarise your findings.”

Paul cleared his throat and glanced at his notes.

“Although I came to no definite conclusions, I was able to hypothesise on the source and methodology of the residents’ abilities.”

The two funding directors watched him in a deadpan kind of way, but Max’s expression offered more encouragement.

“Let’s start with Emilie. In the case of her telepathy, I surmise that the human brain transmits some kind of radio wave and that Emilie has the ability to receive this transmission. However, the more I investigated, the more I realised that the signal appeared to be almost instantaneous. In a few cases, she received the signal before it was transmitted. It’s possible that light itself is the carrier wave for this signal, or that there’s some other, hitherto unknown process at large.”

The funding directors began to look more interested in what he had to say.

“With Beth and Peter’s ability to contact the dead, the question is…does a part of us live on after death? Does, in fact, the electromagnetic field I measured in humans previously, still exist when the body has deceased? And furthermore, is it possible to communicate with it? Perhaps this field is indeed the soul, and it lives in another reality from our own.”

Max leafed through the more extensive report, to the relevant section.

“Regarding Oscar and George’s remote viewing, I can only deduce that a sensory part of the electromagnetic field leaves the body and travels to another location. They don’t report any data other than sight and sound, but it would be interesting if it were possible to apply smell, touch, and taste to the experience. The field should transmit all this information, through a mind-body relationship.”

His audience now gave him their full attention.

“Sakie has the most extraordinary electromagnetic field. It’s ten times more powerful than anything I’ve previously encountered, and radiates much further from her body than anything measured at The Establishment. It’s almost like there is an…intensity dial somewhere in the brain, which is set differently in each person.”

“And finally, Grace. Last, but certainly not least. Her accuracy goes way beyond what would be expected by chance alone, in terms of specific key points that can be verified. At first, I speculated that the future casts some sort of shadow that can be picked up in the present…an emotional, psychic shock wave that can travel backwards in time, like a theoretical particle called the tachyon. Additionally, I considered that the future is also a direct result of actions in the present. Therefore, predictions become as logical as when we see dark clouds in the sky, we know rain is likely. I’m not sure it’s this simple in Grace’s case.”

“When we look into the future, it exists as a state of probabilities. By that, I mean that until we make an observation, all possibilities exist at once in a quantum never-never land. Grace made a prediction concerning a blonde goddess who will be found dead, lying on her bed, with the phone in her hand. Until someone discovers her body, she is potentially alive and dead at the same time, the outcome has not been determined.”

“Why is this… indeterminacy important?” Max queried.

“It could explain why Grace is not correct all the time, despite her uncanny sense of the