This one's for Bonni whose article gave me the original idea and Matthew whose wonderful pictures inspired a large part of it. Matthew has given kindly me permission to use his picture to illustrate this story. Please ask his permission to use any of his work, thanks. |
"The Helinth"
"Oh what the heck !" shouted Jim.
He had just hung a Unicorn wind chime near his large living room window, where it would catch the sunlight, when his phone rang. He looked at his watch and sighed, he only got one type of phone call at nine o'clock at night. He put his hammer down sharply on the shelf.
"Work again !" his wife said cooly, as she had picked up the phone and knew she would be going to bed on her own once again that night. Jim walked over and with a grimace on his face, he picked up the handset.
"What's up now ? You mean the
lead strip mill, a call out again ? At this time of night ?
Coiler motor problem, yeah I'm on my way."
He put the phone down and looked across at his wife as she picked up the newspaper and snapped it open.
"Sorry dear, sounds like an electric motor drive problem, shouldn't take too long this"
"But it's over an hours drive to Hatlington" she replied, "So you'll be at least three or four hours again like last time!"
"Yeah, but it goes with the job, and it pays good !" he sighed, and went to get his heavy winter coat and his tool case from the hallway.
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Jim left the house and scraped the thick ice off the service van's windscreen then got in, shivering with the cold. He was more than glad to start and warm the engine and let the warm air start blowing inside. The lead mill was in the middle of 'nowhere' nestled in a small valley, just outside a small village called Hatlington. It was a hilly area at the foot of Derbyshire peak district, and hated going up there in the winter The roads were narrow with hairpin bends, bad enough in good conditions, but very dangerous in the heavy frost there was that night.
It took him over an hour to drive there, the hedgerows being thick with frost were glistening beautifully like blue diamonds in the headlights as he carefully drove along the lanes. Traces of previous snowfalls could be seen on the fields and dry stone walls, it was always a Christmas card scene up there in winter.
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He arrived at Dent's mill, and as usual there were no lights on anywhere around the reception and office buildings.
"Dammit, no warm coffee on again" he moaned
He parked the van, grabbed his toolbox before locking the doors, and walked over to the security hut to pick up his work pass before taking the long walk he knew he'd have to make over to the strip mill buildings where the machine was.
It was an 'easy' one for a change. He chatted to the night shift foreman who said that one of the coiler reel motors would not wind the lead metal strip onto it's roll at the end of the machine, well not at full production speeds anyway. Jim pulled the inspection cover off the DC motor and listened.
He always listened first. Most of
the time he could work out where the problem was by just
listening to the motors without having to take his meter or
oscilloscope out of the van. He should have heard a clean tone as
all six thyristors that controlled it fired in harmony with the
supply phases, to him it was like music, each machine had a
different tone. However this one wasn't in harmony at all ! It
was a lower pitch, a more of harsh buzzing noise.
"One phase isn't firing so the power's low" shouted Jim as he closed the inspection cover, "Let's look at the motor drive in the cabinet there".
He powered the machine down and opened the cabinet which housed the drives that powered the motors. He hinged down the control board and slid the firing board out.
"It's usually here" he said, "bad joints were always a problem with these ones"
He shone his torch over the circuit board and saw the tell tale signs, the fine cracks on the soldered joints.
"Have it going in a jiffy" he said as he soldered up each of the six small transformers on the circuit card. Jim put everything back in place, stepped back and signalled the foreman to restart the mill. He walked over to the motors and listened to the sweeter tone they were now singing.
"Don't know how you do it !" shouted the foreman "regular wizard you are, everyone else seems to mess around for hours, you just touch it and it works !"
"Just spent many years at this game" replied Jim, "nothing special !"
He looked out of the window into the cold night air, and shivered at the sight of the frost on the wall he could see in the distance.
"Got any coffee on there ?" He shouted to the foreman.
"Hope, only tea mate" came the reply.
"Dammit, I'm off then, see you next time then"
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Jim left the mill building for the long walk in the dark back to his van. He looked up at the sky, there was a slight haze round the moon, then he saw a shooting star blaze an arc across the sky and for some odd reason he thought of Unicorns, he wished to see one, then told himself off for being insanely silly.
He stopped suddenly and felt very scared, as if someone was behind him or watching him. He looked around, circling his torch in an arc then shining it through the hazy air straight ahead of him. He saw a bright reflection from a pair of moving eyes in the hedge across from one of the buildings.
"A deer ? Could be !" he muttered to himself. It would have been no surprise as they often roamed near there, making their way out of the woods nearby in the search for food in the winter. Then he was shocked to see something else, because as the animal moved in his torchlight he saw a blue neon like glow from something in front of it's head !
"No ! deer don't carry flash lights !" he puzzled, and out of sheer curiosity walked over the waste ground to the hedgerow where he thought he'd seen it, his shoes crunching loudly on the frosty grass. He tried to walk more slowly so as the noise he made wouldn't scare whatever animal this was.
"Curiosity killed the cat, satisfaction brought it back" he murmured to himself as he stood by the hedge, hoping to see the animal again. He didn't see anything there, but stood watching the frost glisten like diamonds on the branches and he swept his torch beam along the hedge and back again .He felt something near him, he stood rigid, and heard a puffing breath in his left ear ! He turned around in shock to see in the torchlight a Unicorn that had walked up softly behind him !
He thought of many things over what seemed like an age; the stories he'd read, the picture's he'd seen, this was more beautiful than any of the description he ever encountered. He looked up at the large eyes, the moon reflected in them, it's small white head and the long spiral horn with it's sharp tip inches from from side of his own head.
He felt scared, thought of what he should do, he thought of 'Bonni's' article he read on 'meeting a unicorn' on a webpage somewhere. He just stood there till the unicorn spoke softly to him.
"I have need of you wizard."
This threw him, not the words but
the soft purring voice that see to come from his head and not the
unicorn itself,
"You'd better come with me now", she continued.
Jim stared at then Unicorn and for some odd reason looked at his watch, but he couldn't see the time or anything on it.
"What now ?" he tried to say, but it came out strained and stammered.
"You know me so why are you so scared wizard ?" said the Unicorn, "You believe in us so why are you so surprised by my being here ?"
"I'm not any darned wizard" said Jim, "I'm just....." The Unicorn didn't let him finish,
"You just don't know it yet !" she said, "and someone has need of your magic".
Continued on next page......