STUCK IN TIME

(vii)Book 2: Chapter 2- Travelling in the Past

Natalia's POV

FEW WEEKS LATER

I am in a train. And it's not the present. People are wearing old fashioned dresses with big hats and big gowns. Men are wearing tight pants and funny coats with their necks covered with silk laced clothes. The train is very noisy and out from the window till the far corners I see only fields and small houses. I don't know where I am. Is this a dream or a past memory? Dr Aryan said I'll have to find some cues to differentiate and the first step was very easy. I had to look if I am myself. I now find time to notice myself and find out that I am a young man. Interesting! Before I could proceed further I talk without my will. I say something to the man sitting beside me and we start talking in fluent French. I don't speak French yet I understand very clearly whatever is being conversed and that's how I am sure it's not a dream and I have successfully accessed the past. Hours pass by and the train stops. I am moving spontaneously nothing will work as per my will. I wouldn't stand if I want to. I wouldn't sit if I want to. If it were my dream I would be able to do so. I am someone from my ancestors now.

Now that I think about it I must not keep skipping memories. It's exhausting is one thing but the next is the fact that I should trust my brain if it has allowed to access this one then I shouldn't be greedy and go on with this one. I don't know much about places so I can't guess what country we are in let alone tell what city or what area in particular. I and that man embark a cart now. We are talking about the sales being good this year and oh I know now I am a merchant I have come back to my hometown after selling whatever goods I deal with and this person is my business partner. Cool something is better than nothing. I go home, nice to know that I own a huge house with big courtyards and even better to know that I am single. The whole day passes by and I am doing nothing special. I get really tired and decide to come back.

"Water please." I say first after opening my eyes. Travelling through the past makes me very thirsty.

"For how long have I been in there" I ask dad after drinking water.

"Five minutes hardly. How much time did you spent there?" dad asks in return.

"Almost a day." I tell and he writes it down.

"Last time it was different. It wouldn't get any calculations right. Are you sure you spent a day?" Dad asks again.

"Yes, I am sure. " I tell him.

He has been doing calculations for his research on me. Dad and Dr Aryan are soon going to publish their research. A lot has improved about me because of their efforts. At first I could only access fragments from moms and dads memories and soon I started learning myself how to order the events and relate. It was very easy all I required was concentration. However, the problem was that the memories would pause on their own, like a dream does, even if you want to see more of it you can't; it just stops where it has to stop. So was the case with my visions.

Dr Aryan hypothesized that if I am to access the memories of my bloodline. And travel farther in the past I have to take control of my mind and I should be able to stay with a memory as long as I want. They made me do a lot of meditation.

For a year they also took me to India, China and Nepal where I met the priests and pundits from where I learned a lot. Sometimes they would meditate along with me. I made many friends there. It was the first time I actually met these many people. Else it's just mom dad and Dr. Aryan and sometimes a distant relative who would come to visit mom and dad would also have a small talk with me. Sad life, I know.

When I started to take a control over my mind and stay with the memory for as long as I wanted they decided that the work here is done and brought me back to London. Mom was in the illusion that I am getting cured but I was only being subjected to experimentation. Healthy experimentation or not was not much clear back then but till that time it had no negative impact on me and I actually enjoyed travelling to places through the time without the limitations of body or mind and without the fear of illness or death.

When this stage of their experimentation was met with success they resorted to my vision again but as they couldn't yet understand the way I saw things hence all the experiments and all the hypothesis would prove wrong. So they abandoned it. I guess I will have to live with this vision. I am glad I am not completely blind.

Dad and Dr Aryan started published works on what human mind is capable of when it is accessed just a little more than normal. The books attracted as much criticism as that of fame and dad and Dr Aryan remained silent to it because they knew they would invent a way through which they could prove every word they said and could also travel in the past and change the entire direction of technological research.

They couldn't wait or let me rest for even a day. They did not even want to waste a second and they started finding out a way for me to access the memories of other people from my lineage. They believed that it is in me but it will take its time to reveal. Just like I had the first vision when I was five years old I might have another from further past in few more years. They waited and also asked me to try it but all I could do was access the same memories over and over again.

Dr Aryan thought that all of past lies in the unconscious and if in consciousness we can access our subconscious then in in subconsciousness there must be a way to access the unconscious and a brilliant brain as that of mine wouldn't take much effort for this. So he started working over that and synthesized a drug which altered consciousness.

I now had to drink a cup of that medicine before I tried to access the past. I began to hallucinate a lot but it did work. Only that I couldn't form any pattern and didn't know if this vision is a memory from the past or just a dream. Then slowly I began to learn the difference but the sequencing is still vague.

In the meantime Dr Aryan and dad started to trace the parts of my brain in use when I travel through the time. And then after further months of practice including meditation and natural ways as well as through drinking the synthesized formula and getting into subconsciousness I began to learn everything in a better way.

This drink was having many side effects, I was losing weight, I was getting hair fall issues, I slept so much that if I am not awaken by someone I would sleep straight for three days even then the hallucinations won't go away. I was growing very weak and unable to study, unable to focus, unable to meditate. Finally they became concerned and decided that I won't be given any untested thing in the form of any injection or any drink.

But till then they had published more works about mind and subconscious mind. The only interesting thing was that the world knew them the geniuses of their time but didn't know their object of experimentation.