29 A mad scientist in my lab?

It has been a few months since the rebellion started. My parents somehow managed to take control of the situation and right now there is a complete blockade on the north.

There have been a few conflicts, but nothing serious. Just a party of scouts, running into another one. Small incidents, which aren't even worth mentioning on a continental scale.

By now we can be pretty sure, that the Nobles of the north were hoping to draw others onto their side. But by remaining calm, we took that opportunity from them.

My father and Nicosar are constantly travelling to keep an eye on the situation. Even though they use teleport magic, they are quite busy.

I am in my third school year right now. That makes me nine years old. But right now it's weekend and I am inside my lab! Mwahahaha!

Whenever I have nothing to do, I teleport into this facility inside a mountain. It is located in the north of Midpoint.

The whole complex is a work in progress. I offered every worker on the construction side a permanent employment and a pretty good payment in exchange for their silence.

Everything is financed through my new power plant. It's a cold fusion generator. Though a cold fusion generator would be impossible with science alone, with a little bit of magic here and there you can play a trick on nature.

We are providing the whole city with energy. And there is even enough left for some pretty cool experiments.

Right now my work-crew is building a particle accelerator for me. It's for one of my future projects. The materials come directly from the mountain. A part of the crew is mining everything that's needed.

This whole facility is already a huge complex, but I have something bigger in mind. For this, I will need a big amount of space and resources.

Mwaahahaha! Just thinking of it makes me laugh. Those suckers in the north will get a big surprise.

I love this place! Here I can play around as much as I want. Nobody to disturb me. Most important no Celes. She sticks to me like chewing gum on a shoe.

But here I …..

"Deeeaaaar! Guess who it is!" Someone covers my eyes from behind.

"Huh?" NOO! How can that be? I am sure I gave orders that nobody except me is allowed in this complex! I will massacre the security for this!

"Celes. How did you get here?" I ask in a moody voice.

"I copied the teleportation spell to teleport here directly. With your wristband." -Celes

"Um... I am pretty sure I never let you copy that spell?" I ask. Did she modify the wristband to work from a distance? No. That would be too hard to do.

"I copied it from the wristband, you gave to our parents for cases of emergency." -Celes

Damn! The simple solution is also the most effective! I turn around and see Stephen behind Celes.

"Oh. I see you have brought a visitor too?" I ask.

"Hi, you have a nice facility here!" Stephen greets me.

"Thanks, but it is still more like a construction site." -Me

Celes turns around and looks like she is searching for something. "Huh? Where is Margerie?"

The gears in my head begin to turn slower.

Stephen turns around too. "Hmm, strange... three corners ago, she was still behind me?"

The gears in my head stop?

"You two want to tell me something? Surely it is not that you brought Margerie here? Surely you don't want to tell me that a mad scientist is on the run in here? There is tons of dangerous equipment and you tell me you let Margerie from the leash here? And she is without supervision?"

Stephen and Celes have both an expression on their faces, which says only one thing. GUILTY!

"If it helps, Tanja ran off earlier without asking. We couldn't catch her, so we didn't really loose her per definition. She said something about a perfect infiltration training and vanished." -Stephen

I slap my head and walk over to a communication screen on a wall. Then I activate the communication link to the chief of security. His name is Drem Snowden and he and his team were selected by my parents.

"Yes?" -Snowden

"Errr, my friends paid me a visit via teleportation and two got lost in the complex. One is a happy go lucky ninja. The other is a mad scientist on the run. Could you please fetch them and bring them to the main lab?" -Me

"...."

"Understood. We search for a ninja and a mad scientist. Is the ninja dangerous?" -Snowden

"No, the ninja is not. But you are allowed to stun the mad scientist, if she is close to sensitive equipment." -Me

"Heeey!" -Celes

"It is for her safety too!" -Me

Celes shoves me to the side. "No stunning! Just bring her here!"

"Yes, princess." -Snowden

Snowden deactivates the line.

Then something comes to my mind. "How did you even find me here? You were never here before!?"

"Obviously mother gave me directions, when I copied the spell" -Celes

I was betrayed! My parents gave everything away to her. I will never give them the keys to my inner sanctum again!

"So we wanted to pay you a visit and see how you are doing. You are pretty hard to find out here." -Stephen

I sigh and sign them to follow me. "Come with me, I will show you the lab and the newest invention."

"Oh, cool! Have you made the ring for me Angrod!? Have You?" Celes storms in front. A week ago she asked me to create a ring-shaped device like the wristband.

I know. It's another objective on her list. But I made it anyway. The process of miniaturisation was interesting enough by itself. So it was worth it I guess.

"I won't kneel!" I grab a box in my pocket and shove it into her hands.

"Oh, thank you!" She hugs me again, while I continue walking and drag her with me. Why do I get this warm feeling when she does that? It is not right! Not right I say!

After a short walk we arrive at my main lab. Well maybe not a lab. A big dome would be a more proper term.

I rummage through some stuff until I find what I am looking for. I take the remote control and activate an elevated big screen. It shows a bird-view from high in the air.

"What's that?" Celes asks.

"I used Margerie's overpowered drone technology and pepped it up for high altitude flights. Then I installed some surveillance technology like optics and infra-red.

And then I used a little magic for the controls and to operate it from bigger distances. This drone is currently mapping the entire north.

If I want, I can count the hairs on Sarda's head." -Me

"You know where Sarda is?" -Celes

"It seems the whole bunch together with the guys from Tulhelm set up residence at Mount Seria. Hmpf. A little bit arrogant to name a mountain after a god isn't it?" -Me

"That's really coool!" Stephen comments. "Can you drop it on their heads? It would be funny if one of them suddenly gets squashed by big chunk of metal out of nowhere." -Stephen

"Maybe we will do that later." -Celes

At this moment Snowden enters the dome, dragging Tanja and Margerie at their necks behind him.

Tanja has her arms crossed and is obviously pissed at being caught by a guard. Margerie has a communication screen in her hands. It was obviously broken out of some wall and now it looks like a dissected animal.

"Haaah. Haahah. That's so cool. I never thought about using electricity to change the pigmentation of some elements in order to show a picture of something."

She doesn't even realize her surroundings any more. "I guess I should be happy that she found the communication screen first and didn't rip out something like a plasma cord for my power plant." I analyse the situation.

"Angrod! How does this work exactly? I need to know!" Margerie runs up to me.

"Is there anything else?" Snowden asks.

"Nope, thank you." -Me

The guard turns around and leaves again. He surely is not a guy of many words...

"He got me too easily." Tanja grumbles.

"Don't ignore me Angrod!" Margerie shoves the dissected communication screen into my face.

"If you don't pester me any more, you can have a magical powered screen, which shows you all the information of my less dangerous projects." -Me

The dead animal is instantly removed from my vision and I walk over to a table with one of my portable computers. I turn it on and give it to Margerie.

"You sure did much in the last few months. I can't believe you achieved all that by yourself." -Celes

"I had a little help in form of my automated factory. It was the first thing on my list and it was a pain to realize. Until a month ago my whole workforce was busy with it. But now it is working and creating stuff for me." -Me

"I must see that!" -Stephen

"Maybe I will give you a tour later. But first I want to evaluate the data my drone has collected." I press a few buttons. And a cartographic view of the north shows up.

"That's wrong." Margerie comments the map. "What's wrong?" -Celes

"There isn't enough industry! Here, here, here. Those are big population centres. There should be heavy traffic but there is nothing. Can you enlarge that?" Margerie asks me and I do as she wishes.

When I zoom the city up we can see that it is a ghost town. No cars, no transports, no people.

"Okaay! That's disturbing." I comment the obvious.

"I see no technology. No cars, no city lights, no traffic regulators, nothing that would require rare minerals." -Stephen.

"I think we should call our parents. They need to know." -Celes