Through Glass Darkly Episode 1 by Peter Knyte

it would be.
    You can never tell how a set of lenses is going to affect someone until they get them on, but it was clear within moments that both Platt and Wright were not taking to it in the least. So much so that Platt didn’t hesitate to suggest that there was no point in having the scopes if that was all you could see through them.
    I was beginning to think I’d have to deliver the lensing range demo again, when Fraser came to the rescue for a third time.
    ‘I bet I could use one of those scopes to good effect,’ he chipped in.
    ‘How about a quick game of hide and seek?’ I suggested looking around the room for something to use as an example. It was just then that a member of staff from the boathouse came in with a pot of coffee and some cups.
    ‘Perfect,’ I said, taking one of the cups and pouring a black coffee. ‘We’ll hide a cup of coffee somewhere in this room while you step outside Agent Fraser, and then we’ll see if you can spot its location from the spot where you’re stood right now, once you come back into the room?’
    Fraser seemed game, and after taking a quick look around the room with one of the scopes, he stepped outside for a couple of minutes while we hid the coffee.
    We’d used this as a trick when training new Lensmen for the fleet. Instead of hiding the cup of coffee, one of the people in the room simply drank the coffee and placed the still warm cup back on the tray amongst the unused cold cups. A competent Lensman would not only spot who had drunk the coffee from their elevated body temperature, they would also spot the still warm cup back on the tray.
    I handed the coffee to Jenkins and asked him to drink while I explained. A couple of minutes later with Jenkins having gulped down the coffee, we called Fraser back into the room.
    There were only a limited number of places we could’ve stashed the cup, and Fraser started by examining the obvious ones, in the trophy cabinet, in the only cupboard in the room, but as he swept his gaze around the room to look at these places he must’ve noticed something about his partner.
    ‘You drank it!’ He said, with a genuine smile on his face. ‘I can see your mouth and throat practically glowing with heat.’
    ‘It was very hot coffee,’ conceded Jenkins, with a slightly abashed smile of his own.
    Fraser continued his search, but didn’t spot the cup within a minute or two, so gave up. Before we gave him the answer though, I tried one last test by giving him the spare lensing rig that I picked up in the lab on the ship. I configured the lenses to give a clear picture of the visible light spectrum overlaid with the right bit of the infrared spectrum to spot the cup, and then asked him to look around again.
    This time he spotted the cup within ten seconds of looking.
    Platt and Wright were clearly reasonable people, and when they saw the evidence with their own eyes, they agreed to let me accompany their teams in order to help out where possible.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     

CHAPTER 13 – PROMETHEUS
     
    Even in the fading light of the early evening I didn’t need lenses to see the carnage that the creature had wreaked. The remains of three defenceless tramps that had been sleeping rough in the alleyway.
    I’d seen this type of ‘bodily destruction’ on numerous occasions, heads and body parts cracked or gouged open to reveal cavities where once vital organs were so carefully protected, arms and legs twisted and ripped open to expose bone marrow, sinew and muscle.
    It was never easy to look at, and I hoped it would never become easy, but it was particularly hard the first time, so I felt for the police officers and FBI agents who until that moment had probably thought they were hardened to the rigours of their jobs.
    I did as I had done on all those previous occasions. I flicked my lenses down and started to scrutinise the larger body parts for the tell-tale energy signatures, or more accurately the lack thereof, which