The traffic was very heavy in this central zone of the city and the cab made only slow progress through the clutter of vehicles, much to Gaspard’s frustration, he even took to leaning out of the window and waving the rod at any vehicle that impeded them.
“Priority passage, clear the road !” He shouted ineffectually at truculent carters and obdurate tram cars.
Seeing his agitation the brothers kept a low profile and tried to make sense of the world beyond the carriage, which to Freder meant shutting his eyes and allowing his new sense inform him about everything that surrounded them. He came to the conclusion that there was not a single electrical device in the city. He even briefly tried switching on his phone and immediately had the unpleasant scratching sensation inside his head. He was certain now that this was an electricity free world but that only brought home to him more forcefully just what a pickle they were in, a parallel Earth where Freder and Josef Adams might not exist.
“’Bout time.” Gaspard groused as they finally arrived at the imposing structure that was Piddington Green Records and Assessment Centre.
Its frontage looked like the Parthenon, a soaring sixty foot high portico of stained white stone columns that stretched across much of the street frontage of this imposing structure. The frieze that was carved deeply into the façade was of just one repeated motif, the upraised right hand. Black banners hung down between the columns, each carrying the same motif of the red hand upon a white circle, looking suspiciously like the nazi swastika in its repeated manifestations.

Gaspard jumped out of the cab and handed the cabbie a chit then gestured nervously at the brothers to hurry up. They didn’t get much chance to look around the street as he set a smart pace up the steps and into the cool marble magnificence of the entrance lobby with immaculately turned out guards standing at every turn. The first they approached stepped into their path with an uncompromising stare and single utterance.
“Identification.”
His long night billy stick in his right hand and his hard set face did not make this a polite request, the very set of jaw and shoulder carried the threat of violence.
Gaspard pulled out his wallet and extracted a card that he handed over to him.
“Ronald Gaspard.” He announced. “Crystal Place redoubt.”
The guard looked from the photograph to Gaspard’s thin features and the returned the card.
“Reason for your visit.”
“Identity clarification and SE testing.” He replied waving a hand at the twins.
The previously impassive features showed a momentary flash of surprise at the boys apparel and the guard fished a glass tube from his pocket, presenting the metal disc to Freder first.
“Touch the disc.”
Remembering his earlier experience Freder touched it with his right hand and this time he saw what lay within the glass as the guard raised it to his eyes, a thin gold coloured wafer on a short curved scale. He seemed satisfied and presented it to Josef who repeated the action; no adverse reaction.
“They pass.” The guard said and Gaspard made to move on but the burly arm extended the tube to him as well.
Gaspard looked affronted by this challenge but there was clearly no way he would be allowed to pass unless he complied. Sullenly he placed a finger on the disc and the guard looked carefully at the little gold foil before waving them through with his billy stick.

Gaspard led them away muttering dark oaths under his breath, his footsteps echoing on the highly polished floor as they walked away from the lobby. Freder and Josef’s soft soled trainers made little sound as they walked on the shining stone but their escort entirely failed to notice this oddity as they walked along the seemingly endless beige coloured central corridor, past many identical dark wood panelled doors. No portraits looked down from these austere walls but the hand motif was to be seen on lamp fixtures, ceiling roses and as stained glass inserts in the few skylights that ineffectively lit their way. Finally they came to a door bearing the legend Central Records in red letters on the polished brass plaque and Gaspard opened it to reveal a bizarre room.
It was very large with a ceiling maybe thirty feet high, but dominating nearly all of the space was a monstrous glass fronted apparatus; fluted ionic columns painted glossy dark green soared up at four foot intervals to support the glazing in between that reached from polished floor to off white ceiling. Through the glass they could see bright brass constructions, gears shining with oil, rods and levers in motion, rachets clicking, little metal plates whizzing along guideways, a veritable cacophony of metallic activity muffled by the heavy glass. High upon the green metal framing in letters of gold was the acronym IBM in bold typeface and then in flowing golden script beside it, Pentium. Josef nudged Freder and pointed upwards at it.
“I don’t believe it Fred, IBM pentium, here.”
“Ahhh, the young gentleman is an afficianado of matters matricular I see.” A voice announced from behind a single console that stood in front of the mechanical edifice and a short man with greying hair stood up and came around it to regard them.
“Few ever believe that we can command the resources to have such a superb device, but seeing is believing. The Isiaah Babbage Matriculator, full pentium implementation. We can search on name, street, city ward, county or indeed all four in a combined search, the pentium advantage.” He continued with evident pride. “Ah, Gaspard, what has Crystal Place for me today then ?” He addressed his colleague genially.

“These boys don’t appear in our records, they come from some little village called Croydon.” Gaspard replied, making an obvious effort to speak ‘proper’.
“Then this is indeed the right place to find it. Every city, town, village and hamlet is here boys and we can find it in minutes. You have the details ?”
Gaspard brought out the slip of paper upon which the sergeant had written the details.
“Tch, tch, sergeant Evans really needs to work on his handwriting.” The man commented as he took the paper back to the console with the others trailing after him.
He sat down in front of a typewriter style keyboard and fed a small brass card into a slot before typing in the first details, Freder’s. There was a sound of metal being punched as each key was lightly pressed and within moments the brass blank re-emerged with a neat series of holes in it. He repeated the process for Josef and then inspected the two plates for any distortion or burred edges before placing them in a tray on the right side of the machine and flicking an number of switches to set the matriculator search pattern.
“And away they go.” He announced pressing a large red lever.
Behind him the matriculator began it’s noisy ruminations, flicking the brass plates between its modules and comparing the details with the millions of plates stored in the racks that stretched back into the gloomy recesses of the room.
“Get this.” Josef said quietly jerking his head at the machine. “Charles Babbage made a mechanical analytical engine back in the nineteenth century, these characters are still using the same tech. What is wrong with this place ?”
“I think they don’t have electricity Jo.” Freder answered him quietly. “Horses, steam engines, even those odd cars are diesels.”
“So diesels are modern, sort of.” Josef commented dubiously
“They don’t have any electrical bits though.” Freder reminded him
“Yeah, right. The operate purely by compression, squeeze bang. Like you said, parallel world.”
“One where we likely don’t exist.” Freder said very softly.
They both turned round to see the machine spit their brass plates back out into the console, in the red tray.
“Now that is most singular.” The man said stroking his upper lip. “They can’t be matched with any entry. We have a couple of matches for the names but the street and village names, nothing. Hmmm let’s couple in the foreign visitor records and try again.”
He flipped more switches and put the plates back into the feeder tray, away they whizzed for a second time. Both twins were becoming more apprehensive about what would happen when it became obvious that they had no records. Back the brass plates came, much quicker this time, and there were no indicated matches. He peered at the boys and waved them forward to present them with the form.
“Are these details correct in every aspect ?”
They looked at the clumsy writing but there was no doubt, everything was correctly spelt. They nodded.
“Then we have a problem.” He commented thoughtfully and leant over to press another lever down.
Moments later four burly guards filed swiftly into the room and took each of the twins by the arm.
“Precautionary measures boys.” The man said with a false smile. “SE testing.” He said to the guards and then turned to Gaspard. “Tea ?”

That was the last they saw of Gaspard as they were unceremoniously herded out of the matriculator room and along more corridors, down stairs and along dingier passageways with peeling paint on the walls and just footsmoothed concrete on the floor.
The first room that they stopped at held a camera on a tripod and a bored looking man reading a newspaper. He stood up when they came in and made adjustments to the camera height whilst first Josef and then Freder were made to stand on a certain spot while he loaded the camera flash bulbs, took two head shots, front and side of each and waved them away. The next room was even more empty, no-one and no furniture, just a mirror on wall. They stood in it with two guards for a few minutes and then were summoned out and marched away upstairs and ushered into a slightly less shabby room with a dozen desks in it and told to sit down. They had to wait ten minutes or more for anything to happen here and when it did they were slightly surprised. A slightly stooping man with a sad jowly face came in and regarded them solemnly before placing a box in front of each of them.
“These are tests, do not open the boxes until I tell you.” He told them and then quietly conferred with their guards. The guards left the room and the man took a seat at the front of the room, producing a large pocket watch and laying it upon the desk in front of him.
“Begin.”
They opened the boxes and peered at the contents, they appeared to be randomly shaped polygons all the same colour. Josef tipped his out onto the desk and shuffled them around while Freder picked out each piece and laid them out in neat rows. Both began to see shapes that might be joined together and moved pieces around to make larger shapes. Josef quickly appreciated that in fact there were more than two final shapes and assembled first one and then the next, he finished his third and final shape before Freder had completed any single shape, but he had three part complete objects and only took another couple of minutes to finish. The man silently noted down the times and then collected the tests back before leaving them alone in the room.
“What was that about ?” Freder asked.
“Dunno, maybe some kind of aptitude test.” Josef replied with a shrug.
Again there was a delay before anything new happened, but the oppressive atmosphere of the place suppressed their desire to talk, both were tense and worried. The guards came back in and led them up more stairs into a reasonably bright part of the building where they were parted as Freder was pushed into one room.

“Hey where are you taking Jo ?” Freder demanded.
“Your brother will be interviewed separately Freder Adams.” A seated man said from behind a large wooden desk with just one chair in front of it. “Please sit down.”
Though he seemed to be affable Freder sensed that he was play acting and that this man was not nearly as friendly as he appeared.
“Please.” The man repeated and gestured to the chair.
Freder looked over his shoulder, both burly guards were still present.
“Do they make you nervous ? Leave us.” The man dismissed them with a wave of his hand. “Better ?” He enquired as the door shut behind them.
Freder didn’t feel much more at ease but he sat down on the chair and stared at this new face. Round, heavy eyebrows, brown eyes with slight bags under them. Jowls partly hidden by his extravagant mutton chop whiskers, thin unsmiling lips.
“Would you sign your name for me ?” He requested pushing a form across the desk to Freder and presenting him with a pen.
Freder took the pen and looked at it, he half expected a quill in this backward world but it looked very much like a ballpen and wrote very easily. He looked up into a very hard stare as the man retrieved pen and paper.
“Do you normally use the hand sinister ?” The man demanded in a low tone.
“M-My left hand ?” Freder queried nervously.
“The left hand.” The man affirmed with a hard glint in his eyes.
“Yes.”
“And never the right.”
“I-I can’t use my right hand, I have an injury.” Freder tried to explain.
“Let me see your right hand.” He demanded brusquely.
Freder held it out and the man scrutinised it.
“I see no damage.”
“That’s not where the injury is.” Freder said. “It’s in my head.”
“It is indeed.” The man said in a scathing tone that made Freder quickly retract his hand. “You are not in any of our records, neither domestic nor foreign, you blatantly use the hand sinister, you are in deep trouble Freder Adams. If that is indeed your name.”
“W-What do you mean ?” Freder stammered in the face of the naked hostility of his interrogator. “Of course it’s my name.” He defended himself weakly.
“There are just two Freder Adams in the country of Britannia boy, and both of them are past their majority. Would you like to explain that ?” The man questioned him with venomous satisfaction.
Freder stared at him in fright, how could he explain that he came from a parallel world, he would be locked up as a lunatic.
“I…I…I” He stammered.
“You are no doubt the misbegotten offspring of a Sinisterre wizard and his witch whore, your own actions betray you. Well young Sinisterre we have a place for such criminals as you.”
“I…I’m n..n..not a criminal.” Freder stuttered in shock but his denial fell upon deaf ears.
“You will be sent to our re-education facility.” The man pronounced with all the finality of a judge passing sentence. “Take him !”
Hearing their cue the two guards re-entered the room and had Freder by the arms and up off the chair before he could try to escape.
“Josef !!!” Freder screamed as they dragged him down into the depths of the building.