Seventh Journey

By Robert J. R. Graham

Netex, an advanced research firm with more than one secret agenda, has developed a mind-altering headset technology which now poses a threat to all of humanity. The headset uses a mysterious sound wave called Auditum that can control the brain and even hurls users into a different dimension.

Staff scientist Jacob Cross has been deeply involved in developing this new headset and was lead to believe the technology would serve various medical applications. Now terrified that his invention will be used to enslave millions, Jacob sends himself through the dimensional portal. There, Jacob falls in love with the powerful yet ghostly Tamara, who warns him that the fate of both their worlds are now linked by a shared peril. Tamaras world has fallen prey to a monstrous adversary who now threatens to destroy Jacobs world as well.

Jacob awakens, only to find his real life turned upside down as he is caught in a murderous plot created by the CEO of Netex. His loyalties are quickly torn between the two linked dimensions, causing Jacob to question his own sanity and even his ability to know what is realand what is not.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Jan 24, 2012
• ISBN: 9781462069835

Robert J. R. Graham

Robert J. R. Graham An accomplished author, his works include motivational and self-development books and his Seventh Journey series. He and his family reside in Toronto, Canada.

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Part I

Frequency

Get out of the lake, now! You shouldn’t be in there! A wave of fear washed over me as she said that, but it was too late—I was fully submerged. The last thing I saw was the water turning black, and then the burning began. It started with my eyes and overtook my entire body. The last thing I remembered was intense pain …

Chapter 1

Auditum

Life’s not just one journey, it’s lots of little ones. But this one’s bigger than most of them. Really big. I guess the best place to start is the last day before my leave of absence from Netex. My project involved something called binaural frequencies, which I’ll tell you all about in a bit. But I was noticing some things I didn’t like about the project I was working on. It was a little too ambiguous, with no clear-cut project plan … and as I came to discover, no traceability either. It was as if there was someone trying to hide the progression and steps of the project and its status. Meeting minutes were only kept on paper, never on a laptop. No one spoke of our project outside of the lab areas—the nondisclosure made sure of that. We were never given any insight into the applications of the technology; we were only told that it was for the betterment of mankind, and on several occasions Mark Taylor, one of the project supervisors, had made reference to medicinal applications or meditation techniques. But for something so light-hearted and good for humanity, it was certainly not talked about in that light. And on top of that, there were all these government types—black suits and sunglasses—hanging around the building. Things just didn’t add up.

I decided to take a leave of absence about a week after we tested the headsets on a group of dogs. The purpose was to determine if the technology could be used to train animals, but we could have never known what to expect. We had a shipment of seven dogs, all Jack Russell crossbreeds, loud and full of energy. We kept them cooped up. Outside of taking them for a walk twice a day, their existence consisted of food, water, and a cage. They would bark fiercely all day, and that was the way we liked it—better conditions for the experiment, I was told. I was just glad I wasn’t the one who had to hook them up for the EEG, which involved sticking little white circular pads attached to electrodes to the top of a very pissed-off animal. We used it to measure the effective brainwave of the subjects so that reasonable assumptions could be made regarding the receptivity within certain ranges of binaural beat frequencies.

Typical binaural beat frequencies worked by use of a set of headphones, which would emit slightly out-of-sync tones. In researching this technology, we discovered the earlier works by Dr. Gerald Oster, and the creator, German researcher H. W. Dove in 1839. We were able to use the rudimentary roadmaps for the mind that they’d drawn out.

But they’d really had no idea. According to Netex, this was just the tip of the iceberg. Typically, frequencies more than one thousand kilohertz were thought to be out of range for humans, due to the size of our skulls. The theory went that the sound waves would curve right around us, and we would remain unaffected. Well, my own private research and modifications to the headset blew that theory right out of the water.

I added a technology to my prototype called hypersonic sound. These modifications were used to focus sounds directly like beams of light, as opposed to the way they normally traveled. This technology was used in soda pop vending machines … the ones that subliminally sent you sounds of opening pop cans, so you’d hear the pop and fizz sounds associated with them and then go over and buy one. Charming application of the technology.

Hypersonic sound allows the user to hear sounds outside a typical human’s range, as it focuses sound like a laser. The result was the ability for a human to pick up sounds not normally heard, such as those ranges that would be inaudible using binaural beats. Normally frequencies more than one thousand kilohertz curve around the skull, but with this technology the sound was actually directed right at the eardrum.

This addition to the technology was my design, something that I developed covertly. I wouldn’t have received any funding or approval, and therefore I took full responsibility if it didn’t work. However, I didn’t think that was the problem. It did work, and it had changed me somehow … and then my notes, my prototype, and my computer had all gone missing.

Netex wanted to test the higher frequency ranges on animals. They had no idea that I was working on the hypersonic sound modification, as we were still in the rudimentary stages of mapping out responses to the sounds. Animals have a much higher range of hearing, which afforded us the luxury of testing the higher frequencies, and combinations thereof, without the use of hypersonic sound. The only problem, of course, was that we all thought it would be difficult to gauge the results of the tests. It wasn’t.

We immediately saw a change in the state of minds of these seven angry animals, and we took them through the gambit: they were docile, they were affectionate, and they were incredibly receptive to instruction at the turn of a dial—so much so that it scared me. I don’t think I was the only one, especially since our ultimate goal for the technology was human application.

The day before I went on leave of absence, I decided to walk over to the animal staging area, where the dogs were kept. The only oddity of the entire experiment process was one dog who didn’t respond to treatment after the initial experiment. He remained calm, waited for his food, and was very friendly, but he would not respond to instruction. He reminded me of my dog … another reason why I had to get out of there.

I walked in, and the six other dogs were each sitting in exactly the same position, facing forward in each of their cages and not making a sound. They weren’t moving their heads and would have almost looked dead if I hadn’t seen them breathing rhythmically with each other. The seventh Jack Russell was lying in his cage at the end of the row; he looked content, happy even, while the others sat there awaiting instruction. Lay down! I shouted. They all responded and moved in exactly the same manner, each lying down instantly, except the last. I bent down in front of his cage and stuck a couple fingers through the metal bars. He walked gently over to me and began licking my fingers affectionately. It made me wonder what could be so different about this one dog. Was he able to resist? Or did we just subject him to an ineffective set of tones? It couldn’t have been that; he was so well-behaved, unlike the day we first saw him …

Neither, my friend, a daunting voice answered my question.

Who said that? I stood up quickly and looked around. I was there after hours and didn’t want to be seen snooping. When I heard that voice, I figured I was busted.

I did.

I looked around again to see where the voice could be coming from. It was so clear and crisp, as if the person was standing right next to my ear. I could almost feel the hot breath brush up against me. But all I could find was this little dog, sitting, smiling, and wagging its tail up at me.

Nah … couldn’t be. I must be going out of my mind. I couldn’t possibly—

What, be talking to a dog? People do it all the time, the voice responded, interrupting my sentence. I looked down at him. He cocked his head and began panting.

How can this be? I asked the dog insanely.

I am simply now aware of myself. And you should be pleased; you’re the first one I’ve told! The dog began chewing on his back leg as he sat there. Sorry, old habits die hard, he explained.

My God, this can’t be happening. You’re even cracking jokes? I’m losing it here …

Why resist? It is what it is, my friend. I don’t know exactly how it happened. Something just hit me.

What? What hit you? I asked sheepishly.

"I used the term I, as in I am. That had never happened before. I’d never referred to myself in that manner … and from then on I was able to move forward in my thinking. Why am I in this cage? Why am I surrounded by these other ‘robotic’ dogs? Why, why, why? So I sat in quiet contemplation and tried to discover the nature of my life here, in this cage."

My God. And what did you come up with?

That this is where I am. This is where my life has taken me, and I must accept that as part of my process. I became consciously aware of myself, my life, and my purpose. For now, my purpose is to exist in this cage … but that won’t last forever.

How do you know it won’t last forever? At this point I was so engrossed in the conversation, I almost forgot I was talking to a dog.

Because nothing does. Everything is changing, even as I sit here and converse with you. You will not be here to talk to me forever, but I understand that fate has brought you here to me now, and I must take the opportunity to talk with you. Even if I am confined to live the rest of my days in this cage, I know I will eventually become free, for that is the process.

Why are you opening up to me? Why haven’t you tried to communicate with anyone else? You’re a miracle!

Yes, but so are you—you’re the only one who glows the way you do. A bright white surrounds you, and I know you’re here to help. I know that eventually you’ll release me in some way or another, and perhaps my companions here, as well. But that remains to be seen. For now, just realize the power that you have, the clarity you can bring, and that is enough.

I’m stunned. I don’t know what to say. I haven’t heard humans speak this way, let alone a dog. Who would believe me?

No one, which is why I’ve only talked with you; it’s safer this way. You are open, and others are closed. You have less blocking your perception of reality than others, so you’re able to hear me. He sat there majestically, staring up at me with the eyes of an old soul.

What do you want me to do? Do you want to be free now? I felt so sorry for this animal, yet at the same time, I didn’t. He had somehow accepted his place in the universe.

No, now is not the time for that. Now is the time for your discovery. Now you must go and contemplate your existence and your place in this universe, which is much more complicated than mine. Our paths may cross again, Jacob, but now you must go. Go find the key. They will be here soon.

Okay … thank you. We’ll talk again.

I shook his paw, grabbed some supplies from the cabinets in the office, and went home. How was I to know that this would only be the beginning of the strangest life I’d ever conceived? Truth really was stranger than fiction. I concluded that somehow the higher ranges of frequency had sparked something in that poor animal: conscious awareness.

The technology had applications far beyond what the project managers had been telling me, which was why I needed to discover the effects by myself. That experience heralded a new chapter in my life, and things got stranger ever since.

The next week was a blur, mostly because I didn’t do anything. It was like my encounter with the dog hadn’t happened. I was off work, but other than that, everything was completely normal.

Until Thursday. That morning, Anna woke me up as usual, when she left for work. She tried to be quiet, but while she was getting dressed, I woke up enough to catch a glimpse of her walking out the bedroom door, like a shadow or a fragment of a dream. The bedroom was filled with a faint grey when I saw her dark shadow walking past. Sometimes she kissed me, but not that morning. Sometimes I felt the tickle of the gold necklace I gave her for our second anniversary. It had been my grandmother’s necklace, made from one of her teardrop earrings with a diamond in the centre, which dangled from a chain that was much too long for her. It sometimes tickled my chest and caught my chin as she kissed me.

Other times, I woke up to the harshly annoying cries of our local news radio program, constantly spewing out coverage of the ongoing war on terror—usually describing where the latest suicide bombing took place, or the number of casualties, or something similar. Either way, it was never pleasant to wake up to. No snooze for me. I had to get out of bed and turn the damn thing off. We strategically placed it across the room as a solution to our chronic lateness.

That morning, like every other, the alarm went off. It was 6:30, and for a moment I felt the urgency of being late for work. Then I remembered I was on my leave of absence. Why should I even bother going into work at all? What was the point of it anymore? I had started working for the Netex corporation a little more than a year ago, and I was already having ethical doubts about the application of my research. Although they were a public company, we were primarily government contractors.

I got up and immediately caught an incredible glimpse of the Toronto skyline. The window had been open slightly all night, which filled the room with fresh spring air. I went downstairs and let out Cody, my yellow lab. He was still a puppy at two years old, feisty as hell, and he loved to run outside and play with everyone. I put on some old track pants and a T-shirt, attached the leash to Cody, and took the elevator down seven floors for a walk. That’s when I thought of the dog in the lab again, but it still seemed so unreal. Cody certainly wasn’t going to talk to me. He was more interested in the trash by the fire hydrant than anything else.

Thirty minutes later I returned home and went up to my study and began playing with the headset again. The headset I was developing was supposed to be the company’s saviour, after a string of bad investments. They’d poured everything into making sure that it worked right, and I’d heard that there were many interesting opportunities for military applications of the technology. That’s why I was concerned.

The headset was a mystery in application but a marvel in theory. It could unlock secrets held deep by the subconscious and could revolutionize modern concepts of the brain and its relationship to healing the body. It had the potential to overturn the entire medical industry, but I was sure that its military defence applications would be far less humanitarian.

Just as I was lost in my own thoughts, the phone rang.

Jake! I need to see you as soon as possible. Tarif sounded out of breath. Strange for such an early hour.

What’s going on? You sound like you just ran a marathon.

I’ve been up all night. I found something that I want to show you. I’ll, um, how about I just come over later? I … I just … there’s something we need to talk about.

Something was wrong. I immediately began to think of all the military types in black suits and mirrored glasses hanging around Netex recently, but I wasn’t sure what that had to do with anything.

What’s going on, Tarif? Are you in some kind of trouble?

I could tell that just by saying that, I’d upset him. Look, I have to go, I’ll be in touch with you very soon … I see a car behind me. I—

His phone was cutting out. He wasn’t making much sense and I was getting nervous.

Tarif! Your phone is cutting out …

Jake … talk … Netex … later … His phone died, or was possibly jammed, but I couldn’t understand why that would be.

Tarif had just started working for Netex. I brought him in as a technical analyst in our IT department. As I understood it, he had quite a bit more access than I did to our computer databases. What had he found?

Just then, Cody started barking at the front door. I ran over and noticed a letter lying on the ground. It was in a dark red envelope, with some kind of old-fashioned wax seal stamped on it. The seal looked like a starburst, or possibly a sun. It had six equal points beaming from the centre of it, with three smaller sun rays separating each of the larger beams. The small circle in the centre had some lines on it that I didn’t understand. It seemed like a large Z-shaped mark with four smaller lines surrounding the circle. Strange, to say the least.

I opened the letter, carefully trying not to damage the seal; I wanted to look it up later to see if it had any particular meaning. There was a simple white piece of paper inside with a single typed sentence in the centre of the page: You are not alone.

What could that mean? In a bout of paranoia, I immediately broke open my phone to see if there was some kind of wire tap in there. I had no idea about wire taps except what I’d seen in movies. If I was not alone, that meant someone else was here … or I was being watched.

I scoured my house looking for anything out of the ordinary, but I found nothing. I thought I was letting my paranoia get the better of me, but still I couldn’t deny the evidence that something wasn’t right. First, the telepathic dog. Then I got this weird phone call from Tarif, and now I got some crazy letter. My mind was racing, and I didn’t know what to think about any of it.

I needed to get out of there for a bit. I decided to go for a long walk and clear my head, so I left my apartment. I walked along Wellington Avenue, taking in the fresh smell of baked bread and coffee. It was amazing how many people were awake and on their way to work this early on a Thursday. I hadn’t realized it when I was on my way to work, shuffling along with them. But when I walked just for the sake of walking, I tended to observe more. Everyone was rushing somewhere just like clockwork, or perhaps cattle. I wondered how we’d all become such slaves to the money system. It seemed as if there was nothing else to do; it was simply the only game in town. Sure, there were alternatives—you could live on the streets, but you wouldn’t receive any help there; people would walk past you as if you weren’t human at all. Once you were outside the confines of their system, you lost your status as being worthy of basic human dignity.

I must have walked for a couple of hours, thinking about my circumstances all the way to Lake Shore Avenue, back up to Queen Street, and in and around there. I was taking in the different aromas of tiny cafés, walking through back alleys, and being attacked by the disgusting smell of week-old hot grease pouring out of vents from various food courts. No doubt it was adding to the air pollution in some way, if only by violating the nostrils of those unfortunate enough to breathe it in. I found it amazing, however, that on cold days in winter, those same disgusting vents were home to various homeless people. What an existence they must have.

I found myself at one of the parks downtown around Yonge and Front streets. I sat there admiring the beautiful fountain that shot water high into the air. Pigeons scurried around, looking for breadcrumbs near the local hot dog vendor. I’d been coming to this park a lot during my time off because it was not far from where I lived. I’d noticed that it seemed to be occupied in shifts. During the early morning, typical business people feared sitting down there because it was the homeless shift. Around noon, it became overwhelmed with business types, which most often made the homeless find somewhere else to go. The odd one might ask for change, but typically bums were ignored, so they walked the streets looking for cigarettes or whatever else they did to occupy their time. All of that made for an easy way to insanity, if they hadn’t already lost their minds.

I often wondered how I would survive under such circumstances, since realistically there wasn’t much difference. It would’ve only taken a bad streak of luck to force me out with them. I was only renting my apartment and had very little money saved. My girlfriend, Anna, and I were on the outs with each other, and with her would go half of the income, which would make rent a big problem. I was 28, but I hadn’t had much opportunity to accumulate wealth, as my last occupation seemed more like an apprenticeship than a job. I had been underpaid and overworked, a typical symptom of a society denying its way toward depression. Now I worked for Netex as a researcher engineer, which surprisingly didn’t pay much either. Netex wasn’t a very big company, but they seemed to come out with some astounding products now and then that were typically snapped up by the US government. Anna, on the other hand, had a secretarial job at a local real-estate company. It didn’t pay much, but our combined incomes made ends meet.

I decided to get some breakfast, so I got up and went to a little café called Le Bon Verre, or The Good Cup. I sat down in one of the booths next to the window. Just as I sat down, I noticed someone walk past the café with a black suit and mirrored sunglasses. He walked past the window at an unusual pace. He wasn’t in a hurry like typical businesspeople were; he seemed to take his time. I found this a bit alarming, but it could’ve meant nothing at all. Just then, the waitress came by my table.

Good morning, sir. Would you like a menu or a cup of coffee?

She was beautiful. She seemed to have an immediate presence about her. I was surprised I hadn’t noticed her as soon as I walked in, but there she was. Dark chocolate hair, beautiful blue eyes. She had a little upturned nose, which I’d always found attractive, and an incredible smile.

Sir? Can I help you?

Oh, yes. Sorry, I was just admiring your smile … I’ll have a cup of coffee, if you don’t mind. Two milk, two sugar. I tried to gracefully dance around my obvious staring, and I got her to smile again.

Thank you, sure. I’ll get that right away.

I wasn’t very good with girls. I’d been burned a few times, and since then I’d had some kind of a skewed perspective. As much as I realized on a conscious level that they were no different than anyone else, I always found myself stumbling when I talked to them. Anna always saw through that, though, and thought that I was cute. She didn’t mind my stumbling at the beginning. She just laughed politely yet made me feel like everything was okay. She had that way about her, being able to make me feel so incredible about myself, making me feel like there was nothing I could say or do that would be wrong. That was an attractive quality, and one that complemented me, because I seemed to be cute quite a lot.

I’d known Anna for about 12 years We’d been friends for that long, but we’d only been living together for about three years. It was my idea to live together, as I thought it would be a good way to get through all of the mixed feelings I had about the relationship. It would allow me to see if I’d be able to handle being with someone else for such a period of time and still function as a normal human being. That always seemed somehow out of reach, however, and we both knew it. No one knew me better than she did, yet as much as everything seemed to be great with us, I never got the sense that everything was perfect. Sure, we had our fights like every other couple, and we managed to smooth them over in short order. But the big problem was, I hadn’t made my feelings and doubts known. Part of the reason was that I didn’t understand my own feelings yet; it just seemed to be some deep intuition. Naturally this had begun to tear a rift in our friendship, and we seemed to be moving further and further apart. Yet I couldn’t bring myself to talk about it, because it just didn’t seem like something I could explain at that point. That was just the way it was.

Here’s your coffee, sir. Would you like a muffin? She graced me with another smile as she handed me the menu.

No thanks, this’ll be fine. I don’t usually eat in the morning. Thanks, though. I handed her a couple of dollars because I didn’t intend on staying long.

Okay, well, you have a nice day then. She turned away.

She reminded me of someone in my past, but I couldn’t quite place it. She went to her next customer, who reminded me a bit of Tarif. He had small-rimmed glasses and was losing a bit of hair on top. He noticed me staring at him. I turned to look at my coffee cup and then glanced out the window. I started thinking about Tarif and what trouble he might have gotten into. He wasn’t the type of person to get into trouble. He lived quite comfortably in the reality he’d created for himself, and he didn’t see much point in trying anything new. This had kept him safe, it seemed, until now.

Could it have anything to do with the letter I’d received? Would it have been Tarif who’d dropped it off? I doubted it; he would have come in to talk with me if he had. But I wasn’t certain who would be interested in giving me something like that. Was it to scare me, to warn me … or something else?

I noticed a man across the street smoking a cigarette. He was wearing plain clothes, and it seemed he’d been there since I sat down. He wasn’t looking in my direction, but ever since the letter, my mind had been racing. Was I being followed? I drank half of my coffee, got up, and left. I decided whatever was going on, it might not be such a good idea to stay in one place for too long. I got up and went back to my apartment.

It was about nine in the morning, and I decided to bury myself in my work. Doing usually didn’t require thinking, which was exactly what I needed. I had to gain some perspective. I went down to my study, picked up my notes, and started reading.

The easiest way of applying stimulus to the brain is via the ears. However, problems arise because humans cannot hear sounds high enough to stimulate the brain, so we’ve developed a method based on binaural beats.

If the left ear is presented with a steady tone of 500Hz, and the right ear a steady tone of 510Hz, these two tones combine in the brain. The difference, 10Hz, is perceived by the brain and therefore enables brainwave entrainment. This 10Hz is only perceived in the brain itself, just as two separate eyes take in different light waves and assemble them in the mind, thus giving the illusion of depth. When using stereo headphones, the left and right sounds do not mix together until they reach the brain. Thus the frequency difference of 10Hz is only perceived by the brain when assembled, which we call a binaural beat.

These binaural beats were the basis of Netex’s Auditum headset technology. The theory was that by creating sonic frequencies that could not be consciously heard and were only assembled in the brain itself, we could effect a change in conscious state. The average brain worked at a range of 20–30 hertz on a normal day, but by forcing the brain to interact with higher frequencies, we were able to produce different results in the user, such as calmness, anxiety, or even anger. That was the basic application of binaural beats, but at Netex, we