Unknown time on an unknown day of Winter

Just as things were going so well, this girl showed up and now I'm spending all my time figuring out how to make a Mez damned laser. She is supposed to return here for her lesson on the 32nd day of Winter but I have no idea when that is so as far as I know she could walk through that tunnel at any moment.

A laser is actually pretty simple as far as electronics goes. There are a few ways to make one but the simplest is the laser diode. To make a diode you take a semiconductor material like silicon and you mix in a few electron contributing atoms in one part, the negative side, and a few electron absorbing atoms in another part, the positive side. For a light emitting diode or LED you actually can't use silicon because the light it emits wouldn't be in the range visible by humans. Though, that could actually be useful if the invisible light Arin mentioned is really infrared. For visible light you need to use a wider band gap material like gallium arsenide, phosphate, or nitride.

The folks that got the gallium nitride diodes to work right got a Nobel Prize back on Earth, which is the only reason I happen to know as much as I do about how they work. Anyway, all that you need to make a laser from there is a little clear gap in-between positive and negative sides called the intrinsic layer.

I had a basic idea of what a simple laser pointer needed and drew up a design. The real trick was that I had no tools or materials to make it with. What I did have was an atomic scale printer. But, as I am coming to find, a printer without software is extremely difficult to work with. It's much more like an artistic medium than printing. I eventually had a breakthrough when I switched from restructuring mater in batches to a variable rate continuous process. Before, it was like trying to build a house with a hot glue gun, squeezing out one glob of glue at a time. After, it was more like I had a hose that could spray whatever element I wanted.

After that I was cranking out about one prototype diode every ten measures or so. But, of course, none of them worked. First I needed a semiconductor base by mixing equal numbers of gallium, element 31, and nitrogen, element 7. I had no idea what the crystal structure was supposed to be so I focused instead on it being a hard clear rock. From there I added just a bit of magnesium, element 12, to the positive side and a bit of phosphorus, element 15, to the negative side. It took a lot of guessing, and a lot higher concentration of phosphorus than I thought than I thought it should, but eventually I got the damn thing to work.

Then I had to add the intrinsic layer in there and that ended up being the most challenging part. Basically, I had to figure out how to make two reflective surfaces and enclose the whole thing such that the only way out is through a semi reflective exit point. The idea is to set up a resonance chamber where only coherent light is allowed. It's like two people swinging a jump rope between them on the playground. To get a specific wavelength, the two people need to be standing exactly that wavelength apart. Same goes for the mirrors in a resonance chamber. It took a couple of tries but I managed to make a reflection by introducing a sheer crystal defect and smoothing out the surface a lot. From there I had to try to make the surfaces farther apart, just a few nanometers at a time, until finally I got the lasing effect I was looking for.

I was testing the prototypes by connecting it to a resistor and two cells at a time from the radiation detector's battery. The final version would have its own power supply but this would do for now. I had been awake for at least a day working to make this laser and now that it worked I had earned some rest.

"Hello?" Someone said, "Theod, are you there?"

It was Arin's voice from down the tunnel.

Fantastic. Well, I suppose I should get this bribe over with. I got out of the water and dried off. I just pulled my shirt over my head when I heard her footsteps approaching. She wasn't in her armor but in a loose black shirt and brown trousers. She looked around curiously.

"What are you doing down here anyway?" She asked.

I was too tired to come up with a lie but I obviously couldn't tell her the truth. After a pause I responded.

"I am working on an important but dangerous project. Beyond that I am not willing to say." I said.

She shrugged "Are you ready?" She asked.

"Yes," I said. "Come this way."

We walked away from the lake shore. I told her to wait and I retrieved a small bag of teaching aids I had prepared for the lesson. Together we walked back over to where I had put the detector. I turned and sat down on the smooth rock. She sat down as well. I took a moment to formulate what I needed to say and then began.

"What do you know about light?" I asked.

"It's bright. It banishes darkness. It's faster than sound and comes in many colors," she said.

"So, mostly the easily observable things then," I said.

She scowled at that and I realized I was being rude again.

"Sorry, I didn't mean that as a bad thing. I'm just trying to know where to start," I said. "Okay. Basic primer on light and then dive right into what you need to do to make a laser."

I paused to think about how to start.

"Is light more like ripples in a pond or an arrow shot from a bow?" I asked her.

Her face scrunched up in confusion for a second.

"What kind of question is that?" she asked.

"Humor me," I said.

"I guess it's more like an arrow," she said.

"Why?" I asked.

"Because it can't go around corners." She said.

"Good observation." I said.

I dug through the bag I brought and pulled out a small mirror. I held it up to her and it reflected her glowing hair back at her.

"If it were like the arrow, the light would always lose some of its speed on reflection." I said. "It does not. This is a property of a ripple in a pond."

I put the mirror away and got out a directed light christal that looked a lot like a flashlight.

"Most of the time light acts like a wave," I said.

I shined the light at the cave wall and put my hand up to cover half of it.

"And a small amount of it actually does curve around objects." I said. "Notice the area in the shadow of my hand that is slightly brighter than before I turned on the light?"

"Ya, I see it." she said.

I turned the light off again which returned us to relying on the glow of her hair.

"There are other experiments that show ways in which it acts like an arrow." I said. "For example, light can push an object away. However these experiments require very precise measurements and would take more time then we have."

I dug again into my bag and retrieved the newly made laser diode. I took a few moments to make sure I had the wires correct and then inserted the little plug I had made. A dim blue laser dot appeared on the cave wall.

"The spell I am going to teach you is a way of getting light, which really wants to be a wave, to instead act like an arrow." I said. "If you can make the arrow strong enough it will pierce straight through your enemies."

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

Arin was staring at the dot on the wall with wide eyes. She stood abruptly and walked over to the wall where she looked intently at it. I unplugged it before she could turn around and possibly hurt her eyes. When it turned off she ran back and sat back down so fast I could hardly have blinked. She was smiling from ear to ear.

"Was that magic item from a monster with light magic?" she asked, nearly bouncing with excitement. Again being too tired to lie I just went with the truth.

"No, I made it myself. Though I'm not going to tell you how." I said.

She actually pouted at that. What was she, a twelve year old?

"A laser is different from normal light in three ways. First, it only has a single wavelength or color of light. Second, it is coherent, meaning that all the waves in the light are lined up. Third, the light needs to be focused into a parallel beam." I explained.

"Wait wait wait, slow down." she said. "You lost me at … wavelength."

"Our eyes perceive light as a combination of red, green, and blue." I said. "Well, for you there is probably also at least one more color to allow you to see what you called invisible light but I am getting off topic. Red, green, and blue are different in how compressed or spread out the crests of the waves are from each other. This is called wavelength."

She still looked confused so I tried to think of another way to explain it.

"Think of light like sound for a mark. Red is like the deep rumble of thunder, green is like my voice, and blue is like the high notes of a bird song. Does that make sense?" I asked.

"I guess so." she said. "But sounds aren't so clean like that, right? Their normally a bunch of different tones all mixed together. Unless you're in some place really quiet and you pluck a signal note on a harp. Is that what your looking for, only with light?"

"Exactly." I said. She was picking this up quickly.

"So then this coherent thing you're talking about is just plucking the same note on a bunch of different harps all at the same time." she said.

"As long as they are all in the exact same location then yes." I said.

"And the parallel part is just getting all the arrows flying in the same direction." she said. "Ya I think I've got this."

I was thinking it was going to take me an hour or two of lecture to get her to understand it but she got it in five measures. How smart is this girl?

"Great, there are two more things you should keep in mind." I said. "First, with a limited reserve of magic it will be more effective as a combat spell if you can concentrate it into a short pulse rather than hold it steady like the laser I showed you."

"Why is that?" She asked.

"A continuous laser can burn a line across a monster's hide while that same energy, all at once in a single spot, can burn through it." I said.

She was smiling again and now she was nodding rapidly.

"Second, lasers are extremely dangerous. Especially to our eyes." I said retrieving two sets of safety goggles from my bag. "You can practice safely at very low power but as soon as you get stronger than my demonstration. You need to wear eye protection."

She looked concerned holding the dark lenses.

"How am I supposed to cast magic while wearing these?" She asked.

Damn. I hadn't thought of that. I needed my microscope to cast my magic. As a light mage it made sense that she would need her eyes to cast hers.

"Well, that's a good question." I said. "I will work on finding a solution. For now, keep the strength of the laser below my demonstration. The reflected light from a strong laser can permanently blind you faster than you can blink so don't mess around."

She jumped up and started conjuring blue lights on her finger. I left her to practice, telling her to plug the laser back in whenever she needed it for reference.

I let out a sigh. I couldn't go to sleep yet as she may want to ask questions. I also couldn't go back to working on my various projects as I still wasn't good enough to always contain the harmful radiation out of the water. I went over to my camp and retrieved my notebook and writing materials. I was working to compile everything I knew about death magic so I could correct the record someday. Sending it to the Royal Society of Mages anonymously would be tricky but I could probably find a way. I sat back down next to the radiation detector and began to review the letter.

***

Unknown time on the 32nd day of Winter

I was prodded awake and slowly came to the awareness that someone was standing over me. I jerked and sat up.

"What! … What… who? Oh. It's you." I said, looking up at Arin. "What do you want?"

"I wanted to show you my progress." She said with a big smile.

"Sure, yes, okay." I said standing up.

We walked over to the wall where, by the light of her hair, I could see an array of small black dots. Schrodinger was waiting for us. They were apparently fast friends as she just walked right up to him and gave him a scratch behind the ears. She stood back up and turned to the wall.

"It is starting to work pretty well." she said. "Not exactly an arrow yet but it's getting there."

"Show me." I said.

She took a wide stance and held her pointer finger extended and close to her chest. A deep blue glow started emanating from her fingertip. Then her hand shot out.

"Laser!" She shouted.

A small blue dot in the middle of a slightly larger black dot appeared on the cave wall. It wobbled a bit in shape but didn't move. Then a small puff of smoke came up off the spot and the light winked out to show another black spot.

"Very impressive." I said. "But you have clearly ignored my warning about more powerful lasers."

She gave me a smug look. Then she pointed at the wall again. This time there was a tiny spot of complete darkness on the wall.

"You said the reflections were dangerous so I started blocking them. That's how the darkness spell works anyway. I only let enough of the light through to make sure the color is right. Will that work?" She asked.

I walked up to it and looked more closely.

"The darkness spell." I said.

If it really worked by changing the material to absorb more of the light then that would actually make it a more effective weapon. I gave her a quick nod.

"By the way, why did you shout the name of the spell?" I asked.

She blinked owlishly at me. "Isn't that how you cast a spell?" she said.

I just shook my head.

"I'm just kidding! I just thought it would be more dramatic that way." she said excitedly. "You take yourself too seriously, Theod."

I had to laugh at that. It felt a bit strange. It had been a long time since I laughed like that and I felt something loosen inside me.

"Ya, I probably do." I said.

I looked over at her. She was objectively beautiful and the thing with her glowing hair was striking. She looked like some sort of superhero with her arms crossed and her feet set in a wide stance. I was curious what brought her here.

"Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?" I asked.

"You can ask." she said. "Doesn't mean I'll answer"

"Fair." I said. "Why are you pushing so hard to learn this spell? I know the kind of focus and effort it takes to get from nothing to something like that in a day."

I pointed at the wall with the black dots.

"You're either running from something or toward something and I'd like to know which if you'd like to tell me." I said.

She looked at me for a long time. I just waited, it could take a time to figure out your feelings about something like that. Finally she shrugged. Her face softened and she seemed to relax a bit.

"Whatever. Who are you going to tell anyway." She said.

She sat cross legged on the cave floor and Schrodinger popped into her lap. She started petting him as she explained.

"I am the daughter and granddaughter of bakers." she said. "I was apprenticed to my mother before mage service and she fully expects me to take over the ovens when I get out."

She paused to consider how to say the next part.

"I've never been happy there. In that life." she said. "I've always wanted something more. Danger! Adventure! My uncle taught me the blade and the bow when I was small. He always told me stories about great heroes saving people and slaying monsters. I guess I always wanted a life like that."

She gave me a pointed look.

"No. Before you ask, I know the stories were all puffed up like a robin." she said. "What I mean is I wanted a life that someone would want to tell a story about someday."

She stopped for a minute, seeming to be lost in thought. Schrodinger was purring.

"And then?" I asked.

She came back to herself at that.

"And then I got magic." she said. "At first I was so excited. This would be my ticket to everything I've dreamed of. But then I learned that light magic had no direct combat spells. They told me that I would relay signals for the legion. I am actually providing support for tunnel defense as a kind of punishment duty."

She said it as if it were a fate worse than death.

"Do you know how many stinking cave rats I've killed down here?" she said. "I just … it's just … it's not like the stories. The point is that the next entrance tests for the iron blood mages are being held later this season. I wasn't going to even try until you showed up. Now, I figure they're my ticket out of here."

That was a lot to digest. She was actually looking for danger. The iron blood mages were the elite combat specialists within the mage core. But she wasn't a fool. She just wanted to have a life story worth telling. That was admirable I suppose. I would just rather be alive to tell the story myself.

"Thank you for telling me that." I said. "I also need power so I can relate to feeling trapped without it."

I thought about how much I wanted to be a mage. How much I had specifically wanted to be a light mage. The job of a signal relaying mage is one of the safest in the whole army. I even learned some of the color sequences that light mages used to send messages just in case I got to be a light mage. Then a thought struck me. How hard would it be to make all the powers of a light mage? I've already made a blue LED, if I could make green and red then I could make any color. Infrared LEDs are actually fairly easy as well. I would need a power source and ways of controlling or automating it. Sure there would be issues but it was at least possible.

If I was able to fake being a light mage then I could re-enter service as one. I could easily work as a signaling mage with some high powered lights. The biggest issue would be making it convincing. If people just thought I had spent a fortune on magic items then they wouldn't believe it. I could make excuses for a few odd items but I needed to look like a light mage. For that I needed to be able to compare what I came up with to what an actual light mage was capable of.

"Arin?" I said. "There may be a way for us to help each other get unstuck."