He pulled up the image file of the two sets of two matching tablets. He had them organized with the Linear B tablets on the left and the Linear A ones on the right. Displayed that way, they certainly looked similar. He pointed to the two-word line. “That says one cow in Mycenean. On the right, it says one cow in Minoan. And yes, I have checked this on other tablets. Every time that word appears, it seems to mean one or single or other variations of one unit. The other appears as a multiple version on many tablets. The syntax of Linear A appears to be more Semitic than Greek, but with a Greek admixture. Sort of like comparing French and English. Anyway, every time that word appears on the Linear A tablets, it matches the Mycenean word for cows in a similar position on the matching Mycenean tablet.” He paused here to see how she would react.

Professor Rawlins studied the images on the screen and turned her head slightly to study Jason before returning her attention to the screen. “And is that all you have translated?”

Jason shook his head. “I, um, well, I got so engrossed in the whole thing I sort of translated pretty much all of them.”

She glanced up in startlement. “All ten?”

“Well, yeah. And then I did a whole lot of tablets that have been posted on the net. I could translate all of them, despite lacking the matching Mycenean tablets, which made it a lot harder, and there are still a bunch of words I can’t work out, but overall, yeah, I can translate pretty much any Linear A tablet to a fair extent.” He stood up straight and crossed his arms, waiting to be shot down.

The Professor raised her eyebrows and looked at the images on the screen.

“You have really translated both these tablets?”

“Yes, Professor. If you scroll further down the page, you will see a translation of both tablets.”

She studied his translation for a few moments before sitting back for a second, then turned to Jason.

“And you think you can translate pretty much any Linear A tablet?”

Oooh. She was going to test him. All right, in for a penny.

“Yes, Professor. Allowing for words that I have not previously met and for which the meaning cannot be derived by the context, of course. But essentially, yes.”

She leaned back, looked at him, shook her head, then turned to her computer. She called up some website and then some page and crooked her finger at him to come closer. On the screen was a tablet, yes, Linear A.

“Two different noted scholars have each published translations of this tablet. Unsurprisingly there are differences between the two. What can you see?”

Jason leaned forward, and the Professor moved aside. He looked around the desk.

“Can I borrow a piece of paper and a pen?” he asked. Professor Rawlins frowned but quickly produced a pen and then a paper pad from a drawer in her desk. Jason ran through the tablet silently, mouthing the words as he translated the tablet. There were only a few words that weren’t obvious, but he made a show of hesitating here and there and seemingly having to think about this word or that as he worked through the tablet. Finally, he finished and stood back. Professor Rawlins just looked at him for a minute.

Jason had met Chloe at several functions before and after the girl had graduated from high school, but Chloe had always seemed to regard him as some sort of local wildlife that came with her mother’s job rather than a fellow student. She shared the thin build of her mother, but whereas Professor Rawlins’s mix of button nose and high cheekbones gave her a pixy look, Chloe had indeterminate cheekbones, a beak of a nose, and large ears, presumably gifts from her father. Chloe was with her mother when Jason arrived, leaving the Professor’s office after Jason had knocked. Jason nodded to her, which she barely acknowledged, and then heard the Professor call him into her office, so he put Chloe from his thoughts and entered the room. Like nearly every Classics staff member whose office he had been in, the décor was wood shelves, a desk, a comfortable-looking chair the Professor used, and a pair of University issue chairs for visitors. He plonked himself down on one of these, resting his laptop on his lap.

“You know this is the first time you have ever asked me for a meeting. So far, I have always had to chase you for progress reports.” She smiled in a resigned sort of way. “So, what’s the problem?”

Jason shook his head. “No problem. Well, not really. I, well, I want to change my Thesis subject.”

She looked surprised. “What! This close to finishing?”

Jason shrugged. “I can still finish it if you think I should, but I have discovered something, and, well, I think it would make both a better thesis as well as being a lot more important to Classics research.” There, he had made the outrageous claim that should grab her attention.

She didn’t look impressed with his pronouncement, merely sitting back in her chair and staring at Jason for a moment, a slight frown sharpening her features, making her look more like an evil elf than a pixie.

 “You have made an important discovery?” She shook her head as he nodded. “Where and what?”

She sounded like this had better be good, or else! He flipped open his laptop and stood up.

“I think it would be easiest to show you.” He said before moving over and putting his laptop on her desk. “You know I was looking at those Linear B tablets they found and then those extra ones discovered below the first group which had been stored with a similar number of Linear A tablets?”

She nodded as she had been the one to point him in the direction of the new finds in the first place.

 “Well, they are certainly important in terms of the Mycenean invasion and occupation of Crete and the consequent end of the Minoan civilization. They appear to almost certainly date right from the period of the Mycenean takeover and the lower box, which had the two sets of tablets, clearly points to a continuation and replacement of the Minoan temple city administration by the incoming Myceneans. And if you want me to continue the Thesis as we originally planned, then that is no problem, and it will be finished much sooner than I expected due to that find. But well, look at this.”

Gizel and Karvon continue on their normal undercover galactic travels, in the process dealing with a stowaway and managing to upset the criminal Portia Cartel at the same time. Then, a friendly Imperial Security officer tracks them down to remind them that their wedding date is rapidly approaching. Oops. The Empress is most upset with Gizel’s belated return to Kimeria, yet despite terrorists and further threats from the Portia Cartel, they finally have their big day, followed by a honeymoon that could best be described as interesting!

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Better late than never

By the time he broke for a late lunch, his vocabulary and understanding of the Linear A language syntax was growing exponentially. After a break with the others in the Refectory, he returned to the study room with a new idea. He started pulling scans of other Linear A tablets off the internet and set about translating them as well. Hmm. Had he really just made a massive breakthrough? Everything he translated made sense, so he had to be getting the words right, didn’t he? He sat and pondered the matter for a few minutes leaning back in his chair and staring blankly at his computer screen.

He then sent an email to Professor Rawlins asking for an appointment to discuss his thesis. He returned to his study of random Linear A tablets from the net while getting increasingly fluent in the language. Or, at least, he thought he was. He supposed he could just be getting delusional and making it all up in his head. No, this was real. He considered the matter and decided that being too free and easy with the Minoan tablets would give away too much information that he would have difficulty explaining. He couldn’t very well tell everyone about Urasmian without getting locked up in the looney bin. Yes. A careful explanation based on comparing the two groups of tablets would explain his breakthrough perfectly well. Professor Rawlins got back to him about two hours later and offered a nine-thirty appointment time the following day. He accepted, then decided to call it quits for the day and headed home. The rain had stopped, of course, now that he wasn’t in any particular hurry.

He did enjoy having his parents back home, but at the same time, he found he sort of missed having the house to himself as well. Their holiday had really been the first time they had both been away together for more than just a weekend trip somewhere since his big sister had moved out last year. He sometimes wished he could afford to live on campus, but he had decided to leave his part-time job at Burger King when he began studying for his doctorate, so his finances were limited. His parents agreed with his choice to concentrate on his doctorate and were only too happy to support him, but the lack of a decent income still limited his options and his spending money! Plus, living at home would make it awkward if he finally met a girl who was interested in him. Living at home was seen as such a lame lifestyle for a guy.

Professor Rawlins was a forty-year-old thin woman who still kept herself in shape, unlike some of her male colleagues. She’d been married twice and was now dating an aging actor she’d met when some B-grade film had been made on the University campus involving an ancient Spartan Warrior coming back to life in the Twenty-First Century. It sounded lame even before seeing some no-name actors parading around campus like they were somebodies! Even the Professor thought the script sounded pretty awful! Her eldest child was a fresher at the college but was studying Law rather than Classics. The Professor seemed equally sad and elated at her eldest offspring’s choice of studies. The professor always seemed a little disappointed her daughter was not following in her footsteps but proud of her daughter for getting into Law School.