Irrefutable Proof: Mars Origin "I" Series Book II

Irrefutable
Proof Copyright © 2014 by Shondra C. Longino

All Rights Reserved.

This
eBook is intended for personal use only, and may not be reproduced,
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the author.

 
Irrefutable
Proof
is a work of fiction.
Any
references or similarities to actual events, organizations, real people -
living, or dead, or to real locales are intended to give the novel a sense of
reality.  All other events and characters portrayed are a product of the
author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

 ISBN:  0989564330

ISBN:  978-0-9895463-3-1

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Cover
Design by Shondra C. Longino

Prologue

Anatolia
, Turkey

Circa 10,000
BC

Walking
through the city, people stopped and stared. Not because it was unusual for
strangers to come through, because it wasn’t. People came often to see those who
lived in the temple on top of the
steppe
. It was because the three old
men passing through resembled the gods that lived on that hill.

The
eminent and mighty river unveiled itself there in that place. Its calm and
gleaming waters crossed through the land where the temple stood before it split
into four, branding the nearby grounds lush and green. The grassy valleys were
blanketed with a mélange of black pines and evergreens, while a constant, mild
wind wafted up the hillside and across the plateau.

An
odd lot, the three strangers’ steps were agile, hoisting them up the mound
almost in an orchestrated resolve. Three men, whose age shown in the
sun-stained, dust-filled creases of skin that stretched over their faces and
hands, found little need to speak among themselves for dogged determination,
woven into their beings, seemed to loudly voice their quest. Their backs
slumped, clothes dusty, their sandals worn – there was a resounding
single-mindedness in their journey. The long, toilsome trek from the southern City
of Harran was not in search of inspiration, or inscriptions of memorable
utterances from the ancients. Nor was it to seek wise counsel – but they came
to pass on a heritage, remembered from their home beyond the stars.  And now to
be remembered here.

The
temple had come long before the cities, and the gods, said to live on the
hilltop sanctuary, descended from the plateau to instruct the people moving
amidst the valley below. Overflowing with a wisdom that surpassed
comprehension, the temple dwellers taught the hunters to farm and build
shelters. They taught them how to heal the sick, sail the seas, and hew stone
from the quarries.

And
it was there, on the mound, at the temple, that the three stopped. The
concentric circular walls, chiseled from the limestone in the hills seemed to
open its walls and embrace their presence. The roofless structure beamed in a
welcoming, brilliant light from the heavens. The structure was mighty, with
strong repeating walls – circles of massive T-shaped pillars, each more than
twenty feet in height, but upon their entrance, it seemed to fall subject to
its guests.

At
the arched entrance, the three were met by a young boy from the land
of Ethiopia, called Enoch. He led the old men from the inner circle of the
hilltop sanctuary down the curved stairway carved from the walls of the
underground cavern. Enoch pulled a torch off the wall, illuminating the
darkened corridors, and led them through. The pungent odor of the damp earth
filled their nostrils, their feet dragged along the pebbled path.

There
they met the man they came to see. The one they called Uros. The oldest of them
all, he had deep set eyes whose strength outweighed that of his body’s frailty.

Uros
led them into a small scriptorium with shelves filled with papyri. A wooden
table set in the middle of the room with four stools placed around it. On the
stool that stood in the corner by the book shelf, Uros directed the child Enoch,
to sit.

“Should
we let our history die here?” he asked, as they stood before him. The others
lowered their eyes. “I shall not do it,” he continued. “The Elect has all but
committed genocide.” He gestured for them to sit.

“Much
is forgotten of our home. Our language. Our knowledge. There are not many here
who know of what we were,” Mathias spoke, and head seemingly too heavy for his
neck to hold. “Those able to remember, who still can live as we had, are but a
few.”

“Yes.
It is just as the Elect had devised,” Casporas added.

The
four men spoke in a language not native to the land where they stood, or any
beyond it. It was the language from their home. A home lost millennia ago.

“What
shall we do? Shall we write in the dirt, ‘We are here?’ Or, shall we say, ‘Look
here for us,’ with a post that directs the way?” the youngest one, Mathias,
asked.

“That,
I think, is not such an unreasonable notion,” Casporas said.

“Surely
you cannot mean we are to write it in the dirt?” Mathias countered, frustrated
that that might be the plan.

“Yes.
In the dirt so that it may be seen from above. In the dirt to show what we have
been reduced to. In the dirt to show how low our people’s opinion is of us. And
though it shall be hidden to the eye standing next to it, it shall speak volumes.”
As Uros spoke, his eyes began to sparkle. “In the dirt. On the walls.” He
slapped his hands on the wall of the basement cavern. “There will be signs.
Signs for our people.”

“And,
with the lack of understanding that the people of this earth have, people will
wonder what mystic meanings our signs hold,” Casporas said, and shook his head.
“How will it help?”

“Ha
ha. They will think that man worshipped the stars,” Herona said, quiet up until
now. He seemed to enjoy the idea of others being confused.

“It
must be in a code,” Uros said. “A code that all from home would know.”

“That,”
Mathias laughed, “is your answer for everything. Hide it. Bury it. Code it.”

“I
know what is to be done,” Uros said firmly. “What is needed so that we will not
be forgotten. Heed my words.” All but Mathias leaned forward. “We will leave
markings. It is as I say. Markings in the earth of this planet.”

“Markings?”

“Yes.
It will be the markings of animals, insects, things that have been with us
since the beginning of time. Those things that have survived for millions of
years. Just as we have. The spider. The monkey. The lizard.”

“The
snake?” Herona asked.

“Yes,”
Uros said, acknowledging the addition. “The snake. They have lived in our home
for millions of years and have survived here since we brought them. They will
be here for millions more. They will be the sign. They will point to us. They
will show where we can be found.”

“What
if there are no more of us left when that day comes? When those cast off find
their way here. They will be able to find not one of us,” Mathias said.

“If
that be the case,” Uros said. “The signs will lead them to proof of our
undertakings and we shall subscribe to them of our predicament. Written in our
language for their eyes only. They will know that we have been here and what
has become of us.”

Uros
looked at the shelves on the walls filled with papyri. Already, many of their
people, who still had the knowledge from home had come and written down what
they remembered. Men of medicine and science had preserved what they knew in
the papyri on the shelves. Men who knew the stars, and the earth, and its
plants had come and written their knowledge down. And Uros had kept it. There
on the shelves, all written down, was much of the knowledge that they had once
had.

Now,
he and his companions must finish it. He lifted the papyri off the shelf, and
placed them on the wooden table. Then he reached into a basket on the top of
the shelf and pulled down blank papyri he had prepared. He waved a piece of the
indestructible fabric he had fashioned in the face of the men before laying it
down in front of them. “Neither weather of time, nor ravage of war will keep
our descendants from knowing about their history,” he said, and smiled at what
they were about to do.

“But
they will know. Just as we know,” Uros continued. “And in our language, we will
leave the story, and no one, other than those from our world, will know of it.”

 “Those
that do not have the knowledge that we have now will be unable to understand
what we write. They will have no knowledge of it,” Mathias said. “I can feel in
my bones the pain on the faces of our people during the mass exodus. It is steeped
into my mind. My heart beats each day the sadness of that memory.”

“Is
that wise? Not to let no one else know?” Herona asked.

“We
will provide a way for all to know when the time comes,” Uros said. “We’ll make
a way that our descendants can come to know the truth. A way for them to read
our language. To understand what has happened. A way for them to have our
knowledge.”

He
pressed out a sheet of papyrus, wiping his hands across its smooth surface. And
he remembered the stories he was told. Of the voyage to their new home. About
all those that were left behind to die, he had intimate knowledge of that. The
vision of their story ripped at his heart. Just as it did Mathias’. Just as it
did to all of his people. Even now, four thousand years after the first
migration, it tugged deep in his soul. He felt he could still hear their cries.

“I
will tell your story,” he whispered to his ancestors, as he stared down at the
blank papyri. “And this world will know us.”

“Yes,”
said Casporas. “We must tell what has happened to us. How we were sent out in ships.
Out into the galaxies.”

“To
die.”

“Yes,
to die.”

“Alone.”

“Yes.
Our fellow man sent out to die, alone in this vast universe.”

“How
cruel.”

“To
die out in a universe that we knew was void of our kind. Void of man. Void of
life.”

 “Are
there any left to come here?” Herona questioned just as Mathias had.

“I
do not believe they will ever return. They have all perished,” said Mathias.

“Perhaps,”
Uros said quietly. “Perhaps, not.”

“This
is my belief. We have lived for millions of years. We managed to survive our
own calamitous mistakes. We have found a new home. Surely, the Elect no longer
has power over us,” Casporas said, his face solemn.

Uros
called for the boy, Enoch to fill up the ink wells so they could prepare to
write. Then he passed out to the old men the papyri that the others had penned.
He gave Enoch a blank papyrus and told the boy to write of what he sees and
what he hears. To write it in his own language, the language of the people in
the land that surrounded the temple, just as the old men were set to do.

Then
Uros said to the three, “Copy from the papyrus written by men who have come and
left their knowledge and write it onto the blank one. Write it in our language.
And then I shall gather it into one book.”

For
many days the men quietly copied the knowledge that others from their home had
left. They wrote, they drew pictures, and set forth explanations as best they
could. They wrote of how it was possible to come here, to travel among the
stars. Of their homeland, of the things that had been brought down for
experimentation. They wrote of the women that mated with the men they had
crafted, and of their men who had done the same.

And
after they had finished writing all the knowledge that they remembered of their
home, and that others had remembered and come there to the temple to write
down, Uros bound the pages together and said, “This shall be called the Book of
Knowledge. And whoever shall have the key to understand what is in this Book,
shall have all the knowledge that we possess.”

And
then they fashioned a key.

“Now,”
said Uros. “To decode the book, it will take the symbols we write on this
earth, and the story of our migration. We will write our migration story in
three languages. It will tell of how we came here, and it will hold the clues
for reading the Book of Knowledge.” Passing out more papyri to each of the men
and to Enoch, Uros said, “Let us write.”

So
each of the three men wrote, a word or sentence, but no more, in the language
they were instructed, as Uros recited. Then each passed it to the next. And
then it was hidden away until it was time for it to be revealed, and the people
came to learn the truth of what happened in the beginning . . .