The Deadliest Alien Artifacts (Story Collection) (19 page)

The voices from some men
chasing them seized her attention more and more.

Although she could
recognize a small number of words, what they said was beyond
rational comprehension
–
and probably
inexplicable.

She moved over to
an elevation
–
where she would gain a view of
there
–
with bushes to hide behind.

Splashes of water
sprayed over her bare legs, as she tautly rushed through a stream,
sending droplets of water pouring from her deeply tanned skin. Its
coolness giving her urges to stop to quench her thirst and to
bathe.

Suddenly she realized
that the direction that some of them were searching had changed.
And she grew positive of it. They spoke almost at her; and it
occurred to her that they had to be chasing her. They must believe
that it must be a desolate location, so why would they not follow
her.

And they could be just
as dangerous!

As she rushed over an
area of tiny shrubs, hardly feeling the ground any more, she
altered her direction, but she continued towards her
destination.

How could such a thing
happen? On the previous day, she had taken the place to be the
Garden of Eden and had even considered staying there.

She glanced about as she
went up the elevation.

At the
center
of it, she observed a complex, and, with astonishment,
she realized that they had attacked an American military
base.

Strangely, she was not
convinced that she should be relieved, and the fact that it must be
a secret American military base tormented her.

Her thoughts
vanished as their black shapes started to emerge
–
and
that they were armed soldiers.

Yet, as she put up her
arms, the troops rushed off!

Their
behavior
was so peculiar that she realized what they were
escaping from, and that terrorists had attacked the base and had
activated
something
!

In the fading sunshine,
a burning flare blazed out from the base, and, in seconds, before
an explosion blasted out, destroying half of the island, and her
with it, she glimpsed that it was an atomic bomb, from its blinding
ghostly radiance.

Chapter 13

The
Alien
Artifact

(From the novel
The Alien Sphere)

Chief Science Officer James Dexter struggled
to focus on a distorted form of the sun, seemingly magnified,
shimmering around, as his spacesuit adjusted its polarized
faceplate to compensate for the extra light.

He expected to see the Martian Space
Station in the faint sky
–
in a vague form of a satellite with networks
of translucent tunnels, with large round and square non-transparent
bulges.

The landing site, about him, had
resemblances to volcanic regions in Iceland, which drew his
attention away to the nearby fault line.

Members of the crew analyzed soil samples
nearby. While others inspected the shuttle, for structural
damage.

Professor Burrell, a biologist/exobiologist,
investigated everything, thoroughly.

“
Well, Mars may be excellent for
mining ...!
”
Burrell muttered, through his communicator, gazing about
him.

“
The moon may be better
...!
”
he
replied.

“
Yet why are there no proper meteor
craters ...?
”

“
The atmosphere
’
s indicated at ninety-five
percent carbon dioxide, three percent nitrogen, and the rest in
traces ...
”
he replied, pointing to a monitor on his spacesuit.
“
Well, for one
thing
–
though it
’
s surely thin air instead
–
winds here are thought to
reach the forces of hurricanes ...!
”

They began following Commander
Strachan, as he led the crew away, in a
specific
direction.

They half-heartedly followed
–
observing the
soil and rocks
–
while looking out for traces of fossils and life forms,
within the layers of ground.

Dr Selina Jackson, a zoologist/biochemist,
suddenly yelled.

He left some puzzling smashed rocks, and,
with wonder, followed her eyes to a shape, shining brightly, at a
mound.

Deputy Commander Basinger, who was mainly an
astrophysicist/planetary geologist, like Dexter, went to it.

“
They must have visited
here?
”
Basinger asked, curiously.

Selina suspiciously examined Commander
Strachan
–
who was trying desperately not to respond.

“
Impossible!
”
Commander Strachan announced
firmly.
“
We
’
d know of it. This entire section is the
least checked region on Mars. We
’
re here to put up a flag and open up the
region to future explorations. It
’
s considered to have many rare
minerals
–
desperately needed ...
”

“
We must have found one of the first
space probes that they sent here
–
in the late twentieth
century
–”

“
Or the remains of one of their
rockets ...
”

“
Yet, why is it a metal sphere? And
how did it become embedded like that?
”

“
It must have fallen down
–
from up in
orbit!
”

“
It looks as if it might have landed
here,
”
Burrell joked.
“
From outer space! From a spacecraft passing
overhead ...
”

“
It seems to be
intact!
”

They stood around it, studying
it
–
mystified.

“
Even if there were an atmosphere, and
it crashed at high speed, it shouldn
’
t be implanted in
this
rock like
this
!
”
Burrell muttered.

Dexter shifted in close, and Basinger
touched its surface.

“
This rock, encrusting its surface,
must be at least thousands of years old!
”
Basinger stated,
gasping.

Dexter copied him, brushing his glove
over the rock, encrusting its surface, and felt a weak pulsating
vibration
–
from something
–
as if it were alive
–
deep in its
interior.

II

The Black Hole
Experiments

In the outer fringes of the black hole,
shifting wildly about itself, within the opened up alien sphere, a
metallic gleam of light was magically suspended, motionlessly in
mid-air, from the surface of an electronic clock, by the
scientists.

The clock held at the end of an almost
invisible cable, of translucent material, had its precision digital
numbers frozen in fuzzy multidimensional forms (in a suspended
cluster of partially transparent layers).

Professor Bergman, the leading scientist,
had it released further, edging it into the black hole, creating
more spectacular optical effects from the clock, making it distort
in twisted forms (shaping beams of light with matter like a form of
glass sculpture).

Its numbers shifted fast forward, until they
froze again, and the clock almost vanished, and they stopped its
progression.

A loud cheer erupted from all of the
scientists and technicians crowded into the laboratory,
applauding.

Dexter realized that it was more than a
rupture in space. It had properties of suspending time! It was a
hole in the fabric of space and time, and a gateway into the depths
of time.

He had staggered when he had first
observed the pulsating alien sphere, when he had entered the
laboratory of the UN Space Agency
–
where leading scientists were
carrying out a series of basic experiments on it.

They had not been able to determine its
origins, so they had brought it back to the Earth, to allow leading
scientists to investigate it.

He had shuddered as he had studied its
cleaned surface and perfect sphere shape, with no blemishes or
openings.

The abnormal antics of the laboratory
scientists had captivated him
–
mystifying him with the depth of their
nervousness, and fear of something! Some still repetitively studied
the controls of an immense laboratory laser, with alarm
–
preparing
themselves!

What were they going to do? Had something
gone wrong in their earlier experiments?

A swift flash of light had exploded
out, and the laser
’
s flickering beam had blasted into the
sphere
–
silencing all the scientists.

It had triggered it to unlock, open
(with a deafening bang), and reveal its inner chamber, where it
was
–
by
the manipulation of gravitational forces
–
suspending a black hole.

Professor Bergman calmly raised his hand,
quickly giving a signal to a technician.

“
As you see,
”
he announced,
“
it manipulates perceptions
of space and time
–
within its outer radius! It suspends,
accelerates, and suspends it. And if you
’
ll look
–
to the clock
–
suspended at its outer
radius
– it decelerates
it too.”

The cable emerged outwards, pulling the
clock back, with its numbers going swiftly backwards, until its
numbers once again became motionless.

“
And if you examined that clock, you
would see that the numbers don
’
t move backwards!
”

Dexter copied Basinger, Burrell, Selina, and
the others, and clapped wildly.

He briefly wondered if it could be a form of
time machine.

“
Professor Bergman!
”
a scientist, next to him,
called out.
“
If something fell in there, would it go on a
quantum leap? Would you say that it would appear at some
stage
after
its
collapse?
”

“
I
personally
believe that it would travel into the
future. But where it ends up is not in my field of
knowledge!
”

Dexter wondered if in reality the black hole
was different from what they perceived. But he dismissed the idea.
He did accept their philosophy!

“
What are your
intentions?
”
another scientist called out, from behind the group.
“
Are you going to
send something in there?
”

“
We have investigated it little, so
far, and if we do, I can assure you that I shall have you all
informed about it!
”

“
What uses to industry do you think it
may have?
”
the scientist continued.
“
Could science not use it? It has the power to
stop time in its outer radius!
”

“
We do not know at present how safe it
is! We shall test it much further, and we may find a use for
it
–
as you
mentioned.

“
If you will take an observation of
its shifting movements, which we have been studying closely over
the past few days
–
which some of you may have observed
–
as its
constrained pattern of movements has dramatically
altered.
”

Dexter examined its lethal appearance.
It resembled a large black bubble of pure energy
–
buzzing wildly and
dangerously about
–
ready to discharge somewhere.

“
Do you believe that space is full of
black holes like this?
”
another scientist asked.
“
Is space full of them from
events such as the big bang? And how long do you think it will
last?
”

“
There may be many, scattered
throughout the universe, and a danger to any explorations of space!
Thus we can study this one, and learn to detect them.

“
The length of time that they exist
may depend on their size and the conditions that they exist in. We
just don
’
t
know how long they last! However, I can give you other details
about this one. Our fact sheets have all our findings, from our
experiments, which may interest you.
”