Mr. Nix and Burt get into the elevator and head up to the surface. Once reaching the top, Mr. Nix opens the steel reinforced elevator door, and then an old outer wooden door concealing the steel door. Mr. Nix exits into a small narrow passage where wooden beams support the raw timber ceiling and dirt walls. At the end of the dirt passage is one more wood door.
"Burt, wait down here."
"You think we have a situation?"
"I hope not."
Mr. Nix hurries along the narrow dirt passage to the handmade wooden door. He listens as he opens it, hearing the relaxed presence of horses. Passing through the doorway, Mr. Nix ascends a short incline of old warped narrow wooden steps until he reaches the ground level of a barn stable filled with hay and a few horses in the stalls. He walks over to the calm horses and pets one on its long nasal crest.
"Good boy, Sagittarius. We'll be up to take you out for a ride later."
Mr. Nix walks past the stables and reaches a small side door of the large barn. Carefully pushing it open, Mr. Nix's eyes are temporarily blinded by a bright sunny day. A gentle wind blows the rolling landscape of golden-brown grass. Mr. Nix steps outside, shielding his eyes from the sun with his hand, and takes a few steps toward the front of the barn. He looks over at the farmhouse where two guards stand weapon-ready on the back porch. Mr. Nix signals to them. One signals back. Mr. Nix makes a circular motion in the air with his arm. The guards separate, walk off the porch, and begin a perimeter patrol of the grass field on foot.
A ghostly specter appears from nowhere; a small Grey craft uncloaks at the front of the barn thirty meters off the ground and a hundred meters away. Mr. Nix's heart pounds in his head, knowing the Greys aren't here to take prisoners. He whistles, causing the guards turn where they stand and take cover in the grass. Other guards appear in the farmhouse windows with weapons ready. Mr. Nix spins and dashes back into the barn, the periphery of his vision seeing the Grey ship tilt forward and accelerate toward him.
The guards outside fire at the craft. The first few shots spark off the hull of the ship. Then an invisible force shield surrounds the ship, and the remaining bullets spark off the shield, causing it to become visible for a millisecond where each bullet strikes.
Inside the barn, Mr. Nix rushes to the horse stalls and whips open their gates, chasing them out, and then charges to the barn back door, unlatches and kicks it open.
"Yah, Yah! Go on! Git! Git going! Go..." he yells, herding the horses out the barn's back door. Then a high-pitched rip-tearing crack of wood as a powerful weapon strike blasts into the barn, ripping the roof off from front to back. Horses whinny as they dash into the field under the splintery rain of shredded wood and roof shingles.
While shielding himself from a storm of debris, Mr. Nix maneuvers to the narrow warped wooden steps he came up, and hurries down them. The Grey craft moves forward until directly over the barn roof hole. Gun shots from the grass-hidden and farmhouse-perched soldiers spark and ricochet off craft's shields. An array of blasts flash from the Grey craft toward the area surrounding the barn. The gunfire from the soldiers goes silent.
Mr. Nix rushes through the tight beam-supported dirt passage under the barn floor where Burt stands by the open elevator waving for Mr. Nix to hurry. A massive weapon blast from the ship tears into the barn, bursting it into pieces, causing the floor Mr. Nix runs beneath to break apart and collapse, exposing the sunny sky. Mr. Nix trips on a crossbeam as he reaches the elevator, but Burt grabs his arm and yanks him on, slamming the reinforced steel door shut.
The elevator descends to the bunker. Burt brushes dust and debris off Nix's back while Mr. Nix wipes the dust off his face around his eyes.
On the surface, the barn is nothing but fragments, with only a few pieces of the framework still standing. Hay and wood smolder with tiny spot fires ignited by the Grey weapon's intense heat. The nearby farmhouse that housed the guards is smoldering and collapsed. Two soldiers lay dead in the tall golden grass. The Grey craft lowers, hovering only feet above the barn debris.
As soon as the elevator reaches the underground bunker, Mr. Nix and Burt burst out and run down the corridor.
"Walter! Code Red! Code Red!"
Burt stops and lifts a wall panel in the corridor which scans his palm. Verified, a small console pops out and Burt types in a bunch of numbers, then closes the panel. Power and lights hum and dim as emergency red lights flash along the ceiling.
An automated voice calls out over the intercom system.
"Archive caustic measures initiated."
In the archive storage rooms that hold artifacts from the Roswell crash, the shelving and storage units lower into the floor. As they do, liquid flows from the side walls, filling up the chambers, dissolving the shelves and the artifacts in a flush of acid.
In the bio Lab, Dr. Black sits motionless by the microscope, looking at the red lights flashing. She sees the four tubes which contain the three Grey specimens and Seventeen's body have the liquid in them flush out, then lower into the floor. As they lower, a different liquid flows in from the top. The liquid dissolves the flesh and bones of the three Grey specimens and Tomas into mush as it runs over them. Dr. Black's look of surprise from the alarm turns to horror, as she watches the flesh and bones of Tomas Seventeen liquefy before her eyes. Full of acid, the containment cylinders disappear into the floor. Panels cover the holes as if the cylinders were never there.
Inside the conference room, Walter types into a wall console. Walter shoves the console back into the wall, then wipes the whiteboards and chalkboard clean of equations.
An automated voice calls out over the intercom system.
"Data surge burn initiated."
All the monitors, from the conference room to the bio lab, show a countdown from five to one. Then a massive power surge shorts the computers causing them to go blank, smoke and even a catch fire.
In the lab, Dr. Black jumps as the equipment around her sparks and burns. She stands up, not sure what to do. Moving to exit the room, she stops getting an overpowering vision of being deep in the ocean, hearing her voice say, "...before they destroyed the archive bunker..." The red flashing lights add to her disorientation. She clasps her head. After catching her breath, Dr. Black returns to the moment with an overwhelming sensation she forgot something. As she looks around the lab, Dr. Black spots the core sample in the clear vial from the Grey hand she was analyzing under the microscope. She grabs it and shoves it in her pocket.
Mr. Nix rushes to the conference room entrance, spotting Walter inside.
"Walter, let's go!" yells Mr. Nix.
Walter grabs the case with the skin spawn micro-transmitters and rushes to the door where Nix stands.
"No leave them!" commands Mr. Nix. "They are tracking the chips. We must get out now!"
Walter drops the case and rushed out the door. Walter, Nix and Burt head to the bio lab. When they reach it, Dr. Black stands in the doorway looking around and waiting for someone to tell her what to do.
"Follow us, Dr. Black!" cries Walter.
The shelves in the archive storage room have sunken into the floor, and panels cover the openings, sealing as if the shelves were never there. The bunker now looks empty of items and samples, abandoned, with nothing but burned-out electronics and flashing red lights.
In a back hallway leading to a dead end, a heavy drain cover centers the floor. Walter hits a hidden wall panel, which causes the heavy metal drain cover to slide aside as rungs of a mechanical utility wall ladder extend out from the side walls of the drain beneath it. A platform slides across and covers the drain hole twenty feet down, opening an entrance in the side wall of the drain leading into a concrete tunnel. The four of them climb down the utility ladder as fast as they can.
A heavy explosion burst echoes from the front hallway where the elevator is.
Once the four of them make it down the ladder and enter the side tunnel of the drain, Walter pulls a lever on the tunnel wall. The side tunnel closes, the platform disap
pears, the ladder rungs slide back into the drain wall, and the heavy steel drain cover slides back into position over the drain. Once again, the drain looks as if it drops deep into the darkness, with no sign of an escape route.
Walter, Burt, Mr. Nix and Dr. Black rush through the tunnel and around a turn that ends with a long narrow platform on a transport rail. At the back of the platform is a simple wheel and gear control panel. They squeeze onto the narrow flat platform just big enough to hold them. Walter sits by the controls and rotates the wheel. The cart's quiet electric engine propels them along the electric rail through the long low narrow pipe passage. The platform cart increases in speed as it disappears into blackness.
In the bunker's main corridor, the elevator lays crushed at the base of the shaft. The elevator doors are curled and bent outward like soft plastic. Two Greys walk the corridor on guard. They wear one-piece silver suits with gloves and boots attached. A sophisticated metallic device attached to their backs, runs up their spine, along the neck, and cups the rear of their heads. The device casts a visible scan ray.
The scan ray goes into the walls. Where a space or an object is inside or behind the wall, the scan creates a ghost glow and a temporary transparent x-ray effect. It glows on the panel that Burt opened near the entrance to set the alarms, allowing the Greys to see the console inside. Another panel glows, showing the x-ray image of assault rifles behind it. They go into the empty storage archive, but floor panels where the shelves lowered and disappeared into the floor glow, revealing sizzling liquid inside.
The Greys work their way into the conference room of burned-out electronics. Their scan exposes the panel Walter opened where he activated the electricity surge. A case on the ground glows, exposing the vials inside and the micro transmitters in the vials. One Grey pulls out a disc from its suit and holds it over the case. Like bullets, the micro transmitters bust the vials, tear through the metal of the case, and stick to the disc. The Grey turns it over and looks at the chips, then shows it to the other Grey who approaches. The two Greys look at each other having a telepathic discussion. One puts the disc with the chips in its suit, then they both leave the room.
Scanning as they walk the hallways, they go into the specimen room with the bio lab. Four round floor panels glow where the specimen tubes containing the Greys and Seventeen descended into the floor. They move to the back biolab where the burned-out lab equipment smokes scorched. On a table, a case glows, exposing inside the frozen Grey hand that has melded with a section of metal. One Grey opens up the case and picks the hand out, the sub-Kelvin temperatures not affecting the Grey through its suit gloves. It looks at the wrist, then flips it over, looking at the fingers sticking out the other side. The Greys look at each other and the hand, having another telepathic discussion.
One Grey takes the hand imbedded into metal sample and heads to the main corridor elevator where they entered. The other continues to the back of the bunker where Mr. Nix, Walter, Burt, and Dr. Black made an escape. The Grey goes to the dead-end corridor where a panel glows exposing the lever and console behind it. Standing on the heavy steel drain cover, the Grey scan the walls and ceiling, but finds nothing. The Grey stops scanning as it heads back to the elevator.
Once it reaches the elevator, the Grey removes three trapezoid shaped implosion devices the size of tiny land mines from its suit, sets them on the floor in a row, and activates them. The Grey then jumps through the bent-out elevator doors, leaps onto the crushed elevator, and with amazing agility climbs up the elevator shaft with hands and feet.
On the surface, the tiny fires in the barn rubble grow larger, searing the splintered lumber. The lone Grey holding the frozen hand sample stands under the hovering small Grey craft on a two-meter diameter disc of metal. Another Grey comes out of the shattered farmhouse toward the craft. The last Grey climbs out the top of the elevator shaft, maneuvers through the collapse dirt passage leading to the shaft, and climbs over rubble towards the hovering Grey craft.
When the other two Greys reach the Grey waiting under the ship, they stand on the metal disc. The disc floats up to the craft, lifting all three Greys off the ground into a circular opening in the ship's bottom. The metal disc covers the hole in the ship base, sealing seamlessly to the hull.
As the ship breaks from a sedentary hover and moves, it banks then accelerates away at supersonic speed.
The three trapezoid implosion bombs left in the bunker detonate, collapsing the ground into a crater. The barn, rubble and its small fires crumble inward. Gas lines running through the farm house break, then the snapping electrical lines spark, setting off a gas explosion. Dirt and wood fragments fill the air. When the rubble settles, the remaining fires send a long smoke plume trailing into the sky.
Light and Dark
Chapter 3
Dark Drain Tunnel, Remote California Outskirts.
On the side wall of a long huge unlit runoff drain pipe, a steel portal door with no handles unseals, sticking as it is forced open from someone on the other side. Out crawl Mr. Nix, Dr. Black, Walter and Burt. The darkness offers insufficient light to see. At the end of the runoff pipe four hundred meters away is a bright dot of daylight. Mr. Nix pushes the portal door closed.
"Is everyone good to keep going?" asks Mr. Nix.
"Yeah," responds Burt.
"Sure," says Walter.
Dr. Black gropes for the pipe sidewall. "I don't want to be the one to complain but I can't see a thing."
Nix presses spots on the visual pad of his wrist communicator. It illuminates white light, "This should help a little."
Walter says in a derisive tone, "Might help you. I just can't see in the dark like I use to."
"Burt, grab Walter," requests Mr. Nix.
Walter quips, "I'd rather hold Dr. Black's hand if it's ok. Burt has clammy hands and sweaty palms."
"I do not."
"Walter, what difference does it make?" derides Mr. Nix.
Dr. Black chimes in, "I don't mind holding Walter's hand. But I am curious how you know Burt has sweaty clammy hands." She grabs Walter's hand as they walk the pipe toward the light.
"Hey now, I was guarding a bunker, not in the Navy."
"What does that mean? I was in the Navy," says Dr. Black.
"If you were in the Navy when I was young, I wouldn't mind being stuck out at sea. Opposed to Burt and his moist towelette grip."
Mr. Nix points out, "Damn, Walter, you flirt with every woman who comes by. Don't you ever stop?"
"You spend decades guarding a bunker with Burt, see if you don't go girl crazy."
Burt objects, "Hey, that's not fair. I was trapped in that place with you, and it doesn't make me hit on every woman we meet."
"That's because you know every woman goes for me. Besides, if I was trapped with someone as good-looking as me, I'd be ok, too."
"Are you implying you are so handsome you'd make a straight man gay?"
Dr. Black injects, "Gay, straight, doesn't matter. You two argue like an old married couple."
Mr. Nix replies, "How can any of you can joke right now? We just got overrun by Greys, barely escaped with our lives, that is, if they aren't following us...and, we had to destroy every Roswell artifacts and specimen stored there."
Walter states in an obvious tone, "Nix, we know. That place was my life's work. But if Greys track us down, I'd like to think I spent my last moments with a sense of humor."
"What kind of existential bullshit is that?" barks Mr. Nix.
Walter retorts, "Nix, a young warrior wants to die in a blaze of honor and glory. An old warrior, surviving the blaze, wants to die knowing in a lifetime of battles, he didn't lose everything that makes life worth living. I'm an old man holding a pretty woman's hand making jokes. I'm headed towards the light at the end of a dark tunnel. What you see as existential, I see as literal."
"I'm old, too," grunts Mr. Nix.
"But your mind is still in the heat of battle. I understand you, and to you, dying in action is an honor. I just
hope you take time to reflect on the fight before it ends. A warrior's purpose isn't just to win battles, it is also to make sense of the battles fought and your life lived outside the battles."
They walk toward the light. The darkness contrasts against the approaching sunlight from the opening, making it difficult to see outside the drain tunnel.
"Nix, I can't stop contemplating time travel. There is a phenomenon I am missing."
"What do you mean?"
"Mass and location and time. Our time is not just motion, but motion in our space and dimension. Motion of the Earth, the stars, the galaxies, each changing location. If we consider the beginning of time starts with the Big Bang, the distribution and motion of matter through space in our universe is equivalent to motion through time. Matter moving away from a center, in distance, and in time. We are not only going into history when we go back into time, we are traveling to a specific location of everything in the universe. The Earth at a specific point during a specific rotation where the matter on Earth was in a specific place and formation. You three see where I'm going with this?"
The others respond, "No."
"I'm explaining why we end up on the surface of the Earth when matter passes through dimensional rift to travel time. Gravity and mass are linked by time. Think of the Earth's gravity as spherical, holding us to the Earth, keeping the moon in orbit, et cetera. As time moves, the Earth drifts through the universe, its gravity drifting with it. If we could step back from our universe and see all of time at once, we would see a tunnel of gravity leading from the location in the universe where the Earth first came into existence to where the Earth is now, its current location within the universe. When electromagnetism and gravity unify in the fifth dimension, the two combined become a force tunnel that exists through time and space. When an object enters a dimensional rift, if it lacks the ability to traverse folded space, it remains contained in that electromagnetic-gravitational tunnel, moving along that tunnel traversing time. Graphically, because the Earth revolves around the sun as it moves through the universe, the tunnel is a spiral, like a spring, and in the fifth dimension it is a tesseract spiral that folds into and out of itself. That is how an object can disappear here on Earth into a dimensional rift and reappear on Earth fifty or a hundred years in the past. Understand what I'm saying?"
Nexus of Time Page 5
