Godschild Covenant: Return of Nibiru

by Marshall Masters

  Anthony held up his hands. “I'm sold, but if I'm supposed to try and teach your Andrea how to trust her instincts with all of these magnetic anomalies, I have no idea of where to begin. I wouldn't know a magnetic anomaly from a hole in a wall, which means that you could spend years teaching me the basics before I could hope to have an intelligent conversation on the matter. I'm sorry, but I think you've picked the wrong man. You need someone with the proper background for this."

  “We've anticipated this,” Jeffrey insisted. “That's why we feel it will take you a few years in Russia to handle this. Heck, don't feel that you're in the dark all alone here. Even in his last days, Einstein admitted that some of his theories were seriously flawed and we're not asking you to be an Einstein. All I'm asking you to do is to try. Please, Anthony, won't you try?"

  “But I'm afraid you'll waste years on training me and then find yourselves no further along than you are now."

  Just as LeBlanc was to answer him, Tanya interrupted. “Anthony, what if I could cut your learning curve down from two years to two hours?"

  All eyes turned on her. “You got something up your sleeve?” Anthony joked.

  “Hmmm ... not really,” she replied. “Granted I haven't even tried to set fire to a barn with a model rocket but I did happen to live in this area for a long time, and there is a place called “The Mystery Spot” on the northern edge of what was once Santa Cruz. It used to be a famous tourist trap, because it sits on a large ore body that creates some weird kind of magnetic anomaly. Whenever we had out-of-town guests, my former husband Henry used to take them there.” Her eyes rolled. “If I've been to The Mystery Spot once, I've been there a hundred times. While I'm no scientist by any measure, I do know you'll feel and see the effects of a magnetic anomaly, and perhaps that will give you a good head start, Anthony."

  “That's a great idea,” Jeffrey chimed in. “But does this place still exist after that huge tsunami?"

  “It should,” Tanya said opening a desk drawer. She pulled the folders forward and pulled out a small stack of AAA road maps she kept in her desk. “Let me see if I can find it.” She sorted through maps, and, finding the one for Santa Cruz, California unfolded it on her desk and picked up a pen. Tracing the route to The Mystery Spot on the map, she circled where she felt they'd find it, folded the map again and handed it to Jeffrey. “Why don't you and Anthony go see if your chopper pilot can find this place while Vigo and I do a little scrounging? Let's say, we'll meet you two at the helipad in an hour."

  Anthony laughed as LeBlanc snatched the map with a glowing smile. “You've got a deal. See you there. Come on, Anthony; we're off."

  Anthony shrugged and jumped to his feet. “You know, Jeffrey, I think you're barking up the wrong tree with this sixth-sense stuff. What your Andrea really needs is a little good old fashioned female intuition.” LeBlanc nodded, and the two of them headed out of the office as Vigo watched them leave with an amused grin.

  “Well, I guess there's not much I can add to all this so I just guess I'll wait here for you guys."

  “The heck you will,” Tanya shot back. “You and I need to do a little scrounging first, and you will be coming along on the chopper."

  “Hey, I do scrounging real good. Let's rock."

  * * * *

  WARRANT OFFICER GONZALEZ flew several passes over the area Tanya had marked on the road map and found a spot where she could hover a few feet above the ground. Vigo and Jeffrey hopped down from the hovering chopper, and as Gonzalez circled overhead, they cleared an area large enough for her land the helicopter.

  As Vigo pulled the large canvas bag out of the helicopter and hefted it over his shoulder, Tanya exclaimed, “Wow, this place really got creamed in the tsunami.” She pointed at the base of a small hillside. “That's where the gift shop used to be,” as she kicked loose an old yellow sign with black and red letters that had once hung over the entrance to The Mystery Spot. She pointed to the top of the small hill; “the actual spot is up at the top of that small hill and is about one hundred and fifty feet in diameter."

  “So what's the story on this place?” Anthony asked as he knelt over the sign and looked around. Only fourteen feet above sea level, the raging waters of the Pacific had ravaged the hilltop, even though it was several miles from the shore. Everywhere they looked, fallen and uprooted trees lay on the ground and hillside pointing west in the direction of the receding flood waters, except for a circle of a half dozen trees that remained standing near the hilltop.

  “Early in the last century, some fellow bought this land to build a house and had to buy the hill as well, so he decided to build a work shed on it. After he built it, something literally shoved it down the hill against a large tree and there it stood until the tsunami. After a few years, it just became a curiosity for folks, and then it became a hot tourist spot.” She pointed at the circle of standing trees near the hilltop. “That's where the actual mystery spot is, and why those trees are still standing is beyond me. I guess it is just another part of the mystery. If you guys will follow me, I can see that a good part of the paving and concrete steps survived, but be careful."

  With Tanya in the lead, the group started weaving its way around the debris and up the small hillside. Tanya turned towards the helicopter and signaled for the pilot to join them.

  They had only gone about twenty feet when she stopped and pulled a small pile of debris off a piece of concrete pad that had once stood next to the ticket booth. “Vigo, give me the bubble level."

  He lowered the bag to the ground and pulled out a small carpenter's level they'd borrowed from the maintenance room and handed it to her. She sat the level down on the concrete pad and checked it. The bubble centered indicating the level was on flat ground. She looked towards the back of the group where the pilot was standing, motioned her to come forward and had her stand back to back with Vigo. “Well, I'd say that Warrant Officer Gonzalez here is about a foot shorter than Sergeant Jones.” Agreeing nods confirmed her estimate.

  “OK, Vigo, have you got the digital camera?” He reached in the bag and pulled out an old digital camera with a large LCD display on the back. “Give it to Jeffrey; he'll be our official Mystery Spot photographer today."

  She found two old 2x4 boards, laid them across the pad pointing towards the hill and had Vigo stand on one end with Gonzalez on the other. Then, she had Vigo stand on the side farthest from the hill and Gonzalez on the side closest to the hill. “OK, Jeffrey, stand over there perpendicular to them and take a picture of them facing each other."

  He did as instructed, and the image captured by the camera made Vigo seem much taller than when he and Gonzalez had been standing back to back. “Now, I know you're all seeing this same thing with your eyes and yes, it is an illusion. But if you look at the picture Jeffrey just took, you'll see that it is not a psychological illusion."

  The group huddled around Jeffrey and the camera and curiously eyed the image. “Now, let's do it a different way. This time, I want Jones and Gonzalez to change sides.” The two moved to opposite positions and stepped back up on the boards. This time, Gonzalez appeared to be nearly as tall Jones to the group, and to their amazement, the digital camera image showed the same result."

  “OK, let's gather everything up and go up the hill a bit. By the way, if you begin to feel queasy or nauseous don't worry. It will pass after we come back down.” She picked up the carpenter's level. “Let's go."

  They carefully threaded past fallen trees and debris left behind by the tsunami wave and soon reached a spot in the center of the only remaining stand of trees. Tanya looked up at the top of the trees. “Amazing,” she muttered to herself. “Look up, folks. These trees should all be leaning West because of the tsunami, but they're all still leaning inward towards the spot on which we're standing. Don't ask me why. All I know is that we're standing over a huge ore deposit, which they say caused the magnetic anomaly here and makes all the measuring instruments go wacky."

  “Vigo, the board and the ball
s please.” Vigo removed a straight makeshift plank with a groove running down the center. “Give me a hand Anthony. We need to get this board set at an angle with one end facing downhill. That end has to be at least a quarter bubble off so that the far end of the board is higher."

  Anthony gathered a few broken chunks of concrete and helped her set up the board. After everyone had checked the level to see that the end of the board facing downhill was higher than the other end, she positioned Jeffrey with the camera for another series of pictures and then took two balls from Vigo's hands and held them up. “We appropriated these billiard balls from the recreation tent. They're the usual non-metallic type, so let's see what happens if we put one of them on the low end of the board.” She carefully positioned a white cue ball on the low end of the board. “Anthony, I want you to stand on the other side of the board and let's see what happens when I remove my hand. And Jeffrey, don't forget to take plenty of pictures."

  Holding the cue ball in place until Anthony was in position, she carefully lifted her hand without disturbing the ball. Within a moment, the ball began rolling up the plank as though an unseen hand were guiding it along until it fell off the other end, into Anthony's outstretched hand. She then followed it with an eight ball for a repeat of the same result.

  Each member of the group then took turns as they openly wondered what could be causing the balls to roll up the grooved plank against gravity.

  Finally, Anthony turned to Jeffrey and asked, “Is this what is happening when your probes try to analyze Shiva?"

  “Yes, but the magnetic anomalies they're dealing with are stronger by several orders of magnitude."

  Tanya smiled. She could see that Anthony was beginning to intuitively connect with the phenomenon. She looked around and saw a large 2x6 between two trees. “And now the ‘piece de resistance’ ladies and gentlemen,” she announced.

  She handed the billiard balls back to Vigo. “Anthony, help me get that large board over by that tree and we'll set it nice and level this time.” Anthony followed her to the board and kicked it over with the toe of his shoe to make sure there were no crawling surprises. As he used a fallen branch to shake off the dirt and muck he said quietly, “Tanya my love, you're a genius. This demonstration is a mind blower."

  “I'm no genius,” she smiled. “I just made sure we always got the same tour guide.” She chuckled. “He was a corker. You know, the kind of guy who has been here forever, and what I really liked about him was that he could say hello in every language imaginable. After the umpteenth tour, I got more of a kick from watching people's faces light up when they heard him say hello in their native tongue."

  “I hope he survived,” Anthony said.

  “Me, too."

  The two of them carried the six feet long board back to center of the mystery spot and sat it perfectly flat and level.

  “Do you all remember the difference in height between Sergeant Jones and Warrant Officer Gonzalez at the base of the hill? Well, let's see what happens when we're standing directly on top of the Mystery Spot."

  Vigo stepped gingerly up upon the downhill side of the board and Gonzalez on the other side. “Oh my,” Vigo exclaimed as Jeffrey clicked pictures, “Gonzalez, you look about as tall as knee-high rug rat."

  Gonzalez grunted. “Rug rat, my ass! Let's switch sides."

  The two switched sides and this time Gonzalez who was nearly a foot shorter than Vigo in actual height could now look directly ahead at the top of his head. “Now I'm taller than you, sergeant,” she boasted as Jeffrey continued taking pictures.

  They both stepped down, and everyone huddled around Jeffrey and the camera one more time as he replayed the images. Each image captured by the camera was exactly the same as each of them had seen with their own eyes.

  “In a nutshell, this is the problem we're having,” Jeffrey noted. “Our instruments, which we've built to accommodate our own powers of perception, can be fooled as easily as we can."

  Anthony said, “Can I have the camera for a bit?” Jeffrey handed it to him and he sat down on the plank, cycling through the images for several minutes as everyone quietly looked on.

  After playing back the images several times, he closed his eyes and took three long deep breaths and opened his eyes with a deep knowing smile. “Now it clicks. Now I know what I've got to do. Let's get headed back."

  * * * *

  CORPORAL SUNNY SHARMA was relieved to see them return. Before she had left, Tanya had ordered an armed MP to stand guard in front of her office and the man had turned out to be a dry, witless conversationalist by Sharma's standards. Now that he could leave, his office routine would no longer be interrupted.

  Tanya looked at her watch as she opened the door to her office. “Sunny, why don't you go and get some dinner if you like? Just lock the front door behind you."

  He glanced at Vigo, Anthony and Jeffrey and said, “Sure you wouldn't like a nice cup of tea?"

  “Good idea, Sharma,” Anthony replied. “Come on; let's go in."

  They all filed into the office and sat around the conference table discussing their outing to The Mystery Spot and passing around the digital camera.

  Anthony scanned through the last images of Vigo and Gonzalez standing on the long plank and said, “Tell me, Jeffrey, the holographic image of Andrea was impressive, but if I wanted to find this Andrea, where is she. Buried in some silicon chip or something?"

  “No, she actually resides in a small biomass processor.” He put his hand on the small IBM Biomass desktop prototype. “And this is where she lives so to speak."

  “So show me. Open it up."

  “Sure, just don't go picking around inside as there are some delicate components in there."

  “Don't worry about us,” Anthony replied. Jeffrey nodded and began removing the large cabinet thumbscrews along the top of the prototype and removed the top panel. They looked inside and saw several computer devices and fiber optic cables neatly woven around a thick sealed Plexiglas box in the center of the cabinet. Inside the Plexiglas, they saw a small human like brain floating in a clear pinkish fluid.

  “Is that a real brain?” Tanya gasped.

  “Only in the sense that the IBM bioengineers used human stem cells to create it. However, the oxygenated fluid you see around is modified amniotic fluid. They collect it from pregnant women when their water breaks before giving birth and enhance it."

  “So Andrea must be in a pretty dark and lonely place,” Tanya said.

  “No, her senses are actually better than anything we can imagine, and right now she's in standby mode which is a like a very deep restful sleep. When she is connected to her external sensory controllers, she can sense the world much better than we can."

  “So is she alive?” Anthony wondered aloud.

  “Not in the sense that we understand it. That's why Andrea is a called a quasi-sentient intelligence, or quasill if you will."

  “And what would happen if this thing broke. Would she die?"

  “This copy of Andrea would cease to exist. There is another copy of her personality engram in Russia, so in that sense, if something happened to this copy she wouldn't really know the difference. If she were damaged, she can regenerate her own cells or add more, which is what she does when she creates new sub-routines. That's why we call the larger version a mainframe. It literally gives her the room she needs to grow as much additional biomass as she needs. The brain core where her personality resides is still about the same with the larger version, but the additional biomass looks more like large clumps of hamburger than brain matter"

  “So if I try something with her and something goes haywire, you're not going to lose all your work and she's not going to die, if that is what she does."

  Jeffrey gave him a doubtful look. “Have you got something in mind?"

  “Yes. I want you to wake her up, and then I want everyone to leave me alone with her for a while. Is that OK?” A troubled expression crossed LeBlanc's face.

  “Ah heck,” Vig
o exclaimed. “Do you think he's going to whack on it with a spanner wrench or something? Let him have a go at it."

  LeBlanc studied Anthony for a moment and grunted. “Just be careful."

  “Scouts honor. Now just wake her up, and y'all give me some elbow room."

  LeBlanc reached over, turned on the holographic projector and then tapped a few commands into the keyboard. The projector whirred to life and a moment later Andrea's physical image appeared. “Good morning, Dave,” she said as she opened her eyes.

  Jeffrey groaned. “Can we be serious, Andrea? This is not the time for jokes.” He turned to face the group. “She saw the movie 2001 two weeks ago and she's been yanking my chain with this ever since. I think she just likes pissing me off."

  They all laughed. Tanya put an arm on Jeffrey's shoulder and said to Andrea, “I see you've learned how to irritate these testosterone-driven life forms. Isn't it fun?"

  Andrea giggled. “I'm not at liberty to say,” she replied with a wink.

  “We're definitely talking female intuition here,” Vigo noted wryly.

  LeBlanc pretended to ignore the puns. “Andrea, Anthony here would like to spend some time with you alone. For what reason, he will not say. Are you interested?"

  Andrea's face lit up. “Yes. I would love it!"

  “All right then,” LeBlanc sighed. “Anthony, we'll be outside in the waiting room. When you're finished, just leave everything as it is, and come and get me."

  After they filed out the door, Anthony sat down next to the computer cabinet, studied Andrea's brain in the Plexiglas housing and looked back at the holographic image of her. “I want to try something that could be a lot different from what you're used to, Andrea. I'm not sure how you'll react to it."

  “I'm willing to try, and I am excited by the chance to experience something new. If I begin to malfunction, Anthony, simply command me to go into standby mode. It is a core level function that overrides my higher-level processes; then, tell Jeffrey what happened. He'll be able to resolve it."