The Temporal Key
Page 18
There before her eyes floated an image that looked like two small buildings made of rustic materials with a number of metallic and animal objects surround them. As she looked closer the largest of the metallic objects appeared to be a vehicle much like the one they had seen on their first day there. At the time neither of them had paid too close attention to the old vehicle, but it didn't really matter to them in the long run. A vehicle was a vehicle, and that's what they needed now. She continued to move around the hologram looking for signs of life, and several biological signals showed up in her display. She found horses and various other small creatures that lived around the area and finally a solitary humanoid showed up on her scope some distance from the main domicile. "I think I found our primitive. He appears to be riding one of the equine life signs that keep appearing in the vicinity. He’s about point eight five kilometers heading east from the largest metallic object, which appears to be the vehicle! It’s there, by the settlement." She said as she kept scoping around the area.
"Well, let's hope it stays there." Dayk said. “It’s going to take us almost thirty kiloChrons to make that distance. It’s possible the man and the vehicle will be gone by the time we get there.”
"Is this a stupid plan?" Thalia asked rethinking her own idea. "Doesn't this kind of go against everything we're supposed to be doing anyway?" She asked him. “Preserving the past and all.”
"Yeah, a little bit, but frankly we're not supposed to crash and hand over a bunch of our wrecked technology and fallen comrades either. Sometimes history gets in the way of the rules." Dayk said nonchalantly.
"History gets in the way of the rules!?" Thalia asked with some alarm. “Sir, I don’t mean to…”
Dayk cut her off. "Our future literally lies in the past, this past, and all of this has already been written in the fabric of space-time. We cheat the system by traveling through time." Dayk told her. "What we're experiencing right now is simultaneously the past, the present and the future all wrapped into one event. Which is why we know some of what's going to happen, but not all of it, and it's also why we're stuck in the now trying to decide the best course of action to take, so as to not alter the future and the past in the same action. There are in fact many actions that we could take that might irreparably alter the timeline, a killing, sharing technology, or temporal invasion of the past. Stealing an abandon vehicle will probably leave these people with some unanswered questions, but it won't alter the course of history. This was your idea." Dayk reminded her.
"I know." She said. "Maybe I was just hoping you'd disagree."
Dayk didn't respond but stuck his head back out of the entrance to the small cave. The small aircraft had finished swinging back around and was flying overhead. On this trip the craft was further off from them than it had been on previous passes. He watched as it zoomed off beyond where they were hiding and then came back into the cave.
"Now's as good a time as any." He said. "Care to take a long walk through the desert to steal a vehicle?" He smiled and held out his hand to help her up from her seat. Thalia returned a tired smile and took his assistance.
"What do we do about the search going on outside?" She asked.
"Try and stay hidden." He answered.
The Wreckage Arrives in Roswell
Major Marcel couldn’t contain his excitement as he followed the last of the large covered trucks through the gate and into a hangar at the back of the Roswell Army Air Field. The MPs waved them through as they proceeded, and the massive hangar doors slowly rolled shut behind them. Jesse couldn't get out of the truck fast enough. Still as excited as he had been in the desert, he jumped out of the truck and started moving from cargo to cargo, lifting tarp covers and peeking into box trucks as though he'd never seen any of it before.
As he greedily examined his exciting capture, a Sergeant walked in from the other side of the hangar and marched directly over toward Major Marcel. He stopped short of the Major and quickly snapped to attention and saluted him.
"At ease, Sergeant." Jesse said as the man saluted. The sergeant quickly resumed himself and pulled the notebook he'd been holding under his arm out and opened it. The notebook contained the written documentation of everything that the field personnel had cobbled together as they cataloged the pieces of the ship as they collected them.
"Shall we go through the inventory, sir?" The sergeant asked as he opened the pages of the notebook.
Jesse looked over at him, clearly pondering something, as if the sergeant’s question reminded him of something else. "Where's General Ramey?" He asked and then immediately started marching off toward the hangar’s rear entrance.
"Sir, General Ramey is in the secure corridor. Room A15." The sergeant said as he began following Major Marcel across the massive hangar.
As soon as they stepped out of the back entrance to the hangar, there were two armed MPs standing guard at the door. They snapped to attention as Major Marcel and the Sergeant came through the door. Jesse stopped to speak to the MPs.
"This hangar is now officially secure. No one comes in or out unless either myself, or General Ramey say otherwise. Is that clear?" Jesse ordered the MPs.
"Yes sir." They said in unison.
"Radio up front and pass the order on, all right?" Jesse said as he started to turn and continued toward the intelligence building.
"Yes sir." The commanding MP said.
Jesse stopped in his tracks as a memory came flooding back to him. "Oh, yes!" He exclaimed as he turned around. "There is one more contingent in the field searching for additional artifacts. If they return before I do, have the men up front hold them there, and then call for someone to come and get me."
"Yes sir." The MP said again. As Jesse walked away with the Sergeant in tow, the MP turned to a radio box and began calling the orders in to the MPs guarding the front entrance, and the giant sliding doors.
Jesse and the Sergeant entered the intelligence building at the back of the base and marched down the sweltering hallway past Jesse's own office and down on to A15 where General Ramey was supposed to be. As the two men got very near to room A15, a familiar voice came from another office that was opened just behind them. It was a booming and commanding voice that Jesse had heard almost every day for the last two years.
"Major!" Said General Ramey. Jesse stopped in his tracks and returned to the open room. There sat the General with two of his assistants. Jesse and the Sergeant both snapped to attention and saluted at the open door. "At ease gentlemen." The General said. Jesse walked into the room and stood next to one of the General's assistants.
"Sir." He said politely.
"How did everything come out in the field?" Said General Ramey. "I'm guessing that you still haven't found the missing alien."
"Sir, I believe there may be two missing aliens." Jesse replied.
"Two? Based on what?" Asked the General with clear interest in his tone.
"Sir, there were certain patterns that we saw that suggested the presence of two individuals assisting one another. For instance, we found at least two different sets of foot prints, possibly three, and we also found five body bags, and only three bodies. There was a pulley system that looked rather make-shift in a collapsed part of the vessel, and from what we could tell, it probably would have taken at least two people.... or.... aliens.... to operate and retrieve one of the bodies with that system."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, sir, all three of the bodies we found were already sealed in body bags of some kind. One of them seems, at least on our initial observations, to have been partially crushed, by something. Anyhow, there's more. There's also a significant amount of what looks like dried blood all along the collapsed bulkhead that they used the make-shift pulley system on. It appears as though one of them was crushed in the wreck and the survivors pulled the victim free for storage inside the body bag."
"I see." Said the General. "So, then you've found and retrieved three dead Martians, plus the entire space ship they came in."
"Tell me all about it." The General said.
"Sir, if it's all the same to you, we've got men standing by to start unpacking it in the rear hangar. I think you should have a look for yourself. I’m still having a hard time trying to describe it to myself." Jesse said smiling and inviting the General to come admire his trophy.
"You bet your ass I want to see this thing. But don't unpack it yet. It may not be staying here." Said the General.
"Why wouldn't it stay here, sir?" Jesse asked suddenly feeling like he was about to be robbed.
"Son, this is a small air base. We don't have man-power or equipment, and we've got nowhere to really take this thing apart and have a proper look at it. We simply aren't equipped. But we do have what we need up at Alamogordo." He replied.
"Yes, sir. They do have scientific man-power and equipment to really give this thing the love it needs." Jesse said. He understood, but it still felt like it was being taken away from him. The General could easily see it on his face.
"Major." He said. "I know you're excited to tear this thing open and be one of the one's that gets to examine it in detail. I understand that. I want to see this thing inside and out as well. We might not have what we need to give it a thorough examination, but we're not completely without means. Let's call in Major Moorhead and have him take a look at one of those bodies before it rots any more than it has. He was a professor of anatomy and physiology before the war. No reason we can't have one of our doctors take a look, eh?" Said the General as he stood up from his chair. “There’s a biologist… a specialist of sorts up at Alamogordo. I’ll ask Colonel Turner to fly her out tonight and we can get this started right away.”
"Yes sir!" Jesse said with a smile.
"Let's brief your men and then go and have a look at this thing." The General started marching out the door with his entourage following closely on his heels. Jesse and the young Sergeant quickly turned and followed them out of the office and down the corridor.
The hallway turned to the left and continued for a little way. Shortly after the turn, they came to a conference room. The door was shut, and as they opened it there sat twenty-four men of different ranks and positions all sitting in the room chatting loudly. As soon as the General walked in, they all got quickly quiet and stood up and at attention. Someone called out "Ten Hut!" as they all saluted the General and his entourage.
General Ramey walked across the front of the room followed closely by Major Marcel and their three subordinates. The General and Major Marcel all saluted the men, and then the General spoke. "Have a seat, men." The whole room quickly fell into order and the men sat down still at attention.
General Ramey's eyes looked over every one of them with a scrupulous eye. "Gentlemen." He started coolly. "You've all been witness to something that until recently has only existed in the realm of science fiction. As far as anyone is concerned it is still only science fiction. Everything you've seen or heard over the last twenty-four hours is top secret. And anyone so much as even telling their wives about this will be guilty of espionage against these United States of America. Is that understood?"
"Yes sir!" Came the whole room in unison. The General smiled on the inside, but his face remained stern.
"Now I know many of you probably have lots of questions about this thing. What is it? Where did it come from? For all of you I only have this to say." The General continued. He looked around the room again, taking a long pause. "Get over it. You will not be getting any answers. That's just the way it is." Major Marcel looked over at him feeling saddened by what he was hearing. It wasn't anything that he didn't already know, it just brought it home to hear the words.
"While there may never be any acknowledgement of what you've done for your country here, rest assured you are all heroes. We don't know anything about these beings. We don't know if this is the start of an invasion, or if they're just here to observe. Either way, your contribution will make it possible for us to learn as much as we can from these aliens, and that will make our country a safer, stronger and better prepared place for all of us in the future." The General paused and looked around at their faces. Most of the men looked stoically disappointed. "From here on out you are all on strict orders of silence regarding this event. Some of you will be joining us in the hangar very shortly to assist in further investigation. The rest of you will be returning to your regular duties. I will not say this again; your last twenty-four hours are top secret. Is that understood?" He asked loudly.
"Yes sir!" The men said in unison.
"Sergeant Miller here will have your orders going forward. Dismissed." General Ramey finished. With that he turned and marched out of the room. Only one of his assistants followed him out, the other staying behind to dole out orders. Jesse followed closely on his heels with his own Sergeant tagging along behind him. They immediately left the building and walked over to the hangar that held the biggest secret discovery in the history of man-kind. A secret that they would all be taking to their graves.
Stealing
"Twenty solar sines ago, our time of course, I was in an accident... well, it wasn't really an accident. Our ship broke down. It was an Astrim Twelve model; primitive compared to the Chronis. Ship's name was the Vortex." Dayk said as they trudged through the desert toward the ranch house.
"I know that ship!" Thalia said, huffing and slightly out of breath in her rebreather mask. "The hyper-fusion coils discharged on entry, or something, didn't they?"
"Eh, it wasn't all of them. We had four that just wouldn't hold a charge. They acted like they were holding a charge, but when it came time to return home... dead." He replied mid story.
"I didn't know you were on that ship." Thalia said with some admiration.
"I was indeed," he said. "Anyways. We were stuck about fifty thousand years back from where we are now. It was much colder, far fewer sapiens around. The place was crawling with Neanderthals, which was primarily what we went back to research, but anyway." He said huffing along as they walked up a hill. "The rescue ship had come back to get us, but when they got there, their ship's archiver kept shorting out every time they tried to collect the ship."
"Nothing was going your way," Thalia said with a grin which peaked out of the corners of her mask. "What did you guys end up doing?"
"Well, we ended up leaving the ship there. It sat there for what ended up being about fifty years normal time."
"Why so long?" She asked.
"It wasn't intentional. Another mathematician had made a simple error in calculation, so the second ship came back about fifty years later than it was supposed to. The ship came back covered in all manner of primitive artwork; paintings, mud and stick figures. It was really quite fascinating." Dayk's said happily.
"That didn't corrupt the timeline?" Thalia asked.
"No. Not really. The one thing the Neanderthals lacked was a way to really transmit ideas. Well, we assumed it was Neanderthals by the artwork, by I suppose it could have been early Sapiens as well. In any case, they couldn't transmit their ideas beyond a generation or two, so the only memory of it to last was our own. I mean, I suppose it may have changed a few details in the lives of a few primitives, but honestly, there was absolutely no change to the temporal key."
"What happened to the artwork?"
"It's still on the ship. We decommissioned the Vortex after the trip. It had become an artifact in and of itself. A record of a primitive people treating it like some sort of magical god. Plus, the ship didn't function properly anyhow. Haven't you been to the Museum of Time up north?" He asked.
"Not since I was a kid." Thalia said.
"Well, then it was probably put in there after you were there. You should check it out some time. It's a pretty amazing mix of modern and primitive art."
"Well, I'm glad you think I'll have the chance." Thalia said with a smile.
&nb
sp; They had been marching unseen through the desert for almost twenty-nine kiloChrons. The sun had long since gone down and whatever threat they had been in from the remaining military men had long since passed. Still, the heat of the day lingered into the night as they walked up a hill that was only about one kilometer away from the ranch house.
The sky was lit up brightly with stars, and the moon hung far over the horizon. To the west the sun barely glowed its last hint of the previous day. Nocturnal animals had begun to stir all around them, hiding in the grass and cactus of the surrounding desert. They were able to see clearly in the dark with their augmented eyes. The world looked to them like a strange pastel day. Any life forms they came across were augmented with a dim red highlight that revealed them from their desert hiding places and included a small amount of information that they could detect.
"I've never been so happy to see a primitive habitat before!" Thalia said as they got their first glimpse of it from atop the hill.
"I know what you mean." Dayk agreed as he huffed from the climb. "We may get through this yet."
"It looks like a single primitive is laying down inside the larger structure!" Thalia said excitedly. Dayk quietly agreed with her. “Vitals suggest that he’s sleeping.”
“We still have to be careful. There are three large equine creatures in the smaller structure, and they may already be aware of us. Hopefully, we’ll be able to get in and out without being noticed.”
Before they realized what they were doing, their brisk walk had become a jog as gravity and excitement helped them down the leeside of the hill. They kept their footsteps as light and quiet as possible but seemed to care less about it the closer they came to the ranch house. Hopping through a barb-wire fence and stumbling past random bits of old farm equipment they finally got within meters of the stables when they stopped jogging and took their first rest of the evening.
We made it! Thalia thought excitedly.
Finally. Dayk agreed. Let’s check out the…