Read Online Writers of the Future, Volume 28 by L. Ron Hubbard - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: L. Ron Hubbard
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the roof of an ancient Martian temple. But then I realized, even if it didn’t match my wild imagination, he’d still made an amazing find. I touched it again.
“There’s so much. How deep do you think it goes ? ”
“Nellie estimates another forty feet or so beyond this.”
“Holy crap.”
“They’re all that deep. All thirty-six of them.”
“I don’t . . . thirty-six what ? ”
Jack dragged his hand along the ice and moved to face me. “Thirty-six ice pillars. I’ve only uncovered five, but those stones up top show the pattern Nellie found. These five are all perfectly smooth and exactly the same diameter. And I’d bet they are all the same depth too.”
I stared at him. A lump formed in my throat and I felt a weight on my chest. I was a scientist. I couldn’t let myself believe the conclusions my mind formed. I wanted something like this too bad. It had to be studied.
“It has to be some natural formation,” I said with an overly dry mouth. “Nature does strange things, like those creepy basalt shapes.”
He shrugged. “I’m not saying otherwise. But these things are also equally spaced, thirty-five forming a ring, with another one in the center.”
I turned and rushed back out to the hole in the floor.
“Is this one of them too ? ” I asked, dreading his response.
“Yeah,” Jack said and came up behind me. “Nellie sensed the water ice and stopped here to dig. I wouldn’t have thought to even look back in the hole after we were done except she’d filled her nearly empty water tanks with this single dig and threw extra ice out onto the surface to evaporate. That never happened before.”
“And the hole is—”
“Because it’s sublimating. The light hits it during the day. I tried covering it up, but that created a heated pocket and made it worse.”
My hands shook. If his claim was true, Jack had stumbled across what might be the largest single find in human history . . . and he was letting it vaporize. “You’re digging the others out ? ”
“I’m not exposing them to the light. They haven’t lost anything from their diameters.”
My respiration peaked so rapidly an alarm sounded in my helmet as the suit adjusted my gas levels.
“Jack! We . . . we . . . have no idea how old these things are or what the open air will do to them. We have no right. We’re not qualified to make this kind of decision for the entire human race.”
“Why not ? ” Jack said. “No one on Earth has ever encountered alien artifacts, so we’re the new experts.”
I had a panicky feeling about losing more of this material. I had to stop him. But I took a deep breath and tried to focus. Jack wasn’t an idiot, so I needed to listen to what he was saying. I entered the tunnel and checked the ambient temperature inside. Minus sixty-three Celsius, which might be fine since it wasn’t in direct sunlight.
“We don’t know what’s in that ice,” I said. “Maybe there were sculptures, or carved instructions or some kind of microorganisms. Maybe even cold-suspended Martian DNA. We could be losing hundreds of painfully preserved Martian species.”
“This one was an accident. And it’s too late to save it.”
“Maybe not. We could fill it back up with dirt, then call it in and get all of mankind’s resources behind us.”
“And lose them forever to MarsCorp ? ”
I paused, not sure what he meant. “No one will take this away from you, Jack. You’ll still get all the credit.”
He slapped a dusty glove against my helmet, making my ears ring. “Credit ? You just don’t get it, do you ? I don’t care about getting credit. This is a message. It’s a puzzle and I want to figure it out. I feel like I’m so close.”
The swat on my helmet made me furious, but I held back. I still wanted to convince him it was right before I reported this to the base. “You’ll still be able—”
“No!” he said and bumped his visor against mine, putting his face as close to me as possible.
“There’s so much. How deep do you think it goes ? ”
“Nellie estimates another forty feet or so beyond this.”
“Holy crap.”
“They’re all that deep. All thirty-six of them.”
“I don’t . . . thirty-six what ? ”
Jack dragged his hand along the ice and moved to face me. “Thirty-six ice pillars. I’ve only uncovered five, but those stones up top show the pattern Nellie found. These five are all perfectly smooth and exactly the same diameter. And I’d bet they are all the same depth too.”
I stared at him. A lump formed in my throat and I felt a weight on my chest. I was a scientist. I couldn’t let myself believe the conclusions my mind formed. I wanted something like this too bad. It had to be studied.
“It has to be some natural formation,” I said with an overly dry mouth. “Nature does strange things, like those creepy basalt shapes.”
He shrugged. “I’m not saying otherwise. But these things are also equally spaced, thirty-five forming a ring, with another one in the center.”
I turned and rushed back out to the hole in the floor.
“Is this one of them too ? ” I asked, dreading his response.
“Yeah,” Jack said and came up behind me. “Nellie sensed the water ice and stopped here to dig. I wouldn’t have thought to even look back in the hole after we were done except she’d filled her nearly empty water tanks with this single dig and threw extra ice out onto the surface to evaporate. That never happened before.”
“And the hole is—”
“Because it’s sublimating. The light hits it during the day. I tried covering it up, but that created a heated pocket and made it worse.”
My hands shook. If his claim was true, Jack had stumbled across what might be the largest single find in human history . . . and he was letting it vaporize. “You’re digging the others out ? ”
“I’m not exposing them to the light. They haven’t lost anything from their diameters.”
My respiration peaked so rapidly an alarm sounded in my helmet as the suit adjusted my gas levels.
“Jack! We . . . we . . . have no idea how old these things are or what the open air will do to them. We have no right. We’re not qualified to make this kind of decision for the entire human race.”
“Why not ? ” Jack said. “No one on Earth has ever encountered alien artifacts, so we’re the new experts.”
I had a panicky feeling about losing more of this material. I had to stop him. But I took a deep breath and tried to focus. Jack wasn’t an idiot, so I needed to listen to what he was saying. I entered the tunnel and checked the ambient temperature inside. Minus sixty-three Celsius, which might be fine since it wasn’t in direct sunlight.
“We don’t know what’s in that ice,” I said. “Maybe there were sculptures, or carved instructions or some kind of microorganisms. Maybe even cold-suspended Martian DNA. We could be losing hundreds of painfully preserved Martian species.”
“This one was an accident. And it’s too late to save it.”
“Maybe not. We could fill it back up with dirt, then call it in and get all of mankind’s resources behind us.”
“And lose them forever to MarsCorp ? ”
I paused, not sure what he meant. “No one will take this away from you, Jack. You’ll still get all the credit.”
He slapped a dusty glove against my helmet, making my ears ring. “Credit ? You just don’t get it, do you ? I don’t care about getting credit. This is a message. It’s a puzzle and I want to figure it out. I feel like I’m so close.”
The swat on my helmet made me furious, but I held back. I still wanted to convince him it was right before I reported this to the base. “You’ll still be able—”
“No!” he said and bumped his visor against mine, putting his face as close to me as possible.
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