They finished their drinks, and returned to the sphere to check the contents of a few more pods before the ‘Officials’ took over, and everything was whisked away.
Due to the sheer size of the sphere, now that it was spread out on the desert floor, they hadn’t noticed the pods nearer the centre of the arm were much smaller, and slightly different in nature to those they had already opened.
‘Let’s check one of them out,’ suggested Greg, already walking along the line of still sealed pods towards the new type, ‘they look a bit special, they could contain religious artefacts or something very precious to the Martians.’
The first of the new pods was released from its holding bands, and gently lowered to the sand.
‘There’s no release knob or bump on this one,’ said Hans, running his hand over the surface of the pod, ‘so it looks like I’ll have to get my cutter.’
‘Go on, let him,’ said Paul to Greg, ‘he’s been itching to use it ever since we started.’
Greg was inspecting a raised section on the end of the pod,
‘Looks as if it connected into something on the arm, as it had a series of small holes forming a pattern on its surface.
‘I think this is our opening device,’ he said, pointing to the connection socket of the pod, ‘although why it should be different to the others beats me.’
He ran his fingers all over it, just to make sure there wasn’t a pressure release device he’d missed, and then asked for a small hammer.
‘I’ll give it a tap or two, maybe the mechanism's got stuck, and needs a little gentle persuasion.’
Three taps later, each one getting progressively harder, and a sharp hiss indicated that something was about to happen.
Greg instinctively stepped back as the top of the pod hinged fully open, and then dropped back against the side.
Gingerly the team moved forward to see what the pod contained, and a united gasp caused everyone else to freeze in their steps.
Lying in its protective cushion, with a series of fine tubes and wires coming out of it, was a six foot deep bronze skeletal figure, the bones clearly showing beneath the taught skin and flesh which had dehydrated over aeons of time.
Maybe it was the change in humidity coupled with the slight movement imparted to the pod as Greg rested his hand on it which caused the jaw to drop open in the travesty of a cheery grin.
The ingenuity and technical expertise of the Martians had never been in question, but even they were prone to the odd little mechanical fault, but all was well now.
The last of the Martians had finally reached their new home world, a little late perhaps, but they had arrived.
***
Other stories by
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The Martian Enigma Page 17