The chances of two objects coming down there was immense, and after examining everything he wondered if it could be just space wreckage. Something from some space station or rocket had been discarded and had fallen there.
Rosenberg wanted to check it, before they returned to the shuttle, and so did he! But their main problem was their oxygen was running out, and they only had a little left, even after taking Campbell’s, and they swiftly left, and left Campbell where he was, for investigators to find him, and they saluted him, at where he was, and went away from the hill wondering what had happened.
When they finally approached the place they both started to gasp as they realized that they had lost more air than they had thought they would, and Cronenberg even thought his last tank was empty a dozen times, and felt like collapsing, and he approached the site struggling to focus on what was there, seeing a distorted form of the sun, shimmering around, and he again adjusted the hot temperature that built up in his spacesuit, and wondered what had happened to its stability and ability to control its temperature, and he realized it could be him, and his struggle to get there faster, and he sighed as his spacesuit adjusted and he felt its coolness cool his body, with ecstatic pleasure.
The site looked incredible as they staggered into the area, a miniature valley, and crater in the landscape, hidden at three sides from areas further out, and only visible from where they had seen it on the hill.
It had resemblances to volcanic desert region and Rosenberg started analyzing and taking soil samples about him, while he inspected what was there and found the wreckage of a space vehicle, and on a closer approach he saw that most of it was buried in the ground, and had structural damage from an explosion, and fire.
The heat from the explosion had had more of an effect on it than he had realized further out! Things somehow took a different perspective than the damage of a normal fire.
He asked Rosenberg for his advice, recalling Rosenberg was experienced in space vehicles, as well as being one of the flight engineers like Campbell was, and he had some experience in the old stuff.
They rushed around and investigated everything, thoroughly.
Cronenberg examined it in detail and half-heartedly observed the soil and rocks – while looking out for traces of anything within the layers of ground.
Rosenberg examined things, as swiftly as he could, clearly running out of air and trying to quickly finish the investigation so they could rush away to the shuttle.
Suddenly he yelled out and Cronenberg rushed over and found him standing next to a partially buried spacesuit, stuck in the sand, with the top part resting over boulders, and they examined the helmet faceplate and Cronenberg lifted it up and saw a skeleton inside and he followed its stare going up into the Martian sky, and he read the nameplate on the suit, and realized it his name was Anders, and he recalled his name.
“Did he not go missing?” Rosenberg gasped.
“Years ago! They never found where he went …”
He recalled reading about it when he was younger, and him thinking of becoming an astronaut.
“This place is incredible!” Rosenberg announced. “What are the chances of two space vehicles coming down here?”
He nodded back amazed and examined the rocket vehicle, and wondered what it had been like, and Rosenberg rushed away and continued his investigation of the crash site.
Cronenberg started examining the pockets and contents of the spacesuit and was surprised at how preserved the things were and that one of the items was an old map, with names and locations on it, which clearly had been used a lot by Anders, and he studied the area on it and realized it was the area they were at.
Chapter 7
The Rescue
While they marched swiftly back to the shuttle Cronenberg kept going over the events trying to piece them together but he could not grasp something! Something hidden or obvious! Some clue that they had not noticed!
The heat from bright sun shining straight into their faces, through the thin atmosphere, resembled the blazing sun in space, with its high radiation, and it exhausted them, especially with lower level oxygen they had altered their spacesuits to.
He thought of Anders and the way his body had been resting and his stare and he looked there now, to the location in space, and was surprised to see the Earth.
What surprised him was another large object raced passed it, and faster than it should go, and he slowed, shaded his eyes, and struggled to focus on it, covering up a distorted form of the sun, shimmering around, and he recalled where his spacesuit helmet’s polarization adjustment was and adjusted the polarized faceplate to compensate for the extra light, and started studying the object’s incredible velocity and shape, and even thought it looked like a small alien spaceship.
When Rosenberg stopped and stood dazed he knew it was something big, and when he rested he realized its true identity and that it was one of their shuttles, and they both rushed on.
Their speed increased vastly and he knew he would not die before they reached the shuttle, and knew he had to go faster, and he was surprised when they got over a hill and saw their shuttle was resting at the bottom, and they watched the other shuttle come down from the sky and land next to their shuttle, and they ran down the hill as fast as they could, not wishing to miss anything and to get a new supply of fresh air.
At the shuttle he was so out of air and suffocating that he ordered them to get him into the shuttle, where he removed his helmet and collapsed over the floor, recovering from the run, and breathed the incredible air in, and Rosenberg copied him, and he realized how wonderful it was not to have the helmet on, after sleeping in it, and he studied the amused face of Stanley sitting in at his pilot chair, and he wondered what had happened while they had been away.
He was surprised beer cans were lying over the floor, and tried to work out where they came from, and if anything had occurred.
“Did you manage to contact the base?” he panted, curiously, breathing in the sweet air, seeing the remains of the food they had been eating, and discarded food containers lying about the floor.
“So you made it ...!” Stanley murmured, grinning at him, and at the state he was in, lying over the floor.
“When did you know that the shuttle was coming?”
“Just before you arrived! It was lucky! Our oxygen is starting to get real low!”
“Whose idea was the SOS message over the ground?”
“That was Orwell! He claimed he had seen it done before! And calculated the size it had to be to see from up in orbit! We all worked on making it!”
“It worked! Any food?”
The pilot jumped up and removed a container of food he knew he liked, and gave it to him, and got a drink dispenser!
He watched Cronenberg and Rosenberg sitting on the floor eating through the food hungrily.
“Where’s Campbell?”
Cronenberg gasped and nearly choked, and saw Rosenberg look startled, and watched the others look up with looks of astonishment, knowing something had happened.
“We found him dead!” Rosenberg announced. “Something here kills humans! When we woke we found his body and that he had been partly eaten!”
“What! Something ate him! And neither of you heard anything?”
“The spacesuit and the thin atmosphere don’t carry much sound, and we were heavily asleep in our spacesuits!”
They all seemed to consider what had happened astonished!
“Perhaps that’s what took us here! To eat us!” Lyndon gasped.
“What did you see over there on that hill?” Stanley asked, curiously, examining them, and the state they were in.
“I saw little!” Cronenberg confessed.
“Where you there early in the morning?” Stanley asked.
“Yes!” he replied.
“I thought I saw you! I got up early! The top part is visible from over there!”
“Find anything else? Why did you come from over there …?” Lyndon asked
“Where did you find it?”
“He found it!” Cronenberg pointed at Rosenberg.
Rosenberg replied, “I searched the other side of the hill! I saw it over there, hidden away … It was in a direct line with here!”
They looked at him confused, wondering what it was.
“We found a crashed space vehicle there! It was an old rocket spaceship! We found two pilots! One was called Anders!”
“I recall him!” Stanley replied first. “He vanished with another astronaut on Mars years ago!”
As Cronenberg thought of Anders he realized he had looked identical to the ghost astronaut he had seen in the night over at the hill, which he had searched for signs of in the morning before he climbed up the hill, and he wondered what the hell it meant, and he decided not to mention it unless there was more evidence of whatever it was existing.
They all looked up and watched pilots from the other shuttle enter their shuttle, and them examining everything about them, and one trying to check the damage done to the shuttle.
Cronenberg got up and watched one at work, and recalled him, and his job, and realized he was the best person for the job.
“You’re Commander Cronenberg! What happened before you landed here?” he asked, curiously.
“Something attacked the shuttle and took control of it!”
He looked up, and stared at him with surprise.
“Are there flights records that can confirm that?”
“And we can to!”
He looked confused, wondering what it could be.
“Wait until you see the other space vehicle ...!” he told him, still amazed at the find.
“What other vehicle is that?”
He pointed over in the direction of it, and replied, “Did you not see it while landing? It’s away over there!”
“What could it be?”
“Anders! Remember him! It’s an old rocket vehicle …”
“I remember him! What do you think he was doing out here?”
“I don’t have a clue!” he announced, and he thought about it and realized how intrigued he was, and realized he really wanted to know, and what was there and what was going on there, and why he had seen a ghost astronaut.
Cronenberg went over to Orwell, the shuttle science officer, to see what he had.
“Did you get anything on what happened to the shuttle, and how it came down here?”
“A few things! It sure as hell was not the shuttle itself. I checked records, and also proved it could not have done what it had. There had to be something else that did it!”
It surprised him that he was also questioning what had happened had happened! He also realized Orwell knew that they were also going to have a problem explaining what had happened to them. Would they accept what they told them, and if they did not what would they do about it?
He could try to get a full investigation, as they had been nearly killed, and the highly expensive shuttle could have been destroyed, and it might cost a lot to get it properly repaired.
“There was a strange magnetic phenomenon detected …!” Orwell gasped.
“I wonder what that could be …” he asked, confused, copying one of the rescuers investigating it, to see what he replied with.
“Something of incredible magnitude created a form of powerful magnetic influence, or something of that nature!”
“What could create such power? It had to be tremendous!”
“Someone may have been playing around with something somewhere! I was thinking if it was not from around, as we have seen, then something could have created it somewhere else, by some unknown means!”
“Why would they be experimenting on something out there though? Could it be the southern pole creating a magnetic influence?”
“How could it have controlled the shuttle and carried out what it did!” he moaned, confused. “Someone may be playing around with something in this region!”
“Why would they be experimenting on something out here though?”
“Perhaps they’re creating something big to influence Mars itself!”
“In what way?”
“They could want to alter Mars!” he mumbled to himself. “If they could move it close to the sun or use it to melt all the ice here they might be able to create immense lakes of water and create an atmosphere. They might be able to colonize it one day!”
The idea surprised Cronenberg and he realized that he might even be suggesting it was a secret government or group of governments plan, and he considered why it would be so secretive.
“What are your assumptions?” Orwell uttered, breaking the deep silence, seeing him thinking it over.
“I’ve not drawn any proper conclusions!” he confessed, considering how he could check if it would work. “Whatever it is – it has incredible power! We need more reasonable clues.”
“Even with all our technology, unknown and unexplained phenomena still exists! Who knows what exists out there in the depths of space – and even unseen about us – which could very well be beyond our detection methods and comprehension.”
Some strange thought was going through Orwell’s mind and he was figuring through possibilities and Cronenberg could not fully understand why his view of things had so vastly altered and he wondered what had happened when he was away.
He also occasionally had the look of a person who somehow sensed an oncoming consequence, and was checking ways to tackle it.
Had he found something? Or had he dreamed of scientific finds far too many times?
“At any rate, there might be other mentions of such occurrences on the Earth!” Orwell continued. “Even if most are antiquated and mythological! For instance there are zones like the Bermuda Triangle! Which was reputed to cause a similar effect – before ships and planes vanished! There could be some sort of mass of something around – perhaps a mass of magnetic iron ...! Our detection methods on Mars and even the Earth may be small, and far smaller than we think …The magnetic field of the globe has been found to have altered in many ways over Earth’s existence!”
Orwell searched his face, wondering what he thought, and Cronenberg was sure he was thinking of questioning and getting answers from him.
“I have not heard of it properly doing anything though!” Orwell replied. “Though not altogether investigated – it is very unlikely to have such an intensity and nature – even in northern regions ...”
“Okay!” he replied firmly, determined to force Orwell into giving him something. “It’s coming from somewhere and we all know it exists ... And it will be beneficial to check the disturbance – which cannot be explained by normal science – and find what we can on it.”
“I’ll attempt to find out if someone had something around here, or was using something capable of doing it!”
“Did you find anything while I was away?” he finally replied.
“I checked all the records and found one thing and just before it took control of the shuttle something appeared and flashed on and off, and was just recorded, which I think was unintentional, and I took a photo of the unusual formation, which was buried away in the blur of flickers!”
Cronenberg was surprised when he produced a photo of a complex sphere, which was clearly artificial and of a highly advanced nature, and he realized it looked of highly advanced alien origins!
Chapter 8
The Lost Library
Eventually, after hours of searching records, Cronenberg entered Base One library, after being given recommendations to go there, and glared at vast bookshelves, covering the library walls, as he entered, and gasped at how empty of people it was.
It amazed him that such libraries once were the source of information for the human race, and as he approached the books it became clear that it had a great deal of unidentifiable information, and he put it down to laziness that the stuff had not been added to the computers.
At first he had dismissed that t
here was a library, as the others had not been aware of there being a book on the entire base.
He had just grabbed some books and sat down when Orwell marched in smiling, and marched up to him and sat next to him.
“I saw you coming in here at the end of the corridor!” he laughed, and picked up a book off the table, at his side, and flickered through the pages. “What you looking for?”
“I’ve checked everything about Anders everywhere and have not found anything!” he moaned back.
“Anders!” he replied, surprised. “What do you want to know about him for?”
“Why was he there, for starters? It’s an incredible coincidence he crashed at the exact same place, in a desolate region covering such a vast region, and it was one of the only crashes on Mars!”
“You’re correct! What’s the connection though? Why do you think he was there, anyway?”
Cronenberg just shrugged back.
The furniture about him held his attention, and amused him, and was clearly used to make it look like an original Earth library, to give it authenticity, like many of the rooms and objects about the station, to give it the look of a normal place, as the astronauts had to live there for a long time, and stay indoors, without seeing a normal world.
The vast size of Base One was incredible now, and had been slowly built up over decades, with many countries helping build sections, and them wanting to increase the inhabitants on Mars, and explorations there and in space. It was as though they were on the Earth most of the time, even after being there for years! The military and police had recently been increased to compensate for increases in the inhabitants!
It was now like a small town, in a strange place, and Cronenberg kept realizing how little he knew of the inhabitants, as many he had never seen, and many left and many were new there, and he realized how little of it he had actually seen.
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