It was also as though he could see in infrared and he watched the rabbit move from hiding place to hiding place, and wondered why they were still even at the location and he was sure that once the army moved they would no longer want to search there for it and that they were on their final attempts at searching.
Fogler was determined in finding what was there and he was going down with him, instead of Simpson, and Cameron put on a harness and they lowered him into the well.
As he went down air currents made strange sounds and he wondered if it was the normal sound of them, and he was hearing it in its real form, and he was sure he heard an insect scurrying along a piece of rock, and he listened to Fogler breathing below, now at the bottom of the well, and he sounded annoyed at what he found there and he watched him moving about trying to check things, as though doing it before he arrived below.
He wondered what was happening to him, and how far his hearing could alter, and if it could alter him into something else, and he wondered if it was a sixth or something else involved as he had seen the rabbit in what appeared as a different form of light.
The sounds were amazing and the others above started to notice his peculiar reactions, and mentioned it.
He even wondered what would happen if they remained the way they were, and what the effects would do to him, and he listened to how mind-bending they were! Fogler’s breathing came screaming up through the shaft like a dangerous fury that stunned him, and no matter how he tried to shake it off and contemplate how it could happen it never altered or formed a stable normal recognition and he started not listening, and forcing his hearing to return to normal again.
Clouds of powdered dirt came up from below, swirling through the beams of light in gusts of air, and he felt heat from the air and smelt burning and realized that Fogler was now lighting a fire below for some reason and he tried to see why.
He was using pieces of branches and twigs that were covering the area below and Cameron considered if he was getting rid of them to clean away the mess or using the fire for some reason.
He soon realized that it was both and that he was using it to see properly around him in the darkness below, and he considered if his torch batteries were going flat and if they would only have one torch later on.
He was sure the well was actually built hundreds of years ago and wondered if there had been no water above at the time, and why it had been made. Perhaps they had not owned any land with water and had to use their own water source.
He wondered if it was the well’s builders that had put the treasure there, if it existed! There was little on what was there and why they were there. They insisted he was the one that had the information and they expected him to recall what was happening, but what the hell was it and he could not imagine recalling anything. If only he could meet someone or something that he had known that would remind him.
When he landed beside Fogler at the bottom of the well he suddenly he recalled the map and he watched Fogler absorbed with the fire and searching to fully notice him!
He recalled all the faint lines on the map, and scribbles, and was sure it was a map but everything was too dim and incomprehensive, but he was starting to think it could have been a form of treasure map! He was sure it was a map of the area and that an mark on it was where they were digging and he or the person that it had belonged to had traced the well to there, and had uncovered the well beneath the ground in the wood.
He had kept trying to read the writing on it, and had been so unsuccessful that he had not even realized one word on the thing, and he was starting to think it was in another language or an old language used by the person that had made it.
He had considered having it dated to get who had written it, but he was not sure how to go about doing it yet and was unsure if their dating was accurate, and could give him the wrong time and be off by many years.
Fogler’s plan was clearly to search where they had not looked or properly looked, and Simpson had given him his information.
Cameron soon became more interested in the fire and keeping it going, especially for its bright light and warmth it gave out, and he wondered again what had happened to all the water at the bottom of the well and realized that the underground water supply was either gone or buried below all the mud and boulders.
He suddenly wondered if the treasure was behind any of the bricks making the surrounding well wall going around him and he started to examine them in detail and even though most had been removed and fitted back in place he was surprised that one part of the wall was covered in a thick layer of dried muck and when he pulled chunks of it away he eventually found a black slab embedded in the dried muck, and that it looked like some form of shiny black stone, measuring a foot by half a foot, and it interested him greatly and he wondered why they had not properly searched the whole wall, and what amazed him most was its accurate flatness and shape, as all the other boulders were chiseled rocks.
It was perfectly manufactured and he could not realize how it had gotten there, as none of them had believed the makers of the well had manufactured it less than hundreds of years ago.
The find soon grasped Fogler’s attention and he eventually threw his tool down and rushed over.
Fogler grasped at it furiously, making him wonder what he was doing! He looked really angry at something and he was sure he now thought it was just a perfect brick, as it seemed too heavy to be hollow!
When he uncovered all the muck from it he saw his point and that it looked like it had been put there by someone else, and Fogler washed it with some water he had!
To their surprise it was a corroded metal box, and had not been part of the wall. Cameron was sure it had been on the ground and at one point water had flooded the well and it and the muck had become embedded on the wall.
He recalled the well wall when he had first been there and that the muck had also been on the other sides of the wall and that it had been cleaned away on the other walls by Simpson.
Fogler started banging the side of the box against a boulder on the ground and he found their was a hollow sound after all and they both realized it was really something, and Fogler shouted up to the others and gave them a description of what they had found and they started climbing down the rope to see it, and while they waited for their arrival they checked it and tried opening it, and Cameron found a keyhole and proved the metal box was locked.
Clouds of powdered dirt and stones came crashing down and also swirled about through the well in the torch beams as the two soldiers raced down on the rope, and Cameron held the ropes and allowed them to move down better and wondered if they had made a mistake in giving them the impression that it definitely was something, wondering what the outcome of it all would be, and he considered seeing a specialist on memory loss and its causes.
Cameron watched them come down and land on the ground and he was amazed that Fogler was already trying to smash open the metal box with different objects, and they all examined it and him at work, and when he stopped and allowed them to see it properly Simpson picked up a hammer and chisel and smashed the top off the box with one blow, and they stood with their mouths open as it opened to reveal muck and stones, and Simpson put a newspaper over the ground and emptied the box and they rummaged through it and found nothing but dried muck and pieces of smashed glass.
Chapter 13
The NASA Investigation
Early the next morning they were taken to where the crash site was, to investigate what was there for the army, where they met officials and scientists from NASA and the US military, and they were to help answer their unanswered questions.
They were carrying out examinations on what they could find, and removing samples of everything, and had clearly been there some time, as their equipment was all over the site and their large tents surrounded the area.
What astounded Cameron was that they had clearly found things and a major find and their activity was immense, and they seemed disappointed that it was located there!
What the hell could it be? Was it a highly confidential airplane, weapon, or rocket, and why were they so interested in getting so much information about it. They clearly were not going to let anything go!
The faces on the other soldiers with Cameron were considerable and surprising and he knew something was happening!
Malone could not believe the amount of attention there and made many unsuccessful attempts trying to investigate things and question them.
It was incredible! It was like being beside something of immense size that was hidden behind something! He could almost feel the gravity off it! Like an immense mountain hidden away behind trees in a wood he could not get what was there and just got scraps of information. Yet he knew they would eventually let something go and that they only had to wait. Malone was getting desperate for answers and was clearly running through ideas to get them, and he could sense it.
The heat from what had crashed there had been immense and had more of an effect on them than he had realized! It seemed to go far further than any of them had imagined! Things were far different than damage from normal energy sources and they all looked closely in detail for why.
“What’s going on!” he finally asked an aged scientist, at the edge of the action, and he eyed Cameron up, and studied his face with some astonishment and amusement for some seconds.
“Well! For starters there was originally a massive energy surge detected here from a satellite? They are still investigating all the information!”
“What interest has NASA in it?”
He listened to Cameron’s voice with some surprise and he considered what they had realized.
“A piece of metal was recently discovered here too, and it was analyzed and is thought to be part of a rocket!”
“One of your military rockets crashed here?”
“Wrong! Not ours! They still haven’t detected where it came from! We were brought in to investigate the incident! I’m not fully sure what we’re investigating now!”
“Who else could have such a rocket?” Cameron asked, confused, considering it. “Could it have been a spy rocket?”
“A spy rocket!” he gasped back. “Well, it sure as hell isn’t ours! They did a search and investigation of other countries and nobody claimed it!”
“So it’s a new form of rocket?”
The scientists laughed at him, with a peculiar expression.
Cameron went over to where Malone was questioning a leading scientist, where he was sure he was getting some proper information.
Cameron was sure it had to be one of their rockets, and an experimental rocket or projectile. Yet if it was theirs why were they discovering things that they never knew existed? Yet it could have been a more secretive project that they had not known about, or it belonged to Russia!
“But we do not fully know what it was!” the scientist moaned to Malone, answering something he has asked earlier.
“So why such an interest in it?” Malone asked.
“Interest in it?” he gasped. “Haven’t you heard, that they shot it down ... A powerful military laser shot down the undefined object! They screwed up on where its remains went, and they did not want the story to get out ... It is still confidential! If it had turned out to have belonged to a major country there would have been problems!”
“So you shot down an undefined object in space, with some form of weapon system, and it came crashing down here!”
The scientist stared up through a hole in the above trees, where it had to have come through, and at the above sky.
“So who did it belong to?” Cameron moaned, trying to get some answers to what they were talking about. “You’ve come up with all the abnormalities of the find here and none of it matches another country’s rocket or spacecraft ...!”
Malone looked at Cameron annoyed, but with pleasure when he saw that the scientist reacted as he wanted.
“It’s an unidentified flying object!” he replied firmly.
“Of what origins?” Cameron asked swiftly, before anyone else said anything, and the scientist looked closely at Cameron’s face with some surprise.
“Of alien origins!” he replied, and his face went blank, as he stood controlling his emotions.
Malone stood gasping, with his mouth wide open, finally realizing what he was missing!
“You’ve detected and shot down an alien encounter?”
“We don’t actually fully know its origins in the universe! It appeared, and our weapon systems detected it and destroyed it!”
“Appeared from where?”
“We don’t know! It seemed to emerge in space, accelerating out at an incredible velocity ... For the moment it’ll be classed as an undefined space vehicle!”
Cameron and Malone realized something simultaneously and that if it was of alien origins that they might have declared war on another world, with a far more advanced species!
Chapter 14
The Bar
People kept buying Cameron drinks in the bar and he could barely even stand, and he was amazed the three soldiers had talked locals into it and he thought he would never make it back to the camp.
The newspapers one of the soldiers brought in were astonishing and he did not know what to think of the crash, and if he believed it were aliens that were behind it! He was sure that they were covering up what had happened! Why had they told him anyhow? They all seemed to doubt what had happened in different degrees!
He carefully read the accounts in two newspapers and was surprised that they claimed that they had the definite story and that a giant spy satellite had come crashing down into the wood, and might have been shot down by one of their advanced fighter planes by accident.
After some thought he thought they had shot down something thinking it belonged to someone such as Russia, but he no longer thought it was of alien origins and was some form of advanced technology that was part of some confidential project.
While Cameron finally got up to go to the bar one of his feet seemed to go astray and caught the side of a wall and he flew forward and through the air and landed on his arms, and he saw that he had embarrassingly did it in front of a group of woman at a table and he launched into doing a perfect somersault across the floor, to cover it up being stupid, even though he already looked stupid by his standards, and, to his surprise, they clapped at it and he wondered why he could do a somersault as he had no knowledge of ever doing so, which lead him back to wondering what all the missing information in his head was!
Cameron suddenly had an idea and wondered if there was anyone in the bar that knew him and he could question! He was desperate to investigate ways of getting his true identity!
He wandered around and found a pensioner slumped at the end of the bar with a whisky and realized that he had seen him there on many occasions and was clearly a local, and had been visiting there for some time, and he sat near to him, avoiding going to near him as he did not want to put him off.
After a few minutes he started to realize that he was drunk and after making attempts to talk to him and not even getting a reply he realized he was far drunker than he had realized and he was not even able to communicate.
It annoyed him more than anything and he realized that it could be the only opportunity he might ever have to question someone there, as they would surely move the army camp away in the near future, and he would be put faraway and too far to visit the place.
He had to do something! He had to find something that would get him what he wanted! He needed to!
It surprised him that at the same time as him looking for something the pensioner was collapsing in a heap over the bar and even started falling over and off his stool, and the barman rushed around and stopped him and propped him back in his seat, and Cameron decided to take action and help him further and he immediately started helping the barman shift him against the bar so he would not fall.
“I wouldn’t worry about him so much!” the barman announced, seeing Cameron’s worried face. “H
e’s always in here, and gets like this most of the time!”
Cameron nodded, looking more happier that he was a local that did hang about the bar and that he surely had seen him with the three soldiers drinking there, and he started thinking of ways to question him.
Who the hell was he? Why would none of these blasted soldiers give him anything on his identity! No matter what he did they refused to say anything and it was driving him crazy!
So when the pensioner started slipping off his stool again, and the barman left, he moved up to him and started telling that man how drunk he was and that he should take him home and he decided to take him out the door to a taxi, which he had seen parked outside!
Yet after trying to get the man up and to the door, with him collapsing all over the place and over the floor, he got annoyed and started wrestling with him and lifting him up and he started trying to stop him and he started pulling him across the floor by the legs, but he awoke more and started clutching part of the bar to stop him, and he grew more annoyed with the pensioner and his behavior and immediately broke his grip on the bar and pulled him away from it.
He gripped his legs and dragged him across the floor, while looking about making sure that nobody interrupted him, but the man kept getting a grip of places and objects and he furiously tugged him away, forgetting that he was to get him to give him information on his identity, with nothing else in his drunk mind except getting him to the taxi.
For quarter of an hour he dragged and pulled at him, from when started getting him to the door, and once he was finally outside he thought his mission would be completed but he continued grabbing things like drainpipes stopping him, and it had clearly rained and he ended pulling him through puddles and mud, and he pulled a drain at the side of the road up, and he finally got him to the taxi where he explained to the driver that he was a relative and had to get him home in his drunken state, while the man shouted and swore, and they got him in the back of the taxi and locked the door, and Cameron rushed into the front seat with the driver.
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