***
Trent heard muffled voices and was starting to register blurred lights, as he slowly regained consciousness and began to survey his surroundings. He had been deposited on a small couch, in what looked to be a lobby type of area. Kim was on an identical couch across from him, a thin glass coffee table separated them. She looked to be breathing just fine, and as the previous events came back to him, he started to take notice of all the activity around them. Banks of consoles and computer displays were manned and flashing information, as engineers and support staff bustled about. There were three very large displays dominating the wall at the back of the cavernous room in which he now found himself.
Kim began to stir, sat up and started her own silent survey. When she looked at him she said, “Mission Control.”
Trent understood, “But for what?” he asked.
“For Hubble, at the moment,” an unfamiliar voice chimed in.
They looked up to see a tall man in a dark blue suit with close cropped salt and pepper hair. “That's the best tool we have to see what's going on, at the moment” the man said, motioning towards the displays. All three screens showed a slightly different angle of Saturn, it's creamy, swirling clouds transfixed Trent for a moment.
“Who are you?” Kim wanted to know.
“That's not important. What is important is that we keep you two quiet for the time being and keep those images from getting out,” the man told them.
“Why?” Trent asked immediately.
“Because, people aren't ready for this. Humans are as unpredictable as the weather, and you know it. If we suddenly tell the world that intelligent life, far more advanced than are we and hostile to boot, has been discovered, and in our own solar system of all places, the world would fall into chaos. Look at what happens when something as innocuous as a comet passes by; all the nuts and religious zealots see it as some kind of sign and go crazy.
All the world's belief systems will crumble at that very moment, and religion is the only thing that has kept humans relatively civilized and under control throughout our brief history. So what do think will happen when that control is removed? Many will simply refuse to accept it; interpreting it instead as the end of days or the arrival of some deity. And what about those who see it as an impending invasion, or the cue to launch a revolution? People will panic, riot, kill themselves and others.”
But his tirade wasn't finished yet, “The primal fear of the unknown will spread like a virus. Billions of people will scramble to secure their families, money and possessions, while others take advantage of the chaos. The doomsday preppers will run to their shelters, and what military forces remain intact will posture and flex. Religious conflicts, the likes of which we've never seen, will spill out across the globe. Secular factions will declare wars in the name of their god or gods, in the belief that they are coming to vindicate them at long last. What's left of the alien-worshiping cults who haven't killed themselves in some attempt to join the beings will crawl out from their holes, and they'll have a flock of new, extremely devoted followers.
And what about color? What if they're white, or black, or brown? Will that matter? You bet your ass it will. And what if they have their own gods and beliefs? We barely have order now, so what do you think is going to happen if the news suddenly breaks at this very moment? Civilization, as we know it, will begin to fall apart. That's what.”
“What are you talking about? You can't keep something like this secret,” Kim protested.
“Yes we can, and we have for some time now,” he revealed.
“You knew about this before now?” Trent inquired.
“We've known for decades. We've lost two other spacecraft over the years. Anytime we get too close, they destroy them. I bet you didn't know anything about that did you? See, we can keep a secret,” the tall man said, with more sarcasm than pride, “We've been leading up to it, dropping clues over the years to prepare mankind for the revelation. In the last ten years or so, we've stepped up the pace a bit. Do you really think that the chain of recent discoveries and the prevailing theories on extraterrestrial life are coincidence? Not hardly. We've guided it every step of the way. All the while, we've also been trying to learn more about them, but as you saw, they are...” he paused and looked down as he searched for the right words, then finished with, “...not open to dialogue at the moment.”
“Mars?” Kim asked quietly.
“Yes. I see you put the pieces together.”
Trent looked at the floor and frowned as he attempted to organize his thoughts, then looked back at the tall man, “There was an advanced civilization on Mars that was obviously wiped out by these, whatever they are, and for some reason you think that they'll treat us any different?”
“It is more than apparent that there was an enduring conflict between the two. Most likely, a protracted war,” the tall man countered.
“A protracted war that raged over a billion years ago? Before life even took hold on the Earth?”
“Yes. In fact, we have irrefutable evidence that the attack on Mars actually gave rise to life on Earth. Microbe-laden crustal rocks, blasted into space by the event, landed on the fledgling Earth and seeded it with biology. The famous Mars meteorite, ALH84001, is a prime example; it was purposefully misclassified, so it would remain safe and intact until the time was right. There's also strong evidence that a third, larger planet was involved in the conflict, at one point in time.”
Trent's mind raced. The images in his head swirled and melded together, then calmed to produce a concise picture that he could barely comprehend, “The asteroid belt?” he tentatively asked.
“We think so... It looks as if that planet was destroyed first, and quite possibly gave rise to life on Mars, just as Mars' own destruction brought life to our planet. It turns out that life is quite common and resilient, but it is also quite fickle.”
Kim interjected, “Yeah, panspermia, it's a tired and justifiably controversial hypothesis, and your version just can't be. Jupiter's gravity is far too strong to have allowed the formation of a planet there. And even if it did somehow overcome the influence, all of the mass in the asteroid belt would only amount to a planetesimal smaller than our moon. We've known that for some time...”
“That's because the majority of it was simply destroyed, vaporized during the impact, and a large amount of material was swept up or cast out by the outer planets, while a small amount remained to form the belt,” he paused for emphasis, “And, more importantly, Jupiter was farther out at that time and migrating inward; Jupiter's orbital velocity decreased as a consequence of the material it cast out, thereby bringing the gas giant closer to the solar system's center of mass.
The planet that originally formed where the belt now resides was more massive than either Mars or Earth, and its mass was able to resist Jupiter's gravitational tug. The resulting ejected material from that encounter could have very well influenced, or maybe even tipped the scales of, the juxtaposition of Neptune and Uranus to their current orbits. We suspect that a much larger projectile was deployed in that attack, relative to the Mars projectile, or that the planet endured multiple shots...” the last two words echoed off the walls of Trent's mind.
“You're saying this has been going for...” Kim trailed off.
“Billions of years,” the tall man completed for her. “Based on the amount of iridium found in the KT layer, as well as that found inside and around the impact site, we also think that the Chicxulub event was them.”
“Why would they want to wipe out a planet ruled by dinosaurs? They couldn't have been any type of threat to them, and there were no intelligent lifeforms on the Earth at that time. That doesn't make any sense at all,” Trent retorted.
“That's one of the questions we're trying to answer...”
“So, what now? Are you going to kill us to shut us up?” Trent asked after several minutes of contemplation.
The tall man laughed heartily, “Don't be so dramatic. I don't need to kill you t
o shut you up. As a matter of fact, I don't even need to shut you up.”
He smiled widely, giving both of them time to absorb the information, then continued: “We've already released a report stating that Cassini struck a wayward asteroid pulled in by Saturn's gravity. As you said, we can't keep it quiet for long, there are too many other agencies associated with that particular mission. Plus, amateur astronomers and so on... So, as soon as that story is well-circulated, and the other information we need is in place, you can say and do whatever you want; you won't have any evidence or proof. You will just be two conspiracy nuts claiming that ET shot down Cassini. No one will take you serious, and your ranting will only help us in the long run,” he concluded.
“What are you FBI, NSA...what?” Trent asked.
“I'm with... well, let's just say it's a different agency,” the man replied with a coy smile. “Look, as humans, as an evolving race of intelligent beings, we have an obligation to reach out. It is our destiny.”
Trent shot back with, “But what if they don't want to be reached? What if the beings of ancient Mars thought the same thing? Maybe they thought they were fulfilling their destiny, but sealed their own fate instead? How do you know that reaching out to them isn't seen as an act of aggression? You are, quite literally, invading their space.”
The tall man dismissed Trent's theories with a wave of his hand, “We just need to learn how to communicate with them in the right way. But until then, this will be kept secret, and the plan will continue.”
“Did it ever occur to you that maybe the population isn't as unstable as you think? Did you ever consider telling the truth, and letting the people decide for themselves? Or maybe you're afraid the public will handle it just fine and shut down your efforts to keep disturbing whatever is living inside of that planet. That sounds more likely to me.”
A sinister grin crept across the tall man's face, “Don't be ridiculous,” was his only reply.
Trent persisted, “Your plan doesn't seem to be working; they've been communicating all along, you're just not listening. What if they saw what was coming, yet again, and Chicxulub was a preemptive strike?”
A triumphant expression replaced the tall man's grin as he announced, “Well, if it was, it backfired...”
Kim gasped, and Trent turned to follow her gaze to the large display screens on the far wall of the room. Several more gasps confirmed that the mission control staff were getting readings from it right away. A large, cylindrical object streaked out of the Saturnian clouds and out into space, clear and sharp in the astounding resolution of the Hubble Space Telescope. Tendrils of the tan and cream-colored cloud deck trailed in its wake, then slowly descended back to the surface in a lazy swirl.
While most were staring with eyes and mouths wide open, a few of the engineers were frantically pouring over their displays and performing calculations by hand. One of them looked up and nodded towards the tall man, who looked down for a moment, then leveled his gaze at Trent and Kim. “It's coming for us, isn't it?” Trent asked. Then, as more realizations slammed into his consciousness, he stared off into the corner of the room and mumbled, “There were no wars. There wasn't even a battle. The others got too close... and were wiped out.” The tall man said nothing, he just glared at Trent.
Tears streamed down Kim's cheeks as she pleaded, “Why couldn't you just leave them alone? If you knew, why didn't you just leave them alone? And why didn't you warn anyone? Now we're all dead.”
She fell to the floor sobbing, and Trent dropped to one knee and slid an arm around her shoulders as he attempted to console her, “Maybe it won't be as bad as we think. They've hit us before and things have survived. It might not be as bad...” was all he could manage to say.
“No,” she exhaled, “It will never be different. Even if by some miracle there are survivors, or a piece of the Earth lands somewhere else and takes root, eventually, others just like him will begin the process all over again. Maybe they know that.”
Trent looked back up to the tall man, still glaring at them both, and asked, “So... how are you gonna keep this quiet?”
The End
*****
“I write because I'm terribly unhappy if I don't...” - W.P.
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