The Spiral Road, page 53
part #1 of The Spiral Roads Series
“The rest of the decorative metals are almost exclusively gold. Here you can see we took samples from the leaf work of various embellishments, the decorative plaques, which were all solid by the way, and as many of the statues as we felt was appropriate. The different isotopes found in older period items seems to indicate two differing sources for the gold, but it’s hard to make that distinction for certain. The purity is just off the scale. There were some bronze and silver portions worked into the designs as either support structures or contrasting materials. Also plenty of platinum, rhodium, other semi-precious metals all the way down to copper.” He closed down his tablet, which blanked the large display, as he took his seat again. As he did so the head of the translation team, a vintage archeological scholar, came up to deliver their report.
“Frankly, I don’t have a lot of progress to report. The written language here seems to have little relationship to any of the grammatical families known on Earth. The few examples of writing we have observed are similar in style to cuneiform, but seem to have been written in solid stone, unlike our clay tablet examples, which we are using as a comparative sample for translation. We also have no idea how this was done, by the way, as the characters are impressed, not carved. Certain concepts should be universal, but very few of our efforts to pin down the root structure have had much success. If I had to theorize, I would say this language evolved elsewhere, although it is possible some of it migrated into Earth culture and had formative effects on our own languages, especially ancient Sumerian. We hope to have more progress in a few weeks, but please, don’t expect us to provide comprehensive translations, even then.” Finished with this embarrassing admission, the roughened academic veteran returned to his seat.
Cynthia turned to Professor Markley, and indicated that he should step up next. He glared at her, muttering under his breath about a bus, and stepped to the front. Turning to face the group, he threw his tablet down on a table, sighing with exasperation. He addressed them all with a harsh tone of voice.
“From an engineering standpoint, I can’t find anything here that smacks of high technology. Hell, we haven’t found anything more exciting than some very nicely done pivot hinges on some megalithic doors. And that’s mainly the problem: we can’t even begin to tell you how this place was built. There are no foundations for cranes, no ramps, even those doors I mentioned would practically have to be flown into position and balanced while the cap stone was laid on them. We examined the ‘quarry’, and can’t even find a road to the damned thing, just a cart path barely wide enough for a Jeep. How they transported eighty ton blocks across the terrain is still a mystery.” He paused, and ran his hands through his hair. As he looked around the room, his eyes caught those of Nia, gazing calmly back at him, without a hint of judgement. It gave him a measure of peace for a moment. He continued.
“So far, there is nothing we have found that seems to rise beyond the level of the ancient Egyptians, as far as recovered tools. Eating implements, some hammers and chisels, mostly artisan level stuff, not rough production-quality tooling. No worn out or broken tools, with extensively degraded faces, which one would expect from this much stonework. And as for the pyramid, how those massive corbels were installed is impossible.” He was referring to the corbel arch in the main gallery of the pyramid, a series of long, rectangular slabs of granite that were estimated to weigh over five hundred tons each. They had been stacked upon each other in series, each a little closer, eventually reaching across the tall gap to meet, supporting the surrounding structure. “We don’t currently have a single crane capable of lifting one, and that’s with our latest materials. Steel just isn’t strong enough.”
“What about the chamber at the heart of the pyramid, Professor? Can you open that door yet?” This was a younger researcher, dying to know what lay inside that locked chamber at the end of the interior archway. As was Cynthia, and the rest of the gathered researchers. She too was convinced that at least some kind of an answer may lay inside.
“Not yet. I mean, we could always blast the locking mechanism, but who knows how that would affect the structure. Currently we are using sonic pulses to try and map the internal systems, but as of yet I can’t say we even know HOW it is locked. All we know at present is that it is the one door that hasn’t opened with the push of a finger.” Randy finished his answer, thinking about the stony crypt he had been working in this past week.
Once they had explored the main square, marveling at the randomly placed stupas, they had entered one of the temple complexes, through a courtyard filled with pillars of stone. Reddish-brown granite walls, set with precision and regularity, held an arched and pillared entrance. The pillars to either side weren’t classically Greek, nor were they Egyptian, or any recognizable style. They were all sharply creased, with squared off edges, just like the ones carved into the cliff face. The stonework appeared to have weathered well, very few chips or stains visible, although life had already worked to coat it with small lichens or mosses in shady spots.
But the massive doors to the building had been closed, as though waiting for an owner to return. Nearly fifteen feet high, they were each carved from a single piece of anthracite, polished smooth, and somehow standing freely, with no hinge or fastening visible. When the scouting soldier ahead of them had placed her palm on the surface, the door had swung away from it a few inches, with no effort at all on the part of the surprised young woman. When Randy had investigated, he had found both doors inclined at just the right angle so as to allow them to pivot freely on their outer corners. They opened inward completely, allowing the dusty air of the interior to reveal a barren, empty space. There were a few benches around the perimeters, and an altar of some sort in the center of the room, an unadorned rectangle of what appeared to be simple quartz, although massive and cut from a single crystal. The mysterious crystal seemed to pierce through the floor, disappearing into the stone foundation, rather than floating upon it. The roof was high, perhaps thirty feet and lined with cuts around the perimeter just under the eaves, which were just stone overhanging the edge by a few inches. Rain seemed not to bother the builders much. The many openings gave the interior an airy, light feel.
Of course, vegetation, old leaf piles, mulch and dirt surrounded the space, piled along the interior edges, growing in crevices. There were a few cracked and broken pieces of stone lying here and there, having fallen from the lofty ceilings. There had been little in the way of decor, simple granite braziers, stone holders for candles or torches along the walls. There were piles of what might have once been wooden furniture, although time had worn the remnants away to splinters and dust, becoming mounds of soil. Otherwise, the space had been empty, and devoid of writing or clues, not even any statuary was found there. Taking samples, digital pictures and videos, they moved on to the next buildings, many of which seemed similar in nature. Large, megalithic stones composed the walls, cut in irregular blocks that somehow produced a lovely, integrated look. Surfaces on the interiors were mirror smooth, as had been the exteriors once, before exposure to the centuries. The only textures allowed on stone seemed to be for decorative nature alone, as it was obvious that the few allowed to retain natural character could have just as easily been worked. The natural stone was intricately patterned into the structure, protruding here and there as crenels, crown moldings, door frames and window lintels in the few buildings that had eye-level windows. Even tall people had trouble seeing over the lower edges, Randy assumed they were more for lighting than a view.
Everything here seemed overlarge, the doors, the windows, even the steps were hard for most people to navigate, each one a stretch for the leg. Which of course led him to the pyramid, where his team had intricate sensors deployed and were taking seismic sonar readings with mechanical thumpers. They were attempting to build up a picture of the space beyond the massive gallery. After having cleared the surrounding buildings and found no traps or pitfalls, they had all descended on the pyramid. Facing the large plaza and the mighty cliff, the middle road leading from the square led directly into the mouth of a gigantic portal. Unlike the pyramids on Earth, here the builders invited you inside. The road inclined downwards until it was a few meters below the surrounding terrain, then leveled off as it entered the pyramid gallery proper. The surrounding arch was made from three rectangular megaliths, two planted on their foundations leaning inwards, with a crossing megalith of equal stature. It was impressive architecture, making an obvious statement about the power of the builders. There was no door, only the yawning mouth leading into darkness. The hole pierced the pyramid, leaving the interior in gloom.
Scouting teams reported no sign of animals, inhabitants or traps, so Randy and Cynthia had entered, along with Nia and the other researchers and soldiers. The corbeled arch overhead had been of such regularity, it made the ones in the Egyptian pyramids look amateurish. That was not to say that the pyramid exactly resembled the Egyptian architecture: once inside the road ended at a massive door, the width of the chamber. Triangular in shape, it was covered in various rough protuberances, knots and whorls of stone, intricate natural formations seemingly left uncarved. It was unclear as to how it opened, as there couldn’t be room for it to swing up, or out into the hall. No, he was sure it pivoted somehow from the center, although they had removed drifted soil and sand from the base to find the seam. And that’s where they had been for seven days. Pushing and pulling, tapping it with hammers, looking for hidden levers or panels. Nothing was obvious, there were no handy pictograms with directions such as ‘press here’.
“Thank you, Professor Markley.” Cynthia told him, as he slouched back to his seat. “Well, I’m sure we have all been discussing the next hot topic; the life our biology teams have catalogued, and many of us have observed. The in-depth reports are available to all, and I know I have enjoyed reading them. But I wanted to put them in perspective, if I may.” She began to trudge back and forth, as she keyed a slideshow of various insects, amphibians, small rodents and mammalian creatures, and reptiles the teams had gathered in the past weeks. They had been escorted by military teams when allowed outside of the main temple complex, and had already ranged into the surrounding temperate jungles and more exposed plains.
“What we have here is NOT parallel evolution, or rather, not independent of itself. We have already found multiple species that are clearly of Earth origin and DNA, and others that are clearly DNA-based creatures that have evolved in a series of similar environments, but NOT on Earth. Or at least, not for a very, very long time.” She paused, allowing the muttering in the room to swell, as she had known it would. “What we now know is that there exists a transportation device, between at least two worlds, most likely many more. We know that life from Earth is now here, and it is safe to conclude that at some point in the past, life from elsewhere was brought to Earth.”
“I’m sorry, I just don’t believe we have enough evidence to make those assumptions, Doctor James!” This was from one of the biologists on the team, a staunch defender of linear evolutionary theory. “Why can’t this be an example of panspermia, or even a massive delusion or simulation? We have no proof we ever left Earth, just our senses, and they can be fooled!” The woman was adamant.
“If we are going to question our every sense of observation, we then have no proof that Earth was ever real, either, my dear girl. I, for one, choose to proceed on the evidence we have at hand. We aren’t making assumptions; we are making logical deductions. Some power or entities, at multiple points in our history, and probably other planets as well, have acted to preserve the forward progress evolution made to the life there. Disasters are common on Earth, likely elsewhere. In fact, this supports one of the largest questions evolutionary theorists sought to overcome: How did life seem to arise, or recover from disaster so quickly, if genetic changes were so slow, so limited by the vast number of generations required to evolve complex life forms? If the three-billion-year history of life on Earth were uninterrupted, perhaps. But the last major extinction on Earth happened just sixty-five million years ago, and in the short time since, we believe that the remaining dinosaurs somehow evolved into feathered birds. Yet we cannot even prove definitively which hominid links us to our distant ancestors, only a million or two years into the past.
“But if an agency is moving the life from one habitable planet to the next, as each suffers through the common disasters, then that life has a head start! It begins from a more complex state, in an environment where it can thrive for a time. Grow and evolve further. It must be an incredibly old system, working for uncounted billions of years. And perfectly explains why we have found crickets and cicadas, spiders and snakes, and a host of other life entirely similar to ours, right down to the microorganisms!” Cynthia went on.
“Even the protein chains and amino acids are compatible. We can eat things here without fear of starvation or poisoning, aside from toxins we may be unfamiliar with of course. Our livestock can digest the grasses; the spectrum of light is close enough for our crops. Don’t you see? This means life like ours is common, on planets with similar conditions, possibly even in other galaxies! Someone or something has been guarding life, DNA-based life, and spreading it from one planet to the next. We are standing in a city, created by a hominid form of life that may have risen to sentience on a different planet. In fact, that is my theory, based on all of the evidence you have presented to this Working Group.” She paused, for effect, letting her eyes meet the many skeptical expressions she saw.
“Based on all observable evidence, these ruins were not built by mankind. I believe they were constructed by the race known in ancient times as the Anunnaki, who legend says came to our planet far in the past. Or failing them, the race some call The Watchers, who came to teach us about things like agriculture, architecture, technology and mathematics.” This brought much discussion, and she let it roll through the room as people argued for and against her theory with their neighbors. She didn’t conduct her meetings like the military, and as the Presidential Science Advisor, it was hers to direct. After this burble died away, she continued.
“No, I don’t have a signature with their name on it, but the statuary fits the descriptions to a T, and I am finally beginning to put more credence in ancient tales. Especially very prevalent ones that span multiple cultures, over long stretches of time. It is becoming clear to me that we have never been alone. And that we have, up until recently, had regular contact with other races, other species even. Now, I am not claiming that every myth we have is based in fact, but some of the stories bear common elements, some messages that we have not been paying the attention they deserve. It is possible that many of our religions are garbled accounts of interactions with higher levels of technology, and other beings.” This final theory was too much for at least one rigidly religious military man, who harrumphed, insulted, before stalking out the door, allowing it to bang loudly behind him. Cynthia smiled ruefully at the remainder, most of whom returned it in sympathy.
“As I said, it’s only a theory, at present. Much of this place is self-evident to anyone who will look with open eyes. I want you all to proceed with your investigations, and document everything. We will continue to seek answers here until we get different instructions. I know you will all proceed with the utmost care and determination, but please don’t be blinded by our preconceptions. Throw out anything we have ‘always known’ about history, evolution, and mankind. Look with fresh eyes, because I think we have been missing something important for a very long time. Here, we may find some answers. Thank you.” She closed and immediately walked into the group, who surrounded her. Their questions, theories and dovetailing investigations were all bandied about for some time. Now that she had opened the door to admitting the direction the evidence was pointing, others could now give it serious consideration.
She reflected on how badly modern media had mauled their gestalt impressions of anything alien. Most of it was relegated to implausible B-grade schlock with poor if any science, and people wandering around cheap plywood and CGI green-screen sets. Or the blockbusters with the aliens cast squarely as the implacable bad guys, rapaciously destroying everything in sight. Without apparent motive in most cases, something she considered blatant anthropomorphism. Now however, with the likelihood of other hominid-style species out there, possibly even human clans, the equation might change from her ideal. It might in fact approach that dreaded sci-fi standard of human-yet-alien baddies with all too familiar greedy dreams of conquest and domination. She finished up with the stragglers, some of whom were so technically oriented their sentences took five minutes each. As she did so, Markley approached with Nia, and stood patiently until the rest left.
“I notice you didn’t get into the five w’s today. The one I’m curious to hear is the ‘where’ part. Haven’t the astronomy geeks gotten their results back yet?” he said, without preamble. His interest was mirrored by everyone else, but she hadn’t mentioned the results she had indeed received.
“Why I hadn’t had time to check up on them, Randy. I’m sure they will have it soon, if they don’t already.” She needed time, to find some answers about why they were here, before she let that information out. She had ordered the few astronomy buffs in their group to keep any findings to themselves, then had them re-run the observations. But it wouldn’t be long before simple eye observation placed the more sky-aware in a position to figure it out. It wasn’t like the giant stars known as Alnilam, Alnitak and Mintaka were hard to miss. Even though they were in actuality multiple-star combinations of binary pairs, all the way up to quaternary systems. But they still appeared as single stars to the naked eye, although much brighter than they did from Earth. She was thankful that they were no closer to the raging area of star formation known as M41. The radiation and dust would have made life on a planet much harder.
“I loved your closing, Doctor, it was very thoughtful.” Nia told her politely. She meant it too, as Cynthia could see, and the added honorific was taken in stride as the compliment it was intended to be.
