Chapter 3

Revelation

Dewey Manley managed to find a seat in the second row of the auditorium at the College of Letters and Science at U. C. Berkeley even though the press conference was about to begin. He checked his cassette recorder, turned to a clean page in his notebook and, feeling settled in, studied the group on the stage who were getting ready to take their seats.

There were three men and one woman, ranging in age from what appeared to be early thirties to late fifties. The woman, who he thought to be rather attractive, looked to be at the lower range, right around thirty. She was about 5’ 10", with brown hair that came just to her collar. She had little or no makeup on, and was wearing a beige skirt and jacket with a white blouse. Very professional.

Sharing the stage with her was a large, athletic-looking man of around forty, a bit over six feet tall with dark hair, wearing a plaid shirt and corduroy slacks with no jacket. The second man looked to be in his late forties, very tall, slim, with dirty blond hair flecked with gray and a mustache, dressed in tan chinos and a blue shirt open at the collar under a tweed jacket. The final man was the elder of the group, with white hair, clean shaven and wearing dark gray slacks, a gray tweed jacket and a bow tie.

As the speakers moved to their seats, the audience began to quiet down, and the elder man, who had taken the center seat, leaned slightly toward his microphone.

"Ladies and gentlemen, may I have your attention, please."

The crowd noise went down several notches further. The speaker paused, looking around the audience with the air of one long accustomed to dealing with large groups. At the back of the auditorium there were perhaps a half dozen video cameras set up, and there were numerous flashes as the strobes of still photographers fired. After a few moments, the speaker resumed.

"Thank you all for coming this morning. I’m Dr. Royce Clayton, chairman of the Geology Department here at U. C. Berkeley. Joining me on the panel is Dr. Harold Reynolds of our department," – the athletic man nodded – "Dr. Stephanie Mitchell, also of our department" – the woman nodded at the audience – "and Dr. Robert Fletch, chairman of the School of Geology at the University of Colorado." The tall man smiled.

"We have a prepared presentation, which will be accompanied by some visuals. We’ll take questions afterwards. We will also have copies of photos and video tapes available for you at the end of this conference."

The crowd had now settled down, and the strobe flashes had ceased.

"As I’m sure you’re all aware, a few weeks ago, an interesting and perhaps important discovery was made in Antarctica about 100 miles Southwest of McMurdo Station by Dr. Reynolds and his team while taking core samples from below the ice pack." As he spoke, a slide was projected on the screen to the right of the stage, showing a collection of shacks and vehicles surrounding a drilling rig in what was obviously Antarctica.

"At approximately 130 meters below the surface of the ice, their drill encountered a dense material that required considerable effort to penetrate."

Clayton so far was repeating what even the general press had already reported. As science editor for the San Francisco Times, Manley had written two pieces on the discovery. There had been a fair amount of speculation on what the findings meant, and the tabloids had of course had a field day. According to the American Exposer, the Antarctic team had drilled a hole into a space ship that had been buried under the ice for millions of years, and the aliens inside were really, really pissed! In his own pieces, Manley had reported that most experts took the view that the material brought up was some kind of natural compound that simply hadn’t been seen before.

"Since the initial sample was brought to the surface, and its basic properties determined, an additional four samples have been taken from the surrounding area."

This was new. Following the initial surge of publicity, based on widespread exposure via the Internet, the Antarctic team had clamped down on the spread of information.

"In each of the samples taken, analysis yielded essentially the same results."

As Clayton spoke, slides showing core samples laid parallel in rows at the drill site were projected.

"With the assistance of Dr. Fletch in Colorado and the chemistry department here at Berkeley, the samples have been carefully studied, and our present assessment is that the material is not a naturally-occurring compound."

This created a slight buzz in the auditorium, which Clayton chose to ignore.

"More precisely, we now feel that the material found in the samples was artificially created."

Now he paused, and let the heightened buzz run its course.

"Since the samples were taken from under more than 400 feet of Antarctic ice, and since as far as we know the part of Antarctica in question has been under ice for at least 40 million years, our findings have made us – shall we say – curious."

Several strobes fired, accompanied by the click-whine of still camera shutters. For maybe the hundredth time, Manley found himself both amused and slightly annoyed at the photographers. How on earth did the shots they just took look any different from the ones they took at the start of the session? He guessed that it was just human nature at work, and went back to taking notes.

"I’d like to turn things over to Dr. Reynolds at this point, so that he can give you a better description of the drill site and what he and his team have found."

Reynolds nodded at Clayton, and cleared his throat.

"Our exploration began with a series of echo soundings that revealed interesting features below the ice pack. This was what led us to drill our original core sample. As Dr. Clayton mentioned, we’ve now taken a total of five core samples.

"Our findings were sheer luck. Most of the Antarctic ice pack is a mile deep or more. We just happened to be near the edge of the pack, where the depth was relatively shallow.

"The material brought up from all five locations was essentially the same. It’s denser and harder than granite, and it has a tighter and more closely aligned molecular structure.

"But while it resembles granite in many ways, and contains all of the base elements found in granite, it’s not granite, or at least not any kind we’ve ever seen.

"The material also contains organic compounds, evenly distributed throughout its molecular structure. It appears more than anything else to be a kind of cement, of which granite is a component. But it’s far denser and harder than cement as we know it."

Again the audience stirred.

"The presence of organic compounds means that the material contains carbon, and this allowed us to perform carbon dating tests."

Now the audience grew still, sensing that Reynolds was coming to something dramatic.

"Based on our testing, this material dates from roughly 65 million to 75 million years old."

Reynolds paused as the audience let out its collective breath and the noise level went up. The photographers’ strobes again lit up the auditorium. After a brief pause, Reynolds continued.

"When I say from 65 to 75 million, I don’t mean that our dating techniques are that imprecise. What I mean is that different layers of the material dated to different ages, with the lower layers being the oldest. This, of course, is how layers of various materials are often found, but there’s a major difference here."

The screen now showed a lengthwise cross section of one of the samples, with graphic annotations.

"The differences in age occur in distinct bands near the top surface, where the first layer, around an inch thick, is the youngest. The next layer, about three quarters of an inch thick, is approximately 2 million years older. The pattern repeats with slightly varying degrees of thickness until we reach the oldest and thickest layer about 4 inches deep, and which extends the rest of the way through the material. This lowest layer dates uniformly to around 75 million years. Essentially the same pattern was found in all five core samples.

"At the boundary points, the layers appear to have been fused together somehow, since there’s no significant discontinuity in density." He paused, looking at the audience. "It’s as if we were to build a road, and then periodically re-pave over it every few million years."

Reynolds let the audience absorb this for a moment, and then continued.

"Once we had this analysis of the core material, we took a more extensive set of soundings. Based on these soundings and the drilling that we’ve done, we’ve created a computer model of what we think the surface looks like underneath the ice pack."

A computer rendering now appeared on the screen. It showed a flat surface on which sat a series of truncated, three-sided pyramids, or tetrahedral shapes. It was as if someone had built three-sided pyramids and then lopped the tops off from about a third to two thirds of the way up from the base. Although the structures varied in size and height, there was an order to their layout. As Reynolds spoke, the computer model began to rotate, giving the image additional depth and perspective. The surface of the ice appeared as a mesh hovering above the lower surface at varying heights.

"The structures are aligned in an orderly fashion, and spaced somewhat regularly, laid out almost as if they were part of a city. By way of size, the structures range from around 8 meters to a side at the base to nearly 120 meters."

This put a buzz back into the crowd again. Reynolds waited for it to die down.

"From our sonar soundings, it appears that this ‘city,’ if I can use the term, covers an area of roughly 85 acres, in a triangular layout that’s repeated in the shapes of the structures.

"Somewhat interestingly, the layout doesn’t seem to be aligned in any particular direction. None of the points of the triangles that define the bases are aligned to any compass points. This could indicate nothing, or it could also mean that the structures initially were aligned to compass points but no longer are due to continental drift.

"In taking our core samples, we decided to avoid drilling into any of the structures until we had more equipment in place. The reason for this is that we think there’s a chance that these structures may be hollow. If they are, the air inside them would have been sealed inside them for at least 50 million years, if not longer. We’d very much like to analyze that air.

"Therefore, all of the core samples taken so far have been from the flat areas in between the structures."

The computer image now showed five thin vertical columns indicating the locations from which samples had been taken.

"We expect that when we take samples from the structures themselves, we’ll find the same cement-like material again."

The computer rendering of the "city" now zoomed toward the center of the triangular area as Reynolds continued.

"As you can see, this structure near the center of the city is larger than any of the others, and is also the only structure with two levels."

The central structure consisted of two truncated pyramids, with a smaller one atop a larger one. It was reminiscent of some of the stepped pyramids of Egypt and Central America, except for being three-sided.

"Despite the fact that the ice pack is thicker here than at our original drill site, at roughly 160 meters, or 520 feet, we’re guessing that this is where it would make the most sense to concentrate our investigation. And for that subject, I’ll turn things back over to Dr. Clayton."

Clayton nodded at Reynolds.

"Thank you, Dr. Reynolds.

"Before we move to our plans for further exploration, I suspect that everyone in this room has the same question on his or her mind, which would be: Who or what created this... ‘city?’

"Obviously, at this point we can only speculate, but I’ve asked Dr. Mitchell to offer her comments as a paleontologist. Dr. Mitchell?"

Stephanie Mitchell smiled at Clayton, and then turned to the audience.

"Thank you, Dr. Clayton. Certain members of the media feel they’ve already provided the answer of what’s under the ice, and that we’re already in big trouble with little green men for disturbing them."

This got a laugh from the crowd, which was comprised almost totally of members of the press. Even the stringer from the Exposer chuckled.

"If we look at this logically, there are three possible explanations of how these structures came to be. First, these could be the result of some natural phenomenon, with which we’re unfamiliar."

As she spoke, a textual graphic summarizing her point replaced the computer rendering on the screen.

"Given the nature of the material, the apparent smoothness and regularity of the structures and the orderly way in which they’re laid out, I think this first possibility can safely be discounted.

"Second, they could be man-made. While we believe that the ice pack in that part of Antarctica has been building up for anywhere from 40 to 50 million years, we could be wrong about that. As for the carbon dating indicating an age of 65 million years, just because the material itself was formed that long ago doesn’t mean that these structures made with it were constructed that long ago.

"It’s conceivable that somewhere on Antarctica there exists this type of ‘organic granite’ that formed 65 to 75 million years ago, and that was quarried at a much later time by early humans as a building material.

"There are several problems with this theory, not the least of which is that we’re pretty confident that the ice pack in this area has been building up for 40 to 50 million years, based on testing of core samples of the ice itself. And even if we’re wrong by an order of magnitude, that would still place the age of the pack at four to five million years. Unless our understanding of human evolution is way, way off the mark, our ancestors of that era weren’t even close to having any kind of technology, let alone the technology to build something like this.

"So on at least these two points, I’m fairly certain we can rule out a human origin."

As she continued, the projection added the third possibility on the screen.

"Finally, we come to the only reasonable alternative, which is that the structures we’re seeing were constructed by some intelligent but non-human agents."

She smiled slightly as the crowd registered its reaction. More than a few people were looking at the Exposer stringer, who was grinning broadly.

"At this point, folks, I have to leave you to your own speculation. If we use the date of 65 million years ago as the time these were built, then the only creatures we know of that existed on Earth back then were the last of the dinosaurs and non-sentient – intelligent – mammals. Which leads us to speculate that visitors from somewhere else – aliens, if we must – may have built these structures.

"The fact that this was around the same time that the dinosaurs became extinct perhaps even lends weight to the alien theory. As long as we’re speculating, we could entertain the possibility that the two are related. Maybe the aliens who built this were what killed off the dinosaurs, either on purpose or by accident."

This really set the crowd off, and it was a good half minute before Royce Clayton spoke up.

"Thank you, Dr. Mitchell."

"My pleasure," she replied.

"Ladies and gentlemen, if we could settle down please." The audience slowly returned its attention to the panel.

"Speculation may be fine for the press, and it’s certainly entertaining, but we prefer to rely on hard science to find answers. Toward that goal, I’m pleased to announce that Dr. Reynolds and his team, along with considerable reinforcements and additional equipment, will be returning to Antarctica for an expanded exploration of the site."

As Clayton spoke, a new version of the computer graphic depicting the site appeared on the screen, and a new, thicker column appeared just next to the central structure.

"Our plan is to sink a shaft wide enough to allow people and equipment to descend to the area directly next to the large structure near the center of the site, where we can then open up an area around the structure and explore directly."

At the bottom of the shaft in the graphic a space expanded into a cavern under the ice that eventually encompassed a portion of the large structure.

"This expedition will be leaving for Antarctica as soon as possible, in order to get as much work done as possible while the weather is still relatively mild."

Reynolds’ eyebrows involuntarily went up at that remark. "Mild" is indeed a relative thing, he thought.

"And at this time, we’ll take your questions," Clayton announced.

Dewey Manley knew pretty much what to expect from his colleagues at this point, and he wasn’t disappointed. The first question, from one of the TV reporters – an obnoxious woman named Fiona Sellers, from "KDOH-TV Action 3 News" – set the tone.

"Dr. Reynolds, what do you expect to find down there?" Manley groaned to himself.

Reynolds lifted one eyebrow slightly, weighing his options for a moment before deciding on a straightforward approach.

"I don’t really know," he answered. "That’s why we’re going to tunnel down, to find out."

The question session continued on, with the bulk of the questions as insipid as the first, and as it became clear that the panel was getting ready to wrap things up, Manley headed up the side aisle to beat the rush.

The real story, he knew, wasn’t in the auditorium, it was in Antarctica, and all he had to do was figure out how to convince his bosses that he should be part of the expedition, and then find the strings that needed to get pulled to get him included.

•

It turned out that the senior features editor of the S. F. Times had graduated from Cal with Royce Clayton, and the two had remained friendly over the years. Manley got his assignment and a ticket, as it were, to Antarctica.