Ancient Relics (Shadow of the Ancients Book 1) (4 page)

Paige leans over to her and whispers softly as if
telling a secret, “We just found out we’re at war. And we were just on the
front lines a few days ago.”

Zoey laughs shockingly loud and quickly stops
herself.

Lowering her voice back to a normal range of volume,
she tells them, “Oh, you guys are fine. That was just a scouting party we were
chasing down. You all were nowhere near the actual battle. Lucky, huh?”

Logan looks at Zoey and responds in dismay, “If
that’s what you call lucky, I would hate to see unlucky.”

Rubbing his chest indicating the recent wound he
received, he reminds her, “I was shot by enemy forces. I am still here only
because you were there... And that wasn’t the front lines?”

Zoey attempts to reassure Logan and his team by
mistakenly replying, “Well, actually, one of our guys shot you.”

She pauses for a moment realizing that her comment
probably was not a wise thing to say.

With a hint of sarcasm, she shrugs her shoulders,
dips her head, and attempts to save herself by saying with an inquisitive demeanor,
“Sorry?”

Logan does a double take and fixes his gaze on Zoey
with a deep stabbing glare and narrowed eyes.

“You WHAT?!” he yells.

His question shutters the silence in the dining hall
as all occupants stop and look toward the commotion.

Realizing he has yet again become the center of
attention, to half the space station this time, Logan waves everyone off and
starts back at Zoey, “You shot me?”

Zoey attempts a reply to his accusation, “No, not
me… I don’t think. But it was definitely one of our rounds that hit you. If the
Draks shot you, there wouldn’t be anything left.”

Logan quivers with chills at the thought of
vaporization.

“Is their tech that powerful,” Logan asks.

Zoey confirms, “These guys use solidified plasma
rounds as their ammo with an ionized outer charge. One shot and POOF! Dust… no,
molecules… or atoms?”

The rounds used by Drak soldiers have two main
components. The energy encasement does thermal damage and weakens shield
barriers. The physical part of the round does armor piercing kinetic damage.

If a Drak round hits someone that is not properly
shielded and unarmored, the full force of the round annihilates the target.

“I think I feel sick,” Logan says as he gestures to
the restrooms.

He stands up and immediately passes out.

Zoey, yet again, revives Logan and comments, “Wow,
you sure do pass out a lot. Maybe we should get you back to the ship.”

“NO!” the whole group yells in unison.

Zoey chuckles to herself from joking about the ship,
knowing they could not wait to get off it.

She eases them by admitting, “Just kidding guys,
chill.”

Zoey and Paige assist Logan back to his seat.

“Deep breaths,” Zoey says attempting to help calm
him, “Close your eyes and take deep breaths, thinking of wide-open spaces,
clear skies, and peaceful surroundings.”

Logan takes her cues and closes his eyes, taking in
deep breaths and imagining the serene locals of past digs.

“Ok, I’m feeling a little more clear-headed now,”
admits Logan as he motions to everyone that he is fine.

“Let’s just grab some food and get to Olf III,” Norm
remarks.

Paige looks up at the flight board and says, “Just
order me something that is hot, moist, and doesn’t taste like paper. I’m going
to go charter us a flight.”

While Paige seeks out the group’s next flight, the
rest of the party sits with Zoey talking about what has been going on around
the galaxy.

Zoey informs the group of some additional incidents
that have not made the galactic news yet. She also mentions that the 'war' has
actually been just a series of hit and run skirmishes and NOT all out warfare.

By the time Paige returns, Logan has made the
decision that the dig has officially ended and they will all return to Doga
Prime back in the core worlds.

As the band of displaced archaeologists board their
departing flight, Logan gives Zoey a huge hug.

“Thank you for everything, Zoey. Maybe we’ll meet
again. Look me up if you're ever back on Doga Prime.” he says thoughtfully
while in the embrace.

Zoey replies with a positive and humorous attitude,
“Sure thing daddy-o.”

Logan smiles at Zoey’s strange manner of speaking.
He waves one final farewell before boarding the flight to Olf III.

The rest of the team also wave farewell, giving
thanks and praise for her heroism on Crete IV, and for the information later
revealed to them.

After the team departs, Zoey makes her way back to
the hospital ship to check-in. While boarding her ship, she passes her Division
Commander, Commander Mathias Asim.

“Where to next, Sir?” Zoey asks her Commander.

The Commander gives her a brief update, “Looks like
we’ve been getting reports of more scouts along the Kishar Badlands, near the
outer rim. It could possibly be more Draks, but maybe just pirates. We’ll see
when we get there.”

Just as the people of the Trillian Alliance search
for clues to their own history, the Drak Empire seeks knowledge about their own
ancestry and origins.

Due to frequent wars and the loss of information to
time and weathering, much of the early beginnings of both cultures remain
obscured.

The Drak Empire enlists the aid of scholars from
various professional fields to acquire lost fragments of civilizations long
past.

This dominion of archaeologists in the empire is the
Drak Expeditionary Force.

Their sole purpose is to hunt down ancient fossils
and the ruins of ancient civilizations, in search of clues to the origins of
civilized life in the galaxy, and look for obscure texts written ages ago, and
have since been long forgotten.

The Drak reconnaissance team captured on Crete IV is
a forward reconnaissance team to locate possible sites for future study.

Interrogations of the captured soldiers indicate
that the attacks on outlying systems are a preemptive assault.

The Drak attempt to 'cleanse' these systems of
‘Alliance contamination’ before information and relics could be destroyed or
corrupted by the Alliance usurpers.

The Alliance Intelligence Directorate sends word of
this news to Logan and his team, along with artifacts retrieved from the Drak
recon team and a detailed list of the contents.

As Logan is the directing professor for the Doga
Prime School of Archaeology, he is the first scholar in-line to be given the
chance to study archaeological finds by the government.

Logan arrives early to his office and finds the
package with a DataCom message attached.

The message reads,

“To the Chief Professor of Antiquities, Doctor Logan
Bailey of the Doga Prime School of Archaeology

From the Trillian Alliance Special Directorate of
Information and Intelligence.

Herein you will find artifacts retrieved from a Drak
reconnaissance force on Crete IV. Intelligence gained from captured members of
the recon team indicates they may have been part of a larger force.”

“Please examine these objects and present a report
to The Office of the Special Directorate of Information and Intelligence. You
and your team are additionally invited to join together with a Special Forces
unit to locate and retrieve additional artifacts from other outlying sites.”

The parcel contains four stone tablets with unknown
writings, twelve figurines, and a circular crystalline tablet with no
immediately noticeable markings.

Logan frantically examines the objects in detail,
recording every speck of dust, imaging every symbol he can find, and sending
all of the information through a powerful computer designed to assist with
studying archaeological relics.

While the computer examines the tablets to attempt
to translate the language, Logan initialized the scanner to conduct a detailed
microscopic scan the figurines.

Many of the figurines appear to be Drak, however a
few of the objects appeared almost Tharisian.

These Tharisian like figures are of great interest
to Logan, since his race is of Tharisian descent.

Studying every nook and cranny of the stone
statuettes, he finds indications that the creation of the figures were around
the same geologic time-frame.

The revolutionary finding indicates that there must
have been a cooperative alignment at some point in history between both the
Drak and Tharisian civilizations.

To find Drak and Tharisian artifacts together, and
with all clues pointing to the same period, Logan concluded that the two
civilizations might have had cooperative colonies in the Kishar region of the
galaxy long ago.

“How long ago could this have been?” he thinks to
himself aloud.

“What could have forced the two civilizations
apart?”

He continues his endeavor to find answers, but only
more questions arise with each new clue he discovers.

“Initial evidence indicates that these figures are
more than 100,000 years old,” he mumbles aloud to himself, “If these readings
are correct, then it opens a whole new doorway to the history of both Drak and
Tharisian people.”

Up to now, there have been no indications that there
has ever been an alignment between the Drak and Tharisian cultures to any
degree. Furthermore, there have never been any evidence that the Drak culture
and any Alliance culture have even met prior to the first contact event more
than 10,000 year ago.

As the missing puzzle pieces start to slip into
place, Logan has an epiphany, “The Drak and Tharisian civilizations must have
started on the same home world!”

This realization sheds a completely new light on the
origins of known life in the galaxy.

If the Drak and Tharisian people both came from the
same planet of origin, the two races must have genetic links somehow.

“But what planet could they come from?” he continues
to talk to himself.

Logan pulls out his DataCom and opens a file showing
crudely drawn maps of known star systems in the Kishar Expanse.

As he zooms through system maps, he diligently
examines each prospective system for hints of dual colonization.

“This requires further study on site,” he says,
continuing to speak his thoughts aloud.

Just then, Paige walks in.

“What needs further study?” she asks.

Logan turns, startled at the sound of a new voice in
the room.

“Ah! Come here!” he energetically directs Paige to
come see the new artifacts they received.

Paige quickly walks to his location at the large,
marble-topped workbench where the artifacts lay strewn intermingled with data
pads, halo-lit magnifying lenses, and hand tools.

Drawers and cabinets line the underside of the
workbench to hold and organize tools, hand-held DataComs, and other devices and
parts used for their studies.

“What’s this,” Paige inquires with heightened
curiosity.

“A gift from our fine friends at the Intelligence
Directorate,” he replies.

“Is it a ‘thank you for not pressing charges’ gift
or a ‘sorry for shooting you’ gift?” Paige asks while chuckling at their
previous close encounter with death, due in part to the Alliance military.

With her attempt at humor completely obscured from
his fascination of the artifacts, Logan explains the circumstances leading to
his frolic through theoretical history.

“And that led me to believe that both civilizations
may have been a part of a single, larger, civilization at some point more than
100,000 years ago,” he concludes.

Just as Logan finishes his ranting thesis, a signal
from the scanner he is using to map the statuettes rings out, letting him know
his scan is complete.

Logan stands from his seat at the table and quickly
walks to the scanner, almost tripping over the stool he was perched.

“Ah! It’s complete,” he blurts out in joyous anticipation.

Examining the readout on the monitor, his mouth
drops open wide.

“Huh? This can’t be,” he shouts with puzzled
surprise.

“According to these readings, these artifacts are
close to half a billion years old!” he exclaims.

Paige looks over Logan’s shoulder, examining the
readout for clues as to why the results are so surprising.

After she examines the readout, she looks over to
the artifacts laid out across the table.

One of the objects catches her eye and she moves
closer to examine the object further.

“These artifacts are remarkably well preserved for
being half a billion years old,” Paige announces.

“That’s why I thought they couldn’t have been much
older than 100,000 years,” Logan remarks about her observation.

Sifting through the objects to gain a quick
understanding of them, she reverts to the object that initially caught her
attention.

“And what of this,” she says while picking up the
crystalline disc.

“I haven’t the slightest clue,” he replies to her
query with confusion.

The disc is solid crystal and has a diameter of
around twenty decimeters, a thickness of about a decimeter, and is completely
transparent with no markings.

“Could it be a primitive laser data disc?” Paige
asks.

Logan replies, “I had considered it, but there are
no markings or imperfections that would signal its use to store information.”

Logan takes the disc from Paige and reexamines it
more closely.

He runs his finger tips across it as though to see
if he missed surface imperfections.

Most of the primitive data discs discovered up to
this point have all used a laser reflected against a micro-thin metallic
surface.

The light reflected transmits a digitally encoded
signal from the disc and gives the reading device an image to correlate to
data.

However, this object has no such imperfections
lasers could reflect from, and is completely clear.

Logan notices a slight prismatic glean to the
interior of the crystal disc, however, giving him an idea.

“Look here,” he points out to Paige, “See how the
light bends through the disc, like a prism?”

“Paige looks closer and acknowledges, “Yes, what do
you think it means?”

Logan hesitates to answer for a few moments, and
then walks over to a laser device.

He places the disc under the optical reader of the
laser and turns the device on.

Just as the laser hits the disc, a three-dimensional
image appears in the air. The light sensors in the room detect the holigram and
dim the lights automatically, and dim the windows to blackout the outside
light.

“A holographic recording!” a smiling Logan exclaims
completely surprised and delighted at the sight.

As the holographic image slowly spins in the air,
like a physical model levitating over the table, Logan moves his hand through
the image to show his logical self that it is only a trick of light.

“Impossible,” he utters softly.

The modern civilization of the Trillian Alliance did
not discover how to create three-dimensional hologram displays until the early
part of the late-Phoenix Epoch, not more than 4,000 years ago.

While continuing to examine the light emblazoned
image, Logan thinks aloud again, “A half billion year old Holographic
recording. Who could have imagined?”

As both Logan and Paige greatly admired the magical
image dancing through the air, the remaining team members walk into the room
one by one.

The team members pause in their steps at the
spectacle they are bearing witness too.

“Is that…” a forensic archaeologist named Dexter
starts asking for confirmation that the image is a Hologram.

“It is,” replies Logan in anticipation of the
remaining, unspoken, question asked.

While the well-defined image of the galaxy slowly
rotates, as if it is a galaxy in miniature hovering in the air, Logan has the
idea that this image may be a lost galactic map of the early galaxy.

Indeed, it is an image of the galaxy from a
pre-cultural divide.

One by one, Logan points out familiar star systems
and interstellar corridors.

Familiar regions become clearer as they all study
the map with intensity.

Pointing and prodding the holographic map like a
pincushion, naming stars and discovering mapped systems not yet explored by
their own civilization.

“Well, it may not be necessarily complete, but it is
a start. And, better than we already have,” Logan says while reluctantly
shutting down the display.

“If we can find more maps like this, we might be
able to exponentially expand our understanding of the galaxy in a very short
time,” he continues.

Paige interjects, “We have to come forward with this
find, Logan. We should let the people know what we’ve found.”

“Not yet,” he replies. “We must present this find to
the Intelligence Directorate first. That’s their request for handing these
items over to us.”

A sigh of disappointment hisses through the room.

“Pack your things everybody,” Logan tells his team,
“We’re probably heading off-world again, and to the front lines this time.”

The group, excited and dismayed at the thought,
smiled and nervously congratulated each other.

The front line means combat, and they know they are
not trained for such an endeavor.

“Are we getting a battalion of troops to protect us
this time,” Paige asks, hoping for a confirming answer.

“Better,” Logan replies, “We’re getting a whole
Special Forces group.”

For such of a mission as this, having their own
Special Forces group assigned to them, indicates to the team that it, indeed,
is a highly important mission.