Play Testers Wanted Pt. 08

"OH, so you can actually perform magic," he said. "Let's see what you've found."

"Where is he?" I asked Professor Kent about Nathanial. "How can a guy that big just vanish?"

He must be down watching the diggers at work. I cursed and the two of us raced for the elevator. We took it down and I expected the worst.

"Hurry the fuck up!" I cursed as the elevator descended.

The door opened and we rushed down the tunnel to the dig site. I heard running water. Two men were using a high-pressure hose to wash mud off the thing lodged in the mud. Kent saw this and lost his shit.

"Stop! You could be damaging priceless artifacts you idiots!" He screamed.

"Wait," Nathanial ordered, and the men shut down the hose. "See! There it is!"

We could all see the gleam of green-grey metal through the mud. There was no way to tell how large the object was. Kent demanded he ran the digging crew. Nathanial wisely conceded and handed off authority for now. Kent had the hose withdrawn and everyone get down and carefully search the puddles of mud for any bones, tools, or artifacts. I wished them luck and withdrew. I was here to fight monsters not dig through mud. I moved to the vault area and waited to see what if anything they found. It became a slow tedious process that lasted hours. I meditated to pass the time at first. Then I looked on them as more and more of the object was revealed. The grey-green alloy proved to be nonmagnetic and impervious to heat.

"It is a ship," Kent declared. "Get Mr. Fink down here."

We examined the side of the irregular bullet shaped vehicle. It could be nothing else. They had uncovered an ancient star ship. I had never seen anything like it, no one had. Despite five million years beneath the earth and it was pristine.

"I knew it!" Nathanial declared as he pointed at the discovery of a lifetime. "My name will go down in history."

"There is your radar absorbing material." I replied and he began ranting.

"Think of the technology we'll reverse engineer!" He shouted. "It'll make Stark look like an idiot."

I remained silent sensing the psychic cold increase. He ordered them to work nonstop until the entire thing was unearthed. How the hell was he going to get this thing out of the caves? I glanced at the ceiling of the cave and Nathanial saw me and looked up himself.

"Fah, we'll build a lab around the damn thing." He stated. "It will be a minor nuisance."

There were missing men, no stink of dead bodies, and his biggest worry was erecting a lab around his discovery. As the rest of the ship was slowly revealed Kent went to work examining the skeleton. He was over the moon happy. Most of what came out of his mouth was unintelligible to me. He pointed to portions of the skull and his smile never failed.

"I need to take this back to the university. Don't worry, this is all yours. I just need to measure, scan, and document what you've found." The professor stated and to both our shocks Nathanial agreed.

"I understand. My fame is secured." He announced and I helped carefully prep the skeleton for travelling. "Go with the good professor. If we find anything we'll call."

They did call. Five more times for a total of six almost complete skeletons. He also sent photos and scans of the ship. More professionals were brought in to analyze and try and reverse engineer the ship's secrets. This was a career maker and every scientist knew it. The public learned about it earlier than Nathanial wanted but once it was out, he ate up the attention. I travelled back and forth between the Fink home and the University. I dropped a dime and called Miskatonic University because of the things unnatural nature.

Kent texted me that he had discovered something profound. Since I had a hover limo at my disposal I drove around in style. Toni was so going to spoil me. Teleportation was easy, but a limousine was just posh as hell. The good professor did quick introductions and the pointed at the holographic screen displaying the results of sampling one of the skeletons. I didn't know enough to understand the strangeness surrounding this find.

"Sorry," I began. "I have no freaking clue Professor."

"The mud and clay should have been a clue." He explained. "These bones aren't fossils."

"If they aren't fossils, what are they?" I asked and he simply raised an eyebrow. "Wait, they are still bones. How the hell did they survive five million years?"

"The same protective field that preserved the ship, kept the clay from being turned to stone, also left the bones unchanged. We got DNA from them. They are hominids! They are distant ancestors! You have no idea the impact of this information!" He ranted happily.

"This ship and the skeletons are connected," I said, and he nodded. "Humanity was brought here or augmented."

"I don't know," Kent said letting out a breath. "I don't have enough facts. My imagination is going crazy though. Some higher intelligence, and we can agree on that, we are still trying to analyze the craft or device or whatever it is. I just wish someone like Toni Stark was on this with us, nothing personal."

"Don't worry I feel the same, but she is tied up with a more pressing issue." I replied. "You aren't hurting my feelings. She'd love to be able to attack this problem."

"What are you thoughts," he asked watching me intently.

"Like you, I've never seen anything like this before. The preservation field that protect the ship also kept the bones from fossilizing. It is fascinating. How similar are we?"

"Closer than we are to chimps, less than two percent difference," he informed me as he brought up a second screen.

He went on about those differences and he was noticeably excited. Ken talked about blue eyes and what a big deal that was. Apparently, blue is rare in nature. I found that interesting. The skeleton had opposable thumbs, that was also amazing. The size of the cranium hinted at a much more intelligent creature than would be expected. It was just the beginning of the revelations.

Nine days after the ship was discovered Professor William Hawthorn appeared on Nathanial's doorstep and I did the introductions. Fink was thrilled to have such a prestigious individual in his home. God, he knew how to flatter people! Hawthorn looked the way his name sounded. He was grey around the edges, pushing mid-fifties, with dark brown hair mostly, steely blue eyes, and a ramrod posture. When he spoke it was short and to the point? He seemed immune to Nathanial's superficial charm and was solely interested in just the facts. He reminded me of Sergeant Friday from that old cop show. Just the facts ma'am. Hawthorn commented about the psychic cold the minute he crossed the threshold. All the attention the ship had gotten had increased the radius of the cold spot. It was getting worse. It was feeding off the scientists, diggers, and media experts.

"Give them full access to what we've found so far." Fink rumbled to a man in a traditional white lab coat.

"Groom, but everyone calls me Bob. I am a physicist. Come on down, I managed to shoosh the media hounds out for a few hours." He laughed as we entered the elevator. "If you have any questions just fire away."

"What have you discovered so far?" Hawthorn asked coolly.

"Not much," Bob admitted with a frown. "Whatever the exterior of the ship is it sucks up the full spectrum of visible and invisible spectra."

"That doesn't make any sense. It should be the most perfect black in the universe." I stated and Bob smiled. "Yet, it appears to be a green-grey."

"Yep," Bob chuckled. "Crazy huh. We also finally managed to get a detailed scan of its measurements."

"How?" Hawthorn asked showing excitement for the first time since I met him.

"We rigged a system to lift the ship off the floor of the cavern. We made a two-part mold of it and cast it in a special fast sealing resin. We were then able to scan the mold." Bob said grinning.

"Brilliant!" I declared.

"On the bright side we also got some microscopic particles that we have been able to send to a scanning electron microscope." Bob continued as the elevator opened slowly. "We've had to limit the amount of ambient power the thing absorbs. There is a consensus that feeding it is a bad idea."

"I agree," Hawthorn said. "Interesting."

The scientific team had created a shielded workspace and beyond that only battery-operated devices were allowed. There were three small tripod lights illuminating the craft. The shadows gave it an even more eerie appearance. Hawthorn joined the other scientists and looked at the data they had gotten from the mold. He picked up a tablet computer and moved the image of the ship into different angles and he gasped suddenly. I looked over his shoulder and the orientation of the image was ass up and pointy end down. It sort of looked like a bullet with a rounded end in the back. The surface was irregular with beveled grooves and lacking a clear aerodynamic design.

"The overlapping portions give it an insect-ish look," Hawthorn thought out loud. "Do cell phones work down here?" He asked and they handed him a landline to use. He briskly punched in the number to Miskatonic. "Kwan? This is Hawthorn! Do you have your keys on you? Good! Excellent! Listen, I need your help. Thanks. Go to the Namibia exhibit and go to uh case 36C and tell me if the Zan'chi artifact is still there."

Long pause.

"What does it look like? Well, it looks kind of like a beehive or bug exoskeleton. It is! Good! Pull the files on it and email them to my phone. If you must scan them do it. I'll wait. Bye."

Hawthorn hung up and headed for the elevator. I glanced at the ship one time, shivered, and joined the professor upstairs. Coffee was available and an hour later the files arrived. A few of them had to be scanned a second time because of the poor quality and urgency Kwan had been under. The similarities were uncanny. Not only was the general shape the same but the beveled indentions on the surface were close.

"Holy shit!" Hawthorn cursed after reading the files. "It says here that the relic was unable to be dated because of equipment malfunctions."

"What are your thoughts?" I asked. "You are the expert."

"I have no idea. The stories surrounding the relic we have is that it is tied to an earth demon." He said he hands moving in nervous gestures.

"Aw shit!" I cursed. "Chthon?"

"How do you know that name?" Hawthorn glared at me.

"I was once in possession of the Darkhold." I admitted and he went pale. "It is safe and locked away."

"Can that thing be tied to Chthon?" He asked his fidgeting getting worse. "I hate dealing with the Many Angled Ones."

"You are well informed," I declared, and he explained his bad luck and running into works like the Necronomicon and Al Azif. "It is like an infection."

The mystic disease had permeated the human consciousness since our beginning. It is a part of our collective. They manifested in our dreams and inspired acts of violence, bloodletting, and slavish devotion. How many serial killers talked about the Dark One and most misrepresent it as the Christian Satan, but this thing was billions of years older. It was one of the first of the Old Ones to rise on a primordial Earth. They split into two opposites of light and dark. The chief among the Many Angled Ones were Shuma-Gorath and Chthon. The gods of light were Gaea and her progeny. Anackire stood between the two straddling the shadows and strongest of them all. I was surprised at her silence.

'She'll speak when she chooses.' I thought. Until then I was going to have to riddle this out on my own. Perhaps this was a test? 'I won't fail you. I am your champion. Anackire and Istus will see how I defeat this challenge.'

"I need some fresh air," I said. He followed me outside.

I needed to contact Steph and see how she was doing with the iceberg. I took the elevator back up and the psychic cold followed me. It stopped at the front door for now. Six of the scientists were either smoking or vaping on the front lawn. A small metal bucket was there to collect cigarette butts. I reached out for Steph mentally.

'Steph?' I sent out silently.

'Hey Ghost. How goes the investigation?' She replied a sense of longing in her thoughts.

'I got an ancient spaceship. You?' I replied.

'Wait... what? I thought you were investigating a poltergeist.' She gasped genuinely surprised. 'I can feel your concern. What is bothering you?'

'The more of the thing they dug out of the mud and clay the stronger the psychic cold this thing puts out. Add to that all the missing diggers and experts. This is definitely going to go sideways and sooner than later.' I unpacked all my worries in case I failed.

'We are stumped here,' She shared. 'I know what kind of magic is in effect but not who placed it or what is locked inside.' She shared. 'Even the Eye of Agamotto cannot pierce the enchantment.'

'That's not good,' I sent feeling that sense of dread raise its ugly head again. I shivered and then for her sake buried it deep down. 'Keep me in the loop. I miss you too.'

I had time on my hands and as Hawthorn searched for a solution, I searched my HUD. I glanced at the changes and noticed I had a new skill highlighted. What in the hell was Rune Craft? I dove into its description and fell in love with it. I could create dark elven runestones and empower them with a one-time spell effect. The rune would be destroyed once it was used but it was a great way of placing magical traps. If I raised it to level ten, I could fashion psychic runes that acted like a protective circuit breaker. When I was engaged in a blind psychic scan if I encountered a hostile mind that would otherwise ensnare my mind the rune would self-destruct and break the connection. I liked that.

I stood and stretched. "Surfer?"

"Yes boss." She replied as she manifested.

"I might need to go battle ready without much warning. I need to set up a command phrase to activate armor and weapons."

"Just tell me what you need." Surfer eagerly awaited my commands.

Dread was replaced with whispers of terror and was growing, accumulating, and building quickly. Maybe it was just my imagination, I hoped it was. I raised Runes to level six, it was all I could afford right now. Perhaps after this quest was done, I'd get it up to ten. It was time to go down and see if I could help. Hawthorn and I took the elevator down. The lights dimmed as the elevator slowed but never quite stopped. The door slowly opened and the space beyond was poorly lit. The scientists were in chaos. I ordered them up. They didn't argue.

"You don't have to stay." I informed Hawthorn. "Why don't you keep the others safe if it gets passed me."

He joined the others in the elevator, and I saw his concerned face as the doors closed. I heard Nathanial's voice echoing up from the dig site. I raced down the tunnel and found confusion unfolding. The thing they had dug out was now surrounded by a series of electric lamps. Gone were the battery powered ones. One of them had fallen over and the power was arching and causing the lights to dim. I used telekinesis and pulled the lamp off the ship and a few moments later shit hit the fan. A full-fledged telekinetic attack erupted around us. I threw up a protective shield and tried to get to Nathanial before he was injured. The lights flickered, the high-pressure hose that had been used to wash away the mud erupted and began whipping around smashing into people and objects with no one to control it. Random objects levitated or even flew at ballistic speeds around the chamber.

"Fuck!" Nathanial cursed as a screwdriver deflected off my shield and imbedded itself into the clay covered wall.

"Finally," I said as the activity died down. The lights were still flickering but slowly quit strobing and stayed on.

"Thank you, that might have seriously injured me." He stated as he looked around. "Where the hell is Dennison? Meriwether? Did you cowards run off?"

"Aw fuck!" I cursed as I pointed to the cavern floor. It was covered in a thin layer of watery mixture of clay and mud. It had come off the walls when they used the hose to remove it and power wash the thing's exterior. There were clear signs where the two men were drug off into the depths of cave system. You could see the drag marks and where they had dug their fingers into the slippery muddy. The parallel lines on the floor led to the open tunnel. "Someone needs to go down there..."

"NO!" Nathanial snapped. "You are far too valuable. I have connections. I'll bring in armed men to once and for all map those caves and retrieve any and all survivors or corpses." He said and then looked at the ship. "Beautiful, isn't it?" His personality was mercurial and bordering on madness. One moment he told me how valuable I was and the next he was fixated on the ship and how famous it had made him. While Nathanial called in the troops I snacked and having nothing else to do for now contacted the team taking care of the iceberg via my commlink. Shuri answered.

"Hey girl!" I talked to her as she was dragged into analyzing the enchanted ice and attempted to peer beneath the ice and see what was lurking from the prying eyes of technology or magic.

"Hey. How are you doing?" She asked in that sexy Wakandan accent.

"Five-million-year-old spaceship or escape pod. Unknown alloy and potential energy magnet. You?"

"Ooh, sexy! This damn ice is being equally enigmatic. It absorbs anything and everything we send at it." She said sounding decidedly frustrated and I told her so. "Maybe we can... never mind Stark and Strange are hollering. Talk to you later sexy man."

"Bye." I giggled as she ended the call. "Ice that absorbs tech and magic. Absorbs." The word stuck in my head.

Two hours later they arrived. There were twenty of them. They were dressed from street casual to one guy in a tuxedo. Their races ran from Caucasian to Hispanic to African American. While there was a variety and their personalities were equally different, they had one thing in common. They weren't happy about being called in so casually and ruining their plans for the evening. They each had a duffle bag, backpack, or in a few cases a tactical sling pack. They were all in exceedingly good health and optimally fit.

"Fink." One of the men addressed Nathanial. "Your money is welcomed as always. Who is this?"

"Mr. Davis meet former Master Sergeant Conrad Long. Davis is my occult expert in this situation." Nathanial declared and added. "He and Stark are close."

"Well, if he is good enough for her... what's the situation?" Conrad asked and Nathanial gave him the basics and stopped there.

"Listen, you are dealing with an unmapped cave system. There will likely be multiple choke points, little or no lighting, and an aggressive enemy of undetermined origin." I added and the former Sergeant chuckled. "I don't know if mundane weapons will be of any use."

"Fair enough. Thanks for the heads up. You heard him guys. If standard rounds fail fall back to silver and holy weapons. Gear up!"

I'll be honest. When he mentioned silver bullets and holy weapons, I was surprised. Who the hell were these guys? I watched the strip down, slip into high tech body armor, and take out weapons that showed signs of wear and tear from who knew how many battles. They screamed a well-oiled machine and skilled veterans. After only a few minutes they were armored up, armed to the teeth, and ready to earn their pay day. I wanted to go with them, but Nathanial was holding me back for one reason or another. The team took the elevator down in groups of five.

As they grouped up Nathanial ushered me to his private theatre. Multiple holographic screens appeared as the mercenaries readied below us. I did my own preparation for the eventual shit storm. Call it intuition or just knowing there were over twenty missing people unaccounted for at this point. Best case the mercs did their job and got paid. Worst and more likely some or none of them survived whatever the hell was down there.