Irrefutable Proof: Mars Origin I Series Book II Read online

  Irrefutable Proof Copyright © 2014 by Shondra C. Longino

  All Rights Reserved.

  This eBook is intended for personal use only, and may not be reproduced, transmitted, or redistributed in any way without the express written consent of the author.

  Irrefutable Proof is a work of fiction. Any references or similarities to actual events, organizations, real people - living, or dead, or to real locales are intended to give the novel a sense of reality. All other events and characters portrayed are a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  ISBN: 0989564330

  ISBN: 978-0-9895463-3-1

 

  Cover Design by Shondra C. Longino

  Prologue

  Anatolia, Turkey

  Circa 10,000 BC

  Walking through the city, people stopped and stared. Not because it was unusual for strangers to come through, because it wasn’t. People came often to see those who lived in the temple on top of the steppe. It was because the three old men passing through resembled the gods that lived on that hill.

  The eminent and mighty river unveiled itself there in that place. Its calm and gleaming waters crossed through the land where the temple stood before it split into four, branding the nearby grounds lush and green. The grassy valleys were blanketed with a mélange of black pines and evergreens, while a constant, mild wind wafted up the hillside and across the plateau.

  An odd lot, the three strangers’ steps were agile, hoisting them up the mound almost in an orchestrated resolve. Three men, whose age shown in the sun-stained, dust-filled creases of skin that stretched over their faces and hands, found little need to speak among themselves for dogged determination, woven into their beings, seemed to loudly voice their quest. Their backs slumped, clothes dusty, their sandals worn – there was a resounding single-mindedness in their journey. The long, toilsome trek from the southern City of Harran was not in search of inspiration, or inscriptions of memorable utterances from the ancients. Nor was it to seek wise counsel – but they came to pass on a heritage, remembered from their home beyond the stars. And now to be remembered here.

  The temple had come long before the cities, and the gods, said to live on the hilltop sanctuary, descended from the plateau to instruct the people moving amidst the valley below. Overflowing with a wisdom that surpassed comprehension, the temple dwellers taught the hunters to farm and build shelters. They taught them how to heal the sick, sail the seas, and hew stone from the quarries.

  And it was there, on the mound, at the temple, that the three stopped. The concentric circular walls, chiseled from the limestone in the hills seemed to open its walls and embrace their presence. The roofless structure beamed in a welcoming, brilliant light from the heavens. The structure was mighty, with strong repeating walls – circles of massive T-shaped pillars, each more than twenty feet in height, but upon their entrance, it seemed to fall subject to its guests.

  At the arched entrance, the three were met by a young boy from the land of Ethiopia, called Enoch. He led the old men from the inner circle of the hilltop sanctuary down the curved stairway carved from the walls of the underground cavern. Enoch pulled a torch off the wall, illuminating the darkened corridors, and led them through. The pungent odor of the damp earth filled their nostrils, their feet dragged along the pebbled path.

  There they met the man they came to see. The one they called Uros. The oldest of them all, he had deep set eyes whose strength outweighed that of his body’s frailty.

  Uros led them into a small scriptorium with shelves filled with papyri. A wooden table set in the middle of the room with four stools placed around it. On the stool that stood in the corner by the book shelf, Uros directed the child Enoch, to sit.

  “Should we let our history die here?” he asked, as they stood before him. The others lowered their eyes. “I shall not do it,” he continued. “The Elect has all but committed genocide.” He gestured for them to sit.

  “Much is forgotten of our home. Our language. Our knowledge. There are not many here who know of what we were,” Mathias spoke, and head seemingly too heavy for his neck to hold. “Those able to remember, who still can live as we had, are but a few.”

  “Yes. It is just as the Elect had devised,” Casporas added.

  The four men spoke in a language not native to the land where they stood, or any beyond it. It was the language from their home. A home lost millennia ago.

  “What shall we do? Shall we write in the dirt, ‘We are here?’ Or, shall we say, ‘Look here for us,’ with a post that directs the way?” the youngest one, Mathias, asked.

  “That, I think, is not such an unreasonable notion,” Casporas said.

  “Surely you cannot mean we are to write it in the dirt?” Mathias countered, frustrated that that might be the plan.

  “Yes. In the dirt so that it may be seen from above. In the dirt to show what we have been reduced to. In the dirt to show how low our people’s opinion is of us. And though it shall be hidden to the eye standing next to it, it shall speak volumes.” As Uros spoke, his eyes began to sparkle. “In the dirt. On the walls.” He slapped his hands on the wall of the basement cavern. “There will be signs. Signs for our people.”

  “And, with the lack of understanding that the people of this earth have, people will wonder what mystic meanings our signs hold,” Casporas said, and shook his head. “How will it help?”

  “Ha ha. They will think that man worshipped the stars,” Herona said, quiet up until now. He seemed to enjoy the idea of others being confused.

  “It must be in a code,” Uros said. “A code that all from home would know.”

  “That,” Mathias laughed, “is your answer for everything. Hide it. Bury it. Code it.”

  “I know what is to be done,” Uros said firmly. “What is needed so that we will not be forgotten. Heed my words.” All but Mathias leaned forward. “We will leave markings. It is as I say. Markings in the earth of this planet.”

  “Markings?”

  “Yes. It will be the markings of animals, insects, things that have been with us since the beginning of time. Those things that have survived for millions of years. Just as we have. The spider. The monkey. The lizard.”

  “The snake?” Herona asked.

  “Yes,” Uros said, acknowledging the addition. “The snake. They have lived in our home for millions of years and have survived here since we brought them. They will be here for millions more. They will be the sign. They will point to us. They will show where we can be found.”

  “What if there are no more of us left when that day comes? When those cast off find their way here. They will be able to find not one of us,” Mathias said.

  “If that be the case,” Uros said. “The signs will lead them to proof of our undertakings and we shall subscribe to them of our predicament. Written in our language for their eyes only. They will know that we have been here and what has become of us.”

  Uros looked at the shelves on the walls filled with papyri. Already, many of their people, who still had the knowledge from home had come and written down what they remembered. Men of medicine and science had preserved what they knew in the papyri on the shelves. Men who knew the stars, and the earth, and its plants had come and written their knowledge down. And Uros had kept it. There on the shelves, all written down, was much of the knowledge that they had once had.

  Now, he and his companions must finish it. He lifted the papyri off the shelf, and placed them on the wooden table. Then he reached into a basket on the top of the shelf and pulled down blank papyri he had prepared. He waved a piece of the indestructible fabric he had fashioned in t
he face of the men before laying it down in front of them. “Neither weather of time, nor ravage of war will keep our descendants from knowing about their history,” he said, and smiled at what they were about to do.

  “But they will know. Just as we know,” Uros continued. “And in our language, we will leave the story, and no one, other than those from our world, will know of it.”

  “Those that do not have the knowledge that we have now will be unable to understand what we write. They will have no knowledge of it,” Mathias said. “I can feel in my bones the pain on the faces of our people during the mass exodus. It is steeped into my mind. My heart beats each day the sadness of that memory.”

  “Is that wise? Not to let no one else know?” Herona asked.

  “We will provide a way for all to know when the time comes,” Uros said. “We’ll make a way that our descendants can come to know the truth. A way for them to read our language. To understand what has happened. A way for them to have our knowledge.”

  He pressed out a sheet of papyrus, wiping his hands across its smooth surface. And he remembered the stories he was told. Of the voyage to their new home. About all those that were left behind to die, he had intimate knowledge of that. The vision of their story ripped at his heart. Just as it did Mathias’. Just as it did to all of his people. Even now, four thousand years after the first migration, it tugged deep in his soul. He felt he could still hear their cries.

  “I will tell your story,” he whispered to his ancestors, as he stared down at the blank papyri. “And this world will know us.”

  “Yes,” said Casporas. “We must tell what has happened to us. How we were sent out in ships. Out into the galaxies.”

  “To die.”

  “Yes, to die.”

  “Alone.”

  “Yes. Our fellow man sent out to die, alone in this vast universe.”

  “How cruel.”

  “To die out in a universe that we knew was void of our kind. Void of man. Void of life.”

  “Are there any left to come here?” Herona questioned just as Mathias had.

  “I do not believe they will ever return. They have all perished,” said Mathias.

  “Perhaps,” Uros said quietly. “Perhaps, not.”

  “This is my belief. We have lived for millions of years. We managed to survive our own calamitous mistakes. We have found a new home. Surely, the Elect no longer has power over us,” Casporas said, his face solemn.

  Uros called for the boy, Enoch to fill up the ink wells so they could prepare to write. Then he passed out to the old men the papyri that the others had penned. He gave Enoch a blank papyrus and told the boy to write of what he sees and what he hears. To write it in his own language, the language of the people in the land that surrounded the temple, just as the old men were set to do.

  Then Uros said to the three, “Copy from the papyrus written by men who have come and left their knowledge and write it onto the blank one. Write it in our language. And then I shall gather it into one book.”

  For many days the men quietly copied the knowledge that others from their home had left. They wrote, they drew pictures, and set forth explanations as best they could. They wrote of how it was possible to come here, to travel among the stars. Of their homeland, of the things that had been brought down for experimentation. They wrote of the women that mated with the men they had crafted, and of their men who had done the same.

  And after they had finished writing all the knowledge that they remembered of their home, and that others had remembered and come there to the temple to write down, Uros bound the pages together and said, “This shall be called the Book of Knowledge. And whoever shall have the key to understand what is in this Book, shall have all the knowledge that we possess.”

  And then they fashioned a key.

  “Now,” said Uros. “To decode the book, it will take the symbols we write on this earth, and the story of our migration. We will write our migration story in three languages. It will tell of how we came here, and it will hold the clues for reading the Book of Knowledge.” Passing out more papyri to each of the men and to Enoch, Uros said, “Let us write.”

  So each of the three men wrote, a word or sentence, but no more, in the language they were instructed, as Uros recited. Then each passed it to the next. And then it was hidden away until it was time for it to be revealed, and the people came to learn the truth of what happened in the beginning . . .

  Chapter One

  Jerusalem, Israel

  June 17, 1998

  Ghazi must die.

  She sighed and closed her eyes, lifting up her chin and breathing in deeply through her nostrils. There was, absolutely, positively, no other way. She was sure of it.

  She sat at the white, metal table under the large, beige awning of the Hillel Café with her legs crossed and her hands folded in her lap. With the aroma of rich, freshly brewed coffee enveloping her she felt at ease. Sitting on the far end of the outdoor seating area, she studied the café’s red sign with the black silhouette of a man, on the move, in an overcoat and short brim hat, seemingly as furtive as she felt. With resolve, she pondered what she was about to do. Placing her purse from atop the table to the chair next to hers, she gazed at her reflection in the glass that made up the front of the café. She brushed back strands of her auburn hair that had fallen from the French twist she always wore. She ran her finger down the side of her face, tugged at the collar of her cream-colored knit cardigan, and pressed out her skirt. Eyeing herself, she turned her head from side to side. There’s still that twinkle in my eyes, she mused. She ran her fingers over the obstinate lines that carved their way through her delicate skin from the corner of her cinnamon-colored eyes. Pressing her lips together, she evened out the coral-colored lipstick that had sunk into the crevices. Not bad for an old woman, she thought, at sixty-six, I don’t look a day over forty.

  She watched as Ghazi rounded the corner two blocks up and headed toward her. He was full of life as he sauntered down the street. His navy linen blazer moved with the breeze, his arms swinging lazily with each stride. His smooth, honey colored skin glistened in the sun. He tipped his straw panama and nodded at passersby, greeting them, his white teeth sparkling from behind his beautiful smile.

  How handsome, she thought. She could feel the excitement swell in her chest. To know that he was coming to see her. Surely, she would be the envy of the other women that saw her. She looked around, her face beaming.

  The waiter, in his white shirt and long black apron, bent down and set one of the two cups of coffee that she had previously ordered in front of her. Without standing upright, he hesitated and looked at her. “You smell lovely,” he said. “Is that roses I smell?”

  The waiter was quite striking, she determined, with his dark hair, deep-set eyes, and well-built frame. She lowered her head so he couldn’t see the flush in her face. She touched her fingers to her cheek.

  “Thank you,” she said, a hint of a red rushing up her face. Not raising her head, she lifted her eyes, and found his gazing into hers. She shifted herself in the chair. Oh, now I am blushing. Trying to slow her quickened heartbeat, she took in a breath and replied, almost in a whisper, “It’s rosewater.”

  “Rosewater? Rosewater perfume? Lovely,” he repeated, standing upright and smiling down at her.

  The waiter was young and well-groomed and, she was certain, completely taken in by her. Smitten as a kitten. Just thinking of it made her eyes sparkle.

  Well, little Kitty cat, she mused, I have no time to be bothered with you now. She must forget that fascination for the time being and stay focused.

  “Thank you,” she said again, taking her eyes off of him. She leaned over, picked up her purse and placed it in her lap. Digging down in it, she pretended to look for something. Perhaps some other time she’d have time to play with this Kitty, but now she needed for him to go away.

  “I see your guest hasn’t arrived yet,” he said, nodding at an empty chair. “Should I wait to leave the o
ther cup so it won’t get cold?”

  “No,” she said. Waving her fingers, she gestured for him to set the cup on the table. She nodded up toward Ghazi’s direction. “Here he comes now.”

  The waiter turned, looked in the direction she pointed, and saw a man strolling toward the café. Turning back to the table, he nodded in acknowledgment. He placed the cup in front of an empty chair across from her and became invisible behind others, somewhere back inside the café.

  Glancing toward Ghazi, she gauged the time she had before he would reach the café, and the table. Gently, she slid the cup closer to her so as not to disturb the stillness of the liquid inside. Not straying her eyes from him as he approached, she reached into her purse, unzipped a side pocket, and felt around in its folds. Excitement evincing across her face as her fingernail clicked on the small glass ampoule hidden in the corner of the purse’s side pocket. She fondled it with her fingers before she wrapped them around it and slowly, gently pulled out the small, dark colored vial. Hiding it under the table, she twisted off the cap, and then brought it up and emptied the clear contents into the cup, watching as the murky brew swallowed it up.

  Ghazi arrived at the other end of the outside seating area. Reaching across the table, she put a spoon in the other cup of coffee.

  Standing up, she walked toward Ghazi, and stuck out her hand for him to shake.

  “Ghazi,” she said, as demurely as she could, batting her eyelashes.

  “Oh, hello,” he said.

  “Hello. So glad you could meet me, Ghazi.” She smiled.

  “You recognized me?”

  “Of course! I’ve done my homework. I have a table waiting for us.” She waved her hand, palm up, gesturing him toward the table. Looking up at him, she said, “I knew it might be crowded this time of day, so I got here a little early to get us a table away from the entrance.”

  He’s so tall, she thought. And yes, handsome. Very handsome.

  “So then. After you,” he said, sweeping his hand out for her to take the lead.