The Transcendent Artifact

By V Bertolaccini

Mind-boggling SF action-packed thriller books of explorers encountering objects of celestial origins and entering mind-bending alternative realities!
Ice Station X1: Something is buried deep beneath the ice near an Antarctic American ice station! Something of inconceivable alien origins emerged out of space and crashed at a tremendous velocity and Russian intelligence agencies uncover it first and they uncover a deadly mind-bending voyager and try to make contact!
Deep in the depths of the moon scientists research something colossal and mind-blowing! Nobody knows what! Leading scientists are being killed! A secret agent is sent on an ultimate mission! Scientists create a stargate on the moon after time warps and new forms of black holes are created in particle accelerators in space! Reports claim there is an ultimate weapon capable of destroying entire worlds! Scientists carry out experiments on the colossal stargate, gateway to the stars, and at an exhibition of it an accident occurs and the secret agent enters it and travels out beyond the realms of the universe, and hurtles through a mind-bending gateway through galaxies!
The Lost Alien Artifact: A voyager probe of inconceivable magnitude and origins explores time and universes and detects something of unknown origins in space and time and emerges into this world, and after it has been buried away for centuries, warped and haunting a large castle, explorers uncover the deadly mind-bending supernatural voyager!
Space Odyssey: Beyond the Universe: A newly invented voyager explores the deepest depths of the universe, and leaves space and time when a deadly entity starts killing them all, and on a world in the depths of a new minding-bending universe encounter a deadly alien artifact of supernatural origins, hidden away since the dawn of time!
From Beyond Reality: Scientists, the military, archeologists, hunters, and treasure explorers uncover a fifteen-mile alien artifact, from beyond the universe, after it has been buried away for millions of years on a desolate Pacific island, in a colossal crater, with a monstrous devil-like alien entity, with powers capable of destroying the galaxy!
The Dyson Stargate: Deep in the depths of Mars astronauts discover an alien energy sphere, gateway and existence that spans the whole cosmos, and scientists use its technology to carry out some of the most advanced and dangerous research experiments attained and create a laboratory black hole!
Astronauts enter a colossal and mind-blowing gateway, called the Dyson Stargate, within the black hole, which extends across the depths of space, with trillions of portals, going into the deepest and most buried away and mind-bending reaches of the cosmos!
They are chased throughout galaxies by something hideous, and an existence from the beginning of the universe, created by the creators of the universe, with the sole purpose of stopping highly advanced extraterrestrial species using the gateway or constructing new gateways, to avoid universal civilizations and wars.
None of the astronauts know what created the mind-boggling ancient gateway and what is after them but something else in the gateway keeps saving them from ultimate deadly encounters and dangers and it takes them throughout the depths of the cosmos, hurtling through mind-bending portals, going through vast galaxies!

• Language: English
• Publisher: CosmicBlueCB
• Release date: Dec 19, 2013
• ISBN: 9781310469299

V Bertolaccini

A 21st century publisher/author famous for his unique classic mind-bending beyond space and time, alien artifact, and exploration themed science fiction, who did his first mind-boggling science fiction classic From Beyond Space and Time in 1998, who likes and writes 21st century potential blockbusters, headline action thrillers, high quality action-packed movie-style science fiction horror.

Book preview

Part I

Novel 1

Ice Station X1

V Bertolaccini

Prologue

The Visitation

The pale cold complexion of the Russian scientist entirely altered! Sounds he gave took strange tones everywhere as he started trying to explain, and Weaver strained his eyes trying to see him now, while he considered it, and the darkness in the room grew!

Normal astronomers and observatories around the world never detected it, and would have studied it with great curiosity if they had at a far lower velocity, and would have been baffled, as it went at many times the speed of light!

Weaver grasped at what it was and started to comprehend what he had been missing! He wondered what could detect such an object, and if they even had anything available!

Its origins were undetected by the sources that had seen it and had been set up for high speed objects! The scientist continued, biting his lower lip hard. The detection sites were mainly created and functioned to discover and track any high speed objects for military detection systems and unidentified flying objects of any kind, and from all the accumulated sources known only Russian intelligence agencies investigated it further because of its tremendous velocity and the fact that the location of its descent was accurately traced into this place and region of the Antarctic!

My god! Weaver gasped, realizing the mistake he had made and what the outcome of what was occurring could be!

Yes! The location was traced to this top secret American military ice station base, where they investigated!

It must have been incredible! Weaver answered firmly. The impact must have been tremendous! Did that telescope here with its new technology have anything to do with it?

The scientists here, and in the underground telescope chamber, did not even know of its arrival! If it had been far slower they might have recorded it as an asteroid of immense proportions! It was only recorded as an immense explosion or earthquake of unknown origins, which had lasted seconds, and which had occurred during the night!

Weaver was amazed that it actually landed nearby, and he believed it had to be the telescope that had been responsible, and he had detected that they had been up to something with it when he had discovered it in the secret chamber below.

The magnitude recorded by their equipment had shown them the tremendous power it had!

Tremendous power! Weaver panted, and considered what weight it could have and at what distance away it was.

Russian scientists used examinations of satellite images to examine and trace the exact location where it had landed, and where it had entered the ice!

Like a crazy shooting star exploding out of the polar night sky! Weaver continued. At a velocity and force unheard of!

After a great deal of observations, research, and discussions by the leading scientists they agreed that the thing that they had found had to have artificial origins mainly by its appearance and its tremendous power! It also has to have vast technology, which may give its origins! They had to investigate it as far as they could! Even with this highly confidential American base being here!

Weaver could not get what it could be or the outcome of such a scenario, and thanked the scientist for warning him of it!

Space may be full of them? the scientist continued, giving his opinion. We have to investigate! The future of this world could be at stake?

So there could be more searching for where it came from? Do you think it was damaged landing?

We have to get anything that we can on it! We have to get as much details of it and its origins no matter what!

The technology could very well make it worthwhile! Weaver sighed, thinking of how much it could be worth.

Have they been able to make contact with it? Weaver asked.

As far as I know they have not!

Have they entered it yet?

As far as I know they have not! What it is made of is either indestructible or virtually indestructible! They have been trying everything that they have to get into to it!

Incredible! He replied. I never thought I would live to see one! Never mind confront one! What information have you on it?

There is little so far! It has a vague flying saucer shape and is about quarter of a mile across all around it, and about hundred and something feet high! They have uncovered most of it, except a region still under the ice! They have used everything available to check for places to enter it!

Is there positive proof that nothing emerged from it before they arrived?

"No! But there have been no signs of it anywhere, and no encounters have been reported worldwide from it!

Has there been anything on getting where it originated from?

They have nothing on its origins or destination, and if it had achieved its objective!

Have they found anything to indicate it has intelligence or if there is anything aboard?

They discovered its forces deliberately melted the ice and allowed the water to freeze over it, and that it hid itself away, and it is believed something deadly is buried away in its interior!

I

Ice Station X1

Chapter 1

The Alien Encounter

Out of the silent empty Antarctic night high-powered rifle blasts were astonishing, especially in the fatal blizzard engulfing Willis! The explosions sounded so powerful he believed they were using some form of powerful explosive in the bullets!

Whoever was after him had to be crazy and out for the kill, and stupid for entering them into such a blizzard and fury of snow! He could not realize who was there and just accepted that they might be trying to kill him for being a leading scientist at the ice station!

Ice Station X1 had to be located in the coldest and most remote place on the planet! Even in the summer the place had been deadly cold to him! As far as he was concerned there was nothing there to kill for and nobody there that he thought capable of doing so! It and the coldness made him cringe, and blindly rush on through the blinding blizzard, lost.

A loud explosion blasted out and a bullet thudded somewhere nearby and he had to run through the dark snow landscape for his life! He dared not use his light and he could barely see anything!

The men could be heard over to his side and he realized that they could have infrared sights and he just dived into a pile of snow, and buried himself deep. Surely they would not find him!

Once he realized that nothing had happened he started to enjoy the rest and being free from being attacked. His mind raced through what had occurred! Yet he only realized that the location that he strolled into had been a region that nobody at the ice station went in, and he started to wonder what was there.

Why would they go to such lengths to kill him? What could possibly be there? What could be there in such a desolate place?

When he finally left where he was and started to return to the ice station, he started tracing where he had been where they had appeared and started looking around, and strolled around and found something buried beneath a region on flat snow, which he wiped the snow and ice away from and revealed a wooden cover.

Below it he found a vast hole going straight down deep into the ice below, which had clearly been hollowed out with some large powerful machine, which he had not seen there. Yet the region was vast!

Who had dug such a hole? And he wondered if it was by some foreign country that intended to destroy the secret military station?

It was then that he discovered an old rope and harness buried away in the snow, and knew he had a way to climb down, and he decided to investigate it, while avoiding being killed by them or the blizzard! He was sure it had been dug for a reason and that something was just below him!

He swiftly attached the ropes and fitted the harness around him and shifted in, and turned on his light, and covered the top with the wooden cover.

Mind-bending sounds and echoes from the haunting blizzard screamed down through the ice shaft with fury and left him stunned at the dangers, and no matter how he tried to shake it off and contemplate identities his thoughts never formed stable recognitions of what was occurring in the blizzard above!

The ice that the tunnel went through fascinated him as it was different from the regular ice below the ground there! It looked to him to have been formed from water that had melted and had been frozen quickly afterwards!

Clouds of powdered snow and snowflakes swirled down and through the beam from his light and he continued to release the rope, edging him down, seeking to discover what was below.

He realized that he had avoided being killed after all and wondered if he was going to be killed later, when he climbed back up and went outside.

He groaned as he moved down, realizing the mistake he was making and the trouble he would have getting back to the surface and trying to find the ice station in the dark.

He stopped and dangled about on his rope and examined how the tunnel had been cut, while glimpsing parts of the shaft above, and was surprised again at how large and expensive the equipment used must have been.

He had always wanted to investigate some great mystery and it had even helped lead him into becoming a scientist, at such a far out desolate location, and he wanted to explore more. He had wanted to explore and discover new things of value and greatness, and perhaps even be remembered in history somewhere!

What interested was why they had gone to such lengths to kill him, and why he had not known about the tunnel! Surely they had a way of examining below the ice and would have done it while constructing the underground ice station, especially with it being of so confidential and belonging to the military.

What treasures could be hidden away in such a region, with it being one of the last not properly explored regions?

What was he dealing with though? Why were they trying to kill him? Were they protecting something that they had hidden there?

Something of unfathomable unidentifiable nature could be under him and he had to explore it!

As he lowered himself progressively he started to realize the depth of it and that there could be something there!

Something could be secretively built there with the help of the Russian spies in the ice station, and to be used to destroy the entire ice station in an atomic war!

He realized the implications of the find and that he would have to check what was there, no matter what! He could not let it go, and he had to survive and give the information to someone.

Willis was blinded by the black abyss below him as he lowered himself down through the cold tunnel, uniquely drilled with an incredible precision.

He gripped the rope hard, but spun round, and fixed his foot against the tunnel wall to stop it, and looked up to the top of the tunnel and just saw darkness there now, and looked and listened to what was there, and realized that if he was caught there they could cut the rope and let him fall to his death at the bottom. If he never died he would starve to death there!

So far he had been unchallenged with his insistence in going down and he realized that he best increase his speed!

A silent thud echoed down from the top and eventually a cloud of snow came down making him gasp and search for anything, and consider putting his light out, but he saw that it was a freak gust of wind blowing into the cover.

He wondered why he was lowering himself so slowly down when they could easily fall down by freeing the rope and using his hand to slow and stop it, but it could be dangerous!

The dangers of being caught were greater and he did it, and raced down the shaft, with him continuously having to slow down, while also using his legs and boots against the ice to slow himself.

When the bottom appeared he stopped and stared in wonder, and considered what was in the blackness there, and considered the incredible trouble he would have climbing back up.

He was mainly confused as to what was there to be discovered as he made his way there slowly. The ebbing radiance of the light clearly was increasing and he realized how tired he had become, and he decided it was best sleeping at the bottom! Surely the men with the guns above would not come down at night? They would know the trouble it would be to get back up!

The coldness entering his throat gave him cough sensations, so he speeded up and unleashed the rope allowing him to fall faster.

What would the outcome of it be? Would he even find anything? What could be there? It could have belonged to earlier scientists, checking for something? The ice station was old, and a great deal of research had been done there!

Hazy echoes off his deep breathing broke the extraordinary silence and he examined the ice as he shifted downwards, and he started to find the cold air was damaging his throat and was harder to inhale, and he frequently stopped to gasp for air, while dangling with hideous expectations of plunging into something dangerous.

A distant upper rumble of wind eventually released chunks of ice and he realized how dangerous the place might become if solid ice came crashing down, and that the place the rope was attached to might not be able to support such weight after all, of him and the immense rope, and he considered how he could survive at the bottom if he fell down there!

In an instant the rope jerked and wildly oscillated and he spun uncontrollably around and a surge of blackness engulfed him, and he realized the light had been banged against the ice and had been turned off, and he realized what he had missed and what it would be like if he got stuck there in complete blackness, with him trying to climb back up!

He searched for the light switch while straining his eyes to see further down to the bottom and thought he saw something there, but there were no particular features.

When he had turned the dim light on the tunnel vanished into the darkness at the bottom, and when he arrived there the light was so faint that he was too busy focusing on the ice ground to properly see anything, and he only vaguely saw an immense dark cavity open out!

He hit the ground with a thud and in the turmoil he slipped over sideways into something heavy!

In the dim light he then saw a large artificial black object resting in the central region of the cavity, which went out and vanished in the distance, into darkness, and he examined what he could properly see, and tried to see the cavity roof fifty feet above, and it going higher further in, and he gasped and wondered what hell he was looking at!

He wondered how they had managed to get the equipment down to build such a structure and if it was safe!

They clearly had another way into the cavity to bring it in and he realized that he could get out more easily than he had entered!

He explored over to his side and discovered equipment and small vehicles and a colossal generator and examined the controls and realized how new it was, and he traced cables from it to more equipment and massive lights!

He activated the generator and it swiftly started, and when the lights brightened he gasped, slipped, and collapsed onto the slippery icy ground!

The cavity was immense and went into the distance, but what really staggered him was the black object at its center! It was immense and bigger than any manmade object that he had seen! It was circular and he estimated it went out for at least quarter of a mile in every direction!

He was staggered and exhausted and could not understand any of it! They surely could not have put it there? The construction of it there would have taken vast resources! They would have had to have vast amounts of men and vehicles being brought in!

How could anyone have been able to hide and carry out such an operation without being noticed?

Even if they had worked on it at night lights and sounds would be visible, and vehicles and airplanes taking in supplies would have left signs of activity everywhere.

The ice cavity above and around him also looked like the ice in the tunnel and as though it was different from regular ice! It seemed to him to have been formed from water that had melted and had been frozen quickly afterwards!

He realized that it could have been built when the large ice station had been constructed and that it could well have been a hidden part of it! Whatever it was it had to have been even more secretive than it!

What the hell was it? It staggered him when he thought of the nature of the ice station! The place had been built for atomic warfare!

Could it be an ultimate atomic weapon and doomsday device?

He realized the danger that he was in and he had to get out, and realized he would have to leave the ice station! It was far too dangerous and he considered if he should have it investigated!

While he started wandering up to the deadly black object he wondered how the thing could even lift off! The power behind it had to be colossal and new and highly confidential!

He quickly returned to where he had been and did his best to remove all signs that he had been there. Except the rope was still attached at the top of the tunnel and he had to ignore it and left! He would have to go into hiding for a month or two and hope that it might be forgotten!

He soon found a vehicle and sat in it and got ready to drive away. He was staggered at his original thoughts of what was there! It did not add up! What the hell was it doing there?

He barely even grasped why the ice station was situated there! The Antarctic was not near anything! Surely America had enough land and hidden places where it could be hidden away? It was located away out there where anything could happen!

He shifted the vehicle away slowly getting use to using it while examining the black object and its immense shape, but never saw anything on or in it, or marks of anything, which would had shown that it had been welded or parts had been somehow fitted together!

When he stopped to feel its surface he was surprised that it was not a type of metal and was some new unknown substance.

There had to be a way into it or something, and he raced along its side gasping at the immensity of it. Now amazed that there had been only two gunmen looking after it! How could it have been so hidden away?

The structure was circular and flat at the top and bottom, and he when he reached the furthest region he realized that it was a least quarter of a mile long all around it, and he was staggered!

Eventually he found an opening tunnel in the ice cavity where large vehicles had entered and left, and he followed a road slightly going upwards to the surface and discovered a vast metal door further up, and he failed to discover a way of opening the lock, and he realized that he was trapped in the cavity!

Once at the bottom again he continued going around the black object searching for anything strange, and slowly started falling asleep, still trying to find a solution to finding a way out and what he had discovered, and finally he allowed the vehicle to come to a standstill against a slightly different flattish region of the black object, which looked like the front of it, where he went to sleep and had strange dreams!

When he awoke a few hours later he had a throbbing head from the cold and he was dazed from his dreams, and he jumped out the vehicle and spotted and stared over at a hole in the black object, wondering where it came from!

It confused him and he even wondered if he was imagining it being there and that it was something else!

Where had it come from? He searched around looking to see if anyone had been there or was about!

How recently had the opening in it formed?

He tried to recall if there had been any marks on it or anything there, and again he wondered how long ago it had appeared? Were there people inside? And how dangerous was it being there?

He moved directly below it and listened into it. It was only a few feet above his head and was a perfect circle at the same size as his height!

It still confused him greatly as he did not have a clue what he was dealing with and he realized that he had to investigate it as he would not forgive himself for letting go a chance of explaining it or getting some information! He was a keen scientist and had also investigated everything of the slightest interest.

He shifted the vehicle correctly below it and stood on the highest part of the vehicle and hoisted himself up into it, fascinated at the dangers and the impact of such a discovery! He had been waiting his entire life to see something like it! Even though the dangers were tremendous!

Light dimly beamed through the hole only lighting a small empty area and he looked about and moved into the darkness further in, where dim black shapes became vaguely visible.

He could not recognize if it was a room or large hall and he strolled slowly and blindly into it, wearily resting, and got ready to escape if he heard or seen anyone and stayed observing what the black shapes were, while he let his eyes adapt to the darkness.

He was sure what was confusing him and stopping him grasping small details was what the whole object actually was! The material it was made of was clearly unknown and capable of withstanding tremendous forces, and nothing was familiar to him, which he had not done in a long time and in such a way!

He felt strangely shaped black things about his front in the blackness, and smelled a musty synthetic scent in the air. His eye pupils slightly adjusted, to the blackness, and he stared at places covered in lines and curves.

He moaned thinking his tiredness and disappointment at not receiving any answers to what was going on! Surely it was something? They gunmen were willing to kill for it! The size and cost was tremendous, as well as their bringing in such equipment and building such an immense structure there!

It startled him and he could not grasp the purpose of such a thing! A curved part of a wall had shapes on it and he tried touching them and seeing if they did anything, but there was no response.

He moved further along to another area and observed a dark shape and had a feeling of something being there, like he was being watched!

Something lifted him and he gasped, and it shifted him away, with nothing visible holding him, and he felt some force moving him away into the interior of the black object, and he realized slowly that it could kill him easily!

He tried to theorize about it but there was nothing he could grasp! All he saw was strange dark shapes!

Was it of military origins? It could be to camouflage the technology and confuse any observers? Whatever it was the cost and time behind it proved that it could take warfare to a new level!

Blackness covered his vision and he felt a strange sensation like he was floating through space, and something opened at his front like an energy curtain, and he felt as though he had entered something strange!

A strange blue radiance shone out so dimly that he could not properly see what was there. It shone like a faint blue star.

It swiftly shifted away and his emotions ran amok when he started seeing spectacular views of space, and he could no longer feel any floor beneath his feet or see any of the black shapes.

An eerie sensation gripped him! Something was not right! He sensed a weird presence of something, which he never recognized!

Nothing but space formed around him in stages as though he were standing out in deep space, and he stood staggered trying get how it was implanted within his mind, and he watched a sphere of light floating through the darkness and passed him, and he realized that it had to be telepathically transmitted into his mind, covering his entire sight with vivid visions.

Strange displays of visions and sounds altered and vanished about him, and they reformed into other things, and visions of space appeared and vanished like something was searching through memories for something, and he was sure something was trying to adapt it to him, so that he could understand it. Some of the strange sounds and lights gave him artificial sensations, which he could not grasp the nature of!

He was sure he was picking up knowledge of things but he could not understand what they were, and he then watched infinitely streaking stars, of solar systems, flickering by.

Suddenly he realized the black object he was in was a voyager spacecraft, which had a new form of propulsion, with mind-boggling technology and powers, and an accuracy and capacity inconceivable, and was built to travel into deep space, and he watched its voyage across star quadrants and through clusters of stars, exploring vast unexplored stars.

He wondered what it had been designed to do! Had they built it to make contact with something that they had detected? Perhaps the radio signals from it had been detected?

He wondered if it was in a probe of immense proportions, as there was no mention of any humans!

There were sights of it exploring worlds, but he could not grasp its mission. He knew that it had to be more than for doing what normal probes did and that alien contact and deep space exploration had to be part of it! Had something made contact with them? Did they have a real Star War program hidden away?

Why did this voyager end up there, embedded in ice in the Antarctic? Was it there as it would not be detected by the rest of the world? It surely would be detected coming down even at the Artic! Yet he could not even imagine such a large object not being detected coming down anywhere!

Willis gasped as new visions appeared and he saw nothing but a vision of blackness, and it hurtled through the outer limits of space and time, racing into this universe, and he watched, staggered, realizing that it had traveled beyond the universe, and he realized it had a way of making vast leaps through space with it, but it was inaccurate, and that star traveling was needed to carry out the majority of its voyage!

For some reason its form was a mass of energy and it became unstable and it created vast unstable energy explosions across space and time, which he realized were so powerful that they ripped at the fabric of space and time and made regions temporary unbalanced and warp, with only its protective energy shield holding it from the effects.

Star formations flashed by, as it continued its pursuit of something, with its sphere of white glowing energy floating by like a colossal ghost. Voyaging through billions of stars, while transforming its energy states further from their original states.

Willis watched the visions vanish and the normal surroundings there emerge, and felt himself being moved away and was left standing at the entrance hole, where he gasped and saw the two gunmen standing below at his vehicle, who aimed their guns at him and ordered him to climb down!

Chapter 2

The Secret Military Operation

Once the military aircraft neared Ice Station X1 the soldiers aboard swiftly fitted on their parachutes and adjusted their gear, while receiving updates for the mission from Commander Craven.

Weaver gasped considering the dangerous mission ahead, and gasped again at what had occurred already! Certain things that had occurred interested him greatly!

There was more action than he could believe! What were the events that they were on the trail of? Were the soldiers on the plane being intentionally secretive or covering not knowing things for reasons? What had he let himself in for?

He was to masquerade as a soldier to get into the Antarctic ice station and basically find out what was happening there without getting caught, and to take any action if needed!

Sunlight blasted through one of the windows of the plane, giving him some warmth. The Antarctic conditions were slowly entering the plane and digging deep into his body, and he gasped at the temperatures recorded there and at the fact they were at such a height, which increased it! Normally he did not mind the winter but he liked to get use to low temperatures, and he had not been anywhere as cold before!

So when the plane door was opened for them to parachute and the winds hit them he shuddered and put his helmet over his head!

He automatically dived out with the others gritting his teeth!

He started getting his body use to it, and could still hardly believe the location below and that he would be trapped there without help if anything happened! There was nothing for miles going into the flat white horizon! They had not even seen anything below since they passed the last ship over the sea.

He realized that they had made a mistake! They had been too keen to enter the mission and they had dropped down a greater distance away from the ice station than they should have! And he could barely even see it and only recognized it from the secret intelligence photos of the highly confidential underground base.

The fact that he had been a soldier and his military record and his keenest, fitness, and record of successful spy missions for the intelligence agency were the main reasons for him being chosen for the mission and to infiltrate the soldiers to enter the ice station.

They had given him little and he knew they had little to give! Basically they had little of what was happening and he was to get information!

He discovered little in what he had been told and really only knew that there were deaths occurring all over the ice station, and most had been killed by military weapons, which was why the soldiers were sent in to stop, and he was put there by intelligence agencies to find out more on.

Nothing added up! Who wanted to kill anyone at such a place? It was basically a military and scientist ice station and he could only think that another country was behind it! Yet who had done it and why had they been done it? There were no known cases like it on record, which they or he could find, and he had also unsuccessfully searched for comparisons!

Who could profit from it? They clearly would replace the people killed, and what good would it do for them! There had to be far more behind it! Surely other countries would not have any reasons or be able to profit from it with it being there.

It was there to cover that region of the world if needed.

Someone that he knew had been sure that they had discovered something and that the military and scientists there that knew about it were being killed, and if that was true he believed that he might be able to find something or someone with something.

He gazed over at the underground ice station gleaming with sunbeams and wondered what the hell was there! The case was important and something had to have occurred!

He recalled the immense size of it below the ground as he watched the others let out their parachutes, and he copied them and was left staggered when his entire parachute shot straight upwards, and flew away into the distance!

He gasped and examined the straps and saw that they had been deliberately cut!

He instantly dived towards the only person directly below him, where he could properly reach, and realized that the speed that he was traveling at by diving might be too fast to do anything, and that he would have only one chance and less than a second to grab hold of the other parachutist to save his life!

As he shot down he saw the plane vanish beneath the horizon and grasped the full dangers and loneliness of the Antarctic, and again realized the dangers!

He made himself move over towards the parachutist below and swiftly and powerfully grabbed his waist, and realized he could not hold on and swiftly grabbed a strap from him and tied it to the other soldier’s parachute straps.

Close to the ground he rested and considered his chances of survival and gasped! Someone clearly knew that he was there and had intended to kill him!

Chapter 3

The Gun Battle

Behind them, below the horizon, the sunlight vanished and the early Antarctic night engulfed the soldiers and Weaver studied his surroundings trying to explain why they had made such a mistake! The entire mission had been planned down the smallest detail!

The ice station was further away and the snow deep and terrain virtually impossible to get quickly through! It was incredible that they had actually not landed earlier than when the sun was going down. The incident with his parachute had been a major incident and he knew there was someone there against him and perhaps the mission, and he wondered who had access to the parachutes!

When a loud blast exploded out and a bullet hit and killed one of the front soldiers, beside Commander Craven, Weaver was not fully surprised, and realized that someone was attacking them!

It was lucky there was cover and they rushed below two small hills as bullets flew in hitting the snow all about them, and he realized that there were at least six of them, and that they had made the mistake of being too far away. The bullets were off and they had been lucky that they had hit the soldier.

None of them could see who was there though, and they were hidden away at different locations and moved around, and they were unable to recognize anything! Were they professionals and had planned the whole thing well before they had arrived?

The whole terrain was unfamiliar too them and they had the advantage over them! How could they move forward and get to the ice station without receiving many deaths?

He was unsure if they could survive there the night! They had no proper food or cover, and the temperature was dropping dramatically and none of them had adapted to the environment.

He wondered if they got lost if they could find the ice station there! The place was very hidden away! It was lucky they had seen it from the air and knew the direction.

He even wondered if it was the people from the ice station actually firing on them! If they had not known of their arrival and the situation there was worse than stated they could believe that they were being attacked!

He considered the region and what must be one of the most desolate regions of the world. They had not seen anyone since they had flown over the Antarctic sea, and was sure planes even avoided flying there.

What was staggering was that they were taking on so many soldiers! What did they actually intend to do? They surely could not expect to kill the entire group of soldiers, and if they had been informed about them they would have realized how trained they were! Yet could they be trying to scare them away? Yet that was absurd also, as they would have to go there! There was no where else out there to go to!

The mission now seemed flawed! Why had they not brought far more soldiers and more powerful weapons? The soldiers were shooting away unable to hit anything and their hidden enemy was ignoring it!

Yet they had put together a good team of everyone needed to carry out the mission at the ice station, and if they had landed next to it as planned nothing would have gone wrong! He wondered if it had been the captain of the plane who had landed them there or if it had been a mistake as it had looked at the time?

The adventure brought him back to life after such a long length of inactivity and lack of anything of interest. At times he still could not believe that there was anything out in such a desolate region, and that anything worthwhile existed there!

It was winter and deep snow shrouded everything around them, and he realized again that they would have to camp there. And having not slept outdoors in winter he gasped at sleeping in such thick cold snow, and considered if they would find his remains there one day, and wonder why they had done it. There had been accounts in history of vast drops in temperature and entire groups of soldiers and others being found frozen solid and dead! What if temperatures hit far lower than had been recorded, with there being no recorded proof or witnesses left alive!

The snow landscape was untouched by humans everywhere, and at times empty and hollow with no sound, and had a deep haunting silence that he had only heard before in thick winter snow landscapes. It reminded him of another world! An empty lost world absence of life with faint mists surrounding regions.

What was shocking was how easily they had trapped them, and he was unsure if they even knew how they could avoid any large amount of deaths. If only they had taken a small landing airplane, and kept it there, but they could not have traveled there with the amount of soldiers and at that distance!

There was nothing to recognize anywhere, and he watched some of the men attempt to use communication devices to the ice station, and when they failed they tried to see if there was anything to pick up on it!

Another problem was that they had experienced a long exhausting day and had got more exhausted wading through the deep snow, and a peculiarity he noticed was a distant hum, similar to a distant engine whirling, out at an unknown place, and it started to drive him insane trying to identify it.

It was no surprise that Commander Craven eventually made them blast them with as many well aimed rounds to force some form of reaction, but they seemed to ignore it, and he knew that they would have to hit them with something or force them away!

It was incredible when thick snow piled down, and he knew that they could use it as it was virtually impossible to see through in the dark, and he realized he had a thermal weapon sight in his equipment and he used it to see what he could find through the darkness and blizzard! Yet they were too good at hiding!

What are we going to do ...? one of men finally spluttered, fighting for air, furious that they had been put in a situation.

Commander Craven stopped checking their weapons and showed how annoyed he was at his reply and at the way things were going, and walked towards him.

We better agree to something ... he shouted, giving glances about at things and realizing the mess of his expedition, and decided not to continue.

Where can we go? a soldier named Reeves continued, who was near Weaver, and Weaver had become close to as he was his most trusted person as he had been able to check him out more than anyone else there, which he had done before the mission, as he checked them all as much as possible to find out anything that he should know, and he had checked for the people that he could most depend on.

Well I’ve an idea! Weaver forced himself to reply, seeing that nothing was going to happen, and watched Commander Craven gasp and look like he knew something about him, and he realized that even though he could know something that he was still reacting to what had happened with his damaged parachute and his way of saving himself.

Do you think we should attack them then! Commander Craven answered firmly.

I’ve been monitoring them with my thermal weapon sight! he swiftly replied. None of them show themselves! So I reckon we could easily surprise some of them!

Good idea! But dangerous! You have to wade through that bloody blizzard and not be seen! Can you do it then?

Yes! he answered. Anyone want to join me? We can’t stay here all night!

Weaver was surprised that nobody but Reeves agreed with carrying it out, and he realized that they never thought much of the idea! Yet he did see their point and that he would only be able to get one or two, and risk putting them in further danger. Yet deep down he really wanted to know who was there, and capture one and question him.

So you’re going? Commander Craven laughed.

Yes! he replied firmly, and started fixing himself up and preparing himself, and watched their blank faces examining him.

Once he and Reeves were ready he examined the region around his front and they rushed out and sneaked along regions that they would be unseen in.

He wondered why they had stopped firing anyway. Yet he realized they had probably realized that they were well armed and capable of killing them! How could they attack and beat them with them being so heavily armed? Then as he properly examined the area around where they were he realized that they were capable of attacking them at places that they were not hidden in.

He was still barely able to realize what the outcome of such a situation could be!

Reeves removed his communicator and established contact with Commander Craven and they moved on faster, and as they approached the place where the nearest of the gunmen had been he realized that he could not believe that this case could be solved easily. He just knew something would stop him getting any information from the gunmen if they captured them! This mission seemed to be going to be the worst and hardest!

He thought of the earlier battle and the death of the soldier near him and how ruthlessly they had attacked. He had never fully realized how desolate, deadly, and beyond civilization the Antarctic was, and how far from any help it was. If anything serous happened they could not get help! He wondered if a war took place there if they could handle it.

When they finally reached where the gunmen were he hid and examined the place and found it empty, and they moved in and checked for anything, and he barely found part of a footstep, which gave him no information.

They gave the information back to Commander Craven and continued to the other locations, going from one to another, checking for clues, until they had checked every hidden location, and they informed the others and they joined them.

Now all they needed to do was get to the ice station without getting shot, and they decided to use the darkness and blizzard and go sideways and move there from another direction!

Chapter 4

The Secret Ice Station

The next big surprise they discovered was that the ice station was covered over by deep snow, which they had spent many hours hunting for in the dark and heavy blizzard.

Once they found the entrance they started digging it out the snow, and Weaver was confused and bewildered again! How could they enter it, and he wondered how they managed to survive being suffocated! Surely places bringing in air would be blocked by deep snow! Yet he recalled seeing places that had melted the snow with heat, which were camouflaged and unrecognizable and looked part of the landscape, where they surely drew in air supplies. He examined one and realized it was virtual impossible to enter and it was taking in air.

It was incredible that such a place could exist in such an environment, and he spotted one of the soldiers had found something and he sensed that it was the way in! They thought only of survival and getting in!

The soldier showed them a communicator device covered in ice and snow and then large entrance doors that they uncovered.

Weaver realized that there had to be at least another entrance where they took in and kept large objects and vehicles.

Commander Craven was soon arguing with someone inside of his identity, and that they were expected, which he attempted to clarify, and Weaver realized that some of the scientists had arrived and that they sounded different, and the scientists realized the soldiers had clearly been out in the Antarctic blizzard a long time. They also sounded as though they had not had any proper communications with the outside in a long time!

They finally put a soldier in command in the ice station on and Commander Craven identified himself and they sent out some soldiers to get them.

Weaver could not blame them for being precautious after all the mysterious deaths there, and them being trapped out there, and with the gunmen being there! And he wondered if they were actually at war with each other, for some reason that they had not mentioned and that they had made it confidential?

Reeves repeatedly tapped the solid metal entrance trying to measure its thickness, and realized that it was abnormally thick, and Weaver realized that the entrance had recently been fitted and had replaced a smaller weaker entrance, and he noticed someone had been trying to gain entrance to it or the earlier entrance!

Weaver realized one main point and that the gunmen had to have a base somewhere, but he was unsure if it was faraway or nearby, and he knew that it could be a major clue to finding them!

Surely when it was light and the blizzard stopped they would leave footprints near there!

The entrance was slowly opened by two scientists and two soldiers from inside and Weaver gasped at the warm comforting air and the effect it had as it caressed his body, and he immediately rushed in with the other soldiers, and marched in through a long corridor going downwards, wondering what it would be like staying in such an ice station.

As he moved in at the front of the others he saw that there was better lighting further in and he felt delighted that he would soon be able to rest and be inside and away from the severe cold and blizzard, and be actually exploring an ancient ice station and doing his job that he was there for.

He wondered what the real people and conditions there were mainly like and if they were peculiar with being in such a place, as he had seen elsewhere. Yet the other places were old places and people living in harsh environments without any proper heating or comforts. He realized more than ever how much he had enjoyed exploring hidden secrets and places, and basically the unknown and unexplored, and he examined long corridors, untouched rooms, looking for evidence of anything.

He wondered what being on another world like it would be like, like being on the moon wearing spacesuits and what it would be like to be the first humans to visit another world! What would it actually be like? What would the surprises be? Could they grow food and create and find all their needs?

What magnificent wonders would exist there? Would people eventually start changing and altering to the environment?

At one floor below the ground long corridors went out to a incredible distance that astounded them, as the size was at least quarter of a mile in length with corridors and rooms all along them, with spiral stairs going downwards to the other floors, and their group explored them as they went along.

Weaver realized immediately that the place would be hard to explore and there may be far more people there than they had estimated, and he realized that the plans that he had seen of it had been wrong for some reason!

He sensed other things of danger and mysteries existed there from the scientists they met and the confirmations from the soldiers there! The soldiers were far different from them, and normal soldiers! He could not tell if they were carefree from being there or from having avoided doing anything and being confronted with any action. But they were glad to see them and have help arrive, and they did believe that they could be killed there!

They were taken along a corridor to a long line of sleeping accommodations to stay in with toilets and other needs, and Weaver took a room next to Commander Craven, and Reeves took a room next to him, and they started moving into their accommodations and unpacking their stuff, and Weaver examined his room and was glad to see that it had electricity and heating and other needs, and could be locked and had a key.

Their presence seemed to cause confusion amongst many of the scientists, who could not believe that they had arrived, and they came along the corridor to see and check them out in their rooms.

Some of the scientists started arguing with each other about things he could not grasp, and they stopped themselves mentioning things that were confidential!

The things that started to confuse him were what they were all actually working on there! What were they doing out there in such a large expensive place? There were no indications of anything!

He had expected there to be less of everything, and them just occupying a more normal structure! He wondered if they were funding vast amounts of useless and expensive science research, and if the place should have been closed?

Perhaps they were monitoring the environment for things like global warming? Could they be supplying much needed information about vast amounts of things, as well as looking after the military ice station? Though they could be working on highly confidential research that the military wished to be more hidden!

Chapter 5

The Extraordinary Encounter

Weaver was ecstatic with getting a good meal in the dinner room, with all the others there, resting into comfortable seats, with the scientists and soldiers from there giving them information everywhere, and things were looking up and he realized that his mission there could be a success.

I know most of this place like the back of my hand! one of the scientists claimed, and Weaver realized that he was working his way up to asking them what they knew about the place, and found on their trip there.

Suddenly a scientist leaped up knocking the whole table over, making soup fly over Weaver, and his heart leapt when he saw a figure entering the room in a form of spacesuit, which shifted out from the darkness outside the door, and one of the soldiers that had arrived with Weaver reached for his gun and kept his hand there and ready!

The scientists out of the way from the figure as it shifted slowly and strangely in, like in slow motion, and some rushed out the door behind it, and they all stared at the spacesuit figure and Weaver wondered what the hell they were taking about! It was as though the scientists there believed that it was supernatural or something, which he could not ever recall hearing before! What could possibly make such scientists react in such a way?

They all watched the strange figure move in engrossed at what the outcome would be! It shifted around lifelessly and he watched it pick up a seat and sit opposite him, and he watched shocked faces of the remaining scientists! Their reactions were incredible to him, and he still could not explain anything!

There was something strange going on and as though he was missing something! Something that he could not grasp, and he watched Commander Craven and his shocked reactions! It was like there was something there that should not be there!

He could not place it and he realized that they needed more rest and sleep, and to get use to the strange environment.

Weaver studied the spacesuit faceplate and could not see through the darkness inside, and the figure never reacted and just sat, like a robot, and he examined the suit it was wearing with amazement as he had not seen anything like it! It was far more advanced than he had seen before! It looked like something from the future!

We’ll have to check it! Reeves stated to him, after many minutes of intense silence, to unsaid questions.

It surprised him that he, such a logical soldier, and after all that he had been through over the past days could refer to it in the way he had, and he wondered what he thought it actually was!

Who could it be? one of the other soldiers asked loudly, confused.

He’s not one of us! another finally stated.

That’s a good one! Weaver replied, considered a way to get them to give their fantasies. Who or what could it be?

He must have something to say if he traveled here! one of the scientists quickly replied, confusing him further.

It might be one of the killers of your scientists and soldiers here? Reeves stated firmly.

Weaver watched them all become aware of the further danger, and start to think of ways of protecting themselves.

What does it want? the scientist replied first. That’s the question! Why does it want to meet us here? It could easily have kept itself hidden!

Weaver had a shudder rush up his spine!

What actually are we talking about? one of the silent soldiers asked, who had sat out of the way, and he moved over to it, getting ready to do something, and was immediately stopped by Commander Craven.

Weaver studied the figure and realized that it had not moved or done anything since it had sat down.

What do you want? the soldier asked it, confused.

Weaver knew there would be no reply and that someone might do something, and might do something stupid and fire their gun there, and he rushed over before anyone could and slowly lifted the faceplate of the spacesuit, and stood back shocked!

It was the soldier that had been killed when the gunmen had attacked them, and they stood staggered, and the others that could not see its face rushed over see there.

The dead soldier was lifelessly dead and sat without moving in its seat, and they examined him in every detail and saw that his clothes were identical, and they wondered how it had moved!

We cannot leave this! Commander Craven finally moaned out loudly, showing his annoyance. Great! How am I going to explain this in my report?

While most of them sat down confused, trying to explain how the body had moved there, they watched it fade away and vanish!

Chapter 6

The Hauntings

The events were staggering afterwards! Some of the soldiers seemed to get crazy thoughts about what occurred and they gave accounts of there being something supernatural!

Weaver thought it was something to do with the scientists!

Scientists openly talked about their work researching it at the dinner table, and about mysterious occurrences in the corridors at night. They actually warned them about them, claiming that they regularly occurred in my regions of the ice station.

The way some of the soldiers there talked about it and warned them left them as unexplained deadly occurrences.

Yet the deaths there were worse and major scientists, as well as solders, had been found dead all over the ice station, but the vast majority were outside.

They gave detailed accounts of a group of scientists whose bodies were found scattered throughout a lower corridor, where nobody usually went, and now avoided after the incident.

Weaver was confused more than ever! Would the professional gunmen that attacked them carry out such an attack? Yet he had not heard anything like it! He was not sure if he believed that they had even entered the ice station! He and the others seemed to be protected from them there! Though there was a chance that they could enter by a hidden entrance! Yet they had not seen them or had one clue as to what they were like! Any manic could be given a gun and carry out what they did!

They could be trying to cover their identity, which they had done and he had proven it, and they could have panicked when they had seen their team of highly advanced soldiers coming down from the plane, and had attempted to annihilate the threat against them. But just what the hell was their motive? Maniacs never attacked military ice stations out in places like the Antarctic!

It also surprised him to hear that many of the scientists had been chased by swift-moving lights that had been seen shifting through metal walls, which they never had any knowledge of being possible.

Eventually Commander Craven took the soldiers out to get the dead soldier’s body and to check it, and prove it had not risen from death or whatever they had claimed.

It was far easier in sunlight and out of the blizzard, and they had men surround the area with guns and communicators ready to inform them of any attack, and Weaver wondered why they were not contacting the outside world of the occurrences as they had a form of communications to a satellite at least! Then he discovered that they had to put up a large antenna over the top of the ice station, which was folded away so the station remained strictly hidden away, which they only used when they gave out their communications and for extra supplies to be brought.

The soldiers eventually found the body under snow and soon realized that it had not been moved since the soldier had