SUNGLASESS AND ROCKETS Part 2: The Machine

JUNK GRAVEYARD

Driven on by a mix of curiosity and panic I leaned over the front line to observe the radar screen as my friend did.

Shoot! It looked like a real sea of motionless discs!

"Should we wait for backup?" the pilot asked.

The doctor shook his head in negation.

"We can't wait."

"Those are UFOs," Darwin assured. "Those are friggin' UFOs".

The doctor abstained himself from denying it. The definition of the discs in the radar screen was clear.

"Do we have the reflectors on?" he asked the pilot.

"Yes, all of them," was the answer.

In a matter of seconds we would cross the mysterious sea of floating discs.

"Turn them off," the doctor said. "I don't want any extra light..."

Everyone stared at the panoramic front window.

We waited.

"They're space ships," Darwin announced, surprised. "Flying saucers..."

Through the window you could really see space ships in the shape of discs.

We passed over hundreds of them. They gave the impression of being damaged. The powerful solar light reflected dents in their worn out and dusty fuselage. Even twisted rubbish from a curious dark material was floating.

Lucas avoided them skillfully. There wasn't any sign of movement or activity. You could say that it was a floating cemetery of extraterrestrial space ships.

A junkyard in interstellar space.

"What's a junkyard doing in outer space in the entrance of the LHC enclave?" the pilot said breaking the silence.

"I haven't the slightest idea", the doctor said and got back on the intercom. "Major: there are unidentified objects 1500 feet from the LHC enclave..." he stopped and looked out his window. "The moon is losing mass by an accelerated rate in this region...the gravitational field is reducing." He pointed to the window, "look."

The land showing between the ships appeared filled with perfectly round holes. They weren't craters, they were holes. Holes lined by gigantic failures...

"The ships were buried," I reported.

"The gravity force of the moon can no longer keep them attached to the ground," added Darwin, from the other window. "What we saw on the simulation it's happening."

"I'm not so sure of that," the doctor objected.

"What do you mean?" I cut in. "We still have time to deactivate the machine, don't we?"

The doctor didn't stop scrutinizing the view.

"The loss of mass is happening too fast."

We exchanged an alert look with Darwin.

"More than in the simulation?" my friend questioned.

The doctor didn't hesitate in giving his verdict: "Much more...at least some..."

"There aren't any entrances in sight..." the pilot interrupted. "Do you know any?"

I looked out the window again.

We finished crossing the thick layer of junk, which by the way, didn't impress me any more and it probably didn't the rest of the passengers. The anxiety of arriving to the site of the SVM had soon taken away the charm of the junk from other worlds.

The important thing, indeed, was to find the entrance of the enclave, but between the debris that we still needed to avoid, only an area crowded with hundreds of holes and defects appeared.

"Can you try an entrance through a crack?" the doctor inquired, "I am afraid the reaction will start any moment."