Books of Philosophical Science – 'I imagine therefore I am'
The Council
Chapter Thirty Two
Date: April 6, 1977
Location: Finsteraarhorn, Swiss Alps
“These are of one mind and they give their power and authority to the beast.”
John: Revelation 17.13 -New Testament
Kirstie Martin stood by the large bay window of the converted ski lodge and watched as outside the snow began to fall heavily. The five black Range Rovers parked next to the large white helicopter were slowly disappearing under a cover of white powder, while inside the remote alpine retreat, ten men and two women sat at a large oak table behind her. An open fire crackled fiercely at one end of the room and a tall white-haired man stood at the other end, chatting earnestly to a short stocky man with spectacles and the worse comb over hair style she had ever seen.
The entire wall behind the two men was made of glass, offering a spectacular view of a horizon landscaped with snow-capped mountain peaks and a vista that plunged dramatically into a valley glacier which was lined by sheer rock faces that were intermittently broken by giant crevasses engulfed in swirling shrouds of mist.
Kirstie sipped on the hot coffee she cradled between both her hands and continued to mentally sum up the small contingency that represented thirteen different countries, including her own Australia. She knew the Londoner, ‘he was a spunk,’ she thought. She also knew about four others which included the American, the Italian, and the Columbian ‘another spunk,’ and the Chinese girl, Wai. The others including the comb-over she had never seen before.
She looked outside again at the snow which seemed to be falling even harder now, ‘Fuck me,’ she thought, ‘I am going to be here forever at this rate, at least I have a couple of hunks to keep me company.’
Two years ago, she had taken a job with the Australian Governments trade development arm, Austrade, so that at the age of twenty-six, she could get out and see the world. Before that she hadn’t even been outside of her neighbourhood, let alone the country. Now, she had visited over ten different countries and had recently accepted a job offer with the very hush-hush Australian International Protocol Bureau. The secret to her success was her somewhat casual, but bubbly, demeanour. She could basically get on with anyone and that’s what protocol was all about.
Even though she was young, blonde, and attractive, with a reasonably curvaceous figure, she had never been in a serious romantic relationship. ‘Probably wouldn’t,’ she thought, ‘don’t like good boys, too boring, don’t need bad boys, too much trouble, don’t know how to look after babies, not even interested, and anyway, having different sexual partners was much more fun.’ It was her plan to continue to travel until she got sick of it and sleep with as many international hunks as reasonably possible.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” began the tall white-haired figure, in an aristocratic British accent, “welcome to Chalet Finsteraarhorn.”
He looked slowly around the room at his guest’s faces as he spoke. Kirstie made her way to her seat, as so did the comb-over.
“For most of you, it is your first time here at our research centre,” continued the grey-haired man, “so I hope you will enjoy our hospitality. For the others of you, who have been here before, welcome back and you know you will enjoy your stay.”
There were some light laughs and knowing expressions exchanged between the guests around the table.
“As well as the many pleasurable activities you can indulge yourself in during your stay, such as the massage and therapy room, and our most spectacular music and entertainment room, we also have at your disposal our research library which contains work form our scientific team documenting the last ten years of our investigations.”
When this was said, he turned, and walked to the window, where he stood looking out over the icy landscape. He did not look back at his expectant audience; silence hung like the mist on the distant hills. When he did eventually continue, there was new gravity in his words.
“The reason you were all summoned here today is serious, and urgent, so I will continue without further delay.”
He slowly turned to face them, and then, almost as if reluctant to do so, he walked back to the table, opening a large black folder that sat on the table in front of him. Kirstie could see that on its front was a crest of the United Nations and stamped across it in bold letters were the words ‘Classified’.
“Ten years ago,” he continued as he opened the folder, “I was commissioned to head a secret research team of scientists and military personnel by your respective governments. As some of you would be aware, I was put in charge because my name appeared on a three-thousand-year-old Egyptian stone tablet and, I hope, because I had the right credentials to perform what we assumed the job would be. You would also know, that over the last ten years, I, and my team, have travelled to the four corners of the globe to find out exactly what indeed it did all mean.”
He looked about the room at the faces of bureaucrats and appointed representatives and wondered to himself.
‘Do they have any concept of what I am about to tell them, or even what I am saying to them now?’
“Essentially, we have been on the trail of prophecy,” he continued, deciding to just say it how it was, “we are looking for answers so strange, I do not sometimes know how to ask the questions. Well, one year ago to this day, we were given some answers in an event that nearly wiped out our entire team.”
He paused, as if to gauge some reaction from the assembled members.
“We knew that in the pursuit of these answers, there could be problems, but we assumed that the problems would be more of a philosophical, or ethical nature, we did not expect the other element of danger that we would encounter.”
He paused, ran his right hand through his hair and put both arms outstretched, hands palm down on the table.
“Perhaps, I should first explain some more detail, other than what you already know,” he paused briefly, and then continued, “the numbers that we found laser engraved into the interior of a three-thousand-year-old stone tablet, were finally deciphered as a numeric or digital translation of geographical co-ordinates. This led us to the glacier Finsteraarhorn, which is very near to this chalet. For more than ten years, we researched and travelled, to understand the meaning of these numbers and what direction we should take next. In the mid-seventies, technology developed by an international mining consortium, allowed us to examine the glacier internally, where finally, we found what we were looking for, a large object of metal substance, one hundred metres below the surface, in three-thousand-year-old ice.”
The room began to murmur, and Nigel stopped for a while to allow the significance of what he had just said to seep through to those that understood less of the English language. Once the room had settled down, and all faces were back on him, he continued.
“My team excavated a five hundred metre shaft on a semi-incline, using tunnel boring equipment. At the same time, we assembled on the glacier, some very sophisticated apparatus to first examine the object, and then afterwards, hopefully extract it.”
“We also approached the object from directly above, drilling holes down to the object and around its circumference. Into these holes we sank heat rods down to its level with the intention of melting away the ice surrounding it. What we did not know about the object is what nearly killed us all. Basically, once the heating process was initiated around the ball, it, for some still unknown reason, responded by becoming sensitive to the increasing ambient temperature and self-destructed, taking with it, half the glacier and causing the loss of life of one of our young technicians.”
He stopped in sad reflection of the young team member that had ran off across the glacier, only to be swept away by the torrent of millions of tons of ice cascading down the mountain face.
“Fortunately, all was not lost, as we managed to salvage something from the object. Over this last month we have analysed the recovered material intensively and the results have been amazing.”
He paused intentionally teasing his eager audience.
“One of the research team members removed ten perfectly hexagonal plates from the object before it self-destructed and after extensive testing, we have found that they are in fact memory chips, not all that different from the silicon chip that operates a computer.”
Again, he paused and now he could see the look of amazement on their faces. After all, it wasn’t every day you had computer chips coming from three-thousand-year-old metallic objects buried under a glacier.
