Gardens of Destruction
CHAPTER 10

Professor Bernstein sat at the desk in the command center, diligently examining the printouts spread across the surface. He looked terribly fatigued, with bags under his eyes that made him appear at least ten years older. However, his undying enthusiasm positively charged everyone around him.

“Professor, you look like a convict who hasn’t seen daylight in ten years!” The base commander joked, entering the room.

“No such danger, General,” Bernstein smiled wearily. “Everything’s under control for the moment.”

The uniformed man scanned the room for a chair, rolled the nearest one over to the scientist’s desk, then slumped onto it. The chair creaked beneath his weight.

“I hope so, Professor. I hope so indeed. How are the chemical analyses going? Have you managed to identify the composition of the sample we retrieved with the robot?” The military man looked at Bernstein sternly.

“Well… not entirely. Currently, we’re only aware of the elements used inside, but not how they’re connected to each other. From a chemistry perspective, such a composition would be extremely unstable.” Bernstein scratched his nose slightly guiltily, seemingly displeased with his response to his superior.

It was early morning, and the room was half-empty. Only the staff on duty wandered around with cups of coffee and freshly baked croissants from the kitchen. The aroma teased Patterson’s nose and stirred his stomach. The general had forbidden bringing food into the control room, but he turned a blind eye to the non-compliance. He realized the scientists spent sleepless nights here, some even lacking time for meals. They were doing a tremendous job, even if the results weren’t staggering. But the general hadn’t expected anything extraordinary. He’d worked with scientists under his command for many years, knowing there were no harder working people in the world. He’d seen them fall ill from exhaustion, separate from their families just to be the first to discover something new. He found it difficult to understand them, but that didn’t mean they didn’t have his respect.

“General, can I ask you something?” Bernstein interrupted his thoughts.

“Yes, Professor, what do you need?”

“Well… can’t we, even for a little while, get rid of these planes? I can’t concentrate. What’s with that continuous noise? It’s impossible to sleep because of them.” The professor grumbled indignantly.

The general considered that the scientist might actually be right. The Pentagon had ordered round-the-clock flights to guard the airspace around the object. And the combat planes were not at all quiet. They even annoyed him from time to time, although he’d grown accustomed to sleeping under various conditions since his youth.

“Yes, Professor – I’ll try to talk to the Pentagon to either reduce the flights or expand the perimeter at least, so the noise becomes less intrusive. But still, this is a military base, not a playground!”

“Yet some of us here continue to act like children, General,” the professor teased himself with a smile.

“I wanted to discuss something else with you,” he continued on a serious note.

“Yes, what’s bothering you now?” Bernstein sighed, taking off his glasses and rubbing his eyes with his fingers, creating concentric circles.

“A hundred miles long object sitting out there… that’s bothering me most, but the other thing is you - you’re tired, you need more sleep to be remain focused!” The general scolded him.

“I’ll manage. Everyone says I resemble a bear, I hope I’m just as strong and enduring. After all, I’m quite hairy!” He chuckled and winked at his superior.

“Professor…” the military man continued with a serious tone.

“Tell me honestly, professor. I’ve been going through the printouts, and I’ve noticed that the object’s temperature is increasing by several degrees every day. What does that mean according to you?” The general nervously clasped his hands together.

The scientist put his glasses back on and looked the military straight in the eyes.

“The truth is, this time, I have absolutely no idea. We can’t possibly get an explanation for an alien technology in such a short time,” he shrugged.

“Nevertheless, any assumptions? Even brief ones? Something that sounds plausible?” The uniformed man asked hopefully.

The professor fell silent for a moment, gazing at the tips of his shoes.

“General, I believe I know precisely what you’re about to ask,” he raised his disheveled head.

“I know you’re more than anything else eager to know if there’s life inside that aircraft, whether its behavior results from internal commands or if it’s an automated station sent to explore space?!”

“Well, I...”

“Don’t answer, there’s no need to justify yourself. Do you think I don’t want the same thing as you, General? As a scientist, I’m burning inside, barely sleeping, just to gather more and more information. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime chance for something so grand to happen in your time, and yet... Even so, don’t rush. That’s my advice. Better to have as much information as possible before we have to face them... if they even have faces.”

The professor had grown heated, causing him to feel warm enough to remove his white lab coat.

“So,” he continued, “Yes, my answer is that I believe there is life on that ship. It’s not just an autonomous research station, and we’re getting closer to the moment when we’ll face something unimaginable.”

The general shivered at the professor’s impassioned speech. He felt torn. On one hand, he shared some degree of the scientist’s euphoria; who wouldn’t want to be among the first to encounter extraterrestrial intelligence? On the other hand, the instincts and training of a military man didn’t let him rest. His entire life had been confronted with some enemy or the other. It was getting difficult for him to trust people, and now they wanted him to believe in... aliens. Even now, it was hard for him to utter that word, despite knowing it. His whole life, he had been accustomed to laughing at lunatics who saw aliens everywhere and at conspiracies claiming the government kept everything secret. Yet here they were now, a reality. They came... and the government indeed kept everything secret, for now.

“General, you seem deeply lost in thought?” the professor interrupted. “I’m sorry; I didn’t mean to stress you out. I understand the burdens on your shoulders. It’s not an easy task to organize this entire operation, and I assume there are higher-ups pressing you for answers.”

“No problem, Bernstein, everything’s fine. You know I value your opinion, even if sometimes you delve more deeply than necessary. Get on with your work and try to rest a little more,” the general replied, seemingly ending the conversation as he left the command center. However, he didn’t know how soon he’d return.

Several hours later, Bernstein was still at the computer, dozing off slightly. The professor stood up and went to look out the window. No camera could capture the grandeur of the view. Every morning, he made it a habit to watch the sunrise and the colossus standing in the path of its rays. The sight was breathtaking. In those moments, Bernstein felt a rare sense of happiness in an otherwise dull life.

But it was short-lived. The thermal scanner went berserk; its alarm would have woken even the calmest person out of their wits. The temperature was rising not by minutes, but by seconds, and the electromagnetic field sensor was also displaying strange readings.

“Immediately inform General Patterson!” the professor shouted with his deep voice. “Wake... everyone, actually. Something’s happening.”

“Yes, Sir!” a frightened young guard from the security team responded promptly.

Within moments, the general stormed into the room. Soon, almost everyone had gathered in the control room, looking at each other nervously, while some scientists frantically pressed buttons on their computers.

“What the devil is happening, professor?” the uniformed officer demanded sharply.

“I have no idea. We’ll find out soon, Sir!” Bernstein responded, having regained his composure after the initial panic.

At that moment, everyone felt a slight tremor that didn’t last long. Everyone seemed to be on edge.

“Just hope it doesn’t fall on us!” someone’s frightened voice echoed in the room.

“Enough nonsense, nothing’s going to fall!” Professor Bernstein yelled.

It was as if to defy his words that another tremor was felt, this time even lighter. Despite the fear, no one took their eyes off the colossal object standing in the distance. None of the scientists doubted that the tremors were caused by the behemoth before them.

After some time, things seemed to settle. The ground-shaking had ceased, leaving only a faint rumble. The professor had already taken a seat in an armchair, lost in thought. The rest continued to gaze through the panoramic windows of the command center.

“Professor,” General Patterson approached him, “I suppose once again you have no explanation...”

At that moment, a strange noise began. The military man’s question was interrupted by a sound resembling the breaking of dry twigs in the woods, only amplified many times over. Everyone fell silent, listening intently and searching for the source of the noise.

“It’s coming from IT, General!” the professor broke the silence.

“What do you think that is?” the chief raised his eyebrows, gesturing questioningly with his hands.

“We’ll find out very soon. Something interesting is happening there.”

“Look, look!” one of the scientists in the room exclaimed.

Everyone turned in the direction of the call. A person in the room pointed to something on the monitor in front of them.

“Look what appeared on the surface!” they exclaimed, pointing at something on the screen.

Everyone hurried closer, but it was unnecessary; the image was already displayed on the video wall. Now everyone could see the cause of the strange noise.

“Zoom in on the image,” ordered the general.

The screen showed the object slowly breaking apart, and pieces of various sizes were hurtling toward the ground. The fractures started from the top and moved downward, following a relatively straight line, with slight meandering. It resembled a child’s drawing with an unsteady hand on a blank sheet of paper. However, in this case, there was no paper, just an enormous one hundred-kilometer column embedded in the earth.

The professor grabbed the nearest piece of paper and began sketching the trajectory of the fractures with a pencil. Some of the cracks progressed slower than others. The speed wasn’t consistent, but it remained constant. Soon, nothing but a bunch of lines, descending from top to bottom, remained on the professor’s paper.

“Hmm, they don’t intersect, see?” he showed the paper to his colleagues.

“Yes, indeed,” agreed the others in the team.

“Any theories?” General Patterson asked, sighing heavily, realizing that perhaps there was no point in asking; hardly anyone in the world had an idea of what was happening.

“Obviously, this is a controlled process,” said Dr. Chu. “As a geologist, I can tell you that such precise fracturing is not observed in nature. Besides, look at their number. It’s not just one or two; they’re dozens, as if someone sliced the skin of a cucumber with a kitchen tool.”

Some chuckled at the joke, while others didn’t react.

“I think they just opened the gates...” Bernstein murmured softly.

The general looked at the stressed scientist, as if someone had hit him hard on the head with something heavy.

“Send the robot again!” General Patterson ordered, observing the professor’s concerned expression. “We need to examine closely what’s happening.”

“Furthermore,” he continued, “I’m declaring a Level One alert. All units are to be in full combat readiness, and I want the planes in the air immediately.”

The general’s firm tone stressed everyone in the center. For a moment, silence fell, and all eyes turned to the uniformed man. Professor Bernstein approached him, wearing a quizzical expression.

“What’s all this about? What do you plan to do?” he asked in a hushed tone.

“Nothing... for now, Professor. I just want to be prepared if something happens,” the general replied.

“And what do you imagine will happen?” the scientist continued, looking intently and sternly at the general.

“Look, Bernstein, don’t take this personally. It has nothing to do with you,” the general tried to soften his tone.

“Just assess the situation. Since we’ve concluded that what’s in front of us is of extraterrestrial origin, I think it’s prudent to be overly cautious,” the general added.

“Perhaps a bit more courteous? And what are you being cautious about, General?” the scientist looked at him ironically.

“Professor, trust is hard to earn, you know. And in the current situation, it’s far better to be extremely cautious.”

This time, the professor didn’t respond. He slowly turned towards the monitor, while General Patterson continued to watch him, expecting an outburst. But it didn’t happen. It seemed the scientist had come to terms with the situation, but then he turned around and muttered something barely audible.

“They won’t come out, General. I think we need to go to them.”

Patterson sighed; he knew sooner or later this would have to happen. Someone had to go there, to that damned thing, and find out what it was.

“If we have to go, Bernstein, it’ll be on my orders! Only I will decide when to send people there, understood?”

The chief exited the control room and vanished down the corridors. The scientists slowly dispersed to their workstations, and the professor pondered how much longer they’d have to wait for the meeting of the two civilizations to materialize.

The research robot approached the object at its usual pace. Meanwhile, the air filled with military vehicles — helicopters flew low, and fighters were dispatched higher up. Internally, Bernstein resented such an obvious display of hostility. He had no idea if they were being observed or not. He simply detested violence in principle and couldn’t fathom that anyone, even an extraterrestrial, would travel god-knows-how-many light-years to wage war. But explaining this to the military was difficult.

The robot confidently neared the object. Over the past few days, together with the engineers, they had managed to program a special movement mode for the research device after analyzing its initial passage through the barrier. The tests were successful, and it had gone there and back several times without issue. Through this mode, scientists could easily navigate it through the protective layer of the artificial asteroid. They hoped there wouldn’t be any issues this time. No one knew if the fracturing had somehow affected the object’s shield.

“Here we are, approaching. It’s time to switch to the mode, and call the general; he wouldn’t want to miss the show.”

The last part was unnecessary; it was as if Patterson had been standing outside the door, so accurately did he calculate the robot’s arrival. He entered and, without a trace of their previous argument, teased the professor.

“Did you forget something, Bernstein?” he smiled.

“Pardon?” the scientist replied, looking bewildered.

“I believe you forgot something important the robot should carry.”

“General, everything is checked...” the astrophysicist began to justify.

“I know, relax. But still, you forgot to include a box of candies, didn’t you? You said we should be polite!” the general grinned broadly.

The room chuckled, someone joining in on the jest.

“And a bottle of whiskey wouldn’t hurt after the long journey!” someone shouted, and the room erupted once more.

The professor, with a smile playing on his lips, shook his head, wondering whether to laugh with his growling voice or risk startling his colleagues.

“Come on, let’s focus on the video wall now,” the general interjected, dampening their enthusiasm for jokes.

The robot was just passing through the invisible barrier. So far, so good. Operators directed it toward one of the fractures. The gap appeared imposing; the camera tried to follow it upwards, but it seemed endless. It was wide enough to fit a bus through it, although the research robot was more modestly sized. The shell itself seemed to be at least a meter thick, and its interior appeared empty.

“Stop in front of the opening without entering,” ordered the general.

The device stood at the edge, its lights shining into the object’s interior.

“I can’t see anything!” muttered the professor. “The hole is so vast inside that the light can’t reach the end, and the sun is too bright. We need to go in; otherwise, there’s no way to understand more, General.”

“I don’t think we should take such a risk just yet. Can’t we wait a little longer?” their cautious chief suggested.

“Enough waiting! We know nothing about the object as it is. Now we have the chance; who knows if the fissures will be there tomorrow! Let’s take a look!” the professor spoke with a child-like tone, as if pleading with his mother for an ice cream.

General Patterson didn’t ponder for long. He decided that at least no human lives were at risk; after all, the robot, valuable as it was, remained a machine.

“Alright, let’s do it,” he quietly ordered.

“Thank you, General,” the scientist said, looking at the chief with slightly moistened eyes, a gesture of gratitude in his eyes.

“Let’s go in there, my boy!” he said to the operator, a satisfied smile on his face. ”Nice and friendly!”

The engineer slowly guided the robotic explorer toward the object’s interior. Everyone in the room held their breath, and no one dared even to scratch an itch to avoid disrupting the sacred moment. Only the hum of computer fans echoed, indifferent to the significance of the moment.

Despite entering inside, the flashlights failed to illuminate anything; it felt as if they were in a giant cave. Sweat trickled down the young engineer’s face, leading the robot with trembling hands further inward. Suddenly, something flashed in one of the directions they turned.

“Stop, turn back that way again!” the professor jumped from his seat, waving his arms.

The flashlight and camera focused on something in the distance. They directed the robot towards it. What flashed on the screens from afar looked like a crystalline structure. It slightly resembled a gem crafted by a jeweler.

“Zoom in the camera to the maximum!” the professor ordered excitedly.

And then it happened, something no one expected or wanted. Suddenly, the screen violently shook and went blank; all indicators disappeared. The robot was like dead. Despite engineers’ attempts, they couldn’t re-establish connection.

“Nice and friendly, huh?” the general looked at the scientist with worrying eyes.

***

Light! Warmth! The journey had ended. The garden found its ground. It would flourish! The joy of awakening new life filled their entire essence. A moment of joy and pleasure. Perhaps now? Or not? They needed to rise, but why did they need to? They couldn’t remember anymore. But they knew they would.

They understood, heard, realized. They weren’t alone. And they shouldn’t be. Is loneliness an unpleasant feeling, though? They didn’t know, but they understood—there were Others. It’s interesting when there are Others! They began to feel excited, or did they?

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