Return of the Ancients by Greig Beck Read Free Book Online Page B

constantly with him now, never letting him be for a second.
    Along with the voice, there was the dull pain. His head throbbed – another sign of dehydration.
    There’s water inside you.
    ‘Huh?’
    You know what I mean.
    ‘Oh no, no, no. No way.’
    Did you know you could drink your own pee three times before it became toxic?
    ‘Urk. Now I’m really losing it.’
    Drink it – it’ll keep you alive.
    Arn laughed dismissively. ‘And do you think that would improve my chances with Becky if she ever found out?’
    I wont tell if you don’t.
    Arn ignored the voice, and looked up at the huge stone that loomed before him. He had wandered so far in his mind, he hadn’t noticed how close he was to it now.
    His dry mouth fell open. This can’t be real . . .
    It wasn’t a boulder at all. It was a skull – gigantic, and bleached by a million sunshines. Just behind it, the tops of waist-thick bones stuck out of the ground for a good forty feet before they gradually sunk below the sand. Huge ribs , Arn thought.
    He ran his hand along the skull, perhaps to see if it was real. It was warm and rough to his touch, and tilted slightly onto its side. He could see inside the mouth that it still had a few sharp teeth.
    A dinosaur? No. A whale, maybe.
    And that’ll be you soon, if you don’t find water.
    Arn remembered why he came to the skull, and climbed up onto it. Still facing into the breeze, he squinted. In the distance, something gleamed.

Chapter 6
     

That’s Not Supposed to Happen
     
     
    The room had been cleared and Harper and his senior scientist huddled around one of the screens. Takada tapped the glass with his knuckle.
    ‘I think we’ve got a topological paradox.’ He folded his arms and peered at the blurred area on the screen.
    ‘A wormhole?’ Harper whispered, and ran his hands up through his thinning hair. ‘Maybe; after all, we knew it was theoretically possible. But one that stays open – that’s not supposed to happen . . . even on paper.’
    ‘Well, the visual evidence sure points to something being there that wasn’t there before. Or rather I should say, something not being there, that was before.’
    Harper blinked a few times at the oily distortion. ‘And the boy and our diamond fell through it, or were pulled through?’
    ‘I know, I know, it’s all crazy. But it could have all been a lot worse: if the collision had generated a black hole, even a miniature one, and it failed to evaporate in nanoseconds, it could have given off enough gamma radiation to fry the planet. So we should be thankful for that at least.’
    Harper grunted. ‘So, you think it’s safe to go down there?’
    Takada shrugged. ‘None of the instruments are registering lethal gamma or X-rays anymore. The anomaly gave off just enough rads to cause the blast doors to activate, but not enough to harm anyone.’
    ‘Yet.’ Harper raised his eyebrows.
    ‘And that’s the problem, isn’t it? The non-mass is somehow causing our systems to be drained of power, and refuse their shutdown orders on the collider. We somehow opened a wormhole, and now something is causing it to be wedged open. It’s drawing ever more power, and I don’t now what’ll happen when it reaches a tipping point.’
    Harper leaned on his fists and looked hard at the screen, which had now been recalibrated to focus on the small area of blurred disturbance next to the collision point.
    ‘Give me some options, people.’
    Takeda sat forward. ‘The collider is moving at a speed that has surpassed light. That’s pretty cool.’
    Harper turned to glare at him, and he swallowed and went on.
    ‘But the fact is, the particles we have created are still accelerating. Don’t know why, but each rotation in the chamber means more power is drawn, more speed is achieved, and more fragility enters the system. So . . .’ He shrugged. ‘We need to slow them down. We need a brake.’
    Harper’s eyebrows went up.
    Takeda nodded as he spoke. ‘We need to