Morningstar/Alignment by Keith Trimm (people reading books txt) 📕

All were silent for a moment.

"Yes but now it is possible to save them," Tony said. "We have discovered a recording device which explained how this happened, the event can now be prevented it from occurring again."

"I think your theory is flawed." Alex Parsons said.

"If it is Alex, we have four years to think of another." Brinkman said. "Let me show you what we found that day. It is in the morgue."

The group climbed into a military transport vehicle and drove across the camp to the metal shed, which housed the many boxes of remains found at the site. An armed guard stood at the door and several personnel were shuttling boxes into the building non-stop. Brinkman showed his identification to the guard and the group entered the building. Large shelving units held the boxes into well-organized groups and each was labeled with a date and approximate location of excavation.

Brinkman walked along the rows of boxes looking for the ones dated to the first day. He asked a clerk to assist him in finding the correct container and was led to a box with red writing and a label printed on it. It was marked because of a special artifact found with the remains. The clerk unlocked the lid of the box and opened it exposing the contents inside. The group huddled around peering inside looking for whatever Brinkman had been referring to back at the office. Carefully Brinkman reached into the box and started placing the remains of one of the crash victims on the counter top in a random fashion. After a few moments he produced the artifact in question and set is aside the pile of remains.

"Oh my God!" Tony said in amazement. Upon the table set polished chrome humorous bone with a snake of wires protruding from several locations along its length. The wires connected to several unidentified objects resembling sensors. Engraved on the shaft of the artificial bone read the date September 28, 2008 and the name Tony Rhine underneath. Tony looked in shock as he viewed his own remains laid out on the table. He now realized how this went down and understood that he had volunteered for a suicide mission knowing he would discover the device at the wreck site and somehow learn what had happened. It was a strange sensation coming to know he had been here before and this was the second time he had been through the timeline. He did not know for sure this was the second time through; it could very well have been the 3000th time for all he knew. He might be caught up in a continuous time loop forever reliving these events over and over again.

Tony reached out and picked up the skull and held it in his hands. He was horrified peering into its hollow eyes and thinking one day this would be all that’s left of him. "How did it feel to die" he wondered? "How could he and this pile of bones occupy the same space in the same time?" Everything he knew about physics was wrong.

"Did you see this?" Sonja asked. Pointing to the back of the skull.

"What the hell!" Tony said as he turned it around. "What could have done this?" he asked examining an indentation and crack at the rear of the skull. "Something bashed in the back of my head and left a huge fracture."

Alex peered over his shoulder and took a look. "Looks like you went fast. Probably dead before the plane hit the water." He said with a grin.

"I can see that Doctor, I was just wondering out loud what could have done this to me," Tony said in a sarcastic tone.

"There are also burn marks there, see them," Sonja said pointing at the same area.

"Maybe the plane caught fire," Alex Parsons said. "Happens all the time. A fuel tank explodes and the whole thing gets ripped into a million pieces."

"That’s true," Tony said. "But this plane is intact."

"Mostly intact," Brinkman said. "A large section of the rear of the plane is missing."

"Missing?" Tony asked.

"We think the plane may have had to make a forced controlled landing. We know the area was covered by a sea, but a plane with its fuel capacity could have flown five hundred miles in search of land."

Robert Brinkman placed the metallic humorous bone and sensors into a box heading off for the lab. Tony, lost in a trance, stood staring at his bones piled up in a mix match of different parts, some missing some broken. He had to tear himself away and follow the rest of the group to the research vehicle. At the last moment he grabbed a bone from the table and placed it in his pocket. A good luck charm.

His mind raced as he made his way out of the building and into the transport vehicle. As it sped across the complex he thought about what he would have done if he knew he would find himself at a later time. He knew he would have to use today’s technology and make it as obvious as possible. They had stumbled upon this on purpose and he was hoping to keep right on stumbling. He thought it would be difficult to make a record of anything because over time it would deteriorate into an undistinguishable decayed mess.

The only object that stood the test of time that he knew of was bone, but that was if it had the opportunity to fossilize, and he knew the conditions were too poor for this to happen. The stainless surgical steel would not rust having the best chance of protecting anything electronic inside.

He knew this was some sort of recording device surgically implanted into his body just prior to boarding the plane. There were no places to attach the tendons to the device so he could imagine his arm was useless after the surgery. Most likely it had to be put into a sling or it would have dangled limply at his side looking unnatural. It would have been easy to get past the metal detectors and onto the plane, he would just have had to explain he was injured and had pins put in his arm to help the bone heal correct.

The sensors must have been hooked up to his optical nerve or light pin receivers were inserted into his retina to record the actual light entering the eye. The resolution would be poor due to the low number of sensors that could be safely implanted. Maybe ten by ten making it one hundred pixels per square inch. Poor even by today’s standards. The unit’s size told him that the recording time must have been very limited due to the ability of the memory circuits to hold much information. No more than an hour of streaming video or one thousand stills collected. The image timer must have either been preset, or he was able to record using a remote radio device that started at a push of a button. Audio sensors could have been placed anywhere with small microphones just breaking through the skin.

They reached the lab and everyone gathered around the recording device.

"Look for a portal," Tony said.

"How would you know…?" Sonja said.

"I would have planned it that way," Tony said. "With a simple hookup to a computer of today’s speed."

Brinkman flipped it around till he found an indentation in the shape of a square with the word "Port" engraved on it. He grabbed a pair of needle nose pliers and peeled off the tab exposing a standard telephone jack.

"A modem connection," Alex said. "Clever, I’m surprised the sensor wires did not double as an output."

"I’m sure they did." Tony added.

"We have known for a long time what this was," Brinkman said to the group. "We have interfaced with the recording device through the sensor wires finding we were unable to tap into the memory chip without a password."

"Password?" Alex asked.

"Most likely put there so we would not access the information without the good doctor present," Brinkman said. "I can image that you made that a condition before you made the trip on the plane in the first place."

"How did I ever get involved in this in the first place?" Tony asked.

"The time line has already shifted we think. Whatever events occurred prior to this that led you on this path have disappeared. It is now a moot point."

Tony looked down at the mess of wires and stainless steel.

"What is the password Tony?" Brinkman asked. "You have the key to unlock the whole thing. That is why you were brought here."

"How about Alex? Why is he here?" Tony asked.

"Dr. Parsons," Brinkman said addressing Alex.

"Yes?"

"We have a box in the morgue with your name on it also."

Chapter 5

July 2, 1969

Viola Mae Johnson’s home was clutter of photographs, trinkets and various other odd decorative items. They were her memories of a lifetime swept up into boxes and disposed of into the back of an awaiting van. The pile grew, as her possessions were tosses aside, broken and discarded like common trash.

It was well past midnight and the house was a buzz with a diverse crew of workers emptying the house as fast as they were able. The lights were on and sounds reverberated from the house but no one was listening. Not really. The neighbors knew what was going on. Many were participating in the work. It was a cleaning, the duty of the members to eradicate any sign of their presence to the outside world.

The majority of the town’s folk were members, but not all. Some long-standing residents of the town were unaware of the membership, unaware of the underlying motives of the people in the community. It was a secret society of like-minded people with a common understanding; God and religion that made up the membership. The membership of the church.

This neighborhood was all church. All except for Viola Mae Johnson who moved here in 1942 with her husband Richard and son Dennis. The cleaning crew was a committee referred to as the "Sword", who’s sole purpose is to erase any signs of the church.

This was a job they had not done often, only a dozen or so times since the church was founded in Denton Kansas in 1932. The church, a secret society for the preservation of Lucifer, depended on anonymity to insure its survival. A good one fourth of the town was not church, but a strict code of silence and secrecy insured the church would not be discovered.

New members were carefully cultivated and absorbed through a process of teachings. The teachings were harmlessly spread through the missionary work of young members, deceiving the public, disguised as Christian missionaries. Potential new members were interviewed, questioned and then evaluated to see if they would be good candidates for membership. Those who showed an interest were asked to pray, and join the church, slowly being introduced to the true purpose and nature of the church. No one quit. No one had to.

The official name of the church was "The Children of the Morning Star." Morning Star, being the true interpretation of the name of Lucifer, the beautiful light bearing angel whom was cast from heaven. The church resembled any other church in town. They had a large Gothic style building in the center of town topped off with a cross and many stained glass windows portraying scenes from the bible. To all that passed by it was a Christian church, no different than any other church they would see in any town.

The only difference being the building was a front only used to deceive the rest of the town. Cars lined the streets near the church every Sunday, but no service was held inside. Services were held in a special place out in the country under the stars. Every Saturday evening, the church members would gather at the church building and park their cars along the streets. The members would then car pool together leaving as many empty