Ascendant Saga Collection: Sci-Fi Fantasy Techno Thriller Brandon Ellis (ebook reader for comics txt) 📖

question. He gazed up at Shaughnessy, and was glad to see his new lab partner was curious rather than skeptical. “I know a bit of it. It’s part of my job. I can’t research if I don’t understand the language I’m researching.”

Shaughnessy motioned to the screen. “What does it say?”

Jaxx perused the symbols and glyphs, and whispered the translations to himself. When done, he held his hands out, then shrugged. “I have no idea what they’re trying to spell out. Kuruka mwezi?”

“What’s that mean?”

“Moon fly or fly moon?”

“An insect?”

“No. Fly, the verb. As in flying somewhere.”

“Like, in a plane or a spaceship?”

“Yeah,” Jaxx said under his breath as he examined the words more closely. “Roketi? Rocket. That’s strange. Unless...”

He scrolled down to a glyph that resembled a jet fighter. “It’s showing Atlantean technology.”

“What does it say?”

Jaxx put his hand up. “Hold on.” He read more. “Kipengele? Element.” He scrolled down. “They have hundreds of atomic elements etched here.” Jaxx took a deep breath, then exhaled loudly. “No, that can’t be it.”

“What can’t be it?”

“Nothing.” He gave a dismissive hand. “Just ignore me. This is how I work.”

“Got it, boss. But, those aren’t neutral atoms that we’re looking at. You can see eight protons are in the middle, seven electrons around it on that one. The next one has seven protons, eight electrons. It’s ions to be more accurate and—”

“And, with the group of atomic elements here, we have polyatomic ions.” Jaxx had yet another I want to scream my excitement to the entire world moment, but managed to contain himself.

“Yes.”

“Why didn’t you see this before?”

Shaughnessy shrugged. “I hadn’t scrolled down that far. I was still trying to figure out the first several symbols.”

“With all of these Sumerian symbols mixed with Atlantean symbols, it’s getting a little confusing. Can we lose the Atlantean?”

“Sure, why?”

“They are just repeating words. My Sumerian is better than my Atlantean.” He blushed. How appalling to have to admit that his area of specialization was lacking. “I’ve had more practice with Sumerian. It’s a more recent language—if you can call Sumerian recent. In any case, the Atlantean symbol is saying what the Sumerian symbol is.”

Shaughnessy pressed a couple of keys on the keyboard, then double clicked the mouse. The Atlantean symbols disappeared and the Sumerian symbols moved side by side.

Jaxx bit his fingernail, examining the glyphs. He grabbed a pen and paper and started drawing ion after ion. “All of these are adding and removing, but in a specific sequence. Add, remove, add, remove.” He stood, eyes wide. “Nah, can’t be.”

“It can be. It is,” said Shaughnessy.

“You see it too?”

“It’s advanced plasma propulsion. It’s an ion propulsion formula that creates an electric charge. It’s so simple.”

“The symbol for ‘Sumaku’ is underneath it,” Jaxx replied. “It’s calling for magnets to be added.”

“Well, yeah. That’s how NASA propels its probes, by using extra-strength magnets to prevent the electrons from reaching the discharge channel walls. You don’t want an ionizing event in space.”

“This is how the Atlanteans flew to Callisto.”

“What?”

“Look at all the atomic elements even lower on the screen. It’s like an instruction manual.”

“Holy shit, Jaxx.”

“See those symbols?” Jaxx pointed to symbols at the end of what seemed to be a couple hundred atomic elements. “It says Siku kumi Kuruka mwezi, essentially meaning to fly to the moon in ten days. It’s a blueprint for advanced ion-propulsion systems. It’s either meant for the Atlanteans’ own scientists or they had hoped a future society would come across their structures long after their culture had vanished. It also bolsters my theory that the Atlanteans had a presence in Eastern Africa. They don’t call it the Cradle of Civilization for nothing.”

“Are you saying they flew from Mozambique to Callisto in ten days?”

“Well,” Jaxx nodded, shook his head, then nodded again. “I can’t say where they set off from, but yes, they were highly advanced and if I can convince Slade—”

“If you can get Slade to get this to tech,” Shaughnessy interrupted. “Then you’ve just advanced us by hundreds of years.”

Jaxx grinned. How freaking awesome would it be if he’d been right all along?

4 May 24thUnderfoot Black, Grenada

“We did what you asked and sent the information to tech,” Slade said, lips down turned.

Jaxx, standing near Shaughnessy’s computer station, rubbed his hands together. “What other structures are you hiding from me? I can decode whatever you need.” In a way, Jaxx was in archaeological Disneyland. If he could just tell the other scientists to leave so he could pore over these images, symbols, and structures on his own, then he’d practically orgasm. His eyes were among the first to see what had taken place on a moon millions, if not billions, of miles away. It would tell him a story, a way of life on that moon, and how the Atlanteans terraformed the moon to make it a liveable, breathable object in the solar system.

“You’re not seeing any more images until we deem your translations of the atomic elements correct,” Slade said.

“What do I do then? Go back to my room?”

Slade walked toward the door. “You’re coming with me. We’re going to hypnotherapy.”

Jaxx gave a double take. “What?”

“We have found that when a scientist has a discovery, and if we take them to a hypnotherapy session, we uncover information the subconscious mind hasn’t brought forth to the conscious mind yet. In other words, there are things that you may have seen and overlooked. We aren’t in the mood to have scientists sleep on things in order for the memory of another great discovery within the greater discovery to come to the surface. That can take days to weeks. We don’t have that much time.”

Time for what? Jaxx lifted his gaze. “Am I going to hypnotherapy now?”

“Yes, we’re late. I’ll be watching your session, so feel honored.”

A few days ago, Jaxx had been content doing field research. Well, not really. Content wasn’t the correct word, but he had liked it better than what he was going through at the moment. He