Twin Earth

Chapter 7

Back on campus, in the much colder and wetter climate that was Swindon on a Thursday afternoon, I avoided Robert and the others and immediately made my way down to see James in the lab. I was exhausted, but the adrenalin was keeping me going.

"Pizza?" James grinned eyeing my dishevelled appearance in the doorway and throwing a cardboard pizza box at me.

"Ugh, what time is it?" I asked rubbing my face and collapsing into my old chair. I was surprised to see that my desk, in the windowless dungeon as we called it, hadn't been cleared and as if spying my surprise James remarked, "We knew you'd be back."

"Really? I think Robert had made his feelings quite clear that day."

"It wasn't your fault Tom. He had no right to blame you."

"It was my fault. I never passed on that message."

"Look, you can't keep doing this to yourself. It was just one of those things. You shouldn't have been on that night. Everyone knew how much you were going through with your divorce and Robert shouldn't have forced you to come in. He knew you'd been drinking. He probably did it deliberately."

"Still..." I paused as I relived my guilt yet again.

"We even kept your crappy plant alive," James grinned as he wheeled his office chair over to mine.

"Now I am surprised," I laughed.

"So what d'ya find? I've been analysing the data that the ESA sent over and so far I think I've found another five pieces of the asteroid still out there. None are on a collision course with Earth though. The ESA guys said the meteorite was much smaller than expected?"

"Yes. Whatever it hit must have caused it to break apart, but the shape of it is weird."

"How so?"

"Okay, think of how slate breaks apart, like in sheets that are wafer thin. Like that, but the surface is so void of any indentations or signs of impact, no markings of any kind. Rather than the anomaly smashing it to pieces, it would be more accurate to describe it as being cut or sliced like butter."

"Wow."

"I know. I mean this thing is a thick lump of iron. Imagine what kind of energy it would take to slice a perfect piece of iron into slithers."

"I also heard there was no signs of entry on the object as well?"

"Nothing. No crusting, no heating, and the crater was so shallow there was barely any rock debris and zero shock melting, even with all the sand."

"That is pretty weird," James whispered. "You brought any photos?"

"Yeah Rachel took some."

I left James looking through the photos of the object and made my way back to the door to pick up my case of samples. It was heavy, but I was determined not to disturb it as much as I could. I really hoped to see the sand acting as it had back in Morocco, but a part of me doubted it would be.

"This however, is what I am more interested in," I wheezed taking the vacuumed box over to the lab counter.

"You got some samples with you. Brilliant," James exclaimed excitedly, standing up and joining me. "I was worried you wouldn't have had time and we would have to rely on third party sampling."

"Yeah, hooray for your laser tape," I laughed. "I managed to take a couple of samples near to the front of the meteorite, where it landed. There is something I am hoping to show you."

I opened the case, and putting on gloves I carefully lifted out the two tubular lumps of meteorite I had managed to bring back with me and placed them in a tray of organic solvent, but sadly my worst fears had come true and the sand was no longer acting strangely, instead it fell perfectly normally as I disturbed the meteorite samples.