Alex slightly shook his head in disbelief. Simon picked up on that, "Fenske was whining about some spike in the energy output of the electromagnetic spectrum, and Sarah immediately assumed you were responsible. I'm almost ready to bring equipment in if you can hold off touching stuff for a minute."

Alex only put his hands up and backed further away from the console in response.

Simon brought in the first yellow halogen lamp that was attached to a tripod stand and trailing a power cable behind. Simon quickly set the stand down, pointed the lamp down slightly, and then raised the stand so the lamp was pointing directly at the console before turning it on. The light brought much needed relief from the gloominess of the interior for about two seconds before the room became brighter. The sudden increase in light level startled both Alex and Simon, who both looked up and noticed that the ceiling was now emitting a soft white light.

"Now you do it?" grumbled Simon.

"Turn off the light and see what happens." suggested Alex.

Simon complied, turning off the lamp. The ceiling continued to glow.

"Fascinating, I wonder…" trailed off Alex. He left the Obelisk and walked over to Fenske's table, peered over his shoulder at the energy output graph on the screen.

"The UV energy output has almost become negligible." uttered a surprised Fenske, echoing Alex's thoughts.

"Can you punch up past readings and compare to current readings?" asked Alex.

"Of course, how far back do you want?"

"Five minutes should do."

A second graph popped up on the screen next to the first one, showing at first glance a virtually identical wave. Alex observed it closely, letting loose a small hum of intrigue at what he was seeing.

"What's up?" It was Sarah's voice from behind him. Alex studied the side-by-side graphs for a few seconds more, double checking his observations before turning around to talk to Sarah.

"It would appear that this artifact might be a little more user friendly than I anticipated."

"How so?"

"Well," began Alex, "we don't have to worry about UV exposure anymore. The frequency of the energy output has shifted downward from the UV range to the visible light spectrum. Apparently when Simon turned on the lamp inside, The Obelisk analyzed the light it emitted and adjusted its own emissions accordingly to be compatible with our own visual range. It would seem that the builders of this artifact anticipated that it would outlast their own existence and made it adaptable for any future species to use, whoever they may be."

Simon, who had joined them and stood just behind Sarah's left shoulder nodded; seemingly understanding what Alex just said. Sarah, on the other hand, looked a little uncertain and appeared like she was going to say something, but Fenske spoke up instead.

"How do we know that the whole purpose of this thing is to get us to turn it on and destroy ourselves?"

Now it was Alex turn to look uncertain as he pondered the question. How can he be certain it isn't a doomsday device? However, much to Alex's surprise, Sarah spoke up.

"I can assure you, it isn't."

Alex looked at her quizzically. "How can you be so certain?"

"Well I'm not quite ready to say, other than the rubbings I did on the wall managed to bring out some hidden detail. I still want to study it a bit more, but I will fill you all in when we debrief tonight. Now the question I have is: Can you get The Obelisk working?"

"Uh…" Alex's confidence failed him. He had no idea on how to even begin figuring out the purpose of The Obelisk, let alone getting it operational. An analogy sprung into his mind, he was like an ancient human suddenly confronted with a modern automobile. All he has been able to do so far was open the door and cause the interior light to come on, he isn't anywhere close to identifying the ignition or it's value…

Simon broke the suddenly uncomfortable silence, "Is there some accelerated timeline to make this operational that we need to know about?"

Sarah appeared taken aback by the question, "Um, no. We can take as long as we need to. All our contracts run for a month with options to renew on a monthly basis. If we get to the point that we can't move any further with our studies, then we take all the information we've gathered and publish our findings with what we got."

"Well then, I would suggest we use trial and error."

"I don't think that's…" Alex tried to interject.

Simon wouldn't be deterred, "Look, this thing is obviously a machine of some sort. Alien esthetics aside, it still has to function in a logical manner within the parameters of universal laws of physics. Like all machines it operates with three things: control, power, action. It clearly has power, we've found the control, all we have to do now is systematically work out it's function to establish action."

Alex wasn't convinced, "I think that would be a very dangerous course of action. We're children who may have found a box of matches. That situation never ends well."

Simon shook his head, "Relax. You said yourself that this is user friendly. This is a very advanced piece of technology. I have no doubt that the builders of this thing installed multiple foolproof safe guards to prevent any potentially harmful action to occur."

Alex sighed heavily, "The problem with foolproof is that the universe has a habit of creating better fools that find new ways around it." Alex then turned, "Sarah, I recommend that we wait until Professor Swallow has had a chance to examine the artifact, and then proceed with caution."

Sarah looked back and forth between Alex and Simon appearing to carefully weigh the two viewpoints. After some long seconds of consideration she finally spoke, "I will still contact Professor Swallow, but it will take at minimum three days to get him here, probably longer. In the meantime I see no reason not to proceed with David's plan. Either we advance or we get stuck at another roadblock. I don't believe the artifact was designed to be a weapon or is inherently dangerous. David, you take lead, Alex you observe, okay?"

Simon nodded and headed back towards the Obelisk, but Alex had one last question for Sarah, "Is there something you're not telling us? You seem to know more about the Obelisk than anybody."

"As I said earlier, I rather not say. I still need to confirm what I found, and the last thing I want to do is lead you down a potential blind alley. I prefer you look at this with fresh eyes and fresh perspective."

"Okay." Alex wasn't satisfied, but he felt he had no choice. He's known her long enough to trust her, but couldn't help but feel that her judgment was impaired in this case either due to fatigue, or perhaps some other issues. As he walked back into the Obelisk, he couldn't help but feel a growing disquiet over what they were about to do.