Chapter 14 of From Space: Secrets of The Unknown Shard. Sorry for the long wait, and I hope you readers enjoy the new chapter.
PVZ does not belong to me.
An armored leg breached the surface of the water, and the rest of the leg followed with a fully armored pink and black citron. It was Pulse, who was tired and worn down, pulled herself up from the water hole with her armor in every part of her body drenched. Pulse shook her body a little bit as water cascaded onto the metal floor. She took a deep breath and sighed tiredly, then yawned right after.
"What a day… but at least I got a lot of valuable data after… sightseeing. Hmm, just how long have I been up?" Pulse pulled up her clock cycle from her visor. She became shocked when she saw she had been up for an unhealthy amount of time, more than what she should have been. She wasn't feeling that tired, but better to rest than fall flat and sleep on the floor. Since she arrived on the planet, she has been doing nothing but being active, and she definitely needed to sleep. Once she does she'll review and organize everything.
So Pulse went to get her suit disinfected and dried. Who knows what kinds of harmful germs and bacteria this planet has, and who even knows what it could do to her? She needed to be careful, but she was confident that she was fine, her suit was fully intact and there was no hole or break in it, her suit would have alarmed her if she did. She entered the disinfection chamber, in which it locked all entrances, and the room began to fill with a lime green gaseous substance that began to cling to her body. The more gas that came, the more of the substance stuck to her, in which lime green bubbles grew and multiplied on her surface. The bubbles continued to grow, covering her entire body in the end, she couldn't even see through her visor.
During the process, Pulse opened her compartments which held the samples of the things she collected during her trip out. Every piece from the specimens she collected was safely tucked into and preserved in vials, disks and petri dishes. From the wall, several compartments opened up due to a command from her suit. Out of them, out came mechanical claws that picked up every item she had, the samples she collected, even her tools and took them inside the wall, closing up after they entered fully. Her suit was now empty of everything she had, but she wasn't worried about it, she knew they are now safely preserved. Pulse stayed still for another minute for the chemical bubbles to finish the job and clean every part of her suit, the empty inner compartments and all. Once done the chamber showered Pulse with hot water, which began to wash away the bubbles and collect in drains.
She was officially cleansed, and she was now free to do as she pleased. A door opened up for her automatically on the wall, and Pulse left the disinfection chamber
Pulse immediately headed to take off her suit and store it away for another time, but she needed to make sure that it wasn't too damaged or anything. The suit really went through a lot today.
It didn't take her long before she was back in her favorite signature indoor clothes. She waddled towards the deck of her spaceship with a tired smile. She could feel her eyes trying to shut against her will, but she didn't have time for that at the moment. Another door opened and she was greeted with the sight of the ship's front seat and the many computer screens. She looked around taking in the sight, happy with being embraced with the familiar setting. She took a few seconds to soak up in the safety of the room before sitting down at her seat, enjoying the comfort of its soft and slightly bouncy material mended into it.
"I'm finally back, safe and sound on my ship. Now, I need to store all this information, and hopefully it won't take long. First day out on this planet and already I got into a life threatening situation…" She sighed, and quickly focused on her task.
Pulse doesn't intend to organize them now, even though she would love to get over with. She was too tired from today, and she really would like to sleep it off to have more energy for the next trek into the world. Besides, her tiresome eyes and body won't stay awake long enough to properly and actively organize all the information and material she has gathered. She prefers to rest and have full energy for the work that she will put into it than drag her tired arm around as she typed.
Pulse dug into a pocket and took out a small, square computer chip. She looked at it very carefully, checking for possible damage even though it isn't likely, as it was expertly made to be durable and for any information it held to remain undamaged and secure as much as possible. She carefully inserted the small green and blue chip afterwards into the terminal. The computer began filling up with and storing the information as it did. There was quite a lot of it. The computer downloaded photos, videos, and a tiny few personal notes Pulse made, mostly about the names of the many creatures she documented. Pulse watched it for a while, waiting for it to finish uploading. The computer finally pinged, signifying the completion of the upload. Pulse leaned forward and quickly skimmed through the information gathered. She sighed in content and closed the file after saving it.
"There, now I can go take a nice, peaceful rest, nothing more. I shouldn't sleep too much because there is still so much to see on this planet. Next time, I need to do better, to not find myself in situations like those again…" Pulse left the room, heading for her sleeping quarters. A stair and two halls later, she quickly found herself in the comforts of her resting quarters.
Pulse headed towards the wall, which opened up to what looked like a closet, which contained various soft clothing especially built to fit her for sleeping. They looked like her normal suit, except made of a softer material and had different patterns of shapes than of her own suit. Basically, alien pajamas.
"Which one should I wear?..." Pulse mused to herself. She glanced at the various ones in store. Some bore simple shapes, and some were made with plain colors to identify them, a few others had the pattern of cartoonish animals not native to this world at all. Pulse looked at them all for another second before she picked a blue one with darker blue squares of different sizes.
"I guess this one shall suffice." One short changing sequence later, Pulse was all suited up in fluffy and soft blue pajamas with squares decorated on it. She sighed in content at the comfortable confines of it. The manufacturers of these pajamas truly excelled at their job, as the longer she stood in them, the more she wanted to just sleep right then and there.
Pulse left the closet and made her way around with a smile at her sleeping quarters. It was very similar to the rest of the ship's colors and pattern wise, but with a few personal additions, mostly a few small belongings that she really wanted to take with her. Nothing too important, but it still had value to her. Pulse went straight to her bed, a circular lump of soft material that was supported with some metal beams under it, suspending it from the ground a little but low enough for her to get on without trouble. Pulse fluffed her bed just a bit before she laid down.
She closed her eyes, thus she was sent to the world of dreams.
…
The short grass crunched under the weight of Agent Citron heading back towards the portal to his ship. Agent Rose and Agent Corn went their separate ways after the three went through nonstop investigation of the devastated area. He counted they have been there for hours and they eventually felt it was time to head home, kernel Corn to his barn and Rose to her castle. It only left Citron to his floating orange future fortress. Each of them had various theories as to what happened, and they voiced them to each other, but couldn't come to a logical answer. From the unknown individual to the battered field in the forest. He and Rose attempted various techniques in analyzing the broken field. They found several things.
There were zombies and plants present there. Several sunflower petals and green plant blood was found. They also found zombie blood, while similar to humans, the main difference was that the zombie blood has a rotten smell and taste instead of one like iron. They also found shrapnel of a ZPG rocket, shreds of clothing which clearly belonged to zombies, a piece of a foot soldier helmet, a piece of metal that belonged to a weapon, as well as small pieces of Zombie flesh. The most intriguing thing they found were two things. A large organic piece of metal that belongs to a metal petal, but it's far too big and thick to belong to a normal one. Whatever Metal Petal this belonged to, it was massive, perhaps Sunflower Queen big. Agent Citron supposed that explains some giant tracks found, which only a Sunflower Queen could have made. The other is that a strange piece of unknown metal was also found, but it wasn't related to the Metal Petal one, not even a little, nor was something a zombie would have. It was composed of an unknown alloy that he had never seen before. The specimen was only three milliliters in diameter, but it provided the information needed to form an investigation.
Agent Citron wasn't exactly sure just what they should do at this moment, especially since they still have the war with the zombie forces to worry about. The pieces of plant matter he found was just another long list of reasons, particularly to Kernel, to fight the zombies besides their pollution of the Earth, hunting and harvesting humans and brains, and their expansion for dominance of Earth and beyond. They have begun to take residence on the moon afterall, and with the giant moon magnet incident, Zomboss doesn't waste time to attack them with his new toys. While the magnet was taken care of there were still many other threats by Zomboss, and he will find new ways to get rid of the plant species and humans, mostly the ability to fight him.
That will be left for another time, right now there was another matter of concern, what went down in that field. Unfortunately there wasn't enough information to hold a firm conclusion, so the three needed more. They were able to tape up the place and have some plants, and even human detectives contacted to take a look at the scene. The plant agents weren't police officers or detectives but they still had authority and had extensive resources and connections to LEAF and the plant agents themselves.
As mentioned, Agent Citron was on his way to his ship, leaving the scene to be investigated by them. It was long past noon, with plants going to and from their duties, but he paid them no heed, he had other matters he wanted to take care of. The most interesting pieces of the scene were the mililiter sized unknown metal shard and the Metal Petal metal piece. He already gave them to the investigators to use but he already scanned the pieces, so he already had a basis to use for his own investigation.
Agent Citron made it to his home. The portal in the LEAF base took him straight to his floating orange ship. He immediately walked towards the large mother computer, a large futuristic and very intelligent piece of technology that rivaled most modern inventions. After all, it came from the future.
Agent Citron implemented the information from his high tech orange suit, which the giant computer downloaded it all quickly. Agent Citron watched, and once the information was all taken in he got to work.
He looked at the composition of the Metal Petal specimen. It was very similar to the ordinary Metal Petal, but that was just it, it was 'similar', but Citron found more within the DNA sequences, for there were DNA sequences of Plasma Pea, meaning this sunflower was a hybrid. Not surprising, since plants procreating with other species of plants was fairly common. However, Citron didn't find this as important, the only use for this information is to find and identify who this plant is, if they were still anywhere in the Backyard or lived close enough.
There apparently weren't any mutations, radiation, or any unnatural element discovered in its structure. Perhaps this plant was just born giant that way, but he will need to see the flower to really believe it. There has never been any other flower grow that large but the Mystic Flowers into Sunflower Queens and the new hybrid Hypno Flower, even though there aren't average sized Hypno Flowers, yet. Crazy Dave is not your average human after all.
Now Agent Citron took a look at the other specimen. This one wasn't related to the metal petal piece at all. It was composed of some average metals, mixed in with some that he can't seem to identify or find a basis to. He attempted several times to find a match for the strange object, but couldn't even find anything recorded that matched it. Agent Citron was stumped.
He then rechecked the information again. He actually checked several times and he finally noticed something. One of the elements in the alloy became known only when the Alien Flowers came to Earth on their ships and showed it to him, in which they harbored these same elements in their ship's structure. This element was also not found anywhere on Earth, naturally.
"Then this has to be of alien origin." Agent Citron rubbed his chin in though. Maybe he could talk with some Alien Flowers and plasma peas about it, maybe they can help identify for him just what element is in the alloy. While the Plasma Peas didn't bring any new elements, they are still quite knowledgeable. They also came from space, and if the Alien Flowers don't have an answer for these unidentified elements then he will need to ask the Plasma Peas. If none of them don't have an answer, then he will have to find another way.
Agent Citron checked one more time before calling it quits. He wasn't giving up, he just needed a break. Agent Citron sighed and moved away from the computer, rubbing one of his eyes. Before he goes to visit some of the extraterrestrials he knows, he should inform Rose and Kernel first so that they are aware of this.
The bounty hunter moved the data into another tab and opened another one. He opened the communications software, and began calling the two simultaneously in a shared video chat. It didn't take long for the two to pick up.
The faces of the two agents materialized on Citron's computer, in which the two agents looked upon their respective screens. Agent Rose used her crystal ball for communication. That thing has so many uses for something so simple and apparently compatible with some types of technology. Kernel used a normal PC at his barn for his communication. One can wonder where he gets the electricity when he lives in a giant barn in the middle of a giant cornfield. Perhaps it was Crazy Dave's doing.
"Agent Citron, what brings you to call Agent Rose and I?" asked Kernel.
"I have found something of interest for you both. It's a 'keep this in mind' kind of thing."
Rose looked intrigued. "What sort of thing?"
Agent Citron began. "Well, remember when we were at that battered field, and found that small piece of pink painted metal shard? Apparently it is a complex alloy composed of various metals, and a few of those metals can not be found naturally anywhere, on Earth especially."
Rose's eyes widened and Kernel raised an eyebrow.
"There is no record of this anywhere, nothing matches it. Nothing does. And one of the elements that makes up part of it was only discovered recently, told to us when the Alien Flowers settled in." Agent Citron smiled.
"Then could this be of alien origin? Could it be from some material the Alien Flowers made, or the Plasma Peas?" Kernel questioned.
"I'm thinking of meeting up with some Alien Flower and Plasma Pea scientists to help me with this."
"What if they can't identify it? There is a chance that it isn't a part of their craft, " said Agent Rose.
"Then we have to find another way."
Kernel nodded. "Do you know who of these Alien Flowers and Plasma Peas you will meet with?"
"Yes!" Agent Citron sent a small file to the two agents. The file contained various names of some very brilliant alien plant scientists who now live in Earth. Agent Rose and Kernel looked it over for at most two minutes.
"I recognize some of these plants." Kernel traced a few names in the file.
Agent Rose squinted into her crystal ball. "Me too. I think we met them before?"
"Yeah we have," answered Citron. "When we first arrived for the second garden warfare, some of these plants were there to greet us."
Kernel hummed in thought. "Alright then. When you are finished discussing this with them, contact us again for the results," Kernel said. Citron nodded. Rose agreed with a nod as well before the two plants ceased communication.
…
Agent Citron, no longer in his ship, was rolling down a slightly narrow dirt road from a different part of the Backyard Battleground. The road wasn't too far from the main area, and just about anyone could find their way to it. However, the road stretched into different paths, and one held the destination Agent Citron desired. Up ahead, there was a giant building approaching his line of sight. A tall building with a round top overlooked and inhabited the area on a cliff. The cliff was steep, but the building was safely stapled into the ground firmly. It would take something extreme for the building to be displaced and fall down the side of the cliff, but there wasn't anything of danger to it, and the zombies don't seem interested in it since there has never been anything of interest for them. The building had an opening at the top, which allowed a ginormous telescope to face up towards the void of space. An observatory. This observatory was now being inhabited by some Alien Flower and Plasma Pea scientists, loving the place for its space and purpose. Even though the building has been there before even the first Garden Warfare, it's as if it was built just for them.
Agent Citron continued to roll until he faced the steel door of the observatory directly. "I hope that they are awake…" Citron gave it two knocks. He waited, looking around at the sky and the forest, making sure he wasn't followed by zombies. Many zombies would love to have the opportunity to attack him after all. The future orange heard some shuffling on the other side which sounded like papers and leaves.
Some clicks and sounds of metal sliding, and the door slowly opened. Agent Citron was greeted with the face of a sunflower, unlike most variants, this was an Alien Flower. With wide alien-like eyes and an anatomy unlike Earth Sunflowers or even any earth plant, the only semblance was the shape. The Alien Flower starred with their giant eyes before speaking, which Agent Citron found the littlest bit unsettling.
"Agent Citron! It's a surprise to see you! What brings you to the lovely observatory?" The Alien Flower chirped excitedly, her voice dripped with a sort of strange, buzz-like echo to it. Agent Citron smiled back.
"Hey Ms. Bottle. I'm here because I need your help."
"Hmm? What kind of help?" The flower tilted her head in intriguement. The last time the agents needed her and her companions were years ago.
"I need you and your pals to identify something for me."
"Ooh?" The Alien Flower cooed. "Come inside then, better to explain it to the others than to repeat it again for them." Bottle stepped aside to allow the agent entry, and closed the door once Agent Citron was inside.
The inside of the observatory was an impressive sight. Before their current occupants, the observatory was only riddled with basic equipment and with a rather small number of people that used the place, who have now moved on to other things. Now however, with the addition of alien technology and things that they brought, it's as lively as a beehive.
Bottle, which of all things translated into that word for the Alien Flower's Earth name, showed him to the living room area where it used to be a large storage area. It still has that use, as there are some boxes and crates where some Alien Flowers and Plasma Peas were sitting and chilling.
Bottle cleared her throat loudly, catching the attention of every plant in the room. Many stopped their activities, whether hanging out or actually doing something. Regardless, they gave her their undivided attention.
"Hey everyone, we got a visitor, Agent Citron of LEAF." Bottle motioned for the plant next to her. "And he has something he wants to tell us." She stepped aside a little while she looked at him, the spotlight was now on him.
"Alright, everyone. I will cut to the chase. I'm here because I have a sample of an unknown metallic alloy that was found, I have tried to uncover what it could be with no clear success, Rose, Kernel and I couldn't make a valid conclusion and I would like your help and input to identify it."
The alien plants talked among themselves for a bit, and they happily agreed. Their assistance was needed for something not even the agents could uncover? This served as a challenge for them. They led him down towards a laboratory right behind another door filled with many devices and tools, some brought from their own planets, ranging from medical to scientific, even weaponry. The alien plants scattered to different parts of the lab, and Agent Citron was led to a corner which had some kind of large machine.
Agent Citron marbled at the tech. He has seen this tech before in other locations, but never seeing it in action. Bottle turned to him. "Alright, care to show us what you have?" She asked.
Agent Citron took out the shard, which was inside a plastic casing, and handed it to her. She looked at it for a moment, then went over towards a very delicate scanner. Bottle placed the casing under the scanner on a suspended metal platform. Some robotic arms swept over to open the casing carefully, and take out the metal shard with careful precision, and took the casing and placed it elsewhere on a table next to it, and gently placed the shard on the platform. Another Alien Flower activated the machine in another from a terminal. The scanner was brought to life, with the lights of the violet, blue, white, and green color flickered in the keyboards and on the scanner. A thin strip of light washed over the shard. The machine picked up data of its composition and its molecular structure.
Agent Citron watched the scanner for a few seconds before turning towards the screen next to it, with various Plasma Peas occupying screen showed some data in their alien language in which Agent Citron only understood the basics, same with Agent Rose and Agent Kernel, but thankfully Alien Flowers were fast learners and the three weren't responsible for teaching them some Earth languages due to not being in the First Garden Warfare. What matters is that they had communications going between them.
The scanners finally finished the procedure, which took almost two minutes. Some Alien Flowers and other Plasma Peas stood to look at the screen near the plants, typing away, murmuring things in their language. They were all absorbing the data like heavily dry sponges, eager for the juicy information of what this will reveal. Bottle was also watching the screen, making a small "hmm" while having a petal hand to her chin.
"So?...anything on it?" Citron turned to Bottle.
Bottle continued to look at the screen for another second, then turned to the orange. "Well... we only identified some of its components. Some of the atomic elements shown are present in our technology, primarily on our ships. However, one of these atomic elements, we have never seen before. The alloy formations that this sample is made of.. we have never seen this. That's basically what we have for you. These are alloy formations and an atomic element we have never seen before, not even present in our ways for manufacturing ships or technology." Bottle frowned.
Agent Citron's mouth was agape. A new element? And one not currently present in the periodic table? Just what could this be? Where did it come from? He had so, so many questions right now.
"I can guarantee that these can not be found, nor originated from Earth. Also, the structure has clear evidence that it was manipulated, its formations not natural like say rocks from a meteor. They are far too defined, the metal clearly forged from intelligent hands, or petals." Bottle turned back to Agent Citron. "If this type of metal was present on Earth, then our scanners would have found something by now."
Agent Citron was still baffled, but deduced that the alien plants couldn't help with anything else. He may need to find someone else, but he couldn't think of anyone else. However, this definitely confirmed that whatever this belonged to, it was alien, and one that he is not familiar with.
"It's quite an interesting material, very durable, perfect for ship building and for construction of large buildings. Stronger than a large list of metal alloys commonly used on both Earth and by my people. Perhaps it is comparable to titanium in toughness and usability in weapon's technology since it's better than stainless steel and typically better used for city construction than ships…" Bottle seemed to have been lost in a scientific rant
He sighed. "Well, thank you for your assistance, even if there wasn't much to know."
Bottle stopped her talking and just smiled. "Don't worry about it, the fact that this isn't present in our own systems, we doubted we would find anything of significance about it. Still, this is an amazing thing to learn. If you give us permission, we would like to study this further." She gave him back the shard, which was now inside the protective plastic casing. Agent Citron took and stored it safely inside his armor.
"I wouldn't mind, however this is the only sample of this metal that I have. Perhaps if I find more of this, or to whom this belongs to, I'll get you one."
Bottle nodded and escorted Agent Citron out towards the door. While they didn't find anything useful, the aliens now had the data about it and can gather anything new on their own time, if they find any. And they were quite ecstatic about him coming, now they have something interesting to do since they haven't done anything that they considered significant for quite awhile since the first Garden Warfare.
Bottle waved goodbye to Agent Citron before closing the observatory door behind him. Agent Citron soon walked off, he looked back to the door one more time before fully resuming towards his ship. The sun's position was different now, for not a lot of time had passed when he was in the observatory. The road he walked through was mostly quiet, the occasional chirp of a bird or the buzz of a bug would spring up, but it didn't deter Agent Citron from his thoughts of the probability of the origins of the metal.
The metal must have come from somewhere, no matter how much he told himself this could be from some plant or zombie on Earth, there was a significantly higher chance of it being alien, and not even from the alien plants themselves. It definitely wasn't Earth related if it couldn't be found anywhere at all, even when using a planet scanner, so maybe it fell from space. Whether natural or not, he needed to find out. First however, he needed to inform his fellow agents as to what the alien plants had found for him, or how little they found at least.
Agent Citron finally arrived back to his ship without trouble. He immediately called the other two agents once he settled. The two faces of Kernel Corn and Rose showed up on his screen.
"Citron, you've returned. How did it go?" Rose asked expectantly.
Agent Citron began. "Well, in summary, I gave them the shard and they scanned it. Turns out it is a metallic alloy they don't recognize, and said metal contained an atomic element they don't recognize as well. In short, a never seen before type of metal with lots of durability and strength, and an atomic element not present in our periodic table." Citron finished.
Kernel Corn cleared his throat. "Then, whatever it belonged to, it isn't from Earth? Something that is neither Alien Flower or Plasma Pea in origin?"
"Most likely," Citron responded. "I also doubt that the zombies would have produced something like this if it didn't exist on Earth, or the moon." The moon was already scanned once, and has the similar results as Earth when it came to what it was composed of.
"And Citron." It was Rose. She looked him in the eye, then asked, "is it possible that this shard didn't come from a natural occurrence, such as a meteor?"
Agent Citron looked at her with a straight face. Agent Corn remained silent. The question sunk into the minds of the three. If this shard wasn't of a natural occurrence, not of Earth, or moon origin, or from the crafts of Zomboss, nor from a plant, then they are very likely dealing with another first contact scenario, like with the Alien Flowers and Plasma Peas.
"Definitely not," He answered. "The shard is metal, an alloy, it has no ounce of rock or evidence that it was heated recently, It is too refined and too clean, this was artificially made. It is very likely it didn't come from a natural occurrence."
"We may be dealing with another first contact scenario then," Rose said. Her eyes slightly widened at this realization. Kernel's eyes were hardened, more than he usually is.
"Many things, bad included, can happen if this is confirmed."
Citron nodded, agreeing with the Kernel Corn. "I prefer not to imagine what Zomboss will do with this information."
Zomboss and his minions have not only stolen crucial information, resources, and technology from the plant armada, the L.E.A.F agency, and Crazy Dave himself, but also from the Alien Flowers and Plasma Peas. New technology and resources in his stinky, cold and grubby hands would only mean new toys for him to make, new ways to try and kill them off, as well as try to expand his tyrannical influence. The second Garden Warfare caused a great expansion of the undead, Zomboss going in a rush to claim and conquer as much of the world as possible. The conquest of Suburbia a prime example, as well as the construction of his moon base during that time of strife. The agents of LEAF have also found evidence of Alien Flower tech being used on some of his spaceships. So, an unknown alien or aliens with unknown and advanced tech means that Zomboss will want to hunt them down and claim all they have that benefits him.
"Well, we should keep a lookout in case we meet strange visitors then," kernel said. His mind went back when they encountered that citron while they were out of their base. Maybe they had something to do with this since he has never seen that kind of armor before, but for all he knows it could just be some iron citron wearing some custom armor or something. Plants, zombies, and humans have a tendency to wear the strangest random things they get their hands, vines or petals on. That pink and black Iron Citron is in fact one of the more normal looking ones he has seen. However it is always worth voicing something that is, and could be of concern.
"Remember the citron we encountered while we were at the town hall?" Kernel asked. Agent Citron and Agent Rose turned to him.
"The one with the pink and black armor?" Rose asked. "Perhaps you insist they may have connections with today's events?"
"That, and also about the alien thing. They wore armor that was black and pink, and that shard is also black, with some pink color still on it. This shard could have been chipped during some struggle. And since it was found in the field with the Metal Petal shard and the zombie materials, then maybe they fought, and had their armor chipped in the fight."
Agent Rose and Citron had some surprised looks, Citron more than Rose. How did he not think of that, along with the fact he was the one trying to figure out this shard! Citron just sighed, orange peel leg to his face.
"They have gone elsewhere, and it is unlikely they will show up again, for at least a while, if they haven't been scared away by us." Rose fiddled with her wand for a bit.
"We will have to keep a lookout for them if they return. We may not have solid evidence but that Iron Citron is most likely the one that metal belongs to. All of this can not be a coincidence." Kernel Corn was about to conclude this video call before Citron stopped him.
"Actually, I have a plan. I will use the planet scanner to try and find any large enough source of this metal, and if there is someone that this belongs to, then we can try to meet them. If the source of this shard is in fact an alien being, which all our evidence points to, then they must have arrived on a ship. Their ship will most likely be made from the same stuff, or of similar stuff to the metal shard. I will send a message, even if there is the chance that they won't understand what is written, which is likely, then I will attach a visual of the coordinates with it, " Agent Citron smiled as he explained.
Agent Rose approved."That sounds like a good idea. Maybe it will be revealed where they are or where other pockets of this metal are located in case it isn't from an alien, or the zombies. This alloy is most curious in its structure, and could be of great benefit for us in our war."
Kernel also nodded, approving of this plan.
Citron grinned. "All right then. I will message you two the results once it's done."
Both agent Rose and Agent Kernel ceased communication, leaving Citron just staring at a black screen. Citron then looked into his computer, reaching into a section only for him to use. This section was so private, he installed a code and a password, which would allow him access to the planet scanner, a large satellite that was located in space.
Agent Citron wrote the secret password to allow him access; #StegosRbestDinos4Ever
He was in. Now that he was connected, he went to work. The scanner was currently facing away from Earth and to the moon due to the zombies base located there, so he indicated it to rotate to face Earth once again. Once done he activated its primary purpose, to scan planets and any celestial body for all kinds of things. The high tech device needed to charge up on energy, solar energy actually, since having a scanning radius enough to screen a planet took a high toll of energy.
Agent Citron waited. The satellite was now scanning the Earth. It would take a while, at least an hour, for it to finish. Citron decided to go get some snacks in the meantime. He came back with some chips and juice, and he decided to go check the data on some new recruits who completed his missions to earn their LEAF badge for today. Only one actually failed their mission, so he will need to go talk to them later after this.
At last, the scanner finished its duty. Agent Citron leaned forward, moving his shades above his eyes.
Apparently, there was a pocket of it on Earth. Agent Citron gaped. So there was more of this on Earth? Agent Citron used the satellite to zoom into the spot, but a few things about it didn't make sense, actually everything about it didn't make sense. The source looked to be perfectly spherical, unlike a meteor which would have been irregular and lumpy, so perhaps it wasn't of natural origin after all. Another weird thing about it is… that it wasn't touching any ground or anything. It was actually just floating on the water, not even close to the sea floor, and rather close to the surface. It shouldn't be floating that way, it couldn't. Agent Citron was ninety-five percent convinced that it was actually not of a natural occurrence.
If this is what he thinks it is, then they are truly upon another first contact situation once again.
The bounty hunter was walking back and forth behind his seat. If this is indeed a first contact situation then they need to take precautions, they could be hostile, or maybe a scout ship, or something else, and for whatever reason it was here. Even if they aren't a threat he should be careful. He decided to message Rose and Kernel, for he was sure they were tired of video chats. He sent the two the same message, and he also messaged what he was going to do. He was going to send a message to the vessel. The occupant or occupants may not understand what is being said if they aren't from Earth, but it's a start. If it was the low, low chance that it wasn't a vessel, then he guessed that he just attempted to send a message to some inanimate object rather than an actual spaceship, and even if it wasn't a spaceship but something or someone from Earth, it was worth a try. This will have to do as a start to get some communication going in order to figure out what this was, one way or another.
…
Meanwhile, inside a spherical ship, the extraterrestrial occupant was still in rest. Despite the time that has passed, she continued to frolic in her own dreamworld. She was at peace, without worries, for now at least. The ship was quiet, and peaceful with the quiet snores of its occupant and the gentle whirrs of air conditioning in her room.
In the cockpit of her ship, the computer activated on its own. The alien keyboard flickered with various different colors for a few moments, and the lights disappeared with the computer remaining open. A pending message ready to be accepted, and since there wasn't anything in its code that could have malware, the computer didn't automatically delete it or block it. The message was of alien origin, and in a language that Pulse wouldn't understand. The file contained a message for the occupant, along with a visual location:
For whom may receive this message, I am Agent Citron of LEAF, bounty hunter from the Far Future and a native to planet Earth. I have sent this message to your location in hopes to reach out towards a meet up. I am not a threat, and I have no ill intentions or harbor hostility towards you. Agent Kernel, Agent Rose and I seek peaceful negotiations. If there is a chance that this message is understandable, then I would like for us to meet at the following coordinates written here. If you're available to meet and if this message wasn't understood, then use the following coordinates and images below-
United States, The Wild West, 9:00 P.M.
The message displayed a visual representation of the meeting place. There was a green and blue map of the world, with a red square over the meeting place, and it included an animated display of the sun to show the specific time of day over that location. The message however, was left undiscovered. Pulse was oblivious to any of this, still curled up and snoring in the soft comforts of her circular bed. Agent Citron not aware of the receiver being asleep.
The message remained there unaccepted, unread, and it was likely that it won't be read for a while.
This is the end of the chapter.
I finally got a chapter out, now I can work on the next one.
Also, apparently Garden Warfare 3 is on development! I wonder what new things it will include. Maybe a mushroom class? I hope there is one!
Words: 7k+
Chapter published: 6/22/2019