“Denser material from the bombardment, such as iron from the meteors, sank to the center, while lighter elements such as silicates and oxygen compounds and water rose to the surface. This was the beginning of the formation of Earth as we know it now.”
Dane felt a pang of loss and realized Ahana’s lecture on the formation of the planet was something that Ariana Michelet would have done. Ariana had been a geologist and her expertise on tectonic plates had set the framework for whatever it was Ahana had come up with.
The Japanese scientist continued. “As you can see from the diagram, the interior of the Earth is divided into four major layers. The inner core, outer core, mantle and crust. These have many subdivisions in them, but for our purposes those four will do for now. As we travel from the outside in, we come across a strange phenomenon.” Ahana paused in thought, then resumed. “Let me back up a little bit. It is important that you understand something and that is that most of what I am talking about concerning the interior of the planet has been determined indirectly. After all, the deepest any shaft has even been drilled is barely a scratch on the surface.
“Geologists use recordings of seismic waves from earthquakes to try to determine what the interior of the Earth consists of. There are two different types of seismic waves. P waves and S waves. P waves will travel through both fluids and solids. S waves, on the other hand, cannot travel through water.”
“What was noted was that as one got further away from the epicenter of an earthquake, there was a drastic change in readings of these waves at a certain distance, at an angle of approximately one hundred and five degrees between the earthquake and seismograph. At this angle S waves disappeared, while P waves eventually made their way around the surface. What this meant was that the direct S waves must have hit liquid and been stopped. Thus, extending this angle through the planet—” on the screen a line appeared—“one has to deduce that there is a molten layer of material inside the planet and beneath the mantle. This is the outer core.”
“On top of this, the fact that the planet has a magnetic field also indicates there is a molten layer inside that is in flux. The Moon and Mars have no magnetic field because both are cold planets and solid inside. And the Earth cannot be magnetic in stasis because magnetic minerals lose their magnetism once they are heated above five hundred degrees Celsius. The only way to explain the Earth’s magnetic field is if there is a circulating electric current inside of the planet. Thus convection of molten iron in the Earth’s outer core must be the source for our planet’s magnetic field.” Ahana’s voice sharpened. “Please keep this associated electric field in mind as I continue.”
“Few people know that the magnetic field to which our compasses point is not a constant. Indeed, it is strongly believed that it has switched directions many times over the course of time.
As recently as twenty thousand years ago compasses probably would have pointed to the South Pole rather than North. Think of the immense changes in power given off by such a planet-wide switch.”
“The convection in the outer core affects the mantle, which in turn affects the crust and causes the movement of the crustal or tectonic plates. You all remember learning about Pangea and how the seven continents started out as one and how they rest on plates that have been moving for a very long time. The Earth’s crust is only a thin skin that constitutes less than point two percent of the planet’s mass. And there is a difference between the crust underneath the continents and that under the ocean. The crust under land averages about five times more thickness than that beneath the ocean.”
“Except—” the word hung in the air for several seconds—“at Nazca. The crust is less than two kilometers in thickness at that point and below it there appears to be lines of conductivity that lead deep into the Earth.”
“That is Doctor Reizer’s suspicion,” Dane said.
Reizer leaned forward and spoke at the computer screen. “How have you confirmed this?”
Ahana was in her lecture mode, which Dane had seen before. “Geologists can use P and S wave scans of the planet to map it much like a CAT scan of the brain does a similar thing. The boundary between the crust and the mantle is called the Mohorovicic Discontinuity or Moho for short. At Nazca, the Moho has a hole in it and extending down from that hole is a channel that leads to the molten outer core.”
“How come no one has noticed this before?” Dane asked.
“It has been noticed,” Ahana said. “No one thought it was important before.”
“I’m confused,” Dane said. “If the crust is so thin and there is a channel to the outer core, wouldn’t that be like a perfect set-up for a volcano?”
Ahana nodded. “Yes. Exactly. Except there aren’t any.”
“Why not?” Dane asked.
“I am not certain,” Ahana said. “Looking at the data from satellite over flights and various imaging, it appears as if the crust at Nazca is thin but very dense, almost like a cap placed on top of this channel. I do have a theory on how this cap was formed, but please wait while I explain something else.”
“Moving to the center of the planet, beneath the molten outer core, we come to the inner core. The inner core has a radius of only thirty-five hundred kilometers, but it contains a good percentage of the planet’s mass given its small size. And unlike the outer core, the inner is solid.”
That didn’t make sense to Dane. “Shouldn’t it be even hotter at the inner core?”
“Yes, and it is,” Ahana said. “The temperature of the inner core is estimated to be around four thousand degrees Celsius.”
“Then shouldn’t the rock be melted?” Dane pressed.
“It should be except for the fact that it is under such extreme pressure that the rock remains solid.”
Something was bothering Dane, something Ariana had said. “What kind of rock is there in the inner core?”
“Good question,” Ahana said. “That is exactly what I have been researching. Because while it appears that the lines of power are flowing along the lines of convection and plate boundaries, we have discovered that the strongest line, the most powerful thread of power, so to speak, is going into the inner core of the planet itself.”
“It has been speculated, based on the available data, that the core consists of iron, but I think that is only an outer surface. I believe that the densest and hardest material on Earth has been collected at the very center of the planet under extreme temperature and pressure.”
“Diamonds,” Dane said.
Ahana nodded. “Yes. Diamonds are a mineral form of carbon and the hardest material known to man, rating a ten on the Mohs hardness scale. There are four known types of diamonds: a diamond proper, bort, ballas and carbanado. A diamond proper is one that is a crystallized gemstone. Bort is an imperfectly crystallized diamond that is dark in color. Ballas is a cluster of tiny diamond crystals of great hardness. Carbanado, which some call a black diamond, has no cleavage, which means it can’t split along a definite plane. What if there were a fifth form of diamond, one that humans have never seen?”
“I think there is a crystalline object at the center of the Earth. A diamond or cluster of diamonds on an unimaginable scale. And crystallized in a structure we have never seen or even postulated.”
Dane was beginning to see a connection: the crystal skulls that were used to channel power from the pyramids to stop the gates. Did the pyramids draw power from deep inside the Earth? But how could living tissue turn into crystal, he wondered?