‘Why not? People claim they visit us now, why should they not have come thousands of years ago?’ Baranelli could see the disbelief in the eyes of both Adams and Lynn, and although he did not necessarily subscribe to the theory himself, he also knew it could not be discounted out of hand. ‘Some people,’ he carried on, ‘see information contained in religious texts as direct evidence of alien visitation.’
‘Go on,’ Adams said, unsure but curious now.
‘Has it never occurred to you that most religions have very similar stories in their writings? Ancient Sumer, the Egyptians, Romans, Greeks, the Old and New Testaments — all are almost identical, once you get right down to it. And where did culture — science, mathematics, agriculture, writing — originate?’
‘Ancient Sumer,’ Lynn answered.
Baranelli clicked his fingers. ‘Exactly!’ he said. ‘So after millions of years of slow, painful evolution, we have a sudden spurt of development. In the blink of an eye — in evolutionary terms — we were irrigating the land, building temples, making complicated mathematical calculations, reading and writing. So what went on in ancient Sumer?
‘Some people claim that it was here that alien visitors first came to us, providing us with the seeds of our modern civilization. In turn, we ascribed supernatural significance to them, and organized religion was born. Thus, “gods” coming down from heaven in fiery chariots are not dreams, visions, or metaphors, this is what really happened, aliens coming to earth in their spaceships. But how else could ancient man explain it? And so religion began in Sumer, and then spread across the region, first to Egypt, and then on to Israel, finally spanning the globe and including India, Rome and Greece in its thrall. Everywhere it went, it was modified by the indigenous people there but it was essentially the same as the factual reports of alien landings and alien technology that was experienced first-hand by the Sumerians.’
‘So God was an astronaut?’ Adams asked, still unconvinced.
‘Who knows? It is a theory, yes? A story. And no more or no less convincing than any other, in my opinion.’
‘Well, Fabricio,’ Lynn said, ‘we have a little anomly of our own.’
‘Forty thousand years old?’ Baranelli asked excitedly.
‘Well, that’s how it appeared. Obviously, most of the evidence has now been destroyed.’
‘When did civilization appear in Sumer?’ Adams asked Baranelli.
‘About 3800BC,’ the professor answered immediately. ‘Nearly six thousand years ago, give or take.’
‘So do you have any theories about an advanced people that may have existed forty thousand years ago?’ Adams persisted.
‘Perhaps the cycle that we saw begin in Sumer was not the first time such a thing happened,’ Baranelli said, unsure.
‘What do you mean?’ Lynn asked.
‘I mean if extraterrestrial beings could have come to the earth and provided man with civilization in 3800BC, they — maybe the same beings, maybe another group from another region of the universe entirely — could have come here forty, fifty, a hundred thousand years ago, even. We cannot rule it out. Or else mankind evolved such technology on its own during that period, without any external help.’
‘And then?’ Adams asked.
‘And was then destroyed, like Atlantis, some global catastrophe that completely wiped out mankind. Perhaps some pockets survived, but due to conditions on the planet had to revert to nature, as it were, becoming more primitive in order to survive.’
‘Like Atlantis?’ Adams asked. ‘Are you saying that Atlantis existed?’
‘No,’ Baranelli said slowly, choosing his words carefully. ‘What I am saying is that almost every modern-day culture has some form of Atlantean, pre-historic advanced-culture myth. Is it just a coincidence, or do these myths have a basis in truth? The body Lynn found would certainly seem to indicate that this is the case, no?’ Baranelli asked, his eyebrows raised. ‘And then you have to consider the universality of the ancient flood myths. In our Christian culture, we know predominantly about Noah and the Flood, but this, too, can be traced back to its origins in ancient Sumerian folklore. Indeed, many respected scientists believe the world did experience such catastrophic flooding, in the period between 12,000 and 10,000BC.
‘But this is just an example, to show that it could well be true. Other calamities could have befallen ancient man — meteor strike, volcanic eruptions, the list goes on. The bottom line is, it is certainly possible that an advanced civilization, perhaps even more advanced than our own, once walked the earth, and was subsequently all but wiped out. You have not analysed the DNA yet?’ he asked suddenly.
‘No, not yet. We’re hoping to do that back in the US, if we can get there.’
Baranelli nodded his head, deep in thought. ‘So the body might not even be Homo sapiens,’ he said. ‘Perhaps it is some other branch of the genus Homo, which for some reason progressed faster than us. Maybe their reliance on technology made the catastrophe hit them much harder than it hit us, so they died out completely, allowing us to scrape our way up to the top.’
Lynn and Adams exchanged looks. Another branch of the human family? It was something they hadn’t even considered, and to Adams it certainly seemed more convincing than Lynn having found an alien body or time traveller, two other possibilities that might have explained the ancient corpse.
‘It appears to me that you need to get the DNA tested immediately,’ Baranelli announced. ‘That way we will know what we are dealing with.’
‘That’s why we’ve got to get back to the US,’ Adams agreed. ‘Get the evidence analysed, find out what the hell is going on.’
Baranelli nodded his head. ‘It will be dangerous, my friends. It is clear that the body is important to someone, and they will stop at nothing to keep whatever secret it is that they are hiding.’
‘You’re right about that,’ Adams said. ‘I think we’re dealing with some top-level government interest, with enough power to get things done well south of the border too.’
‘Anybody like that who has a secret, it must be a secret worth knowing, yes?’ Baranelli asked with a mischievous smile and a wink. He took another sip of his wine, and looked directly at Adams and Lynn. ‘And so this is the help you need, yes? You want to know if I am able to get you back to the US undetected?’
Adams and Lynn both nodded and then watched as Baranelli refilled his glass and polished off half of it with one long, leisurely pull.
‘But only if you think you can do it without endagering yourself,’ Lynn added seriously.
Baranelli waved his hand. ‘Don’t worry about that,’ he said. ‘I think I can help you, and I’m sure it won’t endanger me one little bit. Besides, what’s life without a little excitement?’ He finished his wine. ‘You will be back in the US by tomorrow, I promise. Just promise me you will tell me what you find out.’
‘We will, Fabricio,’ Lynn agreed. ‘And we’ll also find out who’s behind all this,’ she said, hands clasping Adams’. ‘I’m tired of being the victim,’ she continued, and Adams was shocked by the fiery determination in her eyes. ‘They think we’re dead, they think they’ve won. Well, we’re going to find out who they are, and we’re going to take this fight to them.’
PART THREE
1
DNA Analytics was located in downtown Phoenix, one of thousands of such laboratories scattered across the United States. The principal work carried out by such facilities is paternity testing, although many work in cooperation with the FBI and other law enforcement agencies to analyse DNA evidence for criminal cases.