Chapter 9
1662words
Search and rescue team captain Harrison stepped on the Antarctic snow, feeling the ice beneath his feet harder and more silent than any place he had ever been. In his fifteen years working in polar search and rescue, he had seen camps buried by snowstorms and dealt with teams that fell apart due to internal conflicts, but the scene before him was something he had never encountered before.
The "Lost Valley" expedition camp remained intact. Several white main tents were firmly secured to the ice like mushrooms, the generator hummed deeply, providing stable power, and even the meteorological monitoring screen in the living quarters continued to display real-time temperature and wind speed. Everything was in perfect order, as if the occupants had just stepped out for a walk and would return at any moment.
But there was not a single person here.
"Calling all teams, report status," Harrison spoke into the communicator, his voice sounding somewhat abrupt in the silent air.
"Tent One is empty, personal belongings are all here, no signs of struggle."
"Lab Two is empty, all equipment is operational, the microscope is still powered on."
"Data Center Three... is empty. Servers are functioning normally, data is still being automatically received and recorded."
Harrison frowned deeply. He walked into the tent marked "Data Pod," where it was as warm as spring inside, with several servers' fans humming. A young rescue team member was checking a laptop, and he turned to Harrison saying: "Captain, the equipment here is too advanced, I don't even know how to shut it down. It's connected to several external sensors and seems to be conducting some kind of geological scan."
This was too strange. A team of more than a dozen top scientists had simply vanished into thin air, leaving behind no distress signals, no signs of struggle, and they hadn't even bothered to turn off their equipment. This didn't seem like they had encountered an avalanche or severe weather, but more like a collective, instantaneous evaporation.
"Captain, you'd better come see this," another team member called from the living quarters.
Harrison walked over and saw that team member was pointing at a small, personal recording device that had fallen to the ground. The device's casing was somewhat worn, but the status light indicated it still had power. Harrison put on his tactical gloves, carefully picked it up, and pressed the play button.
After a slight hiss of static, a woman's voice came through, calm and clear.
"My name is Emilia Clark, biologist for the polar expedition team's 'Lost Valley' mission."
Harrison recognized the voice; he had heard Dr. Clark's audio files in the mission briefing. He gestured for everyone around him to be quiet.
"If you're hearing this recording... stop all exploration of the Antarctic 'Lost Valley' area immediately. Repeat, cease any form of exploration, drilling, or signal scanning immediately."
The voice in the recording paused for a moment. Harrison could hear that she seemed to be adjusting her breathing. Then, when she spoke again, her voice underwent some indescribable change. Her tone remained steady, but there was now an extremely faint, high-frequency buzzing in the background, like the sound of insect wings.
"We were wrong. We've been wrong from the beginning. There's nothing here that needs to be 'discovered'... Seeking, in itself, is being found."
Harrison felt a chill run down his spine. This didn't sound like a scientist's warning, but more like some mystical prophecy.
"It's not malevolent..." Emilia's voice became even stranger, with some syllables unnaturally elongated, as if her vocal cords were being modified by different physical laws. "It's just... responding. It's an... a reality editor..."
The female voice in the recording began to break up, interspersed with more high-frequency noise that no human could produce.
"The area... is... disappearing. Don't come. Don't... seek. To seek is to..."
Finally, the recording was replaced by a violent, jarring noise that sounded like geometric shapes colliding. This noise continued for a few seconds, and then, a completely new "voice" appeared. It was a "language" composed of a mixture of high and low humming, crisp friction sounds, and pure logical pulses. It carried no emotion, yet it sent a shiver through the souls of everyone who heard it.
Harrison abruptly pressed the stop button.
A deathly silence filled the living compartment. Several experienced search and rescue team members had gone pale. They would rather face an avalanche or a polar bear than confront this incomprehensible eeriness.
"Pack this up... along with all the data drives we can take," Harrison's voice was somewhat hoarse, "We're leaving immediately."
He had a strong intuition that Emilia Clark's warning was serious. They should not have come here.
*
One week later, in an underground data analysis center in Colorado, USA.
Dozens of top scientists were seated in a large circular conference room, their expressions grave. The holographic projection in the center displayed the data model brought back from the "Lost Valley" camp.
A young female scientist of Chinese descent, code-named "Hummingbird," was pointing at a red area on the model as she explained: "This was constructed based on the last data uploaded from the seismic monitoring equipment left by Dr. Whitney Lee. Initially, we thought this was just an anomalous zone centered around 'Lost Valley' with a radius of approximately 300 kilometers."
She paused briefly and made a few adjustments on the control panel. The holographic Earth model began to rotate, revealing more red patches across the global map.
"But in the past three days, we've discovered that this anomalous zone... is spreading. And the way it's spreading is very strange."
"Hummingbird" enlarged a new red area located in the deep Pacific Ocean. "It doesn't spread in concentric circles like a virus. Instead, it jumps. More precisely, its diffusion pattern strictly follows some geometric logic that we cannot understand. For example, this newly emerged hotspot forms a perfect equilateral triangle with the 'Lost Valley' in Antarctica and another hotspot on the other side of the Earth. All hotspots have similar complex geometric connections with each other."
A collective gasp filled the conference room.
"This confirms the concepts of 'mathematics' and 'geometry' mentioned by Dr. Clark in the recording," a white-haired physicist said gravely. "What we're facing may not be an organism, nor a form of energy, but something... that is rewriting the underlying logical rules of our reality."
On the other side, a meteorology expert also stood up, his face equally grim. "We have analyzed all the meteorological data left by Anna Volkov, the glaciologist from 'Lost Valley.' Her records of 'micro-climate anomalies' were initially thought to be equipment malfunctions. But just yesterday, across the globe, more than thirteen locations, including bustling cities and remote deserts, reported completely similar, inexplicable millisecond-level temperature and pressure fluctuations. These locations perfectly match the geometric hotspots shown by Dr. 'Hummingbird'."
Panic, like an invisible toxic gas, spread throughout the conference room. They were the smartest group of people in the world, the pinnacle of human civilization's rationality. But at this moment, all their knowledge systems they had been so proud of seemed like a joke in the face of this cold data. They could measure it, they could observe it, but they completely failed to understand it, let alone counter it.
Emilia Clark's warning echoed in everyone's ears: do not seek.
But for a civilization whose instinct is exploration and pursuit of knowledge, this warning itself is the most irresistible invitation.
*
Three years later, Geneva, Switzerland.
In a conference room at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) headquarters, the lights were bright. On the wall, a large screen displayed a world map covered with hundreds of red dots representing "reality instability zones." They spread across the globe like a silent plague.
An official in a suit with a serious expression was addressing more than a dozen scientists seated at the conference table. They were elites from various fields, about to form a new, better-equipped scientific expedition team.
"Ladies and gentlemen," the official's voice spread throughout the room through the microphone, "a new anomalous point, which also has the highest signal intensity to date, has appeared in the Tamanrasset region deep in the Sahara Desert. According to our model simulations, the 'reality structure' there is becoming unstable at an alarming rate."
His gaze swept over everyone present. "Your mission is to go there. Collect data, analyze samples, try to understand it, and find... methods to address it. We've learned lessons from the 'Lost Valley' tragedy three years ago. This time, you will have the most advanced technology and logistical support humanity can provide."
At the conference table, a young female biologist who had just obtained her doctoral degree had eyes that sparkled with excitement and eagerness. She looked at the red dot in the center of the desert on the screen, as if she were gazing at an ultimate secret waiting to be unveiled. She flipped through the mission plan in her hands, which detailed all the known anomalies, including that final recording from Emilia Clarke that was classified as top secret.
She had listened to that recording and experienced that incomprehensible language from another "existence." But it didn't frighten her; instead, it ignited an even stronger desire to explore.
She believed that with more advanced equipment, more meticulous planning, and a stronger team, any mystery would eventually be solved by science. Human civilization has developed to this point precisely because it has never stopped exploring the unknown.
The conference room was quiet, with only the steady voice of the official continuing.
"You are humanity's hope. Mission codename: Prometheus. Good luck to you all."
The young female scientist clutched the plan document tightly in her hand, her heart filled with excitement about embarking on a great journey. Neither she nor her companions truly understood the real meaning behind Emilia's warning.
To seek is, in itself, to be found.
And humanity, it seems, will never learn to stop seeking.
