The God Experiment

Chapter No.43. Way Down there.

Chapter No.43. Way Down there.

A week later while Robert was home alone, he answered a call from NASA. They wanted to discuss a new mission. He told them that they would be there when his wife and son returned home.

That evening, he told them about the call. "NASA has a new job for us."

"Now what?" Janet asked.

Robert shrugged. "I don't know. Let's go find out."

Robert, Janet and James teleported to the JPL mission room where they met Jason and Willis Loather, a planetary astronomer.

"How deep can you go?" Jason asked.

"What do you mean? In the ocean?"

"Yes."

"We don't know, but I suppose we could dive down into the ocean."

"We have a problem which we really have no way to correct," Willis said. "A probe we sent to Europa returned recently and ejected a capsule containing surface samples. Unfortunately, the capsule went off course and ended up in the Mariana Trench."

"Whoa!" Robert reacted. "That's equivalent to a hole in one at the Masters."

James snickered.

"Do you have any idea of where it ended up down there?"

"That's the problem. We're not sure, but we think it's in the deepest part, which is almost seven miles deep."

"As I recall, the Mariana trench is almost 1600 miles long and over 40 miles wide. That's a lot of territory."

"The real problem is that the pressure down at the deepest part is over 1700 times that at sea level. The density of water is higher there and very cold. It would crush a normal human."

Robert exchanged glances with his wife and son before turning back to Willis. "All we can do is give it a try. Show us a photo of what it looks like."

Willis brought up a photo of the probe, which resembled a large metal can.

"Ok, we'll give it a shot."

The superheroes teleported to just above the deepest part of the trench. Although there have been several expeditions to explore the depths of the trench, they were done in bathyspheres or deep diving subs.

"I have no idea what this will be like, but it's worth a try," James said. "We'll need to use our x-ray vision to see things."

They exchanged glances before diving down into the water. At first it wasn't all that wild, but as the descended lower into the depths, things got weird. Strange looking luminous glowing creatures moved around them as if they were food. At a mile down, a large squid tried to latch onto James, but he just swatted it away.

They eventually arrived near the bottom and began scanning for the probe, which they located, but there was something else near it.

"What the hell is that?" Janet said, pointing at a metal pyramid object that was a half meter high.

"Interesting," Robert said. "Maybe it fell off of one of the subs that tried to reach here."

"I'm not detecting any radiation or explosives in it," James said.

"Let's take it to NASA and let them decide what it is."

They ascended to the surface and flew back to JPL.

"We found your probe and something else, but we have no idea what it is."

Jason and Willis looked at the pyramid shaped object before Willis reacted. "It's not one of ours. Maybe it's a Russian or Chinese probe."

"We'll leave that up to you," Robert said. "If you need us, just give us a call."

They disappeared.

"You realize how powerful they are to endure the pressures at the bottom of the trench." Willis said.

"Yes," Jason said. "They are effectively indestructible, and yet they don't demand anything."

Willis shook his head. "Amazing."

A different discussion was taking place in the Oval Office. President Hollis had assembled his Chief of Staff, military advisors and Secretary of State. He also invited Judith Valor, his chief strategist. He wanted her opinion about the superheroes.

"I don't see any reason to be concerned about them," she said. "They're a typical suburban family living in a modest house. They are members of a parish church where they conduct curing sessions. The woman is an office manager for a credit union, the man is a Marine veteran who served in the Iraq War as a medic. Their son is a high school senior with no behavior problems. And, they have a dog."

That elicited a few guffaws.

"As you already know, they have helped the FBI solve several difficult crimes, and they have provided NASA with several unbelievable mission saves. They prevented nuclear war between us and Russia and thwarted a Chinese invasion of the West Coast. They did all of these things without asking for anything in return. The good news is that they are American citizens and appear to be willing to help us remain free from any attempt to take us over."

"I am forever indebted to them," the president said. "They saved me from assassination and rescued my grandchildren from harm when they were kidnapped. They never asked for anything in return."

"Why is that?" the secretary of Defense, asked. "Why haven't they asked for anything. They could easily take over this country and conquer the world."

"They claim that they are participants in a God experiment," Judith said.

"That doesn't make sense. God doesn't need to experiment."

"They claim that it's real and they are being judged by how they perform, which includes them not doing anything that would cause harm."

"It doesn't matter, "The president interrupted. "There is no way to control them or stop them. Our best course of action is to allow them to do their thing. They exhibit no signs of attempting to take over. Let's just leave it that way."

No one could come up with a better idea.

The Steris family was also having a discussion about their situation.

"I'm surprised that no one has revealed who we are," Janet said.

"Maybe the government has finally realized that we are not their enemy," James said.

"I think it's the fact that we don't ask for anything," Robert said. "Surely, they must realize that we are not going to do anything stupid."

"We've become the Incredibles," James said.

"Maybe we can avoid their foibles," Janet said.

"I think we already have," Robert replied.

They realized that he was right.