A Unique Perspective

The two security guards followed the trail of the skiff and nodded toward the snow buggy as the two trails separated. And so, the geologist and the physicist were alone at the bottom of the Earth in Antarctica.

The buggy was cozy and warm. The younger physicist figured a way to listen to music, and the older geologist just chuckled at their choice. Over time it was very eclectic and even played a song or two that the geologist thought were classics.

The snow was bright even with what little light the sun was shining on the western horizon. It was slowly getting lower as the winter was descending upon the southern hemisphere. A secondary measurement of the crater was needed before it might be buried under snow and lost in the coming year. As they crossed the ice, they could see the rocky outcrops of the original expedition's journey. They got larger as they followed the old expedition's tracks following one of the sensors used to measure the glacier's mass and movements. They were probably setting off the sensors back at the base, but that was someone else's problem.

“So where are you from?”, the geologist asked.

“I got pulled here from college to do this. My thesis is on tracking impact trajectories. It's why I know so much about measuring them”, the physicist responded.

“That didn't tell me where you came from?”, the geologist retorted.

“Sorry, I'm hoping not to be here or have to come back here. This snow is too much, and if it wasn't such an interesting find I never would have agreed to come here.”

She still hadn't answered the question, but the geologist went on, “You know I'll be taking measurements too? We could write a paper on this encounter together if you want?”

“No thank you. This new evidence might explain my theory that particles of larger asteroids could separate into even smaller ones”, the physicist explained.

“Your name would appear at the top of the paper of course?”, the geologist offered.

“No thank you. I'm trying to make a name for myself”, the physicist confided.

There was silence between them for a song or two.

“So, what's so special about this crater? I'm just here to confirm the geology of the impact and see if I can find any similar formations in the local strata”, informed the geologist.

“The figures sent to me by the missing team showed that it was moving at Mach 5 on impact in 300-million-year-old soils. If any of this is true, it shows something impacted so hard that it could have been given that much momentum inside of our atmosphere. Something like that shouldn't happen without intelligent means”, the physicist said with enthusiasm.

“300 million years? That's around the time of the Permian extinction. Do you think this could have something to do with that?”, the geologist asked intrigued.

“I hadn't thought about that, since I believe the world is only 6,000 years old. It may be a possibility, but no use getting ahead of ourselves. We still have to verify the discovery”, the physicist reminded him as she started to rethink the offer to write a paper together. The geologist just rolled his eyes.

"I understand why the original geologist said 300-million-year-old soils, but why do you believe that? I thought this was a religious group of explorers?", the physicist asked.

"In our field of work, it's hard not to believe that the science has it right. Besides if you're religious you should realize that no human understands the mind of God," the geologist said.

"What is that supposed to mean?", the physicist asked.

"Well first off any religious group can be filled by many denominations. I've worked with Israelites, Jews, Catholics, Christians, Sunni, Shi'a and even a follower of Thor in my time in this career. So many people have different views. As a Christian myself I still believe the Bible has things mainly correct, but I question how humans have interpreted it. Take the creation of the universe for instance. On day one there was light and darkness which could be an ancient explanation of energy and matter, so on the first day god divided the energy that allowed our matter to form into our solar system. Possibly by causing a supernova near a hydrogen gas cloud. On the second day God divided the hydrogen cloud that formed our solar system into the heavens and Earth, and on the third day land; or elements, began to emerge from our cloud of hydrogen. If you think of volcanoes as the origins of our first amino acids, they could have been the first plant like structures on Earth to emerge back then. On day four our atmosphere cleared for the first time which allowed life to see the Sun, moon, and stars for the first time, while on the fifth day animals in the sea began to emerge. Then finally on the sixth day God created the land animals and humans, while he's still resting today. If you take a day and make it a billion years it actually works out very clearly to the 4.5 billion years geology considers the Earth to be although it could have been molten for a billion or two billion years or if the Theia impact hypothesis is correct the surface would appear younger, meaning we do not conceive time as God would. It also means that God has only been resting for about 300,000 - 600,000 years or longer depending on which type of bipedal apes God had in mind when he created us. This means that even I do not really understand the mind of God or know his time for coming, but I think it's a better idea than saying civilization is 7,000 years old and that the world is 1,000 years younger," the geologist laughed at his attempt to explain his own faith.

The physicist shook her head no and laughed with him. "There are a few things I don't agree with in your explanation. Evolution is one of them. Thinking water and hydrogen are the same thing is another, while I think God is female or has no gender instead of just assuming it's a man. But I see what you're saying."

"See even you have issues with the original source material, which only proves that we all have our own ideas of what God, or the Bible have to say," the geologist said with a smile on his face. "I've even met atheists with their own interpretations, but they think gods are popular humans that made it into the historic record or natural phenomenon that were given human form."

The physicist just smiled and thought about what the geologist had said, as in the end he was correct. She had altered her dogma to fit the beliefs of her religion. And perhaps that's what everyone had to do on their own.

As they continued across the ice, the sound of the buggy crossing it got louder. It took a few hours to cross the ice to the rocks. They then came to the outcrop of rock in which the crater was found. Since they couldn't follow the original expedition's tracks off of the ice, the geologist made a decision to make tracks of their own as he piloted the buggy off of the ice.

As the geologist maneuvered the buggy down the embankment it was steeper than he had expected. As they rode down the ice, the physicist was forced forward from her seat and as though by instinct the driver reached his arm across the petite physicist's chest to force her back into her seat. The geologist left it there until they were completely off of the ice and onto the rocks. The geologist then patted the physicist on the knee and said, “There that's better. Sorry I wasn't expecting it to be so steep.”

The physicist was irate. “How dare you!”, she scolded the geologist.

“What did I do?”, the geologist inquired shocked by the physicist's reaction.

“You just violated me! You grabbed my chest and touched my knee! That's inexcusable!”, the physicist exclaimed.

“I said I was sorry. I was just trying to hold you back in your seat so that you didn't hit the stick shift, which may have left us stranded out here. And as for touching your knee, when I was younger, I was taught by my older siblings that was a way to relieve anxiety in someone else when they were stressed in a vehicle. I'm very sorry you took offense by that, but I meant nothing by it. I'm married and wouldn't do anything to jeopardize what I have with my spouse,” the geologist said defensively.

The physicist thought for a second and his plea made sense. “I'm sorry but I had a suitor that did that shit on purpose all of the time”, she said irately.

“Well not everyone does that all of the time. Some of us are truly concerned with your safety. And some of us still think of touch as a calming coping skill. I'm sorry that some people out there are assholes and make others freak out by being touched”, the geologist said in a calming tone. “Now that I know you feel that way, I'll try to use my voice to calm you down. Hopefully we don't have any more downhill grades, but please realize that you need to keep yourself in your seat or I may have to touch you again only for our safety. But thank you for telling me how you feel, or I'd have never known that you think that way and could make you uncomfortable by touching you in other ways you may not like.”

“You think touch can take away anxiety? I think in a lot of people it causes anxiety now-a-days. People like you are thought of as creepy. Why would you think a stranger touching someone diminishes anxiety?”, the physicist asked with a sneer.

“I guess not many families still touch each other to show love and care of one another if everyone feels that way now-a-days? I guess families like mine are a dying breed. Maybe that's why so many people are anxious and depressed now-a-days since something so calming now causes anxiety because of other's bad intentions. It's a shame what a few bad apples have done to the human conditioning,” the geologist said retrospectively. “But I'll do my best to keep my hands to myself now that I know it bothers you like that.”

They were silent for the rest of the trip. As they got closer to the impact site the tracker's signal got louder. “There it is,” the geologist said as they spotted the crater. It was a large elongated oval shape and had a well-defined ridge.

The geologist pulled the buggy as close to the crater as possible, and both exited the buggy quickly. The physicist had her field equipment ready to deploy, while the geologist had to get his equipment out of the back of the buggy.

By the time the geologist got his equipment to the crater the physicist had taken most of her measurements. “Boy, you seem like you're in a hurry?”, the geologist said.

“It's cold out here and I just want to get back as soon as we can. Can you help me with this?”, the physicist asked holding up a measuring tape.

“Sure”, the geologist said as they began measuring the width and length of the crater.

“This doesn't seem right", the physicist said surprised.

“What do you mean?”, the geologist asked.

“For the size of the impactor the crater seems too large”, the physicist retorted.

As they finished recording the measurements the physicist began doing more calculations to determine the speed at which the impactor hit. The geologist began his examination by taking a core sample. As he twisted the core extraction instrument into the ground, he noticed that they were being watched by an emperor penguin off in the distance.

“Sorry guy, we'll be out of your territory in no time”, the geologist said to himself, continuing the core extraction.

“Mach 6?!”, the physicist exclaimed.

“What?”, asked the startled geologist.

“This is crazy. I never thought anything could get that much momentum leaving a larger impactor. And the trajectory of the impact suggests it landed here from just out of the Atlantic Ocean. None of this makes sense”, the physicist said as she began recalculating her findings. “I must have gotten something wrong.”

The geologist continued extracting the core sample. As he did the geologist noticed two more onlookers. The geologist thought that was odd, but what did he know, he wasn't an ornithologist.

“Same result. This is insane”, the physicist said to herself. She began looking around the crater to see if if there may have been more of the impactor left at the site.

The geologist pulled up his core sample from the ground and began taking photos of the strata in which the crater had formed. The age calculation of 300 million years seemed to check out, but the core sample would help them figure it out better.

The geologist then started looking around the crater for more of the impactor as well. Everything inside seemed to be from ice flows dropping rocks as the snow melted away yearly. They each even found a small meteorite that must have been left there as the ice thawed, since there were no craters left by them. But other than that, they found nothing else of interest. The geologist even pulled out a metal detector to help them locate more items of interest, but there was definitely nothing else there.

As they packed up to leave the geologist looked back at their spectators and a large mob had amassed since he last looked their way, and they were all watching them intently from afar.

“I think I'm ready to be out of here too”, the geologist nodded toward the mob of emperor penguins that had amassed since their arrival.

The physicist looked up and noticed the penguins for the first time.

“Is that usual?”, the physicist asked.

“I'm not sure, and we can't find out until we're back at base camp”, the geologist said as he snapped a picture of them. They put the core in the back of the buggy along with their equipment and slammed the lift-gate down.

They both climbed into the buggy as the crowd continued to get bigger. The geologist started the buggy and sped away as fast as it would travel safely. He found a less steep ramp of ice that helped them get back up onto the glacier and after finding their original tracks followed them back to the base camp. When they returned the security guards had returned already. They had lost the tracks to their quarry.

The geologist told everyone about the strange penguins they had seen, but no one was familiar with their habits and the Internet was down due to the storm that was heading toward them.

The geologist made himself and the physicist hot chocolate as the physicist recalculated their measurements. As the geologist went to walk away the physicist grabbed his hand and said, “Thank you. Maybe we can write a paper together as I'll need your expertise of layers of strata to help explain this.”

“Sounds good to me,” he said as he sat down to read what she had written.