The Descent

Ali  got  one  photo  of  the  sun  and  moon  iconography,  no  more.  When  her   flash billowed,  the  entire  wall  of  pictographs  –  its  pigments  and  record  –  lost  color,  turned pale, then vanished. Ten  thousand years  of artwork  turned to blank stone.

Yet  with  the  animals  and  handprints  and  sun  and  moon  images  burned  away,  they discovered a deeper  set  of engraved  script.

A  two-foot-long   patch   of  letters   had  been   cut   into  the   basalt.   In   the   abyssal shadows,  the  incisions  were  dark  lines  upon  dark  stone.  They  approached  the  wall tentatively,  as if this too might disappear.

Ali  ran  her  fingers  along  the  wall.  'It  might  have  been  carved  to  be  read.  Like

Braille.'

'That's writing?'

'A  word.  A  single  word.  See  this  character  here.'  Ali  traced  a  y-tailed  mark,  then  a backward  E.  'And  this.  They're  not  capped.  But  look  at  the  linear  form.  It's  got  the stance   and   the   stroke   of   ancient   Sanskrit   or   Hebrew.   Paleo-Hebrew,   possibly. Probably older. Old Hebrew. Phoenician, whatever  you want to call it.'

'Hebrew? Phoenician? What are we dealing with, the lost tribes  of Israel?'

'Our ancestors taught hadals how to write?'  someone said.

'Or else hadals taught us,' Ali said.

She  could  not  take  her  fingertips  from  the  word.  'Do  you  realize,'  she  whispered,

'man  has  been  speaking  for  at  least  a  hundred  thousand  years.  But  our  writing  goes back  no  further  than  the  upper  Neolithic.  Hittite  hieroglyphics.  Australian  aboriginal art. Seven,  eight thousand years,  tops.

'This  writing  has  got  to  be  at  least  fifteen  or  twenty  thousand  years  old.  That's  two or  three  times  older  than  any  human  writing  ever  found.  These  are  linguistic  fossils. We  could  be  closing  in  on  the  Adam  and  Eve  of  language.  The  root  origin  of  human speech. The  first word.'

Ali  was  enraptured.  Looking  around,  she  could  tell  the  others  didn't  understand. This  was  big.  Human  or  not,  it  doubled  or  tripled  the  timeline  of  the  mind.  And  she had no  one  to  celebrate  it  with!  Settle  down,  she  told  herself.  For  all  her  travels,  Ali's was a paper world of linguists and bishops, of library  carrels and yellow legal pads. She had occupied a quiet place that didn't allow celebration.  And  yet,  just  once,  Ali  wanted someone  to  knock  the  head  off  a  bottle  of  champagne  and  douse  her  with  bubbles, someone to gather  her up for a wet  kiss.

'Hold up your  pen beside the letters  for scale,' one of the photographers told her.

'I wonder what it says,' someone said.

'Who  knows?'  Ali  said.  'If  Ike's  right,  if  this  is  a  lost  language,  then  even  the  hadals don't know. Look how they  had it buried under more primitive images.  I  think  it's  lost all meaning to them.'

Returning  to  their  rafts,  for  some  reason,  the  name  circled  around  on  her.  Ike.  Her slow dancer.

On  September  5,  they  found  their  first  hadals.  Reaching  a  fossilized  shore,  they unloaded their  rafts  and  hauled  gear  to  high  ground  and  started  to  prepare  for  night. Then one of the soldiers noticed shapes within the opaque folds of flowstone.

By  shining  their  lights  at  a  certain  angle,  they  could  see  a  virtual  Pompeii  of  bodies laminated in several  inches to several  feet  of translucent plastic  stone.  They  lay  in  the positions  they  had  died  in,  some  curled,  most  sprawled.  The  scientists  and  soldiers fanned out across the acres of amber, slipping now and then on the slick face.

Pieces  of  flint  still  jutted  from  wounds.  Some  had  been  strangled  with  their  own entrails or decapitated. Animals had worked through all  of  them.  Limbs  were  missing, chest  and  belly  walls  had  been  plundered.  No  question,  this  had  been  the  end  of  a whole tribe or township.

Under Ali's sweeping headlamp, their white skin  glittered  like  quartz  crystal.  For  all the  heavy  bone  in  their  brows  and  cheeks,  and  despite  the  obvious  violence  of  their end, they  were  remarkably  delicate.

H.  hadalis  –  this  variety,  at  any  rate  –  looked  faintly  apelike,  but  with  very  little body  hair.  They  had  wide  negroid  noses  and  full  lips,  somewhat   like  Australian aborigines,  but  were  bleached  albino  by  the  perpetual  night.  There  were  a  few  slight beards,  little  more  than  wispy  goatees.  Most  looked  no  older  than  thirty.  Many  were children.

The  bodies  were  scarred  in  ways  that  had  nothing  to  do  with  sports  or  surgery:  no appendectomy scars in  this  group,  no  neat  smile  lines  around  the  knees  or  shoulders. These  had  come  from  camp  accidents  or  hunts  or  war.  Broken  bones  had  healed crookedly. Fingers had been lopped off.  The  women's  breasts  hung  slack,  thinned  and