Rick,
Agree with everything you said in the rant!

Also agree with the decline of NASA, without competition from another power it takes a lot out of the urgency. Those simple conversion errors on the early Mars robotic missions really damaged thier reputation.

Anyhow I am not in this for the money. I would hope that anyone contributing would agree to sign over any copyright to Hall of Maat. If, in the unlikely event, that we come up with a marketable screen play we might make Maat financially self sustaining into the future.

Sorry if you did not like my conspiracy theory but realize that we are talking about the days when NASA had the 'best and the brightest' and funding was no problem. Also Area 51 never seemed to have funding problems.

If you have got a better conspiracy theory, let's hear it.

Anyhow I polished up the plot outline over the weekend. I was lucky to come of age at the start of the 'computer revolution' and the first part of my movie is an attempt to display the difficulty a group of slide rule engineers would have had trying to understand technology a million years in advance of our own.

BTW: I really suck at writing dialog so maybe we can get KK involved or possibly get Steve Johnson (Mercury Rapids) back on the board, this is really 'right up his alley'.


Here is version 1.1

Apollo 17 in 1972 was the last opportunity to investigate an anomalous object spotted earlier during the Apollo 15 and 16 missions. Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt had a secret mission during the second EVA on the lunar surface to investigate that object and if possible retrieve it. During that EVA they took the LRV to that area and spotted what appeared to be a spherical shaped shiney object. They carefully approached on foot and speculated whether this was a remnant of some undocumented Soviet space junk or just what else it might be. One clue that it was not man made was a thick layer of cosmic dust and micrometiorites surrounding the dome. Cernan collected a sample of the debries and determined the object was only about a foot in diameter. When he tried to lift it in moon gravity it weighed only about a pound. The object was loaded on the rover and they continued on with their geologic sampling mission.

The object was classified top secret and only referred to by the code name "Luna Blossom" in internal NASA correspondence. The first problem was to determine what was inside the dome without damaging it. Ultrasound was indeterminate because the dome seemed to be only a cover a few millimeters thick and the material was of some strange mixture of silicone and other unknown elements. The dome was very reflective and absolutely seamless. The bottom was equally featureless except for a small depression in the center. Visual observation detected a microscopic gap between the dome and the base. Xray scans revealed a metal mesh beneath the dome and several 3 dimensional objects attached to the base. Finally in 1974, after much deliberation an attempt was made to open the object. A suited volunteer and the object were sealed inside a 'clean room' at area 51. To everyone's surprise a simple push of a screwdriver in the bottom depression caused the dome to release from the base.

Under the dome was a metalic mesh that resembled some kind of antenna. Below the 'antenna' was a group of blocks that seemed to be interconnected with a clear 'plastic like' material that resembled fishing line.

The few remaining German 'Paperclip' scientists were at a loss to explain what the device might be or how it functioned but one resident ALIEN at Area 51 seemed to understand the technology even though he was not familiar with the device. He suggested that some of the blocks were solid state computer chips that processed data that was transmitted as light through the 'fishing lines'.

A faint magnetic field was detected in one of the blocks which seemed to ocassionally fluctuate as light was shown into the gaps between the blocks so the device appeared to be functioning. It was decided to reattach the dome and attempt to determine the response to external stimuli of light and radio waves. The first response to normal visable light was an slight increase in the minute magnetic field so the device seemed to be solar powered. There was no detectable response to low frequency radio waves no matter what the amplitude. However there did seem to be a response at a very high frequency even at very low amplitude. After much debate the experts concluded that this must be some kind of solar powered radio receiver.

But what and where was the transmitter?

Over the next few years many experiments were conducted to try to understand what the device was and how it functioned. It was finally determined that high frequency light directed at some of the 'fishing lines' resulted in a detectable light response in other lines which confirmed the device communicated between the blocks with light pulses. It was also determined that the 'dome' could be replaced with a battery which allowed much easier access to the blocks. For some strange reason the device 'seemed to come to life' with no external stimuli at certain times of the day.

One major breakthrough ocurred when an experimenter accidentally discovered that high frequency light pulses directed at certain of the 'fishing lines' resulted in prolonged light pulses in other of the 'fishing lines'. This activity seemed to be directed by the large block that had a faint magnetic signature. Further experiments determined that the light pulses coming from the 'magnetic block' were regular in pattern and seemed to be some kind of a 'computer type' binary code. Also a pulsating light directed at one particular 'fishing line' resulted in a prolonged response that produced a detectable electrical response in one part of the 'antenna'. By the late 1970s NASA scientists were speculating that the device was a solar powered solid state radio receiver, data storage device and a transmitter.

From this point on, the major effort was directed toward trying to access the data apparently stored in the 'magnetic' block. This block was cubic in form measuring about 6 centimeters on each side. A major problem was encountered when trying to interface the device with a mainframe computer in the next room. The data output from the device was so fast that the computer was unable to record anything but the start of the pulse. Eventually programmers hacked a way to get the device to repeat the individual bits 10,000 times so the mainframe could record that bit. Programmers confirmed that the light pulses were a binary code and that the cube contained an unbelievable amount of data, much of which was repetive and seemed to be organized as records within records. Soon a warehouse full of magnetic tape recordings from the device were in storage. One old programmer commented that "there would not have been a tree left in North America if all that data had been stored on paper punch cards".

During the Reagan administration project Luna Blossom was deemed highest priotity and was under the highest security. Eventually analysis of the binary code revealed patterns that some blocks of data changed regularly with each succeeding record while many other blocks of data remained the same for long periods and then changed rapidly for many records and then sometimes repeated previous patterns. Eventually all the data for each major record came to an end.

Even though security was very high and the device remained under wraps at Area 51 it was necessary to bring in outside expertise. Sandia Labs became involved and a leak developed. Within a year computer companies were taking orders for magnetic bubble memory chips. The leak was 'terminated' and the magnetic bubble chips were never delivered.
see [www.dvorak.org]