In January 2015, Caltech astronomers Konstantin Batygin and Mike Brown announced new research that provided evidence of a giant planet tracing an unusual, elongated orbit in the outer solar system. Fifty years later, we landed on Planet X for what was thought to be the first time. The missions were eventually abandoned when all was said to be found on Planet X, was disappointment.
This is a letter that was discovered in the murdered body of a young woman’s pocket, who washed ashore on Jersey’s La Haule Beach beach last week., and that ended up in my hands.
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Dear Robin,
When I started my career, I never thought I’d be sending you this letter, one day. I know it’s been a while since I died. I will make sure you only get this once you’re safe, but I wanted you to know why I’m not there with you right now.
From my recollection, this is what happened:
The communications room was completely silent as Commander Morris took his last step onto the surface of Planet X. This was the most important mission in the history of humanity. The human race depended on the outcome of this mission, so everyone waited patiently as they saw the commander’s feed focus on his own boot. You should have seen it! The gravity was so intense that it was like a magnet pull.
He could be heard taking a deep breath, a massive, dense, new forest coming up on the screens.
“It feels like home…” he finally said.
Everyone erupted into cheers. Some shook hands, others hugged in relief as the crew of astronauts started their activities on the screens.
I just stood there in awe. I remember it like it was yesterday.
When it was time for the briefing, I skipped out of the room accompanied by my boss. For the first time ever, we looked like we were best friends, off to go inform the president about our success. I could never, ever, have guessed what we were about to find out.
The first step was to take air measurements and make sure the atmosphere, the pressure and the air components were good enough for humans to live under. One could almost tell by the vegetation surrounding the crew, with every screen in the room emitting a green light. It was fainter than the light on earth, not only because of the planet’s orbit, but also because of the current state of the Earth. By now, I hope you’ve made it out.
At that precise moment, the crew was around Jupiter’s distance from the Earth, so the planet was slightly colder, but the fact that it was 10 times the size of our planet, helped.
I came back into the room hours later, only to witness the commander pulling off his helmet and taking a first whiff of extraterrestrial air.
“It’s just like home.” - he said, the camera turning towards the rest of the crew, each of them removing their helmets hesitantly and showing a nervous smile once they felt the air.
Because of Planet X’s movement, the days were some hours shorter than the Earth’s, and the only light the crew had to work with was the light from the shelter they built.
The second day, they started exploring, which lasted for some days. Oh, Robin, I felt like a child all over again, looking at everything new for the first time. All the trees seemed new, all the water seemed fresh even though there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. I could have watched those screens for the rest of my life. Our new home was going to be absolutely wonderful.
It was on the fourth day that something unexpected came into view. We couldn’t communicate directly with the crew, because what we were watching was a feed that was about three days old by now. All we could do was watch, as a strange formation reflected off the sunlight on the ground about 100 steps in front of the commander.
At first, no one could believe it. The commander hadn’t noticed it - I guess he was watching the rest of the landscape and more worried about where his feet would go -, but in the room, everyone was losing it. All I wanted to do was pick up a phone and ring him, but obviously that wasn’t possible, so we all waited impatiently until he finally saw it.
We could hear him call out for the others, and together they slowly walked towards whatever that was. I am not sure how to say this, but what we saw changed everything, forever. It certainly changed my life.
In that camera feed, rested a rusted metal door facing the sky, and the best part is it had markings on it. I refused to believe it then, but I wouldn’t dare to doubt it now. It was what looked like ancient Egyptian writing.
It wasn’t exactly a match, but the resemblance was such that no one could have argued otherwise.
There were also drawings like the hieroglyphs that have been found on Earth around the world. Does this mean that we, humans, have been on this planet before? Does it mean that someone from this planet visited us? And if so, why aren’t they living on Planet X now? What happened to them?
After a lot of debate and photographing, the crew decided to pull the door up. It took four of them to make it move, but in the communications room we weren’t paying too much attention. Everyone was busy trying to make sense of the things we had just seen. I couldn’t get my eyes off the screens and will never forget what I saw.
At first, there was only darkness. It looked almost like the light of the sun was being sucked into nothingness, but something fast shone in the distance. I almost lost my breath just then. For some reason, I started getting heavy memories of the Alien movies, and I didn’t like it. The commander aimed a light inside, and it was nothing but a long tunnel. Around me, everyone else was back to paying attention to the screens, but no one knew what we were looking at.
Inside, the tunnel was completely marked with the same kind of symbols and writing as before. There were also pictures that seemed to tell stories. The same stories we have seen on Earth before. Spaceships hovering above the ground, a figure like a god on top of a pyramid with little figures all around. There were hundreds of these, but Robin, we know this planet takes around three thousand and six hundred years to orbit around our sun. This coincides with almost every mystery around that era on Earth. It explains all the technology we have seen in Earth’s ancient times until now. I wanted to write about this. Share it with the world, but you know what happens when you discover something that will prove every powerful person wrong.
As the crew advanced through the tunnel, I kept trying to understand more and more of the characters on the walls of that irregular tunnel, but I lost my train of thought when after about half an hour of steady strides, the tunnel opened up into an indescribable place. I wish you would have been there.
At first, it seemed like the crew had just walked up to nothing - like there was a gigantic hollow space inside, but it didn’t take too long until somehow, at the slight touch of one of the flashlights, the whole place lit up.
In that infinite cave, under the ground of the seemingly undisturbed and deserted of humanoid life Planet X, rested the remains of possibly the biggest and most advanced civilization humankind has ever seen. I thought we knew our roots, Robin, but I was wrong. As soon as we saw it, we knew we had just laid eyes upon the oldest bit of our civilization’s history, and there must be so much to learn.
I wish we could have observed it for longer. I wish we could have learned more. I wish I could have learned more, but what I’m about to tell you is probably another thing that got me killed. Remember, if you’re reading this, watch your back and never tell anyone what you know. If you do, tell everyone at the same time and prove it before they can stop you.
At that moment, as we tried to see what the crew had just found and tried to figure out how in the world this fit into everything we knew until now, out of nowhere, one of the crewmembers started shrieking. It wasn’t a scream or a cry, it was an ear piercing shriek that could only mean he was dying.
Suddenly, all eyes turned to his screen, but all we could see was smoke coming away from him. The commander’s camera turned toward the crewmate, and we saw that something - something we couldn’t see - was eating away at his suit and his skin. Quickly, we realised he had been hit by some sort of gas that came out of the wall, but there was nothing anyone could do. In less than one minute, he had turned from a perfectly normal human being, to a zombie looking thing that shrieked and cried. Then to a skeleton, and he was gone.
That’s when we heard some kind of call, this time from somewhere inside the hidden underground city. The commander turned towards the abyss again, and the quiet was completely gone. Now, the city seemed to be gaining some kind of light, and in the distance, shadows could be seen dashing around at such a speed that we couldn’t tell what the hell was going on.
In the middle of the panic, as we heard what the crew was discussing to do next, we started noticing the amount of bodies far down the hidden city, paving its floors. There must have been hundreds down there exactly like our crew, but how? How did they get there? It’s impossible that there could have been other missions like ours. I thought it was, at least. Now, I know it wasn’t impossible at all. Each crew was being sent to retrieve a little more information each time, Robin. That crew I was watching on the screen was just another means to an end, and we were supposed to accept it in the name of science and human evolution.
I watched it all, and I couldn’t believe it. As the shrieking that echoed around the city got closer and the crew started to panic and rush out of the tunnel, I could feel my heart pounding for them. It was like a horror movie where you completely connect to the hero, who you already know won’t make it out alive.
Somewhere among the panic and the mess, whatever made the shriek was named Banshee. They were demonic, and shrieked like death.
I watched as the remaining members of the crew scrambled up the tunnel, trying to keep themselves up while they ran, because they weren’t used to the gravity levels yet. The horror on everyone’s face is not something I will ever be able to describe.
Every time the commander looked around, his breathing getting more and more intense, I could see the black banshees getting closer. Eventually I realised, they weren’t monsters at all. Maybe they were now, but one of the closest ones was the crewmember who had just died right before our eyes. Now, he was a zombie running at the crew surrounded by more of these black things I was now guessing were old crewmembers, and nothing was stopping him.
Every time the commander looked forward again, I could see the light at the end of the tunnel coming closer and closer. It was breathtaking in the worst sense of the word, Robin.
Just as he was about to reach the surface, one last shriek was heard, and the image and sound froze. After about an hour, it came back for just 4 seconds, before it cut out for good. All we saw was that the camera was still attached to the commander, and that his body was being dragged back towards the ship.
We tried to warn our superiors, but realised very quickly that they already knew what was going on. We were given two options. Keep working with them and swear secrecy, or simply leave. I knew if I left, it wouldn’t be too long before you’d be out posting “missing” fliers for your old man, so I decided to stay and try to learn more about what is going on.
So far, we’ve learnt that this is an intelligent place somehow, but that it couldn’t have done the markings itself, so the two initial main theories still stand. Either humans have been there before and built this place that killed them in the end, or whoever was there visited us, taught us how to become a civilization and left this place behind.
But I can’t take it anymore, Robin. I can’t take seeing more of this, and there are new crews coming in faster and faster to try to take advantage of part of Planet X’s orbit while it’s still moving close enough, but every time we go there, it seems like whatever this place is, it gets more and more advanced. It creates better and more capable creatures out of humans like you and me.
I write this to you today, because one of our ships has just signalled that it’s coming back to Earth. We’ve never ordered such a thing, and don’t have any active crews up there right now. I fear that they have learned how to operate our machinery. I fear that they might be coming to us, and I’m not sure anyone is ready. I write this to you, so you can be the
whistleblower for me. I’m so very sorry, but if you have received this letter, it means I’m gone. It means I’ve been disposed of.
My dear Robin, I never meant to put you in this position, and I never thought this would be my end, but I’m trapped in here and I don’t think I’ll make it out alive. Please let everyone know that Planet X is not our new beginning. Planet X is what will bring us to extinction through our greed. Don’t tell the medium or the president. Tell all the people at the same time, prove it, and don’t trust anyone else.
I will love you forever, my free little bird.
Dad