Neith Part 1: Introduction

Author: Ron Sparks

“That’s not supposed to be there,” Eric said as he relinquished control of the eyepiece to Sarah.

She looked through the lens, “What isn’t?”

“You’re looking at Venus. Venus doesn’t have a moon, but if you look right there, on the right, you can clearly see something there.”

“Maybe an asteroid?”

Eric laughed, “No way. Asteroids aren’t that big. I’ve been observing this for a week now, making sure that I wasn’t seeing some background star or object that only appeared to be attached to Venus. This “moon” is showing phases and is moving across the sky in conjunction with Venus.”

Sarah stood up, her face nearly invisible in the darkness, “Planets don’t just suddenly sprout moons, Eric.”

“I know. This is crazy.”

“Besides,” she said, “wouldn’t others have noticed this and reported it by now? You’ve been looking at it for a week.”

He nodded, “They probably think it’s just as ludicrous as I do. I mean, if I reported this and it turned out to be false I’d get laughed right out of the building.”

Sarah dusted off her jeans, “Well I think you should report it. If you’re wrong, you can deal with a little ridicule. But if you’re right . . . ”

“That’s easy for you to say. You won’t be the one who can never show his face in the astronomy department again.”

“Yeah,” she said, “but they can’t deny their eyes. It’s right there, plain as day. Or night. Or whatever. What do you think it means?”

“I dunno,” he said as he packed up his telescope, “my mind is a whirlwind of ideas on how this could happen. Everything from aliens to alternate realities to centuries of poor astronomy. But shit,” he looked up at the sky, “we’ve sent probes there and there never showed anything even remotely like a moon around Venus.”

~~end chapter~~