Written by Michael Landolfi – A National Geographic film crew has cameras rolling as Professor Ignatius Trok unearths his most recent find.
He faces the camera and says, “This eight ton triceratops has lain undisturbed for at least sixty-five million years. The fossilized skeleton is totally intact. There are at least twenty more just like it buried on this ten-acre site and they are all facing the same direction, as though the herd was running away from some mortal threat. It’s the greatest discovery of my life.”
Moments after the huge fossil is lifted from its grave an assistant races to the professor and says, “Professor come quick, you must see this!”
The film crew follows.
In the dinosaur’s former tomb, the sun’s rays are bent back toward the witnesses.
“What on earth?”
All available persons begin to carefully excavate the object. In ten minutes it’s lifted by the same crane that hoisted the dinosaur fossil.
Professor Trok faces the camera again and describes the artifact, “Unbelievably, beneath our triceratops we have unearthed a metallic disc-shaped object. It’s approximately three feet in diameter. One side is flat and crisscrossed with saw-toothed ridges two inches deep. The other side is dome shaped and sports three broken mounting brackets.”
The film crew zooms in on the object.
Two months later, news agencies around the world repeat the U.S. President’s words, “Professor Trok has uncovered the most important discovery ever made by mankind. Laboratories in Switzerland, Germany, and the U.S. agree the disc is composed of a previously unknown metal. This changes everything. It is the discovery of a lifetime.”
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Asheville native, Michael Landolfi survived Catholic school, the 70s and the Marine Corps. He lives an untamed life in Bent Creek, is on the trails daily and writes wild stories for those with short attention spans. His tales will tickle your funny bone, pinch your heart and twist your gut. Imagination run wild. Find out for yourself. His new book, 5-Minute Short Stories: A Bathroom Book, containing 35, 5 minute stories, is available on Amazon.
