lecting chabazite, mica and quartz geodes.

He had lost all sense of time in his

pursuits and as he climbed towards the plateau above the temple of Caik, he
spotted a circle of basalt pillows that appear to have been laid deliberately by
the human hand. To investigate it further he got close to them and started looking
around. After some examination he realized that the stone circle was a likely
remnant of the ancient megalithic peoples streaming into the peninsular of the
subcontinent. While scanning the rocky debris in side the circle he found a metal
ingot with the image of the Vetla, an agent of Rudra, stamped on to it. It was
clearly from an age closer to the current time. He realized that it was likely
dropped by the Vetla-worshiping tribesmen who gathered on the adjacent hillock on
certain nights for an animal sacrifice. His excitement knew no bounds at his find,
which suddenly made him aware of the time, and he headed home.

The next day school was off much to the relief of Somakhya. Lootika was to visit
him for lunch and then hang on. Somakhya was in his home lab when he heard his
mother intercept Lootika at the gate. Much to his embarrassment he heard her
quizzing Lootika about the questions on the just concluded exams and how she had
answered them. Lootika answered that she had already forgotten about them. S.M:
Lootika, but would it not be nice cosmetics if you guys actually translated your
intelligence into splendid results on the exams? Lootika: Nice cosmetics may be,
but for whom to behold? As long as we pass and go to the next class what do these
exams matter? And not that we are barely scraping through. Then Somakhyas mother
proceeded to ask Lootika in regard to some molecular biologist featured in that
days newspaper: Would you someday be rich and famous like him. Somakhya was now
positively concerned knowing how brusque Lootika could be. He half got up from the
microscope to distract them and bring her in quickly. Thankfully, Lootika responded
with a boring answer: I am not too good with names of people so I will have to
read the article to find out what he works on precisely to give you an appropriate
answer. This answer was so confusingly unexciting for Somakhyas mother that she
decided not to pursue that line questioning any further. Somakhya heaved a sigh of
relief that unnecessary fires were not lit.

She ushered Lootika taking the box with some food item which Lootika had brought
along asking her: Should I have my husband drop you back home in the evening I
just saw in the news that an animated protest for the aggrandizement of the local
apabhraa was to take place. As you know this is often coupled with
pratibrhmaatvam and we could be a target. L: So it is. A member of one of the
protest-organizing committees even asked me to join saying that the brhmaa-s
proscribed females from using the artificial Sanskrit language. So it was natural
for women to stand by those fighting for all education in the state language! In
any case thank you but no worries; my father said hell pick me up in the evening.

After lunch Somakhya and Lootika were engrossed in a deep discussion on silicate
minerals and Somakhya was showing her the minute crystals of various minerals under
his microscope even as they set aside samples for chemical analysis. Lootika
produced from her bag a rock which she had found. It had a striking globular
crystal growth with the surface of each globule having a smaller crystals a bit
of fractality. At base of the globular growths was another mineral with a smooth
more glassy surface. L: What is this one? Somakhya closely examined it with a
lens: The globular crystals are a good specimen of chalcedony while the the
mineral at the base is moganite. Such appear to have formed in some quantity in our
local basalts during the end of the Mesozoic.

As they they set up some acid treatments for qualitative analysis Lootika remarked:
Deep within the two of us are svbhvika biochemists and these minerals have a bit
of an alien touch! Studying their chemistry makes me even more skeptical of
Silicon-based life outside of computers elsewhere in the universe.
S: In most part I tend to agree with one possible exception that deserves more
discussion. We have been looking at a bunch of zeolite structures and as you would
have noted while there is the same tetrahedral geometry there is much less tendency
for lability and tendency to prefer oxygen over hydrogen in this indeed I would
posit lies the difference between the ability to make life or not. The one
exception being certain clays, which some have seen as a possible Si based form of
life.
L: Ah! talking of clays I forgot to show you this. She pulled out a bottle with
an interestingly colored clay in it. This one is from Sagaradurga. Somakhya
prepared a mount of the clay under the microscope and remarked: You see those
crystals are believed to be part of a templating mechanism that allows clays to be
treated as a type of Si-based life.
Having taken a close look Lootika donned her spectacles again saying: But is such
accurate templating not a general process in any crystal growth? You would recall
our freezer experiment to grow snowflakes that our parents would hate us for. While
every snowflake is unique, the six sectors of each snow flake are often accurate
copies of each other suggesting that templating mechanism around the core starter
is transmitted quite faithfully even in water. But such templating hardly gets you
to life. Moreover while it might be moderately accurate across the six sectors it
is too mutable between snow flakes to represent any faithful information
transmission.
S: Thats right. The snowflake is a good example for how ac