Roleplay: "Contact: Impact"

NASA, Mission Control, Houston, 03:17 UTC

"Confirm, object has entered the atmosphere! Speed 14 kilometers per second, angle of entry 38 degrees!" the radar operator's voice was alarmed.

NASA's control room fell into tense silence. All the screens showed the same thing - an unknown object, which had appeared on long-range surveillance just 12 minutes ago, had crossed the upper layers of the atmosphere and was heading towards Earth.

"Where is the impact point?" the mission director asked sharply, leaning towards the main display.

"Calculations indicate that it is somewhere in the area of Nevada..." the operator froze, then added: "...about 80 kilometers northwest of Area 51."

A hum of voices swept through the room. Coincidence? Unlikely.

03:24 UTC, Nevada, coordinates 37.2°N, 115.8°W

When the object hit the ground, the night sky lit up with a bright blue light, as if lightning had flashed in clear air. The blast wave blew out the windows of a nearby research station. Seismographs recorded a tremor of 4.1 points.

Ten minutes later, the first group of military personnel was already heading to the crash site. They expected to find an ordinary meteorite - a melted, cracked, red-hot piece of rock.

But what they found defied explanation.

In a crater surrounded by black burnt sand lay a smooth, almost perfectly symmetrical object, shimmering with a strange purple glow. The surface seemed metallic, but no known substance could withstand such temperatures without damage.

And most disturbingly, the object was pulsating, as if... breathing.

NASA, 03:41 UTC

"We've lost the signal from the drone sent to the object," the technician said, his fingers clutching the edge of the table.

Dr. Emily Carter, still watching the live feed from the second drone's camera, felt her throat tighten.