The Matriarch Matrix

by Maxime Trencavel

  Well, no one else has the good taste to wear banana slugs, except his dear Mei, whose gesture was so special to him. Then the first onset of eeriness for today sends him into shivers. He asks himself again what kind of man this Alexander is that he asks, coerces, decrees, objectifying his women all over the world, forcing them to dress in color coordination as if they were his minions.

  Mei touches her MoxWrap. A door opens, and she instructs Peter, “Remember, do exactly what I ask. Trust in me. Trust in what I am about to do. You are here to learn today. Only ask germane questions and not the flippant cheeky monkey ones you did with Mr. Chapwell the Third, as doing so will only get you deep into trouble. Not only with Mr. Murometz, but with his beloved Kurdish woman.”

  He is rigid. Eyes wide. Seeing this, she takes his hand into hers and plants a wet full-lip-pressing kiss where his right dimple should be. “Above all, remember to be the bold man who pulled me back when your mother wanted to talk privately. Can you do that for me?”

  He nods, and she says, “Now, wait on the other side of the door as I get Mr. Murometz.”

  And with those instructions, they enter the room. It is round like the conference room in San Francisco, with several doors around the perimeter. But unlike San Francisco, in the middle, five white high-back chairs surround a low round clear glass table, two on one side and three on the other, set up so the participants can see each other clearly. It is lit all around the edges with a royal blue fading into a sky blue lining the ceilings. A floral scent covers a slight chlorine tinge.

  On the other side of the room is an awe-inspiring, towering man, dressed in black, watching the news play on the screens around the room. His height dominates the room as the monolith dominated the outside. More than two heads taller than Peter, over seven feet in height, he turns and faces them with his long face, long ears, and dark piercing eyes that seem as if they were seeing right through you.

  Mei goes up to this giant, and she hugs him. Not quite the typical French two-cheek kiss. To Peter, it seems more intimate, but what does he know? He grew up in California.

  “Is he ready?” Peter overhears, to which Mei nods, glancing towards Peter.

  The giant glances over at the telltale mark on Peter’s right cheek, smiles, kisses the top of her head and says, “That’s why I love you so.” And Mei leaves through a door opposite Peter.

  Alone with the gargantuan giant who turns towards him, Peter’s nerves start to get the best of him. Something very primeval quakes inside him as he shakes, staring upwards at the towering monstrous man. Should he be scared? Or very scared?

  Chapter 13

  Well, certainly no one could have been unaware of the very strange stories floating around before we left. Rumors about something being dug up on the Moon. I never gave these stories much credence, but particularly in view of some of other things that have happened, I find them difficult to put out of my mind.

  —HAL 9000, 2001: A Space Odyssey

  12:40 p.m. GMT+1, May 15, 2021

  MoxWorld EU Headquarters, Luxembourg

  His long legs only need a few strides to cross the room, and then Alexander Murometz looms over Peter, who strains his neck to look up at the man who is his new boss. At his eye level, he beholds a platinum pendant around the giant neck. A bull’s head again? A gigantic hand extends out to shake, interrupting Peter’s inquisitive thoughts, and Peter puts his own hand out meekly.

  Alexander grabs Peter’s whole arm with his other giant hand and shakes Peter’s hand, in a surprisingly warm, welcoming fashion. “Welcome, Peter. I’m so pleased you could meet me in person. Please. Sit down.”

  “It is my honor to meet you in person, Mr. Muro…Alexander.” As he sits down, Peter quips, “And it is so nice we can talk sitting down this time.” But Peter catches himself too late and wonders if he came off like a “cheeky monkey,” a term he didn’t expect to be said so bluntly by Mei.

  Taking the seat directly opposite Peter’s, Alexander asks, “Did you find Mei to be beautiful, so excellently beautiful?”

  Peter is thinking all sorts of things, some not so appropriate for the moment, but says, “I found her to be the perfect tutor. The perfect host.”

  “Excellent. I trust she briefed you on the work Jean-Paul and I have done over the past few years.”

  “Yes.”

  “Excellent. Then I will introduce you to the project for which you will be a team member. You’ve already met Mei. You’ll be meeting the other team members shortly.”

  Alexander pauses, glances aside and then back at Peter. “My boy, first let me ask you, how many people do you know of who experience the dreams you and I suffer?”

  Remembering Mei’s instruction, Peter pauses to think. He decides to answer conservatively and replies, “Other than you and me, my father, his father, my mother’s uncle, and Mei’s grandfather. That’s six in total.”

  “Excellent. And why do you think, in a world of nearly eight billion, only six are afflicted?”

  Peter thinks again. What did Mei say yesterday? Never underestimate him. Never read too little into what he asks or says. So Peter asks, “Could the answer be that I have yet to meet enough people and ask the right questions of them?”

  “Exactly, my boy. There must be more. Finding the true answer is merely a question of reaching a large enough population and screening for the behavioral and genetic markers of the affliction.”

  Peter sees the same smile on this giant’s face that he saw on his father’s face when he answered his question sitting atop his lap with the archeology journals.

  “The dreams—the affliction, as Jean-Paul calls it—run in my family as in yours. These dreams dominated our upbringing as they did yours. And from childhood, I was resolved to finally solving the meaning of the dreams, resolving the affliction itself, deciphering the meaning of the ancient traditions, determining what the object means and how to harness it for world peace.”

  Alexander pauses, gauging his young protégé’s response. “And you, Peter, my boy, what did you agree with your grandfather to do?”

  Peter does not hesitate in this answer. “The same. To finally decode the oral tradition and find the object. I guess I can add world peace too, but in all honesty, that wasn’t part of my discussion with my grandfather.”

  “Excellent. I’m pleased you feel you can be candid with me. Let us seek world peace as a goal you and I will share. Our special bond. Peter, on your journey you will find many ups and downs, many confusing new concepts, many new people whose trustworthiness you will need to ascertain. The one thing that will be certain, the one thing you will find over time to be the one constant, is the bond between us. You and I, we are more alike than different at a very deep level.”

  Peter’s brain pauses. Alike? Who is he kidding? I have a neck ache staring up at him with those piercing eyes of his. Don’t underread him, she said. I don’t read him at all, and I’m too petrified to ask.

  Pausing a moment, Alexander then describes why he built up his empire as he did. Fortunate to have access to his father’s wealth, he expanded that fortune step by step, not for the money, not for power, but in order to gain access to what was needed to solve the puzzle of the affliction and the traditions. He needed to find a way to screen billions of people in every remote corner of the earth. New technologies needed to be created and put into as many hands as possible. He needed to gain access to historical archives in libraries across the world. Jean-Paul and Mei helped him gain insights into hidden information in the Vatican and China, but he needed the advocacy of bureaucrats worldwide as well. So his reach extended deep into key organizations around the globe.

  Seeing the giant pause and stare into his eyes, Peter realizes he needs to acknowledge him. “A very well laid-out plan. Very ingenious. You have so many critics. If they only knew the truth of what you have done for mankind.”

  “You are very astute, young man. You can go far in my organization,” the giant compliments him. “I have my critics. I let th
em speak, for history is rife with critics of the successful. Driven by ignorance, by jealousy, by impotence, complete and utter impotence, critics do little to build the world. They accuse me of influence peddling. They accuse me of secret behind-closed-door deals at the highest levels of social, political, financial, and religious institutions. They accuse me of making critics, opponents, suddenly turn favorable or disappear.”

  Alexander chuckles lightly. “Ironically, the last organization accused of such global influence was the Society of Jesus, and here I have a Jesuit working with me. But a Jesuit who works not for power, or money, or worldly goods, or the charms of a thousand virgins, but to solve the traditions, find the object, and discover what it means, or what it does. And maybe for world peace.”

  Peter is enamored with this man and his vision. And his grandfather would be so proud of him; he is finally going to solve the mystery of what has ailed their family since the beginning of known time. But Peter refrains from letting Alexander know his true purpose in joining this endeavor. World peace is nice, but for his grandfather finally to find his peace is what is in the back of Peter’s head.

  Leaning forward in his chair, Alexander stares into Peter’s eyes with his own piercing dark ones and says, “Peter, I trust Mei has reviewed with you the terms of working with me? Are you on board? If so, you must trust me implicitly. Only if you fully trust me and trust your team can this mission be successful.” To which Peter agrees. Agrees fully.

  Again with those dark piercing eyes, Alexander stares straight into Peter’s soul as he says, “And there’s the confidentiality agreement you signed yesterday. If, after hearing what the mission is in totality today, you find you’re uncomfortable with it, with your role in it, with what you may need to do for it, then you can leave. But you must keep what you hear, your mere presence here, in utter confidentiality. I want your personal agreement, eye to eye on this.” Peter agrees. Fully agrees.

  “You should know, as well, there is no one alive who can tell you what happens when you break a personal agreement with me,” Alexander says ominously, and Peter shivers again.

  With these terms made perfectly clear, Alexander raises his hand and a door opens. Another tall man, shorter than Alexander but still much taller than Peter, walks through, dressed in a black vicuna turtleneck sweater with raspberry trim and black dress pants, matching Peter’s. On his chest, the flash of silver from a cross.

  “Peter, may I have the honor of introducing you to Father Jean-Paul Sobiros?” says Alexander.

  Peter stands and shakes this priest’s hands, to which he says, “Welcome, Peter. It’s merely Jean-Paul. Simply Jean-Paul. I have so awaited your arrival.”

  Alexander looks at him. “Jean-Paul. You may say you left the Order, but a source says you may still be Father Sobiros. But only one source. The others say the pope fully accepted your renouncement of your vows. I guess some things can be left a secret in your own privacy.

  “Because the good Father here is well schooled in modesty, I will provide to you his background,” Alexander says to Peter. “He holds dual PhDs in theology and philosophy, a high standard for up-and-coming Jesuits. But he also pursued a master’s in geo-archeology, specializing in extraterrestrial materials and matter, as well as a master’s in biblical archeology, specializing in your favorite topic, the alien-human interaction hypothesis.”

  Peter looks at Jean-Paul with a raised eyebrow.

  “And the good Father’s academic pursuits led to his appointment to the Pontifical Commission for Sacred Archeology, which is where he first found the traditions and history of the afflicted. Even more interesting, my sources in the Vatican indicate he was a member of a hush-hush group working on the Vatican’s strategic plan if contact were to be made with extraterrestrials, something Jean-Paul will neither confirm nor deny.” Peter looks for a reaction from the good Father, who simply stands by with his serene smile.

  “My sources also indicated he had a special relationship with His Eminence, his confidante, his point person for certain difficult subjects and situations.” Alexander looks at Jean-Paul. “I am told you and His Eminence would regularly meet behind closed doors in his private residence, on topics to which no one but you and the Pontiff are privy. Other than you, I could not find or develop a source for further clarification. And so, I offered Jean-Paul a position he could not refuse. My sources say your renouncement of your vows was very controversial, very disconcerting among the highest levels of the Church. You have my deepest respect for your sacrifice in leaving the Church. And the results of your work thus far have justified your decision.”

  Glancing at his MoxWrap, Alexander excuses himself. And Peter is alone with the former priest.

  Jean-Paul, in his serene way, assuages Peter’s apprehensions. He informs Peter he remotely watched Peter’s entire interview and testing in San Francisco. He asks Peter if he truly understands how special he is. Like Alexander, he is a direct descendant of many afflicted ancestors, and thus he possesses the most genetic concentration of the affliction markers they have found to date, other than Alexander.

  Peter stiffens and interrupts. “How do you know what my genetic structure is? Only three people in my near family are afflicted, and only two in a direct lineage.”

  Jean-Paul blinks in a measured manner. “Your mother is afflicted. Her parents are as well. Your grandmothers and grandfathers on both sides as well.”

  Stunned for the first time today, but sure more stunning is yet to come, Peter asks, “And my sister?”

  “Michaela, she possesses almost as close a DNA match with the hypothetical originator cluster as you do.”

  He explains his hypothesis of an epicenter for this affliction, only a few people. Over the millennia, these genes were diluted. But if clusters of afflicted people interbred, the genetic markers became more concentrated, and their DNA makeup more closely resembled that of the originators.

  Scratching his head, Peter asks, “But how? How did you collect and analyze people’s DNA?”

  “A miracle performed by Alexander’s several holding companies, which all provided information and resources in different incremental and additive ways. I joined with Alexander because he had developed the ability to screen billions and billions. You see, each and every one of those free MoxPhones and MoxPads contain a rudimentary one-use genetic sequencer built in. This data, along with their searches, their communications, and their notes are all screened in Alexander’s central processing facilities, which are the largest of their kind, orders of magnitude larger than those of any other company or any governmental agency. From this, we garner lists every day of possible new afflicted individuals.”

  He pauses, blinks in his measured way, closely watching Peter. “Peter, may I ask, how did you get your MoxWrap?”

  “That’s a good question. I won one for each member of my family and my girlfriend, Sarah, in a contest. Just a few months before Sarah and I moved to New York,” Peter adds sadly.

  “As in your case, we send free MoxWraps to everyone who tests as a possible high positive on the MoxPhone and MoxPad initial screenings. The MoxWrap is a much more sophisticated piece of technology. It features full gene-sequencing capabilities, multiple methods, and multiple samplings. The MoxPhone only wicks in your finger secretions through the screen membrane. The MoxWrap allows much more skin contact around your wrist as well as a greater array of biometrics. Along with the greater multitudes of uses and apps that the device offers, we can get an extremely accurate picture of an afflicted person’s behavioral markers and family tree, members of which we may send a free MoxPhone if they do not already own one.”

  The civil liberties gene in Peter erupts. “But, but what about data privacy? That’s illegal, isn’t it?”

  “Why, Peter, did you not read the user agreement required to activate your devices, and the user agreements of certain apps? Certainly you are not one of those people who simply pushes the ‘accept’ button, are you?”

  The cheeky monkey
gene just pops, as Peter the editor retorts, “You mean line four thousand out of ten thousand?”

  Jean-Paul blinks and replies, “You are close, Peter. Actually, on your unit, it was line 3278 to line 3321, with an addendum on line 8734.”

  Jean-Paul lets him absorb this information, however true or untrue it is. “The high-probability candidates worldwide are invited to interview at no cost with a MoxWorld company. And then we confirm our test algorithms and gene sequencing with fuller biological sample obtained during the interview process, and we confirm our behavioral and ancestral algorithm findings in that five-hour test you took.”

  Peter squints, trying to remember at what point they could have gotten his biological samples. Mei on the airplane? Did she take samples from him? Is that what she did when he slept? He squeezes his thighs together, imagining where she obtained genetic material from.

  “I have personally conducted final screenings with a couple hundred around the world. And you and Alexander are the most exceptional among billions around the globe.”

  Peter rubs his chin in deep contemplation. No wonder Mei said no cheeky monkey stuff. This is seriously serious stuff, the kind usually found in the science fiction stories he loves reading. If only he could write this all down, if only he could write instead of edit, he would be a best-selling author. Speaking of Mei, he asks, “And Mei?”

  Jean-Paul blinks measuredly again and replies, “She is a positive. Not as high as you and your sister, though.”

  “Does she know?”

  “She knows she’s a high moderate positive, but not the full extent of the DNA match and where. Sometimes, the DNA match means physical manifestations, including morphology, and sometimes it can mean behavioral, and sometimes it means both.”