Terminal Event

by Robert Vaughan

“If I said I would grant you an interview, would it improve the chances of you having dinner with me?”

  “Since every reporter in the country would love to talk to you right now, I would say that it dramatically improves your chances.”

  “Is that a yes?”

  “It is a yes.”

  The Jefferson Expansion Arch, gleaming in the floodlights, made an impressive showing. So, too, did Bush Stadium, lit up as it was for tonight’s baseball game between the Cardinals and the Cubs. Cars were backed up in the exit lanes of I-55, I-70, and U.S. 40, trying to get off.

  Damien turned off Broadway onto Market, where he was to meet Ava Glennon at Tony’s Restaurant. Ava had suggested Tony’s because it was close to the TV studio where she worked. One of St. Louis’s trendiest restaurants, it was also a little pricey, but northern Italian cuisine was their specialty and it was Damien’s favorite.

  Ava had made the reservation in her name, and Damien felt just the slightest diminution of his manhood, asking the maître de to show him to Miss Glennon’s table. Any lingering discomfort fled, however, when he joined her.

  “I hope you don’t mind,” Ava said, “but I haven’t eaten all day and I am starved. I told them to bring the salad as soon as you arrive.”

  “Hey, don’t mind me. I’m always ready to eat, and as far as I’m concerned, a salad is what you eat, while you are waiting to eat.” Even as Damien answered her, the waiter brought two large salads.

  “Do you like artichokes?” Ava asked as she began removing them from her salad and stacking them on the bread plate.

  “I love artichokes,” Damien said.

  Ava held her bread plate over Damien’s salad and dropped them in.

  “Thanks.”

  “I’m glad you asked me out tonight,” Ava said. “As we are adversaries, I was beginning to think that you would never talk to me.”

  “What makes you think we are adversaries?”

  Ava picked up a pepper, then bit it from its stem. “Well, think about it. You are right at the center of the most newsworthy event in the country right now, probably in the world, and I am a news reporter. My job is to get as much information from you as I can, and yours is to withhold as much as you can from me. That makes us adversaries.”

  Damien laughed. “My job isn’t to withhold information.”

  “You found six human embryos in that canister. Did you tell anyone about it?”

  “Evidently I didn’t have to. It was worldwide news within hours.”

  “That’s my point. If someone hadn’t leaked the story to us, we would still be waiting to hear about them.”

  “Who leaked the story?”

  “I can’t tell you that,” Ava replied. “As I said, my job is to get through the anti-news barrier that you and everyone else at Jeff U have put up against us.”

  “I have not erected any barrier to the news, Miss Glennon.”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake, Damien. We’re on a date. Do you call all your dates by their last name?”

  “I don’t want to be presumptuous.”

  “You aren’t presumptuous, I can testify to that. You were saying that there is no barrier to the news, yet you haven’t given a press release since this whole thing started.”

  “Oh. Well, I can answer that. I don’t feel it is my place to give press releases.”

  “Someone has to give them. And you have been named project director, haven’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then if you aren’t going to do it, who is? Have you appointed a media relations consultant?”

  “No. Are you applying for the job?”

  Ava tilted her head and looked at Damien with a curious smile. “Are you serious?”

  Damien hadn’t been serious when he made the offer, but the idea of Ava Glennon being his spokesperson held some appeal for him. “Yes,” he said. “I’m very serious.”

  Ava thought for a moment. “I’m flattered by your offer, but I think I’ll stay right where I am, trying to uncover whatever information you can’t cover up.”

  Damien waved his hand. “Believe me, I am not trying to cover up anything. If I am asked a direct question, I will answer. But the question has to be direct. I won’t help you with a fishing expedition.”

  “You want a direct question?”

  “Yes.”

  “All right.” Ava looked at him with a beguiling smile. “How did you get that scar on your forehead?”

  “What?” Damien asked, surprised by the unexpected question.

  “This scar, right here.” Reaching across the table, she ran the tip of her finger across the little, fishhook-shaped scar. Surprisingly, the contact with her finger felt cool and warm at the same time.

  “Is it that disfiguring?” Damien asked, automatically reaching up to touch it.

  “Disfiguring?” Ava shook her head. “Oh, quite the contrary, my dear professor. It gives your face interest – character – even pizzazz. So, how did you get it?”

  “I was a quarterback in college. It was fourth down, with four seconds left on the clock. We were losing by only five points to Murray State, a team that was supposed to beat us by at least three touchdowns. A touchdown could win for us, and we had one last chance. I took the snap, faded back, back, back – ” Damien paused for dramatic effect.

  “And?” Ava asked.

  “I was sacked,” he said dryly. “Cruelly and brutally. We lost the game, and I was marked for life with the sign of my inability to come up with the big play when it was most needed.”

  Ava laughed heartily. “You came out ahead.”

  “How do you figure that?”

  “If you had won the game who would have remembered? But this scar will be with you for life. And, from the way you told that story, I would say that you’ve told it before.”

  “Guilty.”

  The waiter brought the entree then. Ava had ordered veal scaloppini. Damien had one of his all-time favorites: lasagna.

  “You are aware, are you not, that there are many people who don’t want these embryos to be born?” Ava asked as they began eating.

  “You mean like Reverend Caldwell of God’s Legion?” Damien asked.

  Ava began mimicking Caldwell. “Gawd made man from mud, and he breathed life into him. And from Adam he took a rib and made a woman. Adam and Eve came from mud and gawd’s own hands and breath. They did not spring from the golden calf of Antarctica!”

  “Oh, but don’t forget the people who are positive that these are clones of Elvis Presley, JFK, Marilyn Monroe, James Dean, Amelia Earhart, and Rudolph Valentino,” Damien said, and they both laughed.

  “The problem is,” Damien continued on a more serious note, “that it isn’t just Caldwell and his followers who are causing trouble. There are actually large segments of mainstream Christians, Jews, and Muslims who say we should not bring these embryos to term.”

  “Oh, I hope they don’t win out,” Ava said. “I want them to be born.”

  “Why?”

  “For one thing, I’m curious about them. I want to know where they came from.”

  “They won’t be able to tell us. When they are born, they’ll be just like the rest of us.”

  “I suppose so. Still, I think it would be fascinating. Off the record, and I promise I won’t quote you on this, where do you think they really came from?”

  “I’ve been giving that more thought than you can possibly realize. There are a lot of unexplained mysteries in our past. Did you know, for example, that we have found batteries that are over a thousand years old? And we think the Egyptians may have had some sort of electric light because there are no signs of smoke on the highly decorated walls of some of the tombs, but it would have been impossible to paint those pictures in the dark. Also there are some drawings of men holding a shaft, connected to what appears to be a battery, with light coming from the shaft.”

  “I’ve always wondered about the pyramids, the Sphinx, and the pictographs that can only be seen from the air,” Ava
said.

  “You are right to wonder,” Damien admitted, “for no one has ever come up with a universally accepted explanation for all these things.”

  “Do you think your embryos have something to do with all that? I mean, in vitro fertilization, that is a very recent procedure, isn’t it?”

  “Among the ancients, we have found examples of brain surgery performed successfully,” Damien replied. “Is it that great a leap to suggest that in vitro fertilization may have been possible as well?”

  “So, who do you think left the canister? The Egyptians?”

  “Egyptian culture was at its zenith less than five thousand years ago. We have no idea how old the canister is, but we are pretty sure that it had already been under the ice long before the first pyramid was built.”

  “So you are saying that some civilization, long before the Egyptians, had the technical expertise to bury embryos thousands of feet under the ice?”

  “Yes.”

  “Oh, my,” Ava said. “I’m sorry now that I made this off the record. I could really get a story from this.”

  “And destroy all my credibility,” he said. “But go ahead, my life is in your hands. I ask only that you be gentle.”

  Ava laughed, then put her hand across the table and let it rest lightly on his. “I shall be charitable,” she promised.

  Ava had come directly to the restaurant from the network, so when they finished eating, Damien walked her back to her car. Such an arrangement precluded any opportunity for a casual “night-cap” which, at this point in their relationship was probably good. He held the door to her Lexus for her and, just before she slipped in behind the wheel, she kissed him. Though not a deep lover’s kiss, it was more than a casual kiss, for he felt her lips open slightly under his, and he could taste her refreshed lipstick, the after-dinner mint, and what he could only think of as “essence of Ava.”

  “Do ask me out again, Damien,” she said. “I don’t anchor the news on weekends.”

  “I will,” Damien promised. He watched her drive off before he returned to his own car.

  Damien’s drive home took him down Skinker Boulevard by Forrest Park. The park was filled with tents, and the parking lots were crowded with cars, vans, and campers. The Reverend Phillip R. Caldwell had come to St. Louis from his world headquarters in Atlanta. He had called for an ecumenical gathering of the faithful of all religions, and thousands had responded. “God’s Legion” as they called themselves, came to St. Louis to let it be known that they were opposed to giving life to the embryos. Caldwell was demanding that the embryos be destroyed and the golden calf, as he called the cylinder, be melted down and the gold be given to the national treasury.

  A Sunday-morning talk-show host pointed out to Caldwell that he opposed abortion on the grounds that life began the moment the egg was fertilized. Therefore, by destroying the embryos, he would be committing de-facto abortion. Caldwell sidestepped the accusation by declaring that “life begins in the womb, not in a golden calf.”

  That statement became the rallying cry, not only of God’s Legion, but of everyone who was opposed to letting the embryos be born. A huge sign facing Skinker Boulevard read, “Life begins in the womb, not in the golden calf.”

  When Damien got back to his apartment he was greeted by Charlie, a Jack Russell terrier. Charlie sat on Damien’s lap, letting Damien rub him behind the ears as he watched one of the many cable news shows that was devoting all its time to the South Pole cylinder.

  “I think people who have called us conspiracy freaks and UFO nuts are going to have to rethink their attitude now,” one of the guests was saying. “Clearly, what we have here is directly related to the Roswell Incident.”

  “Related in what way?” the host asked.

  “Well, can’t you see? When the UFO crashed at Roswell, nearly all the aliens were killed. But the U.S. government took eggs from the females and sperm from the males in order to create these embryos. Then, they put them in a cylinder and buried them down at the South Pole. The only thing is, they didn’t count on them being found so soon.”

  “How do you explain the fact that, in 1947 in vitro fertilization had not yet been developed?” the host asked.

  “Ah, by humans it hadn’t been developed, but don’t forget, our government was dealing with aliens then. Clearly, the aliens told them how to do it.”

  “So, you want the embryos to be born?”

  “You’re damn right I do. When they are born and you see those skinny little bodies with the big heads and bug-eyes, our case will be made.”

  There were several other guests who had their own take on the situation, but the one who made the biggest impression on Damien was a well-known science-fiction writer. It was his contention that the embryos were left by some race of technologically advanced people who, for some reason, had died out.

  “I believe they left these embryos so they would be discovered thousands of years later. It’s as if they are sending a message to us.”

  The host noted, “Mr. Vance, it is easy to see why you are so successful as a science fiction writer.”

  5

  “You are going to meet with the President?” Ava asked. Their relationship had advanced to the point that this conversation was taking place in the living room of Damien’s apartment.

  “Yes. Apparently he wants a briefing about the embryos from the horse’s mouth, so to speak.”

  “What are you going to tell him?”

  “I’m going to tell him exactly what I have told you,” Damien said. “I’m going to tell him everything I know.”

  “Do tell President Tobin that I said hello, will you?”

  Damien laughed. “After the way you treated him during the last debate, what makes you think he wants to hear from you?”

  “Ohh…what a shot,” Ava replied, though the smile let Damien know that she was taking it in the good humor with which it had been offered.

  Damien had never flown first class before, but he had never been invited to meet with the President of the United States before, either. The 757 was still climbing as he looked out the window to see that they were passing over the Mississippi River. Shortly after they reached cruising altitude, a very attractive flight attendant appeared beside his seat.

  “Would you like something to drink, sir?”

  “No, thank you, I’m fine,” he said.

  He leaned his head back against the seat and listened as she passed down the aisle, greeting the others. He must have dozed off because the next thing he was aware of was the sound of the landing gear being lowered.

  When he left the plane at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, he saw someone holding a sign with his name.

  “I’m Damien Thornton,” he said.

  “I have a car waiting for you, sir.”

  The car was a black Cadillac stretch limousine sitting in a no-parking area right in front of the exit. There were two uniformed police officers keeping watch over the car.

  The driver opened the back door for him and Damien was surprised to see someone sitting in the back seat.

  “Dr. Thornton, I’m Phil Wilson, the president’s science adviser. Welcome to Washington.”

  “Thank you, Dr. Wilson. I read your paper on DNA sequencing with chain-terminating inhibitors. It was a brilliant study.”

  Wilson smiled. “I’m always surprised, and, I must say, pleased, when I meet someone who has actually read something that I have written. Unlike your book, After Pangea, none of my efforts have ever made the New York Times list.”

  Damien laughed modestly. “Believe me, that was a completely unexpected anomaly.”

  The car moved swiftly through D.C. traffic, passed through the gate, and stopped under the portico of the White House. Damien then followed Wilson through the White House to the West Wing where the president’s appointment’s secretary was sitting behind her desk. She smiled at the two men.

  “Good morning, gentlemen.”

  “Hello, Betty. Would you inform th
e President that I have Professor Damien Thornton with me?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  To Damien’s surprise, President Timothy Tobin, a tall somewhat stooped figure, emerged from the Oval Office to personally escort the two men back inside. At the president’s invitation Damien sat on one of the two facing sofas, the president sat across from him. Wilson sat in one of the chairs.

  “Professor Thornton,” the President said, after the preliminaries were over. “I’ve read all the speculation in the press, I’ve heard the talking heads on TV, but I want to hear it directly from you. Do you think the embryos are extraterrestrial?”

  “I can’t say, definitely, that they are not,” Damien replied. “But I don’t believe they are. I think they are human, from right here on earth.”

  “I have been led to believe that, at the depth from which they were recovered, that they have to have been there for thousands of years,” the President said.

  “Hundreds of thousands of years would be more likely.”

  “But how is that possible?” The president laughed. “I mean, I think we can eliminate any speculation that Cro-Magnon man had the technology to isolate, store, and protect embryos for thousands of years, can’t we?”

  Damien laughed as well. “I would say that is a safe assumption, Mr. President.”

  “Then I want an opinion from you, and I promise you I understand that, at this point, I’ll be getting your best guess only. Tell me, Dr. Thornton, what do you think is the origin of the embryos?”

  “My best guess, Mr. President, is that they came from a very advanced and heretofore unknown civilization.”

  “If that is true, what happened to them?”

  “Again, Mr. President, it is only my best guess, but I think that some catastrophic event wiped out all human life.”

  “May I ask a question?” the science adviser said.

  “Of course, Phil, that’s why I wanted you here.”

  “Dr. Thornton, if this earlier civilization became extinct, as you suggest, where did we come from? Are you suggesting that we are, in fact, regenerated from this earlier civilization? Or did we spring anew?”