Terminal Event

by Robert Vaughan

  “Do you think he can keep quiet about it?” Lewis asked.

  “He’s worth over twenty billion dollars,” Calhoun said. “He didn’t make that much money by giving away all of his business secrets.”

  “The problem is, Worley owns the Digital News Network, which means that telling secrets are his business,” Damien said.

  “Are you suggesting we don’t tell him?” McElwain asked.

  “No, I think Walt is right. There may come a time that we will need a lot more money from Worley, and if he thinks we’ve been keeping things from him, he may not be inclined to be as generous as he has been.”

  “I agree,” McElwain said. “We are going to have to tell him everything. I’ll get a report off to him.”

  “Is there any chance of that report being compromised?” Lewis asked.

  “No, he’s provided us with a protected access to his private server,” McElwain said.

  After he finished a round of golf on one of the six golf courses that he owned, this one in Florida, Marcus Worley walked out to the helicopter that sat on the pad in front of the club house. The Sikorsky S-92 was painted white with the windows set inside an anodized gold stripe that ran from the front of the helicopter to the rear. The name Worley, was written in script in large blue letters below the windows.

  Worley made a little whirling motion with his finger as he approached the aircraft, a signal to his pilot to start the engine. The blades began to rotate slowly, but quickly became a blur as he strapped himself into the seat.

  “What have you got for me, Edna?” Worley asked the woman who was sitting in the large, leather chair just across from him.

  “The latest report on the Antarctic Six,” Edna replied, handing him a manila folder.

  Edna Cunningham was a 52-year-old widow whose husband, Colonel Hiram Cunningham, had been killed in Iraq twenty years ago. She had come to work for Worley shortly thereafter and in the last twenty years had become one of his most trusted employees. She knew all his business arrangements, knew who he would want to talk to and who he wouldn’t want to talk to, and was extremely adept at putting them off. Of all his employees, only she had unlimited access to him.

  Edna had been a very beautiful young woman and was still quite attractive, but there had never been anything between them except a very close and interdependent working relationship. Worley didn’t want to jeopardize that arrangement by anything as volatile as sex, and Edna, who was earning half a million dollars a year, felt the same way. Despite the fact that there had never been a sexual relationship between them, or perhaps because of it, they were very close.

  “Are they wanting more money?” Worley asked.

  “No, sir, they’re just keeping you abreast of things. There’s quite a surprise in this report.”

  “Oh? None of the babies have gotten ill, have they?”

  “What babies?” Edna asked with a smile.

  “What do you mean what – ?” Worley was looking at the papers and something he saw stopped him in mid-sentence. “My God! This can’t be real!”

  When Damien went down to the television station he was granted immediate access to the green room because not only did everyone know who he was, they also knew of his relationship to Ava. Ava was in the middle of her show, and Damien took a Sprite from the refrigerator, then sat on the sofa to watch the telecast on the monitor.

  Because so much of the news was harsh, some of it even frightening, every show featured at least one story that was designed to ameliorate the hard-edged reports that filled the broadcast. These, her staff called “soft and fuzzies.”

  Ava was just concluding her soft and fuzzy.

  “…the dog, which was a stray, is credited with saving the lives of the Mikerson family by standing out front and barking loudly enough to wake them up, warning them of the fire.”

  The picture on the screen was of a man, woman, and two children gathered around a little white dog that seemed happy with all the attention.

  “I’m happy to say that the dog is no longer homeless. And that’s America Tonight.”

  The picture changed to that of an insurance commercial, and Damien stepped out of the Green Room to wait for Ava.

  Ava greeted him with a kiss.

  “I liked your story about the dog,” Damien said.

  “That’s because he looked a lot like Charley.”

  Damien smiled. “Yes, he did, didn’t he?”

  “Damien, I’m going to ask you the same thing I have asked every night for the last month,” Ava said. “When can I see Michael?”

  “You never give up, do you?” Damien replied.

  Ava smiled. “Nope, and I’m going to keep asking until I wear you down.”

  “Before we go any further with this, Ava, I have to have your promise of absolute secrecy.”

  “All right,” Ava agreed. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to be so secretive about, I mean by now the entire world knows about them. But if you need my promise before you’ll let me see Michael, I promise.”

  “You can see him tomorrow.”

  “Oh, great! I know he isn’t really my child, but I did give birth to him. Will you let me pick him up and hold him?”

  “I doubt that you will be able to.”

  “Why not? I mean, if everyone is afraid of bonding, I don’t think the baby will bond with just one hug. But if that’s a requirement all right, I’ll keep my hands to myself.”

  “I don’t mean you can’t pick him up because you won’t be allowed to. I mean you can’t pick him up because, physically, you will not be able to pick him up. Michael, and all the others, are the size of ten-year-old children.”

  “You don’t mean that! That’s not possible!”

  “From everything I know about biology, and about the physiology of the human body, I agree with you. Nevertheless, Michael and the others have matured to that of a ten year old.”

  Ava was stunned by Damien’s words. “I guess I can see why you would want this a secret,” she said.

  “Do you still want to see him, knowing what I just told you?”

  “Of course I do.”

  “All right,” Damien said. “I’ve got it all set up for you. Come to the Six House tomorrow morning.”

  “What time?”

  “Ava, Michael isn’t going anywhere, so you can come at whatever time is convenient for you. Just give me a call so they’ll know when to expect you.”

  “Will you be there?”

  “I’ll meet you there, but I’ll let you decide whether you want me to go in with you, or meet him by yourself.”

  “I think I would like to meet him by myself.”

  Damien smiled. “I thought you would. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  It was ten o’clock in the morning when Ava pulled into the parking lot near what had been the surrogate house. She was met by one of the security guards as she stepped out of the car. Because he had also been one of the guards who had watched over the surrogate mothers, they knew each other.

  “Hello, Miss Glennon,” the guard greeted with a smile.

  “Hello, Mr. Coker.”

  “Professor Thornton said you would be coming to see the children today. He’s waiting for you. You’re the only surrogate mother to come back, by the way,” Coker said, waiting to escort her to the house.

  “Yes, well, all the others have returned to their homes,” Ava replied. “Have you seen the children?”

  Coker shook his head. “No, ma’am, they are really keeping a close eye on those babies. Nobody but Professor Thornton ‘n the other doctors have seen ‘em. I’d kinda like to see ‘em though. They must be cute little buggers about now.”

  Coker’s comment surprised her. He was one of the security guards and not even he had seen them. They really were keeping this a very close secret.

  “This is as far as I can go,” Coker said when they reached the dorm. “This is The Six House.”

  Damien stepped out onto the porch.

  “Come on in,�
� he invited. Ava followed him into the reception room.

  “Before you go in, I want to show you a picture that I took of Michael just a few minutes ago,” Damien said.

  Damien called up a photo on his phone, then showed it to Ava, who gasped when she saw it.

  “This, is Michael?”

  “Yes.”

  The last time she had seen him, no more than a month ago he had been a newborn infant that she held close to her. What she was looking at now was a particularly handsome boy, with large, deep blue, expressive eyes.

  “I know you told me about this but…” she said, unable to complete the comment.

  “Words like impossible, unbelievable, shocking, astonishing, incredible ...have no meaning now. At least not with these six,” Damien said. “That’s why I showed you his picture. I want all the shock to be gone by the time you actually meet him.”

  “When I meet him, can I tell him who I am?”

  Damien had to smile. “You won’t have to.”

  When Ava stepped into the room that had been set aside for her to meet Michael, the photograph had not really prepared her for what she saw. There was no way this could be the baby she had cuddled but four weeks ago. But she knew that Damien had no reason to lie to her.

  The boy was sitting at a laptop, his fingers flying over the keyboard. He looked up when Ava came into the room then stood and smiled at her.

  “Michael, do you know who I am?” Ava asked.

  “Yes, ma’am. You are Ava Glennon, the only child of Dan and Linda Glennon. Your father is a lawyer, your mother a school teacher. You are a two time winner of the Edward R. Murrow award, you also won the Emmy Award for a documentary you did on the effect the War in Afghanistan has had on the girls and women there. You have been voted best female news personality three times. You are a graduate of the University of Missouri, during which time you were selected as Miss Missouri, and were first runner up as Miss America. You also have a master’s degree from Washington University in St. Louis.”

  Ava said, “Heavens, how do you know so much about me?”

  “I have read about you,” Michael replied.

  “Then you also know that I am your mother.”

  “No, ma’am, you carried me to term, but you aren’t my mother,” Michael said.

  “Technically, I suppose that’s true,” Ava said. “Michael, are you and the others disturbed by having to live here, locked up like this?”

  “No,” Michael said. “This is as it should be.”

  “But don’t you miss being able to go outside and play with other children?”

  Michael smiled. “It is not our mission to ‘play’ with other children.”

  “Mission? Heavens, aren’t you awfully young to have a mission?”

  “We are not young, Ava. We are old. We are very old,” Michael said.

  13

  After Ava left, Damien went to the day room where all six of the children were sitting at computers. The speed with which they were typing certainly belied the scene because while they looked like ten-year-old children, the monitor screens were moving at a very rapid pace.

  Michael was interfacing with a website dealing in quantum entanglement and he looked up as Damien approached.

  “Hello, Dr. Thornton,” Michael said.

  Damien returned the greeting. “What did you think of your visit with Ava?”

  “It was a pleasant visit. I think she feels a degree of attachment with me, based upon the fact that she carried me to term.”

  “I’m sure you understand that it’s a natural thing.”

  “Yes. After all the surrogate mothers did have to undergo treatments designed to synthesize conditions of pregnancy while they carried us, so I’m certain that their reactions were every bit as physiological as psychological.”

  Damien couldn’t help laughing at this. “That’s pretty astute, Michael, for a child who is only a hundred thousand years old.”

  Michael laughed as well. “I’m sorry. I suppose we do come across as a bit supercilious. We are still having to adapt.”

  Social media picked up the story first, as supposedly authoritative articles appeared on the internet, then television reports, then in print.

  What has happened to the Antarctic Six? It is now known that the story released to the public, claiming that the embryos were implanted in surrogate mothers was all a ruse. They were never intended to be carried to term. Instead, these human embryos were dissected as if they were frogs in a high school biology class.

  The grocery store tabloids had their own version of the story.

  U.S. military takes control of Antarctic Six

  Although the military and the United States government have tried to keep it secret. It is now an accepted fact that the embryos, with a DNA that is nearly identical to human beings, are in fact not human at all, but are creatures from far beyond our own solar system. The aliens possess incredible powers and are being cloned to be used as warriors for the U.S. military. All information is being classified as top secret.

  The internet speculations and the supermarket tabloids could be easily dismissed, but when the United Nations Security Council got involved, it became even more serious.

  “The delegate from the Russian Federation is recognized.”

  “Madam President, as the entire world knows, an exploration team from the United States recently discovered six frozen embryos beneath the ice at the South Pole. Since the public announcement of that discovery, the world has been kept in the dark as to status of those embryos.

  “We have heard stories suggesting that American biologists dissected them, and we have heard stories that examination showed them to be creatures who possessed supernatural powers. The same story that ascribed supernatural powers to the creatures, has also suggested that the Americans are cloning the creatures so that they may build an army of warriors with superhuman strength.

  “I believe that this body of nations, assembled, should inform the Americans that because the canister was found in that part of Antarctica that, by treaty cannot be claimed by any sovereign nation on earth, the embryos belong, not to America, but to the entire world.

  “I believe, also, that this deliberative body should demand that the United States make the study of these embryos open to scientists from around the world.”

  “Thank you, Ambassador Boykov. Does Madam Ambassador Welch wish to respond?” the Security Council president asked.

  “I do, Madam President,” Anita Welch replied. “I can, and do, categorically deny that the embryos were dissected, and I deny that they were cloned. However the scientific examination of the Antarctic Six is ongoing, and intensive, and we feel that at this point, any disruption in the routine, such as introducing other scientists to the research team would be detrimental to the ongoing project.

  “We ask that the rest of the world remain patient, and refrain from intruding into the activity for fear of compromising the work. We are keeping a detailed record of all procedures and results and will, at the appropriate time, make everything known.’

  U.N. Security Council Votes to Censure U.S.

  Thirteen of the fifteen members of the United Nations Security Council voted to censure the United States for failing to provide information on the status of the Antarctic Six. Though the U.S., as a permanent member of the council has veto power, it abstained, rather than veto the vote. Great Britain also abstained, whereas France, China, and Russia voted for censure.

  Ava Glennon, who had returned to her desk as a commentator for Digital News Network, reported the story of the censure as did every other news organization in the world. Unlike every other news organization, however, she knew the real story. She knew that The Six had not only had been born, but were aging at an extremely rapid rate.

  “I’m sitting on the biggest story of my career,” she complained to Damien, “and I can’t use it.”

  “Ava, we could have kept you out of it entirely,” Damien replied. “You are not only aware of the story
; you are part of the story. And because of that, you, more than anyone, should understand our reasons for keeping everything quiet.”

  Over the next few weeks Ava came often to the Six House, visiting not only with Michael, but with the other five as well. In so doing, she had watched them grow from precocious children, to adults.

  “When are we going to tell the true story about them?” Ava asked. “The stories that are being spread now are wild, and are going to get even more outrageous. Don’t you think it’s time that we told the truth?”

  “You remember the reactions we had when people were calling them spawns of Satan, don’t you?” Damien said. “What do you think they would say if they knew that these children, who, if they were normal, wouldn’t even be born yet, are now twenty-one-year-old adults? Do you think they would be safe?”

  “Oh, I hadn’t thought that they might be in danger,” Ava said. “I see what you mean.”

  On one of Damien’s visits, Michael asked him if he could convene all the scientists and government officials who had taken part in the program.

  “We have an announcement we would like to make,” Michael said.

  “Yes, of course I’ll be glad to assemble them,” Damien said.

  At one o’clock that afternoon, twenty-five of the men and women who had been an integral part of the program from the very beginning gathered in a meeting room of the Six House.

  The Six had put out chairs for their guests, and had even arranged for punch, coffee, and pastries for them. There was a podium in front of the meeting room, and six chairs were arranged in a semi-circle in front of the room, which made it obvious that the meeting would not be conducted by the scientists who had been monitoring the program, but by The Six themselves.

  Not until all the biologists were seated did The Six come into the room, now all, tall, handsome men and beautiful women.

  Five of the Six took their seats as Michael stepped up to the podium.