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by Clint Townsend

  Those fortunate enough to be invited to dine with Dr. Wyczthack were treated to a visually stunning feast for the eyes prior to the meal being served. Intricate crown molding, fifteen-foot walls, and ornate sixteenth-century tapestries hung from the cathedral-style ceiling. Colorful Chihully glass sculptures, fireplaces, fountains, rare flowering plants, and a mammoth wet bar kept Cain’s attendees delightfully distracted until time for dinner.

  Cain and Bianca commissioned the production of twenty-five tables and three hundred chairs specifically for Bacchus Hall. The round, one-piece tables, large enough to seat ten people comfortably, twelve at most, were lovingly sculpted and carved from exotic hardwoods from around the world. The master craftsmen incorporated combinations of Afromosia, Cocobolo, Ebony, Mahogany, Tiger and Zebra woods, burled Walnut, Bubinga, and Carpathian Elm. Because of the beautiful and brilliant artistry of the tables, a conscious decision was made to not cover them even during meal service. The only linens provided to the guests during their dining experience would be that of their napkins.

  For the evening’s entrees, Bianca and the chef decided on Russian caviar to be paired with Alaskan Salmon and Maine lobster, and a choice of hand-carved Japanese Kobe or Nebraska grass-fed bison steaks. With fresh floral centerpieces, Swarovski crystal candle bases, Christofle silverware, and Raynaud fine bone China, it was more than appropriate that the Chateau Latour be poured in Riedel glasses.

  ***

  The steak was flavorful and juicy, the salmon tender and flaky, and the Bordeaux luscious, deep, and robust. The meal had been executed without so much as one hiccup.

  Once the attentive staff had cleared the plates, the diners were left to enjoy their coffee and Bollinger champagne.

  Cain’s speech and spiel had progressed nicely, right up to the point when he casually said, “Fifty million dollars. Each.”

  “Fifty million dollars?!” the audience repeated with incredulity.

  Of the one hundred invited guests, a dozen silently rose from their seats and promptly exited the lavish dinner. The remainder of attendees, while voicing their strong objections to such an astronomical cost, did not leave the opulent feast.

  “How many inhabitants did you say will be in each Cloud?” a man seated in front of Cain rudely called out.

  “We will deploy three thousand individuals to each of the Clouds,” Cain replied.

  “That’s more than three trillion dollars!” another man shouted.

  “Yes, it is,” Cain stated.

  Several more dinner guests stood and departed in quiet protest.

  “Do you plan to introduce any of the selected inhabitants to your EC’s?” asked Muhammad bin Ibrahim, the governor for the Central Bank of Malaysia.

  “No,” Dr. Wyczthack flatly answered. “There will be no direct contact with any Cloud inhabitants. We do not intend to introduce human interaction of any kind.”

  “Well, if you don’t mind my asking, then what motivation is there for me to surrender my wealth for an experiment?”

  The gaggle of elite financiers, corporate presidents, intellectuals, and filthy rich began to mumble and whisper. Although deep down inside Cain despised the brood of real estate moguls, railroad magnates, and financial wizards, he was forced to admit to himself that Engenechem, while more powerful than Amazon, Apple, Google, and Wal-Mart, lacked the cash reserves necessary for self-funding the Cloud Program. Engenechem had more than enough means to see the Cloud Program to fruition, but it meant lengthy delays in construction, fabrication, and assembly of the Clouds. Waiting for cash reserves to build themselves up again would take years, maybe a decade. If Cain wanted his Cloud Program to stay on course, he’d be forced to ask for outside assistance.

  “Mr. Ibrahim, ladies and gentlemen, this is more than a grand experiment. We’re not conducting a summer internship at some community college or running a contest for nominees to live in a bio dome for a week. This isn’t space camp for teenagers. The Cloud Program will be … is … the pinnacle of scientific research, the standard by which all future endeavors will be judged … the crowning achievement in mankind’s quest to establish human life beyond Earth. As we are all well aware, our planet is dying. We’re killing it! Every day, little by little, ever so slowly, we are destroying this precious world. Drilling, mining, excavating, deforestation, air pollution, water pollution, soil contamination … doomsday is fast approaching, whether we want to admit it or not. We are now, and have been, preparing for Earth’s inevitable demise, be it next week or next century.”

  The subdued and emotionally deficient snobs were unappreciative of Cain’s semimotivational speech.

  “But a thirty-year experiment?” Mr. Ibrahim again spoke up. “And you expect us to foot the bill?”

  “This might seem a bit awkward,” Cain stated, “but it’s an absolute necessity. The fifty million-dollar price tag for this privilege is, at least to you in this room, all but a trifle. Think of this in the context of corporate sponsorship, in place of a fee or expense. Imagine that you’re Phil Knight in the late nineteen-eighties, and your company, Nike, is on the hunt for the next Michael Jordan.”

  The intimate crowd still wasn’t biting.

  “Meesta Cahn,” said Akio Mimura, the director and president of Nippon Steel, “You wi find that insuting our interregence make us weary of doing business wit Engenchem. Why do you make such pwopostwous wequest?”

  “Mr. Mimura, please believe me when I tell you that no insult was intended. While Engenechem has always positioned itself with generating, and sustaining, a vast source of income, the costs for the Cloud Program have, shall we say, expanded beyond our immediate means. Total costs for Cloud construction is $125 billion dollars … each. Bathrooms, dormitories, propulsion systems, air and water filtration and purification systems, lighting, waste management and collection, communication systems, clothing, medical facilities … food … it’s mind-boggling when you consider everything it takes to sustain life in an environment where it’s impossible for life to exist.”

  “I can appreciate your position,” Anette Olsen, the CEO for Ganger Rolf stated, “but just now you said that ‘we’ … would be on the lookout for the next Michael Jordan. To me that says not only are we being solicited to finance your project, but we’re expected to locate and identify your staff?”

  Anette sipped the last drops of her Bollinger, turned to her side, and loudly snapped her fingers.

  “Miss Olsen…,” Cain began as he stepped away from his chair. He intercepted the briskly moving waiter and relieved him of his fresh bottle of champagne. Approaching Anette on her right, she slowly raised her glass to receive a refill.

  “I’m in no way suggesting that any of you be responsible for selecting candidates for Cloud deployment,” he stated as he poured the golden bubbly.

  Cain twisted back to Bianca and nodded. Bianca rose gracefully from her seat and walked a few paces to something covered with a shiny black fabric. She faced the guests and stood silently.

  “A simple misinterpretation, Miss Olsen,” Cain charmingly stated with a slight chuckle.

  Dr. Wyczthack again glanced at Bianca and nodded. She pulled back on the black coverlet and revealed a handsomely ornate wooden service cart with a large pyramid-shaped stack of black boxes. Bianca gently pushed the cart to Cain as he spoke.

  “I’d be more inclined to label this arrangement as a ‘joint venture’ of sorts. It would serve both of our interests well to have each of you not only financially involved, but your intellect and ingenuity as well.”

  Cain handed off the bottle of champagne to the waiter, turned, and was given the box from the very top of the pyramid. Bianca smiled as she released the perfectly square, velour-covered case into Cain’s hands. Dr. Wyczthack faced Anette, placed the box on the table in front of her, and then stepped away. He winked at Bianca, giving her the go ahead to dispense the boxes to the dinner guests.

  Anette Olsen, daughter of famed Norwegian shipping and offshore drilling magnate Friederi
ck Olsen, grasped the small box. She firmly held the base in her right hand and delicately pulled back the lid. Bianca continued to pass out the tiny black cases as Cain addressed his guests.

  “This,” he said, “is the extent of your requested involvement.”

  Cain reached out to the opened box in front of Anette and removed a piece from the scarlet silk-lined interior. He motioned for the others around him to open their boxes.

  “What are these for?” Mr. Ibrahim asked. “What am I supposed to do with them?”

  Inside each small, tissue box-sized case, in neat little rows, there lay one hundred micro USB thumb drives with shiny, black teardrop-shaped bumps on the outer edge.

  “All I ask,” Cain began as he held up the microdrive, “is that each of you use extreme prejudice and bias when informing your potential candidates of the Cloud Program.”

  “How…,” Mr. Imura started asking.

  “When you find yourselves in a position to approach your candidate,” Cain interrupted, “you will inform him, or her, that you are in possession of information that they might be interested in. Information regarding a highly secretive project that you believe he or she could easily qualify for and become directly involved in, and they possess certain talents, etc., etc. Then you hand them this … and you’re done.”

  The intimate crowd sat in their chairs, perplexed. They picked up and examined the chips, then looked about at each other, and placed the chips back in their boxes. This process was repeated several times.

  “We’re…,” Miss Olsen started, then paused. “You’re placing the burden on us … to handpick thirty thousand individuals … to send up to your orbital habitats … for thirty years?”

  Cain laughed out loud.

  “You?” he asked, patting Anette’s shoulder as he tried to suppress his giggling. “All eighty of you? Eighty people to select thirty thousand? No … no, no, no. My dear lady, I have thousands of employees dedicated to this one endeavor alone. Throughout the month I will be conducting this same presentation. I’ll travel to New York, Los Angeles, Rio de Janeiro, Sidney, London … Madrid, Frankfurt, Moscow … Beijing, New Delhi, Jerusalem, Budapest … Copenhagen, Milan, and Abu Dhabi. While I’ve made preparations to accommodate one hundred guests at a few of those meetings, other locations will see three and four hundred guests, and even more still at the remainder of my presentations. Like you, each of them will be given one hundred microdrives, identical in every way, to dispense how they so choose, and to whom. So by month’s end, I will have a potential one hundred thousand additional sets of eyes scattered throughout the world … leaving me with as many ten million candidate options for deployment to the Clouds.”

  “Why dis cheep?” Mr. Imura inquired, raising his hand and microdrive.

  “When activated,” Cain stated, walking to his seat, “the applicant will be immediately connected to my staff here at the SUBOS.”

  He held up his empty champagne glass and motioned for the waiter to bring the bottle as he explained, “Whatever device the individuals choose to use, these microdrives will ensure that all information is encrypted, the GPS chips rendered useless, and all communications will be untraceable by the NSA, CIA, DHS, or Google.”

  The waiter promptly returned and filled Cain’s glass from a fresh bottle of Bollinger. Before he placed the glass to his lips, Dr. Wyczthack glanced at his guests and pointed to his glass, then pointed to them and raised his eyebrows, as if to ask “Would anybody else care for a refill?”

  Everyone quickly held up their glass. Cain snapped his fingers, bringing the waiter back to his table. He draped his arm across the young man’s shoulder and whispered in his ear while motioning to his guests.

  “Yes, sir, Mr. Wyczthack,” the man quietly replied and dashed away.

  “Now, where was I?” Cain asked, sipping his champagne.

  “You were explaining the importance and significance of the microdrives,” Bianca answered, gently placing her left hand on Cain’s right arm.

  “Oh, yes, Mr. Imura. How silly of me. I apologize,” he said, bowing slightly.

  Just as Cain opened his mouth to speak, the waiter returned with two bottles of chilled champagne in each hand.

  “Ah!” he said and began clapping.

  Behind that waiter was another, and another, and another, all laden with multiple bottles of the fine, crisp, and expensive French champagne. Cain turned to Bianca and smiled as she, too, applauded the arrival of the delightfully delicious intoxicant. Bacchus Hall exploded with raucous applause as more and more staff streamed out from the bar and delivered to each of Cain’s guests their own bottle of champagne.

  Applause turned to laughter as another wave of dining staff entered the room. This time they bore handcrafted wooden boxes filled with fine cigars and sterling silver trays of assorted Swiss chocolates and cheeses, blueberries, and strawberries. The giddy patrons stood and clapped. Robust aromas from nicely aged Bolivar, Montecristo, and Partagas cigars filled the air. Fragments of broken chocolate bricks from Frey, Cailler, and Teuscher chocolatiers were scooped onto chilled plates. The pairings of soft Brie, luscious chocolates, bright fruit and crisp champagne was the topper to a dynamic meal.

  “Getting back to our topic of conversation,” Cain announced as he stood, “My staff will conduct a thorough interview with each of the candidates you select. At that time, he or she will be given full disclosure regarding the Cloud Program and what our long-term expectations and goals are. They will then go to their physician of choice for a series of draws for blood work that will be conducted here at the SUBOS. The vials will be special air-freighted from wherever they are in the world. Once we receive the samples, the blood will go through hundreds of tests. In the meanwhile, my staff will conduct a genealogical history search for the candidates, going back as far as five generations.”

  “Why the genealogy?” Mr. Ibrahim asked, puffing his cigar.

  “We’re looking for irregularities in their family history,” Cain replied, exhaling a plume of smoke from his Partagas. “We need to know if the people we’re sending up there have a history of emphysema. Did their mother have cystic fibrosis? Does their paternal grandfather suffer from Alzheimer’s? Maybe a maternal great-grandmother had Lou Gehrig’s disease. This will greatly affect and influence medical treatment facilities and protocols, not to mention reproduction results.”

  “Wait a minute!” Anette Olsen hollered, slapping the table. “You plan on bringing babies into the picture? How will that work? I mean, why? You’re already sending up families, why have more babies?”

  A few of those seated around Anette agreed and applauded her question.

  “Miss Olsen,” Cain began. “No one mentioned families. Ever. One candidate will go, whether married with children or single.”

  This revelation startled Anette and many of the others as well.

  “So, just like that, you’re going to separate a father or mother from their family?” Anette inquired, obviously disturbed by the idea.

  “I’m not separating or dividing anyone. That’s up to the individual candidates to decide. Furthermore, testing will determine who goes and who stays. Just because a person might be married and qualify for the program doesn’t necessarily mean his or her spouse qualifies.”

  The slightly intoxicated diners spoke candidly with their seated neighbors, some with more volume and slurred speech than others.

  “Ehrwier you stated tuty tousen go to Crowds,” said a very inebriated Mr. Imura, trying desperately to speak clearly. “But aso say foty-fy tousen can go to Crowd. Which numba twu?”

  “You’re correct, Mr. Imura, I did say both of things. And both of those statements are true. We fully intend to send, and are preparing for, an initial deployment of thirty thousand individuals for a test span of thirty years. Ideally, we’d prefer to house each Cloud with two thousand females and one thousand males. Through genetic testing, chromosome research, and genealogical research, we’ll identify the prime female candidates for i
mpregnating via artificial insemination. We expect to achieve a ninety-five percent success rate and produce five hundred offspring every year.”

  “Whaz dis tessing albout?” Mr. Ibrahim attempted to ask. “Why s’much tessing?”

  “We require the absolute best of what this world can offer. The individuals we select must be of the highest caliber intellectually, physically, genetically … every last one. Chemical engineers, architects, physicists, mathematicians … our future rests on their shoulders. So when you’re contemplating who to approach with the microdrive, remember that while good looks are temporary, knowledge is life lasting. People who we don’t need to waste our time on is someone like … like, uh … oh, who was that singing punk all the girls were so crazy for about fifteen years ago?”

  The befuddled group tried and tried to think of the popular singer Cain was referring to, but no one could recollect his name.

  “Oh, come on, please, somebody help me out,” Cain pleaded.

  “Jusin Beeba!” Mr. Imura gleefully shouted, jumping to his feet.

  “Justin Bieber!” the semisloshed crowd repeated, clapping for the smiling Japanese man.

  “Justin Bieber!” Cain and Bianca echoed, as they applauded Mr. Imura who bowed over and over.

  “I can stan Jusin Beeba!” Mr. Imura proudly declared. “My gandata jove mi cazy wit him muzic!”

  Everybody stood, laughed, and clapped along.

  “Can any of you imagine what our world would look like if we left it up to Justin Bieber to repopulate the planet?” Cain shouted, raising his glass, “No Justin Bieber!”

  “No Justin Bieber!” his guests shouted, then gulped down their bubbly.