“I’m not supposed to say anything to anybody before the announcement.”
Chuck moved in front of the bank chairman and waved a tentacle at the camera.
“It’s going to be big news,” said the Pyr, waving two tentacles for emphasis. “I’d make the calls to suspend trading now.” Then he glided back out of camera range.
The Fed chairman’s eyes were wide and her mouth was open. Then she pulled herself together.
“If you’re pulling a practical joke on April Fool’s Day…”
“I’d never joke about something like this.”
“What, never?” said Jannosh, popping his white beard-tentacled face in front of the camera for a moment.
“Well, hardly ever,” said Murriym, doing the same from the other side with droll Tigrammath humor.
The Fed chairman’s look of shock returned, doubled and redoubled. Then she spoke.
“I’ll make the calls.”
“Thank you,” said the bank chairman. “April 1, 2015 will join July 20, 1969 as a date that changed the planet forever.”
“What happened on July 20, 1969?”
“The moon landing.”
“Oh, yeah, right.”
“You’ll make the calls?”
“As soon as I hang up.”
“Thanks. Not a word about why—just make it happen.”
“Understood. Uhura out.” She cut the connection.
“Everyone’s a comedian,” said the bank chairman. He nodded at the alien trio. “The persuasive assist was appreciated.”
“No problem,” said the Pyr. “By the way, how do you plan to get us to the stage at Times Square without us being seen?”
“There’s a private elevator from my office to the parking garage. We can restrict access to the level where my limo is parked and take you down that way.”
“But how do we get from your limo to the stage?” said Murriym.
“George, send some interns down to that Islamic clothing store in Tribeca with a company credit card. Tell them to buy three chadors with head scarves and veils. One extra tall, one short and one medium. And have them pick up a long, plain black skirt, too.”
The chairman looked at Murriym.
“Size eight,” said the Tigrammath.
“Got that?”
“Got it,” said George. “I’m also arranging a police escort so they’ll be back in time.”
“Smart,” said the chairman. “What’s the word from the networks?”
“All the majors will be there,” said George, “and lots of little fish, too. Once they heard that something big was coming down, they all decided to send crews.”
“Excellent,” said his boss. “You want maximum exposure, right?”
“Yes,” said Chuck. “‘Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead,’ as a famous Terran said during an earlier example of first contact between civilizations.”
“That was Admiral David Farragut, not Commodore Matthew Perry,” said the chairman, who was something of a history buff. “If you’re referring to opening Japan to trade with West, Perry said something more along the lines of ‘open your borders to our trade or our battleships will pound the hell out of your capital.’”
“My apologies,” said Chuck, “though in practice the sentiments are equivalent. Free trade is unstoppable.”
“Does that mean you have space battleships hidden in orbit?”
“They don’t need to be in orbit,” said the little Pyr. “With congruent-tech wormhole drives they can be here in hours from the closer GaFTA planets. But we don’t have battleships, just armed merchant vessels for protection from pirates. With unlimited free trade, we’ve evolved beyond warfare.”
Yes, and there’s a bridge to Brooklyn not far from here I’d like to sell you, thought the chairman.
“Fascinating. That does get us down to the particulars, though.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’m holding a press conference in an hour and a half to announce first contact with not one, but three alien species who come bearing gifts, but I don’t have any details about what you’re putting on the table.”
“You’re connecting with far more than three alien species,” said Murriym. She was literally looking down at him. “There are 967 species in the Galactic Free Trade Association to date, and it’s only Wednesday.”
“You’re not helping,” said the chairman. “I’ve got to put together a press release and a speech for the news conference that will reassure the planet that this is just another business relationship for the companies of Earth—not the biggest thing to happen since the invention of fire. And I’ve got to figure out a perfect statement for the three of you.”
“Don’t worry,” said Chuck. “We’ve done this before. I’ve got a script that’s never failed.”
“Let me see it,” said the chairman.
“I sent it to your printer.”
George was still on the phone arranging logistical details, so the chairman removed the warm sheets from the output tray himself.
“Hmmmm,” he said, squinting slightly at the small print. “‘We’re from the Galactic Free Trade Association and we’re here to help you.’ Oh dear God.”
“What?” said Chuck.
“If I let you say that, you’ll be lucky to make it off the stage alive.”
“I told you we should have had a Pâkk in the delegation for self-defense,” Murriym whispered to Jannosh.
“I thought that’s why you were here,” Jannosh replied.
“In some parts of the United States the phrase ‘We’re from the government and we’re here to help you’ is considered highly offensive. In the rest of the country it’s just considered funny. If you say it, you’ll be crucified.”
“Literally?” asked the Pyr. “Given my species’ anatomy, that might be hard to do.”
“Okay, be that way,” said the chairman. “Do you have an orifice where waste leaves your body?”
“Yes, in the center of my base. It’s surrounded by my mobility cilia.”
“Good. Then I’ll rephrase my statement. If I let you say that, you’ll be impaled. Do you understand impaled?”
“Let me look it up.”
The Pyr consulted a donut-shaped device he pulled from somewhere on his person. Lights flashed and symbols appeared on the unit’s edge.
“Oh dear Euclid! We won’t use that phrase at the press conference. We won’t. We won’t.”
“Good, though we may release it afterward to defuse tension about your arrival,” said the chairman. “Maybe I can get ThinkGeek to make T-shirts.”
The chairman watched the Pyr calm himself—at least that was how he translated the alien’s reduced rate of trembling.
“What do you suggest we say?” said the little pyramid.
“First, tell me the full terms of the deal,” said the chairman. “Once I understand, I can figure out how to share it with the public.”
Air slowly whistled out of the Pyr somewhere—spiracles?—as if he was sighing.
“It’s simple, really,” Chuck said. “Like hundreds of other species, Terrans are now eligible for membership in the Galactic Free Trade Association.”
“Why now?” asked the chairman.
“Because you’ve independently developed congruent technology.”
“What?”
“Wormholes. Ways of connecting two separate points in space as if there was no intervening distance,” said the Pyr. “It’s how we get unlimited energy, raw materials, and faster than light travel.”
“And teleportation,” said Jannosh.
“Though that’s mostly used for cargo,” said Murriym. “There are still risks and unfortunate side effects related to teleporting complex matrices like sentient minds.”
“Side effects?” said the chairman.
“A one in ten thousand chance of brain damage,” said Chuck.
That explains a lot, thought the chairman.
“I haven’t heard anything about our scientis
ts creating wormholes,” he said. “Something like that should be front page news.”
Murriym stopped licking the fur on the back of her left hand and replied.
“Last Friday at 3:37 p.m. in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Dr. Janet Yu and her team of researchers, academics from Carnegie Mellon working on a DARPA funded project with IBM, successfully used microchip technology to create the space time topological stresses needed to generate a wormhole.”
“Last Friday?” said the chairman. “It’s Wednesday. Why isn’t it all over the Internet?”
“Due to Congressional budget cuts, the project was shut down at 5:00 p.m. Friday afternoon,” said Jannosh. “They never had a chance to verify their results.”
“How did you find out about it?” asked the chairman.
“Congruency detectors,” said Chuck. “We’ve been monitoring Earth for some time.”
“They’re expensive, but worth it,” said Jannosh.
“Wormholes,” said the chairman. “I’d always thought it would be developing a warp drive.”
“One gets you the other,” said Murriym, licking the fur of her other hand.
Was that a nervous gesture? thought the chairman.
“George, find Dr. Janet Yu at Carnegie Mellon—PhD, not medical doctor—and get her on the phone right away. I need a human hero for this press conference and she’s it.”
“Yes, sir,” said George, who was on the phone with the chief of the NYPD arranging crowd control. He expertly used his silent keyboard and an expensive executive support search app to find Janet Yu’s personal cell phone number and call it.
“Doctor Yu?” said George, taking advantage of a lull in the conversation with the police chief, “This is the executive secretary for the chairman of JPMorgan Chase. Do you have a few minutes to speak with him?”
George could hear crowd sounds and children’s voices in the background.
“I guess so,” said a puzzled contralto from the other end of the line.
“I’ll connect you now,” said George. He waved to get the chairman’s attention. “Line two.”
The chairman picked up his handset.
“Dr. Yu, this is the chairman of JPMorgan Chase. Are you sitting down?”
“No, I’m standing in the Hershey’s Chocolate World store in Times Square trying to ride herd on my children. Put that down!”
“What?” said the chairman.
“Not you,” said Dr. Yu, “my son. He’s about to pull over a Reese’s Pieces display. I’ll be right back.”
The chairman could hear dozens of cross-garbled conversations. Then he heard a crash and a sound like ten thousand poker chips being dumped on the floor.
“Sorry about that. I’ll pay for it,” the chairman heard Dr. Yu say. Then she was back on the line. “I was too late,” she said.
“Are you the Dr. Janet Yu who is doing DARPA research with Carnegie Mellon and IBM?”
“I was until five o’clock on Friday. Now I’m just a tourist.”
“Great. I’m glad to hear you’re in New York. You’re about to become world famous.”
The chairman heard her talking, but not to him.
“How much? Three hundred dollars? You’re kidding me.”
Then she came back.
“Mister, I don’t know if you are who you say you are, but you just cost me three hundred dollars I really didn’t want to spend. Anthony, stop eating those off the floor! Jeanette, grab your brother.”
“How would you like three hundred thousand dollars deposited in your bank account in the next five minutes?” said the chairman.
“Say what? Is this a phishing attempt? I’m not giving you my bank account number no matter who you say you are.”
“George,” said the chairman.
George was already typing.
“As if I needed you to tell me,” said the chairman to himself.
“There you are, Tony! Where were you?” said Dr. Yu. “Pick up your son. Elizabeth, Jeanette, stand next to your father and be good. Don’t step on the candy! I’ll be with you as soon as I get off the phone.”
The chairman heard subdued crunching sounds under the general hubbub of Hershey’s Chocolate World.
“What do you want?”
“I want to talk to you—privately—about the implications of your research. If you and your family would walk a block south on Broadway and go to the lobby of the New York Marriott Marquis at 47th Street, you’ll find I’ve reserved a suite in your name. I’ll meet you there with some friends of mine in less than an hour. Have a nice snack from room service on me.”
“I’m not doing anything just because somebody claiming to be a corporate big shot says so.”
“Check your bank balance.”
George was already making arrangements at the hotel.
“Holy sh…” Then Dr. Yu remembered her children were in earshot. “Wow. Okay then.”
“And there’s plenty more where that came from to help fund you.”
“The Marriott Marquis. Broadway and 47th. Room service. Got it.”
“Thank you, Dr. Yu,” said the chairman. “I knew you were quick on the uptake. I’ll make arrangements to have your luggage moved from your current hotel to the Marquis.”
“Thank you. We’re staying at the…”
“I know where you’re staying,” said the chairman, nodding at George, who nodded back. “And we’ll make arrangements for 24/7 security for you as well. Don’t be alarmed if there are guards outside your suite.”
“It’s big, then?” said Janet.
“You have no idea,” said the chairman. “But you will. Soon.”
He hung up.
“Did you get all that, George?”
“Got it, boss. If you want to talk to Dr. Yu first, we’re going to have to leave now.”
“But when am I going to have a chance to write the press release and prepare my speech?”
“I’ll take care of it,” said George. “My assistant says the interns just dropped off the disguises.”
“Excellent,” said the chairman. “Let’s grab them, get our guests properly dressed, and head for Times Square.”
George returned with four large shopping bags. With the chairman’s help, he got all three of the alien diplomats dressed from head to toe, or apex to mobility cilia in the Pyr’s case. George had wisely instructed the interns to pick up a Styrofoam wig display head and Chuck used one of his tentacles to hold the head above the top of his body so that he looked more like a portly Saudi princess than a dumpy Dalek. Two other tentacles served as shoulders and gave the robes something to hang on. George offered to cut eye holes so the Pyr could see, but Chuck said he’d just extend an eye stalk so he could look through his veil. Murriym the Tigrammath needed the long, black skirt for full coverage—the chador alone only came down to her knees. The chairman’s mind wandered and he wondered if Tigrammaths played basketball. George switched from his desktop to a more portable tablet computer so he could continue working his magic, then the five of them took the chairman’s private elevator to the parking garage.
“I’ve cleared the level where the limousine is waiting,” said George. “We’ll pick up our police escort at the top of the ramp.”
It was hard to tell through all the fabric, but the chairman got the distinct idea that the aliens were enjoying their adventure. He was concerned about how Chuck was going to get into the limo, but the little Pyr leaned back, shuffled forward on his rear cilia, and dropped his front inside the vehicle. The rest of him followed easily. Jannosh had no problem climbing in, but getting Murriym inside was more of a production. The chairman knew NBA players and they preferred limos based on SUVs, not stretch Lincolns, because they were higher off the ground and had more head room. The Tigrammath bent down and crawled into the limo, then sprawled at the far end of the passenger compartment, taking up four seats. The chairman entered, followed by George, who used the intercom to tell the driver they were all aboard.
The limo navigated the
turns inside the parking garage smoothly then emerged into the spring sunshine to meet its escort, two marked NYPD patrol cars and a pair of motorcycle officers. The engines on the mounted officers’ big Harley-Davidsons growled and blue lights on poles behind them began to rotate. They were joined by the light bars on the squad cars, but they didn’t turn on their sirens. The mayor was adamant about keeping noise pollution to a minimum. They went half a block south on Park Avenue then turned right on 47th Street. At mid-afternoon on a Wednesday, traffic was bad—and all the television crews heading for or setting up at Times Square made it even worse. The police escort helped, but with the streets nearly gridlocked, there was nowhere for vehicles to move out of the way.
The aliens were staring out the windows. The chairman knew they’d been observing Earth for many years, but he sensed that this was the first time any of them had ever seen Manhattan from street level.
“After the press conference, could we see The Lion King?” asked Murriym.
“I want to see Wicked,” said Jannosh.
“And I want to see Les Mis,” said Chuck. “Do you hear the people sing…” he began in a strong tenor voice.
“I could probably buy out the theater for a private showing of Mamma Mia,” said George, quickly.
“Yeah,” said all three aliens in unison. “That would be great.”
“I think we need to wait and see how the world reacts to the announcement,” said the chairman.
“True,” said the Pyr. All three aliens looked subdued. Have any of them ever done this before? thought the chairman.
After fifteen minutes they’d only traveled two long blocks from Park to Sixth Avenue. Then they sat. The intersection was blocked by a truck from Weasel News that insisted it had the right of way to turn south on Sixth when everyone in greater New York knew that avenue was one way north.
“George?” said the chairman, looking pointedly at his ninety-five thousand dollar Patek Philippe watch.
“The grid is well and truly locked,” said George. “We’re going to have to walk the last block and a half.”
“You’re kidding,” said his boss. “We can’t let our guests be seen in public before the press conference.”
“This is New York,” said George. “No one will give them a second look.”
Xenotech The Man Who Sold the Earth: A Story of the Galactic Free Trade Association (Xenotech Support) Page 2