Private communication between President A. Sayyid Quarishi and Ambassador Julian Evans en route to Earth.
Priority: Secret and Confidential.
Transmitted on FLT sub-space to the Earth Light Cruiser Ariel.
Adjusted Time May 3rd 2055._____________________________________________________________
Dear Julian.
I was reassured to get your reply and then to hear that you have set off for home already. We are having some difficulties here, which I shall talk over with you as soon as I can in private. There have been some ugly incidents in which Antarians have been harassed and two nights ago someone threw paint over their Legation in Montreal. They seem to take these matters in their stride (and even draw parallels with anti-Hathman rioting on Antar) but we should always be cautious.I didn’t want to add to these difficulties by upsetting the Antarians over the codex!
Despite pver thirty years of contact and exchange there is still so much potential for misunderstanding! And it is easy to get things out of all perspective here when I get my intelligence through the diplomatic corp! I still find the main Antarian language very complicated but I try. Their command of our languages and their grasp of our history is so good - but then I guess they have been among us for centuries.
However reading Grey’s journal assures me. Apart from its merit as an extraordinary account of our contact with Antar, to me it depicts a journey Grey made within himself, somehow, to a place he wanted to believe in but for a long part of his life dared not to. The man at the end, standing there with Max as the ships depart, is not the man at the beginning. But I suppose that was true of all of them, but especially Grey. It is hard to explain. I never met him, (and I only once briefly met Max, although his image is seared into my brain still). Godspeed Julian, come straight to New York from the Orbital.
Alex.
(ps The Antarian Ambassador spoke with me last light. She was amused by Grey’s description of his dream about Kuvar’s head! She then asked me whether S’eeth Sia Ova ever gave anything to Grey, towards the end of his life, long after the current extracts finish. She was quite persistent about this. She couldn’t have meant the head (for it is now on Antar I believe?). Do you know anything else she could have been referring to? It was a curious, potentially unpleasant conversation that I do not want to have again.
The Roswellian Codex. CC Teen/Mature. 42nd bit (05/06/
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Patroclus76
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April 2nd – 3rd. 2006.
`We came across Earth many many centuries ago, and we have been among you for centuries since.’ S’eeth had looked at all of us, and I had wondered suddenly how old was the Antarian? I tried not to stare at the reed like, translucent, body, the dark pupil-less eyes. What great age lingered in there? What long vast experiences filled such intellect?
`We were impressed by the resilience of the dominant humanoid group that emerged from Africa and migrated rapidly across the planet, especially the musculature of the body.’
`Homosapian sapian?’ I asked
`Yes, we watched you rapidly displace earlier humanoid groups. We began a series of long term experiments to try and reverse our own decay by hybridising human and Antarian DNA, to keep your phenotype but to enhance the cerebral cortex and the brain cavity. What we discovered surprised us. Many of the psychic abilities you now claim for yourselves come from your human side.’
`How did you go about collecting your human subjects?’ asked Isobel suddenly.
`We abducted them. Initially it was not an ethical issue, but as your societies evolved we were increasingly concerned about detection’
`Not an ethical issue!’ Isobel had been angry, Max had tried to calm her. `Professor Grey’s father was abducted and his entire career destroyed because of you!’
S’eeth seemed unmoved by this sudden out burst.
`We shall apologise to your governments later and will discuss issues of compensation, Princess Vilandra. You must understand the crisis that confronted us. We could only outpace the rapid aging by pushing forward the boundaries of our life expectancy, but we lived increasingly as infirm, sterile immortals. Integrating your genetic material with ours proved incredibly difficult. Despite sharing a core sample of base DNA sequences, our two species proved extremely reluctant to hybridise. We used bacterial RNA from a gandarium hive species but it required a very rare genetic make up in the human host to take, a `flaw’ that is extremely rare on earth, and the gandarium could only be used in very confined spaces for fear that it would produce plasmids, or viral-bacterial mutations of great virulence’
`We know’ said Kyle, recalling a distant adventure many years ago. He did not elaborate but S’eeth appeared to acknowledge the reference. He had then continued:
`We had a break through just on the eve of the rebellion by Kuvar and the Shelloth or Skins. Following the murder of Zan and the royal four we improvised on a plan that I had devised, and sent you to Earth. It was not our intention that you should have remained so long in the maturation fluids but the landing went amiss and the S’eeth who accompanied you buried the pods as best she could, the other defected to live amongst you retaining a human form.’
`What of the pairings, myself with Tess, Michael with Isobel?’ Max asked firmly `Was that part of the plan?’
`The pairing was encoded in you to see if the cross would take and not revert to either of the parent stock. We have almost no living experience of birth or sexual reproduction. We had no idea how it would work between two hybrids.’
`We were an experiment?’ said Michael, clearly shocked.
`Yes. And one that did not work. The betrayal of S’eeth Kar Va, the one you called Nasedo, provided us however with an opportunity to study the child of Zan and Ava. Following the coup, many of the leading S’eeth collaborated with the new regime. As the creators of the Shalloth, they were loath to kill us, and they still needed our help even though they sought to establish their political and cultural supremacy at our expense. We came to know of the deal made between S’eeth Kar Va and Kuvar concerning the re-capturing of the hybrids. We had planned a contingency to try and rescue you all should you have been mislead into returning, but Nasedos plan went astray’ a silence fell. I saw Max squeeze Liz’s hand in memory of her dramatic intervention to frustrate the betrayal of Tess. It was a painful memory for them all, more so for having it narrated back so dispassionately.
`Kuvar made the deal with Nasedo to bring my child to the throne in mystead, and to kill us all. That is what Tess - what Ava told me before she died' For the first time Max had sounded human, vulnerable.
`In part. The real truth behind the scheme was that just as the ship carrying the pods left for Earth, Kuvar came across our plans. He lived in fear that the hybrids would produce the one child that might restore the S'eeth. So Kuvar ensured Nasedo became involved as guardian of the royal four. It was crucial for him to know if the offspring was what he feared most. But as you know the child was entirely human, with no trace of Antarian DNA at all and no sign that the principle DNA pairings had changed. He was most relieved.’ `Had Max and Tess had more children, it is possible that a hybrid would have been produced that could have passed on the combined inheritance intact and produced the child you wanted?’ I had asked, my curiosity getting the better of me.
`No’ said the Emissary. `I was able to examine Ava’s child because Kuvar wanted his genetics authenticated. It was clear that the Antarian genes had become recessive and would be most likely bred out of the line. The base sequences of the Antarian genome used were not stable. And the human phenotype was aggressive and dominant Had Ava and Zan continued to sexually reproduce they would have produced fragmentary pairings of the two genomes each one more or less human. If the children of the original hybrids were to reproduce the probability of an Antarian phenotype increased but they they would suffer from the genetic defect of massive and rapid aging’
`Like the clones from the phoenix children’ I had added, to myself.
There was a heavy silence as we listened to this extraordinary, incredible story. `So you were back to square one?’ I said, surprised to see that S’eeth was aware of the expression. I thought I had seen a cold, dry smile like autumnal leaves wither the grey face.
`Indeed. However, as a scientists Hathman Grey, you of all humans must appreciate the powers of chance, of, luck? Often the most dramatic breakthrough comes from that which is not planned for’
`What did you not plan?’ Max sat down on the bottom step, seemingly exhausted or emotional. Perhaps the talk of Tess had been too difficult, the recollection too painful. To our surprise the Antarians lowered themselves as well, as if they could not be higher than Max. They squatted down on their haunches, resting their long arms on their knees. They looked like grey herons, cloaked and wise, utterly alien, sitting with their legs in water.
`We did not plan you, your majesty’
`Your powers of cellular regeneration – your ability to heal – come from the royal line, the product of long spiritual contemplation and secrecy. We did not realise at first however, than on healing non-Antarians you recombined their DNA to be compatible with yours. When we learned that you had saved Yantra-Parker and that she wasa rival for your affections we realised that she was a much more likely candidate to breed with you than Ava’
`Tess – Ava – told you this’ interrupted Max.
`Yes. When I examined the child she had told me how you had never loved her, that even when you had conceived with her your thoughts were of someone else. She spoke of a love that transcended her and at times even yourself. We realised then that if you and Yantra-Parker were to have sex then the chances were extremely likely to produce an Antarian genotype restored through human DNA. Yet we could not make contact with you, or send another S’eeth to you. Antar was convulsed by war. Nasedo was dead, killed by the skins*, Langley refused to respond to us, and Kuvar was entering the final dark madness of his regime. We had to regain contact with you’
`Jesus' said Kyle, which I thought was a rather inappropriate remark.
`So Liz is carrying your modified, restored, improved, genome?’ I had asked, hoping that my voice had not conveyed a tone of sarcasm.
`Liz is carrying an entirely human child, and an entirely Antarian child, in looks, with a modified genotype that shows no sign of accelerated aging’ I found this doubtful.
`But she is only six weeks pregnant and she is about to give birth!’ I said incredulously.
`That is not a defect. It is a consequence of the Antarian child's natural early life cycle. After birth the human child will revert to a normal growth sequence. We have not had an Antarian born for 4,000 years Hathman Grey. Yet we know however that Antarian children develop rapidly and continue to grow after birth until their 14th month in earth terms. They then become Malaquev for the first part of their life cycle’
`Malaquev?’ Max asked.
`Male’ said S’eeth Sia Ova. `The adult will remain male until after about forty or so of your earth years until they shed their tails and become female, Mala sias’ The Antarians all bowed slightly. `If they live long enough they may become males again’
Liz had looked at me, `has my child a tail?’**
I had nodded in what I hoped would be seen as a sort of a positive and not unusual way.
`So how do you account for Max – I mean Zan – succeeding where so many of you had failed? How did it happen?’
`We do not know’ came the surprising reply.
`Was it anything to do with Max’s double pair of chromosomes?’ I had guessed, thinking back to his mysterious and bewildering data.
`Yes, although we do not understand how they got there. There were not part of the initial design and they cannot have come from his blood line because they are human. In some unlooked for way the doubling up of the DNA facilitated the conservation of the hybrid.’ There had been a long silence. I had developed a serious headache, as if I had crammed too much information, too quickly, into my brain.
And then Max had suddenly laughed, a curious sound, unlooked for. I ralised how so rarely he did laugh. He had shook his head as if in conversation with himself. `Clayton Wheeler!! The old bastard! I have a dead man’s genotype in me!’
_______________________________________________
[size=9]* I did not fuly understand why Mesado was killed by what was, in effect, his own side. But the politics of Antar were complex. Many of the S'eeth collaborated with the skins BEFORE the coup, and some then double crossed them when the opportunity arose. Nasedo was a notorious and capable S'eeth, part of the reason he was sent to guard the Royal Four in the first place. See The Songs of the Black Star by S'eeth Ram Aias and Isobel Evans. [/size]
** The Antarian reproductive cycle is very complicated, and because the Antarian S'eeth have been sterile for so long, little is known even by them. The birth of S'eeth Om Sia was therefore awaited with great excitment. It was also clear to me how, given the `normal' acceleration in the early maturation of the child, the Antarians had triggered the pathology of rapid aging: it had been in part a natural proclivity of their species. See Provisonal Findings on the Antarian Reproductive System. Seminar on Reproductive Heath. Antar Science Academy. 2011.
`We came across Earth many many centuries ago, and we have been among you for centuries since.’ S’eeth had looked at all of us, and I had wondered suddenly how old was the Antarian? I tried not to stare at the reed like, translucent, body, the dark pupil-less eyes. What great age lingered in there? What long vast experiences filled such intellect?
`We were impressed by the resilience of the dominant humanoid group that emerged from Africa and migrated rapidly across the planet, especially the musculature of the body.’
`Homosapian sapian?’ I asked
`Yes, we watched you rapidly displace earlier humanoid groups. We began a series of long term experiments to try and reverse our own decay by hybridising human and Antarian DNA, to keep your phenotype but to enhance the cerebral cortex and the brain cavity. What we discovered surprised us. Many of the psychic abilities you now claim for yourselves come from your human side.’
`How did you go about collecting your human subjects?’ asked Isobel suddenly.
`We abducted them. Initially it was not an ethical issue, but as your societies evolved we were increasingly concerned about detection’
`Not an ethical issue!’ Isobel had been angry, Max had tried to calm her. `Professor Grey’s father was abducted and his entire career destroyed because of you!’
S’eeth seemed unmoved by this sudden out burst.
`We shall apologise to your governments later and will discuss issues of compensation, Princess Vilandra. You must understand the crisis that confronted us. We could only outpace the rapid aging by pushing forward the boundaries of our life expectancy, but we lived increasingly as infirm, sterile immortals. Integrating your genetic material with ours proved incredibly difficult. Despite sharing a core sample of base DNA sequences, our two species proved extremely reluctant to hybridise. We used bacterial RNA from a gandarium hive species but it required a very rare genetic make up in the human host to take, a `flaw’ that is extremely rare on earth, and the gandarium could only be used in very confined spaces for fear that it would produce plasmids, or viral-bacterial mutations of great virulence’
`We know’ said Kyle, recalling a distant adventure many years ago. He did not elaborate but S’eeth appeared to acknowledge the reference. He had then continued:
`We had a break through just on the eve of the rebellion by Kuvar and the Shelloth or Skins. Following the murder of Zan and the royal four we improvised on a plan that I had devised, and sent you to Earth. It was not our intention that you should have remained so long in the maturation fluids but the landing went amiss and the S’eeth who accompanied you buried the pods as best she could, the other defected to live amongst you retaining a human form.’
`What of the pairings, myself with Tess, Michael with Isobel?’ Max asked firmly `Was that part of the plan?’
`The pairing was encoded in you to see if the cross would take and not revert to either of the parent stock. We have almost no living experience of birth or sexual reproduction. We had no idea how it would work between two hybrids.’
`We were an experiment?’ said Michael, clearly shocked.
`Yes. And one that did not work. The betrayal of S’eeth Kar Va, the one you called Nasedo, provided us however with an opportunity to study the child of Zan and Ava. Following the coup, many of the leading S’eeth collaborated with the new regime. As the creators of the Shalloth, they were loath to kill us, and they still needed our help even though they sought to establish their political and cultural supremacy at our expense. We came to know of the deal made between S’eeth Kar Va and Kuvar concerning the re-capturing of the hybrids. We had planned a contingency to try and rescue you all should you have been mislead into returning, but Nasedos plan went astray’ a silence fell. I saw Max squeeze Liz’s hand in memory of her dramatic intervention to frustrate the betrayal of Tess. It was a painful memory for them all, more so for having it narrated back so dispassionately.
`Kuvar made the deal with Nasedo to bring my child to the throne in mystead, and to kill us all. That is what Tess - what Ava told me before she died' For the first time Max had sounded human, vulnerable.
`In part. The real truth behind the scheme was that just as the ship carrying the pods left for Earth, Kuvar came across our plans. He lived in fear that the hybrids would produce the one child that might restore the S'eeth. So Kuvar ensured Nasedo became involved as guardian of the royal four. It was crucial for him to know if the offspring was what he feared most. But as you know the child was entirely human, with no trace of Antarian DNA at all and no sign that the principle DNA pairings had changed. He was most relieved.’ `Had Max and Tess had more children, it is possible that a hybrid would have been produced that could have passed on the combined inheritance intact and produced the child you wanted?’ I had asked, my curiosity getting the better of me.
`No’ said the Emissary. `I was able to examine Ava’s child because Kuvar wanted his genetics authenticated. It was clear that the Antarian genes had become recessive and would be most likely bred out of the line. The base sequences of the Antarian genome used were not stable. And the human phenotype was aggressive and dominant Had Ava and Zan continued to sexually reproduce they would have produced fragmentary pairings of the two genomes each one more or less human. If the children of the original hybrids were to reproduce the probability of an Antarian phenotype increased but they they would suffer from the genetic defect of massive and rapid aging’
`Like the clones from the phoenix children’ I had added, to myself.
There was a heavy silence as we listened to this extraordinary, incredible story. `So you were back to square one?’ I said, surprised to see that S’eeth was aware of the expression. I thought I had seen a cold, dry smile like autumnal leaves wither the grey face.
`Indeed. However, as a scientists Hathman Grey, you of all humans must appreciate the powers of chance, of, luck? Often the most dramatic breakthrough comes from that which is not planned for’
`What did you not plan?’ Max sat down on the bottom step, seemingly exhausted or emotional. Perhaps the talk of Tess had been too difficult, the recollection too painful. To our surprise the Antarians lowered themselves as well, as if they could not be higher than Max. They squatted down on their haunches, resting their long arms on their knees. They looked like grey herons, cloaked and wise, utterly alien, sitting with their legs in water.
`We did not plan you, your majesty’
`Your powers of cellular regeneration – your ability to heal – come from the royal line, the product of long spiritual contemplation and secrecy. We did not realise at first however, than on healing non-Antarians you recombined their DNA to be compatible with yours. When we learned that you had saved Yantra-Parker and that she wasa rival for your affections we realised that she was a much more likely candidate to breed with you than Ava’
`Tess – Ava – told you this’ interrupted Max.
`Yes. When I examined the child she had told me how you had never loved her, that even when you had conceived with her your thoughts were of someone else. She spoke of a love that transcended her and at times even yourself. We realised then that if you and Yantra-Parker were to have sex then the chances were extremely likely to produce an Antarian genotype restored through human DNA. Yet we could not make contact with you, or send another S’eeth to you. Antar was convulsed by war. Nasedo was dead, killed by the skins*, Langley refused to respond to us, and Kuvar was entering the final dark madness of his regime. We had to regain contact with you’
`Jesus' said Kyle, which I thought was a rather inappropriate remark.
`So Liz is carrying your modified, restored, improved, genome?’ I had asked, hoping that my voice had not conveyed a tone of sarcasm.
`Liz is carrying an entirely human child, and an entirely Antarian child, in looks, with a modified genotype that shows no sign of accelerated aging’ I found this doubtful.
`But she is only six weeks pregnant and she is about to give birth!’ I said incredulously.
`That is not a defect. It is a consequence of the Antarian child's natural early life cycle. After birth the human child will revert to a normal growth sequence. We have not had an Antarian born for 4,000 years Hathman Grey. Yet we know however that Antarian children develop rapidly and continue to grow after birth until their 14th month in earth terms. They then become Malaquev for the first part of their life cycle’
`Malaquev?’ Max asked.
`Male’ said S’eeth Sia Ova. `The adult will remain male until after about forty or so of your earth years until they shed their tails and become female, Mala sias’ The Antarians all bowed slightly. `If they live long enough they may become males again’
Liz had looked at me, `has my child a tail?’**
I had nodded in what I hoped would be seen as a sort of a positive and not unusual way.
`So how do you account for Max – I mean Zan – succeeding where so many of you had failed? How did it happen?’
`We do not know’ came the surprising reply.
`Was it anything to do with Max’s double pair of chromosomes?’ I had guessed, thinking back to his mysterious and bewildering data.
`Yes, although we do not understand how they got there. There were not part of the initial design and they cannot have come from his blood line because they are human. In some unlooked for way the doubling up of the DNA facilitated the conservation of the hybrid.’ There had been a long silence. I had developed a serious headache, as if I had crammed too much information, too quickly, into my brain.
And then Max had suddenly laughed, a curious sound, unlooked for. I ralised how so rarely he did laugh. He had shook his head as if in conversation with himself. `Clayton Wheeler!! The old bastard! I have a dead man’s genotype in me!’
_______________________________________________
[size=9]* I did not fuly understand why Mesado was killed by what was, in effect, his own side. But the politics of Antar were complex. Many of the S'eeth collaborated with the skins BEFORE the coup, and some then double crossed them when the opportunity arose. Nasedo was a notorious and capable S'eeth, part of the reason he was sent to guard the Royal Four in the first place. See The Songs of the Black Star by S'eeth Ram Aias and Isobel Evans. [/size]
** The Antarian reproductive cycle is very complicated, and because the Antarian S'eeth have been sterile for so long, little is known even by them. The birth of S'eeth Om Sia was therefore awaited with great excitment. It was also clear to me how, given the `normal' acceleration in the early maturation of the child, the Antarians had triggered the pathology of rapid aging: it had been in part a natural proclivity of their species. See Provisonal Findings on the Antarian Reproductive System. Seminar on Reproductive Heath. Antar Science Academy. 2011.
Last edited by Patroclus76 on Fri Mar 24, 2006 2:51 am, edited 4 times in total.
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Patroclus76
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April 2nd – 3rd 2006.(written up 4th April)
`You, you died?’ I had asked again. Max and Liz were sitting on the bottom steps of the first landing, where the main staircase, fluted and ornate as a baroque organ turned at right angles and continued its descent to the main hallway. Max had looked up at me, as if I had discovered something deeply private about him, and said `yes’ plaintively, as if he wanted the subject dropped.
It was 4.30 pm and Maria, Michael and Isobel, exhausted by the night in the cellars and then the `science stuff’ (Michael) had gone for a long siesta. Kyle had gone to meditate. The Antarians had gone to prepare for the imminent arrival of about twelve Heads of Government (they had not specified which) and several other guests they alluded to but would not discuss. Our meeting had broken up well and on good terms. Somehow I had feared it was bound to end with death rays and alien invasion but there was a mood of extraordinary euphoria. S’eeth Sia Ova had taken Max aside for a while and spoke with him at some length. Michael had suddenly asked the emissary who had won the Antarian wars, to which she replied `No one’*. S’eeth Sia Ova had then asked me to walk with her outside. We must had made an odd couple, a grey haired recluse in tweeds, a dressing gown still over my shoulders, and a tall grey clad Antarian, walking in a rather stiff manner a little like an insect. `There is something you will need to know Grey, before the end of this’. I had looked at her curiously.
`Are there any problems?’
`No. Just the need for information. I will speak with you before your governments arrive’ She said delphically. Before I could press further, the Antarian had walked out into the afternoon, dazzling after the rains, and simply dematerialised into thin air. I had returned to cross examine Max.
`So you died and you came back to life as someone else?’ Of all the extraordinary stories Max had told me this was the hardest to believe. He looked at me anxiously, as if I thought he was making it up `Julian! Yes, but its difficult to explain, painful even. I became Clayton Wheeler when I was coerced into trying to reverse the aging process and then well, he turned into me! I was in his head although it was my head, and my body.’ He ran his finger across his lip, a sign that I should desist. Liz took his hand away.
`Reverse the aging process, how curious, the antidote to the advanced cellular decrepitude of the babies in Boston? I wonder?’ I had shaken my head. `You chastise me for comparing you to Christ, Max and then you nonchalantly mention that you have come back from the dead!’ Liz laughed and looked at me wide eyed, a beautiful habit she had, flashing her surprise about her. `Even S’eeth looked taken aback and I am sure that doesn’t happen often’ Liz had sensed that Max was still troubled, `Its OK Max, it does explain the odd chromosomes though’ she smiled, kissing his ear.
He curled into her like a cat wishing to be stroked. I smiled at the illusion. Liz had then said `Giving the child up will not be easy though, Antarian or otherwise, although I can understand that it - he - will need to grow amongst its own kind – Julian – is S’eeth female?’
`I think so. Or perhaps on the brink of being male again, I am not sure if it is polite to ask but if the opportunity arises - ’ I had noticed Max smiling at me then, his eyes narrowed slightly, and then widening, vivid, alive. Liz was stroking his hair and forehead. `I am sure you will find an opportunity Professor Grey, I am sure you are itching to get S’eeth on her own and pick her brains!’ He made a sort of mock startled expression as if this could not possibly have been on my mind. It was a priceless expression of intimacy and he had stuck his foot out in my direction. In that moment I experienced such an extraordinary feeling of love for him that I had felt suddenly unable to speak. It was if I had seen my vast solitude as a scholar and the bitterness I had kept within me transformed in an instance. Like the Buddha at Buddh Gaya, my enlightenment was unlooked for and instantaneous.
`So who’s coming this evening?’ asked Max, he had stretched his head onto Liz’s bulging stomach and was listening to it as if it was a sea shell. `I have no idea’ I had mused, `Most of the civilised world I suspect!’ I had sat down on the other side of Liz and, uncharacteristically, pressed my ear to her stomach as well. `Guys!!’ she had protested, `Do you mind?’
`What do you hear Max?’ I had asked. He pressed his ear hard in mock concentration. Liz laughed. `Max!’ We all paused, Liz holding her breath. Max listening carefully. `I hear the song of a new world’ he said.
`Sorry to interrupt this – whatever this is’ Michael had been standing over us as if from no where, his striking face full of mild sarcasm and innuendo, `Maxwell, Julian, Liz. I have two things to tell you. One is that several helicopters are approaching from the south and the second is Isobel and Maria want to know if we bother with dinner before we meet the G9 or whatever the industrialised world is called now, or after?’
I had stood up and walked out onto the terrace. Several large twin bladed Chinook helicopters were coming down between the lines of Antarian ships. In all the excitement I had forgotten – or simply not thought about – how this would look to the outside world. A monstrous invasion, the shocking revelation that we were not alone in the Universe written, almost literally, across the sky for all to see. No cover-up would work this time. I marvelled at the technology. I wished my father had been alive to see this, the confirmation of his own experiences. I stood looking up, hands in pockets. Was I being watched? Did the Antarians feel the same sense of wonder as I did? Or was this now all rather pedestrian to them, a lesser species irritatingly holding their king and his saviour child through sentimental attachment and familiarity? How odd, how stupid human curiosity can be! I manfully resisted the temptation to wave at them.
The lead helicopter was landing and I watched a civilian jump out as soon as the ground was close enough, ducking under the blades and running towards me. ``Professor Grey?’ I had nodded, surprised, seemingly to have forgotten that I owned the place. `Hello there, quite a day we’re having! My name is Jonathan Michaels, senior White House aide. We have a lot of work to do for the next few hours and I am going to need as much help from you as I can’. He shook my hand vigorously as if testing it actually belonged to me. `You do?’ I had asked, nonplussed. He had his arm around me in that fake way all hacks insinuate themselves into positions of responsibility. He was walking me back the way I had come `President Bush will be here in about three hours and then shortly after, the British Prime Minister and several heads of state from the Permanent members of the UN Security Council. They will need to have at least an option of staying the night. We’ll put the press in tents’. Had the setting above us been anything less unreal I would have considered this a joke in poor taste. `Where are the hybrids?’ Michaels was already multi-tasking, a mobile phone in one ear, gesticulating with his free hand. `We will want to see them and speak with them in closed session and then with the press’
`Oh my god, can’t this wait?’
Michaels looked appalled `This is the event of the – ‘ he spluttered, open mouthed, like a gold fish actually,
`Alright, alright. You will have to organise everything, Wilcox is too old and I am busy. Very busy. What time do they arrive’
`In just over four hours’ several more helicopters had landed behind us, and much activity was taking place. The former signs of battle had been discreetly removed.
Later……
I had gone back to inform the Roswellians that our evening was now full and that we should prepare ourselves for the total onslaught of the global media, and more heads of state than you could shake a stick at. I found however that this had already started. Everyone, including Wilcox, was crammed onto my sofa watching the Emergency Broadcast Channel. This kept showing President Bush in Washington asking for calm (the press room looked far from calm and neither did the President). There were long rather complicated shots of the UN Buildings in New York and the Security Council and then some random footage from Europe, the Middle East and Japan. Then we would have shots of Bone Hill House re-laid live from some far off helicopter. It showed the great majestic circle of ships – now over twenty – drawn about us, glittering in the lowering sunlight. It was clear from the camera angle that the ships were enormous. The House itself had looked beautiful. `Why I could not sell this property is a mystery’ I had mused. Michael smiled and slapped my back quite hard `Jules they’ll make it into a museum after today, and we’ll all have statues!’**
Suddenly Maria said `we have to dress up!’ Isobel smiled radiantly, `Oh my god of course!’ and before Kyle could intervene the matter was decided. For several moments there had been pandemonium and a flurry of out fits. Outside on the lawns more and more things appeared to be arriving by air. Michael had fetched down one of my formal dinner suits and Isobel somehow managed to alter it. Once dressed he looked extraordinarily smart, and as a result Max wanted one as well. Isobel, trying to change the colour of Maria’s hair, had to alter another suit but Max’s chest was too broad so she improvised with one of Wilcox’s old uniforms. The result was curiously beguiling, making Max look a little like a Prussian Hussar. He complained that his pants were too tight at which Liz cut a hole in the back. (`Sorry Jules’). Kyle wore a linen dress suit that made him look very Italian if not slightly sinister. There had been quite a fight with Isobel about whether he combed his hair back or not. Not to be outdone I had proposed to wear a rather fine Donegal tweed suit. Isobel appeared in what had once been a rather heavy damask curtain, which ended up on Liz because it was the only thing that would cover her adequately. Maria out did everyone with a long black dress, simple and elegant.
Suddenly Wilcox who had been trying to watch the television called us to attention. The television had gone live to the White House. The room fell silent amid a rush for the remote and the volume. Bush had made it back to the Oval Office and had somehow escaped the screaming press. He sat looking owlishly at the camera as if the escape had been a bit too close for comfort. He spoke of a historic day for all `human kind’ one long anticipated, perhaps even feared. He then referred to the Antarians directly. The enormity of what we were seeing began to sink in, especially for Max. Bush noted that the Antarians had made direct contact with several governments and had informed them that they had come to Earth peacefully in search of former members of their exiled Royal Family who were now needed to `resolve the healing of Antar after what appears to have been a series of long and ruinous wars’. Clearly, despite their extraordinary technology, they were not dissimilar to us. Then suddenly, to everyone’s amazement, pictures of Isobel, Max, Liz, Michael, Maria and Kyle flashed across the screen, including live interviews of people in Roswell. `That is such a dreadful, dreadful picture of me’ Maria had protested and buried her head in a pillow. Then there was a picture of me, about ten years ago, heading up the genome project. I thought I had looked spiteful and over zealous. The camera switched back to Bush and had closed in to show the perspiration on his forehead. `The Antarians will be holding a summit with us at about 9 pm PST. They have asked us to allow them to land on the Bone Hill Estate property and this has been granted as a show of good will. They have also asked for certain undertakings from the government which we have also agreed to’
later....
At 8.45 pm, Jonathan Michaels appeared with a horde of staff officers and said that the summit would be in the formal dining room. It had seemed appropriate. I had just settled down into my library, to thumb through some old friends for consolation, when I was aware that S’eeth Sia Ova had discreetly materialised in front of me. I was momentarily startled. `Forgive me Grey’ she said nodding slightly. I smiled and invited the emissary to sit and then noticed that this was not really an option given her height. `You must be busy with these arrangements’ I had said. I was nervous and S’eeth must have sensed it. `We are not so unalike, you and I, Grey. There is an expression on Antar: She who breaks a thing to find its meaning has lost the path of wisdom.’ I was taken aback. `I understand that, there are similar expressions on Earth’ I had said, eventually. There had been a silence.
`You participated in the Boston experiments because you wanted to know the answers, because for part of you the ends justified the means. Another part of you was appalled at what was going on and how you had become implicated in it. Imagine a whole race, divided between a moral responsibility and a desire to know, a race without compassion and one desperate to survive. Yet there was still within us, Grey, a sense of shame, shame at what we had done. It is a powerful emotion, like love.’ I had felt myself blushing in horror.
`On Earth geneticists are debating whether emotion or memory is coded in the same way as height’ I had said, more to myself, trying to change the subject.
`You will know the answer to that shortly’ S’eeth had sounded empathic, so much so I had looked up, slightly unsettled.
`What do you plan to do with the Antarian child?’ I had asked eventually. S’eeth nodded again, an sudden movement, as if each question was anticipated.
`We shall have to clone enough for the genome to be dispersed throughout the population of the S’eeth and then we shall abolish the institutional and political framework that made the Era of Experiments possible. We shall learn to feel again, even to sing. That will be the hardest part. We will need human help. The child is an Antarian restored to us through human DNA and by accident. Is that not, in some sense, a miracle?’ It seemed a strange word to use, although I had myself used it about Max.
`Rather like Zan, the one you call Max.’ S’eeth said with disconcerting prescience. `You are infatuated with Max are you not?’ Again, the word had seemed strange, and I had gone to protest, but had suddenly thought how appropriate the word was. I was infatuated with him.
`Yes’, I said quietly `I suppose I am. I have a very strange feeling when I think of him’. I had sat deeply bemused. The emissary stood as if in thought. `Grey’ the emissary said directly `Your father was the human donor for Max’s DNA. It is only right that you know this now’
__________________________________________________________________
* S'eeth was indeed female, although she was old enought o be on the verge of becoming male again.
** It has always amused me to think that Michael was entirely right in his prediction, except for the statues, of which only Maz has had any worth mentioning. Jan 12 2016
`You, you died?’ I had asked again. Max and Liz were sitting on the bottom steps of the first landing, where the main staircase, fluted and ornate as a baroque organ turned at right angles and continued its descent to the main hallway. Max had looked up at me, as if I had discovered something deeply private about him, and said `yes’ plaintively, as if he wanted the subject dropped.
It was 4.30 pm and Maria, Michael and Isobel, exhausted by the night in the cellars and then the `science stuff’ (Michael) had gone for a long siesta. Kyle had gone to meditate. The Antarians had gone to prepare for the imminent arrival of about twelve Heads of Government (they had not specified which) and several other guests they alluded to but would not discuss. Our meeting had broken up well and on good terms. Somehow I had feared it was bound to end with death rays and alien invasion but there was a mood of extraordinary euphoria. S’eeth Sia Ova had taken Max aside for a while and spoke with him at some length. Michael had suddenly asked the emissary who had won the Antarian wars, to which she replied `No one’*. S’eeth Sia Ova had then asked me to walk with her outside. We must had made an odd couple, a grey haired recluse in tweeds, a dressing gown still over my shoulders, and a tall grey clad Antarian, walking in a rather stiff manner a little like an insect. `There is something you will need to know Grey, before the end of this’. I had looked at her curiously.
`Are there any problems?’
`No. Just the need for information. I will speak with you before your governments arrive’ She said delphically. Before I could press further, the Antarian had walked out into the afternoon, dazzling after the rains, and simply dematerialised into thin air. I had returned to cross examine Max.
`So you died and you came back to life as someone else?’ Of all the extraordinary stories Max had told me this was the hardest to believe. He looked at me anxiously, as if I thought he was making it up `Julian! Yes, but its difficult to explain, painful even. I became Clayton Wheeler when I was coerced into trying to reverse the aging process and then well, he turned into me! I was in his head although it was my head, and my body.’ He ran his finger across his lip, a sign that I should desist. Liz took his hand away.
`Reverse the aging process, how curious, the antidote to the advanced cellular decrepitude of the babies in Boston? I wonder?’ I had shaken my head. `You chastise me for comparing you to Christ, Max and then you nonchalantly mention that you have come back from the dead!’ Liz laughed and looked at me wide eyed, a beautiful habit she had, flashing her surprise about her. `Even S’eeth looked taken aback and I am sure that doesn’t happen often’ Liz had sensed that Max was still troubled, `Its OK Max, it does explain the odd chromosomes though’ she smiled, kissing his ear.
He curled into her like a cat wishing to be stroked. I smiled at the illusion. Liz had then said `Giving the child up will not be easy though, Antarian or otherwise, although I can understand that it - he - will need to grow amongst its own kind – Julian – is S’eeth female?’
`I think so. Or perhaps on the brink of being male again, I am not sure if it is polite to ask but if the opportunity arises - ’ I had noticed Max smiling at me then, his eyes narrowed slightly, and then widening, vivid, alive. Liz was stroking his hair and forehead. `I am sure you will find an opportunity Professor Grey, I am sure you are itching to get S’eeth on her own and pick her brains!’ He made a sort of mock startled expression as if this could not possibly have been on my mind. It was a priceless expression of intimacy and he had stuck his foot out in my direction. In that moment I experienced such an extraordinary feeling of love for him that I had felt suddenly unable to speak. It was if I had seen my vast solitude as a scholar and the bitterness I had kept within me transformed in an instance. Like the Buddha at Buddh Gaya, my enlightenment was unlooked for and instantaneous.
`So who’s coming this evening?’ asked Max, he had stretched his head onto Liz’s bulging stomach and was listening to it as if it was a sea shell. `I have no idea’ I had mused, `Most of the civilised world I suspect!’ I had sat down on the other side of Liz and, uncharacteristically, pressed my ear to her stomach as well. `Guys!!’ she had protested, `Do you mind?’
`What do you hear Max?’ I had asked. He pressed his ear hard in mock concentration. Liz laughed. `Max!’ We all paused, Liz holding her breath. Max listening carefully. `I hear the song of a new world’ he said.
`Sorry to interrupt this – whatever this is’ Michael had been standing over us as if from no where, his striking face full of mild sarcasm and innuendo, `Maxwell, Julian, Liz. I have two things to tell you. One is that several helicopters are approaching from the south and the second is Isobel and Maria want to know if we bother with dinner before we meet the G9 or whatever the industrialised world is called now, or after?’
I had stood up and walked out onto the terrace. Several large twin bladed Chinook helicopters were coming down between the lines of Antarian ships. In all the excitement I had forgotten – or simply not thought about – how this would look to the outside world. A monstrous invasion, the shocking revelation that we were not alone in the Universe written, almost literally, across the sky for all to see. No cover-up would work this time. I marvelled at the technology. I wished my father had been alive to see this, the confirmation of his own experiences. I stood looking up, hands in pockets. Was I being watched? Did the Antarians feel the same sense of wonder as I did? Or was this now all rather pedestrian to them, a lesser species irritatingly holding their king and his saviour child through sentimental attachment and familiarity? How odd, how stupid human curiosity can be! I manfully resisted the temptation to wave at them.
The lead helicopter was landing and I watched a civilian jump out as soon as the ground was close enough, ducking under the blades and running towards me. ``Professor Grey?’ I had nodded, surprised, seemingly to have forgotten that I owned the place. `Hello there, quite a day we’re having! My name is Jonathan Michaels, senior White House aide. We have a lot of work to do for the next few hours and I am going to need as much help from you as I can’. He shook my hand vigorously as if testing it actually belonged to me. `You do?’ I had asked, nonplussed. He had his arm around me in that fake way all hacks insinuate themselves into positions of responsibility. He was walking me back the way I had come `President Bush will be here in about three hours and then shortly after, the British Prime Minister and several heads of state from the Permanent members of the UN Security Council. They will need to have at least an option of staying the night. We’ll put the press in tents’. Had the setting above us been anything less unreal I would have considered this a joke in poor taste. `Where are the hybrids?’ Michaels was already multi-tasking, a mobile phone in one ear, gesticulating with his free hand. `We will want to see them and speak with them in closed session and then with the press’
`Oh my god, can’t this wait?’
Michaels looked appalled `This is the event of the – ‘ he spluttered, open mouthed, like a gold fish actually,
`Alright, alright. You will have to organise everything, Wilcox is too old and I am busy. Very busy. What time do they arrive’
`In just over four hours’ several more helicopters had landed behind us, and much activity was taking place. The former signs of battle had been discreetly removed.
Later……
I had gone back to inform the Roswellians that our evening was now full and that we should prepare ourselves for the total onslaught of the global media, and more heads of state than you could shake a stick at. I found however that this had already started. Everyone, including Wilcox, was crammed onto my sofa watching the Emergency Broadcast Channel. This kept showing President Bush in Washington asking for calm (the press room looked far from calm and neither did the President). There were long rather complicated shots of the UN Buildings in New York and the Security Council and then some random footage from Europe, the Middle East and Japan. Then we would have shots of Bone Hill House re-laid live from some far off helicopter. It showed the great majestic circle of ships – now over twenty – drawn about us, glittering in the lowering sunlight. It was clear from the camera angle that the ships were enormous. The House itself had looked beautiful. `Why I could not sell this property is a mystery’ I had mused. Michael smiled and slapped my back quite hard `Jules they’ll make it into a museum after today, and we’ll all have statues!’**
Suddenly Maria said `we have to dress up!’ Isobel smiled radiantly, `Oh my god of course!’ and before Kyle could intervene the matter was decided. For several moments there had been pandemonium and a flurry of out fits. Outside on the lawns more and more things appeared to be arriving by air. Michael had fetched down one of my formal dinner suits and Isobel somehow managed to alter it. Once dressed he looked extraordinarily smart, and as a result Max wanted one as well. Isobel, trying to change the colour of Maria’s hair, had to alter another suit but Max’s chest was too broad so she improvised with one of Wilcox’s old uniforms. The result was curiously beguiling, making Max look a little like a Prussian Hussar. He complained that his pants were too tight at which Liz cut a hole in the back. (`Sorry Jules’). Kyle wore a linen dress suit that made him look very Italian if not slightly sinister. There had been quite a fight with Isobel about whether he combed his hair back or not. Not to be outdone I had proposed to wear a rather fine Donegal tweed suit. Isobel appeared in what had once been a rather heavy damask curtain, which ended up on Liz because it was the only thing that would cover her adequately. Maria out did everyone with a long black dress, simple and elegant.
Suddenly Wilcox who had been trying to watch the television called us to attention. The television had gone live to the White House. The room fell silent amid a rush for the remote and the volume. Bush had made it back to the Oval Office and had somehow escaped the screaming press. He sat looking owlishly at the camera as if the escape had been a bit too close for comfort. He spoke of a historic day for all `human kind’ one long anticipated, perhaps even feared. He then referred to the Antarians directly. The enormity of what we were seeing began to sink in, especially for Max. Bush noted that the Antarians had made direct contact with several governments and had informed them that they had come to Earth peacefully in search of former members of their exiled Royal Family who were now needed to `resolve the healing of Antar after what appears to have been a series of long and ruinous wars’. Clearly, despite their extraordinary technology, they were not dissimilar to us. Then suddenly, to everyone’s amazement, pictures of Isobel, Max, Liz, Michael, Maria and Kyle flashed across the screen, including live interviews of people in Roswell. `That is such a dreadful, dreadful picture of me’ Maria had protested and buried her head in a pillow. Then there was a picture of me, about ten years ago, heading up the genome project. I thought I had looked spiteful and over zealous. The camera switched back to Bush and had closed in to show the perspiration on his forehead. `The Antarians will be holding a summit with us at about 9 pm PST. They have asked us to allow them to land on the Bone Hill Estate property and this has been granted as a show of good will. They have also asked for certain undertakings from the government which we have also agreed to’
later....
At 8.45 pm, Jonathan Michaels appeared with a horde of staff officers and said that the summit would be in the formal dining room. It had seemed appropriate. I had just settled down into my library, to thumb through some old friends for consolation, when I was aware that S’eeth Sia Ova had discreetly materialised in front of me. I was momentarily startled. `Forgive me Grey’ she said nodding slightly. I smiled and invited the emissary to sit and then noticed that this was not really an option given her height. `You must be busy with these arrangements’ I had said. I was nervous and S’eeth must have sensed it. `We are not so unalike, you and I, Grey. There is an expression on Antar: She who breaks a thing to find its meaning has lost the path of wisdom.’ I was taken aback. `I understand that, there are similar expressions on Earth’ I had said, eventually. There had been a silence.
`You participated in the Boston experiments because you wanted to know the answers, because for part of you the ends justified the means. Another part of you was appalled at what was going on and how you had become implicated in it. Imagine a whole race, divided between a moral responsibility and a desire to know, a race without compassion and one desperate to survive. Yet there was still within us, Grey, a sense of shame, shame at what we had done. It is a powerful emotion, like love.’ I had felt myself blushing in horror.
`On Earth geneticists are debating whether emotion or memory is coded in the same way as height’ I had said, more to myself, trying to change the subject.
`You will know the answer to that shortly’ S’eeth had sounded empathic, so much so I had looked up, slightly unsettled.
`What do you plan to do with the Antarian child?’ I had asked eventually. S’eeth nodded again, an sudden movement, as if each question was anticipated.
`We shall have to clone enough for the genome to be dispersed throughout the population of the S’eeth and then we shall abolish the institutional and political framework that made the Era of Experiments possible. We shall learn to feel again, even to sing. That will be the hardest part. We will need human help. The child is an Antarian restored to us through human DNA and by accident. Is that not, in some sense, a miracle?’ It seemed a strange word to use, although I had myself used it about Max.
`Rather like Zan, the one you call Max.’ S’eeth said with disconcerting prescience. `You are infatuated with Max are you not?’ Again, the word had seemed strange, and I had gone to protest, but had suddenly thought how appropriate the word was. I was infatuated with him.
`Yes’, I said quietly `I suppose I am. I have a very strange feeling when I think of him’. I had sat deeply bemused. The emissary stood as if in thought. `Grey’ the emissary said directly `Your father was the human donor for Max’s DNA. It is only right that you know this now’
__________________________________________________________________
* S'eeth was indeed female, although she was old enought o be on the verge of becoming male again.
** It has always amused me to think that Michael was entirely right in his prediction, except for the statues, of which only Maz has had any worth mentioning. Jan 12 2016
Last edited by Patroclus76 on Sat Mar 25, 2006 1:51 pm, edited 4 times in total.
-
Patroclus76
- Addicted Roswellian
- Posts: 178
- Joined: Wed Mar 08, 2006 5:02 pm
- Location: Bristol, UK
- Contact:
Private Communication between Ambassador Julian Evans and President A. Sayyid Quarishi:
Earth Orbital.
Priority: Secret and Confidential.
Transmitted on Holomail SPX 3 format*
May 10th 2055.
____________________________________________________________________
Dear Alex.
We are delayed here for a while because of severe micro-meteor showers and I am not transporting down to the surface a la Antar! I will be with you in about 12 hours. If you need to talk we have a dedicated channel here. In the meantime I have been reading through all the news and catching up with family stuff. Aunt Iz is going to meet with me in Washington, where Jessie is being considered for Henry’s job as AG (what’s the score there, has Maitland had enough?) Your political ratings look good by the way! (elections next year?). So much to catch up on! It is so extraordinary to see Earth below, a brilliant blue-white gem suspended in space, and not the grey-white sands of Antar! I have missed Earth more than I care to admit.
I have been thinking about your postscript concerning the Antarian ambassador. It is Heleq Marva of the Shalloth still? Curious remark, does he communicate directy with you often? Ki’var’s head is still safely installed in some secret place on Antar, partly out of deference to Shalloth sentiment, although he had as many enemies amongst them as he did the S’eeth towards the end. There are some loyalists, but they are remnants of the old houses, as much as the Rath and Zan cults are. The new regime has, on the whole, done a good job of invigorating a broader mysticism than the old dispensations allowed for. He cannot have meant the head!
I have, given the delays here, been wracking my brains trying to think what Marva might have been referring to – do you want me to look into this? (ie how important do you think it is?). Odd that you are also thinking of Grey as well, but I guess that is an effect of re-reading the codex. I was twelve when he died, and although I saw him as a second father to me, my memories are curiously out of focus, as if they are rather photographs of someone, a likeness, with no animation. I have powerful memories of him with Max though, and with Liz. Actually I can talk with Isobel and Michael if you want about this, tactfully of course. Michael rarely missed anything about Grey and he and Max were with him to the very end. So too of course was S’eeth Sia Ova. Do you know that he is now almost 900 years old now! I could talk with him, but I doubt very much he would see me. He is very silent now, close to the waters, as they say on Antar.
I know there has always been an attempt to make a connection between my father’s disappearance and the S’eeth, and also some connection between the S’eeth and Grey, but as with all conspiracy theories it is all just too elaborate. (I can hear Grey now actually, pulling on that confounded dressing gown and saying Occam’s Razor!!). However painful, I have long come to the conclusion that my father is dead and so has Liz and the others, even Maria (who curiously struggled the most to come to terms with the news) and who spent the longest time looking for him.
The only sinister note that disrupts my careful rationalisation of all this is, is of course, Grey’s last diary entry before he died, referring to the painting, and the bizarre fact that he had it brought to him on his deathbed. We all, rightly in my mind, agreed to sequester this passage under 5/7, although I am convinced that he was at this stage in his long illness, delusional. S’eeth did not give him the painting though, it had been in Bone Hill House for years, from at least the mid 1950s. Perhaps that is what Marva was getting at? Some confusion about S’eeth giving him a painting? It is possible, given all the interest in the codex, that some of the later entries have been leaked in someway? Michael has the actual formatted copies on him of the entire journal and not just the entries released by the court ruling. I could ask him to let me go over them? Sorry I am rambling now!! We can talk about this further when we meet.
Anyway my instinct is to let it go, Alex. Marva might well have been trying to make some sort of elaborate joke, in part because he might have been offended by Grey’s dream, although which bit I am not sure!!! (I thought the bit about Max's tail was very very funny!! Max would have laughed at that!!)
See you very soon!
Julian
Ps – I cannot communicate with Liz at all and the hub is not accepting even my level of clearance. Any clues on this?
_____________________________________________________________________
* this format will not play back any image on standard SPX formats. Voice print only.
Earth Orbital.
Priority: Secret and Confidential.
Transmitted on Holomail SPX 3 format*
May 10th 2055.
____________________________________________________________________
Dear Alex.
We are delayed here for a while because of severe micro-meteor showers and I am not transporting down to the surface a la Antar! I will be with you in about 12 hours. If you need to talk we have a dedicated channel here. In the meantime I have been reading through all the news and catching up with family stuff. Aunt Iz is going to meet with me in Washington, where Jessie is being considered for Henry’s job as AG (what’s the score there, has Maitland had enough?) Your political ratings look good by the way! (elections next year?). So much to catch up on! It is so extraordinary to see Earth below, a brilliant blue-white gem suspended in space, and not the grey-white sands of Antar! I have missed Earth more than I care to admit.
I have been thinking about your postscript concerning the Antarian ambassador. It is Heleq Marva of the Shalloth still? Curious remark, does he communicate directy with you often? Ki’var’s head is still safely installed in some secret place on Antar, partly out of deference to Shalloth sentiment, although he had as many enemies amongst them as he did the S’eeth towards the end. There are some loyalists, but they are remnants of the old houses, as much as the Rath and Zan cults are. The new regime has, on the whole, done a good job of invigorating a broader mysticism than the old dispensations allowed for. He cannot have meant the head!
I have, given the delays here, been wracking my brains trying to think what Marva might have been referring to – do you want me to look into this? (ie how important do you think it is?). Odd that you are also thinking of Grey as well, but I guess that is an effect of re-reading the codex. I was twelve when he died, and although I saw him as a second father to me, my memories are curiously out of focus, as if they are rather photographs of someone, a likeness, with no animation. I have powerful memories of him with Max though, and with Liz. Actually I can talk with Isobel and Michael if you want about this, tactfully of course. Michael rarely missed anything about Grey and he and Max were with him to the very end. So too of course was S’eeth Sia Ova. Do you know that he is now almost 900 years old now! I could talk with him, but I doubt very much he would see me. He is very silent now, close to the waters, as they say on Antar.
I know there has always been an attempt to make a connection between my father’s disappearance and the S’eeth, and also some connection between the S’eeth and Grey, but as with all conspiracy theories it is all just too elaborate. (I can hear Grey now actually, pulling on that confounded dressing gown and saying Occam’s Razor!!). However painful, I have long come to the conclusion that my father is dead and so has Liz and the others, even Maria (who curiously struggled the most to come to terms with the news) and who spent the longest time looking for him.
The only sinister note that disrupts my careful rationalisation of all this is, is of course, Grey’s last diary entry before he died, referring to the painting, and the bizarre fact that he had it brought to him on his deathbed. We all, rightly in my mind, agreed to sequester this passage under 5/7, although I am convinced that he was at this stage in his long illness, delusional. S’eeth did not give him the painting though, it had been in Bone Hill House for years, from at least the mid 1950s. Perhaps that is what Marva was getting at? Some confusion about S’eeth giving him a painting? It is possible, given all the interest in the codex, that some of the later entries have been leaked in someway? Michael has the actual formatted copies on him of the entire journal and not just the entries released by the court ruling. I could ask him to let me go over them? Sorry I am rambling now!! We can talk about this further when we meet.
Anyway my instinct is to let it go, Alex. Marva might well have been trying to make some sort of elaborate joke, in part because he might have been offended by Grey’s dream, although which bit I am not sure!!! (I thought the bit about Max's tail was very very funny!! Max would have laughed at that!!)
See you very soon!
Julian
Ps – I cannot communicate with Liz at all and the hub is not accepting even my level of clearance. Any clues on this?
_____________________________________________________________________
* this format will not play back any image on standard SPX formats. Voice print only.
-
Patroclus76
- Addicted Roswellian
- Posts: 178
- Joined: Wed Mar 08, 2006 5:02 pm
- Location: Bristol, UK
- Contact:
April 3rd, 2006.
I had sat speechless, winded almost, as if S’eeth had struck me violently across the face. It is difficult to recall now what I felt most strongly, anger, relief, joy? My rage over how my father had been treated and what the consequences of these abductions had been for his life was tempered by the curious, inner revelation that I had known all the time. S’eeth – feeling my emotional implosion stepped back slightly – but I remained sitting and silent for what seemed at the time hours but which was only probably a few minutes. `Grey?’ asked the emissary cautiously, as if this was not quite the sort of reaction she had expected. Had she thought I might attack her? Smash things, cry? (I had momentarily wanted to do all these things).
`I think I need to be alone, S’eeth Sia Ova, for a moment at least’ The Antarian once more nodded crisply, the head jabbing down on the long neck. `I and the S’eeth take full responsibility for this. I was a leading advocate of the experiments, and I am currently under indictment by the provisional government, along with most of the Science Guild for war crimes.’ This revelation had only added to my emotional confusion. My image of S’eeth – who I had felt an immediate empathy with, now seemed sinister, a criminal, someone who had carried out awful and dreadful experiments on unwilling subjects. `Are you ashamed about this as well?’
`I am ashamed, and yet the result is before us, Max, the new child, a new future. I cannot bring your father back, Grey.’
`Does Max know about us?’ I had asked quietly.
`No. You can tell him if you wish to. In a complex way it makes you, in effect, siblings.’
S’eeth turned to leave, and then paused, looking at me. `Towards the end of Kurvar’s regime, even the leading Shalloth realised that the Antarian Imperium was doomed. Kuvar had kept me alive and in servitude because of the role I had played in rescuing the Royal Four and because he needed the Guild to function long enough for the Shalloth to learn from us, and to take up their positions in the Sciences. Strange as it seemed I developed a form of friendship with Kuvar. Yet in the end, Kurvar had gone mad, for it is a degenerate tendency in Shalloth genes. As the economic basis of the Empire collapsed, the Shalloth and delegates of the three other caste races approached me to bring around what was left of the S’eeth to depose him. It was an ironic moment for me. But already the S’eeth had sensed the end, and were prepared to make amends, even to die. There are few of us left Grey, we have immense life spans but have had no offspring. We number barely 1,000. In the end we planned a coup, and it was I who severed Kuvar’s head. Even at the end the Shalloth feared him, even in death. The S’eeth proposed the restoration of Zan, but the Shalloth and the others opposed it. All had come to know of the child Yantra Parker was carrying. I was entrusted to come to Earth and to request that the child be returned and that Zan abdicate, preparing the way for the abolition of the Monarchy. I was instructed to return with the child’
I do not know why S’eeth told me all this. It was as if her revelation over my father needed to be buried – or put into a wider context. I had nodded, bewildered. `Will the Shalloth accept the child? Will they not see it as a way to restore the S’eeth? A threat?’
`They may, but that is not our intention, and they will benefit from the Peace. There will be guarantees, and Earth will play a significant part in providing surety to our fragile unity.’ There had been another silence. S’eeth had then asked `Is not the essence of humanity to forgive, and to ask forgiveness in return?’ I had thought of Prospero, standing at the end of The Tempest, Shakespeare’s greatest and most eloquent testimony to humanism. `Forgive me, Grey’. S’eeth gave me her hand. It was narrow and dry to the touch and when we shook hands there was almost no power in it.
At that moment the library doors had been pushed open and Max, illuminated from behind, had rather appropriately cast his shadow across the floor between us. S’eeth bowed (a hard slow movement starting from the shoulders) and then immediately vanished in a soft cascade of light. `Hey, Julian?’ Max sat down next to me. To my consternation my face was wet with tears. He was concerned, anxious. He put his arm around me and forced me to look at him. `What did S’eeth have to say? Are we in danger?’
`No Max, it isn’t that’
`Then tell me what has upset you?’ Even in my distress I had fought down a smile at this typical transformation, the image of Max as my father now, inverting the role I had I wanted to play with him.
`S’eeth Sia Ova confessed to having been behind the abduction of my father, and’ how could I say this - `She told me that he was also the donor of your human DNA, which of course makes us – ‘
`Brothers?’ He gasped. Max paused and then stood up. He took my hand in his and pulled me up to my feet and then he did whatI always longed for but dreaded, long for because it opened up my soul, dreaded, because it destroyed all my self control, and all my sad delusions about who I was and what I had done with my life: he hugged me tightly.
Later…..
Michaels organised the formal meetings with the heads of state effortlessly and without undue stress. I was of some reassurance that the White House was staffed with such professionals. The dining room was full of presidents and prime ministers, all of which were introduced to us, standing in the entrance hall, dressed up and radiant (although Max was clearly very nervous and was afraid they would ask him something about Antar which he could not remember). How beautiful they all looked, and how extremely joyous! Michael and Kyle worked the politicians with remarkable skill. Isobel and Maria revealed a side to themselves that I had suspected but not seen, socialites with consummate skill. President Bush had taken a particular shine to Isobel. But it was Max and Liz who stood at the heart of all things, Max, dark, tall, kingly (there was no other word) his eyes shining, wearing his tasselled jacket like a 19th century cavalry officer, and Liz, the damask curtain having been transformed into some exquisite regal gown. How her darkness complemented Max, how together, in some quintessential way, they were one.
The Antarians had then arrived and there was a sort of hushed panic: I heard someone from Fox TV say `OMG real life aliens!’ and someone from BBC 24 dropped his camera. We had then gone into the dining room and the press were sent back to their tents. Once alone, the summit had got down to immediate business with what had struck me as a curious normality. S’eeth Sia Ova and five other S’eeth (there had been no Shalloths or any other race) negotiated primarily with the US President (who I have to say, was shorter than I had imagined), who then negotiated with the UN Secretary General and the British and Canadians. The Germans, French and Japanese were largely spectators. I will not bother too much recording the details*, but in effect S’eeth wanted protection for the Roswellians should they decide to stay on Earth, and amid protests and denials, catalogued the Special Unit and the whole FBI witch hunt, including my experiments in Boston. S’eeth’s preparations had been meticulous.
The discussion about Boston had been a disconcerting revelation, one that put me curiously on the same footing as S’eeth – a sort of collaborator. There was then the issue of technology and an alliance. It appeared that the Antarians were determined to bring Earth in as a sponsor of their own treaty, which Bush was keen on but no one else until they had more information. The idea of getting their hands on serious realistic space travel gave most of the human diplomats palpitations. Max was then asked to confirm that he had indeed abdicated and he said he had. Liz was then asked whether she agreed to allow one of her children to depart with the Antarians. This had been a difficult, painful moment, but she had said yes with that beautiful, open way of hers. I had looked at Max as well, thinking that this was the second child that circumstances had forced him to forgo. In essence that evening, in my own dining room, the Bone Hill Protocols were fleshed out and signed. S’eeth could not hold the pen but merely imprinted her name mentally – an ability that rather shocked several of the diplomats. The conference broke up quickly with great excitement.
At that moment, at about midnight, I had heard the buzzer go down stairs in the boot room. Jonathan Michaels, who had been fawning about with various people, had looked at me and said `Get that will you’ rather bluntly. I had pulled a face (which Michael saw) and walked off down towards the main hallway. Never had I seen the house so full of life and energy. TV cameras and cables were everywhere. I almost felt the old House excited itself, or at least amused. As I stooped down the buzzer sounded again. I had said `Yes’ curtly, feeling suddenly exhausted.
`Professor Grey, the families of the hybrids are here’
`The who?’
`The families? Mr and Mrs Evans and the Parkers, Mr and Mrs Valenti? Can you open the gates please?’ Bemused I released the gates. This was clearly Se’eth Sias Ova’s doing, or it was a formal undertaking by the government to become inclusive and transparent. I had walked slowly back into the dining room. Most of the politicians had gone, although I heard the British Prime Minister ask Max about his `uniform’ (!) Michael had deliberately shaken some bottled sparking water and was now about to let Jonathan Michaels open it unaware. He had winked at me just as it t sprayed him from head to foot. I had signalled Max.
`What is big brother’ he said smiling, although he had looked tired, exhausted.
`Your parents are here, all of them’
Of the many things that had happened to me that day, or indeed over the previous week, the sight of my friends being reunited with their families was the most moving, the most eloquent of all. They arrived, bewildered, overwhelmed by the cavalcade of cars and their long journeys, awed by the great pile of House with its circle of floating ships, now lit from within with a ghostly blue ambiance. As they emerged out of the gloom into the main hallway to meet me I recalled the arrival of their children here just a few weeks ago, wet, exhausted people, anxious for their future. Now all had been transformed. I shook each parent’s hands, feeling their curiosity and emotion and then I led them into the dining room and watched as tears flowed and people hugged in a whirl of renewal. Images stay in my mind as I write this, Isobel weeping at the first sight of her mother, Maria rushing towards her mother and greeting her new step-father Jim Valenti with mock horror, Kyle bright eyed, and Max, his ability to take on any more emotion seemingly exhausted, just looking at everything as if he was hallucinating. I took in their joy like one, long chilled, warms oneself by a great roaring fire and then I withdrew from the great wooded panelled room, like a footman, satisfied that finally after its long existence Bone Hill had found an event, an occasion worthy of its style and grandeur. I stood for a while, composing myself. As I turned to walk to my study I saw Michael sitting on the steps in the hallway.
He had sat with his head down, his hair chaotic and to one side. He was resting his elbows on his knees, and holding his face in his hands.
`Michael?’ I had walked towards him, `You ok? Why aren’t you enjoying the party!’ He looked up, his face wet with tears. `Hey?’ I sat down, putting my arm around his shoulder. The spontaneity of the act surprised us both. How far we had come in such a little time! `Sorry’ he said, his voice broken, `I just feel weird that’s all’
`Yeah, I know what you mean. I feel weird this evening, but then again I suspect the whole planet feels pretty weird!’ he had smiled at me. He wiped his eyes briskly, on the pretence that his tears were the product of an irritant, not emotion. `What’s your problem?’
`Seeing everyone with their families is odd, I guess I had become rather paternal to everyone’
`Hey Max told me about the abduction Julian, you have been promoted into the Roswllians as a blood member – congratulations!’ I had felt embarrassed, but Michael had said `you’re a really cool guy Julian, I am sorry I was a bit in your face at the beginning’
`That’s ok’ I had smiled, `Michael, all of you share an extraordinary love for each other, I felt it that first night you came to me, like orphans from the storm that night, here in this hallway. I know you must feel excluded tonight, but nothing could be further from the truth. I can’t image how they would cope without you’
I stopped, unable to articulate my feelings. `Go on inside, otherwise they will come looking for you’ I suggested. Even as I spoke the door opened and Isobel came out, radiant, intensely happy `Michael!! Come here, we’re waiting for you!!’ Max’s head appeared behind his sister’s `Hey Michael!’ I removed my arm surreptitiously from his shoulder `Go on Michael’ I had whispered. We stood up and he walked away, regaining his composure as Isobel threw her arms around him and pulled him through the doorway. Max half turned, paused and looked at me intently. `Julian?’
`Maximilian?’**
`Are you really going to bed?’
`I am. I have some theorising to do and then I shall sleep. I have had a very long day and I am twice your age’. He stepped out into the hallway and walked towards me. `My parents will want to meet the famous if not rather mysterious Professor Grey’ he had smiled seductively, like someone who has never failed to charm his way out of anything. Years seem to have fallen from him. He was almost a boy again. `Will they now?’ I had said, unable to prevent a smile. `Oh no young man, do not cast your spells on me tonight. And some would say the slightly notorious Grey’ we had both laughed.
`God I could do with a drink!’ Max had said, suddenly, and then, his mood changing,
`S’eeth wants me to go to Antar at some stage, not now, but in a few months, to help her smooth over the government. What do you think, can I trust her?’
I had paused, thinking. `Yes, you can. S’eeth is under indictment for some form of war crimes, so I suspect she is anxious to comply and to cooperate. This whole peace process will not be easy, and the more we know about Antar the better. I will come with you if you want?’
Max had looked relieved. `I would love that, Professor Grey’ he turned, and then had added. `Did you request that our parents be allowed to see us?’
`No. It was the emissary I guess. Part of a plan to ensure that you can return to a normal life if you want to? S’eeth is clever’
`Will anything be normal after tonight?’ A great burst of laughter came from the dining room. `Max…’ I started, but I was unable to finish, unable to convey in words the enormity of what I was feeling. I wanted to say so much but it was as if all the words I could use were very small and the canvas of what I wanted to say was infinite. In the end I said simply `You had better go’.
____________________________________________________________
*There are many accounts now of the Protocols and the first summit, the most useful one is by David Logoan and Emma Jervis The Longest Night: The Bone Hill Protocols in Historical Perspective. OUP, Oxford 2008.
**Oddly on discovering that we were related I assumed Michael's habit of changing his name to fit the circumstances. Names are odd things. Re-reading these now I notice how S'eeth Sia Ova, who is sitting opposite me now reading poetry has NEVER called me Julian, while she started the habit of calling Max and Liz's human son Julian The Younger. february 2016
I had sat speechless, winded almost, as if S’eeth had struck me violently across the face. It is difficult to recall now what I felt most strongly, anger, relief, joy? My rage over how my father had been treated and what the consequences of these abductions had been for his life was tempered by the curious, inner revelation that I had known all the time. S’eeth – feeling my emotional implosion stepped back slightly – but I remained sitting and silent for what seemed at the time hours but which was only probably a few minutes. `Grey?’ asked the emissary cautiously, as if this was not quite the sort of reaction she had expected. Had she thought I might attack her? Smash things, cry? (I had momentarily wanted to do all these things).
`I think I need to be alone, S’eeth Sia Ova, for a moment at least’ The Antarian once more nodded crisply, the head jabbing down on the long neck. `I and the S’eeth take full responsibility for this. I was a leading advocate of the experiments, and I am currently under indictment by the provisional government, along with most of the Science Guild for war crimes.’ This revelation had only added to my emotional confusion. My image of S’eeth – who I had felt an immediate empathy with, now seemed sinister, a criminal, someone who had carried out awful and dreadful experiments on unwilling subjects. `Are you ashamed about this as well?’
`I am ashamed, and yet the result is before us, Max, the new child, a new future. I cannot bring your father back, Grey.’
`Does Max know about us?’ I had asked quietly.
`No. You can tell him if you wish to. In a complex way it makes you, in effect, siblings.’
S’eeth turned to leave, and then paused, looking at me. `Towards the end of Kurvar’s regime, even the leading Shalloth realised that the Antarian Imperium was doomed. Kuvar had kept me alive and in servitude because of the role I had played in rescuing the Royal Four and because he needed the Guild to function long enough for the Shalloth to learn from us, and to take up their positions in the Sciences. Strange as it seemed I developed a form of friendship with Kuvar. Yet in the end, Kurvar had gone mad, for it is a degenerate tendency in Shalloth genes. As the economic basis of the Empire collapsed, the Shalloth and delegates of the three other caste races approached me to bring around what was left of the S’eeth to depose him. It was an ironic moment for me. But already the S’eeth had sensed the end, and were prepared to make amends, even to die. There are few of us left Grey, we have immense life spans but have had no offspring. We number barely 1,000. In the end we planned a coup, and it was I who severed Kuvar’s head. Even at the end the Shalloth feared him, even in death. The S’eeth proposed the restoration of Zan, but the Shalloth and the others opposed it. All had come to know of the child Yantra Parker was carrying. I was entrusted to come to Earth and to request that the child be returned and that Zan abdicate, preparing the way for the abolition of the Monarchy. I was instructed to return with the child’
I do not know why S’eeth told me all this. It was as if her revelation over my father needed to be buried – or put into a wider context. I had nodded, bewildered. `Will the Shalloth accept the child? Will they not see it as a way to restore the S’eeth? A threat?’
`They may, but that is not our intention, and they will benefit from the Peace. There will be guarantees, and Earth will play a significant part in providing surety to our fragile unity.’ There had been another silence. S’eeth had then asked `Is not the essence of humanity to forgive, and to ask forgiveness in return?’ I had thought of Prospero, standing at the end of The Tempest, Shakespeare’s greatest and most eloquent testimony to humanism. `Forgive me, Grey’. S’eeth gave me her hand. It was narrow and dry to the touch and when we shook hands there was almost no power in it.
At that moment the library doors had been pushed open and Max, illuminated from behind, had rather appropriately cast his shadow across the floor between us. S’eeth bowed (a hard slow movement starting from the shoulders) and then immediately vanished in a soft cascade of light. `Hey, Julian?’ Max sat down next to me. To my consternation my face was wet with tears. He was concerned, anxious. He put his arm around me and forced me to look at him. `What did S’eeth have to say? Are we in danger?’
`No Max, it isn’t that’
`Then tell me what has upset you?’ Even in my distress I had fought down a smile at this typical transformation, the image of Max as my father now, inverting the role I had I wanted to play with him.
`S’eeth Sia Ova confessed to having been behind the abduction of my father, and’ how could I say this - `She told me that he was also the donor of your human DNA, which of course makes us – ‘
`Brothers?’ He gasped. Max paused and then stood up. He took my hand in his and pulled me up to my feet and then he did whatI always longed for but dreaded, long for because it opened up my soul, dreaded, because it destroyed all my self control, and all my sad delusions about who I was and what I had done with my life: he hugged me tightly.
Later…..
Michaels organised the formal meetings with the heads of state effortlessly and without undue stress. I was of some reassurance that the White House was staffed with such professionals. The dining room was full of presidents and prime ministers, all of which were introduced to us, standing in the entrance hall, dressed up and radiant (although Max was clearly very nervous and was afraid they would ask him something about Antar which he could not remember). How beautiful they all looked, and how extremely joyous! Michael and Kyle worked the politicians with remarkable skill. Isobel and Maria revealed a side to themselves that I had suspected but not seen, socialites with consummate skill. President Bush had taken a particular shine to Isobel. But it was Max and Liz who stood at the heart of all things, Max, dark, tall, kingly (there was no other word) his eyes shining, wearing his tasselled jacket like a 19th century cavalry officer, and Liz, the damask curtain having been transformed into some exquisite regal gown. How her darkness complemented Max, how together, in some quintessential way, they were one.
The Antarians had then arrived and there was a sort of hushed panic: I heard someone from Fox TV say `OMG real life aliens!’ and someone from BBC 24 dropped his camera. We had then gone into the dining room and the press were sent back to their tents. Once alone, the summit had got down to immediate business with what had struck me as a curious normality. S’eeth Sia Ova and five other S’eeth (there had been no Shalloths or any other race) negotiated primarily with the US President (who I have to say, was shorter than I had imagined), who then negotiated with the UN Secretary General and the British and Canadians. The Germans, French and Japanese were largely spectators. I will not bother too much recording the details*, but in effect S’eeth wanted protection for the Roswellians should they decide to stay on Earth, and amid protests and denials, catalogued the Special Unit and the whole FBI witch hunt, including my experiments in Boston. S’eeth’s preparations had been meticulous.
The discussion about Boston had been a disconcerting revelation, one that put me curiously on the same footing as S’eeth – a sort of collaborator. There was then the issue of technology and an alliance. It appeared that the Antarians were determined to bring Earth in as a sponsor of their own treaty, which Bush was keen on but no one else until they had more information. The idea of getting their hands on serious realistic space travel gave most of the human diplomats palpitations. Max was then asked to confirm that he had indeed abdicated and he said he had. Liz was then asked whether she agreed to allow one of her children to depart with the Antarians. This had been a difficult, painful moment, but she had said yes with that beautiful, open way of hers. I had looked at Max as well, thinking that this was the second child that circumstances had forced him to forgo. In essence that evening, in my own dining room, the Bone Hill Protocols were fleshed out and signed. S’eeth could not hold the pen but merely imprinted her name mentally – an ability that rather shocked several of the diplomats. The conference broke up quickly with great excitement.
At that moment, at about midnight, I had heard the buzzer go down stairs in the boot room. Jonathan Michaels, who had been fawning about with various people, had looked at me and said `Get that will you’ rather bluntly. I had pulled a face (which Michael saw) and walked off down towards the main hallway. Never had I seen the house so full of life and energy. TV cameras and cables were everywhere. I almost felt the old House excited itself, or at least amused. As I stooped down the buzzer sounded again. I had said `Yes’ curtly, feeling suddenly exhausted.
`Professor Grey, the families of the hybrids are here’
`The who?’
`The families? Mr and Mrs Evans and the Parkers, Mr and Mrs Valenti? Can you open the gates please?’ Bemused I released the gates. This was clearly Se’eth Sias Ova’s doing, or it was a formal undertaking by the government to become inclusive and transparent. I had walked slowly back into the dining room. Most of the politicians had gone, although I heard the British Prime Minister ask Max about his `uniform’ (!) Michael had deliberately shaken some bottled sparking water and was now about to let Jonathan Michaels open it unaware. He had winked at me just as it t sprayed him from head to foot. I had signalled Max.
`What is big brother’ he said smiling, although he had looked tired, exhausted.
`Your parents are here, all of them’
Of the many things that had happened to me that day, or indeed over the previous week, the sight of my friends being reunited with their families was the most moving, the most eloquent of all. They arrived, bewildered, overwhelmed by the cavalcade of cars and their long journeys, awed by the great pile of House with its circle of floating ships, now lit from within with a ghostly blue ambiance. As they emerged out of the gloom into the main hallway to meet me I recalled the arrival of their children here just a few weeks ago, wet, exhausted people, anxious for their future. Now all had been transformed. I shook each parent’s hands, feeling their curiosity and emotion and then I led them into the dining room and watched as tears flowed and people hugged in a whirl of renewal. Images stay in my mind as I write this, Isobel weeping at the first sight of her mother, Maria rushing towards her mother and greeting her new step-father Jim Valenti with mock horror, Kyle bright eyed, and Max, his ability to take on any more emotion seemingly exhausted, just looking at everything as if he was hallucinating. I took in their joy like one, long chilled, warms oneself by a great roaring fire and then I withdrew from the great wooded panelled room, like a footman, satisfied that finally after its long existence Bone Hill had found an event, an occasion worthy of its style and grandeur. I stood for a while, composing myself. As I turned to walk to my study I saw Michael sitting on the steps in the hallway.
He had sat with his head down, his hair chaotic and to one side. He was resting his elbows on his knees, and holding his face in his hands.
`Michael?’ I had walked towards him, `You ok? Why aren’t you enjoying the party!’ He looked up, his face wet with tears. `Hey?’ I sat down, putting my arm around his shoulder. The spontaneity of the act surprised us both. How far we had come in such a little time! `Sorry’ he said, his voice broken, `I just feel weird that’s all’
`Yeah, I know what you mean. I feel weird this evening, but then again I suspect the whole planet feels pretty weird!’ he had smiled at me. He wiped his eyes briskly, on the pretence that his tears were the product of an irritant, not emotion. `What’s your problem?’
`Seeing everyone with their families is odd, I guess I had become rather paternal to everyone’
`Hey Max told me about the abduction Julian, you have been promoted into the Roswllians as a blood member – congratulations!’ I had felt embarrassed, but Michael had said `you’re a really cool guy Julian, I am sorry I was a bit in your face at the beginning’
`That’s ok’ I had smiled, `Michael, all of you share an extraordinary love for each other, I felt it that first night you came to me, like orphans from the storm that night, here in this hallway. I know you must feel excluded tonight, but nothing could be further from the truth. I can’t image how they would cope without you’
I stopped, unable to articulate my feelings. `Go on inside, otherwise they will come looking for you’ I suggested. Even as I spoke the door opened and Isobel came out, radiant, intensely happy `Michael!! Come here, we’re waiting for you!!’ Max’s head appeared behind his sister’s `Hey Michael!’ I removed my arm surreptitiously from his shoulder `Go on Michael’ I had whispered. We stood up and he walked away, regaining his composure as Isobel threw her arms around him and pulled him through the doorway. Max half turned, paused and looked at me intently. `Julian?’
`Maximilian?’**
`Are you really going to bed?’
`I am. I have some theorising to do and then I shall sleep. I have had a very long day and I am twice your age’. He stepped out into the hallway and walked towards me. `My parents will want to meet the famous if not rather mysterious Professor Grey’ he had smiled seductively, like someone who has never failed to charm his way out of anything. Years seem to have fallen from him. He was almost a boy again. `Will they now?’ I had said, unable to prevent a smile. `Oh no young man, do not cast your spells on me tonight. And some would say the slightly notorious Grey’ we had both laughed.
`God I could do with a drink!’ Max had said, suddenly, and then, his mood changing,
`S’eeth wants me to go to Antar at some stage, not now, but in a few months, to help her smooth over the government. What do you think, can I trust her?’
I had paused, thinking. `Yes, you can. S’eeth is under indictment for some form of war crimes, so I suspect she is anxious to comply and to cooperate. This whole peace process will not be easy, and the more we know about Antar the better. I will come with you if you want?’
Max had looked relieved. `I would love that, Professor Grey’ he turned, and then had added. `Did you request that our parents be allowed to see us?’
`No. It was the emissary I guess. Part of a plan to ensure that you can return to a normal life if you want to? S’eeth is clever’
`Will anything be normal after tonight?’ A great burst of laughter came from the dining room. `Max…’ I started, but I was unable to finish, unable to convey in words the enormity of what I was feeling. I wanted to say so much but it was as if all the words I could use were very small and the canvas of what I wanted to say was infinite. In the end I said simply `You had better go’.
____________________________________________________________
*There are many accounts now of the Protocols and the first summit, the most useful one is by David Logoan and Emma Jervis The Longest Night: The Bone Hill Protocols in Historical Perspective. OUP, Oxford 2008.
**Oddly on discovering that we were related I assumed Michael's habit of changing his name to fit the circumstances. Names are odd things. Re-reading these now I notice how S'eeth Sia Ova, who is sitting opposite me now reading poetry has NEVER called me Julian, while she started the habit of calling Max and Liz's human son Julian The Younger. february 2016
Last edited by Patroclus76 on Sun Mar 26, 2006 12:30 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Patroclus76
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Private communication between President A. Sayyid Quarishi to Ambassador Julian Evans en route to Antar.
Priority: Secret and Confidential Full encryption.
Transmitted on FTL sub-space to the Earth Light Cruiser Ariel.
Adjusted date May 23rd 2055. ________________________________________________________________
Dear Julian.
Many thanks for coming all this way to talk in person with me. I found your presence here a huge relief and it was so good to see you looking so well. I know there were many other things to do and people to see, but I appreciate the hike from Antar! The publication of the relevant section of the codex concerning S’eeth’s indictment has passed off without any untoward events, so your instincts were right after all! (I promise not to bring you on a 24 light year round trip next time you cite your instincts!).
However, despite my earlier communication to you, there is pressure growing to release the remaining part of Grey’s codex up until his death. The Antarians are oddly in favour of this as well, bizarre given their reaction to the Supreme Court ruling that published the 2006 entries earlier. You seemed to think that this was a good idea when we first met and that we should do it? (I am not sure now, you seemed ambiguous just before you left). I will consult with Michael and Maria. Kyle Valenti sent me a holotext from Bhutan saying that so long as Grey’s privacy was protected he was in favour of them all being released, as did Isobel. This means more work for you I am afraid if we go ahead with it! Your mother is Off World at the moment, although I gather you managed to see her at Bone Hill House (see below). What were her views on more of the codex? I am sorry about the security surrounding her flight, incidentally. I am not clear who actually authorised it but it’s a joint mission with the Antarian Science Guild and they are obsessive about security. I do wish at her age she would slow down just a little! Did you know that your (new!) sister has gone with her?
The Antarian Legation here troubles me, as you know, and it was good to get that off my chest as well. There is something not right about it. I was as surprised as you were to know that the Ambassador has made several trips to Bone Hill House on his own, and frankly outraged to discover that he wanted access to the library and Grey’s study. I don’t want an incident, but if this happens again I might press for his recall, or at least summon him in for a dressing down. I don’t like Marva, frankly. I am tempted to authorise some sort of surveillance but suspect this would be misunderstood on Antar, I don’t want to seem as if I am playing the Shalloth off against the S’eeth.
Finally, Julian I trust you with everything, you know that. Yet you must keep our final conversation completely confidential. You cannot be right about the painting you found, it just doesn’t make any sense – Liz must be mistaken, surely, it was a long time ago? (and yet she has never got anything wrong in her life!) Surely if Max had not recognised the painting when he first saw it with Grey, he would have the second time, when Grey had it brought down just before his death (but is this story true?)? If not Max what about Michael? Please keep this utterly secret between us. Did you have time to talk to Michael about this? Can you transmit me a copy of the painting on this line? Be careful, keep in touch, and please try and see S’eeth Sia Ova before he dies. The very last thing I want Julian, the very last thing in the run up to an election, is pressure to re-open the investigation into the disappearance of your father.
Yours ever
Alex.
Priority: Secret and Confidential Full encryption.
Transmitted on FTL sub-space to the Earth Light Cruiser Ariel.
Adjusted date May 23rd 2055. ________________________________________________________________
Dear Julian.
Many thanks for coming all this way to talk in person with me. I found your presence here a huge relief and it was so good to see you looking so well. I know there were many other things to do and people to see, but I appreciate the hike from Antar! The publication of the relevant section of the codex concerning S’eeth’s indictment has passed off without any untoward events, so your instincts were right after all! (I promise not to bring you on a 24 light year round trip next time you cite your instincts!).
However, despite my earlier communication to you, there is pressure growing to release the remaining part of Grey’s codex up until his death. The Antarians are oddly in favour of this as well, bizarre given their reaction to the Supreme Court ruling that published the 2006 entries earlier. You seemed to think that this was a good idea when we first met and that we should do it? (I am not sure now, you seemed ambiguous just before you left). I will consult with Michael and Maria. Kyle Valenti sent me a holotext from Bhutan saying that so long as Grey’s privacy was protected he was in favour of them all being released, as did Isobel. This means more work for you I am afraid if we go ahead with it! Your mother is Off World at the moment, although I gather you managed to see her at Bone Hill House (see below). What were her views on more of the codex? I am sorry about the security surrounding her flight, incidentally. I am not clear who actually authorised it but it’s a joint mission with the Antarian Science Guild and they are obsessive about security. I do wish at her age she would slow down just a little! Did you know that your (new!) sister has gone with her?
The Antarian Legation here troubles me, as you know, and it was good to get that off my chest as well. There is something not right about it. I was as surprised as you were to know that the Ambassador has made several trips to Bone Hill House on his own, and frankly outraged to discover that he wanted access to the library and Grey’s study. I don’t want an incident, but if this happens again I might press for his recall, or at least summon him in for a dressing down. I don’t like Marva, frankly. I am tempted to authorise some sort of surveillance but suspect this would be misunderstood on Antar, I don’t want to seem as if I am playing the Shalloth off against the S’eeth.
Finally, Julian I trust you with everything, you know that. Yet you must keep our final conversation completely confidential. You cannot be right about the painting you found, it just doesn’t make any sense – Liz must be mistaken, surely, it was a long time ago? (and yet she has never got anything wrong in her life!) Surely if Max had not recognised the painting when he first saw it with Grey, he would have the second time, when Grey had it brought down just before his death (but is this story true?)? If not Max what about Michael? Please keep this utterly secret between us. Did you have time to talk to Michael about this? Can you transmit me a copy of the painting on this line? Be careful, keep in touch, and please try and see S’eeth Sia Ova before he dies. The very last thing I want Julian, the very last thing in the run up to an election, is pressure to re-open the investigation into the disappearance of your father.
Yours ever
Alex.
-
Patroclus76
- Addicted Roswellian
- Posts: 178
- Joined: Wed Mar 08, 2006 5:02 pm
- Location: Bristol, UK
- Contact:
Single transcoded message between Ambassador Julian Evans to President A. Sayyid Quarishi hidden within a diplomatic carrier wave:
Antarian Orbital.
Priority: Secret and Confidential: multiple encryption.
Adjusted date June 1st, 2055. __________________________________________________________________
Dear Alex.
I took this image of the painting with my mother when we visited Bone Hill House. She is adamant that it is the same painting she saw just over forty years ago in the same room. If it is I have not the slightest notion of what it means but she is convinced it is linked to Max’s disappearance, and as you say she is not usually wrong. It is really important that the other Roswellians see this, and in a way that keeps the picture secret and does not arouse any suspicion. I am going to visit S’eeth Sia Ova, which is a serious breach of protocol, but there is something not right on Antar.
In the meantime Alex I need you to do something for me. I want you to find out as much as you can about this painting, I wanted it carbon dating, and I want a list of all the owners of Bone Hill House before Grey bought it in 2003. I am going to use the instinct word again, and I don’t care what power of State you need to deploy, but get to the painting before anyone else does.
Yours in haste
Julian
ps
I have just re-read Grey's journal entry for April 2006, there is no doubt Liz is right: Grey refers to it three times in the saem entry:
Liz found me eventually, alone, in a long dark sitting room, almost bereft of furniture. A wild sapling, seeded in the guttering, had veined the window with roots and branches. The only other significant feature had been a painting, unfamiliar to me, of a group of people outside what appeared to be a cave. It was dark and curiously out of perspective, sinister.
I walked away to the dark abandoned painting. I wondered who had been the last person to look at it. I was not conscious of seeing it before. There was a puzzled silence behind me.........
Liz’s cell phone went. It was Kyle, Isobel wanted us to meet and vote on opening up negotiations with the Antarians tonight. She walked towards the doorway. We were probably miles from the main house, up under the eves near the back of the house. I had paused to look at the painting. Max had joined me. Liz called us to hurry. The cave was on a high mountain, a dark ragged sky, dimly lit as if by fire. I suddenly realised that the cave was a tomb. It had sent a chill down my spine.
Antarian Orbital.
Priority: Secret and Confidential: multiple encryption.
Adjusted date June 1st, 2055. __________________________________________________________________
Dear Alex.
I took this image of the painting with my mother when we visited Bone Hill House. She is adamant that it is the same painting she saw just over forty years ago in the same room. If it is I have not the slightest notion of what it means but she is convinced it is linked to Max’s disappearance, and as you say she is not usually wrong. It is really important that the other Roswellians see this, and in a way that keeps the picture secret and does not arouse any suspicion. I am going to visit S’eeth Sia Ova, which is a serious breach of protocol, but there is something not right on Antar.
In the meantime Alex I need you to do something for me. I want you to find out as much as you can about this painting, I wanted it carbon dating, and I want a list of all the owners of Bone Hill House before Grey bought it in 2003. I am going to use the instinct word again, and I don’t care what power of State you need to deploy, but get to the painting before anyone else does.
Yours in haste
Julian
ps
I have just re-read Grey's journal entry for April 2006, there is no doubt Liz is right: Grey refers to it three times in the saem entry:
Liz found me eventually, alone, in a long dark sitting room, almost bereft of furniture. A wild sapling, seeded in the guttering, had veined the window with roots and branches. The only other significant feature had been a painting, unfamiliar to me, of a group of people outside what appeared to be a cave. It was dark and curiously out of perspective, sinister.
I walked away to the dark abandoned painting. I wondered who had been the last person to look at it. I was not conscious of seeing it before. There was a puzzled silence behind me.........
Liz’s cell phone went. It was Kyle, Isobel wanted us to meet and vote on opening up negotiations with the Antarians tonight. She walked towards the doorway. We were probably miles from the main house, up under the eves near the back of the house. I had paused to look at the painting. Max had joined me. Liz called us to hurry. The cave was on a high mountain, a dark ragged sky, dimly lit as if by fire. I suddenly realised that the cave was a tomb. It had sent a chill down my spine.
Last edited by Patroclus76 on Tue Mar 28, 2006 2:36 am, edited 4 times in total.
-
Patroclus76
- Addicted Roswellian
- Posts: 178
- Joined: Wed Mar 08, 2006 5:02 pm
- Location: Bristol, UK
- Contact:
April 7th, 2006.
Several days have passed since the summit (or is it years, or even life times?). Bone Hill House will never be the same, and I shall never be the same again either. My friends are here with their families, so too is half the world’s press, and the Antarian ships are above us still, a brilliant shimmering fleet of metal shaded by the movement of sun and cloud. Sometimes I feel they have always been here. I have spent my time sleeping, trying to keep this journal up to date, and meeting S’eeth Sia Ova (who has developed a curious and literal habit of `dropping’ in without any notice at all and then vanishing, sometimes mid sentence). I have fobbed off innumerable interviews and ad hoc meetings with politicians and scientists, all wheeled out to head up a delegation that will return with S’eeth Sia Ova to Antar. The news is full of Antar, and the Antarians are full of news about when we leave, what we shall need, what they can do for Earth – what bewildering times we shall all live in!
As I move from my old withered self into this new, curious dispensation, I feel at times as if I am living my life vicariously, even voyeuristically. I spend my waking moments watching Kyle and Michael perform on various live TV interviews, intimate with the bevy of wasp waisted women that surround and pamper them. The library has become the favourite location for chat shows, hosted in the main by obscure celebrities I have never heard of. (I worry about the lights and the heat on the books and my manuscripts). Michael is a natural star, and Kyle has taken to wearing shades and roses in his lapel and sauntering about the House as if it is a film set. Wilcox has become a minor celebrity on the local radio station. There is huge public interest in the ships, and the Antarians have allowed various politicians to board them, including Max, Liz, the others and myself. On the other hand Michael’s attempts to let S’eeth `franchise’ him guided tours for the `Hathman’ population failed (to everyone’s evident relief).
Isobel and Maria have appeared on every cover of every possible magazine, as have innumerable shots of the Roswellians draped about my terrace or about the stairs, usually with me sitting at their feet or up behind them like a club mascot. After one rather gruelling session, in which I feared the number of flashlights might induce epilepsy, I had turned to Max and said quietly `the court of ex-king Zan! More star studied than Camelot!’ and he had laughed, in that sudden, spontaneous way of his, as if he was as surprised by his ability to laugh as others were. And as the smile had faded, rolling away, he had looked at me like my father used to look at me, contemplatively, one great calm. I wondered when Max would ever lay down the burdens of the world? For the moment there is joy. On one photo call, Michael was secretly shoving two fingers up behind Max’s head, smiling, with Liz trying to push his arm away, Kyle was stroking her stomach, an image caught for ever by a local reporter.* I had sat smiling at the back, like a gratified parent, and I had thought: I would die for these people, I would do anything I could to protect them, now and for ever.
Liz is expected to give birth in a few days time. S’eeth has tried to convince her that she can undergo some form of matter transfer that will deliver the children pain free, but Liz has refused. I am worried that this will lead to complications The Antarian child has a long tail and a series of extra skeletal, almost exoskeletal structures on the top of its back and down its abdominal facieses. I have tried to lobby Max to persuade her, but he is immovably behind his wife. S’eeth has assured us all that if something goes wrong they can intervene quickly, but it is all rather trying. The Antarian child will also need to go into a pod chamber almost immediately for a few weeks to fully mature. I am both bemused and fascinated by this. In the ancient life cycle of the Antarian S’eeth, cocooning took place instead of the chamber, but the understanding of this is lost and required parenting to produce the gum. I worry about the long-term plans S’eeth has for Antar when so little is known about the child, and when so much technology is involved in assisting reproduction. From what little I know of the Antarian Wars, the task seems to me at least to get away from technology as much as modify or limit it. Yet what do I know of such things.
In some senses, all’s well that ends well, and yet I am anxious. I worry what effect the birth will have on Liz, on giving up the child, and what effect all this will have on her parents, who want to be with her during delivery but have not been fully briefed as to the nature of the birth (they know she is having twins and that is about it – the Parkers are really pleasant, especially Mrs Parker, who I have rather taken to). I seem to worry about Max constantly though, a nagging odd feeling that comes over me like a form of panic attack. Maria has told me to stop fussing on at least three occasions. My fears are irrational, and yet they persist. I fear he will be exhausted, or that he will be trapped by some odd loyalty he retains, despite his abdication. We have not talked further about his renouncing his powers. Moreover, he has been constantly diverted by S’eeth Sia Ova into endless private `chats’. I do not ask him what they are about. I see S’eeth enough on my own. Yet my heart misgives me whenever I see them deep in counsel, and I watch Max tracing his lip and mouth with his hand amid growing trepidation. (`She fancies him’ was Michael’s simple parsimonious explanation, when I had asked him for an opinion, but his eyes were cautious, alert). Bless him, thank god for Michael, he will never fail Max.
I wish I could be more precise about all of this, but my fear is unfocused. I worry that S’eeth has under-estimated the difficulties of involving Earth, with its own domestic rivalries and hatreds, with Antar, which the more I hear and try to understand, the more complex its history becomes. On afternoon, sitting near the swimming pool in which Isobel was swimming relentlessly up and down, I explained to S’eeth how every government on the planet was no doubt scheming to get their hands on an Antarian vessel and expose its secrets. S’eeth had casually remarked how the entire Antarian fleet, over two hundred, many in orbit, were being regularly spied on by everything the American and the European governments could fly over or round them. `It is perfectly normal’ she had concluded, looking oddly with her black burning eyes at Isobel’s swimming, which clearly struck the Antarian as distinctly abnormal. S’eeth had watched Earth for longer than I dared to ask, but seemed remarkably upbeat about the role she had allotted humans to play. I should stop trying to guess such intelligence. Yet Max had asked me if I trusted S’eeth Sia Ova. I had said yes. There are times when I am not so sure.
S’eeth has taken to walking about Bone Hill House a lot, sometimes with me, sometimes with Max, sometimes with both of us but often as not alone. Several times I have come across the Antarian emissary well off the normal run of what Wilcox and I referred to as `the settled provinces’. I would come across her tall locust like stance in odd rooms and chambers almost as if she is trying to work out the physical dimensions of the place, or crudely, to `case the joint’ as Michael would put it. I thought it rude to ask what, if anything, she was doing, and put it down to a form of Antarian curiosity. But it has been bothering me in some way.
Four paragraphs sequestered under article 15/7.
April 12th, 2006.
I slept long and deep into a brilliant spring morning. I did not dream of anything. When I awoke, Max was sitting on a sofa near the door, reading, stretched out in that cat like way he has. I asked him if anything was wrong and he said `No, but S’eeth thinks that Liz will go into labour very soon’. He looked refreshed, excited. He stood up and handed me my dressing gown. `Julian, I have been thinking, about our relationship’
`Our relationship?’ I asked, quizzically.
`Aren’t I more of a father to you, than you are a brother to me?’ I frowned, slightly un-nerved. It was not always possible to know when Max was joking or not. `Possibly, but it might prove a bit impractical’ we had walked out onto the terrace to find that the lawns were still full of tents and pavilions, as if an entire army had camped out. Wires, cables and mobile transmitters were everywhere but surprisingly not one bit of rubbish. Michael and Kyle were working their way through the morning shows.
`We could rotate it’ said Max seriously, `every six months?’ Liz, Isobel and Maria were walking towards us from the main entrance.
The births took place in my laboratory today, at 2.30 in the afternoon. The US government wanted to examine the Antarian child, but S’eeth ruled that they would have to be satisfied with photographs and that only after the child had left the pod would they consent to a scientific investigation by a team of international scientists – headed up by me. Liz looked tired, anxious but powerful in her resolution. Max, a green surgical gown pulled over his T-shirt and jeans, was constantly at her side, as was Isobel, Maria and Mrs Parker. Max had not shaved, and his darkness shadowed his anxiety. Before the labour was in effect induced, S’eeth asked Liz and Max for the naming of the children. They had looked at each other, and Max had kissed her forehead. `Tell them’
`The human child we shall call Julian Maxwell’ Max had looked at me, half a smile lifting his mood. `A family name’ he said gently.
`An the Antarian we shall call S’eeth Om**, although he shall also have the human name of Gabriel Michael’. The S’eeth nodded, as if all was well. I was unable to say anything for a while, and S’eeth had to take the rather intimate liberty of shaking me slightly to get my attention.
Liz went into labour shortly after noon. Max looked incredibly tense, especially as Liz seemed to tire quickly. I willed them both to relax. Three nurses stood by, and about ten S’eeth, none of which I had not seen before. Michael and Kyle stood outside, like surrogate fathers, looking up the long room at each noise or movement. The terrace was thick with representatives of the fourth estate. Overhead the Antarian ships kept their silent vigil. I fought down horrific memories of a clinic in Boston, a different man, a different world. The human child was delivered relatively easily, with the Antarian sibling a few moments later. Our anxieties here proved groundless.*** The human child was a beautiful dark skinned boy, with a great mop of black hair over his eyes. After a curious hesitation he screamed the place down and was only settled when, gummy and red, he was passed to Liz to hold. Soothed by his mother and the Roswellian women, he had looked about him with disconcerting assurance as if we were already familiar to him. Max was in tears. His beautiful face streaked wet with relief and when Liz passed her son to him, I was struck by how gentle Max was, his powerful hands holding the child’s head with extraordinary tenderness. The child had looked at Max slowly through dark hazel eyes as if Max was a old friend, someone he already remembered. I checked the day. Wednesday’s child. Liz took the baby and then passed it to her mother. I was, I am entirely unashamed to say, crying as well.
S’eeth then passed to Liz the Antarian child. At first sight, the baby was very humanoid, but there was a world of difference between him and his human brother. The colour of the child’s skin was a delicate powder blue, lighter around the joints and the head, but deep ultramarine in the groin and tail. The tail, a long thin muscle, stretched from the lower vertebrae of the back, and snaked unobtrusively around his leg. The shoulders and back had a small set of ridge like cartilage that rose up behind the ears and into the skull like a crown. The head, deep blue was covered in a fine fuzz of white moss like hair. The face was remarkably human, narrower, with sharp cheeks and a wide smooth forehead.
I had feared this moment more than any other. I had feared that, however hard I had tried to construe or rationalise it, Liz would give birth to a monster, something demonic. And yet what S’eeth gave her to hold was something profoundly beautiful, a exquisite jewel of life, forged in the eons of time that marked the fall of the S’eeth. As Liz went to hold the child I sensed her inner struggle, I sensed her human fear of something non-human, and I sensed her powerful maternity. For a moment both were finally balanced. She had taken the child and looked about her, her eyes weeping silently, and as she smiled, her fear gone, the child had stirred, unfolding. I had expected the eyes of the child to be those of S’eeth Sia Ova’s, deep black eyes of an infinite, inscrutable wisdom, like the eyes of a whale, alien. Yet when the child opened his eyes they were human, deep, and brilliant green, luminous almost. Liz gasped in amazement, her mouth wide in awe and the Antarian, focusing on his mother, and besides her, the dark numinous presence of Max, widened his eyes and smiled. At that moment, the S’eeth, who had stood impassive yet attentive throughout, fell to their knees and gave forth a shout of great joy.
___________________________________________________________________
* I have this picture in my study still, it looks out at me each day and each time I see it I smile at the memory of the camalot years
** S'eeth Om was in part an idea of Kyle, who wanted OM as the first word of creation from the Hindu-Buddhist tradition.
*** The bone like structures on the Antraian child were actualy very soft and folded as Liz gave birth without tearing or damaging her. Alas Mrs Parker fainted at this stage.
Several days have passed since the summit (or is it years, or even life times?). Bone Hill House will never be the same, and I shall never be the same again either. My friends are here with their families, so too is half the world’s press, and the Antarian ships are above us still, a brilliant shimmering fleet of metal shaded by the movement of sun and cloud. Sometimes I feel they have always been here. I have spent my time sleeping, trying to keep this journal up to date, and meeting S’eeth Sia Ova (who has developed a curious and literal habit of `dropping’ in without any notice at all and then vanishing, sometimes mid sentence). I have fobbed off innumerable interviews and ad hoc meetings with politicians and scientists, all wheeled out to head up a delegation that will return with S’eeth Sia Ova to Antar. The news is full of Antar, and the Antarians are full of news about when we leave, what we shall need, what they can do for Earth – what bewildering times we shall all live in!
As I move from my old withered self into this new, curious dispensation, I feel at times as if I am living my life vicariously, even voyeuristically. I spend my waking moments watching Kyle and Michael perform on various live TV interviews, intimate with the bevy of wasp waisted women that surround and pamper them. The library has become the favourite location for chat shows, hosted in the main by obscure celebrities I have never heard of. (I worry about the lights and the heat on the books and my manuscripts). Michael is a natural star, and Kyle has taken to wearing shades and roses in his lapel and sauntering about the House as if it is a film set. Wilcox has become a minor celebrity on the local radio station. There is huge public interest in the ships, and the Antarians have allowed various politicians to board them, including Max, Liz, the others and myself. On the other hand Michael’s attempts to let S’eeth `franchise’ him guided tours for the `Hathman’ population failed (to everyone’s evident relief).
Isobel and Maria have appeared on every cover of every possible magazine, as have innumerable shots of the Roswellians draped about my terrace or about the stairs, usually with me sitting at their feet or up behind them like a club mascot. After one rather gruelling session, in which I feared the number of flashlights might induce epilepsy, I had turned to Max and said quietly `the court of ex-king Zan! More star studied than Camelot!’ and he had laughed, in that sudden, spontaneous way of his, as if he was as surprised by his ability to laugh as others were. And as the smile had faded, rolling away, he had looked at me like my father used to look at me, contemplatively, one great calm. I wondered when Max would ever lay down the burdens of the world? For the moment there is joy. On one photo call, Michael was secretly shoving two fingers up behind Max’s head, smiling, with Liz trying to push his arm away, Kyle was stroking her stomach, an image caught for ever by a local reporter.* I had sat smiling at the back, like a gratified parent, and I had thought: I would die for these people, I would do anything I could to protect them, now and for ever.
Liz is expected to give birth in a few days time. S’eeth has tried to convince her that she can undergo some form of matter transfer that will deliver the children pain free, but Liz has refused. I am worried that this will lead to complications The Antarian child has a long tail and a series of extra skeletal, almost exoskeletal structures on the top of its back and down its abdominal facieses. I have tried to lobby Max to persuade her, but he is immovably behind his wife. S’eeth has assured us all that if something goes wrong they can intervene quickly, but it is all rather trying. The Antarian child will also need to go into a pod chamber almost immediately for a few weeks to fully mature. I am both bemused and fascinated by this. In the ancient life cycle of the Antarian S’eeth, cocooning took place instead of the chamber, but the understanding of this is lost and required parenting to produce the gum. I worry about the long-term plans S’eeth has for Antar when so little is known about the child, and when so much technology is involved in assisting reproduction. From what little I know of the Antarian Wars, the task seems to me at least to get away from technology as much as modify or limit it. Yet what do I know of such things.
In some senses, all’s well that ends well, and yet I am anxious. I worry what effect the birth will have on Liz, on giving up the child, and what effect all this will have on her parents, who want to be with her during delivery but have not been fully briefed as to the nature of the birth (they know she is having twins and that is about it – the Parkers are really pleasant, especially Mrs Parker, who I have rather taken to). I seem to worry about Max constantly though, a nagging odd feeling that comes over me like a form of panic attack. Maria has told me to stop fussing on at least three occasions. My fears are irrational, and yet they persist. I fear he will be exhausted, or that he will be trapped by some odd loyalty he retains, despite his abdication. We have not talked further about his renouncing his powers. Moreover, he has been constantly diverted by S’eeth Sia Ova into endless private `chats’. I do not ask him what they are about. I see S’eeth enough on my own. Yet my heart misgives me whenever I see them deep in counsel, and I watch Max tracing his lip and mouth with his hand amid growing trepidation. (`She fancies him’ was Michael’s simple parsimonious explanation, when I had asked him for an opinion, but his eyes were cautious, alert). Bless him, thank god for Michael, he will never fail Max.
I wish I could be more precise about all of this, but my fear is unfocused. I worry that S’eeth has under-estimated the difficulties of involving Earth, with its own domestic rivalries and hatreds, with Antar, which the more I hear and try to understand, the more complex its history becomes. On afternoon, sitting near the swimming pool in which Isobel was swimming relentlessly up and down, I explained to S’eeth how every government on the planet was no doubt scheming to get their hands on an Antarian vessel and expose its secrets. S’eeth had casually remarked how the entire Antarian fleet, over two hundred, many in orbit, were being regularly spied on by everything the American and the European governments could fly over or round them. `It is perfectly normal’ she had concluded, looking oddly with her black burning eyes at Isobel’s swimming, which clearly struck the Antarian as distinctly abnormal. S’eeth had watched Earth for longer than I dared to ask, but seemed remarkably upbeat about the role she had allotted humans to play. I should stop trying to guess such intelligence. Yet Max had asked me if I trusted S’eeth Sia Ova. I had said yes. There are times when I am not so sure.
S’eeth has taken to walking about Bone Hill House a lot, sometimes with me, sometimes with Max, sometimes with both of us but often as not alone. Several times I have come across the Antarian emissary well off the normal run of what Wilcox and I referred to as `the settled provinces’. I would come across her tall locust like stance in odd rooms and chambers almost as if she is trying to work out the physical dimensions of the place, or crudely, to `case the joint’ as Michael would put it. I thought it rude to ask what, if anything, she was doing, and put it down to a form of Antarian curiosity. But it has been bothering me in some way.
Four paragraphs sequestered under article 15/7.
April 12th, 2006.
I slept long and deep into a brilliant spring morning. I did not dream of anything. When I awoke, Max was sitting on a sofa near the door, reading, stretched out in that cat like way he has. I asked him if anything was wrong and he said `No, but S’eeth thinks that Liz will go into labour very soon’. He looked refreshed, excited. He stood up and handed me my dressing gown. `Julian, I have been thinking, about our relationship’
`Our relationship?’ I asked, quizzically.
`Aren’t I more of a father to you, than you are a brother to me?’ I frowned, slightly un-nerved. It was not always possible to know when Max was joking or not. `Possibly, but it might prove a bit impractical’ we had walked out onto the terrace to find that the lawns were still full of tents and pavilions, as if an entire army had camped out. Wires, cables and mobile transmitters were everywhere but surprisingly not one bit of rubbish. Michael and Kyle were working their way through the morning shows.
`We could rotate it’ said Max seriously, `every six months?’ Liz, Isobel and Maria were walking towards us from the main entrance.
The births took place in my laboratory today, at 2.30 in the afternoon. The US government wanted to examine the Antarian child, but S’eeth ruled that they would have to be satisfied with photographs and that only after the child had left the pod would they consent to a scientific investigation by a team of international scientists – headed up by me. Liz looked tired, anxious but powerful in her resolution. Max, a green surgical gown pulled over his T-shirt and jeans, was constantly at her side, as was Isobel, Maria and Mrs Parker. Max had not shaved, and his darkness shadowed his anxiety. Before the labour was in effect induced, S’eeth asked Liz and Max for the naming of the children. They had looked at each other, and Max had kissed her forehead. `Tell them’
`The human child we shall call Julian Maxwell’ Max had looked at me, half a smile lifting his mood. `A family name’ he said gently.
`An the Antarian we shall call S’eeth Om**, although he shall also have the human name of Gabriel Michael’. The S’eeth nodded, as if all was well. I was unable to say anything for a while, and S’eeth had to take the rather intimate liberty of shaking me slightly to get my attention.
Liz went into labour shortly after noon. Max looked incredibly tense, especially as Liz seemed to tire quickly. I willed them both to relax. Three nurses stood by, and about ten S’eeth, none of which I had not seen before. Michael and Kyle stood outside, like surrogate fathers, looking up the long room at each noise or movement. The terrace was thick with representatives of the fourth estate. Overhead the Antarian ships kept their silent vigil. I fought down horrific memories of a clinic in Boston, a different man, a different world. The human child was delivered relatively easily, with the Antarian sibling a few moments later. Our anxieties here proved groundless.*** The human child was a beautiful dark skinned boy, with a great mop of black hair over his eyes. After a curious hesitation he screamed the place down and was only settled when, gummy and red, he was passed to Liz to hold. Soothed by his mother and the Roswellian women, he had looked about him with disconcerting assurance as if we were already familiar to him. Max was in tears. His beautiful face streaked wet with relief and when Liz passed her son to him, I was struck by how gentle Max was, his powerful hands holding the child’s head with extraordinary tenderness. The child had looked at Max slowly through dark hazel eyes as if Max was a old friend, someone he already remembered. I checked the day. Wednesday’s child. Liz took the baby and then passed it to her mother. I was, I am entirely unashamed to say, crying as well.
S’eeth then passed to Liz the Antarian child. At first sight, the baby was very humanoid, but there was a world of difference between him and his human brother. The colour of the child’s skin was a delicate powder blue, lighter around the joints and the head, but deep ultramarine in the groin and tail. The tail, a long thin muscle, stretched from the lower vertebrae of the back, and snaked unobtrusively around his leg. The shoulders and back had a small set of ridge like cartilage that rose up behind the ears and into the skull like a crown. The head, deep blue was covered in a fine fuzz of white moss like hair. The face was remarkably human, narrower, with sharp cheeks and a wide smooth forehead.
I had feared this moment more than any other. I had feared that, however hard I had tried to construe or rationalise it, Liz would give birth to a monster, something demonic. And yet what S’eeth gave her to hold was something profoundly beautiful, a exquisite jewel of life, forged in the eons of time that marked the fall of the S’eeth. As Liz went to hold the child I sensed her inner struggle, I sensed her human fear of something non-human, and I sensed her powerful maternity. For a moment both were finally balanced. She had taken the child and looked about her, her eyes weeping silently, and as she smiled, her fear gone, the child had stirred, unfolding. I had expected the eyes of the child to be those of S’eeth Sia Ova’s, deep black eyes of an infinite, inscrutable wisdom, like the eyes of a whale, alien. Yet when the child opened his eyes they were human, deep, and brilliant green, luminous almost. Liz gasped in amazement, her mouth wide in awe and the Antarian, focusing on his mother, and besides her, the dark numinous presence of Max, widened his eyes and smiled. At that moment, the S’eeth, who had stood impassive yet attentive throughout, fell to their knees and gave forth a shout of great joy.
___________________________________________________________________
* I have this picture in my study still, it looks out at me each day and each time I see it I smile at the memory of the camalot years
** S'eeth Om was in part an idea of Kyle, who wanted OM as the first word of creation from the Hindu-Buddhist tradition.
*** The bone like structures on the Antraian child were actualy very soft and folded as Liz gave birth without tearing or damaging her. Alas Mrs Parker fainted at this stage.
Last edited by Patroclus76 on Tue Mar 28, 2006 3:56 pm, edited 2 times in total.
-
Patroclus76
- Addicted Roswellian
- Posts: 178
- Joined: Wed Mar 08, 2006 5:02 pm
- Location: Bristol, UK
- Contact:
Single transcoded message from President A. Sayyid Quarishi to Ambassador Julian Evans hidden within a diplomatic carrier wave:
To: Earth Legation, Antar.
Priority: Secret and Confidential: multiple encryptions.
Adjusted date: June 3rd 2055. _________________________________________________________________
Dear Julian.
I was rather startled by the urgency of your last message, and more so by its content, but I followed you advice immediately. I have asked to see Michael and Maria who are in France, as well as Isobel and Jessie, who are both in town actually. Kyle is still in Bhutan where he is heavily engaged in the running of the monasteries, but I finally got someone from the Indian consular office to track him down. We are ostensibly meeting here in New York for a get together to mark the end of the Codex serialisation, but I shall get us to Bone Hill House immediately and in great secrecy. I hope this will take place in the next week or so. In the meantime I have had Bone Hill closed to the public on the grounds of a collapsing roof (alas almost too true) and the need for urgent repairs. This was three days ago.
Liz is a bit of a mystery and I am beginning to wonder if her planned Off World trip is exactly what it seems. I don’t wish to alarm you, but I ran into the Antarian liaison officer of the Science Guild, and the ship your mother mentioned, The Electra, has not been commissioned to fly yet. Did she give you any indication as to where she was going (or where she had been?) S’eeth Om Sias’s has also vanished. Did you speak with him (her – sorry!) after the ceremonies at Ekbatana? Have you seen her to talk to recently? I know you have always acted as a group where family matters are at stake, especially over your father, but is there any reason to think, on this occasions, your mother and Gabs would have acted alone? There is one other thing. You mentioned to me in an earlier message en route out from Antar that the main communication hub was blocking your attempts to contact Liz on her ship– I found out this morning that it was re-directing all messages, and that the transmission frequency was terrestrial, indeed in a sense, local, certainly within the Federated American Territories. Liz has not been assigned any missions since 2052. What shall I do?
I have used my private office and my designated security staff to pull up any records and data we can find on Bone Hill House. The House has had various owners, as you would expect. It was a private house until the mid 1930s, and then it became a country club. In 1941 the Military requisitioned it for an army base (a hospital and a recovery home). In 1946 it became a private house and then in 1955 it became a hotel. It remained a hotel until 2000 after which it stayed on the market for three years until Grey bought it in 2003. It would appear that the contents of the House, a majority of the paintings and part of the library were literally left in situ until Grey started to restore it. A local property company managed it, while two tenants - and a man called Wilcox and a women named Miss Clever – lived there, even after the Greys moved in. Miss Clever died in 2005, the same year as Grey’s wife, and Wilcox died in 2009. On the face of it, there seems nothing exceptional about any of this.
The painting is, however, distinctly odd. It is oil and acrylic on canvas. It is not signed, and the carbon dating of the materials and the canvas are inconsistent. Grey started an inventory of the paintings throughout the House in 2003, but although it was never finished there is every indication that he started from the top of the House and worked down. The list is dated 2006 and there is no mention of a painting in the Long Gallery, which is the room in question.
As to the painting itself, the canvas is much older than the materials used, circa early 1900s, while the paint is modern – mid to late 20 century. There are signs that it has been painted over a seascape, although not in any obvious or usual way. The group of six people in the foreground look `modern’ but it is hard to tell, one of the girls appears to be wearing boots. Two art experts think it is a painting of St Helens erupting in the 1980s. The chemical analysis shows also that it has been subject to great heat, with a tracing of Cadmium X, a rare isotope on earth. There are numerous fingerprints on the painting, especially on the frame and on the top. Most of them are Max’s, none of Grey’s. Your brother’s fingerprints are there as well, although he was rarely at Bone Hill House while Grey lived there, or indeed after your parents moved in after Grey’s death. I have found the section of Grey's journal which you cited with your photograph of the painting. It seems clear to me re-reading it thatGrey had neevr seen the painting before. Of that I am sure. Why and in what circumstances would he want to see it before he died?
Does the painting mean anything to you, why did Liz make an immediate connection with Max, and why now, ten years after his disspaerance? Please try and se S’eeth Sia Ova. In the meantime, I shall check out the intelligence the Antarians gave us concerning abduction routes and see if Bone Hill, or that area of Washington state generally, is related to any activity, and I shall also go through the sequestered parts of the codex that have been withheld for publication. One thing I am confused about here. Henry Maitland told me that you were instrumental in advising him which sections to withhold under 15/7 of the Freedom of Information Act. And yet in a holotext message to me from Earth Oribital on May 10th, and in subsequent conversations with you, it was clear that you had never read the codex prior to its release, and then only the same codex as is being read by the general public? If that is true (and I may have misunderstood), who authorised the edits from the original electronic text?
Alex.
To: Earth Legation, Antar.
Priority: Secret and Confidential: multiple encryptions.
Adjusted date: June 3rd 2055. _________________________________________________________________
Dear Julian.
I was rather startled by the urgency of your last message, and more so by its content, but I followed you advice immediately. I have asked to see Michael and Maria who are in France, as well as Isobel and Jessie, who are both in town actually. Kyle is still in Bhutan where he is heavily engaged in the running of the monasteries, but I finally got someone from the Indian consular office to track him down. We are ostensibly meeting here in New York for a get together to mark the end of the Codex serialisation, but I shall get us to Bone Hill House immediately and in great secrecy. I hope this will take place in the next week or so. In the meantime I have had Bone Hill closed to the public on the grounds of a collapsing roof (alas almost too true) and the need for urgent repairs. This was three days ago.
Liz is a bit of a mystery and I am beginning to wonder if her planned Off World trip is exactly what it seems. I don’t wish to alarm you, but I ran into the Antarian liaison officer of the Science Guild, and the ship your mother mentioned, The Electra, has not been commissioned to fly yet. Did she give you any indication as to where she was going (or where she had been?) S’eeth Om Sias’s has also vanished. Did you speak with him (her – sorry!) after the ceremonies at Ekbatana? Have you seen her to talk to recently? I know you have always acted as a group where family matters are at stake, especially over your father, but is there any reason to think, on this occasions, your mother and Gabs would have acted alone? There is one other thing. You mentioned to me in an earlier message en route out from Antar that the main communication hub was blocking your attempts to contact Liz on her ship– I found out this morning that it was re-directing all messages, and that the transmission frequency was terrestrial, indeed in a sense, local, certainly within the Federated American Territories. Liz has not been assigned any missions since 2052. What shall I do?
I have used my private office and my designated security staff to pull up any records and data we can find on Bone Hill House. The House has had various owners, as you would expect. It was a private house until the mid 1930s, and then it became a country club. In 1941 the Military requisitioned it for an army base (a hospital and a recovery home). In 1946 it became a private house and then in 1955 it became a hotel. It remained a hotel until 2000 after which it stayed on the market for three years until Grey bought it in 2003. It would appear that the contents of the House, a majority of the paintings and part of the library were literally left in situ until Grey started to restore it. A local property company managed it, while two tenants - and a man called Wilcox and a women named Miss Clever – lived there, even after the Greys moved in. Miss Clever died in 2005, the same year as Grey’s wife, and Wilcox died in 2009. On the face of it, there seems nothing exceptional about any of this.
The painting is, however, distinctly odd. It is oil and acrylic on canvas. It is not signed, and the carbon dating of the materials and the canvas are inconsistent. Grey started an inventory of the paintings throughout the House in 2003, but although it was never finished there is every indication that he started from the top of the House and worked down. The list is dated 2006 and there is no mention of a painting in the Long Gallery, which is the room in question.
As to the painting itself, the canvas is much older than the materials used, circa early 1900s, while the paint is modern – mid to late 20 century. There are signs that it has been painted over a seascape, although not in any obvious or usual way. The group of six people in the foreground look `modern’ but it is hard to tell, one of the girls appears to be wearing boots. Two art experts think it is a painting of St Helens erupting in the 1980s. The chemical analysis shows also that it has been subject to great heat, with a tracing of Cadmium X, a rare isotope on earth. There are numerous fingerprints on the painting, especially on the frame and on the top. Most of them are Max’s, none of Grey’s. Your brother’s fingerprints are there as well, although he was rarely at Bone Hill House while Grey lived there, or indeed after your parents moved in after Grey’s death. I have found the section of Grey's journal which you cited with your photograph of the painting. It seems clear to me re-reading it thatGrey had neevr seen the painting before. Of that I am sure. Why and in what circumstances would he want to see it before he died?
Does the painting mean anything to you, why did Liz make an immediate connection with Max, and why now, ten years after his disspaerance? Please try and se S’eeth Sia Ova. In the meantime, I shall check out the intelligence the Antarians gave us concerning abduction routes and see if Bone Hill, or that area of Washington state generally, is related to any activity, and I shall also go through the sequestered parts of the codex that have been withheld for publication. One thing I am confused about here. Henry Maitland told me that you were instrumental in advising him which sections to withhold under 15/7 of the Freedom of Information Act. And yet in a holotext message to me from Earth Oribital on May 10th, and in subsequent conversations with you, it was clear that you had never read the codex prior to its release, and then only the same codex as is being read by the general public? If that is true (and I may have misunderstood), who authorised the edits from the original electronic text?
Alex.
-
Patroclus76
- Addicted Roswellian
- Posts: 178
- Joined: Wed Mar 08, 2006 5:02 pm
- Location: Bristol, UK
- Contact:
a copy of Grey's sketch of S'eeth Om's exoskeletal structures following his birth from the pod appeared here by error. It was placed along side the wrong entry and will appear in two days,
Ministry of Information
April 14th, 2006.
I have been rushed off my feet trying to give Liz and Max some privacy. The press have proved incorrigible. Not one opportunity has been missed trying to get a photo or an interview. And Michael has been particularly exhausting. Yesterday he and Kyle had been sounded out over the making of a film, a `bio flic’, of the Roswellians life story. Michael was, not surprisingly, massively enthused, and had to be talked out of it over dinner through the `triple veto’ of Max, Maria and Isobel. Just as the argument had died down, Wilcox, back from his recent fame on Radio KB5, had suggested that he thought it sounded rather a good idea, which had started Michael off all over again. Isobel had then suddenly left the room in tears. Yet apart from these intimate, little spats, we are changed. The babies have transformed everything, the House, the Roswellians, and in some definitive sense, the Antarians.
For me, the birth of Julian and Gabriel have finally exorcised Wyndham, the deep-seated horror I had seen for years each night in my sleep. For Max, the births had healed the loss of his first son and the emotional trauma that had surrounded his infidelity with Tess. We had never spoken about it, but I had sensed it, and sometimes Liz had gone to speak of it to me but then let it go, unstated, not sure where to begin. For Liz her long fears were over, her fears of having children that would age in front of her very eyes, of having a monster, something she had always, subliminally at least, associated with the crash of 1947, and sometimes even with Max, a dark, alien side she suspected was there, half seen. For Maria and Michael there came that day of the births a singular revelation, that they belonged together and that they should marry as soon as they could. Amid all the tears and joy that were shed in my laboratory, Maria and Michael had kissed each other, amazed to find that their long journey was over and that, like Eliot’s Quartets, they had found their way home through the simple realisation that they had never left it.*
Kyle, who had sat holding S’eeth Om with tears running down his face, the day of the births marked an epiphany that had started the day Max saved his life, the day he had awoken from his own oblivion, bewildered, with Max’s hand on his chest and his father next to him, weeping. S’eeth Om and Julian Evans were to him tokens of a divine covenant, a promise, that there was a deep rhythm to the Universe that could be glimpsed and understood and of which death was only a small part. For Isobel, I feared that the birth of her nephews seemed a portent of her own solitude, something exclusionary, as if she was fated always to be outside looking in at the joy of others. Max sensed this as well, in that canny way he often sensed emotions in other people, for amid the chaos that followed the arrival into my laboratory of the Roswellians, their parents (and alas, some of the press) to see the babies, he had left Liz and embraced Isobel, deeply and beautifully, and the tears she had wept were in part those of joy, but in part those of abandonment.
As for S’eeth Sia Ova, I had no real idea what she had been feeling. The Antarian cry of joy – and a sudden, extraordinary sound of booming from the ships that had sent many people below running for cover – was evidence of a deep emotion, and yet when S’eeth Sia Ova had taken to helping me organise the melee with the press and the diplomatic representatives there was no trace of any feelings on her face. Perhaps thousands of years of genetic manipulation had so reduced their emotional repertoire that only a fellow Antarian could have identified some trace of engagement. She was a cipher I had yet to decode. In the days before the births I had grown suspicious of her, and yet that day she was remarkable, calm, deeply considerate. Despite obvious misgivings within some of the S’eeth over the urgency to take Om to the pod, she allowed the child to stay with his parents and his human brother for about ten hours until, late in the evening, she had asked Liz to allow him to be taken to the maturation chamber. `It is important that Om bond with his human parents and his brother’ S’eeth had said simply. `Much may depend on it’.
What is it I fear? What is the doubt that is growing in me? Max and I had carried Om to the flag ship. Once on board, lost in its vast deep luminous whiteness, we had placed the new born Antarian into a translucent, fleshy egg, where once settled he had, quite naturally, curled up into a ball and dramatically lowered his own body temperature. The egg filled with a thick viscous fluid and we had stood for an hour or so, Max in awe, like a small boy, watching the surface of the egg cloud over and fur up. Afterwards I had sat holding him while he had wept uncontrollably, as if overwhelmed by an inconsolable grief that no words could comfort. I had no idea, no inkling, of what had so moved him, exhaustion, sheer raw emotion, the imminent departure of Om? Of one thing I am sure. I would rather die than ever see him in that state again.**
April 15th, 2006.
I awoke and had breakfast and then went out for my morning wrestle with the press. I had been bothered by a dream in which I had been lost in a place of utter darkness. I had awoken shouting for Max, convinced he was in grave danger, and had showered long and hard to wash the terror from me. Outside, the crowds were beginning to thin a little, and for the first time some of the tents have come down and had not been replaced. Wilcox was outraged by the state of the lawns. Just before lunch I came across S’eeth Sia Ova and Max in one of their little cabals, yet as I had changed course to walk off towards Michael’s improvised golf course, Max had beckoned me towards them. He seemed relaxed, restored to himself. `Julian, S’eeth has just told me that it is impossible to take our physical powers away’ I had looked at S’eeth Sia Ova and frowned. `Oh dear, why is that?’
`The source of their power is in part Antarian, but it is also human. Given the way Max and the others are designed, it is impossible to isolate the necessary genes to turn off their powers without considerable risk. ’ It did not surprise me – at least in a genetic sense – perhaps it had surprised me that S’eeth had only now seemed to realise this, or had told Max first and not me (but why should that matter?).
`Then you will have to stay special’ I had said. I had tried to sound light hearted but the tone was wrong, and S’eeth had looked at me with that stiff rather painful turn of the head. `I think it now quite likely that they shall be allowed to return to their normal lives even if they remain hybrids. I have assurances from their governments, and we shall be on hand to protect them if necessary.’ The situation had changed, there could be no doubt about that. They were normal now, at least in one sense, and S’eeth Sia Ova had played a very canny hand in getting explicit guarantees so that they can all now resume their lives. Max was sitting on the grass, his back against one of the birch trees. The strong spring sunlight had dappled his face and shoulder, and he had plucked daisies as he listened to us. `I feel better that he has retained his powers’ said S’eeth suddenly, `And the others. They are not ours to take away, and a day may come when he will have need of them’. Max had not stirred. He had smiled as if he had thought of something long ago. Yet I had thought the remark odd, and had merely nodded in vague agreement. S’eeth had started to vanish, but had thought of something to say and so had remained, half visible, a curious translucent shimmer. `I believe that S’eeth Om will leave the maturation chamber on the 22nd April’ and at that she had fully dematerialised. I had thought disconcertingly of the Cheshire Cat in Lewis Carroll. I sat with Max for a long time in thoughtful silence.
Later that evening, after I had finished writing up my journal, I had dropped in on Liz and Max before going to the library. Julian was being breast-fed. Liz sat, her black hair thrown behind her head, looking incredibly centred and calm, holding Julian's head and smiling. Max lay on the bed, watching everything carefully and protectively, dangling his shoes on the end of his feet. I hovered for a while by the door, hesitant to disturb the trinity, until Liz looked up `Hey, Julian’ she said, smiling at her son, `here is your namesake’ Max sat up, his shoe falling to the ground. `S’eeth called my son Julian the Younger!’ he had smiled, `isn’t that weird!’
`It is’ I had sat on the end of the bed, `especially since she only ever calls me `Grey’’ I tried my impersonation of S’eeth with some success and we had all laughed. `But I guess I am now Julian the Elder, I wonder how old S’eeth is?’ Liz had looked up at my musing. `Julian, I want to see my son before he leaves to Antar, and I want to see him often’ the bond had worked, that at least was in S’eeth’s favour. `Can you make sure she understands how I feel? I will not give me son up completely’
`Of course. And I think that is what S’eeth wants. She wants Om to be a visible connection, an emblem of the unity between Antar and Earth. Incidetally I never really thanked you both for the honour, the privilege of having your son named after me’ Liz had looked across to Max and then to me and smiled, adjusting her shoulder. `The privilege is ours’.
I had stood up and said my good nights, as I turned to go, I heard Max climb to his feet and walk out after me. He put his hand on my arm, `Not so fast’. He walked with me for a while. `What’s wrong?’
`Nothing’ I could not lie to Max, no matter how hard I tried. He had then raised one eyebrow, Spock like, and my deception had collapsed completely. `It’s probably nothing’ we continued walking through the central spine of the house, his shoeless feet silent next to me. I had oddly recalled my dream, the one in which Max’s feet were the feet of a lion. `But? –‘ he coaxed gently
`I forget, are you my father this week, or am I yours?’
`Julian –‘ he said softly, stretching out the name. I had sighed. `You asked me recently if I trusted S’eeth and I said I did, but now I am not so sure Max, She is an extraordinary creature, and I have a sense of empathy, and I want to trust her, but I am not sure that she has told us everything’
`About what’
`The whole war, the whole exceptional epic of the child. The death of Kuvar even? It is as if she is holding something back from us, from you’
`Michael senses it too’ Max had said. `He has been agitating for some time’ (Bless Michael, every last stubborn insensitive bit of him). `S’eeth has spent a lot of time talking with me about Antar, and the situation there with the provisional government, about how Om is needed to help restore the races, how he will be allowed to come and go as he pleases, how important Earth is to the Antarians. The usual stuff, I don’t sense anything wrong’. Someone, Maria, had called his name from the front of the house. `Do you have anything specific to go on?’ he had swung around to stand in front of me, `or is this intuition?’
`Intuition I am afraid’ Maria called again.
`I had better go and see her; she wants to discuss her marriage to Michael. Listen Julian, anything at all, anything, come to me.’ He had turned then and jogged off into the cavernous gloom of the house.
I resumed my circumnavigation of the lower hall and eventually reached my library in darkness. I had long worked my way around this place without lights. They so rarely worked, and then they did, they were so hard to find to switch on and off, that I had developed a sort of sixth sense. Despite the gloom however, I noticed that the doors of the library were slightly open, and I had also noticed that a curious green light was coming from within. I approached silently. Through the opening I could see someone standing by the windows towards the first stack of shelves. They were at an angle to me. An odd object, not unlike an oil burner or a lantern, was producing the light. I screwed up my eyes, trying to make out some detail. To my astonishment I saw S’eeth Sia Ova holding the container of Kuvar’s head with one hand as if indeed it was a hurricane lamp. It was from the container that the odd, uneven light emanated. I then noticed that the lid of the container had been removed and that S’eeth was manipulating the head with her other hand. I had froze in horrified fascination, afraid to breathe, conscious that Sia’s could easily and quickly sense my presence. As I watched, S’eeth began to draw something from out of the head, a long cylindrical object like a baton, something that had been hidden or buried in the scalp or inside the brain cavity itself. The object was hard to discern, but I could tell by the way it refracted the light, that it was made of some form of crystal. I had started to turn to walk quietly away from the doors when S’eeth had turned towards me and said `Grey? I have something to ask of you’
Three pages sequestered under article 15/7.
________________________________________________________-
*`We shall not cease from exploration,
and the end of all our exploring shall be
to arrive at where we started
and to know the place for thre first time'
Four Quartets.
** many years later I pondered as to whether the site of his son in the pod brough back his own supressed memories of his own birth, a sort of visceral image of the ruined pod chamber and his own life, hisown sadness. I have often wondered whether or not Max's profound abiity to love and BE loved came from a deep and unbearable solitude.
Ministry of Information
April 14th, 2006.
I have been rushed off my feet trying to give Liz and Max some privacy. The press have proved incorrigible. Not one opportunity has been missed trying to get a photo or an interview. And Michael has been particularly exhausting. Yesterday he and Kyle had been sounded out over the making of a film, a `bio flic’, of the Roswellians life story. Michael was, not surprisingly, massively enthused, and had to be talked out of it over dinner through the `triple veto’ of Max, Maria and Isobel. Just as the argument had died down, Wilcox, back from his recent fame on Radio KB5, had suggested that he thought it sounded rather a good idea, which had started Michael off all over again. Isobel had then suddenly left the room in tears. Yet apart from these intimate, little spats, we are changed. The babies have transformed everything, the House, the Roswellians, and in some definitive sense, the Antarians.
For me, the birth of Julian and Gabriel have finally exorcised Wyndham, the deep-seated horror I had seen for years each night in my sleep. For Max, the births had healed the loss of his first son and the emotional trauma that had surrounded his infidelity with Tess. We had never spoken about it, but I had sensed it, and sometimes Liz had gone to speak of it to me but then let it go, unstated, not sure where to begin. For Liz her long fears were over, her fears of having children that would age in front of her very eyes, of having a monster, something she had always, subliminally at least, associated with the crash of 1947, and sometimes even with Max, a dark, alien side she suspected was there, half seen. For Maria and Michael there came that day of the births a singular revelation, that they belonged together and that they should marry as soon as they could. Amid all the tears and joy that were shed in my laboratory, Maria and Michael had kissed each other, amazed to find that their long journey was over and that, like Eliot’s Quartets, they had found their way home through the simple realisation that they had never left it.*
Kyle, who had sat holding S’eeth Om with tears running down his face, the day of the births marked an epiphany that had started the day Max saved his life, the day he had awoken from his own oblivion, bewildered, with Max’s hand on his chest and his father next to him, weeping. S’eeth Om and Julian Evans were to him tokens of a divine covenant, a promise, that there was a deep rhythm to the Universe that could be glimpsed and understood and of which death was only a small part. For Isobel, I feared that the birth of her nephews seemed a portent of her own solitude, something exclusionary, as if she was fated always to be outside looking in at the joy of others. Max sensed this as well, in that canny way he often sensed emotions in other people, for amid the chaos that followed the arrival into my laboratory of the Roswellians, their parents (and alas, some of the press) to see the babies, he had left Liz and embraced Isobel, deeply and beautifully, and the tears she had wept were in part those of joy, but in part those of abandonment.
As for S’eeth Sia Ova, I had no real idea what she had been feeling. The Antarian cry of joy – and a sudden, extraordinary sound of booming from the ships that had sent many people below running for cover – was evidence of a deep emotion, and yet when S’eeth Sia Ova had taken to helping me organise the melee with the press and the diplomatic representatives there was no trace of any feelings on her face. Perhaps thousands of years of genetic manipulation had so reduced their emotional repertoire that only a fellow Antarian could have identified some trace of engagement. She was a cipher I had yet to decode. In the days before the births I had grown suspicious of her, and yet that day she was remarkable, calm, deeply considerate. Despite obvious misgivings within some of the S’eeth over the urgency to take Om to the pod, she allowed the child to stay with his parents and his human brother for about ten hours until, late in the evening, she had asked Liz to allow him to be taken to the maturation chamber. `It is important that Om bond with his human parents and his brother’ S’eeth had said simply. `Much may depend on it’.
What is it I fear? What is the doubt that is growing in me? Max and I had carried Om to the flag ship. Once on board, lost in its vast deep luminous whiteness, we had placed the new born Antarian into a translucent, fleshy egg, where once settled he had, quite naturally, curled up into a ball and dramatically lowered his own body temperature. The egg filled with a thick viscous fluid and we had stood for an hour or so, Max in awe, like a small boy, watching the surface of the egg cloud over and fur up. Afterwards I had sat holding him while he had wept uncontrollably, as if overwhelmed by an inconsolable grief that no words could comfort. I had no idea, no inkling, of what had so moved him, exhaustion, sheer raw emotion, the imminent departure of Om? Of one thing I am sure. I would rather die than ever see him in that state again.**
April 15th, 2006.
I awoke and had breakfast and then went out for my morning wrestle with the press. I had been bothered by a dream in which I had been lost in a place of utter darkness. I had awoken shouting for Max, convinced he was in grave danger, and had showered long and hard to wash the terror from me. Outside, the crowds were beginning to thin a little, and for the first time some of the tents have come down and had not been replaced. Wilcox was outraged by the state of the lawns. Just before lunch I came across S’eeth Sia Ova and Max in one of their little cabals, yet as I had changed course to walk off towards Michael’s improvised golf course, Max had beckoned me towards them. He seemed relaxed, restored to himself. `Julian, S’eeth has just told me that it is impossible to take our physical powers away’ I had looked at S’eeth Sia Ova and frowned. `Oh dear, why is that?’
`The source of their power is in part Antarian, but it is also human. Given the way Max and the others are designed, it is impossible to isolate the necessary genes to turn off their powers without considerable risk. ’ It did not surprise me – at least in a genetic sense – perhaps it had surprised me that S’eeth had only now seemed to realise this, or had told Max first and not me (but why should that matter?).
`Then you will have to stay special’ I had said. I had tried to sound light hearted but the tone was wrong, and S’eeth had looked at me with that stiff rather painful turn of the head. `I think it now quite likely that they shall be allowed to return to their normal lives even if they remain hybrids. I have assurances from their governments, and we shall be on hand to protect them if necessary.’ The situation had changed, there could be no doubt about that. They were normal now, at least in one sense, and S’eeth Sia Ova had played a very canny hand in getting explicit guarantees so that they can all now resume their lives. Max was sitting on the grass, his back against one of the birch trees. The strong spring sunlight had dappled his face and shoulder, and he had plucked daisies as he listened to us. `I feel better that he has retained his powers’ said S’eeth suddenly, `And the others. They are not ours to take away, and a day may come when he will have need of them’. Max had not stirred. He had smiled as if he had thought of something long ago. Yet I had thought the remark odd, and had merely nodded in vague agreement. S’eeth had started to vanish, but had thought of something to say and so had remained, half visible, a curious translucent shimmer. `I believe that S’eeth Om will leave the maturation chamber on the 22nd April’ and at that she had fully dematerialised. I had thought disconcertingly of the Cheshire Cat in Lewis Carroll. I sat with Max for a long time in thoughtful silence.
Later that evening, after I had finished writing up my journal, I had dropped in on Liz and Max before going to the library. Julian was being breast-fed. Liz sat, her black hair thrown behind her head, looking incredibly centred and calm, holding Julian's head and smiling. Max lay on the bed, watching everything carefully and protectively, dangling his shoes on the end of his feet. I hovered for a while by the door, hesitant to disturb the trinity, until Liz looked up `Hey, Julian’ she said, smiling at her son, `here is your namesake’ Max sat up, his shoe falling to the ground. `S’eeth called my son Julian the Younger!’ he had smiled, `isn’t that weird!’
`It is’ I had sat on the end of the bed, `especially since she only ever calls me `Grey’’ I tried my impersonation of S’eeth with some success and we had all laughed. `But I guess I am now Julian the Elder, I wonder how old S’eeth is?’ Liz had looked up at my musing. `Julian, I want to see my son before he leaves to Antar, and I want to see him often’ the bond had worked, that at least was in S’eeth’s favour. `Can you make sure she understands how I feel? I will not give me son up completely’
`Of course. And I think that is what S’eeth wants. She wants Om to be a visible connection, an emblem of the unity between Antar and Earth. Incidetally I never really thanked you both for the honour, the privilege of having your son named after me’ Liz had looked across to Max and then to me and smiled, adjusting her shoulder. `The privilege is ours’.
I had stood up and said my good nights, as I turned to go, I heard Max climb to his feet and walk out after me. He put his hand on my arm, `Not so fast’. He walked with me for a while. `What’s wrong?’
`Nothing’ I could not lie to Max, no matter how hard I tried. He had then raised one eyebrow, Spock like, and my deception had collapsed completely. `It’s probably nothing’ we continued walking through the central spine of the house, his shoeless feet silent next to me. I had oddly recalled my dream, the one in which Max’s feet were the feet of a lion. `But? –‘ he coaxed gently
`I forget, are you my father this week, or am I yours?’
`Julian –‘ he said softly, stretching out the name. I had sighed. `You asked me recently if I trusted S’eeth and I said I did, but now I am not so sure Max, She is an extraordinary creature, and I have a sense of empathy, and I want to trust her, but I am not sure that she has told us everything’
`About what’
`The whole war, the whole exceptional epic of the child. The death of Kuvar even? It is as if she is holding something back from us, from you’
`Michael senses it too’ Max had said. `He has been agitating for some time’ (Bless Michael, every last stubborn insensitive bit of him). `S’eeth has spent a lot of time talking with me about Antar, and the situation there with the provisional government, about how Om is needed to help restore the races, how he will be allowed to come and go as he pleases, how important Earth is to the Antarians. The usual stuff, I don’t sense anything wrong’. Someone, Maria, had called his name from the front of the house. `Do you have anything specific to go on?’ he had swung around to stand in front of me, `or is this intuition?’
`Intuition I am afraid’ Maria called again.
`I had better go and see her; she wants to discuss her marriage to Michael. Listen Julian, anything at all, anything, come to me.’ He had turned then and jogged off into the cavernous gloom of the house.
I resumed my circumnavigation of the lower hall and eventually reached my library in darkness. I had long worked my way around this place without lights. They so rarely worked, and then they did, they were so hard to find to switch on and off, that I had developed a sort of sixth sense. Despite the gloom however, I noticed that the doors of the library were slightly open, and I had also noticed that a curious green light was coming from within. I approached silently. Through the opening I could see someone standing by the windows towards the first stack of shelves. They were at an angle to me. An odd object, not unlike an oil burner or a lantern, was producing the light. I screwed up my eyes, trying to make out some detail. To my astonishment I saw S’eeth Sia Ova holding the container of Kuvar’s head with one hand as if indeed it was a hurricane lamp. It was from the container that the odd, uneven light emanated. I then noticed that the lid of the container had been removed and that S’eeth was manipulating the head with her other hand. I had froze in horrified fascination, afraid to breathe, conscious that Sia’s could easily and quickly sense my presence. As I watched, S’eeth began to draw something from out of the head, a long cylindrical object like a baton, something that had been hidden or buried in the scalp or inside the brain cavity itself. The object was hard to discern, but I could tell by the way it refracted the light, that it was made of some form of crystal. I had started to turn to walk quietly away from the doors when S’eeth had turned towards me and said `Grey? I have something to ask of you’
Three pages sequestered under article 15/7.
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*`We shall not cease from exploration,
and the end of all our exploring shall be
to arrive at where we started
and to know the place for thre first time'
Four Quartets.
** many years later I pondered as to whether the site of his son in the pod brough back his own supressed memories of his own birth, a sort of visceral image of the ruined pod chamber and his own life, hisown sadness. I have often wondered whether or not Max's profound abiity to love and BE loved came from a deep and unbearable solitude.
Last edited by Patroclus76 on Fri Mar 31, 2006 3:28 am, edited 5 times in total.