The Invitation(57)

Through the muddled confusion of her unsettled thoughts a quiet, silent voice assures her. How could years of heartfelt love, and affection freely expressed between a mother, and her son be anything less than genuine? It’s not that he isn’t who he appears to be, but rather he is that, and very much more as well. All, she thinks, must be for the best. Her maternal instinct comes to the fore. That innate reflex of nurturing love that mothers alone are privy to sweeps all doubts aside. Ken Myers in name, substance, and spirit is and forever will be her son, the product of that lawful union   of marriage between herself and her departed husband. No matter what else transpires, this remains inviolable. She feels relieved. She will trust in the belief that all will turn out for the best. What could happen? This episode in Miami, Florida, highly dramatic as it is, will end, she thinks, and things will get back to normal.

The last twenty-four hours have been an emotional roller coaster for Kathryn Myers. Perhaps now she can let go of the worry and foreboding she has felt. Like most, she was up late last night riveted to the TV, and consequently slept only a few hours.

Mrs. Myers noticed something unusual after getting up this morning. After turning on the light in her bathroom, she saw that her nose was bleeding. She can’t remember that ever happening before, but it stopped a few minutes later, and appeared to be nothing serious.

Events at Olympic Stadium have kept the world spellbound since they began. It has been nearly thirty hours since an alien spacecraft has appeared in the skies above Miami, subsequently landing and initiating an extended, comprehensible dialogue with the Vice President of the United States. Evidently timed to coincide with saturation media coverage of the Olympic Games, that unique, and unrepeatable moment of interstellar contact with another civilization had come, and is playing out in the open view of billions of onlookers. Only some understand that what they are seeing will initiate a seminal change in human consciousness, and forever alter mankind’s understanding of his place in the universe. Many believe that the unprecedented events in Miami will serve as a catalyst for constructive change, and expect some form of positive outcome. People seem to be in a general state of perplexed amazement by the utter and singular strangeness of what they’re seeing, but for most, it is the messenger and not the message that grips their imagination. Warnings of environmental catastrophe aren’t new, but this is something of another magnitude. Even as this dramatic event is still unfolding, sketches and design plans to replicate the facial likeness of the Linesian android have begun. The image of this creature is now considered to be a saleable corporate commodity, and there are those who know that when this is over, market sales of anything Linesian will be phenomenal. Linesian clothing, Linesian sunglasses, Linesian video games, any saleable item that can display a likeness or make any sort of connection will be exploited. The market possibilities of capitalizing off of this global event are already being eagerly planned for. This creature who has travelled inconceivable spans of time, and distance to deliver its potent warning of impending environmental collapse to mankind will be caricatured and become a marketable commodity, adorning children’s lunch boxes and beach towels.

For one man, though, the prophetic words and images communicated to the people of Earth so dramatically are to be taken with the utmost seriousness. Vice President Scott Conner is by temperament receptive to new and novel sources of knowledge and scientific discovery, and finds it completely within the range of credibility that the events he is seeing before him are genuinely valid, and until shown to be otherwise, believes they should be considered accordingly. He finds it impossible to ignore the dire warning he is hearing point-blank, directly from the alien figure standing no more than ten feet away from him.

One of the most confusing aspects of the strange spectacle being played out in Miami is the inexplicable behavior of the President of the United States. Sitting patiently as if in a doctor’s waiting room, he looks completely disengaged from the momentous events taking place in front of him. Instead it’s the Vice President who is assuming the role of humanity’s interlocutor in the unprecedented dialogue that the world is now seeing and hearing so stunningly.

Mindful of his responsibility to advocate for human survival, he searches for words to ply his case. Looking upward, he sees, still hanging in the sky, the enormous image of a creature the Linesian calls Neo homo, a creature purported to inherit man’s future. After a prolonged silence, the Vice President asks the Linesian, “This image we’re seeing in the sky right now is a projected image. How are you doing that?”