Dark Star Rising Second Edition (Pebbles in The Sky)

by Bagley, Jeffery

“General, I want you to have the FBI round up some of the people who were giving those vaccines as well as some who were working in the factory that made them. Find out what they know. Then, use whatever resources you have, to see what some of our allies are making of all this. And, on your way out, tell someone to get my damn Chief of Staff here now.”

  As the General ducked out President Bailey slammed his fist down on the table. He really did not need this to happen right now. He was the first president in American history to be elected that did not belong to any of the major political parties. He had won a hotly contested election that had come down to the wire between both the traditional political parties and his own independent ticket. In the end, he had won because he stood for what he had promised to be a strong Nationalist Party, dedicated to making strong ties with South and Central America and drifting away from the overseas alliances of the past.

  Not that very much of those remained anyway. Europe was scattering all over Africa and South America, England was shipping out to Australia and New Zealand. Canada was right behind the Brits. Former world powers like Russia and China had their own agendas. Russia had wiped out and taken over most of the Middle East and China had done likewise in Southeast Asia. He did not see how in the world the United States could be accused of genocide when the damn Russians and Chinese were shooting every ethnic person they came across in their newly conquered territories.

  He hit his intercom again. “See if you can get ex-President Montgomery on the phone for me. What…yes I know it is three o’clock in the fucking morning. Tell her I apologize, but I need to ask her something very important. Get me some coffee and a bottle of Motrin also. I am getting a splitting headache.” Damn, No wonder Paula was so relieved when her second presidential term was up, he thought. I hope to hell she did not know about this.”

  …

  Brett Driskall struggled awake to the sound of someone ringing their door bell. Looking at his alarm clock it read 5:40 AM. Now, who the heck is at our door at this time of the morning? Damn, it was a Saturday morning at that he thought to himself. He managed to drag himself out of bed and get some pants on and weaved his way to front door. Flipping on the porch light he looked out and saw two men in dark suits at the door. “Who is there, and how can I help you,” he called. There had been a rash of crime recently in the area, and he was not going to take a chance opening the door with Susan and Brianna fast asleep in bed.

  “FBI,” came the answer from the person at the door. A FBI badge was shoved up against the window beside the door. After seeing the badge and ID, Brett opened the door.

  “What the heck is this about?” asked Brett. “I don’t think any of us have done anything to get arrested that I know about.”

  The federal agent shook his head. “Are you Doctor Brett Driscall?”

  Brett nodded his head yes.

  “We have orders to escort you and your wife to the airport where there is a government jet waiting to take you to Washington.”

  Brett shook his head, trying to wrap his still sleepy and befuddled mind around what the agent had said. “You want to fly us to Washington at this time of the morning, and on Saturday at that? What the hell for?”

  “This order comes directly from the President, Doctor Driskall.”

  “Honey what’s going on?” asked Susan, as she came into the living room.

  “These FBI guys have been instructed to invite us to the White House to meet the new President I guess,” replied Brett.

  “That is out of the question,” said Susan. “I am not dragging Brianna onto some plane for an un-planned trip to Washington. They will have to wait until tomorrow until I can get our things packed and I will have to get someone to keep Brianna. We just can’t go today.”

  “Mrs. Driskall, our orders are directly from the President. It is very urgent that you come.”

  “Well, the President will just have to wait until we arrange babysitting,” said Jessica.

  The agent looked at Brett and Brett just shrugged.

  “She’s the boss when the child is involved.”

  The agent was obviously flustered; “I will be right back.”

  He stepped outside and pulled out his cell phone. Brett could hear him arguing with someone on the phone, and then he spoke to several other people. The other agent just stood inside the door with a solemn expression on his face. The first agent finally came back in the house and held out his phone to Jessica.

  She took it and held it to her ear “This is Doctor Jessica Driskall, to whom am I speaking with? Oh, good morning Mr. President, yes it is very early here also. Yes, actually I was the one who spearheaded the birth control vaccine research, I am not sure why you would call me at this time of the morning about that. We turned that over to the drug companies several years ago. Well, there is a problem doing that. I cannot just leave my daughter here with a stranger. No, I am not dragging her on a plane from her bed this time of the morning. Well, I suppose I could do that, but your agents at least have to let me shower and pack a few things. Yes, Mr. President, I look forward to meeting you also, I will sir, goodbye.”

  The two FBI agents and Brett were all looking at Jessica. She handed the phone back and turned to Brett. “I am going to Washington to have lunch with the President. You get to stay here and baby sit. Why don’t you make the nice agents some coffee while I go shower and pack a bag? She turned and headed back to the bedroom.

  Brett looked at the two agents. The first one was standing there with his mouth hanging open while the second ones solemn expression had turned into a grin. “You like it black or what?” said Brett. “It takes her a while to do her hair for formal occasions.”

  …

  President Bailey returned to his desk after the full National Security Council meeting. He was fuming and his temper was on a very short fuse. This whole mess with the vaccines was turning into a media nightmare. The United States was being accused of racial genocide and ethnic cleaning when it was quite apparent to anyone looking at the facts that the administration was totally ignorant and innocent of the accusations. From what had be determined in the past eight hours, it was apparent that the vaccines that had be distributed to the third world countries also contained the birth control vaccine. That crucial little piece of information had not been advertised to the recipients of the vaccines. When the humanitarian group headed by Benjamin Greco and his associates had offered the vaccines as well as the clinics and the staff to give the injections, the third world countries could not possibly pass on the offer. Well, it seemed now that the free offer was coming back with a heavy price tag.

  Efforts to find Benjamin Greco or any of his rich cronies had so far been fruitless. It seemed most of them had skipped their native countries and moved to some development for the immensely rich in Bolivia. Bolivia was not on the best of terms with anyone and refused any type of extradition of suspected criminals to other countries. It had become a haven for drug lords and white collar thieves. The few factory technicians and clinic operators that had been located that were involved in the manufacture and administration of the vaccines knew nothing. Benjamin Greco and his associates had covered their tracks well. When the vaccination campaign was completed, all the left over stock of the vaccines had been destroyed. That had been a very clever and convenient way to hide any evidence. Benjamin Greco was beyond the United States grasp. Interpol was a joke now that Europe was migrating southwards, and his military advisors strongly advised against a military raid on the reclusive billionaire’s ranch in Bolivia. They felt that this would stir up anti-American rhetoric and be counterproductive to the improved relations he was seeking with South American countries.

  The real issue was the problem of all the anti-American sentiment this had stirred up. The invasions of Russia and China as they sought warmer climates had not caused half the uproar that this was currently causing. The remarkable thing was, it was probably a good thing that it had happened. There had been wide spread concerns that after E-day t
here would be wide scaled starvation, disease, and fighting over food resources. Anarchy would have ruled as the world had come to grips with the fact that Earth could no longer support the human population density that it had before the arrival of the Brown Dwarf. With nineteen years to go before E-day the widespread removal of almost an entire generation of humans just might draw down the population to the point that the amount of starvation and fighting could be minimized. Left up to the people who had inhabited those poor countries originally, that would not have happened voluntarily.

  There was a knock on his door and his Chief of Staff stuck his head in. “Doctor Jessica Driskall has arrived sir, should I send her in?”

  President Bailey waved his hand. “Yes, yes please do.”

  He stood as an attractive, red-haired, but obviously emotionally distraught woman was ushered in. He motioned for her to have a seat and for his Chief of Staff to leave them. “I take it that you have seen the news and are aware of what is going on all over the world right now?” President Bailey asked.

  Jessica nodded her head yes.

  “This has caused our country a great deal of negative publicity. There has also been considerable loss of life in some of our embassies and among American civilians that are overseas. What I need to know from you is what you and your husband knew of this, and how this could have happened?”

  Jessica shook her head. “I am not sure what I can say. We did develop the vaccine. Benjamin Greco was very insistent in us pursuing that project. With the threat of the Peters Star, it seemed a very good idea. It saved so many women from having to take dangerous hormones or undergo surgical procedures to keep from bringing children into the world that we would have a hard time feeding. It has been very profitable and widely used in this country and others with little or no side effects. It was never given against a woman’s will that I or my husband were aware of. I even took the vaccine myself after my daughter was born.”

  “So, you were not aware of Mr. Greco’s intent to render over half the women of child bearing age in the world infertile?” asked the President.

  “No! Neither my husband nor I would have agreed to, or cooperated with that effort. I do remember Mr. Greco asking very pointed questions about the possibility of mixing vaccines though. He was also very vocal sometimes about what he perceived were the useless masses living in the third world countries that used up resources, fought each other constantly, and just existed to breed new generations. At the time, I would not have dreamed that he was contemplating trying genocide on this scale.”

  “Well,” admitted the President, “It is still debatable that it is genocide as he was actually saving lives by giving the vaccines and preventing mass starvation in the future. In his own egocentric way, he has probably done the world a huge favor. After E-day, the starvation, wars, and the pursuant rape of all the forested areas of the planets would have been terrible. We could have possibly caused a wide-scale collapse of the already weakened eco-system. Between you and me, I would like to shoot the bastard for the black eye he has given us, but at the same time I want to shake his hand for possibly giving us a solution to a huge problem.”

  “Is it true that you helped him have children by in-vitro fertilization?”

  Jessica nodded. “Twins, yes.”

  “So, while he was playing God and keeping other women from having children, he went and had twins by a surrogate himself. That is the part that really burns my ass. That is probably going to hurt his case and probably get him killed.”

  Jessica looked alarmed and started to protest.

  “No, not by us, but there are some other fruitcakes out there that are going to be gunning for him real hard. I hope he has hired good security,” said the President.

  “So, tell me this Doctor Driskall. Is there any antidote to this vaccine, or a way to reverse it?”

  “An antidote is not really needed,” explained Jessica. “Take me for example. I am not technically sterile from the vaccination. I still ovulate, have menstrual cycles, and produce eggs. My reproductive tract is perfectly normal. However, my immune system has been trained, so to speak, by the vaccine to view sperm cells as a foreign body, or an infectious organism. My immune system attacks and destroys them on sight. The vaccine is not completely one hundred percent effective, but pretty close. You could take one of my eggs, fertilize it with my husband’s sperm in-vitro, put the fertilized egg back in my womb and it would grow normally. So, it is wrong to say I am sterile.”

  “You could also probably give a woman immune system suppressant’s and increase her chance of becoming pregnant the normal way, but that would put her at much higher risk of cancer and other infections at the same time. But still, the recipients are not sterile. It is a rather expensive procedure for in-vitro fertilization, or IVF, and the women from the poor countries would not be able to afford to have it done. It is not always successful either, or you can end up with multiple births of low birth weight and all the problems associated with those babies. On a positive note, the inability to reproduce is also not inherited. If I had a baby by in-vitro fertilization tomorrow and it was a girl, it would not inherit my immunity to sperm cells and would be just as fertile as it would normally have been.”

  “I see,” said the President. “So, the next generation of women will not be sterile, at least the girls who do manage to be born to these women.”

  Jessica nodded her affirmation.

  “Thank you, very much Dr. Driskall, for explaining a little better how this vaccine works.”

  “You’re welcome, Mr. President. I am sorry all this happened, we really had no idea about any of this.”

  The President started to stand and then sat back down. Dr. Driskall, I understand that you and your husband are in charge of the DNA Ark project, how it that going?”

  “We are making progress, but it is slow tedious work. We are trying to collect the DNA for those creatures and plants that are at the highest risk of extinction as well as those that are considered the most essential for a healthy ecosystem first. So, it takes some careful consideration and forethought.”

  “So is it true that if say, the Gorilla’s become extinct, if you have saved and stored a replica of their DNA, you could bring them back some day?” the President inquired.

  “Technically yes,” replied Jessica, “although there are some issues we have yet to resolve.”

  “What are those?” he asked.

  “Well at the moment we could take the DNA data from a Gorilla we have stored, reproduce that DNA, put it in a Gorilla egg cell, implant it in a female Gorilla, and then if everything goes right a baby gorilla is born. The issue is what if there are no Gorillas left, no Gorilla egg cells, and no surrogate Gorilla mothers. We have no solution to growing that DNA into a baby gorilla. Having the DNA stored is the most important part though. The other parts we will eventually work out, although it is probably many years down the road. We cannot take gorilla DNA, plop it in a cow’s egg, and grow the gorilla baby in a cow’s uterus. We will have to invent an artificial egg of sorts and an artificial womb to do all that. As I said, we have a lot of work ahead of us on that.”

  The President stood. “Thank you Doctor Driskall for coming all the way to Washington. I guess in about fifteen more years you could just drive over to New Washington, the new capitol, from your home.”

  Jessica laughed. “Yes, It would take about an hour and a half, unless the traffic there is as bad as the traffic is here in Washington.”

  Jessica stood and turned to go as the President’s Chief of Staff, who was waiting outside opened the door. As she was leaving the President stopped her.

  “Doctor Driskall, you are aware that we will need to provide your family some security for a few years?”

  Jessica looked shocked. “Why is that?”

  “Because there are about a billion very unhappy women in the world right now that are very jealous that you have a baby and they cannot. The security should not be needed forever, but at least for a few
years. I know you do want to keep your daughter safe.”

  “I had not thought about that,” said Jessica, “But, please yes, I would die if anything happened to Brianna.”

  After she left, the President looked at his Chief of Staff. “You better get some federal agents assigned to them right away. They are too important to lose to some crazy asshole with a gun that is pissed about his wife not having more children that would grow up and be more adult crazy assholes.”

  Chapter 30

  February 23rd, 2025

  Houston, Texas

  Peter Rockwell sat in Mike Banscott’s office at the new JPL headquarters in Houston. They were both looking at the latest observations that had been taken of the Brown Dwarf over the past four weeks. “We have had no real surprises in regards to information on the Dwarf,” explained Peter. “Although we are learning new things daily about it, there are really no real changes in what we have predicted for trajectory or it’s interactions with our solar system. If anything, we have firmed up what we have suspected from before. Jupiter will be ejected from the solar system as will all but two of its moons. Those two will be captured by the dwarf, just like it captured the planet that is orbiting around it now. Saturn is toast. The Dwarf will overtake Saturn and pass within ten thousand miles from center of mass to center of mass. That constitutes almost a direct hit. Saturn and its moons will cease to exist and be absorbed in the Brown Dwarf. The dwarf will still be far from the mass needed for fusion to start however, and except for the heat produced from the collision, it will be as before. It will need a couple of thousand years to shed that heat so for a short period of time it will glow almost as brightly as the moon. The dwarf will be so far away at that point though; it will just be a bright star to us here on Earth.”

  “There are no updates to its closest approach to Earth?” asked Mike.

  “Unfortunately no,” said Peter. This is where it gets interesting though, and that is why I flew in to talk to you. As you know, we are getting better and better data on the planet in orbit around the Dwarf. It is approximately seventy eight percent of the diameter of Earth, and approximately eighty four percent the mass. It appears to have an active magnetic field caused by a liquid, molten core. This is probably a result of radioactive decay as it is here on Earth. In addition, it is subjected to immense tidal forces in that highly eccentric orbit around the Dwarf it is in. It is really quite amazing that it was captured at all and not ejected from its home system like Jupiter is going to be from ours. From what spectrographic data we have gathered, the planet seems to have had a nitrogen/carbon dioxide/oxygen atmosphere in its past. All the gases are frozen now, but, as the planet and the dwarf near the sun they will thaw and the atmosphere will become gaseous again. The planet appears to have quite a bit of frozen water ice on its surface as well.”