The Bovine Connection (49 page)

The penny round tile floor was cool under her feet. Feeling a chill, she shivered. She grabbed her white terrycloth robe on the back of the door and wrapped it around herself. Stepping out of the bathroom she noted the calm silence. Her cell phone rang. Her eyes focused and she looked around the room to see it on the bedside table. Angelica slowly walked over and picked up her cell phone to see she had no missed calls. She frowned, drawing in her breath. She placed the cell phone back down and lowered her brows. Angelica felt confused as she stood perfectly immobile, with lost eyes as she stared out the window, her heart pounding hard against her chest. Her cell phone rang again and startled her. Dazed, she turned her head, and she heard the name “Marc,” in her mind.

She peered down and then slowly lifted her cell phone without looking at the caller ID and put it to her ear. “Hello… Marc?” she asked curiously.

“Angelica, are you all right?”

“Yes, Marc… I’m fine,” she answered softly. There was silence.

“Good,” he murmured.

Angelica looked at the peony on the bedside table, turned and walked out of her room.

“Marc,” Angelica whispered. “Michael… It wasn’t a dream was it?”

“No,” he answered delicately.

Angelica’s knees buckled. She closed her eyes and nodded as she grabbed the railing of the staircase to steady herself. Angelica took a deep breath. “Marc, something weird just happened.”

“What happened, Angelica?”

“I could hear the phone ring before it actually rang… and I somehow knew it was you.” He was silent.

“Marc… are you there?”

“Yes, yes, I’m here.”

“Marc, are you standing in your kitchen in front of a window over the sink?”

Dr. Bishop glanced out the window. “Yes, Angelica, I am.”

Dr. Bishop was quiet. “Marc, are you there?” Angelica blurted.

“Yes,” he whispered.

Downstairs, Angelica held the phone between her chin and shoulder as she started the Keurig and grabbed a coffee mug from the cabinet.

“Marc? Something has happened to me. I feel different.” Angelica bit down on her bottom lip. “I think I can hear your thoughts.” Angelica frowned.

Dr. Bishop stood straight up. He looked out the window at a large Crape Myrtle tree with white blossoms swaying in the wind and took a deep breath. “Oh,” his disembodied voice whispered. “Angelica, how about we go to my beach house at Chesapeake Bay for a few days? I feel it’s too early for us to return to work.”

Standing at her counter, watching the coffee as it finished dripping into the mug, Angelica considered his suggestion for a moment. “No.”

Angelica picked up the coffee mug and turned toward her den. “I have a story to write.”

“Yes, I suppose you do. Are you going to write everything?” he asked, lowering his shoulders.

Angelica thought for a moment… “Hey, how about we grab lunch soon?”

Dr. Bishop smiled. “Perfect.”

“Good,” she whispered. “I’ll call you in a day or so. Oh, and Marc… Thank you for saving my life!”

“You’re welcome, Ms. Angelica Bradley.”

Angelica started to hang up… “Angelica wait… Are you sure you are okay?” he asked, as he looked up at the sky and saw a bright flicker of light. Exhaling slowly, he felt a deep sense of peace.

Angelica glanced down and noticed a pink peony petal stuck in her hair. “Yes,” Angelica said softly as she lifted the pedal to her nose and smelled it.

I
t was very quiet in the lab. A storm had been brewing all afternoon. The evening sky lit up with flashes of lightning. He could hear the sound of rain drops harshly hitting the windows. With each loud roar of thunder, the lights flickered.

Everyone had left the University of Colorado for the day. The room was brightly lit with overhead lighting and table lamps. Trays of small empty tubes covered open spaces on the lab tables. The thermal cycler device holding a block of tubes containing PCR (polymerase chain reaction) mixture had finally stopped, after raising and lowering the temperature of the block in pre-programmed steps. It had separated and then amplified the DNA, creating many copies of the strand.

Dr. Goolrick looked away from the computer screen as the lights flickered off and on. “Oh dear,” he murmured as he stood up, rushed over, and sat down at his old dulled down desk. Lifting his fingers slowly to his chin, he considered who to call first.

Dr. Goolrick picked up his cell phone. After several rings, Dr. Hamilton Howell answered. “Hello Walter!”

“Hamilton, the results from Ms. Bradley’s hair sample are conclusive. The nuclear DNA indicates viral resistance, as I suspected. Ms. Bradley’s hair strand contains two deleted genes for CCR5 protein and no intact gene for normal undeleted CCR5. As you may recall, the CCR5 deletion factor has been implicated in AIDS resistance.”

“Yes, yes… go on,” Hamilton urged.

“Ms. Bradley has the advanced DNA… showing up around the world. Are you sitting down?”

Hamilton glanced around curiously for a place to sit in the men’s locker room at the gym. He had just showered and wrapped a towel around his waist. Hamilton stepped over to a teak wood bench. “Yes.”

“The profile indicates biological material matching some of the individuals in the abduction cases, confirming Ms. Bradley is also most probably an abductee.

My analysis confirmed the strand came from someone biologically close to normal human genetics; however, this particular strand was…” Dr. Goolrick was silent.

“Well go on,” Hamilton said hastily.

“A rare Chinese Mongoloid type.”

“Really?” Hamilton gasped.

A man dressing beside him looked over. Hamilton smiled at him, indicating everything was fine and then turned his head, lowering it into the phone. “A rare Chinese Mongoloid? Are you certain?”

Dr. Goolrick rolled his tongue across his top teeth. “Without a doubt.”

“Walter… that is one of the rarest human lineages known!”

Dr. Goolrick nodded. “Yes, and considering that Ms. Bradley’s hair is light and not black, that is most curious. Hamilton, Ms. Bradley’s white blonde hair shaft appeared translucent, revealing an optical transparency and pronounced mosaic structure… Showing reflections to light. This is not what you would expect from an Asian type mitochondrial DNA.”

“Could there be a mistake in the results?”

“No, I am certain. I preformed the test and viewed it with my own eyes.”

“Exciting news, Walter!”

“Indeed! The root section confirmed the rare Chinese type DNA in the hair shaft so I focused my analysis on the root of the hair strand and it revealed Ms. Bradley is a hybrid according to the DNA profile. The donor had the rare Chinese mongoloid DNA and the “unknown,” I would presume to be alien DNA. Therefore, along with the biological normal human DNA, Ms. Bradley had the other two, as well.

As we have concluded through our research over the years, the CCR5 deletion factor has been determined to be the utility in fighting disease. This would allow for the grey beings to create their hybrids and show up with this advanced DNA, eliminating the concern for human diseases while crossbreeding.”

“The donor DNA is a match to the strand retrieved from the abduction case in North Carolina, correct?” Hamilton asked.

“Yes, the strand obtained by the woman who claimed angelic humanoid beings visited her in the middle of the night. When she woke, she had a long white hair stuck to her wedding ring. She put it in a baggy and that was our first of the many showing up,” Goolrick replied.

“Do you think they are trying to tell us something by leaving hair samples?” Hamilton asked.

“They very well could be.” Dr. Goolrick pursed his lips and raised his index finger to his chin.

“Well, I have to say the argument of Darwinian selection pressure is not holding up for the human species. Sooner or later mainstream is going to have to contemplate alternatives,” Hamilton said.

”Indeed.” Dr. Goolrick leaned back in his chair and was silent for a moment. “Yes, panspermia and non-Darwinian intelligent intervention,” he said flatly.

“So have you called Ms. Bradley?” Hamilton asked.

“She’s my next call.”