The Infinite Evolution - Conversion (38 page)

“
And you’re ok with this?” asked
Jade, hoping Izri was not intimidated by this evolutionary
feat.

“
Very much so, Jade. We are here to protect
you.”

“
That’s good to hear, but you
must need something from me. I can’t see why someone would want to
put all this time and effort into something if they weren’t going
to see a return.”

“
You are indeed an observant young lady. We do
need something from you.”

Jade looked directly at Izri, “And what would that
be?”

“
We need your help in discovering how we can
reproduce without using our technical achievements.”

“
Say again?” asked Jade with a concerned look
on her face.

“
Do not worry. We are not going
to dissect you or have you do anything that would make you feel
uncomfortable. We believe you are the key to opening the knowledge
we seek and I mean that literally. There are rumors on my planet
about a symbolic item, which contains the secrets to both our
technical and biological achievements as a species. We know of the
technical aspects, but we have lost the biological ones, due to
certain members of our society who felt these methods were
archaic.”

“
What do you need me to do?” asked Jade
confidentially.

“
We need you to upload to our planet and make
contact with this particular item, we feel you have the genetic
coding to open it.”

“
Upload? How is that
possible?”

“
It is no different from what I do when I
downloaded to this humanoid shell. We would preserve your Earth
body and insert you into a Tureissian shell upon upload. Once you
have completed the task at hand, we will download you back into
your Earth body.”

“
Are you serious?” said Jade
frightfully.

“
Completely, that is the only way
we can get you to open this symbolic item. As you know we can only
take solid material items to your planet or ours via vehicular
space travel, and that would take too long.”

“
What makes you think I will be able to open
it?”

“
In studying our archives
we have learned this symbolic item, which we call
The Stone of Tureis
, was created by our society long ago and it holds the DNA
of the humanoid species in its purist form. Anyone who holds this
stone can read our history and learn how our society developed
biologically, but no one can unlock the secret that gives us the
ability to reproduce naturally. Unlike us, you are a direct product
of your natural environment and we believe your natural
consciousness may be able to read this secure
information.”

“
So you want me to hold this stone and try to
hack it with my mind?”

“
In a manner of speaking,
yes.”

Jade started to think how this
could be pretty cool and thought, “How many teenagers would ever
get the opportunity to travel to another planet, meet the humanoid
species who seeded Earth, then hack an ancient stone by using their
mind?”

“
Ok I’ll do it, but only under two
conditions.”

“
What is that?”

“
Reece has to stay here with my body while I’m
gone.”

Izri smiled, “Absolutely, I think that is a very
reasonable request.”

“
You do?” replied Jade
surprisingly.

“
Yes, and your second condition?”

“
I would like to know what happened to my
father, Spencer Cade.”

“
Your father’s field program was downloaded to
a newborn baby.” Izri purposely refrained from telling Jade about
the second Spencer, who held onto his memories, in an attempt to
create less confusion.

“
When?”

“
I do not know the specific time, but it was
fairly recent.”

“
That means he’s just a baby.”

“
Yes.”

“
He wouldn’t remember me would he?”

“
Unfortunately not. One of the
processes of getting downloaded to a new body is your memories from
your past life get scrubbed. I am sorry Jade.”

“
That’s ok, I understand,” replied Jade with
great disappointment. “I’m just grateful to know a part of him
still exists.”

“
That is very mature of you.”

“
Thanks, I guess.”

“
Look on the bright side, you
will be seeing Reece real soon, which is a good thing because I
know you two have strong ties with each other.”

“
Yes, we do,” smiled
Jade.

“
Ah… great your breakfast is
here,” said Izri as he directs one of his assistants to place the
food on the table. “Please enjoy, I need to follow up on some other
matters. Feel free to use my holoscreen while I am out. I will see
you shortly, ok?”

“
Ok,” nodded Jade as she started
to eat her breakfast while holding back her tears, knowing for
certain she was never going to see her father again.

Pushing
Forward

“Let’s go Spencer, wake up, you lazy fool, wake up!”
yelled Oliver.

“
Oh my God, old man! What’s your
problem?”

“
You need to get up. We have our new orders
and we’re leaving in twenty minutes.”

“
Alright, alright, I’m getting up calm down,
we’re not in the military, although I’m sure you think
so.”

“
You young-uns always showing
disrespect to your elders, I’ll see you downstairs in ten
minutes.”

Oliver walked out of the
cluttered bedroom and headed to the kitchen, while Spencer dragged
himself out of bed complaining about the mattress being too hard.
As Spencer washed up, he kept admiring his good looks as he gave
the occasional flex in front of the mirror. Spencer continued to
review the new information that he had learned from his downloads
and was surprised at his knowledgebase when it came to medical
related issues, specifically ones relating to viruses. Once Spencer
finished grooming his well-toned physique, he headed downstairs
where he met up with Oliver and two new colleagues.

“
I figured you had gone back to
sleep, about time you got down here,” said Oliver.

“
Good morning to you, too,” replied
Spencer.

“
Enough with the wise attitude,
now say hello to Melissa and Karl. They will be joining us on our
trip.”

Melissa was a petite woman in her
early twenties with short spiky hair and glasses. Karl, who was in
his later twenties, was considerably larger in both height and
weight and his hair approached his waistline.

“
Nice to meet you,” said Karl as he extended
his arm and shook Spencer’s hand with a firm grip.

“
Nice to meet you, too,” replied Spencer
trying not to show any discomfort from the handshake.

Spencer quickly redirected his attention to Melissa
and again exchanged pleasantries.

“
Ok, ok, enough with the
introductions. Everyone will be able to get to know each other when
we’re in flight. Karl, do you have all our medical
gear?”

“
Yes, Oliver.”

“
And Melissa, have you secured
our electronic passports.”

“
Yes, here they are.”

Melissa pulled out three circular
cylinders approximately three inches in length and one inch in
diameter and passed one to both Karl and Spencer.

“
What do I do with this?” asked
Spencer.

“
Place your right thumb on one of the ends and
press down,” replied Melissa. Before she finished telling Spencer
what to do, Karl had already completed the task.”

“
Why?” asked Spencer.

“
Oh for God’s sake, just do it,”
snapped Oliver as Melissa and Karl stood there staring at
Spencer.

“
Fine,” said Spencer as he clicked the top and
instantaneously felt a device enter his body.

“
What was that?” asked Spencer.

“
Is this guy for real?” replied
Melissa; “It’s your passport. You’re going to need it when you go
through security.”

“
What! My passport is inside me?”

“
It is a subcutaneous chip that
acts as a virtual id. Consider it a big step down from a PIC,”
explained Melissa.

“
Ah great, you’re saying I have a machine in
me,” wined Spencer.

“
I wouldn’t call it a machine,
it’s a device,” replied Karl.

“
Why didn’t Oliver get one?”
asked Spencer.

“
Because I have a paper passport
you fool, now stop worrying about me and focus on the task at
hand.”

Spencer looked over at Oliver and
said with a sly look, “And that is…”

“
You need to get outside and load
up the van with the medical supplies. Karl, go with
him!”

“
Yes Oliver.”

After Spencer and Karl left, Melissa looked over at
Oliver and asked, “Who is this guy?”

“
I don’t know, I was interested in meeting him
in the beginning, but now he just seems like your local lap dog. It
doesn’t matter, we don’t need him to be intelligent, just a
mule.”

“
Well, hopefully he’s not going to be as
stubborn as one,” replied Melissa.

“
We’ll see.”

Oliver and Melissa finished
packing up their personal items and headed outside to see Spencer
and Karl’s progress. Once the van was loaded, Spencer went back
into the house, gathered a few personal belongings, to include his
insulin, and headed back out where he found Oliver and Melissa
impatiently waiting for him. Karl was already in the back of the
van sleeping. As Spencer entered the van Oliver instructed him to
sit in the back with Karl, and he did without too much
complaining.

“
Oliver it’s nice to see you’re wearing
suitable clothing, nothing like what you were wearing when we met,”
said Spencer.

“
You really want to test my patience?” replied
Oliver.

“
No, sorry just trying to spread some
humor.”

Oliver ignored Spencer’s last
comment and said. “Alright, let’s get out of here.”

Melissa instructed the van to
take them to the airport as she listened to Oliver comment on the
days when humans actually drove and not machines. As Spencer sat in
the back, he realized this was what he must have sounded like when
talking to Jade. Surprisingly enough he was not fond of Oliver’s
attitude.

The drive took less then an hour,
and upon their arrival, everyone was thrilled to exit the van.
Melissa, Karl, and Spencer all carried their fair share of gear and
luggage, while Oliver, who was feeling his age, carried little and
spent his energy being concerned about how security was going to
screen them. Although they had a private charter, they still needed
to go through the same screening process as commercial passengers.
The only difference was they would go through a shorter line
allowing security personnel more time to focus their attention on
chartered passengers. Oliver was the first to go through and did
not have any issues, except a comment on how archaic his form of
identification was. Spencer was sure Oliver was going to say
something obnoxious, but he did not. Oliver knew to keep his mouth
shut; the last thing he wanted to do was get into an argument with
one of the security personnel. After Oliver completed his screening
Melissa, Karl, and Spencer walked through a small archway where
their subcutaneous IDs were scanned and the fake virtual passports
were all accepted. Once cleared, all four walked down a twenty-five
foot transparent enclosure where their physical bodies were
analyzed for any prohibited items.

The four exited the security
terminal and walked to the tarmac where they met up with their
luggage, which hadn’t yet been loaded onto the aircraft. Spencer
stood outside the aircraft, amazed by its sleek design, how the
wings folded inwards towards the nose of the plane, opposite from
the traditional design. As he marveled over this fantastic machine,
Melissa walked up and said, “What, haven’t you ever seen a
PAV?”

“
A what?” asked Spencer.

“
A personal air vehicle.”

“
Not like this one, no,” said
Spencer.

“
You’ve never flown before have
you?”

“
No.”

“
Don’t worry it’s nothing. Even you could fly
this plane, it’s that easy.”

“
Thanks, I guess. So are we going to have to
taxi out?”

“
No, this baby can take off vertically. There
are two small vertical engines on the belly that allow us to lift
up, then the two jet engines on the rear do the rest, as well as
the autopilot of course.”

Oliver stuck his head out the door of the PAV and
yelled, “Are you two going to stand out there for the rest of the
day, come on let’s go!”

“
We’re coming,” replied Melissa.

Spencer looked over at Melissa
and said, “You know, when I first met him, he seemed like a crazy
old man. Now he seems like a crazy old grumpy man.”

“
You may want to watch what you say about him
in front of me.”