Chapter 4

In March I started talking about Bess to Albert. Telling him that before Mommy started guarding us, she ordered him 11 little brothers and sisters. “I’m very excited, your first little sister comes in April. She will be so much fun. Just think we will have two birthday parties every year, one for you, and one for her!”

“Ice cream?” he asked.

“She might like cake. Or maybe cupcakes. We won’t know until we ask her. But something you should know about babies. They are small and delicate. At first they don’t know how to talk, or do anything. Bess is going to have Penny taking care of her, so you don’t have to worry. Nobody is going to make you change her diaper, or give her baths, or feed her. But if you want to you can help do all those things. That’s part of what it means to be a big brother.”

I just got a simple okay from him in response, then he wanted to know about eating ice cream for dinner. He really was obsessed.

April 4th Bessie Jane Cook arrived. Everybody called her Bess, the same as my father’s mother. I had her up on the roof in the pagoda to show Melanie when Albert came to see her for the first time. He wasn’t impressed. He wanted to tell Mommy about his swimming lessons instead. I left them to talk.

In May, a meteorite destroyed a Christian Church in the United States. The preacher and congregation had been talking about how they needed to teach a lesson to those sinners at the women’s clinic. “Nothing but a good lynching for those abortion loving baby killers.” Five people left the building just before it exploded in heavenly fire. A single baby was miraculously left untouched amidst the destruction.

The world only paused for a moment, the news mentioned the event showing the destroyed building, and repeated the video of ‘the three curses.’ A few weeks later a street preacher tried the same thing, and the people around him beat him to death, in fear of death due to proximity of hate. The sky lit with a meteor, but it didn’t reach the ground.

The Muslim world was still reeling from the 9/11 disaster. There was a shortage of radical imams, and those that remained weren’t willing to say much about it. No one wanted to test the waters. Meteorites held a special place in Muslim culture, a holdover from their Zoroastrian past. The sacred stone of Mecca was said to possibly be a meteorite itself.

Nonetheless shortly after the church was destroyed, a group in Syria calling itself the Islamic State declared that it was at war with Israel, and the satanic West that supported it, ‘Death to the unbelievers,’ they announced.

Fifteen meteorites wiped them out fifteen seconds after the announcement. Them and every town they controlled in Syria. A massive sustained lightning strike from a clear blue sky hit Mecca afterwards, igniting the cloth covering of Kaaba, and killing every person inside the walls of the grand mosque. Only a few thousand died, as it was still months till haji.

The structure was otherwise undamaged, but the heart of Islam took a deep breath, and began to think about things other than jihad.

Jane found a new surrogate for Cary, he was implanted in June, for a March birth. She was less than happy with his full name. Dad thought Cary Grant Cook was an excellent name. Mom said it was simply a family tradition considering my name was John Wayne Cook. She was delighted with the naming scheme, doing them all alphabetically. Jane did admit that Cary Grant had been Melanie’s favorite actor growing up.

In July we had my annual island birthday party. It gets louder, more rowdy, and raucous every year. The first of my five new past lives series got published, detailing the life of Melanie and myself as a couple in the ancient Fertile Crescent. In it, I’m a priest of the local religion, the story including the full text of all twenty one parts of the ‘Story of Gilgamesh,’ which I was performing a recitation of the night we first met in the story. It would be decades before the archeological discoveries supported the story and events of the book, but they would come.

It was a tragic story that ended with us both dying, her a death leading the escape of the Kings harem from captivity, me leading a revolt against the King that took her from me.

August saw some excitement in space, as the second generation of crops on Butterfly Station were harvested. They had been grown from seeds taken from the first crop grown in space. They were sent to Earth to determine if the superconducting electromagnetic radiation shield had protected the crop from genetic damage. Testing hailed the shield as a success, but this was a multigenerational experiment. Crops grown in Mars gravity seem to be little different from the Earth gravity torus. The Martian Explorer Test, with a volunteer astronaut that had spent a year in simulated Mars gravity showed minimal difference medically. This was a planned five year test.

September was quiet. There were some memorial events, but ground zero was still a pile of debris. West St remained closed, both from debris removal and the new Buddhist temple being built there. The city had agreed to close West St between Liberty and Fulton deeding the land to the new Buddhist Temple when debris removal had finished.

The Pacific Union conducted a ceremony on the anniversary inducting Albert and Bess as Prince and Princess of the Pacific. Albert liked telling everybody he’s Prince Albert for about a week before he moved onto something new. Bess was 5 months old, and did good to not wet herself during the ceremony. I gave Albert a stainless steel, but gold plated, crown to wear. It ended up in his toy chest a few days after the ceremony.

I spent some time in my lab in October working on a new medication. By November it was complete. A male contraceptive. A slow dissolving yearly injection that turned off fertility in men. It had one side affect, specifically designed for widespread adoption. It reduced the male sexual recovery, the first refractory period, to 10 minutes or less no matter the person’s age. Additional refractory periods take longer, but are still significantly short. I took it myself, my year of mourning had passed, but I swore no more children for me until Melanie’s are born and grown up some.

Like my other medications, it became a wildly successful product. Women demanded it of their men, and men who don’t have it were considered poor bed mates. It was even more successful than the pain reliever I developed in 1999, a non-addicting drug based on the venom of a sea snail. It was severely needed at the time as the drug treatment I created worked for cocaine, cannabinoids, and opioids, making nearly all pharmaceutical and surgical pain relievers ineffective.

I permanently canceled the annual movie preview in New York, but kept the apartment for future use. John Jr and Carolyn came for a visit in early October. She was pregnant again, but it was still early. They brought their daughter Annie, who seemed to be constantly running after Albert wanting to play with him.

They stayed until just two weeks before Thanksgiving. Mom and Dad along with my grandparents returned to the US when John Jr and Carolyn did on my old 767 for a family Thanksgiving. I stayed behind with my two kids, their nannies, and their Grandma Jane.

In November, I was contacted by the City of New York. They wanted me to be on the memorial committee for the North Tower site. I declined, but told them I’d like to submit a design to the committee.

My submitted design turned the area around the destroyed buildings into a park. The actual footprint of the North Tower had a sunken pool with cascading waterfalls on the four sides. Just below the surface of the water of the pool there would be a glass window, bringing light into the PATH station and subway stations below ground.

On the window itself, standing back to back I have diamond statues of Melanie Cook and Steve Jackson. Melanie is facing uptown towards where Albert was at the Empire State Building, while Jackson faces opposite toward the crash site in the Hudson.

The statues are dressed as they were that day, four times life size, both holding their helmets, faces pointed up out of the hole that is the memorial pond. I submit the drawings, and artwork. I also offer to provide the statues. Melanie would be 20’ 8” tall at four times life size.

December brings renewed media attention as the videos of the sword making are released for the first time. I’m interviewed, my hair is slowly growing back, as I stopped the ‘hair off’ treatments after the first year anniversary.

I show off the scars on my arm, and describe that terrible day from my point of view. We talk about Melanie’s book, and our relationship. I talk about the adventures we had, and show the single doubloon she had kept from the pirate ship. I showed the sword, scratches and damage untouched, I unsheathed it so the cameras can record it both sides of it.

It’s cathartic for me in a way. I’m not afraid of crying on TV. I discuss some of my inventions, and plans for the future. I even discuss how the technology developed to improve the Buran had been rejected by NASA for the Space Shuttle. I lament the lack of vision in improving the craft, increasing safety, and range so they can reach Butterfly Station, and beyond. I also show off pictures of my newly completed spacecraft the Monarch, Morpho, and Queen, descendants of the now retired Buran.

Finally I talk about the children. Albert still doesn’t understand what’s happened, and the rest will have never met her. I talk about my hopes for the children, and keeping my promises to Melanie. I talk about how I’ve turned control of my holdings over to others, and rarely spend time managing business activities. My life is the kids, and Ocean City. I do admit that the thought of going back to New York is too painful for now, but that I hope to do so again someday. Perhaps when it’s time to share with the children the story of their mother.

The term Pratyekabuddha comes up, and I discuss its meaning, and its context in my life. I explain that I can’t teach the method I achieved enlightenment, but that I can teach what a past me learned from Buddha himself. I promise to write a book about those teachings. While it will be controversial, it will be accepted and bring a decided shift to the mainstream Buddhist philosophy, creating millions of new converts, and eliminating the nihilist leanings.

I’m asked about the temple at the site of ‘the three curses.’ I admit that it really doesn’t matter to me. I’m interested in the memorial honoring Melanie and Steve, but the location of the curse is as important to me as the circle in the desert, or the circle in San Diego, or even the circle here at the roof of Central Tower.

I’m eagerly told by my interviewer that there is already a shrine in the desert, where the meteor for the blade landed, but it’s not much visited as it’s hit with lightning every time a storm passes thru. I’m asked about the La Jolla house, and its significance. I mention that was where our wedding took place, and it remains special to me regardless just for that.

When the interview ends, the crew went off to get video of the location of the sword making ritual. It’s packaged together, with my interview and recorded video from security, house staff, bus drivers, and Melanie’s own video camera. It aired as a special TV program internationally Wednesday December 25th.

New Year’s Eve came, and we had an island party. Albert loved his horn, blowing it constantly all day. I found him asleep a few hours before midnight with it still in his mouth. Sam visited me for the holiday, her first trip to Ocean City since it’s completion. We renew our friendship, but I admit to her that I’ll never marry again. She enjoys the visit, but leaves disappointed the second week in January, wishing that our relationship could have been more than casual.

On January 16th Columbia took off from Florida for a science mission. I watch the launch on the news, and immediately call Al.

“Sorry to bother you, but you have a major problem,” I tell him as soon as he answers.

“I’m listening John, what do you need?”

“I don’t need anything, but NASA is about to try to kill another seven astronauts.”

“What happened, and how do we fix it?”

“It’s the foam they put on the fuel tanks. It’s broken off before and caused damage, but the craft survived. NASA isn’t going to do anything about it, because the shuttles have always made it back before. This time the damage is to the leading edge of the wing. It needs its thermal protection, as it is directly heated by reentry. Lost tiles are common, but they usually happen elsewhere on the orbiter.”