Chapter 1: School of Thought

With the Birth of Andrew Alan McKesson, Dave and Ginny decided they needed to build their own home on Meadow. They began looking all across North America for the perfect place. It wasn't until Sheb Halliday suggestion it that they looked in the area of the Smoky Mountains of North Carolina and Tennessee. When they saw Meadow's version of the Cataloochee River valley, the knew they had found their place.

They picked a spot near the upland end of the valley, on a small rise that gave them a dramatic view down the valley. With the spot picked, they soon began looking at plans. After three months of endless changes, Dave's mom finally made a proposal.

"Do you two trust me?" She began. They both nodded. "Then why not leave this to me? The two of you are too wrapped up in being parents, and the millions of details involved in getting the folks on Obsidian operating smoothly, being Legionnaires and explorers, its no wonder you can't make a decision about a house. I'll get together with your Grandpa A.J. and a few other people, and we will design and build your home, and present it to you. Everyone's happy, and we all get back to business. What do you think?"

They should have known that Elizabeth McKesson was just acting as the front man for a larger organization. The plan to build a house for the new family was a joint effort of... everyone! Every member of the McKesson Clan, every one of the Holders of Rhel, everyone in the Legion, every one involved in Obsidian and with Obsidian Research. Everyone but Dave, Ginny and Baby Andrew McKesson were in on the building. And they built big!

While Dave and Ginny had been thinking of a house just big enough to raise three or four children in, everyone else understood one simple fact. Wherever they lived would become the center of the universe for their friends, family and followers. There would always be company at their house. It would be a place where people gathered, groups met and decisions were made.

So while there was a small dining table in a rear sun room near the kitchen, perfectly placed to catch the morning light coming up the valley, there was also a massively huge dining room which could seat a hundred. The kitchen was also greatly oversize, with room for a large cook crew to prepare large meals for the crowds that might fill the dining room. There were a dozen guest bedrooms on the second floor. The third floor was the 'private residence' part of the house. There was a basement, even a secret level of sorts, but there was no massive underground component like they had built for the first house on Meadow.

Built of massive timbers and stone, but with all the modern amenities, as well as all the Seeker extras that Con and the Obsidian staff could hide behind and inside the walls, ceilings and floors, the house was completed and they were moved in within six months. A house that size was going to need a full staff to take care of it, and unlike in the past, they built the caretaker's house at the same time, in a side valley a few miles to the northeast.

It was during this time that Arden Anderson and Alicia Jackson got married. Dave's prediction of a double wedding turned out to be oddly accurate as well. Pete Parkin and Sarah Granger were married in the same ceremony. Arden and Alicia honeymooned on the island of Maui in Hawaii. Pete and Sarah honeymooned on the island of St. Thomas in the Caribbean. Within a month, and only days apart, Alicia and Sarah announced that they were expecting.

The applicants for the head caretakers position was limited to couples 'hitched or fixin' to get hitched', as Hoot Jenkins put it. Dave and Ginny selected their surprise preferred choice, Dwight Alvarado and his bride to be Shelaana Dru.

The two had met during the basic classes all Meadow settlers were required to take. According to Dwight, they had walked out of the Garden on Obsidian at the same time, thanked their teachers, turned and saw each other. The attraction was instantaneous and mutual, and they stopped on one of the low benches that surrounded the garden and struck up a conversation. They were at the meeting-the-parents stage within three weeks. They were married in their new home in what everyone referred to as a combination wedding and house warming party.

Dave, amongst others, had noticed the high incidence of romantic connections being made between McKesson and Rhellian candidates. It was hard not to notice, with his Uncle Ambrose and Ia Sardic now each very seriously disinterested in most anything that did not involve the other.

The other nice thing about living in the Smoky Mountains was being able to stay synchronized with the folks in Chocowinity. They were regular visitors to the McKesson house, and Aaron, Ambrose, A.J., Sheb and Violet became regular benefactors of their Light rejuvenation treatments. This soon came to include Doc Aillard and Ia Sardic, as they became regulars at A.J.'s house as well.

One pleasant morning, just before Andy's fifth birthday, Dave was sitting with his Dad and Grandfather A.J., Drinking tea in the sun room and watching Andy and Ginny playing, when A.J. Started an interesting conversation.

"Dave, how difficult do you think it would be for Constantine to build an exact copy of my house in Chocowinity here on Meadow?"

"Not much of a problem at all, grandpa. Why? Are you thinking of moving to Meadow?"

"I'm planning on dieing, Dave. At least I'm planning for everyone on Earth to believe I'm dead."

"What!" Dave exclaimed in surprise. When he realized his dad hadn't reacted similarly he turned to him "Dad, are you in on this idea?"

"Yup."

"Of course your dad knows what is going on Davey, he's my chosen successor after all." A.J. Said with a wicked grin. "Listen, I've been thinking for quite some time about how to handle the fact that I'm looking younger and younger every year. You rejuvenation treatments are not only working nicely, but the effects seem to be building some momentum. I'm starting to look too young! Hell, I'm 83 years old, but I look like I'm 40! I have to wear makeup to make myself look older when I go to any McKesson Group functions."

"Wow! I hadn't thought about the age difference thing. Too involved in the process to think about the long term results, I guess."

"Well the same problem is starting to worry both of your Uncles, Doc Aillard, Sheb and Violet too, although they have less to worry about since they're not quite the public figures your Grandfather and you are."

"Thanks for reminding me Dad." Dave said with a laugh. "I assume, knowing the way the McKesson mind works, that you all have devised some sort of plan?"

Of course they did, and it was dramatic.

Three years after the triggering of Dave's original set of inspiration bombs, the publicly known research in the field was sufficient for Obsidian Research to announce the Obsidian Fusion Reactor. The oil and power industries on Earth had immediately tried everything in their power to suppress it. They dumped millions of dollars into the pockets of congressmen and officials of the Atomic Energy Commission and every other Federal agency who had a shred of control or influence. Legislation was introduced, PR agencies were hired, TV advertisements condemning the reactors as dangerous and untested blanketed the airwaves. The reactor technology was on its way to being bogged down in red tape for decades.

Then Howard Dexter stepped forward. Howard was a senior aide to Senator Warren Remington of Virginia, and he quickly became history's most famous whistle blower. He stepped forward with digital video recordings of both the meeting between Senator Remington, three other senior Senators and a group of OPEC oil ministers, as well as another meeting between Senator Remington and the heads of three of the four largest American power companies.

"I just had an epiphany that woke me up in the middle of the night." Howard was quoted as saying. "I realized how truly evil our actions were, in trying to suppress the fusion reactor, merely because doing so benefited those people willing to pay for the Senator's influence. So I decided to do something."

A couple more whistle blowers came forward from the ranks of congressional aides and corporate assistants to confirm Howard Dexter's story, and the tide shifted. TV, radio and newspaper news organizations seized on the corruption story and ran with it.

Obsidian Industries, Obsidian Research and the McKesson Group were all publicly the world's biggest Howard Dexter fans. But it took only a second of consideration to make us wonder about our benefactor.

Obsidian Industries invited Howard Dexter to a symposium on fusion energy at Duke University, as a special guest of honor, all expenses paid. The Dave/Ginny full fusion gave him a thorough going over. Howard Dexter was definitely under the influence of a coercer, and one with much more finesse than Lyle Boyle.

The compulsion that had been laid on him to reveal the actions of his employer, the former Senator and currently indicted co-conspirator Warren Remington, was still there. When the time came, Howard Dexter would testify, with utter truthfulness and an uncanny level of detail. Several other compulsions had been laid upon him. The simplest was one that compelled him to get as close to me, or the McKesson family as possible.

Whoever he was, this coercer was infinitely more sophisticated than the sick combination of Dwayne and Lyle Boyle. Howard Dexter had no idea who controlled him, no idea he was being controlled at all. Faint traces, bare hints of a masculine touch lingered and nothing more.

To find the coercer who held Howard's strings we were going to have to keep him as close as possible, and monitor him heavily whenever he was near any of us. It became a waiting game.

The powerful men he had exposed had been quick to hire investigators and researchers to look for some dirt in Howard Dexter's past. We arranged to get the results of their efforts ourselves. More importantly, we looked for signs that the investigators themselves had been tampered with.

Three months after Howard Dexter came forward, the Chinese physicist whose work had 'inspired' the development of the Obsidian reactor held a press conference to claim that the reactor technology was indeed safe, and that the Chinese government would immediately begin negotiating with Obsidian to open a plant in China to produce reactors for the global market. The rest of the world, and the rest of the U.S. Congress, took notice.

It was in the midst of this chaotic series of events that we finally got a nibble from our surveillance of Howard Dexter. We were able to do a quick trace to an unknown face in the crowd during an independence Day parade in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. We planted our faintest, most gossamer tag and then studiously ignored him. With our tag planted, and Howard Dexter's testimony before congress completed, Grandpa A.J.'s plans were enacted. To celebrate the recent good news, A.J., Ambrose, Aaron, Sheb, Violet and Doc Aillard took the Nereid out for a run up to Boston.

After a stop in Ocean City, Maryland to pick up our new good friend Howard Dexter, In full view of at least 6 other vessels, as well as a large number of people on shore, the Nereid exploded in a blinding and deafening blast that completely and utterly obliterated it.

Public opinion quickly placed the blame on the energy companies that had so recently been exposed. We definitely felt a little guilty when the President declared a national day of mourning. Of course there had been no one on board the Nereid when the blast destroyed her. They were all safe and secure in the new replica of A.J. McKesson's house on Meadow. Howard Dexter, freed of his compulsions was giddy with relief, and just a little awe struck.