Pulses by Jerry Merritt

Author:Jerry Merritt [Merritt, Jerry]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Jerry Merritt
Published: 2013-05-11T07:00:00+00:00

Chapter 33

At the road block the next morning a sergeant waved Bourne through before he even had a chance to slow down.

“Now that's more like it,” he said as the old Cadillac hurtled on toward the landing site. “Nothing like a pompous, overweight senator eating a whole humble pie on television to get everyone's attention, eh, Luke.”

Redleaf beamed happily from the front seat. “I think it broke Slaytor's heart to have to call me last night and tell me I'd be assigned full time to the control team. He still sounds like he has a nasal stoppage from where you popped him. I was about to lose my mind playing Slaytor's gofer. Thanks, major.”

“Just Luke. Okay?”

“Whatever you say, but I feel more comfortable with major. What's on the program for this morning?”

“Not much. Alex and I discussed it late yesterday. He'll modify the networks he has already connected himself into so that anyone can pick up a phone or go onto any communications net and just ask to connect to Alex. The connection to the ship will be made instantaneously. We also need to get more info on this offer of extended life. People are scrambling to find out what Alex meant by his statements yesterday.”

“Do you really think it's possible?” Dan asked.

“I don't see why not,” Bourne replied. “During the evolution of life on this planet, the early organisms didn't grow old and die. And many of today's organisms are essentially immortal.”

“Come on,” Dan said. “I've never heard of an animal that lives forever.”

“Sure you have,” Bourne continued. “You've heard of an amoeba haven't you?”

“Sure, but they don't live forever.”

“No? What happens if you destroy an amoeba?”

“It dies.”

“Really? The amoeba would have been the result of a recent split of a preceding amoeba. Was the amoeba you killed the original amoeba or only half the original amoeba?”

“Okay, Doc. I see what you're driving at, but what if I killed both the amoebas?” Dan looked satisfied with herself.

“All you've done is moved back one generation. Both those amoebas were the result of a single amoeba that had split previously. That amoeba still lives because you haven't destroyed all of it. And if you do, that has no effect on all the other amoebas that are still part of the original amoeba.”

Dan thought about that for a minute. “Amoebas are different, though. They're single cell. What about higher organisms?”

“Well, you've got to get all the way up the Volvox elegans before you find a multicellular organism that actually comes to a natural end of life without leaving a trace of its original self. Only the Volvox's offspring live on. The parent dies. Something happened during that stage of evolution that caused cells to be able to divide only about fifty times before they all die of old age. An original new cell brought about by sexual reproduction has its clock reset to zero but it also has a built-in self-destruct mechanism. No one knows why we age or how it works.

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