FATHER MATEO PEREZ
CASTEL GANDOLFO, ITALY
“From my perspective, the Big Bang remains the best explanation of the universe’s origin that we have from a scientific standpoint.”
FATHER MATEO PEREZ WAS BUSY WORKING on the observatory dome door. What was I thinking? I shouldn’t be out here messing with this, he thought, overly aware of his short, rotund body where it stood on the small circular walkway that wrapped around the metal telescope housing. Once again he rummaged through a bag of less-than-adequate tools and cursed under his breath, looking around to ensure no one had heard. The slight wind from the south carried the smells of the early fall countryside gently toward him, but the beauty of the day was wasted on him and did little to lift his sour mood.
He was so lost in his thoughts, he scraped his hand attempting to use the wrench. After swearing to himself, he threw it back into the tool bag, simultaneously wiping grease from his hand and sucking the blood off his index finger. He shouldn’t be doing this without assistance. He should stick to what he was good at—he was a respected astronomer, well known for his publications, mostly around properties of galaxies, and for his radical comments about extraterrestrial life.
Cardinal Russo emerged onto the observatory walkway, inadvertently slamming the door open. Father Perez jolted upright and nearly fell over the edge. Had there not been a railing, he surely would have toppled from the suspended walkway. No one ever journeyed up to the observatory, let alone someone with the stature of Cardinal Russo. Father Perez knew the cardinal liked to think of himself as merely the political arm of the Vatican, but to many he was the most powerful official in the Roman Curia: the Secretary of State and Camerlengo of the Holy Roman Church.
Cardinal Giovanni Russo was an old man. His face was creased by time, but his piercing brown eyes were bright and very alert. His close-cut white hair was thinning and mostly obscured by his zucchetto.
“Are you quite all right?” Cardinal Russo asked.
“Oh, excuse me, Your Eminence! Y—you startled me,” Father Perez stammered. He glanced self-consciously down at his grease-covered clothing. This was not the way he imagined meeting such a high-ranking official from the Vatican.
“Not at all, not at all, my son,” the Cardinal chuckled, slowly working his way along the narrow walkway toward Father Perez. Russo was considerably older than Mateo but enjoyed good health. His clear eyes revealed his depth of wisdom, owing perhaps to having more secular knowledge than most who were dedicated to the clergy. “You look very busy.”
“Yes, the door has been giving us problems for several days, Your Eminence. Sadly, I am too impatient to wait for a repairman.” Father Perez shifted his weight nervously. He began to mentally review all the work he had recently completed, trying to remember what might had offended those above him.
“So, what have you observed that is new and interesting lately?” the Cardinal asked.
“Actually, there is a solar storm that we are tracking in an effort to calculate its potential impact on Earth …” Father Perez began. After a brief pause, the Cardinal Secretary responded with a very stern glare.
“You know, in the 1600s we had Giordano Bruno tortured and burned alive for suggesting the earth was not the center of the universe,” he said.
Father Perez felt his heart fill with terror.
Father Russo laughed aloud. At first, Father Perez did not know what to make of this, but after seeing the warmth in Father Russo’s eyes, he smiled back.
“Here we are four hundred years later, and we know we were wrong. I suppose it’s too late to apologize to him!” Cardinal Russo said, still chuckling. “Ah—well—what are we going to learn tomorrow? Come with me. I have something to share with you.” Without waiting for a reply, Father Russo turned and began his slow descent.
“I’m sorry, your Eminence, I’m in the middle of this …”
Cardinal Russo continued down into the observatory. “Yes, yes, I am sure it will wait. Come with me,” he said over his shoulder.
Father Perez stood gaping at him for a few seconds before closing his mouth and carefully ambling after the old man. Despite the slow pace of the Cardinal, they were soon in the courtyard, where Father Perez felt he was close enough to speak. “Excuse me, Your Eminence, I do not exactly understand. Where are we going?”
The Cardinal Secretary did not turn around this time, but held up his index finger. “All in good time, my son,” he said. “All in good time.”
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
Prove all things; hold fast that which is good.
It was unusually cold and gray for mid-September in Geneva. Dr. Sofia Petrescu sat at a small table in the cafeteria at the United Nations building, eating her lunch. She tried to act like she didn’t notice Professor De Vos sitting nearby and hid her face behind her thick blonde hair, realizing as she did how fruitless the attempt would prove. It was rare that she escaped male attention anyway, given her looks and slim, athletic figure. Those were not the ostracized professor’s interests, but she knew very well he had others.
Her position and background made it almost inevitable. She served as a consultant to the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs in Vienna, primarily on subjects dealing with technology use in outer space. UNOOSA focused on maximizing the peaceful use of space by member countries; its director, it was rumored, had officially been designated by the U.N. to be the first contact for any extraterrestrial communication. That thought always made Sofia laugh—like the U.N. would have control over the situation.
Sofia had grown up in Romania, raised by a harsh, bitter grandmother, bitter over the obligations thrust on her to raise a child on her own after both of Sofia’s parents had been killed in an automobile accident. She barely remembered them now. She had very few fond memories of her childhood, and she’d lost contact with her grandmother after she’d left home.
Her grandmother had sided with the Nazis during the Second World War, just as Romania had, and she had a militant, abusive way about her. After the war and the Yalta Conference, Romania was subjected to a forced armistice that gave the Soviet Union unlimited control and military presence in Romania. Sofia had been educated in Soviet-run schools and had never understood her grandmother’s hatred for the USSR. Not that she cared what her grandmother thought. Her grandmother had treated Sofia like more of a house servant and a nuisance than a family member. Sofia had retreated into her books and schoolwork, and looked forward every day to the long walk to school and the reprieve it granted her from the pain that surrounded her home. That house held so many bad memories. Even at an early age, Sofia knew that her only way out was through education. In Romania there was little opportunity for women, and she knew for certain that her grandmother could not afford any secondary education. Nor would she approve. Sofia excelled in school and obtained a scholarship to the University of Bucharest.
Professor De Vos was making a beeline over to her.
Dr. Jonas De Vos was a member of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and a chemistry professor at the Université Catholique de Louvain in Belgium. Sofia had known him from her brief time as a post-graduate astrophysics researcher at UCL, where Professor De Vos was one of her doctoral advisors. At that time his reputation had been pristine. But no longer. Although he was still recognized as an accomplished researcher, Sofia knew things hadn’t been going well for him lately: he had lost his research grants, and his papers had been rebuked and criticized among his peers. She barely knew him otherwise—or cared to, anymore.
“Sofia, please—I need your help here,” the professor said as he abruptly sat down at her table, scattering his files on the table inadvertently. “You have not responded to my emails.”
“Professor De Vos, I’m sorry, but I have no environmental science background—you know that,” said Sofia, sighing. “I don’t think I can be of any help.” She had hoped to avoid this conversation in person.
“You are precisely the person who can help. Sofia, you know what they have done to me here,” he added motioning around the room. “I’m fearful I’m going to lose my position at the University. My removal from the IPCC Working Group, and the recent, very public criticism from my colleagues at the U.N. does not bode well for me.” He looked down at the floor self-consciously. “My research will prove my postulate correct,” he said quietly, motioning to his files. “I just need your help in verifying some data.”
Sofia stifled a cringe. She knew that Professor De Vos’s recent publications had challenged the notion of human causal impact on global warming and climate change, a central theme to the U.N.’s IPCC plan and a foundational battle cry for its controversial Agenda 21.
“Professor, with all due respect, I don’t want to get mixed up in your climate-change argument. It’s really not my place …”
“Sofia, please listen,” he pleaded. “You must understand, as a scientist.” He broke off, collected himself, and started again.
“CO2 is not a pollutant; it is a nutrient, and there has never been any direct evidence of human activities causing temperature change. Yes, that is a hypothesis, and a reasonable one—one which I’ve studied to see if there was a causal connection. But it has now become a religion, a sacred cow you dare not speak against. This is not science. If you vary from the U.N.’s party line one iota, you will be ostracized. The IPCC is made up of alarmists. The mentality around the U.N.’s climate change forum is cult-like. This is not what I signed on for. The IPCC was set up by the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Programme to assess the scientific basis for climate change. However, they have made their decision already: the party line is that global warming is caused by man-made carbon dioxide—end of story. The goal of the program, when I joined it, was to provide a rigorous and balanced scientific study of the issue. That is not happening. I have been urged by several of my counterparts on the committee to reconsider and revaluate my findings—can you believe that?”
“Even more of a reason for me to steer clear of the debate,” Sofia said.
“Please, Sofia, you above all people will be interested in what my research is showing,” the professor pleaded as he fumbled through his files. “Please bear with me for just a minute.”
Sofia sighed and did her best to simulate a polite smile.
“All throughout human history we have many periods of time, and I mean centuries, that were much warmer periods than the present—the Medieval Warm Period, for example,” he went on. “The theory that global warming is man-made is an abject hypothetical with little evidence, and frankly, I’m beginning to believe it is more about global governance controls and taxation. That is all Agenda 21 is. Too much is at stake now. The U.N. could never admit they were wrong, especially now that they have architected a global control and taxation system around CO2 being a pollutant and the cause of global warming. Any pure scientist wants to test the hypothesis from a neutral perspective, free of bias. But any research that contradicts the U.N. and the IPCC is scuttled. That’s where you come in.” Professor De Vos scooted his chair closer to hers and leaned in. “I do believe in global climate change,” he said. “Yes, it is happening. But a real scientist should seek the real causal factors. And I think I have identified the real primary cause.” He let the statement hang.
“And?” Sofia demanded.
“The periodicity of sun spots is the culprit,” Professor De Vos said in a whisper. “As you must know, the periods of solar minimums, the periods of least activity in the eleven-year solar cycle of the sun, occur contemporaneously with decreases in global temperature. The sun has the volume of 1.3 million Earths. How could something so massive and so close not have an impact on temperatures? It’s 99.8 percent of the mass of the entire solar system, for God’s sake.” His voice was rising as he became more agitated. “How could it not be rational to question whether global warming is causally related to the sun, that massive thermonuclear furnace next door to our planet?”
“Okay, Professor. I’ve heard that argument, and it’s reasonable enough, I suppose but how do I fit in?” Sofia asked.
“There are specific periods of sunspot activity. This has been documented diligently since William Herschel noticed the correlation in the late 1700s. We have a documented Little Ice Age, as it was called in the 18th century. What was unique about that timeframe? There were virtually no sun spots during this period. And we’re heading into another such period now.” Professor De Vos pulled out a paper from the folder and handed it to Sofia.
“This is a report by Knud Lassen from 1860, showing solar variations and how they impacted global surface temperatures. This scientific precedent and others are being ignored and persecuted, purposefully. My own research demonstrates that clouds form with increased magnetic fields—I call it ion-induced nucleation of the troposphere.”
Sensing that Sofia wasn’t following, he went on. “Here is the bottom line,” he said. “When there are fewer sun spots, as is the case during a solar minimum when there is less solar activity, more solar radiation reaches the earth. The radiation proximately causes cloud cover which leads to a cooling effect. Believe it or not, we are not in a warming phase now. My data suggests we are headed into a long cooling period. Likewise the inverse is true: the earth will heat as solar activity increases, and we have less of a global cloud cover.”
Sofia considered this for a moment. It made sense; in fact it was a rather simple postulate. Was this sort of hypothesis really what had aroused such a violent protest against the professor’s research? She decided to find out. “Professor, I’ll take a quick look,” She relented. “Please understand, though: I’m not putting my name on anything.”
Professor De Vos was elated. “Thank you, Sofia. Thank you,” he said, pushing the files toward her eagerly. “Here are some additional findings that correlate. I think you will find them interesting. And troubling,” he added nervously, as he got up to go.
JAMES ANDERSON
PARIS, FRANCE
“The most likely [scenario]: We find an intelligent civilization and there’s no way in creation we can communicate with them because they’re so alien to us.”
The ringtone James Anderson had assigned to his friend Robert was playing from his pocket as the phone vibrated. Before he’d even said anything, Robert’s voice came through.
James rolled his eyes and wondered why he had answered the phone. “Hey, Robert—uh, look, I’m kind of busy right now. I am at the Polidor in Paris, eating a fabulous confit de canard, or duck to you non-Francophiles,” he said, chortling at his own joke.
“Sorry, but you need to hear what I found,” Robert blurted. “It’s something very strange, maybe an anomaly. I do think, however, that we need to take a deeper look at it.”
James sometimes found it hard to talk to Robert after his decades in academia. Those locked in the world of University who dedicated their entire existence to researching a single protein string, and limited their interactions to those measured by a micropipette titration set, tended to develop their own language, syntax, and cadence of speech. It was a little unsettling for some, James included.
“Look, I really don’t like it when you start sounding like a mad scientist,” James said. “If you found some special biological pathway, can you at least wait until I am back at the apartment actually trying to fall asleep?”
“That’s funny, James. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“Hang on. If this is about more funding, the answer is no.”
“No, it’s not. I’ll talk to you soon, okay?”
James hung up the phone. Shit. Why didn’t I turn that off? James thought to himself. Probably just needs more money. I’m sure of it. He had just enough alcohol in him to feel especially in tune to the injustices of his life without having a completely foggy brain.
He reflected on his friendship with Robert. Dr. Robert Matson had been a lifelong friend, and was now a business partner; he was the one friend James had maintained from childhood. James had grown up rich, really rich—and as a kid, he knew it. From grade school through high school, he had defined himself by what he and his family had: the biggest houses, the nicest cars, the best clothing. James had gathered friends who glommed onto him, wanting to be part of that lifestyle. And even at a young age, Robert was the only one who challenged James about how he treated others. He used to say, “James, everyone knows you’re rich; why do you throw it in other people’s faces? You constantly talk about money and belittle others who don’t have what you have. Stop being such an asshole.”
James had met Robert in middle school, and they’d both attended St. Paul High School in upstate New York, a private boarding school catering to the elite. James’s father paid his way in. Robert had been accepted based on his intellect, and awarded a scholarship available to families with bright children who couldn’t afford the tuition—helped along by a nice recommendation from James’s father, which James use to hold over Robert’s head. Nevertheless, James, who had always been athletic, was willing to stand up for the slighter, nerdier Robert, and the two had become fast friends.
As a senior, James went to Paris to study for the year through a joint program with The British School of Paris, where he partied and ran hard with the rich kids for the entire school year. Then in his second semester, he and his father had a very sobering conversation. His father had lost nearly everything they had when the Nikkei Stock Index in 1992. James only knew that his father worked in international finance, and they now had nothing. The tuition and school fees were already paid for James through the end of the year, but after that, he would come home to a new reality.
This forced a fierce introspection upon James. All that he had defined himself by was gone. He returned to a small two-bedroom ranch home with a single-car garage, fronting a four-lane highway. All his “friends” had vanished along with the money. This was a pride-crushing experience that laid him bare. He could tell some relished seeing that James had been thrust into a new reality. The only friend who still hung around was Robert. He had always been there.
For over a year, James struggled to find himself. He reflected often on how he had treated others, and made it a point to apologize to those he had mistreated, especially Robert. At the end of that time, James emerged a new person, much more sensitive and concerned with others’ feelings and situations. He also realized he hated being poor, and decided to do all that it took to be successful in life and to give back and lift up those around him. He still felt like he had to look out for Robert, but he also knew he valued Robert’s advice and judgment above all others.
James decided it was time for a walk along the Seine. He walked over the Pont des Arts, which was filled with pedestrians. A fantastically beautiful woman approached from the opposite direction, her long, black hair seeming to flow into her scandalously short, black dress. Her legs were tan and perfect. He held her gaze. Wow, James thought. She batted her eyes at him and smiled.
James continued walking, a little more confidently. Maybe I still have it, he thought. He stopped at a small shop and pretended to be looking in the window as he surveyed his reflection. Some slightly graying, black hair, maybe a few creases by his eyes. His jaw was still quite square—no double chin yet. He sucked his gut in a bit. Not bad, he thought. Still got a bit of an athletic build, maybe with a little wear on it. After a minute, he released his breath. Crap, I need to lose at least fifteen pounds, he lamented.
Later that evening, he found himself back at the Bonaparte. This time he sat outside, but under the awning since it had begun to rain. He sat at a small table nursing a beer and watching couples running here and there in an attempt to dodge the raindrops on their way to the small theater next door.
The phone rang. “Robert, again?” he said aloud. He picked up. “Bonjour, Monsieur Robert,” he said in a Monty-Pythonish French accent.
“James, where are you?” Robert replied.
“Well,” James retorted, “where in the hell do you think I am? I just talked to you a couple of hours ago.” This guy is a PhD, for God’s sake, he thought.
“I am fully aware of the country you are in, and I also am aware of the state I would probably find you in should I be in that country with you,” Robert said. “However, when I asked you where you were, I was speaking metaphorically and wondered in fact if you were available to talk.” His tone was hurried and exasperated, which immediately worried James. Robert was never emotional about anything.
“Yeah, go ahead,” James sighed, extinguishing the last of his cigarette brutally in the ashtray and taking another sip of his beer. “All I’m doing right now is drinking a lonely beer at the Café Bonaparte, watching all the saps spending $16 on a beer across the street at Les Deux Magots.”
“No, that’s not good,” Robert said hurriedly. “You can’t talk there. You need to go back to your flat immediately and call me. And make sure you call from a landline—” There was a pause and a rustling noise on Robert’s end of the phone. James looked at the half-empty pint glass he held between three fingers and frowned.
“On second thought,” Robert’s voice resumed so abruptly that James almost dropped his beer, “I’ll email you a dial-in number. I’m a bit freaked out right now. There is a DNA anomaly here that is causing me some serious goose bumps.”
“Robert, you aren’t making that much sense right now, and I really haven’t had enough beers to help that. What’s this about?”
“There is something very—well, unexpected—here, to say the least. Oh, and James?”
“Yeah?”
“Hurry the hell up.”
“Okay. Give me twenty minutes,” James said, disconnecting. “Shit,” he muttered to himself as he stood, fishing several Euros from his pocket. “I should have trusted my gut and stayed the hell away from investing in biotech companies.”
AGENT DEVON STINSON
FLASHBACK: JOHN F. KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, APRIL 15, 2010
And a great war broke out in Heaven: Michael and his angels fought with the dragon; and the dragon and his angels fought, but they did not prevail …
“Mr. President, you will need to cancel any plans of a return mission to the moon,” said Mitchell Perkings quietly.
Sitting in a small conference room at the Kennedy Space Center, the president was preparing to give a speech. He frowned and glanced at his watch, then looked around the small room. The table was occupied by Director of National Security Perkings, NASA Administrator, Charlie Hastings, and NASA Chief Engineer Thomas Kramer, as well as a young man unknown to him.
“Mr. Perkings, Mr. Kramer was quite insistent that we meet before this speech,” he said. “Now I’d like to understand what is so important.”
Agent Stinson had a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. The president had yet to be briefed on Project Aquarius, and Stinson knew he was not going to like what he was about to find out.
“I’m very sorry, Mr. President. I know your agenda has been very full, but this is an extraordinarily important matter,” Kramer said.
“From what I understand, you are planning to announce a return to the moon very soon,” Perkings said.
The president glanced over the men in the room. “That is the plan at this point,” he agreed sternly, “and I see no reason not to go forward with it.”
“Mr. President, I’m not sure we have time to fully brief you as we anticipated before your speech,” Perkings went on, unfazed, “but I think after we have some time to talk, you will reconsider this plan. You’ll need to cancel or change your speech today.”
“I don’t like making changes without knowing what is behind them,” President Brooks said. “If you want me to push this aside, you need to give me the full details, and now. What is this all about, gentlemen?”
The men around the table shifted uncomfortably, feeling the weight of the information that they needed to share with the president. For a moment they sat in silence, their faces stern in serious consideration.
“Mr. President, this is Agent Devon Stinson of the NSA,” said Perkings finally, motioning toward the young agent. “He is our team lead on Project Aquarius.”
“Nice to meet you, Agent Stinson,” the president said politely.
Agent Stinson nodded. “Thank you, sir.” He got up and closed the door to the small conference room “Mr. President, Project Aquarius is an above-top-secret, multinational program managed within the U.N. Security Council. It is the repository of all collective information we have on UFOs and any information we have on extraterrestrial biology. What I’m about to tell you may be a bit—well, unsettling.”
FATHER MATEO PEREZ
THE VATICAN
“We are not split into a world of Spocks and Kirks.”
Father Perez followed the cardinal through Castel Gandolfo. They continued to a silver Mercedes waiting on the street. The chauffer opened the back door and motioned for Father Perez to enter. He slid across, allowing the cardinal to join him. Once the door shut, the cardinal turned and smiled at him.
“Your work has attracted quite some attention, Father Perez,” he said. “You are good at what you do. So good, in fact, that His Holiness would like to meet with you.”
It took a second before Father Perez could respond. “Thank you, Your Eminence. My only wish is to please.” Although this was not exactly true, he felt it was better than saying his only wish was not to bite the hand that fed him.
“I am counting on that fact.” The cardinal turned away from him and looked out the window, abruptly ending the discussion.
Father Perez began to sweat. Now he was truly terrified. Going to the Vatican to meet the pope could not be a good thing, at least not for someone in his position. He was aware that some of his colleagues occasionally called him “the agnostic priest” behind his back, but he had never felt his position more precarious than at this moment. He had known that he would never obtain rank above a priest, and he had accepted that; he’d never been much interested in the religious side of the church anyway. But why he was being singled out now was beyond him. Although he had made a poorly received statement on extraterrestrials years ago, he could see nothing of controversy in the current area of his research—solar flares and their impact on the magnetosphere—that would put him at any risk.
Was he going to lose his job? He loved being an astronomer—it was the only thing that meant anything to him. And though he had always known he could be laicized, he had never known anyone subjected to this. As a priest, his earthly goods were all linked with the Church; what would he do if he were stripped of his title? He supposed he might find a teaching job somewhere, but would the church give him the time to find it before taking back the possessions they had bestowed upon him? The thought of applying to an upper-level university wearing the lay clothing he’d worn when he entered the seminary brought a snort that he suppressed in a fit of coughing. His head was spinning.
What could the pope want with him? He had met Saverio Ferretti before he became Pope Paul VII; as the cardinal from Venice, Pope Paul had served as one of his examiners when he’d joined the Jesuit Order. Perez knew that Pope Paul was also a scientist at heart and had been known to make statements against some traditionally held beliefs. Could that have something to do with it?
Near the end of their drive the cardinal’s cell phone rang, and the cardinal listened carefully to the person on the other line. The few times he spoke, he did so in a hushed, cryptic tone, doing his best to keep his part of the conversation unheard. Father Perez felt almost as if he were intruding and shifted uncomfortably, trying not to overhear what was being said.
Whatever was going on, Father Perez felt very much in over his head. He’d never been the adventurous or aggressive sort. As a kid in the ghettos of Buenos Aires, he was never much of an athlete; instead, he had fallen in love with the stars. He began reading at an early age, and could always be found gazing at the sky or buried in a magazine reading about the latest supernova. He’d attributed his curiosity about outer space to his mother’s intense Catholicism and faith in God and heaven, but he inherently knew—at least from the moment he could think for himself—that heaven was not really a place. He was painfully aware that it was not “up there beyond the stars” as his mother would say. However, there was something up there. Of this, he was convinced.
To make his mother happy, he’d done his catechism, made his confirmation, and accompanied her to mass every day. But he’d never allowed himself to believe that the whole practice was anything more than a cultural routine. Faith in an afterlife made his mother happy, and he believed it gave her peace of mind. At least, it answered those questions for which she wanted answers. He, however, had questions that went beyond the catechism.
A motorcycle screamed past the car, interrupting his thoughts.
He smiled to himself at the irony of his entrance into the seminary, glancing briefly at the cardinal. He’d told himself he did it for his mother. She rarely ever spoke of her own family; when she did, she limited her recollection to an older brother who had been a priest. But despite these associations, and although he’d never said it aloud to anyone, he knew his choice had really been made to distance him from the social concerns that served to motivate young men his age but seemed alien to him. The practical side had been real, too: although his mother made sure their stomachs were never grumbling, funds for continuing his education had not been available. Not only had the Church assumed the cost for his seminary, it had also paid for any continued education he desired.
His was not the typical path of a parish priest, and surprisingly, that had never been an obstacle. In fact, the Church had seemed to encourage his academic appetites, insisting there were many roles to fill that required scholarly work beyond theology. Ultimately, he’d moved on from the seminary, and with the blessing of the church, began to pursue a master’s degree in physics, concentrating on astronomy.
After that, he dared apply to the University of Padua, where he’d received his doctorate in astronomy. Then, as a nod to the Vatican for paying his way, he earned a degree from the Pontificate Gregorian University in theology.
Once his education was complete, Rome had sent him to Mount Graham, Arizona, to begin his research. He had first been worried that the Vatican would return him to Italy to teach at one of the seminaries, but apparently they’d had other plans for his life. When the call to return home finally came, it was with an appointment at the observatory in Castel Gandolfo to continue his work. That kept him busy, and gave him a sense of self-worth and accomplishment without demanding that he pretend to believe in something he didn’t.
The day’s frustration with the observatory cemented his preference for the much more advanced Mount Graham facilities. His staff at the Vatican observatory was very small, much like the town itself.
Soon they arrived. Upon entering the Vatican through a guarded gate, the cardinal hung up the phone and exited the car without comment. Father Perez followed the cardinal as he walked under the entry arch to the papal apartments. Perez was awed; he had never had a reason to venture inside the business area of the papal apartments. Although Pope Paul chose to live modestly in a flat nearby at the Vatican guesthouse, he still conducted business in the top-floor apartment of the Apostolic Palace.
The journey to the meeting room was slow as they proceeded through the Clementine Hall and past the colorful Swiss Guard, down the Seconda Loggia, and through more corridors guarded by even more Swiss Guard, until they finally arrived at the desk of the Prefecture of the Papal House.
“Father Perez,” Cardinal Russo stated to the man behind the desk, whose sole response was a nod.
The cardinal then led him through several more passages before finally opening a door to a large room. After a pause, Father Perez followed him into the room through the camel-colored curtains framing the door. A table with one large white chair at the head and several smaller wooden ones sat in the center of the expansive room. All the walls were painted with intricate details. The floors bore a beautiful pattern of inlaid marble. The furniture looked to be from the 16th century. The room was furnished with only a few elegant pieces, perhaps to give the impression of modesty, while the exquisitely painted walls, marble inlay, arched ceilings, and elaborate chandeliers hanging over the table betrayed another intention. Cardinal Russo walked behind the table and took a seat next to the white chair. He motioned for Father Perez to sit across from him. As Father Perez seated himself carefully, Cardinal Russo smiled, leaned back in his chair, and began humming.
Father Perez had never been in this meeting room before, but knew it to be the Stanza di Eliodoro immediately upon his entrance. This was the smallest of the Vatican’s Raphael Rooms, adorned with paintings by the famous artist on all the walls and ceiling.
The Expulsion of Heliodorus from the Temple dominated the room. It depicted the expulsion of Heliodorus from the Temple of Jerusalem after his attempt to take its treasures. The Meeting of Leo the Great and Attila depicted Saint Peter and Saint Paul floating through the air, wielding their swords in anticipation of battle. It amazed Father Perez that these works were completed in the early 1500s, and yet with careful preservation, had remained in prime condition. It was almost tragic that they were rarely seen by the public. Father Perez wondered if this room had been chosen today for a specific reason.
Father Perez shifted his eyes to a large, darkly stained cupboard on the opposite wall. As he had done since childhood in every mass he had ever sat through, he began blocking out the world around him and focusing in on the detail of the cupboard. It was a technique he’d learned in the Latin high masses he had suffered through with his mother before he could understand them. After his first fidgety experience when he had dared to complain, his mother had snapped at him, telling him that he should be looking at the stained glass to entertain himself. He had taken it to heart and used the method for every situation he found boring or uncomfortable thereafter.
The doors opened abruptly, jerking both Father Perez and Cardinal Russo to attention. Cardinal Russo slowly rose from his chair and bowed as the pope stepped into the room, several guards in tow.
Father Perez remained frozen in awe. Until this moment, he had not believed he had truly been summoned to appear before His Holiness in person. The cardinal politely cleared his throat to gain Father Perez’s attention, prompting Father Perez to his feet to execute a low bow. When he rose, his face was drained of all color, and his eyes were wide. The pope smiled with a twinkle in his eye and took a seat, his stark white hair adding an air of wisdom to his commanding presence. The smile betrayed the serious aura around the man. He tossed a stern look at the Swiss Guards, who glanced hesitantly at Father Perez before stepping outside the room.
The pope looked to make sure the doors were completely closed, then inched forward on his chair. “Well, it is all arranged then?” he asked.
Cardinal Russo nodded. “Yes, Your Holiness, we can begin immediately,” he said.
The pope folded his hands on the table and held the gaze of the priest before him. “Thank you for coming today, Father,” he said. “You continue to do great work for the Church.” He took a deep breath, then said, “Father Perez, today we have a new task for you, a task for the Jesuit Order. One that may—shall we say—test your faith.”