Illegal Alien

The image was coarse, but it clearly showed a large object shaped like a shield or a broad arrowhead floating atop gray water. The object seemed capable of changing colors — one moment it was red; the next, orange; then yellow. It cycled through the hues of the rainbow, over and over again, but with a considerable period of pure black between being violet and red.

Cut to a dour, middle-aged man with an unkempt beard. The title "ARNOLD HAMMERMILL, PH.D., SCRIPPS INSTITUTE," appeared beneath him. "It’s difficult to gauge the size of the spaceship," said Hammermill, "given we don’t know the precise altitude of the plane or the zoom setting used at the time the video was taken, but judging by the height of the waves, and taking into account today’s maritime forecast for that part of the Atlantic, I’d say the ship is between ten and fifteen meters long."

A graphic appeared, showing the vessel to be about half the size of a Space Shuttle orbiter. The reporter’s voice, over this: "The United States aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk is on its way now to the splashdown site. Earlier today, the president’s science advisor, Francis Nobilio" (black-and-white still of Frank, a few years out of date, showing his hair as mostly brown) "and astronomer Cletus Calhoun, best known as the host of PBS’s popular Great Balls of Fire! astronomy series" (silent clip of Clete at the rim of Arizona’s Barringer crater) "were flown by military jet to the Kitty Hawk, and are now on their way to rendezvous with the alien ship. The Kitty Hawk should reach its destination in just over one hundred minutes from now. Bobbie and Lou?"

Back to CNN Center in Atlanta and a two-shot of Lou Waters and Bobbie Battista. "Thanks, Karen," said Battista. "Before Dr. Calhoun left the U.S., our science correspondent Miles O’Brien managed to interview him and University of Toronto exobiology professor Packwood Smathers about what this all means. Let’s have another look at that tape."

The image changed to show O’Brien in front of two giant wall monitors.

The one on the left was labeled TORONTO and showed Smathers; the one on the right was labeled LOS ANGELES and showed Clete.

"Dr. Smathers, Dr. Calhoun, thanks for joining us on such short notice," said O’Brien. "Well, it looks like the incredible has happened, doesn’t it? An alien spaceship has apparently landed in the middle of the Atlantic. Dr. Smathers, what can we expect to see when this ship opens up?"

Smathers had a square head, thick white hair, and a neatly trimmed white beard. He was wearing a brown sports jacket with leather patches on the elbows — the quintessential professorial look. "Well, of course, we first have to suspect that this ship is unmanned — that it’s a probe, like the Viking landers, rather than carrying a crew, and—"

"Look at the size of the thing," said Clete, interrupting. "Pete’s sake, Woody, ain’t no need for the thing to be that big, ’less it’s got somebody aboard. ’Sides, it looks like it’s got windows, and—"

"Dr. Calhoun is famous for jumping to conclusions," said Smathers sharply.

O’Brien was grinning from ear to ear — he evidently hadn’t expected to get an impromptu Siskel and Ebert of science. "But, as I was about to say, if there are alien beings aboard, then I expect them to be at least vaguely familiar in body plan, and—"

"You’re hedging now, Woody," said Clete. "Couple years ago, I heard you give a talk arguing that the humanoid body plan would be adopted by purty near any form of intelligent life, and—"

Smathers was growing red in the face. "Well, yes, I did say that then, but—"

"But now that we’re actually goin’ to meet aliens," said Clete, clearly enjoying himself, "you ain’t so sure no more."

"Well," said Smathers, "the human body plan might indeed represent an ideal for an intelligent lifeform. Start with the sense organs: two eyes are much better than one, since two give stereoscopic vision — but a third eye adds hardly any value over two. Two ears likewise give stereophonic hearing, and they’ll obviously be on opposite sides of the body, to give the best possible separation. You can go right down the human body from head to toe, and make a case why each part of it is ideal. When that spaceship opens up, yes, I’ll stand by my contention that we’ll probably see humanoids inside."

The Clete on the TV set looked positively pained. The one sitting next to Frank aboard the Kitty Hawk shook his head. "Peckerwood Smathers," he said under his breath.