Yeti Unleashed Page 27
“Enough, Doctor. You are still in your probationary period, correct? Yes. Doctor, as of this moment you are no longer employed by California Pacific University. Your termination is effective immediately. As per the terms of your probationary period, you can be terminated without cause at any time. You are to turn your keys in to security, along with your ID. Then you are to report to HR and sign the necessary papers in order to receive your final paycheck. I will entertain no objections. Good day, sir.”
Pauling stood and Wickingham followed suit. His legs felt like Jell-O, his head swam. He thought he might faint.
As he stumbled to the office door, he noticed Dixie out of the corner of his eye.
She sat, still silent, with the same smirk on her face.
***
Harry pulled the steaks off the grill and brought them into the house. The setting sun cast deep shadows over San Francisco Bay to the east of his and Dixie’s San Mateo home. Gathered around the large dining room table were his wife, Siscom, Drayton, Radner, and Millie. Harry had mixed drinks for everyone, and they had spent the last hour rehashing the events of the previous week. He felt close to them, a feeling kindled by communal suffering.
As they ate, the discussion about their experiences continued, with Drayton making his point. “Frankly,” he said, “I’m glad it’s over. I’m not the camping type.”
“I feel so sorry for Jimmy,” Millie said. “His death--so senseless.”
“If he had followed our guidelines,” Radner said, “he would be alive now and this whole tragedy would not have happened.”
“Yes,” Millie said, “but...” Her voice trailed off and tears formed in her eyes. It was obvious she agonized over Jimmy and his family. “I feel so sorry for his parents.”
“Yes, we all do,” Dixie said. She sat next to Millie and gave her a sympathetic pat on her arm.
“And we all can be grateful that the board of trustees took the advice of the investigating committee and allowed the facility to remain open,” Radner said, beaming. “And that I and Harry still have a job at Cal Pacific.”
“I’ll second that,” Dixie said, which produced much laughter from the group.
“As tragic as the loss of life of both people and the Yeti is,” Siscom said between mouthfuls, “the world has lost something equally valuable. And that is future scientific knowledge those animals might have provided. Who knows what contributions their lives at the facility could have provided?”
“Well said, Gerald,” Harry said. “Collecting and preservation of physical specimens is an integral, irreplaceable element of biological sciences. There is hardly a branch of biology that does not rely on the examination of organisms’ bodies, be it for the purpose of their identification, understanding of the functions of their respiratory system, or the speed of transmission of neural signals. Museum collections, where specimens are preserved for future scientists, are also a special, important case. There, specimens are often deposited not for a particular, clearly defined research project, such as when a geneticist examines thousands of fruit flies to measure the expression of a particular gene. Rather, collections serve as both a documentation of the current state of species composition in a particular time period or an area, or as a library of morphological and genetic diversity across a wide range of species.
“We cannot anticipate what questions will be asked, and answered, using specimens deposited in such collections. For example, the ban on the use of DDT, a horrible environmental pollutant, was based on the discovery made in ornithological collections that bird egg shells had been getting progressively thinner, thus leading to high mortality of birds, ever since the chemical began to be used. The spread of chytrid fungus that was killing amphibian species across the globe was understood only by examining specimens dating back a hundred years.”
“Very interesting, Harry,” Radner said.
“My point is that having the Yeti in our possession was of great scientific value, even if immediate gains were not realized.”
“We had discovered the entire Yeti genome,” Millie said.
“A great advance to be sure,” Harry said. “But having them where we could continue to study them was the greatest advance, and to lose potential knowledge is sad, very sad.”
“But aren’t specimens lost all the time?” asked Siscom. “Sold to collectors or on the black market?”
“It is an odd situation. Even that a tiny scrap of bone or tooth fragment might be of immense value to someone if it provides evidence of a new pattern of evolution or provides data for geochemical analysis, yet it is something that even most paleontologists might throw away as worthless. These things really are priceless, and worthless, and it’s sometimes odd to think of them in that sense, but it is true, and profoundly so in some cases.
“This contrasts strongly with how people view fossils and scientific specimens. While it’s true that something like a Yeti skeleton is clearly worth a ton of cash, that’s not true of most. But people hear about the expensive ones and even a good dinosaur tooth can set you back tens or even hundreds of dollars from a collector, so the image builds up that they are all valuable.
“If they aren’t, why do people spend thousands and thousands to travel the world and scour the Earth for them, ship them home, prepare them, and store them? This can and does lead to the false assumption that all fossils are valuable and, as a result, people expect money you don’t have and can’t pay and don’t want to pay for something or even access to something that is not actually valuable in the first place.”
“What my husband is trying to say is that these specimens are both priceless and worthless. In and of themselves, they are not worth much at all but, to us scientists, they are priceless for the information they contain.”
Dixie smiled and nodded at Harry.
“Well said, my dear,” he replied.
“But even at a more basic level,” Millie said, “the loss of such specimens creates a major stumbling block for paleontology. If a previously studied and published fossil has been stolen and sold off, then the specimen is off limits to researchers who want to take a fresh look or check up on old data. The fossil has effectively disappeared from the literature as it’s no longer open to study. To me, it’s a matter of reproducibility. If a specimen like the Yeti skeleton can’t be permanently stored and cared for in a museum, then no one can re-examine or check on what has been gleaned from it.”
“Fossils are part of a natural history heritage that belongs to everyone,” Radner said. Destroying them in any way not only steals them away from science, but prevents researchers from translating discoveries made from them into the inspiring visions of our past and what our future may hold. It is a loss to humanity.”
“The good news,” Millie said, “is that we have the Yeti’s genome and blood stored in a freezer. At our leisure we can study, compare, and hopefully understand their relationship to we humans.”
“In the case of our Yeti, there is more good news,” Harry said. “We know that they are living, breathing hominids, existing right alongside of us. So it would be possible to go back to Mongolia and return with another pair. We have the facility. We have the expertise. We have the personnel. It would be possible.”
A buzz went around the table.
“How about it, Millie?” Harry continued. “After you earn your doctorate, would you be willing to become Dr. Radner’s assistant at the primate facility? Help us if we manage to bring back another pair of Yeti?”
Millie’s eyes turned wide and bright. A broad grin crossed her face. “Gee, Dr. Olson.” She giggled. “Nothing would please me more.”
Dixie sank deep into her chair. Oh brother. Here we go again.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Richard Edde was born and raised in Oklahoma. After graduating from Central State College, he attended the University of Oklahoma College of Medicine, where he earned his medical degree in 1971. After spending a few years in family practice in two rural Oklahoma towns, he complete
d a residency in anesthesiology. Following a long career in academia and private practice, he retired to devote time to writing. His first novel, The Photograph, was released in 2014. Dr. Edde resides in eastern Oklahoma with his wife.
GENRE: PARANORMAL THRILLER/ROMANTIC ELEMENTS
This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, businesses, organizations, events or locales is entirely coincidental. All trademarks, service marks, registered trademarks, and registered service marks are the property of their respective owners and are used herein for identification purposes only. The publisher does not have any control over or assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their contents.
YETI UNLEASHED
Copyright © 2017 by Richard Edde
Cover Design by Jackson Cover Designs
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All Rights Reserved
EBOOK ISBN: 978-1-626946-14-9
FIRST PUBLICATION: FEBRUARY 25, 2017
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