"Get to your point, counsel, or I shall dismiss this witness and toss you in jail along with your client."

I winked at Max, enjoying a small token of revenge.

"Dr. Wallace… the accused claims to have witnessed John Cialino dragged below by a large water creature, a creature often referred to as the Loch Ness monster. As a doctoral candidate at Scripps, didn't you once author a scientific paper on this same species?"

"No."

"No?" Max strode back to his table, returning with a Xeroxed copy of a report. "I have it right here, Loch Ness: A New Theory. Written by Zachary Wallace, Scripps, 1999. You are Zachary Wallace, yeah?"

"Listen, Mr. Rael, I don't know how you managed to obtain a copy of this document, but it's essentially an unpublished dissertation."

"Why unpublished?"

"My dissertation committee rejected it."

"Rejected? On what grounds?"

"On the grounds that legitimate scientific bodies aren't interested in chasing legends, and they don't like their doctoral candidates chasing after them, either."

"Still, the report certainly makes a good case for Nessie's existence."

"The paper merely highlights Loch Ness's uniquely isolated ecosystem and—"

"Oh, I think it does a wee bit more than that. If I may," Max thumbed through the dissertation to a previously marked page, "And I quote, The true mystery of Loch Ness lies in its relationship with the North Sea and the Great Glen. The Great Glen was forged 380 million years ago when a sixty-mile fault line fractured, creating a huge trench that split the Highlands geology from southwest to northeast. From this gorge, present-day Loch Ness was created, when a massive glacier advanced through the Great Glen some twenty-thousand years ago. As the ice melted and sea levels rose, Loch Ness may have actually existed as an arm of the North Sea. This theory is backed by recent discoveries of sea urchin spines, clamshells, and other marine material made in deposits recovered from the bottom of the Loch. However, once the glacier fully retreated ten thousand years ago, the land rose in an isostatic rebound and the waterways separated, perhaps trapping a few large sea creatures in the process.' End quote."

"Yes, Mr. Rael, this is the mantra recited by most Nessie theorists, that the retreat of the glaciers from the last ice age trapped ancient sea creatures in Loch Ness. But if you had bothered to read on, I go to great lengths to shoot this theory down. Ten thousand years is far too long for a small colony of large predators to remain isolated in a Loch, and inbreeding alone would have terminated their existence some time ago."