Whenever Santo went on assignment, either to a war zone or simply looking for a missing alien computer chip on a deserted island, he always exercised one philosophy, ‘it’s better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it’. It was for that reason at the hangar young Henrik Anderson thought what Santo was throwing into the back of the D-wing was for a major attack on an unsuspecting country. His question to Santo was a natural one.
“Is there a war Captain? Should I get the remaining D-wings ready for an attack?”
Santo grinned and said,
“Not to worry Henrik. It’s just me going on a little harmless mission. I’ll be back in a couple of hours.”
Just then, Antoni Amato, an alien historian and House of the Nazarene archeologist walked into the hangar carrying a small cardboard box. Antoni was a stocky man who often matched Kirk’s propensity to smile and at times be annoyingly cheerful. This time he was not smiling. The closer he got to Santo, the more his dire expression became evident. Santo knew something was wrong. Because he was chomping at the bit to get going, before Antoni could even defend his reason for being there, Santo blurted out,
“This better be good news.”
By the way Antoni froze and looked at the box in his hands, Santo knew it was not.
In a timid manner, Antoni extended the box to him and said,
“Maria said that your destination was somewhere in the South Atlantic. She needs to get this equipment to an archeological dig in the middle of the Sahara desert.”
In an effort to stem what Antoni assumed was going to be Santo’s wrath, he quickly added,
“She said that it was on your way and would only be a few minutes delay and you would not mind the slight detour.”
Waldorf, in his new positon of organizing Nazarene laboratories throughout the world was also searching for brilliant scientists capable of daring to accept the possibility of alien influences on this planet. Antoni Amato was a scientist Waldorf wanted to recruit. After setting up a meeting with him, Waldorf dangled a lucrative carrot, saying to him,
“Look what scientific convention has done to you. Come and join us. We have research facilities in both England and South Africa aimed at your genius. Come and fulfill your insatiable appetite for the truth of your research. Think of it, unlimited funding and working with fellow scientists of your thoughts. We will make arrangements for your family, housing, and schools.”
It was too much of a temptation for Antoni Amato and soon he became one of Maria’s favorite alien archeologists.
Exasperated, Santo sucked in a deep breath. As if performing an important safety inspection of the rafters high above, he cast his eyes to them. He was aware that they had archeology projects all over the world and were short on D-wings transporting discoveries and equipment back and forth to various laboratories throughout the world. The search for extraterrestrial artifacts had become so successful that the House of the Nazarene was forced to build a massive structure on the grounds just to hold all the various discoveries. Maria had brought in Nazarene experts from all around the world to study the recovered alien technologies.
An hour ago, while dressing for this assignment, he tried his best not to hear Maria’s words,
“You know I don’t like you going on a solo mission. It’s one of the highest rules you set for your men and you should be setting a better example to them.”
He also tried his best to cast aside a suspicion that Antoni Amato’s sudden appearance was a tactic by Maria to keep him busy and away from this solo mission or worse, to be his backup.
Dogged determination for this mission surfaced. Although not pleased, he accepted the delay. To make room for the box, what was on the passenger seat was shoved in the back compartment. Thinking that was all, he turned back to Antoni but did not like that he was still hiding behind a mask of concern. Santo barked,
“Now what?”
Although Antoni was a stocky man, a squeaky voice escaped.
“I have to go too.”
Still thinking conspiracy, he demanded,
“Go where?”
“To the desert project. Maria said that you would not mind.”
Although Santo’s eagerness for the mission to the island was delayed, and somewhat diminished, he admitted that it was only a slight delay.
Santo also understood that he was taking a needed D-wing out of the diminished fleet for a personal project. His trip to Alakati with Kirk, his first mission since relocating to Bulgaria had aroused a buried desire within him. He wanted to get away from the desk. He wanted to strap on his AK BASIC handgun and reactivate adrenalin. He came to realize that he did not want Waldorf’s position as Head of Nazarene Security as a full time job. He ‘needed’ to go on this solo mission. His foul mood disappeared slightly when hearing that Antoni only wanted to follow the box to the desert, not to the island. Not in an inviting manner, but as polite as his slightly diminished rage would allow, he rudely pointed to the D-wing and snapped, “Get in.”
Once in the craft, Santo carefully inched it out of the hanger. He then shot up to the stratosphere so fast that to an untrained eye, it seemed to disappear right in front of them. Inside the craft, Antoni meekly handed him a small flash drive, saying,
“Here are the coordinates Sir.”
Santo pointed to a spot near the dash and Antoni placed it there. Instantly the onboard computer downloaded the information from it. Now, instead of an island, they were on the way to a location in the middle of the Sahara desert.
A few minutes into the flight, Santo reached back and pulled out a leather pouch. In it was his trusted AK BASIC handgun. Back in the house, while getting dressed, he deliberately kept it out of Maria’s sight. Over the years, she had seen him kill too many people with it and by her passive nature, hated that gun. Santo loved his AK Special. Antoni watched him snap it into his shoulder holster and gently pat it. Santo felt tinges of elation and adrenalin flowing through what he thought was a tired body no longer fit for a field operation. It felt good. Antoni saw the content expression. It was an expression of pleasure he had often expressed but it was when holding tight to his wife, not a gun.
Now, because of an added mission of dropping Antoni off in some remote desert area and taking into account the time duration of the flight, it was not necessary to enter the stratosphere and take advantage of planet rotation speed. The fact that Santo was finally underway somewhat diminished his annoyed disposition. Looking over to the still slightly uneasy Antoni, he asked,
“What’s in the box?”
A slightly relieved Antoni surfaced and said,
“It’s a replacement part for the magnetic resonance imaging drone we are using to map out an alien city long since buried in the sand.”
Santo simply smirked and let it pass. It was something that did not interest him anyway. However, clearly it was not Antoni’s sentiment. Relieved that the Captain was not going to push him out a mile above the clouds and continue on his merry way to some island, Antoni happily explained,
“As you know, with our new House of the Nazarene mandate to search and prove an alien history on the earth, we have located many such potential locations. This one in the desert is by far the most exciting. Our imaging satellite located five massive pyramids and very tall obelisks in a long buried city with streets and buildings.”
Santo was aware that wind and sand has a unique ability to throw a blanket over secrets in the desert. However, he was not sure about a whole city buried by sand. The Sphinx and maybe a couple of pyramids, yes, but nothing on such a large scale. Antoni saw his smirk of disbelief and added,
“Deserts are one of the oldest landscapes on Earth. The sand can preserve artifacts, and yes, even whole cities like a time capsule. Our Sat-imagery has even located old river systems right in the middle of the desert as well. It wasn’t always a desert you know.”
He then added,
“Our next project will be in Australia. We have located about the same configuratio
ns under sand in the Great Victoria Desert.”
Thankfully for Santo, the D-wing computer slowed them down and hovered over what he saw as vast stretches of sand dunes. He asked,
“Are you sure this is the place? It doesn’t look like there is a massive archaeology dig down there.”
“Yes. The dig is under the sand. What you are seeing is a special coated massive tarp covering the project. It keeps other satellites from spying on us. There is actually an enormous project underneath the roof.”
Just as the D-wing lowered, an audible beep from an instrument panel sounded and Santo understood that the security crew under the tarp was asking for ID approach codes. After entering the code, Santo gently set the D-wing down in an area indistinguishable from the rest of the vast desert. As the craft touched down, not a grain of sand was disturbed.
While reaching back for the box, Antoni thanked Santo for the ride. Santo opened the canopy and suddenly one of the many great assets about the D-wing became apparent. With an outside temperature of at least 40 C, the hot air hit Santo in the face like opening the door to a furnace. As Antoni climbed out of the craft, apparently feeling no ill effect of the sweltering heat, he turned to Santo and said,
“You are welcome to come and have a look if you wish.”
For a second it sounded tempting but archaeology and lost alien cities has never been high on his list of interests. Santo watched him walk up to what appeared to be an ordinary sand dune and suddenly an invisible door opened. After walking in, it closed behind him. With the distracting mission complete, Santo raised the D-wing and disappeared high into the sky. Although there was no advantage to it, Santo just felt like zooming high and entering the stratosphere anyway.
While flying over the rest of Africa, destination the center of the South Atlantic Ocean, there was also no need to double check D-wing operating systems but he did anyway. It had always boggled his mind how simplistically the D-wings controlled and utilized gravity. Years ago, Waldorf explained that it was like squeezing a cherry pit between your fingers until the pressure forced it to shoot forward. It was now just a matter of keeping the pressure there all the time. Squeezing harder on top made the D-wing head downward and harder on the bottom raised it. Conversely, doing the same on the sides turned it this way or that. Thank goodness for what the Great Grays now referred to as antiquated technology. Inertia inside the craft was countered by a personalized gravity field inside, in effect countering inertia. Santo never understood gravity wave deviation frequencies. All he understood was that the computers were all functioning properly.
Now over the ocean and closing in on the GPS position, Santo started to get excited for the mission. The fact that it was almost a hopeless cause, one only initiated by a weak suspicion that Niko Waltz had stolen the missing computer part and it might still be on the deserted island did not deter his enthusiasm for an adventure at all. The GPS indicated that he was now only three kilometers from his target and he could see the small island in the distance. Excited, he was already starting to pre-check his equipment.
Then, with no indication that something was wrong, suddenly the D-wing came to an abrupt midair stop. It was so violent and unexpected that Santo shot forward from his seat and violently crashed into the canopy. Dazed and confused, he landed in the foot-well in a crumbled heap. As he struggled to regain his senses, reaching for the seat for support, he succumbed to a swirling head and passed out.
When he finally regained a semblance of alertness, he struggled back into the seat. It was not clear how long he was unconscious but it was still light outside so he reasoned it was not too long. An investigating hand to his head found no blood and it did not feel like he had a concussion. He looked through the canopy and saw that he was stationary in midair high above the island. A check of the GPS indicated that it was the right island.
All the gauges indicated a properly functioning craft, except it was stuck in mid-air. He tried to power up and turn but to no avail. Backing up was just as useless. As if a fly caught in a spider web, he hung suspended. Thinking that it was a computer glitz he called Jessika. His first command to her was abrupt.
“First of all, you are not to report to Maria that I hit a glitch. She will only worry.”
That was not the real truth of the command. True, she might worry but he did not need a blast of, ‘I told you so’ when he got back.
He explained what happened, that the craft just came to a violent sudden stop for no apparent reason. From her master computer she tethered into his computer and performed a program diagnostic. Eventually she had to admit that there was nothing wrong with his computers or the gravity wave deviation frequencies. She could offer only one solution, saying,
“I’ll transfer you over to our lab in Switzerland where they specialize in antigravity waves and applicable computer programs.”
Doctor Marls was the chief scientist for their Swiss laboratory. Except for very bushy eyebrows that needed combing he was the spitting image of Einstein, messy hair and all. Nobody understood more about gravity waves and field modulations on this planet than Doctor Marls did. The only determent to his brilliance was a heavy accent hard to understand. He was also an argumentative and cantankerous old man.
A moment after summoned, Dr. Marls was on the computer communicating with Santo. He demanded,
“I am a busy man. You will tell me what is wrong now and I tell you how to fix it.”
Santo explained exactly that had happened, including smashing headlong into the forward canopy when the D-wing abruptly stopped.
“No,” snarled Marls, “it is not possible that you shot forward and hit the canopy.”
Santo did not know how to reply to the strange comment. He was knocked out! He knew it was possible. Before he could respond with a ‘what the hell’ explicative, Marls continued,
“There are safeguards in the program preventing a shutdown glitch in both inner and outer gravity shields at the same time. You are wrong. That could not have happened.”
Ignoring the insolence, Santo bit his tongue.
The Doctor shot back with questions.
“You tell me how high above the island you are.”
“About a hundred meters. I can see it down there.”
He then added a possibility of his own,
“It feels like I slammed into some sort of a force field.”
“No,” snapped the Doctor, “that is ridiculous. There is no such thing as a force field.”
He then added,
“It could be a superior computer probably on the island jamming your onboard D-wing computer. It sounds as if it is freezing your gravity functions. I suspect that you are held captive by your locked up gravity computer.”
“Then what do I do Doctor?”
He made it sound very disrespectful.
“To the simplistic mind of a soldier, it is called a re-boot. From here, I shall shut down your power grid including all your computers.”
Santo knew what that meant and objected,
“But that will leave me a sitting duck.”
“Yes, but it will also leave you with no computer to jam up and freeze you in that position. There is obviously a powerful computer on that island somewhere that has hacked into yours. No computer to hack into equals no power to hold you captive like that.”
Again Santo knew what that meant and said,
“Without the computer to operate the impact avoidance program I will plummet to the earth.”
“Yes, but not to worry, as soon as you are only a few meters from the ground I will reactivate all your controls. If your computers still freeze up, at least you will be low enough to maybe jump to the ground.”
Just a little nervous, Santo asked,
“Are you sure that will work?”
“Yes, I’m pretty sure.”
Recognizing that his only two options were to die frozen in midair or maybe die crashing into the island, Santo opted for the ‘maybe’ option. He said,
“All
right Doctor, do it.”
The Doctor added,
“Just remember that when I switch off all you power, you will not be able to communicate with me. When I switch it back on, be sure to give me a report of your condition.”
Suddenly what Santo thought was going to be an easy search and recovery mission had turned into a nightmare.
For just an ounce of luck, Santo held his breath and silently prayed to a God that he was not sure actually existed. Suddenly the cockpit went black and because there was no internal gravity keeping him in his seat, when the D-wing started to plummet, he shot up and again banged his head on top of the canopy. With a dead D-wing and no transmission ability, while in freefall and bounced around, he nevertheless said aloud,
“Any time Doctor. Turn it back on any time now.”
Earth Before Man Page 10