by D F Capps
“Okay,” Hollis said. “Enough for tonight. Welcome to the U.S. Space Command.”
“Yeah,” she said softly. If she ever wanted a challenge in her life, this was it.
* * *
When Diane returned to her quarters, she unpacked her luggage and put her personal items in the dresser drawers. She held her brother’s varsity sweater against her chest, the one treasured item she always carried with her. Tears flowed as she sat on the bed, rocking forward and back, hugging his sweater as tightly as she could. She missed him so much.
The disappearance of her brother, the shock of seeing a real UFO, the breaking storm with the sudden wind, and joltingly close bolts of lightning all swirled in her mind. Her heart pounded as her emotions were swept up in reliving that terrifying event once again. The only difference now was the loss of hope that her brother was still alive, somewhere. The reality of his death was finally sinking in. She wondered once again if he had suffered or had been in pain. How long was it before they killed him? How did he die?
She shook herself out of the downward spiral of morbid thoughts and feelings that flooded through her. He was gone. She looked up at her reflection in the mirror above her dresser. Something in her expression had changed. A steely resolve stared back at her with an inner strength she hadn’t recognized, and a determination unknown to her before this moment. After all these years of wondering, now she knew. Fate had brought her into the one place where she could do something to avenge her brother’s death. She would not let this opportunity slip away. No. She would find a way to make them pay, and pay dearly, for the loss of her brother.
Chapter 6
“Technology consultant?”
Dr. Theodore Shugart waited while Captain Edwards studied the authorization letter and ID in the beam of his flashlight.
“The army has its own recovery team. Why aren’t they here?”
Theo nodded. He had anticipated the MP questioning why the regular team wasn’t here. It was an unexpected shift in procedure.
“They may be involved somewhere else,” Theo said. “President Andrews personally requested that my team and I take care of the recovery.”
Captain Edwards looked skeptical. Furrows in his brow showed his concern over the change taking place. Theo felt he was hiding his nervousness well. What he didn’t want was Edwards using his normal chain of command to validate Theo’s presence at the crash site.
“How do I know this is actually the president’s signature?” Captain Edwards asked.
Theo handed him his cell phone.
“You can call him. It’s on the top of the list.”
Edwards turned the beam of his flashlight on Shugart’s face.
Captain Edwards looked skeptical. “Is this phone secure?”
“Secure and encrypted,” Theo answered.
Captain Edwards initiated the call.
“No, this is Captain Edwards, military police. Who am I talking to?”
Edwards sounded nervous, the flashlight beam shifting in the dark.
Lightning flashed in the distant clouds, but no thunder. Too far away, Theo thought. The storm could have contributed to the saucer crash. He’d know more, once they got it back to Ceti Research.
“No, sir. I don’t need you to wake the president. I’m just verifying Dr. Shugart’s authorization to be here. Can you give me a description of Dr. Shugart?”
Edwards shined the flashlight beam on Theo’s face.
“Uh huh.”
Edwards returned the light to the ID and letter in his hand.
“Yes, sir, I understand. Thank you, sir.”
Edwards handed Theo’s phone back to him.
“Sorry for the inconvenience, Dr. Shugart, but we have to verify everyone’s authorization before they get access. Corporal Osborn will drive you to the crash site.”
Theo took his ID and authorization letter, relieved that he hadn’t been stopped, or worse yet, arrested. At least Andrews wouldn’t have to use the cover story they concocted to get Theo released from military custody. He picked up his duffel bag, and climbed into the HUMMVEE. So far, so good, he thought. This would be his first alien saucer recovery.
The crash site was surrounded by multiple floodlights with portable generators running next to them. A ring of a dozen soldiers patrolled the perimeter.
“Anyone been close to or inside the craft yet?” Theo asked.
The craft was definitely Zeta Grey in design: standard scout saucer, fifty-two feet in diameter, and sixteen feet in height. The outer skin was a dull stainless steel gray. The scout saucers were multipurpose craft used for exploration, abductions, and occasionally for combat.
“No, sir. We’re strictly perimeter control,” Corporal Osborn replied.
The door in the top slope of the scout saucer was sprung open a few inches. Probably from the impact, Theo thought. At least getting into the craft would be easy enough.
“I have a medical team en route. Please see that they’re not delayed.”
The left circular edge of the craft was buried in the ground with soil plowed up over the upper section.
“Yes, sir. I’ll have them brought right in.”
The bottom of the door wrapped over the outside edge by several inches, but it was still eight feet above the ground.
“I’ll also need two ladders—ten or twelve feet long.”
Osborn got on the radio and relayed the request.
“Could be a half-hour, sir, maybe a little longer.”
Theo nodded. “We’re going to be here all night, Corporal, you got a way to get any coffee out here?”
Osborn shook his head. “Maybe after daybreak, sir. Right now we got nothing.”
Which is good, Theo thought. By daybreak they should be back at Ceti Research and out from under the prying eyes of the army.
He pulled his nuclear, biological, and chemical protection suit out of the duffel bag and put it on. He picked up the radiation meter and slowly approached the craft. Radioactivity was elevated, but not dangerous. He nodded and thought, The Element 115 reactor was either shut down prior to impact, or it wasn’t damaged in the crash. Element 115 is a super heavy metal used to generate antigravity fields. He’d know more, once he got inside.
He walked slowly around the craft, checking for radiation, and inspecting the exterior surface for any sign of further damage. When he arrived at his starting point, his heart froze. The door was open a foot and slowly rising.
Corporal Osborn had his M-16 to his shoulder, aimed at the scout saucer door. Theo ran to Osborn, waved his arms in the air, and shouted, “Don’t shoot. Don’t shoot. We need it alive!”
Osborn continued to aim at the scout saucer. “If it poses any kind of a threat, my orders are to shoot it, sir.”
“It’s injured. It’s not a threat. Believe me, if it was in any kind of shape to be a threat, you’d already be dead.”
Osborn’s radio crackled.
“Medical team has arrived.”
Osborn glanced at Theo. “Copy that. I have activity at the site—I need support ASAP.”
The door continued to open slowly.
“Roger, support on its way.”
Theo turned to face the craft. “What about my medical team?”
Osborn stepped between Theo and the saucer. “Nobody gets close to that thing until it’s secure. That includes you, Dr. Shugart; now back away from the saucer, sir.”
Theo walked away, shaking his head. The door reached its fully open position without anything appearing in the opening. Three minutes later, a Black Hawk helicopter circled in and took up a position with its machine gun and searchlight aimed at the saucer door.
A rounded gray object slowly appeared in the doorway followed by two small hands with long slender fingers that gripped the bottom edge of the opening. It slowly dragged itself out of the saucer, hung over the threshold, and then fell to the ground below. It lay crumpled in the dirt, its spindly arms and legs twitching.
“Let me get to it
while it’s still alive,” Theo shouted over the thumping of the chopper blades. “You can see it’s not a threat. Get my medical team in here now!”
The chopper moved so its bright spotlight illuminated the inside of the scout saucer.
“No movement inside. No immediate threat. Backing off,” came over Osborn’s radio.
Osborn grabbed his mic. “Site is stable. Send in the medical team.”
Theo paced as he waited for his team to arrive. Finally, two more HUMMVEEs pulled up with his three-member team, and four more soldiers. The team put on protective suits and followed Theo to the injured alien, which Dr. Fortner proceeded to examine.
“Is it still alive, Doc?” Theo asked.
Dr. Fortner looked up at him. “As far as I can tell, it’s still hanging on. We have a chopper on the way. I’ll know more when we get it back to Ceti Research.”
Theo walked back to Osborn.
“It’s dying. We need to evacuate it while we can.”
Osborn checked with Captain Edwards then said, “Okay. Go ahead.”
* * *
A half hour later the alien was on a chopper and the ladders arrived. Theo, Dr. Fortner, and his two assistants, Dave Ellis and Sam Laski, climbed into the scout saucer. The doorway led directly into the passenger compartment with three seats in a triangle on a raised center section. One seat was set forward with the other two farther back on each side. The floor-to-ceiling height was only five feet, forcing them to crouch. A six inch diameter tube extended down from the ceiling in the center and flared out in a general tear shaped form mounted to a square section on the floor.
The Element 115 reactor, Theo thought. He checked for radiation leaks and visually examined the tube and flared section for any damage.
Dr. Fortner checked the bodies of the two Zeta Greys crunched against the front wall. “We’ll need to get these two back for an autopsy. Get some body bags.”
Dave Ellis climbed back down the ladder to retrieve the bags. Theo checked for any other radiation leaks, and slowly descended through a narrow hatch into the lower level of the scout saucer.
Three large coils were attached to the ceiling by a large swivel with control struts allowing the bottom of the coils to swing up to eighty degrees in any direction. Six cables spread out from a spherical central hub, with two cables connected to the top of each coil. The coils produced the antigravity waves that propelled the saucer.
The design was identical to the demonstration saucer provided by the Tau Cetians, with the exception of the control console, which this saucer didn’t have. Without the manual controls, Theo couldn’t power up the craft, or check any of the control systems.
He supervised Dave and Sam as they put the dead Zeta Greys into body bags, carried them out of the saucer, and set them on the ground. He called for a Chinook helicopter while Dave and Sam started rigging the nylon strap system that would be used to airlift the craft back to Ceti Research.
Chapter 7
Sean Wells swallowed the last of the Green Spot whiskey in his glass as the two remaining ice cubes gently nudged his upper lip. The fifty-dollar bottle of golden colored Single Pot Still Irish whiskey was a gift from his editor, Ed Schultz, honoring Sean’s investigation into insider trading between investment bankers in the derivatives market. After fourteen years as an investigative journalist for the New York Times, he had gained a reputation for no-nonsense articles that laid bare the shenanigans of some of the rich and powerful on Wall Street, as well as the political hacks he so vehemently despised.
He pushed the wire-rimmed glasses back up on his nose and read the data one more time. Ed may want his bottle back, he thought. For some time the New York Times had been referring to people who opposed the science on global warming as skeptics rather than deniers. That policy was now being changed. Sean’s new assignment was to expose the climate change deniers and their fake claims as to the latest global cooling trend.
“The climate isn’t cooling,” Ed told him, “it just isn’t heating as fast as it was. Get the facts and prove the deniers are wrong.”
No problem, Sean thought. Digging for the facts was what he did best. How hard could it be? Temperature was temperature, scientifically defined and recorded. He added an ice cube to his glass and poured a second jigger of Green Spot from the half-empty bottle. If it were only that easy, he reminded himself. He walked slowly to the glass sliding door leading to the small balcony of his fifth-story apartment on Avenue D in the East Village. Even at ten in the evening the street below was bustling with people and taxis.
The one unerring sense he possessed was his ability to detect BS, and that alarm was ringing loud and clear. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) had set very specific guidelines for the placement of temperature sensors to assure accurate and reliable readings. What amazed him the most was that the temperature sensors weren’t read and monitored electronically. The readings were made manually, by volunteers, and sent in to the National Centers for Environmental Information, or NCEI. None of the sensors were accessible over the Internet and data was released only once a month for the previous month’s readings.
Critics of global climate change had taken photos of many of the official temperature sensors and posted them on the Internet, complaining that the location of the sensors didn’t comply with NOAA standards. Those rules required temperature sensors to be a minimum of one hundred feet from any building, structure, or heat source, such as gravel, pavement, equipment, or exhaust vents. The photos showed temperature sensors located over gravel, on or next to asphalt pavement, mounted on buildings, roofs, and in the direct path of hot exhaust from air conditioning heat exchangers—any of which would push the temperature readings artificially higher.
In response to the photos, the NOAA issued the following statement: “The adjusted United States Historical Climatology Network Conterminous U.S. temperatures are well aligned with recent measurements from NOAA’s U.S. Climate Reference Network (designed with the highest climate monitoring standards for siting and instrument exposure), thus providing independent evidence that the USHCN provides an accurate measure of the U.S. temperature.”
The problem was, fully 89% of the fifteen hundred temperature sensors were non-compliant with the NOAA rules. What stuck in Sean’s craw was the second word in the statement: adjusted. A thermometer doesn’t lie, but people, in his experience, certainly did. What good were the highest climate monitoring standards for siting and instrument exposure if eight out of every nine sensors didn’t comply with the standard?
The most disturbing data he read was from the southeast United States. Independent unadjusted temperature records from compliant sensors demonstrated the five-year running average had actually decreased by 0.020 degrees over the last decade. The adjusted NOAA running average for the same period showed a 0.200 degree increase.
Why am I not surprised? Sean thought. Where there are political hacks, there’s money flowing. So I follow the money and see who benefits.
* * *
At 7:00 a.m. sharp, Sean knocked on the glass door to Ed Schultz’s office at the New York Times. Ed glanced up and waved him in.
“Yeah, I don’t care,” Ed said into the phone. “If you have documentation that proves our story is wrong, send it to me and we’ll print a retraction along with your side of the story. Front page, I promise.” Ed looked at Sean and smiled. “Yep, I can’t wait to hear from your legal team. Thanks for calling.” Ed put down the phone.
“Another satisfied customer?” Sean asked.
Ed grinned. “For some reason they all think the threat of a lawsuit will make us stay away from reporting their crooked dealings. This guy even thought I would care about hurting his bottom line.”
Sean shook his head. “I can’t imagine.”
Ed leaned forward, expectation written all over his face. “So, what have you found so far?”
“Pretty much what I expected—the green supporters and the environmentalists are paying scientists to
stack the data in their favor, and the oil cartel is shelling out millions to the global warming deniers on the other side. Some of the data on each side is valid, but a lot of it is bogus. To be honest with you, I don’t think there’s enough reliable information to determine exactly what the climate is doing, if anything.”
“So it’s about money?” Ed asked with a hint of disappointment in his voice.
Sean shrugged. “A good portion of it is. On the one hand, none of the dire scenarios and predictions of global warming have come to pass. On the other, we have more severe weather being blamed on a now mostly unseen warming trend, especially if you completely ignore severe weather from the past.”
Ed leaned back and shook his head. “And if you include the past?”
Sean sat in the nearer of two seats in front of Ed’s desk. “Depends on how far back you go. Looking at the last fifty years of weather, storms are getting more severe. If we go back six hundred years, we’ve had worse, and plenty of it. Big storms are cyclical.”
“The president says global warming is real,” Ed stated dryly.
“He does,” Sean replied, nodding. “I need a press pass to the White House and travel expenses to and from Washington to dig out who is getting the money. Maybe then I can figure out why Andrews is pushing the agenda so hard.”
Ed looked out the window, his usual frown reforming. “Okay. How long?”
Sean shrugged. “A week, maybe ten days.”
Ed looked over at him. “Updates to me every night?”
Sean smiled. “As usual.” Time to go hunting for more crooks.
Chapter 8
“How’s the Zeta Grey we recovered?” Theo asked as he arrived at Ceti Research. The facility was initially carved out of an extensive system of caves deep in the mountains of the Painted Desert region in Arizona and quickly expanded to four hundred acres underground.
“Still hanging in there, but definitely not conscious. It’s in containment chamber eight,” nurse Eta Donatello said.