Fallen Star (Project Gauntlet Book 1)

by Richard Turner

  Grant and Maclean walked into the room and took a seat at a long, wooden table. Pictures of Peterson Air Base from its founding in the 1940s until the present covered the walls.

  Grant stretched his arms, interlocked his hands together, and cracked his knuckles. “You know, the more time I spend around those two, the less I know about what is going on.”

  “I hear you,” said Maclean. “In Iraq, Hayes said there was no such thing as UFOs and now, here we are in an office of a building masquerading as the base’s archives. But whose real role is to investigate UFO sightings.”

  Grant raised a hand. “That’s not quite correct. Hayes said there is no proof that they have ever visited Earth.”

  “That is what I said, Captain,” said Hayes, as he walked in with a sleeve of cups and a pot of freshly brewed coffee in his hands.

  Maclean poured himself and Grant a cup of black coffee.

  “Doc, if you don’t believe we have been, or are being, visited by extraterrestrial beings, why are you working here?” asked Grant.

  “Because there is an arms race going on out there that isn’t just confined to nation states,” replied Hayes. “Multinational corporations all around the world are busy gathering intelligence on their business rivals. It won’t be long before they start to use advanced technology, currently restricted to the military, to spy on the competition. Don’t even get me started on the threat posed by today’s terrorist organizations. Can you imagine a mini nuke flown into downtown Tel Aviv inside a stealth drone? The whole Middle East, if not the world, would go up in flames.”

  “Ah, Jeremy, the eternal pessimist,” said a Hispanic woman, as she entered the room.

  Grant and Maclean stood up to greet her. She was in her forties, with a slender face, and shiny black hair which was cut short above her ears. Her gray pantsuit fit her lithe body perfectly.

  “Gents, I’d like you to meet Doctor Elena Leon,” said Andrews.

  “She’s not a real doctor,” moaned Hayes.

  “Please, not this again,” said Andrews. “You should know by now that I value both of your opinions.”

  Elena held out her hand in greeting. Grant smiled and shook it. “Good afternoon, ma’am, my name is Captain David Grant, and this fellow is Sergeant James Maclean.”

  “My pleasure,” said Elena.

  Andrews closed the door and waited for everyone to take a seat. “For the newest members of the team, this briefing, naturally, is top secret-special access, and anything that is discussed here today can never be repeated to anyone outside of this organization.”

  “Colonel, I’m not sure what my security clearance is these days, but I’m guessing it’s not anywhere near your military’s version of TSSA,” said Maclean.

  “You needn’t worry,” said Andrews. “The forms you signed in Iraq are all I need. Besides, you wouldn’t be in the Australian SAS if you were untrustworthy. Now, to put what you’re about to hear into perspective, I guess you should learn more about Project Gauntlet. When Project Blue Book officially closed in 1970, the armed forces decided to keep the investigation into unidentified flying objects going, albeit at a much more reduced level. For close to thirty years, Gauntlet was run by a long-in-the-tooth Air Force captain and his assistant, a technical sergeant. A lot of what they did, however, was focused on the business of misinformation.”

  “Why would they do that?” Maclean asked.

  “If one of our top secret experimental aircraft was sighted or photographed by a member of the public, they would visit them in the guise of fellow UFO enthusiasts and encourage them to report it as a craft from outer space. Both the B-2 bomber and the F-117 fighter were erroneously reported as UFOs for years before the truth came out.”

  “What happened to make the government enlarge the project?” asked Grant.

  “In January of 2000, President Clinton was briefed by his national security team about the proliferation of UAV technology, and the impact it was going to have on future wars. It was decided to enlarge Project Gauntlet, and its main focus now became on the recovery of downed unidentified craft anywhere in the world. As luck would have it, a week later, people in eastern Finland reported seeing a UFO flying over their homes. In fact, it was a wayward Russian drone which eventually ran out of fuel and crashed in the forests outside of the city of Kouvola. Gauntlet sent people there disguised as UFO enthusiasts, and found the drone partially submerged in a lake. An Air Force recovery team was on standby in Norway, and flew straight to the crash site. We had the drone whisked out of the country before the Finns or the Russians ever knew what had happened.”

  “The recovery of this drone helped NATO understand just how far the Russians had progressed with their UAV technology since the collapse of the Soviet Union,” explained Hayes.

  “Okay, that makes sense to me, but why even bother to keep looking into alleged UFO sightings if they don’t exist?” said Grant.

  “Perhaps I should answer this question,” suggested Elena.

  “Be my guest,” said, Andrews, taking a seat.

  Elena looked over at Grant and Maclean. “Gentlemen, my job here is to advise Colonel Andrews on all matters relating to Ufology.”

  “See, I told you she wasn’t a real doctor,” blurted out Hayes.

  “Hey, there’s no need to be rude,” said Maclean. “Let the lady speak.”

  “So what exactly is Ufology?” asked Grant.

  “It is the study of all things related to UFOs,” replied Elena. “It has been called a pseudoscience by people such as my esteemed colleague, Doctor Hayes, but it has been around for decades, and is in no danger of going away any time soon as a field of study.”

  “Do you believe that the Earth has been visited by people from another planet?”

  “With all my heart.”

  “But you can’t prove it,” interrupted Hayes.

  “No. Not yet, but I will,” Elena replied.

  “Doctor, what makes you so certain that extraterrestrials have come to Earth?” asked Grant.

  “Because there have been sightings going back to the beginning of recorded time.”

  Hayes sat forward in his chair. “Yes, and let’s take a look at these sightings. In ancient Rome, they wrote about something resembling a clay pot descending from the clouds. In Japan, it was something made of wood resembling a ship. Here in the United States in the late 1890s, we had a rash of sightings of mystery ships that were reported to look like balloons.”

  Elena sat back and crossed her arms across her chest. “And what’s your point?”

  “The point being is that when confronted with something people can’t readily identify, they see what they want to see, using the technology of the day to makes sense of it all.”

  “What about all of those sightings made during and after the Second World War?” asked Maclean.

  “Have you ever heard of Operation Paperclip?” said Hayes.

  “No.”

  “At the close of the war, the allied and Soviet forces rushed to get their hands on Nazi technology and the scientists behind it. Paperclip was the name the U.S. forces gave to their efforts. Let’s face it. Without Wernher von Braun and his rocketry experts, it’s doubtful the American space program would have been as successful as it was.”

  “Are you saying that the UFOs reported in the late 1940s are attributable to these Nazi scientists?” asked Grant.

  “Most definitely, I am. The Nazis successfully tested flying discs in 1944 and 1945. First in Prague, in the former Czechoslovakia and later at Peenemunde on the German coast. When your forces captured SS General Kammler, he provided them with the plans and the skills to recreate these discs back home in the States. He wasn’t the only Nazi with intimate knowledge of their flying disc program to be captured. Test pilots, engineers and design specialists were rounded up and sent to secret test facilities spread out all across the country.”

  “Were these early flying saucers any good?” asked Grant.

  “Not really,” replied
Hayes. “The technology was still in its infancy, and there were numerous crashes in the early days.”

  Maclean snapped his fingers. “Roswell! Say, didn’t a real UFO crash there, and your government covered it up?”

  Hayes shook his head. “Sorry, no. The initial reports of a crashed disc were correct but it wasn’t from outer space, it was one of the army air corps’ top secret, experimental flying discs that had crashed in the New Mexico desert. The men who flew the craft were a pair of former German Luftwaffe pilots. Unfortunately, they died a couple of months later, when their disc crashed into the side of a mountain.”

  “What happened to these discs?” said Grant.

  “The program was scrapped in the mid-1950s. It wasn’t worth the money or the cost in test pilots’ lives.”

  “Did the Soviets have a program like the Americans?” asked Maclean.

  Hayes nodded. “Naturally. That is where some of the UFO sightings in Alaska and the American Northwest in the late 1940s and 1950s come from. They probed our airspace, and we did the same to theirs. The discs on both sides were soon superseded by more reliable spy planes, and then by satellites.”

  Maclean shook his head. “Man, this puts everything I’ve ever read or seen on the television about UFOs in a different light.”

  “What Doctor Hayes is forgetting, is that those are but a fraction of the sightings that have occurred over the past century,” countered Elena.

  “Agreed, but let’s look at how the sightings are reported,” said Hayes. “Radar and eye witnesses are the two means by which UFOs get reported. If it’s spotted on radar, it has to be man-made. You can’t disagree that the number of reported radar sightings dropped dramatically when stealth technology began to be used by the Air Force.”

  “Yes, you are correct.”

  “Now, eye witnesses. Studies have shown that the people most likely to report a UFO sighting are those whose incomes are at the lower level of society. And by people who have status-related anxiety disorders, or by people who crave attention and hope to get it by reporting a UFO.”

  “Even you have to agree that some of the best and most credible sightings have come from pilots, military officers, and government officials,” countered Elena.

  “Those people represent a tiny fraction of the reports cataloged each year in the country, and even they can make a mistake.”

  “Okay, Professor Hayes, what about all those reports of abductions by UFOs?” said Maclean.

  “Sergeant, these so-called abductions are just as easily explained away,” replied Hayes. “The typical abductee claims to have been captured and taken on board an alien spaceship for testing of some sort, and then returned to where they are taken from. The problem is that many of these people only remember what happened to them when placed under hypnosis, and this has proven to be a less-than-credible means of obtaining the truth. Some psychologists associated with the abductee phenomenon have been accused of planting memories in their patients’ subconscious.”

  “What about the reports of tracking devices implanted in the abductees?”

  “Good grief, Jim, you have seen way too much crap on television,” said Grant, shaking his head.

  Maclean shrugged. “What can I say? I read and watch a lot of science fiction.”

  “To date, there hasn’t been a single implant found that wasn’t man-made,” said Hayes. “I’m sorry, but there’s no way anyone can convince me that UFOs aren’t just misidentified natural phenomena, or the accidental sighting of an experimental drone or airplane.”

  Elena let out an exasperated sigh and fixed her eyes on Grant. “Captain, you seem to have already made up your mind on the veracity, or lack thereof of extraterrestrial visitation. I have one question for you. I read your report. Why would a UAV need a cockpit? By design, it is an unmanned aerial vehicle.”

  Maclean tapped his colleague on the arm. “Hey, she’s got you there.”

  Grant ran a hand over his chin while he hemmed and hawed for a few seconds. “I might have misidentified something on the drone and thought I was looking at a cockpit.”

  “Yeah, but even the mock-up had a cockpit on it,” said Maclean. “We both saw it. So why make one on the drone if it wasn’t needed?”

  Grant shrugged. “I’ll have to think about that one for a while.”

  “Now you can see why I have these two experts to help guide my thoughts,” said Andrews. “While I tend to lean toward Professor Hayes’ conclusions, there is always that one or two percent of reports that even he cannot explain away. Besides, if a real UFO were to crash and we could get to it first, just imagine the technological advances that could be made.”

  Elena stood. “Sir, if I’m not needed anymore, I’d like to read the reports sitting on my desk before it gets too late in the day.”

  All of the men stood. Andrews walked to the door and opened it. “Elena, please swing by my office before you leave today. I’d like your views on why there seems to be an upswing of reported UFO sightings near missile silos here in the States, Russia, and the UK.”

  “My pleasure, Colonel.”

  A soon as Elena was gone, Maclean spun around and gave Hayes an evil look. “Hey, Doc, you may be a bright man, but there was no need to be so rude to Ms. Leon.”

  Andrews stepped between the men. “Sergeant, you’re new here. This is how they always speak to one another. Come tomorrow, she’ll be on the attack and Hayes will be the one on the defensive.”

  “Yeah, but I’m always right,” said Hayes.

  Andrews chuckled. “All I can say is, God help you if you ever get it wrong.” He turned his attention to Grant and Maclean. “I bet you two gentlemen will want to get settled in the base’s transient quarters before getting down to work.”

  “And what might that be, sir?” asked Maclean.

  “I want you two to find and retrieve the craft that was taken in the Iraqi desert. A dozen good men, along with all of your colleagues, died because of it. Like you, I want those responsible to pay for what they did.”

  “We’d be happy to,” said Grant. “Which one of your people is responsible for that part of the world?”

  “Captain Jones is. She’s quite good, and is as angry as you are about what happened.”

  “I doubt that,” said Maclean.

  “I wouldn’t. Her cousin was First Sergeant Long who died when your camp was overrun.”

  A pang of guilt hit Grant in the chest. He had met Long a couple of times, but hadn’t had much of a chance to get to know the Sergeant.

  “Well, that proves I can still say the most inappropriate thing at the worst possible time,” said Maclean.

  “It’s okay,” said Andrews. “You didn’t know.”

  “I sure as hell do now.”

  “I’ll have Technical Sergeant Takei guide you through the process of clearing in on the base. Just remember, you’re both here as civilian workers for the base’s archival staff. Sergeant Takei is waiting to present you with your new ID cards.”

  “Administration duties!” croaked Maclean. “Somebody please put me out of my misery.”

  Chapter 9

  The Caribbean Sea

  A dark thunderstorm was brewing inside Peter Roth’s head. He sat at his desk in his dimly lit room, massaging his temples. The word he had just received from Professor Cordovan in Romania was soul crushing. The disc they had recovered in Iraq was useless. Aside from being packed with sand and rocks, there was nothing inside of it. Sometime long ago, the occupants must have realized the ship was damaged beyond repair, and set off a device which had melted the interior of the vessel.

  Roth reached into a desk drawer and pulled out a bottle of pills, popped a couple in his mouth, and chased them down with some whiskey. Billions of dollars had been spent getting them this far, and now he had nothing to show for it.

  His laptop chimed. Roth glanced at his gold Rolex and saw it was time. He took a moment to compose himself before using a remote to turn up the lights in the room. Roth lift
ed up the screen, pressed the enter button and waited for the four other members of the Aurora Group to appear. Like Roth, each member of the group was a wealthy entrepreneur. The familiar faces of three men and one woman appeared on his screen.

  “So, what can you tell us, Peter?” asked a Russian man with straw-blond hair.

  Roth took in a long breath. “The word is not good, Maksim. It would appear that the craft we recovered was damaged so badly that nothing can be salvaged from it.”

  “Nothing?” said the woman. Her voice was tinged with a New York accent.

  “I’m afraid not.”

  “This is most disconcerting,” said Maksim.

  “I’m sorry, but the ship had been buried in the sand for close to six thousand years. It’s amazing that the hull of the ship was still in good shape.”

  “We had pinned all of our hopes on this find,” said a man with a well-trimmed, white beard and a strong Arabic accent.

  “Has anything of value been discovered by your satellite overflights of South America?” asked a Brazilian man with thick glasses on his round face.

  “Nothing so far, but I am hopeful,” responded Roth.

  “Where are your brother, and his men?” asked the woman.

  “They’re safe, Diane,” said Roth.

  “That is good. I see the world’s press doesn’t seem too interested in the story coming out of Georgia.”

  “By tomorrow, no one will remember anything about an explosion in a hangar in Batumi. People today have incredibly short attention spans. They’d rather read what happened to their favorite celebrities while they were on vacation than real news.”

  “Very well, Peter. Today has not turned out as I had hoped,” said Maksim. “Yet, tomorrow is another day. You and your brother are to be commended for your work to date, and your loyalty to the Aurora Group is beyond reproach.”

  “The ridiculously easy destruction of both the American and the Russian Special Forces teams has sent a message to their respective governments that they are facing people who possess technology far in advance of their own and are not afraid to use it,” said the Brazilian man.