by Terry James
“That’s not the half of it, Lori. The President, himself, met with me personally. Told me I am to do something, perform special service for the country.”
“The President? President Johnson?”
“I know, I know. Unreal, right?”
She said nothing, looking again at the orders.
“After the President told me that, the deputy director of Covert Operations for the Department of Defense--name’s Robert Cooper--he came up to me, and said I am to work on a special project assigned to me by President Johnson, himself. He then mentioned you, by name, Lori. Said to make sure I let you know.”
“Me? What do I have to do with it?”
“That’s what worries me,” he interrupted her. “Why do they want you involved?”
Both sat in silence, considering the meaning of it all.
Mark said, then, “I’m leaving this afternoon.”
Ervin Beery was a concern to many of those involved with flying, both those at Randolph, and those who called him their friend.
He had problems, the rumor went, and they involved personal matters. His drinking, as a result, had become much worse over the past months, the rumor mill claimed.
The thoughts ran through James’ mind, while the two men pre-flighted the T-38. Laura had more than once mentioned the talk among flight officers’ wives that Col. Beery’s wings might soon be clipped. He would be taken from flight status. Not a good position for a wing commander. A man couldn’t fly without wings…
“Looks good to go,” Ervin Beery said, closing the preflight book and putting his right foot on the bottom rung of the ladder. “That nose strut could use a shot of air, but I don’t see that we have a problem there,” the full bird colonel said, climbing toward the front cockpit.
James looked at the front strut, and mentally measured the allowable tolerance between the top and the bottom. He agreed. It wasn’t a problem.
“Chief,” he said to the crew chief who followed Beery up the ladder, and prepared to hand the wing commander his helmet, which had hung on the iron hook jutting from the side of the ladder. “Maybe you’d better take a good look at the nose wheel strut when we get back. Looks like it might need a shot of air.”
“Yes, sir,” the young man said, helping Beery to straighten the harness straps.
The flight was to last no more than 40 minutes. Just enough time to make sure the new engines were okay to begin a schedule of sorties. He hoped those forty minutes would relax him a bit. Despite the discussion he and the wing commander would have about the things troubling him.
To some it would seem ridiculous, flying a complex, high-performance fighter-trainer, and at the same time trying to carry on a conversation on other matters. Not to the fighter pilots, for whom handling the birds were as natural as walking. The whole thing would be cathartic. Like a conversation while walking down a country lane would be for some.
The crew chief held his right hand up after the plush unit had done its starting work, and both engines were running smoothly.
The man at the rear of the plane manning the unit quickly disconnected the hose and buttoned the panel against the T-38s bottom. The crew chief motioned the jet from where it had sat for more than an hour, and soon it pointed southward down the runway.
After trimming the bird for take-off, Beery released the brakes by taking pressure off the top of the rudder pedals, and pushed both throttles fully forward, igniting the afterburners. The sleek fighter-trainer quickly picked up speed, its afterburners’ blue-white flames thundering behind.
Beery kept the plane on the concrete until the last possible second, and then pulled the stick back. The T-38 shot almost straight up.
The maneuver was prohibited, but Ervin Beery rarely paid attention to such regs when flying his test-flights. James wouldn’t tell on him, he thought, enjoying the ride.
“Go, baby!” Beery said from the front seat, watching the altimeter spin. James watched the other gauges. All seemed working perfectly.
The colonel’s breathing was heavy over the intercom, his excitement raging. After 30-plus years of flying, the old man still loved every second of it. The wing commander leveled the T-38 at 40,000 feet, and put it into a series of rolls, coming again to level flight.
“She’s as smooth as a baby’s butt,” he said.
“Let’s give the ABs a going over,” he said. He pulled the throttles back to 90 percent, to 70 percent, and then jammed the throttles fully forward. The plane shot forward, the increased thrust pushing the flyers back against their parachutes.
After repeating the test several times, Beery throttled the aircraft to cruising speed, and said, “What about these nightmares, James?”
The abruptness of the question’s timing took James aback.
“I’ve had them since the Roswell experience,” James said, cutting through to the heart of the matter.
“Yeah. I’ve been clued in to all of that stuff,” Beery said, jockeying the throttles slightly back and forth. “You really think you saw a UFO?”
“I know I did, Colonel. Two over New Mexico, and one over Israel in ‘48.”
“You think these vision things are part of that?”
“Yes, sir. I do.”
“Now you’re upset with the D.C. bunch?”
“It goes much deeper, Colonel…” James paused to gather his explanation. “They are playing with my mind, and not only mine, but with that of Mark Lansing. Capt. Mark Lansing, a marine F-4 pilot, the son of the man who was my friend. The guy who disappeared that day in ‘47.”
“You think they’re doing something to affect your brain?” Beery said, matter-of-factly.
“Yes, sir. I know that somebody is doing it. And now they said they are going to bring my daughter into this thing. I figure the only way to deal with it, and at the same time get back my sanity, is to go to the media, I guess.”
There was silence for 20 seconds, before Beery said, “Well, James, you’re one of mine. I’ll back you all the way, if that’s what you’re determined to do.”
James was stunned, having thought that Cooper, or someone within the D.C. group who knew about his sleepwalking and about his UFO encounter at Roswell, would have told Beery to talk sense to him, talk him out of spilling his guts.
“They gave me a story that you’ve about lost it, James. I didn’t believe them for a second.”
James was touched. He had always liked the old man, except when the colonel had been drinking. Beery was known as a commander who would go to bat for his men, no matter the consequences. Now, he knew it was true.
The T-38 flew at 45,000 feet, outrunning the sound of the J-85s roaring behind.
“Let’s take this baby home,” Col. Beery said, banking a steep left and turning for Randolph’s east runway more than 100 miles away.
Without warning, the plane shuddered. An unforeseen thunderstorm held them in its grip.
Impossible! The skies had been clear for as far as could be seen, Morgan thought. Not possible!
“Colonel,” James said. No response.
“Col. Beery,” he repeated. Still no response. Ervin Beery’s helmeted head, James could see through the wind-screen separating the back cockpit from the front, was fixed in a straight-ahead position.
“Colonel!”
James heard a deep growl come over the intercom’s earpieces within his helmet. It sounded like the audiotape he had given Mark Lansing to decipher.
The growling words continued and grew louder. Were they Beery’s words? They had to be his words!
“Colonel…Colonel!”
In the front seat, Beery’s eyes were transfixed, his pupils dilated. He neither heard his co-pilot’s calls to him, nor his own muttered words.
The black swirling grew worse around the T-38 and caused it to shudder again. Ervin Beery pushed fully forward on both throttles, and, at the same time, pushed the stick forward.
The bird nose-dived in full afterburners, rocketing ever faster downward through the black,
boiling turbulence.
James tried to grab the throttles, the stick. He couldn’t move. Try as he did, with all his strength, he couldn’t move!
Laura shivered, a sudden chill tingling her spine. She walked among the small appliances at the Base Exchange, searching the shelves for a certain brand of toaster. It would be a wedding gift for a major’s daughter.
The shiver struck again, and she wished for a jacket, or sweater…something to warm her.
While she was at the BX, she would also find something for Rev. Banyon and his fiancée, Susie. She mused, while shopped, when would their Lori become a bride? Would it be Mark Lansing? Lori would be a beautiful bride. Beautiful, and brilliant! She had finished high school a year ahead of schedule. Undergraduate work a year ahead of schedule. She would finish her graduate studies in molecular biology in just two years…
Brilliant--and--beautiful. Mark Lansing, if he were the one, would be a lucky fellow.
She daydreamed while her eyes scanned the stacks of every conceivable small appliance. A nice, chrome coffeepot would be just right. But did he and Susie even like coffee? Just because she loved it, didn’t mean they did. No, a coffee pot was definitely out…at least until she could find out if they liked coffee.
Rev. Banyon. Why was he suddenly preaching Bible prophecy? Nothing else, just prophecy.
Why was it so much on her mind? Must be because the pastor preached it so much, she thought, picking up a small toaster and examining it. She put it back and moved a bit farther along the aisle.
Did the fallen angels really come to earth? Intervene in the affairs of human beings, the women of the times just before the Flood? Was there really a flood that covered the whole earth? Rev. Banyon thought so, with all his heart…
Again, the shiver of a chill.
Laura hoped she wasn’t coming down with something.
“Will Mrs. Laura Morgan please come to the front?”
The Base Exchange’s loudspeakers crackled her name. “Mrs. Laura Morgan. Come to the front, please.”
She saw an officer in dress blues standing, his service hat in hand, a solemn look on his face. It was Col. Carl George, an adjutant to Gen. Matsen, the base commander.
She knew before he spoke. Something was terribly wrong.
Mark had said his goodbyes to Lori. He had kissed her and promised to call every day they were apart, no matter where he was when it came time to call.
Her tears were almost more than he could stand. He fought now to choke back his own emotions. A combat pilot, an F-4 fighter pilot. How would that look? A United States fighter pilot--a Marine--showing emotion because he had to leave his…what was she to him? His girlfriend? She was no mere girl. She was a beautiful woman.
Whatever was going on with the trances, the weird things happening, he had to follow orders. He wanted to talk to Lori’s father before he left, but they wanted him to leave now. Said to contact no one other than Lori. He hadn’t yet told her, asked her. But, she was as good as his soon-to-be wife, in his mind--which should now be concerned in getting this bird pre-flighted.
The thoughts ran swiftly while he knelt to look upward beneath the aircraft. He rubbed his right fingertips along one panel.
No. Only clear liquid, not red fluid. Just moisture collected from the humidity. Not hydraulic fluid as it had first appeared.
After satisfying himself that all looked good on the F-4’s belly, he stood and flipped the page of the pre-flight book. He would next check the horizontal stabilizer on the aircraft’s left side.
Why had they ordered him directly to Andrews, rather than to his home base? He supposed someone would fly the F-4 back to Egland from Andrews.
Why the hurry? His things at Egland would be gathered and sent to him at D.C. Why the hurry…?
“Sir.” A transit sergeant dressed in a white jumpsuit approached him while he stood by the drooping, camouflaged horizontal stabilizer.
“I’m sorry, Captain, but flying has been temporarily suspended,” the non-com said. “Maybe we can resume in about two hours, they tell us.”
“What’s the problem?”
“A T-38 went down south of here. Rumor has it that it was a test flight being flown by Col. Beery.”
“The wing commander?” Mark said.
“Yes, sir. They say it flew straight into the ground,” the sergeant said, shaking his head. “Col. Beery was a good guy.”
“Didn’t make it out, huh?” Mark said.
“No, sir. Some think it might have been a heart attack.”
With his take-off delayed, his order to take time to talk to no one but Lori was, at least in his mind, no longer valid.
He had cleared things with Base Ops. He could be reached in the little snack bar.
He removed his G-suit and stowed it in the cockpit while standing on the ladder. He would call Lori. Hopefully, she would hurry to him, and they could spend at least an hour and fifteen minutes or so together, before he would have to again put on the G-suit.
He walked quickly to the several pay phones around the corner from the snack bar, searched for change in the flight suit’s zippered pockets, and dialed.
The phone rang five times, and he slammed the receiver in its cradle. He searched his mental files of phone numbers she had given him where she might be reached if she were not at her parents’ apartment. He recalled a couple of the numbers and dialed them. No luck. Lori wasn’t there.
Mark walked back to in front of Base Ops, surveyed the vast, almost empty flight line, and wondered what to do next.
Where was she?
He looked to his left to see his F-4C being buttoned up by the transit crew chief and two other men. Civilians, he surmised.
“Mark!”
Lori’s voice! He turned to see her hurrying toward him, her arms outstretched.
“Oh, Mark!”
She was crying. Not sad tears of having to part, but tears that gushed as if her heart were being torn out.
“Lori, what’s wrong?” He held her close.
“They say…they say Daddy was killed today!”
Chapter 8
“I was just thinking about calling you,” the deep voice said, after answering the phone.
“Oh?” Christopher Banyon was surprised. The two men hadn’t talked in nearly a month. “I was thinking about driving over for--to get some thoughts from you,” Christopher said.
“And, I was just thinking about inviting you,” the man continued the banter, glad to hear from his friend again.
An hour later, they sat in Randall Prouse’s San Marcos home, in the cluttered office just off Prouse’s den. Both were Christians, Christopher Banyon was satisfied, but each came from different doctrinal backgrounds.
Banyon’s own denomination paid scant attention to Bible prophecy yet future, to eschatology--the study of end-things from a Biblical perspective, Christopher Banyon thought. His church viewed prophecy as mostly already fulfilled. That which wasn’t yet fulfilled was either symbolic, allegorical, or both.
Dr. Randall Prouse believed that the greatest, most profound prophecies in the Bible were yet to be literally fulfilled. Prouse was considered a fanatic by most of Christopher’s Reformed Church colleagues--those whose doctrinal views were distinct from Catholic tradition and ritual. The kind of thinking that had got Luther and the others in trouble and set in motion the reformation. At the same time, the Reform clergy viewed prophecy much as did the Catholic Church they left.
Despite their differences, Christopher considered Prouse a close friend. This brilliant scholar had influenced his growing disaffection for his own church’s refusal to consider the possibility of prophetic things as being literal. Things like rapture, tribulation, Armageddon, and the millennial reign of Christ.
When Banyon brought the subjects up in conversation with colleagues of his denomination, he could count on being subjected to amused, head-wagging condescension.
Prouse who had earned a doctorate in theology, was viewed by most, even non-Re
form Protestant ministers in the area who knew him, as a part-time preacher, who only espoused prophecy. These were prophecies that they viewed in most cases as insignificant and irrelevant to the time, or to the future.
“I’ve got to tell you, Chris, I’m wary of dreams and visions,” the San Marcos college professor of archaeology, who also held a Ph. D., said. “Usually it’s bad pizza, or spaghetti, or too much sauerkraut. But, I had my own nightmare last night. One that included you.”
“Me?” Christopher said with a surprised laugh.
“Yes. You were in a terrible storm. You were cut off from any chance of help. Then, out of the lightning came--I don’t know what.”
Banyon, who held a cup of tea on a saucer, almost dropped it, spilling some of the cream-laced liquid.
Prouse reached forward to help steady him, seeing the younger man’s face go ashen.
“You okay?”
“Yes, yes, thank you. I’ll be fine,” Christopher said, setting the cup and saucer on one corner of his friend’s old desk.
“You don’t look okay,” Prouse said, getting a roll of paper towels nearby and tearing off a few sheets. He knelt and dabbed at Christopher’s pants and shoes.
“Thanks, it will wash out. Hope the carpet’s okay.”
“It’s mostly on you, I’m afraid,” his friend said, finishing up mopping the spill.
“Sorry to startle you. This dream of yours must have been something. When you told me that you were in a storm during your--dream--and that there were creatures struggling outside your window, I had to pay attention.”
“Like I said when I called,” Christopher said, “this wasn’t a dream. It, like your dream, happened during that terrible thunderstorm last night.”
“Yes, we had a really strong one, too,” Randall Prouse said, resettling himself in the chair across from his friend. “I think that’s what set me to dreaming. About the storm. I don’t know what brought you into it, but it was one of the most realistic nightmares I’ve ever had.”
Christopher felt still shaken by his friend’s revelation. He started to tell his experience during the storm, but his words spilled out in the form of a question.