Commute
Gerald stared absently at the walls as the shuttle hurtled forward. Thought of as futuristic even by his agencies terms just 20 years ago, the insides of the shuttle now had a distinctly dated ’Disney Futureworld’ feel to them, smoothly curved beige and off-white plastic, molded seats with light mustard colored back and seat cushions. His eyes glazed over the 70s style propoganda that lined the area near the ceiling surrounding the transit maps, much like any modern public transit might present. ’The truth is out there, ’ began more than one of the posters, showing various patriotic silhouettes of agents and images of the Majesty logo, a simple line drawing of the all seeing eye, ’and it must be stopped!’
The message, informally adopted as the agencies slogan, wasn’t lost on Gerald as much as he was simply over exposed to it. During his long and difficult training in one of the very first graduating classes of Majesty agents, this message, others like it and the now ’famous’ alien footage were pounded to rote into his head more than any other. Humans were not ready for first contact, and early exposure before the Majesty disclosure program completed would spell certain doom for the entire planet. It was mantra, it was scripture, it was survival. It was perhaps the most closely guarded secret mankind had ever attempted to contain.
Gerald had been an agent of the super-secret agency for nearly 20 years. He’d been recruited into the CIA Intelligence Corp in his early 20’s, rose up through the ranks and drew the attention of Majesty recruiters, many of who also worked at the CIA. Gerald believed in Majesty’s mission, in the message, firmly, deeply.
Not only was he intellectually convinced by the evidence presented both alien and earthly, but emotionally and spiritually as well. The things he had seen, the near miss events that pushed the planet dangerously close to exposure, the aftermath of those events and the cost, in lives, in freedom. He hadn’t started out as resolute in his belief in the mission either, just like a lot of agency recruits.
The process of indoctrination was not an easy one. The biggest challenge for any new agent was akin to the overarching human dilemma - our species lofty belief, even with an understanding of the vastness of the universe, that we were ever alone. So engraved was this myopic belief into our philosophical and spiritual notions that it represented the gravest threat, could bring down entire civilizations...
And certainly could - and did - drive an individual man or woman right out of their minds.
The process of recruiting and indoctrinating was slow, deliberate, and often utterly unsuccessful. The layers involved with level setting a humans understanding of the real situation out in the cosmos were extensive. Obviously it always began with the simple truth - we have been visited.
‘What a difference a decade or two makes’ he thought to himself. He recalled his early training, the scenario drills and simulations that flunked out so many of his colleagues, a failure which, for most government agencies meant simply looking elsewhere for a career, but with Majesty and the secrets they kept, meant a far darker fate for those who did not, or could not, make the stringent cut Majesty agents were required to meet.
To live such a secret existence was not for everyone, and Gerald had struggled often with the toils of it himself. Agents were forbidden to marry or have children, but they could have relationships, though the parameters were too invasive and regulated for almost all most agents. Unfortunately, this led to many relationships between agents, most of which ended badly, but all of which ended as eventually did the policy allowing it to happen at all. As a result, the life of a Majesty agent was one of very short term relationships, and most of an agent’s friendships, long or otherwise, were with other agents.
Over the years, Gerald felt he had seen it all, but was frequently reminded otherwise. The agency mandate & mission was deceptively simple in ideals, and immensely complicated in execution. Disclosure was coming, for better or worse, the timetable was set in stone. There was the timetable, there were milestones, and there were significant risks for failing to meet any of them, ranging from ‘highly destabilizing’ to ‘planet ending’, and with hundreds of categoric permutations in between. Ultimately, Majesty would both execute a complex global plan to prepare Earth’s populace for the most stunning realization in human history while simultaneously and aggressively suppressing any events that could endanger early disclosure.
Gerald snorted derisively to himself, recalling the words of one of his first trainers. ‘Here is what humans think they can endure mentally and spiritually’, he had said, indicating slides showing Frankenstein, Dracula, Godzilla and other classic movie monsters. ‘And here is we know they can’t handle.’, moving on to a slide showing news footage of the fallout of the H.G. Wells radio show ‘War of the Worlds’, which had, in addition to being a carefully planned and executed government experiment incited fear and hysteria into thousands of radio listeners, and resulting in controlled hysteria.
It wasn’t just lessons like this, or the internally famous alien footage that convinced agents like Gerald of the importance of the mission. Factually, there had been much debate within the agency about how applicable the alien footage and the events described were to humanity. The culture shown being engulfed in it’s own self-destruction was indeed more advanced than Earth’s, but was also entirely theocratic, where every living creature believed in the same notion of a greater being governing their lives. It was easy for an agent, even for Gerald to question the applicability of what the Visitors had show us to what might actually happen here.
But then, Gerald knew, was the existence of so much more evidence, countless experiments, endless documented cases that clearly sent the message of our planets utter incapability to survive the notion of not just alien existence, but the existence of a cosmos teeming with intelligent life, some benevolent, some neutral, and some decidedly hostile to life such as that on Earth. Even the extensive research conducted, under great secrecy, had revealed that humanity was nowhere near ready for the understanding that lay on the horizon. Indeed, time and time again it had been established that humanity would systematically destroy itself if it found out it was not alone before being properly prepared.
But then again, a Majesty agent was different, Gerald supposed. He knew the research by heart, he saw the data time and time again, in his heart he knew Majesty protected a secret worth giving one’s life for, or taking one, for that matter. He reflected on the times when he’d been forced to perform the latter function, remembering how he’d struggled with the ethics of it, how taking the life of an innocent person had kept him lying awake at night, until a few choice missions had left him with the steely resolve - there were truths worth protecting, even at the cost of civilian life, even sometimes, at the cost of civilian lives.
Beyond the thick plexiglass of the shuttle tube, the rock and strata layers that had been cleanly bored out into the tunnel system flew by, the shuttle speed of nearly 800 kp/h presenting an ever changing collage of earthy patterns.
The aging tunnel system has been bored through the earths crust nearly a mile below the surface, and traversed routes between most major cities, all reachable in minutes or fractions of hours. Drills capable of literally melting rock to glass had created these tunnels at a mile or more per day, and at an average depth of 1 mile below the surface. The drills themselves had been invented and quietly patented in the late 60’s, but had actually been in service since the mid 1940’s before reaching the required level of declassification.
Despite being nearly 50 years old, the shuttle still conveyed a sense of futurism to it, even if only because this kind of transportation was still unheard of on the surface, but then again, Gerald mused silently, such a great many things were unheard of. The Twelve Year rule maintained by several government entities but especially Majesty ensured that what the public knew existed was already nearing mothball status by the time they ever heard of the tech. This created a reality wherein existed concepts and inventions that would defy human imagination, but also horrors and realities that would drive even the most sober, scientific minded person to insanity - or worse.
Hurtling along silently, Gerald was alone in the cylindrical compartment, one of only 5 compartments in each shuttle, not including an attendant and power compartment housing the shuttle propulsion unit. There has been other passengers off and on between stops, but complications of ultra-secret protocols made making conversation a gamble amongst people of the various agencies, so most kept to themselves on these fairly short rides.
Gerald was shaken from his light reverie by the tell-tale announcement that played gently through the air. A chime rang out and an automated message spoke in a pleasant female voice; ‘The next stop at Langley Virginia is now approaching. Passengers disembarking at this stop should make their way forward at this time to present identification.’
Gerald stood up and began moving forward. He glanced at his watch, then advanced it 3 hours to Eastern time. He had boarded the shuttle in Nevada just 40 minutes ago, and was now 3 time zones ahead of whence he had departed. Before the sun set on the western coast, he would be back in Nevada again to catch the connecting shuttle back to his home near Peugeot Sound Washington, all in a days work.