1-THE BLUE LAKE GENESIS

“If aliens ever visit us, I think the outcome would be much as when Christopher Columbus

first landed in America, which didn’t turn out very well for the Native Americans.”

-Stephen Hawking

71 years, 8 months, 27 days until the Blue Lake Event

Blue Lake

South of Wendover Army Airfield

Tooele County, Utah

Saturday, May 26, 1945

The Jeep screamed across the Bonneville Salt Flats, the remnant of an ancient seabed. Arrival at the hills and bluffs brought it to a crawl. It descended on a treeless high-desert range and navigated over a rolling sea of sagebrush, prairie grasses, and Russian thistle mired by sections of bone-jarring, washboard road. It took the four airmen over an hour to arrive at their destination—a barren alkaline mudflat, where over a dozen Jeeps waited.

Sergeant Eric Anders and Private Jardine Wolstenholme slid out of the driver and passenger seats. Corporal Frank Murphy and Private David Hosek bounded from the back of the topless vehicle. Unprepared for the condition of the ground, Hosek and Murphy skated on the slick surface. Hosek’s stout backside took the brunt of the fall. The gangly Murphy glided on one foot, arms gyrated to maintain balance before his toe found a rock and he flew headlong into a belly slide. Murphy cursed and wiped the wet concrete-like muck from the front of his trousers, coat, and gloves.

Wolstenholme and Anders roared.

“Don’t laugh, Wolsty!” Murphy said

“Ignore him, Private. That was hilarious!” Anders guffawed.

“It was funny, Murph.” Hosek wiped the brackish gunk off his trousers and the back of a standard-issue olive-drab wool coat.

“Shut up, Hose!”

∞

They arrived at Blue Lake’s southwest bank to find steam rising from the warm-springs-fed body. Although it was a chilly evening, a couple of dozen soldiers frolicked in the tepid water: thrashing, yelling, cannon-balling, belly-flopping.

An armed MP pointed. “Fishing’s up that way.”

Not in the mood for a crowd, they passed the long row of airmen fishing from the bank. They leaped over the narrow outlet brook and attempted to pass an MP patrolling on the other side.

“That’s far enough, boys,” the MP said.

“Come on Private,” Murphy said. “The fishing’s all FUBAR with all those goons making a fuss in the water—scaring all the fish.”

The MP pointed with the rifle barrel. “Two packs of smokes and don’t go past that sagebrush clump.”

“One pack and to that bare patch.”

“And I get to keep the biggest fish.”

“Private, you drive a hard bargain,” Murphy said. “Deal!”

“Remember, anyone or anything outside the boundaries, I have orders to shoot to kill.”

∞

Side-by-side on the chalky banks, the four airmen dangled bare feet in the warm water, extended cane poles, and drowned worms.

“Wolsty, will that girl of yours still be around after the war?” Anders asked.

“Sarge, she’s the truest girl you’ll ever meet. She told me not to get killed or she’ll die an old maid.”.

“I hope you’re right, Wolsty. Colleen’s giving birth any day now, and I won’t be able to see my firstborn until old Tojo’s head’s on a pike,” Anders said.

Hosek stared at his feet swirling in the water. “At least you got to see her on last leave. My cousin spent two years fighting Krauts in Africa and Italy before he got to go home to meet his son.”

“I know. You’ve told me before, Hose. Those damn Japs need to surrender now!” Anders said.

“You know once the atom bomb is dropped there won’t be many Japs left,” Murphy said. “The poor slant-eyed Nip bastards won’t know what hit ‘um.”

Anders backhanded Murphy’s shoulder, followed by a stony stare, and finger to lips, and whispered, “Loose lips sink ships, Corporal. Didn’t you learn anything at Los Alamos? Most of the personnel present lack full Silverplate clearance.”

“Sorry, Sarge. I didn’t think anyone could hear.”

Wolstenholme whispered. “Good thing that MP’s out of hearing range—or you’d have OSS and G-men crawling up your backside for the duration of the war.”

“I hear Alaska’s kind of nice this time of year,” Hosek murmured. “Soon to be Buck Private Murphy.”

“Shut up, Hose!”

∞

From a distance, the sound of a canid bark rolled across the desert. Another replied from the opposite direction. The barks soon turned to howls.

“You think the coyotes will join our little soiree?” Wolstenholme asked.

“The mangy mutts are wondering if red-blooded American fighting men taste better than Jack Rabbit.” Hosek chuckled.

Those frolicking in the water, and those on the banks, became still as the chorus of howls echoed across the desert. The origins were hard to trace as the vocalists, volume, and intensity of the chorus grew. The ruckus continued for several minutes, then abruptly ended.

A bellow broke the silence. “What the hell’s that?”

“Coyotes, moron!”

“No! Over ground zero, moron!”

A collective murmur grew along the shoreline. The four airmen saw other airmen staring across the lake to the bombing range to the north. They put down their fishing poles and stood up.

Above the horizon, three cigar-shaped objects, bathed in a cream-colored glow, silently rotated and weaved in a uniform pattern.

“What the heck?” Wolstenholme said.

“The flyboys testing something we don’t know about?” Anders asked.

The desert was quiet—not a peep from coyotes or men. All mesmerized by the silent, fluid waltz of the three luminous objects over the salt flats. There was a general sense they were witnessing history in the making, even if they weren’t sure what they were seeing.

From fifteen miles away, the faint unmistakable sound of air raid sirens reached the lake, signaling that these objects weren’t experimental army aircraft. The craft ignored the alarm and kept weaving in the same elliptical motion. Air raid sirens were the call for the men to return to base, but being spellbound by the sight, they forgot their duty. The military police should have rounded up the men, but the same distraction afflicted them.

The distant rumble of four P-47 Thunderbolt fighters sounded. As the fighter aircraft neared, the three unidentified objects froze in mid-air. The two lower ones levitated parallel to the highest. Two craft remained still as the third inched forward. It shot across the sky; faster than any aircraft the men had ever seen. Experience taught them that the faster fighters and bombers flew, the louder the roar from the exhaust manifolds. Yet, this object remained silent as it curved upward at a forty-degree angle and out of sight.

As the fighters shot past the remaining two objects, the full-throttle rumble from the Pratt and Whitney engines gave chills to the men on-the-ground. The fighters banked hard after passing over Blue Lake and engaged the targets.

With eight .50-caliber Browning M2 heavy machine guns mounted on each Thunderbolt, the fighters lit up all thirty-two guns with a combined firing capacity of over 26,000 rounds per minute. One enemy craft rocketed upward and out of sight. The remaining one moved straightaway to the east. The Thunderbolts matched course but couldn’t keep up.

The craft stopped at the edge of the bombing range, out of view for the men on the ground, and rotated in an elliptical motion as if winding up for the pursuing aircraft. As the fighters neared, the enemy craft froze a couple hundred feet above the desert floor.

In firing range, the lead Thunderbolt lined up with the object, let loose two bursts of machine-gun fire, and banked left. The second plane took the center position, fired another blast, and passed to the left. The third repeated the action, and the fourth, too.

The pilots were confident to have hit the target. Near the maximum speed of three-hundred-sixty air knots, the pilots took half a nautical air-mile to turn around to continue their engagement.

As the Thunderbolts neared, the alien craft shot across the bombing range and returned unscathed to its original position at Blue Lake.

The men on the ground released a communal sigh.

A few moments later, the P47s returned with guns blazing. Those at the lake hooped and hollered, and had a perfect profile view of the skirmish. From their perspective, the phosphorescent tracer rounds disappeared into an invisible wall shielding the craft. The lead Thunderbolt made a kamikaze course for the unidentified object. A moment before the Thunderbolt made contact, the enemy craft rocketed upward and out of sight.

The Thunderbolts circled back for another pass but found nothing.

West Desert Bombing and Artillery Range

Wendover Airfield

Tooele County, Utah

Saturday, May 26, 1945

A tumbleweed rolled past the last Jeep arrived at the bombing range’s southwest auxiliary gate.

An MP jumped from the vehicle and saluted. “All men accounted for and returning to base, Major Fishburn.”

“Very good, Sergeant. Keep your eyes open. We don’t want to leave anyone stranded.”

The lead Jeep had two MPs seated upfront and one in the back. The second Jeep contained a driver and Fishburn upfront and another MP in the back.

The Jeeps finally reached the hills and bluffs. They bounced and sputtered up a sandy incline among sagebrush and cacti. As the lead Jeep started its downward descent, and the second crested the hill, the electrical systems of both vehicles failed and the engines stalled. Both drivers turned the ignition switches, but the Jeeps were void of power.

Fishburn looked at his wristwatch. The radioactive pigments on its dial didn’t illuminate. “Radio ahead and let them know of our predicament.”

An MP cranked the dynamo on the two-way radio. “The radio’s dead, sir.”

“What the hell’s going on?” Fishburn said.

Fishburn had scarcely spoken when a beige light appeared 150 yards ahead. It took him a moment to recognize an alien craft, thirty feet above the next promontory. An intense green-blue beam radiated to the ground. The men shielded their eyes and across the valley, coyotes wailed.

“Gunners, lock-and-load! Fire-at-will! Take down the sonofabitch!” Fishburn yelled.

The rear-seated gunners stood. With both hands, they gripped .50-caliber machine guns mounted on tripods secured to the floor. They pulled back on the actions, aimed, and squeezed the triggers—but nothing happened.

After a few minutes, the hum and blue beam terminated. Coyotes hushed as the alien object crept silently from the promontory, cleared the cliff’s edge, and shot out of sight. The men startled out of a stupor when a single round fired from each machine gun, and the Jeeps’ electrical systems came back on as if nothing had happened.

“Get Colonel Tibbets on the SCR,” Fishburn said.

The MP cranked the dynamo. The radio worked fine.

∞

The Jeeps arrived at the promontory, where the enemy craft previously hovered.

“Halt, I hear something,” Fishburn said and gave hand signals.

A soldier rolled out of the back of the Jeep and crept towards the hill’s edge before dropping to crawl. He reached the rim and scanned the moonlit scene below. He stood, signaled the others, and crept downhill with M1 Carbine ready.

The others arrived to find an empty Jeep. Its front bumper wedged against a rock outcropping. Still in gear, the engine idled roughly as tires spun out the fine white sand. Fishburn turned off the ignition. He recorded the Jeep’s motor pool number on the back bumper and had the radio operator call back to base. Sergeant Anders, head ordinance crew chief requisitioned the Jeep.

In the moonlight, soldiers searched and called out names. “Private Hosek!” “Corporal Murphy!” “Private Wolstenholme!” “Sergeant Anders!”

Skull Valley Band of Goshute Indians Reservation

Tooele County, Utah

Sunday, May 27, 1945

Sheriff Bob Hendricks arrived at Gabriel Bear’s two-room home a little past midnight. The Sheriff remitted a U.S. Army request for an Indian tracker. The Goshute, or Desert People, were the only trackers for the West Desert. A millennium before Hendricks’ rancher-grandfather settled Grantsville, the Goshute survived off this godforsaken land. Among Goshute trackers, Bear topped the list. Over the years, Bear rescued several missing tourists, hunters, and fugitives wandering the deserts and mountains of Tooele County.

The Sheriff didn’t know if Bear would help with this case. 1Bear’s ancestors had a long, sordid history with the U.S. Army.

1As nomadic hunter-gatherers, the Goshute were a peaceful, non-warring tribe. The indigenous people of the Great Basin survived in the parched, desolate range as scattered clans south of the Great Salt Lake. The nearest tribes, the Northwest Shoshone, Ute, and Piute, found the West Desert too inhospitable to live. However, in the mid-to-late nineteen-century, New Mexico slave traders and Utes still ventured into the West Desert to abduct Goshute for sale as slaves into Mexico.

In November 1851, the Jackass Mail Company, led by Captain Absalom Woodward, established bivouac with ten men near a cluster of Goshute wiki-ups at Ibapah. Bear’s grandfather was away with a large gathering of men on the annual antelope hunt, and left the women, children, and elderly behind. The hunting party returned to discover the young women ravished by the whites—and the guilty men had moved on.

Days later, during a winter whiteout, four Jackass Mail riders succumbed to Goshute arrows on the way to Salt Lake City. Woodward and five thousand dollars in Federal gold went missing, too. Discovered a few days later, a search party found the remains of men and mules strewn amongst the U.S. mail by scavengers. Woodward and the gold were still missing. Newspaper accounts back east claimed the Goshute butchered the riders for mules and gold—and the public demanded justice. The Goshute imparted frontier justice to the men that savagely raped their daughters—unjustly treated as ruthless highwaymen instead.

Afterward, the U.S. Government attempted changing the skilled hunter-gatherers into unskilled farmers. White settlers wantonly harvesting wildlife, overgrazing the delicate steppe, and fenced off life-giving springs destroyed the Goshute’s traditional livelihood. Facing starvation, the peaceful people became maundering highwaymen to survive—robbing stagecoaches and way stations, and stealing cattle from settlers.

From the early 1850s through most of the Civil War, the U.S. Cavalry made up of regular army, and later California Regulars, waged a one-sided conflict against the Goshute—sometimes massacring women and children as they slept.

Indian Affairs agents encouraged the Goshute’s relocation to reservations in the Uinta Basin and Oklahoma, but the natives remained. Being in isolated and sporadic groups, the Goshute lacked central leadership to decide. Besides, much of the land of the West Desert was so inhospitable that few white men desired to homestead the area. Faced with genocide, the Goshute accepted a Treaty for Peace and Friendship with the United States Government to end hostilities. Abraham Lincoln announced the treaty just three months before his assassination. Bear’s ancestors felt Mr. Lincoln’s demise was a just fate.

Wendover Army Airfield

Wendover, Utah

Sunday, May 27, 1945

A guard at the front gate shone his flashlight in the driver’s side window. He turned to his colleague. “Great. Another drunken Injun.”

Bear rolled down his window. “Hello, I’m...”

“Sir, you need to turn around. When you reach the highway, make a left turn back to your reservation.”

“Not my reservation.” He shrugged. “The name’s Gabriel Bear. I’m here at Major Fishburn’s request.”

“Just a minute, sir.” The guard scanned a clipboard with a flashlight. “You can park at that hangar first on the right.”

Escorted inside the hangar by a junior officer, Bear contained surprise at over two-hundred men gathered. Most gawked at the Goshute scout in their mist—surprised that he wore cowboy attire instead of a feathered headdress, buckskins, and moccasins.

Bear realized that for many of the men, this was the first encounter with a real, live Indian. He was well-acquainted with the stereotypes created by Radio City, pulp fiction, and Hollywood. He envisioned white families huddled around the radio rapt to the Lone Ranger and Death Valley Days; or how these boys had highly idealized imagines of noble cowboys and savage Indians populated from Zane Grey and dime novels; or when these young men had an extra two-bits, they’d purchase a soda pop, popcorn, and admission for two to see the Saturday matinee with a young gal. Hollywood created a vision of the natives: Caucasian faces painted with rust-colored make-up, black war paint stripes, and black wigs with braided ponytails held in place by a headband. The bloodthirsty savages were ready for war at the slightest provocation. Bear hoped to educate these men otherwise.

His head waggled at the whispers of Tonto, Geronimo, and Cochise as he followed the officer up the wooden platform.

“Major Fishburn, Mr. Bear, to see you, sir.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant.” Fishburn extended a hand and winced at Bear’s unexpectedly firm grip. “Mr. Bear, thank you for coming on such short notice. These men are at your disposal. What do you need from me?”

“I need actual boots from your missing soldiers, or at least the same size and type they were wearing. Also, I need a topographical map of the area.”

“Right this way.”

Fishburn led Bear to a table of maps.

“Where were they last seen?” Bear asked.

Fishburn provided location details, physical descriptions, and activities of the men. He omitted any mention of the unidentified craft.

Bear pointed to the map. “I only need four soldiers with me. Here, here, here, and here.”

“What about the other men? We can cover more ground with them.”

“Too many soldiers trampling the vegetation will make identifying the missing soldier’s tracks impossible.”

He suddenly realized that Fishburn worried about losing face with the men—so eager to find their missing comrades. The Major also kept something close to the chest.

Bear ran a finger across the map. “The rest of the soldiers can search at the base of the escarpment here.”

He understood the men may have wandered over the cliff in the darkness. More soldiers at the bottom of the promontories might speed up the process—assuming the men plummeted to their deaths. This allowed Fishburn and the soldiers to feel as if they were making a Herculean effort to find their missing comrades, yet kept them from getting in Bear’s way.

Bear almost got his wish. Four soldiers in one Jeep, while Fishburn drove in another with a driver and radio operator. As long as they stayed put, Bear figured they’d be no harm.

Before leaving the hangar, Bear explained each of the four soldiers’ role in the search. Fishburn set up adjacent to the missing men’s Jeep. A Lieutenant led the larger portion of soldiers away in six-by-six troop carriers across the salt flats to the base of the cliffs.

About a hundred yards north of the missing airman’s Jeep, they left a soldier with a wooden staff—a head taller than the man and with a red bandanna tied to the top. The convoy continued until reaching the abandoned Jeep. While Fishburn set up a field command center (a Jeep with maps on the hood and a two-way radio). Bear took four single boots, shoestrings tied together, and hung them around his neck. He led a soldier with a wooden staff and bandanna about a hundred paces to the south. He cautiously checked for signs of human passage. Bear retraced steps precisely for the return to the command center. Bear took a man to the west. He guided the last man east to the top of the promontory.

He looked for signs of the missing men at the precipice until he was certain no one had taken a step into the abyss. Below, dozens of soldiers searching. Bear turned in the opposite direction to see the other three soldiers holding their staffs with red bandannas and waved. The other three waved back in acknowledgment.

Bear carried a full quiver of sticks with pieces of red yarn tied to the ends to mark any signs of passage. He moved from the top of the promontory towards the red bandana to the south. The Indian scout reached the man on the south and made a beeline towards the red bandana to the west. From west to north, and north back to the top of the promontory, he still had a full quiver of markers on the first perimeter sweep.

His raised arms overhead with hands pointed inward to signal to move the search grid inward twenty paces. Had Bear found signs of human activity near the original perimeter, he’d point hands outward to expand the search perimeter ten paces—except for the one soldier at the cliff’s edge. Bear repeated the process and moved the perimeter inward four more times. He worked back to the start but found no trace of human traffic past sixty paces from the field command center.

The mystery made Bear chuckle at the thought of childhood stories about Isapia-ppeh, the legendary mischievous coyote. Given Isapia-ppeh’s character, he might have something to do with the missing men. Maybe Isapia-ppeh’s mortal enemy, Kinniih-Pia, or Mother Hawk, spirited the soldiers away to safety. He knew these were just tales, but Goshute children learned morals, life lessons, and useful principles through story. He felt the white man’s story of Hansel and Gretel might be relevant; except no breadcrumbs left behind by the missing men—or any footprints or trampled vegetation. He couldn’t tell either fairytale explanation to the Major.

“They found nothing below the cliff. What did you find?” Fishburn asked.

“Major, your soldiers did not walk out of the area.” 

The seasoned Goshute scout pointed to a map. “The only tracks on the outer perimeters are from coyotes and deer. Many human tracks from this point inward. It could be your missing soldiers, or your men looking for them last night—or both. There are no man-made tracks outside of the third perimeter.”

“Are you sure? How in the world did they leave the area unseen?” Fishburn asked.

“Maybe I missed something. Does this map show any subterranean cavities?”

Fishburn and Bear scoured the map and found an abandoned tin mine and a couple of caves—but no place for the men to hide underground within five miles from where they were last seen.

“Either your soldiers drove away in another automobile.” Bear looked skyward. “—or flew away.”

Fishburn turned towards Bear with a dismayed expression that quickly turned to closed body language.

“What are you not telling me, Major?” Bear asked.

“You wouldn’t believe me if I did,” Fishburn said.

“Why not? My grandfather told stories of Goshute disappearing in the sky.”

West Desert Bombing and Artillery Range

Wendover Army Airfield, Utah

Eric Anders felt gratitude for the lack of a breeze. He wished the humidity level was a bit lower, too. Moist air penetrated through the layers of clothing and deposited a layer of frost on the surface. He sat cross-legged on the crusty salt flats, huddled with his three comrades for warmth. The two army-issue wool blankets they shared provided little additional warmth.

They considered trudging across the bombing range back to base to keep warm, but one false step in the dark and kablooey! Setting off an unexploded ordnance was too big a risk. They’d stay put until dawn’s first light.

“How the hell did we end up here? The last thing I remember was us fishing,” Murphy said.

A thought entered Anders’s mind: some are carpenters and others are sledgehammers.

“Me, too. I remember coyotes howling,” Hosek said.

Heads nodded.

Some are eagles, and others are pidgins.

“I’m so cold—but this throbbing in my temples is much worse,” Wolstenholme said. “And the big toe in my left foot hurts like heck.”

Heads nodded again.

Some are wanderers, and some are travelers.

The audio hallucinations convinced Anders that hypothermia was setting in.

∞

They planned to leave at dawn, but overcast skies delayed the journey until sunrise. Walking for miles, the sky brooded and darkened with every step. Oversized raindrops splattered on the hard pan-salt surface from time-to-time.

Anders spotted an unidentified airborne object heading towards them.

“What the hell’s that?” Anders said.

His heart raced as a gray craft flew silently and rapidly from the north. As the object arrived, it engulfed Anders in a beam of light. The intense brightness and a rhythmic thumping shot a déjà vu-like terror through his heart.

“Run!” Anders yelled.

He turned to see his colleagues sprint across a flat, barren, and vast surface with no place to hide. Anders tried to catch up as instinct took over choice and reason. Under a massive surge of adrenaline, Anders’ legs felt as if they were churning through deep sand. His heart pounded and breath couldn’t come fast enough to his burning lungs.

Alkaline dust swirled from the ground, caused a searing pain to eyes and lungs. Anders fell to his knees, ribs hurt from coughing, gritty viscous tears flooded eyes. As his vision cleared, Anders realized a craft hovered directly ahead. An out-of-nowhere second craft hovered to their flank. He’d seen multiple records broken for airspeed, payload, and distance by American’s latest experimental aircraft, but had never seen a machine that maneuvered like these--and scared the hell out of him.

A portal in the lead craft’s midsection opened. Anders shuttered with recognition that running wasn’t an option. A command emanated from the aircraft confirmed his observation. Out of the dust cloud, a figure sprinted towards Anders. He instantly recognized the slim build and unusual gait of the runner.

“Murphy halt!” Anders yelled.

Murphy maintained course and speed. Anders rose from his knees to a four-point stance. The former high school defensive end drove a shoulder into Murphy’s thighs and wrapped arms around him. The two crashed to the ground as the heavens released a deluge that seemed to blow in all directions.

∞

Anders’ heart raced. Strapped in a jump seat, blindfolded, with wrists and feet restrained, heightened his anxiety. The craft’s swooshing thumps were confusing. He sensed terror in others around him. He flinched at a shoulder brush.

“Who are you?” Anders shouted over the din.

“Murphy, Jack. Corporal. United States Army Air Forces, Serial Number: 19837622!”

“Murph, it’s me. Anders!”

“Sergeant Anders? Why the hell did you tackle me?” Murphy shouted.

“To keep you from being shot!”

“How did you know they would shoot me?”

“By the sniper taking aim at you and the order over the loudspeaker to halt or be shot!”

“Huh? Who has us? The Japs?” Murphy shouted.

“No way! It’s not the Japs!”

“Where are they taking us?”

“Don’t know, but definitely not to Wendover!”

Two Years, 5-Months Later

The Pentagon

Arlington, Virginia

Tuesday, October 21, 1947

After the fateful night two years ago in the Utah desert, Sheldon Fishburn remained sorely amazed at what he’d witnessed since. He headed the Roswell investigation in July of this year. The event revealed more than he could imagine. The biological and technological evidence collected would provide decades of research and development.

It still felt unreal that President Harry S. Truman hand picked him to lead the special group with countless men and hundreds of millions of dollars—under the auspices of twelve men.

Fishburn inserted his key in the lock on the Pentagons’ executive elevator on the main floor. Another officer tried to join him. “Sorry, single access only.”

The door closed. He turned his key again, and the elevator lurched downward, before stopping at Sub-basement 12. Until three weeks ago, he believed the Pentagon only had three basement levels.

∞

Fishburn felt like a fraud among a quorum of the most powerful government and military leaders, and greatest scientific minds of the twentieth century. He scanned each face seated around the conference table.

Physicist and engineer Lloyd Berkner, one of the lead developers of radar and modern naval navigation systems. The world’s leading biophysicist, Professor Detlev Bronk. Dr. Vannevar Bush, head of the Office of Scientific Research and Development and co-founder of the Manhattan Project. Secretary of Defense James Forrestal. Assistant Secretary of the Army, Gordon Grey. Rear Admiral Roscoe H. Hillenkoetter, recently appointed as director of the newly created Central Intelligence Agency. Jerome Clarke Hunsaker, M.I.T. professor and chairman of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics. Theoretical astronomer and astrophysicist, Dr. Donald Menzel. Former intelligence director, Rear Admiral Sydney Souers. General Nathan Twining, author of the Air Force memo: AMC Opinion Concerning “Flying Discs.” And last, former U.S. Chief of Military Intelligence, General Hoyt Vandenberg.

Fishburn nodded at the senior aides that hovered around the conference table, ready to dispense coffee, data, and reports.

Armed with a rubber-tipped maple pointer-stick, he stood by the projection screen.

“For the next three years, we’ll be evaluating the three proposed sites in Nevada, California, and Utah as the lead R&D facility,” Fishburn said. “Next slide.”

A salt-crusted dry lakebed came on screen.

“The area around Groom Lake is ideal given its natural runway and isolation. However, we must acquire significant acreage to keep prying eyes away. Also, the site is too remote for movement of personnel by ground transportation. Next slide.”

Another infinite dry lakebed filled the screen.

“As of today, I believe Dugway Proving Grounds is the ideal site,” he said. “Next slide.”

On screen, a few hangars and a paved tarmac.

“As you can see, Dugway has plenty of land, including a large section of the Bonneville Salt Flats, existing infrastructure, isolated from the populace, and the Lincoln Highway is within reasonable driving distance to the facility.”

“As of today, you say, Colonel,” Hillenkoetter said. “We need to think more long term. You know my concerns about Dugway. The Lincoln Highway is too close for my tastes, and Salt Lake City will encroach the site within the next hundred years. Secrecy is more important than the cost and logistics of air transportation, Colonel Fishburn.”

“Duly noted, Director Hillenkoetter,” Fishburn said. “We have leading futurologists and a Nobel Laureate mathematician forecasting multiple scenarios for each site.”

“We can build a base in less than three years,” Forrestal said. “Let’s go with Dugway and move forward.” 

“Given that we want a facility that lasts a minimum of two centuries, spending three years to analyze our decision is a drop in the bucket,” Souers said. “Besides, Wright Field is more than adequate for the next ten years.”

“Colonel Fishburn, is the plan to still transfer the Extraterrestrial Biological Entity from Wright to the new site once it’s up and running?” Forrestal asked.

“Yes, Mr. Secretary. Nothing has changed.”

“Excuse me, but why are we still keeping It alive?” Vandenberg asked. “Hasn’t It already provided all the information we need? The Thing’s a security risk.”

“General, the EBE has given much useful information about the IGC and Dumal factions, and is still providing vital technological data,” Twining said.

“Nathan, I’m uncomfortable with It reading our minds. It could be a spy,” Vandenberg said. “I’m uncomfortable with the whole IGC alliance, too.” 

“Isn’t an alliance per se. It’s an advisory relationship,” Grey said. “As you know, the Soviets and Dumal entered a secret alliance at the end of the war. We need the IGC on our side during this so-called, Cold War.”

“Call the alliance what you will, Mr. Grey,” Vandenberg said. “We’re still in bed with a superior military force that shouldn’t be trusted.”

“The Dumal alliance with the Nazis didn’t work out too well for Hitler,” Twining said. “The IGC-Allied cooperation is partially responsible for that outcome.” 

“The Dumal, the flying saucer friends of fascists. Now I guess now they should be called the flying saucer friends of Stalin.” Grey laughed.

“I didn’t trust Von Braun and Oberth before they introduced the President to the Dumal bastards—and even less since,” Forrestal said. “I guess the President choosing the IGC over the Dumal is the lesser of two evils. Similar to crawling in bed with former Nazi rocket scientists to defeat the Russians.” 

“We should drop A-bombs on the entire lot of them. Stalin, the Dumal, and the IGC—before they get us,” Vandenberg said.

“Hear, hear General,” Forrestal said. “Let me reiterate that the American people must be made aware of the danger that lurks in our midst. The Nazis and the Soviets are nothing compared to them. It’s the right thing to do.” 

Fishburn locked eyes on Forrestal. “Mr. Secretary, might I remind everyone present that our mission is to protect the American people, and avoid panic in the streets. The President’s directive is crystal clear. Keep industry moving, and keep citizens working, shopping, and procreating in ignorant bliss at all costs—and leave the little green men up to Majestic-Twelve.”