Blue Darker Than Black

by Mike Jenne

  Squinting through the rushing wind, he saw the launch site in the distance. Speculating on how long he would continue to beat the odds, he thought of Deirdre and wondered if he would live to see her or their children again.

  11

  TRANSITIONS

  Naval Aerospace Support Office, Los Angeles, California

  9:50 a.m., Wednesday, November 19, 1969

  Ed Russo had never been so frustrated in his entire life. The Air Force’s massive MOL program had been cancelled in June, so his assignment was drawing to an end. In fact, his tour would have already concluded if Admiral Tarbox had not temporarily extended the assignment to coordinate September’s Blue Gemini mission to intercept and destroy a Soviet maritime surveillance satellite. At present, he was still assigned to Tarbox’s small organization, which had received a vague new name—“Naval Aerospace Support Office”—and had physically moved to a government office complex several miles away from the old Air Force MOL complex. Even as the MOL project was being dismantled, Russo’s surroundings had changed little. The El Segundo sky was perpetually overcast with a grimy pall of smoke, and the air still reeked from the pungent fumes of nearby oil refineries.

  He was alone in an open office bay that was the workspace for the six men—five Naval aviators and himself—who comprised the last group of military astronauts selected before the MOL program folded. A transistor radio played in the background; reading a summary of the morning’s news, a broadcaster casually announced that two Apollo 12 astronauts—Charles Conrad and Alan Bean, both former Navy men—were walking on the moon.

  Leaning back in his chair, Russo grinned as he tore open a manila envelope containing a long-anticipated message. As he perused the official letter from the Air Force’s personnel office, he gritted his teeth and groaned. Several weeks ago, he had applied to attend the Air War College at Maxwell Air Force Base in Alabama. The year-long academic course was effectively a prerequisite for advancement to general rank. But although he met the course’s prerequisites, his enrollment application was denied. Cursing, he angrily ripped the dispatch into small scraps.

  Russo had to return to the Air Force, but the transition would not be nearly as simple as he had previously anticipated. Although he had been chosen—but not formally announced—as an MOL astronaut, and had participated in extremely significant activities with far-reaching strategic implications, he was now two years behind his contemporaries with very little to show for his efforts. Even though he had never flown in space, he might as well have, since it was as if he had just vanished off the face of the earth while his contemporaries built and reinforced their careers with squadron commands, multiple combat tours, and other challenging assignments.

  He now lamented his stint as Tarbox’s protégé, as well as many other choices he had made, particularly since it was very obvious that he would not be allowed to quietly slink back to the Air Force. With every day that passed, he became more painfully aware of General Tew’s far-reaching influence. This morning’s rejection letter was an excellent example of Tew’s broad reach. In addition to the Air War College, Russo had submitted paperwork for numerous follow-on assignments—squadron command in Vietnam, squadron command in Europe, test pilot duty—but his applications were summarily rejected. Try as he might, he was frustrated at every turn; Russo could not shake the clinging stigma that came with his affiliation with Tarbox. His military career was in limbo, on the verge of disintegration, thanks to the vengeful general.

  As if to pour salt into his wounds, seven MOL astronauts were afforded an opportunity to transfer to NASA, forming “Astronaut Group Seven” back in August. Even as the new group arrived at Houston, NASA’s astronaut bench was filled to overflowing; primary and back-up crews had already been designated for the remaining Apollo flights, so the erstwhile MOL astronauts probably would not fly for years, if ever. Ironically, even though Russo had endured the same selection process as the MOL astronauts, his group was not publically announced, so he was not granted the same opportunity to move to NASA.

  Of course, things could eventually change, and in time NASA might need more men, and Russo certainly met or exceeded all of their prerequisites. But still, it might be years before the space agency put out a call for another crop of astronauts. Even then, regardless of his qualifications, it was doubtful that he would ever ride a NASA rocket. Russo had a close friend who worked at Mission Control at the Manned Spaceflight Center at Houston, who solemnly informed him that he should not waste any time or energy applying to fly for NASA, since he would not be selected. It was yet another example of Tew’s insidious influence.

  Even though the Air Force wasn’t welcoming him back with open arms, Russo was absolutely sick of the Navy in general, and his five cohorts in particular. He was weary of their insistence that he abide by their culture and speak with their unique language. As far as they were removed from ships and the sea, they couldn’t just call a wall a wall, it had to be referred to as a bulkhead. Likewise, a ceiling was an overhead, a window was a porthole and the floor was a deck.

  With little else to occupy their time, his Navy counterparts constantly engaged in tireless efforts to make his existence miserable. He had been the butt of countless pranks, which had gradually transitioned from benign harassment to mean-spirited and downright cruel hazing. Lately, it had grown much worse, with his tormentors striking at him not only in the workplace, but also at home. It had come to a head two months ago, when he heard an ominous buzzing sound as he turned the key to unlock the door to his apartment. Cautiously, he had entered to discover his humble abode was occupied by a large and very agitated rattlesnake.

  Consequently, Russo was compelled to always stay a step ahead, perpetually moving from one dismal low-rent apartment to the next. He existed like a wandering migrant, living out of suitcases and never fully unpacking his belongings. His social life was nonexistent; he didn’t date and had no friends.

  Russo was surprised that the Naval aviators had not already moved on to other duties, now that the MOL project was cancelled. Tarbox regularly met with them, apparently to discuss opportunities for follow-on assignments, but Russo was not a party to any of those meetings. Moreover, the Navy men weren’t inclined to share any details with him; treating him as an interloper, they remained tightlipped in his presence. Russo suspected that something was afoot, that Tarbox was working on some sort of scheme for the future, but he had no idea what it might be, and at this point he really didn’t care.

  The phone jangled, interrupting Russo’s thoughts. He answered; the pleasant feminine voice on the other end was Tarbox’s secretary, summoning him to a meeting with the admiral.

  Hanging up the phone, Russo did not rush out of the room, as he had on previous occasions when Tarbox beckoned. He watched the clock on the wall, allowed a full minute to pass, and then called Tarbox’s secretary back to ensure that the summons was legitimate and not another prank. It was, so he headed upstairs.

  10:20 a.m.

  He entered the admiral’s office and stood quietly before the expansive metal desk. Papers were neatly arrayed on desktop, like fighter planes arranged on the limited space of a carrier’s flight deck, carefully set for efficient arrival and departure. Russo was startled at the volume of paperwork; as the head of an organization that seemingly had no active mission, at least at present, it seemed as if Tarbox’s workload had not dwindled in the least. As Russo watched, waiting patiently, Tarbox gradually worked his way through a row of paperwork, scanning each document in turn, signing some and setting others aside in a neat stack, apparently for further consideration or clarification.

  Assuming that the admiral had not heard him enter, Russo softly cleared his throat.

  Tarbox didn’t even look up to acknowledge his arrival, but continued working. Finally, he spoke. “I know that your time here is nearly up, Russo, but I have an offer for you to consider, if you’re interested in staying here with us.”

  Stay here? Surely, the admiral must be kidding,
or at least he wasn’t aware of how urgently Russo sought to leave this place and get on with his career. Before arbitrarily replying, he quickly considered his other options, which were few and dismal. But as anxious as he was to leave the Navy, he was still curious. “What do you have in mind, sir?” he asked.

  “I have received authorization for a long-term project,” explained Tarbox tersely. “Most of the key personnel in this office will be assigned to this new effort, to include your five counterparts. As you might imagine, some flying will be involved. I have one additional billet to fill; if you take it, you will remain here for the next five years.”

  Five years? Five more years of agonizing harassment? Ugh. “That sounds intriguing, sir, but …”

  “I’ve been allocated three slots for the Navy’s nuclear propulsion school in Maryland,” said Tarbox abruptly. “I’ve already identified two officers to attend, you’ll be the third if you accept my offer, and your follow-on assignment is contingent on satisfactory completion of the nuke course. Moreover, when and if you complete the nuke course, which is six months in length, you will matriculate to a six-month temporary assignment aboard a naval vessel or at an on-shore research facility.”

  “Nuclear propulsion school?” asked Russo, trying to conceal his skepticism. “Did I hear you correctly, sir?”

  Nodding once, the admiral did not look up, but continued to scan and sign documents. “I’ve reviewed your college records, and you meet the basic academic requirements to attend the nuke course,” he said. “Bear in mind that you will still have to undergo a personal interview with Admiral Rickover before you can be enrolled, but I am confident that we can adequately prepare you for that hurdle.”

  “And the follow-on assignment, sir?” asked Russo. “What would that entail?”

  “One step at a time, Russo. If I didn’t make myself clear, there will be no follow-on assignment if you do not complete the nuclear propulsion course. Was that not clear? In any event, we will not discuss the specifics of the follow-up assignment until after you return from your nuclear training.”

  Russo considered the admiral’s offer. He was already over two years behind his contemporaries, and now Tarbox expected him to essentially mark time for an entire year without any clear objective on the horizon? And nuclear training? To what end? The admiral’s offer was puzzling at best.

  Tarbox cleared his throat and asked, “Well?”

  “I appreciate your offer, Admiral, but since I intend to continue my flying career, I don’t see how this nuclear training could possibly be relevant to—”

  “Relevant? Ha! I decide what’s relevant,” hissed Tarbox, finally looking up from his paperwork to fix Russo with a baleful gaze. “You can accept my offer, or you can go back to the Air Force. As for flying, from what I’ve gleaned of your prospects, you would be lucky to fly anything with wings.”

  Russo’s heart sank; the admiral was absolutely correct. “Can you at least grant me some time to think about this, sir?” he asked. “Please? Five years is a very significant commitment.”

  “You want time to think, Russo? Certainly. My offer expires in two minutes, so you now have 120 seconds to make up your mind.”

  Waffle ’n’ Egg Diner, Dayton, Ohio

  9:30 a.m., Friday, December 19, 1969

  Morozov had grown accustomed to eating breakfast in this diner. Usually bustling, it was presently deserted, save for an elderly man at the counter, reading the morning newspaper, and three middle-aged women occupying a booth near the entrance.

  The trio of women plied themselves with hot chocolate as they prepared for a last-ditch shopping foray, comparing objectives and strategies like field marshals before a major campaign. The place was festooned with chintzy decorations. Strands of paper garland were draped between the light fixtures over the Formica counter. From the jukebox, Bing Crosby crooned “White Christmas.”

  The short-order cook, a ponderous bald man in his fifties, warily kept an eye on the door to the stockroom. A ragged scrap of mistletoe hung down from the doorframe and he obviously stood vigilant to pounce on any waitress dim-witted enough to linger in the portal for more than a fleeting second. By Morozov’s observation, none of the women appeared likely to oblige.

  Morozov dumped sugar into his coffee and stirred it with his fork. He was disgusted with the sweet tooth he had developed since being posted to Ohio. Before coming here, he had maintained a fairly ascetic existence, depriving himself of all but the most basic staples.

  Savoring the syrupy concoction, he thought it was just as well he spoil himself while he still had the opportunity, since this was likely the last time he would enjoy sugar in such plentiful supply. It was all but unavailable back home in the Soviet Union, despite their cozy relationship with Cuba. Perhaps the sweet stuff was a luxury reserved solely for the nomenklatura, much like the rumored shiploads of rum and cigars that arrived weekly from the Caribbean bastion of Communism.

  He sighed as he looked at this morning’s headline: “AIR FORCE SHELVES BLUE BOOK.” A smaller headline stated “UFO Research Project to Shut Down.” He had already received official word that his mission was to be curtailed, now that the Blue Book project was defunct. Tomorrow, he would pack up his belongings, move out of his rented room, and board a Trailways bus for the long ride back to Washington.

  Since this mission had been such an abject failure, his future prospects were woefully dim. His dreams of a vaunted posting to Hanoi were quickly fading. In fact, he now dreaded a hasty summons back to the Aquarium—the GRU headquarters at Khodinka Airfield near Moscow—with demands for a complete accounting of the money and resources poured into this dry hole.

  Despite Hara’s assurances that Hangar Three was home to a facility that reverse-engineered Soviet aircraft, Morozov still harbored thoughts that perhaps Yost had been telling the truth all along and the Americans were so protective of their UFO secrets that they had been willing to sacrifice him.

  He even considered Jimmy Hara’s death to be peculiar. According to Carr, his information source within the base hospital at Wright-Patterson, Hara had been earnest when he claimed that he was dying of leukemia. In fact, he had succumbed in late October, not long after they had rendezvoused in the cemetery. After reviewing Hara’s medical reports, Morozov learned that Hara’s particular medical condition was often caused by exposure to intense radiation, which caused to him to question what it was that Hara worked with in Hangar Three, and whether it was really hand-me-down MIGs and Sukhois as Hara claimed. Another odd twist was that Carr was hastily reassigned to Alaska not long after he had provided the information about Hara’s records. Anyway, there is just no way of knowing, thought Morozov. The only absolutely sure things were that this aggravating mission was finally over, despite his lingering questions, and he had a bus to catch tomorrow.

  Auxiliary Field Ten, Eglin Air Force Base, Florida

  2:45 p.m., Saturday, January 10, 1970

  Sitting cross-legged at the base of a large pine tree, Glades had positioned himself on a slight rise, at a spot where he could observe the kill zone and all the inner workings of the ambush. The kill zone was a short stretch of gravel road in an isolated area of Aux One-Oh. The road transected a sparsely wooded area dominated by small groves of scraggly pines, sumac shrubs, and various scrub oaks.

  It was a dreary afternoon. A slight but steady wind blew from the south, bringing cold air from the Gulf of Mexico. Shivering slightly, Glades buttoned the two buttons of the green acetate “sleeping shirt” that he wore under his jungle fatigue jacket for extra warmth. He had been back at Eglin for less than a month, returning just in time for Christmas. Over the years that he had cycled between Eglin and Southeast Asia, he discovered that while he was able to quickly shift his mental gears to adapt to the different pace and circumstances, his body did not acclimatize as swiftly. His internal thermostat seemed permanently set for the moist heat of Vietnam, and he didn’t adjust well to the damp cool winters of the Florida Panhandle.

&nbs
p; Leaning back against the pine’s scaly bark, he looked at the tiny metal calendar clipped to his watchband. He had been in the field for eighteen days out of the past three weeks. He looked forward to tomorrow, when he could stretch out on the couch, drink a cold beer or two, watch the Super Bowl to see if the AFL Kansas City Chiefs were all they were cracked up to be, and spend time with Deirdre and the kids.

  Today, he was working an additional duty assignment, one that he didn’t especially enjoy. Because of his pre-existing arrangement with the 116th Aerospace Operations Support Wing at Aux One-Oh, Glades had recently been pressed into service as a technical advisor and mentor to a special unit currently being formed within the Wing. The new unit, led by a captain, was a “Rapid Response Flight” of eighteen handpicked men that would deploy immediately in time-sensitive situations. All would attend Army Ranger school, where Glades worked as an instructor between stints in Vietnam, and all eighteen would eventually go to the Army’s HALO free fall school at Fort Bragg.

  Today’s exercise was a daytime rehearsal of a night ambush. More specifically, the drill was one of a series of exercises to refine tactics and techniques for a “silent ambush,” in which the ambush force would use silenced weapons and special procedures to quickly assault an enemy vehicle or small convoy that was carrying captured US personnel.

  In the scenario, which would be rehearsed twice more in daylight before being run twice again tonight, two US pilots were grabbed after ejecting over a remote area in a Third World country. The Rapid Response Flight would stop the convoy, take back the pilots, and then immediately prepare them to be extracted by a Fulton STAR—Surface to Air Recovery—“Skyhook” system flown by an MC-130 Combat Talon aircraft.