by Cliff Ball
“You bet I’m shocked, but at least you look human enough. This is really crazy; Amelia’s an alien, who knew? This feels like something out of the Amazing Stories magazine I recently read. Am I supposed to ask you to take me to your leader?” the officer shook his head no, “Ok, well, lead the way to wherever you’re gonna take me.” The officer and his guards took the two and led them off for processing by the Terran authorities.
The ships’ crew scattered pieces of the Lockheed 10E Electra all over Howland Island and then the ship flew off towards Terra. The United States conducted a massive search all over the Pacific and didn’t find the aircraft parts until someone independent of the government found the parts on Howland Island. There was speculation that Japan had shot the aircraft down, even though Japan claimed they hadn’t, and took Earhart and Noonan prisoner, but that theory was laid to rest when the United States occupied Japan after World War Two. On Terra, Fred Noonan actually thrived for the short time, in Terran terms, that he lived on Terra. He worked on starship navigation systems, which took him a very short time to learn, and he found he enjoyed working on technologies that had been beyond his imagination a few years earlier. As for Susan Transavera, even though she was banned from leaving Terra, she was asked by historical societies and universities to speak about her experiences flying primitive Earth aircraft and how she dealt with living in a somewhat technologically backward society. She claimed she enjoyed Earth, especially since she lived in Malibu, California when she wasn’t flying and got to live in a house near the ocean. She missed flying propeller driven aircraft, so she had a replica of her last plane built and flew it all over Terra, which gave her a following of people who wanted to do the same thing, since propeller driven aircraft hadn’t been used since the Terrans had originally left Earth. Susan was also asked by a publisher to write about her adventures on Earth, she does, and the book ends up on the Terran bestseller list. So, the punishment ended up not being much of a punishment for the flier known on Earth as Amelia Earhart.
Chapter Seven
World War Two breaks out on Earth and the Terrans note that this time it really is a worldwide war, fighting was occurring in the oceans, the seas, and on six continents. Terran scientists predict that Germany would conquer Europe and Africa, while Japan would take all of Asia and the Pacific Islands, including the Australian continent. Once both countries conquered those regions, the Terrans thought Japan and Germany would team up and conquer North and South America. Hitler, they reasoned, would then turn on Japan, conquering them and their territories, and then he would have the whole world to himself. The prediction fell apart when Hitler made a strategically bad blunder when he ordered an attack on the Soviet Union while still trying to take over Western Europe and bombing England into submission and when Japan miscalculated the reaction the United States would have when they bombed Pearl Harbor.
When the United States ends up testing up a nuclear weapon in the desert of New Mexico, this threw out the prediction of humans not inventing nuclear weapons or nuclear power until the end of the twentieth century. The next question was whom would the Americans use it on, Tokyo or Berlin? Berlin made more sense, with it being easier to fly to than Japan, but the Germans surrendered after a massive invasion by the Allies, so the nukes wouldn’t be used on them; however, the apparent logistics of nuking the Japanese seemed nearly impossible for the current state of technology on Earth. Japan was further than any American bomber could fly, and it could be quite dangerous to any naval ship to carry a nuke and then be attacked, because it could go off. The Americans though, seemed to like pulling off the impossible, because they managed to drop two bombs on Japan within a week, causing the Japanese to surrender. After those two failed predictions, the Terrans decided it would be best to end the predictions and stop underestimating this current generation of mankind.
After the war, the United States and the Soviet Union entered a state of cold war between the two superpowers and both started testing bigger and more advanced atomic bombs, underground, in the Pacific, and the frozen continent of Antarctica. The thought never occurred to the Terrans that the Ragnor would return to Earth when one of their ships detected the energy pulses given off by these bombs. The Ragnor sent two scout ships so that they could search the Earth and find the locations of nuclear weapons laboratories. As one of the Ragnor ships flew over North America, mainly over the United States, people on the ground begin claiming they were seeing flying saucers. The cloak of the Ragnor ships’ was making it appear that the ship was a flying saucer, because apparently the cloak was not very effective inside of Earths’ atmosphere, and not only that, but the United States Army was able to track the ship on radar because of the flaw in the design of the alien ship. As the ship flew across the country, air bases sent out P-51 fighters to try to intercept the fast moving craft; some people on the ground even attempted to shoot down the Ragnor ship with rifles and shotguns, which was not in any way effective.
The alien ship stopped and hovered over Los Alamos, New Mexico, when the Ragnor detected a high amount of radiation in the area. Nearby, at the Roswell Army Air Field, the control tower picked up the ship on radar, the pilots were called to scramble their fighter aircraft, and intercept the bogey. A few minutes later, a P-51 pilot by the name of Chuck Yeager intercepted the Ragnor ship, made a few circles around it to check out the ship, tried to communicate with the ship, and then contacted flight control in Roswell, “Flight Control, this is Yeager, I’ve intercepted the bogey. It definitely looks like nothing I’ve ever seen; all attempts to contact the craft have failed. I am now going to try to shoot the unidentified flying object down. I will keep you informed, Yeager out.”
The Ragnor were not paying attention to the human aircraft flying around their ship, since they obviously thought they were invisible to the humans, until a hail of aircraft bullets hit the ship. They attempted to leave the area since they had no weapons on these scout ships, but whomever the human pilot was, seemed determined to shoot them down. The other Ragnor ship was contacted and informed that the one in North America was being shot at, so the other one was supposed to immediately leave Earth, their secret cover now blown. Yeager was wishing he had some missiles on his plane, but, unfortunately for him, guided missiles for aircraft were in the planning stages, so he kept shooting at the UFO. One of his bullets must’ve hit something important, because the alien ship started having smoke pour out of it, so Yeager targeted the area. The alien ship flew north briefly, then plunged to Earth outside of Roswell, as Yeager pursued it all the way. The ship crashed, leaving debris all over the place, Yeager then contacted Roswell, “This is Yeager, the UFO is down, repeat the UFO is down. It has crashed outside of Roswell and there’s a visible plume of smoke coming from the crash site. I suggest someone contain the site immediately. Over,”
“This is Roswell; we have personnel being sent to the crash site to clean it up as we speak. Thank you, pilot, for your efforts at taking down the UFO. Over and out.” responded the control tower at Roswell.
Soldiers swarmed the crash site twenty minutes later, picking up debris and cordoning off the area. A farmer, whose land this was that the Ragnor ship crashed on, was standing near the remains of the crashed ship with a shotgun in his hands, waiting for whatever it was that was inside the ship to come outside, even though he was frightened to death it was something that may kill him. An Army officer approached him, and said, “This site is off-limits to civilians, you need to leave.”
“This is my land; you can’t just take it away from me. How about you get this here wreckage off of my land, you pay me not to talk, and I won’t be any trouble at all to the government.”
The officer thought about it for a few seconds, and then replied, “Ok, you will have to sign a confidentiality agreement to never reveal what you’ve seen here today. If we ever find out that you went to the press and told them you saw aliens or an alien spacecraft, then the government will seize your property and make you go away. Is that crystal cl
ear?”
“Clear as a bell, sir.” then the farmer sarcastically saluted the officer and walked away.
An Army engineer found a hatch on the alien spacecraft, so he and a few others pried it open, and carefully made their way inside. The technology they were looking at was beyond their level of experience, so none of them knew what to make of it, but they found the control center of the ship, and found four tall, bluish looking aliens. Three of them were obviously dead, while one appeared unconscious, so medical staff were called in and the aliens were all removed to a specially set up hangar at the base in Roswell, along with the ship itself. The three dead aliens were put in the morgue so that they could be looked at later on and dissected, while the unconscious one was sent to a special medical unit set up inside of the hangar. The base commander called President Truman about the situation, who had been informed about the people who witnessed a flying saucer around the nation.
“I will be there tomorrow to look over the situation, General. I’ve ordered certain measures to be taken to get these flying saucer stories out of the newspapers and to convince people what they saw was not what they think they saw. I’ve also been in contact with the Soviets, who also shot down an alien craft of their own, but no aliens survived the crash, at least that’s what they say. I currently have more pressing matters to attend to General, so good afternoon, and I’ll see you tomorrow.”
The next morning, newspapers around the country had articles making fun of the claims that people saw flying saucers. One man, who had tried to shoot down the Ragnor ship with his shotgun when it flew over his house, was told by the government to show the rest of America that what he actually shot at and what was found in his yard was a twenty inch saw blade, which the government said he allegedly claimed to be a flying saucer. Another article had a scientist claiming all he saw were flying cups, dishes, and the like; those were the flying saucers everyone claimed to see, there was no such thing as aliens. Others claimed they were just playing pranks, there was no alien spacecraft, and it was just for fun. At first, officers at Roswell Field said it was some sort of craft that had crashed, but, then they issued a press release the next day saying that a weather balloon failed, had crashed on some farm land outside of town, and the bodies were actually test dummies testing the upper atmosphere. The farmer and a few newspapers that the General called up even backed the claim. President Truman arrived in Roswell shortly before noon and went directly to Hangar 18, the site of the alien ship and live alien.
Truman was escorted into the hangar and the first thing he saw was the alien ship. Even though it was damaged, the ship itself was still mostly intact. He walked around it for a few minutes, inspecting the ship, and then asked, “Does the Army Air Force have any plans to rip this apart and use the technology for ourselves?”
“We do, sir. The plan is to take apart the craft and see if we can’t make heads or tails of the technology, then adjust it for our own use and understanding. I’d like to take it back to Wright Field in Dayton so we can study the flight mechanics of this craft and then apply it to our aircraft.” responded the head engineer in charge of the alien spacecraft.
“No, Wright Field isn’t the location I had in mind for the ship to be housed and studied. There is a facility in Nevada that is being secretly built to test all of our newest technological innovations, code-named Area 51. This ship and its only alien survivor will be taken there and studied for the benefit of the American people. Now, where’s the alien?” asked Truman.
Truman was led to the back of the hangar where the medical unit was set up for the injured alien. Truman was slightly shocked when he saw the tall, blue, small-eyed alien, who was conscious and looking directly at the president when he entered the aliens’ direct field of vision. “Can you communicate with it?” asked Truman.
“Yes sir, Mr. President. Apparently, the alien has a sort of translation device imbedded in his vocal chords and eardrum, so they can understand and communicate with us. Would you like to ask it something, Mr. President?” asked the medical technician, keeping a wary eye on the alien.
Yes, of course. Greetings, to you, alien visitor from another planet. I am President of the United States, Harry S. Truman. Let’s get to the point; I want to know why you’re here.”
The alien responded in the mechanical voice of the translator, “We are here because humans are an inferior species to us and you make for good experiments. We detected the energy pulses of your nuclear weapons and wanted to find out what was going on. You, the Terrans, and all the others are a plague to the galaxy.”
“You know we will put a stop to your nefarious schemes, do you not?” responded Truman.
“I doubt it, human. Your species has been slow to develop; it’s surprising to us that the Terrans come from your planet, as advanced as they are.”
“That’s the second time you mention Terrans. Who are they?”
“You will come against them eventually; some even live and work on this planet. They have been trying to manipulate the direction of your planet for over a millennium, so that they can drag you into their war against us. Neither of your species will succeed.” bragged the Ragnor.
“You don’t know the ingenuity of the American people, we will find out where your planet is and eventually we will pay a visit there. We will also root out these Terrans and give them what for, I guarantee,” then turning to the med tech, “make sure you find out all you can about its species and how to figure out the technology on that ship of theirs. Once you are at Area 51, I authorize you and your team and any future teams to find out the information we want by any means necessary,” then to the General, “When I get back to Washington, I will issue the Majestic-12 Executive Order and authorize everything you need to get this done, and consider this the highest state secret the United States has ever had, so that means it is against the law for anyone with knowledge of this to talk about or refer to this. I will also inform the Joint Chiefs and the Secretary of Defense that no President, other than me at the moment, will know about this until such a time necessary for the President to know the details and act upon the information. Good day, gentlemen.”
The Majestic-12 were an elite group of men, six civilians and six highly ranked military men, chosen by Truman to keep the aliens, Area 51, and everything associated with it a secret. Truman had James Forrestal, the first Secretary of Defense, become the head of the entire group, who in turn chose the head of the Central Intelligence Agency, Rear Admiral Roscoe H. Hillenkoetter, to operate the facility. Others were given specific tasks to misdirect, misinform, and deny everything. Maps of the United States were re-drawn, so that it appeared there was nothing but Nellis Air Force Base in the vicinity. Some people with special knowledge were also put into positions at Wright Field, where another Hangar 18 was constructed to build and test, they hoped, some of the flight technology that would come from investigating the alien spaceship.
Wright was also where the first stages of Project Sign, then finally, Project Blue Book would originate. Project Sign was to investigate any reports of UFO’s, and if possible, find a reasonable explanation as to what people were actually seeing, and then deny everything having to do with investigating reports of UFO’s. Project Blue Book was used to determine if UFO’s were a threat to national security, see what could be done to protect the United States from these threats, and then respond accordingly. Blue Book was also supposed to find and evaluate any new technology coming from UFO’s, so as to defend the United States from the Soviet Union, if they ever attacked. Eventually, both Projects were shut down and all knowledge of both were disavowed and anyone who found out about it was investigated, visited by mysterious men in black, and threatened that if they didn’t keep their mouths shut, they would disappear or be made to look like they were crazy and saw conspiracies everywhere. Most cooperated with the secret government agents.
Chapter Eight
At Area 51, the alien spacecraft was housed in an underground facility that could withstand a
ny kind of nuclear explosion. The Joint Chiefs assigned Air Force engineers to take the ship apart and study all the various components required for it to work, and if possible, implement all alien technology into human technology. The individual Ragnor, who was still alive and none too happy with his situation, was coerced into helping the humans develop the means for supersonic flight, since no current aircraft in the inventory of the new military branch of the United States Air Force was capable of going fast enough to fly faster than the speed of sound, and all previous attempts had met with absolute failure. The Ragnor was taken to his computer, since the human scientists knew this was a computer, even though it was light years ahead of the ENIAC, and they watched as the alien accessed the information for traveling faster than the speed of sound. When the information appeared on the computer monitor, the Ragnor said, “The information you primitive humans seek is now on this monitor. What do you need to know?”
“We need to know how to keep our aircraft from breaking apart. When the last couple of attempts were made, the skin of the airplanes began peeling off, forcing the pilot to eject. On another flight, an engine failed and blew up, killing the pilot. We’re not sure what caused the malfunctions, can you help us with this?” asked one of the flight engineers.
“Your attempts at supersonic flight have failed because you are an inferior species and you have primitive machines and inferior equipment. Your aircraft does not have the right materials nor do they appear streamlined enough for speed of sound flight; therefore, I will show you how to make the right materials so you can achieve this minor milestone in your history.”
