Event

FIFTEEN

The four converted C-41 war-surplus Dakotas touched down on the runway at Roswell Army Airfield at eight that night. They passed row upon row of Boeing B-29 bombers lining the runway and taxied to a small hangar, all the time under the watchful eyes of air police, who escorted them in four jeeps. Lee wasn't concerned with their presence. As he looked out his window, he saw the giant Boeing bombers and noticed how the aging birds still looked lethal. The 509th Composite Bomb Group was world famous for a plane that was once listed among its ranks, named the Enola Gay.

The bomber-group intelligence officer, Colonel William Blanchard, stood at the bottom of the staircase after it was rolled into place by the base ground crew. The high wind was flapping the bottom of the officer's trousers, and he held on to his hat as he waited for Lee to descend.

"General Lee, I had heard you were a private citizen after your service during the war." The colonel extended his hand. The offered handshake was ignored by Lee. He was followed down the staircase by men who carried bags and boxes full of equipment. The second, third, and fourth Dakotas were unloading larger pieces of equipment, and the Event Group's security teams exited through the rolling side door used for cargo. Garrison wasn't at all surprised the base's intelligence officer knew of him and whom he used to work for.

Lee looked at the base roster sheet he had studied on the plane ride over. "You must be Colonel Blanchard?"

"Yes, sir."

"Colonel, where is your commanding officer?"

"The base com--"

"I don't need the base commander, Colonel, I mean the man that's in charge of"--Lee once again looked at his clipboard and flipped a few of the pages that had been wired from Washington--"Operation Purple Sage."

Blanchard seemed taken aback by this. "I don't think you know the way army intelligence works any longer, sir."

Lee smiled and tilted his hat back, fully exposing his eye patch. "Colonel, two years ago I was still a brigadier general on active duty in the OSS. I now hold a civil rank equivalent to that of a four-star general, so don't you dare pretend to tell me how the army or its intelligence apparatus operate. Johnson! Bridewell!" he called over his shoulder.

Two men broke away from the Group's security team and ran to where Lee and the colonel were standing. They wore army fatigues and were carrying sidearms.

"If the Colonel says anything other than 'Yes, sir' and doesn't lead us to where they either have the wreckage, or to the gentleman in charge of this investigation, arrest him on charges of disobeying a direct order from the president of the United States and obstructing an official presidential inquiry."

The two men moved to either side of Colonel Blanchard and stood at parade rest.

"Very well, if the president wants amateurs running this show, it's his funeral," the colonel said into the rising wind, then abruptly turned and started for the hangar entrance.

They followed Blanchard as if they were in a parade. Garrison had assembled the largest field team since the Lincoln Raid on Ararat in 1863. He had metallurgists, language experts, paleontologists, atomic and medical-research scientists, quantum theorists, structural engineers, machining experts, and sixty security personnel. The quantum theorists were on loan from his friend at Princeton, Albert Einstein. They had been flown from New Jersey into the dirt runway at Las Vegas by his P-51s and weren't at all happy about it. He knew Albert would charge him a huge favor in the near future for the loan.

Blanchard walked over to one of the huge hangars that held sway over Roswell Army Airfield. It was large enough to house two B-29s side by side. Military police had surrounded the building, and they all carried Ml carbines or Thompson submachine guns. The colonel glanced over his shoulder at Lee and gave him a sour look as he saw the Group's security personnel advance on the MPs and give them new orders. He scowled and then opened a small door just to the left side of the large hangar doors. Lee followed him into a spacious office with several people in the smoke-filled room. Colonel Blanchard walked over to a surprised man in a white shirt and whispered something to him.

Lee scanned the faces in the room as his security team followed him into the office. They closed the door behind them, shutting out the noise of the blowing wind, and totally surrounded the men in the office.

The men standing around in mild shock were the intelligence types Lee had come to know well during his hitch in the Office of Strategic Services. But it was the one man who was seated all alone at a table that caught Lee's immediate attention, as he definitely looked as if he didn't belong there. He was sweating profusely because of the huge light they had trained on him. The disheveled man looked at Lee with a dull gaze, then quickly looked away. Garrison spied an officer standing against the far wall. He recognized this man from the roster and briefing material, which included his photograph. Major Jesse Marcel. He held Lee's gaze, then slowly shook his head.

"Can I help you... General Lee, is it?" asked the man with whom Blanchard had spoken. He stepped forward and held out his hand and said, "I'm Charles Hendrix, Army Intelligence, and special adviser to General LeMay."

Lee continued to look at the man in dungarees and sweaty denim work shirt sitting with head lowered at the table. He handed the letter from the president over to Hendrix instead of shaking his hand, not sparing the man a glance while doing so.

Hendrix read the letter, first frowning, then with a shrug of his shoulders. "The president shouldn't be too concerned with what we have here."

Lee knew the type of man who faced him. He had run into a few during the war. Their favorite saying, "For the good of the country," was a phrase this man would use to justify everything from torture to murder.

"Would you like to tell President Truman he shouldn't be concerned, personally, Mr. Hendrix? And if you're looking for a title to use in connection with me, try The Man in Charger

"The point I'm trying to make is, I think the president has little understanding of what has happened here," Hendrix said, taking a Camel cigarette out of the pack in his shirt.

Lee smiled. "You may be surprised by what he understands, and if he has little understanding of this situation, it's because someone is not passing on the adequate amount of intelligence. Don't ever play word games with me again." Lee pulled out a chair next to the man sitting at the table and slowly sat down. He removed his hat and placed it on the table. He gave the man what he hoped was a comforting smile to try to relax him, knowing at the same time his scar might have just the opposite effect.

"This man is being detained for questioning," Hendrix said calmly as he paused with the match held an inch from his cigarette.

Garrison turned and looked at the man from Army Intelligence, then back at the scared gentleman with his head lowered at the table.

"Sergeant Thompson, remove this light, please."

One of the security men in the detail walked to the wall and pulled a plug. The area of table where it had been shining darkened to a more comfortable setting from the soft fluorescent lighting from the ceiling.

"Don't know about you, but bright light hurts my eye."

The man at the table didn't respond; he just raised a shaking hand up to his face and touched a bruised spot on his cheek.

"Who are you, sir?" Lee asked.

"Br... Br... Brazel," he answered.

Lee searched the notes he had taken from a Teletype he had received from Washington. The name was familiar. "You work a ranch about... what, seventy miles from here, don't you?"

The thin man looked at the senator and then looked quickly at Hendrix standing behind Lee, who was calmly looking down at him. Lee caught the movement of the man's eyes and thought, This man is scared to death,

"Mr. Brazel, make no mistake, I'm the boss man here. I speak on behalf of the president of the United States." Lee placed a hand on the man's knee and patted it softly.

Suddenly the man's right arm went up and he pointed to Hendrix. "That's what he said, said the president wanted me to say it was a lie what I found." Brazel lowered his eyes. "What I found was real," he mumbled in a barely audible whisper.

Lee looked at Hendrix, who arrogantly returned the stare.

"That was a lie itself, Mr. Brazel. The president wouldn't ask that. He may ask that you stay quiet about this, but not to lie."

"No?" was all the man asked. He was looking deeply into Lee's eye, trying to see if there was truth there.

"No, Mr. Brazel. This man said that, not President Truman."

"He said something bad could happen to me and mine, said we would never be found."

Lee closed his eye and tried not to turn to face Hendrix. Instead, he patted the man on the leg again. "No one is going to harm you or your family, Mr. Brazel, I promise you that." He leaned forward and looked into the man's face.

"Now, you found some wreckage from something that crashed out on your ranch, correct?"

"Yes, sir, that and the three small green fellas I found the day after."

Lee was stunned. "You found bodies?" He turned to look at Hendrix. "That wasn't in the reports to Washington."

Hendrix stomped his foot and walked away and whispered something to Colonel Blanchard, who in turn started for the side exit.

Lee snapped his fingers and a Colt .45 appeared in Staff Sergeant Johnson's right hand. He pointed it straight at Colonel Blanchard. The man came to a halt and raised his hands slightly, as if he were embarrassed and didn't know how to proceed.

"Are you going to shoot an officer in the United States Air Corps, Lee?" Hendrix asked.

"You bet. You weren't hesitating to threaten Mr. Brazel here." Lee nodded toward the rancher. "What makes you any better than the very people you are sworn to protect?"

Hendrix took this all in with a calm that only experience could teach. But Garrison could also see the muscles in the man's jaw working in slow clenching movements. He definitely wasn't used to having his orders countermanded.

"You found three crewmen in the wreckage?" Lee asked, still looking at Hendrix.

"Yes, sir, I saw one thingamajig knock down the other, leastways that's what I thought I saw. Then the one... air-a-plane or whatever smashed into the ground. Next day I found the three green fellas in the wreckage, only they wasn't people like you and me, arid one of the little guys was hurt real bad. The other two were as dead as doornails and it looked like coyotes had a go at 'em."

"You mean you witnessed a collision of some sort between craft?"

"Wasn't no collision, 'cause the other thing in the sky just took off. It was like one car running the other off the road. He wanted me to lie about that too," Brazel said, nodding toward Hendrix.

Lee stood and pointed to six security men standing just inside the door. "You men, place Mr. Hendrix under arrest."

"You don't know what you're doing, Lee, General LeMay gave me orders to--"

Lee cut him off. "Curtis LeMay takes his orders from the president, just like every man in this room!" Garrison's voice echoed in the huge hangar. Lee stood and with a strong arm gently assisted the rancher to his feet. "Mr. Brazel, please accept the apology of the U.S. Army for their decidedly unprofessional behavior. This... this episode hasn't brought out the best in people. They're scared." Lee grasped the man's limp hand and shook it. "Rest assured, sir, we don't eliminate American citizens." Or very seldom do, he thought.

Brazel let his hand be shaken. He was still sweating.

"But I would ask a personal favor of you, sir, if I could?"

Mac Brazel just looked at Lee.

"Don't say anything about this to anyone unless you hear from me that it's all right to do so, fair?"

"Fair enough, not a word," Brazel said with a slow deliberateness that told Lee this man would keep his word. Then Lee noticed a slow curl of Brazel's upper lip; it was the first smile he had seen on the man's face.

"Sir, on behalf of President Truman, I wish to thank you. Mr. Elliott here will escort you home." Lee gestured for his meteorologist, who stepped forward and shook hands with the rancher. "He has some questions he would like to ask about the weather that night in and around your ranch. Give him a full description of both craft, everything you can remember."

"Yes, sir, I will. But one thing I know, that weren't any accident. One of those things hit the other on purpose."

Lee just nodded, thinking about the man's bizarre statement.

"Where do I get transportation, sir?" Elliott turned and asked Lee.

"Steal it," Lee said. "I don't think the 509th Bomb Group will miss a jeep for a few hours."

"Yes, sir," Elliott said, gesturing for Brazel to follow. He was stopped by a lieutenant in Lee's security force and given a Colt .45 automatic.

"Just in case someone outside of our group has any ideas about tagging along behind you, I'll have two more jeeps with our men in them escorting you. But if you're approached by anyone other than our people, don't be afraid to use that." Then the lieutenant turned to Lee. "Senator, I recommend we station a couple of our people with Mr. Brazel." He said it loud enough to make sure others heard it.

"Thank you. Elliott, get everything you can about this collision that knocked this second disk out of the sky. Mr. Brazel, again, thank you, sir."

Garrison watched and waited until the two men had stepped out into the night's windy darkness. When the door was open, the loud engine noise of a B-29 bomber was heard.

"The rest of my team is already inside." Lee turned to the dark-haired major who had stood silently through the bizarre scene of a moment before. "Major Marcel, isn't it?"

The man stepped forward and gave a quick nod of his head. "Yes, sir, and your team is already coordinating with our base investigators."

"Excellent. Was that your idea, Major Marcel?"

"Yes, sir, I was hoping someone would show up with a little common sense, so I left orders to cooperate in advance."

Lee turned to face Hendrix and was silent as he watched the man light another cigarette.

"For Mr. Brazel and anyone else you may have on this base, Mr. Hendrix, you could be brought up on charges for kidnapping and, most probably from the looks of your guest, assault. And did you expect to hide the fact you had a survivor, or that there was evidence of another craft in the same area as the first?"

Hendrix tossed the burnt match away. "I know you, Lee. I was also briefed. You were with that old dinosaur, 'Wild Bill' Donovan and those OSS boys, so let me tell you a little secret: things have changed."

Lee just glared at Hendrix as if he were some strange bug.

"If you were one of the best and the brightest, you should know how we work, Lee, how the job gets done," Hendrix continued, even though Garrison had heard enough and turned and walked away. "We have a unique situation here and you can't be allowed to foul it up," he called out loudly. "A few of the new guard have a saying that you may want to embrace for the hard years ahead. It's called controlled violence, and it means the gloves come off and anything and everything goes, just like our little Red friends in Russia."

Lee slowed but didn't stop walking toward the door.

"And another thing, the controlling of information is paramount in today's world, keeping it from the public, who have always been too adolescent to understand the real world. We'll play like the rest of the bullies on the block now, no more Pearl Harbors."

Lee stopped and almost turned around to answer Hendrix, but he just took a breath and continued on. He knew that man was more than likely the future of intelligence, and he also knew it wouldn't be the last time he would run into him, or another hundred just like him.

"The world Will be a place you won't recognize in ten years; it's going to become very cold and hard."

Garrison knew Hendrix might be right, but today, all he could do was control his small corner of this changing world. Lee ignored Hendrix, just shook his head sadly, then stepped into the brightly lit hangar to face the Event that would change the world forever.

The hangar looked even larger from the inside than it did from out. Extra lighting had been installed in the last twenty-four hours to give added illumination. Pratt & Whitney, Rolls-Royce, and other engine brands waiting to be installed in aircraft or under repair lined the walls as they had hastily been pushed aside so the area could hold the remains of a very different kind of aircraft.

Lee studied the wreckage that littered the expanse of oilstained floor. It seemed there was enough to account for ten B-29s. The wreckage had the color of unpainted aluminum, bright and shining. Some of the pieces of debris were of brightly colored violets and reds. Some of it was large, others small as confetti. Some were box-shaped, others in strange pentangle and quadrangle configurations.

As Garrison watched his people moving from one piece to another, he noticed an area in the back of the old wooden hangar that had been sectioned off by what appeared to be large plastic sheets. Outside of the semitransparent area there was a mixture of the base's air police contingent and the Event Group's own marine and army security personnel. Lee could see strange and ghostly shadows of men walking inside due to the brighter lighting installed there.

As the director started to walk in that direction, Ken Early, the team's metallurgist, stopped him.

"Sir, I think we have something here you should see right off." Ken was holding out a piece of the strange metal for Lee's scrutiny. It was small, about the size of a regular postal envelope. Around the edges were what looked like dots and dashes. Interspersed with these were symbols such as lines through circles and smaller circles inside pyramids and other octagon-shaped glyphs.

"Are the linguists working on this writing or whatever it is?" Lee asked.

Early looked from the metal in his hand to his boss, then swung around to look at the others in his team. His white lab coat was already dirty. "Uh, yes, sir, I think they are already on it." He shrugged, letting his thick-lensed glasses slide down his nose.

The answer was lost on Lee as a sound the like of which he had never encountered issued from beyond the plastic in the back.

"Look," Early said at his elbow, aware of the noises but choosing to block them out.

Without consciously knowing it, Lee had started toward the rear of the building. Only the metallurgist's voice brought him to a stop.

Early held the piece of metal in his right hand; he slowly closed his stubby fingers around it and crushed it. The sound reminded Lee of saltines being crushed. As the director watched, Early opened his hand, and amazingly the strange metal slowly reverted into its original flat shape.

"Well, I'll be damned," Lee said softly.

"It's like nothing we know of, almost as if each fiber"-- Early hesitated, then corrected himself--"like its genetic makeup and, shape has been programmed into each... each..." He looked lost for a moment, searching for the correct term. "Hell, sir, it remembers what its shape is supposed to be, as if programmed in design. I mean, there are a few polymers that companies like 3M are working with that have tendencies toward healing themselves, but that technology is fifty or sixty years away and is all so much theory right now."

"That is something, Doctor, but if that is the case, what happened to all this other material, why didn't it return to its original shape?"

Early looked around him at some of the twisted wreckage with a look of bewilderment on his face.

"We won't figure this out in one day, Ken. We have to do what we can and start documenting. I don't know how long we'll be able to keep this to ourselves. The military can usually talk presidents into anything, and eventually they'll get their way."

"Yes, sir," Early said, moving quickly back to his materials team.

Lee started for the rear of the building again. The cries had lessened somewhat to small whimpers. As he walked, his personnel were combing through debris and writing and snapping pictures. Except for a few, who glanced up from their work every so often to look toward the sealed-off area, most were busy doing their jobs and seemed totally willing to ignore the scary noises filtering throughout the entire hangar.

Lee walked the final paces to the closed-off tent area and spoke to the two Event guards.

"Bring Mr. Hendrix here," he ordered.

Lee stepped through the flap. The tent smelled of strong antiseptic. Major Marcel had arrived inside ahead of him, and he quickly stepped up to meet him and take him to the doctor.

Lee turned and watched as Hendrix was led into the clean area. Garrison immediately saw three gurneys. Two were covered with white sheets and obviously had something under them; he could see where a dark liquid had soaked through the white cloth of one. A medical team surrounded the third table; these doctors were his people from the Group mixed with base personnel. Dr. Peter Leslie, Captain, U.S. Navy, formerly of Walter Reed Medical Center, was in charge. He was a surgeon handpicked by Lee to lead the medical teams on field finds. He hoped Leslie could handle something like this. The doctor looked up as Lee and his group entered. He gestured for one of the nurses.

"We're trying to keep this area as sterile as we can, please put on those masks."

Lee accepted a gauze mask from the nurse and tied it around his mouth.

"These are appalling conditions. The base surgeon tells me he was kept from treating the survivor at the base clinic."

"Well, Doctor, there hasn't been a hell of a lot of clear thinking going on out here. Now what have we got?" Lee asked.

"Those two there, I understand they were found already dead. The base surgeon reports that the bodies have indications of massive head trauma, more than likely impact-related, and they also show signs of postmortem predator activity." Dr. Leslie pulled back the sheet on the first one. The body had been short, about four feet and thin, the skin was pale green and it had a large, hairless head that had been ripped open. One of its large eyes looked as if it had been torn out, and a huge gash ran along the left side of its head from the temple area. The wound looked deep. The remaining eye was partially open, and Lee could see the black orb beyond the thin eyelid. He noticed the black pupil itself was large and had a tint of red in its dilated state. The mouth was small, almost the size of the opening of a beer bottle, and no teeth were visible. Lee looked at the thin frame and the small, rounded belly. The smooth skin was featureless and unlined; veins were coursing through just beneath the grayish-green skin.

Leslie gestured for the director to step forward and view the second figure. "This one died also of crash trauma and was dead when they brought it in."

Lee looked at the doctor and nodded, then walked over to the third gurney. The doctors and nurses made room and moved away. As he looked down, the small, thin lips of the creature trembled, then the small body tensed and went into spasms and it cried out. The sound was piercing and it brought to mind the cries of an injured child.

"Can you do something for its pain?" Lee asked, removing his hat and holding it tightly.

"I'm absolutely terrified of killing it with any assistance I give it. We don't know its metabolism or nervous system. For all we know our pain-reducing drugs could kill it. I hate seeing it like this, but the consensus of everyone here is that it's just too dangerous."

"Can you save it, Doctor?" Lee asked.

Leslie looked at his shoes, then glanced at his colleagues. "With the right facilities and--"

"Is it going to live?" Lee demanded.

"No. It has massive internal bleeding from wounds that we just can't close up. It's so delicate our sutures tear right through its flesh."

"Then use your best guess and ease its pain, Doctor, on my responsibility."

"You can't do that, Lee!" Hendrix yelled, shaking off his guards once again.

Lee saw the small being tense for a moment when the shouted words disturbed it.

"Take that man outside and put him into submission."

"We need the creature awake and answering questions, not spending its last minutes pain-free, goddammit!" Hendrix was screaming as he was pulled from the enclosure. "You better listen to me, Lee, the first saucer was intentionally brought down by that second ship...goddammit, Lee, you have to listen!"

Lee clenched his teeth and gestured for the doctor to do as he had been ordered, and the voice of Hendrix finally faded away.

"Did Hendrix question this being?" Lee asked Marcel.

The major stepped forward and looked around, making sure to keep his voice low. "Hendrix had more than a few minutes alone with the... crewman. I think he got information from it."

Lee shook his head, then gestured for the doctor to get to work.

Leslie quickly grabbed a stainless-steel syringe and a small bottle and pulled an amber liquid into it. "I'm going to treat it as I would a child with similar injuries," he said. "If you're a praying man, Mr. Director, now would be a good time. I don't know what this morphine will do to it."

Lee watched as the doctor easily slid the needle into the small creature's arm. He watched being winced as the syringe penetrated its thin skin.

"With the exception of my group, will you ladies and gentlemen excuse us, please?"

The Roswell base nurses and two doctors left without comment.

Lee turned back in time to see the being's body relax and its pain-filled features grow slack. He was afraid it had died right before his eyes when the small mouth opened and then closed. Leslie carefully lifted its right eyelid and quickly stepped back when the black pupil rolled and looked at him. As Lee watched the startled expression of Leslie, he looked down and saw both eyelids flutter open. The large head rolled and the next thing Lee saw was the small being looking directly at him.

Lee had hoped for something better to come out of his mouth, but when he said, "I'm sorry," he didn't know why.

The creature continued looking at Lee. As Leslie moved back toward the gurney, it moved its head slowly and looked at him. He quickly lifted a thin piece of gauze from its chest and replaced the greenish soaked bandage with another, which the doctor laid as gently as he could on the large puncture wound. He repeated the process with the head wound, and again with an injury on the throat that was deep and more than likely beyond his surgical prowess to repair with any equipment. The small being blinked and took a sharp intake of breath. Its eyes closed and it hissed again. Leslie closed his eyes, knowing it had caused the small thing pain in removing the bandage. Slowly the eyes opened, and to Leslie's and Lee's astonishment, it smiled and blinked its eyes once again.

"I think it may understand you're here to help it, Doctor," Lee ventured.

Leslie nodded, thankful that his intentions had been understood.

The alien slowly rolled its head to the left and took in Lee once again. They watched as its arm rose from its side and slowly pointed at Lee's face. Garrison raised his own hand and felt; then he understood. The small finger was pointing at his patch, or possibly the long scar that marked the right side of his face.

"I was wounded in the war," he said. Then he smiled. "I hope you have no understanding of that."

The creature again looked away. It saw Leslie and its eyes moved to the small chrome table beside the gurney. It again pointed, but this time it was indicating the syringe that had been used to ease its pain.

"No, I don't think we can give you any more, my little friend," Leslie said as softly as he could.

The being again attempted the smile and turned its head back to the left and pointed at Lee, again indicating the scar or eye patch.

"Amazing, I think it believes you are injured and he wants you to have the same shot I gave it," Leslie said.

Lee smiled and slowly reached out and with his fingers gently touched the being's fingertip. The alien again smiled. "I'm afraid this wound is an old one," he said, using his other hand to touch the eye patch.

Lee was watching the small being and leaned closer. "Doctor, could this injury to its neck cause it to lose vocalization?"

"Right now we can't be sure if it talks at all. The wound by itself wouldn't be life-threatening, at least I wouldn't think. But is it keeping it from speaking? I really don't know."

The creature seemed to be listening to their exchange and reached for the gauze-covered wound at its neck. It swallowed and removed the hand and looked at Lee and reached for the scar again. He leaned over so the being could touch. It lightly ran its long, thin finger along the pinkish scar tissue, then lightly touched the patch. Its eyes were slowly opening and closing. The mouth was moving. Still looking at Lee, it swallowed and again reached for its throat.

"W... arrrr," it said barely above a whisper.

Lee was astounded. He looked at Leslie, who nodded that he too had heard the word. Lee turned his attention back to the little creature and jumped when it slowly and painfully sat up with difficulty. It was shaking badly and was obviously in much pain as it attempted to move. Lee and Leslie both tried to gently push the being back onto the white sheets of the gurney. The small alien resisted and looked at Lee with eyes that pleaded for help. Garrison relented and removed his hands. He nodded once at the doctor, and he too stepped away and allowed the visitor to sit up. It turned over on its belly and slowly slid from the gurney, almost falling. Leslie quickly disconnected the IV from its bottle and rolled up the tube.

The alien made first one step, then another tentative and smaller step. Lee and Leslie adjusted to allow for the motion. The small creature stopped after four steps and shook extremely hard, closing its large eyes in pain. Leslie reached out with a fresh square of gauze and dabbed at its chest wound, but the alien wasn't paying him any mind as it reached out and tentatively took Lee's large hand and then took Leslie's. The little hands held on tightly to both men as they slowly made their way from the plastic-lined area of the hangar. As Garrison reached out and parted the curtain that separated the hospital from the rest of the huge hangar, they felt the eyes of the Group on them. People were stunned at the sight of their boss leading the injured alien from the secured area at the back. Hendrix, with his hands now cuffed in front of him, stared wide-eyed at the strange trio as they moved. The alien stopped and watched as the Group security men, their mouths ajar, moved Hendrix back away from its path.

"Major Marcel, quickly remove everyone from the hangar with the exception of my departmental supervisors. All other personnel, including my technicians, are to evacuate the hangar, now," Lee said quietly in rapid-fire orders. He stepped to the front of the small alien to block the view from the interior of the hangar as Marcel started barking orders.

"What did it say, Lee? Tell me!" Hendrix said loudly, startling the small being and forcing it to take a step back. "Tell me, goddammit!"

The small alien narrowed its eyes as it took in the handcuffed Hendrix. The large head first moved left, then right, as if it were sizing up the intelligence man in its mind. The eyes, still narrowed, blinked, and then it moved on, dismissing Hendrix outright.

Lee waited until the last of the technicians were out of the hangar, then he stepped aside and allowed the alien's progress into the hangar's interior to continue.

The supervisory men and women of the Event Group were standing and watching the most amazing happening in history; one by one their activity stopped as the small alien with Lee's and Leslie's assistance gingerly stepped through the debris of the crashed saucer. Its thin legs suddenly became wobbly and it almost collapsed. Lee placed his other arm in the small of its back, helping to support it more firmly. That was when it gently removed its hand from first Lee, then Leslie. It stumbled and fell; both men reached down for it, but it stood quickly and started moving faster through the piles of debris. Event personnel moved out of its way. A couple of the women and at least one of the doctors let out a cry as the alien came a little too close to them as it walked, then stumbled and fell in front of a huge container. Again the body was racked with shudders as it stared up at the enclosure. Leslie grimaced as he could see it was bleeding quite freely from the wound in its chest.

It touched the side of the container and seemed to relax again. Then it lowered its eyes and closed them, and without looking, it pounded softly on the side with its tiny fist, producing a hollow sound that echoed slightly in the large hangar. Then the alien looked up and saw Lee standing over it.

"Destroyer... dead" it whispered.

Lee leaned down. "I don't understand you."

"The Beast..." It swallowed, making a face as if its speaking caused great pain. "Dead" it repeated, then suddenly slid to the floor.

The remaining few people inside the hangar gasped as it fell over. Lee and Leslie immediately reached for it. But Lee was quicker and lifted the small alien into his arms and nodded for Leslie to take the lead. There was loud talking among the group now as they made their way back to the hospital.

"Alright, what you saw is top secret. Now get your teams back in here, let's move, people," Lee said over his shoulder.

The small creature opened its eyes and watched as Lee carried it back to its bed. "No, w... ar. War" it said, and swallowed gingerly. "No ex--tinct man" It reached up and touched Garrison's face. "Man is... safe...for now. No extinct by Destroyer." It smiled far broader than it ever had, then it weakly tapped its chest. "Kill Des... troyer."

Lee quickly returned the small being to its bed and Leslie went to work, applying pressure to get the bleeding to slow.

The alien was looking at Lee, its eyes drooping and its small breaths coming in short gasps. "We use... animal... to assist... our master race, to, to... clear... new worlds... for... Gray Masters.... Destroyer... not... meant for... here, but uninhabited planet... Some Gray... want to... clear... your world...for their... need. I... kill Destroyer, animal... is dead... No... war... this time... but... my masters... try... again maybe... kill your... world"

Lee watched as the being's gaze went beyond him to nothing. He saw the large pupils dilate, then fix. Leslie checked its small chest for some kind of movement but found nothing. Its greenish skin immediately started to turn a grayish white. It had died as if content; it went with a small smile that was now frozen in death.

Lee sat with a distraught Dr. Leslie for ten minutes, then headed toward the exit of the hangar thinking about monsters and war. His head pathologist, Gerald Hildebrand, approached him. "Sir, I'm afraid I have something you must see." The young professor stepped back when he saw the greenish blood that soaked the director's clothing. Lee's eye patch was almost off. Hildebrand reached out and pulled the patch back into place.

Lee absently nodded his head in thanks and placed his fedora on his head.

"You have to see this," Hildebrand said again.

Garrison followed the doctor to a rather large piece of debris. It was at least ten feet high and the same width and also had small canisters attached to its top. Lee remembered it was the same container the small alien had insisted on seeing and touching. He came out of his thoughts as he realized that the animal the small being had called the Destroyer had been in this cage. It now made sense why the alien had to confirm to itself that the creature was dead.

"It's here, sir," Hildebrand said, still looking at Lee with concern.

He followed him to the front of the enclosure. The professor leaned down and pointed to a large brown, jellylike mound on the floor of what Lee now knew was a live-animal cargo container. A disgusting smell emanated from it.

Lee suddenly turned away. "Jesus, that's bad."

"Yes, sir, it is. It looks like whatever it was had been completely covered by something that ate it down to this." Hildebrand removed a fountain pen from his lab coat and slowly slid it into a liquid that had gathered on the floor around the gelatinous mound of material. As he lifted the pen, it slowly began to melt, first bubbling, then turning to liquid as the doctor threw it to the floor. "We tested all three containers separately and received no reaction, but once the chemicals are mixed, it turns corrosive, more so than anything I've ever seen."

Lee listened but didn't comment.

"There are other containers like this one, some small, some large, but none as big as this one, but they all have the same kind of substances in them. It may be genetic material that's been reduced to that," Hildebrand said, pointing to the fluid substance at the floor of the cage.

"Get samples and be careful," Lee said, suddenly tired.

"We did find this in the large container, or what I now believe may have been a cage, sir. It was embedded deep in the metal." He walked over to a nearby table and brought back something for Lee to see. The object was some sort of appendage, large and curved. Its tip was like a shovel, sharp and seemingly serrated at its leading edges. It had to measure a good fifteen inches in length. Some kind of scaly flesh clung to its base.

"If I didn't know any better, I would say that is one hell of a big claw, sir," the doctor said in awe.

Lee nodded, his thoughts turning to what the small being had said about the Destroyer. The director turned and walked away. His mind was traveling a hundred miles an hour. "The Destroyer" he mumbled to himself as he entered the hangar's office once again. Could Brazel be right, could one of the saucers have brought the other down? Could this have been a... God, could this have been some freakish act of war?

The room was empty and he walked to the phone and dialed fifteen numbers. He waited for the clicks and the chirps to stop and for the phone on the other end to ring.

"Yes."

"Mr. President, Garrison Lee reporting, sir," he said into the black handset. He rubbed the bridge of his nose with his left forefinger and thumb.

"What's goin' on down there, Lee?" Truman asked.

He hesitated a moment as he gathered his thoughts.

"It seems, sir, our flying saucer may have been downed by a second, similar craft, and I believe it was brought down here, on Earth, on purpose."

"Downed! Downed by whom?" Truman asked in confusion.

Lee waited until the famous "Give 'em hell, Harry" temper subsided a little.

"It's all pretty speculative right now, but the craft may have been some type of container or cargo ship... and..." He hesitated. "Hell, sir, I think you better sit down for this one."

Compton hadn't moved from his chair throughout the whole of the senator's story; he stared at his shoes, just listening. No questions had been asked by Jack or Niles, and the old man had finished uninterrupted. The senator had added more to the story than he had included in his written report those many years ago. After all, he had had years and years to theorize and piece things together to update his file. The theories fit. Throughout all of the recorded abduction reports made by citizens throughout the world, there had been two factions. One, the Gray beings that were encountered were aggressive and hostile, and two, the Green creatures were kind, gentle, and always benign. Therefore, Lee deduced there were two separate groups involved, one group aggressive and bent on invasion, the other passive and helpful, intent on stopping the Gray whenever they could. The theory fit the facts, and Lee embraced it.

Jack stood and slowly walked to the credenza and poured a glass of water from the pitcher, then walked back and placed it before Lee, repeating the scenario from the day before, only in reverse. The senator lifted his tired eyes toward the major and accepted the water in silence.

"Now you think the same thing has happened, another premeditated attack?" Jack asked.

"Yes, I'm not a believer in coincidence," Lee answered. "We don't have much time if that creature survived the crash; I just wish we knew what it was and its capabilities."

Compton took a deep breath and stood. "Speaking of which, I'm not getting anything accomplished sitting in here." He started to turn away, then stopped and looked at Collins. "I'm relieved the weight of this thing is not only on our shoulders now." Then he left the conference room.

"This Event has haunted me for almost sixty years," Lee said to the remaining two people in the room. "Now another saucer is here again and we can't find it. I guess we need a break and hope God favors the lucky."

"So what it boils down to is that we have to find the remains of this... Destroyer... and verify that it was killed by its present keeper or in the crash itself," Collins said. "If it has indeed followed the same pattern as the incident in '47, that would clearly explain the aggression of that second saucer yesterday and its attempt to keep our naval fighters out of the way."

"There are so many variables to consider, Jack. For instance, the master-slave relationship as told by the being in Roswell. What if this time the animal's keeper isn't as benign as the last?"

There was silence for a moment and then Jack looked at the senator. "We have very little information to go on without the testing that needed to be done in '47 on the animal's remains. Someone out there, whoever stole the debris and murdered the Event personnel, has vital information that may help in saving this planet if it comes down to that. What about this Hendrix? Where did he vanish to?"

Lee shook his head. "He was killed in an air force plane crash two weeks after Roswell. And, yes, before you ask, I know it was that son of a bitch that hijacked the debris and bodies from Roswell. After I turned in my final report, Mr. Truman, as I suspected he would, bowed to the pressure from the Pentagon and their intelligence communities. Then Eisenhower, completely paranoid about anything he didn't fully grasp, buried it and we were out totally. The Event Group had essentially been pushed aside by the triumvirate of LeMay, Dulles, and Hendrix, and men like them, who ended up having the last say in the matter after all."

A knock sounded at the door, stopping the question in Jack's head. Alice stood and walked to the huge double doors and pulled them open. Outside stood Carl Everett and a man in a green flight suit. Alice beckoned them in.

"Commander Everett," she said, smiling, "and you must be Lieutenant Ryan?" She stepped aside as the two men entered the room. "I hope you had a nice rest, Mr. Ryan?"

"Yes, thank you," Ryan said.

The senator stood and, using his cane this time for support, walked to greet the newcomer.

"Senator Garrison Lee, this is Lieutenant Junior Grade Jason Ryan, of the USS Carl Vinson" Alice said as the two men grasped hands.

"I understand you have had a trying experience, Mr. Ryan," Lee said sadly.

Ryan was looking around the huge conference room while he shook the old man's hand. "Somewhat, but I'll live. Senator?"

"I suspect you will live, son, and, yes, former senator," Lee said, letting the man's hand go.

Ryan watched him turn and head back to the long conference table. Everett made the other introductions while Lee sat.

"I must admit, I've never seen the back room of a pawnshop before, but this is a little much," Ryan said while still looking around him. Then he smiled as he took in Major Collins.

"I'm going to be blunt with you, Lieutenant," Lee began. "Your flying for the navy? Those days are over. We need information from you and we're also short on personnel. You are now a part of our group, so consider yourself on detached service and your new commander is this man." Lee gestured toward Collins.

Jack nodded at Ryan, looking the naval pilot over, and accepted his 201 file from him.

"Is your incident report in here, Mr. Ryan?" Jack asked.

"Yes, sir."

"I'll debrief Lieutenant Ryan," Lee said. "I want you and Mr. Everett to see what you can do to give Niles a hand in the Computer Center. We just received word the NSA's pulling their photo-recon satellite, so that's going to leave Boris and Natasha and the National Weather Service as our only eyes out there. That's only two KH-1 Is to play with and five remote drones, and we need that ship found quickly," Lee said, almost pleading. "Jack, find out who's been piggybacking us since '47; you'll have full access to the Europa XP-7, and the best backdoor technician we have. Find out all you can, discover who's been on our back for sixty years, and then get the Cray back to Niles. God knows he's going to need it."

Jack and Everett nodded, then turned to leave.

"I'll have to excuse myself, as well," Alice said. "We're having a very small memorial for Gunnery Sergeant Campos. You two have work to do, so you're excused. I'll make your apologies." She too headed for the door.

Lee called after Collins, "Jack, you have a moment?"

Jack stopped short and turned to Lee.

"We have an extensive file on the activities of Mr. Farbeaux. Somewhere there's a link to whom he is working for. If you can't find anything, study him; learn his tactics, because I expect him to show his face right when we don't need him to. That notebook you found tells me he's interested, either for himself or whomever he's working for. As you know, you and Commander Everett will lead the discovery team when the saucer is found. Niles has already ordered all of our security personnel off field duty and we're bringing them home. If the worst happens, we'll need everyone, so plan for it. And you had best start considering what we do if"--Lee looked at Ryan, then back at Collins--"if the animal is loose."

"Yes, sir," Collins said.

Lee turned to the young navy flier. "We have a lot to discuss, and I'm feeling a little tired. May I just say, welcome to the Event Group, Lieutenant?"

"Will I fly here, Senator?"

"I think we can accommodate that, yes, Lieutenant."

Ryan took the senator's hand again and gave it a brisk shake. "My days were numbered in Tomcats anyway," he said, just now realizing his naval aviation days were all but over. "If you're offering me a job, I'll take it, sir. Now, what in the hell is the Event Group?"

Run you fathers and pick up your sons, for the night of the Destroyer soon comes.

-- ANCIENT HEBREW TEXT