Groom Lake (10 page)
Authors: Bryan O
“These look like crop circles,” Blake said, looking at a series of geometric images, lines and curves, arranged in an unnatural, uniformed fashion on the paper.
“We didn’t have crop circles back then.”
“Are they hieroglyphics?” Blake wondered allowed, trying to ascertain if they were an ancient form of written language.
“Fritzy insisted they were
not
Egyptian, and wouldn’t say much beyond that.”
“What’s their correlation to anti-gravity technology?”
“I never knew if they were related at all, until recently. A while back I filed a Freedom of Information Act request for anti-gravity related materials. They recently sent me four boxes of assorted documents, the origins of which stem from various sources: Army, Navy, CIA, Air Force, congressional testimony. Unfortunately, most declassified documents are like dead men which tell no tales.” He presented Blake a three-page document with everything blacked out except the page numbers. A second example offered a little more to read:
After reading just the first sentence, Blake wondered where the information was in the Freedom of Information Act.
The professor continued, “I started thinking that my only hope with finding information in these documents would be through divine intervention. Soon afterward I discovered several boxes have documents in an unabridged state … no black marks.”
“Why would that be?” Blake asked.
“Somebody made a big mistake because I should never have received this. Not that I don’t think I have a right to it as any American should. And I’m certainly not telling them about the mistake.” The professor produced another document, two stapled pages, a memo as the first page:
“It’s vague,” Blake said, studying the memo, “and the names are in code.”
“Look at the second page.”
He did, and then grabbed the professor’s images, comparing the two documents. “This is the document you traced. What’s it mean?”
“Electromagnetics is another name for anti-gravity,” he told him. “Someone thought these images were related to anti-gravity. Fritzy was asked to decipher them. We were in the electromagnetic subgroup.”
“So if you were already in a classified environment, then maybe they figured out what these images said and took the program further underground.”
“I think if we can decipher these images, maybe figure out who this memo came from, we’ll be one step closer to understanding the government’s anti-gravity program.”
“You know,” Blake said, “I’ve heard rumors about the government testing anti-gravity craft in the Nevada desert.”
“Area 51. I know it well. In my FOIA docs there are copies of at least a half dozen magazine articles addressing those rumors. One cluster of papers combined a series of photocopied news articles. Apparently some agency was interested in monitoring media accounts of Area 51. Aside from that, for the last five years I’ve heard rumors about what the government has in that desert.” The professor paused, considering testimonies he’d read in the press about aerial sightings at Area 51. “Have you ever heard UFO reports where the witnesses described the object accelerating so fast it seemed to vanish from sight?”
“Something like that.”
“People have reported seeing similar feats in the sky over Area 51. Do you think the lights are vanishing into the distance, or maybe, perhaps, a wormhole?”
“That’s pretty intense,” Blake said, and then an idea struck him. “Professor, what if I take a trip to Nevada? Maybe I’ll get lucky and snap some pictures of whatever they’re testing.”
“That’s the last thing I want you doing! You go out there and you’ll end up on a list. We all live in Big Brother’s shadow, kid, but there’s no reason to capitulate yourself and bow to him.”
“Isn’t that what you did by requesting these documents?”
“Yes, but Big Brother already knows who I am. That’s not true in your case. Stick to the paper trail for now.”
Blake didn’t know what to make of the situation, but he sure was intrigued. “Why don’t I focus on this doc? See if I can figure out who might have sent or received it.”
“I assume this means you’ve accepted my employment offer.”
The nighttime sky, with its speckling of white dwarf stars and red giants on the black canvas called space, enthralled Special Agent Grason Kendricks whenever he let himself appreciate Earth’s eternal backdrop. Even with mankind’s advances in astronomy and physics that provided an ever-increasing understanding of the universe, Grason could do little but wonder about the intricate details of life in the distant solar systems that he saw as twinkling lights in the sky.
Is someone on this planet hiding secrets that could further my understanding of life out there
? he again asked himself, knowing too well the probable answer.
And if so, by what right
? The thoughts were perplexing for Grason at best. As long as factions of the American government developed backroom technologies he would search for answers. He’d first seen man’s predisposition to control power through secrets as a young officer in the Air Force—before his days working with Project Blue Book—when doors guarding America’s greatest secrets were closed in his face. Operation Patriot was the first opportunity in a life devoted to servicing his beloved country that might allow him to understand the gamut of America’s knowledge.
• • •
The nighttime sky, with its speckling of white dwarf stars and red giants on the black canvas called space, enthralled Damien Owens whenever he let himself appreciate Earth’s eternal backdrop. Even with mankind’s advances in astronomy and physics that provided an ever-increasing understanding of the universe, Owens still had a far greater understanding of the spacetime continuum than most.
“Put your thumb in the air,” Owens told Kayla as she stood at his side on a placid desert highland. “Hold it so your thumbnail is north of the Big Dipper’s handle.”
Kayla did as instructed, positioning her thumb above the Big Dipper, which was easy to overlook among all the stars, made visible by such a clear night.
“Focus on the dark patch of sky just above the joint in your thumb,” he told her. “If you could look through the world’s most powerful telescope, you would see a faint speck of light in that region. No astronomy books nor star catalogs can tell you much about it. They couldn’t tell you it’s a spiral galaxy like our own Milky Way. They couldn’t tell you the little speck of light is actually hundreds of thousands of stars. Some with planets, moons—” his words stopped.
“And?” she asked raising her eyebrows, expecting more.
Owens studied her reactions, the eagerness and excitement in her eyes. “Many humans will go to their graves wishing they knew a fraction of what I know about the stars,” he continued. “I’ve given you clearance because I trust you, and want to teach you what I know, but you’re not ready mentally. You need to hide your feelings better. Don’t listen to my revelations like a drooling puppy waiting for a treat. Despite what you feel inside, you always want to give a stoic expression. You can’t keep secrets without lying, acting and manipulating. Once you’ve mastered your body language, you’ll know what I know.”
As perfect as Blake Hunter strived to be, he had one vice—Trevor Sinclair—his best friend since childhood. Trevor often professed after drinking several beers that his primary purpose in life was to keep Blake from being a nerd. While Blake’s athleticism and ability to attract the opposite sex precluded him from joining the likes of stereotypical bookworms, Trevor did provide a stable influence of social activities and occasional mischief.
In high school, during one of Blake’s few self-imposed moments of indiscretion, he had wired the door handles on his car so they gave off a slight electrical charge. His hope was to deter theft of his car stereo, a common dilemma facing his peer group. One morning a girl parked too close to his car and while inching out of her vehicle, wedged her butt against Blake’s door handle. Like a cow prod, the handle shot her with a bolt of electricity that sent her screaming to the vice principal’s office after squeezing free.
Blake arrived at the VP’s office to find Trevor already there protesting his innocence, “I didn’t have anything to do with it this time.” But his words were ignored by a vice principal who figured that for every ounce of trouble linked to Trevor, a pound went unpunished.
After Blake assumed full responsibility, and argued he had a right to defend his property, he and Trevor were sentenced to a day of detention where they had to write 500-word essays on the error of their ways. Trevor copied and submitted an essay from a previous offense while Blake wrote over 2,500 words, including 1,000 on the decline of western civilization because leaders like their esteemed vice principal violated citizens’ rights. He concluded the essay with a quote from the
Declaration of Independence
:
. . . when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
When Blake moved from Santa Cruz, California to campus in Los Angeles to begin his college career, Trevor packed a duffle bag, grabbed his surfboard and tagged along, establishing residence in a hammock he had slung from Blake’s dormitory bunk. Blake’s assigned roommate enjoyed the livelihood of Trevor’s company and didn’t mind the hammock dangling above his bottom bunk, except the time Trevor was so drunk he peed in his sleep.
Besides taking credit for Blake’s social wellbeing, Trevor also avowed himself responsible for having introduced Blake to Professor Eldred. Trevor had devised a water balloon launcher from surgical tubing that could hurdle projectiles upwards of several hundred yards from their dorm’s sixth floor window. Tactical balloon warfare became a daily social event for the floor’s male residents. The game lasted several weeks before someone—Trevor—scored the first direct hit on a person. Blake wasn’t present for the launch, but the student newspaper later gave him details and a front-page photo of Professor Bertrand Eldred picking balloon shrapnel from his coat. An accompanying bio that mentioned his interests in space exploration compelled Blake to visit the professor.
Blake and Trevor shared a variety of domiciles while living in Los Angeles. The latest was an aging two-bedroom apartment in West Los Angeles. Even with their low personal overheads, it amazed Blake that they, primarily Trevor, made ends meet. Yet, no matter how broke they may have been at times, Trevor always managed to pay the cable bill, keep beer in the fridge and finance frequent trips to Las Vegas.
• • •
Blake was so intrigued by his afternoon with the professor that he stayed up late working on the computer. Using various Internet search engines, he looked up key words: ANTI-GRAVITY, AREA 51, AIR FORCE, BLACK BUDGET, CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY. Those searches steered him to web sites that hyperlinked to other topics: GRATCOR, ROSWELL, S-4, BACK-ENGINEERING, DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY, NEVADA TEST SITE and a host of UFO web sites. The UFO web sites offered significant amounts of information about Area 51, including directions, base photographs, maps and pictures of the surrounding land, even a Russian satellite picture.
The problem with researching on the Internet was credibility. There was no shortage of information for Blake to read, but he hesitated to believe many testimonials, especially when people claimed to have smoked a cigarette with aliens at Area 51, or others who said aliens abducted them while they hiked the hills surrounding the base. He focused on testimonials with multiple facts: dates, locations, names, technical references. A few sites offered possibilities. Blake hoped to find something or someone who might know what the drawings were, and maybe who might have used the codenames MJ-1 and MJ-10.
With all theories, a researcher made assumptions—educated guesses. Blake figured someone with knowledge about Area 51 and anti-gravity either received the information first hand or through a friend. Maybe even a friend of a friend. He went fishing on the Internet by sending E-mail letters to several individuals hosting informative web sites, hoping for a bite.