The Gemini Divergence (58 page)

When the alert caused a base SAT, to respond
to the storage area in force; the tower scrambled two waiting
fighters. Then the object ascended abruptly into oblivion, finally
disappearing from radar.

Minutes later, General Lemay heard a knock at
his door.

It was a secure messenger, delivering a
sealed envelope with a report of what had just happened.

He immediately opened the envelope and read
the enclosed paper.

When he finished, he looked up at the full
moon shining in the night sky and moaned silently, “What the hell
are they up to now?”

30 April 1964

Gus was working at Stallion Test Site in New
Mexico, monitoring tests of America’s newest missiles.

He had just prepped one of their older
RB-57Fs to monitor the most recent testing and watched the plane
take off a few minutes earlier from their remote desert
location.

Now he was preparing the workshop at their
makeshift airport to receive the plane when it returned after the
test.

As usual, he had a radio set up to monitor
Holloman tower’s conversations with his plane as he worked. He
always did this in case there were to be an event that would
require a change of equipment to receive the aircraft.

He was just about to finish setting up and
trying to remember where he left his playing cards, so that he
could kill the time playing solitaire, when the pilot suddenly
reported, “Holloman Tower, I am still in rotation over Stallion,
awaiting the test launch… I have another aircraft up here in
rotation with me. I was not aware that there was to be any other
aircraft present… Please advise.”

Gus stopped and looked at the radio sitting
on top of a truck hood, as he listened for the tower’s response,
“Copy that Stallion one. We don’t show any other aircraft assigned,
besides you. Where did you say it was?”

Gus started to walk briskly for the workshop
door to see for himself as the pilot spoke again, “I’m flying
circles at about two miles distance around the missile on the
ground, and the other aircraft is flying the same circle directly
across from me. All I can see is the Sun reflecting from it. I
can’t tell what it is… Don’t you see it?”

“Negative, we see nothing on the screen, and
you’re too far north for a visual.”

From Gus’s vantage point, the sun was not
hindering his view of the object. He could tell immediately that it
was a saucer, but he could do nothing. His radio was for listening
only and the tower was miles away on the other side of White
Sands.

He didn’t know what was going on, but after
hearing what happened at Minot the other day, he figured that he
had better get to the missile perched in the next desert wash, so
he grabbed the radio and jumped into the truck and took off across
the desert floor.

As he was approaching the ridge between
washes, he lost sight of both aircraft, but the radio blared,
“Holloman tower, I can see the other aircraft now. It’s below the
sun’s glare now. I think that it is approaching the missile. It
looks like a saucer… What now?”

“Stand by, Stallion.”

After clearing the top of the ridge, he could
see the missile in the valley below as the saucer started to circle
the lone rocket.

Gus didn’t know what to do.

He couldn’t stand by and watch the saucer
damage the missile, yet he knew that the missile could take off at
any time and that it was much too dangerous to move any closer than
he already was.

Then his radio crackled, “Stallion One, we
just received instructions that you are to use the film initially
meant for the test, to film the object. I repeat. You are to film
the object instead. Missile launch has been scrubbed.”

“Copy that, Holloman, cameras on.”

After hearing that, Gus floored it,
catapulting himself down into the valley.

He deliberately kept swerving the truck in
order to kick up as much dust into the air as possible, because
flashing his lights would be futile in the bright desert
valley.

He wanted to attract the attention of the
saucer pilot and let him know that somebody was on their way;
hopefully they would errantly think that Gus was actually
approaching security forces and run.

Elation came over him as the saucer quickly
swerved away and ascended into the sky until it vanished.

He quickly left the test sight and drove into
Socorro, to find a phone to call General Lemay.

“I don’t know what they are doing yet, Gus. I
wish I knew myself.” Lemay responded.

“We are fairly certain that they don’t have
the capability to build their own nuclear weapons, and we haven’t
caught them trying to smuggle out the necessary supplies to build
one yet… Is it possible that they are trying to steal one?”

Gus could hear Lemay suddenly sigh, “God help
us if they are.”

*~*

It was a normal busy day at the receiving
department of the State Department of the United States.

The receiving manager was going about his
daily routine of opening letters addressed to the United States
Government by governments and corporations from around the world
and routing them the their proper departments for proper
dispensation.

He had a pile of letters to be opened and a
pile of letters that he had already opened and written their new
destinations on the fronts for his clerics to re-mail.

He took a sip of his coffee and picked up the
next letter; noticing that it was from the Office of Premier
Khrushchev at the Kremlin.

Wow this one should be interesting
, he
thought, as he opened the letter and read softly, “To the State
Department of the United States… Due to unsolicited but necessary
services rendered by the Red Army and the people of the Soviet
Union, and those same services being provided for the common safety
of the American citizens by protecting the public skies over the
Continental United States, specifically itemized below. We fully
expect the Treasury of the United States to remit…”

He instantly spewed coffee from his mouth
like a volcano, in an instant reaction to his sticker shock.

After he read it again to be sure, he picked
up the phone and dialed the State Department Operator, “Hey Julia,
get me the Secretary of State’s Office, and then get a line to the
White House… Not for me, for the Secretary, because a few moments
after you patch me through to him, he is going to be calling you to
connect him to the President’s Staff… No. Really, this is no
joke.”

15 May 1964

The Air Force was going to retry the missile
test that was scrubbed a fortnight before.

This time Lemay had assigned a FAC to be
present if the need for communications between the test site and
Holloman tower would arise.

Also different this time, was that Gus had
been assigned to stand watch on the ridge overlooking the test.

He sat in the truck with the FAC sergeant
listening to the countdown.

They knew that Lemay had ordered a couple of
fighters to be ready in the air at launch time.

Even though they could not see the fighters,
the FAC was getting routine position reports from them.

As the launch time neared, they could hear
aircraft in the area start to report UFOs to the tower.

Holloman tower then responded with confusion
because the incoming objects were broadcasting the proper IFF
signals.

The FAC sergeant assured Gus, “They have to
be ours. Nobody could duplicate our IFF signal codes.”

Just then, two kugelblitzen and one large
saucer with some type of mechanical pincer claws flew over their
heads into the valley.

One of the kugelblitzen circled the truck a
time or two in order to assess if they looked to be a threat, then
pealed off and joined the others around the waiting missile.

“Holy shit! What the hell are those?” cried
the FAC.

“Those… are what we have been waiting for… If
I were you, I would call those fighters now.”

The FAC picked up his transceiver and called
the fighters in, as the large saucer began to extend its pincer arm
towards the missile.

“What the…?” Questioned Gus, “What on earth
is it going to do?”

He watched in horror as it looked as though
the giant mechanical arm was either going to pick up the missile,
or pinch it in two.

Suddenly, their hearts skipped as the
thunderous fighters zoomed over the valley in a preliminary
pass.

Gus could hear them report over the FAC’s
radio set, “Holloman tower, we have a visual. There are three of
them and they look like they intend hostilities towards our
missile… Please advise.”

“This is Holloman, the call is to flame them.
I repeat… Flame immediately.”

“Roger that… One Martian shish kebab coming
up.”

They could see the fighters start to turn
miles away, but the saucers were already starting their rapid
ascent, in full retreat.

Once the fighters had turned, they tried to
climb in pursuit of the Overseers, but had to break away before
their aircraft stalled.

The FAC was white as a ghost as he turned to
Gus and asked, “What the hell where those?”

Gus just leaned back and smiled as he
scoffed, “I’ve been asking that for years.”

1 July 1964

General Lemay had called an emergency meeting
with the President and the Joint Chiefs of Staff to express his
extreme concern about how the Raumsfahrtwaffe had now started
broadcasting IFF signals from their spacecraft.

“Now we can’t tell them from our boys unless
we get close enough to see them in person. In other words, they
have just effectively ended our ability to shoot them down by using
missiles from a distance or from the ground.”

“Well then why are they reportedly still
running when our fighters show up?” asked President Johnson.

“It’s probably that they have not adjusted to
their advantage yet. Once they see our need to have a visual
confirmation first, before we shoot. I’m sure that they will become
much more aggressive… They’re still just trying it out to see how
it works.”

“What do we do?” asked McNamara.

“We have to show them that they can still be
shot down. Even if we just get lucky, we have to hit one that is
transmitting the IFF signal.”

Taylor objected, “It’s just too dangerous.
What if we accidently shoot down an airliner? Worse yet, what if we
shoot down another country’s airliner.”

“That would be very awkward to explain,”
worried Johnson.

“I don’t agree with General Lemay. I’m sorry,
I don’t see any way around it,” insisted General Taylor, “We will
have to continue to prohibit our pilots from firing on anything
transmitting the IFF.”

“What if we can confront them at some place
where we know that there would be no airliners or civilian
aircraft?” theorized Lemay, “like space, or at altitudes that
airliners could never achieve.”

“How do we do that?” asked McNamara.

“We will have to get those Air Force capsules
into space right now. Doctors Volmer and Von Braun have assured me
that with only eight in the sky at any time, there will always be
one over the continental U.S.”

“General Lemay, I agree,” insisted the
President, “Mr. McNamara, I want to start putting those things into
space before the end of the summer, no matter what… I mean it. We
can’t have things invading our airspace that we can’t do anything
about.”

“But we don’t have the facilities to launch
that many along with the NASA Gemini missions,” pleaded McNamara,
“Cape Canaveral is big, but it is not that big. Besides, how do we
explain that much activity?”

“How ‘do’ we do that?” queried Johnson as he
gazed at Lemay.

“I have already anticipated this problem, and
have ordered for that part of the program to be commenced from
Vandenberg Air Force Base… We can float them in from the ocean so
nobody sees them being shipped in and launch them right back over
the Pacific… The Gemini uses the Titan II missile anyway; none of
the contractors will question the launching of our front line ICBM
from our premier missile testing facility.”

McNamara relented, “That might work… Mr.
President, I’ll call Martin in the morning about kicking up
production.”

“There is even more reason to be concerned,”
added Lemay, “We have recently noticed another shift in the
Raumsfahrtwaffe tactics. They have been evolving from watching our
nuclear testing, which is where they got the Overseer nickname from
in the first place, into trying to destroy or steal our nuclear
devices. That seems to have been their prime directive during our
last few encounters with them… Gentlemen, they ran these last
times, but with this new IFF flap, it’s hard telling how long they
will be running from our planes.”

“Generals,” spoke Johnson with authority, “I
want you to use all of the resources at the disposal of this great
nation to rid the skies of this menace.”

“How do you wish to do that Sir? I mean,
besides General Lemay’s plan.” asked General Taylor.

“I want to have nuclear detection ability in
every nation on earth. I don’t want there to be one square acre on
the planet for anyone to hide any nuclear device or program. We
can’t let the Raumsfahrtwaffe smuggle or covertly research and
build a bomb anywhere on earth… I want to know the name of every
single person that knows how to build one. I want to monitor every
single company that so much as builds anything as simple as the
nuts and bolts or paint that is used in the manufacture of these
devices.”

“How could we possibly handle that?” doubted
Taylor, “We would have to start a whole new bureau.”

“No we wouldn’t,” insisted Lemay, “The Air
Force has a unit that does every bit of that already; just not
quite on that scale… Where do you think all this info comes from
already? Who do you think covertly cleans these things up every
time they crash? Who is the only organization that has been able to
track all of the Soviets technological research and the only one to
deal a blow to the Overseers in space? Its AFOAT gentlemen…
Presidents, Truman and Eisenhower saw the same problem and wanted
the same thing… It’s just that now the problem has grown and we
need to grow AFOAT to keep up.”