Don't Mess With Earth Page 13

  “No, sir, it’s nothing like that. It would probably be best if I just let you read the file and not try to give you the whole song and dance. Here you go sir,” Houston handed the Area 51 folder to O’Bana, “you’re probably going to be skeptical and dismiss this whole idea as a fairy tale, but, I assure you that it is quite real.”

  “Let me be the judge of that, Tom,” stated the President as he opened the folder to see the official logo of Area 51, and he absentmindely let out a derisive snicker as he began to read the documents.

  Defense Secretary Houston squirmed impatiently in his seat waiting for the President to finish reading the Area 51 folder, which only took forty-five minutes, since all he did was skim the documents. O’Bana closed the folder, tossed it on his desk, and said, “This is a bunch of bullcrap. President Truman writes an executive order to hide this information, creates a secret organization to disavow any and all knowledge about aliens, we end up with lots of technology we currently have from an alien and his knowledge, and we’re also apparently stuck in the middle of a war between the alien we have and his people and some supposed humans who left Earth thousands of years ago and have been watching us most of that time since then. Now, I’m expected to make a decision based on the fact that we now have the means to do something about all of this intergalatic stuff that may drag us into an interplanetary war. The American people elected me to fix all of our economic problems and get us out of the Middle East, yet I’m supposed to be considering conducting a pre-emptive war against two planets nobody knows exist yet. If I knew how much this job really sucked, I wouldn’t have bothered running for president. Tom, do you know if this Majestic-12 organization still exists, because if it does, I’d like to meet them and tell them what I think.”

  “Sorry, sir, but the men who ran Majestic-12 have all died from old age and they had no one to replace them. The reasoning for not replacing the original members was because of secrecy, everything they did was recorded for posterity sake though, but we couldn’t have too many people, other than those who work at Area 51 or parts of Wright-Patterson, know about this. I understand your anger, I was really torqued when I found out and that was two days ago. Would you like to visit Area 51, get the lay of the land, and find out everything you need to do to make a decision, sir?”

  “You bet I would. Request two F-22’s from Andrews and get us two pilots you can rely on to fly us to Nellis, ASAP,” then the president paged his secretary, who came into the Oval Office, and the President said, “Get someone to bring my car around, Cynthia,” seeing the look Cynthia gave him and before she could say anything, he continued, “no, I don’t need a convoy or a contingent of Secret Service, the Secretary of Defense and I are going over to Andrews immediately,” then he said to Houston, “let’s go, Tom.”

  Two hours later, the two F-22 Raptors, after flying at mach 4 the entire way, landed at Nellis Air Force Base outside of Las Vegas. The President and Secretary of Defense got into an Air Force car waiting for them and drove north to Area 51. An hour and a half later, they stopped at the gates of the installation, where the guard asked to see their identification, and then, when he realized who they were, stood at salute. “Sergeant, you can stand at ease, just open the gates to let us in.” ordered O’Bana.

  The two men made their way to the hangar for the trip underground, where they found General Bridger waiting for them. “Mr. President, welcome to Area 51 and I hope what you’re shown today is an elightening experience.”

  “Thank you, General. Now, you can give me the grand tour of your secret base.”

  The three men traveled down the elevator to the underground complex, where five minutes later, the doors opened up to the complex. As they stepped through, O’Bana stood in awe of what he saw and said, “I feel like I just stepped into Independence Day. I guess you have the Ragnor ship here, corpses of the aliens, and some kind of mad scientists here too. Am I right, General?”

  “Except for the mad scientist, you’re right on every count, sir. We conducted autopsies on the dead Ragnor back in 1947, and we figured out their ship and its technology back in the ‘50’s and ‘60’s. Unfortunately, it took us this long to nearly equal the Ragnor technology and build it ourselves, but we finally have done so. If you would follow me, sir, I’ll take you on the tour.”

  Bridger showed O’Bana the hydroponics bay, the massive storage locker, the science labs, the morgue where the dead Ragnor were kept in formaldahyde, the secret museum collection of aircraft assembled and flown by Area 51 and its pilots, along with the virtual simulator, and then the Ragnor ship. O’Bana walked around the ship, and then asked, “I thought this was supposed to be a flying saucer,”

  “That’s a common misconception sir. The Ragnor cloaks in our atmosphere didn’t work very well, so it appeared as if their ships were flying saucers. Since 1947, anytime anyone without this knowledge looks for UFO’s, they expect to see a flying saucer. The Majestic-12 didn’t bother to crush this idea, but they did put out the idea that people were suffering from hysteria if they saw a flying saucer. Sometimes, those reports of weird lights in the night sky weren’t aliens, they were our pilots testing new aircraft, and they were messing around by tapping into the paranoia people already had about aliens and being abducted. We have people over in Rachel who keep claiming to see UFO’s, then a news reporter comes out every so often, so we put on a show for the reporter, convincing everyone that people who believe in aliens are a little bit nuts. One of the last flight tests we conducted was over Texas and people reported seeing UFO’s there too.”

  “Has anyone actually tried to fly this ship since it crashed?” asked the President.

  “It’s unflyable, sir. General Yeager and some other pilots once tried, but the ship just would not fly. We think it has something to do with damaged stabilizers, but, we’re not entirely sure since some of the technology is relatively new to us, and Ostoro made it perfectly clear that he wouldn’t tell us what was wrong with his ship. Some of the engineers thought about gutting it and replacing everything with our own versions of the technology, but, it was thought building a whole new ship would be more cost effective.” remarked Bridger.

  “I see. Where is this Ostoro character now?”

  “He is helping to update the Reprisals’ software, something about being able to hack into any computer system with ease, and the operator not knowing a hacker had been in the system. The Reprisal is this way, sir.”

  They walked to where the Reprisal was being worked on; it was surrounded by cables and a mobile computer workstation, where Ostoro was working with Engineer O’Rourke to update the software for the ship. They stopped what they were doing, while the President walked around the ship and admired what he saw. Once he was done, he walked over to O’Rourke and Ostoro and said, “Good job with the ship, very impressive. Ostoro, I am President of the United States Brad O’Bana, I just want to thank you on behalf of all the people of the United States for the help you have given us over the years,”

  “Don’t thank me, because it’s really kind of meaningless to me. I’m in a situation where I had to help willingly or be tortured to reveal the Ragnor secrets. I have a pretty good idea what you humans might do to my species, because if the situation were reversed, we’d do the same thing. I was wondering though, if you were planning to do anything about the Terrans?”

  “Of course we are, but I’m not privy to the specifics and I really don’t want to know. All you need to know is they’ll get what’s coming to them in the end,” then turning to Bridger, General, I need to speak to you and the Secretary of Defense alone for a few minutes.”

  Bridger led them to his office, where the three sat down, and Bridger asked, “What’s wrong, sir?”

  “What do you plan on doing with Ostoro once you take care of our problem with his people?”

  “I don’t know, I don’t think anyone has ever really thought about it, one of those problems we just kind of want to ignore and hope it goes away. Is there something you wan
t specifically done with or to him?” asked Bridger.

  “I think once I let everyone know the truth, I think Ostoro might become a major problem, especially if the media tries to request permission to speak to him. I don’t want to know the details, but, make sure he disappears by the time the mission ends. Understand, General?”

  “Yes, Mr. President.” answered Bridger, grudgingly.

  “Houston, once this goes public, I need you to monitor the threat levels coming from some of our enemies, and do whatever you have to do to get them to calm down if the need arises. I don’t want or need more wars on my watch as President. As far as the mission planned by Area 51, I give you full authorization for whatever is necessary for you to accomplish the goals. Once the Reprisal is away from Earth, I do want the mission details, since I’m probably going to have to explain what’s going on to everyone on Earth. I definitely don’t look forward to it, but, I have to do what I have to do.”

  “Yes, Mr. President. Is there anything else?” asked Bridger.

  “Not right now, General. I’m satisfied with the direction this is going, so I will return to Washington. Let’s go, Mr. Secretary.” the President and Secretary of Defense then left Area 51.

  Bridger returned to where the Reprisal was and took Engineer O’Rourke aside and said, “The President has authorized us to go ahead with the plans. I want all the WMD’s loaded on board, make sure all of it works properly, and make sure those computer viruses do what they’re supposed to do. I’m going to inform everyone else and the Reprisal will leave in two days. Get to work, O’Rourke.”

  The General then walked over to the guards who always kept a watchful eye on Ostoro, and asked, “Do either of you have a problem with getting rid of our guest?”

  The two looked at each other, and they both shrugged their shoulders, then the senior of the two guards spoke, “Not at all, sir. Do you have any preferences for how you would like for us to get rid of him?”

  “I don’t really give a flip how you get rid of him, the President ordered it, and I want it done as soon as possible. Got it?”

  “We understand, sir. You can count on us, because getting rid of the creep will be a pleasure, sir. Anything else we can do, General, sir?”

  “No, that’s it. Carry on gentlemen.” Bridger walked away.

  “How do you want to do this, Matt?” asked John, the senior guard.

  “I can think of any number of ways to get rid of Ostoro. Get one of the doctors here to do a live autopsy on him, load him up on the Reprisal and shove him out the airlock, shoot him in the head, send him to Guantanamo and let the Al Qaeda prisoners have at the ultimate infidel, strap him to an electric chair, or drop him off in the middle of Death Valley,”

  “Wow! You’ve really thought about it. I think since the Reprisal is about to leave anyway, we just take him aboard, shove him out the airlock somewhere, and that way it would be impossible to find his body in the vastness of space,”

  “It appears to me that we have a solid plan. Let’s go talk to Captain Kell and get her permission for us to go with them.” remarked Matt.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Two days later, the Reprisal was prepared for the next phase in its mission. The guards received permission to bring Ostoro aboard the starship, who was entirely confused on why he was going along on the mission. Once everything and everyone was prepared to launch, Captain Kell contacted Area 51 Control, “This is the Reprisal. We are ready when you are, Control,”

  “Reprisal, this is General Bridger. I want to wish all of you good luck and Godspeed on your journey. You have the go ahead to depart, Reprisal.”

  The ship departed the hangar and cloaked, even though it was still dark outside, they didn’t want to take any chances of anyone seeing the ship. Less than five minutes later, they left Earths’ atmosphere, flew past the International Space Station, and then they passed the moon. Two and a half hours later, the Reprisal was in position to orbit Mars, still cloaked. Kell asked, “Have the Terrans detected our arrival?”

  “It appears that they haven’t, sir. Everything looks quiet,” said Lieutenant Woods at the helm.

  “Very good, lieutenant. Can you gain access to their network?”

  “I’m attempting to now, sir. They have firewall protection, but I can get around those in no time at all. It helps that someone forgot to completely erase their programming language from the Spirit; otherwise, their system might take a couple of weeks to hack,” five minutes later, “I’m in, and beginning the download of the Trojan Horse virus as we speak, sir.”

  “How long will it be before the virus takes effect?” asked Kell.

  “It really depends on the size of their network, anywhere from say fifteen minutes to two hours. The first system the virus is set to target is their communications, so they won’t be able to contact anyone if they begin to have a major problem. I’ll keep track of when their power goes down, and then we can land and do what we’re going to do.”

  “What about the two parked starships down there, they would have independent systems from the base, which typically ours usually do.”

  “The computer engineers back on Earth were very thorough with this virus. Before the communications system goes down completely, the computer will automatically contact the ships that are assigned to their base, and upload the virus to their systems. After a few minutes, both the ships and the base should be completely defenseless and then ripe for the Marines to storm the place.” responded Woods.

  “I have one last question, Lieutenant. Since the base is surrounded by a dome, will the virus target their life support or will that stay up?” asked Kell.

  “Life support will continue to work, sir, they made sure of that.”

  “Good, we will continue to wait for your signal on when we can continue, Lieutenant.”

  Meanwhile, on Mars, the Terran computers were beginning to fail. It began with annoying little glitches as some Terrans were trying to monitor Earth orbital traffic; the software began showing in numerical computer code instead of actual data, giving them the problem of trying to figure out orbital paths of various human spacecraft in orbit. Another was working on a report, without saving anything for the twenty minutes the Terran had been working on it, when the screen suddenly went green and the computer was saying there was a fatal error. The Green Screen of Horrors was meant to be a mean little joke the software engineers at Area 51 wanted to inflict on the Terrans, which proved quite effective when a few other Terrans couldn’t even get their computers to reboot. They also quickly discovered internal and external communications were affected by whatever was wrong with their computers, because Commander Lomanco came storming into the Control Center with a very irritated look on his face, “What on terra is going on here?”

  Dr. Traynor, who was trying desperately to reboot his workstation, looked over at the Commander, and said, “Sir, I have no idea. Our computers were working fine a few minutes ago, and then they began acting as if a virus was affecting them. Seeing as how I installed firewalls, I don’t see how it’s possible our systems have been hit with a virus,” then the lights shut off, bringing up the emergency lights, but nothing else, “although, it does appear as if someone has installed a virus in our system. Whomever did this, appears to have done a thorough job,”

  “Traynor, I need a non-networked computer that has no virus on it, so we can get everything else working again. I do not want to be defenseless in case this is an all out attack against this base, think you can handle that?” asked Lomanco.

  “I will certainly try, sir, but I will get to work on it right away.”

  As Lomanco gave the order to Traynor to find a non-networked computer, the cloaked Reprisal landed near the two small Terran ships. Ten squads, consisting of ten United States Marines each, quietly left the ship in their specially made military equipped spacesuits, and made their way into the Terran base. The blueprint of the base that Lieutenant Woods took from the Terran computers was helpful to the Marines who were or
dered to go and secure the vital parts of the base, while the rest were to round up the very few people who actually were stationed here. Apparently, this base was manned mostly by a dozen scientists, a dozen engineers, twenty military personnel, the whole operation overseen by a military commander, and most of the inner workings of the base relied heavily on the computer network. Secretary of Defense Houston had wanted to use overwhelming force to subdue the base, so two hundred Marines were on board the Reprisal, but half of that were to be used in the initial operation since learning of the lack of personnel that the Terran base had. As the Marines found base personnel, they were sent to the cargo bay where they would all be held.

  Dr. Traynor was frantically searching for a non-networked computer, he wasn’t sure where one was, and turned the corner of a hallway, only to walk right into a squad of Marines, who were heavily armed and wearing night vision goggles, scaring the Doctor out of his wits who wasn’t even suspecting the base had been invaded. He threw up his hands, and said, “I surrender. I’m the Chief Scientist here and I don’t want to be harmed!”

  “You are Dr. Galen Traynor?” asked the staff sergeant in charge.

  “Yeah, who are you?”

  “We are United States Marines and we’re taking this base.”

  “Do you mean United States as in the United States of America on Earth? You’ve got to be joking, you guys can’t be this advanced, at least not according to the last intelligence reports we’ve received. Every manned spacecraft you have is only an orbiter, so how did you get here? Are you responsible for our computer problems?” Traynor asked.

  “We do mean that United States from Earth; as for everything else, it’s on a need to know basis, and right now, you don’t need to know. Where’s your commander?” asked the sergeant.

  “Well, uh, I last saw him in the Control Center, trying to figure out what was wrong with the computers. Apparently, I found out what’s wrong with our computers,”