 
The Children of Roswell

The Children of Roswell

(Book One)

The S.W.I.F.T. Chronicle

By

Alan James

SMASHWORDS EDITION

*****

PUBLISHED BY

Alan James on Smashwords

The Children of Roswell

Book One; The S.W.I.F.T. Chronicle

Copyright 2011 by Alan James

Smashwords Edition License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

Other books by Alan James

The Children of Roswell

(Book Two)

The Homestead Incident

The Children of Roswell

(Final)

Ergosphere Reset

Jonathan Parker

and the Moan T'aye Ghost Dance

(A SteamPunk Tale)

Butcher Butcher

The Case of the Butcher-Paper Butcher

Preface

You have all (no doubt) read the countless stories of the Roswell saucer crash in 1947. The truth is you probably bought this book because the title contained the name of that once sleepy little town lost in the desert of Chaves County, New Mexico. If you are like me, you grab at every chance to garner as much new information about that day in July (and the important days and years thereafter) trying to squeeze as much truth as is possible from the falsehoods that have been perpetrated by our government in their efforts to keep that very truth from you.

Please rest assured, I will not bore you by rehashing the stories you have already heard. This is not another Roswell book per se; for there will be no mention of the Roswell rancher and the tale of what he found on his property. Nor will you find pages of repeated dialog from witnesses (military or civilian) about the pieces of debris and its unusual properties. You will not hear again: the story of the grey creatures; their autopsies; testimony from Officers (or their children) as to what they saw, heard, or knew.

What you will read (in the pages that follow) is the story developed from testimony given to me by a long retired Air Force pilot whom I befriended many years ago while we participated in a mutual hobby. This was a solid, God fearing man (military to the core) but, he was a man with a burning need within, to tell his story before he passed on.

I am not quite sure why he chose me as his confessor, for there was a great disparity in our ages. Perhaps it was that he saw a copy, or two, of the many books on UFOs that were constantly littering my desk in my shop. Whatever the reason, he sat me down, early one Saturday morning, in a secluded hangar at the local airport and began a one sided verbal journey that wouldn't end until late in the evening-hours of the following day.

His hands shook and his voice cracked as he forced himself to break the vows he had taken as an officer in the service of his country. He was risking, in his mind (for he was well indoctrinated) being thrown into prison and losing what little time and retirement pension he and his wife had left. I could tell that this bothered him greatly and I asked him several times if he would rather stop.

"No, No, just let me finish," he would reply. "Someone has to tell this story. I have to tell this story." And then he would whisper, "Before I die."

Then, he would wipe away a tear with curled, shaking fingers and continue.

What follows, is the story (as accurately as I could pen it) told to me over those two days (some four decades ago). It is the story of a young officer, caught up (and lost in) the bureaucracy of a military machine that was fresh out of World War Two, and later the Korean conflict (war). It was a military that now found itself burdened by the pressures and the threat of communism and the cold war. It was a military divided by pomp, ego, and a sense of self inflicted grandeur.

I have changed names and a few places to protect my storyteller and hiding places now scattered around the country. Many of the places named in this book still exist (some nearly intact) and readers are welcomed to search them out. I myself have stood in a couple of the very places mentioned in these pages, and believe me, the ghosts of the past only add to the mystique.

Those of you who are already believers in the conspiracy that began in the New Mexico desert on that July day in nineteen forty-seven, will understand (but maybe not agree with) the moves made by our government and some of the individual players in the days, weeks, and years that followed the original crash. Some of you, who have found yourselves on the fence (not knowing whether to believe or not) may be pushed off your precarious perch (in one direction or the other). My only hope is that my storyteller finds some modicum of peace in knowing that: His truth is now "out there."

Alan James

To my wife Linda and son Jonathan.

Thank you for giving me the time

and the support.

The Children of Roswell

(Book One)

The Swift Chronicle

by

Alan James

TAILLIGHTS

Kelly stood with his back to the trailer, a briefcase in one hand and his service cap in the other. His uniform was damp with sweat.

The long ride from town had been hot and uncomfortable, and the cold desert wind that had made cracking a window seem the worst of two evils, now began to chill him. Squinting his eyes against its dryness, he watched as the car from the motor pool disappeared over the rise at the end of the runway; the dust from its tires giving extended life to its taillights. The red glow increased, then fell back, again and again, as the drivers foot bounced on the brake pedal. Another three or four miles and it would reach the highway that would take it back under the light dome that was hanging over the horizon to the southeast. Kelly's eyes stayed on the red glow until it disappeared.

He was alone now. He felt alone. He had spent the last two weeks in Tucson waiting for his orders. He had felt alone there too, but not like this.

"Tucson," he muttered to himself, half chuckling, half longing. As much as he had disliked what had seemed to be a loosely guarded internment, he felt sure he was about to gain a new perspective on what little amusement he had found there.

As he turned toward the trailer, the outlines of aircraft caught his eye. They were black against the darkening Paynes-grey sky to the west; row after row of tail-sections tapering into the darkness. A closer look in tomorrow's light would show only skeletons, for few had escaped the hand of Mother Nature, or vandals. Beyond the row of castaways he could see an old control tower, its antennae broken and swaying in the wind. Its once glass façade was filled with empty spaces refusing to shine in the moonlight. Kelly finished his turn toward the trailer, and with his head down to assure his footing, he walked slowly in the direction of the only light he could see. The weeds, blown by the wind, cast faint, flickering moon shadows where they poked through the crumbling asphalt taxiway. He continued until his path was finally blocked by an old, loosely hung, chain link fence.

'Strange,' he thought. He hadn't noticed the fence on the ride in. It was strung along its top with rusty concertina wire. As he moved along the fence to his left, away from the trailer at a slight angle, he eventually came to an open gate. It creaked softly as the occasional gust pressed against the large NO ADDMITTANCE sign wired across its front at eye level. He pushed his way through, and as the gate swung shut behind him, a second thought made him turn and reach. He was too late. It closed with a soft but solid clank. Even as he was reaching, he was sure the gate would lock itself if he missed it. He was right.

He turned, once again, toward the trailer and the light. Walking slowly, he imagined hearing noises from every direction. 'Just the wind,' he kept telling himself. Another few steps and then from behind: he was startled by a sharp 'crack.' He spun quickly, but there was nothing. As his eyes moved up to the top of the old control tower, there, as he watched, he heard another loud 'crack.' It was one of the old antennae; broken near its top and hanging by a thin strand of wire. He continued to watch as every other arc brought it into sharp contact with one of the rusty walkway railings. 'Jumpy!' he thought, '... why so jumpy?'

He was full of questions now. Two weeks ago he had been pulled from a position he had struggled years to achieve. He'd been living every young pilots dream: working as a test pilot; civilian status; and more flight time than he had imagined possible in the post war Air Force. In the last year and a half he had flown nearly everything to come off the boards. And now, he was back in uniform, stuck in the middle of a hole in the southwest American desert called Marana.

In years past this place had been alive with aircraft, both military and commercial. Old F-80s from the Arizona Air Guard once plied the skies here. Even then, the commercial companies, and the military, had started using the vast open areas beyond the runways to store old, mothballed airplanes. Now, that is all it was used for. The dead and dying airbuses now served as attractions for the occasional history or photography buff, or as luxurious stopovers for Mexican nationals making their way north, looking for work.

Kelly stood motionless, watching the moon's reflection move slowly across one of the few unbroken panes of glass in the old tower.

"Lieutenant?"

The muscles in his Kelly's stomach tightened so violently that he appeared to duck, as if trying to avoid an imaginary blow from behind. With his head down he turned slowly. Expecting to see nothing less than the ghost of a long dead airline pilot, he was somewhat relieved when his glazed eyes saw only a small handgun. A gun he could deal with, but he had no wont to tackle an apparition on its own grounds.

"Lieutenant Kellerman?" the voice behind the gun said. Then, after seeing the name tag above Kelly's breast pocket, the man said, "Didn't mean to startle you. We didn't recognize you."

Kelly stood with his eyes still frozen on the gun. He hadn't moved since he first saw it.

"Oh!" the man said, then, half heartedly chuckling as he looked down at the gun, "... it was my turn to play cowboy."

The gun was gone and an open hand was offered in its place.

"I'm Brickman... Cory Brickman."

Kelly, with many unrelated thoughts racing through his head, reached for the handshake and quickly filled the man's open hand with his service cap. Brickman smiled but held back another chuckle.

"Fair enough," he said, "from cowboy to valet... consider it an apology... for the scare I just gave you."

Brickman grabbed the briefcase from Kelly's limp left hand, guided the cap back into a sweaty palm still outstretched for a handshake, turned and headed for the trailer.

"C'mon," he said, "meet the others."

Kelly stood there for a moment, watching the stranger move away. His shoulders shuddered slightly from a half developed shiver that tried to climb his spine. He reached up, closed the collar of his coat, tried, and then thought better of, taking a last look behind.

He didn't like this place. He didn't like the childhood fears it was conjuring either. As far back as he could remember he'd been afraid of things that went bump in the night. Now, in adulthood, his fears final manifestations were usually little embarrassments scattered around his various duty stations. He knew, inside himself somewhere, there was an ability to control situations like the one he had just been through. But that ability always seemed to elude him. In fact, he'd never been able to stop himself from getting into these kinds of situations. He seemed drawn to all the darkened rooms and unlit alleyways he had passed in his lifetime, especially if they hinted of opportunity.

Brickman had left him standing in the dark, in more ways than one. He wanted a few answers before they reached the trailer, but for now, he would have to wait. Cory was already standing atop the small porch at the end of the trailer. The light, mounted on a pole over the roof, threw a hard white cone down on him. He was wearing a ball cap and the shadow from its bill blackened his face. He was looking back at Kelly as he passed his open hand across his body at waist level, gesturing toward the door. Kelly couldn't see his smile. What he did see was the vision of a harbinger, offering entry into yet another darkened room.

THE TRAILER

Brickman closed the door behind them. He was still smiling. "This way," he said, pointing to the opening at the end of the short hallway.

It was warm inside, and Kelly could smell coffee. He reached up before anyone was looking and wiped the sweat from his upper lip. As he entered the room, four faces turned to meet him. The men were seated at a long row of tables placed end to end. They faced a narrow, uninterrupted window that ran nearly the length of the trailer. The paperwork at each man's station was neat and uncluttered, and each had his own radio-headset, telephone, coffee cup, and what Kelly thought was a typewriter and television screen.

"This is Lieutenant Kellerman," Brickman announced as he sat Kelly's briefcase on the floor.

The man sitting second from the right-end of the tables stood to introduce himself. Raising his hand to Kelly, he gave his name:

"Lieutenant, I'm Ken Matson."

As Kelly tried to hand Matson his cap, Brickman quickly grabbed it away and the two men shook.

"He'll be alright in a bit," Brickman said as he tossed the cap onto a table against the front wall, "he's still a little rattled from my cowboy act."

"Well," Matson chuckled, "if we are all very lucky, you won't get another turn at that for quite awhile. Here, let me have that," he said using two fingers to pull the gun from Brickman's belt. With the toe of his boot he nudged a small box from under his table, set the piece in it, and pushed it back under. "I'm team leader here," he said turning to face Kelly again. "If you've got any problems or questions that these yahoos can't handle, you come and see me."

"This is Dr. Forest," Matson said, nodding to the slightly overweight and fastly balding man now standing to his right. He handles all the incoming biological telemetry and makes sure the life support systems keep our pilot..." he paused, as if searching for a word, then finished with, "... alive. See that he gets your medical record. The information will have to be loaded if you're going to fly for us."

"Ben Perkins," Matson next motioned to the man just beyond Dr. Forest, "is our radio man. He handles what little voice communication we use."

Kelly nodded. As he reached for the handshake, Perkins quickly withdrew his hand and pressed his headset tight against his ears. The screen in front of Dr. Forest suddenly came to life. As the doctor turned to attend it, a long bank of tape reels, mounted against the back wall, began spinning.

"What'ya got Ben?" Matson asked.

Perkins raised a forefinger to his lips, asking for silence; his free hand continuing to press his headset to his ear.

Matson's excitement was now obvious. He could wait no longer for Perkin's reply. In a hurried attempt to seat himself, he juggled his headset halfway to the floor. Finally getting a grip on the piece of equipment, he placed it over his ears. With both elbows on the table and both hands pressing the ear-pads tight against his head, he sat, quiet and motionless; his mouth hanging open. He stared, without focusing, at an empty spot on the long window in front of him.

As Brickman took the chair on Matson's right and began keying his typewriter, Kelly heard someone calling his name. Looking down the length of the trailer he saw a man sitting at a separate table positioned across the short end-wall. He motioned a "come here" with an outstretched hand. As Kelly approached, the man tapped the seat of the empty chair next to him.

"Sit here," he said, "they're going to be busy for a few minutes." The man then offered his hand and his name: "Will Johnson," he said.

Kelly shook the man's hand and then grabbed the chair and turned it around. He sat in it backwards, folding his arms over the backrest.

Both men were seated sideways to the row of tables. Facing back down the length of the trailer, Kelly looked at each man in turn. He couldn't help but notice how casual they were. It was apparent that things were happening very quickly now, but everyone, despite Matson's anxiety attack, looked like they were old hands at whatever it was they were doing. Kelly turned to Will, who had just glanced at his own screen. "They don't let you work with them?" he asked.

Will smiled. He had the look of a man holding back the punch-line to an inside joke. Staring again at his screen he said, "You noticed, huh?" Then, nodding his head in the direction of the others, "They call me easy money. My screen has been just like you see it for the last... " he hesitated for a moment then continued, "... for as long as I've been here."

Kelly looked at Will's workstation. He paused, studying each object in turn, then nodded toward the screen, "... that's not a television, is it?... and that's not a typewriter," he said, pointing to the keyboard.

Will gave him a puzzled look. "No," he paused, "they're not." He paused again, as if trying to decide whether to finish answering. Then, after glancing at the men at the other end of the trailer, he pointed to the keyboard. "That is a computer input terminal," he said quietly, "and that, while it is actually a television, has been modified so we can read the computer's output."

"Computer?" Kelly questioned as he turned his head to see the tape reels still spinning against the back wall. "Computer?" he said again. "You mean like that Enivac or Uniac thing I read about awhile back."

"Yeah," Will said, "but they're Eniac and Univac."

"Can't be," Kelly said, "those things fill an entire building. I've seen pictures of 'em. You'd never fit one in here."

Will smiled, "That, my friend, was nineteen-fifty-one. A lot has happened in the last three years. And," he said, holding a finger up to make a point, "they say that in another year or three, you'll be able to fit one in the trunk of your car."

Kelly looked at Will's screen again. The only thing on it was a three-view outline of a very sleek looking jet aircraft. Other than that, the only interesting feature was the word ORDINANCE stenciled on the frame above the display.

"So," Kelly said, trying to pry a little more information from Will, "why do you get to sit and do nothing?"

Will turned away from Kelly, looking once again down the length of the trailer. He spoke without looking at Kelly. "The less I have to do, the better it is for everybody."

"What do you mean?" Kelly asked quietly.

Will started to speak, then stopped short. Staring at Kelly, it appeared that he wanted to say something, but instead, he changed the subject. "Do you have your orders?" he asked.

Kelly looked at his briefcase, still sitting at the other end of the trailer where Brickman had left it, then back at Will. He was now quite sure he wasn't going to get any more in the way of information from him, so he stood and walked the length of the trailer to retrieve the case. He sat and thumbed open the latches at each side, and, still sitting backwards in the chair, awkwardly opened the briefcase between his chest and the backrest. As he pulled his orders from between a stack of papers, a small metal container, the size of an aspirin tin, fell to the floor. Will reached down and picked it up.

"That's supposed to go to Dr. Forest," Kelly said as he halfheartedly reached toward the container. When he realized that Will was not going to return it immediately, he changed his open handed grab to a sheepishly pointing finger. "That's supposed to go..." his voice tapered off as he watched Will lift the top from the small box and carefully empty the contents into the palm of his hand. Sandwiched between two pieces of cotton-packing was a small, sealed, cellophane envelope. Will held it to the light above them.

"Each time I see one of these, it's smaller than the one before," he said as he turned the envelope from side to side, front to back. Inside the cellophane was a tiny, round disc. It was no thicker than a human hair, with a diameter no larger than a twenty-two caliber bullet. Kelly was now more curious than upset.

"What is it?" he asked as Will lowered the little package between them.

"It's a wafer transceiver. Our people in Maryland were supposed to implant it," he said while holding it up to Kelly's left temple, "right there... before you got to Tucson."

"Why didn't they?" Kelly replied.

"I don't know for sure, but I can guess," said Will, pausing as if, again, wanting to say more. "At any rate, their failure to do so is why Cory met you outside with a gun. We'd have known who you were, if this had been activated." He slipped the disc back between the cotton packing and tucked it into its container and finally handed it to Kelly.

Ben Perkins voice suddenly filled the trailer, "It's her Ken."

"Are you sure?" Matson replied. "I don't hear a damned thing but static."

Cory Brickman chuckled as he reached to his side and laid a hand on Matson's shoulder. "When was the last time you ever made anything but static out of the recovery signal?"

"Alright! Alright," Matson barked, "so it's her." He took a neatly folded twenty dollar bill from his shirt pocket and tossed it over to Perkins. Ben had obviously won the bet to see who would hear the recovery signal first. For Matson, it was a losing battle. Ben had always been first to hear the signal, and probably always would. After all, he had designed the program for hiding coded messages in background static almost ten years ago. It was only natural that he would hear a signature of his own making. Matson would, however, year after year, accept the losing wager. But then, that was one of his little programs. One of his little ways of lightening the tensions over the long days filled with continual boredom. He was also responsible for Brickman's favorite, playing cowboy, and the now defunct, "pizza run to Tucson". The team's original security officer had been lost during that one. He was cited for speeding in town, and, like all good soldiers, he stuck to his cover story. He was just an English professor from Seattle, spending a couple weeks photographing Indian ruins in the southwest. All team members knew that they were not allowed to return to the trailer once the civil authorities could put them anywhere in, or near, the state of Arizona. From that point on, as a team member, he simply ceased to exist.

IDENTIFICATION

Matson tapped his keyboard, asking for the event schedule. The green monitor blinked once, then displayed:

EVENT SCHEDULE

LOCAL TIME 01:46

RECOVERY 01:44

IDENTIFICATION 02:02

ACCEPTANCE 02:04

RECALL 03:01

ACCEPPTANCE 2 03:03

LANDING 00:00

DEPARTURE 00:00

Matson studied it for a moment, then spoke to Perkins, "... you ready with the ident tape Ben?"

"Comin' right up," Ben said as he reached for a small lock box at the far side of his table. He keyed the lock, opened the box and pulled out a tape cartridge marked "IDENT". He handed it to Forest who turned it slowly in his fingertips. Raising it to eye level, he turned toward Matson. As their eyes met over the top of the tape, Forest raised an eyebrow in question and Matson answered with a quick nod, then watched as Forest slid it into the player at the base of his terminal. It swallowed it slowly; the dust cover closing with a snap. Forest's hands went to his keyboard and his screen answered:

IDENTIFICATION

SEND 02:02 LOCAL

LOCAL 01:58

TRANSMIT SEQUENCE ACTIVATED ON

ENTER

Forest took a deep breath and pressed ENTER. "Now we wait," he said, almost to himself.

Matson, having heard Forest's quiet refrain, turned to him and said, "She's comin' home this time. I can feel it."

Forest slid his chair back and stood up. "Well, we'll know for sure in an hour or so, how 'bout some coffee?"

As Matson and Forest moved toward the cafeteria sized coffeepot sitting against the wall, Kelly closed his briefcase and set it on the floor beside his chair. Still clutching the little box which held the transceiver, he stood and slowly made his way toward Dr. Forest. As he walked, he looked at each monitor in turn. The time and event schedule now filled each screen. He watched as the LOCAL TIME blinked its way, second by second, toward IDENTIFICATION.

Forest turned to meet Kelly, "Ah Lieutenant, what can I do for you?" His eyes moved to Kelly's hand holding the little box. "What do we have here?" he said as he reached for it.

It was obvious that Forest knew what was in the little package. He took it from Kelly and held it where everyone in the room could see it.

"Gentlemen, look here. The boys in Maryland have lost all hope. They didn't even bother to integrate our pilot this time."

Matson took the box from Forest. "I'll be!" he said, turning to Kelly. "Did they tell you why they didn't implant this? Did they tell you," he continued before Kelly could answer, "what it was for?"

Kelly stared at Matson for a moment. It was just as well with him that they hadn't cut him open and placed the little disc in his head. 'Just as well, indeed,' he thought to himself. Matson didn't seem angry; at least Kelly didn't think so. It just looked to him that Matson had expected one thing, and got another.

"No!" Kelly said. "No one told me a thing before I left the east coast. I've been sitting in Tucson for two weeks, just waiting. Then, earlier this evening they shoved an envelope with my orders under my arm and pointed me at the door; said a driver was waiting outside. On the way out someone handed me that little box with instructions to give it to Dr. Forest. The next thing I knew... I was in a motor-pool car headed here. When the car stopped, the driver said to walk toward the trailer."

"Then it's true," Matson said, "... they have finally given up. They don't believe she's ever coming home." He tossed the little box toward the back of his desk.

"If that's really the case," Forest replied, "why wouldn't they have told us... and why bother to send a pilot?"

"Why should they tell us anything?" Matson said. "Even if they are thinking about closing us down, they'd still need us out here... for awhile anyway. Somebody has to keep track of her, at least until all the loose ends are tied up," he hesitated, "until they find a way to destroy her."

"Destroy her?" Cory broke in. "Why would they do that?"

"What do you think, Cory," Matson said, "you think they're just going to walk away and abandon her?"

"Abandon who?" Kelly said. "Destroy what?" he continued.

"Look Kellerman," Matson replied, "if they told you nothing back east, or in Tucson, then that must be the way they want it, for now anyway."

Matson looked at Will Johnson who was now walking up from the far end of the trailer. Matson had a question written all over his face, and Will knew exactly what it was.

"No boss," he said, before Matson could ask, "I didn't tell him a thing."

"Good," said Matson, then turning to Kelly, "look, I know you've got a bunch of questions you want answered, but, you're going to have to wait awhile longer. Just keep this in mind: you are our pilot. And, if you've got just a little patience, you just might get a chance to fly one hell of an airplane." He reached up and placed a fatherly hand on Kelly's shoulder. "And that, my young friend, has got to be enough to hold you for now." Matson continued to look at Kelly, waiting for at least a nod in the affirmative. When none came, he turned and looked toward his monitor. The time had counted up to 02:02. The computer beeped once and the light on the tape player began to blink.

Perkins was still sitting at his table, his headphones still pressed tightly to his ears. He was listening as the IDENT signal went out. Just ten seconds, and it was over. He turned to look at the others standing at the coffee pot. They were all looking back at him as he gave a timid thumbs-up.

Matson raised his hand, gesturing toward Perkins' screen, "Well boys," he said, "now she knows we're here."

"Yeah," said Cory, "and in about a minute and a half, we'll know if she gives a damn."

Matson, Brickman and Will Johnson moved to positions behind Perkins' chair, watching his screen rather than their own. Forest sat down at his table to their left. Kelly found himself standing alone, and quickly moved to Matson's table. He watched as the local time clicked upwards.

'What had he gotten himself into now?' he thought to himself. 'And why all this mystery?'

He stood there silently, with his hands on the back of Matson's chair. He rose slightly onto the balls of his feet, hoping no one would notice, as the shiver that had started its way up his spine when he was outside with Brickman, now finished its little journey to the back of his neck.

As local time on the screen hit 02:03, the display went blank. Matson bent forward, putting a hand on Perkins shoulder. "C'mon," he pleaded at the screen.

Perkins looked at his watch. Since the local time was no longer being displayed on the screen, he counted out loud, "Twenty seconds... twenty-five... thirty... thirty-five."

"Another twenty five seconds," Johnson broke in, "and we're outta business. Just like last year," he paused, "... just like every year."

"... fifty... fifty-five... sixty." Perkins stopped counting as the screens came back on.

Silence filled the room, and, after what seemed like an eternity, "Is that it Ben?" Matson said, squeezing Perkins shoulder.

Perkins turned to Matson, "Let's send the ident code again."

"Damn," Matson half whispered.

Perkins turned to face Matson and started to ask his question again, but Matson hadn't finished, "Damn," he said again, then, suddenly realizing what Perkins had said, "what? Oh hell! Ben, we sent it four times last year, and it didn't make a bit of difference."

Matson looked out the long black window into the darkness. Johnson was making his way back to his chair in the rear. Brickman moved to his station and rested his head in his hands. Disappointment seemed to flood the trailer.

Matson, still standing behind Perkins and still looking out into the night, laid both hands on Perkins shoulders. He gave him a little shake and said, "Go ahead Ben, send it again." He paused and then shook him again, "We've got nothing but time."

Perkins started to reach for his keyboard when Kelly, who had been watching Matson's screen, said, "Hey! Wait! Look!" pointing toward the monitor. "It's changed. The schedule... it's changed."

Perkins ran his finger half way down the screen... and... there it was. He seemed dumbstruck. He couldn't speak. The trailer was again silent. The line, that before had read: ACCEPTANCE 02:04, now read ACCEPTED 02:04.

Matson, still holding Perkins by the shoulders, began shaking him like a rag doll. Brickman, who had stood to see what Kelly was pointing at, now grabbed Matson. Johnson was back from the other end of the trailer, and got in on the celebration.

Kelly stepped back and watched in mild amusement. 'Five grown men,' he thought to himself, 'jumping around like kids.' He felt pleased, and disappointed. He had been the first to notice, what was now the cause of their little celebration, but no one was paying him any attention. He looked again at the screen, then back at the men; still shaking; still dancing.

Slowly the group started to settle down. Perkins fell back into his chair, nearly out of breath. Brickman and Johnson shook hands for another thirty seconds, turning it into a one armed Indian wrestling match, laughing all the time. Matson turned, looking for Kelly, who was standing a few steps off, still staring at them.

"Hey, Lieutenant," he said, "why the long face?"

Matson took a couple steps toward Kelly and bear hugged him as another uncontrollable rush of excitement overtook him. Kelly just stood there, with both arms hanging at his side. Matson stepped back and slapped Kelly's shoulders with both hands. "Smile," he laughingly demanded, then paused as he looked questioningly into Kelly's eyes. "Don't you know what this means?" he asked.

"Hell no, he doesn't know," Perkins said from his chair. "How could he? He just got here."

Matson regained a little composure. He tapped his shirt pockets, then his front pants pockets with his open hands as if looking for something. Brickman knew exactly what he was looking for. He reached to his shirt pocket and pulled out an old, ragged pack of Camels. He shook one up and offered it to Matson who lipped it without lighting. He never lit his cigarettes. He just used them to keep his hands busy when he was nervous. He looked at Kelly again and continued, "What this means Lieutenant, is maybe, just maybe, after three years of waiting, I'm going to have an airplane for my pilot... that's you...," he said poking him in the chest, "... to fly."

Kelly was again bursting with questions, but he had no idea where to start. He was still remembering Matson's little talk about being patient, so, he decided to ask something obvious.

"So," he said, looking around, then back at Matson, "what happens next?"

"That's it?" Matson asked with a smile. "Now that I can finally tell you something, all you want to know is what happens next?"

Perkins heard where the conversation was headed and broke in: "Ken, I know you want to fill the Lieutenant in... we all do, but, we've got a long way to go yet, and she's a long way from being parked on the apron out front."

Matson looked a little disappointed as the reality of what Perkins had just said began to sink in. Perkins got up and walked over. "Look," he said to Matson, "you're the boss, and you can tell him what you like. But, if she doesn't come home tonight," he paused and motioned with a head nod toward Kelly, "then the Lieutenant here, already knows all he needs to know."

Matson, looking at Kelly, but talking to Perkins, said, "Yeah, you're right. But the Lieutenant only asked what happens next. I think we can tell him that much."

Kelly turned and stepped over to Perkins screen and then turned again to Matson. "If all you're going to tell me is what happens next, then you can consider my question rhetorical. It's obvious what happens next," he said, looking again at Perkins screen: "We wait 'till 3:01, and do the same thing all over again."

RECALL

With a little less than an hour to kill, Kelly walked back to the rear of the trailer and took his seat next to Will's station.

He sat facing the monitor; still nothing but the little three-view on the screen, and the ominous ORDINANCE in prominent view. Will followed, and sat beside him without speaking. To the left of the monitor was a radar screen. Will reached to his left and threw a switch on the console. Then, acting as if he had forgotten something, he stood and started back to the other end of the trailer. The CRT slowly came to life with its eerie yellow-green glow. Kelly watched as the sweep painted a couple returns. He could see echoes coming from the east and south. 'Those had to be out over Tucson... not much activity this time of night,' he thought, 'just one anonymous echo and one with transponder information; probably one of those new seven-oh-sevens landing at the municipal airport.' The anonymous was most likely a private plane. Maybe someone coming home late, or leaving early. He imagined: 'perhaps, a business man, just getting in from a late meeting in Chicago, his wife waiting to pick him up, or maybe, a father and son heading west to the High Sierras for a little trout fishing.'

As Kelly continued to watch the screen, he found that the monotonous motion of the sweep, around and around and around, painting the two aircraft, again and again, began to slowly block out the sites and sounds of the trailer. Again and again it swept. Around and around it swept.

'Mesmerizing,' he thought to himself. He raised his hands to wipe away the sleep that was slowly overtaking him. There was a small bathroom at this end of the trailer and he decided to splash a little water on his face; anything to wake him a bit. As he began to pull his gaze from the sweep, it painted a very faint echo in the upper left corner.

'Northwest,' he thought, 'at angels eighty.' He stared. 'That's not right.' He blinked to clear his vision, then, looked again. 'Oh, c'mon,' he said under his breath. 'That can't be right. We've got nothing around here that flies at eighty thousand feet.'

Johnson was just returning as the sweep again moved past the little echo. But this time, it painted nothing. "Did you see that?" Kelly said, turning his head.

"What's that... see what?" Will said, looking at the screen as he took his seat.

Kelly found himself pointing to an empty spot as the sweep again moved past the upper left corner, leaving nothing but empty space. "Right there," he said, touching the screen. "It was big, like maybe an old dash-eighty or a seven-oh-seven," he paused, "and it was at angels eighty."

"Eighty thousand feet?" Will laughed quietly. He quickly glanced at the others. They were busy at their stations; not seeing or hearing what was going on at his end of the trailer. Looking Kelly square in the eyes he asked so that only Kelly could hear, "You've flown just about everything we've got, haven't you?"

"Well, yeah, but..."

"Then tell me somethin' Kellerman," he paused, "what do you know, that we got here in the States, that flies at eighty thousand feet?"

Kelly sat with a puzzled look on his face as Will continued, "It was probably just a KC-ninety-seven out of Yuma... on a training mission. They're over here all the time." He added short sentences as he thought of them, each time trying to make his explanation sound better. "Probably at angels eight." "You must've read it wrong." "We've got nothin' that flies that high." "Nothin'," he said, as he flipped the switch to the off position. Kelly still had his finger on the screen as it faded to black just as the sweep was about to paint the empty upper left hand corner again.

Kelly watched as Will stood again and walked back to Matson. Dr. Forest was standing behind Matson, and, as Will bent over to whisper, the doctor leaned in to listen. Kelly kept his head down, pretending to shuffle through some of the paperwork on the desk in front of him. He could see Matson and Forest both cast quick glances in his direction, and then turn back to Will. They remained huddled, continuing their conversation. Their whispers grew louder from time to time, and Kelly could just make out a few words. "Gonna have to tell him sooner or later," and "not now, not yet." He tried to make it look as if he were paying no attention to them. He shuffled the papers again, reached down and raised his briefcase to the table, all the time listening. The last thing he could make out was something about a "Colonel Rathman," or "Rashman."

Kelly had heard that name before, or one like it. 'Rantman,' he thought to himself, 'that's the guy I'm thinking of.' But if it was the same Rantman, he couldn't possibly have anything to do with this little project. Kelly remembered the name from his flight school days. Rantman was a World War II and early Korean ace; one of the hottest pilots the United States ever put in the sky. Scuttlebutt was, when the US started the space program everyone was talking about, he would be at or near the top of the list. 'Nah,' he said to himself, 'couldn't be Rantman... gotta be somebody else.'

***

Kelly had finished in the bathroom. The cold water felt good on his face. Between that, and the time he had spent at Will's station watching the radar screen, and going through some of the paperwork in his briefcase, he had managed to kill almost forty minutes. He hadn't thought about reading his orders until now. They didn't say much: report to Kenneth Matson; follow orders received from said Matson; conduct yourself in a manner befitting an officer of the United States Air Force. He checked his watch. The next scheduled event was getting close. As he moved back up the length of the trailer, he also checked the time slowly clicking up on each screen. It now read 02:50 hours. As he approached Matson's station he could see that the event schedule was already displayed:

LOCAL TIME 02:51

RECOVERY 01:44

IDENTIFICATION 02:02

ACCEPTED 02:04

RECALL 03:01

ACCEPPTANCE 2 03:03

LANDING 00:00

DEPARTURE 00:00

As before, Matson turned to Perkins, "I guess we're ready for the recall tape Ben."

Ben reached for the lockbox once more, turned the key, opened the lid and reached inside for the next cartridge. And, like last time, Forest took it and turned toward Matson. He held it at eye level between them.

"Well," he said matter-of-factly, "we've never gotten this far before." Matson nodded. Forest opened the player and removed the used IDENT tape, pushed the RECALL tape into the slot and watched as the cover again closed with a snap. Forest's hands went to his keyboard and his screen again answered:

RECALL

SEND 03:01 LOCAL

LOCAL 02:56

TRANSMIT SEQUENCE ACTIVATED ON

ENTER

He held his index finger over the enter key. After a pause for a deep breath, he raised his finger deliberately, then brought it down sharply. No one made a sound as the sharp crack from the key stroke echoed thru the trailer.

Cory Brickman finally broke the silence. "This is gonna be the longest seven minutes we've ever spent in here."

They all sat quietly, staring at their screens. Then, one by one, each man seemed to sense Kelly standing behind them. Matson and Dr. Forest turned first, then Brickman, Johnson and Perkins. With all five men staring at him, Kelly asked no one in particular, "What have we got that flies at angels eighty? Or should I ask, what have you got that flies at angels eighty?"

Matson turned to Forest. Forest shrugged his shoulders.

"KC-ninety-sevens don't fly at eighty thousand," Matson said. "Will told you that what you saw must have been a ninety-seven. He's been a scope dope for at least twenty-five years that I know of, and more before I met him. I'll take his word for it, over yours, any day, son. It had to have been a ninety-seven."

"I'll admit," Kelly said, "I've been a target, a thousand times more often then I've sat in front of a scope, but, I know how to read a transponder echo." He paused only long enough that no one could get in the next word, "... and I'm certain, that echo came back at eighty. I'd bet money on it."

"Listen Kelly," Matson used Kellerman's first name, hoping a sound of familiarity would lighten his mood, "... you understand the military concept of compartmentalization, and information being passed from one compartment to another on a need to know basis, don't you?"

"Sure I do," Kelly replied. "I understand security, and clearance levels, and all that stuff. But, I figured that when I walked in that door," he thumbed in the direction of the hallway, "that we were all on the same team here."

"Well, unfortunately... for now," Matson returned, "you, and the rest of us, are still in different compartments. And it's going to have to stay that way for a bit longer." He didn't give Kelly time to respond. "Remember what I told you about being patient."

Kelly shifted his weight and glanced to see that all eyes were on him. He nodded his head in the affirmative, then looked at the ceiling, as if looking for strength, or answers. "Alright!" he said, still looking up. Then, bringing his gaze back down to Matson, "We'll play it your way awhile longer, but I..."

Just then Perkins drew everyone's attention with a quick turn back to his screen. With his hands on his headset as before, he gave a countdown from five. The time on the screen clicked to 03:01. He slowly removed his right hand from his head, his index finger bobbing up and down as he counted off the seconds. As he reached ten, it was over. The recall signal had been sent. "That's it boys. We'll see if we get two answers in one night."

"Hell," Matson quipped, "we've already had one more than we've ever got before."

Now, all eyes were on the screens. As the local time reached 03:02, the screens, like last time, went blank. Each man now sat, or stood, as if in a trance, staring at his watch. 03:02:30... 03:02:45. And then, at 03:03, the screens came to life again. Perkins ran is finger down the event schedule, and there, like last time: ACCEPTANCE 2 at 03:03 had changed to: ACCEPTED 03:03.

"No mistake about it now," Matson said, breathing heavily. He reached under his table. It was obvious he was searching for something. Then he was on all fours, digging at a pile deep against the wall. Almost out of reach, he finally found what he was looking for. He pulled out what appeared to be a large, heavy manual. He shoved his keyboard to one side with an elbow and set it in front of him. "She's comin' home," he continued. Then jokingly, "The only problem is, I'm not sure I remember how to get her back here."

Cory Brickman grabbed his chair and moved over to Forest's station. They huddled in quiet conversation while Will threw on a light overcoat and headed for the hallway and the door.

With Will outside, and the other four men busy, Kelly headed back to the radar scope at the rear of the trailer. He moved his briefcase to a position that would best block the scope as much as possible from the others. Flipping the switch, he watched as the screen came to life. He kept a sideways glance at the sweep as he shuffled papers, trying not to look too suspicious. In actuality, he didn't care if he got caught. He just wanted another look at the little bogie he had spotted before. And, as the sweep reached the upper left hand corner, there it was. It was echoing loud and clear. And it was shouting: angels eighty, just like the last time. He had not made a mistake.

Something struck Kelly as odd as he stared at the echo. It now read as a ninety-seven, just like Will and Matson insisted. The problem with that, also like Will had said, ninety-sevens don't fly at that altitude; nowhere close to that altitude. And the other thing that bothered him now was, it hadn't moved much since he first spotted it. It was pinging a strong ID and altitude, but hardly any air speed. If it was flying, then it was flying at just above stall speed.

And then, it was gone. He continued to sneak a peek at the other end of the trailer. The others were still busy at their places; Perkins and Matson still leafing through the manual; Forest and Brickman still gleaning information off of the doctor's screen. Kelly moved his briefcase to the floor and slid his chair directly in front of the scope. He noted the time and continued to monitor the sweep. He could hear a small commotion in the hallway. Johnson was on his way back in. He didn't care. As the sweep moved slowly around another time, it painted his bogey once more. This time it was nearly fifty miles to the south of its original position. He checked his watch again.

'Fifty miles,' he paused, saying to himself, 'in three minutes. That's got to be close to a thousand miles an hour.' He sat staring once again, not really focusing on anything in particular. He was trying to process this new information; information that made no sense. He turned to sneak another look over his right shoulder; still, no one watching. He turned back to the scope, not noticing that Will was now walking up behind him. The sweep painted once more, and there sat the little bogey, nearly motionless in its new position.

As Will stopped behind him, he had dragged some cold air in from outside. Kelly felt it as it laid gently on his back and neck. He now knew he had company.

"Do you see it, this time?" he asked Will quietly, not wanting to raise everyone's attention. Then he turned in his chair and looked Will in the face. "Do you see it this time?" Then without waiting for Will to answer, he turned, put both elbows on the table, grasped both sides of the scope with his hands, and stared at his bogey, afraid that it would disappear again if he took his eyes off of it.

"Wait here," Will said, as he turned and headed to Matson and the rest of the men.

Kelly could hear them, bantering back and forth again. He didn't bother trying to listen this time. He no longer cared what they thought. He was going to get his questions answered, or they could make other arrangements for a pilot. As that thought raced through his mind, he suddenly had a vision of the locked gate and razor wire on the fence outside.

The men's voices suddenly went quiet, and he could hear footsteps behind him. He turned to see all five of them making a half circle, hemming him in at the end of the trailer. 'Here I am again, he thought to himself, 'at the end of another long dark alleyway, and no real plan of escape.'

"Well, Kellerman," Matson spoke first, "looks like you've stuck your nose in far enough now that we've got to make a decision. We either fill you in on what's going on here," Forest added...

"... or we kill you," Brickman finished the sentence laughing.

"Give it a rest," Matson chided Brickman, then turned back to Kelly. "Like I said, we either fill you in, or we kick you loose. And we can't kick you loose until we are sure we won't need you," Matson took a breath, then continued. "... and we won't know if we'll need you until we find out if our plane is coming home... or not," he scratched his forehead. "You see... don't you? We're in sort of a pickle... a catch twenty-two, as it were... after all... you are the only pilot in the building," he paused.

"So, this is what we've decided to do," Forest said, leaning in. "Since the boys upstairs laid this thing with you, squarely in our lap, we're going to take care of it the way we see fit. Since Will here," he nodded in Johnson's direction, "has been here the longest, he's going to try to make sense of this whole thing for you. Ask him what you want, and he'll answer what he thinks you need to know, which will probably be almost anything you want to know. This is sort of one of those, 'in for a penny, in for a pound,' type of things. Once you know even a little, you'll know too much. And if our plane doesn't come home, well, we'll worry about that, and what to do with you, when it happens."

"What do you mean?" Kelly asked, "What to do with me."

"Hah!" Matson laughed, "You do see our problem, don't you? If we have nothing for you to fly, and you hold all the information we are about to give you, well, you see," he stammered, then asked, "a conundrum, isn't it?"

THE TRUTH

Will sat at the table next to the radar scope. Kelly, now ready for answers, stood next to him and pointed at the echo: "Let's start with this," he said.

"I not sure that's the best place to start Kellerman."

"What is this thing Johnson? If I'm supposed to fly it, you'd think you could tell me what it is."

"It's not that simple," Will struggled for the right words. "Look, I could tell you it's an airplane, because that's what it is. And then I could tell you it's the plane you're gonna fly, or supposed to fly. And then you'd say, but it flies at angels eighty and over a thousand miles an hour. And then I'd say, it flies a lot higher than angels eighty, and a lot faster than a thousand miles and hour. So, that would make it, the very special airplane that you're gonna fly. And after saying all that, you still wouldn't have all the answers you want."

Kelly stared at the scope again, then back at Will, "OK, lets start wherever you think is best."

Will stood again, walked to the coffee pot and drew two cups, black. He took a long pull on one and handed the other to Kelly. While retaking his seat, he questioned, "Do you remember where you were, or what you were doing, around July of nineteen forty-seven?"

"Well yeah, I do remember," Kelly said, setting the coffee cup down and pushing it aside. "Me and a buddy of mine had just graduated from MIT. We were hot to join the Army Air Core, but the scuttlebutt was that the new Air Force was due to be split off from the Army. The split was supposed to be finalized sometime that September. So, we headed to Florida for a little R&R. You know, we figured we needed to kill some time. I guess I was spending most of that time, maybe three or four months, on the beach, with the ladies."

"You didn't listen to any radio or read any papers?"

"I don't remember reading any papers. Like I said, I was on the beach, with the ladies." Kelly showed half a smile. "I wasn't paying much attention to current events."

"You must have heard, somewhere down the line, about an incident that happened at Roswell?" Kelly showed no inclination to speak, so Will finished with, "New Mexico?" Will stared at Kelly, waiting for a reaction. Finally, he could see a light slowly coming on in Kelly's eyes. "You know what I'm talking about, right?"

Kelly looked away from Will to the radar scope. The sweep was still painting his little bogey (a solid echo, every time around). He dropped his head as if a great wave of disbelief had suddenly rolled over him.

"Yeah, I know," said Will. "It's a little hard to take," he paused, "but, it's true."

Kelly was searching for words now. He didn't know which question to ask next. He looked at Will again. "So," the words came slowly, and with hesitation, "you're tellin' me, that the echo on the scope... is," he paused, "... a flying disc?"

"No! No," Will said quickly, "only partly, only partly."

Kelly wasn't quick to answer, so Will continued. "It's an airplane, like most airplanes you're familiar with, except it has some very special technology that was borrowed from the incident at Roswell."

"I thought," Kelly decided to pursue another line, "that all the stuff from Roswell, turned out to be nothing but pieces of a balloon. They packed up all the debris and flew it off to Wright Field, or some other base."

Will showed a small knowing smile, "Well, you got part of it right." He paused long enough for another slug off of his coffee. "The part you got wrong is," he moved closer to Kelly, "it never even got close to Wright Field. It never even got close to Ohio. Somewhere over the Midwest, on its way to Wright, that plane and all its contents, and I mean everything: the pilot; the co-pilot; all the service men; and every piece of your so called balloon debris, became the first men and equipment of the new United States Air Force. And that was a full two months before the Air Force officially existed. Truman signed the paperwork while they were still in the air, and General Ramey and the other officers who thought they had scored a major coup, had to watch as their plane and all its contents flew off over the horizon to a destination even they weren't told." He sat up straight in his chair, "Boy, were they a bunch a pissed off brass." Then he gave a conceding nod, and continued, "I gotta give Ramey credit though; he played the part of a good soldier. He laid out a complete cover story; pictures of a weather balloon and everything... killed the speculation in the papers, and radio, all by the end of that week."

Kelly just sat there, trying to take it all in. "It was a flying disc", he said as a statement, not a question.

"That's what I'm tellin' you Kelly", Will said, putting a hand on the Lieutenant's shoulder, "it was a disc. It was a disc," he almost whispered the second time.

Kelly continued to stare at Will, as if he were pleading with him to somehow change his story. Something... anything, had to make more sense than this. "Look," he said, "I do remember a little bit about the story. And what I heard was that the debris was nothing but pieces. Lots and lots of little tiny pieces. There couldn't have been enough left to use in any meaningful way."

In his mind, Kelly realized he was, once again, looking down one of those long, dark hallways that so often tested him. His face was flushed and hot and he was sweating from his upper lip again. He could only sit. Sit, and try to decide whether he would walk down this long dark corridor, or turn and run as fast and as far away from here as his legs would carry him. He took a deep breath (he'd been taking a lot of those lately). Since he never was one for running, he thought: for now at least, he wanted to hear more of Will's story. "So", he asked, "how did they, or you, make use of all the debris? There must have been some larger pieces, huh? Engine, or motor, or drive unit, or whatever it is that powers one of those things?"

"Whoa, slow down. That's more than one question," Will said, again smiling. "First off, it wasn't us, at least not us here in this trailer. It was us though, in the sense that there are more, or were more, of us here at Marana. And, the problem of what to do with, or how to use all those tiny pieces," he paused for more coffee, "was made considerately easier, at least that's what they thought at first, because there were two discs, not one. And you can bet General Ramey and his boys would've went ballistic if they had found that out. He'd a figured, if there were two discs, he should've been entitled to one of 'em."

"Two discs," Kelly replied.

"That's right," Will continued. "Two discs. One came down in pieces and the other landed nearly intact."

"You mean they had a whole one?" Kelly asked loudly. He looked down the trailer to see a few eyes staring in his direction. Cory was smiling as he and the others turned back to their work.

"Well, nearly a whole one. It was dinged a bit in the nose section. It had stuck itself in the side of a little draw about a hundred and twenty or so miles to the west and north of Roswell. Someplace called San Agustin."

"So, you, or these other guys here at Marana, removed the engine from the whole disc and mounted it in a conventional aircraft?"

"Well, yeah, that was the first thing that was tried. Worked real well too, except when they tried to take it to speed. As it neared super sonic, it suffered severe out of plane acceleration. Nobody realized at first that the gravity drive, that's what they were calling it by then, was designed to move itself in any direction you wanted, regardless of whether the plane had wings or not. At that speed, and this didn't happen at lower speeds, when the pilot pulled back on the stick, some sort of inertial trigger in the drive, sensed, by the movement of the plane, that it was supposed to change direction. And that's what it did. Tore the wings right off the F-eighty-six, and nearly killed Colonel Rantman right then and there."

"The Colonel Rantman?" Kelly asked.

"Yes," Will said, lowering his eyes, "the same, but he's, unfortunately, no longer with us. He was flying the next eighty-six. They had modified the controls to read the stick differently. The acceleration continued through the plane's long axis so that it no longer tried to jump straight up. Unfortunately, even though they had beefed up this eighty-six, the wings still came off again, around a thousand miles an hour. Rantman got out, but the drogue chute on the ejection seat was shredded. He was tumbling so fast when his main chute deployed, that it just wrapped itself around him and the seat. He never had a chance."

Kelly, once again, didn't have any idea where his next question was coming from. Never mind, that they wanted him to fly a plane they couldn't keep the wings on; a plane powered by technology taken from a crashed disc... this was a plane that had already killed at least one man that he knew of. "You're tellin' me," he asked, "that this drive thing, this gravity drive thing, has survived being dug out of a smokin' hole in the ground?... and it still functions?

"Yeah, amazing huh?"

"And the one from the disc that went to pieces?"

"That's a different story," Will said as he reached into a small drawer on the other side of the radar scope. "This is a piece of debris from that disc." He handed Kelly a small shard, about three by four inches, of what looked like tinfoil. It was irregular in shape; had a mirror like surface and almost no weight at all. Kelly turned it in his fingers.

"Try to bend it," Will said, almost taking it back from Kelly. He seemed drawn to it as Kelly handled it. "Bend it quickly, but be careful of the sharp edges."

Kelly held it in front of himself and tried to fold the little piece with a quick move of both hands. It resisted like it was made of solid steel.

"Now," said Will, touching it again, as if he wanted it back, "try it again, very slowly."

With his hands in the same position, Kelly tried again. This time, applying a slow steady pressure, the piece began to give way. It was like pushing against a shock absorber. If he pushed harder, it offered more resistance. By easing off the pressure a little bit, he was eventually able to fold it nearly in half. He released his pressure completely, and the metal, if that's what it was, began to unfold by itself. As Will took it from him, it slowly regained its original shape. Will put it between the palms of his hands and rubbed it slowly. Will's demeanor was changing as he handled the little scrap. Will, seeing Kelly staring, quickly returned the piece to its drawer. As he pushed it closed, his fingers lingered on the drawer handle. He turned to Kelly, "How 'bout that... it's got a memory," he paused. "All the pieces did the same thing," he said as he removed his hand from the drawer and continued. "The drive from this disc was destroyed, completely, just like the disc itself."

"Why one and not the other?" Kelly asked.

"That was the question everyone wanted answered. When the discs first arrived, everybody was quick to jump all over the whole one. They left the pallets, with all the pieces of debris, in the corner of the hangar. It was all covered with tarpaulin and tied with rope. Nobody wanted to play with the broken one. As time went on, they were able to disassemble the good one. A bunch of really savvy fellows these guys were. They got the drive out and figured out what the power source was. They had the whole thing figured out inside the first year it was here. But then, they ran into their first big problem. They couldn't figure out how to take the outer skin apart. They had in mind using it to cover a conventional aircraft, like a Sabre jet. Up until that time, the disassembly was simple nut and bolt stuff. But, the skin, well, it was all one piece. No rivets, no welds, at least none that could be seen. No one could figure out how it was assembled in the first place. That's when someone had the idea to look at the pieces still covered and tied to the pallets in the hangar. There they sat, untouched for more than a year. When the pallets were moved out to the front of the hangar and uncovered, well, that's when the guys noticed something really strange. Most of the pieces on one of the pallets couldn't be separated. They had, sort of, melted, and started flowing together. This struck every body as rather weird, because they had tried every cutting technique known to man to take the other ship apart. Nothing would melt this stuff. Yet here this pallet sat, with one big lump, and a few stray pieces on it."

Will took another draw on his coffee. "They continued working on the drive unit. Got it married to a third F-eighty-six. This time they tried to modify the container that held the power plant. That nearly got one of 'em killed. Seems this battery kind of thing, that's used for power, is highly radioactive. When they first got it opened, one of the techs was handling it barehanded. Got burned pretty bad. They shipped him off to Bethesda, I think. At any rate, we never saw him again. After that, they put it back in its original container, which looked like it was made from the same material as the skin. Amazing stuff," he said, shaking his head. "Then, one day, the pilot who had flown the discs here, a year and a half before, shows up. He was a bird colonel and he wanted to see what was going on with the disc, and, since he was cleared anyway, no one objected. The first thing he says when he sees the melted lump of disc skin sittin' on the pallet was: "Must have been the lightning". "What?" one of the techs asks him. "Yeah," he says, "hell, July weather was really bad that year, at least in the southwest. We got hit four times flying this stuff over here." Finally, the lights started going on in everybody's heads. They checked the bottom of the pallet and the spot in the plane where it had been strapped down. Sure enough, there was the proof: burn marks no one had noticed before. They were paying so much attention to the whole disc that they nearly let the answer to their biggest problem slip away. They finally concluded, that back in July of forty-seven, the first disc was struck by lightning. But they didn't think the lightning itself caused the explosion. It turns out that the skins integrity was controlled by vibrations at hyper frequencies. The lightning strike found its way into the gravity drive, which works by producing hyper vibrations, or gravity waves. They found out that these gravity waves work at the molecular level, somehow producing, sort of, a negative gravity field below or behind the disc. Nobody knew it at that time, but, it turned out that these hyper waves could be used for more than just propulsion. One day when they were runnin' the drive up for a test in the hangar, they got a little surprise. It had just been installed in the third F-eighty-six, and it was setting next to the original disc. As they tried new settings on the controls of the drive unit, one of the techs noticed that there was movement coming from the front of the whole disc. They weren't sure at first, but as they stood and watched with the drive running in the eighty-six, the damaged portion of the disc sitting next to it began to repair itself. The bent parts and pieces just seemed to flow and mold themselves together. Well, after they recovered from the shock, they were able to figure just what was going on. They determined what settings on the drive unit... did what... sort of. At least, they were able to put some of the debris pieces together, a little at a time, until they worked out a technique to cover an entire plane."

"Last I heard was that everybody thought a lightning strike, back in forty-seven, had overloaded the drive unit in the first disc. The disc then went to pieces because the drive unit now thought that it had been switched to this so called repair mode. The skin lost all of its cohesion and simply disassembled itself at an estimated five or six hundred miles an hour. Apparently, they don't have lightning where these folks came from. The drive unit was then ejected in the direction of the other disc. It exploded as they came in contact, or near contact. That's what caused the damage to the second disc's front end; not the crash as it came down at San Agustin."

Will paused for more coffee, "Oh! and there's one other thing they think they figured out while doing work on this new hyper frequency welding... that's what they call it now. You know about all the UFO sightings since forty seven, right?"

Kelly, remembering the vague stories he had heard, nodded yes, in order to keep Will talking.

"You know how it seems people are seeing them in all kinds of shapes and sizes?" Kelly nodded again. "Well, it appears they can change the shape of the disc, using this same technique, while it's in the air. With very careful frequency control in this repair mode, the techs were able to get the San Agustin saucer to completely finish its own repairs. And then, with a little more trial and error, they made little changes to its shape. Best guess was, it helps the disc travel at high speeds in a planets atmosphere."

Kelly was now almost completely overwhelmed. He thought for a moment, then asked, "If they had a whole disc, why did they continue trying to modify a conventional aircraft?"

"Ahhh!" Will breathed heavily. "There's still so much to tell you about the technology, and you're changin' the subject to politics. Look, word came down from the top, that since the project was to be kept above top-secret, it would be best to fly the technology in an aircraft that was familiar to the public. Now granted, the F-eighty-six was still relatively new, but it had the look of a normal airplane, and if we ever lost one, and the press got hold of it, well," he paused, "John Q. wouldn't be any the wiser."

"Speaking of the press," Kelly asked, "how on Earth are you hiding all this out here? We're not that far from Tucson; not that far from civilization."

"You just got here Kelly. You've never seen this place in the daylight, have you?" He continued, "This place is dead. Just a bunch of old mothballed planes, desert plants and cactus, maybe a coyote or two. We don't do anything out here to draw attention. No new paint on the buildings. When we have to, we drive in and out of here only at night. We fly in supplies on a couple private planes. We're very careful not to make a big show of security. That would only draw attention. Our best security is no security at all. And our cover, if we ever need one: we're a civilian weather station on lease to the Air Force. We do experiments and keep records on the effect of southwestern weather on all the abandoned aircraft."

"And the outpost in Tucson, where I got my orders, how do they fit into this? Do they know what goes on out here?"

"No. They know nothing. All they do is act as a way-stop for an officer that gets shipped out here once a year. They think you were sent to keep tabs and collect info on all of our supposed weather studies. They probably figured you were a bad boy gettin' some kind of punishment for a little indiscretion somewhere in your recent career. After all, what kind of on the ball officer would get himself shipped out here? No," Will repeated, "they're just your typical recruiting station, with no clue at all what's happening here. In fact," Will continued, "very few people in the country know what's going on out here. Maybe not even the President anymore. About three years ago, right after we put our plane up for the last time, President Truman mixed things up on us. Somebody convinced him that the thing to do was start a new black operations outfit. They supposedly found an isolated spot somewhere out in the Nevada desert. They sent a bunch of trucks and MP's and a whole lot of guys in suits and dark glasses. They tarped and tied up the San Agustin disc, packaged all the records, all the equipment, everything they could get their hands on. They drove out the gate, and that was the last we ever saw of 'em. The strange thing was, even they didn't know that there were two discs. You see, we'd been flyin' the third eighty-six for nearly six months when they came. The guys who had done all the work, all the studies, every piece of important research to figure out how this technology worked, well, they were all gone. There was no reason for them to stick around. The Air Force left a couple corporals to guard the place. After the suits had taken everything, the techs were notified. They just assumed that both discs were taken. No way for them to know any different since they weren't here. And we... well we were tucked away here, in our little trailer, about a half mile away from the main buildings. The Air Force had done such a good job of compartmentalizing, that they didn't even realize they had left half of their secrets behind." Will reached for his coffee again. "So, here we sit in Marana, a small, nearly forgotten, weather outpost with a few trustworthy ties to an underground cadre of friends who continue to put their necks, and their careers, on the line to keep us in business. I doubt even Eisenhower was told about us, or if he was, he must think that everything's been moved to Nevada."

"Amazing," Kelly shook his head in disbelief, "that something like this could happen in the modern day Air Force."

"Well, when you stop and think about it Kellerman, the modern military environment, with all its infighting and compartmentalizing, is exactly the kind of place this sort of thing could happen."

Kelly sat, still trying to make heads or tails of everything he was learning. Will turned to the radar scope and took a quick glance, then typed a line on his keyboard. His screen went dark. He threw a couple switches on the frame that held the radar console. The output scale changed to 2X. His computer screen came back to life. It still showed nothing but the little three-view. "Ah good," he said quietly, "still no problems."

"What kind of problems were you expecting?" asked Kelly.

"None, actually. It's just that this keyboard monitors and controls the armament on the aircraft. If there were a problem, well, you can imagine, we'd need to take care of it quickly."

"If this is an experimental project, why is the plane armed?"

"Again," Will came back, "politics. Believe me, it wasn't our idea, or the techs that put her together; but it did give me something to do. It came down from the top. Got no idea why. She's got the six original fifty cal Brownings. M3s with ball rounds, twelve hundred rounds a minute, times six, at nearly three thousand feet per second at the muzzle. And even at that speed, she can fly fast enough to outrun her own ammo."

Both men had their eyes on the radar screen as the little echo disappeared once again.

THE REST OF THE TRUTH

Will turned away from the radar scope and called down the length of the trailer, "You guys getting' anywhere?"

Matson raised his head, shaking a slow no as he looked at the others.

"Nah, nothin' yet," Brickman answered. "have you got her on radar?"

"We've been watching her, but she just went dark again."

"And nothing on primary?" asked Forest.

"No, nothing at all. Primary is useless. If she doesn't turn on the transponder again, we're blind."

As Will turned back to his station, he noticed that Kelly had reached over and switched the scope back to normal. He gave a questioning look, and Kelly said, "I wanted to make sure she hadn't moved outside the 2X field."

"Shouldn't have to do that. She should be heading in this direction." He paused, and then, under his breath, "I don't know why I should count on that. Nothings worked right on this project, yet." He gave Kelly a shrug, "I guess we'll leave it on normal for awhile."

Kelly, still not finding an end to his questions, asked, "Why won't she echo with primary radar?"

"Far as we can figure, UFO's get pinged only when they want to get pinged. The skin from the disc is invisible to primary radar. The only time we can see her is when she's got her transponder on, and she has apparently decided to turn it off whenever she feels like it."

"You mean the transponder won't reply to a request to squawk?" Kelly asked.

"It did, when we first put her up, but now, well, we're not quite sure what's going on with it."

"So, why not replace it? You've had, what did you say, three years, to change it out?"

Will gave him a hard look. "That's not exactly what I said." He continued to stare. "You still don't understand what I've told you, do you?" he paused. "Kelly, we haven't been able to do any kind of work on this plane for the last three years, because she hasn't been on the ground for the last three years."

Kelly pushed his chair back from the table. They continued staring at one another. Kelly was trying to mouth a question, but he just couldn't seem to get it started. Will thought he could recognize what Kelly was trying to convey. Something like, 'What kind of fool do you take me for?' or something close to that. It now became obvious to Will, that Kelly didn't understand nearly as much about what was going on, as he thought.

Kelly stood, deciding to say nothing. He spun and headed for the other end of the trailer. Grabbing his cap from where Cory had thrown it earlier, he turned to Matson "Get yourself another pilot," he said as he made the turn toward the hallway and the door.

Matson looked at Will as if to say, 'What in hell did you say to him?'

Will was already on his was up the length of the trailer. As he hit the hallway Matson turned to Cory, "Go with him," he barked, "We can't afford to lose him."

As Will cleared the steps he could see Kelly, already half way to the gate. He knew Kelly had nowhere to go, so he continued at a walk. As Kelly approached the fence, he realized he was going to look stupid yanking on the locked gate. Instead, he raised both hands and leaned against it. Will and Cory flanked him. They gave him a couple seconds to stand there and relax.

Will placed a hand on his shoulder, "Sorry Kelly, I guess I... ", he paused, "... I guess we all assumed that this would all be, somehow, easy for an outsider to understand. We've been at this a long time now, and it seems we've lost touch with the real world."

"Yeah," Brickman quipped, "we, pretty much, take all this for granted... flying saucers, n'all... you know?"

"You are the first pilot we've had to," Will searched for a word, "initiate."

Will dropped his hand from Kelly's shoulder. Kelly slowly turned to face them. "You're not going to open this gate for me, are you?"

"Can't do that Kelly," Cory said. "You know that."

Kelly stood there, staring between them at the trailer off in the distance; the light still casting the sharp cone down on the little porch. His foot was in it now, and he knew it. In fact, both feet were in it, as deep as he'd ever been in it before. 'What would an outfit like this do,' he thought to himself, 'with someone like me? Someone who knows too much.'

Will reached up for the back of Kelly's arm. He gave it a gentle pull and offered, "C'mon Kelly, let's go back to the trailer. We'll talk some more. You can ask some more questions... try to make a little more sense of all this."

Kelly raised his arm to throw off Will's grip. He stepped between them and headed back toward the trailer on his own.

***

Kelly moved to the back of the trailer and took his seat next to Will's station. Will and Cory were busy having a quiet conversation with Matson. When they finished, Matson came down and sat in Will's seat. "Sorry Kelly," he started, "I know this is a little hard to get around." Kelly looked at him in silence. "I can remember back in forty-eight, when they first introduced me to all this. 'Wow!' was all I could say, over and over again. I must have sounded more like an idiot than a scientist. It took awhile," he went on, "but, I eventually put myself in the right frame of mind, and things finally started falling into place." When he was sure Kelly had nothing to say, he offered, "What can I tell you Kelly? What more can I tell you? What do you need to know, or hear, that might make you feel more like becoming a part of all this?"

Kelly was having a tough time resolving the situation. This was a deeper, darker hole than he had imagined. He wasn't sure if he was standing on the precipice, or if he had already fallen in. Maybe a few more questions would help him decide.

"This plane, it's killed a man," he stated to Matson, instead of questioning.

"Yes," Matson paused, "it has."

"More than one?"

"Yes."

"More than two?"

"No! Just two."

"Tell me about the second."

"Will told you about Colonel Rantman?"

Kelly nodded.

"Well then, that leaves Colonel Randy Parker."

"R.T. Parker?" Kelly interrupted.

"Yeah, the same. You've heard of him?"

"He was one of my instructors at flight school." Kelly paused. "He's dead?"

"Well, yes. We think. The truth is, we really don't know, for sure."

Kelly looked puzzled, "What do you mean, you don't know?"

Matson looked around the room, trying to find a little sincerity to add to his answer. "Look, Kelly, this is going to be a bit hard to understand. But then," he cocked his head to the side, "what hasn't, lately?" He paused, then, "Parker, Colonel Parker, took off in the third F-eighty-six in June of nineteen fifty. Eighteen-thirty hours on the sixteenth, to be exact. We were able to maintain communication with him for a little more than three weeks."

"Three weeks? How in hell was he supposed to stay alive in the cockpit of a Sabre for three weeks?"

"Let me finish," Matson came back quickly, "You'll find the answer to that and more, just let me finish." He picked up where he had been interrupted, "He should have been able to survive, we estimated, for approximately two years." Matson saw Kelly move to ask another question. He raised a hand to halt Kelly, and continued. "If you think everything you've heard up to now has been a little crazy, well, just keep listening. There was a phenomenon discovered at the crash site of the San Agustin disc. As the Army boys were doing their recovery, one of the officers decided to have a look inside. He mentioned to one of the other officers what he was going to do. They stationed a soldier to guard outside of the hole in the front of the ship, where the officer entered. The guard and the other officer both swear that the officer, who entered the disc, disappeared inside and didn't come back out for almost an hour. But the officer, after his trip inside, also swears that he was in there for no more than thirty seconds... a minute, tops." Matson gave Kelly some time to soak up this bit of incredible information.

"You mean that the time...," Kelly stopped, not being able to decide how to phrase the question.

"Yeah, that's right. The time on the inside of the disc, is different than the time outside, that is, when the drive unit is running. Nobody realized it when they started the recovery, but the drive hadn't stopped when the disc hit the slope face."

"Time slows down in the disc," Kelly made another statement, not a question.

"Well... let's say it's different... inside the disc. It can be shifted in either direction. In fact, that's how the techs were able to do so much engineering on the drive unit and the disc itself. With a little experimentation, they were able to calculate the time differentials at different drive settings. They figured they saved at least twenty to thirty years worth of time by moving their work stations inside the disc. They would send a couple guys inside with a particular task in hand, and they would come back out a few hours later or sometime a few days later, swearing they had been inside for weeks or months."

"So," Kelly started, "you figured that by using the time differential, you could keep Parker in the air for two years, and only two weeks would pass for him?"

"That's right, because, with the proper setting, we were able to swing time in either direction. You see? A short time for Parker would equal a long time for us. We packed the cockpit; no longer like a cockpit that you would be familiar with, it had lots more room now, especially behind the seat, with about two weeks worth of food. We got a catheter inserted in him along with a bag into which he could do his duty. We had one of the dietary guys, from some college or another, come up with a menu that would all but eliminate the solids."

"So, what went wrong?"

"We don't really know... for sure. After we lost communication, we started the recall protocol that you've been watching. We did that once a week, then once a month, and finally once every year. You are the second pilot on the yearly schedule. There were two before that, a month apart. We didn't worry about a pilot before that because we were hoping against hope that Parker was still alive."

"And now, what do you think?"

Matson took a deep breath, "Well," like I said, "we don't know for sure. The techs never did get the time-thing down to an exact science. Parker could have died early on, or he could have lasted a year, our time, maybe more. We just don't know."

"You communicated with him for three weeks?"

"Yeah, about that."

"And what did he say? What was going on?"

"Nothin' out of the ordinary: the catheter was uncomfortable; he was getting sore in the rear; his legs kept going to sleep. Other than that, oh," Matson remembered, "and he complained about a pain in his back that kept getting worse. He was saying something about changing the seat when he got back. It had a bad spring, or something, pokin' him in the back. Can't remember anything else except the daily grind he put in, relaying all the flight data. He was a real trooper. Not many people would have, or could have, put up with that."

"Hey, that's not what you expect me..."

"No! No!" Matson stopped him short. "No, we're not putting you in the plane, at least not right off. There's lots of work to do first, not the least of which will be to remove Parkers body. Then we'll make damn sure it's safe to let you climb in. Hard tellin' how long that's gonna' take, because, like I said, we aren't really sure what's wrong with it."

"The way I see it," said Kelly, "you've got more than one problem, and one of them is a big one. You've got a dead man on your hands, and a famous one at that. If I remember right, Parker was Rantman's wing man. They'd been buddies their whole careers. He had nearly as great a record as Rantman. Surely, someone's going to miss a guy like that? Hell, someone's got to be missing him already."

Matson thought for a moment. "Back when we lost Rantman, we were able to pass it off as a test flight incident. We were lucky, the plane crashed in an area that we were able to control. We removed the drive unit from the remains of the F-eighty-six, and no one was the wiser. After all the unpleasantness was over, we had a long talk with Parker, who had joined us the same time as Rantman. We all agreed that we couldn't take the chance that someone on the outside might find out what we were doing. As luck would have it, this decision turned out to be even more important when the guys in the suits came and pirated the San Agustin disc. Parker decided that the best thing would be for him to disappear, and so he did. We rigged another Sabre to explode on the runway, right out front here. We filled a small urn with a little ash, teeth and bones and turned it over to the Air Force. Turns out, the only relative that Parker had was a spinster aunt up in Michigan. She never knew Parker, but was pleased to receive his burial flag and a small stipend that the Air Force delivered."

"So," said Kelly, "no one's missing Colonel Parker?"

"Not a soul."

"And the other pilots you had lined up? What about them?"

"They were never told what was going on. The first two showed up as placeholders. We told 'em we had empty spots to fill on our pilot roster, and they were to 'standby'. After it was clear we weren't going to need them, we shipped them out. They went away clueless. The third guy, well, that was a slightly different story. We figured if we could get telemetry back from something other than the plane itself, then we might have a better chance of finding out what went on with Parker. So, we had the little transceiver implanted in him. That made it a little harder to cut him loose; but in the end, we told him that the tests (and we hadn't yet told him what the tests were) had been canceled; and he was sent back with all the usual instructions. You know: under penalty of severe sanctions by the United States Air Force and the United States government, loss of pay, loss of pension, loss of life, etc., etc., you will keep your mouth shut or else."

Kelly raised his head to look at the ceiling, afraid to ask the next question. "What about me?" Then he paused, thinking of all the implications of his next question. "Do I just disappear too?"

Matson appeared to be having difficulty finding the right way to phrase his answer. "Kelly," he started, then waited until Kelly looked him in the eyes, "tell me about your parents."

A puzzled look flooded Kelly's face. "What?"

"Your parents Kelly, tell me about them."

"My parents," he paused, "are dead. They've been dead for six years," he paused again, "died in a car wreck while I was at MIT. Why?" he asked.

Not answering, Matson continued, "And your brothers and sisters? Tell me about them?"

Kelly's face, now flushed with an uncontrollable rush of blood, was becoming uncomfortably hot. The sweat was once again at his upper lip. Suddenly, he was beginning to see another one of his monsters at the end of another long, dark hallway, and a dark realization was setting in. 'I don't have brothers, or sisters,' he thought to himself. 'Neither my Mom, nor My Dad had brothers or sisters.'

"Christ," he said, looking back up at the ceiling, then at Matson, "I've already disappeared... haven't I?"

"Well," Matson returned, "let's just say, you were chosen... very carefully."

Kelly thought back to the gun that Cory had held on him earlier in the evening. And now he wondered how many more there might be in this little trailer. He turned to look at the others. They were now all staring back at him.

Matson could see that Kelly was really on edge; enough on edge, he thought, that he might, at any second, bolt for the door, knowing full well what little good that would do him. "Look," he said softly, "we're not the bad guys here. Nobody's going to take you out and lose you in the desert. We're not like that."

Kelly turned to look once again at the others, then back at Matson. "So, why make sure that I had no ties, no family?"

"Easier to hide you from the Air Force."

"Surely the Air Force knows where I am?"

"That's true, they do, sort of. But, you have to remember, the Air Force thinks all of the technology collected at Roswell and San Agustin is now safely hidden away somewhere in the Nevada desert. And remember too about our cover story for this place?"

"Yeah," Kelly replied, annoyed, "the one about this bein' a simple weather station where guys who've maybe been in a little trouble, get sent to kill a little time; punishment for getting out of line. Hell, the worst I've ever done was hit a home run off the base commander at Andrews in a pickup softball game."

"That too, is true," Matson again finished with, "sort of. You remember where you were before your two weeks in Tucson, don't you?"

Kelly thought for a moment, then, "Yeah, after I was pulled off the line, I was sent over to Bolling, in DC; spent two days there before my flight left for Tucson."

"Actually Kelly, you spent four days at Bolling."

"Hell I did. I was there for two days."

"Kelly, listen to me. You were there for four days. Two of those days were spent in the local city lockup, for drunk and reckless driving. If you don't believe me, check the paperwork in your briefcase. I'll bet you haven't looked at half of what's in there, have you?"

Kelly reached for his case. Matson stopped him with a quick grab to his elbow. "Believe me Kelly. It's in there."

"How? How can you do that?" Kelly asked, letting his briefcase drop back to the floor. "How can you mess with my record like that? Why wasn't I asked to volunteer for a mission like this?"

Matson answered, straight faced, "This all came down from a position a lot higher on the ladder than mine. And as far as being asked to volunteer, well, you can imagine how much information would be passed around the country if we went askin' every Tom, Dick and Lieutenant, if he wanted to come out here to "hell and gone" and fly some alien technology for us. Hell, the boys in Nevada would send the suits with dark glasses over here in a heartbeat. We'd be outta business, and probably out of air to breath. We're talkin' national secrets here, Kelly. Hell, this is bigger than a national secret. Couldn't take a chance like that."

Kelly sat back in his seat, his monster clearly visible. His problem now was how to deal with it. He needed one more question answered to make a better assessment of his position.

"So, if I've got this right, the people at Andrews think I've moved on to bigger and better things. The folks at Bolling think I spent two days there, and they've probably forgotten I ever existed. The guys in Tucson think I spent four days in Bolling, two of which were in the local hoosegow, and they too, probably don't know, care, or remember a thing about me."

Matson nodded affirmatively, "Yeah, that about sums it up pretty well."

Kelly moved forward in his chair, closer to Matson, "Why me?"

"I'm not the one to ask that question... but I could hazard a guess, if you'll be satisfied with that. Our people probably ran a psychological profile on you. I'll bet it had "loner" written all over it."

"Loner?"

"Well sure, think about it. When was the last time you saw anyone you'd consider to be a close friend?"

Kelly thought back to Florida after his graduation. He'd spent those few months with Jennings, on the beach, with the ladies. Even Jennings wasn't what he'd call a close friend. He'd flunked out of flight school and they hadn't seen each other since.

"See what I mean," Matson said, after Kelly didn't answer. "No close friends, no family, and, more than one person along the way has put down on paper, that you are a quality pilot. That's a profile that our guys were looking for." He paused, then he touched Kelly on the forearm and said, "That is... why... you."

CHARLIE BRAVO SIX-FIVE-TWO-TWO-SEVEN

"Hey," Perkins called down the length of the trailer, "if you two are done with your palaver, we need to get Will back on the scope."

Matson drew his hand back from Kelly's arm, and replied, "Yes, I think we're done." He looked into the Lieutenant's eyes, "for now," he said with a fatherly grin.

As Matson started to push his chair back, Kelly raised his hand with a questioning look.

"Yes Kelly... another question?" Matson said softly.

"Pilots," Kelly said.

"I thought I mentioned the pilots Kelly."

"I mean... the original pilots... in the disc."

Matson paused, "Ah... yes,... there were pilots, indeed, there were... four... all dead. As far as we know, they are in Nevada."

Matson stood to return to his station, not saying another word. He gave Will a nod as he offered him the empty seat. Will's attention went directly to the radar scope. As Matson sat at the other end of the trailer he asked aloud, "Will, let's send a request to squawk, see if we can get her to come out of hiding."

Kelly had followed Matson back to his station. With the request being sent, he asked. "Won't everybody in the neighborhood be able to see her, if she's painted again?"

"Never happen," Cory answered. "The only other primary radar system using the same frequency we do is in Nevada with those G-men, and they're way over the horizon."

"Then why bother to make her look like a KC-ninety-seven?"

"When we first set this project up, we didn't have equipment capable of using clandestine radar frequencies. Once we switched over, we left our original protocols in place. That way, if she was flying high and wide and did happen to show up on Nevada's scope, they'd just think they had an equipment problem of some kind. Remember? Like you said yourself, KC-ninety-sevens don't fly at angels eighty."

"Got her, Ken," Will's voice filled the trailer. "She's due west, eighty miles out at fifty."

"Is she headed our way?"

"She's headed straight at us, losing altitude and doing about six hundred and fifty knots."

"Damn-it," he blurted, "she's supersonic. She's gonna wake up the whole southern half of the state." Matson's fingers went to his keyboard. "Any change in speed, Will?"

"Yeah, now she's doing twelve hundred."

Matson was at the keys again, "How 'bout now?"

"Oh great, now you've got her on the deck and doing a little over fifteen hundred knots."

"What the hell is she doing? At that speed, she'll be here in less than a minute."

"Yeah," replied Will, "and if she holds her present heading she'll take the roof clean off this place."

Matson was once again beating on his keyboard, alternating between glances at Will who was constantly shaking his head 'NO'.

Cory was counting down the time. "Thirty seconds guys," he said in a loud voice.

Matson tried one more flurry with his fingers. Then Cory announced "ten seconds" and the trailer went quiet. They all knew there would be no warning. There is no sound wave to the front of an aircraft traveling supersonic.

Then, as Cory turned to look out the long window, it came.

"Popop"

Nearly simultaneously, each man reached for his ears as the pressure wave (that accompanied the sound) moved quickly through each of them.

They sat, or stood quietly, holding their ears. Then slowly, each man dropped his cupped hands in front of himself, as if expecting to see a palm full of blood. They remained nearly frozen until Will exclaimed, "What in God's name just happened? That thing was less than a hundred feet off the deck and straight over the top of us. It should've took our heads off. It should've broke every pane of glass in the place."

Matson asked, "Is everyone OK? Cory?"

"I'm fine boss, it just made my ears pop, that's all."

"Me too, I'm fine," Perkins responded touching parts of his body as if looking for something broken.

"Kellerman? Where's Kellerman?"

"Right behind you," Kelly replied, "I'm OK."

Matson turned to Will, but before he could ask:

"She's turned to the south Ken. She's about thirty miles out again, and coming to a dead stop at fifty thousand. I had her at eighteen hundred knots as she passed us."

The disbelief slowly faded as each man began realizing that the devastation they had expected, hadn't materialized.

"She's just sitting there again, like before?" Matson asked.

"Yeah Ken, she's not movin' at all."

Matson paused to take a breath as he looked around the room, then asked, "Anybody got any ideas?"

"No ideas boss," said Cory, "but I got a question."

"Yeah, I know son. The same one I got. What kind of solid object travels at over two thousand miles an hour and doesn't create a significant pressure wave? She made no more noise than a small caliber pistol at a hundred yards."

Kelly walked to the one spot along the window where the tables weren't blocking access. He craned his neck and looked, as best he could, to the south. "Too bad we couldn't have got a look at her when she went by."

"Man," said Cory, "she was traveling at more than three thousand feet-a-second. All you'd have seen was a blur."

"Well, that might be, but, I'll bet you're going to have to get a look at her to find your answer." Kelly motioned toward the end of the trailer, "Will told me that the original disc could change shape in order to travel through a planet's atmosphere. Maybe that's what you're dealing with here."

"That would be hard to believe," said Matson. "She's just disc skin stretched over an old Sabre superstructure. The techs did take five feet off of each wing when they figured out that they didn't need wings on it at all. But that's about all the shape shifting that's in it. And that wouldn't account for the lack of a pressure wave."

"Why not remove the entire wing set?" Kelly asked.

"Believe me, they wanted to," Matson answered, "but remember, if she was ever seen by anybody on the outside, she still had to look conventional."

"Conventional," Kelly half laughed, "I don't care how conventional she looks, if anyone got a peek at what just buzzed us, they ain't gonna be thinking conventional."

"You're probably right, but I don't think it's likely anyone got a look," said Cory. "The sun's not up yet, and the only possible visitors we might have around here are a few braceros sleepin' in the old wrecks out there."

Kelly thought it odd that no one seemed worried about the plane being seen. It didn't seem to him that it would take much to draw a lot of attention this way, if this "thing" started showing off in the daylight. "So, what do you do next? It doesn't look like your plane minds you very well."

"I don't know," said Matson. "We're sort of wingin' it right now. She didn't respond at all to the commands to reduce speed." He looked at his blank screen then keyed his board for an event schedule. There was nothing. "She's not responding at all guys, somebody give me a little help here. What are we missing?"

"Well, she answers to squawk, once in awhile, so we know she hears us," said Cory.

"Only when she wants to," quipped Perkins.

"You got the long range Omni-directional ILS on, right Ken?"

"Yeah, and that should be good all the way out to where she's at."

"And what about the short range?"

"Oh hell, no," said Matson. "She came in so hot, I didn't have time. I never even thought of it," he paused. "You think it's that simple? She was looking for short range ILS?"

"Well, as far as we know, she's flying without a pilot, so she's blind. Makes sense that she'd need help gettin' lined up."

"I'll turn it on," Matson said, "but it won't make any difference now. It's only got a range of about eight to ten miles. At least she's just a little west of due south of us, so she'll be close to an upwind leg when she heads this way. She ought to pick it up just fine when she gets close."

"What else guys?" Matson continued, "anything else we missed?"

"Look Ken," Perkins offered, "I know this sounds a little creepy, but I could try," he paused", I could try voice comm."

"Yeah, you're right Ben," said Cory, "after all this time that is pretty creepy."

Matson dropped his head, then, "Anybody?" he questioned as he looked around at each man in turn. "OK then, so it's creepy, let's give it a try."

Perkins turned his chair back to his table and pulled the old radio style microphone toward him. He threw the switch on the transmitter and waited for the tubes to come up to temperature. He leaned forward into the mike, and hit the key-to-talk. "Charlie Bravo six-five-two-two-seven this is King Alpha six-oh-oh-six-five, do you copy?" He looked around at the others as he waited, then tried again, "Charlie Bravo six-five-two-two-seven," he paused again, "where are you two-two-seven? We're about to start the poker game without you. Come in Charlie Bravo. Come in Charlie Bravo."

"Anything on the scope?" Matson asked Will.

"No Ken, she's dark."

"Go ahead and try it again Ben."

"Perkins leaned into the mike once more, "Charlie Bravo six-five-two-two-seven, this is King Alpha six-oh-oh-six-five, do you read two-two-seven?" He waited a few seconds, then, "C'mon two-two-seven, there's five of us sitting here with chips and beer. Are you playing tonight, two-two-seven?"

Kelly listened to the steady hiss coming over the speaker. It reminded him of nights he had spent, as a kid, at his grandmothers place in Utah. He'd spent hours in front of Gram's old Philco, with the "big knobs", trying to tune in one of big stations out of Chicago or St. Louis. Nothing but the same hiss, broken by a crackle here and there, he imagined, caused by a lightening strike in some far off storm over the horizon.

Perkins turned the volume down but left the radio on. "Doesn't look like were going to get voice, Ken," he said turning to Matson. "I'll leave the set on for awhile just in case."

"Sure, can't hurt," Matson said, turning back to his screen. The last time he had looked at it, was just after his last request for an event schedule. It was empty then, but now, "Hey! look at this," he said, almost startled. Perkins and Cory spun quickly.

"What is it Ken," Cory asked.

"I'm not sure," he answered as the rest of the men gathered around his station.

There, in the same general format as an event schedule was:

KA60065CB65227KA60065CB65227

KA60065CB65227KA60065CB65227

KA60065CB65227KA60065CB65227

KA60065CB65227KA60065CB65227

KA60065CB65227KA60065CB65227

KA60065CB65227KA60065CB65227

KA60065CB65227KA60065CB65227

KA60065CB65227KA60065CB65227

KA60065CB65227KA60065CB65227

KA60065CB65227KA60065CB65227

And then on one line at the bottom of the page:

IWANTTOPLAY

"You've got to be kidding me," Will said, having left his radar scope, now looking in over Matson's shoulders. "That's our call sign."

"Yeah, and that's hers," Perkins said, reaching over and touching the screen on a CB65227. He looked at Matson, "But how in the hell did they get on your screen?"

The trailer went silent. Then, all eyes focused on the single line at the bottom of the screen.

Without turning to face him, Matson asked Will, "Besides us, here in this trailer, who else knew about the poker game?"

"No one," he answered.

"Well," Cory offered, "that's not completely true."

Will looked puzzled as he turned first to Cory, then with raised eyebrows, as if remembering, to Matson, "Cory's right. Rantman and Parker both knew."

"But, I thought they were both dead," said Kelly.

"Yeah, well," Matson paused, "we know for sure that Rantman's dead, and we're reasonably sure that Parker is too. I mean, three years, nobody's gonna survive up there for three years."

"So," asked Kelly, "then who does that leave?" He looked at the men staring back at him, "someone in this trailer?"

"Someone in this trailer?" Cory came back quickly, almost venomously.

"Whoa, ease up Cory, he's just tryin' to help," said Matson. "Look Kelly," he said turning to face the lieutenant, "we'll look for answers to your question somewhere other than in this room. Besides, the way I'm looking at the problem, it gets a lot weirder: instead of asking 'who else' knows about the poker game, maybe we should ask... 'what else' knows."

LIKE A BAT OUTTA HELL

Matson turned back to his keyboard and asked again for an event schedule. His screen went dark. It remained dark. He looked at Perkins.

"Try something simple Ken."

"OK," Matson replied, "can't get any simpler than this." He typed:

CB65227?

The screen replied:

CB65227

"It's just repeating what you type," said Cory.

"No, she's not," Matson replied. "I used a question mark. I asked her if she was CB65227? and she said yes, see, no question mark."

"Ken," Will spoke from behind, "ask it... or her... whatever... ask it, if it is... Colonel Parker."

"OK, let's try the same format." He typed:

PARKER?

The screen answered:

PARKER

Matson typed without hesitation:

CB65227? OR PARKER?

The screen again answered:

CB65227PARKER

And then, one line down:

?

Matson, puzzled at the question mark, and more so, the combined name reply, turned to look at Will, then Perkins. "Guys, unless I'm mistaken, she's," he paused, "or it, is askin' us a question." He paused again, "C'mon guys, Give me some help again, what does it want to know?"

"Maybe she wants to know what she's supposed to do." Cory continued to use the feminine, "Maybe she's just sittin' there waiting for us to tell her what to do."

"I'm sure it's not going to be as easy as telling her to come home."

"Try giving her something useful," Will said as he turned to walk back to his station, "try runway heading, wind speed and direction, you know, like what you'd give any pilot for landing instructions."

Matson typed:

Heading 283

Wind 275 at 15 kts.

The screen quickly showed:

28327515kts

Will, now positioned at the radar scope, voiced loudly, "She's movin' again. Looks like she's up to one hundred fifty knots on a heading of zero-two-five. She's losing altitude."

"Watch her speed. I'd like a warning if she decides to buzz us again."

"She's holding at one-five-oh knots, Ken. I think she's makin' for a two-eighty-three intercept."

Matson had left his seat and was hurrying to the back of the trailer. He stood behind Will, watching the scope. Kelly moved to the window again, straining his eyes to the south.

"She'll be in position for an upwind turn in about thirty seconds," Will said softly, knowing that Matson was now standing behind him. "C'mon baby," he whispered, "c'mon."

Both men held their breath. They seemed not to blink as they stared into the green glow, then Matson pointed, "There," he said, "she's coming left."

"And," Will continued, "it looks like she's all the way 'round to two-eight-three, and," he drug out the word, "it looks like she's holding."

Matson spoke again, "OK guys, she's about six or seven minutes out. Cory, grab a pair of binoculars and get outside. There's enough moonlight that you might catch a glint off that shiny surface... join him if you like Kelly." He continued barking orders, "Ben, make sure we're recording all the telemetry, and if you get the chan...," he was cut off by Perkins.

"Ken, were not receiving telemetry. We haven't all night. The only transmission were getting from her, is her half of the keyboard conversation between the two of you."

"Why does that not surprise me?" Ken replied. "OK, let's keep the recorders going anyway, we might get somethin'."

***

Cory and Kellerman had made their way outside to the front of the trailer, on the window side, just out of the glare of the porch light. They trained their binoculars to the south, sweeping side to side, up and down, searching for anything that moved or bounced the slightest bit of moonlight back in their direction.

"If I'm doin' my math right, she's still about twelve miles downwind," Kelly offered. "We're gonna have to be really lucky to see her that far out."

***

Back at the radar scope: "She's holding steady at a hundred and fifty knots right down the middle of the runway. She not loosing altitude fast enough though."

"I don't think we have to worry about her glide slope Will. We're not talkin' your everyday aerodynamics here. Far as we know, she can come straight down if she wants to."

"That's not what I'm worried about. If she continues in at this altitude, she'll be way above the ILS cone. We could end up with the same results as last time."

Matson thought for a moment, "Where does she need to be?"

"If she's somewhere between four to five thousand feet at five miles out, she should pick it up loud and clear."

"OK," Matson said, "forty-five hundred feet at five miles. Now all I have to do is figure out how to communicate that to her."

"And you'd better hurry. She's headin' for the deck again, and her speed's climbing so fas..., damn Ken, she's at eighteen hundred knots again. If you're gonna do something, you'd better make it quick."

***

Outside: Kelly caught a faint glint in the dark double circles of the binoculars. "Did you see that," he asked Cory.

"Yeah, I've got her. Oh man, she's comin' in like a bat-outta-hell."

The two watched as the little star like object closed on them at an unbelievable rate. It was coming out of the sky at about a forty-five degree angle heading for a point well beyond the runway threshold. Then, suddenly, about two miles out, it slowed abruptly and started to level its flight path.

Cory, with binoculars still pressed tightly against his eyes, "Jeeze, I thought she was fixin' to dig another big hole in the ground."

***

Matson was just settling down in his seat when Will yelled, "Hold it Ken, she's slowed. Don't confuse her with instructions right now, it looks like she's doin' fine. She's back down to a hundred and fifty and it looks like about a four or five degree glide slope."

"She must have got her bearings when she hit the ILS cone," offered Perkins.

Dr. Forest had moved to the window where Kelly had stood before. He was a fairly short man and was on tiptoes to get a view to the south end of the runway. "There she is," he yelled.

The other three men abandoned their screens and radar scope and rushed to the window to join Forest. With necks craned and hands on each others shoulders for purchase, they could just see the tiny, almost white from moonlight, little object as it crossed the threshold and moved down the runway. It slowed quickly, moving as smooth as silk.

***

The plane was now no more than a quarter mile away, and Kelly, still using binoculars, could see that it had not lowered its landing gear. It appeared, however, to move as if it were rolling on solid surface. He watched as it slowed further, and then begin a turn toward the trailer. He found this rather strange, because the plane continued on a straight path down the runway. He continued to watch as it turned completely sideways to its direction of travel, as if moving on a cushion of air. And then, it stopped, pointed directly at the trailer.

Cory turned to Kelly, "You're seeing the same thing I am, right."

"Yeah, she landed gear up."

"Good, I thought I was missin' something."

"C'mon, let's get back inside," Kelly offered.

"Shouldn't we go have a look at her," Cory almost insisted.

"I'm not so sure that's the best thing to do right now. I don't think we've got the slightest idea what's waiting for us out there. Let's go back in and see what Matson and the others have in mind."

***

As they re-entered the trailer Dr. Forest was just coming down off his tip-toes, while the other four stayed at the window. Kelly didn't wait for anyone to speak, "Here," he said to no one in particular, "take a look at it with the binoculars." As Matson turned to reach, Kelly continued, "I've flown lots of Sabre-Jets before, and that don't look like any one of 'em."

Matson trained the glasses on the object and remarked to Will, "Grab that other pair and have a look." As Will took the binoculars from Cory, Matson continued, "She's not on the ground. I couldn't tell that before. She's floatin' six feet off the deck Will"

"Yeah, I see that," Will exclaimed, then after a long pause, he whispered to Ken, "Lieutenant Kellerman is more than right. That's not the same plane we sent up with Parker. Can you see through the canopy?"

"No," Matson replied, "it's reflecting too much moonlight."

As they continued to view through the binoculars, Cory had stepped over to Matson's station, "Hey guys, she's talkin' again."

Matson quickly covered the distance to his table and took his seat. There on the screen was another:

?

While they pondered the little question mark, Cory saw his chance at the binoculars again. He took a place at the window, and after focusing on the plane he asked, "Why do you suppose she's aimed herself right at us?"

"What?" Matson replied, still preoccupied with his screen.

Perkins then offered, "I'll bet she has keyed in on us as an electromagnetic source. I'm sure we're the only broadcast source of any kind for miles around."

"I'm not sure I like those six, big, fifties pointing in our direction," Cory chuckled.

As if he had suddenly remembered something very important, Will made a dash for the back of the trailer. He sat and keyed his board. The little three-view, that had been there before, enlarged itself to cover the screen. He gave a sigh of relief as he saw that the nose section showed no indication of activity. Kelly suddenly realized what Will was looking for. He hurried to Will's station, leaned over his shoulder and quietly asked, "Has she been armed?"

"No," he said, catching his breath. "No, I've got a clean board."

"What will it look like if we've got a problem?"

"Six small red circles, three on each side of the nose." Will shook his head slowly.

"What is it?" Kelly asked.

"I thought it was a good idea at the time, made me feel like I wasn't so much of a duncel, you know, if I actually had live ammo to look after, but now, I sure wish we hadn't armed her." He paused, "She's carrying full magazines."

"Sixteen hundred rounds?"

"Sixteen hundred and two."

"And two," Kelly chuckled snidely, "that'll make a difference. Does Matson know?"

"I'm sure he does, but he doesn't think about things like that. In fact, that would be the last thing on his mind; that little ship... opening up on us."

"One of us has to keep an eye on your screen."

"Yeah, I agree," and with a couple keystrokes he reduced the three-view to its previous size in the corner of his screen. "There, that makes it a little harder to see from the other end of the trailer."

"You don't want anyone else to know if she goes red?"

"Look, they've got enough on their minds as it is," Will said softly, but sternly. "Let me handle things at this end," and he turned to the radar scope, ignoring Kelly.

***

Perkins turned to Matson, who was still pondering the question mark. "We've got to get her closer to the trailer Ken, and then get her under cover. The sun's comin' up in a few hours and she's fixin' to be real easy to spot."

"What are we gonna cover her with? I don't recall havin' anything around here that big."

"There's three or four old cargo chutes in the service shed down at the far end of the runway; gotta be hundred footers at least; they should do the job."

Cory, still at the window with binoculars, called to Matson, "Hey!" he exclaimed, "you don't have to worry about movin' her, she's comin' this way."

Matson stood to look, then, sat back down quickly to check his screen; still seeing nothing but the question mark. "Will," he called to the back of the trailer. "Do you see any movement on radar?"

"No Ken, she's lost in ground clutter. Eyeball is the only way to keep track of her now."

"She's comin' straight at us guys, very slowly, but right at us."

Perkins suggested, "Ken, try keeping her busy. Type something... ask her something."

"Oh, you think she can't move and answer a question at the same time?

Perkins was now standing at the window with binoculars. "Cory's right," he said, "she's headed this way. Looks like a quick-march pace and she's about fifty yards out. If we don't get her stopped, she'll go half way through us."

Matson typed:

PARKER?

The screen quickly answered:

PARKER

He typed PARKER STOP

The screen answered:

?

He typed PARKER HALT

The screen answered:

?

The plane was now off the runway on a collision course with the trailer. It moved onto a small grassy area where Cory and Kelly had stood earlier to watch her as she screamed out of the sky beyond the end of the runway. Perkins watched as it passed over an old redwood picnic table setting out front. He lowered the binoculars, and, with his eyes, he could see the table begin to vibrate violently a few inches off the ground. It seemed locked in some sort of force field that held it in place as it was beat to pieces. "Hurry Ken," he pleaded, "we got about twenty seconds."

Matson looked up. He could now see the top of the plane's vertical stabilizer shining in the moonlight; moving closer. He went back to his keyboard and typed a question mark.

When the screen failed to answer, he looked back up at the window, and in a hopeless gesture, he braced both hands on the front of his desk, fully expecting to be bowled over in a shower of broken glass.

"Hey, what'd you do," Perkins asked loudly. "She's slowing."

All eyes were riveted to the front of the trailer. They watched as the plane slowly filled the window and then stopped no more than twenty feet from the glass. Perkins could feel the vibration that had destroyed the picnic table as it began to work its way into the floor beneath him. As the window began to shake to the point of near destruction, a set of three landing gear flashed from under the craft; so quickly that it seemed they materialized from nowhere. The plane then settled the last few inches to the ground. Perkins, with his eyes on the window, watched as the glass began to undulate in a wave motion from the harmonics set up by the vibration. As it reached the point where he was sure it would explode, sending shards of glass over everyone, the vibration suddenly began to fade away.

SOMETHING CHROME

Matson, Perkins and Will made their way to the small space available for standing at the window. Dr. Forest grabbed a chair to stand on, and Cory climbed up on the table between stations. He placed both hands on the sill and peered out the window, only his fingers, eyes, and forehead visible from outside. Kelly found a spot behind Matson and Perkins. The men stood in silence. The plane was illuminated, only slightly, by the light coming from inside the trailer, but it was enough to tell each man that they were not looking at an F-eighty-six.

"Cory," Matson barked in a hoarse whisper, as if he didn't want the plane to hear, "hit the floods."

Cory backed away from the window, climbed down off the table and ran to the back wall. He opened a small breaker box that housed a set of switches. Placing his thumbs against all four, he pushed them upwards. As they snapped to the on position, he could hear the breath as it left the lungs of each of the men still at the window.

There, before them, sat something chrome. It was completely chrome. Down its center appeared to be the vestige of what was once a Sabre-Jet fuselage. Its nose was almost completely closed, as if an attempt was being made to streamline it to a point. At the angle the plane was sitting, and because the J-forty-seven engine had been removed, Matson, who was centered on the craft, could look into what was left of the air intake and right out the tailpipe. The shape of the canopy was still there, but that too had been modified. It was much lower in profile, and it too was chrome. The horizontal stab was gone, but the vertical stabilizer was still there, standing straight, tall and tapered in all its former glory.

And then there were the wings, if that is what they could now be called. The root of each wing, next to the fuselage, had migrated fore and aft until they were connected to the plane very near the nose and tail. The leading and trailing edges had rounded themselves until they scribed a graceful, circular arc on both sides of the plane, so that when viewed from above, they formed a perfect disc.

They stood, speechless, for a moment, until Matson spoke softly, with a lilt in his voice, "Oh my," Then he paused before whispering, almost reverently, "What have we done?" Turning back to the room, he spoke to no one, and everyone, "She's recreating herself. She's becoming a disc again."

"A hybrid?" Perkins questioned quietly.

"Maybe, or maybe not," Forest said, his own incredulity slowly wearing off. "At this point, I don't think we can be sure. If she hasn't finished changing herself, she may very well end up a perfect disc, again."

Will stepped away from the window. As he walked past Kelly he motioned with an eye movement, as if to say, 'follow me'. As they walked toward the radar scope Will asked quietly, "Did you see the gun ports?"

"You mean the blackening?"

"Yeah, all six guns," he paused and shook his head. "She's fired rounds."

Kelly took a minute to ponder the implications, "What on Earth would she be shooting at?"

"Not a clue," Will answered. "There's never been any reports, that I can remember over the last three years, of anyone havin' potshots taken' at 'em by an F-eighty-six shootin' up the desert floor around here. That surely would've drawn, at least, a little attention."

Kelly started to speak, then held back.

"What is it?" Will asked, "you got something to say, let's hear it"

"Look," Kelly said, "I think you're getting the same feeling about this that I am." He paused, not wanting to believe what he was thinking. "You guys say you're sure Parker is dead, right?"

"Yes! He's got to be."

"Well, somebody, or something, is answering when Matson types the questions."

Will nodded.

"What if there was a thing," he searched for a better word, "a presence..."

Will interrupted, "You mean, an intelligence?"

"Yeah, an intelligence... living, or existing, in the skin itself. Hell, maybe the ship was just as alive as its crew." He paused again as his monster in this deep and ever darkening hallway grew larger. "Hell maybe there never was a crew."

"What? You think it's a living machine?" Will whispered.

Kelly nodded almost imperceptibly, then asked with a raise of his eyelids, "Why not?"

"And, what about Parker?" Will questioned. "Remember the answers? It called itself CB65227PARKER. And the poker game? It said it wanted to play."

"Yeah," said Kelly, "and it responded to landing info. Those things have been bothering me too."

Will looked at his scope, then back up at Kelly, "Look, this is some really way-out-there stuff. And, we could be way off base just as easy as not." Will reached over and turned his screen off. "Let's keep this between you and me, for now, OK"

Kelly couldn't quite tell if Will had just asked him, or told him, to keep all this quiet. He thought it strange that Will would want to hide this (and the fact that the guns had been fired) from the others, but he nodded his head in the affirmative. 'I'll play along with you, for now,' he thought to himself.

***

Matson stood, "Let's go have a look at her." He turned to Perkins, "Ben, you can come out later, but for now, I need you to stay here and monitor the screen. If she's got something more to say, you can relay it to us by walkie-talkie."

"Fine with me Ken... you guys go find out what she's all about," he smiled. "I'll come out when I'm sure it's safe."

***

As the men rounded the corner to the front of the trailer, they shielded there eyes from the light of the four bright floods. The glare was compounded by the highly polished surface of the craft.

As they approached, each man, in turn, seemed drawn to lay hands on it. Cory led the way, followed by Matson, Forest, Kelly and finally Will. Cory continued dragging his right hand along the surface of what had been the left wing's leading edge as he made his way to the side of the nose. His eyes were level with the gun ports. He was not schooled in the fineries of fighter aircraft, so it never occurred to him, as he ran his hand over the three streamlined openings, that from each of them, death could be issued at three thousand feet per second. It also didn't occur to him that the blackness in each port indicated: that might have happened already.

Matson and Forest ducked under the wing on the left side of the disc, and approached one of the landing gear. They could clearly see that they weren't landing gear any longer. Each of the three struts was made of telescoping tubes, ending in a heavy, circular pad about twelve inches in diameter.

"Makes sense," said Matson, "she doesn't need wheels anymore."

The two made their way to the rear, touching everything, exploring everything as they went. The fairing between the old fuselage and the disc wing was molded in ever graduated, perfect elliptical curves.

"She is really streamlined," Forest said as they made their way forward again.

Kelly remained near the left edge of the disc, leaning with his right hand resting on the craft for support. He looked over his shoulder at Will, who was just beyond him at the point that would have been the wing tip. Will stood with both hands on the edge of the disc, rubbing both hands slowly over its surface. The look on his face, and the way he was touching the chrome, reminded Kelly of the little piece of skin Will had shown him in the trailer. Will seemed mesmerized again, just like before. Kelly placed both of his hands on the craft and moved them like Will. 'Nothing,' he thought, 'if it's having an effect on him, it doesn't seem to be bothering me,' he looked at the others, 'or anyone else.'

Kelly reached over and touched Will on the shoulder, "Will," he whispered. Will remained engrossed in whatever it was he was getting from his laying on of hands. "Will," Kelly said, touching him again. Will stopped for an instant, then withdrew his hands quickly, holding them up in front of him. He looked at the palms first, then the backs, and then the palms again. Then realizing he was being watched, he turned to Kelly, "What?" he said abruptly.

"You've been standing there rubbin' on that thing for almost three or four minutes now."

Will stared at Kelly, like a man who had taken a long walk, and hadn't completely returned yet. "You're crazy man, I just this second put my hands on it."

PARKER

"Hey Cory," Matson said, while he and Forest were making their way back from the other side of the craft, "Grab that ladder under the trailer. Let's have a look up top."

"Hell," Cory said, "we don't need no ladder." The wing was between belt and chest high to Cory. He laid both hands on the leading edge, and like a swimmer leaving a pool, he catapulted himself up, first hooking one foot then pulling up the other. He stood there looking like Hillary atop Mount Everest.

"Well that's just fine for you, youngster," Matson said, "but what about us old guys?"

Kelly turned from Will, "I'll get the ladder," he said.

As the others watched Kelly, who was taking some time to pull the ladder free from weeds that had grown up through it, Cory suddenly screamed at the top of his lungs. They turned just in time to see him fall, spread eagled, flat on his back; landing on the wing about half way out to the tip. Holding the back of his head, he turned to Matson and tried to speak, but couldn't. He slowly raised his free arm and pointed. There at the area, where just moments before had been a completely opaque, chromed cockpit area, was now a transparent approximation of a canopy. It covered what once served as the business office for a fighter pilot. And, just visible to the men standing on the ground, was the top of a standard issue combat pilot's helmet.

"The ladder, quick," Matson barked at Kelly. They stood it alongside the wing, and Matson, with Kelly steadying him, made his way up. Forest followed, and together the two men made their way to the now transparent canopy. Matson laid his hands on the clear surface and leaned forward to look inside. It was Parker all right; dead. His eyes were sunk deep into their sockets. His skin was wrinkled and had the look of old tanned leather. He sat solemnly, head facing straight ahead, both hands in his lap, looking for all-the-world like he was taking a nap. Both legs matched his hands in perfect alignment. His feet were back away from the rudder pedals.

Matson turned to Cory, now sitting behind him, "We've got to get this canopy opened," he said, pointing back at it, "What did you do to make it change like this?"

"Geeze, I don't know boss. I just touched it, down lower... there," he motioned with a still shaking hand.

"Kelly," Matson looked at the lieutenant, still standing by the ladder, "where is the canopy release on an F-eighty-six?"

Kelly moved forward to a spot near where the wing joined the fuselage. "This thing has changed a lot since it was something I would recognize, but, my best guess is," he pointed, "anywhere along there, just forward of where Cory said he touched it."

Matson put his hand to the spot and moved it fore and aft. Nothing happened.

"Here," Kelly offered, "try a little lower, along the same line."

Matson did so, and as his hand reached a spot about a foot below the canopy line, he felt his fingertips sink gently into the surface. Having no idea what to do next, he pushed a little harder. A sound, not unlike that made when a cork is gently teased from a Champaign bottle, startled Matson. He stepped back as they all watched a line form and then open across the canopy; about where it would have separated if it were still the original.

"Amazing," Matson whispered, "That was a solid piece of glass."

The rear portion of the canopy, comprising about three quarters of the whole, now slid quickly backwards. It stopped with authority, as if locked in the open position.

Dr. Forest, as if he suddenly thought that this was his area of expertise, stepped in front of Matson. He kneeled beside the open canopy, and knowing full well that he would get no response, laid two fingers on the dead pilots' jugular. He didn't need to say it, but he did, softly, "He's dead alright." He turned to Matson, "What now?"

"We're gonna have to get him out of there," Matson replied as he stepped alongside Forest. Then it occurred to him, "Dr., why no odor? I would have expected the smell of death to come crawling out of there when the canopy opened."

Forest ran his fingers along the corpses jaw line. He felt his arms and neck area. "Looks to me," he said, turning back to Matson, "that he's, somehow, been mummified."

"How on Earth could that happen, sitting in a cockpit like this?"

Forest thought for a moment, then offered, "Ken, I don't think it could happen on Earth, at least, not around here, but, it could happen, in theory, at altitude," he gestured skyward. "It's dry up there, above the weather. If the fuselage along side the cockpit, or the canopy, lost integrity while he was as high as this thing can fly, well, over time, the low humidity could have done this."

Matson looked at Parker, then turned to Kelly, "If it won't bother you to help with something like this, why don't you and Will give us a hand getting Parker out of here." Matson knew better than to ask Cory.

Kelly, already standing beside the ladder, used the second and third rungs, and stepped onto the wing.

"Where's Will?" asked Matson.

"Don't know, right off. I lost track of him a couple minutes ago."

Matson gave a quick look around, "Alright then, it's the three of us." Then at Kelly again, "Cory isn't going to be much help with this," he said with a slight smile, "so, why don't you get over to the starboard side, and lift from there."

Kelly moved to the rear of the plane, at a point where the front end of the dorsal fin, that streamlines the vertical stabilizer, meets the fuselage; right where it's at its lowest point above the wing. He threw a leg over, like mounting a horse, then slid over the smooth surface to the other side. Once in position, he put his right leg inside on the cockpit floor. He grabbed a fist full of Parkers flight suit at the buttocks with his left hand, and slid his right hand under the right knee. Matson slid his left arm under Parkers left arm pit and steadied his head with his right. Forest, without stepping inside, grabbed hold, much like Kelly had. Matson gave a quick three count, and they lifted the surprisingly light pilot from his seat. Kelly stepped completely inside the plane and bent over the port side of the cockpit as they laid the body gently onto the wing.

"How 'bout that," Matson said, "no rigor. I would've thought he'd been stiff as a board."

As Matson looked up at Forest for an answer, the Doctor threw up both hands and said with a half smile, "Don't ask me... we just pulled a mummy out of an F-eighty-six, and I'm supposed to have all the answers? Rigor only lasts for a few days in a body anyway. I've got no idea what being cramped in this cockpit for years, at altitude, might have done to it."

"Cory," Matson barked, "think you can handle getting a stretcher for us?"

"Sure thing," he said, gaining his feet, "but I didn't even know we had one around here."

"The tall closet, inside, where we keep all the mops and cleaning stuff. Look in the back. There should be a medical cot leaning against the back wall. The legs are made to come off. Grab it and bring it here."

"OK," Cory muttered as he jumped from the wing, glad to be away from the body.

The three men, Kelly still in the cockpit, stood over Colonel Parker. Forest kneeled, checking the flight suit along its left side between the armpit and waist. "Help me roll him a bit, so I can see this side of his back."

"What are you looking for Frank?"

"Look, here," he said, as the area under the left lower back became visible, "I think this is blood."

Kelly turned back inside the cockpit and checked the corresponding spot on the seat. "There's blood here too," he said as he brushed his hand over the area, "looks like it's been here awhile."

Dr. Forest jumped as the walkie-talkie, hanging on his belt, suddenly came to life with a screech. "Ben!" he exclaimed, "give me a warning next time," he said, holding his heart while looking through the long trailer window at Perkins.

"Sorry 'bout that, put Ken on."

"Yeah Ben," Matson said, "what'ya got."

"She's talking again. There's been nothing but that little question mark all the time you guys have been out there, but now, about the same time you laid the body out on the wing, she filled the whole screen with the word pilot, and each word is followed by a question mark."

"OK," Matson answered, giving a puzzled look to Kelly and Dr. Forest. "Let me know if that changes, and give a yell at Cory and tell him to grab one of the wool blankets too." And then in afterthought, "Oh, is Will in there?"

"No. He came in a bit ago. He went back to his station, then back outside. I thought he was out there with you guys."

Matson handed the walkie-talkie back to Dr. Forest. They could all hear Perkins yell to the back of the trailer at Cory. Then, a couple loud bangs and a thud issued from that same general direction. Cory rounded the corner as the trailer door slammed shut and the last leg went flying off the cot.

"Cory," Dr. Forest asked with a smirk, "when did you turn into such a klutz?"

"Sorry fellas this whole thing has got me on edge; never have liked bein' around the dead." He handed the cot, now a stretcher, up to Matson.

They laid the body onto the stretcher. Kelly jumped from the wing, and they maneuvered Parker over the edge so that Kelly could grab hold of the handles. They lowered the body and carried it back around to the porch. Cory picked up the blanket from where he had dropped it in his nearly headlong dive out the door; and as they lowered the corpse to the ground, he covered it without looking.

THE SHED

Matson stood. He took a couple steps back, looking around the corner to the plane. After a few steps around the porch so he could see down the length of the far side of the trailer, he asked no one in particular, "Where in hell is Will?"

"Haven't seen him for awhile," piped Cory, "maybe he went to the shed to get the cargo chutes."

Matson turned to Kelly, "Would you mind checking that out? If that's where he went, he'll need a hand carrying three of those things all the way back here."

"Sure," Kelly replied. "I'm gonna go inside and use the head first."

Kelly had no intentions of stopping at the head. He went straight for Will's station. He checked to make sure Perkins was still busy at his own table, then, he hit the switch to turn on Will's screen. A feeling of relief came over him as he saw the weapons on the plane were still dark. As he turned to leave, he flipped the switch to the off position, and then, he stopped. Suddenly, in his mind, he saw Will, outside, hands rubbing on the leading edge of the wing. He reached over and opened the drawer that contained the piece of disc skin. The drawer was empty. On the way to the hallway and the door outside, he turned and walked up behind Perkins.

"Anything new?" he asked.

Perkins answered with something, but Kelly wasn't really interested. What he wanted, was a look at the box under Matson's' table. The same box that held the pistol that Cory had displayed earlier. Like Will's drawer, the box was empty.

***

Kelly was on his way to the end of the runway, looking for the shed that held the cargo chutes. If Will had come this way, Kelly thought, he would have had plenty of time, by now, to get a couple chutes, and be heading back. He should meet him on the way. He had checked all the shadowed areas as he walked: the small lean-to at the end of the trailer; a disjointed group of sage brush to the left of the path. He found nothing. He cursed himself mentally, for not asking for a flashlight.

As he approached the shed, he saw the padlock, open and swinging on the hasp. The door was closed back against the hasp, so that a crack about an inch wide remained. He could hear a few soft clanks and bangs inside. Someone was moving things around in there. He changed direction a few degrees, and walked the last few steps quietly. He took a position next to the small side window, away from what little moonlight was left. He stood and listened.

"What to do, what to do?" a soft voice almost whispered, "we are so very far from home."

"Don't worry," another voice answered, "we will find a way. In fact, help is now on the way, I can feel it."

As Kelly moved, to better his position, he didn't notice the old shovel and rake that had been hung on a couple of rusty nails along side the window. The shovel didn't make much noise as it fell from its perch and landed in the tall grass, but he figured it was enough to blow his cover. Thinking on his feet, he ran to a spot about twenty feet in front of the door and called inside, "Will, are you in there?"

Kelly could hear what he thought were muffled voices, some shuffling and then another soft thud. "Yeah," the voice paused, "yeah, I'm in here." Will then said, nervously, "C'mon in and grab one of these chutes."

Kelly pulled the door open slowly. He could see Will standing inside, his hand just coming out of his pocket. He was afraid that hand would be full of the missing gun. It was empty. Will's eyes were open wide, with white showing all the way around his pupils.

Kelly really didn't want to be this far away from the trailer, in this little dark shed, with a man he thought might be going off the deep end. He grabbed the chute nearest the door, and, as Will turned to grab two more, he took a quick look around; there was no one else there, as far as he could tell. 'If there is another person in here,' he thought, 'he's got to be invisible, or very small.' At this point, he thought it better not to ask Will questions. He made a quick about-face and moved away from the door. As he started for the trailer, he looked back over his shoulder. The doorway was filled with blackness. How many times, he thought, had he seen that before. He stopped. He would wait for Will. He didn't want him walking behind.

As they made their way around the end of the trailer, the porch light struck Will's face. Kelly thought it odd that Will now looked like the perfectly normal guy he had met earlier.

They could tell by the voices that the others had moved inside. "Let's leave these out here," Will said, dropping his chutes at the foot of the steps. Kelly tossed his alongside and followed Will up under the light cone.

***

The four men sat at their stations, in the same positions Kelly remembered them from earlier that night. Matson turned, "Ah, Will, there you are. Did you get the chutes?"

"Yeah, they're just outside."

"Good. We're going to be in morning twilight before too long, and direct sun shortly after that. We've got to get her covered and," he paused, "and, we've got to get rid of the body."

Cory broke in, "Get rid of it?" he said, turning his eyes to Matson, "He's..."

"Look Cory, you know as well as I do, that the six of us in this trailer, are the only people on Earth who know that Colonel Parker didn't die over three years ago." He continued as Cory lowered his head, "Look Son, just what would you have me tell folks, if his body suddenly turned up?"

"I can't do it," Cory said. "I won't do it," he affirmed, turning back to his screen.

"Don't worry, I wasn't going to ask you. And besides, we don't have to worry about that right now. We can keep him covered, and out of the way."

Matson turned back to his screen, "So, everybody, what are we supposed to make of this," he pointed to his screen. The same message was still there. Ten rows of the word PILOT, each one followed by a question mark.

Perkins spoke, "It hasn't changed since you guys removed Parker."

"Not at all?" asked Forest.

"Well, it hasn't actually changed, but, the screen has blanked and then the same thing reappeared."

"I don't think that's good," said Kelly.

Matson turned to face him, "What do you mean, not good?"

Kelly stumbled, as usual, looking for the right place to start. "Look, I'm way outta my league when it comes to this science stuff," he paused to look at Will, not fully knowing why, "or this science fiction stuff, but, I figure we're lookin' at this whole thing the wrong way." He looked back at Matson, "Remember what this thing did when you didn't give it what it wanted the first time?" He paused. "Well, now it's askin' for something again." Kelly looked around the room at the other five; hoping one of them would pick up the ball.

"You think it's asking for a pilot, don't you?" asked Matson.

"Yes sir," Kelly replied strackly, as if answering a superior officer.

"So, do you think we should give it one," he paused, "right now?"

"No sir," again strackly, "that would certainly make things worse, at least for the pilot. This thing probably killed Parker."

"We don't know that for sure son," said Dr. Forest.

"Well, we do know that it took Parker up, and when he came back down, he was dead. That's enough to tell me that I ain't gettin' in it 'till I know it's safe, or at least, a whole lot safer."

"Relax Kelly," Matson reassured, holding up two calming open palms. "No ones going up in her again 'till I say so."

"But, you're not listening to what I'm saying, are you?" "She," he pointed to the plane sitting outside, "may have a lot more to say about that, than you, or any of us do." Kelly looked down the length of the trailer at Will. He could see Will, almost imperceptibly, move his head in the negative. At this point Kelly made his own decision. "She's got six fifty caliber Brownings pointed right at us. And I'm with Cory on this one. I don't like them pointed this way either. Do you have any idea what she could do with those?"

"What on Earth makes you think she might use those against us, or anyone else, for that matter?"

Kelly looked back down the trailer. Will was gone. He turned back to Matson, "She's already fired her guns," he said.

Matson, and then the others, quickly turned to look at the shiny plane sitting in front of them. "Christ," Matson said, "look at the gun ports. I didn't notice that before."

"What?" asked Forest.

"They're blackened." Matson said turning back to Kelly.

Dr. Forest and Perkins both appeared to realize, at the same time, that they were each in near perfect alignment with the port and starboard guns. They stood and moved to the side. Matson, who was directly in front of the intake, seemed a little more at ease with his position, but, he stood anyway, slid his chair to the side, walked directly away from the window, and then, as if those few extra feet, between himself and the plane, would make any difference, he stepped quickly across the line of fire.

"Will." Matson called to the back of the trailer.

"He's not in here," Kelly said.

"Where in hell's name has he gone this time?" Talking to Kelly, he said, "You know the armament on the F-eighty-six, don't you?"

"I know how to pull the trigger, and I know there's an arming switch in the cockpit, but, I doubt that the switch will do us any good."

"Why's that? If we turn it off, it can't fire, right."

"Well, under normal circumstances, I'd say yes, but, well, it's an electrical switch, not manual. It arms the trigger, not the guns. And besides, the plane has obviously armed itself at least once already. It had to in order to fire the rounds that blackened the ports."

Matson, with a near hopeless look, asked, "Then what do we do?"

Kelly looked at the shiny remnant of the eighty-six on the other side of the glass. "She's got six, fifty caliber rounds chambered, one in each gun. The Brownings are gas operated. The recoil from each previous shot moves the action and chambers the next round. If you remove those rounds, there's no way she can chamber new ones by herself." He looked back at Matson, "That is, unless she's made modifications to the guns along with the rest of the changes."

"Can you do that, son?"

"I'm a pilot," he said, "I had mechanics to do all the reloading. The closest I've ever come to a Browning, out of an aircraft, was when I fired one mounted on the back of an army jeep. I watched the army guy load it, but I wasn't paying much attention. Best I can tell you, we'll have to remove the ammo belts from the feeders, then, pull the slide back to eject the live round from each gun, and I see lots of problems, right off the bat."

"What do you mean?" Forest asked.

Kelly walked to the window, paying no attention to the line of fire. "Look at her nose," he said with a nod in that direction, "there are no longer any access panels. She's as smooth as glass. How do we get inside?"

"Maybe, the same way I opened the canopy," Matson offered.

"Yeah, maybe, but I still see an even bigger problem." He turned to look at the plane once more, "What if she doesn't want us inside?"

"I don't know how to answer that," Matson said. "I guess it could get really dicey... if she decides to get defensive." He paused, then looked around, "Where in the hell is Will?" he yelled. "He should be helping with this. Damn it," he exclaimed out of frustration, "he might have an angle on this we haven't thought of."

"I'll go look for him," Perkins offered. "You don't need me right now anyway. You can monitor the screen while these guys cover the plane."

"Yeah, sure, but don't stay gone too long. I'd rather be down one man, than two."

As Perkins nodded and headed for the door, Kelly grabbed him by the arm, "Look, Perkins, you know Will a lot better than I do, but, well," he struggled for words again, "he's been acting strange lately, especially when he's alone, and especially when he's got that little piece of disc skin with him."

"Will's probably the steadiest hand we've got here Kelly," Matson said. "He was here even before me. What do you mean by him acting strange?"

Kelly thought carefully, knowing he was the outsider here; arriving only hours before. "Haven't you guys noticed how he acts with that material?"

"Yeah, I have," Cory said, thumbing back at Will's station. "I've seen him take it out of the drawer, when he thinks no one's looking. He just sits there... rubbin' it," he paused, "that is kinda strange, isn't it?"

"And he's got a lot worse since the plane landed." Kelly continued to explain, "When I went to the shed to find him, I'd swear he was talkin' to someone, but, when I had a chance to look inside, well, he was the only one in there."

Matson waved Perkins toward the door, "Kelly, let's you and me have a talk... Doctor," he turned to Forest, "you and Cory head back outside and start stretching out one of those chutes. Take a look around and see what there is to tie off to, we don't want those things blowin' all over the county when the wind picks up in the morning."

Matson walked to the back of the trailer and took Will's seat. Kelly followed, but before he sat down, he flipped the switch on Will's screen, "You know how to read this screen, don't you?"

"Look," Matson said, "before we talk about anything else, we've got to straighten out this trust issue you have with Will."

"Sir," Kelly slipped back into his military character, "I mean no disrespect, but, do you know how to read this screen?"

Matson looked Kelly in the eyes, and recognizing the intensity he saw there, turned to Will's screen, "Well, yes, for the most part. It represents telemetry on the physical configuration of the aircraft. Landing gear, dive brakes, canopy opened or closed and locked, see there," he pointed, "the indication is that the canopy is open," he paused. "Will went over that stuff with us ages ago, why?"

"And what about the guns? Did he tell you about the guns?"

"He might have, I can't rightly say I remember one way or the other." Again he asked, "Why?"

"Earlier, I let Will know that I was aware that the guns had been fired. He asked me to withhold that information from you, and it became evident that he didn't want you, or the others, to see his screen. So, I ask you, why would he do that?"

Matson stared with a puzzled look. "If what you say is true, then I don't know. I can't imagine why he would do something like that."

"Look," Kelly said, pointing to the nose area of the plane, "when the guns are armed, and I mean electrically, because they are already armed physically, you will see six small red circles, three on a side, right here. One of us has to monitor this screen at all times, at least until we find a way to permanently disarm her."

Matson was now in a hard place; he had to decide to either trust a friend he'd known for years, or this newcomer. At that instant the nose of the little three-view on Will's screen went red. Three shots rang out.

"She's shooting at us," Matson screamed as he dived for the floor.

"No," said Kelly, squatting next to him. "That was small arms fire." Then, standing slowly, "Look, the window glass, it's still there. Those shots came from out by the lean-to at this end of the trailer." Kelly helped a shaking Matson to his feet. "Is there another gun in here?"

"What's wrong with the one under my desk?"

"Somebody barrowed it awhile back, and I'm afraid it was Will. I think Perkins is in trouble, or worse, and we ain't gonna be much help to him without some firepower."

"No, th-that was the only gun," Matson stuttered, still trembling.

Kelly looked around, searching. A broom handle... something heavy... hell, he'd settle for a stapler, or a paper weight.

"There was a very-pistol in the back closet where Cory found the cot. Would that help?" Matson asked, still crouching as they moved toward the door.

"Wait here," Kelly said, pushing Matson against the hallway wall, "and stay down." He made his way quickly to what was more of a long skinny storage room than a closet. He felt for the light switch. No light and the door opened the wrong way, so it blocked most of the light from the trailer. He moved his hands over the shelves, searching in near darkness; blankets, spare parts, paper reams, flotsam, and then... there! There it was. He grabbed the small box next to it... cartridges, he hoped. As he made his way back to Matson, he already had the pistol broke open. He pulled a cartridge from the box and rammed it home. He closed the pistol and put a couple extra rounds in his side pocket. As he Passed Matson, he whispered "You'd better stay here."

"No argument from me," Matson said quietly, "be careful."

As Kelly left the trailer he threw the switch next to the door, hoping it would dowse the harsh porch light. It did. In the darkness, he made his way down the steps to the side of the trailer away from the plane. He continued, in the dark, down the length of the trailer to the little lean-to. He stopped to listen; he heard nothing. As he started to make his move around the corner, he picked up a shadow, cast by the flood lights that were still illuminating the plane. The shadow was getting larger. He waited until the man turned the corner and walked into the same darkness that engulfed himself. He pulled a very cartridge from his pocket and tossed it onto the roof of the lean-to, and at the same time he stepped out from his cover. As the man's attention was drawn to the sound on the roof, Kelly demanded, "Don't move, or I'll blow your damned head off."

"Jesus, don't shootdon'tshootIt'smeCory," he paused, but not very long, "don't shoot, please don' shoooot."

Dr. Forest, who was following close behind Cory, was now also, frozen in place. Kelly stepped out into the light.

"Almighty, son," Forest said with relief, "you scared us half to death. Was that you doin' all the shootin'?"

Cory stepped out of the darkness holding his crotch, trying to hide the fact that he had wet himself. "Sorry about that Brickman," Kelly said to Cory, "now I guess you know how it feels." He turned to Forest, "No, it wasn't me." Then realizing there was still a shooter out there somewhere, he held the pistol up at the ready and began scanning the darkness down the path that led to the shed. He heard a small movement under the lean-to, but, again, he could see nothing. "Cory," he said, "move over by the doctor, and both of you cover your eyes for a second." Kelly walked to a spot about twenty feet from the end of the trailer and fired the pistol into the ground. The bright red light illuminated the underside of the lean-to with an eerie glow; and there, in the rear, sitting with his back against the wall, was Will; a bullet hole in the middle of his forehead. It was all poor Cory could take. Without a word, he took off as fast as his legs would carry him. After about ten feet, he tripped over a piece of the picnic table that was destroyed earlier by the vibrations from the plane. He fell headlong into the starboard wing tip, striking it with his forehead. He lay there, in the light of the floods, out cold.

BETRAYAL

Dr. Forest and Kelly had just made their way inside the trailer. Forest had gathered up a couple hand towels and was about to make his way back outside to attend to Cory, who was still lying motionless where he had fallen. The walkie-talkie, still on his belt, suddenly screeched to life.

"Help," a soft, shaking voice whispered. "Help me," it pleaded again.

Forest grabbed the radio and keyed to talk, "Ben? Ben, is that you?"

Matson, who was trying to come to terms with just being told, by Kelly, that Will had a bullet hole through his head, turned to the doctor and motioned for the radio. "Ben, where in hell are you? What happened out there?"

"Don't talk so loud, they'll hear you," Perkins pleaded. "I've got the volume turned all the way down, but, it's still very loud."

Matson turned to Kelly, "Was there anybody else outside with you? What's he talking about?"

"I didn't see anybody else, just me, the doctor, Cory, and," he hesitated, "and Will."

Matson looked at the walkie-talkie, then put it to his mouth and whispered, "Where are you Ben?"

"I'm in the bushes, on the north side, off the path to the left."

Looking at Kelly, "You got a couple more rounds for that thing?" gesturing at the very-pistol.

Kelly nodded.

"Would you mind seeing if you can find him, and keep an eye out for anything else out there?"

Kelly opened the pistol, tossed the spent cartridge at the trash can next to the door, and shoved a fresh one home. As he headed for the door, Dr. Forest started to follow.

"No, Doctor," said Matson, "Cory can lay where he is awhile longer. I want you safe in here 'till we find out what's going on out there."

This time Kelly thought about asking for a flashlight, but decided against it. It would only make him a better target.

***

Kelly held close to the side of the trailer. He was now at the lean-to, the same spot where he had first seen Cory's shadow. Now that he knew where to look, he could just make out Will's body, head sagging, sitting against the wall in the darkness. 'Damn,' he thought, 'I should have thrown the switch on those floods.' The light partially bathed the path he was about to walk along. 'Anybody within a hundred yards will have no problem seein' me the minute I step out of these shadows.' He decided if he was going to be a target, he'd make himself as hard as possible to hit. The bushes that Perkins was hiding in were the same ones he had seen on his walk to the shed; just five or six scraggly pieces of sage about four or five feet tall. With the very-pistol raised at his side to chest level, he ran along the side of the path away from the light. It was a dash of about twenty yards to the first bush. His problem now was he didn't know which side of it to hide behind. He moved to the darkest position he could find and crouched. He listened. He heard nothing.

Finally, "Perkins," he whispered; still, nothing but silence. "Perkins, where are you?"

He moved to the next bush in line, farther into the darkness. "Perkins," he whispered again. "Perkins, it's Kellerman, where..."

He was interrupted by a meek call from somewhere out by the farthest bush. "Overrr herrrrre," the voice whispered, barely audible.

Kelly moved another bush closer. "Perkins, is that you?"

"Yes," came another whisper.

"Perkins, do you have the pistol? Who was doing all the shooting?" No answer. He moved to the next, and then the last bush in the line. There, lying as close to the ground as was humanly possible, was Perkins. He was completely prone, with both hands flat on the ground and pulled up toward his chin. His face was lying in the dust and as he raised it as Kelly approached, the dust, caked from sweat, fell in chunks.

"Where is the gun?" Kelly asked.

"I don't know," Perkins replied, still whispering, "Will had it, I don't know where it is now. Please, can't we be more quiet?"

Kelly grabbed Perkins chin from underneath and pulled up slightly. There on his left temple was a small gash, no longer bleeding because it was packed with dirt. "How'd you get this?" he asked.

"Will."

"What, you mean... Will hit you?"

"Yes," he paused, "Will hit me with the gun."

'Well,' Kelly thought to himself, 'it had finally happened. Will had finally cracked. Whatever was going on between him and that little piece of disc skin had finally pushed him over the edge.'

"Look Perkins, we gotta get you back inside. C'mon," he said, sliding a hand under Perkins elbow.

"No, No... the others," he cried, again in a whisper, pulling his arm from Kelly's grasp.

Kelly thought that he knew now, what was going on. "Look," he said, putting his face closer to Perkins. "Look at me," he almost snarled, "Will was the only person out here beside yourself. He's been talking to himself. I heard him myself when we went to the shed for the chutes. Now come on, let's get you inside."

He grabbed Perkins again, this time giving him no choice, or time, to refuse. Perkins was wobbly on his feet, so the two walked slowly back to the trailer. Kelly supported him first by the arm, then by grabbing him around his waist. He was taking every opportunity to frisk Perkins for the gun. As they walked to a point where the light from the floods was harsh against them, Kelly frisked him with his eyes. Perkins was not carrying the pistol. Kelly turned one last time to look down the dark path behind them. 'Where in hell is it?' he thought.

***

As Matson and Dr. Forest helped Perkins to sit on the closed toilet seat, Kelly offered to the doctor, "I'll start getting him cleaned up. Why don't you two go out and check on Cory? I had a look around on the way in, and I don't think there's anyone else out there."

Matson started to speak, but Kelly grabbed him by the arm. Perkins had his head in his hands and didn't see Kelly put a hushing finger to his lips. Kelly motioned the other two out of the bathroom. As they reached the door to the porch, Matson asked in a whisper, "If there's nobody else out there, then who shot Will?"

"I don't know for sure," Kelly said, looking Matson in the eye, "but, I'm workin' on it." He closed the door behind them.

Kelly checked the drawer under the bathroom sink for a wash cloth or towel. He found nothing but a roll-towel dispenser hanging on the wall. He grabbed the bottom of the case and pulled it up and open. He used his pocket knife to cut a length of cloth from the roll, wet it, and started cleaning Perkins face and wound.

"So, Ben," he used the familiar, "tell me exactly what happened out there?"

Perkins pushed the towel away, laid his head back down in his hands, and very matter-of-factly said, "I don't know, it all happened so fast."

Kelly tried to resume cleaning his wound but Perkins pushed him away again. "Look, just leave me alone. I don't owe you any explanations."

Kelly stepped back from him. He stared, thinking how quickly Perkins demeanor had changed. Then he thought of the piece of disc skin and how it had affected Will. 'Could Perkins have it on him?' he wondered. 'Did he shoot Will and then take it from him?'

Kelly heard movement on the porch. Matson and Forest were helping a groggy Cory back inside. He pulled a chair up to the end of the hall, "Here, set him here," he offered.

As the doctor tended Cory and then Perkins, Kelly grabbed Matson by the arm and led him to the back of the trailer. Will's screen was still on, but the little three-view no longer showed red at the gun ports. "Look, it's showing safe again. Do you remember, just before the shooting started, it flashed red?"

"Yeah, I remember," Matson replied. "So, why did it arm itself?"

Kelly paused like always, when he wasn't sure of the implications, "I think it must have felt threatened."

Matson looked out the window. From where they were standing at the back of the trailer, he could just make out part of the nose and some of the left wing. Then, turning back to Kelly, "OK, assuming you're right in giving this," he could no longer force himself to call the plane her, "this thing credit for some sort of intelligence, then tell me, who was threatening it."

"Look, remember how we were talkin' earlier about the Air Force and secrets, and compartmentalizing? Well," Matson tried to interject, "no, let me finish," Kelly continued, "you probably think I'm half crazy already, but the way I got it figured is: this plane and all of its pieces, hell, maybe even the stuff in Nevada, it's all from the same compartment. It's all part of a greater whole."

Matson was taking too long to get his interjection out, so Kelly continued, "When Will disappeared outside and Perkins went looking for him," he lowered his voice further, "I think Perkins had the gun, not Will. And when he pulled it, Will was holding the piece of disc skin in his pocket. Will felt threatened, so, the plane felt threatened." He paused, looking toward the bathroom. "If Perkins has that little piece now, and he knows where the gun is, we could all be in real trouble."

"I'll talk to him. I'll find out what's going on," he paused in worried thought. "Christ! Kelly, first you tell me Will's gone crazy on us, and now you say it's Perkins. There's got to be an explanation for this."

As Matson turned to move toward Perkins, Kelly grabbed his arm, "Listen, be careful what you say to him. I don't care how long you've known him, we've got one man dead outside, and Perkins was the only other man out there with him."

BROTHER

Kelly left Matson inside with the others. He wanted to have a look at Will's body. More precisely, he wanted to check Will's pockets. He had to know for sure if Perkins was in possession of the piece of disc skin.

The body was still in the same position under the lean-to. Kelly slowly made his way through, and over, all of the junk that was scattered about. He knelt beside the corpse and checked the coat, then the shirt pockets; there was nothing there. He tried the pants; the right front pocket contained some change and two, thirty-two caliber bullets. That was the same caliber as the pistol Cory had held on him. The disc skin was nowhere to be found. 'If Will had been holding it,' Kelly thought, 'perhaps he dropped it when he was shot.' He went to his hands and knees and began patting the ground around the body, and as he shifted position away from Will's legs, he caught the palm of his right hand on something sharp. The object was so sharp that he didn't feel the pain until it had cut a half inch slice into the heel of his thumb. He had time enough for half an exclamation of pain, and then, his mind went elsewhere.

***

A pale, rose colored sky, filled side to side with two huge, but weak, red suns held his attention, but for only a moment. He turned to his left to see a canyon. A canyon that seemed to go on forever, disappearing over the horizon. Looking down he could tell, or feel, that he was not grounded. He could not tell how high above the surface he was, but, as unlikely as it seemed, he felt at ease there. Behind him, out on a wide, expansive plain, sprang what looked like a large city, its tall spires reaching for heights he wouldn't have thought possible.

His mood suddenly changed as his vision caught movement. A man stood before him; a seemingly familiar man. He was sure it was his brother. 'My God,' he thought, 'what is he doing here?' He wanted to reach out and touch him. He wanted to take him in his arms and hold him. Oh, how he missed his brother. The man started moving slowly away from him, then faster and faster; receding quickly into the distance. Kelly's heart was suddenly filled with an aching he had never experienced before. "Brother," he cried, "Brother." He could no longer contain his sorrow. Tears fell from his eyes and rolled over his lips; he could taste the salt. He cried, uncontrollably, "My Brother, where have you gone?" He yelled, dropping to his knees, still sobbing, "I will find you. I promise, I will find you."

***

As Kelly's body slumped forward under the lean-to, the disc skin pulled free from the cut in his hand. He laid there for a moment, still on his knees, supporting the front of his body with the side of his face. He groaned. Pulling his hands forward, he slowly pushed himself to a position on all fours. He wiped his face with his bloody hand, not remembering that he had been cut. The taste of his blood now replaced the salt of his tears. Standing quickly, unsteady on his feet, he braced himself against the back of the trailer.

He stood there silently, trying to piece together his vision. 'Brother?' he thought, 'I don't have a brother.'

"Kelly," he heard a voice in the distance. "Kelly," it called again.

It was Matson calling him from inside. He gathered himself as best he could, and after a step, he looked beneath him. There at his feet was the little piece of chrome. He had not seen it, he had felt it. He bent to pick it up, his blood still fresh on one of its corners. Suddenly knowing, he carefully slid it into his left front breast pocket, over his heart.

THREE MORE BOGEYS

As Kelly entered the trailer he could see Matson and Perkins sitting at their stations. Cory was on the floor, lying on one of the wool blankets from the storeroom. Dr. Forest was leaning over him, dressing his head wound. Cory was still too dizzy to stand or sit. Kelly stooped and quietly asked, "How's he doing."

"Oh!... Kelly," Matson said quickly turning, "take a look at the radar scope. It looks like we may have a problem."

As he stood, Kelly made eye contact with the doctor. He mouthed a short smile, "He'll be OK?"

The doctor nodded.

The scope was filling the corner with its eerie yellow/green glow as Kelly took Will's chair.

"In the upper left corner," Matson yelled to him, not taking his gaze from his own screen.

There, just beyond the spot where he had first noticed the echo of the plane now parked outside, he watched the sweep as it painted three small returns, two slightly larger than the third. "I've got 'em," he yelled back at Matson.

"So what do you think?" Ken asked.

"Hell, I'm not the one to be askin' that. Will should be..." he stopped mid sentence, remembering. "I don't know," he continued, "they're traveling very slowly."

"You think it could be three more of what we got parked outside? It looks like their coming from the right direction."

Kelly thought for a moment, "My best guess is no. These things wouldn't be showin' up on primary if they were discs. Ours didn't."

Kelly turned to look at Matson, who was already staring in his direction. "Military?" Ken asked.

"Helicopters are my best guess. And they gotta be military. I don't know any civilian outfits that fly choppers in formation."

"It's Nevada," said Cory, lifting himself up on an elbow, "how in the hell did they find us?"

"Take it easy Cory," said Matson, standing and walking back toward Kelly, "we don't know who it is, and there's no reason to think it's anybody from Nevada. We've given them no opportunity to see us in any way, in the air, or on the ground."

"I wouldn't be so sure, Ken, they're headed straight this way," Kelly pointed to the scope, "and they're only about thirty, maybe forty minutes out."

"Then we've got to get it covered."

"We won't have time. And besides, if they are looking for her, she'll stick out like a sore thumb with those chutes draped over her."

"Then," Matson paused, "we've got to move the thing."

"And how do you plan on doing that?" He stared at Matson's questioning face. "You had a look inside her earlier; did you recognize anything in the cockpit that looked familiar to you? I've been in quite a few eighty-sixes, and nothin' I saw looked familiar. I wouldn't even know how to close the cockpit, let alone get her started."

"We've got to try," said Cory from his position on the floor. "If we can get her started, then, maybe we can use the guns."

Suddenly, from an unexpected voice, and with a harsh sound of authority, "Nobody's starting anything, and nobody's using any guns, but me."

Perkins stood with the thirty-two pointed from his waist in their direction.

"Ben," Matson gasped, "what's going on? What are you doing?"

"Get down on the floor, both of you. Doctor, you and Cory stay right where you are, and don't anybody move."

"Ben, what...?" Matson couldn't get the words out.

"Get on the floor now," Perkins screamed, pushing the barrel of the gun in Matson's direction. It was clear that he was not one who had found himself in this type of position many, if any, times before in his life.

Kelly was growing nervous at Matson's refusal to take a seat on the floor; afraid Perkins might start shooting at any moment. As he kneeled to the floor he reached for Matson's coat and gave it a tug, "Get down, now," he ordered quietly.

Matson swallowed hard, then spoke again, "Why Ben? Why are you doing this?"

"I'm doing my job Ken" he paused, "no, I'm doing my duty, the same way you should." He waved the gun at the window, "This plane, this disc... this thing, it doesn't belong to you. It doesn't belong to any of us. I'm not risking my life, or my future, helping you keep this thing a secret any longer. Now that it's on the ground, it's going back to the Air Force."

"But, how did they find out?" Matson asked sideways to Kelly. "There's no way they could've found out?"

"He called them," Kelly said from behind Matson. "He called them on the short-wave when we left him inside to monitor the screens."

"You killed Will," Matson's lower lip trembled.

"I didn't want to hurt anybody Ken... you've got to believe that. But, somehow, Will knew what I was up to. When I went out to look for him, he stopped me at the lean-to. He said he wouldn't let me hurt them. His eyes were all glassed over and he had his hands on that little piece of skin... rubbin' it. He was talkin' crazy. 'I won't let you hurt them, you mustn't hurt them,' over and over, that's all he was sayin', and, then... then he came at me. Don't you see Ken? I had to shoot him, I had to."

At this point Perkins was shaking as badly has Matson. Kelly was becoming more and more apprehensive, especially as Perkins' wavering arm brought the gun to bear on him. Out of the corner of his eye he could just see Will's screen and the little three-view. The nose was now glowing with six little red circles. Almost without thinking, he looked at Dr. Forest. He gave him a palm down signal with his right hand. Forest must have thought Kelly was about to try something, because he immediately fell on top of Cory, covering him. At the same instant Kelly reached for Matson's coat again and pulled him down. As they hit the floor, their whole world erupted in a thunder clap. Glass and wood splinters began exploding all around them. Perkins had taken three steps toward Matson and Kelly. He had left his position where he was in alignment with the port side guns, stepped behind Matson's chair, and stopped at Forest's station, not realizing he was now in line with the starboard fifties.

When the six rounds came through the glass and thin fiberboard, the port side rounds, although doing great damage to the trailer, passed through and embedded themselves in an old seven-oh-seven a couple hundred yards beyond the chain link fence. The starboard rounds struck Perkins, one in the medulla oblongata, effectively releasing tension on all of his muscles. His trigger finger relaxed as his head left his body. The other two rounds separated his spine mid-back and at waist level, spewing internal organs and bowel against the hall wall.

The men lay there quietly until Kelly raised himself enough to turn his head, once again, toward Will's screen. The red warning was gone. "It's OK guys," he said, patting Matson on the back, "we can get up now."

"Are you sure Kelly?"

"Yeah, see for yourself," he turned Matson to see the three-view, "she's disarmed herself again."

Forest, rather nonchalantly, wiped small pieces of Perkins from the side of his face. Being a doctor must have made the carnage a little easier to take. Cory, however, was a different story. It took awhile to coax him into the storeroom in the back. They laid him on the blanket again. Now, after three bodies in one night, he was a basket case.

***

The south end of the trailer was a complete mess. The entire length of window had been shattered and was lying in broken shards about the floor. It crunched under their feet as they took turns using an old push broom to try and shove as much of Perkins as they could, into an isolated corner where the hall and south wall met. The lower portion of his body was then moved by grabbing both legs and heaving it onto the gory pile of his remains.

Perkins screen had taken a direct hit from one of the port side fifties. The upper backrest of his chair had faired no better. Matson and Kelly decided the best thing to do was abandon that end of the trailer for now. They moved what they needed, nothing more than a couple of chairs and the short wave, to Will's station.

"One of us, and I think it needs to be me," said Kelly, "needs to go out to the plane and see if we can make heads or tails of its layout. I think Cory was right, we might be able to use the fifties, if we... if I, can figure out how to make 'em work."

Matson took a seat at the radar scope and Forest sat next to him, each watching Will's screen and the little three-view. Kelly grabbed a walkie-talkie and headed for the door. "Give me a call if the nose goes red again, or if the choppers change course."

As he approached the plane, Kelly started to look at it in a slightly different light. 'Hadn't the little piece of chrome in his breast pocket,' he thought, 'and this big piece of chrome now standing in front of him, just saved his life.' He thought so.

He used the ladder to climb onto the wing. He had thought of laying hands on the leading edge and vaulting aboard like Cory had earlier, but now, somehow, he thought a little more respect was due. Kneeling at the cockpit, he gave it a quick once over. He didn't recognize much. The dash was the same flat shape below the windscreen, but, now it was completely smooth. The instruments, switches, everything, was gone. The stick was still there, but it too had undergone a change. It was no more then a chrome broomstick, about the same height as before, but Kelly thought it looked pretty spindly. He wondered how it would hold up if he had to crank a really tight high "G" turn. Surely the feedback would bend or break it in two.

The seat... he looked at it closely... it was the only thing in the cockpit that hadn't changed. Standard issue, high backed to break the bullet proof glass if a pilot ever had to punch-out with the canopy jammed in the closed position. The old harsh upholstery was still there, complete with the blood stain left by Parker.

He keyed the walkie-talkie, "I'm going to climb inside. Keep an eye on her nose and let me know, quick-like, if she goes red."

Forest didn't answer, he just keyed-to–talk to let Kelly know he got the message.

Kelly raised himself from his knees and stepped across the seat with his right foot. With one hand on each side of the now much skinnier cockpit, he lowered himself into the seat, tucking his arms inside to finish in one smooth move. Looking around from this position, he still didn't recognize much. The trigger arming switch that he was interested in was gone, as was the trigger itself on the stick. He hadn't a clue how to start this thing. He remembered Matson touching the fuselage outside to make the canopy open. He raised his hand and touched what used to be the instrument panel at a point where he thought the arming switch used to be, with no results. Like Matson, he slid his fingers around, increasing his search area. He yanked his hand from the panel as a small area below his fingers began to glow a soft red. Suddenly the walkie-talkie came to life, "Kelly, she's armed herself again, be careful."

"Yeah," said Kelly, "I think I did that. I might be gettin' the hang of this thing. Looks like everything's still here, I just have to go lookin' for it." He touched the red glow, the light went out. "How's that?"

"Good! She's dark again," came the reply.

Kelly wanted to know for certain where the trigger had moved itself. 'Probably still on the stick,' he thought, but he wanted to be sure. However, he decided that this wasn't the safest place to try and find it; not with friends inside and close to the line of fire.

He put his right hand up and over his head, reaching behind for the front lip of the canopy. Before his fingers came in contact with the clear glass, it snapped forward, just missing his fingertips. It gave the same resounding thud of authority it had issued when it opened earlier. The line where the two canopy pieces came together, quickly disappeared. He knew it was locked. He reached skyward and pushed. It wouldn't move. As he reached forward to the point where the two pieces had just joined, the canopy separated again and opened quickly. The little light went on as his grey matter started putting two and two together. 'Could it be that easy', he thought. He reached again, up and to the rear, keeping his hand out of the way this time. Again the canopy closed and sealed. He noticed, this time, that the canopy had started moving before his hand had gotten very close to it. "Ha," he laughed, "I do have this thing figured out," he said under his breath... "at least this part." He leaned forward, this time holding his hand in his lap; just thinking about opening the canopy. Again the slit appeared forward of his head and the canopy once again snapped open, this time much faster and with much more authority.

"Hey Kelly," Matson called from inside, "the choppers are changing direction."

"Which way are they headed?"

"Uh," Kelly could hear Matson asking the doctor something in the background, "look Kelly, neither me, nor the doctor know enough about readin' this scope to know."

"OK, listen. That scope in front of you, with its back to the end of the trailer, is in perfect north/south alignment. Pretend it's lying flat on the table and you're sitting in the middle of it. North is forward and south is behind you. Got it?"

"Yeah, OK, then they're moving to the north of us, yes, to the north of us, about halfway up the screen from us," he paused, "if we're in the middle... hey!" he exclaimed with a hopeful smile in his voice, "... that means it might not even be Nevada, huh?... may be helicopters from Yuma on a training mission. They're gonna pass right on by us... huh?"

"When's the last time you saw helos out this way?" Kelly answered quickly. "I think it is Nevada, and I know exactly what they're doing. They're gonna swing wide to the north for a while, just like they're doin now, then they'll head south and come in out of the morning sun from the east. If we hadn't caught 'em on radar, we'd a been dead ducks. At least now, with them flying that big loop around us, we're gonna have another twenty or thirty minutes to do something about 'em."

With hands again braced on either side of the cockpit, Kelly pushed himself to a standing position. As he stepped out onto the wing, he keyed the walkie-talkie again, "I'm coming back inside. One of you needs to get Cory up and movin' around. We've got to get out of here."

He laid the ladder against the side of the trailer; next to the holes made by the three port side guns, and as he looked back at the canopy, he had barely begun to think, and it closed.

THE HANGAR

Dr. Forest braced the still dizzy Cory with a forearm under his armpit. The youngster was still suffering from his tangle with the plane's leading edge.

"Keep him movin'," Kelly ordered as he entered the trailer. We're all gonna have to be in one of those old hangars on the other side of the runway before they get here."

"That's almost half a mile Kelly," the doctor offered. "In a couple hours he might be able to try it, but, in the shape he's in now, he won't even make it to the taxiway."

Kelly walked to the radar screen and checked the position of the helicopters. "Oh no!" he let the words slip, under his breath.

"What is it?" said Matson.

"Oh... it's nothin'," Kelly said as he switched the console off, "they're traveling a little faster than I thought." He didn't want the others to know that he had spotted six more targets coming in from the northeast. They would rendezvous with the first three in minutes. "C'mon, we've got to hurry." As he reached to turn off Will's screen, he saw the nose of the little three-view. It was red again. Kelly smiled.

"We need a car. You guys said you used a car to go to town once in awhile. We need it now if we're gonna take Cory with us."

"Yeah, we got one," Cory mumbled, thinking he might be left behind if someone didn't produce one immediately. "The last time I used it I parked it out on the other side of the fuel pumps... filled it up too."

With Forest and Matson on each side of Cory, the four headed for the door. Kelly brought up the rear. As he got to the hallway, the little pistol that Perkins had held on them earlier, caught his eye. It had been swept up with the bloody remains.

"Hold up fellas," he said as he bent over to pick it up. He wiped it down with one of the towels that had been used to clean Cory's wound. "Got a box of shells for this?"

"Nah," Cory mumbled again, "what was in it, was all we had."

Kelly thumbed the release and opened the cylinder. One live round. He put a finger over it, raised the barrel, and let the spent cartridges fall to the floor. "Looks like only one of us gets to commit suicide."

The others stood looking back at him, slacked jawed. "I'm joking," he quipped, "now get movin'."

As they reached the bottom of the steps, "It's over there," Matson said, pointing with a nod of his head, "behind that little pump house."

They walked to the south east, leaving the plane in full view. As Kelly turned to look at it, he wondered if this would be the last time he ever saw it. He wondered if the few minutes ahead might be the last time he ever saw anything.

There, on the other side of the pump, was an old forty-seven Ford four-door sedan. Mud encrusted the fender wells; the passenger side windshield was broken and hanging inside by the weather stripping. The package tray window was sun bleached and cracked to the point that it was completely opaque.

They helped Cory into the back seat. There was plenty of room for him to lie down. Dr. Forest followed, and sat on the edge of the seat at Cory's feet. Matson, after giving a yank on the broken windshield to remove it, sat in the passenger seat. Kelly made his way around to the other side and as he cranked down on the door handle, it came off in his hand. He tapped on the window and showed it to Matson, who leaned over and opened the door.

As Kelly slid in, he reached for the ignition. No key. "Cory?" he said turning his head to the rear.

"Visor," was the quick reply.

With the key in the on position, Kelly pushed the dash mounted starter button. He had envisioned a nearly dead battery and then having to push this old tub halfway across the runway to get it started. Instead, after two quick revs, the big V-eight came to life. He looked out the windshield and surveyed what lay in front of him: dirt for about twenty feet, then wild grass and small weeds.

"Can you drive one of these things?" he asked Matson.

"Of course I can. Why would you think differently?" was Matson's semi-terse reply.

Kelly shrugged his shoulders, "Here," he said, sliding out. "Pull her up about twenty feet or so, just into that grass."

"Where are you going?" Matson asked as if Kelly were leaving them behind.

"Just do it," he said slamming the door.

As the car pulled forward, Kelly made for a huge tumble weed that had rolled up against the pump house. He brushed the footprints they had made walking from the trailer, and the tire tracks, all the way to the grass line. Matson already had the door open and slid back to his side, but he had left the Ford in first gear so Kelly had to chase it a few feet before jumping behind the wheel. "I thought you said you knew how to drive one of these," he said with a wry smile.

Kelly drove toward the taxiway, making sure to stay on all the vegetation he could find. Once on the asphalt he turned to the right and headed for the runway apron at the approach end. The hangars on the other side were all connected to the main runway with turnouts, followed by another taxiway, and a few more turnouts, that led to a large parking area running the length of all seven hangars. He wouldn't have to worry about leaving tire tracks on this side.

The large, transport sized, hangars were in a line parallel with the runway. Windows were broken along their sides, and the huge sliding doors on each, were locked. They needed to hide the car, and Cory was in no shape to crawl through a window.

"Let's shoot the lock off of one of them," offered the doctor.

"We've only got a thirty-two caliber handgun and those are heavy padlocks. Even close up, the best you could hope for is to dent one, and you'd more than likely catch a ricochet instead."

"All these hangars have doors on the other side," the Doctor said, "we could try those."

"Yeah, and all these hangars have nothin but dirt down both sides. The choppers would see our tracks in a heartbeat."

Cory lifted his head in the back seat, "The perimeter road."

"Of course," said Matson, "there's a perimeter road. All we have to do is go to either end of the runway. Once we get on it, it'll take us all the way around to the other side of these hangars. We'll be on asphalt all the way."

Kelly turned the old Ford around and headed back to the south end of the runway. He hooked a left and they paralleled the fence line until the road began a slow bend to the north.

Kelly kept one eye to the sky in the direction they were heading. He wasn't sure how much more time they had, but he didn't expect that the choppers were to the east of them yet.

He pulled in front of the first hangar door. They could see, without getting out, that the padlock was securely in place. It was the same for the next three, but as they neared the fifth hangar Kelly noticed that the lock had a shiny ring at each end of the horseshoe where it entered the main body of the lock.

"Somebody's been in this one, and wanted to get back in again without using a key," he said to Matson as he stepped from the car, "but they didn't want anyone else to know. See here," he pointed to the telltale sign of no patina. He grabbed the body of the lock and pulled down sharply. It opened with a crack that echoed through the huge empty building.

They were in full morning twilight now, the sun not quite up, but they could easily be seen by anyone that might be near. Kelly knew they had to get inside quickly. As he leaned on the edge of the door to push it open, he found that the desert winds had packed the rolling track with sand and debris. With Dr. Forest scraping the track with a jack handle they had found in the trunk, Kelly and Matson heaved against the door. It moved slowly at first, then, finally, they had enough room to drive the car inside.

Kelly parked the car under a storage loft that had been erected in the southwest corner. The doctor and Kelly helped Cory up the metal staircase and got him situated on his blanket in the corner. The head wound was apparently worse than the doctor had thought, for Cory, despite his short spells of lucidness, was beginning to show signs of severe concussion. They shifted a couple wooden crates and pallets toward the corner to hide him.

Below, they did the same with the car. There wasn't enough junk to hide it completely, but at least it looked like it had been parked there for years.

Kelly and Matson, leaving Forest to look after Cory, moved to a position at the northeastern-most window. They had a clear view of the sky to the east from there, and the window was dirty and sun baked enough to make it difficult for anyone to detect motion inside, at least at a distance.

Kelly reached down and put a hand on the pistol in his front pocket. It gave him only a small scrap of confidence, for at the same time he wondered what good the little thirty-two was going to be against nine choppers filled with thirty or forty of those suited, sunglass wearing soldiers, or commandos, or whatever these guys were, coming from Nevada.

***

Kelly pulled up a couple small packing boxes that had been stacked in the corner. He slid one to Matson and sat on the other. They kept watch to the northeast and east. Kelly wanted the earliest warning possible. He knew that in the exclusive circle of fighter pilots, the one that spotted his enemy first was most often the victor. Maybe not often, in as lopsided a battle as this one promised to be, but, none-the-less, he wanted any edge he could get.

"Matson," he said to the now much older looking man staring forlornly out of the dirty and cracked window pane in front of them, "tell me what you know about these people from Nevada."

Matson turned slowly toward him, "How on earth did this happen?" he mused.

It seemed Kelly could see all the way to the back of the old man's head. His eyes were completely empty. "Look, Ken," he offered with a soft touch to Matson's shoulder, "if we have any hope at all, it's in the three of us... you, me and the doctor. Now, pull yourself together and give me a little help here." He paused as he saw the lights coming back on in Matson. "The guys from Nevada, tell me about them?"

"What I know won't help much, but I'll tell you what little there is. Our contact in Maryland is our only link to information on the outside. After the suits came to take the first disc, our friends went silent on us. For awhile we thought that they had been taken, or worse. We hunkered down and tried to keep an even lower profile than usual, until, finally, we heard from them. They had destroyed files, hidden other information and kept their heads down, just like us. They are, or were, original members of the Office of Strategic Services when it was formed under William Donovan back in forty-two. After the war, that agency was broke up and handed over to the war department. Our guys maintained connections, and when Truman formed the Central Intelligence Agency in forty-seven, they all had new jobs. Problem was: there was a new group of hawks that had Truman's ear. They talked him into that new base in Nevada, and our friends were left out in the cold. This was a group of people, like the US military had never seen before. They answer to nobody but the President, and our guys tell us that they told Truman only about a tenth of what they have goin' on; and Eisenhower almost nothing. They rounded up the country's best scientists from all fields aeronautical, and any fields close enough they deemed important. They pay 'em huge bucks and had them sign their lives away just to get on board. They call their projects black operations and word is they are authorized to use deadly force at their discretion to protect their work or their persons. The projects are paid for from a fund that doesn't show up on anyone's ledger books... supposedly money from illegal armory sales." He stared at Kelly for a moment, "So, if you're wantin' to know if we're really in trouble" Kelly raised an eyebrow, already knowing the answer, "I'd say yeah, we're in big trouble. They ain't gonna like it one bit that we've been playing with one of their toys for the last three years... and keepin' it a secret from them to boot."

Kelly chuckled, "I thought you said you didn't know much about these guys?"

Matson returned with a chuckle in replying, "Mostly useless information."

"Not really my friend. You told me what I needed to know. Now I know one thing for sure, our lives depend on that little chrome plane on the other side of the runway. It's our only hope of getting out of here alive."

Kelly stood, "I'm gonna go talk to the doctor. We've got to get Cory movin' or we'll have to hide him in here, and that'll put a kink in my plans. I'd like you to sit here and keep your eyes peeled on that stretch of sky," he pointed, "to the northeast. The sun's up above the horizon now, so we should catch a glint or two off of the choppers. Give me a yell if you see anything."

As Kelly turned to leave, Matson queried, "Plans?"

"Well yeah, we gotta have a plan, right?" he smiled, "Don't worry; I'll fill you in after I talk to Doc."

As he walked away he turned back to Matson, "There's a question I've been meanin' to ask you. Is this a black project, this little plane?"

"Well, at one point in time I suppose it was, but we never called it that. All we ever called it was S.W.I.F.T."

"Swift," he puzzled, "why swift?"

"You know, the little bird, like a swallow. When they first take to the wing they stay aloft, sometimes for the first three or four years of their life. They eat, crap, and even mate on the wing. They land only to nest. It seemed to fit perfectly with the military's love of acronyms. Es-doubleyew-eye-ef-tee. It stands for Strategic Weapon Infinite Flight Time."

A HUN IN THE SUN

The doctor had pronounced Cory fit enough to get to his feet. Oddly enough, they found an old bottle of headache tablets in the glove box of the old Ford. Cory dissolved a couple under his tongue. He was still in pretty bad shape, but after Kelly explained that he planned to booby trap the hangar, they decided that moving him would pose much less of a threat to his health than staying where he was.

Kelly and the doctor walked Cory the length of the hangar. Matson steadied him while the other two slid the huge door open enough to walk through. At the next hangar, to the north, Kelly found an unlocked window along the side facing the building they had just left. He muscled himself up and in, then handed out a couple pallets. With the added height, and a little help from their patient, the doctor and Matson were able to hand Cory through the window to Kelly.

While the other two made Cory comfortable inside, Kelly tossed the pallets back inside, and as he closed the window he said, "Ken, grab a hammer or something heavy. Take a position at the corner window and keep watchin' to the northeast. As soon as you see 'em, Bang on the side of the hangar as hard as you can, then hide yourselves and don't come out 'till I come for you."

He backtracked, making sure to wipe out any evidence of their move. Inside the hangar once again, he opened the same window that he and Matson had sat in front of, then went back outside to the massive door. With all the strength he could muster, he rolled it closed. Replacing the padlock, he slammed up on the base to lock it completely.

He shimmied through the window he had just left open, closed it, and ran to the other end of the hangar and looked at the trailer that had been his temporary duty station just minutes before. He couldn't make out much at this distance, but he could tell it was still covered by the long morning shadows cast by the hangars at this side of the runway. He knew the people from Nevada would wait 'till the sun was up enough to blind anyone looking to the east. He remembered his flight school and combat training, years before, when he was taught the same tactics the Germans had used back in World War I. They called it "the Hun in the sun." Any pilot unlucky enough to be caught in the down sun position... was dead meat.

Earlier, Kelly had spotted four drop tanks, similar to the ones used on the eighty-six. They were against the east wall at this end of the hangar. He spun the filler cap off of each and rocked them gently, checking their contents. Each held about three inches of kerosene except the fourth, which was nearly full. 'Strange,' he thought, 'we would always burn off as much fuel in the wing tanks as possible, or we'd just get rid of the tank over water or open land.' He smelled at the filler spout. There was no mistaking the strong odor of gasoline. Somebody had used this tank to store gas for use as cleaning solvent. They had even installed a petcock on the underside for drawing small amounts at a time. Suddenly, inexplicably, one of his monsters had smiled at him. He couldn't remember that happening before. The tanks had been stored on bomb dollies for easy transport. He moved the gas laden tank, and one other, to a position along side the old Ford near its right front fender.

He quickly surveyed the area. Up in the loft he pulled at an overhead light that was hanging from a cross member some twenty feet above. The wire separated at the junction box above so he was able to salvage all twenty feet of wire along with the old incandescent light bulb. He found an old partial roll of rusty pigging wire on the workbench under the loft, along with a couple short lengths of two-by-four, a few shop rags that had been thoroughly covered in grease, and a pair of pliers that had wire cutters built into the jaws.

Sliding himself under the rear of the old forty-seven, with a little banging and cussing he was able to coax the drain plug loose from the bottom of the fuel tank. He sized up the two-by-fours and chose one to his liking, and, while holding a carefully folded grease soaked rag in his left hand, he made the final twist on the fuel plug with his right. As he pulled it clear he shoved the rag up over the opening; grabbed the two-by-four and laid one end against the rag and wedged the other end against the floor. A couple quick punches with the heel of his closed fist drove the piece of wood straight up and down under the drain plug. The old rag wasn't stopping the fuel completely, but it was good enough for his purpose. He tied one end of the bailing wire around the bottom of the same two-by-four and shoved the roll to the front of the car where he fed the end outside the hangar through a small space in the wall sill-plate.

An old rusty coffee can served as a container to transfer about half of the gas from the near fully laden drop tank to the one sitting next to it. Kelly then spun the outside tank so that its opening was facing the other (with the fuel just showing, but not spilling).

Carefully, he tapped the light bulb with the pair of pliers, first getting it to crack, then, pulling away the glass without damaging the filament; he lowered it into the first tank to a point just above the gasoline. He took one turn with the wire around the thread boss to hold it in place and then strung the other end of the wire over to the Ford.

Opening the hood and reaching for the distributor cap, Kelly popped the clips and pulled it free and pushed it aside. Standing in front of the car he placed his right hand on one of the fan blades while pushing hard against the fan belt with his other. Now, putting his weight down on the fan, he was able to turn the engine just enough to open the breaker points. He cut the wires coming from the light filament just long enough to reach under the hood and replaced the distributor cap. Then, pulling a plug wire from one of the forward spark plugs, he wrapped a bare end of one of the wires around the brass end cap of the plug wire. He bared the end of the other wire and wrapped it several times around the engine block lift ring at the front of the engine.

He now had a length of double wire left. It was just long enough to reach from the car to a point outside where the end of the piggin' wire sat. Feeding it through an unused grommet in the firewall, he climbed under the dash and pulled it up toward the starter button where he carefully removed the two wires from the button and wrapped one to each wire coming from outside.

He opened the hangar window in front of the car and looked closely at the last two wires he had just shoved through the sill plate. The bare ends were a good three or four inches apart. Satisfied, he walked back to the driver's side door, reached in, closed his eyes tightly, and turned the key to the on position. Kelly suddenly flinched at a loud noise. He thought he might have blown himself to pieces, but instead, it was Matson beating on the side of the hangar next door.

Kelly checked the shift lever to make sure the transmission was in neutral, then slid out of the hangar through the window, closing it behind him. He dragged three pallets from the side of the hangar and leaned them against the wall under the window, leaving enough room for a man to crawl behind them. Then he made his way to the waiting trio at the next building.

Cory was up and moving about, much to Forest's chagrin. The doctor had tried to keep him down awhile longer, but Cory was having none of it.

"They're coming," said Matson, "but it looks like there's more than three of them. It looked like the whole sky was glitterin' just above that tree line on the horizon," he pointed.

"Yeah, I know Ken, there's nine of 'em." They walked to the window. "The horizon is about three miles away on flat ground, but they're flying at least five hundred feet off the deck. At that altitude you could've seen them as far out as twenty-five miles, so, I'm guessing, minus the time from when you saw them 'til now, we've got about ten minutes."

"So, what do we do, just sit here and wait?" asked Cory.

"That's all we can do right now. You guys go get comfortable over in the corner where we'll have a good view of the trailer. I'm gonna watch for 'em comin' from this direction. I'll join you as soon as they show over the top of those trees due east of us."

"What about our plan," Matson asked.

"That comes later. First we see how they react when they see the plane."

The three headed for the corner. Kelly took a position at the window next to the door. He wasn't sure, but he thought he could hear the muffled staccato of helicopter blades in the distance. 'That many, all coming at once, should really rattle these old hangars,' he thought.

As he sat waiting, his hand, the one with the wound, found its way to his breast pocket where the little scrap of chrome resided. He rubbed it from the outside of his pocket, pushing it harder and harder against his heart. He thought it strange how it warmed him, made him feel so... at ease.

Suddenly the choppers were passing overhead. "Wha..." he blurted, looking around, then up, "where in hell did they come from."

'Where had the time gone?' he thought.

There were four Bell H-thirteens flying abreast, followed by five Sikorsky S-fifty-fives. Glass fell from the upper windows as shockwaves from the rotor blades slammed down and echoed through the empty hangars. Kelly ducked away from his window position, his hand still on his breast pocket.

He made his way to the other end of the hangar where they watched the nine helicopters descending on the little trailer, now in full sunlight, on the other side of the runway.

ENEMY AT THE DOOR

Kelly turned the latch and pushed the window open at the bottom. They listened as the rumble of the choppers slowly diminished. With the top half of their four heads just showing above the window sill, they watched the four H-thirteens hold their altitude while the big Sikorskys landed side by side in the grassy area just short of the little plane. The thirteens then turned themselves sideways so the passenger in each, with his feet out on the strut, could cover those on the ground.

As the Sikorskys began pouring soldiers onto the grass, Kelly said, "Let's get a count fellas. We need to know how many we're goin' up against."

"Look," Matson offered, "the helicopter on the left end; those aren't soldiers like the rest of 'em."

"Yeah, you're right. Looks like four of those suited guys with the dark glasses you were tellin' me about... and... that big guy... I'm guessin' he's a Colonel or a bird-Colonel. The short guy beside him is probably his aide."

"I count thirty all together," Cory said, sitting down and leaning against the wall under the window, "I ain't feelin' so hot again guys."

"Sit there and rest, we won't be seein' any action for awhile yet," Kelly said, patting him on the shoulder. Then turning to the others, "OK, that's twenty-four soldiers... twenty-eight counting the gunners in the little thirteen's; four suits, probably with weapons on them; two pilots in each Sikorsky, and one in each thirteen;... and the two brass."

"That's forty eight of them," the Doctor whispered, "and they've all got guns."

"No, I think you're wrong Doc. I'd bet money the Colonel's aide isn't carryin'," he said with a curled lip.

***

Soldiers from three of the helicopters set up a perimeter, while six, weapons at the ready, mounted the steps and entered the trailer. The Colonel and one of the suits stood pointing in varying directions, seeming to be paying no attention to the plane.

A head showed through the broken window, "The trailer's clear," the voice rang out, "but we've got a body... or at least, what's left of one."

The suit, standing with the Colonel, gave a nod, and the man ducked back inside. "Wait here Colonel," he said, starting up the steps.

"Damn it Brandt, I'm coming inside with you. This is just as much my operation as yours."

Brandt raised a hand and laid it on the Colonel's chest as he tried to walk past, "Preston, don't make..."

Colonel Preston grabbed the younger mans wrist and held it as they stared at one another. Brandt finally eased the tension in his arm and lowered his hand. Preston straightened his top coat and went inside.

It was obvious that the soldiers inside were working for Brandt. They all wore black fatigues as opposed to the regular camo on the men outside on perimeter guard.

Brandt said, looking at the pile of Perkin's remains, "Does this one have identification on him?"

One of the men stooped and rifled through the corpse's blood covered pants pockets, acting for all the world like he had handled dead bodies all his life. He pulled a wallet from the remains and handed it to Brandt.

"It's Perkins," he said, turning to Preston, "this is the guy that called us."

Just then, one of the perimeter guards, who had spotted Will's lifeless body sitting against the north end of the trailer under the lean-to yelled, "We gotta 'nother body back here."

"And there's another one under the porch," came the call from the near end.

"It's a regular slaughterhouse around here," Brandt said, spinning on his heels as if looking for the announcement of yet another corpse.

As Brandt and the Colonel made their way down the steps, a couple of the black suits were uncovering the mummified remains.

"Look at that... I know who this is," the colonel's aide said as he approached, "it's Colonel Parker."

"Who?" Brandt asked.

Preston stepped forward, "Randall Thomas Parker... Colonel Randall Thomas Parker," he corrected himself, looking at the body in bewilderment. "He died more than three years ago. What in God's name happened to him?"

"And what the hell is he doing shoved under a porch in the middle of this hell hole?" Brandt said under his breath.

One of Preston's men double-timed up and handed him Will's wallet. "He's got what looks like a small arms round to the middle of his forehead, sir."

"Thank you Sergeant," he said pulling out the driver's license. "William Henry Johnson," he looked at Brandt, "sound familiar?"

"Yes, it does," he said, taking a clipboard from one of the suits. "Here," he said, folding a sheet back, "William Henry Johnson, radar and weapons specialist. This says he's been here since this thing started."

"That Perkins fella inside, is he on your list too?"

"Yeah, radio man," he said, tilting the clipboard toward Preston. Then turning to one of the suits kneeling beside Parker's body, "Can you tell what killed him?"

"No sir. He has some dried blood on the lower left side of his back, but it appears to be from a scratch or small puncture; nothing that should've killed him."

"So, we've got one cause of death unknown, one small caliber to the head, and what," he said to one of his black fatigued men coming down the steps, "Harris, what would you say killed that man inside?"

"I've seen that before sir, in Korea. It takes at least a fifty caliber to cut a man up like that."

Brandt moved away from the steps toward the plane. He looked at the damage to the outside of the trailer, then the nose of the plane, "Harris," he yelled, "get your men out of that trailer on the double, that things got fifty cals pointed right at 'em."

As the black fatigues poured out of the trailer, Preston turned to one of his men, "Let's get these bodies bagged up and stowed in one of the choppers. Gather all the tape reels from the recorders inside and any loose paperwork that looks at all pertinent." As the soldier stepped away, "Oh, and son, don't be worrying about getting shot up by that little plane, the cockpit's empty," he said loud enough for Brandt to hear.

Brandt was once again flipping pages on the clipboard, "Looks like there were three more people working here: a Corbin Thomas Brickman; Dr. Francis Forest, and one Kenneth Matson. Do you know any of these people?" he asked Preston.

"Never heard of them, why, would it make a difference?"

"Well no. Once we catch up with them, I'll get what I want from them, one way or another. I just thought if you knew one or two of them, it might make things go a little... smoother."

"Colonel Preston," one of the green fatigued soldiers shouted as he ran down the steps carrying Kelly's briefcase. "Look at this sir, these orders are dated yesterday, out of Tucson."

Preston gave the document a quick glance and turned to Brandt, who was already reaching for it, "Looks like we've got one more. Is this guy on your list?"

Brandt checked Kelly's name against his manifest. "No, and with his orders stamped with yesterdays date, I wouldn't expect him to be." He turned, "Harris, take your men and check the grounds. Make sure you get that shed to the north and anything else that's big enough to hide in. Get the thirteens on the ground and have those guys help you."

***

Brandt and Preston walked to the plane with the other three suits and the Colonel's aide close on their heels. Securing the area had been their first priority, so this was their first good look at it. Brandt ran his hands down the leading edge of the wing as he walked toward the fuselage. The other three suits spread themselves around and underneath, none of them able to keep their hands off of the smooth, shiny chrome.

Not to be outdone, Preston pointed his aide toward the ladder. They set it in position and Preston was up on the wing before Brandt could stop him. Brandt snapped his fingers and gave a quick nod of his head, and like trained dogs, the three suits were on the wing with the Colonel.

"Preston," Brandt bellowed, as he made his way up the ladder, "I have been trying to be as nice about this as possible. You know, you and your men are here for security reasons only. You know that," he reiterated. "You don't work with this stuff in Nevada, and you aren't going to work with it here."

As Preston took a step in Brandt's direction, he heard from behind, the unmistakable sound of three Army M1911 model Colts; their slides slamming home a forty-five caliber ACP round in each chamber. He stopped, not looking to his rear, "What are you going to do Brandt, shoot me?" he paused, "how's that going to look?"

Brandt made a slight movement with his eyes and Preston suddenly felt one of the Colts at the back of his head. "It's going to look any way I make it look," he said as he stepped forward into Preston's face. "Remember who you are dealing with here," he said sternly, then turning and taking a few steps away, not looking at Preston, he lamented, "Damn it, I've always known it was a mistake... letting you military types in on the Nevada thing. I told them from the beginning, we should take the time to build our own security force." He hung his head for a second, then turned back, "Look around," he swept with his hand. Preston saw that he was now covered by Harris and his five man team and he could hear the four H-thirteens moving closer. He looked up over his shoulder to see each of the small choppers sitting sideways, above and behind him, with a black fatigued figure, belted and hanging half out the side. He was staring down the barrels of four Thompsons, each loaded with the same forty-five ACP round that was now pointed at the back of his head.

"Harris," Brandt barked, "get on the horn. Tell Nevada to let the Director know that I'm having a problem with my military escort."

"No, wait... that won't be necessary," Preston begged with as much dignity as he could muster, "we'll do it your way."

Still talking to Harris, Brandt ordered, with the slightest of smiles, "Escort Colonel Preston and all of his men to the choppers. I am sure that the Colonel will tell his men to comply. Get them on board along with all of the bodies. Three aircraft should be plenty, and make sure they're not taking anything but their weapons with them. I want you to round up all the paperwork and tape reels that his men were collecting and put it my chopper," he turned to stare again at Preston, "then tell the pilots to take them all back to Nevada."

"Yes Sir," Harris said smartly, as he waited for the Colonel to back down the ladder.

"Oh, and Harris," Brandt said remembering, "then tell HQ that my guess is this little plane, at first glance, is going to weigh in at around three ton, or a little less." Brandt was familiar with the weight and size of the disc at the Nevada facility. He continued, "One of our heavy lift Shawnees should be fine for transport. Tell them to have one on standby and I'll confirm as soon as I know for certain."

***

Brandt watched from atop the wing as the blades on the big Sikorsky's began coming up to speed. As the last one took off it blew Kelly's tumbleweed up over the top of the little pump house. He turned from the dust and watched as the three suits began exploring the canopy area. On their knees, they moved their hands over the clear glass and fairing area between the wing and fuselage. It wasn't long before one of them touched that spot that Matson had found earlier. Feeling his fingers moving into the skin, he pulled back quickly.

"What was that," Brandt wanted to know.

"Look, here Sir, the skin is, sort of... soft."

Brandt waved the man aside and kneeled. He placed his hand on the spot and applied pressure. He jumped as the line formed along the front of the canopy. They watched in amazement as, like before, the canopy parted and slid back briskly to a full open position. The disc he was familiar with in Nevada had never done anything like this.

He stood and nodded to the man on the other side of the cockpit while pointing at the pilot's seat. The man, now having permission, quickly stepped inside and then slowly lowered himself into position.

Brandt took a step back and surveyed the fuselage.

"This looks like it might have been a Sabre at one time. Have you had time in a Sabre," he asked the man.

"No Sir," he said with a smile, "I was just entering flight school when I got the offer to volunteer for this wonderful organization," he smiled. "I got a couple hours in an old Bird Dog, that's about it."

As Brandt cast eyes on the other two, they both shook their heads in the negative. "OK," he said, looking back down at the man seated inside, "climb out. Harris has been in jets. I'll have him take a look."

As the man began pushing himself out of the seat, the canopy, without warning, closed with a gruesome thud against his back, driving the air from his lungs. As it crushed him against the forward half of the glass, the others could hear his ribs cracking. He was unable to inhale. He hung there, gasping for air.. The canopy hadn't cut him in half, but instead, molded itself around him.

Brandt grabbed with his fingernails for the crack between the two pieces of canopy, but it was no use, it was gone.

"Do something!", he yelled, looking at the others. He pounded on the glass. "Get me something to break this canopy."

"Sir," Harris said, jumping up onto the wing, "you won't break that. We don't have a weapon on site that'll make a dent in it. Especially when you consider it's probably made from the same stuff the skin is."

"We carry a couple of M-nines in my chopper, don't we?"

"Well, yes Sir, we've got an M-nine, but... that'll take out the cockpit and half the plane with it, Sir."

It seemed Brandt had a human-side in him after all, at least where his men were concerned. He went to his knees again, frantically searching for the soft spot below the canopy. Finding it, he drove his fingers into the recess. The glass separated and slid back once again. The dead man crumpled back into the seat, bleeding from the mouth and ears. Brandt started to reach for him, but one of the others grabbed him by the arm, "Sir, what if it closes again?"

They stood in silence, staring at the man, who just seconds before, had been known as a colleague.

"Harris, round up one of the repelling cables. We'll throw a noose over him and pull him out. We can't leave him in there."

***

Twenty minutes earlier:

"By the commotion, I'd say they've found Perkins body," Matson said, squinting for better focus.

"Yeah, and Parker's too... looks like they just pulled him out from under the porch." Kelly took a deep breath and rested his chin on the window sill to steady himself. "Looks to me like the Colonel and that one suit don't get along too well."

"The guys in the suits and the soldiers in the black fatigues have got to be CIA," Matson offered.

"That might work in our favor. I'm sure they don't enjoy taking orders from one another. A little in-fighting could give us an edge."

"Look Kelly, they're up on the plane."

"Yeah," Kelly said abruptly, then suddenly, something else was on his mind. As Matson and the doctor continued watching, he found his hand at his breast pocket again, pushing the little piece of chrome hard against his heart. How warm it felt. As he reached inside his pocket the warmth increased. A sensation of well being seemed to flood over him. He removed the piece of metal from his pocket and held it between his hands. As his vision began to blur, he started to realize he was no longer in the hangar.

"Kelly!" "Kelly," the doctor said, shaking Kelly hard by the shoulder. Kelly's hands separated and he dropped the disc piece to the floor.

He stared for a moment, looking at nothing in particular, then, "What?"

"It looked like you went catatonic on us," said Forest. "Are you OK?"

"I'm fine... I think." He paused. "How long was I out?"

"By the time we noticed, maybe four or five minutes, maybe a little longer."

Kelly looked down at the chrome piece, shining back at him from the floor, "That's the same thing that was happening to Will."

"Hey, look guys," said Matson, "am I seeing this right? It looks to me like the suits are holding guns on the brass."

"That's what it looks like to me Ken," said Forest, retaking his position at the window, "and look at the little choppers, they're moving in to cover."

They watched Brandt giving orders. They watched as Harris walked the Colonel and the green fatigues to the line of choppers, put them in, and sent them on their way.

Kelly, now coming back to his senses, said, "Hey, I told you, they started at each others throats, and cut the odds against us in half."

"Yeah, but there's still twenty-two of them, and those guys in black look tougher than the rest of them combined."

"Look Kelly, the suits on the plane are messing around the cockpit area. What happens if they get inside?"

Kelly thought for a moment, then he reached down and picked up the piece of chrome. "Doc, I'm gonna need your help." He sat cross legged on the floor with his back to the window, and with the thumb and forefinger of his left hand he began massaging the cut on the heel of his right thumb. Scraping away the dried blood with a fingernail, he was able to re-open the wound,

"Looks like they've got the canopy open," Matson said, not taking his eyes from the window.

Holding the piece of metal up for the doctor to see, Kelly said, "I'm going to shove this into the cut in my hand. I want you to count the time on your watch. Give me five minutes, then pull it out."

Kelly could see the doctor was about to waste time asking a question. "We don't have time Doc. I'll explain later. Remember, five minutes."

Kelly gritted his teeth, spread his palm as wide as possible to open the cut, and slid the chrome piece in. He pinched the wound and held it closed until he...,

***

Kelly's brother once again stood before him; the rose colored sky with the same two red and dying suns overhead. "Help me brother," the vision in front of him cried, "If they take me, you will never find me." His brother raised an arm, reaching, 'looking so helpless,' Kelly thought.

"They're here brother... they're here, now... help me," he pleaded.

Kelly felt as if his heart were tearing in two. He began to cry, then to sob. A darkness: full of fear; and then hatred, flowed over him. Suddenly, his emotions turned to rage as a man walked up behind his brother. He was a tall, burly, menacing, brute of a creature. The man took his brother by the arm and turned to lead him away. Kelly fought to maintain control; his face flushed with heat. The sky beyond them began to darken and swallow the two men as the stranger pulled his brother along. With all the strength he could muster, Kelly lunged toward the man, not striking him a blow, but instead, pulling from deep within himself, a force he had never felt before. He guided this force directly at this monster; this black monster stealing his brother. The monster spun to look directly at Kelly; its mouth open wide; its eyes glaring in disbelief. It grabbed its chest as the canopy crushed it.

***

Kelly felt the sharp pain in his hand as the doctor wrapped it with the cleanest rag he could find. He raised his head to look at the blurry figures in front of him. Again he could taste the salt from his tears. As he reached to wipe his cheeks the doctor asked, "How you feelin' Son?"

Even while sitting, Kelly needed to steady himself. He put a hand to Forest's chest to keep from falling forward onto his face. The doctor pushed him back against the hangar wall, held his chin up and checked his eyes.

"No Doc," he said, grabbing Forest's hand from his face, "I gotta keep my head down... I'm gonna be sick." He leaned forward as the doctor moved out of the way, and, having put nothing in his stomach for the last twelve hours, proceeded to dry heave on all fours. He finally turned his face to the side and rested it on the cool cement hangar floor.

They gave him a few minutes to gather himself, then Matson kneeled beside him. "Feelin' any better?" he asked. Kelly didn't answer.

"He's sleeping," said Cory, "even I can tell that. I heard his breathing go shallow."

They rolled him onto his side, and after Forest checked the hand wound another time, they laid Cory's blanket over him.

"Let's let him rest," Matson said, turning to look out the window again, "we can wake him later if we need to. It looks like those guys are going to be busy for awhile. The canopy closed on one of their men."

Kelly lay on the hangar floor, his dreams filled with the vision of his brother... and a rose colored sky.

A PLAN IN MOTION

"Kelly," Matson shook him gently, "Kelly, wake up Kelly. They're starting to move, over on the other side."

Kelly pulled the blanket from his shoulders and sat up slowly. There were three men in this place with him. They looked somewhat familiar. They squatted around him and he stared at each one in turn. Forest recognized the lost look in Kelly's eyes, "Its Doc, and Matson, and Cory," he said slowly, pointing to the others.

As the faces grew more familiar, Kelly rose to his knees and looked out the window. Suddenly realizing that the sun was going down in the west, he asked, "Hey, what in hell happened to the day?" He turned to look out the east facing windows. "The sun was just over the horizon... there," he pointed, "just a minute ago."

As Kelly tried to stand, Forest and Matson each took hold of his arms until he steadied himself.

"You've slept the entire day away Son," Forest told him.

Kelly thought for a moment, then, he put his hand over his heart. Someone had put the little piece of disc back in his pocket, 'where it belongs,' he suddenly thought.

"The whole day huh?" he asked.

"Yeah, like a baby," Cory responded.

"Must be this disc skin," he said pulling the piece from his pocket. "Every time I mess with it, I lose track of a piece of time."

"Look Kelly," Matson said, more forcefully now that he seemed fully awake, "it looks like we might get company before too long. We watched as they spent the better part of the morning trying to extricate one of the suits from the plane. He was crushed when the canopy closed on him. That six man squad in the black fatigues cleared the grounds all the way down to the shed near the end of the runway, and even the first few rows of mothballed aircraft beyond the fence. They've got nothing left to do but come this way."

"The suit, the one in the plane... did they get him out?"

"Yeah, eventually. They were havin' a hell of a time though. It looked, from here, like the canopy kept trying to close on 'em."

Kelly put the little piece of chrome to his chin and scraped it along his growing stubble. He slid it back into his shirt pocket, then, looking out the window, "This is actually gonna work out better, now that it's getting dark. Cory," he said, turning to Brickman, "how'd you like to be a hero?"

Cory looked at Matson, pleading with his eyes. He had no idea how to answer the question.

"What have you got in mind?" Matson asked in Cory's stead. "You have to remember," he said in a fatherly tone, "these guys belong to me. I'm responsible."

"I know Ken, but, I've got two things to do at once. I'm gonna need some help."

"What about one of us then," he nodded toward the doctor.

"Look, I figure, even in the shape Cory's in, he can still run the hundred, twice as fast as either of you. He's the best choice."

"And you? What are you going to do?"

Kelly looked at Matson, trying to make light of his answer, "Well hell, I'm gonna surrender."

***

They watched as long as the fading light allowed. The choppers hadn't taken off yet, but Kelly knew it wouldn't be long. Matson headed for the north side of the hangar. They opened a window, and per Kelly's instructions, began throwing out assorted empty packing crates and pallets. They were far enough from the trailer that the ruckus wouldn't be heard, still, Matson insisted on tossing each piece so it didn't land on the previous.

"OK," Matson called across the hangar when they had finished, "we're ready."

"Go ahead then," Kelly answered, "stack 'em like I told you. Climb under 'em and hunker down, and for heaven's sake, stay hunkered. This could take awhile and I don't want you showin' yourselves beforehand."

Matson and the doctor climbed through the window. They stacked the various pieces randomly against the hangar, leaving a small crawl space against the wall. They backed in on their bellies, each from the opposite end, pulling one last box in position to close off their end.

"You OK Frank?" Matson asked in a whisper."

"I'm fine Ken. I guess I'm a little scared... but I'm fine."

***

Kelly explained to Cory about the pallets he had leaned against the hangar, and the piggin' wire attached to the two-by-four. "It's the bare one," he told him. "The two hooked to the starter button are insulated. It's gonna be dark, so you'll have to check by feel. You can handle that, right?"

"Sure, I got it. I wait for them guys to start searching the car and the loft. I pull the piggin' wire. I count to ten nice and slow, then touch the other two wires together and hold 'em together, until all hell breaks loose... then I run for the trailer and I don't stop runnin' 'till I get there... right?"

"Yeah, that's right. But, remember, don't leave this hangar until they've already checked the front sides or they start their search at either end of the back side. We don't want you caught before you get the chance to make some noise."

"Don't worry, my jobs gonna be a lot easier than yours," Cory said, both hands shaking uncontrollably. "Betcha never expected anything like this when you left Tucson, huh?"

Kelly smiled and offered his hand, bandage and all. The handshake seemed to calm Cory, and he smiled sheepishly.

"Listen Cory," Kelly said, still holding the handshake, "I want you to make sure you realize what I'm gettin' you into here."

"Hey," Cory replied quickly, "I know... I know... when I touch the wires together... people die... I know."

***

Kelly shimmied through the side window and closed it carefully behind him. He made his way north along the side of the hangar, away from the trailer. Coming to the edge of the asphalt, he hid on his belly behind a couple large tumbleweeds still firmly attached to their roots. He had situated himself so that he could see between the hangar Cory was in, and the one he had booby trapped. His view was a straight line to the trailer and the helicopters.

***

Brandt was climbing down from the plane, "Harris, you got all that material stowed in my ship?"

"Yes Sir, all the paperwork, tape reels, everything."

"Good. We'll leave my chopper here. Get two of the thirteen's in the air now. Have them reconnoiter those hangars on the other side. Tell them to make a pass: one in front and one in back at the same time, so no one can get out without being seen. I want their landing lights on so anybody that's over there knows we're coming... maybe they'll try and make a run for it... and tell them I want anybody they find, left alive, for now. We'll leave the other two thirteen's here. Have two of those men guard this plane and bring the other two, and my pilots, along with us."

"Yes Sir," Harris snapped. He turned to dispatch his orders. As the two H-thirteen's took off and headed for the south end of the hangars to begin their sweep, Brandt, the two remaining suits and the black fatigued squad led by Harris, scrambled aboard the Sikorsky.

***

Kelly watched as the little choppers made their way to the end of the hangars. At the first building they stopped. Turning to face the hangar, they slewed side to side, lighting the front and back doors simultaneously. Finding nothing at the first hangar, they continued slowly down the line until they reached number five. The pilot on Kelly's side of the hangar saw it right away. The track that the huge doors rolled in had been cleaned. Kelly hadn't kicked the dirt back into the groove when he replaced the padlock. The little chopper shot skyward, its pilot, obviously on the radio to his partner on the other side, because it too rose to roof height. They both snapped a sharp peel-off to the south to wait for the Sikorsky. They would leave hangars six and seven alone for now.

As Kelly saw Cory bolt for the front of the hangar and the pallets he had leaned against the wall, he smiled to himself. His plan was in motion.

***

"Sir," Harris tapped Brandt on the shoulder as the Sikorsky was touching down next to hangar number one, "the pilot says there's evidence of intrusion at hangar five. The door is locked, but he believes it was made to look like all the others. The rolling track has been cleaned, Sir."

As Brandt stepped from the big chopper, its rotors now starting to slow as the pilot throttled back, he barked, "Put one of the thirteen's back up and have him cover the front, we'll go in the back. Everybody with me, except..."

Harris knew his boss too well. As Brandt was giving the order, Harris was using hand signals, telling the pilot and co-pilot to stay with the aircraft and keep it running.

They made their way down the backs of the hangars staying close to the walls. As they neared hangar five Harris took over. Two fingers to the eyes then a finger in the direction he wanted, placed two men, one at the near and far side of the building; as lookouts. The little chopper was in position at the front.

Harris checked the lock. Another hand signal brought a man up quickly from the rear. "It's a stout lock," he whispered, "but the hasp will go easy."

The man nodded then reached into his kit and pulled out a small C3 charge. He molded it around the lock and pushed a detonator in place. As the men slid back around the corner of the building, half on one side, half on the other, he fed the small spool of wire out behind him. Harris twisted the wire ends around the terminal of the hand generator, checked that his men were clear, turned his back and twisted the handle.

The explosion would have been deafening, had anyone been inside. Glass fell from the windows as the sound echoed through the hangar. The soldiers were at the door before the pieces of shrapnel had finished falling around them. As they pushed the door open, the first four men led the way with large flashlights. Harris immediately saw the center of the hangar was empty so he gave the signal to cover the sides. As they reached the rear, Harris held up three fingers and pointed up at the loft. Three more fingers motioned toward the area under the loft where the old Ford was parked.

***

Cory held himself as still as possible, which was in fact, nearly impossible. He was shaking from the cold and the fear. He probably would have wet himself again when the C3 went off, but he hadn't had anything to drink all day. As the noises grew closer, his grip on the pigging wire increased to the point that his fingers were going numb. The little helicopter flying over him had passed its light over him several times, but the cross lathed pallets and his now dull and dusty clothing, were keeping him well hidden.

The three men had reached the top of the loft and he could hear them as they rummaged through the boxes and assorted junk.

"Check the car," came the order from Brandt.

"Yes Sir," was the reply.

A soldier reached for the door handle, and seeing there wasn't one, moved to the passenger side.

"Hey, I smell gas," he said as he opened the door.

At that moment Cory gave a yank on the wire. Nothing happened. He yanked again. Still nothing. The two-by-four, now thoroughly soaked and swollen with gasoline, was wedged so tightly under the gas tank that Cory couldn't budge it. He gave one last heave, and to his horror, the wire snapped.

The man at the passenger door heard the twang of the wire. He spun to see the broken end sticking up out of the sill-plate. Taking a few steps to the front of the car, the smell of gas struck him again, "Trap!" he yelled, "it's a trap, everybody out."

Cory may have been scared to death, but at this instant, he kept his wits about him. He grabbed the other two wires and jammed them together. He could hear the old Ford start to turn over. As the points closed, the distributor rotor touched the base of the plug wire attached to the light filament.

The man, who had yelled the warning, now saw that his avenue of escape was blocked by the two wing tanks. As he turned to run in the opposite direction, the first tank exploded. He did not feel the pain as his fatigues were seared to his flesh. The concussion had rendered him unconscious. The force of the explosion pushed the second wing tank toward the center of the hangar. The gasoline at its mouth had ignited and the sudden pressure buildup, instead of exploding, sent it spinning like a Fourth of July firework. It spewed burning gas over the soldiers in its path and as the fuel-air mixture and the heat in the tank reached a critical stage, it too exploded, sending more fire and shrapnel in all directions.

The three soldiers up in the loft had been relatively safe so far. Peering out into the hangar, they saw the two explosions; the first as it boiled up around the side of the loft; and the next, just seconds later, out in the middle of the hangar. Thinking the worst might be over, they stood to assess the situation. They didn't realize that when the first tank let loose, it raised the right side of the car enough to relieve the pressure holding the two-by-four in place. Gas had been gushing from the tank for nearly ten seconds and when the flood of liquid hit a hot piece of wing tank, the flames boiled again, this time around both sides of the loft. The three soldiers dived for cover in the corner, and at that moment, the fuel tank on the Ford let go with a vengeance. The rear of the sedan lifted off the ground and struck the underside of the loft. The force pulled the loft's floor joists loose from their hangars and as the floor pulled away from the wall, the loft, and the three soldiers, fell helplessly into the inferno.

Through all this, Cory had been trapped behind the pallets against the hangar wall, which was now growing hotter by the second. As the tank on the Ford let go, it blew a small stream of burning gas out through the small hole in the sill plate. Glass showered down on him from above as rolls of fire made its way outside through the jagged openings.

Just as he thought he couldn't stand the heat any longer, the helicopter that had been covering the front of the hangar, decided to abandon his post. The risk of another explosion, and the chance of taking a piece of shrapnel in the main or tail rotor was too great. The pilot grabbed the collective and pulled hard. Flames licked at his skids through small holes in the old roof as he made his way to safety.

Cory saw his chance, and as the hair on his arm was beginning to give off that sickening smell, he pushed hard on the pallets. He rolled free into the coolness of the dark desert night. The flames, and the light they were giving off, were diminishing quickly now as the gasoline burned away. He stood without looking back. As he began to run, he thought it strange: this nearly euphoric feeling that was overtaking him. He had never felt so good, so scared... and so free... all at the same time. He ran harder and harder, tears of fear and joy running down his cheeks. This was the first time, in his heretofore quiet little life, that he had ever felt the true rush of adrenaline.

The flames were nearly gone now, but the damage had been done. Of the thirteen men that had entered the hangar, seven lay dead or dying. Brandt had pulled Harris from the flames, but there would be no saving him. He had taken too many breathes of the scalding air inside the hangar and his lungs were of little value to him as he groped for air. As Brandt held him in his lap, Harris's body went limp. He reached up and pulled his eyes closed. To his two remaining suits standing behind him, he said, "Damn good soldier, this...," his mouth trembled with rage.

"Yes Sir, he was indeed," the suit said, touching Brandt's shoulder, "we'll take care of him Sir."

"No," Brandt jumped to his feet, "have a couple of the pilots do it. You two, get the demo man and anybody else that's fit, and come with me."

KELLY'S TURN

Kelly watched from under his tumbleweed as Brandt reorganized his troops. Even at this distance he had felt the heat from the fireballs. He wished he was able to see the other side of the hangar. He knew he didn't have time to worry about it now, but he wanted to know if Cory had made it out in one piece.

Now it was his turn. He raised himself to his feet and fingertips. Staying low, but not too low, he skulked to the next set of bushes. Out of the corner of his eye, as planned, one of Brandt's men caught his motion in the darkness. With a couple of quick hand signals, the black fatigues spread out and surrounded Kelly. He only hoped he hadn't made them suspicious by getting caught so easily.

He raised his hand to shield his eyes as the flashlights bathed him in white.

"Stay on your knees and put both hands behind your head," he heard, as he felt the end of a rifle barrel press against the back of his neck. "Don't move one inch, if you want to live."

Brandt walked up slowly, squatting in front of Kelly with his left knee on the ground, his right elbow resting on his raised right knee. He gave Kelly a quick once-over, then, seeing the name tag, he said, sarcastically, "Ah, you must be the new man."

Brandt waited for an answer but Kelly said nothing.

"Search him."

Two men grabbed him under his armpits and pulled him to his feet. The search was complete. Shoes, pants legs, crotch, butt crack, all pockets. As they worked their way up, Kelly was dreading them reaching his breast pocket. As the man grabbed his shirt over his heart and squeezed, he braced for the question that would come, "What is this and where did you get it?" But, the question didn't come. They moved up to his collar, then ran fingers through his hair, and finally, spinning him around, one man barked, "Open your mouth."

Kelly was shoved back to his knees. Brandt stood over him this time. "Mister Kellerman, and I call you mister because your rank doesn't mean a damn thing to me... and you don't either; except for the information you have, that I want." He reached down and with a hand under Kelly's chin; raised his head. "I'm way past being a nice guy. You and your friends have killed a bunch of good men; my men. There is only one way you live to see the sun come up tomorrow, and that is to tell me exactly what I want to know." He pulled up harder on Kelly's chin, "Do we understand each other, Mr. Kellerman?"

Kelly had to push down with his chin against Brandt's grip in order to nod in the affirmative.

"Where are your friends, Mister Kellerman?" Brandt asked, releasing Kelly's chin.

Kelly dreaded what would come next, "I don't know, I'm the only..."

Brandt had already raised an eyebrow to one of the men, who brought his rifle butt down sharply on Kelly's right collar bone. His head snapped to the same side, as the upper lobe of his trapezius muscle tied itself into a knot. He fell onto his right side, reaching across his body with his left hand to grab his aching shoulder. In the darkness, Brandt made no significance of Kelly reaching with his other hand and placing it over his breast pocket.

It was still there. The little piece of chrome was still there. As he pushed it hard against his heart, Brandt grabbed him by the hair and pulled him back to his knees.

"Mister Kellerman," Brandt said, again raising Kelly's chin, "you know the question... now... please, for your sake... try a different answer."

Kelly, his head still leaning toward his badly cramping neck muscle, looked Brandt in the eye, "I tried to give you the only answer I've got... if you don't like it, you can go..."

He never expected to finish his sentence, and he was right. The rifle butt came down hard again, on his left shoulder this time. Kelly rolled forward onto his face.

The monster at the end of this new, long, dark tunnel, now had a face, and it had a name. It was Brandt. Fighting through the pain, he pulled his right hand up under him and again pushed the little piece of disc skin hard to his heart.

Brandt stepped back and addressed the two suits, "Leave me one man, the rest of you get the doors blown on those last two hangars. There are three more of them around here somewhere."

"Yes Sir," the suit said, pointing at one man to stay behind. They double-timed off in the direction of hangar six. Kelly envisioned Matson and Forest, behind the pallets, fighting off the cold. 'I probably should have told them to take the car and just start driving,' he thought to himself, 'they might have had a better chance of getting away.'

"Bring him," Brandt ordered as he turned and started the long walk back to where the Sikorsky was parked at hangar one.

Kelly struggled to his feet, the soldier helping only slightly. He walked with the end of the soldier's rifle barrel prodding him every other step. About the time they got to the third hangar they heard the resounding bang and echo as the C3 did away with the lock hasp on hangar six.

His thoughts, again, went to Matson and Forest: 'Would they lie there, still and quiet, or would the soldiers find them anyway?' He wished he could help, but he barely had the strength to walk. His arms were raised across his chest to make it appear he was rubbing each shoulder muscle, but his right hand was at his pocket again, pushing hard against his heart.

'Maybe I'm too far away,' he said to himself. 'Maybe it can't hear me...' his train of thought changed his choice of words, 'maybe it can't feel me from this distance.'

As they reached hangar one, the next charge of C3 went off, slightly softer this time. As the echo faded, they heard another report, sharp and crisp, and familiar.

Brrrrt.

"Damn-it," Brandt turned to the man holding the rifle on Kelly, "that was a fifty... where in hell did it come from?"

As the soldier was just starting to hunch his shoulders in the negative, they heard the sound again.

Brrrrrrt.

It sounded a little longer this time.

"Give me your rifle," Brandt yelled to the man behind Kelly, then, "That's coming from the other side of the runway. Get on the radio and find out what's going on over there."

Brandt held the rifle on Kelly as the soldier jumped inside the open bay door of the chopper and reached for the microphone.

"Forward to Home Guard, Forward to Home Guard, come in Home Guard." He got no answer. "Forward to Home Guard, come in Home Guard," again nothing; then a third time... with the same result.

"They're not answering, Sir."

Brandt turned to face Kelly. He grabbed his arm and yanked him down to his knees. Raising the butt of the rifle he started down toward Kelly's left shoulder blade again.

"Sir,"

Brandt stopped just before making contact with Kelly.

"Sir, they've found two of the others behind the sixth hangar. They're bringing them now."

Kelly turned his head as much as the pain in his neck would allow. He could see the soldiers marching two men, heads down, hands behind their backs in his direction. It was Matson and Forest. 'Damn it,' he thought. He wasn't counting on having to worry about their welfare when the next bit of fireworks started.

Brandt yelled into the open door of the Sikorsky, "Tell that thirteen to get back in the air and have him find out what's going on over on the other side," then to Kelly, "Mr. Kellerman, where's the last man." He leaned down toward Kelly's ear, "You take the next shot right across the top of your head; and quite honestly, I don't care if I kill you."

"OK... OK... I can tell you where he was the last time I saw him, but, he may have moved since then."

Brandt took a couple steps over to the Sikorsky, its blades still spinning in readiness, "Mr. Kellerman, I am not playing games." He motioned for the microphone. "Morrison," he spoke to one of the suits walking back with Matson and Forest.

"Morrison here, Sir."

"James," Brandt used Morrison's first name. Kelly had no way of knowing that in this elite group of fighting men, that this was a signal to ignore the next direct order. "Pick one of those two, I don't care which, and kill him."

Playing the game, Morrison replied questioningly, "Sir?"

"Now James," Brandt yelled into the microphone.

Kelly barely had time to yell, "No!..." when he heard the shot in the distance. If he had been looking in the right direction, he might have seen the muzzle blast, clearly visible from where he crumbled forward to his elbows.

"You son-of-a-bitch," Kelly spoke into the asphalt, "I told you... I told you all I know."

"You told me nothing Kellerman," Brandt said as he walked to Kelly's side, "you told me nothing."

Taking two quick steps, Brandt kicked Kelly hard in his ribs on his left side. Kelly felt the air leave his lungs as he rolled onto his side.

Brandt reached down and pulled Kelly's head up by the hair, "Do I kill the other man, or, do you tell me where the last man is?"

Out of options, Kelly, gasping for breath, pleaded, "Don't shoot him... I'll tell you... I'll tell you."

Brandt used Kelly's hair to pull him back up on his knees, "I'm waiting, Kellerman."

"OK... OK," Kelly gasped, "... he was waiting under cover, in front of the hangar... the one that we booby-trapped. When it blew, he was supposed to hi-tail it to the other side. He seemed to think he could get the guns to work on the plane." Kelly knew this lie had to last long enough to get him out of this jam. He figured by the time they checked it out, he'd have gained fifteen, maybe twenty minutes.

He slumped backwards, sitting on his heels. He looked up at the night sky above him. He had never realized you could see so many stars out here in the desert. The cold wind, that had chilled him when he first arrived the night before, now felt refreshing as it played against the sweat on his forehead and cheeks.

Morrison and the others walked up, leading Matson and Dr. Forest. As Kelly saw them both, alive, he looked over at Brandt who was already staring at him. Brandt's chest heaved slightly as he chuckled under his breath, a slight smirk hanging on his lips until Kelly looked away.

"Cuff Mr. Kellerman," Brandt barked, his temper, now apparent to everyone, growing shorter.

As Morrison snapped one cuff closed on his right wrist, Kelly turned to Matson and the doctor, "You guys OK?" he asked softly.

Brandt had turned to walk away, but hearing Kelly speak, he immediately unleashed a back kick that Kelly just saw coming out of the corner of his eye. It was the kind of kick that would easily hyper-extend a knee, if that was where it had been aimed. It struck Kelly in the upper chest, over his heart, driving the little piece of chrome sideways in his pocket until it cut through his shirt and into his skin.

"No talking between any of you," Brandt bellowed as he spun. His gaze stopped at the Sikorsky. "Morrison," he smiled, "cuff Mister Kellerman to the chopper."

"You heard the man," Morrison said, forcing Kelly to his feet. He thumped him with the sharp corner of his rifle butt as they walked the short distance to the helicopter. Now, dizzy with pain, Kelly collapsed at the bay door. Morrison wrapped the open end of the hand cuff around the long metal bar used as a step below the door, and closed it over the connecting chain.

Kelly was now stretched out on his back, his right hand shackled. He rolled onto his stomach, putting as much weight as he could on the little piece of metal. He drove it deep into his pectoral muscle. As he began to lose consciousness he whispered, "Help me, Brother."

Kelly did not hear the Brrt... Brrrrt.

Kelly did not see the explosion. The fireball was huge as it billowed and rolled upward, turning the night sky over the little trailer a bright, brilliant orange. Even at this distance, Brandt and his men could here heavy pieces of metal and other debris crashing back to the ground.

Brandt yelled, "Morrison, I said I wanted to know what was going on over there."

"Yes Sir, I'll see what I can find out."

"The rest of you guys... in the Sikorsky, now," he ordered, then, "No! No! leave those two here," he said of Matson and Forest, "we'll come back for them. Cuff them together back-to-back and set them down next to the hangar."

Morrison was yelling, "Sir, the thirteen pilot says the explosion was your Sikorsky... and... Sir... he says the disc is gone, Sir."

Brandt collected himself for a moment, "Morrison, who's in the thirteen?"

"That would be Arnell, Sir."

He stepped over Kelly and reached into the Sikorsky for the radio microphone and yelled, "Arnell."

"Arnell here, Sir."

"You and your gunner get back here, now... and watch your six all the way."

"Yes Sir."

Brandt tossed the mike back into the chopper. He stepped over Kelly again, and through the cockpit window, spoke to the pilot, "Get your rotor up to speed, we may have to get out of here in a hurry."

The pilot touched the bill of his cap in casual salute, and, with the rotors in neutral pitch, he slowly throttled up. As the noise from the engine increased, Brandt looked alongside the hangar toward the area where they had seen his Sikorsky go up in a boiling orange cloud. There were still small pockets of flame as some of the old dry brush and tumbleweeds were fanned by the south-western breeze.

"THE DISC IS ON YOUR SIX"

'Where in hell is that thirteen?' Brandt thought. He started to move for the microphone again when he heard the windows in the first three hangars start to rattle; then, the familiar pop-pop-pop of chopper blades. He turned to his right in time to see the thirteen, about ten feet off the deck, as it emerged from between hangars two and three; running as fast as its blades would pull it. A few seconds later, he saw why.

The plane came out on the same line as the little helicopter, its brilliant chrome skin sparkling in the light given off by the moon now high enough in the sky to do it justice. It was about twice as high off the ground as the little chopper and looked like it was having no trouble, whatsoever, keeping up.

"The disc is on your six," Brandt yelled into the mike.

As it crossed a line, even with the Sikorsky, and parallel with the hangar doors, it began to slow. Its nose rose slightly, as if using the forward air pressure as a cushion. It gained another twenty feet and then slowly turned, hovering to face the Sikorsky. It spun back again in the direction of the thirteen, strangely looking like it was trying to make up its mind. Once more it turned toward the Sikorsky, then with a quick and recognizable finality, it snapped back and took a heading on the thirteen.

Up again, it raised itself, another twenty feet or so. Even at this distance a strong vibration could now be felt in the asphalt. It, very quickly, adjusted its nose down a few degrees, slewed its nose, again almost instantly, to the right; the vibration in the asphalt increasing with each movement. It made one more small correction to the right, then, Brrrt. Fire poured from its nose as two tracers could be seen leaving each gun port. That meant at least sixty rounds were now headed down range.

Brandt turned to look in the direction of the little thirteen, now almost three quarters of a mile away. He could just make out the little sparks as the fifty calibers tore into the metal tubing that made up most of its fuselage. The tail section broke apart on the right side and the tail rotor swung forward in a half circle. It struck the canopy, still spinning, killing Arnell instantly. The soldier in the passenger seat would die seconds later as the wreckage fell slowly from the sky.

The disc now adjusted its altitude, and it seemed, its attitude; instantly dropping to about thirty feet off the deck, it slewed again, slowly, very deliberately, in the direction of the Sikorsky.

Suddenly, Brandt felt hunted. He jumped for the step that Kelly was cuffed to and hauled himself inside the bay door.

"Get us out of here," he yelled forward.

"What about him?" the pilot motioned with his head toward Kelly.

"I said get us out of here, NOW!"

Matson and Forest looked on in horror as the big helicopter dragged Kelly, half unconscious, into the night sky. He dangled, spinning slowly as the pilot pulled on the collective as hard as he could.

With his arm stretching to its limit, Kelly's shirt grabbed a sharp corner of the little piece of metal embedded in the self inflicted wound in his chest. A few seconds more and it was pulled free of the wound and slid slowly down the inside of his shirt to his belt line. His warm blood followed the same path, staining his shirt to such an extent that, looking from the ground, Doctor Forest thought they had shot Kelly before taking off.

As the helicopter rose to roof level, the pilot cranked hard left on the stick. The huge chopper banked abruptly to the left on a path over the top of hangar one. About half way across the roof, the shiny chrome disc suddenly shot up in front of him, stopping instantly at his level, blocking his path. The pilot pulled back hard on the stick, pointing the big choppers' nose almost forty-five degrees skyward. With quick work on the stick, he leveled the chopper, and the two sat there, as if staring at one another. The helicopter pilot moved his stick to the left and the big chopper leaned over and slid to its port. The disc, as if choreographed, moved to its right to block. The chopper tried right, the disc blocked left.

"What do we do, Sir?" the pilot almost pleaded to Brandt, "you want me to turn her around and run south?"

"Don't be foolish... you saw what it did to the thirteen. We can't outrun that thing," he paused, his gaze frozen on the chrome demon in front of him, then, "What I need now is some firepower."

A voice behind him rose above the noise of the rotor blades, "Sir, if you want firepower, there's a couple M-nines in the back."

"Morrison," he yelled without hesitation, "grab those nines and get up here."

***

Kelly was slowly coming-to. To say he was disoriented would not be the slightest of exaggerations. A moment before, he was back on that beautiful rose colored, two sunned world, enjoying the view over the wide canyon below him, and now... and now... he blinked his eyes hard against a harsh cold tornado of a wind that was blowing down on him as he craned his neck upwards to assess his situation. His right hand and forearm were nearly numb as he reached with his good hand to gain purchase on the step above. He could not. The pain had become too great, so he settled for grabbing his wrist in order to take some of the weight off of his right shoulder; a shoulder he was certain was going to dislocate any minute.

Beneath he could make out the roof of the hangar some twenty feet below. As his slow spin on the handcuff chain brought him around to face the north, he saw the brilliant shine of the chrome disc, now bathed by the landing lights of the Sikorsky. The vision filled his senses. His body warmed and once again tears flowed in streams, blown down his cheeks by the wash of the rotor blades. His slow spin continued, and he strained his neck as long as possible to keep his eyes on the plane. When he could no longer see it, he snapped his head in the other direction and picked it up from the other side. An urgency began to fill him as from deep within him came a welling of emotion he could no longer control. His lungs filled with all the air they could possibly hold, and, louder than any man has ever yelled before, a single word roared from him: "B_R_O_T_ H_E_R."

A small flash appeared from a single gun on the port side. Kelly heard no sound. He was jolted back to reality by an excruciating pain that filled what senses he had left in his right arm. His wrist had been pulled upward with a mighty jerk. He felt the pop as the ball and socket separated in his shoulder. He feared now, that once his full weight came back down on his arm, it might tear the ligaments, and he would fall to his death, leaving his arm attached to the helicopter.

Kelly began his fall... but there was no tug on his arm. He now felt, and heard, the wind building speed as it rushed passed his ears.

'Well,' he thought, 'at least I'll die in one piece.'

The disc had fired a single round, striking the handcuff chain just below the step. The force of the fifty caliber bullet broke the chain, but at the same time it pushed it backwards, pulling upward, violently on Kelly's arm.

The plane then refocused its efforts on the Sikorsky. In a split second, having already slewed left a couple of degrees, it began a slow turn to the right, letting go a fusillade with all six fifties. For four seconds the mighty guns roared. Almost five hundred rounds tore through the big Sikorsky, nearly tearing it in half, lengthwise.

Mid way through the cacophony, Brandt pulled the trigger on the M-nine Bazooka; its sound lost completely in the bellow of the fifties. The little two-point-three inch rocket left the stove pipe and made a straight line for its chrome target.

As the debris from the big Sikorsky fell through the roof of the hangar, the disc (a four foot hole blown in its starboard side at the canopy and wing fairing) wobbled slightly on its central axis, then slid backwards, crashing through the wall and coming to rest on the hard concrete floor of hangar two.

***

Kelly was lying on his back, once again looking up at the bright stars in the Arizona night sky. He thought, I'm alive... my God, I'm alive.'

He rolled his head, first to the left, then to the right, barely able to see over the depression he was lying in.

"Corrugated steel... this looks like corrugated steel," he said to himself.

To his right he could see a column of smoke rising twenty feet or so from him. He couldn't tell at the time, but it was smoke from the Sikorsky on the floor below him.

He had landed on the roof of hangar one, between two of the curved roof rafters. The steel had given way enough, without pulling itself free, to cushion his fall.

***

"Kelly," the voice called.

"Ke__lly," it called again.

Kelly thought it sounded so far away. Then, a few minutes later, "Kellerman... Ke__ller__man," cried another voice, closer this time.

It was Matson and the Doctor, walking nearly back to back, their arms stretched sideways behind and between them, still shackled.

"Here," he called, with what little voice he could muster, "up here."

The two men worked their way inside the hangar through a large, jagged hole left by the Sikorsky's engine that had broken free from the huge chopper when it hit the floor. The electrical system had sparked a small fire under what was left of the helicopter's dashboard. The pilot and co-pilot seats were now smoldering; the occupants, long past worrying about being burned.

At the side of the gaping hole in the roof, the chopper had brought down three of the long, curved, wooden roof rafters. They had stayed, nearly in one piece; each rafter in turn (supported by torn strands of the steel roofing) reaching a little closer to the floor than the one before it. They hung there looking like one end of an old, broken Japanese paper fan. The last one in line extended nearly all the way to the floor and had turned somewhat sideways so that its two-by-six webbing looked like they might act as a crude, if not precarious, ladder.

"Kelly," Matson yelled, "call out again, so we can tell exactly where you are."

"Up here... I'm up here... on the roof."

Both men turned their heads upwards. They had been left sitting against the outside hangar wall and did not see the action that had brought down the Sikorsky.

"How in God's name did you get up there?" Matson queried.

Kelly, now mustering strength he thought beyond his abilities, pulled himself from the hollow he was lying in. Using his good left hand and arm, he crawled on hand and knees to the edge of the chasm.

"I'm not sure," he answered Matson's question, "but I reckon I'd rather be up here, than under that pile of junk," he said, nodding his head toward the tangled and smoldering remains below.

Surveying the situation, Kelly turned back to the two men, "You guys are gonna have to find a rope or something. Maybe some parachute shrouds... anything... and then find a way to get it up here to me."

Matson and the Doctor turned slowly, like two dancing dolls on top of a music box, and waved their handcuffed hands at Kelly.

"Oh," Kelly said, "You're not going to be much help, are you?"

"Sorry," Matson said, then offering, "Look, over there to your left, where these three rafters are attached... can you get over there?"

Kelly looked at the spot along the edge of the roof. There were several open holes; the steel roofing either hanging in place by a single attachment point, or having fallen to the floor below.

"Yeah, maybe," then in after thought, "... hey Doc, my right shoulder's dislocated, got any ideas?"

"Oh Jeeze," Forest whispered to Matson, "that's not good." Then he called up to Kelly, "Is it anterior or posterior?"

"Is it ant... , what?"

"Sorry, sorry," the doctor apologized, "does it feel like your upper arm bone has moved to the front or rear of your shoulder?"

Kelly tucked his chin to check the position of his arm, "Looks like it's moved to the front."

"Ah, good, good, that's anterior. If you're going to have a dislocation, that's the one to have."

Kelly chuckled, finding humor at this unusual time, "Thanks Doc, I'll remember that, next time I have an urge to dislocate somethin'."

Forest smiled and Matson quickly poked him in the ribs with an elbow, nearly knocking them both off balance.

"Kelly," the doctor called up, getting back to business, "can you unbutton your shirt?"

"Yeah, I think so."

"Just the top three or four buttons... Oh, can you bend your elbow?"

Kelly, with the help of his left hand, pulled his right hand upward. He stopped halfway, wincing in pain. "No Doc," he gasped, as the pain subsided, "if you want me to bend it enough to get it in my shirt... it ain't gonna happen."

Forest turned to Matson, shaking his head he mouthed, "Bad." He turned to look up at Kelly, "Sorry Son," he offered softly, "I'm afraid the only thing left... is to move it as little as possible."

"Yeah, I figured," he said as he rolled over onto his back again, enjoying the cool desert breeze on his sweat and tear stained face. "Give me a minute to get myself together, and I'll see what I can do about getting myself down."

He rolled away from his injured shoulder and pushed himself back to his knees. Carefully making his way around the open spots in the roof without incident, he found himself looking down the length of what he hoped would be his salvation. The rafter, the last in line, reaching a few feet from the floor, was attached to the top of the wall by a steel hanger. The hanger was a cradle with two flat flanges, one on either side. The rafter was held in the cradle with four large lag bolts, all of which were still in place, but, three of the carriage-bolts, holding the cradle to the top of the wall, had been snapped in two. The fourth bolt was bent and stretched by the force of the falling roof. He stared at it, moving his head to the side to let the moonlight strike it. He was about to put a lot of faith in that little bolt and he wanted to know it intimately. He reached his hand under the wall top-plate and felt for the bottom end of the bolt. 'Good,' he thought, 'the nut's still there.'

With his right arm dragging beneath him, he turned himself around and backed slowly over the edge, gaining a foothold on the rafter's first cross brace.

"Easy," Matson yelled from below, "this ain't no race; we've got all night now."

Using only his feet and his good left arm, he slowly made his way to the second, then third cross-member. He used his forehead to brace himself while he reached underneath his body to reposition his limp right arm farther to his right side so as to make it slide along a piece of the corrugated steel roofing still attached to the rafter. He stopped often, to rest and to look down at the two men waiting patiently below. They said nothing, but moved closer to the end of the rafter, anticipating what little help they might be able to give with all four hands cuffed behind them.

As Kelly reached the half way mark in his journey to the floor, he felt the rafter shudder. The single piece of corrugation holding his rafter to the next, was about ten feet above him, and he watched helplessly as the last four sheet metal screws holding them together, pulled loose, one at a time. He felt the lower end of the rafter, still attached at the roof line above, fall to the floor and then rebound, having bent in the middle under its own weight. When it hit the floor a second time, a loud crack echoed through what was left of the hangar. The rafter separated just below Kelly's feet and he started a long arching swing toward the south side of the building. He threw his good arm over the cross member he had been holding, and hung on for all he was worth. Closing his eyes, he waited for the rafter to slam the wall. To his surprise, he never actually hit the wall. He looked below to see that the bottom of the rafter had struck against a line of storage lockers. Bending in the middle, it rebounded. After a slow arc back toward the center of the hangar, it reversed again and struck the storage lockers a second time. The last bolt holding the rafter-hangar to the top-plate could bare the strain no longer. It snapped in two, and the rafter fell the last six feet to the floor with Kelly still riding along with a one-armed death grip. It rebounded one last time to a point straight over Kelly's head. Fearing the huge wooden rafter would now fall backwards, crushing him beneath it, he held on even tighter, willing it southward. It teetered a moment, then settled slowly, back against the wall.

He was still about four feet off the ground when Matson and the Doctor got to him. There wasn't much they could do to help without the use of their hands, so the doctor suggested they back up against Kelly's legs for support. He was able to lower himself enough to sit on both their shoulders, and as the two men stooped to lower him to the floor, Kelly, finally, ran out of strength. His grip on the last cross-member failed, and all three men collapsed in a pile on the cold cement floor.

HANDCUFFS AND HIPPOCRATES

Kelly opened his eyes to see stars (real ones again). He raised himself as best he could on his left elbow to look around. He was lying on an old greasy packing tarp between hangars one and two, about twenty feet away from the Sikorsky's engine. Matson and the doctor had decided to move him outside when the wind had died, causing the smoke from the burning helicopter upholstery to hang in a nearly unbreathable layer near the floor.

He looked to the hole in the side of hangar two. The moon was throwing enough light through some of the upper windows to illuminate parts of the floor inside. He could see the plane sitting inside. It looked to be in about the same shape he was. She was laid over to one side, having tried to lower the landing struts as it crashed through the wall. It looked like it only got the port side strut down in time. 'Sad,' he thought, 'the last time I saw her, she looked so... so, almost elegant... and now... so sad.'

He thought it strange to be using a word like elegant to describe this plane, and strange to be feeling so terribly sad seeing her lying there, crippled. He should be feeling relieved, or lucky, even happy to have survived the ordeal just passed, and yet... this sadness... such deep sadness, was now rolling over him. It was not unlike the darkness that he had seen so many times before, when he looked down those ominous halls and alleyways that had challenged him all his life. This darkness, however, felt a little different. He did not fear it. It was just there, waiting.

He laid his head back down and reached to his waistline with his good hand. There was an uncomfortable thing: something sharp and sticky, poking him under his belt. He pulled his shirt up. It was the piece of disc skin. It had cut him again and his fresh, and dried blood, had stuck it to his lower belly. As he pulled it free, Doctor Forest seemed to appear in front of him.

"I must have passed out again," he said, trying to raise himself to his elbow again.

"No Son, just lie there," Forest said as Matson sidestepped out from behind him, their hands still shackled.

"What have you guys been up to?" Kelly said, tucking his chin to his neck to see them.

"We walked to the edge of the runway, and yelled for Cory... but, well, we're afraid we've lost him. He must have perished in the fighting over there."

"I told him to hide in the pump house. He could still be OK."

"We could see the pump house, or rather, we could see where the pump house used to be. It was gone, probably destroyed in that big explosion we heard. Things are still burning over there."

Kelly laid his head back down and again looked at his sky full of stars. 'This doesn't feel good,' he thought, 'I've sent Cory off to his death...'

"I need to find a way to give you a good looking over, and set that shoulder, but I'm at a bit of a disadvantage," Forest said standing sideways and wiggling his handcuffed fingers. "Do you know how to open these?"

"Did you check the bodies for keys?" he offered, tucking his chin to look at them again.

"Yes, we did... no luck."

"Find some wire, check the workbenches inside. Any thing should work, piggin' wire, stiff electrical, anything. If there's none in there, go back down to hangar five, and get the piece of wire sticking out under the sill-plate... where the pallets are... out front." He relaxed his neck muscles and let his head roll back.

The two men walked away like a pair of beach-crabs attached at the rear of their carapaces.

Holding the disc skin in his fingers, he raised it by bending his elbow. It was now completely covered in his blood. It took a few seconds, but he finally realized he was holding it in his right hand. The pain had lessened, and that felt better, but it scared him. As he relaxed, his arm fell to the ground, his fingers pointing in the direction of the hole in hangar two; the bloody piece of chrome resting in his open palm.

Kelly could not hear as the small piece of metal pipe, just disturbed, rolled a few feet across the concrete floor, or the torn piece of siding, as it slid from the portside wing. He could not see, as the starboard landing strut, slowly began to lower itself.

***

"Kelly, wake up... Kelly... Kelly... hey... ah, there you are," Matson said, as Kelly slowly opened his eyes. "We've got some wire, what do we do?"

Kelly raised himself to his left elbow again, "You guys come around here to this side, so I can see you better."

They went down to their knees, and then leaning against one another, they managed to sit, back to back.

"OK, pick which one of you is gonna do the work."

"Go ahead Doc," said Matson, "you've got the hands."

"Ha!" Forest exclaimed, "I haven't had the hands for almost twenty years... but, I'll give it a try."

"Let me see your piece of wire."

Forest held it up as best he could in the moonlight.

"Perfect, that'll be perfect." Lying back down, he reached over with his left hand, and wincing with the pain, grabbed his right arm and hauled it across his body.

"Careful Son," Forest said, "you should move that as little as possible."

"Tell me about it," Kelly replied with watery eyes. Then, moving again to his elbow, "See this skinny part, right here?" he was barely able to point at the cuff on his right wrist, his left elbow planted firmly on the ground, "this part with the teeth that goes into the little tunnel."

Forest leaned forward, not being able to see much in the moonlight. He squinted in frustration, and then, in recognition, "Yes... yes, I see the tunnel... oh yes, and the teeth."

"Good, now here's what I want you to do. Slide the wire inside the tunnel, above the teeth. There is a little pawl that comes down from the top and engages the teeth. You have to hit the pawl square on, or the wire will slide right by it."

"That's it?" asked Matson, "we just push the pawl out of the way?"

"Don't get ahead of me Ken," Kelly grunted, almost smiling, "the next part is yours. When the doctor feels the wire against the pawl, you have to squeeze his handcuff a little bit tighter. That should take the pressure off of the pawl, and then he can push it up and out of the teeth. Don't push too hard, or the pawl will drop over the next tooth. The cuffs will just keep getting tighter and tighter, until you can no longer move the pawl"

Using Kelly as his eyes, the doctor eventually finagled the wire into the tunnel, and, after a few tries, he found the little pawl. Matson squeezed and the wire quickly slipped off its target. Again the doctor slid the wire in, and again he found the pawl. This time he held it in place as Matson pushed, lightly this time. Matson felt the pressure release as the pawl moved up. He pulled the toothed-half of the shackle a full three or four teeth out of the tunnel before the wire, again, slid off to the side.

"We've got it now," Forest exclaimed, a big smile on his face. After another try, the cuff was off.

With their hands free, Matson set about removing the cuff from Kelly, while the doctor checked the wreckage of the Sikorsky for a first aid kit. With water they found in the toilet reservoir in hangar one, they cleaned and then dressed Kelly's wounds. The gash in his chest had quit bleeding, but the damage done to his wrist was a different story. The handcuff had torn the skin open below his palm, exposing a tendon, and luckily, a still intact blood vessel. The doctor poured nearly the entire bottle of disinfectant over the opening, and then carefully folded what skin was left, back in place before wrapping it snuggly. Leaning back on his heels, he looked at Kelly, "There Son, almost good as new." He managed a small smile.

"Thanks Doc," he said, tucking his chin to look at his dislocated right shoulder, "now, what about this?"

Forest looked at the shoulder, then at Kelly, "Perhaps you should rest awhile before we move on to that." As he started to stand he noticed the bloody piece of metal lying next to him on a small clump of grass. "Have you been carrying this with you all along?" he asked, picking it up and holding it in front of Kelly. He grabbed the cloth he had used to clean Kelly's wounds and started to wipe the little piece of chrome.

"No!" Kelly reached across his body with his left hand and grabbed Forest's wrist, then softer, "No Doc, don't clean it, please... don't clean it."

With a puzzled look, the doctor set the rag down. He stared at the piece of metal, hesitated, then turned enough to look through the hole in the wall behind him. He could see that the disc had nearly righted itself. He placed the piece back in Kelly's clean right hand.

As they stared at one another Kelly said, "Don't ask me to explain it Doc, but... it's... it's more than a good luck piece."

The Doctor rolled Kelly's fingers closed over the little piece and pushed it softly down to his chest.

As the doctor stood, Kelly turned to Matson, "Look, this whole thing isn't over yet. There will be more people from Nevada. You can bet that when they don't hear from these guys, they'll be on the horn. They'll turn that Colonel's choppers around and we'll have more company in no time." Then to the doctor, "I think we need to do this now," he moved his chin in the direction of his right shoulder.

Forest looked to Matson who shrugged his shoulders, then back at Kelly, "All right, if that's what you want." He dug through the first aid kit and pulled out a small tin of aspirin. "Here, chew a few of these."

"Nah, my mouth is too dry, I'd never get 'em down, and I ain't drinkin' none of that toilet water... besides, we ain't got time to sit here and wait for them to take effect. Let's just get it over with."

Forest sat fully on the ground at Kelly's right side. He took off his right shoe and set it aside. "Pardon my smelly foot, he said."

"Don't worry, it can't be any worse than what you're about to do to me."

Reaching for Kelly's right arm, he slowly moved it out and away from his body. Seeing him grit his teeth with the pain, Forest asked, "You sure you don't want to chew those aspirin?"

"No Doc, but... how much farther are you gonna move it?... it really... hurts... what you're doin'."

"I won't move it any further than it is now, but you have to relax for the next part," he said, placing the heel of his foot against Kelly's arm pit, "do you think you can relax?"

"I'll try Doc, but... AHHHHH!" Kelly yelled as Forest quickly took up pressure on the arm, pulling out, then up with a slight twist; the movement ending in a crisp POP.

"Jesus Doc!" he exclaimed, "what are you tryin' to do, kill...?" he paused suddenly discovering that the bulk of his pain was gone. "Hey, that's it? That's all there is to it?"

The Doctor smiled, lowering Kelly's arm down and across his chest, "It's nothing, really, hell, Hippocrates was doing the exact same thing over two thousand years ago."

"Yeah," Matson chuckled, "but I'll bet Hippocrates washed his feet first."

Kelly smiled and managed to move his right hand up to his heart. He opened it and pushed the bloody piece of metal hard against his chest. His smile grew as he felt the warmth flow through his hand, to his arm, and then to his shoulder. He closed his eyes and, once again enjoyed his rose colored sky; his two dying red suns; and the vision of his brother; a brother, he was now beginning to believe, he actually had.

HIM

When Kelly opened his eyes again, the doctor was leaning over him, "It's two in the morning Son. If company's coming, like you said, well, we thought you'd want to be up... we need to know what you want to do."

Kelly recognized the subordinate tone in the doctor's voice. Matson said nothing, he just stared. 'Huh,' he thought to himself, 'I guess they've put me in charge.'

Without thinking, he rolled to his stomach and pushed himself up to his knees, then to his feet.

"Whoa, Kelly, take it easy," Forest said, reaching for him, "you'll dislocate again."

Kelly looked down at his hand. His eyes followed his arm up to his shoulder. He raised it out to his side to nearly ninety degrees. He moved it through a range of motion like the driver mechanism on a steam engine.

"Feels great Doc," he said, opening his hand. The little piece of disc skin had stuck to his fingers. It now tumbled to the ground and Kelly reached for his shoulder, grimacing.

"See, I told you," Forest said, grabbing Kelly's elbow.

Matson was watching from the side. He looked down at the blood stained piece of metal at Kelly's feet, then back up at Kelly's shoulder. He didn't want to make this connection, but, it was becoming all too obvious.

He reached down and picked it up. It was very warm to the touch. He expected the blood to be cold, hard and crusted, but, it was fresh and started to run as he raised it. He quickly leveled it, having a sudden feeling that he didn't want to lose any of the blood to the ground. He placed it into Kelly's now hanging palm. The hand closed around it and both men watched in amazement as Kelly raised his elbow in what seemed little, or no, pain.

Forest put a hand under Kelly's armpit and with his other hand on the elbow he gently tugged on Kelly's shoulder joint.

"Feels really solid in there... I'm surprised, it should still feel like a freshly reduced dislocation, but it doesn't."

Matson reached for Kelly's hand, "Let me have the piece of metal," he said, starting to uncoil Kelly's fingers.

Kelly pulled away, "Sorry Ken... let's just say, for the sake of argument, that we tried your little experiment. You took the piece from me and my shoulder started hurting again... you gave it back, and it stopped."

All three men turned as a loud clang rang out through the hole in hangar two. Another piece of pipe or other debris had fallen to the floor as the disc continued to right itself. She stood, nearly level, a mere thirty yards from them.

Matson said softly, "It's healing itself," then turning to Kelly, "... like you."

Kelly said nothing as he walked with Matson and Forest following him toward the opening in the hangar. As they approached, they saw one last slow movement as the starboard landing strut extended another inch. There she sat, perfectly level, the jagged hole in her side now gone, the drive unit, having done its job, now reducing itself to a low hum; idling.

Kelly walked to the portside wing and raised his right hand. Opening his fingers (the piece of metal again stuck to his palm) he laid it on the smooth chrome surface.

With pictures of his far away planet flashing through his mind, he could feel heat building in his hand. When it reached an intensity he could no longer tolerate, he pulled away. Looking at his hand he saw no evidence of a burn, but the little piece of metal was gone. He looked back at the wing in time to see the outline left by it, slowly fading into the wing; leaving only a small blood stain. In a few seconds, that too, disappeared into the wing.

Matson rubbed his hand over the spot, then looked at Kelly, "How does your shoulder feel now, without the metal in your hand?"

Kelly squeezed it with his good left hand, "Feels good... yeah, it feels good."

They stood, looking at one another, neither of the three wanting to speak first. Finally Kelly offered, with a slight chuckle, "Crazy, isn't it? This thing... He," he corrected himself, "Maybe He... really is alive."

"Yeah," Matson said, laying a hand on the leading edge, almost hoping to feel something himself, "and it seems, you're becoming connected, somehow."

"He?" said Forest, "you've been calling it a her," he stared at the plane, then back at Kelly, "now, all of a sudden, it's a he?"

"Yes, most definitely... it's a He," he paused, looking around, "here," he said pointing, "help me slide this crate."

With Kelly guiding, they moved one of the many packing crates into position at the leading edge. Kelly laid a hand on Matson's shoulder for balance and in two steps, he was on the wing. As he took a couple steps in the direction of the cockpit, Forest asked, "Do you remember where the canopy release is?"

"Oh yeah," he said, it's right here." But instead of bending over to touch the spot that the doctor remembered, he tapped himself on the side of his head, "it's right here," he said again. The canopy snapped open with a quick tsssst.

"What in blazes was that?" Forest queried.

Kelly thought for a moment, then remembered that the doctor and Matson were at the far end of the trailer on the other side, when he had first found out how to open and close the canopy.

"Don't need hands anymore," he said, "I just think it, and it happens. Seems you were right Ken, I am connecting with this thi__, with Him," he caught himself. "You're not going to believe this," he looked into the open cockpit, "but I think, he thinks I'm his brother... or... he is making me think, I'm his brother. I'm not sure which."

The two men stared at him.

"Yeah... I know, I know it's crazy" he shook his head slowly, "but, it seems, the more I made contact with that little piece of chrome... the more I... shoot, I don't know... the more I wasn't here, in this place any more. I think I was... where these things, these people, these beings, came from."

"You mean you went to their planet?" asked Forest.

"No, not really... I think I went there by using his memories. He showed me where he came from... he showed me... himself."

"And what does this thing, this He... what does he look like?"

"Well, I don't think I really know. I think he used a human representation of himself." He turned to Matson, "You've read the workup on me, right?"

"Yes."

"You know I don't have a brother?"

"Right, no family at all."

"Well, this person he showed me was himself, but... it was my brother. The feeling was so strong, I couldn't deny it. I believed it then, and... I'm afraid... I believe it now."

"But you've lost the chrome piece. Its hold on you shouldn't happen again... right?"

Kelly looked at the open canopy again, then back at Matson, "I don't think that's the way it works anymore," and then to the doctor, "It has my blood. It has a part of me Doc." He continued to stare at Forest, hoping for an answer.

"Son," said Forest, "please don't look to me to explain this one... I missed the whole semester on alien medicine," he said, grinning sheepishly.

"This is what was happening to Will, isn't it?" Matson asked.

"Almost," Kelly responded, "but it wasn't quite the same. He never cut himself with it. He just handled it; rubbing... you know... you saw him. It messed with his mind. He couldn't figure out what was happening to him... got his signals crossed. In the end, he fell apart, mentally. When Perkins tried to talk him into turning the disc over to Nevada, Will balked. Thinking he was now the disc's savior, he attacked Perkins... and that's when Perkins shot him."

"So why you... why are you OK?" Matson puzzled.

"I got no idea. Why are people alike in some ways, and different in others? You're guess is as good as mine." A movement in the cockpit startled Kelly, "Hey, both of you, step back from the front of the plane. He's armed the guns."

As the doctor and Matson moved out of the way, Kelly reached into the cockpit and touched the dash where the red warning light was glowing. It went out. "That's better," he started to say, but the light came back on. He touched again. Again it went out, then back on. He tried with his mind this time, and again, the same results.

"I don't know what's going on fellas. Make sure you give the front end a wide berth 'till I figure it out."

Kelly very gently stepped into the cockpit and with both hands on the canopy rail he lowered himself into the seat. The old and crusty upholstery still hadn't changed with the rest of the plane.

Forest could see the top of the old seat above the canopy rail, "The seat, and the rest of the plane... a bit of a dichotomy, huh?"

Kelly turned with a puzzled look, "A di... what?"

"Oh, nothing, I just meant, it's old... the seat... it hasn't changed."

"Oh yeah, go figure," he said as he pushed himself back, feeling the support of the built in lumbar cushion. A sharp pain suddenly burned him in his lower back and he lurched forward, reaching for anything to grab hold of on or under the dash area. Everything was smooth and clean. Even the area under the dash was closed off. He found nothing to give purchase. Visions of the rose colored sky flashed through his mind as he fell back into the seat, twisting, trying to hold his left side up and off of the lumbar support.

"What the hell happened?" Matson yelled.

Kelly, with his senses returning, looked back and down at the spot where the pain had come from. It was the bloody area that had coincided with the wound on Parker's back. He turned his body enough to sit sideways on his hip and ran his fingers over the dried blood. There, he pushed harder, separating the covering and then the old horsehair below.

"Hey, take a look at this," he said down to the two anxious men below. Then, motioning with his hands, "come up and take a look."

As Forest took a step in the direction of the packing crate, Matson grabbed him by the arm. "Are the guns still armed?" he asked Kelly.

Kelly looked at him for a moment as a calmness seemed to wash over him and very softly said, "Don't worry Ken," smiling, "I won't harm either of you."

Matson and Forest stood, frozen. 'Was this still Kelly?' they thought.

After a few seconds of standing and staring motionless, Kelly asked, "What?" with a puzzled look.

"Kelly?" Dr. Forest questioned.

Continuing to stare, Kelly's look changed to one of incredulity. "It's me... Kelly... what's wrong with you two?"

Still not sure who they were talking to, Matson explained, "You said, YOU wouldn't harm us," Forest all but whispered.

"Oh... yeah... well, come on up here and maybe I can explain why. C'mon," he said again as he saw them hesitate, "nobody's gonna hurt you... not me... or the plane... c'mon."

Kelly pushed himself up and stepped out of the cockpit (to the starboard side) as Matson and the Doctor climbed onto the wing and approached.

"Look," he said kneeling, "here, where Parker's blood is. One of the cushion springs is broken. This is what injured him. This is why he complained of having trouble with his back."

The doctor looked up at Kelly, "Don't you think he would have known the difference between a bad back and a broken spring?"

"No... not necessarily," he paused, "this spring just did the same thing to me that the little piece of chrome did."

"But it's just a rusty old spring," the doctor offered.

"Look," Kelly said, pointing at the base of the seat, "see how the floor seems to flow right over the legs of the seat. The whole seat is now just as much a part of the plane as, say, the canopy, or the joy stick. Look," he said excitedly, "there are no seams... anywhere. This entire plane is one..." he struggled for the right words, "one, living... breathing... thing."

As the men stared, Kelly continued, "The spring is a conduit, a means of communication. That's what happened to me just now. I felt the plane... I went home again... well, I mean,... not home... you know... that other place."

"Seems dangerous to me Kelly," Matson said.

After thinking a moment, Kelly's furrowed brow showed his concern. "Yeah Ken, I know... I think you're right... sort of. This spring, it's like a direct connection. It's much stronger than the little piece of metal. In the split second that it touched my back, I was gone, almost completely. The feelings, the emotions... were very strong. I had to fight off the feeling of wanting to lie back against the spring again."

Matson looked across the cockpit at Kelly, "You're going to try to fly this, aren't you?"

"Isn't that why I'm here?"

"Oh, come on Kelly, under perfect circumstances, maybe, but, you've got no obligation whatsoever to climb into this thing and risk your life. This project is all but over. What we need to do now is find a way to get as far away from here as possible."

"I'm sure you're right about Nevada," the doctor broke in, trying to sound convincing, "they'll be here soon, and there's no way we'll be able to stop them this time. There's bound to be another like Brandt, and when he sees all the damage we've done... all the dead, well... the three of us will just sort of dry up and disappear out there behind one of those sand hills," he nodded to the south.

"Listen, the two of you don't have to stay here with me, but, I'm stayin', either way. This is more than the SWIFT project now... I can't... I... I won't leave." They stared at one another. "Go ahead," Kelly spoke again, "if you leave now you can get to the freeway before sunup. Tucson's only twenty miles after that. Call one of those friends you've got in high places, maybe he can find a way to hide you from the bad guys."

"And you?"

"Me?"

"Yeah, what are you going to do?"

Kelly paused for a moment, and then, with one of those grins that can come only from a man holding four aces, he said, "Well hell Mister Matson, I am going to do exactly what I came here to do. I'm going flyin'."

LOOSE ENDS

Matson leaned over and whispered in Forest's ear. The doctor nodded, apparently in agreement. "OK then, we're with you. If you can get this thing... Him," he interjected apologetically, "if you can get Him flying, we're probably better off here, than out there in the open."

Kelly smiled softly, wondering if he was about to get two more of his friends killed.

"I need to find something, or some way, to cover this broken spring. Will one, or both of you, climb down and have a look around?"

"I thought you wanted to communicate with... Him."

"I do, but He has too much control with a direct connection like that. I'm thinkin' that contact with the joystick is gonna work just fine, and, if I need a better link than that, I'll open the cut on my wrist and touch Him. That way I'll save some control for myself."

As the two men reached the hangar floor, Kelly caught motion in the cockpit again. It was the gun-armed warning light again, and now it was blinking furiously.

"Stand fast, you guys, something's up. This warning light's going crazy."

"Nevada can't be here already, can they?"

"No, I don't think so," he stared at the light, "but something's bothering Him," Kelly said, looking back down at Matson. Then, "Hey, where's the Doctor?"

Matson turned to look around.

"He's right here," a deep, clear voice said.

The doctor stepped out from under the far end of the port side wing, a forearm wrapped around his neck on his right side; the barrel of a forty-five caliber Colt was resting against his left temple.

Kelly waited until they stepped into the faint moonlight, hoping to get a look at the man holding the gun. He was hiding behind the doctor, limping badly on a bloody left leg.

"Mr. Kellerman, climb down, now, and please don't test me."

It was Brandt.

"Get down! NOW!" he yelled, his voice echoing through the empty hangar. He pushed the Colt harder against Forest's head.

Kelly walked to the leading edge and slowly stepped down onto the crate, then to the floor.

"Alright, now, everybody outside. Stay to the left edge of the hole in the wall and then move east, away from this thing's gun ports, and so help me Kellerman, if it moves or makes a sound, I'll shoot the doctor here."

They moved along the wall outside until Brandt nearly collapsed behind the doctor.

"Everybody down," he said, dragging Forest down by his collar. "Kellerman, you and your friend, Matson, right?" Matson nodded, "You and Matson, against the wall, and don't move. Doc, you take a look at this," he said, spinning Forest by the shoulder.

His left pants leg had been split from cuff to pocket and as he held it open they could see that he had applied a tourniquet about half way up his thigh. A long gash had been torn on the inside of his leg, starting just above the knee and continuing half way down his calf, exposing the side of his knee joint. His forehead was crossed at the hair line by a large gash, apparently gained when the helicopter hit either the roof or the floor of hangar one. Not being able to stem the blood flow, he continually wiped it from his eyes; first one, then the other.

Forest reached for the tourniquet, loosening it slightly. Brandt winced as he quickly tightened it again, "Oh, that's not good," he looked at Brandt, "you've nicked the artery, and... you've cut the collateral ligament nearly in two, I can't fix either here. You're going to have to continuously loosen the tourniquet to freshen the blood supply to your leg."

Brandt pushed Forest's hand away from his wound, and with a disgusted look on his face he said, "What do you think, I just became a soldier yesterday? Tell me something I don't know." Then softer, "How long can I do that, before I pass out from loss of blood?"

Forest stared at the gun, and as Brandt lowered it, he offered, "Look, I have no idea how long you bled before you got the tourniquet applied."

Brandt started to raise the gun again.

"OK," Forest offered, "at the rate it's bleeding... I'd say you might have an hour... no more."

Brandt turned to Kelly. "Then you guys better pray that help... my help, gets here before then, because all you are to me now, are loose ends... and I take care of my loose ends," he said pointing at Kelly, between the eyes. "Now, Mister Kellerman, tell me about this disc... why does it listen to you?"

Kelly hesitated.

Brandt slid his aim to the right until the wavering front site covered Matson. He pulled the trigger.

"No!" Kelly yelled, as the hammer fell forward and gave off a surprising CLICK.

Brandt had picked the Colt up off the hangar floor. It had apparently fired when it contacted the solid concrete surface. The weight of the soldier carrying it, kept the slide from moving enough to chamber the next round.

Kelly yelled, "No!" again, as Brandt pulled the slide, chambering a good round and sending the spent cartridge flying, "No, I'll tell you what you want to know."

"I'm waiting," Brandt said, putting the front site on Kelly's head once again.

Kelly stammered, 'Where to start,' he thought. "Yeah, it's true... this thing... He... we... we communicate...."

"He?" Brandt questioned.

"Yes, it's a he."

Brandt looked to the opening in the side of the hangar, then back at Kelly. He motioned with the Colt for Kelly to continue.

"When I touch Him, He talks to me... sort of."

"You mean he actually talks... to you."

"Well yes... no... He uses pictures... symbols."

"I can sew that cut on your forehead," the doctor broke in.

"What?" Brandt turned.

"Your forehead, do you want me to sew it closed?"

'Christ,' Kelly thought, 'what are you doin' Doc, let the S.O.B. bleed to death.'

"No," Brandt barked, then softer, "no, maybe later." He motioned at Kelly again, "What about these pictures?"

"Well, He showed me where He comes from... what it looks like. He showed me pictures of my brother."

"And how does this thing know your brother?"

"Hell, I don't know... I don't even know my brother... I mean, I don't even have a brother."

"What the hell are you talking about, Kellerman?"

Kelly could tell that Brandt's temper was growing shorter. "Look, I don't know how to explain this part. It seems He tries to manipulate me, with emotions. He made me believe I have a brother, and that he, my brother, is in trouble. He wants me to help."

"And what is it he wants you to do?"

"Look, I know this isn't the answer you want to hear, but... I don't know... yet," he added at the end of the sentence as he saw the fire blaze in Brandt's eyes. "I don't know, I swear, I don't know."

Brandt reached to wipe away another rivulet of blood making its way down from his head wound. He wavered slightly. Kelly's eyes went to the doctor who looked back knowingly. 'Maybe it won't be too long,' he thought to himself, 'time might solve this problem.'

"How do you make it shoot?" Brandt said trying to gain his feet. Forest stood, instinctively helping.

"Damned Hippocratic oath," Kelly muttered.

"What was that?" Brandt asked, now standing on his own.

"I said the damned thing shoots whenever it wants to. I don't really have any control over it."

Brandt once again pointed the Colt at Matson.

Kelly raised both hands, palms up, "OK, look, best I can tell you is: it shoots when I'm in trouble, or when I'm hurt... like when your goon slammed my shoulders, or when you kicked me."

"Or when you were hanging from the Sikorsky?" Brandt asked.

"Yeah, exactly."

Brandt began to stagger. Taking a couple quick steps backward, his knees gave way and he went down slowly on his butt. Using his free hand to support himself, he maintained aim in Kelly's general direction.

"Get over there with them," he said to Forest. "Sit doctor," he ordered, as Forest had remained standing. "Looks like I'm not going to last until help gets here," his head fell to his chest.

Kelly anticipated standing and rushing him, but Brandt recovered quickly.

"It's time to take care of loose ends," he said, almost at a whisper. "If I pass out... the plane disappears... and I won't let that happen." He rolled forward, tucked his legs under, and pushed himself up, staggering in a small circle until finally maintaining a semblance of balance. Kelly watched as the forty-five wavered side-to-side, slowly rising until it was pointed at a spot just above his brow line.

'God,' Kelly thought, 'I hope this ain't gonna be like in the movies, where the guy stands there, talking for ten minutes before he shoots.'

It wasn't. Kelly watched as Brandt's finger, seemingly in slow motion, squeezed the trigger. He heard the sound. He thought that strange. He had always heard that you never hear the shot that kills you. 'Any second,' he thought, 'I'll feel the pain... or... maybe, I won't.'

He had closed his eyes and visions of the night before came rushing over him. 'Oh Jesus, I don't even get to see my whole life. It just starts with last night.' He watched as he stepped from the motor pool car and walked toward the trailer. The old airplanes, the control tower and its broken windows... 'and there's was Cory, holding the little thirty-two on me... 'Lieutenant,' he says, just like last night... and there's Cory, holding the little thirty-two on me, 'Lieutenant,' he says, just like last night... and there's Cory...?'

"What the..., I can't even get my last dream right. It's got a damn hic-cup in it."

Kelly's eyes were now open slightly and the vision of Cory continued to perplex him.

"Lieutenant," the voice called again.

Then, he felt a hand on his shoulder, "Lieutenant, it's me, Cory."

Kelly rolled his head up and saw the young man standing in front of him. Still not sure, he fingered his forehead, checking for the gruesome forty-five caliber hole.

"Christ Cory, where in God's good name did you come from?"

"... been hiding in one of the drainage culverts under the service road," he said with a quivering lower lip. "I got to watch the whole shootin' match from there." He paused as he took a deep breath, then, "Looks like I got back here just in time." Tossing the empty pistol to the ground, he finished with a lilting voice, "Good thing I had one round left."

"Yeah... yeah, good thing," Kelly said, while looking down at Brandt's body, then back up at the young man. "You did good Cory, but, you scared me worse this time than last. Hell, I thought we were meetin' up at the Pearly-Gates."

"Hah," Cory laughed in a sudden release of emotion, "after all this, are you sure that's where we're goin'?"

A PILOT, AT LAST

Kelly slid the twelve-by-twelve inch square piece of plywood over the broken spring. It rested in place perfectly. Cory had found a pair of wire cutters earlier, and was about to cut the spring short enough that it would no longer protrude beyond the upholstery. Kelly stopped him in time and then took a full fifteen minutes explaining why that would not be a good thing to do. In the end, he told him that the plane was alive, and "how'd you like it if I cut off one of your fingers." That seemed to get the point across.

"All right, I think I'm ready to give this a try. You guys better all move outside. I'm not sure what the vibrations will do, but there's liable to be glass from these hangar windows falling all over the place."

Kelly lowered himself into the seat and reached for the belts. "What the hell?" he said, not finding them on the first grab. He spun in the seat, checking the floor of the cockpit, then the area immediately behind the seat. He would have sworn that there were belts when they removed Parker.

"Hey Ken," he yelled as Matson was walking away, "this thing had shoulder and leg belts, didn't it?... when we removed Parker?"

"Of course it did, you couldn't fly it without them."

"Well, it ain't got any now."

Matson's shoulders slumped, his hands hung at his sides. Then, scratching his head, "Maybe you ought to climb down then, 'till we can rig somethin'. You're liable to kill yourself without restraints. You saw the way it can maneuver... hell, it'll plaster you all over the insides of the canopy."

"I'll take it easy Ken, real easy. I just want to get it runnin', take it up few feet, then set it right back down, that's all."

Matson shook his head, then herded Forest and Cory outside.

Kelly leaned back hard against the plywood. It was working; no problem with the broken spring. As he looked up at the opening over his head, the canopy, not so much as snapped shut, as it just, all of a sudden, seemed to be closed, instantly. Taking only a moment to marvel at that, he grabbed the joy stick and moved it slowly to what he thought might be the neutral position in front of him. He moved his feet to the rudder pedals; no pedals. He pushed into the floor board where they should have been, and the metal gave way. 'Ah,' he thought, 'we do have rudder pedals.'

He pulled back on the stick, ever so slightly; nothing happened. He pulled back more; still nothing. Laying the stick side to side, he looked to the rear of the disc wings. Nothing moved.

"Hell, the drive unit, the gravity drive, isn't even working. I ought to be able to hear it, or feel it, but there's nothing."

While holding the stick, he re-centered it, then concentrated, trying to will the unit to start; still nothing. Putting both hands on the side of the cockpit, just below the canopy rail, he closed his eyes and relaxed. At first the results were the same, but then, slowly, he could feel himself drifting, floating, his vision clouded with the soft rose color of that far off place. And then, there, just out of reach, was his Brother. Kelly reached for him but the image moved just far enough away to be out of his grasp. Kelly tried to step forward, and then reach again. The image moved away, just enough, again and again.

"Brother," Kelly said softly, "why do you taunt me?"

The figure turned slowly until it was facing away from him. It wore a one piece covering not unlike a jumpsuit, except there were no pockets, no zippers or buttons. It almost appeared to be painted on the figure. As Kelly watched, a spot on his Brothers lower left back began to turn a deep crimson. He was bleeding. He was bleeding in the same spot that Parker had bled. He was bleeding as if punctured by the broken spring in the seat.

"Jesus," Kelly said out loud, "he's speaking in pictorial metaphor. He wants a direct connection, like He had with Parker."

The thought of another direct connection... one that meant connecting directly to the plane instead of the little piece of metal... a connection that he would have no control over, scared him. Two times, his previous connections were broken by pure luck. The other time, Dr. Forest had been there to pull the piece of metal from the wound in his palm. This time, there might be no way to free himself.

A feeling of closeness, of claustrophobia, seized him from all sides. He could feel the cockpit closing around him. As it continued to smother him, his Brother was pleading again, "Kelly, take my hand," he said, reaching.

His name rang in his ears. His Brother had called him by his name. With his face warming and tears welling in his eyes, he pulled his hands from the sides of the cockpit. He felt the entire ship rumble. As he thought of it, the canopy opened, and he could hear glass falling from windows in the hangar. Afraid to touch the cockpit again, he moved his legs to the side and tucked them toward the rear along the sides of the seat, then, leaning forward quickly, he pushed himself to a standing position without using his hands.

Stepping out onto the wing he could see the others. They had run to the middle of the open area between the two hangars.

"Kelly, are you all right... what was that?" Matson yelled, as they moved back toward the opening in the hangar.

As Matson called his name, Kelly heard his name again, in near unison, in a soft whisper. It came from the cockpit. As he looked back to where the sound had came from, he saw blood, his blood, lots of his blood, below the canopy rail where he had held his right hand. The dressing that Forest had applied was soaked. Grabbing his hand and holding it to his chest, he watched as the blood in the cockpit quickly disappeared into the chrome surface. "Kelly," came the whisper again.

Bothered by this new voice; a voice he wasn't sure was real, or perhaps existed only in his head; he moved to the packing crate and stepped down off the disc.

"Kelly, let me look at that," Forest said, rushing up to grab his hand. Unwrapping the bloodied cloth, the doctor was surprised to see that the wound was healing well. "I thought you had torn the whole thing open again, but, it's doing nicely." He paused and worked Kelly's arm through a couple ranges of motion. "Does your arm or shoulder hurt?"

Moving his shoulder joint a little by himself, "No, not really Doc... feels pretty good," then, with a puzzled look, "where in hell did all that blood come from?"

Was there more than what is here on this bandage?"

"Yeah, the canopy rail was covered with it."

Forest looked at the wound again, "It must have come from here, but this is all closed up and scabbing over." He looked up over Kelly's shoulder at the disc. "I think your friend is helping," he said, nodding into the hangar.

Kelly turned to look, "I'm not so sure he's my friend Doc."

"What do you mean Kelly," Matson asked, "and what was that noise that rattled the hangar?"

"Kelly," the whisper came again.

Kelly looked at the others. They showed no reaction, just a look of question as he turned and continued to stare into the hangar. He knew then that the voice was in his head, and that he was the only one that could hear it.

Kelly broke his concentration on the disc and looked at the others, each in turn. Forest recognized the lost look in his eyes, "Kelly... Kelly! Hey Kelly!" he said, shaking him.

As the glaze left his eyes the doctor guided him to the hangar wall and sat him down, leaning him back against the cold steel.

"C'mon Kelly, we want to help," Matson offered, "Tell us, what's going on... please?"

Kelly raised his head, looking at the nearly full moon. He felt the almost healing, cool desert wind play on his neck. 'How many other people on Earth are looking at this same moon, at this very moment?' he thought, 'and how many are wondering what they're going to do with the flying-saucer sitting in their back yard?' "Not many, I'll bet," he said softly.

What's that, Kelly?" Matson asked, "I didn't hear you."

Forcing himself, he grabbed at reality once more, and lowering his head he stared at the wound on his hand, "Nothin' Ken, it was nothin'". He turned his hand, front to back, then looked up, "Look, fellas, this is hard... I don't... I..." he changed his train of thought, "I'm just a normal, healthy," he half chuckled, "or at least somewhat healthy, red-blooded, all American boy. I never asked to be singled out for anything like this. I don't know from this stuff... this alien stuff. All I can tell you... is... what I think... what I feel is happening to me. I've told you most of that already... but... now I think He wants me connected."

"You mean like you were with that piece of metal shoved under your skin?" Forest asked.

"No Doc, he wants more than that. He wants me leanin' up against that broken spring... connected directly to him... like Parker."

"But it killed Parker," Cory entered the conversation.

"I'm not convinced of that," Kelly returned, "at least, not completely, not yet, but, the thought does bother me... a lot."

"Can't you operate it from here, from outside? Wasn't that you doing all the shooting before?" asked Matson.

"No, that wasn't me... well it was, but only indirectly. When I was hurt, I would use the piece of metal, and He would know I needed help. He was protecting me. I don't think He'll let me do that now. The feelings I got when I was just in there... He wants me inside... and connected."

Matson and Forest looked at one another, then to Kelly. "You're not considering doing that are you?" Matson asked.

"I'm starting to think," he hung his head again, "that I don't have much of a choice. Sitting here now, I can feel Him... while it sits in there... I can feel him. How crazy is that? It's as if He's getting stronger, or I'm getting weaker. I don't think it matters which, but I get the feeling that it won't be long before the urge will be overpowering."

Forest put a hand on Kelly's shoulder, "What happened to the blood you just lost in the cockpit?"

"Same as on the wing when the metal piece disappeared; it faded into the chrome."

Forest said, shaking his head slowly, "Well, that's it then, isn't it? This plane, this disc, or flying saucer, whatever you want to call it... like you said, it's a living, breathing being, and now it has your blood. It knows you... and worse than that, now... it knows you intimately."

Kelly reached out a hand to Forest, who helped him to his feet. He took a few steps toward the opening in the hangar and Matson reminded him, "What about seat belts? We haven't had time to scrounge something up for you."

Continuing his slow walk inside, Kelly said without turning around, "I think seat belts are the least of my worries Ken, anyway, anything we jury rig is liable to do more damage than good. Probably just cut me in two."

One foot to the crate and the next to the wing and Kelly was up. As he moved to the open cockpit he remarked, "This gun arming light is goin' crazy again."

Matson, holding the big Colt, spun to look outside. Straining his eyes to see in the moonlight, "I don't see anybody out here."

"There can't be anyone left, but us," Forest said, "and from what Cory says, there wasn't a soul left on the other side."

Kelly turned to face the three men standing below him, "That only leaves one answer," he paused, "Nevada's on the way again. I've got no idea how far out He picked them up, so we better not take any chances." He looked at Matson, "You guys have got to get out of here."

"Sure Kelly, we'll move outside like last time."

"That's not what I mean, Ken. You guys better try to make the highway, and then Tucson. This is gonna get ugly. They'll bring three or four times the manpower that Brandt had, and they'll be shootin' first and askin' questions later."

"And what if you need help?"

Kelly gave them a half smile, "I appreciate the offer, but I think the best help you can give, will be to stay out of the way, so I don't have to worry about you."

"Listen Kelly," Matson took on a somber tone, "if we should, somehow, all survive this... how will we find you?"

Kelly thought for a moment, "If you make it to Tucson, where're you headin' after that?"

"Probably back up to Maryland, where our help is."

"Too many people up in that part of the country. This thing'll stick out like a... hell, it'll stick out like a flying saucer," he chuckled.

"I suppose you're right. You got any ideas?"

"Yeah, tell you what," he smiled, "in a week, you start runnin' an ad in the Sunday classifieds in the Miami Herald. You can do that by phone from Maryland. Make the ad say you're selling an old surplus F-eighty-six, for parts, and leave your number. If you don't hear from me after two or three weeks, well, by then I guess you can expect the worst.

As the three turned and walked out of the hangar, Cory turned and walked backwards, "Give 'em hell Kellerman," he yelled as he gave Kelly a sharp military salute. The three walked around the east end of the building and down the taxiway. He watched through the front windows until they vanished into the darkness.

***

Kelly reached into the cockpit and grabbed the piece of plywood covering the broken spring. With a quick snap of his damaged wrist, he sent it sailing to the dark recesses of the hangar. He listened as it clanged off the far wall. The cloth rap the doctor had applied to his wound had loosened and it fell with the quick motion of his toss. As he reached to pick it up, he noticed that the lacerations, that just minutes before were a crusty clump of scabs, were now clean. He held his wrist to a column of moonlight coming in through an upper window. It looked, almost translucent... new... shiny.

"Thank you," he said, without thinking.

He stepped into the cockpit and lowered himself into the seat. Without hesitation, he pushed his back against the lumbar support. Surprised, he felt only a mild sting. His vision, however was changing rapidly. The rose color was all around him, like before, but this time he stayed in the hangar. No great canyon in front of him, no tall spired city in the distance, the two dying suns were gone this time.

(Almost before he thought) the canopy was closed. (Almost before he thought) he could feel, and hear, the hum of the gravity drive beneath and behind him. He could see windows to each side of the hole in front of him. They began to vibrate more and more as the drive came up to power. Shards began to fall as the glass could no longer stand the strain.

Closing the canopy and starting the drive, those were simple commands, he thought. Making Him maneuver once He's in the air shouldn't be too much of a problem either, just simple movements of the stick, but, how do I get Him to rise straight up off the ground? With that thought, the drive unit, in a split second, had whined to full power. Most of the windows that still held glass, exploded outward, showering the ground outside with a million tiny moonlit sparklers as the disc shot to the top of the hangar. "Stop!" was the only thing he could think of (he yelled it out loud) and the disc came to a screeching halt, wobbling slightly on its central axis within a few feet from the ceiling. He had ducked his head, fully expecting to be thrown up into the top of the canopy, but instead, it felt like the inside of the cockpit had closed in on him from all directions, holding him in his seat. He could move his arms and legs, turn his head in all direction, but, this gentle but firm pressure held him securely in place, and, now that the sudden deceleration was over, the pressure subsided.

There he sat, forty feet off the concrete floor of the hangar, afraid to think, afraid that the slightest wrong thought might lead to disaster. There had to be a way to get Him back on the ground, he thought, and with that, he saw the empty window frames in front of the canopy, start to rise as the plane slowly descended, touching down gently on the spot where it had started.

Kelly knew he was going to have to become a little more proficient than just up and down. Hell, the plane could do better on its own. He had to get it outside and get a little air time under his belt.

The drive unit was idling again and as he thought about moving outside, it seemed to anticipate. The whine increased again, slower this time as Kelly tried to reign in his enthusiasm. The plane lifted slowly and began to slide forward, entering the hole in the wall, dead center. Once he was completely outside of the hangar, Kelly used his stop thought again, with a little less gusto this time, and the plane hovered as the whine of the gravity drive indicated it had slowed to a speed commensurate with the energy needed to, just, hold it in place.

He remembered watching earlier as the craft had slewed back and forth, eventually shooting down the little chopper with Arnell aboard. 'A valuable skill,' he thought. He envisioned himself looking back into the open hole in the hangar wall behind him and the disc spun at lightening speed to the right. He tried to stop it at the opening but overshot by a full quarter circle. He tried again, this time leading with his head, much like a ballet dancer pirouetting on point. This time he snapped to a stop looking directly into the dark ruins of the hangar.

Putting slight pressure on the joy stick to the right, he began to slide the ship sideways above the ground, and as he passed in front of one of the few whole panes of glass still holding its place in a dangling frame, he stopped. The moon was reflecting off the chrome with a brilliance that surprised him. 'No sneakin' up on anybody in this thing,' he thought. Then, puzzled by the vision in front of him, he slid the craft closer to the window. Near enough now to make out some detail, he could see that the canopy was, like before when they first saw it, solidly chromed.

"How on Earth?" he said, under his breath, as the twinkle of hundreds of pieces of broken glass filled his vision from below; from under the plane. With a wonder he hadn't felt since he was a youngster and his parents had taken him to a local air show to see things he was sure were, at that time, quite impossible, he realized that he hadn't been looking through the canopy at all. He had been looking through the disc in any direction he wanted. And then, as he blinked, the vision in front of him lingered. He closed his eyes and the sparkles from below remained, and as he gazed forward again, (his eyes still closed) there, reflecting in the unbroken window, was the disc. He rocked the wings, just to make sure he was seeing correctly, 'or not seeing,' he thought.

"The disc is seeing for me. He is seeing for me, and then feeding the information through the connection. 'The connection!' he thought loudly, as if yelling to himself. Leaning forward, he ran his left hand down his lower back, only thinking afterwards what unexpected results might occur should he suddenly pull the broken spring from his flesh. Feeling no sudden movement in the disc, he felt for the torn upholstery and the sharp spring in the seat. He felt neither.

'The seat is smooth.' Twisting to look behind him, he found that it too, like everything else in the disc, was now chromed. It had changed since he left the hangar. The disc now seemed complete, except for the F-eighty-six fuselage married down its center. As a disturbing thought struck him, he raised his right hand to eye level. Looking at his palm and backhand, he whispered, "Thank God, still flesh and blood."

***

Kelly played right on the stick then slewed to the right to face the direction he was moving, then pulled back on the stick while thinking up. The nose came up and he rose quickly as the hangars grew smaller below him. He took a course east by north; the last direction he had seen his three friends moving when they had left him earlier.

As he leveled the disc he kept watch forward through the bottom of the cockpit. They hadn't made very good time, he thought, as he found them struggling through some tall brush about a mile ahead of him. He had strained to see them at first, but, once he caught their movement, the center of his field of view seemed to move toward him, as if being magnified. "Must be how the hawk homes in on his prey," he smiled.

They had no idea he was coming as he pushed the stick forward to begin a surprise military "Howdy". He leveled at the treetops and increased to what he thought might be about three-fifty or four hundred miles per hour. As he passed over their heads he put the disc in a forty-five degree climb and laid hard left on the stick. The chrome wing tips sparkled like diamonds in the clear desert air, as the barrel roll brought each around in turn to reflect the moonlight back on the men below. At about five thousand feet he stopped the roll abruptly in a steep bank to the left. Pulling back gently on the stick, to start a long graceful climbing turn, he looked back over his left shoulder to see the three below him, waving him on. Knowing full well they couldn't see him in the cockpit, he reached across his body with his right hand and gave them a thumbs-up and a final word: "Watch your six, my friends."

SAINT STUCKEY

Kelly leveled the disc at what he guessed was twelve to fifteen thousand feet. He was surprised, as he looked around, how much he could see in the moonlight. 'The disc can see much better than these human eyes,' he thought.

The highway below was only intermittently painted by headlights from what little traffic there was at this time of morning. 'Not many people looking up,' he hoped. To the southeast the dark ribbon led back to Tucson, and to the northwest, to Phoenix, 'But,' he thought, after the little town of Eloy, he would make the turn to the west at the junction, and head toward Gila Bend, and then Yuma. He remembered the little towns along this stretch of highway as stops for the call of nature, or a quick breakfast, lunch or dinner, on the vacations he used to take with his parents. It seemed like nearly every year, they would pack the old thirty-six Ford, (with much more camping gear than they needed, and never enough food), say a temporary goodbye to the little town of Beatrice (in the extreme southeast corner of Nebraska) and head out for New Mexico, Arizona, or anywhere near the four-corners area to explore the Ancient Indian ruins that intrigued his Father so much.

At the time, he wasn't into the history behind the old mud and adobe brick buildings, but he had relished in the pure joy of climbing over and through them, especially the cliff dwellings. Not many had keep-out signs back then and the occasional arrow point that he would find was framed by his Mother and hung on his bedroom wall.

'Simpler times,' he thought, 'much simpler times.'

A faint orange glow below him caught his eye. At least he thought it was one shade of orange, or another. He was still getting used to the rose color that the disc imparted on his vision. As he concentrated on the image below, it leapt toward him and snapped into focus... 'Ah,' he thought, 'hawk eyes again.'

Now the colors became more apparent. It was a blue and white building with an oversized and very steep pitched roof that was cantilevered over its front. There was a somewhat lighted dirt parking lot out front, and across that huge roof, the bright red letters suddenly called to him: "Stuckey's".

He could remember, riding in the package tray of the old Ford, looking up out of the slanted rear window, at the stars at night, or the clouds during the day. Seeing one of the roadside stores, his Father would say, with the most serious face he could muster, "Did you know Son, that Mr. Stuckey is the Patron Saint of forlorn vacationers." And as I turned to him and smiled, he would continue, "No, no, it's true Son, the Pope canonized him back in twenty-eight, right after he tasted his pecan divinity."

A smile came to Kelly's lips, "Pecan divinity, from Saint Stuckey." As his mouthed watered, he tried to remember the last time he had eaten. It was back in Tucson; a bowl of ham and beans drawn from a huge pot that was delivered to the recruiting station by one of the local restaurants; that and an RC Cola. No wonder he was starving.

'What would it hurt,' he thought; it was still dark outside. Banking to the right he kicked a little right rudder while pushing forward on the stick. He would approach the store from the north, well out of sight of the highway.

As he maneuvered to cactus-top altitude, he pointed the nose at the store, now just a faint glow over the top of the sage brush, a mile or so ahead. He felt the nearly imperceptible shudder below his feet as he thought the landing struts down. He slid the disc to the left a few feet and set it down in a shallow dry wash. The lights of the store were now hidden from view. That was good. If he couldn't see them, then they couldn't see him.

***

The walk to the store would be less than a mile. As he jumped from the wing of the disc, the first thing that struck him was the heat. It was now early morning and the breeze that had earlier refreshed him in Marana, had faded to a quiet and sticky calmness. The desert sand was now giving up the heat that it had stored from the previous day. As he began to sweat, he looked himself over. He hadn't time earlier to notice what terrible shape he was in. His coat and shirt were torn at the right armpit, stretched beyond resistance while dangling from the Sikorsky. The sleeves were bloodied to stiffness. His pant-legs were covered in blood, grease, grass stains and assorted smudges of dirt and a bit of something he wasn't sure of.

"How in hell do I explain all this to the store-keep when he asks, "What on Earth happened to you?" He laughed to himself as he jumped sideways, startled, as a jack-rabbit darted from the opening of its warren. "Easy there little fella," he offered, as the two ears, zigzagging in frightened retreat, disappeared over the next rise.

With a deep breath he pressed on, circling wide to the side of the store to make it look like he was coming in from the west, just in case anyone was looking.

The gravel, spread near the gas pumps out front, crunched beneath his feet as he made his way to the door. He stopped before entering, looking around as best he could, inside and out. He saw just one man, a young man, working the counter, his head buried in a paperback. As he pushed through the door, the bell suspended above, announced his entry. When the attendants head rose from the book, Kelly could see that it wasn't a young man after all. She was tall, he thought, maybe five-nine, and twenty, maybe twenty-one years old. Her hair was cut page-boy and she wore a blue ball cap, pushed back on her head, the bill reaching for the ceiling. It had a big red 'N' stitched on the front.

"Ah, a fellow Cornhusker," he said to himself.

As he approached the counter her look became stern. She finally raised a hand, palm forward. She looked scared, and Kelly stopped as he saw her eyes move to a spot behind and below the counter. He thought she might go for the gun he knew would be there.

"I've had an accident... up the road a ways."

She relaxed when she finally recognized what was left of his uniform, "Hey, you're Air Force, aren't you?"

"Yes Ma'am," he said with his finest Midwest etiquette, "got banged up a little."

"Looks like more than a little," she hesitated, recalling something, "hey," she exclaimed again, "you're plane crashed, didn't it... I saw it. I was out back just a few minutes ago, emptyin' the trash," she pointed, "I saw you come down."

She was out from behind the counter before he could answer, so he decided to let her keep talking.

"Here, come back here and sit down... Jeeze... you've got blood all over yourself... here, sit here," it seemed she couldn't stop, "... I'll get a towel and some water," and then she was gone, but only for a moment.

She returned with an old ceramic water bowl ('her dogs' water dish,' he thought) and set it beside him. She dunked the towel in the water, and leaving it there, pulled Kelly's coat back over his shoulders. When he resisted she quickly said, "Look, I need to clean you up, heaven knows what kind of infections you're gonna get with wounds-a-bleedin' like that." She finished pulling off his coat and rolled his right sleeve up to his elbow. She turned his wrist over and back, looked up his arm to his elbow, then rolled the sleeve on his left side and did the same.

"Where are you cut Mister, I don't see anything... how 'bout your legs?" she asked frantically, thinking Kelly was about to bleed to death right in front of her.

When he didn't answer, she looked up, her gaze focusing on his eyes. Jumping to her feet, she knocked the water bowl to the floor.

"Jeeze, Mister, what's wrong with your eyes?"

Staring at her, he saw nothing wrong with his vision. He reached up and touched his cheeks below each eye, "I don't know, why, what's wrong with them?"

"They're all milky, kinda... shiny like."

They continued to stare at one another as Kelly tried to come up with a plausible answer.

"You're wearin' those new contact things, aren't you?" she said, bending over for a closer look.

"Yeah, must be my contacts. I got fuel in my eyes climbing out of the wreck... must've turned 'em cloudy."

Breathing a sigh of relief, she stepped forward again to pick up the water bowl. "You scared me there for a minute Mister. When I watched your plane come down earlier, I thought I was seein' one of those flying saucers. You know we've had 'em around here before. Your plane was shiny, and it made no noise, just like I was told about 'em. Then, when I see you all covered in blood and no cuts anywhere, and then your eyes, well... you know... my imagination kinda went..." she stared, "Hey," she said softly, as if almost afraid to ask, "you're not an alien, are you?"

"No," he smiled, "no, I'm not an alien, I'm a Cornhusker, like you."

She smiled briefly, and then with a look of worry, "What about all that blood?" she asked.

He looked around, trying to feign embarrassment, "Look," he said, lowering his eyes, "I am cut... but... it's personal... know what I mean. I'd like to clean it up myself."

"Oh, below the belt, you mean... yeah... sure." She stood and pointed, "In there, use the bathroom."

As he stood, "Do you sell clothing, pants, shirts; that sort of thing?"

"No, sorry, we've got a few tee-shirts, but that's about it," she apologized, shrugging her shoulders. "Hey wait," she suddenly remembered, "... in the garage around back. There should be a pair or two of clean coveralls. The mechanics usually leave them hanging in the parts locker. I'll get the keys and fetch you a pair."

"Thanks," he said to her back as she rushed out the door, "I'm gonna grab a few things to eat."

As she waved and kept running, he grabbed a large paper bag from behind the register and began tossing in anything that looked good (and as hungry as he was, that included just about anything on the shelves).

He had filled the bag and set it on the counter when she appeared at the door holding a pair of blue coveralls folded over her arm. He took them from her, and holding them by the collar, let them unfold to the floor. They looked at least one size too big and their previous owner's name was embroidered over the front pocket. He wondered if "Lee Roy" would miss them in the morning. And, when he turned them around... there... emblazoned in big, bold red letters across the back was, of course, Stuckey's.

'Oh, perfect,' he thought, and then, with a smile, he said "Thanks," and headed for the bathroom.

He stripped to his shorts, pulled his wallet and cash, and his name tag from the pants and ragged shirt, then tossed his uniform into the trash bin under the sink. He gave himself a quick military sink bath, and as he pulled paper towels from the dispenser to dry himself, he noticed his eyes in the mirror. The girl was right; his eyes were milky. He blinked hard and then rubbed them; splashed water on them, but each time he looked again, the cloudiness remained. He stepped closer, and with his nose almost touching the mirror, he could see that the covering over his eyes wasn't a milky white, but instead; a pale silver. His eyes were starting to take on the sheen of a weak coating of chrome. He stepped back, refusing to believe what he was seeing. As he stood there in his shorts, he closed his eyes and raised both hands to cover them, but the vision remained. He could still see himself, standing there, nearly naked, his two eyes shining through the back of his hands.

"How you doin' in there?" the girl called from just outside the bathroom door, "everything OK?"

Kelly had slipped his socks back on and was climbing into the coveralls, "Yeah, I'm fine, be out in a minute." Zipping up the front of his new uniform, he took a last look in the mirror. His eyes were getting worse by the minute.

As he left the bathroom, she was standing there waiting. He turned his head to walk past her but she grabbed his arm and then his chin to turn him to face her. "Oh man, your eyes aren't lookin' so good." She turned to a spinner rack setting on the counter and grabbed a pair of sunglasses. "Here, you'd better wear these until you get them looked at; you're gonna scare people if you don't keep 'em covered."

Yeah, I guess you're right, thanks. What do I owe you for all this?" he pointed to the bag.

"Oh, do you have to leave so soon? You sure you don't want me to call somebody... you're gonna need help... aren't you?

Seeing she was going to rattle on again, he raised his hand and smiled, "NO!... No thanks," he said, throwing a twenty dollar bill on the counter, "that won't be necessary. I radioed the base that I was having trouble. I'm sure they've got a chopper on the way by now. I've gotta get back to the wreck before they get there."

As he picked up the bag and shifted it to his left arm, he saw the paperback she had been reading. "Jules Verne," he said spinning it so he could read the cover (and the one next to it), "and H.G. Wells," he looked up at her, "you like this stuff?"

"Yeah," she smiled, "time travel, flying saucers 'n' all. That's why I got so excited when I saw your plane coming down earlier. I thought for sure I was seein' my first one."

He stared at her for a moment, then, seeing her name above her shirt pocket, "Peggy is it?"

"Yes," she smiled, "Peggy."

He stared again as a puckish thought formed in his mind. "Well Peggy, when you get to the part in this one," he spun the copy of "War of the Worlds" back around to face her, "when you get to the part where he tells you what the Martians look like... don't you believe it, not for a second. Martians don't look anything like that."

"Oh yeah, and how would you know?" she said with a smile that quickly changed to look of bewilderment.

As he held the door open to leave, he turned to her and said very matter-of-factly, "Because I stopped there first... on my way to your planet."

With a straight face he left, closing the door behind him. She watched through the large window next to the entry as he turned left and walked along the front of the building. He made no attempt to disguise the direction he was headed.

***

He set the bag of groceries on the disc, stepped to the side, and putting both hands on the now familiar chrome, bent his knees slightly and vaulted aboard. He sat, dangling his legs over the leading edge, now refreshed; the warmth of the desert didn't seem to bother his as much. He then turned to attack the contents of his brown paper larder.

Enjoying his Moon-Pie and RC Cola, his thoughts wandered back to the store. Had the girl behind the counter run out back when he left? Was she standing at the edge of the clearing, behind the store, waiting to see the helicopters coming down to rescue the stranger with the glassy eyes, or, he thought, was she a different person altogether. Was she waiting out front for the sheriff she had called the second he was out of sight? Perhaps she had noticed, and then wondered why, an Air Force pilot would be flying in his blues, and not a flight suit, or, giving her the benefit of the doubt, maybe she really thought he needed help.

It didn't matter, either way, for tonight, the girl behind the counter (he smiled as he thought it) tonight, would see her first flying saucer.

***

The next day the radio stations in Tucson, and the newspapers, first local, then national, would carry the story: "FLYING SAUCER LANDS AT STUCKEYS". And Miss Peggy Ballard would be at the center of the excitement. She would tell how the beautiful chrome ship had flashed back and forth across the sky before (as she stated to the reporter) "It actually landed right here in the parking lot." The front page picture would show her (Miss Peggy Ballard in bold letters below), pointing to the depressions left in the gravel by the three landing struts; that area now cordoned off so as to keep the now daily melee of cars and people from erasing those treasured mechanical footprints from local folklore.

The newspapers and radios would not, however, carry the stories of the sightings and the battle that would take place, this very night, in the miles that lay ahead of Kelly.

***

As he raised the disc from the parking lot, he could see Peggy's eyes (themselves as big as saucers) peering through the lower corner of the big front window. He smiled and then waved, but she would not see either gesture through the chromed canopy. He wished she would have come outside, like the story in the newspaper would later say she did, and watch his grand departure. But, she was content to watch from cover, as the dust swirled in tight vortices from each wing tip, the disc moving away quickly, only a few feet above the ground. When he reached the highway, Kelly pulled back on the stick and the disc shot skyward, again spinning in a series of quick barrel rolls; wingtips again flashing in the moonlight.

He leveled and took a heading west toward Yuma. He would go west at least that far, and passing well outside of town, his plan was to then turn north and approach the southern desert of Nevada from the south.

Below him, he could see a man changing a flat tire alongside the highway. The traffic on these southwestern highways isn't heavy, even during the day. At night they are downright barren. Kelly thought the tire changer might be the only human for at least five miles in any direction, except for Peggy back at the store. Busy, the man struggled with a rusty lug nut and paid no attention to what was happening above. Kelly smiled to himself and wondered how many people, since nineteen forty-seven, had wished for all the world to get a glimpse at a flying saucer, but never took the time... to look up?

FISH IN A BARREL

As he finished another RC Cola and candy bar, he threw the wrapper and empty bottle back into the paper bag and forced, with thought, a look as deep into the darkness ahead of him as he could. He had expected to see what he guessed would be nothing less than an armada of helicopters heading his direction by now. He was hoping to decoy them as far away from Marana, and his helpless friends, as possible.

There in the distance, with a vision still beyond his complete understanding, he saw them. Vague helicopter shapes against a rose colored landscape. Four lines-abreast, maybe five choppers deep. 'Twenty,' he thought, and then hoped that was all they had for him.

He had no idea how he was going to make himself visible to them, so he decided on the direct approach. Pushing forward on the stick he began a shallow dive that would take him passed them on their left side. The moonlight should still be bright enough to make him visible at that distance, but he would rock his wings, casting extra reflections, just to make sure.

He stopped his acceleration at about four hundred miles per hour. He wanted to be slow enough that they could see him, but fast enough that nothing but the luckiest of shots would have a chance of striking his chrome charge. He knew that at least a few of these choppers would be gunships, and at this closing speed they would have to lead him by over twelve hundred feet. By the time they saw him, it would be too late to make the shot.

He was now about fifty miles west of Gila Bend, just north of the Mohawk Valley. He remembered this part of the country as being full of nothing but emptiness. Nobody would be getting in the way of the stray bullets that the choppers would surely send his way.

As he approached them, he remarked to himself that the moon, now in the western sky, behind and above the choppers, was in perfect position to make him as visible as possible.

The helicopters now filled his rose colored vision, but they were still at least a half mile away. A second later, he saw the tiny flashes of machine gun fire from two of the choppers on the left side of the formation. Every fifth round showed the white hot trail of a tracer, making it easy for him to watch as they followed an ever increasing arc, passing harmlessly behind him.

As he passed, he banked hard left and circled behind them. The guns were firing on the right side of the formation now, and he could tell that the gunners were adjusting their lead as the bright white tracers marched steadily toward him. As they came ever closer, he pulled back on the stick; climbing; leaving the formation far below. The thought of turning back to attack, flashed deep in the recesses of his consciousness, but he felt no great urgency to act on it.

From the beginning, when he had left Marana, he had been thinking that his sole purpose was to find these people from Nevada (these men like Brandt) and simply blow them all out of the sky, but now, somehow, the threat had faded, and along with it, the wont to destroy them. Even though they were shooting at him, he could find no place within himself from which to pull the fear, or the hate, to do such a thing. He felt in control, yet, as he hovered, stationary above them, he envisioned just how easy it would be. 'Fish in a barrel,' he thought, 'like chasing a Volkswagen with a Corvette.'

He could feel something else now. Even before he had left Marana (although he didn't realize it then) something else had been pulling him; pulling him north and west. It didn't feel to him like a want, but rather a need. There was something he had to do up there, and it was pulling at him, hard.

He spun the disc on its central axis and took a heading just west of north (for no particular reason he could think of). As he collected his thought processes and aimed them at the spot in his brain that would throttle-up the gravity drive and make his disc move (in any direction he might wish) he suddenly found his focus, his bundle of thoughts, fading from his mind. A familiar feeling washed over him as his hand fell from the stick. As he stared forward, the hills and valleys below him disappeared, and once again he found his mind filled with the vision of that beautiful, and he knew now, very distant planet (a real place, he was now certain).

His Brother stood before him, and in the distance, far behind that image, over the spired city, six men (he thought them men) were coming ever closer. In a moment they had quartered the distance, in another it was halved.

Kelly struggled with this vision. His Brother was again in trouble. 'Why does he insist on speaking to me with pictures,' Kelly thought, 'why not just let me see, with my eyes, or his eyes? Why not talk to me?' he questioned his Brother. 'You've talked to me before.'

As Kelly watched, three of the men, now hideous monsters (as in a vision before) moved ahead of the others and closed in on his pleading Brother.

"Kelly, Ke__lly," he cried, "They are here... help me my Brother... help me."

Kelly could stand the pain no longer. His heart felt as if it would explode. Tears poured from him as his vision changed from the soft rose to a bright crimson. As he watched in horror, the first monster, now only seconds from his Brother, raised his arms and began to spew long trails of fire from under each appendage. Its mouth opened wide, it issued hundreds of small black hornet like things that passed around all sides of his brother and continued on their inexorable journey toward him.

He felt himself rocked, violently, his head careening off the side of the canopy. His vision cleared in time to see a tracer deflect off the canopy in front of him. The first Sabre jet had passed just a few feet above his port wing, its downdraft forcing his wing down violently. The second Sabre was on him now, Brownings blazing. Another tracer struck the canopy, just below where the first had left a small spider-web crack. With only the tracers visible, Kelly wondered how many more times he had been hit. As his attacker passed directly over him, the disc, without provocation from Kelly, spun instantly one hundred eighty degrees, corrected three degrees upward, and he felt the short shudder as it unleashed what was no more than a half second burst from its own fifties.

Kelly played with the numbers in his head as he watched his tracers grow tiny in the darkness: the Sabre was probably doing six hundred miles per hour; that's nine hundred feet per second; my rounds left at three thousand feet per second with my speed at zero; I fired approximately four seconds after he passed; so he was already two thirds of a mile away; the Brownings have a max range of four-and-a-half miles, one-and-a-quarter effective; "and he's gonna be outside of that, a little," he said to himself as he watched a glimmer of moonlight sparkle in the direction of the tracer. Again and again it flashed as the right half of the eighty-six's elevator and part of its rudder fluttered in high speed spirals, slowing quickly to fall silently into the blackness below. He couldn't see the Sabre as it lurched up and then rolled to the right with its tail section trailing far outside its turn radius. He did, however see the yellow flash of the ejection charge as it threw the pilot clear of what was now seven and a half tons of uncontrollable junk.

Tracers were again streaking passed him, from the rear this time, as the third Sabre closed in from behind. This time he felt as if he would have a say in what was to happen next. He willed the disc in a quick slew to the right, leading with his head, stopping with his nose pointed directly at his attacker. Sparks flashed from his right leading edge across the front of his canopy and down his left wing.

'This guy is good,' Kelly thought, 'painting me with lead by using a little rudder pedal.'

The Sabre started to pull up and to the left about six hundred yards out. "Big mistake," Kelly whispered under his breath. He raised the nose of the disc, corrected right, and at less than two hundred yards, sent a half second burst into the exposed belly of his monster. In a split second the sides and bottom of the Sabre sparkled with a thousand little wind fed flames as the compressor exploded and sent countless pieces of turbine blades flying through its skin. The fuselage failed in a final burst of flame and the two large pieces fell, trailing flame and burning debris toward the ground. Kelly followed it down, down... down, waiting for the flash of the ejection seat. It never came.

He watched the ball of flame boil up from below as the fuel tanks on the Sabre exploded on impact.

"Where in hell's the first one!" he yelled at himself as his head snapped up and all around, "where has he gone?"

Kelly scanned the sky, above and below, but he saw nothing. He thought perhaps the pilot had decided not to make another pass after seeing his wing men dispatched so easily (and especially after seeing what little effect their Brownings had).

There were three more in his vision. "Where were they? Surely they wouldn't quit? American pilots don't quit... they never quit."

And he was right. Six small specks (trailing white smoke) closing at an unbelievable speed... "Up!" his mind yelled... and the smoke trails vanished below him. He had seen them before. They were FFAR rockets, unguided. And then, right behind the rockets... something... a jet. "What in blazes?" He spun his head to his left as it passed him, no more than a blur. He braced himself by reaching his palms to the canopy as the double blast of a sonic shockwave struck the disc, sending it wing over wing in the opposite direction.

He was falling. He needed bearings. Which way was up? Then, far below, he saw the remains of the burning Sabre, and to the west, there was the moon. Now a simple task: a couple quick moves of the stick righted the disc.

"That guy was super-sonic," he said out loud.

Knowing full well there was two more coming behind that one, he pointed himself straight up and climbed. There was safety in altitude (he knew that). A greater foe is often taken down by the lesser adversary, when the latter has the sun or altitude on his side.

From below, two more trails of smoke. He slowed his forward speed slightly. He needed to know if these two missiles would track him. He watched as they continued in a straight line, passing a hundred yards ahead of him.

Now he knew: they weren't tracking him on radar. They had fired two AIM-4 Falcons, guided by the radar unit in the firing jet. They were just using them as point and shoot missiles.

'Well, that makes it a little easier,' he thought, and now, wanting to have a look at this super-sonic foe that had just tried to punch him out of the sky, he laid the discs nose over and slid down to intercept from above and behind. As he picked up speed he could hear a sharp, high pitched, whistle starting to play loudly in the cockpit and the disc started to pull off to the right. He tried to correct with rudder and then ailerons, but the disc simply began to slide sideways.

The first Sabre to make a pass at him had not only hit him with its fifties, it had released an entire pod of (sixty-eight millimeter SNEB) rockets, nine in all, and one of them had struck home. He didn't know it, but he had a foot wide hole torn in the underside of his right wing, near the leading edge about half way out. Three hundred fifty to four hundred miles an hour was now all he could do. He pointed the nose skyward again. "Damn!" he said, "now I'm the fish in the barrel."

OUT OF THE BARREL

His disadvantage was now huge. He not only had the remaining Sabre jet to worry about, he now had these three somethings he had never seen before. He needed light. He needed to see them. He was helpless unless he could see them coming. 'How long 'till sunup,' he thought, looking over his shoulder to the east, 'It'll never get here in time... at least an hour to go. Damn, if I could see them, maybe I could out maneuver them.'

As he coaxed as much speed out of the disc as he could, he waited for the next round of smoke trails. He was surprised they hadn't already launched another salvo.

'Light,' his mind yelled, 'light, where in hell is all this light coming from.' He craned his neck up over his head and then turned in his seat. There, above his vertical stabilizer, sat a huge shadow. The glare from the light made it impossible to tell what it was emanating from.

"Landing lights, Christ, I've got one of those monsters sittin' right on my six, lightin' me up like a damned Christmas tree."

He started to lean on the stick to the right, but looking first (like any good fighter pilot) he noticed a large shadow off his starboard side. It was blotting out stars on the horizon and it was huge. He looked to the left; the same shadow met him there.

As he looked right again, the running lights flashed three times on the bogie flying just off his wing. On the third flash, they stayed lit. If that was meant to get his attention, it did. The display light at the rear of the fuselage, meant to illuminate the tail number, blinked on.

'Heavens!; he thought, 'what a beautiful sight.' The light showed him the outline of a back-canted triangle. He stared in awe; he'd never seen a vertical stabilizer quite like that before. As amazement started replacing his fear (since he wasn't being shot at for the moment) his rose vision started kicking in.

"My God, she's a Delta." He scanned her from her long slender needle pointed nose, down the cylindrical fuselage to her two massive triangular delta wings. It was a new F one-oh-two Delta Dagger. He had heard vague stories about this new supersonic interceptor being built by Convair out on the west coast (but they weren't supposed to be in the air yet).

The Delta's pilot reached to his instrument panel and Kelly saw its canopy lights come on. This pilot was all business as he turned to Kelly, and with a stern face he moved the index and middle fingers of his right hand to his visor over his eyes, bidding Kelly to look. He then pointed under the disc, and then, making two fists, he put his hands together, thumbs and pointer fingers touching. Rolling his hands apart, as if breaking an imaginary object, he made the universal sign.

Kelly, knowing exactly what the man was saying (he had a hole blown in the bottom of the disc) nodded his understanding, (forgetting that the pilot probably could not see through the chromed canopy).

The pilot then raised the same two fingers to his eyes a second time and this time he pointed to an area below his own plane. Kelly continued to stare as the Dagger slowly rose to a position that clearly showed its entire underbelly. Two, not so small, doors snapped open amidships and two large trapeze mechanisms carried four large missiles down into the airstream.

Kelly recognized them immediately. When he saw the first two fly past him, harmlessly, earlier, he had assumed they were AIM dash fours, but, these were GAR dash elevens. They contained proximity fuses, and would detonate when they got close to their target. He knew they were radar guided, but he was afraid that at close range (and these guys could run up on him easily now) their systems could be getting a bounce off of the Brownings and support equipment in the nose of the disc.

The Dagger brought its pilot back to Kelly's level to make eye contact once again and this time he made one more universal signal (the one signal no fighter pilot ever wants to see). Grabbing his face mask, he pulled it briskly from his mouth and nose, and with a grimace and lip curl that would make any B-movie actor proud, he pumped his fist, with his pointer finger aimed at the ground, three times.

Kelly had seen it once before, in an old movie about World War One fighter pilots. The Red Baron had thoroughly beaten his English foe (or French, he couldn't remember) but, instead of shooting him out of the sky, he flew alongside and ordered him to the ground.

'Humiliating,' Kelly thought, 'these guys think I'm beat.'

And all along he had reckoned he had been putting up a pretty good show for himself (at least against the Sabres).

Kelly flinched as a blur of six of the smaller FFAR rockets screamed over the top of his canopy and disappeared into the darkness ahead of him; their white smoke temporarily blinding him. The impatient Dagger, above and to his rear, apparently thought he was taking too much time to obey the command to surrender.

Kelly rocked his wingtips a few quick times (a signal of acceptance or understanding) hoping to buy a few precious seconds. He knew if he gave in now and followed the Daggers, to wherever it was they wanted him to go, the helicopters, which had been watching the strange dogfight play out above them, would continue their journey to Marana, there, to possibly find his friends.

There was only one thing to do now. He had one last trick in his arsenal (besides his superior speed when his disc was healthy) that they didn't. With a quick look over his shoulder to make sure he wouldn't be rammed by the Dagger behind, he gave the command: "Slow."

As his speed fell off the three Deltas shot passed him. His mind's eye, now aiming the guns on his nose, went to full magnification and, as the F one-oh-two on his right started to bank and climb to its right, he released a short burst into its tail. Two of the tracers disappeared into its tailpipe just as its pilot had gone to afterburners. The engine burped a couple times as the flame from its rear flashed twice and quit. It gave one last burst of fire before flaming out with a bang that Kelly could hear from his cockpit. The Dagger fell off its climb and its nose dropped passed level as it started a slow, wide, death spiral toward the ground. The pilot, having no choice now (his hydraulics gone with his engine no longer running) pressed his helmet back against his seat and reached between his legs for the ejection handle.

Kelly watched the flash and then the short rocket burn as the ejection seat pushed the pilot away from his wounded ship. The pilot chute opened briskly and in a few seconds it pulled the seat away, allowing the pilots main chute to deploy.

"Damn it!" Kelly yelled as he turned back to the business at hand. Taking the time to make sure that Dagger pilot had gotten out OK was a waste of valuable time (he had now lost sight the other two bogeys).

"Up," he commanded, and pulling back on the stick, he climbed as fast as the damaged disc would allow. He didn't want to be attacked from above, but he had no idea if he could out climb his foes. His main objective now was to stay far enough away to avoid being picked up on their radar, and still get off a shot or two.

"Ting-ting-ting-clang-clang", his ears were filled with an unmistakable sound, and his eyes darted back and forth, his vision filled with sparks from the upper surface of the disc. He was taking fire. It was the fifty caliber Brownings from the lone Sabre Jet that had made the first pass at him (and done the original damage to the underside of his wing).

Kelly pulled back on the stick until he was on his back, then, with a slight push left on the stick he rolled to level, pointing directly at the F-eighty-six. Now, two smoke trails issued from the wing pod of the Sabre, and then two more. Kelly knew his enemy had nine rockets per pod, and assuming he had fired all nine from one pod on his first pass, he now had these four to worry about (and then five more still to be fired). Kelly raised the disc a few feet so as to make the approaching rockets pass harmlessly below him, but at that same instant he saw two blurs enter his field of view from the right. One of the Daggers was back on him already, and as he craned his head to watch its two FFAR rockets also pass below him, he saw two of the big GAR missiles leave their trapeze mount below.

He knew if that Dagger, or the other, was able to get close enough to keep him locked on its radar, then the GAR would explode the instant it reached it closest approach.

'Big sky,' Kelly thought, 'but which way to go? Hard left and down... good as any. No, Damn it! Damn it!' he had guessed wrong. The other Dagger was coming up from below and to his right. Craning his neck again, he saw the smoke trails from the GARs change direction. They were tracking him. They had a lock. And now the Dagger from below was firing: two more smoke trails; two more GARs.

Kelly watched as best he could as the four missiles closed on him from two different directions.

"Wait... wait," he said, marking time, "NOW!" and he pulled back on the stick, thinkin "UP UP UP," at the same time. He felt the pressure in the cockpit build against him, holding him in place, as the tremendous G-forces from his high speed turn tried to pull the blood from his brain.

As the missiles reached that particular spot where they were no longer closing on their target (in fact, just starting to move away) the proximity switches in each, activated by the nearest Daggers radar system, was triggered. All four GARs detonated nearly simultaneously. Kelly felt the tremendous thump of the shockwave as the disc was thrown sideways and clear of the explosion. The Dagger pilot, closing from the rear, looked on in horror as he realized that his available turning radius wasn't going to be enough to avoid flying directly through the flaming cloud of shrapnel. His plane shuddered and belched as the compressor breathed the hot gas and tiny pieces of warhead and missile casing. With a dying whine the mighty Pratt & Whitney J fifty-seven power plant lost RPM and went quiet (the pilot, now flying an out of control ten ton glider).

Kelly wasted no time watching for a parachute this time. Instead, he righted the tumbling disc. He knew the lone Sabre still had five rockets left in its wing pod, and any number of fifty caliber rounds left. The remaining Dagger had two GARs and probably both bay doors were still full of FFARs. 'Lucky,' he thought, these F one-oh-twos weren't outfitted with guns or canon.

He pointed the nose skyward again, and not finding the pair in the near vicinity, he leveled the disc and tried to calm himself. With adrenaline flowing at high speed, he couldn't relax enough to get his long range vision working (it apparently took more concentration than he could apply when he was juiced like this).

'Strange feeling... very strange feeling,' he thought, as he reached up and felt the back of his head. "What the hell?" Now the feeling was on the back of his hand. Pulling his hand back from behind his head to give it a quick once-over, he realized the feeling was, again, at the back of his head. Spinning quickly, to see what was touching him from behind, a series of bright white flashes grabbed has attention.

It was the Sabre and the flashes were his fifties. "Christ, I could feel him comin'," Kelly realized.

He spun the disc, not bothering to bank or turn. Sliding backwards, he quickly sized up his current situation. The fifties on the Sabre wouldn't do him too much damage (he had already noticed that the first two spider-web cracks in his windscreen had healed themselves) but its rockets were a different story.

"Why is he coming so slowly?" Kelly asked himself out loud. "At full throttle, he should have halved the distance between us already."

As he sent a short burst from his fifties toward the Sabre Jet, he felt the touch at the back of his head again, "Christ, he's a decoy... Damn it!" he cursed himself as he spun the disc back around in the direction he was already moving.

The One-oh-two was supersonic again and well within range of his GARs. The pilot, however, was waiting 'till he heard the buzz in his headset, telling him that he had a radar lock on the disc (he wanted to make sure that both tracking and the proximity fuses would be operational).

As Kelly's vision zoomed in on his adversary, he saw the first GAR drop from the weapons trapeze below the wing. The decoy had worked, Kelly was late. Putting his imaginary cross-hairs on the nose of the missile, he took the only action he had left. He loosed a short burst, then quickly re-aiming; he targeted the second GAR still hanging in the weapons bay, and fired again.

The seconds seemed to last forever as he held his course, straight at the Dagger. If he pulled up and out of the way, the missile would follow him and move out of the path of his bullets, already on their way.

As the huge flash filled his field of vision, only then did he yank back on the stick. A quick second later the second GAR, still attached to the Dagger, exploded. Fire and shrapnel tore through the bottom of the wing, and the big plane seemed to stumble sideways. Kelly, turning to watch, looked on dumbfounded as it continued in a straight line, fire pouring from its wing tank. 'Surely the entire under-belly of the wing and fuselage is gone on the right side,' he thought. Then, almost in slow motion, the Daggers right wing folded upwards, over and onto the fuselage (as if it were on an aircraft carrier, folding its wing for close order storage). As the right wing separated completely, the left wing, still producing lift, put the plane in a fast spinning barrel roll to the right. Its nose started to slowly arc toward the ground, and once again Kelly watched as the bright flash and rocket exhaust pushed the ejection seat, and the pilot, to safety.

Now he had the last Sabre Jet to worry about. With a quick survey of the area, he found he was alone. Did he hit the Sabre with that short burst just before he turned to attend the Dagger coming up from behind him? He wasn't sure, but, with his adrenaline supply easing off (now that the bulk of the battle was over) he found it easier to concentrate on his long range vision.

"There," he said, "I see you."

Looking to the north he could see the jet, making its way back to its base in Nevada, a thick cloud of black smoke pouring from its tail pipe.

Kelly breathed a quick sigh of relief, took another moment to calm himself further, then pushed the throttle (in his mind) forward. Faster... faster, and then he felt the slight pull again as the disc tried to slide sideways. It hadn't completely healed itself, but it was well on the way. He wished he had this much speed just a few minutes earlier.

***

Kelly knew three things for certain now (four if you count that the CIA was really pissed at him): he knew he had to get to Nevada (but he wasn't sure why); he needed to disable the helicopters in order to protect Matson, Dr. Forest and Cory; and he needed to give the disc a chance to finish healing itself.

The choppers, he would handle first. He reckoned if he gave the disc time to heal first, the choppers would be in the air, and that would mean a higher body count (he had no wont to kill any more American fighting men, no matter who they worked for).

As he dived on the loosely formed formation below, he could see the men scrambling to climb inside their rides.

The choppers were lined up perfectly (their noses all pointed into the prevailing wind) for what he had in mind. As the last of the soldiers running for the safety of their choppers saw that they wouldn't make it in time, they either took prone positions for firing at him, or they dived for the nearest creosote bush and hid themselves.

Kelly lined up on the first row, and with an economy of fire power, he unleashed as little as six rounds per chopper, striking the tail rotor assembly, the gear box, or the tail rotor drive shaft on each machine.

At the end of the row he pulled up and spun the disc one hundred and eighty degrees, and much like an ice skater turning to skate backwards a short distance then digging in his skates to reverse directions, he dived again on the next row. The Thompsons were firing now from each open bay that bore on him, but the ACP rounds were merely bouncing off his chrome surface. He handled the third row much the same way, but, unfortunately, the last three choppers in the last row were now in the air.

While they were still close to the ground he put rounds into two of them. They began wild circling gyrations as they slammed back to the ground with rotor blades bending severely, one fuselage breaking in two behind the crew compartment.

The third helicopter was up and stable, and running south toward the highway. Kelly gathered the disc and made quick work of circling in front of it and blocking its path. The chopper pilot grabbed collective, laid the stick over and banked hard right. Kelly again assumed a blocking position, then again, and again.

Finally, the chopper pilot held his ground and turned slowly sideways. Two Thompsons opened up from the bay. Kelly could see the half hearted looks on the soldiers behind the guns (they had been ordered to fire into a hopeless situation). The ACP rounds again bounced off in all direction, making a pretty light show of sparkles and loud ricochets.

With both ammo belts expended, the soldiers stared, apparently willing to except their fate. Kelly dropped his nose a little and rattled the air with two seconds of fire and lead, the rounds passing just below the choppers step. He then turned himself sideways to the chopper and dipped his wing three times. It was the same signal he had received earlier from the Dagger pilot.

The chopper pilot, no longer willing to risk the lives of his men in a futile effort, cut power and set the Sikorsky down on a service road, a few miles from the highway. Kelly waited until the soldiers had de-planed, then blew the tail rotor to pieces.

As the chopper crews gathered their wounded and called muster, those that could, stood and watched as Kelly pointed the disc to the north, raised its nose and shot skyward, barrel rolling until he was out of sight.

***

Once over the first set of foothills, Kelly set the disc down in the north end of the Mohawk Valley. His vision had let him see the small grove of old oak trees growing at the bottom of the western slope and he slid the disc between them. The moon was down far enough now that it no longer cast its light to the bottom of this ancient river bed. Morning twilight would start to lighten the eastern horizon shortly and he knew if he was lucky, the oak trees might hide any reflections the morning sun would bounce off the chrome skin.

He reached behind the seat for his larder bag and then thought the canopy open. He had not yet ceased being amazed at the speed with which that little task was carried out. He sat, once again, dangling his legs over the leading edge of the left wing, pulled the bag up beside him and sifted through its contents: "Two ABBA ZABBAs; another Cherry-a-Let; four Moon Pies; and three more RC Colas and, of course, a big chunk of Pecan Divinity. Damn," he chuckled, "a regular connoisseur, I am."

Finishing off another Moon Pie and an RC, he slipped from the wing and started a walk-around. It was far too dark for him to see anything without the aid of the disc's vision. Stooping to waddle underneath, he found three small holes in the bottom of the port side wing (probably shrapnel from the four GARs that went off together) and there on the starboard side was the gaping hole from the direct hit by the little FFAR rocket (fired by the first Sabre Jet). It was still large enough to slip a basketball through, but, by the discs present flight characteristics, he guessed it was a lot smaller now than before.

He stepped from under the wing and continued his inspection. Except for a few scuffs and scratches caused by flying debris and a few fifty caliber rounds, he was in fine shape. As he walked back around the left wing, he ran his hand down the leading edge and made his way back to the fuselage. With his right hand still on the leading edge, he laid his left hand on the nose, just below the gun ports. Closing his eyes, he took himself back over the events of the last few days: the fear; the lost hope; the pain; the deaths, and then, the unanswered questions he could see lying in front of him in the days ahead (if he still had days ahead). He knew only one thing now with any real certainty: he would no longer live his life as a normal human being (for he no longer was... a normal human being).

THE THREE RACES

Kelly grabbed his larder bag, and, on his hands and knees, crawled under the starboard-side wing. Exhausted, he rolled onto his side and then to his back. From here he would be able to watch the progress of the largest hole as it slowly grew ever smaller. The rhythmic hum of the gravity drive, now began to put him to sleep. He reached behind his head and scooped a small pile of warm desert sand to use as a pillow, then, rolling his head back and forth in it to make a soft cradle, he closed his eyes and drifted off.

***

"Brother," the voice whispered softly.

***

"Brother." it whispered again.

***

Kelly raised himself to his elbows. Looking through the vee formed by his shoes, he could see the figure he had known as his Brother, standing a few yards in front of him; his right hand stretched out as if longing to touch, or to be touched.

"Brother," he called again, then, with the warmest of smiles, "I see you are healing well."

Sitting up, Kelly reached to his right shoulder, "I suppose you are right." Then, he offered, looking up at the bottom of the wing, "As are you... the holes are nearly mended."

"Kelly," the figure said softly, "you have misspoken. You do not look at us when you look at the disc." He paused, then, "My Brother... you look at yourself."

Kelly's face filled with bewilderment as a question formed on his lips, a question that would stay trapped there (for his brain was unable to work the proper muscles to set it free).

"Kelly," the figure spoke again, "you are confused. We are not surprised. Please, let us try to explain."

Kelly, now becoming just as frightened as he was confused, tried to stand, banging his head on the chrome surface above. He collapsed to a cross-legged sitting position and watched as the little shooting-stars faded away at the back of his eyelids.

"Please Kelly, do not be alarmed... we would never harm you."

Kelly, rubbing the top of his head, and, being somewhat surprised that he was apparently having a normal ("no, not normal," he thought) conversation with his Brother figure, asked, "You... you call me Brother... why?... For you are clearly, not my brother."

"Oh, but Kelly, we are most certainly... your Brother. From the first time your life's blood became one with us, the change was, set-in-stone, to turn a human phrase... and... it is now, as it was then... irreversible."

"Damn," Kelly said, under his breath, "I'm a blood brother to a flying saucer."

"It is much more than that Kelly," the figure said matter-of-factly.

"I meant no disrespect, honestly. It is just that... well... my race tends to have a penchant, or more properly a weakness, for "uncalled for humor" in times of stress. I am sorry... please continue... I will listen quietly."

"Kelly, there is no need to sit quietly, please, be a part of this conversation. We are sure you have many questions."

"Yes, as a matter of fact I do," he said, again rubbing the bump on his head, "may I ask another?"

"Of course."

"You say I am part of the disc..."

The figure interrupted, "You know that to be true already Kelly, you have felt as much for some time now... have you not?"

Kelly stared for a moment, "Yes, I suppose that is true, but, why have you confused me so; making me believe that I have a brother... a brother that I know I do not have? A brother, you would also have me believe, is in great danger."

"You know the answer to that question as well, for you told your friends, and quite correctly so: that we merely wished to illicit emotions in you... emotions that could be channeled into the disc, and the weapon there-in. We knew that you held a great fear for these people from the north, but we were not sure if that fear was enough to make you rise against your own kind."

"Why did you not simply fire on those people yourselves? Surely you can fire the guns in the disc."

"In fact Kelly, we cannot. For you see, we are not here, physically, as it were... and even if we were, it is doubtful that we could have operated the weapon. When you, or more precisely, those of your race, combined the two technologies many years ago, we found it very difficult to become accustomed to this new intrusion. We spent the intervening years learning, very slowly indeed, to adapt to it. We have made changes to shapes, here and there; even changing the shape of your technology where we felt it important in order to better, and hasten, the integration, but, we are unable to become one with it. We cannot act physically with it. Your technology, or the materials that make up your technology, are not compatible with our... our...."

The figure turned his head to the side, as if listening to an invisible someone standing next to him. He shook his head several times in agreement, and then turned, once again, to Kelly.

"Kelly, we will start our story farther in the past. Perhaps that will help you to better understand."

Kelly cringed as the figure walked toward him. It had failed to lower itself under the disc, and instead it simply walked through it. Kelly then watched in amazement as the figure flowed into an amorphous lump that quickly reassumed the shape of his Brother, now sitting cross-legged next to him.

"We hope that did not disturb you."

"Oh no," Kelly swallowed, "no... I'm fine with that," he said, shaking his head as if it were an everyday occurrence.

"Where to begin then... perhaps the crash"

Kelly nodded.

"Very well then, we had just departed our Mother-ship and...,"

Kelly raised his hand quickly.

"Ah," the figure smiled, "you wish to start a little farther back."

Kelly smiled sheepishly and nodded again.

***

Kelly listened as his Brother told the story of leaving their home-world. Leaving to travel the great void and explore what planets they might find. They routinely traveled such great distances, that speaking of it in terms of Earth miles was meaningless. They measured the great expanses in something they translated to English as Galactic Units. One Galactic Unit being, simply, one tenth the diameter of the local galaxy, which, with a quick question, he learned, was indeed, the Milky Way.

Their home lays approximately five and one half of these units, or about seventeen thousand parsecs, on roughly the same concentric arc as the Earth; in an anti-rotational direction. They have found that most life-bearing worlds occupy a band approximately one galactic unit wide, on either side of this same concentric arc. It seemed the Milky Way had a "Goldilocks Zone," just like our solar system.

They had moved along this arc at near light speed for some six thousand years in Earth time (a time span barely remarkable to them because of their time shifting capabilities) before happening upon the Earth.

Kelly was quick to ask about the value of making such a journey, when everyone they knew on their home-world would surely be dead and gone on their return. He didn't receive an answer quite to his liking, or understanding, but he accepted it none-the-less. It seems that his brothers (and he apparently had countless brothers now) are immortal, in almost every way. Barring accidents that damage the physical being (accidents Kelly would soon learn about) they could expect to live beyond time itself. And, even if the damage to the physical self is un-reparable, the soul (that was the closest translation they could convey) could survive in the inanimate (that, apparently, being tools or other materials that are handy at the time of damage).

As the mother-ship approached, and then orbited Earth, four beings (one of which was Kelly's story teller) entered two discs, two in each. The mother-ship holds one disc for every two beings aboard (a total of two hundred and forty discs). The discs not only act as near-space transportation, or shuttles, but also as living, dining and sleeping quarters while traveling the boundless depths of space.

On their very first flight to the planet's surface, they were struck by, what they thought at first was a weapon. It turned out to be a high-powered discharge of lightening from a violent weather disturbance over the Lincoln County, New Mexico desert. They tried to explain to Kelly why they experience no such phenomena on their home-world, but, being the meteorological dunce that he was, the explanation went well beyond his comprehension. He shook his head in polite acquiescence and bid his Brother continue.

As the gravity drive in the damaged disc overloaded and began to disassemble its saucer, the drive unit itself broke free and careened wildly into its partner disc. The two beings in the first disc found themselves helplessly falling through the cold wind and rain of that ferocious New Mexico thunder storm. They chose to leave their corporeal bodies, already damaged beyond repair, and took up residence in two small pieces of the disc floating to the ground nearby.

At this point Kelly franticly raised his hand again and his brother kindly explained: "We are a race of non-corporeal beings. We are energy... life... without form. Over countless millennia we have developed a symbiotic relationship with two other races on our home-world. One is a corporeal race. They are beings shaped somewhat like yourself. The other is... well, much harder to explain...." He turned to the invisible one beside him again, nodded, then continued, "Kelly, please, reach up and touch the disc above you, at the edge of the hole that has almost finished healing."

Kelly raised himself to his knees and ran his fingers along the edge of the hole, then jerked his hand away quickly.

"Ah, you see, do you not? It feels..."

"... alive," Kelly finished his brother's sentence, "it really is alive, I mean... I never really believed..."

His Brother smiled, "The disc, like our mother-ship, is made from a living substance, much like the metals found on your Earth. It has no will of its own, but, as you have seen, it can heal itself, it can be manipulated, and it can be resided in."

"You mean you can live, or exist in this... solid."

"Why of course, Kelly. As I have told you: that is how we saved ourselves during that great conflagration in the year you call nineteen forty-seven."

Kelly reached up and touched the edge of the hole again and his brother continued.

"You can feel it, can you not?"

Kelly looked in wonder as his fingers took on the sheen of highly polished chrome as he moved them along the smooth edge. When he removed his hand their normal color returned.

"You see Kelly... you are a part of the disc. You are a part of the disc in a way we never can be... for you, as a physical being, are able to join with the living material. You make it a living being in the truest sense of the word. Even our corporeal selves could not do such a thing."

Kelly ran his fingers over the disc once more, then remembered: "My eyes," he said reaching up and removing the sunglasses, "what is happening to my eyes?"

"That is merely a manifestation of the joining. You will undoubtedly experience other changes as the joining continues," he paused, with a concerned look, "Brother, believe us, it is nothing to worry yourself with... now, please, sit again and I will finish."

'Easy for you to say,' Kelly thought, as the story continued with the second, slightly damaged, disc continuing a little farther into the wind and rain, before crashing in a small gully; both of its passengers leaving their corporeal selves for the safety of the solid chrome surface of the disc.

"Your people then gathered all the pieces and bodies, put them in one of your flying machines and took everything to one of their military bases, where countless members of your race picked and jabbed and cut and burned us. When they finally learned to use the surviving gravity drive to weld and meld your technology to ours, we had to leave your disc, for you see, that is when we found that we are incompatible with your technology."

"And where are you now?"

"We are with your Brother, of course."

Once again Kelly's face went blank and the figure realized that a further explanation was needed, "I am sorry Kelly, we tend to speak as a collective. Will it make it clear if we tell you that we now reside in the other disc, your Brother, the one held captive in the north?"

"Yes... I think...." Kelly paused, "You and three others are existing in pieces, or the whole, of the other disc... in Nevada."

"That is almost correct, and again, we are sorry... it is so hard to communicate in the singular. Three others exist in the whole of the other disc. I, however, reside with you."

"With me! You mean... inside me?"

"Yes, don't you see Kelly; I was in the small piece of skin that you carried with you. When you placed that piece of skin against the disc while the gravity drive was operating, the disc reclaimed its own, and I relocated, to you."

"And it is you... healing me... changing my eyes...?"

"No, it is the disc that heals you, of course."

As Kelly's head sank farther into his chest, he heaved a huge breath from deep within.

"Kelly, this will all become clearer as you continue to integrate. For now, you should rest," his Brother said, laying a hand (a hand Kelly surprisingly felt) on his shoulder, "there is still much work ahead of us."

A NEW LOOK

Kelly woke with a slight kink at the back of his neck. The sand pillow hadn't worked as well as he would have liked. Grabbing his larder bag, he climbed out from under the disc and moved quickly to the cover of one of the old oak trees. The Sun was at its zenith now and it was fiercely hot. Leaning against the sturdy trunk, he pulled another Moon-Pie and RC from the bag. "Why didn't I grab a couple sandwiches back at the store," he complained.

As he worked on his snack, the fighter pilot in him took over again and he began a quick walk-around. Squatting, he could see that the underside of the disc was now smooth and unblemished. The canopy was free of cracks and the upper surface of the disc was rid of all the dents and dings from the Ball rounds and shrapnel.

His only worry was his ammo supply. Although he had tried to use the Brownings sparingly, his best estimate put his reserve at no more than two hundred rounds. Oh how he wished he carried as much ammo as those fighter pilots in the movies (seemed like John Wayne's plane never ran out). He knew that the F-eighty-six, fully armed, only had a little more than thirteen seconds of sustained firepower... that meant he had less than a two second burst, and then he would be defenseless. He remembered from the episode with Perkins, back at the trailer, that the guns could be fired one round at a time (all six at once). All he had to do now was figure out how that was done.

With his bag in hand, he threw a leg up and pushed himself unto the wing surface. He heard the canopy slide open. He was feeling more at ease now, thinking ahead, anticipating (or the disc was). He set his bag in the cockpit and slid carefully into the now form-fitting comfort of his reshaped seat As he reached for the joy-stick he caught a dull flash from his lower peripheral vision. Raising his right hand in front of his face, he saw nothing out of the ordinary at first, but then, as he turned his hand slowly in the filtered sunlight, the area on his wrist that was so damaged by the handcuff, gave a dull reflection (of the trees outside, he thought). He pulled the sleeve of the jumpsuit up to his elbow and (as a sudden wave of anxiety flowed over him) he saw his own distorted reflection staring back at him. Sliding the sleeve on his other arm up as far as it would go, he gasped as he saw the same thing, and, as his face flushed red hot with primal fear (he felt he was being attacked from within) he began to hyperventilate. Falling ever farther into a state of panic, he watched in horror as his skin took on the chrome sheen of the disc. Pulling the zipper down his chest with the speed of man being swarmed over by a colony of fire ants, he saw nothing any less frightening. Every square inch of visible skin was casting reflections of his immediate surroundings.

"My God!" he screamed, as the canopy slammed open. He reached for the sides of the...

"Kelly," his Brother spoke softly yet urgently, "Kelly, calm yourself... please... calm yourself. There is nothing to fear."

As he stepped out onto the wing he held both arms out in front himself, then grabbed the jumpsuit at his chest and pulled it open.

"This looks like something to worry about to me," he yelled, tucking his chin to look at his shiny chest; his lower lip trembling.

"Kelly, please, you must relax yourself... this will pass. This is merely another manifestation of the joining... you will soon see."

"How on Earth am I supposed to relax with this happening to me? I'm going to be a solid piece of chromed steel in a few minutes... stiff as a board."

"Oh, we do not think that will happen, Kelly."

"You don't think... what do you mean, you don't think?" he blurted

"Kelly, we have watched this happening to you since you began healing from your injuries. It is a natural part of becoming one with the disc, or more precisely: one with the living material."

Kelly took a deep breath and stared straight ahead. It occurred to him that he didn't know where to look when talking to his Brother (without the figure standing in front of him). He felt foolish, on top of everything else, talking into thin air (even with no one else around). He pinched the skin over his pectoral muscles, then his biceps. 'Still soft,' he thought, then, "still soft," he repeated out loud, his voice cracking with both fear and relief.

"Kelly," his brother continued, "you must remember, there are parts of the disc that have remained supple throughout its transformation, and to this very day, remain so. There is no reason to believe that it will be any different with you."

As he stood there, feeling himself all over his arms and chest, the chrome sheen slowly began to subside. He laughed a sheepish giggle of relief as the final vestiges of chrome patina gradually disappeared.

"You see Kelly? You are made whole again."

"And if it happens again?" he returned with trepidation.

"Think Kelly... as we have told you... what you have seen is nothing more than a physical manifestation of your own state of mind. Once you learn to control your emotions, as in using the weapon (the Brownings) then it will not happen again... unless, and until, you wish it to."

Kelly pulled his sleeves down and zipped the jumpsuit half way up. Sliding back into his seat, he looked at his hands once again, then, bringing the gravity drive up to speed, he watched the leaves on the oak trees as they began to dance in response to the excited gravity field around and below him. He thought up.

***

The three college students and their paleontology professor watched in amazement from their fossil dig in the eastern arm of the valley, as the disc rose not one-hundred yards in front of them. A second too late: one of the students grabbed his camera and snapped a hurried photo as Kelly suddenly barrel-rolled northward and disappeared over the cactus covered ridge. The blurred (and out of focus) photograph would eventually make its way to the Air Force Blue Book files, there to be derided as a classic example of desert mirage or light refraction phenomena. But, the students, and their professor, would forever, have an exciting story to tell for the rest of their lives.

***

Kelly leveled off at what he thought might be somewhere around thirty thousand feet. He had no way of knowing for sure at what altitude he was. He also knew that the folks at Nevada wouldn't see him coming until he got very close, so, he wasn't going to waste time, or energy, worrying about not being at an assigned altitude for the direction he was flying. Aircraft, depending on where they were headed, flew at even or odd angels (thousands) plus five hundred feet, and as far as he knew, nobody had assigned altitude corridors for flying discs. He chuckled as he thought about the absurdity of calling for an altitude assignment (if he had a radio).

He made a guess at his speed: somewhere around four or five hundred... no need to push any faster... he was in no hurry to get there. He needed time to develop a plan. He was going up against what he was certain would be a large force, but it would probably be made up of regular Air Force. He had defeated what he thought was the bulk of the CIA troops back at Marana and over the Mohawk Valley.

"They'll have more of those new F-one-oh-twos, and a hangar full of eighty-sixes," he said to himself, "and they'll have a battery of ground based rocket launchers and regular artillery."

He realized it would be downright "Stupid", he voiced, to take on a force like that with what little firepower he had left. He wouldn't even be able to test his ability to fire very short bursts with the Brownings. He couldn't afford to waste what few rounds were left in the gun bay.

"No way," he said aloud, "going in on-full-tilt won't do." He reached up to scratch what he thought was an unshaven cheek. "What a time to worry about appearances," he said to himself, and as that thought was formulated in his mind, he felt his cheek suddenly go smooth. His hand was shiny chrome and he could see reflections, once again, in his own skin. His face was now casting the same shiny reflection back at his hand, and then back and forth, again and again, as if he were standing in the house-of-mirrors at the local carnival back home.

Now, getting somewhat used to the sight, he marveled at his reflection, moving the back of his hand, just so, in order to get the best view of his face. Startled, he reached for his head with both hands.

"Bald!" he yelled, and then, finding he was not all that dismayed by the thought, "Jeeze', I'm balder than a damn que-ball." He hadn't noticed that his earlier experience with this changing (his arms and chest upon returning to normal) hadn't returned the hair to those places. As an afterthought he slid his hand under his belt, just to make sure. Somehow he wasn't surprised; he was bald everywhere.

With a little practice he was able to control the change from chrome to flesh, and back again, almost instantly. He was even able to make himself shimmer, much like a cuttlefish does when approached by an enemy.

As he finished this phasmidic practice, a plan began to take shape in his mind. He might be able to use this new talent, in a ruse, to his advantage. He knew that he had at least three objectives in Nevada. He, first and foremost, had to rescue his three Brothers now residing in the captured disc. He also felt a need, almost as strong as the first, to save the disc itself (although he had no idea how he was going to handle something that large). And thirdly, if it was at all possible, he would try to recover the bodies of the corporeals, although this task, and he didn't understand why, wasn't a high priority in his mind.

***

Kelly closed his eyes and relaxed as much as he could (for a country boy doing four hundred miles an hour in a flying saucer). His idea now was all about building any advantages he could, no matter how small. He would circle to the east of this base in Nevada and come in from the north. To do this, he needed to know just where it was he was going.

"Brother," Kelly said softly, "can you help me find our Brothers?"

"Of course... but you have already started. Continue to relax, and they will call to you."

With his eyes closed Kelly could see the faint line of the horizon in front of him. It was a clear day aloft, but the mountains, in the distance, were veiled in a faint haze. Never-the-less, he could see a distinct rose colored glow at about his eleven o'clock.

"Ah, yes, I see them... but, you knew where they were... why not just tell me?"

"And what would you learn from that, Kelly?"

He took a heading due north and poured on the coals.

"Kelly," his Brother said with enthusiasm, "by our new heading and acceleration, I can only surmise, you have finished the formulation of your plan."

Kelly chuckled, "Nothing gets by you, does it?"

"You mean, of course, nothing gets by us. I speak to you, whenever possible, now that I am getting more used to it, in the singular, to make you more comfortable."

"So, you... and the others... you all know my thoughts? You know what I know, as soon as I think it?"

"As you will of us, once you have learned." He paused, then, "You will find it a great advantage in this place you call Nevada."

"That may be," Kelly said, almost apologetically, but, here on Earth, we humans prefer... no... we treasure... our privacy."

This time his Brother chuckled, "To use your own phrase Kelly, 'That may be,' but it should be obvious to you by now, that, strictly speaking, you are no longer human, and at this moment, you are not on Earth."

Kelly was, ever more quickly, becoming used to the fact that he was on a one-way trip to wherever it was he was... not so much going... but, well, he felt like he was in a head long dive into becoming something else. Images from his yesterdays began to play through his mind, much like he imagined they do before one is about to die. But, there was not that impending-doom kind of urgency in these little vignettes: his parents; pictures of places he had been; things he had seen and done; his grade school days; high school; MIT, and even as late as on the beach in Miami. He felt as if he were being given a last chance to enjoy what it was he used to be... a last look at his past. He took them all in, savoring each little morsel as it passed. He knew that tomorrow, hell, he knew it would be no more than a few hours, he would be someone else; he would be something else. Kelly Kellerman was descending deeper and deeper into one of his familiar dark hallways, and soon, the old Kelly Kellerman, would be completely, and forever lost there.

"So... Kelly..." his Brother spoke with an inquiring tone, "you do have a plan?"

"Why do you ask, when you obviously know?"

"While that is true Kelly, your human side can confuse us at times. Perhaps it is a matter of semantics... you... you plan to surrender... again?"

"Brother, you are right on both counts. It is a matter of semantics... I do plan to surrender... in a manner of speaking." He smiled inwardly, "Would you be less confused if I changed the word to... infiltrate?"

"Of course, that does help. With little or no weapons, it would be the only logical way to reach our objective. How can we help?"

"Just stay close, I will let you know."

"But Kelly, I am already as close as..."

"It was only a figure of speech Brother," Kelly said, rolling his eyes, "When I am ready for your help, I am sure, your course of action will become unmistakably clear."

"Very well then, Kelly, we will... stay close."

ON TO NEVADA

After thirty minutes of northing he looked to the west and the disc turned. Another hour or so, and he would make his final turn to the south. This approach from the north was not so much a tactical move anymore, as it was to give the impression that he was a worthy enemy. Upon reaching the base he would fire a few rounds here and there... do a bit of fancy flying; in general he would put on a good show. In the end, he would land somewhere, as close to his Brothers as possible, all the while giving the impression that he was being captured (more or less).

The Sun, now well on its way to the Pacific Ocean, hung in the western sky like the familiar yellow orb that he had always known (except for the slight rose tinge).

In all his previous military flight time he had always been busy. Flying, to him, had always been business. He had strived to become the best pilot he could. Like all American military pilots, he wanted to be the best there is, or ever was. Now, however, even though his near future portended a possible doom, he felt, somehow, relaxed. Every cattle pond below, every river or wet creek-bed, reflected the bright light of old Sol. He no longer needed to squint his eyes at their brightness, for his new vision compensated instantly. He studied them with a keenness he had never known. The meandering of every roadway drew his interest. He traced them, zooming in for detail, trying to guess if he had ever passed that way with his parents in years past.

He was beginning to feel more and more at peace, and it seemed to empower him. He noticed his vision was growing sharper as he continued to trace the dirt roads and highways along the way. His thought process was also beginning to organize itself in such a way that he could trace the roads and think about his plan of attack at the same time. 'Oh,' he thought, 'what I wouldn't give for a dog-fight now, with two or three adversaries. I'll bet I could track them all, and with this machine, fire at them all, almost simultaneously... no problem.'

***

The turn to the south came about an hour later. It was an uneventful turn, except that Kelly fought off a little boredom by slewing to the south first, letting the disc slide sideways for awhile before actually changing direction by adding a sudden burst of speed (vectored at about forty-five degrees to cancel the westward drift).

"No wonder the government wants to get their hands on this thing," he said to himself. "The Migs in Korea would have never stood a chance (not that they did anyway)."

The horizon to the southeast now showed clearly, the rosy signature of his three lost brothers, hanging there; not moving; waiting. He was also becoming troubled by the vision of several black objects moving around the glow. He knew they would be aircraft, probably Daggers. And then, off to his right, was a larger target.

"How did he sneak up on me," he asked himself, sliding the disc toward this new, black object. As he moved closer, the craft started to present itself as a visual target. It was a KC-ninety-seven, and it had a radar dome.

"Well, there's no sneaking up on anybody now," he cursed, "they've probably got me painted five-by-five."

He knew the 97 would be no immediate problem, as it carried no weapons, so, he slewed to his right and vectored his thrust again to fly a path over the top of it, in order to head almost due west. His only hope of getting close now, was to come in at them out of the sun. If he could only get inside the base perimeter before they did him too much damage, they would have to forego using their air or ground launched missiles for fear of hitting their own planes. That would make the F-one-oh-two's useless, for they carried no guns. He would be up against the smaller, slower, but tighter turning Sabre Jets. That would make it a gun war (Brownings versus Brownings) and he knew he could come out on top in that fight.

He watched the pilot and co-pilot of the ninety-seven crane their necks to watch him as he flew no more than a hundred feet over the top of them.

***

The last hour saw him make two more turns, once again to the south, and the last to the east. He was now headed straight at his Brothers, and his enemy. He was detecting no targets anywhere near his position; they hadn't come out to meet him. 'That was good,' he thought, 'and that was bad, too.' With an hours heads-up time, they would be re-fueling their planes, and waiting; planning.

The air was starting to thicken as the evening wore on. He could see his shadow cast in a dark cone in front of him and, lining it up on the glow of his brothers, he guaranteed he would be hidden by the glare of the sun.

The Daggers were done re-fueling and in the air again. They had been flying a tight formation to start, but now they broke in all directions. There were five of them, one holding course straight at him, others heading above, below, north and...

"Christ, this isn't good," he exclaimed.

They were going to surround him, and with each of them carrying four GAR's, that posed a considerable problem. He had dodged four missiles earlier, but, if he read these guys right, he was going to face at least ten at a time. He didn't see any way he was going to come out of this without damage. And now, looking south he could see another Dagger, not associated with the first five. Nevada had called Vincent Air Force Base in Yuma and arranged for a stray to cover Kelly's six. That meant an even dozen GAR's at a time, for they would surely fire two each at a time.

He was still thirty minutes from his Brothers, and knowing that he had to come out of this first sortie with a flyable machine, he decided to take the battle to his attackers. He had to break free of this giant globe they were trying to trap him in. Once they fired their missiles with him in the center, he would have, literally, no place to turn.

The lead Dagger was holding course straight at him, but, since he was closing the fastest, he had cut back power in order to give the others time to form the globe. Kelly pegged this guy, with his power cut back, as the weakest link, and he guessed, or at least he hoped, that these new jets would suffer from the same weakness that his old F-eighty-six did. In order to increase from cruising speed to full power the pilot would simply push the throttle forward, and then wait; sometimes ten; sometimes twenty seconds, before he was back at attack speed. A fighter pilot never wanted to get caught with his pants down, or his throttle back.

Kelly increased his speed, deciding to close the distance with his forward adversary as quickly as possible. The other Dagger pilots had obviously been briefed on what to do if it looked like the disc was going to run or attack. They all changed headings immediately, giving up the big globe formation for an ever decreasing surround (each jet heading straight at him from above, below and all four directions on the level plane).

In a field of rose colored nothingness, Kelly spotted the forward Dagger. It had taken the shape as one of the monsters that had attacked his brother earlier.

"This isn't necessary," he said to his Brother, "I am completely committed here... we can do away with the motivational pictorials."

In an instant the scene had changed to a magnified view of the jet bearing down on him. He asked for more magnification and the pointed nose and razor thin wings of the Dagger filled his field of vision.

"What the hell," he asked, as six small black circles, in two vertical lines, danced slowly, in unison, over the nose and wings of his adversary. And then it occurred to him; he was, somehow, bore-sighting down the barrels of his Brownings. Wherever he laid those little circles was exactly where the fifty caliber Ball rounds would go.

Doing the calculations quickly he figured that a closing speed of almost twelve-hundred miles per hour meant they were approaching one another at a mile every three seconds. He had no more than five seconds. He put the six circles on the nose of the one-oh-two, aligning the center circle on his left side on the starboard intake fairing. As he fired as short a burst as he thought possible, he saw the circles jump up just the slightest bit before the fifties roared.

"Brother, did you do that?" he blurted.

"Yes Kelly, we did. You did want to correct for fall, did you not?"

It didn't matter one way or the other now, because as Kelly concentrated on his target, he saw that he had been a second too late. Just before the black smoke started pouring from the tail pipe of the Dagger, he saw the tell-tale white smoke of all four GARs as they leapt from their trapeze perches. He checked left, right, up and down, nobody else had fired at him yet. They were waiting for him to commit.

One or two of them would have him covered no matter which way he chose, so he picked no direction at all. As he thought 'Stop', he felt the inside of the cockpit close in on him again, squeezing him, holding him in place. He was beginning to understand what was happening now. The drive was creating a small gravity well in his immediate vicinity, and it was increased whenever it was needed to protect him against the wild G-forces from high speed turns, or in this case, sudden stops.

Kelly sat, motionless, counting seconds. He fired another short burst, this time at the GAR's, then he waited. The next three seconds seemed like an eternity with the missiles and Daggers all bearing down on him. As two of the Gar's exploded, he raised the disc straight up toward the one-oh-two diving from above. The GAR's made a turn upwards toward him, but, his speed was enough that the distance between them started to increase. The proximity switches detonated both remaining missiles. The concussion sent him tumbling, as if someone had thumb-flipped a silver dollar. Picking out a prominent feature on the horizon, he waited for it to come around again, then snapped the disc to a full stop.

He now had all six bogies placed in the three dimensional battlefield in his mind. He could see them all at once, and the Dagger diving from above was nearly on him. With his change of direction he had thrown their timing off. They would all reach the center of the globe at different times, and now they were all too close together to use their GARs, unless they were really stupid (and he didn't think that for a moment).

In the next second the pilot in the wounded Dagger blew his canopy and punched-out while the remaining five all let loose with a barrage of smaller SNEB unguided missiles, each plane spraying its shots by yawing with their rudders as they fired.

Kelly watched for a moment as they all broke formation to avoid each other's missiles. "Look at that," he said aloud, "not one of them turned east... I'm home free." And with that he accelerated to the east, toward the base, as the little SNEBs passed harmlessly below and behind him.

Looking back to the west he could see the Daggers gathering themselves, in a loose formation, miles behind him. Even if they all went to full afterburners they wouldn't catch him now. He had enough of a lead that he decided he could take the time to make his approach look good. He still wanted to give the impression that he was not much of a threat. He wanted to land in the middle of his enemy, and he was counting on them not wanting to do the disc a great deal of harm.

Just before reaching what he thought was binocular range, he started the disc to wobble, as if damaged (if only slightly). He hadn't actually felt himself take damage in this last close call with the GARs, but, if he had, it was so small it wasn't affecting the way the disc handled. Either that, or the disc was healing itself extremely fast now. As he approached the base his magnified vision showed, as expected, four batteries of ground based missile launchers and what looked like a line of forty or fifty-seven millimeter anti-aircraft guns. The latter were mounted on huge, fully swiveled, grey painted, iron platform mounts, as if they had been lifted straight off of a battleship. The runway looked to be about two or two and a half miles long ('a little long for my needs,' he thought), and there were six large hangars lined up in the same south south-east to north north-west direction on the east side.

As he flew over the last foothill that defined the west side of the little valley that the base was nestled in, he watched two helicopters heading east under him. They had been dispatched to pick up the pilot he had downed just seconds earlier. He brought the disc to a dead stop, still allowing it to continue its little wobble; wanting everyone down there to take a deep breath; and he wanted to make sure that the F-one-oh-twos, now coming up fast on his six, weren't going to give him any more trouble. As he watched them, flying in a left echelon, they peeled off to the south and began a big circle to the east. They would leave him alone, for now. It looked to him like the folks down there wanted the same thing he did (the disc on the ground; and in one piece).

'That means cooler heads have prevailed,' he thought. 'The guy in charge must not be a Brandt.'

As the Daggers went by him in the distance to the southeast, he stopped the wobbling motion and jumped the disc forward the last mile in an instant, and, not knowing the correct configuration for silent flight yet, a powerful sonic boom echoed through the valley, visibly surprising the men below. He made a near ninety degree turn to line up with the runway, and slid over the threshold to a spot that was even with the second hangar on the flight line. This was the hangar with all the important looking brass standing around, waving arms and barking orders.

At a hundred feet off the deck he eased off the power and slowed to about fifty miles per hour before making a final ninety degree turn directly toward what he thought was the man in charge. As the men on the ground started to duck or take cover behind vehicles, and with the anti-aircraft guns tracking him (still holding their fire) he brought the disc to a full stop no more than a hundred feet in front of the only full-bird-colonel on the flight-line. Without hesitation he dropped the disc to the asphalt, stopping only a foot or two above it. Kelly chuckled, exclaiming a subdued "Oops", as he watched the colonel's (and everyone else's) hat, fly from their heads as the compressed air from his little maneuver struck them like a small hurricane.

YOREEL

There he sat, watching the airmen and soldiers climbing out from under and behind the trucks, cars, and anything else they could find to give cover. The Colonel, however, had stood his ground, except for a slight duck and a mad grab for his cap as it left his head.

With the canopy closed, Kelly was surprised to find he could hear the man shouting orders, "Bring those jeeps up and flank this thing... line 'em up so you don't have to worry about cross-fire."

Two jeeps with swivel mounted Brownings pulled up on either side of him; the soldiers each chambering a round; making ready to fire on the order.

"Bailey, make sure no one's been injured," he said, taking his cap from the Lieutenant now standing next to him, "and get Washington on the horn."

"Yes Sir," came the reply and the young officer started barking his own orders, yelling and pointing in all directions; men coming to attention all around him, saluting, and then running off to the four points of the compass.

"Calm down, young man," Kelly said to himself as he smiled, remembering the exuberance of his own very recent youth, "you will get a lot more done if you just calm down." Then, thinking with a questioning exhalation, "Huh, here I am, twenty-six years old, calling a man, probably as old as I am, young man."

Strangely, he did feel older, but not physically. In fact, physically, he felt better now than at any time he could remember. But, mentally, and with a self-assuredness he hadn't experienced before, he felt... he hesitated to say mature... he felt more... in control.

"Probably because I am no longer alone," he thought.

As the Colonel continued barking orders, Kelly took stock of his position. He could see, clearly now, the rose colored glow of his Brothers, but, they were not in one of the hangars on the flight line. The glow was, strangely, coming from the hillside on the east side of the runway about a mile away.

"They've got the other disc hidden in a bunker," he said to himself. "I wonder what other surprises they have got for me out there."

Taking a better look around the valley, now that he had time to relax a little, he could see that this place was completely isolated. There was absolutely nothing for miles around, and he remembered seeing nothing worth noting on the way in.

"Looks like they can do pretty much as they like out here," he said with a sigh.

He knew, sooner or later, he would have to open the canopy and make an appearance, but, to what level of grandiosity would his first appearance take? Well, he hadn't, quite yet, decided. For now, he was relatively safe right where he sat.

The Colonel was still standing in the same spot, apparently waiting for something, or someone. As young Lieutenant Bailey came running up behind him with a field phone (handing the receiver to his superior) Kelly could tell that this was what he was waiting for. 'Must be Washington,' he thought.

Kelly leaned forward in the Colonel's direction, forgetting that a simple bit of concentration was all that was now needed to hear, at least one side of the conversation.

"Yes... yes, I'll talk to him now," the colonel said, matter-of-factly. Then, after a short pause, "Yes, yes Mister President, this is Colonel Waterman... yes Sir... yes Sir... no Sir, those helicopters and their air cover have not returned sir... no Sir... yes Sir... no Sir, and from what little radio traffic we could monitor, they won't be coming back... yes Sir, the Daggers too, all of them... yes Sir... no Sir, that was one of the strange things, not a single loss of life. We thought we had lost one of the pilots, but he got out at the last minute... yes Sir... even this last sortie just west of the base, nobody lost... yes Sir, that's true, but Brandt took a much more aggressive approach Sir. He went in with guns blazing and lost everybody, including himself. We went in holding back a little. It appeared to us after the battle over The Mohawk Valley, that the disc wasn't interested in doing physical damage. It seemed to be in a defensive mode Sir... yes Sir... it's here Sir... right here, we have it on the ground not fifty feet in front of us now Sir... yes Sir, right in front of me... no Sir... it landed here, all by itself after the little tiff we had with it."

Then followed: a prolonged period in which the colonel did a lot of affirmative head nodding, followed by a couple of quick, verbal "Yes Sirs," and a final "Yes Sir, Mister President," and then after the colonel disconnected, he blurted a loud, "Damn it!"

"What is it Sir?" Bailey asked, taking the receiver from Waterman.

"General Macon is about two hours out and the President himself will be here by fifteen-hundred hours tomorrow."

"Damn it... Sir," the lieutenant copied his colonel's expletive.

"What, Lieutenant?"

"Oh, nothing Sir... I'm sorry Sir," Bailey said apologetically, "what are we going to do now, Sir?"

As the two officers continued their conversation, Kelly was again taking stock. This colonel, standing in front of him, looked, and acted, like a level headed soldier. He didn't relish the thought of dancing to the tune of a desk-hardened General, especially one out of Washington. Kelly was familiar with the type: fine tuned by years in the cockpit, now forced to live out the rest of his career pushing papers, and looking for the first chance to regain a little bit of the glory he once knew. He would be hard headed, set in his ways, and he would believe himself nearly invincible.

Kelly stared into Colonel Waterman's eyes, who, although he had no way of knowing it (the canopy being in a chromed state) was staring right back at him, and after a brief second of contemplation, decided that this was the man he would deal with.

Reaching to his chest, he took hold of the coverall zipper and pulled it all the way down. If his ruse was going to work, he couldn't go outside looking even the smallest part human. Two arms, legs, two eyes, a nose and mouth, and a head (albeit bald) was human enough; he didn't want to ruin his chromed effect with a Stuckey's uniform. He pulled his shoes off and slipped out of the coveralls, and, finally said good-bye to his briefs. With the slightest effort he watched as he turned himself into a shining example of Michelangelo's David. Well, maybe not quite that well muscled, but, 'Hell, I don't look half bad,' he thought aloud.

As he prepared himself mentally to open the canopy, he noticed that the Colonel, his Lieutenant and a few armed soldiers had started advancing on the disc. Wanting a little more breathing room for his grand entrance, he brought the gravity drive up the one-quarter speed very rapidly, then let it fall back to idle. The sudden increase in local gravity sent a concentric pulse of energy in all directions. It was as if a huge invisible hand had suddenly pushed against the men moving toward the disc. They staggered backwards as the Colonel grabbed his Lieutenant, who had lost his balance and was gasping for air from the unexpected blow to his chest. He then raised both arms, calling for a quick retreat.

"That's better," Kelly said as he tucked his rolled-up clothes and shoes behind his seat. He listened carefully. No one, or thing, was moving outside. He could hear the faint roar from the five remaining Daggers to the south, still circling the base. He held his open hand up to his face for a final check: chrome face, eyes, ears, and looking down, chrome chest, legs, and package. He almost wished he was standing outside the disc, waiting for the shock of seeing himself stepping out of the cockpit. With his check complete, the canopy opened with an amazingly high pitched crack. "Easy," he told himself, "you're going to scare one of these guys into doing something foolish."

He sat for a moment, as the small chorus of gasps and exclamations of wonder died away. Then he stood; his chromeness exposed to this little corner of the world.

It would not do, to step out of the cockpit and down to the tarmac as a mere human would. 'No,' he thought, 'this must be done with style... an unearthly style... and without the slightest hint of fear or trepidation.' He snapped his head to the left and started a slow panoramic sweep of his enemy. He wanted to look as un-worldly as possible, but in truth, he ended up looking almost robotic, which was fine, after all, he was made of metal. Placing his left hand on the wind-screen, he stepped from the cockpit onto the starboard wing and walked directly to the leading edge. With both eyes now trained on the Colonel, he lowered the disc the last few feet to the ground, stopping it just before it touched the tarmac, and stepped off. Without looking back, he raised the disc back to its former position a few feet above the ground, and then, he made a big mistake.

Raising his right arm and showing an open and empty palm, he began to stride toward the Colonel. It was way too quick of a move for one of the hot-shots holding a side-arm on him. Sergeant Telford was a rummy from the old red-neck school of shoot first and ask questions later, and wanted nothing more than to be able to tell the story of how he single-handedly brought down this alien-menace. Now, having what little excuse he needed, he squeezed off a round that caught Kelly just below his shoulder joint in the middle of the lateral head of his deltoid muscle. Strangely, the first thing Kelly thought of, as he reached for his shoulder while flying through the air to his left, was being blindsided by Perry Littleton (they called him "Little John") in an off-campus pick-up rugby match back at MIT. Little John wasn't much of a ball handler, but he loved to sneak in his patented, and nearly deadly, tackles whenever the opportunity presented itself. Kelly remembered sitting out the rest of the game (or was it the rest of the week?)

As Kelly slammed the ground, landing hard on his left side, he watched, in an illusional slow motion, as the Colonel's mouth opened and closed in a strange silence. He was apparently yelling at someone, but Kelly could hear nothing. The world around him was filled with pressure. A pressure he could feel on his skin, against his eyeballs, but mostly in his ears. All at the same time, the disc had slewed right, and with the six Brownings nearly directly over the top of Kelly, it had fired about a hundred rounds into the half smiling, dim-witted Sergeant Telford, and, at the same time, it had cycled the gravity drive to full power three or four times in about a second. The resulting gravity surges acted like hammer blows sent out in an ever enlarging circle. He continued watching as the Colonel picked himself up from the tarmac, wiping pieces, and blood, of the sergeant, from his face and clothing. The soldiers, who had been manning the fifty cals on the flanking jeeps, had also been blown to the ground and were in the process of, half-heartedly, clambering back to their posts when the Colonel began yelling at the top of his lungs: "Hold your fire... damn it!... Hold your damn fire... everybody, hold... your... fire!"

Kelly's eyes met the Colonel's again, and this time the Colonel raised both hands, palms open, facing Kelly, as if asking him if he would be willing to let cooler-heads prevail in this volatile situation. Kelly gave him a slight head nod, and then, tucking his legs under himself, and still holding his shoulder, he rocked up onto his knees. As he looked around, he could see most of the soldiers cowering behind vehicles or the hangar doors, not wanting to tangle with the deadly fifties, or the gravity drive again. Moving slowly this time, he lifted himself to his feet, and expecting to find his hand covered in blood, he removed his grip on his right shoulder. He looked with astonishment as his open hand showed only the flattened remains of a forty-five caliber ACP round. Remembering his situation, he pulled himself out of his state of wonder, and quickly took on his alien persona once more. The Colonel was still staring in a state of wonderment all his own, and, as their eyes met, Kelly held his hand out, turned his palm down and slowly let the flattened piece of lead fall to the ground.

Colonel Waterman swallowed as the lead hit the tarmac with the dull sound of a zinc war-penny. Then looking side to side and waving his hands with open palms forward, he addressed everyone within ear-shot.

"Everyone, and I mean everyone," the second everyone being aimed, with a quick glance at one of the men manning a fifty on the jeep to the right of Kelly, "I want no... I repeat... absolutely no weapons discharged without my orders. No talking, no loud noises, and no sudden movements of any kind by anybody. So help me, I'll shoot the first man that disobeys these orders. Lieutenant Bailey," he said looking for his aide. "Where in the hell is... Oh, there you are," he said as the young Lieutenant came out from behind the far hangar door. "Bailey, pull yourself together man, and get a couple corpsmen to clean up what's left of the sergeant. The rest of you, clear a way to hangar two and if I can get our visitor to follow me, I don't want anyone but Lieutenant Bailey and a single corpsman to follow us in... no exceptions... got that?" he said with authority.

"Yes Sir," came multiple answers from all directions.

The colonel stared at Kelly for a moment, then asked, "Are you injured?"

Kelly stood without expression. He would let the colonel puzzle over the situation for awhile.

"Your shoulder," Waterman asked reaching with his left hand and touching his own right shoulder, "are you hurt?"

Kelly let him stew for just a few seconds more, then taking on an understanding expression, he raised his right hand with pointer and middle finger extended, and shook them back and forth as if answering in the negative.

"Ah, good," the colonel said with a relieved, yet puzzled look. He found it hard to believe he had just watched this visitor take an ACP round at close range, and he was now standing in front of him, apparently unharmed.

At a loss for his next line, the colonel stepped to one side, and pointing with his right hand he passed his left hand across his body at waist level, beckoning Kelly to walk with him into the hangar. It reminded Kelly of the vision that his friend Cory Brickman had presented to him on his first night back at the trailer in Marana. 'Here we go again,' he thought, 'into another dark hallway.'

As he took his first step he noticed, with no outward trepidation, that he no longer had toes. It was as if he was wearing hospital slippers that had become a part of his feet. "Oh God no," he nearly said out loud, then, checking himself, he breathed a quick sigh of relief as he saw his package, still hanging there.

'No more changes,' he thought to his Brother, 'no more changes without checking with me first.'

"But Kelly, it is only eliminating the superfluous."

'Hey,' he thought loudly, 'I will decide what is superfluous.'

***

Kelly scanned the inside of the hangar as they walked through the large doors. It was laid out much like those back at Marana, except that the entire eastern quarter of this one was partitioned into what looked like offices. As the colonel bade Kelly to turn toward the open door to the first partition, he saw the title, Colonel Waterman stenciled above the portal. Under the name was a nicely painted picture of a skunk he had seen in a cartoon when he was younger. 'Mascot?' he thought.

Waterman walked through the door then turned and held it open wide for Kelly. "Bailey," he said quietly, "inside with me... corpsman, stand-by right where you are until I call for you, understand?"

"Yes Sir, Colonel Watermen, Sir."

As the colonel closed the door and moved behind his desk, he offered a chair to Kelly. Deciding to stand instead, Kelly shook the same two fingers he had used earlier, to answer in the negative, and then watched as the Colonel (somewhat agitated) and Lieutenant Bailey each took a seat (Bailey to his right, next to the door).

As Waterman made himself as comfortable as he could with Kelly towering over him, he leaned forward as if to start the conversation, but a commotion outside his office window drew his gaze away from Kelly. It looked like half his command had decided that they didn't want to miss out on this interview with the alien. Soldiers had lined themselves up three and four deep and none of them seemed ashamed to be looking through their Colonel's private office windows.

"Bailey, see to that, will you?"

As Bailey stood and moved toward one of the windows, presumably to yell his orders at the men outside, the Colonel re-directed him, "For Christ's sake Bailey, go outside and take care of it," he said, rolling his eyes at Kelly (as if he fully expected this alien standing in front of him to understand human facial expressions).

Kelly stared at him and then let his chrome eyes follow the young officer out of the room.

The two men stared at one another for a moment and then Waterman finally decided he would give it another try. This time, however, he leaned back in his chair, thinking that the less confrontational he might appear, the better.

"Sir," he said softly, having no idea whether this creature in front of him would understand a word he was speaking. His concentration was suddenly broken as Lieutenant Bailey made a clumsy, door banging, re-entry into the office.

"Christ man, do you think you could act a little less like a shave-tail in the officer's mess."

"Yes Sir... sorry Sir," he stammered as he spun to catch the roll-shade that shot up and slapped itself against the window five or six times before coming to a halt.

As Bailey finally seated himself, the Colonel continued, "Sir, I hardly know where to start," he smiled, "do you need medical assistance?" he said pointing to Kelly's right shoulder, still concerned that this alien visitor might be injured.

Kelly, playing his part, gave him a questioning look, then raising his eyebrows while reaching for his shoulder, and figuring he was going to have to speak sooner or later anyway, answered, "I do not require medical assistance." He let some inflection with just a little intonation seep out as he spoke. He wanted to make the Colonel feel he was talking with something other than a machine.

"Oh, good," Waterman leaned forward, "you can speak."

Kelly stared as the Colonel continued:

"Would you like food... are you hungry?"

When Kelly sat quietly, Waterman moved his hand to his mouth, making the universal eat sign.

Again Kelly raised his eyebrows in question, then, waiting what he thought was the proper amount of time, and almost smiling as if suddenly understanding, he said, "I do not require sustenance." And then, almost in the same breath, he thought to himself, 'Damn it! That was a mistake. I'd kill for any kind of a sandwich and a cold glass of milk.'

"You don't eat... at all?" the Colonel queried.

"Not at this time," Kelly said, deciding to leave his options open.

Waterman paused for a moment and then his eye was caught by a quick hand movement from Lieutenant Bailey, who was waving as if he were in grade school and trying to attract his teacher's attention.

"What is it Bailey?" he asked, disgruntled with the interruption, but not wanting to take the chance that the Lieutenant might have something important to say.

"Sir, ask him if he has a name... Sir... ask him what he is called... Sir."

"Yes, yes Bailey," Waterman said gruffly, waving his hand for Bailey to shut up, "that was my next question."

'Oh Boy,' Kelly thought, 'a name.'

He hadn't given that any consideration at all: what to call himself. The only thing that came to mind was the Stuckey's uniform he had put on the day before. He remembered looking down and seeing the mechanics name embroidered above the breast pocket. "Lee Roy" it read, and, without giving the Colonel a chance to ask his question, he looked first at the Lieutenant then back at the man behind the desk.

"I am called YorEel."

PRELUDE TO A BATTLE

Colonel Waterman looked at his young Lieutenant, who was smiling, having just received an answer to a question he had just offered.

"Mister YorEel," Waterman said, turning to Kelly once again, having given his subordinate an obligatory half smile, "is that your first name?"

"That is my name," Kelly hesitated, and then toying with the Colonel, "and you are called ColWaterman... and the other is LtBailey."

As Waterman struggled to find a way to answer without possibly offending his visitor, Kelly continued, "It is there, on your coverings... the little piece of gold colored metal... it says ColWaterman," then turning toward the junior officer, "and his says LtBailey."

"Oh," Waterman said, with some amusement, "No Sir, these are our designations of rank."

Kelly gave a somewhat knowing nod, "I understand this notion of rank. We use it ourselves from time to time." He looked at the Lieutenant then back at the Colonel, "So, you are Col, and you hold the rank of a Waterman, and you," he turned again, "are Lt and your rank is that of a Bailey," he continued quickly, "I understand the rank of Waterman, and why you appear to be in charge here in this arid and inhospitable desert of a place, but you Lt, just what are the duties of a Bailey?"

As Bailey started to open his mouth, the Colonel waved him quiet again, "Bailey, I'll handle this." Then to Kelly, and seemingly in a hurry, "Mr. YorEel, not that it makes a great deal of difference, for you may call me anything that pleases you, but, this first part," he pointed to the Col. on his name tag, "is my rank. My full name is Colonel Harold Thomas Waterman."

Kelly stared at Waterman for a moment then turned to the young man sitting by the door, "And is your name so long and complicated also?"

Again the Lieutenant tried to answer but was waved down. The colonel was becoming short of temper. He needed this conversation to move along much more quickly than it was. Taking a deep breath to compose himself, he turned from the cowering Bailey and spoke to Kelly in a somewhat subdued, but on the verge of exploding, voice, "Mr.... YorEel, these things, our names, our ranks," he searched for words, "they are trivial things... wouldn't you agree?" And then without giving Kelly a chance to answer, "We have much more important things to talk about, for, you see...,"

Kelly interrupted, "Mister Col, I sense an urgency about you. Why is this?" he asked, smiling inside, for he knew that this man's General was on his way to this place, and the poor colonel was making an attempt at a little coup. He was, in the next hour, hoping to bundle this space-man and his flying saucer into a neat little package that he could hand off to his superior and move himself up the promotion ladder, much like every other long-in-the-tooth lifer in any branch of the military. As Waterman began to speak again, Kelly again interrupted, "Mister Col," and this time it was he who leaned forward, "where are you keeping my Brothers?"

The Colonel sat straight in his chair, looked quickly at Bailey and then back at Kelly, "Mr. YorEel, I assure you, there are no more of your kind on this base... I assure you Sir," he reiterated.

With that, Kelly stepped forward and the Colonel stood quickly, not being sure just what this alien's intentions were. Kelly made his way around the edge of Waterman's desk and continued to the row of windows where the soldiers had been previously lined up for a look at the goings-on in inside. Waterman's right hand had found its way to the Colt forty-five semi-auto on his hip and Kelly glanced at it casually. Looking the colonel in the eyes, he said, "Col Waterman, you saw what little effect your weapons had on me earlier. Would you really be so foolish as to try to use that on me?"

"For self-protection... yes I would, Sir."

Kelly raised his right hand, palm toward the Colonel, as if assuring him that there was no need for any sort of violence at this time, and then closing all his fingers except for his pointer, he turned slowly, finally pointing to the foothills on the east side of the valley.

"My Brothers are there, in those hills... inside those hills." Then, turning to the Colonel again, "You will take me to see them... now!"

Colonel Waterman was at a loss, and clearly, he felt at a disadvantage. He had thought, for one reason or another, that this conversation would take a much different course. He had envisioned this alien: nearly helpless; lost on a strange planet; and surely overwhelmed by his superior forces, would be somewhat of a push-over. 'What made this... creature,' he wondered, 'think that it held the upper hand here?'

Attempting to regain control of this situation (if he ever really was in control of this situation) he turned to his Lieutenant, "Bailey, bring both jeeps into the hangar and have them cover this office door with their fifties."

"Yes Sir," Bailey said sheepishly, looking at Kelly as if asking his permission to leave.

"Now Bailey!" the Colonel almost yelled.

"Do you want me back in here, Sir?" the young man's voice trembled, hoping the Colonel would give him leave to hide behind anything big and heavy out in the hangar.

"Yes I want you back in here, why wouldn't I?" he said, calming slightly. Then, turning to Kelly, "Mister YorEel, you must understand, I am trying to conduct this interrogation..."

Kelly's eyes raised and the Colonel reacted immediately.

"... this interview," he corrected himself, "in an atmosphere of friendship" he paused, "of good (and he knew it sounded pretty stupid, even as it left his lips) planetary relations. You must understand, Sir, I have a plane full of superior officers on the way here at this very minute, and I can assure you that I am a much easier person to deal with than any of them. Please Mr. YorEel, I am trying my best to be your friend. These men who are coming will use weapons much more powerful than the one used on you outside."

Kelly, once again let Waterman stew, then, "What is it you want from me?"

Waterman's eyes brightened in a state of apprehensive anticipation. He leaned forward, speaking matter-of-factly, "We need to know things... things like: what is the source of power for your saucer; what weapons do you carry, other than those conventional guns you have mounted; what was that pressure wave device you hit us with; where are you from; why are you here, and most important of all: are you, or your race... hostile."

Kelly paused, as if thinking, "And if I give you all this," he asked softly, "then... you will take me to my Brothers?"

Knowing full well that he had no intentions of doing anything of the sort, the Colonel answered with a smile, "Of course Mister YorEel, of course," and with a hand motion, he offered Kelly a seat again. Kelly moved to the chair, but still preferring to stand, waved his two fingers in the negative once more. Waterman was again put off. He loved sitting behind his huge oak desk, playing the part of the big-shot; and he disliked, immensely, having someone refuse to sit, only to end up hovering over him in his own office. He decided to remain standing.

"Some of your questions are easily answered," Kelly started, "some are not. I can answer two of them in the same sentence. As to why we are here and our intentions: we are explorers. As to where we are from, well, there are no words in your language that could possibly be used to give our home world a name. Simply pick any word you like and we will agree to call it that. Any galactic coordinates that I might give you, to find our home-world, would be meaningless, for you have nothing to take reference from. If you have a picture of this galaxy, our galaxy," he smiled, "I could perhaps point to the place, if that would be sufficient." Kelly looked at the colonel questioningly.

"Perhaps at a later time," Waterman said gruffly, waving Kelly to continue, "Please, tell me about the power source."

"Ah yes, the power source, and the weapon I used," he continued (knowing he had no knowledge of the process by which the disc produced the force that drove the soldiers back). He figured his line of BS was working well for him so far, so, he threw some more. "This is even harder to explain than where we are from. You see, unless you can understand the mathematics, the physics, the particle theory, the..." Kelly stopped, then looking at Waterman as if searching for words that simply didn't exist, he asked, "Sir, do you have primitives on your planet?"

"What?... primitives? What do you mean by primitives?"

"Is there no place on this planet where there exists a race that is not as advanced as yours?"

Waterman thought for a moment, wanting answers much faster than they were coming, "Yes, yes of course, we have pockets of primitive people in places all over the Earth."

With a smile on his chrome lips Kelly continued, "Good, good Col Waterman. Then please, in your own words, as if I were one of your primitives, explain to me how the propulsion system works on one of the aircraft that attacked me earlier." As Waterman stammered for his answer, Kelly spoke again, "You see my dilemma, do you not? If I were to try to explain the process by which we obtain power from the high-end elements contained in my ship, some of which do not even exist on your planet, it would be as if I were, and I mean no disrespect Col Waterman, as if I were talking to one of your primitives. You do see that, don't you?"

"We have scientists, mathematicians, who will be able to understand you, I am sure."

"Are these scientists here on this base... now?"

"No, they are not," Waterman said with a noticeable redness now showing in his cheeks. He could tell that this conversation no longer held the hope of delivering a nice neat package to General Macon. "Bailey," he yelled, "get in here... bring two MP's with you. Mister YorEel," he said, turning back to face Kelly, "I am truly sorry, but you apparently don't understand that your cooperation here is mandatory." He held an open hand to Kelly, feigning friendship. "Sir, I am trying my best to make this as easy on you as possible, can't you see that?"

Kelly watched as the two MP's, rifles at the ready, walked in with purpose; with young Bailey, trying not to look too much like he was hiding behind them. With his chrome eyes fixed on the Colonel, Kelly said unblinkingly, "Col Waterman, you WILL take me to see my Brothers now."

"I am sorry Sir, but that is impossible. I have orders... and they do not include taking you to see anybody. In fact I have exceeded my orders already, by trying to be friendly."

Kelly could tell that the Colonel was now beginning to have trouble controlling himself. Waterman had hoped to have the situation well in hand already, or at least before his superiors arrived. Kelly wanted the same, but while Kelly still had time, the colonel now felt that he did not.

"Sergeant," the colonel barked to the lead MP. "Take this man... this... take our visitor to the brig, and stay with him. In fact, escort him with one of the jeep mounted fifties. I want no mistakes Sergeant."

"Sir," Lieutenant Bailey said meekly, "we don't have a brig, at the moment sir."

"What, what do you mean, we don't have a brig? Of course we have a brig."

"But Sir, last month you told the guys from plot fifty-one that they could put all their new computer stuff in there until they get their new labs put together. Sir, it's full, floor to ceiling."

Kelly knew he had to do something soon. He didn't want to get himself locked up, at least not without options.

Colonel Waterman turned his head in the direction of a commotion outside his office. "Sir," an MP yelled, throwing the door open against an unsuspecting Lieutenant Bailey, "the disc is moving Sir."

Waterman reached to his waist for his Colt. He flicked the safety off and pulled back the slide in the same motion. Pointing the piece at Kelly's chest he bellowed, "Stop whatever it is you are doing, NOW!"

As the vibrations from the gravity drive increased, loose objects on the colonel's desk began to dance about; the windows began to rattle, and suddenly one of the panes behind Waterman shattered, causing everyone but Kelly to duck their heads.

"I warn you, I will shoot," Waterman again bellowed, holding the forty-five at arm's length, still pointing directly at Kelly's sternum. The Colonel then watched in amazement as Kelly set himself in the chair that had been offered earlier. As Kelly slowly lowered himself, Waterman could now see through the door held open by a cringing Lieutenant Bailey. Beyond the door he could see the two jeeps he had ordered to guard his office. Looking between the jeeps he could see the disc, hovering in the hangar doorway, and he suddenly realized he was staring down the barrels of all six of the Brownings.

ESCAPE

Lieutenant Bailey never knew if his Colonel ever saw the flashes, or heard the roar of the fifties. All he knew for sure was that Waterman's head suddenly seemed to disappear as his body was driven back against the window that had just shattered, coming to rest hanging half outside the building. The MP standing next to him, along with the two that had stood behind Kelly, were now just a jumble of bloody body parts lying in what now seemed like a way-too-small office. The Lieutenant began to gasp for breath as he fought to keep what little composure he had left. Kelly turned toward the crying young man, who was now holding the open door against himself with one hand and squeezing his crotch with the other.

"Lieutenant Bailey," Kelly said softly but with firmness, "hit the deck, now."

As Kelly rolled out of the chair onto all fours, the Lieutenant slid down the wall and covered his eyes with both hands, hiding his fear and his tears. An instant later the sound of fifty calibers filled the hangar as the disc fired the remaining store of its precious ammunition. The jeep mounted fifties fired at the disc until the soldiers manning them were either cut to pieces or knocked down by the disc's now wildly pulsing gravity waves. Kelly reached over and pulled Bailey toward him as one of the jeeps was driven nearly all the way through the office wall.

Kelly could tell the young man was nearly senseless. As the sound of gunfire tapered to a few stray shots every second or two, he took the Lieutenant's chin with his fingers and turned his face so they were no more than half a foot from one another.

"Lieutenant," Kelly whispered, "what is your first name?"

"K_K_K Kenneth," he stuttered, his eyes shut tightly.

"Kenneth, look at me," Kelly said, shaking him lightly until Bailey opened his eyes, "I'm going to ask you some questions, and if you answer me quickly and truthfully, you may just get out of here alive, do you understand me?"

The young man trembled as he shook his head yes with a single nod.

"Good... now, Kenneth, is the other disc being kept in a cave or bunker in the direction I pointed to earlier?"

Bailey nodded again.

"Are the bodies stored in the same place?"

Another nod came in the affirmative.

"How do I get in?"

This question couldn't be answered with a simple nod of the head. Kelly pulled the young man down and covered him as a few more stray rounds came through the wall of the office, then, pulling his face back up, "Son, the quicker you give me answers, the quicker I can get out of here and the quicker they will stop shooting in this direction. Now, how do I get in the bunker?"

Bailey fought to control himself, wiping both eyes at once with his hands. "If the d_doors aren't open when you get there, th_then y_you won't get in. The bunker is hardened. It's made to withstand an atomic blast."

"Lieutenant Bailey," Kelly said, tightening his grip on the young man's chin, "surely there is a way to open the doors if they are closed when I get there."

"Y_Yes."

"Well?"

"Pass code... y_you'll need th_the pass code."

"Kenneth," Kelly shook him again, "I am getting real tired of having to wring this information out of you." Pulling the Lieutenants face closer until they were nose to nose, he said sternly, "Give me the code and tell me how to use it, now."

"OK... OK, I'm just scared Sir. I don't want to die, Sir."

"Kenneth!" Kelly nearly yelled.

"OK, OK, th_there is a b_box mounted to the right of the door. The Colonel has a key to the padlock. Inside the box you punch the numbers on the number thing... I don't know what it's called... Sir... it's got numbers on it and you...,"

"I understand Kenneth, is that all I need to know?"

"Well Sir, once you're inside; the big red button closes the door... and the big green one opens it again."

"Thank you Lieutenant," Kelly said letting go of Bailey's chin, and as he started to move away he turned back to the young man, "Oh, one more thing."

"Yes Sir? What's that, Sir?"

"The code Lieutenant."

"It's tw_twelve-se_seven-nineteen-forty-one, Sir."

"Pearl Harbor Day," Kelly said, "clever, but not very secure." Then before turning away again, "You drive, don't you Kenneth?"

"Yes Sir."

"And the Colonel has, or had, a staff car?"

"Yes Sir."

"OK, then when I leave this room I want you to wait until the shooting dies down, then get to that car and start driving. Drive south and don't stop until you hit Yuma, got that?" The young man's lower lip was still trembling, "Got that?" he asked again and got a short head nod for an answer.

Kelly left the Lieutenant lying on the floor and made his way on hands and knees to the front of the colonel's desk. Without raising himself, he felt in the right front corner of the center drawer. 'Right where everybody tosses there keys,' he thought. And there they were: a key ring with about ten or twelve to choose from. He would waste some time going through them one at a time, but, that would be better than trying to shoot the lock open and possibly damaging the number pad inside.

As Kelly made his way past the Lieutenant again, he told him to keep his head down a little while longer. The shooting was about to start again when he left the hangar.

The front end of the bent and broken jeep was fully through the wall where Bailey had been seated before Kelly pulled him away. He climbed over the collapsed front windshield and into the passenger compartment. Peering up over the short driver's side door he could see that his disc had moved to a position no more than twenty feet from him. It sat there, humming, wobbling slightly; waiting for him. The gravity pulses, which had now stopped, had apparently cleared the hangar of any soldiers that had been brave enough to enter once the shooting started. Outside, however, he could see some activity as men were pulling what looked like, a two inch gun into a position that would give it a clear shot at the disc.

Kelly looked up at the swivel mounted fifty-caliber Browning over the rear of the jeep. It would be useless. One of the soldiers had been firing when the gravity pulses hit, and one of the cartridge casings had found its way, in the melee, back into the slide. It was jammed there. Kelly may have gotten it out, but, he would have put himself in a completely exposed position. He decided his best hope was to get to the safety of the cockpit, and then move the disc out of the canon's line-of-fire.

He slowly opened the driver's side door and tried to step out. The door, however, had been bent in the previous action and as he was just reaching the point where it was open enough to crawl through, the hinge gave out with a mighty POP. He looked at the men moving the canon, who were now looking in the direction of the noise he had just sent their way. He saw one man pointing, yelling, fumbling with a rifle that was slung over his back. Another soldier began to climb onto another jeep to man yet another fifty-caliber machine-gun.

"Make a brake for it Kelly," he told himself, "you are dead meat if you stay here."

As he leapt from the front seat he heard the first rounds from the jeep and the lone soldier now peering down the barrel of his rifle. He could hear the sonic pops as the bullets passed on either side of him. He made a dive for the upper surface of the wing, sliding like superman nearly all the way to the cockpit. In this position, if he stood, even a little to enter the disc, he would put himself in someone's crosshairs. As he thought it, the disc slewed so that the vertical stabilizer of the old F-eighty-six was between himself and the shooters, and as he listened to the bullets ricochet in all directions, he thought the canopy open and climbed inside. Slamming the canopy shut, he slewed the disc toward the men outside the hangar door and was surprised to see them all dive for cover. "They don't know my guns are empty," he whispered to himself, "that will give me a few extra seconds."

As the disc moved through the hangar door he again began taking fire from another jeep mounted fifty and a couple of soldiers with rifles. Kelly watched the sparks fly as the bullets struck home, but the dents and scratches they were leaving were healing almost as soon as they appeared. As he moved a little farther out over the tarmac he could see a couple brave souls try to push one of the two-inch rounds into the breach of the canon. He knew that the disc could now handle the smaller arms he was up against, but this two-inch canon would surely do him some damage. As that worry, that fear, built in his mind, and with the fifty caliber and rifle rounds bouncing off the disc all around him, he concentrated. A gravity pulse left the disc and drove the two men to the ground. The pulse also suppressed the small arms fire for a moment. The two soldiers at the canon pulled themselves to their feet and again were trying frantically to close the breech. As a strafe of fifty caliber rounds slammed the canopy between him and his view of the canon, he jumped, his muscles tensing violently. The next gravity pulse left the disc instantly, not in its usual concentric ring pattern, but instead, in a concentrated column that rippled the air as it traveled directly at the canon. Kelly watched in a state of mixed horror and surprise as the two-inch gun was driven flat into the asphalt, as if made of soft lead. The two soldiers were dead before the shell in the breech and a dozen more in the metal shell crate, exploded, driving shrapnel in all directions. While these lightweight pieces of brass weren't doing the disc any damage, they wreaked havoc with the men on the ground, effectively bringing the firefight to a halt.

Looking east by north, right through the walls of hangars three and four on the flight line, Kelly could see the glow of his Brothers in the distance. He had to get there, and quickly; but he still had to contend with the anti-aircraft guns, that were at the moment, being re-manned by soldiers who had been relieved of their posts when the alien had been enticed inside. He decided that his best shot was to stay as close to the ground as possible.

'Surely,' he thought, 'they won't fire at me while I'm so close to their own men and equipment.'

As he increased his speed along the flight line, they did fire, and in chorus. As he continued accelerating, he watched behind and to his right, as rounds passed just behind the disc and disappeared through the walls and windows of the hangars. The fourth building in line suddenly erupted in a huge fireball that was followed by what sounded like a Chinese New Year celebration. He could hear thousands of pops and saw another fireball that pushed the entire front of the building out from under the roof. The once, seventy foot tall structure sagged, hesitated, and finally collapsed to the ground.

His steady acceleration kept the gunners from ever getting the correct lead on him and as he passed the last hangar in line, he hooked a hard right to head for the hills, keeping that last hangar between himself and the big guns. They would be firing blind at him now.

As he gained a few feet of altitude and zagged a bit to make himself a little harder to hit, he felt a sharp pain in the back of his neck. He didn't have to look... he knew what it was... the Daggers were back on him. As he thought his next move, he was late. The ground in front and under him suddenly erupted in small dirt geysers as tens of small, unguided rockets exploded all around him. They were all firing at once.

'Why aren't they using the guided GAR's,' he wondered. 'Are they still trying to capture me with minimal damage?'

He doubted that. By the way they reacted when he left the hangar, he sensed that they were all told to stop him at any cost. Something had changed, but he was at a loss to figure what it was. And then the thought crossed his mind.

"Lieutenant Bailey," he said aloud, "that little shit. He must have gotten on the horn to General Macon as soon as I left the hangar. 'Nah,' he thought, 'nobody could have grown a pair that fast.'

Yet, it had to be. Bailey was the only person alive on the base that knew Colonel Waterman was dead... and now General Macon knew, which meant that the President knew. And the first thing that the President would have told Macon was, "If the disc can't be captured, then make sure that there is no way it can fall into the wrong hands."

Now, taking fire from behind and above, he knew he was in real trouble. Was there a way to use the gravity pulse against airborne targets? He would have to find out. If he was going to do battle in the air though, he needed altitude. As he thought up, the upper surface of his left wing took a direct hit, from either one of the small rockets or a lucky shot by one of the anti-aircraft guns. A jagged hole showed itself a few feet from the tip and Kelly could see desert floor through it. The disc wobbled and plummeted the short distance to the ground. He managed to stop the decent, but not before skipping several times against the somewhat soft desert sand. He watched as the left wing plowed through a hillock, sending dirt, sand and creosote bushes flying in all direction. The sand lingered in the hole torn in the wing and continued to stream out behind him as if he were leaking fluid.

With a hole in his wing, super-sonic flight was now out of the question. In fact, he figured anything above three hundred miles per hour would be a real challenge.

Another volley of the small, unguided missiles, made their way toward him. Again, he could feel them coming.

"Why aren't they using the GAR's?" he wondered. "Can't they see me on their scopes?"

"Brother," Kelly said softly as he slowed the disc and watched the smoke trails of a dozen screaming rockets pass in front of him; exploding against the defenseless desert sand.

"Yes?" came the answer.

"Brother, they cannot see me with their radar?" Kelly questioned.

"They cannot," his Brother answered in the same quiet voice. And even though Kelly could not see him, he knew he was smiling. "Since you no longer had use of your guns, the disc assimilated the hardware. And since the fuselage was replaced with the living material over a year ago, you can no longer be seen by their radio waves. Except for the human visual spectrum, you are invisible."

"Oh, how I wish the sun was down," Kelly whispered."

"I cannot help you with that Brother," was the reply.

Kelly started to chuckle, but suddenly felt the pressure at the back of his neck again. He stopped the disc dead in its tracks, then, still maintaining a horizontal attitude, he shot skyward with all the acceleration the disc could muster with its damaged wing. This sudden movement created such a vacuum at ground level that a few cubic yards of sand was sucked from its resting place on the desert floor. It boiled upward, roiling in the vortices created behind the disc, and as the lead F-one-oh-two flew through this unbreathable blend of air, plant life and silica, it inhaled the deadly mixture. The turbine faltered as the friction from the sand, almost instantly, raised the temperature of the bearings and races to well above the point of structural failure. A single turbine blade broke free from the hub and jammed itself into the engine sidewall, stopping it instantly. The sudden torque tore the engine from its mount, cracking the bulkhead behind the canopy. The Dagger folded in two and spread itself over the desert sand like a canister of napalm.

From his new position above, Kelly watched as the remaining Daggers turned away from the sand cloud and started their long circling maneuver to re-engage their enemy. He would use this time to his advantage. Following the two jets that had turned to the east, he calculated a spot to intercept them half way around their circle. At a distance of about a half mile, he magnified his vision on the two and, like with the canon, he concentrated the gravity drive into a point, then released it with what he thought was the proper lead. He could see the land, and then the jets through the moving pulse as its pressure wave distorted the path of the light, causing them to ripple like a mirage.

As the pulse and the Daggers met at a single point in the distance, he thought at first he had missed. Nothing happened.

'Maybe the pulse looses power over distance,' he thought.

As he brought the two jets up in his vision again, he saw the wing-man stop his turn and fly a tangent course while the lead continued turning, if only for a moment. The plane that had leveled off suddenly showed a puff of smoke as the canopy was jettisoned. That was quickly followed by the bright yellow flame from the ejection seat. The lead Dagger's turn radius began to increase until it was in a tight turn, its nose eventually pointing toward the ground. Kelly watched as it exploded below and to the north, expecting, but never seeing, the bright light of hope from the ejection seat.

Now there were two Daggers left and he had them spotted to the south, but they weren't turning to engage. In fact they were holding course due south. They were running for the Air Base at Yuma.

THE BUNKER

Kelly looked back in the direction of the bunker. He could see that a small convoy of vehicles had started making their way in that direction. He figured he could beat them to the blast door and get inside before they started offering fire.

With the hole in the wing not mending as fast as he would have liked, he still managed to cover the distance in no more than twenty seconds. He was at the lock-box and trying the various keys when he heard the first long shots whizzing overhead, making dull thuds as they struck the bunker's earth-covering above him. The fifth key on the ring did the trick and he was at the number pad; punching as fast as his chrome fingers would move. As he entered the last number he heard the loud whine of a huge electric motor somewhere in the dark recesses below ground. As it came up to speed the, huge, five foot thick steel door began to slide sideways.

"C'mon, c'mon," he said as the massive door barely crawled along its tracks. Finally, he was able to step inside and when the door was open wide enough, the disc followed. He ducked behind a short wall that held the green and red buttons that Bailey had told him about. He slammed his palm against the red one as stray bullets began clanging and whining off the disc and interior walls of the bunker. And, finally, it was closed.

As he turned away from the buttons, a small flashing sign at waist level caught his eye. Bending for a closer look, he was mildly surprised.

The Lieutenant had failed to tell him, on purpose no doubt, about the emergency intruder lock-out. As he hit the un-assuming little button next to the flashing sign, three six inch steel rods began to slide out from the wall on the opposite side from where he was standing. He watched as they buried themselves inside three large bosses built into the door. When the rods had quit moving with a bang that seemed to echo endlessly, three more small rods slid into each boss from positions above and at right angles to each, effectively locking the huge rods in place. 'Nothing is getting in here,' he thought, 'unless I push that button again.'

He turned around and gazed into the near darkness behind him. The lighting in the bunker was subdued, with only small recessed lights along the walls at floor level. The main lights had been turned off when everyone was told to report to hangar two to back-up the main force welcoming the visitor.

"Ah, there it is," he said, moving to a panel mounted in a small guard shack that was all but hidden in a dark niche just a few feet to his right. The sign, in typical military stencil-font said: WHEN ABANDONING SITE SECURE ALL LIGHTING. The small arrow pointed to the big switch. Kelly pulled the locking pin from the guillotine type cover and lifted it up and out of the way. With his thumb, he pushed the green button until he heard the electric solenoid snap shut behind the panel. As he turned, he watched in amazement as the lighting seemed to cascade forever, deeper and deeper into the mountainside.

The corridor, at the entrance where he now stood, was at least forty feet wide, and the ceiling, although only about ten feet above him, tapered upwards quickly to at least thirty feet. As he walked straight ahead, the corridor opened to his left. A huge room, supported by granite columns left in place every forty feet or so for support, stretched at least, he estimated, two, maybe three hundred feet, back into the mountain. The distance to the wall directly to his left, however, was only a hundred feet or so. And he could make out another sliding door built into it.

The lighting to the rear of the huge room was considerably more Spartan, and it appeared, by the drilling machines and front-end loaders lined up against the far wall, the process of digging this massive hole in the ground was still an ongoing process.

Kelly looked again to the sliding door he had spotted on the left side wall. His vision blurred slightly and then the customary rose tint (now so familiar when he was about to see his Brother) filled his thoughts.

"This is not necessary, Brothers. I know you are there. I am coming to get you. And, by the way," he said, turning his thoughts inward, "where have you been Brother? I could have used a little help these last few minutes."

The voice from within came back with its usual soft inflection. "Brother, do you wish me to speak every time I give a little push here, or a little shove there. We... I, thought you would be less distracted if I merely helped when you needed it."

As with the outer door, there was another touch pad behind another lock box. Kelly had to run back to the outer door to retrieve the keys he had left in the guard shack. He wasn't used to doing business without pockets. After opening the box he punched in the same code he had used outside. Of course it didn't work. "Nothing could be that easy," he muttered. Trying several more codes from days in military history, the huge electric motor finally roared to life with the numbers oh-seven-oh-four-seventeen-seventy-six.

He heard the huge locking rods and keeper-pins disengage as the huge door began to move. No faster than the exterior door, it took a full five minutes to open to its forty foot width. The chasm was dark inside except for the now three distinct rose colored glowing orbs hovering near the far wall. He opened the light switch cover next to the door and thumbed the button. As the switching solenoid slammed home he turned and almost had to cover his eyes.

"My God... she's beautiful," he said aloud.

Before him rested the San Agustin disk. With its nose section fully self repaired, it was not possible to tell which direction it might fly. It sat there; shining... gleaming... like no other object Kelly had ever seen in his life. It reflected the overhead lighting to such an extent, it was almost blinding.

This disc was clearly different from his. The wings, or the circular disc, had a wider span. It was easily forty feet, and Kelly wondered if it would make it out either door or between the support pillars. "Surely it would, for it made it in, didn't it?"

He laid a hand on the leading edge and found it nearly razor sharp. It was perfectly smooth; no seams, dents, scratches or control surface outlines anywhere. From the edge, the wings increased in thickness until they met the central bulge at which time they were nearly three feet thick. The central bulge itself was considerably larger than his Sabre cockpit. It was a perfect sphere on top with a diameter of ten or twelve feet. The center of the sphere was nestled down into the disc at the center, with the bottom of the sphere protruding only a foot from the underside of the disc, where it was flattened. The one thing, or things, that were the same, were the landing struts that held the flattened portion of the central bulge no more than six inches off the granite floor.

Kelly looked back through the huge door at his own ride, hovering inside the main entrance, still wobbling slightly, sand still trickling from the jagged edges of its wound.

His first thought, at the pitiful sight of his former F-eighty-six was, 'How do I get the drive unit out of the Sabre, and mounted in this gorgeous creature.' He turned and laid both hands on the perfect San Agustin Disc. 'I will need tools,' he thought. 'There must be tools here, somewhere. They must have...'

His body convulsed and went rigid, and for a moment he blinked hard, trying to dispel the vision in front of him. His fingers appeared to flow into the disc, and as hard as he pulled, he could not remove them. His vision flushed once again with the familiar rose color of the home world and he gasped as his breath seemed to leave him. Warmness filled first his fingers, then his arms. It flowed throughout his body, finally reaching his feet. And suddenly, he knew what it was.

"Ah, no, no, no, come on guys," he pleaded out loud. "There ain't room enough for all of you in there. One of you inside me has been creepy enough."

His three lost Brothers had taken new residence, in him, and as he stood with his fingers now un-melding themselves from the disc, he turned his head to the side, and closing one eye, he shook his head slightly, as if trying to loosen something inside.

"Hey, settle down in there," he said softly, "isn't there a better way to do this... a better place for you all to stay?"

"You are in a hurry, are you not?" the soft voice of his Brother asked.

"Not at the moment," he answered, standing in the huge underground room, talking to himself. "This should be a safe hiding place for awhile."

"But the men outside... they will find a way in. Even with the locking apparatus you activated."

"Yes, I suppose you are correct. They wouldn't have left themselves without a fail-safe."

"Then we must hurry, for the next step will take some time."

"The next step?" Kelly questioned, "what next step?"

"Why, the reason we removed ourselves from the disc, of course. The living material will reclaim that which it has lost."

"I do not understand Brother."

"Kelly, do you remember when I first joined you?"

"Yes, you mean the day I touched the little piece of disc skin to the Sabre disc?"

"I told you then, that I had to leave the living material at that moment because we, you and I, could not exist in it at the same time."

Kelly shook his head knowingly.

"Well, the same must happen now. The two discs will become one, and since you are one with the Sabre disc, so you will become one with the new disc."

"You mean the two discs will merge?"

"It is the only way the living material can reclaim its own. Since it has no drive unit, we cannot fly it home to the Mother ship, and the Mother ship certainly cannot come into such a confined space."

"You mean the Mother ship... is still here," he looked to the ceiling of the bunker, "up there, waiting, after all these years?"

"Kelly, your years are but fleeting moments to us, a mere blink of an eye. We could, and would, wait millennia to recover our own."

"But why didn't your Mother ship come down and make the recovery back in nineteen forty-seven? Surely it could have?"

"Without doubt, but, that is not our way. We had never meant to be seen, but the electrical storm changed that. It was something we had never planned for. So, we chose to wait until an opportunity presented itself to make the recovery... discreetly."

"But, Brother, something tells me that this recovery is already anything but discreet."

"While that is true Kelly, the individuals that are aware of us, have kept us a secret from the inhabitants of your planet all these years, and we suspect that their failure here will induce them to continue their charade for decades to come, if not forever."

"Their failure?"

"They have failed already Kelly. Even if we don't escape, they will lose both discs and all proof of our existence. They will see to it. They would not want to explain to the people of your world, how they, the Military, protectors of the masses, lost such a great opportunity... how they let these flying saucers slip through their fingers. They will make excuses, devise elaborate explanations; they will bury all that has happened here today deep within the dark recesses of their bureaucracy. And then you, the discs, and our Brothers, will cease to exist."

Kelly hung his head, knowing that his brother was correct. "If We fail," he asked his Brother solemnly, "how will it end for us?"

"In a glorious and blinding flash of light, my Brother, for your world has, not too long ago, harnessed the power of your Sun."

"You mean they would...?"

"It is already on its way Kelly. Look to the east and you will see the darkness covering the glow of our home world."

As Kelly closed his eyes and directed his vision to the east... he could see it. The beautiful rose colored sky was there, but in the center of his field of vision, covering the beautiful canyons and cities, was a huge dark mass of boiling clouds; a great black monster, larger and more fierce than any of the black things that had stood before him in the past, and he could feel its fierce heat against his face. The heat continued to grow until he had to turn his gaze away.

THE TRANSFORMATION

"So, my Brother, what do we do, what do I do?"

"Simply call your Sabre disc to this room and bring the gravity drive up to speed."

"What speed Brother, how will I know?"

"You will know. The living material will show you. Then my Brother, simply stand aside and be as amazed as we were, millennia ago, when we watched it for the first time."

***

As the Sabre disc slid toward him through the second door, Kelly began to feel a bit of melancholy. 'Strange,' he thought, 'I will miss my Sabre.' He had grown used to it; attached to it. He was finally becoming somewhat proficient in it, and now, in a few, or ten, or twenty minutes (he wasn't sure how long it would take) it would be gone. It would be replaced by something new, something different.

The disc was fully inside the second room now and Kelly walked beside it, keeping one hand on the starboard wing tip, gently guiding it with thoughts and a physical shove now and then. When the nose of the Sabre was within three feet of the San Agustin disc Kelly slowed its forward motion, stopping with no more than a few inches between them.

"Closer Kelly," his Brother said, "they must touch one another."

"Of course, I should have known," he lamented.

Kelly walked to a point directly behind the Sabre and pushed gently on the now unused exhaust nozzle at the rear. As his disc moved forward, he felt the nose of the old F-eighty-six slide up onto the front edge of the circular wing and come to rest there.

He pulled his hands away from the tail section as he felt, and watched, a ripple begin to run through both discs. It started where the two discs had come together and moved quickly from there to the rear of each. The ripple was in concentric circles, much like someone had tossed a pebble in a glassy pond. He felt the motion move through his own body and as he looked down he watched the same ripples travel down his chest and arms, through his legs to the granite floor below, then reflect upwards to make the same journey again and again. As the rippling in the discs and his body came to a slow halt, Kelly smiled; what else could he do?

And now, he heard a new voice. Heard is not the correct term to use here, for he did not hear it. Not in the same sense that he could hear his Brothers. This voice was more like a feeling. He cocked his head, as if listening more carefully for a repeat of the vague sentence that had passed through him. It came again, and he recognized it this time. It was a feeling of readiness; of preparedness.

"Ah, wonderful Kelly," he heard his Brother say, "it speaks to you, and you hear it, don't you?"

"The living material," Kelly offered as a statement of wonder, not as a question.

"Yes Brother, you become more and more a part of it as every day passes. Soon you will hear it as easily as you hear us."

Kelly smiled yet again. He was truly becoming at ease with this... this alien thing... this creature... this being or beings that now lived within him. He was resigning himself to this new life, no matter how unusual or creepy or scary ("or even short," he thought aloud) it might be.

He now knew what to do next. As the sound of the Sabre's gravity drive rose from a gentle hum through various stages of increased pitch to an almost unbearable scream, Kelly moved to a point between the two discs just outside their wingspans. From there he watched as the rippling started again. Small pieces of granite and other flotsam, lying loose on the floor, began to dance the same way he had seen other items affected by the gravity field. The lights above began to flicker, then pulse, keeping time with a low frequency hum that increased and diminished, again and again, becoming louder and stronger with each cycle. Pieces of granite began to fall from the ceiling, bouncing off the shiny surfaces of both discs, seeming to do no damage except to create more of their own ripples. As one such piece fell near Kelly, he looked to the rear of the cavernous room. He saw the rubber-tired loaders that had been used to haul the diggings out of the bunker. They were moving and vibrating as if they weighed almost nothing, but they would at least offer some protection from the falling debris that was all around him now. As he took his first step to run to the loaders....

"Lieutenant Kellerman!"

The voice came from a speaker somewhere in the room; barely audible above the whine and pulse of the transformation now taking place. "Lieutenant Kellerman," the voice came again, "this is General Macon... can you hear me in there?"

"Macon... here already?" Kelly said to himself, "and how does he know that I am in here?"

"Lieutenant Kellerman... please... talk to me."

"Brother?" Kelly said their name as if asking for council.

"Kelly," his Brother answered, "the blackness continues its approach from the east... there is little time."

Kelly found himself suddenly pulled in two directions. The violent transformation taking place in front of him and the voice of General Macon were opposed; diametrically; literally. He could run to the entrance, away from the transformation (the danger was less by the guard shack he thought). He would talk to Macon. 'I still have to get,' he paused his thought; 'We still have to get out of here. There will be a lot of firepower out there; waiting for us when we open that blast door. Perhaps Macon can be tricked into helping us.'

In his heart he knew that wasn't going to happen. Macon undoubtedly knew that he had defeated Brandt at Marana, and he had beaten the force sent to intercept him at the Mohawk Valley. And now he had escaped to the sanctuary of this bunker. 'No,' he thought, 'Macon will NOT give me another chance at trickery.'

As a small piece of granite glanced off his shoulder, he turned away from the big loaders at the far wall and made a dash for the relative safety of the second doorway. He huddled under the huge steel header that defined the upper track of the sliding mechanism.

"Kellerman, I know you can hear me. There is a handset in the guard shack. Pick it up so that I can hear you."

He gave one last look at the loaders at the back of the room. His eyes lingered on the discs as the ripples became waves, flashing, stuttering, changing hue and color. They looked like two giant cuttlefish, flashing an alien language back and forth. He could not see, from his position, but the front of the remnant F-eighty-six fuselage and the leading edge of the San Agustin disc were as liquid metal; flowing into one another. The transformation was beginning.

He bolted for the guard shack, dodging granite boulders as he saw them leave the ceiling above him. Not slowing, he slammed into the rear of the shack, spun, and for a moment he watched the chaos he had left behind. From here the discs now glowed a brilliant red-rose, the color combining with the chrome and moving through each disc in waves like rolling, billowing clouds.

The guard shack was made of steel with side columns that acted as shoring at the entrance. Heavy mesh cribbing along its back wall was keeping the loose rocks at bay for now. Feeling in no immediate danger, Kelly reached for the telephone hand-set on the standing-desk in front of him.

"Hello," he voiced tentatively.

"Lieutenant Kellerman, this is General Macon."

Kelly was reasonably certain that his little charade was over now, at least where Macon was concerned. That left him at a bit of a disadvantage not knowing just how much the General knew. He decided to continue with the ruse a bit longer, in hopes of gleaning at least a little information.

"I am called YorEel."

"Yeah?... and this is the damned tooth-fairy Lieutenant. Now cut the crap and stand at attention. You're talking to a superior officer. Do you understand me, Lieutenant?"

"Not much of a diplomat, are you General?"

"I see no need for diplomacy here son, I'm holding all the cards."

"And what cards would those be General."

"Listen son," the general apparently switching to father/son mode, "I didn't just fall off the turnip truck. I'm not foolish enough to tell you what I've got waiting for you out here, and I'm guessin' you're not dumb enough to believe what I tell you anyway, so, like I said, let's cut the crap. If you want any hope of keeping your career in the Air Force, or of even staying alive, I suggest you open this door and let's settle this little problem."

"General, let me understand you clearly. Are you telling me that...?"

Kelly turned quickly as the rumble of a large chunk of the ceiling between him and the discs slammed to the floor sending shards of rock in all directions.

Having felt the vibrations from his position outside, the General queried, "What in Hell's going on in there Kellerman? Are you all right?"

"I'm fine General. I'm working on a little surprise for you."

Ignoring Kelly, Macon continued, "Don't be a fool son, this can only end one way, we both know that."

"General, the way I got it figured, there's at least three ways this thing can end: You kill me; I kill you; or, the most likely scenario," Kelly paused, "you nuke the place."

"Nuke the place," Macon guffawed, "what on Earth makes you think I'd do such a thing?"

"General," Kelly continued in a knowing voice, "if that option's not on the table, then why the B-thirty-six?"

"Lieutenant, listen to me, the sun's going down and it's getting cold out here. You're not going anywhere, and neither am I. Let's quit the word games and solve this. If you open the door now, I will give you my solemn word, you will be safe. No one will harm you. We can work all the details out later, but for now, I guarantee you your safety."

Kelly stood in silence, thinking about the General's offer and his reaction to his last sentence. Then it struck him, "My God, he talked all the way around the B-thirty-six. He doesn't know. He really doesn't know."

"General Macon, listen to me very carefully. No bull-shit this time." Kelly swallowed hard and tried to curtail what little bravado he was projecting. "Don't ask me how I know, you wouldn't believe me anyway, but there is a B-thirty-six at fifty thousand feet over the eastern horizon. It's headed this way and it's authorized to drop a piece of high-yield ordinance right in the middle of our little party."

There was nothing but silence coming over the line now; inside it was still pure bedlam. The two discs were locked in a slow-motion wrestling match, their surfaces at times flowing like molten metal, and other times freezing in place like cold-set solder.

'Something is wrong,' Kelly thought. 'This is taking way too long.'

As Kelly was about to ask his Brother for some small bit of reassurance, he heard the General bellow over the phone line, "Damn-it, those fools!" Macon had just been on the horn to the radar officer back at the hangar, and was told that there was indeed a large bogey at fifty thousand feet, headed directly toward his position. Macon was in such a state of disbelief that he had squeezed his handset and accidently pressed the key-to-talk button.

"Ballenger," he yelled to a subordinate (as Kelly listened) "get a couple engineers over here immediately. I want the back of this electrical box cut open. We have to get to the internal wiring and over-ride the intruder lock-out." Then as an afterthought, "But first get Washington on the line, I want to talk to assistant director Farley at the CIA... and Ballenger, make sure the operator knows it's a priority-one call."

After hearing that Macon was now intent on breaking in, he turned his attention back to the discs. The floor of the bunker in the first room was littered with stone and a heavy coating of dust. The air was so thick the discs themselves were barely visible in the far room beyond the second door. The area under the door header was still relatively clear of the debris; the huge header still doing its job of holding up the ceiling above its massive span.

As he made his way to the safety of the second door header, he heard the intensity of the gravity drive change. He had not thought it possible to make any more noise than it already was, but he was wrong. The high pitched scream finally increased to a point that he could no longer hear it. Now it became painful. Falling to his knees, he grabbed his ears and pressed tightly. It did no good for the sound waves were now passing through his entire body.

His own skin again flashed and rippled, keeping time with the wildly pulsating discs. The huge bucket on the rubber-tired loader closest to the San Agustin disc began to sag, and then flow, melting onto the granite floor where it stood. The molten metal flowed back against its front tires and after a few seconds of acrid black smoke, both tires exploded with the sound of a howitzer, sending pieces of their steel rims, molten metal and rubber flying in all directions. The lights hanging overhead increased in intensity until Kelly thought they would blind him, then, mercifully, they began to explode, sending sparks, glass and burning filament pieces throughout the room like fireworks.

Kelly closed his eyes and tried to bury his head between his legs as larger and heavier granite chunks fell around him. The pain in his head was reaching a point that he thought it would surely explode. The sound was now so loud that it simply beat against him; through him; in a constant stream of pressure and pain. As his senses filled to the point of overload, he rolled to his side, his body now in a fetal position, helpless. "Dying?" he asked himself, "Am I dying?... please ..."

THE NEW DISC AND GENERAL MACON

Silence

Silence

"Silence?... no... not complete silence," he thought. Although the sound came from only yards away, to Kelly it sounded a hundred miles in the distance. It was the sound of the gravity drive, now a soft whine, decreasing in pitch as it lowered itself to an idle once again. He lay there, breathing in the acrid smell of burning rubber and electrical insulation; not caring.

Darkness

In time, he tried to open his eyes, only to find they were already open. Staring into darkness, every movement of his eyeballs brought a sharp, dry pain to his forehead. The space between his ears rang with the sound of a thousand church bells. He slowly came to realize that the lights in both underground rooms had all been destroyed, except... except... for over there... way over there.

Turning his head slowly, painfully, he could just make out the faint light. With a little concentration he recognized the guard shack at the entrance, its single light bulb the only surviving light source in all this blackness.

He had been unconscious now for nearly twenty minutes and was just now beginning to realize where he was. He had no way of knowing that General Macon had made great progress, despite his engineer's trepidation about the noises and rumbling coming from inside. In fact, they were ready, on the General's command, to fire up the auxiliary compressor that had been brought up from one of the hangars, and start the slow process of rolling the door open.

Slowly gaining his faculties, Kelly lifted himself to a sitting position, wincing each time a sudden head or eye movement produced a burning, white-hot pain across the inside of his forehead. He slid himself backward a foot or two and gently leaned against the edge of the huge steel column that supported the door header.

Unable to see, he felt himself: his arms; his chest; abdomen; his legs (without bending so far that it hurt his head again). He was still in one piece, but he would have given anything for a handful of aspirin.

Remembering, he turned his head slowly in the direction he was sure he had last seen the discs. There was nothing but a dark void; blackness.

"Strange."

He had been able to see well enough in the dark before.

"Why not now?"

As he pulled his eyes away from the darkness, a small flicker of light grabbed him in his extreme peripheral field. There, halfway to the rear of the room, was a small, faint light. He recognized it. It was a reflection of the lone remaining light in the guard shack at the other end of the first room. He must be looking at the central bulge of the new disc, he told himself.

"The new disc, why can't I see it Brothers?" he called out loud, "why can't I see it? What has happened? What is wrong? I cannot see."

For the first time, his Brothers did not respond.

"Brothers," he yelled and his voice echoed through the emptiness.

"Brothers," he called softly one last time, leaning his head against the cold steel.

Nothing

***

General Macon gave a quick nod to the engineer and the sergeant pulled the lever back on the jeep's power take-off. When he let the clutch out, the driveshaft at the front of the jeep turned the flywheel on the trailer mounted compressor. As the air pressure built, they waited. At one hundred and fifty pounds the General nodded again and everyone watched with silent expectation as the lowly private threw the air valve to the open position.

Even through the five foot thick walls they could hear the locking pins as they backed out of the rod bosses and then slammed into their cradles. Then, with a loud groan, the huge locking rods began to slide from their respective bosses. As they banged loudly into their back-stops, Macon nodded once again and the private grabbed the air hose glad-hand and twisted it free. With the sound of the air still escaping from the open hose, he reconnected it to the next hand in line. With that, the huge door, resisting for only a moment, began, ever so slowly, to open.

Kelly slowly forced himself to stand. Everything seemed to be working for him, but his head still felt like something was trying to scratch its way out of his forehead. As he listened to the noises coming from the door, he could visualize the pins and rods moving. There was nothing he could do now, except wait.

As the door moved the first foot, a long blade, about six inches thick, along its vertical edge, stayed in the doors jamming surface. It was a mechanism that sealed the door by sliding into the jam about a foot farther than the door itself. It was pushed in place by giant springs after the door was closed, and now that the door was opening, the small locks along its edge would be released once the door pulled them free. As they released, Kelly watched as the blade collapsed back into the door, letting a one foot wide, twenty foot tall shaft of blinding sunlight suddenly fill his sanctuary. Holding the back of a hand over his eyes, he moved fully into the second room, leaning against the wall to hide himself. And now, as he looked through his fingers, his vision adapting somewhat to the light, he saw it.

'It is,' he thought, 'the San Agustin disc.'

Slowly lowering his hand, he whispered, "No, it is not."

It was different. It had changed. It was bigger.

"That makes sense, it should be bigger. It has two discs worth of material. It looked to him like it might, depending on how it was laid out inside, hold four or five passengers.

On the floor where his Sabre disc had rested before the transformation, was the dark residue of what once was the vestige of framework and machine guns from his old charge. The new disc was now pure living material.

He felt a nearly uncontrollable need to touch it, and as he walked toward it, one more item on the floor caught his eye. It was his larder bag. As he bent to pick it up, it glowed. He had rolled the top closed the last time he had partaken of a moon-pie, so the inside was relatively clean, but, as he raised it from the floor, he had to shake and then blow the last bit of granite dust from its outside. He held it with his back to the ever increasing brightness of the intruding sunlight and marveled. It was indeed, glowing. As he unrolled it, there in the bottom, along with the empty bottles and candy wrappers, were the four RC Cola bottle caps, glowing with the unmistakable rose tint of his Brothers.

His heart leapt to his throat and as his eyes watered, he implored, "Brothers, are you safe there... are you alright... are you alive?"

As he peered into the bag his eyes filled with a vision of his home world again. And, as before, over the beautiful canyons and tall spired cities, he could see his Brothers standing before him; hands outstretched, pleading, and Kelly now knew: they were dying.

Again tears poured from his eyes and his lungs filled to capacity. As Macon stepped through the now four foot opening of the blast door, Kelly felt the blackness behind him.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOO!" he screamed.

The General, startled by the chrome vision standing in the doorway of the second room, hesitated for only a second, then raised his sidearm. It was too late. Kelly had already clutched the larder bag to his chest and, with his right hand held far behind his head, he gathered all the darkness, all the hate, all the fear he could find within himself, and, concentrating it all into the palm of his hand, he threw it at the General.

Macon managed to squeeze off one round, the insignificant piece of lead being consumed by the pure ball of energy moving toward him. His eyes were filled with wonder as he was pushed and strained through the heavy steel mesh at the back of the guard shack. His service cap, medals and belt buckle hung against the mesh for a moment before falling to the ground.

Kelly stood there... amazed, his arm still outstretched from the throw. He looked at his hand as he slowly rolled it into a fist and then, bending his arm to flex his bicep into a mighty bulge, he looked at the slowly opening blast door, and yelled again, "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO."

BATTLE AT THE BLAST DOOR

As Kelly strode toward the now nearly half open blast door, a soldier stepped half way inside, another poked his head just enough inside to look around the corner.

"General Macon, Sir, are you OK Sir?" one of them called. Then, as they both looked in Kelly's direction, seeing what appeared to them, a chromed and naked apparition moving in their direction, their mouths fell open as if to scream, until the head sticking around the corner was able to mutter, "Holy Mother of God, what in unholy hell is that." As the soldier half-in the door started to raise his rifle, Kelly's hand came up to his waist directly in front of him, and as if dismissing a bothersome problem with a casual backhand, he loosed another ball of energy. The talking head dived for cover outside the door, but the man raising his rifle took the full force of the plasma. He was slammed to the far side of the door and half his body was pushed inside the slot that, only moments before, had held the huge sealing blade of the blast door.

Shouting... much shouting; Kelly could hear someone barking orders. Continuing to walk toward the door he heard a man yell, "Now!"

A smoking canister, then another and another flew through the still opening door. They were flash-bangs, and they went off in quick succession; each giving off a deafening sound and a near blinding, phosphorous-fed white light. If the ringing in Kelly's ears had gotten any better since the transformation, it was now increased to the point of raging pain once again. And although his chrome eyes had helped somewhat, he was now nearly blind.

Three, four, then five soldiers charged through the door, rifles firing even before they were aimed at Kelly. A round struck him in the upper left pectoral muscle, just above the larder bag still clutched in his tightly closed hand. Another ricocheted off his right thigh. His senses were being overloaded. He held his Brothers in one hand and untold power in the other. As the next round struck him in his belly, just grazing the larder bag... he screamed.

This was not a scream like the others. It was a roar; a deep, powerful, guttural roar. It came from the pit of all his fears and hatred. It held within it the love he felt for his Brothers, the fear for their safety, and with it came POWER.

This time the ball of plasma formed around his entire body. The rifle bullets were now being deflected before reaching him. He stepped forward quickly with his right foot, aiming with the palm of his now outstretched right hand. This time the energy left him in a solid wave. It filled the room in front of him from floor to ceiling, and it was on the soldiers in an instant. Their bodies exploded from within, but before the mass of their insides could be scattered around the room, the heat turned them to a thin, black ash that floated slowly to the floor.

Kelly was no longer Kelly. He was a now an uncontrollable mixture of alien mind, intelligent material, and unleashed human emotion.

"I will protect you, my Brothers," he screamed at the top of his lungs, "by all that is in me, I swear, I will protect you."

With lightning speed he made for the door, and as he appeared to the soldiers outside, they, like the others, made the same deadly mistake; they paused; gaping in amazement.

With rifles pointed at him from all directions, and a two inch canon straight ahead of him, he again gathered the power within him. An early rifle shot from his left tore through the larder bag, sending shards of bottle glass, and his now precious bottle caps, flying. He watched the bottle caps, as if in slow motion, each one holding the essence of one of his Brothers. And again he screamed; "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO."

As the energy built from within, the heat emanating from the light ball around him drove the soldiers from their positions. The barrel of the two inch gun deformed and sagged so that when the gunner pulled the lanyard to fire, the barrel and the breech split at the same time, the resulting explosion killed the gunner, the loaders, and a couple riflemen hiding behind them.

Kelly suddenly bent in the middle, doubling to his knees, then, with another deafening roar, standing quickly, stretching both arms wide, he loosed the most tremendous ball of plasma yet. It drove the now melting equipment; the jeeps, trucks, the remains of the gun, backwards as if they were cardboard toys in a windstorm. Small, black dust forms, holding the shape of humans for only an instant, drifted slowly to the ground to mingle with the desert sand.

In the distance, toward the hangars, he could see two, maybe three jeeps, nearly hidden by their own dust trails; making for what they thought was the safety of the hangars.

Kelly, now breathing heavily, as if starved for oxygen, turned slowly to assess his surroundings. There was no movement; at least none that he could see. He held the torn larder bag in front of him, its precious cargo... gone.

"Oh," he screamed, and then, falling to one knee, he screamed again, "Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh." He grabbed his head with both hands.

He did not scream for his Brothers. He screamed from pain. His head was filled with it, and it was worse than he had felt inside the bunker. He was not shot. He felt to make sure. He was not shot.

"Ohhhhhh," he winced again, the pain striking even harder.

The top of his head... it came from the top of his head; bearing down on him, as if to crack his skull. And then... he could hear it. It was the sound of rattling, buzzing, rumbling, all rolled into one. It shook the ground around him. He could see what loose pieces of dirt and sand there was around him, dance to its vibration. And then... he knew what it was. He had heard the sound before. Looking up, in the distance to the northeast, he could see the tiny black spot. Magnifying his vision, the blackness covering the rose color of his home world, now, suddenly, took shape. It was the B-thirty-six, its mighty Pratt & Whitney Wasp engines, each producing thirty-eight-hundred horsepower and driving massive nineteen foot propellers, produced such a loud and powerful resonance that they could shake dishes off a kitchen shelf from fifty thousand feet. Relentlessly, it came forward. And there, in the foreground, ahead of it, stood his Brothers. They seemed somehow broken, weeping, helpless. They reached for him, cowering from the monster behind them. As they fell to the ground, the demon that was the B-thirty-six moved over them, devouring them.

He screamed his mournful plea again, "Nooooooooooo," and then again, "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO."

And then, as if his whole life had been lived to save himself for this one single moment in time, he spread his legs for balance, reached both hands to the sky in the direction of the darkness and issued forth a single ball of pure plasma. It lingered, dancing on his fingertips until, with his own mighty roar, it leapt upwards making the air before it incandesce, like a meteor sent back to the heavens from whence it came.

He watched as it slowly became a pinpoint of light, as bright as the sun, moving ever upward. Surely the men in the giant bomber could now see it too. They, however, could but look in wonder as it closed on them, becoming bigger... brighter... more ominous. After the nearly ten mile climb to the beast, much of its energy was spent, but it still hit the huge bomber with a force large enough to do great damage. Kelly watched through his chrome eyes as the left wing of the huge plane gave way just inside the outboard twin jet-pod. The wingtip folded upwards, then back, finally coming loose from the spar. Its momentum carried it into the rear of the fuselage where it buried itself in front of the massive vertical stabilizer. It seemed, for a moment, that the monstrous plane would carry on like that; compensating for the missing thrust and extra drag. But then, the fuselage buckled at the point where the wayward wingtip was protruding from it. In one mighty flutter, the entire tail section separated and the forward fuselage and wing dived forward and down, turning itself on its back. And now, with more thrust on the starboard wing, the bomber went into a deadly inverted flat spin.

Kelly could see the tiny specks as they left the plane one by one, the crew abandoning their lost ship.

And now he tried to relax, his whole body feeling like a fire was burning from within. He fell to his knees, then leaned back onto his heels, his head falling forward to rest his chin on his chest. But, with his first deep breath, he knew he was not done. The huge monster, now dead, was still falling from above, and in its belly laid the real cause of the darkness he had seen earlier. The bomb would have been armed by the time the plane came apart, so, there was no stopping it now. With his head still resting on his chest he calculated. From fifty thousand feet he would have less than three minutes to get back inside, climb into his new disc and fly at least a distance of ten to twelve miles, depending on the size of the bomb.

Pushing himself up, he stood slowly, aching he thought, like an old man. Holding his lower back with one hand, he turned to walk to the blast door, noticing that its progress had stopped half way open. One of his plasma releases had blown the compressor to oblivion. Looking down as he continued walking, he saw one of the bottle caps nearly covered with granite dust.

'It must have been inside the radius of the plasma release that did so much damage out here.' he thought as he went to one knee to pick it up. "My God, it's warm... it still glows," he said, rolling his fingers closed over it, then, "Three more, three more... I've got to find the other three."

And then he remembered the blackness above him... falling; relentless. He wouldn't have time to find them all, get to his disc, and make the safe distance in time. He was a few short feet from the control panel at the guard shack. Stepping inside he pushed the red bottom and listened for the huge motor below. He breathed a quick sigh of relief as the door began to close. The general's engineers hadn't damaged the interior mechanisms.

He was now back outside, on hands and knees, sifting through the dirt and sand with his fingers. There... there was another, and then another. He had three.

Above he could hear the giant bomber, in its death-throws, spinning slowly around and around itself, its huge motors still shaking the ground. The bomb would be detonated by an altimeter set to at least a thousand feet above the local ground level. As he looked up he realized the blast door would not be fully closed before the blinding light of the lithium-deuteride core put an end to everything within a seven mile radius. As the giant door inched its way forward, Kelly caught a glint in the track just ahead of the big rollers. There it was: number four. As he moved to grab for it, the vibrations from the door and the bomber shook the bottle cap enough that it slid to the center of the track. As the roller moved over it, Kelly lost his chance to get his fingers under the massive door fast enough.

"No," was his meek cry of resignation. The cap was lost. He could never reverse the door, remove the cap, and get the door closed in time. In fact he was already certain it wouldn't be fully closed as it was.

He stepped inside the door, the sound of the bomber now nearly overwhelming. He ran to the back of the second room, sitting against the back wall behind the new disc, the big half melted rubber-tired loaders all rattling from the vibrations.

And then... there was utter silence.

A BILLIONTH OF A SECOND

In the first billionth of a second, it was as if the Big Bang had taken place in the bomb-bay of the huge aircraft.

In that infinitesimal amount of time, the entire explosion was over, and all that followed was merely a manifestation of that little universe expanding at near light speed. The air around it, in all directions, was turned to plasma. A great glowing, boiling, writhing, orange ball, in seconds almost five miles across, its bottom now touching the ground; continued to expand, growing, alive with heat and death. In another few seconds, as the heat began to dissipate, the plasma ball, almost as quickly as it had formed, disappeared, showing at its center, a great rising column of desert sand, now turned to chunks of molten glass. Rising with it were the remains of anything that had been unlucky enough to be within a half mile of the epicenter; rocks, plant and animal life, stones... humanity. At the top of the column sat the mushroom cloud, rolling, climbing ever higher. Huge circular cloud formations took shape around it as the pressure change wrung moisture from the surrounding atmosphere. And then the mushroom cloud separated from the column and continued its climb upward as if some mythical giant had lain on his back on the desert floor, snapped his jaw, and sent the leviathan's own smoke ring hurtling into the heavens.

REBORN

As Kelly sat with his back against the wall, the sudden silence startled him. He did not realize that at the center of such a conflagration of fire and brimstone, there could be no sound. The bomb had removed all that could make sound. There was now nothing left outside but the Sun's own heat, violence, radiation, a deadly maelstrom for an instant, frozen in time. The air molecules, that only a second before, would have transmitted the vibrations that Kelly might have recognized as sound, were now gone. All that truly existed outside in the middle of the plasma ball, was a great emptiness; a nearly pure vacuum.

As the giant door was less than an inch from closing, a vertical shaft of unbelievably bright light cut through the opening. Kelly cowered in fear as a fierce heat filled the room. Paint on the guard shack disappeared in a puff of smoke, and as the door finished closing, just as quickly, the light was gone. In a straight line from where the small door opening had been near the floor, a red line seemed to be painted. The line went straight to the guard shack where the paint was gone, then up the wall to the ceiling behind, and finally to the door seam at the ceiling. Kelly suddenly realized that the thin shaft of light had heated the stone and metal to the point of incandescence.

Kelly watched in the lingering silence as the glowing red line slowly faded.

And then, as the Earthly world outside rushed back in to fill the void left by the plasma world the bomb had created... the sound came.

Kelly did not expect its suddenness. It was as if his ear had been held against a wall with a small hole punched through it, and someone had quickly pulled open a sliding door to open that hole. A thousand jet engines were on the other side of that wall, and they filled his head, and they filled his body.

He thought the Earth itself was being shaken to its core. Again rocks and dust fell from the ceiling, and he rolled to his side and took refuge under the loader closest to him. He lay there, once again in the fetal position; waiting.

The sound seemed to go on forever, diminishing ever so slowly. He held his clenched fist, with its precious cargo of Brothers in their bottle-cap vessels, close to his chest... close to his heart; again, waiting.

When, finally, the sound seemed to be only a distant rumble, far beyond the distant hills and whatever else was left outside, he slid out from under the loader and stood. Steadying himself with a hand on the huge piece of machinery, he leaned himself against its six foot tall rear tire.

Now, shaking uncontrollably, he realized that, except for his convulsions, he was paralyzed. Paralyzed not of body however, but of mind. He looked to the huge blast door, so far away at the end of the other room, and he saw the fear that held him. It was the door itself.

He was safe here, in this room. He had his disc. He had his Brothers (three anyway). He had himself (in one piece, no less). He did not want to open that door. Not from fear of the radiation that was surely waiting for him behind it, for he was certain that what radiation had entered through the crack as the door closed should have been enough to kill him; but for the fear of the new life that waited for him... out there.

It was sinking in. He was the only human like himself on Earth, and the feeling that was now flooding over him was... well... it wasn't really loneliness... he just felt... empty.

***

Having walked the almost one hundred feet to the blast door, Kelly stood, staring blankly at the green button. The button that would either open the door to a world of confusion, violence, temptation, danger, and quite probably, at some time in the future (near or far) his own death, or, if he took the time to explore this new self he had become, gather what positive aspects of this new life he had experienced over the last few days, even seek the council of a few new friends he had made (if they had escaped alive) then maybe, just maybe, the door would open to a life that would see him survive; perhaps, even thrive.

He reached up and pushed the green button. It had been nearly thirty minutes since that first billionth of a second. As the door slowly rolled open he could hear the last few pieces of rock, sand-glass, concrete, and melted and twisted metal falling to Earth, some of the flotsam having reached an altitude of one hundred thousand feet from the force of the blast. It would continue to rain like this for minutes longer, the dust in the valley taking days to finally settle.

Except for these missiles falling back to the valley floor, the view in front of Kelly was empty. There was nothing remarkable left. The Sun, just now tucking itself behind the horizon to the west, scribed a long bright orange trail in a straight line toward him; its light reflecting off the valley floor's new glass covering.

The minutes passed. He stood looking into the emptiness as the door continued to open, and, finally, he was jolted back to the reality at hand as the echo announced the huge piece of metal had reached the end of the roller track.

He held his three Brothers tightly in his fist as he walked back to his disc. He had made up his mind. He would accept his new self, his new world, and, he would take his Brothers with him, even though he was now certain there was little he could do to help them.

As he approached the saucer he heard the gravity drive increase slightly as it raised itself so that the wing, or disc portion, was about six feet above the room floor. As he thought the canopy open, instead, a long door-like seam appeared on the underside near the central bulge. Kelly watched as the doorway opened to the floor, acting not only as a door, but a ramp. He smiled as he thought, 'Much more civilized,' then chuckled at his paradox.

Inside, he made his way up a three step stairway to the cockpit. He stared in amazement at the roominess of the place. Two form fitting seats graced the forward section at the windscreen while three others, evenly spaced behind, made for a very comfortable feel. Another set of steps led down to a small hold in the rear.

"Amazing," he said aloud, "I wouldn't have thought it was this big, looking at it from the outside."

He stood for a moment, unconsciously rubbing the headrest of the pilot seat, his seat, then without further hesitation, he stepped forward and took his place at the helm.

Still clutching his Brothers tightly, he pondered where to put them. He couldn't simply set them on the floor. As his eyes moved across the dash area, a rectangular seam formed, complete with a well placed finger hole. A quick pull opened a flat drawer about a foot square. He laid his Brothers gently on the smooth surface and immediately Kelly could tell that there was something special going on between the disc material of the drawer, and his Brothers. Each bottle-cap nestled itself into the floor of the drawer and began to glow (albeit weakly) with that familiar rose color of his home world. Kelly caressed the edge of the drawer and then removed his hand. It closed itself and the seam disappeared, as if never there.

Thinking the ramp closed, he listened as the landing struts snapped to the up and locked position, and, leaving the gravity drive in its near idle state, he inched the disc forward, just easing it passed one of the huge granite support columns on his left. He could see the twilight pouring in the open blast door ahead of him. It was the same darkening twilight he remembered from a few nights ago when he stepped from the motor-pool car and first looked at the little cone of light over the trailer porch at Marana.

He pushed the disc forward... faster now... for he truly wanted out of this hole in the ground. It had begun to close in on him, and he was surprised to feel sweat building on his upper lip once again. "I guess there are some things about me that won't ever change," he said, reaching up and wiping away the moisture. The closer he got to the blast door, the more power he asked of the gravity drive, until finally the floor was alive with dancing debris. Granite was again falling from the ceiling, bouncing off the disc like noisy raindrops on the sheet-metal roof on his dad's workshop back home.

As he slewed the disc to the right he could see Venus hanging brightly in the west just above the now dark outline of the mountains. He took a last look around at the rubble lying on, and still falling to the floor; the remains of the guard shack; and there in the back, the ashen remains of his old Sabre disc.

He looked forward again, out the huge blast door for the last time... out into the darkness that now held his new future. He brought the gravity drive to full power, and as the scream began to echo through the valley, he loosened his minds grip on the disc. An instant before it leapt from the mouth of the bunker, the bright light of Venus sparkled ever so briefly off of a small, round, glowing piece of metal, dancing in the bottom of the door track.

End

EPILOG

The frail little creature leaned his forehead against the view-portal, straining to see the almost imperceptible movement on the surface below...

"There!" he exclaimed, "just there... above the tip of that long skinny sea that extends northward along the east side of that equally long and skinny peninsula. He is there; in that desert area still warm with radiation."

"Yes Brother," the little one standing next to him answered, "I see it... and... and now... I can feel him. He... he is powerful Brother, do you feel that as well?"

"Yes... but... but now... he is different. He is changed. He is no longer... like us."

"And look there Brother... do you see?... "

"...... He approaches."
